Interview: Country Music's Pam Tillis

Pam Tillis has been a part of country music from a very early age, first appearing on the Grand Ole Opry at the age of eight. She grew up learning from her father, Mel Tillis, who has entertained fans for more than fifty years. After a brief stint in the pop world, she found herself back where she felt most at home.

Her early country albums were rooted in those steep traditions, but as she discusses in this interview, she was steered in a direction that she quickly learned wasn't where she wanted to be. In her recent release, It's All Relative, she honored her father by covering his music. In April she will release Rhinestoned on her own Stellar Cat Records label.

In a recent phone interview, Pam took time out of her busy schedule to talk to me about the new album, her new label, the direction of Country Music, and grass roots promotions.

Your new album will be released next month. How do you describe Rhinestoned?

I've heard it called neo-traditionalist and I kind of like that. I've never been one for type casting, but it does, in some ways, describe the music. I like to think that it's firmly rooted in the past, but it's also inclusive of many things that are in the moment.

It's a little bit traditional. I think of it as somewhat of a roots record, but it's a little left of center of commercial country that you might hear on the radio: a little Americana with shades of bluegrass.

Every record has a different vision, but for this one I was really thinking about some of the early '70s country, some of the music that was from a real impressionable time in my life, Gram Parsons and early Emmylou [Harris], early Linda Rondstadt, Neil Young, The Byrds. I call it hippie-country. In a lot of ways it's hippie-country.

I can definitely hear some of those '70s folk influences you mention.

Yeah, those are the influences. At the same time on the last two records I've made I've wanted to do something that didn't feel like it belonged in any particular decade. I wanted to do something timeless.

You sort of touched on this, but early in your country career, your music had that country pop feel—

It started to go that way, yes. My first album for Arista wasn't that way at all. Actually my first three albums weren't like that, but then it started to change. You know, I'm proud of all my records, but I just didn't feel like that was where I wanted to be.

So it was a conscious decision to turn your focus?

To head back, yes. (Laughs) To turn back to the barn.

This album is a follow up to your tribute to your father, It's All Relative. Did you feel a lot of pressure covering your father's music?

I did. I really did! I wanted to do it justice and I wanted to make him proud. I wanted to please the older fans, but also find a way to turn the younger generation on to his music. Maybe they'll go back and seek his work out. I had a lot of goals with that one.

Article Author: Connie Phillips

Wife, mother, aspiring novelist, and music editor at BC Magazine, Connie Phillips spends most of her time in a fantasy land of her own creating. In reality, she writes about music, television, and the process of writing, when she's not cheering on her kids at equestrian events. …

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