Birthdate: July 29, 1966
Hometown: Sharon, Kansas
Family:
Husband, John
Daughter, Delaney Katharine
Brothers, Steve and Marty
Sister, Gina
Mother, Jeanne
Father, Daryl
Favorite Color: I like lots of different colors, blue is one of my favorites
Favorite food: home-cooked food (meatloaf, mashed potatoes, roast beef, fried chicken, etc.) fruit & veggies, chocolate, tacos, cheeseburgers.
Favorite kind of pizza: Cheese!
Pepsi or Coke?!?!?: Pepsi, definitely!
Favorite TV shows: Seinfeld, Roseanne (I really don't watch a lot of TV)
Favorite Soap Opera: Guiding Light
Favorite Singers: Lots! They include Buck Owens, Merle Haggard, Patty Smyth, Rickie Lee Jones, Aretha Franklin (her older stuff), Lefty Frizzell, K.T. Oslin, George Strait, Linda Ronstadt
Favorite Season: Fall
Favorite Holiday: Christmas
Martina also says, "I like to go to movies, read, cook, stay at home, and work around the house in my spare time!"
Here is Martia's Biography for the release of Wild Angels:
"With this album, I feel like I've found songs about me," Martina McBride says of her third release, Wild Angels. "It's coming from a more personal place, and I connect more with the songs on this album than I ever have before."
In the two years since she released her groundbreaking second album, The Way That I Am, Martina has enjoyed a number of career and personal achievements: The album went platinum and spawned three Top Ten hits including ("My Baby Loves Me" and Life #9"). In '94, she picked up the Country Music Association's award for video of the year for "Independence Day." And she became a mother when she gave birth to daughter Delaney Katherine on December 22, 1994. The last milestone is clearly the closest to her heart and foremost on her mind. It was also a major inspiration for Wild Angels.
"Motherhood changes your outlook," Martina says. "You become really protective, and you realize that what you do impacts someone else's life. It's a huge responsibility. I've always wanted my songs to speak for me, and I was even more conscious of that this time around. I think the songs I sing should stand for what I believe, and the people who buy my albums should get a sense of who I am from my music. They can get that in this album."
After having fans and reviewers comment that many of the songs on her previous albums were dark or sad - - in direct contrast to her own optimistic and cheery personality - - Martina re-evaluated the music she had released.
"I realized that a lot of the songs I've recorded are in third person," she says. "A lot of them are story songs about other people, where I feel compassion for the characters in the song, but they're not me. There are songs I've recorded that I really haven't been able to relate to very well--like 'Where I Used To Have A Heart' or 'Heart Trouble.' I can sing the song and feel the emotion, but it's not about my life -- especially as it is now."
Never before has Martina's life been shown as clearly as it is on Wild Angels. Kicking off with the title track, she gives praise to "wild angels" who have stood as sentinels over a relationship. In the poignant ballad, "All The Things We've Never Done." she comforts a partner who worries he's never been able to give his wife material treasures, while she tenderly tells him it's all he hasn't done that has kept them together. He's never left her when she needed him. He hasn't lied or broke her heart. It's one of Martina's favorite songs on the album.
"When I heard that song, I told my co-producer, Paul Worley, 'This is my life!'," Martina says enthusiastically. "I have looked and looked for songs that have captured the relationship my husband John and I have. What is so amazing is that with this album, I not only found one, but three! Besides 'All The Things We've Never Done,' there's 'Driving All The Time' and 'Born to Give My Love To You' - - which now, I actually sing more for Delaney. I'm so happy that I found these songs, because they say what I've wanted to say for so long."
Even songs like "Phones Are Ringing" and "Cry On The Shoulder Of The Road" offer hope and promise. "These are not songs about my relationship, but the women are strong, which I feel I am," Martina says. "These aren't women who say. 'It's bad, but hey, it's a relationship.
The women in her songs have that attitude, she says, because she herself is just that sort of woman. "I would never give someone that advice--tell them to stay in a bad relationship, so why would I sing about it?" she asks.
"The charts are full of relationship songs, and everyone records them," Martina continues, "but I think it's important to take a stand and say, "This is what I believe." I want to offer hope. And I don't think anyone should ever wallow in their misery. Lyrically, I want to say something about life, but I can only sing about things I believe in."
With Wild Angels, as with her previous albums, Martina served as co-producer with Paul Worley and Ed Seay. Worley says with each album, Martina's role in the studio has become increasingly important.
"She's always been really good at self-critiquing her own vocal performance," he says. "But over the three albums, she's learned more about communicating with background singers and musicians. She's always been very much involved in the track arrangements, but this time, she was even more involved in what the musicians played on the tracks than ever before. With that, we were able to come up with some interesting and different arrangements."
I had really specific ideas about the production of this album," Martina says. "First off, I get tired of hearing the same sounds on the radio all the time. The second thing is, I didn't want it to just be song-space-song. I wanted there to be some fun stuff that would make people go, 'Wow, what's that? That's really different.' "
"We included a laugh from Delaney before 'Wild Angels,' " she says. "We also left in some of the studio banter which kind of gives people a feel for what it's like when we're recording."
Her quest was to make her album sound different from the music that's currently available, and clearly, Martina has succeeded on all fronts. The retro influences meld comfortably with the singer's country core creating something unique and exciting yet still somewhat familiar. The loose production gives songs like "Two More Bottles Of Wine" and "Cry On The Shoulder Of The Road" an almost live feel, and that's exactly what Martina wanted.
"I listen to stuff like Creedence Clearwater Revival and The Band, and I think, 'Man, we would never let those records pass today,' " she says. "You'd never put out those records, because they're not perfect. The harmonies are out of time. The bass guitar is a little out of tune, but they have such a great feel. We shouldn't try to make our records picture perfect. We should keep some of that grungy stuff on 'em. So that's kinda what we did."
Having worked with Worley and Seay on three albums, Martina says they've encouraged her growth, just as she has encouraged theirs. "I think this album is a little more loose than Paul would have gone without done without my imput, but he got into it. I think it expanded both our horizons a bit. I think we bring out the best in each other and push each other -- creatively -- in new directions. There's also great respect and friendship and trust. "That gives you the confidence to try new things."
Worley agrees, saying Martina's own commitment to her craft is such that he'd never second guess what she wanted to try with her album. When asked how she sets herself apart from other female artists, Worley answers quickly. "Martina sets herself apart as an artist -- period -- not just from other female artists," he says. "She is listed as a co-producer, and she was literally in the studio, sitting there at my side, for every single note of that album. There's not one thing that went on that album that she wasn't there for the execution and perfection of. "I've never worked with another artist who is that dedicated to producing their own album."
"There's a tendency in Nashville for the artist to be involved in the songs; show up for the tracks; put their vocals on and just kinda go away while all the overdubs and mixing takes place. Then they sort of give it their final blessing at the end of the day."
"Martina doesn't do that. We've made three albums together, and she's become more and more knowledgeable in every aspect of it. The progression of the three albums, you will see that here is an artist who has grown and progressed and perfected their own craft."
Martina McBride is a true artist in every sense of the word. Releasing music that is a reflection of her inner self and constantly trying to improve and hone her craft has made her one of the most popular and promising performers in country music today. "I love to go in and create," she says. "To do the same thing album after album would be boring. I'm still growing, and I want my music to grow, too."
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