k.d. lang is back with an album of Canadian covers and is relieved the heady days of mega celebrity are over, writes Tony Clayton-Lea
Few people in contemporary pop music have been more resolutely and rigidly defined than Kathy Dawn Lang. To those who have a casual interest in her music, she is one or more of the following - pantheist, vegetarian, lesbian, feminist. A singer, I hear you ask? Yes, she's that, too, but sometimes it seems - through a sense of misplaced perception, perhaps, or a strange quirk of fate - as if only by default.
These times are somewhat less frantic for k.d. lang (she prefers to spell her name in lower case because "it's more generic", although whatever that means in this context is anyone's guess). More than 10 years ago, she was riding the crest of a commercial wave with 1992's Ingénue, the record that took her out of her stylised country music torch 'n' twang setting and placed her firmly in the upper regions of the music elite.
At the same time, she went public about her sexuality, something that merely added to the noisy tittle-tattle around First World dinner tables. What with the lesbian "issue", her strong stance on animal rights, her once-confessed notion that she was the reincarnation of Patsy Cline and being wet-shaved by Cindy Crawford on the cover of Vanity Fair, the way looked very clear for a celebrity car crash. Lang got lucky, though - the brightness of her mainstream success started to fade.
Her recently released new album, Hymns of the 49th Parallel - a good if somewhat arid record that sees her sing songs from noted Canadian songwriters such as Neil Young, Joni Mitchell, Leonard Cohen, Jane Siberry and Ron Sexsmith - fits her presumed demographic perfectly. Lang now considers herself a little bit country, a little bit rock 'n' roll, a little bit mainstream, a little bit niche. She says, with what sounds like her tongue planted firmly in her cheek, she "has always managed to fall between the cracks and I don't see why these cracks should be any different".
Born in Consort, Alberta, Canada in 1961, lang is a farmer's daughter who exchanged muck for art. By her adolescence she had become a skilled guitarist and pianist, and had dabbled in the classical and avant garde fields before deciding that country music would be her preferred method of self-expression. Yet even in this arena she was adamant it wouldn't be any old country music. Like many people of a certain age, she had once despised C&W but as she grew older she discerned something in its constituent parts - in essence, life's nitty-gritty experiences - that drew her to it.
Her ironically-titled 1984 debut, A Truly Western Experience, was followed by 1987's Angel With A Lariat. Both records eschewed typical country music trappings, to the extent that many country radio stations refused to play them. 1988's Shadowland seduced them, however, with its smooth Nashville sheen (by famed country producer Owen Bradley) and guest appearances by Loretta Lynn, Kitty Wells and Brenda Lee. 1989's Absolute Torch And Twang sealed the lid on the voices of the disbelievers, but the intervening period between that album's release and the genesis of her next album (Ingénue, released in 1992) produced a stylistic turnaround that prised her out of her cowboy chaps and slipped her into dinner party dresses.
Ingénue was far removed from country music; swapping Brenda Lee for Peggy Lee, lang (who had fallen deeply in love for the first time, making the album a distinctive and personal statement of intent) went on to win a Grammy and other awards. Success, though, wasn't as cracked up as it's meant to be. Mainstream success for lang essentially equalled loss of resolve.
"It was exciting at the time," she says, "but it's kind of like getting high - it's exciting when you're doing it but then you come to the period of time where you're coming down and you swear you're never going to do it again.
"The conflict came after the experience of Ingénue, and I don't know if it was other people's expectations of me or my own perceptions and expectations of myself. Then you think the next record is going to sell more, or that it's supposed to, and do you even want it to sell more? Artistically, it takes a lot of introspective time to figure out where it is you want to go and what your art means to you. It took me a while to figure that out. Even though I thought I was completely prepared and mentally fit to face the challenges of fame, I don't think you ever really know until you're there."
The follow-up to Ingénue, 1995's All You Can Eat, was so poorly received it effectively curtailed her mainstream career. Previous levels of fame have therefore dissipated, for which she is greatly relieved.
"I feel now that people are interested in me because of my music. I think that when you are at a certain level of celebrityhood, people's knowledge or appreciation of you might not be based on your artistry; rather, it's based on your persona, your style, or who you know. To me, I'm just happy to be, after 20 years in the music business, still able to sell out venues and have people come hear me sing."
She is satisfied that gay culture has evolved so much in the past 10 years that her sexuality now means very little.
"There are television shows such as Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, so the whole gay thing is kinda blasé now, isn't it? When I came out there weren't very many other outwardly gay artists, so being gay isn't as much an anomaly as it used to be. I think it's not so trendy or controversial any more, so it's not quite as media-worthy. In my existence in the world, that's something I'm also relieved about."
Her new album harks back to her interpretative days, yet although she claims "there are so many great songs out there" and "interpretation is a big part of what I do and what I like to do - it makes me a better singer and songwriter", there is nevertheless a scenario of aimless thumb-twiddling about it. Following a few queries, it transpires that (despite the record fulfilling its purpose more than adequately) lang's singing of part of the Canadian songbook is little more than a stopgap until her own creative juices start flowing again.
How prolific is she, then? How many songs would she get through in, say, a month? "You mean to write?" she asks, in an "are-you-actually-serious?" tone. "I don't write very often - only when I have to. I find it an arduous experience." Lazy? "Not as a person, but I'm sure lazy when it comes to songwriting."
Does she feel she's not able to put across what she would ideally like to, then, and therefore has little problem singing songs written by other people?
"That is certainly the case with this new record. To be honest, in the environment we have found ourselves in in the past four years, I've felt a type of writer's block. I don't think I could even begin to convey the feelings I have about the state of humanity and the world, globally, politically. I just feel I don't have the capacity to express these things right now, and so that was one of the reasons why I turned to my favourite songwriters for them to express that.
"I feel now in my life, and my experience of life, that these things are not something I can frivolously talk about. They're too important to mock up and breeze over. There are things I take very seriously. My spiritual life is very important to me, and what I say to people and how I express myself publicly is also very important to me. I don't want to waste people's time and I don't want to say something that doesn't matter. Quite simply, I don't feel as a songwriter I have it right now."
How honest of her, too, to admit this. Is she happy? She says she is - very happy.
She lives a fairly quiet, extremely private life: "I like to paint, cook, hang out with my dogs and swim. It's all very normal. I put my happiness down to life, pure and simple. Getting older, too, is good, and being able to roll with the punches a bit more."
Hymns of the 49th Parallel is out now. K.d. lang plays the Waterfront, Belfast, on December 5th and the Olympia Theatre, Dublin, on December 6th.