(...Story Continued from Previous Page) I'm short and I have a big appetite. I don't worry so much about it when
I have long periods of time off the road. But to get in those [stage] clothes,
they're too expensive and they're too tight, too tailor-made. You just can't run
those clothes to the cleaners and say, "Can you alter this?" It's a whole
process. You have to take the beads off and then let it out and then sew beads
back on. So I have to stay in the stage clothes. But as soon as November's over,
mid-November, I'm not even thinking about that through the holidays. I'm gonna
eat and eat and eat and then I'll worry about that next year. (laughs)
Did you think about reprising Doralee for the stage version [of "9 to
5"]?
It's still called "9 to 5," not "95." (laughs)
Who inspired your current single "Shinola?" You take that person to
the woodshed for being a jerk.
I just took that term "You don't know squat from Shinola" that we've all
heard and I thought somebody needs to write a song about "You don't know love
from Shinola." Well, what would that be about? It would be about the biggest
scumbag you ever dated or that you've seen your friends date or your sister
marry and date. So I had no problem drawing from that, especially being brought
up in the part of the country where I'm from, where there's a lot of male
chauvinist redneck pigs.
Watch the video:
"Shinola"
In the song "Backwoods Barbie," you sing about how even Backwoods
Barbies get their feelings hurt. When is the last time you got your feelings
hurt?
Oh, I get my feelings hurt more often than I would ever say. Little snide
things people still say. And a big part of it is about how you look or what you
wear: "Do you think that looks good?" "Do you really not have any better taste
than that?" Or "Do you just wear that because you want to?" We all live with our
feelings on our sleeves; it don't take much to offend a sensitive little person
that has to live with her feelings on her sleeves in order to write the kind of
songs that you need to.
The 42nd CMA Awards are coming up. Only six women, including you,
have won Entertainer of the Year. What's up with that?
Oh, I don't know. I think women really have fair shots now. I think a lot of
the girls don't really put together as big and huge a show as a lot of the men
do, like Garth ... They're kind of ... they're sturdy, I guess.
They can fly around, do entertaining things. I really think that it's more that
some of the men have the bigger production shows. But I think the girls are
doing wonderful. A lot of these young girls have not had a lot of time to put
together those big, big type shows that a lot of the guys have.
You recently said you could relate to Sarah Palin because you're both
small-town girls, both Pentecostal and both carry an AK-47.
That's a joke. I don't have an AK-47.
You can't carry one in any of your outfits!
I couldn't carry it; I wouldn't carry it. I just was making a joke, like the
line by Doralee, that was actually based on years and years ago, when I first
came to Nashville. I had a gun. I had some kind of an ordeal in New York and
some guy was trying, well actually, was trying to rape me. Oh man, I grabbed my
gun out and that's basically where that line came from: "Change you from a
rooster to a hen," although I didn't say it in exactly those terms. And it ended
up in a Playboy magazine years ago, before the movie. So that's the only time I
ever admitted anything. But I do not have an AK-47. I was just trying to make a
funny.
Melinda Newman is a freelance journalist who covers music and
entertainment for the Associated Press, the Los Angeles Times, the Washington
Post, the Hollywood Reporter, Performing Songwriter and other outlets. She is a
former talent editor and West Coast bureau chief for Billboard
magazine. |
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