Interview by Liani Solari
Published on mindfood.com, 8 December 2008. Image: “kd lang” by Charlie Llewellin is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.
Enjoying the success of her first self-produced album, Watershed, and accompanying tour, Canadian singer-songwriter k.d. lang speaks with Liani Solari about her 25-year career.
LS: Writing and producing your own album, as you did with Watershed, is very different to interpreting other artists’ songs…
KD: Sometimes I don’t feel the inspiration to write but I do feel like singing. Both are challenging and both are important to me as a musician. As a vocalist it’s good to interpret the work of others; as a songwriter it’s good to write, to use more emotion. I identify more strongly as a vocalist than a songwriter.
In addition to your own songs, you’ve included a live version of your interpretation of Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah on Watershed. Can we anticipate a duet with “the ever-provocative Mr Leonard Cohen”?
Oh, I don’t know. No, probably not a duet. He certainly can hold his own with that song.
You’ve been fortunate to have had mentors such as Miss Peggy Lee [1920–2002]. How did her mentoring come about?
I just started listening to her as a kid, around the age of 20. I never got tired of her vocal style and interpretive humour [lang performs Lee’s Don’t Smoke in Bed on the Live in London DVD]. I was fortunate enough to meet her in the late ’80s. She was an amazing woman – very, very metaphysical.
Your success is lauded by the media, the music industry and your fans. How do you measure your own success?
I think it’s moderate. After 25 years in the music business, I’m fortunate to have a job! A career in the music business is difficult to maintain, so I don’t take it for granted. I don’t think I’m a superstar or anything.
How have you coped with the diminished privacy that comes with fame?
I’ve been in show business for 25 years so it [fame] has waxed and waned. It takes a while to figure out that you’re sort of in the driver’s seat – you can choose where you hang out and who you hang out with. I have a really nice balance, the best of both worlds, now.
Sunday Life magazine quoted you as saying, “There is something I’m looking forward to doing when I get to Australia [for the Watershed tour in April/May 2008] but I’m going to keep that to myself. I wouldn’t want photographers hanging around, so I’m keeping it a secret.” Are you able to reveal that secret now?
No [laughs], I’m going to keep it a secret because I like to do it every time I go!
You’ve described your journey as a vocalist in almost meditative terms: letting self-conscious thoughts fall by the wayside and focusing on the purity of the vocals. What is the ultimate goal?
I think just to enjoy it as much as I possibly can, and hopefully that enjoyment will transcend to the people listening to it. Music is a transportive experience and the goal is just to enjoy it. It’s that simple, really.
You became a Buddhist practitioner and started writing Watershed at around the age of 40. Do you feel you’ve reached a stage in your life where you can reconcile perfectionism with just letting the music be?
Well, I would say that’s definitely my aspiration. I don’t think I’ll ever really reach that, though. Artists need to always be striving for something.
Watershed was six years in the making. Do you ever become impatient with your art?
No, not impatient. Maybe complacent.
How do you shake off that complacency?
Well, with a bottle of wine [laughs]. White, generally. Red is too hard on the voice.
You have a painting studio at home. What medium, style and subject matter do you work with?
Oils, but also whatever I have. Abstract Expressionist is my style. I’m fond of the work of American Abstract Expressionists such as Franz Kline [1910–62]. In California [at the time of the interview, lang lived in Los Angeles], the strange lack of architecture is conducive to painting cityscapes and streetscapes. Because I’m not a gifted artist, only three of my paintings are good enough to be hanging on my walls at the moment.
The Dalai Lama sent a congratulatory letter to Barack Obama on his election as US President in which he mentions Obama’s “concern for the situation in Tibet”. To what extent is Obama an instrument of hope, not only for Americans but also for the rest of the world?
Oh, a tremendous hope. He is someone who has the openness, integrity and unity to be a tremendous hope for the world. I have high hopes for what he can achieve with his openness.
If you hadn’t become a musician, what would you be doing?
I would have gone into the culinary arts. It’s always been a passion.
So, if you could invite anyone to a dinner party, who would it be?
I would love to have dinner with Patsy Cline [1932–63], sit with the Dalai Lama, and have a drink with Dean Martin [1917–95].
Tell us more about your spiritual journey in the autobiographical song Jealous Dog on the Watershed album.
The first verse is about wanting things you don’t have and realising you should be grateful for what you do have. The second verse is about not fitting into Christianity, the experience of being gay. The “friend with a handsome trait” is Lama Chödak Gyatso Nubpa, my Buddhist teacher, who licks his plate in an expression of appreciation for what he has.
Liani Solari 