A Conversation with Elizabeth Cook (continued)

PM: Let's move on to the title song--every time I mention it to a woman they laugh big time--"Sometimes It Takes Balls To Be A Woman." Whose idea was that, and where did it hit you?

EC: That song I wrote with this girl named Melinda Schneider. And we're friends. She's an established artist in Australia. And she was sort of bemoaning some of the personal trials and tribulations with both her career and her personal life. And I just said it, I just said that line to her like in response to something she was about to have to face.

PM: It's a hilarious statement.

EC: And it was going to be hard for her to do it, and she was going to have to do it. And so I said that line. And she was like, "Oh, well, we'll write that." And we wrote that and "Rest Your Weary Mind" on the same day. So those two were also written on the same day.

PM: Wow. I don't know how people write two songs in one day. I feel like after I write a song on a given day, I want to just stop. And a lot of people they get on a hot day, they want to write two, they want to write three songs sometimes.

EC: Yeah.

PM: Balls, that was a very star-studded lineup, beginning with your choice for a producer in Rodney Crowell. What made you pick him to steer the boat, and what kind of a producer did you find him to be?

EC: Oh, well, our paths just sort of led to each other. I was looking for somebody experienced to work with that we could entrust with the budget and help me get the project done. And he's somebody I've known for a while. David [Macias, her manager] made the call, and Rodney was available and wanted to do it. It was that simple.

PM: Yeah, I can imagine that Rodney has been a big supporter and a fan of yours from the git.

EC: We almost worked together on my very first record. I'd come close to working with him very, very early on. I mean, it fits. He wanted to do it, and he was into the little weird songs that I was writing, which was important for me. That would have been a deal breaker for me, otherwise.

PM: Yeah. He writes his own left of center songs as well.

EC: Right. That was what was important. And he makes good sounding records. When we got in and found him very focused, very calm, very experienced, extremely experienced, and totally on task. He was just eye of the tiger the whole time. We had a very limited time to get it done, and a small budget, and we had to turn it out.

PM: What was the time frame? What did you record that in?

EC: We tracked everything in three days. The whole record was done in two weeks, mixing and everything.

PM: Damn. I thought that a couple of Marty Stuart's team, Harry Stinson on drums and Kenny Vaughan on guitar, did you mighty proud on this record.

EC: Oh yes, right, they sure did. They sure did. And it's all people I've worked with before. There were certain players that I brought to the table and certain players that Rodney knew, that I had worked with before as well.

PM: And certainly I think my two favorite bass players, Michael Rhodes and Alison Prestwood, I mean, you just can't go wrong.

EC: Yeah. Oh, they're great, really good.

PM: So your manager, David Macias, and his company, 30 Tigers, put Balls out on their label of the same name, right?

EC: Well, their label is called 31 Tigers.

PM: Oh, 31 Tigers, right.

EC: Yes, yes, they put the record out.

PM: So are we allowed or disposed to talk about what the original plans for release and distribution were, or is that not for our readers here?

EC: No, we can talk about that. I had been offered a record deal by Dualtone. The deal was delivered, printed on paper. I don't know what they'd have done if I would have signed it. [laughs] Basically when it got time to track, the resources were not in place for us to pull the trigger. And Rodney had a schedule, and so did we. And we were on a timeline, and so they weren't really able to do their part at that time, and so David scrambled and came up with a second plan, and we went ahead and went for it. And I'm really glad it worked out like it did.

PM: It's amazing. And how did that affect relations with the Dualtone folks afterwards? Was it more or less amicable?

EC: Yeah. I mean, it's fine. I don't think it necessarily sheds a good light on them from a business standpoint.

PM: Right.

EC: That's a red flag. And it's never fun for an artist to get to that point and get that far along and have the rug yanked out from underneath them. But I don't bear any ill feelings--everything is fine. I don't have any issues with them. And I'm sure they probably haven't given it much thought, either.

PM: Yeah, right. Well, good for you. So is the CD being worked heavily to either country or Triple A radio?

EC: Yeah. I went to number 5 on the Americana Chart.

PM: That's great. And who is working it? 31 Tigers?

EC: They outsourced promotion. It did get tested with some secondary country radio stations, and a lot of the stations were very conservative and wouldn't play a song that had "balls" in it. They don't have the understanding of what a metaphor is to the degree that the Americana people do.

[laughter]

PM: That's pretty sad.

EC: So that's how that played out. We did make a video that's airing on GAC and CMT.

PM: Oh, wow. Since you guys had to do it yourselves, it's amazing that you found the money to do a video--or did you just get creative and do it pretty cheap?

EC: Well, we got creative and did it cheap, just like we've done everything.

PM: Right.

EC: But sometimes I think that makes the best art. But yeah, I have a good relationship with Roger Pistole, I've known him for years.

PM: Oh, he did it? He's a great guy.

EC: Yeah. It was a luck thing, again, just like with Rodney. It was like we caught him at the right time. "Can you do this for this amount of money, yes or no?" You either can or can't. And he wanted to, so we did it.

PM: He's very talented on a low budget. I've seen him do that.

EC: Yeah. We went down to the skate park, the Rocket Town. It had these little skateboarders in drag, and my band in drag, Tim was in a dress, and Paul Slivka and Mark Giovino were all in dresses.

PM: Amazing.

EC: It's on Youtube.

PM: Oh, okay. I'm going to check it out, then, if it's on Youtube.

EC: And the un--the potty humor version is on Youtube. That's not the version they're showing on CMT, just so you know.

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