Copley News Service

Palm Springs, Calif., is well known as a mecca for wealthy retirees to play golf, sip cocktails and broil in the sun. But for fast-rising country-soul singer Shelby Lynne, whose new album is one of this year's best, the desert city is a creative oasis where she can develop her music away from the limelight.

"That's exactly why I'm there. I didn't want to live in L.A., and it didn't make sense to go back home," said the Virginia-born Lynne, who grew up in rural Alabama, came of musical age in Nashville and moved to Palm Springs in 1998.

"I like it because there's nothing there," she continued, speaking from a recent concert stop in Colorado. "You don't run into rock 'n' roll stars in Palm Springs, or people who want to be rock 'n' roll stars."

Lynne, who 13 years ago was touted as a budding country-music sensation, is finally becoming a star herself.

Her specialty is a sultry, rough-edged fusion of country and soul music. And the intensely personal songs on her sixth and latest album (for Island Def Jam Records), I Am Shelby Lynne, provide the perfect vehicle for her earthy, blues-tinged vocals and unbowed lyrics about adversity, love gone very wrong and the resilience of the human spirit.

"My goal with songs is to reach people and communicate honestly," said Lynne, 31. "And that's never changed, especially now that I'm writing songs. I write it first for me and hope I can have people respond."

Stifled In Nashville

Writing is a still-evolving skill for Lynne, whose songs on her new album mix elements of Aretha Franklin, Dusty Springfield and Al Green, by way of Patsy Cline and John Lennon.

With the exception of Lynne's 1991 album, "Tough All Over," which featured songs by Johnny Cash and Duke Ellington, and her 1993 country-swing album, Temptation, her three other previous releases were dominated by slick, formulaic country-pop songs by established Nashville tunesmiths. These were forced on her by the succession of record labels that had signed Lynne, only to drop her when she failed to score any hits.

It was unpleasant for the nonconformist singer, who felt stifled by the dictates of the Nashville music establishment. And despite winning early praise from George Jones (who shared vocal duties on her 1987 debut single) and Loretta Lynn, Lynne grew so frustrated by the musical direction in which she was pushed that she refused to tour in support of her albums. Her rebellion also extended to her attire, perhaps most notably when she arrived for the taping of a Nashville TV show wearing combat (rather than cowboy) boots. By 1997, she left Nashville to hole up for a year in Mobile, Ala., before moving west to Palm Springs.

"As far as Nashville goes, by my third album, everybody knew that I wasn't going to have a hit record in country music," recalled Lynne, who is the older sister of singer/songwriter Allison Moorer.

Lynne is hesitant to discuss the family tragedy in which her father fatally shot her mother, then killed himself, when Lynne was just 17. But she now regards her musical travails in Nashville as a source of inspiration for her stirring new album and her decision to follow her muse.

"Absolutely, yeah. I do believe that I learned a lot of things," she said. "I had to get comfortable with who I was as a person to make this album, and it took me 10 years to do it. I was in Nashville since I was 18, and I left when I was 27. It's all in the live-and-learn thing. I just happened to be making records as I was growing up."

Musical Rebirth

The critical response to her new album has been almost euphoric, both in this country and across Europe, where Lynne recently completed a three-week tour with her new band.

With I Am Shelby Lynne, she has been reborn, at least musically speaking.

"I wanted to start over and have a fresh view, and it was pretty easy. It was time for me to be born again, as a musician and songwriter. And the songwriting part really takes precedence because I'd never written an entire album before."

Why not?

"I don't think it was time before," she said. "I never had the songs hit me and come as naturally as they did this time."

On I Am Shelby Lynne, her emotionally volatile music is accomplished yet raw, thoughtfully constructed, but loose-limbed and full of unexpected twists. Much of the credit for those twists goes to Bill Bottrell, whose previous album credits range from Sheryl Crow to Michael Jackson. And Lynne's organic blend of country and soul reaffirms that the two Southern-bred music styles have much in common, just as country and blues are close musical kin that come from the same melting pot.

"I feel like they are the same, it's just different interpretations and different instrumentation," she said.

"To me, Hank Williams was a great soul singer. On the flip side of that, I'd love to hear Al Green sing Ray Price's 1971 country hit) 'For the Good Times' (RealAudio excerpt). I think it's all the same; if a song is great, it can cross any boundaries and genres. It's a shame that everything has to be so categorized and nailed down. I feel soul is soul, no matter what package it comes in."

Asked to describe exactly what music means to her, Lynne said: "Music has been a savior for me many times. Sometimes it's been all I've had. I'm never without music. ...

"When I was a kid, I heard Elvis Presley's singles of 'Rip It Up' (RealAudio excerpt) and 'Blue Suede Shoes' (RealAudio excerpt). I started playing guitar when I was 7 [because] I wanted to sing those songs, and — oh, man! — it just goes downhill from there."

— George Varga