Composed (10 page)

I hung a sign above the door to the control room that read ABANDON THOUGHT, ALL YE WHO ENTER HERE. I was rebelling against overthinking, overproduction, and contrivances of any kind. I was determined to make this record as “organic” as possible—in concept, sonics, arrangement, choice of instruments, and recording technique. I didn’t want to do a lot of preproduction, beyond the basic arrangements that Steuart had helped write. I hired Michael Rhodes and Eddie Bayers to join Steuart and me on the basic tracks, and the five of us, along with Roger, began recording. From the outset it was an intensely satisfying experience. The gents did revolt at one point against my “no full drum kit” rule and insisted that I let Eddie play the full complement on a few songs. John Stewart, my dear friend and mentor, came in to record a guitar track on a song we had written together, “Dance with the Tiger,” and my heart melted at the poignancy of his part. Mark O’Connor, Edgar Meyer, and other world-class musicians came in to play on several tracks, and I was in my element; I loved making this record as I had no other. The entire process was the antithesis of the
Rhythm and Romance
experience—civilized, measured, easy, and so musical.

When recording was complete, I went with Roger to Los Angeles to mix it, and my toddler Carrie and I settled into the Sunset Marquis. The mixing went especially well—Roger was such a strange and gifted person. I would begin to tell him something I wanted to try or something I wanted changed, and as soon as I opened my mouth, before I could say a word, his arm would be slowly reaching across the console to do the very thing I wanted. I remember that at one point during the recording, I had one request that couldn’t be done—some technical thing that just couldn’t be achieved on the Trident—and Roger spent a couple days inventing a device to override the limitations of the analog board to get me what I wanted.

Steuart was, again, a gift, and I came to appreciate the full depth and breadth of his genius during
Interiors
. He and I started our own little autodidact club, making lists of books and talking about literature and philosophy over drinks. Even though Steuart and I parted musical ways many years ago (he has since become a member of the Eagles), to this day I have a very fond place in my heart for him and know that he fundamentally changed me as a musician, by inspiring me with the depth of his attention—to music, to books, and to life in general.

I took the finished record back to Nashville, totally proud of what I had accomplished, and played it for Rodney. “It’s great,” he said, “but I don’t think it’s finished.” I was shocked. I remember lying on the floor next to the boom box that I had just used to play Rodney the tape, staring at the ceiling and wondering if he was right. He argued that the record was
too
interior, too quiet, with too much of the same monochromatic emotional and sonic palette, and suggested adding a few songs to balance it and give it more energy. I started to cry, but after thinking about it for a day, I reluctantly agreed that he should produce a few more songs for the record.

When Rodney hired Richard Bennett to play on my song “On the Inside,” I started to feel that it might have been the right decision. I loved how Richard played and how “On the Inside” came out, and even thought it should open the record. There was another song, a ditty I had started and Rodney finished called “Real Woman,” in which I had never had any faith, as I thought it was too self-conscious and not even a real song—I had begun writing it with tongue firmly in cheek, but Rodney took it seriously and finished the lyrics and suggested we record that as well. Even though I had reservations, I agreed. I was still so disconnected from “Real Woman” that I left the studio after we got the basic track and let Rodney and Steuart work on the guitar parts. I came back at the end of the day to hear what they had done, and as I sat at the console a feeling of dread flooded through me. “What do you think?” Rodney asked. “I think it sounds like a fucking Pepsi commercial,” I said, and left the studio, almost distraught. I thought that song had ruined the record. Rodney and Steuart were shocked. Although Rodney rethought it a bit so that it didn’t turn out too badly, I still have not listened to that track in nearly twenty years.

“Real Woman” is probably my greatest musical regret—even more than the giant snare/synthesizer sounds of the mid-eighties, or some of the more sophomoric, navel-gazing songs I wrote for
Rhythm and Romance
. To my mind, it completely diluted the artistry of the record, and the only thing that could salvage it even today would be a great R&B singer like Anita Baker taking it to a whole other level of empowerment.

I delivered
Interiors
to the label, and they sent the head of A&R to the studio to listen to a few key tracks with me. After listening to four songs, he laughed coldly and said, “We can’t do anything with that.” He looked at me with bemusement. He was clearly flabbergasted that I thought this was music the label would consider commercially viable. I was stunned, and felt as if I had been slapped in the face. He explained further: “Radio won’t play this.” When he left the studio, I started to get angry. To my mind this was the most “country” record I had given them—almost entirely acoustic, very folk based, a real singer-songwriter project. I said to the assistant engineer, who was with me in the control room, “He’s wrong. I can’t wait to prove him wrong.” He was, as it happened, right. The first single, “What We Really Want,” made it only to number 39, my weakest showing on the country charts in well over a decade. My heart sank, and I started to become nervous about the album’s prospects. After that, nothing happened; the label abandoned the project. About three months after
Interiors
came out, I was on a plane staring out the window and thinking about what I should do. I knew the life of that record was effectively over—Columbia would not put any money or effort into another single, and yet . . . it was the most heartfelt, most artful thing I had ever done in my life.

