Between a Heart and a Rock Place (26 page)

From our first conversations with Tom, it was clear that he understood exactly what we wanted to do with this record. Neither one of us had any big expectations about what this deal would do. There was no bullshit talk of platinum sales or aspirations of returning us to our former glory. And quite frankly, we didn't want either of those things. I'd been a rock star, I'd sold out stadium shows, I'd been chased by paparazzi. I had no interest in any of that. What we wanted was to figure out how we could keep our personal life intact, make money, and still have fun. I wanted to be a badass mother who could rock and make a living doing it.

This arrangement met those needs, while also having the added benefit of getting a new album out to help us keep a toe in the water from a recording standpoint. I didn't want my career to disappear, but I did want it to belong to me, not some record stooge. Regardless of how the record performed this would be a win-win situation for us. The deal with CMC was a means to an end, satisfying our need to keep recording while also giving us the chance to learn the business of running a label. Once we accomplished that, we'd be able to branch out on our own.

The result of all this was
Innamorata,
a record we made under some of the most peaceful circumstances we'd ever worked in. The record is
one of my favorites; it was the beginning of the artistic experimentation we'd been missing for so long. Sure, we'd had freedom with our last two records on Chrysalis, but there was always pressure to sell. They went along with our plans because they had to by contract, not necessarily because they wanted to. There's such freedom in creating when you aren't concerned with critics or people trying to make your life miserable.

From the beginning, Spyder wanted to mix the tone up a bit. He wanted to make an electric/acoustic record, bring a viola in—keep the vocals aggressive but make the bed a bit different. The only electric guitar is actually on “River of Love,” and even that felt a little odd at first because we were going in another direction. The title cut, “Innamorata,” was the first song we recorded, where we got the technique down. Once again, we made it live with very few overdubs. One of the songs, “Papa's Roses,” was inspired by Katherine Dunn's provocative novel
Geek Love,
about a traveling carnival and the crazy family that runs it. It's quirky and fascinating, and it encourages a great deal of interpretive thought. We ended up making a beautiful video for the song “Strawberry Wine,” which we shot in Dallas with two very young directors. It was simple but innovative, and, most important, it was peaceful. I was sad more people didn't get to see it, so we included it on a video compilation we later did called
Choice Cuts
.

In the end,
Innamorata
sold a respectable amount of records, but that wasn't the point. We'd accomplished what we'd set out to do, and that convinced us we were ready to go independent and start our own record label. Though it wasn't nearly our most successful record sales-wise, we made more money on that record than on any other we'd done simply because we owned everything—all the publishing was ours. Even when you're a major star and selling millions of albums, you're still only making less than a dollar on each record you sell (in some cases it's
a lot
less than a dollar). While we were making more than that in our most recent deal with EMI, in comparison it was still terrible.
Almost all the money from each record sold would go into the pocket of the label. But with CMC, we took home about 40 percent of the revenue from every record sold, a number that presumably would be even higher if we had our own label. So even though we were selling less, we were making more, and we were doing it all without having to put up with any crap from the record company. This was a revelation. Not only was this going to give us the creative freedom we craved, it was going to be lucrative as well.

Seeing the money we could make combined with our gut feelings about the fundamental shifts digital technology was bringing to the industry. After years of having other people tell us what to do, being independent just felt right. We could put aside the commercialism, and the charts, and even the profits. I'd get to make the music I felt like making and have a wonderful time doing it. Nobody would be saying “You need to cut this song because so-and-so has publishing.” Or “This one's a radio-friendly record.” Or “You need to get in the studio today no matter what because the schedule is everything.” I would make music at my own pace and not think about hits. If one or two squeaked out onto the airwaves, it would be great. It would be gravy. But my lifestyle didn't have to change. I could still have time to be with my family and friends. I could have a life.

We played a few dates with Steve Miller, who was quite the gentleman, and tried some of the
Innamorata
music out. On the whole, it was received enthusiastically, enough so that we put together a nationwide club tour that took us from St. Louis to Chicago, Cleveland, Scranton, New Haven, Norfolk, Phoenix, and Las Vegas. We played Tramps in New York and the House of Blues in New Orleans. Of course the crowds loved hearing our older hits, but we were pleased that some of the biggest ovations came from performances from
Innamorata,
including “Only You,” “River of Love,” and an acoustic version of “Papa's Roses” that Spyder and I did.

Musically this tour was exciting. Switching from electric to acoustic
performances was great for contrast, and I believe it added some fascinating texture to the shows. We also opened shows for Styx during that time. It was one of the best ways to showcase the music for a big crowd yet not have to work on a grueling eighteen-month tour. Again, these decisions were ours to make. No record company was telling us we
had
to do something.

I never again wanted to work for a company that
got inside my head
. I didn't want some guy in a suit invading my brain and rattling around in there. Almost from the beginning I'd been saying that I wanted a situation where
everybody did their job
. My job is to make music; the label's job is to sell it. How hard is that to figure out?

 

A
ROUND THE TIME THAT
we'd been preparing to take
Innamorata
on the road, I was approached about participating in an upstart new traveling tour that was beginning that summer, something called Lilith Fair.

