A 'Watershed' Breaks K.D. Lang's Writer's Block
The singer-songwriter will perform on GMA Tuesday to mark release of new album.
Feb. 4, 2008 — -- For the first time in eight years, three-time Grammy winner K.D. Lang is releasing an album of all new, original material.
Lang played the roles of producer, writer, multi-instrumentalist and singer for the album "Watershed," and her influences on this record showcase her country roots. But the album also has hints of jazz, folk, pop and flamenco.
The Canadian songstress usually has a particular theme identified with each album, but this one is all about where the artist is right now, according to her Web site.
"Watershed is like a culmination of everything I've done — there's a little bit of jazz, a little country, a little of the Ingénue sound, a little Brazilian touch," she said on her Web site.
"It really feels like the way I hear music, this mash-up of genres, and I think it reflects all the styles that have preceded this in my catalogue. I didn't feel the need to be genre-specific because this experience felt so wide open. I didn't have a band in the studio where I had to come up with a feel for a song because the clock was ticking and dollars were flying out the window."
The album is a real feat for Lang, who has said she struggled with writer's block after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. She blamed her musical delay, in part, on the incident.
After such a drastic event, she found it difficult and frivolous to pen the same types of love songs that had garnered her so many fans.
It seems that critics believe the album was worth the wait: many have embraced Lang's latest effort.
The album is the latest in a 25-year career that saw Lang grow beyond her Canadian popularity to international fame and success on the U.S. charts. In 1992, she hit the airwaves with her signature hit, "Constant Craving," but that wasn't the most important thing to occur.
The same year, she came out publicly as a lesbian and found that her success didn't wane. For a while she became the face of gay, lesbian and transgender individuals in the music scene, long before other artists publicly acknowledged their sexuality.
Today, Lang sits as an artist who is no longer associated only with her sexual orientation. Her clout has expanded to make her a critical darling and one of music's most adored singers, one whose fans are cheering her long-awaited new album.
