Melissa Etheridge is not just a musician; she’s a force of nature, blending her raw, soulful voice with poignant lyrics to create an indelible mark on the music industry. Born in Leavenworth, Kansas, in 1961, Etheridge’s journey to musical stardom is as inspiring as her powerful vocals.
Her rise to fame began with her self-titled debut album in 1988, featuring hits like “Bring Me Some Water” and “Like the Way I Do,” which showcased her gritty vocals and unapologetic lyrics. Throughout her career, she’s continued to captivate audiences with her honest songwriting and electrifying performances.
Etheridge has amassed an impressive array of accolades, including multiple Grammy Awards and an Academy Award for Best Original Song for “I Need to Wake Up” from the documentary “An Inconvenient Truth.” Her discography boasts a string of hit songs like, “Come to My Window,” “I Want to Come Over,” and “I’m the Only One,” each track showcasing her evolution as an artist, while staying true to her Midwestern roots.
Yet, Etheridge’s life took a poignant turn in 2004 when she was diagnosed with breast cancer. Rather than succumbing to fear, she confronted the disease head-on, becoming an advocate for breast cancer awareness and a symbol of strength for countless women facing similar battles. Her openness about her struggle, including her decision to undergo chemotherapy and her subsequent journey to recovery, resonated deeply with fans around the world.
Despite the challenges she faced, Etheridge never allowed cancer to dim her creative spark. She continued to produce music that reflected her resilience and determination, earning critical acclaim and accolades along the way. Her willingness to speak out on social and political issues – combined with her electrifying stage presence – has inspired generations of fans to stand up for what they believe in.
Melissa Etheridge has left a lasting impression on the world, inspiring countless individuals to find strength in their own struggles and to embrace life with unwavering passion. In this conversation, discover the fascinating journey that this musical icon made to arrive where she proudly stands today.
You started singing and songwriting at a really young age. How did you decide that you wanted to become a songwriter and pursue a career in music?
It was the late 1960s, early 1970s, and there was great music: it was everywhere. There was one radio station— you got it all in one place and everyone heard the same things. WHB 710 Radio, which was the radio station in Kansas City, would play the Jackson 5, then you’d hear Tammy Wynette, Led Zeppelin, then a Frank Sinatra song. So, it varied, but it was all this great music.
We constantly listened to the radio at home. When I was young, my parents would bring home albums… The Mamas & the Papas, Aretha Franklin, and I would listen to them over and over. My mother would also have classical rock records. I fell in love with music.
When I was a kid, my biggest influence was probably The Archies, the cartoon. I watched it as a child, and I thought, “They’re in school; they’re playing instruments.” When I was eight years old, my father brought home an old Stella Harmony guitar for my sister, but she didn’t play it. They finally let me play it, even though they said I was too young. Then, by the time I was 10 years old, I was really playing the guitar and writing.
Do you remember the first song that you wrote?
Yes! (Laughs) Well, I remember the first song that I wrote as a 10-year-old. “We were on the bus.” I rhymed “Gus” with that, then I would write “Love, don’t let it fly away, it’s love.” Like protest songs, when I was 10! This would be 1970 and 1971. When I was 12 years old, my grandmother passed away, and I wrote my first real song, “Lonely as a Child.” It was sad. It was about a child in a war-torn country, losing its mother. It was very sad. I liked that people had an emotional reaction, and I kept writing sad, emotional songs. I played in bands, I played cover songs, I learned what a hit pop song was. You learn what people like to hear and the makings behind it. I found my own voice when I was 17 or 18.
Death is something that we don’t really understand when we are young. Did you find it cathartic to write that song, to deal with your grandmother’s death?
At the time, I didn’t know that was what I was doing. At the time, I was this kid that was feeling… my grandmother’s funeral was my first time with a death experience. I was moved by the way people gave respect to others who are grieving. It touched me deeply as we were driving to the cemetery. They would not only stop, but they pulled over to the side of the road. It touched me as a 12-year-old deeply. I sat down on the porch, and I wrote that song. Now that I look back, I can see that all of those things were connected, but at the time I was just gonna write a song.
You were very young at the time. How supportive were your parents to your progression toward a career in music?