On its face, the pitch was quite a concept: an all-female festival tour celebrating women in music. Grammy-winning singer-songwriter Sarah McLachlan came up with the idea, not as a political statement, but to showcase the wonderful music that women continue to contribute to the culture. But political or not, Lilith Fair grew out of Sarah's refusal to accept stereotypes about female artists. I had always loved Sarah's voice and songwriting, but her business sense and entrepreneurial spirit were equally admirable. First, she was fighting stigmas like the decades-old idea that radio listeners wouldn't stay tuned to a station that played two female artists in a row. Then, of course, there were the concert promoters who remained skeptical about booking too many women on the summer tour schedule.

To counter the portrayal of women as bad business, Sarah and her friend (and fellow Grammy-winning singer-songwriter) Paula Cole
booked a summer tour in 1996. One of their shows was called “Lilith Fair,” after the biblical Lilith who refused to obey Adam and exited Eden for parts unknown. The shows were so successful that in 1997, Sarah launched a wider Lilith Fair tour, playing thirty-five cities, with a variety of female musicians, and it became the top festival tour of the year. I already had our
Innamorata
tour booked, so when I was approached about playing Lilith Fair, I found I only had two dates available. But you couldn't have kept me away from those two. It was such an honor not only to be asked to participate in this groundbreaking event, but to be told that I had been an inspiration for many of the young women involved.

Some people questioned whether this “all-chick-singer” tour could work. Would this end up being a bunch of divas fighting over dressing areas? Would egos spin out of control? Could that many women actually be trusted to
get along
? At the press conference just prior to my August 19 appearance in Milwaukee, I told people exactly how I felt about all that kind of talk:

I played two nights and truthfully they were the best forty-eight tour hours onstage I'd ever had. Standing up there with all those successful, capable young women made me think of the early years when every day was a fight just to be a woman in the man's world of rock and roll. I thought back to all the radio promoters and record men. The guys who'd said things just to try to make me feel uncomfortable and the guys who told me I didn't know what I was talking about. I thought about wearing baggy clothes to hide my round pregnant body and having the program directors at the radio stations lick their lips as they asked me to take a seat on their laps. I thought about the extra five layers of skin I'd had to grow just to be standing on that stage two decades after that lunatic songwriter had chased me around a piano.

While times had changed, I knew that none of those problems had gone away completely. I knew that all those women—both those onstage and those in the crowd—had to contend with these issues in one way or another, usually on a daily basis. But the most important thing was that all of us kept going. We'd be damned if we were going to let bullshit get in the way of our vision for the future, our plan for life. I'd spent my entire career being the only female in a sea of guys. Now I was surrounded by women who, like me, couldn't resist the call to perform. I watched them up there, confident and in control. Seeing all of those young women enjoying each other's musical talent, supporting each other, warmed my heart. Women like Sarah McLachlan, Paula Cole, Meredith Brooks, Jewel, Shawn Colvin, and the Indigo Girls were playing their music, interacting with each other, being treated with respect, and proving once and for all that an all-female lineup could sell out festivals.

The best part was that their shows were all spectacular. That was what made me almost cry with happiness. I'd felt like I was constantly out there fending off the lions with a baseball bat. I kept thinking what a struggle it had been and how far we'd come as female performers. Just like me, they had a sound in their heads that they had to follow;
they had to put their voices out there. And it made me so proud to know that without even realizing what I was fighting for, I'd been on the front lines on behalf of young, strong women like the ones I witnessed onstage those nights. I'd signed on with big hopes, but even those hopes couldn't prepare me for the atmosphere of beauty that permeated the entire tour. It was an uplifting and emotional experience. It was an incredible sisterhood. It was the Estrogen Express.

On the second of my two nights, we sang an ensemble number together, Joni Mitchell's “Big Yellow Taxi.” I got the fun line, “Late last night, heard the screen door slam / And the big yellow taxi took away my old man.” Earlier that day, we'd done another press conference at a big long table with all the ladies. I'll admit I got teary eyed when each of them spoke about the sacrifices that those of us who'd gone before had made and how grateful they were for what we'd done. I'd never been prouder to be part of a group of women who forged a path where none had been before so that future generations of women could walk unencumbered in pursuit of their dreams.

The next day, Lilith Fair's website said: “Pat Benatar rocked the house.”

 

I
N MY HEAD, THE
strength that I gathered from Lilith Fair mingled with my newfound understanding that I could be successful and independent. Together they solidified my resolve that whenever we were ready to release another album, we would do so on our own. Bold vision required bold moves.

This resolve was aided by a rather serendipitous encounter after the tour. For years we'd been scouting land in Hawaii, near where we married in Hana. We could see how wonderful life on that island could be, the privacy and the inspiration of the surroundings. Now we could afford to consider buying the land, building a house, and living
there part of each year. The problem, of course, was the very thing we loved about the area: its remoteness. This is the jungle. If you don't build close enough to a populated area, you will never get the power and water hooked up. You have to start from absolutely nothing. We had looked every year for just the right place.

It got crazy. It seemed like every year we went to Hana for vacation and spent the whole time looking for a place to one day build a house. We'd drive here and there, look at some piece of property that was too far into the jungle and another that was too close to the neighbors. It ended up taking up all the hours out of what was to have been time off!