Jessica Harp says Michelle Branch is a career Wrecker.
Harp, Branch's longtime friend and former backup singer, is talking by telephone from her Nashville home about The Wreckers, her country music duo with Branch that produced the gold debut album, "Stand Still, Look Pretty" (Warner Brothers) and had a No. 1 single with "Leave The Pieces" and a second Top 10 single, "My, Oh, My."
Harp says the project has been so satisfying and successful for both that Branch intends for it to be her full-time career.
So, she says, don't hold your breath for a new pop album from Branch, whose platinum discs "The Spirit Room" and "Hotel Paper" spawned the hits "Everywhere," "All You Wanted" and "Are You Happy Now?" and whose duet "The Game of Love" with Carlos Santana won a Grammy award.
"She would probably like to make a solo record less than I would," Harp says, laughing. "She's really happy with this, we both are really happy with this, and, you know, if it's not broke, then why fix it?"
In fact, Harp says The Wreckers are anxious to record again and will take off all of October to go back into the studio. And the next album, she says, is likely to have even more of a country flavor.
"When we were making the first record, there was a little bit of constraint from the label," Harp says. "We were with a label that had only had pop and rock artists, they never had a country artist, and they were a little nervous about figuring out how to put out a country record. So I think we were held back a little bit.
"So it'll probably be even more in that direction for the next record, since we'll have the freedom to really do what we want."
The seeds of the duo were planted when Branch and Harp were fledgling singers whose fans alerted one another -- and then the singers -- to their similarities. When the two met during a Branch tour stop in Harp's native Kansas City, they became fast friends and Harp joined the tour as a backup singer.
But Harp says country music was her first love.
"When I was really little -- really, really little -- I was madly in love with Reba McEntire and the Judds, and always had a passion for country music," she says. "I always loved all kinds of music, but country music for some reason was the one that I always wanted to do, and I always used to say that I was going to grow up and be a country singer."
Harp says she was about to sign with a country label in 2003 when Branch talked her out of it -- Harp says it was in mid-drive to the appointment -- so they could record as a duo instead. And when they did, Harp adds, their songs naturally leaned toward country.
At the same time, she says, Branch was feeling disillusioned with her pop success.
"I had been spending a lot of time in Nashville for a couple of years, and Michelle was kind of hearing about my experiences there and hearing how sort of different it was from the pop world, and I think she had a fascination with it from that," Harp says.
"And when we sat down to kind of pull together all of our material for our record, it just really lent itself to country music and, you know, that sort of instrumentation -- mandolins and banjos and fiddles. We loved that and wanted it to be a part of our record."
But Harp says Maverick's widely reported hesitation about the record wasn't overstated. The record company first tried to tone down the country sound, then introduced The Wreckers to the public by releasing the less-country single "The Good Kind" and having them tour with acts from the WB Network TV show "One Tree Hill."
"They kind of put us on that tour just to sort of stick us out there and see what happened," Harp says. "And Michelle and I both knew that it probably wasn't the right move for us. Here we were, headlining a tour, playing a record that no one knew, it wasn't even out yet. And so looking back, that probably wasn't the best thing for us to do."
Released in May after more than a year's wait, "Stand Still, Look Pretty" made The Wreckers the first country duo in 15 years to hit No. 1 with their debut single, and only the second female duo to do it ever.
They were nominated for a Grammy, but lost to The Dixie Chicks, and were nominated for two Academy of Country Music awards, but lost to Brooks & Dunn and Little Big Town.
The Wreckers also have reached a broader audience. The CD hit Billboard's Top 20, and "Leave The Pieces" the Top 40.... And when the time is right for all that, that will definitely take the front seat."
But for now, The Wreckers is the center of her life -- although, ironically, she says she would like to record a solo album "at some point in my life, just because I haven't really had the opportunity to do that with a major label.
"But at this point I'm having so much fun doing this and I really feel like this is where I'm supposed to be right now. So Michelle and I sort of made a pact that as long as this feels right, that we're going to keep doing it."
------ (c) 2007, The Morning Call (Allentown, Pa.) Visit The Morning Call at http://www.mcall.com/ Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.
---------- PHOTO (from MCT Photo Service, 202-383-6099): MUS-WRECKERS AP-NY-03-29-07 1213EDT ;
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