Taylor Hicks Article/Interview about his new CD

[R!ck]

Hicks plans to stick with his own style

Soul man: Season 5 American Idol winner Taylor Hicks' self-titled album contains songs in his swamp-shaded blend of pop, funk and soul that he calls "modern womp." "The thread of this album is groove," the singer says.

By Edna Gundersen, USA TODAY

CALABASAS, Calif. — Taylor Hicks knew the bum rap on American Idol winners. Since the 2002 coronation of Kelly Clarkson, they've been regarded as empty vessels shuttled through a gantlet of songwriters, producers and industry honchos eager to committee-cobble a debut album packed with bankable hits.

This champ had his dukes up.

"I'm not a piece of clay ready to be molded," he told veteran producer Matt Serletic at their initial meeting last summer. "I'm pre-sculpted."

To Hicks' relief, the pair clicked immediately and set out to showcase the gravel-voiced Alabama belter in a Taylor-made disc that plumbed his Southern roots and soulful style. The 12-track Taylor Hicks, due Tuesday, includes a cover of Marvin Gaye's Wherever I Lay My Hat, tunes by Rob Thomas and Paul Peña, and Bryan Adams' The Right Place, penned for Ray Charles, who died before he could record it. Hicks wrote Soul Thing and The Deal.

"The thread of this album is groove," the silver-haired singer says, applying the term "modern womp" to his swamp-shaded blend of pop, funk and soul.

"I made sure it's not shaped the way anyone other than myself wants it. I understand the business. You can't give up your artistic integrity. The backbone of this music is who I am as an artist. I can honestly say every song is a direct representation of me."

Serletic, who has produced hits by Santana, Matchbox Twenty and Aerosmith, says working with Hicks was "an exciting process. He's such a warm guy, very much a musician, and he knows the history of soul music. He and I were on the same mission to make a record that felt good and had great songs and lyrics with a strong emotional connection."

The songs play to Hicks' strength as "a fantastic singer who sings his heart out and passionately commits to performing," he says. "There's something old-school about that. He could bring soul music forward."

Music journalist Rona Elliot, who served on USA TODAY's American Idol coaching panel, sees the album as a compromise between Hicks' desire for a Soul Patrol jalopy and American Idol's bid for a marketable vehicle.

"Taylor's voice is crisp and clear, rich and soulful throughout," Elliot says. "His backup singers and musicians are impeccable. The rhythm and musicianship are tight and bright. So the production values are great. There are soaring power ballads that lift you up and pop ditties I'd rather live without.

"(He's) honoring his influences, but I don't hear the originality I think the guy is capable of. He is not Van Morrison, Joe Cocker or Leon Russell. He's establishing his own musical footing but has only taken baby steps."

Since winning the show's fifth run with 63 million votes, Hicks has been in AmericanIdol overdrive, completing a summer tour with fellow finalists before hammering out the CD in seven weeks of 18-hour days.

"This pace, it's like I'm trying to find the phone booth to put on the Superman outfit," Hicks says during a recent break at an inconspicuous recording studio in the hills above the San Fernando Valley.

He chats about his consuming career in tones amiable and solemn, dialing back the exuberance of his Idol show persona.

"It's been tough, but I understand that when there's a demand, you have to supply," he says.

He recalls all too vividly a preceding decade of low demand as he toured the South's roadhouse circuit fantasizing about a record deal.

He says, "I slept, ate and breathed my dream, and nobody discouraged me," which is why not a single pal chided him when he fled to Las Vegas for American Idol auditions. He had a modest aim.

"I got on the show to sing and find a decent agent to book me at fraternity parties," he says.

Instead he became Gray Charles, the Motown throwback whose blue-eyed soul and goofy dance steps upstaged his pop-leaning competitors. He believes age (30) and experience proved vital in his victory.

"I started with Ray Charles as the foundation," he says. "He taught me what a good song is. That's all that mattered. I studied Van Morrison, Bob Seger, Supertramp, Jose Feliciano, Run-DMC. I tried to sing like Ray, Etta James, Elvis, Aretha."

At 14, he was playing harmonica in blues bars. He taught himself to play guitar.

Soon he was on the road making a living when he didn't have to resort to odd jobs: playing the Easter bunny in a mall, stripping floors in a nursing home. A dozen years passed before Idol catapulted him to the national stage. He's pouring his pre-Idol memories into a book.

"You can learn a lot from the back highways of Alabama and Georgia and the trials and tribulations I went through to get heard," he says. "I was a struggling musician and a struggling accountant. It's a great motivator."

Hicks released two albums back then. The first, In Your Time, sold 1,500 copies. His American Idol single, Do I Make You Proud, a slice of cheese that he was reluctant to record, sold 190,000 copies its first week.

Had he failed Idol's audition, "I probably would have gotten a small independent record deal," he says. "I would have stayed at it. I was getting there in my own little way."

He's aware that American Idol's 30-million-plus viewers don't flock en masse to record stores.

"It doesn't bother me," he says. "My mentality is to try to write and produce a great album. I can't speculate or worry about something I have no control over, like the record-buying public.

"The show was the greatest opportunity I've ever had. It allowed me to create this record and further my career. It served its purpose, and now I have to move on and be Taylor Hicks."

[Josh]

I love Taylor Hicks!!!!