I suddenly realized that I could no longer work with Columbia Nashville, and after talking to Rodney, my dad, and my manager at the time, Will Botwin, I decided to ask the label to transfer me to the New York division. (Dad had given me the best, and most succinct, advice, born of years of arguing, wrangling, convincing, and coaxing music industry executives to understand or support him: “Screw ’em,” were his exact words. “You belong in New York.”) Will offered to go into the meeting with me, but I told him I wanted to do it alone. I met with Roy Wunsch, then the head of the label in Nashville, and a few other key people. I told them that I was well aware that the record hadn’t performed for them, and warned them, kindly, that this situation was going to get worse, because this was what I was going to do from now on. I said that we would likely both be unhappy in the future, so I felt it was in their best interests to transfer me. The gentlemen seemed relieved. Roy shook my hand and said, “We’ll miss you,” and that was it. I walked out into the hall, the door closed behind me, and I actually had to lean against the wall, I was so dizzy. Twelve years on this division of the label, and it was over in twenty minutes. That transfer on paper to New York in 1990 was the beginning of my transfer of body and soul to New York completely. I had just met John Leventhal, and I knew my life was going to change, although I couldn’t foresee how profound and how permanent the change would be.

W
ith my transfer at the label, the end of my marriage, and my departure from Nashville, I entered a storm of a magnitude I could scarcely have imagined. With the press—and many of my friends—excoriating me for all those decisions, I moved with all the girls to Westport, Connecticut, for the summer of 1991, even though I was touring during almost that entire period, and then to Manhattan in the first week of September 1991. The older girls returned to Nashville and their schools there, and only Carrie remained with me when I rented my first apartment in the Village, paying for an entire year in advance. At 13 Morton Street we soon befriended Velvet Abashian, who had a tiny real estate office on the ground floor of our building. Actually, Velvet befriended us, for every time she saw me coming up the stoop with Carrie in the stroller, she came out and lifted both in through the front door. Her kindness made her a dependable ally as I negotiated living in New York with a toddler on my own. I enrolled Carrie at Barrow Street Nursery School and did a lot of traveling back and forth to Nashville to see her sisters while I tried to figure out how to uproot their lives and bring them to live with me.

During this period I did my best to keep my head down, refusing to respond to the accusations and rumors that had been circulating in the press or among my friends—that I had become a lesbian, that I was having an affair with Will Botwin, that I had bleached my hair blond and was taking drugs—or to the “interviews” that I had supposedly given, in which I deplored Rodney and my former life. None of it was true, but all of it was too tawdry to warrant a response, I thought. In the midst of all this,
Interiors
was receiving rapturous critical reception and was nominated for a Grammy in the category of Best Contemporary Folk Recording. I felt vindicated, and thrilled. I had toured fairly extensively in back of the record, with just Steuart and bassist Jim Hanson, and the experience had refined me as a musician in so many ways—I had to play a lot more guitar than I had been accustomed to, and I had to carry a show that was composed of rather dark material but make it seem elegiac. I did a pretty good job. John Leventhal even came to see me when I played Town Hall in New York, visiting backstage to say that he loved the show. (I know now what a rare occurrence it is to impress John.) John Prine wound up winning the Grammy for
The Missing Years
, and I was genuinely happy for him—John was an old friend, and certainly deserved the honor. I had gotten the validation I wanted for
Interiors
, and I was ready to move on.

I decided to ask John Leventhal to produce my next record, describing to him the songs I was writing as “elemental.” I told him that my new song “The Wheel” would be the central piece of the record—he had heard me perform it live—and I also wanted it to be the title of the album. The recurring themes, I explained, were of fire and water, wind and moon, and I wanted the sonics to somehow reflect the references to the elements. I don’t think he really understood me, and it’s true that at the time I was deep in some foggy quasi-New Age mind-set in a weak attempt to detach from the tremendous pain I was actually in over the divorce and the effect it was having on my children. I was ungrounded and spinning from all the changes in my life. He agreed to produce the record but said he wouldn’t do it alone, arguing that since
Interiors
I should think of myself as a producer as well, so he would coproduce it with me, with equal billing.

