A Conversation with Tywanna Jo Baskette (continued)

PM: Have you done much traveling?

TJB: Not really.

PM: Been to Europe?

TJB: Once, actually.

PM: Who with?

TJB: Just a friend.

PM: Recent years or many years ago?

TJB: Many years ago.

PM: Traveling is important, I think, perhaps especially to artists.

TJB: Yeah, it gives you something. Like Venezuela, I would love to go back there--except I got so sick, so much that it was dangerous, and I lost all my--something--what is it called? I'm so distracted. Someone is banging on something outside. Electrolytes. It was bad. But Venezuela was beautiful, and there are monkeys and crazy birds everywhere.

PM: I think it's really dangerous right now.

TJB: Yeah, I think it is too, so politically bad.

PM: People are getting kidnapped, and like that.

So what do you think about this CD that you're about to embark on with Clay now? Will it be continuing down the same road as Fancy Blue, or are there changes afoot?

TJB: I hope so. I'd like to make every record the same. Like have every record have different genres on one record. I have no desire to go out and make a rock 'n' roll record or any certain genre, really, jazz or country. I kind of thought about maybe doing a country record, but then I thought it's more fun to put different styles together, because that's the way I write. I don't just sit down and write country songs, or sit down and write jazz songs or even those little 45 second songs. They're just all mixed up. And I think the record should be all mixed up too.

PM: Yeah. Is there stuff we call jazzy on Fancy Blue?

TJB: "Sunny Day."

PM: Yeah, "Sunny Day," right. How did that get jazzy?

TJB: It just came out that way.

PM: Yeah. Was the melody kind of jazzy and then Clay played it that way, or how?

TJB: I guess so. The melody is the way I wrote it, he doesn't change the melodies or anything. Then he plays it the way he plays it. Is that what you mean?

PM: Yeah. I guess he just heard it was a jazzy thing and then played it that way. Yeah, you really found the right guy for you down there.

TJB: Yeah, I think he really, really gets the music. Because it's so delicate, you have to think delicately, I think. Like "Parakeet," what is that? Is that jazzy?

PM: That's a good question. Yeah, I think that's got jazzy elements.

TJB: And then some of them are classical, like "Goat Cheese." [laughter] "I Love Goat Cheese" is a classical melody.

PM: And it's amazing. I like me some goat cheese, and I can't ever eat it without thinking of that song.

TJB: Thank you. I love goat cheese too. I could eat it every day.

PM: It's funny when you write something very specific how it can really become part of somebody's life. I mean, I can't have any goat cheese in an omelet or any brunch anywhere without thinking of Ty Baskette's song.

TJB: I have a new song, "I Love Clean Sheets."

PM: Ahh. Is it going to be on this next record?

TJB: I don't think so, but I like it. I don't know.

PM: I remember you put me in a song one time.

TJB: Oh, yeah. It's called "M as in Frank, F as in Mary."

PM: [laughs] Thanks for doing that.

TJB: Yeah, I'd like to record that, too. There's just so many, and the list is already really long. I don't know what we'll end up recording.

PM: So when you go down to Mississippi tomorrow, how many pass-alongs do you have in your pocket right at the moment?

TJB: A hundred or more. I'm not sure.

PM: Are you still writing all the time?

TJB: I guess so. You know how you write, like sometimes you won't write at all for a month or two, and you think, "It's over, I'll never write another song." And then the next day you write four songs in a day.

PM: Right. Well, you can.

TJB: That's the way I write, anyway.

PM: Another whole aspect of the things you've done that we haven't touched upon--one of many--is you've done a lot of videos, both as an actor and as a makeup person. How did that start? And tell us something about that world, and that part of your career.

TJB: What do you want me to tell?

PM: Well, how did it start, your involvement in any--

TJB: Oh, like being a model?

PM: Yeah.

TJB: Well, I entered the county fair. And they said, "You should get an agent." And I said, "Okay."

PM: How old were you?

TJB: When I entered the fair, though, isn't when I got the agent. It was a few years later, maybe when I was 22. When I entered the fair I was 18. And I didn't win, I got runner-up.

PM: Okay. So you entered the beauty contest--no, what did they call it?

TJB: The Fairest of the Fair.

PM: The Fairest of the Fair, right. You were 18, and you got runner-up.

TJB: But I hate that stuff. I don't want to promote that stuff.

PM: Well, of course, but it's just, hey, your story.

TJB: Yeah.

PM: So it's interesting, because you're interesting.

TJB: And then I guess that's when I started thinking I could probably model, because people started telling me that around then.

PM: Right. And you went in your early twenties and got yourself an agent.

TJB: Yeah. And then I just started doing a lot of music videos, mostly. And then usually if it was L.A. or New York directors, I'd pretty much always get the job. And if it was a Nashville director, I'd hardly ever get the job.

[laughter]

TJB: It was so weird.

PM: That's funny.

TJB: It was like that a lot.  continue

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