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PEOPLE & ARTS Friday 6 September 2019
Tucker is still bold, brash, but enjoying a fresh start

By KRISTIN M. HALL ager when she made her the early ‘90s, like “Down full of details and referenc-
Associated Press first splash on the music To My Last Teardrop” and es to her childhood, her
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — At scene. “Two Sparrows in a Hurri- love of horses and her fam-
her publicist’s office on Mu- “When Billy Sherrill and I cut cane.” ily. On the first song, “Mus-
sic Row, Tanya Tucker was ‘Delta Dawn,’ I remember But the deaths of her father tang Ridge,” she sings, “A
fielding questions from re-
porters and posing for pho-
tos wearing pink hair and
a blue, wide-brimmed hat
while a documentary crew
followed her around.
The 60-year-old singer
proudly mentioned to a This Jan. 26, 2014 file photo
photographer that she shows songwriter LaShawn
recently showed Tim Mc- Daniels, right, and his wife
Graw she could still do the April Daniels at the 56th
splits. annual Grammy Awards in
With her first album of new Los Angeles.
Associated Press
songs in 17 years, “While I’m
Livin’,” out on Friday, Tuck-
er is in the spotlight again. Grammy-
And while being rebellious
is part of her DNA, this time winning
she’s ready to make nice.
“I’m not 20 anymore. It’s songwriter
obvious. But I’m just trying
to do what’s expected of LaShawn
me, and that’s never usu-
ally my case,” Tucker said. Daniels dies
From the beginning of her In this Aug. 20, 2019, photo, Tanya Tucker sits for a portrait session in Nashville, Tenn., to promote
career, Tucker has chal- her new album, ‘While I’m Livin’. in car crash
lenged the standards of Associated Press
how women in country mu-
sic were supposed to look, him telling everybody, ‘I and mother in 2009 and woman’s life ain’t just a list Associated Press
sing and act in their per- don’t want it known that 2016 weighed on her, and of the worst things she has LOS ANGELES (AP) —
sonal lives. she’s only 13. I want to she stopped recording for done/I leave you now with LaShawn Daniels, a
While she had 10 No. 1 keep that a secret a little a long time. Shooter Jen- a heart of stone/Sometimes Grammy Award-winning
country hits and 40 songs in while, as long as we can,’” nings, son of Waylon Jen- the past is hard to outrun.” songwriter who penned
the top 10, and won CMA said Tucker. nings and a producer as Tucker also covers Miranda songs for Beyoncé, Whit-
female vocalist of the year Sherrill, her producer, want- well, had been trying to Lambert’s hit “The House ney Houston and Lady
in 1991, what has come to ed people to hear the hus- persuade Tucker to return That Built Me,” to the glee Gaga has died. He was
define her most is the tab- ky-voiced Texas singer first to the studio, and he found of Lambert, who considers 41.
loid image earned by her and not see her as just an an ally in Carlile. her a musical hero. Daniels’ wife April said
brashness, bawdiness, love oddity. Tucker didn’t know who The album’s title and final in a statement that her
affairs with other singers, The song become her Carlile was, but soon song was inspired by an husband died in a car
athletes and actors, and first hit, in 1972, and her learned that Carlile was just idea from Tucker. accident Tuesday in
rehab. most recognizable song. as headstrong as Tucker They were talking about South Carolina.
“She is well known for hav- It earned her the cover of could be. sending flowers to a fu- He earned a Grammy in
ing a complicated life, a “Rolling Stone.” Jennings introduced them neral, but Tucker remarked 2001 for his songwriting
complicated relationship By the late ‘70s, her image via text, messaging them she’d rather have flowers work on Destiny Child’s
with drugs,” said Grammy- had turned from innocent both in a group chat. Tuck- while she was still alive to “Say My Name.”
winning singer-songwriter to scandalous, with her er, apparently unaware enjoy them. Daniels co-wrote sever-
Brandi Carlile, who helped rock album “TNT” and its that Carlile was included The song, “Bring My Flowers al Grammy-nominated
co-produce and co-write photo of Tucker wearing a in the chat, wrote back, Now,” features a simple pi- songs including Tamar
the new album. skin-tight, red body stock- “Who is this Brandi b----?” ano track, and has Tucker Braxton’s “Love and
Country music “goes so far ing. “She wasn’t that into talk- reflecting on the long shad- War,” Toni Braxton’s “He
as to make heroes out of “I just wish I knew where ing to me or even having ow of the miles she’s trav- Wasn’t Man Enough”
the men that have lives like that little red suit was. I’d me work on writing songs eled, and the regrets and and “The Boy is Mine,”
that,” she added. like to see if I can still put for her,” Carlile said. “I took joys of a life well lived. a track featuring Brandy
But even as some of Tuck- this in it,” Tucker now jokes. that as a challenge.” For a woman whose life and Monica.
er’s contemporaries like She later noted that it was But once Jennings and has been reinvented over He also contributed on
Dolly Parton and Loretta probably one of her worst Carlile brought Tucker into and over, Tucker has even Beyoncé’s “Telephone,”
Lynn were lauded as icons, records. Sunset Sound studio, she surprised herself with this al- Jennifer Lopez’s “If You
Tucker’s contributions Then there was the tumul- felt more at home. bum, thanks to her champi- Had My Love” and Mi-
weren’t as well remem- tuous love affair with Glen It reminded her of record- ons in Carlile, the Hanseroth chael Jackson’s “You
bered in the ensuing de- Campbell, who was 20 ing her first album with Sher- twins and Jennings. Rock My World.”
cades. She’s never been years older than she was. rill, when they recorded live “This album, and it really His wife, April Daniels,
asked to join the Country They both had their addic- without overdubbing. sounds kind of funny to me called her husband a
Music Hall of Fame, for in- tions and “it snowballed,” Carlile and her longtime to say that, but to me it’s a “man of extraordinary
stance, despite a long ca- Tucker said succinctly. co-writers and vocal part- start,” Tucker said. faith and a pillar in our
reer. She rebounded with a string ners Tim and Phil Hanseroth “Even after all I’ve done, family.”q
Tucker was barely a teen- of hits on country radio in wrote songs just for Tucker, this is the start.”q