They weren’t not supportive; that was the best thing. It was quiet, except for my older sister— she made a lot of noise. I would keep to myself and sit in the den and practice my guitar. My father got me a piano when I was 14, and I would write and play. Once I started singing a couple of songs that they liked, they would have me perform for visiting family. It was fun, but I remember once asking my mother at 16 or 17 – I was playing in bands and wanted to do this – I asked her if she thought that I would make it as a star, and she said, “It’s a one in a million chance, but why not you?” And that was enough to get me going.
When you were in grade seven, you started traveling with a local variety show. How did that come about?
I did! It was a fun thing to do on the weekend. It would be once every couple of weeks. He – Bob Hamill was his name, and he came from Philadelphia. I have no idea what he was doing in Leavenworth, Kansas – would gather all these acts together and we would go and play. It was never further than twenty miles. He reminded me of the music man, putting a show together. He was a showman; he was a ventriloquist… He convinced the Chamber of Commerce to put a talent show on in the plaza, our local mall. It had seven stores, but it was the mall. I was in sixth grade, and my friend said, “Let’s go sing at the talent show.” We got up and sung folk songs. There were acrobats, dancers, [and] little girls and boys singing country songs. At the end of the final night, he said, “Give me your address, and I will sign you up, and you can be part of The Bob Hamill Variety Show.”
He called us up and we would play at old folks’ homes, Kiwanis clubs… then we started playing in the prisons. We would entertain these guys in prison, then we went to the women’s prison and did a show. It was bizarre, but it was delightful. They were crazy audiences; they were hooting and hollering – who knows why – but I enjoyed it. It was my first experience with an excited audience and that made me want to do it more.
Did you get nervous performing in front of people initially?
Yeah, there would be nerves, but it was so close to the excitement of it that it was more like fuel. Things would go wrong, and things would happen, but each experience helps you grow.
You went over to Boston to attend the Berklee College of Music? Was this straight after high school?
I graduated in May of 1979, and then I went to Boston in September. I stayed in Boston for about a year, but I never really wanted to go to school in the first place; college wasn’t anything that I thought about. But my mother wanted her daughter to go to college. So, I thought, “Okay, but it has to be a music college.” I was trained, I could read music, but Berklee was a place where you could major in guitar. There were no other places where that was offered. I got in there, and this is 1979, and in my guitar class of 60 kids, there were only two women. Each of my classes were like that; there were very few women. The talent there was remarkable. I came from a singer-songwriter, rock ‘n roll sort of base, and there’s these jazz guys that are running circles around everything. But I didn’t have a love for it. I had a teacher that told me this has to go after this… I said, “No, it doesn’t. There are no ‘have to’s’ in music,” and he said, “Yes, there is.” So, I sort of ran up against that, and it all fell apart. I got a job in a restaurant, was making a living, and I could have an apartment. I didn’t want to go to school anymore.
I stuck around Boston and performed around town for another year.
By 21 you moved to the West Coast?
I turned 20 and I went back to Kansas City, because I lost my job. I don’t know why, but I got fired. I came home, got an apartment, and worked for another year to have enough money to buy a car to drive out to [Los Angeles].
LA can be a very lonely town when you are new and don’t really have a base. When you arrived at 21, did you know anyone? What was the game plan when you started driving West?
Well, I fortunately had an aunt who lived in LA. My father’s sister and my father’s brother both lived there. My aunt lived alone, and my sister had gone out there a couple of years before and stayed. It wasn’t a good experience, but I didn’t know that at the time. I asked my father if he thought that I could sleep on Aunt Sue’s couch if I went out. (Laughs)
I had been able to make a living in Boston, I’d been able to make a living in Kansas City, and I was self-sustaining and took care of myself. I figured [that] I would go out to LA, get a job, and I’d be there. So, I drove out to California… I stayed in two hotels along the way. That’s all I could afford. I had friends in Oklahoma City that I stayed with, and a friend of a friend that I stayed with in Phoenix. But I got there.
So, I knew my aunt, but I did not know a single other soul otherwise. It was hard.
