Heroine in Progress
April 1999
It's fortunate that Jo Dee Messina has made a go of this country music thing, because only one other career would have satisfied her: superhero.
That line of work doesn't pay much - note that Batman is independently wealthy, Superman works as a reporter and Wonder Woman is doing commercials for contact lenses.
But fortune was not linked with fame in Messina's mind, anyway. As a child growing up in Holliston, Mass., she had decided fame was her destiny, and that she would use it to save the world. By the time she was a teenager and embarking on her mission in country music, her idealistic goals had taken firm root.
"I found an old journal of mine form ninth or tenth grade," Messina says. "I was reading through it and I'd written, 'I want to become famous so that I can help out Muscular Dystrophy Association and Cerebral Palsy.' I had a list a mile long of everyone I wanted to help." Her amber eyes sparkle as she adds, "And then it said, 'P.S. I'm going to marry Randy Travis.' Isn't that funny?"
Messina has remained true to her long-avowed mission (well, except for the part about Randy Travis). With two gold albums and five hit singles under her sonic belt, she's used her name recognition and talent to come to the aid of the T.J. Martell Foundation, St. Jude's Children's Hospital, and Vanderbilt Children's Hospital, among others.
And her recent feat of achieving three consecutive multiple - week No. 1 singles with "Bye Bye," "I'm Alright," and "Stand Beside Me" has further increased her recognition in the industry - and the opportunities for turning fame into a flaming sword. She's performing more benefits these days, as well as traveling with the George Strait Festival tour, which is exposing her to larger audiences.
"Even when I was a little kid I wanted to save the world," Messina admits. "That's why the song 'Even God Must Get The Blues' [from I'M ALRIGHT] is a favorite for me. There's something I do before I sing that song, and that's to say [to my young fans] 'How many of you have sat around and said, Hey check out those shoes? or Oh, can you believe she's wearing that? Well, when your sittin' in that circle with your buds and they're pickin' on somebody, I have a challenge for you. I dare you to find something nice to say about the person they're making fun of.' I say, 'It's easy, easy to be mean. That doesn't take anything. It is hard - takes a stronger, smarter, wiser person - to be nice to someone, especially when your friends are pickin' on them.' That's what I tell my kids at my shows."
While Messina was in Los Angeles recently for a media tour, she met with the head of CBS Television, another perk of her success in the past year. The result was an invitation to make an appearance on Nash Bridges, the weekly cop drama starring Don Johnson.
After the excitement wore off, Messina started worrying about the impact on "her kids" if she were handed a role as a bad gal. Even sharing a scene with Johnson wouldn't sway her into taking a part that would give the wrong message to her fans.
"Acting sounds like fun," she says. "It would be something I'd like to do, but my first love is music. That's where my heart is. I might be crazy, but if my character in any way jeopardizes the kind of person I am, then I don't want to do it. I don't want to be some gun-wielding, drug-using alcoholic, because that's not who I am. I am such a preacher about 'Fight for what's right.' I'm always telling the kids at my shoes, 'Just because all your friends are doing something you know is wrong doesn't mean you have to do it. They can still be your friends and you don't have to do it. But who wants friends like that?"
"The [producers and writers are] going so out of their way for me, but if I'm not comfortable with it, maybe they'll have to get somebody else," she decided. "And you know what? If I lose an acting gig it's not going to shatter me like it would an actor. If I lose a single [release], that'll kill me. My heart is so in music. But I think the whole acting thing would be fun, and I'd love to give it a shot." [Note: Since this interview Messina was scheduled to be on location as this goes to press; the Nash Bridges episode featuring her acting debut reportedly will air April 30.]
Despite her artistic priorities, Messina doubtlessly will embrace her acting moments as passionately as everything else she does. If she's not able to leap tall obstacles without stubbing her toe, it's not for lack of trying. Throughout her life Messina has been vaulting hurdles that would have tripped up a lesser individual. And each time she has landed stronger and more determined.
When her parents divorced, the winsome three year old simply "adopted" her next door neighbor, Mr. Alderman, as a father figure. When she was struck by a car at age five and nearly died, she decided her survival meant she had a purpose in life. At 19 she moved to Nashville on her own and endured four mean years, a few devastating heartbreaks, and serious financial problems before "Heads Carolina, Tails California" turned the tide.
Just as she was getting her head above water, however, the backwash caught her when her third single faltered. In 1997 her label postponed recording sessions for her second album at the same time that another personal relationship began crumbling.
