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'musical milestones' Everything that we need is there — we have a couple of Fairchilds, a couple of LA-2A [audio compressors], some really great vintage outboard gear and of course a full Pro Tools rig. I have a Neve console and a Studer, and it's all hooked up for making records. More than that, though, is the vibe here. That's what makes it difficult about looking for a new place. It's a little daunting to find a place PMthat has room for a studio. But the right thing will come up. It's an odd time to be trying to sell a house anyway, so I don't think it's gonna happen too quickly. end it was a great challenge for me, and one I ultimately enjoyed. What were the sessions like? Everything was live in the studio. I had worked that way before, but when producing myself I usually work with just three musicians, because it's a more controlled atmosphere. I'd play bass and have a drummer and guitar player, and we'd overdub to that. This was quicker because we had a large pool of musicians, everybody was on the same page about the style and we would rehearse. We'd learn it, do three or four takes and pick the best one. It was very old-school. Which instrument do you usually write on? In the last few years I've been writing on bass a lot, and on guitar—but this album it's all keyboards. I wrote on Wurlitzer and piano. That's my first instrument, and I definitely wanted to shake it up. I've been doing the same thing for 16 years, and I felt like getting back to playing the keyboards. Did you play other instruments on the record? Nope, that was it. It was great. It was a departure, and definitely it felt right with the tone of the record. How did Keith Richards come to play on "Eye to Eye"? We called him. He was in the islands and he said, "As soon as I get back, we'll do it." We sent him the tune, and he came in the day after he got back. He knows that genre of music [reggae] so well, and as soon as he started playing it made it feel so much more authentic. You've known Keith for a while. Are you still a little in awe of him? Oh my God, I'm completely in awe of him. He walks in and I'm just like a kid. I'm nervous and I'm constantly saying to myself, "I can't believe I'm in the same room as Keith Richards." And yet he's been such a great champion of what I do, and of me as a person. He's amazing. How about Justin Timberlake, who sings on "Sign Your Name?" We were both working at the old A&M studios 2003 Live at Budokan good timing W hen Sheryl Crow bought her horse farm When about 35 miles outside Nashville several years ago, she suddenly found that she had room to store all the musical equipment that she had previously been keeping in the downtown popular storage facility, Soundcheck. Music City was battered by catastrophic flooding in early May, and Crow watched in amazement as Soundcheck was completely swamped — destroying millions of dollars worth of instruments and gear belonging to local musicians world-famous and unknown alike. "God, it just makes me sick," she says. "When we bought this farm, it had a big storage garage, so we moved everything down here. Luckily we're not near a river, although my little creek looked like the Mississippi." In May, Crow was among the performers at a fundraiser for the Community Foundation of Middle Tennessee's efforts to aid flood victims. To learn more about the organization's ongoing work, go to cfmt.org. [now Henson Recording Studios in L.A.]. One of the beautiful things about working in a corporate studio is that you have the luxury of having a lot of great musicians around. We started on a couple of tunes and I played him "Sign Your Name." He said, "Who's doing the backgrounds?" I said, "We haven't figured that out yet," and he said, "I've got it. I've got this one." And he went in and nailed it. What's in your home studio? I've had the same gear since my third record. 2005 Wildflower 2008 Detours What was it like recording at Electric Lady? I loved it. I feel like there's such a heavy spirit there. I would be singing upstairs in the room where Hendrix supposedly slept on the floor, and a huge draft would all of a sudden come through. I would look up and say, "OK, Jimi, what's going on?" I felt like there was a real presence there. It's a luxury to be able to go to a couple of different places to record. It creates a different kind of atmosphere and a different kind of energy. [My home studio] is a great place for doing vocals, it's a great place for writing. Los Angeles was a great place to track, because we had a great pool of musicians there. In New York, Keith Richards and Citizen Cope came in. Each place had a little something different to offer. What are your hopes for the future? I'd like this album to sell 10 million copies. (laughs) Which I know it's not, because people don't buy records that much anymore. So I'll just say that I want to keep going as an artist. I want to continue to mix it up. I want to continue to tour, because I love it — that's what I make records for. I also want to continue doing things that are out of my comfort zone. For instance, I'd like to get into some scoring, providing music for movies. You can't just keep doing the same things as an artist. You've got to stay alive and stay interested and keep growing. CLIC K FOR M ORE Sheryl Crow sherylcrow.com M Music & Musicians Magazine mmusicmag.com 2008 Home for Christmas sai-national.org 2010 100 Miles from Memphis FALL 2010 PAN PIPES 13

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