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“Every day is a winding road,” Sheryl Crow, 62, sang in 1996, but her own road has been a superhighway. From her Missouri high school days as a majorette, track athlete and Paperdoll Queen beauty contest winner to her meteoric rise (nine Grammys, 50 million albums) to her life as a mom, home-studio musician and activist, the singer/songwriter has zipped to victories, with occasional crashes (cancer, sexism, depression).
She claimed to quit her recording career with 2019’s Threads, on which she collaborated with Johnny Cash, Stevie Nicks, 75, Bonnie Raitt, 74, Mavis Staples, 84, Eric Clapton, 78, Keith Richards, 80, Willie Nelson, 90, Kris Kristofferson, 87, James Taylor, 76, Emmylou Harris, 76, and Sting, 72.
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Yet that evolution has brought Crow to Evolution, her 12th studio album (released March 29). It’s a contemplative soul dive balanced by joyful, rousing music, as Crow examines her pursuit of serenity and insight in a perilous, unstable world. Her funny pop firecracker “Alarm Clock” rails against an annoying wake-up buzzer for disrupting a wonderful dream with the glare of reality. The title track explores Crow’s anxieties about artificial intelligence. “Don’t Walk Away” dwells on the fragility of relationships.
From her 50-acre compound in Nashville, Tennessee, Crow told AARP about her new songwriting, why marriage is off the table, the thrills and frustrations of raising sons Wyatt, 16, and Levi, 13, and how to make aging a growth experience.
You announced that Threads would be your last album. So how did Evolution evolve?
I knew I should never say never. It was definitely not my intention to make a record. This was the first time I’ve written songs out of necessity and without thinking, This might go on the next album, because there was no next album. I just ended up with a bunch of little screenplays or pages of a journal.
What was your impulse?
I’m dumbfounded by how fast we’re speeding out of control in our own evolution. I did the only thing I know how to do: go to a notepad, grab a guitar, sit on the porch and download.
Several songs express zen-like messages about accepting yourself, letting go, living in the moment.
It is where my head is always striving to be. It’s a work in progress. As soon as I turn on the TV or look at my kids face down on their phones scrolling, my peace goes soaring out the window. I still meditate, twice a day. Hope for the future is going to come from this next generation realizing what technology is doing to us spiritually, to our relationships.
Evolution has a curious dichotomy: a cautionary intensity but an uplifting tone in songs like “Do It Again,” “Love Life” and “You Can’t Change the Weather.”
I feel like I’m anchored. My 13-year-old flippantly told me two years ago, “You know, you were born in the 1870s.” Even though it sounds doom and gloom, the album is upbeat and fun. I’ve had this incredible life filled with me traveling around the world, playing gigs, me this and me that. I came to a place, especially after being diagnosed with cancer [in 2018], that the work (on myself) really began.
And what did you learn?
It sounds very woo-woo, but the only hope for having peace is if we can turn off the noise. That’s the only weapon I have to infiltrate what I’m working against: cellphones, technology. I’m on the warpath of trying to function better. I’ve done all kinds of work to try to shed skin, to navigate and still have a modicum of joy. I did a guided mushroom journey.
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