13 QUESTION METHOD: ERIN McKEOWN

From elegant pop to balls-out rock, sweet electronics to witty swing, Erin McKeown has packed a ton of music into her young career. With four studio albums, two EPs, and numerous soundtracks and compilations to her credit, the 29-year-old songwriter and multi-instrumentalist hasn't stopped for a breather in the last 10 years. Along the way she has averaged 200 shows a year and garnered the praise of fans and critics alike. McKeown's newest release is Sing You Sinners, a mischevious take on the not-so-standard entries in the American Songbook.

1. Which was the first record you bought with your own money?
Cyndi Lauper — True Colors. On cassette.

2. Which was the last record you bought with your own money?
Andrew Bird — Armchair Apocrypha.

3. What was the first solo you learned from a record — and can you still play it?
The piano solo on “Let It Be.” I think so, but I haven’t tried in a long time.

4. Which recording of your own (or as a sideman) are you most proud of, and why?
Arggg. I do have a lot to choose from. I’ll say my album Sing You Sinners, because I produced it myself, and I think it’s the best singing I’ve done on record. (I know, not the flashiest answer for the guitar questionnaire.)

5. What’s the difference between playing live and playing in a studio?
This is absolutely one of the greatest mysteries for me. At different times in my career I have felt 100 different ways. I used to blow off the studio because it was so artificial, or rather so vastly different from being in front of an audience. Then I began to embrace the studio, trying to use all the available tricks and technology there to compose and shape my perfect 3 minutes. That grew old too, so I went on a kick where anything that happened in the studio had to have its roots in real-time. Technology could help, but in the end the studio needed to sound invisible. And all of that leads me to my current thought that there is very little difference between the studios and live. In the studio you can think about things over and over, on stage you get once chance and then you have to move on to the next moment. But either way, the clearer idea you have going into both situations, the better you’ll be able to realize it.

6. What’s the difference between a good gig and a bad gig?
For me, first and foremost, the audience. I feed on them and off them and for them so directly that they make or break the gig for me. How many gigs have you played where the sound was shit, you missed whole sections of songs, but the audience was right there with you and enjoying themselves so thoroughly that you had the time of your life. A good audience is listening, but not stiff. Likes itself and likes you. Is just plain happy to be there.

7. What’s the difference between a good guitar and a bad guitar?
A good guitar is transparent! You don’t think about the effort required to play it, you only think about and hear the music you play through it.

8. You play electric and acoustic. Do you approach the two differently?
I am a totally different guitarist on each instrument. Sure, a few basics are the same: I always play flatwound strings, never use a pick, but the way I think about playing them is night and day. I played the acoustic only for a long, long time, and the way I play it reflects the music I learned to play guitar with — funky, unadorned, full, and percussive. The whole band in one simple box. I only really started to focus on the electric guitar about five years ago, and my tone and style is more smooth, subtle, and simple. The electric guitar is an atmosphere for me, a part of a bigger picture of a band and a song. It chimes, it plays lines, it growls and drones. It works in sympathy with other instruments.

9. Do you sound more like yourself on acoustic or electric?
After years of neglecting the acoustic, I think I am coming back to it — so I would hope the answer would be both.

10. Do you sound like yourself on other people’s guitars?
Fortunately, or unfortunately, I always sound like myself — whether I am playing other people’s guitars or singing other people’s songs.

11. Which living artist (music, or other arts) would you like to collaborate with?
I really, really want to write a musical, so anyone who reads this and is interested — mckeown.the.writer@gmail.com

12. What dead artist would you like to have collaborated with?
Edith Piaf!

13. What’s your latest project about?
I have two projects cooking right now. Firstly, I am finishing writing an album of new original songs. They already feel, at this stage, like a departure. It’s been a long time since I have written with my guitar, and most of these new ones have come to me on guitar. I hope to be in the studio by the end of ’07. Second, I am working with the amazing Allison Miller on a duo project called Emma (http://www.myspace.com/WeAreEmma). The idea is that although we are both well known instrumentalists (drums for her, guitar for me) we want to stretch ourselves to play other instruments, collaborate on longer form songs, and incorporate computers and humor into music in new ways. We’re hoping to record an album at the end of the summer.

Web site: http://www.erinmckeown.com/