For more than four decades Carlene Carter has deftly dealt with the duality of being both an independent artist and the latter-day embodiment of Carter Family legacy. Those aspects of her life and much more are covered in Cartwheels In High Heels, her much-anticipated autobiography that has been completed and is expected to be published this coming year.
The daughter of June Carter Cash and legendary country star Carl Smith, and stepdaughter of Johnny Cash, she self-describes as a “Carter Girl,” as were her mother, grandmother and maternal aunts. While that lineage has stood her in good stead in Nashville and Bristol, TN – where her forebears brought what became known as country music out of the Appalachians and into the recording studio for the very first time – it was in England where she initially found her place in professional music beyond the Carter Family.
She started her singing career with The Carter Family while still a teen; in her early 20s she released her self-titled debut album recorded in England with Graham Parker’s band The Rumour and an ocean away from her Tennessee roots. When “Mother” Maybelle Carter, her grandmother and a pillar of the original Carter family, passed shorty after that album’s debut, Chet Flippo wrote in Rolling Stone that she “lived to see her granddaughter Carlene merge Nashville with contemporary rock and roll.”
Musical Shapes was also recorded in Britain and produced by her soon-to-be husband Nick Lowe, in which she was backed by Rockpile (Lowe, Dave Edmunds, Billy Bremner, Terry Williams). As recently as this year, that landmark album was cited by PopMatters as one of the Top 20 new wave albums recorded by pop/rock artists. This put her in the company of Fleetwood Mac, Paul McCartney, Billy Joel, Queen, Linda Ronstadt and Neil Young, and the only country artist among them. The same outlet noted, “Carter has made it clear . . . that she plays and sings country music her way,” a reality underscored by her rollicking and rocking country hits “Come On Back,” “Every Little Thing” and the Grammy-nominated “I Fell In Love.”
Beyond her own recordings, Carlene Carter is a successful songwriter, having co-written “Easy From Now On” for Emmylou Harris and, like her mother, has a dramatic theatrical aspect to her talents. She’s been on stage in London’s West End in Pump Boys and Dinettes and starred as her own mother in Wildwood Flowers: The June Carter Story and had a role in a touring production of Ghost Brothers of Darkland County, the Southern Gothic musical play written by Stephen King and John Mellencamp. She toured with Mellencamp and collaborated with him on the album Sad Clowns and Hillbillies, and contributed her own material to the album.
LISTEN IN - Carlene will be on-air with Jessie Scott at WMOT 89.5 FM this Thursday, July 15 at 5:00 pm Central Time.