Conversations: Sheryl Crow

The outspoken musician discusses her fiercely personal album "Detour," her dust-up with Karl Rove, and why all she wants to do is save the world.

By Eryn Loeb

Read more: Environment, Interviews, Sheryl Crow, Arts & Entertainment, Global Warming, Arts & Entertainment Music Interviews

Jan. 30, 2008 |

Ever since lodging "All I Wanna Do" in our heads back in 1993, Sheryl Crow has been steadily writing and performing solid, decidedly nonwimpy pop music. Her self-titled 1996 record was bolder and rawer than her debut album, "Tuesday Night Music Club," and garnered the kind of mixed reviews that so often greet sophomore efforts. But the contemplative balladry of 1998's "The Globe Sessions" was greeted with raves. She showed she had friends in high places with "Sheryl Crow and Friends: Live From Central Park" (1999), which included guest appearances from Eric Clapton, Chrissie Hynde, Stevie Nicks and Keith Richards. The sunshiny confection "C'mon C'mon" was released in 2002, followed in 2005 by the more pensive "Wildflower."

A nine-time Grammy winner, Crow has resisted sugarcoating. Back in 1996, a certain big-box retailer refused to sell her music after being named in her song "Love Is a Good Thing": "Watch our children while they kill each other/ With a gun they bought at Wal-Mart discount stores." More recently, Crow has been vocal about her opposition to the Iraq war. And after being diagnosed with breast cancer in 2006, she became known as an advocate for that cause, too. (She has since recovered, and calls herself a "poster child for early detection.")

Apart from her music, these days the 45-year-old singer is perhaps best known as an environmental activist. (She even became something of a punch line after suggesting that people should use less toilet paper.) In the spring of 2007 she and fellow activist Laurie David headlined the Stop Global Warming College Tour, aiming to raise awareness about global warming and put pressure on lawmakers to curb it.

Crow's new album, "Detour" (slated for release on Feb. 5), is meant to be a rousing call to action. Songs like "Love Is Free" and "Peace Be Upon Us" address the current state of the world, from the mess in New Orleans to the war in Iraq. Others like "Lullaby for Wyatt" (named for her young son) and "Drunk With the Thought of You" are more immediately personal. While people bemoan the shortage of contemporary singer-songwriters building on the protest tradition, Sheryl Crow stands out as that rare commercially successful artist who puts political issues at the heart of her music. She spoke to Salon by phone about tying it all together. (Listen to a podcast of the interview here.)

How did you decide what direction to go in with the new record, and how did the concept evolve?

I worked with Bill Bottrell, who produced the "Tuesday Night Music Club" record. I had not worked with him since 1993. The two of us have gone on many detours in our lives that brought us back to this point. We always knew we had a great creative relationship, so it just felt like it was time to get back together. It was really like a homecoming for the two of us. It was a very creative and emotional and intense process. We recorded 24 songs over the course of about 40 days. Conceptually, I think the two of us agreed that the record had to be very raw, and [I was] committed to writing about what's going on right now in the world and also what was happening with me personally. I think most people know that the last three years were very informative and intense years for me, so that had a very heavy impact on the content of the record.

I'd just adopted Wyatt -- he was 3 weeks old when I started the record. Just having him around rendered me completely fearless and unable to edit myself. He sort of made the whole writing process feel more urgent and intense. The lyrics really just spilled out; it was almost like a writing binge for me.

The first single, "Shine Over Babylon," certainly seems meant to fit into the tradition of political songs, and you've described it as being in the tradition of Bob Dylan. What are your thoughts on the relationship between music and social change?

Well, I would love to think that there is a correlation there. I know that when I was growing up -- I was maybe 10 years old when the Vietnam War was coming to an end -- there was an intense social movement of kids who were like 10 years older than me, college-age kids [who] were really taking it to the streets. Young people certainly had a voice at that time, and their musicians brought, I think, a real voice to what they were feeling. We've seen that sort of wane over the last 20 years. We've gotten more geared towards entertainment and away from having artists try to help us [sort out] what was happening socially. I don't know that there's a great impact now, but I like to think that there are people out there who are talking about these very things. I know that in my life I'm surrounded by people who are concerned about the environment and upset about what's happening in the government and extremely disturbed about where we stand in the world theater and where we're being led as a people.

Has it been challenging in any way to integrate your political activism and your music career?

Not at all. Clearly I'm not one of the young kids out there just getting started. I'm not a flavor of the month. Also, I'm older than [the musicians] getting played on the radio. For me it feels like there's a lot of freedom in that, a lot of freedom in being able to talk about what I want to talk about. Not to mention that I don't feel like I have any choice: These are the things that are interesting to me, and that matter to me, and it would be difficult for me to betray myself and not write about them right now.

Next page: Confronting Karl Rove ...