Before we started
The Wheel
, I asked him to produce a single track of my song “From the Ashes” for a charity compilation album, and we went into Electric Lady Studio on Eighth Street in New York to do it. I have a searing image from that session, one that marked a before-and-after moment in my life. I was sitting at the console, and John was standing next to me with his yellow Telecaster strapped across his body. He was about to do a guitar overdub while plugged directly into the board. When he started playing, everything fell away from him: self-consciousness, a desire to please, distraction, tension, fatigue, and even ideas about what he would play. He was absolutely, profoundly in the moment. I was seduced, heart, mind, and body.

We fell in love while we were making
The Wheel
. When we started the record, we were crazy with longing for each other but remained reserved, as we were both still extricating ourselves from our previous relationships. By the end of the record, we were a couple.

By then I had moved from Morton Street to a loft on Mercer Street in Soho, and John was spending most of his time there.

Chelsea moved to New York, and I enrolled her at St. Luke’s with Carrie. The following year Caitlin moved up, and we moved to a bigger place, occupying the top three floors of a brownstone at 241 West Eleventh Street in the Village. We settled into a life together there, and all three girls went to St. Luke’s, just a few blocks away. By this time, Hannah was graduating from high school in Nashville. That was a good year for me, with all three girls in the same school, in the tight community and protection of St. Luke’s. I loved the school, and I loved the girls being there. And yet, with John and me in the second year of our relationship, it became a little rocky as John suddenly found himself a father to three girls, two of whom were adolescents and resentful of the fact that I had pulled their lives apart. Much of the time, our desire to make it work outweighed our skills in managing the difficulties, but desire can become commitment, and commitment can make the forces of the universe work to your advantage. That’s what happened for us.

The Wheel
was a satisfying and truthful record, and conveyed—for me anyway—the crazy longing and lust of new love. (Years later I met John Hockenberry and his wife, Alison, at a party, and they told me how they had fallen in love listening to
The Wheel
while working as journalists in Afghanistan, interviewing people who later became al-Qaeda. That was one of the most strange and gratifying stories I heard about how the record affected other people.) I still have a lot of affection for it. It wasn’t commercially successful, however, and I had to start thinking seriously about what I wanted to do with my life and how I could reinvent a forum for my work that was outside Top 40 radio, since that avenue was closing for artists like me. Will Botwin, who had been my manager for a decade by this time, had left management for a job at Columbia. He introduced me to Danny Kahn, who has been my manager since. I had heard around that time that Columbia was going to focus more energy and put more marketing dollars behind two of my contemporaries and labelmates, Shawn Colvin (with whom John had worked for many years and had been romantically involved) and Mary Chapin Carpenter. We had appeared together as a trio at “Bobfest,” the huge extravaganza held at Madison Square Garden to celebrate Bob Dylan’s thirtieth anniversary in music. I became nervous; I had been on the label a long time, longer than either of them, and felt I might be taken for granted at this point. I knew I had to do something proactive on behalf of my own future interests.

I went in, alone again, to see Don Ienner, the head of Columbia.

“I’m about to turn forty,” I told him, “and I have to make some changes in my life. I know my contract isn’t up, but I’m asking you to release me from it so I can find out what I want to do.

“This is about a life change,” I explained, “not a label change. Please.”

He looked surprised and then became pensive. “This is painful,” he finally said. “I respect your decision, but I will genuinely miss you.”

“Thank you, Donnie,” I said, and I knew his sentiments were sincere. “I’ll never say a bad word about you.”

He smiled. “I didn’t think you would.”

The Wheel
might have been over from a marketing standpoint, but it did find its audience. Even today, if I do a show and don’t sing “The Wheel,” it is guaranteed that someone will find me, write me, or send a note backstage expressing disappointment and indignation that I neglected to perform the “most important song” in my repertoire. And repertoire is destiny. I’m still crazy in love with John Leventhal.