I quickly figured out that there was no work to be had in LA––musicians were playing for free and not having a problem with it. I was young and meeting women, and one came from Long Beach. We went to this new club called the Executive Suite, and I noticed that there was a piano in the corner. I asked if they had live music and they said no, but the [venue] used to be a steakhouse, and the piano came with the restaurant. They had a disco there at the time, and I told them that I could play before the disco. So, I got a job playing at this bar in Long Beach, like five nights a week, from 5PM to 9PM, before the disco.
I brought people in for cocktail hour. When that ended, because it got popular, and they went full disco, I went to the other bar in Long Beach called Que Sera. It was a women’s bar, and I played there. From that, I got a job at Vermie’s, and I went back and forth from Pasadena and Long Beach every other night. It was brutal, but the cost of gas wasn’t like it is now. Women would come every week to hear me play, I was a draw. There were these women that would come in on Sundays after their soccer games from Cal Tech. One night, one of them asked if I had a demo or something. I had made this demo of one song, and I gave it to her. That was enough to get a manager. He said that he wasn’t interested initially, but his wife came down… she was one of the coaches. So, she came down and she went back to him and said, “You have to come see this girl.” He finally came down and signed me right away. He liked the way that I performed. I was not just singing songs. He believed in me. He said, “I don’t know how long it’ll take, but I think you can make it. I think you have what it takes, so let’s try.”
Then, it was all about getting a record deal. That was the main focus. He started bringing record companies out to see me, and he brought the president of Capitol Records at the time; he was one of his best friends. My manager had managed Bread, and had been in the business for a while, so he was successful. And the guy loved me. It was 1982 or 1983. He said that he wanted to sign me. But then… I can’t tell you how many times I would get in with a record company and then the president would be fired, everybody would go away, and the whole deal fell apart. It was like that with A&M and then Warner Brothers, everybody came out to see me.
Yeah, the business has always been quite fickle. But in 1988 your first album comes out, finally.
Yes, on Island Records! Chris Blackwell himself walks in and literally asked me why I wasn’t signed. This was 1986. He said that he wanted me on his label and then he went away. I didn’t believe him, but he made it happen. I never even had an A&R guy; he loved me and signed me. It was super cool being on Island, but I didn’t know what to do. I’d never made a record before. I’d been performing solo for 10 years. I didn’t have any musicians and there wasn’t a record company guy there to guide me. But Chris said to me, “I want what I heard in the bar.” We had already done the photo shoot for the album cover, and Chris loved the picture so much that he had them blow it up. He had someone put the picture up and said, “Make the album sound like this photo,” so we did.
Your first album was successful right away.
Well, what do you call right away? It was successful on the rock radio in Canada. It was very big in Australia. It was huge in Europe. In America, it was playing on rock radio. They had the difference between pop and rock, but it was nice, and I’m very happy with how it hit. It was perfectly fine, and I was able to play and to go do concerts all over the world. I loved it.
Were you concerned that it wasn’t hitting on the Billboard Top 20?
I wouldn’t say I was concerned. But I was comparing myself to others, and that will make you sad every day, no matter who you are. I did a lot of that. Tracy Chapman’s album and mine came out on the exact same day. So, “Fast Car” was the number one song, but I’m so glad now. I wouldn’t trade it for anything.
Do you remember the first time you heard yourself on the radio?
Yes, I was in London. Chris always thought that I would break in London first, so he wanted me to be like Chrissie Hynde and The Pretenders, since they got huge in London, then came back to America. Initially, I did this intensive tour of England and, to this day, England is the least of all the English-speaking countries in the world for me. I sold the least number of records there, I never got on the radio, and it never ever worked. It was painful. But I was with the record guy, and we had been to a radio station, we were driving away, and they played one of my songs. It was the first time I heard myself, as I’m in some car. The song came on and I thought, “Wait a minute, that’s me!” It blew my mind.
Did your life change after the first album came out?
Yeah, my life was constantly changing anyway. I got my own house, but I was gone most of the time. I loved being on the road, and I loved playing, and I was writing. When I was home, I had friends and we had a lot of fun, and then I’d go tour. I would come home and make an album. 1988 to 1993 was pretty much like that.
I am a huge fan of the Laurel Canyon culture of the 1970s and the music movement that was happening in southern California at the time. Was that era of interest to you?
