ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, February 11, 1997 TAG: 9702110036
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: STEVE MORSE THE BOSTON GLOBE
Sheryl Crow is no longer the ``girl next door'' in blue jeans. Not that long ago, she was a homespun presence in Missouri, dreaming of a music career while teaching elementary school. That was before she sold 9 million copies of her debut album, won three Grammy awards, suffered the inevitable media backlash, launched a censorship fight against Wal-Mart and learned some hard lessons about the fickle nature of fame.
``The only thing in this whole career-stardom-fame trip that I consistently enjoy is playing live,'' she says. ``Everything else can cause you so much turmoil and so much gut ache.''
Crow, who stops at Radford University's Dedmon Center on Thursday, recently gained an insight on fame when she vacationed in New Mexico and read Ayn Rand's ``The Fountainhead.'' Notes Crow: ``I loved it when Ayn Rand said that fame is nothing more than a coat of paint. That really is the way it is.''
It's a coat that Crow has worn uneasily, whether describing her second and latest album, ``Sheryl Crow,'' as being about ``shedding your skin and starting all over again from scratch,'' defending herself in print or performing with Eric Clapton (with whom she's been linked romantically).
A loner by nature, she found her privacy stripped bare when her debut disc ``Tuesday Night Music Club'' sold in the millions three years ago. She then endured jealousies from some musicians who played on the album; and some of this dirty linen was aired in the press.
Crow's hit single ``All I Wanna Do (... is have some fun)'' won record of the year at the 1995 Grammys, but you can't help feeling that Crow might now prefer singing, ``All I wanna do is get some peace.''
``I was so accessible and so girl-next-door that I felt sort of run over. I don't feel like being so open this time,'' says Crow, 34, who is now largely off-limits to the media and plans to keep it that way as she focuses on touring.
``I feel differently about my career now,'' says Crow, who even changed her look to blonde and went from ``granola to Gucci'' (to quote one critic) in the video to her recent hit, ``If It Makes You Happy.''
``Some people said [of the video], `Wow, she doesn't look like herself. She's not wearing jeans!' I thought it was really interesting that people got so bogged down with that, because I think Michael Stipe [of R.E.M.] has changed his look no less than 30 times in the last few years. And John Lennon changed it every five minutes.''
Two things haven't changed. First, she's committed to social causes such as planning a concert to fight scleroderma, a disease that involves the overproduction of collagen and is killing one of her friends. The other is her stance against the Wal-Mart chain for its censorship policies. Wal-Mart officials banned her new album because it contains the lyric: ``Watch our children while they kill each other with a gun they bought at Wal-Mart discount stores.'' (Experts estimated that Crow lost 500,000 Wal-Mart sales by not changing the verse.)
``I think people really need to take notice of the fact that Wal-Mart has a monopoly in many small towns, and they're censoring what it is that you can purchase. I just think it's evil. And they're doing it under the guise of caring about people, and that's simply not the truth.
``People who don't live in small towns have no idea what [Wal-Marts] do. They've put every mom-and-pop record store out of business. In my hometown [Kennett, Mo.], you literally cannot buy my record. That kind of thing really encourages bootlegging and home taping. That's not [Wal-Mart's] concern, but for artists, it is.''
Crow's answer to all her critics lies in the quality of the new album. Some songs continue the vein of her earlier blue-eyed rock-soul hits ``All I Wanna Do'' and ``Leaving Las Vegas,'' while others refine her Stonesy uptempo sound and Dylanesque folk-rock. The album's biting lyrics and picaresque characters also show influences from the Beat Poets to novelist John Fante. ``The book I was reading when I made the record was Fante's `Ask the Dust.' Fante wrote a series of books about a guy named Arturo Bandini. In this particular book, everything I was writing at the time I felt was about the alter ego of the guy in the book.
``Fante was a [Los Angeles] writer in the '30s who was an influence on Charles Bukowski, who I don't particularly like. Fante looks much less at the bottom of an empty bottle than Bukowski. There's so much tenderness in his writing, but he also has a very wacky view of life.''
Crow needed a wacky view of life to survive the soap opera that developed after ``Tuesday Night Music Club'' became a hit. That album was named for the informal group of musicians who met on Tuesdays in Los Angeles to team on songs. The group included Bill Bottrell (who was due to produce Crow's second album but quit and has since called Crow obnoxious), David Baerwald and Kevin Gilbert, a former boyfriend who died last year. Even now, Crow is rebutting claims that these musicians played a bigger role in making the album than she did.
``It was so confusing. I always knew the reason I was in that group was that I was as much an independent entity as all of them were. We all produced our own music and all played our own instruments, so it was a natural progression [to work together]. Then when there was speculation about whether I was even there. It was so strange to have to battle that. ... But let's just say I'm over it.''
No wonder, though, that she's reluctant to discuss her relationship with Clapton, who has joined her at gigs ranging from the Viper Room in Hollywood to a show in Paris. ``I feel like it's really nobody's business what my relationship was with Eric. What Eric and I had or have, or will have or whatever, is something that's really precious to me, as is my relationship with many other people.
``I don't feel that people are privy to that. I feel I have to at least protect that part of my life. But I will say that I think he's a fabulous person and we're very close. He's played with me frequently and I've played on his record, which is going to come out probably next year. Whether we write together and stuff, I don't know. Maybe.''
Crow is more at ease discussing her new tour, which features two musicians from her last major outing (lead guitarist Todd Wolfe and multi-instrumentalist Scott Bryan), plus newcomers Jeff Trott (guitar), Tim Smith (bass), and Jim Bogios (drums).
``It's going to be like homegrown rock 'n' roll. I play a lot of instruments, Jeff plays a lot of instruments and Scott plays a lot. So we have the luxury of being like The Band,'' Crow says of the former Dylan backing group that later carved its own niche. ``There are a lot of different layers and we're able to improvise.''
Speaking of The Band, critics have often compared The Wallflowers, opening for Crow on Thursday, to the Canadian rockers. Jakob Dylan, Bob Dylan's youngest son, is The Wallflowers' lead singer, though he probably takes more inspiration from Tom Petty than his dad.
The group is promoting Album No. 2, "Bringing down the Horse," during this tour.
The Wallflowers also are on the bill for Thursday night's Sheryl Crow concert at Radford University.
* In concert:
Sheryl Crow, with the Wallflowers, Thursday at 8 p.m. at the Dedmon Center at Radford University. Tickets are $16 for the public and $13 for RU students and staff. For further information, please call 831-5420.
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