"Kenny Chesney always tells this story about seeing me in a Wal-Mart in the middle of making the I'M ALRIGHT album," she recounts. "I was like, 'It's over, Kenny. My career is over! I can't get this album done.' And I was just cryin' on his shoulder in the middle of Wal-Mart."
Messina's lips curve into a rueful smile. "He came up to me at the No. 1 party for 'Bye, Bye,' and he's like, 'And just to think a year ago, me and you ... yada, yada, yada.' But when somebody says to you, 'A year from now ...' that's a long time! The year that's passed doesn't seem like a long time, but the year ahead seems like an eternity."
While she is in the middle of a heartache, Messina's sensitive nature sinks her to the bottom of the abyss, but her buoyant personality and survivor's heart always bring her back to the surface. She lives life in the here and now and dreams of the future. She seldom glances over her shoulder at the hurts of the past.
She will, however, sing about them. "When people say, 'Oh, "'Bye Bye'" is such a strong song. You're such a strong woman,' I tell them the heart is like a muscle," Messina says. "When you build muscle, you have to break it down to build it back up. That's why they say, in weight training, to work out every other day. You break the muscle down as you lift, and it heals the next day, and then you break it down again and it heals even larger. And I think that we are that way. 'Stand Beside Me' is the hell I went through to get to 'Bye Bye.' Like they say, what doesn't kill you makes you stronger."
Her third album, which she began recording last August, is taking as long to put together as I'M ALRIGHT. This time, however, the inching progress is causing impatience, but not desperation. For one thing, there won't be any bleak year between singles, and she's coming off an album that is nearly platinum (one million sold).
Although her debut record yielded two hits, "Heads Carolina..." and "You're Not in Kansas Anymore," the lackluster third releases, "Do You Wanna Make Something Of It," left a bad taste in Messina's mouth. It was hard on the overachiever to sample failure.
"I look at this album we're making now as my sophomore album," she says, using the industry reference for an artist's second CD, and dismissing her first. "My first album [JO DEE MESSINA] had a bunch of different stuff. It was a little bit of this, a little bit of that. I think I'M ALRIGHT was focused, but in view of the career, this album coming up is my sophomore album. Because it's like, "OK, she's past the new kid stage, now what's she made of?' So I'm trying to show where I am and who I am. Who I am is pretty well straight down the middle. But, oh, boy, wait 'til you hear the stuff we've cut!" She erupts with a typical Messina squeal. "Eeeee! I wish we could finish it so I can get this stuff out there!"
Considering the independent musical stance she established with I'M ALRIGHT, it's tantalizing to speculate about what the next project will yield. Two assumption seem logical: most of the tunes will reflect Messina's perspective on her own life, and there won't be a cut called, "My Pity Party."
"It's funny; when it comes to myself, I never ask why, but if I see somebody else being hurt, that really gets to me," she reflects. "They say that the Lord doesn't give you any more than you can handle. I think about how bad things hurt my feelings and how deep I hurt, and I realize I haven't even begun to endure some of the things other people have.
"There's a little boy here in Nashville. You almost read about me in the news because I was just livid. This little boy was a paraplegic. Couldn't eat, couldn’t walk, couldn't speak. And his mother's boyfriend beat him so bad he broke all four of his limbs and put him in the hospital. I wanted to go down and beat the living crap out of that guy myself. ...when I look out and see people like that, it makes me so mad. When I see, especially children, being abused and neglected. I haven't endured anything like that."
Well, she's right. Messina's trials pale against a backdrop of gross inhumanity, but her capacity for empathy is enhanced by her own experiences. And that's what makes her, if not a superhero, then perhaps the role model for her fans that she's wanted to be since the first time she saw Reba McEntire in concert.
When she leads into her songs by telling personal stories about her own choices, Messina is trying to do for her young fans what McEntire did for her as a teen. "I always tried to walk a straight line," she says. "Reba McEntire was a role model to me. She walked a straight line. And The Judds. The way they lived, what they believed, how they carried themselves, how they did for other people. That's what a role model is. And I wanted to be like that. I wanted to be like Reba: hard-working, successful, above board all the time."
Messina might not be as self confident as she wishes to be, and she's chagrined by her track record with men, but she's been true to her ideals. And she likes the person she's become as a result of wanting to lead by example. The higher profile that comes with hit records is no problem. "All it makes me do is put makeup on before I walk out of the house," she says. Then she grins. "Usually."