Yeah! That is why I came out to California. I thought that Jackson Browne was going to be there and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, The Eagles, and Fleetwood Mac… they were all going to be playing in the Canyon. But I show up in 1982, and it was all Spandex and big hair, and I thought, “What happened?” It was completely different and very strange, but that was the music I was loving — that was it.
When you arrived, Whisky a Go Go and Troubadour, were those still clubs that people were playing at?
Yes, but it was Guns N’ Roses, Ratt, L.A. Guns.
Big hair and metal guys.
Yep.
How did you get connected with some of the musicians that you had looked up to?
When I was making my first record, the executive producer that Chris sent over to oversee it all, knew Bonnie Raitt. He had produced a couple of her albums. He wanted to introduce me to her and did so just before my first album came out. She was so kind and supportive; she was incredible. I also met Jackson Browne, and Bonnie quickly took me into that 1970s and 1980s bubble of people that were doing benefit work, moving socially forward, and they called me out to do those things. That is where I met everyone else.
Did you get a little starstruck in the early days?
I tried not to show it. I was also observing what they were like because they had what I wanted: what are they doing and how are they managing their careers?
In 1989, Brave and Crazy came out, and peaked at #22, and, in 1992, Never Enough also peaked at #22, but in-between, 1991 was a sad year for you.
Yeah, I lost my dad.
You guys were close?
Very much so, he was an incredible human being. He was a high school teacher and a basketball coach. Everyone loved him. He had come from migrant farmers in Missouri, his father had been in World War II and was a horrible alcoholic. He had a metal plate in his head. His mother worked just as hard and there were seven kids. I think there were nine and two of them died. It was the poverty of the 1930s, the Great Depression. He came out of that, and he was good in sports; he had been a swimmer. His high school coach said that he could get a scholarship to college. My dad didn’t know anything about that: he didn’t know what he was going to do with this life. But he went to college, he met my mother, he married, and he graduated with a teaching degree. He was able to go up to Kansas––we didn’t have any family there, but he went up there and he started life. He had the belief that you can come from nothing and become something.
He got to see the first two albums, so he got to see his little girl successful at what she started when she was only seven.
Yeah, that was cool. I remember taking him to Quebec, he had never been up to Canada before. They came up to see me and we had such a wonderful time. I played at this big outdoor concert with thousands of people, it was fun to have him see me play on that level.
In 1993, you released the album that would catapult your career and fame, Yes I Am. It was a huge album for you. It had numerous radio hits, and it seemed like you were everywhere. That must’ve been a bit overwhelming.
The good news was that it took a good year for it to get there. I put the album out around 1993 and it was this slow momentum. I could feel it a little bit at a time. We would get out of the clubs, we were playing at more theaters, I was at different radio stations, different pop stations, so it slowly worked up. It wasn’t this big bang and then it was over. It was one of the reasons that the single “Come to My Window” never made it into the Top 10 of singles, but it was on the chart for the longest, because people would start playing it… and it took forever… and by the time these guys started playing it, then the others stopped playing it. It always kind of stayed around.
What was the story behind “Come to My Window”?
I was in this relationship; I was very dramatic, and we would spend a lot of time away from each other. I remember being in Europe, I called her, and we didn’t even say anything, we would just listen to each other breathe on the phone. It was this longing, yet there were parts of it… I remember writing the bridge “I don’t care what they think / I don’t care what they say / What do they know / About this love anyway?” completely separate. I remember bringing it in, and thought, “Wait a minute, that fits. I might be unhappy, but I don’t care what everybody says anyway. What are they, what do you know about what I’m doing?” Then, it was this sweetness— it was a mix of stuff. I almost didn’t put it on the album because I thought that it was too complicated of a song, but people seemed to like it. (Laughs)
What about “I’m the Only One”?
That song was straightforward. I was getting back to my first album feel, because I could see how much people liked that bluesy rock. I was playing this blues lick and, then again, my relationships fed so many of these songs. She was unfaithful, and it was perfect. But I didn’t want to write and make me sound like poor, poor, pitiful me. I wanted to write like, “Wait a minute, you’re doing this, but you’re gonna regret it.”
“I Want to Come Over”?
I wrote that song the next year, for the next album. That was me remembering the beginning of that relationship. She was married and I thought, “I don’t care, to hell with the consequences.” I thought, “I’m going to do this anyway.” And that is the song. (Laughs) It’s the stalker song.