John and I were married on April 30, 1995, in a sculpture garden on Elizabeth Street on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. Actually, it was more a sculpture
lot
than a garden, as the statues, which were scattered around on an area of gravel surrounded by a chain-link fence, were all for sale. Still, it made for a beautiful setting, and embellished with a tent, huge floral arrangements, and a faux bridge leading from the street, it wound up looking like a comfortably shabby urban version of the Borghese Gardens. At around four fifteen in the afternoon I stepped out of a town car with my mom at the rear entrance to the garden and immediately saw John standing twenty feet from me, his back turned, his black hair spilling over the back of his collar. His shoulders filled out his dark suit tensely as he stood looking toward the tent where we would shortly take our vows. He was holding a blue umbrella, as it had started to drizzle and was quite chilly. My dad came up to my mother and me and began to tell us something, but I was mesmerized by John’s back, by his silhouette against the gray mist, and by the blue umbrella, so I didn’t hear what he was saying. Dad looked at me questioningly and softly called my name, and I startled. “I just realized that he’s my husband,” I explained, dazed. “It’s something about the umbrella.”

My parents were both Southerners, but their respective Souths were worlds apart.

My father was from the Mississippi Delta, the bottomland, where families struggled for their lives and livelihoods, and were constantly at the mercy of storms and floods and droughts—which had a profound impact on their view of the world and their place in it. My mother grew up middle class, in San Antonio, Texas. She was the daughter of Tom and Irene Liberto, staunch, devout Catholics and second-generation Italian Americans. (In the immigrant exhibit at the Institute of Texan Cultures in San Antonio, there hangs an enormous portrait of my great-grandparents, Angelina and Frank Liberto, who came from Sicily in the late nineteenth century.) Tom Liberto, my grandfather, was a bespectacled insurance salesman who was also an amateur magician, champion gin rummy player, and rose gardener and breeder so renowned that he was asked to create a special rose for Lady Bird Johnson on her visit to San Antonio in the early 1960s. The Lady Bird Johnson rose was never produced commercially, but my grandfather was enormously proud of having been chosen for the assignment. My grandmother Irene Liberto came from a long line of elegant, feisty women who stayed home, but also stayed fully
themselves
.

Irene and Tom had a solid marriage and three children: my uncle Ray (the aforementioned honky-tonk piano player), my mother, Vivian, and my aunt Sylvia, who would talk to me about sex and any number of adult topics that my mother, somewhat of a prude, was too shy or mortified to address. Grandma Irene was a funny, lovely woman who was also an alcoholic. Many times my mother would come home from school and find my grandmother passed out on the sofa. My mother would frantically clean the house and get the dinner going before my grandfather got home so he would not be aware of his wife’s condition. My grandfather—who was probably also an alcoholic but not the “designated patient,” like my grandmother—was a taskmaster and had very rigid ideas about family life and gender roles, and operated from a narrow moral certitude. This had a profound effect on my mother, who lived with a lot of shame and a sense of heavy secrecy. She did, however, keep an impeccably clean house, as she had an absolute terror of dirt and untidiness.

Irene’s sister, Mamie, was gorgeous in her youth, with a figure that made young men swoon. She retained her full breasts, long, shapely legs, and trim waist well into her seventies. She was also so deeply attached to her mother, whom we always called Nanny, that when she grew up and married, she moved across the street from Nanny so they could “visit” every day over coffee. (Nanny, who lived to be over a hundred, had extraordinary skin, remaining virtually unwrinkled into her nineties. In fact, all the Liberto women, most especially my mother, had gorgeous, flawless skin and aged beautifully.) Aunt Mamie was married to Uncle Bud, and they appeared to me to have a much more fluid, fun relationship than my grandparents. They were deeply, extravagantly in love for over sixty years. They called each other “sweetheart” and “precious” and “angel” throughout their lives, and I remember Aunt Mamie stroking Uncle Bud’s hair as she stood in back of his easy chair, asking, “Can I get anything for you, darling?” When she died, Uncle Bud was inconsolable. He cried and visited her grave every day, until he just surrendered to his grief and died a few years later.

Their grand love story was matched only by that of Aunt Louise and Uncle Joe, relatives on my dad’s side. Louise, Dad’s oldest sister, and Joe lived across the road from each other in Dyess, Arkansas, and fell in love in their youth. Although they planned to marry, Uncle Joe first decided to see the world, joining the navy in 1940 and shipping off to the South Pacific. Uncle Joe’s ship, the USS
Houston
, was sunk on March 1, 1942, which happened to be Aunt Louise’s birthday. Uncle Joe was taken prisoner by the Japanese, and after a few years he was presumed dead. Aunt Louise grieved deeply, but recovered, married, and had a son, Damon. After nearly four and a half years of unspeakable torture, deprivation, illness, and loneliness, Uncle Joe, to the utter shock of everyone, returned home, malnourished and sick but alive. Aunt Louise extricated herself from her marriage, and she and Joe married in 1946. They had three children and lived together in marital bliss for fifty-seven years, until Aunt Louise died in April 2003.