Sheryl Crow: ‘AI is so real. It feels like an assault on my spirit’
What inspired you to make a new album, Evolution, after calling 2019’s Threads your “final” album?Jade99I’m raising two teenage boys who ask a lot of hard questions, and after we started talking about AI I found myself writing a lot in the mornings after they go to school. I wound up with seven songs that were halfway between a diary and venting. I called my producer friend Mike Elizondo and said, “I have these songs. I don’t want to produce myself. Can I send them?” He was blown away and excited, so we wrote two more and then we had an album.
It’s my response to what’s happening in my country, in my little world, and I guess in humanity at large. In Mike’s studio this young songwriter said she couldn’t get any traction from male singers unless she had a guy singing on the demo, so she paid $5 to have John Mayer’s voice singing on it, using AI. When she played it for us I almost started crying. It was so real, it felt like an assault on my spirit. We have to protect ourselves. So the album’s full of all this light and fluffy stuff [laughter].
Your recent single Alarm Clockdocuments the moment a vivid dream is rudely interrupted. Do you typically remember dreams after waking up? VerulamiumParkRangerIt depends on the dream. I have stress dreams more than I used to. Alarm Clock is a metaphor for life, too. Once you get jerked into the reality of how disturbing things are, it sort of robs you of the joy of fantasy, although life can still be beautiful. My cellphone is my alarm clock, so I wake up with the fear that my brain is being deteriorated by radioactive material.
Was your mention of “Bud” beer in All I Wanna Do a paid product placement?redgregI wish! If it was, I’d have made a ton of money. But no, that shit was really frowned upon back then. It was in Wyn Cooper’s poem, Fun, which inspired the song, although funnily enough I’m from Missouri where Budweiser is made, so it was my beer of choice. “I like a good beer buzz early in the morning” wasn’t factually correct very often, although I can’t lie and say
I’ve never done it.
Is it true that for some time you didn’t enjoy playing All I Wanna Do on tour, and that it was initially a throwaway track that nearly didn’t make it on to your first album?NotDericeBannockIt was my least-favourite song on the record and I didn’t think it should go on there. It felt throwaway, but my little brother who was in college at the time said, “No, that’s the song all of us kids like. That’s going to be your biggest song.” I was like, “Dude, that’s never coming out,” but then of course after it was massive I said: “I should hire you as my A&R guy.” There was a time when I hated playing it, but I realised that that song took me all over the world, places a kid from a tiny town never dreamed of seeing.
How did you go from “All I wanna do is have some fun” to duetting with the man in black [Johnny Cash] on Redemption Day?atribecalledvestWell, in response to those travels you end up writing songs that are deep and meaningful. I wrote that song in 1996 after going to Bosnia and thinking: “Why are we [the US] in Bosnia?” There was all this genocide going on but we weren’t doing anything about it in Rwanda. In my frustration the song spilled out. Many years later, Johnny was making a record; his brother-in-law gave him that song and he asked me if he could record it. After he passed we did another [duet] recording of it with his family’s blessing.
What was it like singing with Emmylou Harris at Johnny Cash’s funeral? tomcasagrandaThree months before Johnny passed he had asked me to sing at his wife June’s funeral, where I saw this larger-than-life man become diminished by the loss of this woman he loved so passionately. Then he called me to say: “I’m not done yet. I’m going to record your song.”
When he passed soon afterwards his family asked me to sing with Emmy. I’d known Johnny for maybe two years, but seeing her with all her years of history with him felt powerful and transformative. The funeral was very emotional. We sang Every Grain of Sand, Johnny’s favourite Bob Dylan song. The lyrics were perfect for that moment and I’m very grateful that
Dylan walked the earth. Every time I made a record, I would read his lyrics to get myself into a higher place.
How did you come to hear Mississippi by Bob Dylan and did he ever express an opinion of your version on The Globe Sessions?Whovian79I didn’t think my record was finished, and my manager was good friends with Dylan’s publisher and asked: “Uh, does Bob have any [unreleased] songs lying around?” So his manager came over. They won’t let you have a copy of the song: they play it for you, then they leave. So I had to learn it. Then I got the lyrics and recorded it. Years later he said: “Hey, I heard your version of Mississippi.” I asked him if he liked it and he went: “Did you like mine?!” He was not going to give it up. He’s a very witty, funny person. When I was running round with Eric Clapton, Bob asked me if Eric had shown me any licks. He’s such a trouble-causer!
Your song Woman in the White House longs for the day the US elects