You lost your son, Beckett, to an opioid overdose in 2020 when he was only 21. Tell me about Beckett.
Someone said this about him once, they said, “When Beckett is happy, everyone is happy. When Beckett is not happy, nobody is happy.” He was very bipolar, and he struggled with life. He struggled understanding it, finding a rhythm with it. They weren’t testing children back then, but who knows what he would have been diagnosed with. When he wasn’t using, or coming down, he was wonderful; we loved him so much. He was so much fun and so funny. He just couldn’t do life this time around.
He was passionate about snowboarding and hurt his ankle at some point. Is that how he got into the opioids?
Yeah, that’s when it got really bad.
You know, there is a stigma with pharmaceuticals: that if you’re weak, you’ll get hooked. It’s a stigma to label people that they’re troubled people. They either understand it, or they don’t understand it, that there is some kind of weakness, or it is their fault. That stigma still permeates today. That is what we are trying to combat in the Etheridge Foundation— the opioid use disorder. It is a real condition; it is covered by the American Disabilities Act, there is a lot of new thought around it.
There should be, it has destroyed enough lives.
Okay, so you have a brand-new album, “I’m Not Broken,” coming out in early July! You chose to record this one at the Topeka Correctional Facility for Women. Why so?
The Topeka prison is what the Leavenworth women’s penitentiary used to be: it used to be inside the men’s, it used to be together there, right next to Leavenworth in Lansing. In the 1990s, they moved it out to Topeka, so it is still the same institution, but they got it out and put it 45 minutes away. When I was in The Variety Show… Johnny Cash came to Leavenworth when I was eight years old. We didn’t get to see him, but they got to see him. At eight years old I thought that prison must be a place of fine entertainment. (Laughs) What Johnny Cash did to go in there and create [an] energy of goodness and hope, I always felt strongly about that. In the 1990s, Tammy Wynette became a friend, we were talking about doing a concert, going down to a female prison in Virginia. Then she got sick and died, but I had been thinking about this forever. Finally, a few years ago, Paramount+ backed it, and I said, “Let’s do it!”
Were you nervous?
Terribly. But again, my nervousness is an excitement and there is an unknown. I get that energy when I am doing something, and I don’t know how it is going to go, because 95 percent of the time, I know how a show is going to go. I feel confident, I can’t wait, I’m so excited, it’s fun, and then it’s all over. But I didn’t know how this was going to go. I had to talk to the warden and say that my shows were very enthusiastic and emotional. I asked if she was going to make them sit. She said that they weren’t going to make them do anything. She kept telling me to play for as long as I want, do whatever I want, and play whatever I want. (Laughs) She fully supported the show, and I decided to go all out.
I knew that some of the women were going to have no idea who I was, I wasn’t on their radar. I wanted to come in as a musician and make them feel good; and sing the songs that might relate; and tell them a story that might move them along. I was very nervous, and I was emotional. I didn’t know how emotional until right before we went on with the band. I said, “Let’s get together… I’ve wanted to do this all my life,” then I burst into tears. (Laughs)
It was a fabulous concert and the women really seemed to enjoy themselves. When I was watching the documentary, closer to the end I was a little shocked. Five of the women spent a fair amount of time writing you letters. We see the connection as they read their letters aloud. Normally, if someone writes a letter to someone, there is already some type of connection with them. You’re a public figure, so I figured that they must know your music, so they wrote to you. But then, sitting around the table, one of them admitted that they didn’t really know who you were. How did they start writing to you?
That was part of Shark Pig, the production company; they are an incredible production company. They had the idea that they wanted to get connected with some of the women in prison, so there would be a story for me to work from, to be personal. They went to the prison, and it took a long time to get the ones that we got, because they have to be willing to open up their whole lives. I don’t think they know how their lives are going to change after this. (Laughs) But it’s big. I thought that they were incredibly brave, especially not knowing me very well, to do that. The one who didn’t know me was the most verbose, she wrote me letters and she still writes me letters; it’s interesting.
Were you happy with the outcome of the concert?
I was delighted with the response. It was what I had hoped for. But I am also hoping that we can change some hearts and minds about incarceration and drug addiction. There is much to be done.
