Natalie Merchant
'I Realized How Much I Valued Singing'
AFTER SURGERY FOR A SPINE DISEASE LEFT HER UNABLE TO SING,
THE CONTEMPLATIVE SONG WRITER IS BACK ON TOUR WITH HER FIRST ALBUM IN NINE YEARS
By EILEEN FINAN
Gen X Icon “There have always been artists that were more serious and ‘cause-y’ and artists that were frivolous,” says Merchant (in 2022 and, inset, in 1993). “I think time has vindicated me.”
It’s an unseasonably cold day in upstate New York, and Natalie Merchant is bundled in a purple parka for a Zoom call. She turns her computer screen to show the thick haze outside that has drifted in from Canadian wildfires, obscuring the sky above her rural home and making the unusual summer weather all the more disturbing. “We haven’t been able to go outside for days,” says Merchant, 59. “It’s hard to think about anything else.” Then suddenly, an unwanted guest appears at her window, stopping her midsentence: a 2-in. long gypsy moth caterpillar. “They’re so destructive that the forest canopy is disappearing,” she explains. “I spent the entire winter crushing their egg sacs. But there she is, so I’m going to knock her down.” She excuses herself to do battle with the invasive species that has been devouring woods across the Northeast: “I will risk going out and breathing that air to kill that caterpillar!” Since she first hit the music scene in the early ’80s as the teenage frontwoman for the alt-rock band 10,000 Maniacs, and later as a solo artist, Merchant has been a warrior for a cause. Racism, pollution, colonialism, poverty, child abuse—all have inspired Merchant’s songwriting. Her activism and her literary lyrics—once praised as “the thinking man’s Madonna,” she playfully countered, “I prefer the Emily Dickinson of pop”— have earned Merchant, who has collectively sold 15 million albums, a devoted fan base. But three years ago, a personal crisis threatened to silence her when surgery for a rare and painful degenerative spine condition left her unable to sing for 10 months. “I thought maybe I was retiring from music,” says Merchant. “I thought, ‘Well, I had a good run.’” Instead, the singer, with her distinctive contralto intact, returned this year with Keep Your Courage, her first full album of original material in nine years—a collection of pandemic-inspired songs that “remind you that you are not alone in your suffering”—and her first major tour in six years, which begins its European leg in October. Now fully healed and back to her vibrant dancing onstage, “I’m singing better than I ever have.''
Early Inspiration
Lyrics for the first 10,000 Maniacs songs came from Merchant’s teenage journals: “Cringeworthy,” she says.
Kindred Spirits
Merchant (in 1990) with fellow activist singers Billy Bragg (left) and Michael Stipe (whom she also dated).
Parenting Pause Merchant
(in 2004) took time off from songwriting to raise her daughter Lucia, now 20.
‘I could talk, but I couldn’t sing with my real voice. I couldn’t find it’ — NATALIE MERCHANT
Stage Presence
“I’d taken a long break from performing. But after the first show, I felt totally comfortable,” says Merchant (on tour in Fort Lauderdale in April).
A Painful Condition
Merchant’s disease—spinal degeneration with OPLL—“is a process that occurs when a body over time turns a ligament that’s normally soft and mobile into calcification. Essentially, it hardens,” says Dr. Byron Stephens, division chief of spine surgery at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. The condition, uncommon in the United States, is more prevalent in eastern Asia. Because of the risks, surgery should be done “as a last resort but if properly indicated can have an incredibly positive impact,” says Dr. Stephens, who did not treat Merchant. Because it’s a progressive disease, patients can face further complications, a fact the singer has come to terms with: “It’s not curable, so I’m going to fall apart bit by bit like everyone, but my spine is going to fall apart first. I’m just enjoying the time before that happens, and I have to decide whether to have another surgery.”
Solo Career Success
Merchant’s first solo album, 1995’s Tigerlily, sold more than 5 million copies and spawned three hit singles. Her latest, Keep Your Courage, “seemed like an appropriate title for the times—with the pandemic, the climate crisis and so many other crises—to encourage people to stay strong and hopeful.”
Merchant was just 17 when she first performed for an audience with a local band from her hometown of Jamestown, N.Y. A year later the group recorded their first album as 10,000 Maniacs with songs Merchant wrote. “At 18, it’s not your greatest work,” she says. “But there were moments.” By the early ’90s the band had three multiplatinum albums and performed at MTV’s Inaugural ball for newly elected President Bill Clinton. But at the height of the group’s success in 1993, Merchant left the band, saying at the time that she “didn’t want art by committee anymore.” Her solo debut, 1995’s Tigerlily, gave the singer her first Top 10 hit with “Carnival.” The earnestness of Merchant’s lyrics—and her activism—attracted both praise and snark. (“Even as you wish she’d lighten up, you can’t help but admire Merchant’s uncompromising vision,” an Entertainment Weekly critic wrote in a 1995 review.) But Merchant remains unapologetic. “Some people at my record company would’ve appreciated if I had been less cause-y and more sexy,” she says. “But there are worse things than being too serious.” The singer took another unconventional turn after 2003 when she had her daughter Lucia (whom she shares with her ex-husband) and stepped away from songwriting and touring. “The most important job I had was being my daughter’s mother, and I was able to be present in a very intense way,” she says. She sewed costumes for her daughter’s school plays, was a class parent and helped run the craft fair. She also volunteered with a local preschool, made a documentary about domestic violence victims and protested fracking. “Songwriting requires solitude for me, and it seemed self-indulgent in the face of these things,” she says. “People think, ‘Oh, you weren’t writing or touring? You must have been sitting on a couch eating bonbons.’ But they were very busy years.” In December 2019 a health crisis brought her to a standstill. It began with a nagging neck ache that extended down her arm: “The pain was unendurable.” She was diagnosed with spinal degeneration with ossification of the posterior longitudinal ligament, or OPLL (see sidebar). If it’s left untreated “there’s a chance you may become paralyzed,” Merchant says. In March 2020 she underwent a four-hour surgery to replace three vertebrae that had deteriorated. An incision was made over her vocal cords, which needed to be pulled aside during the operation. When she woke, Merchant discovered she could speak but couldn’t sing: “I couldn’t find the power or keep the pitch. I could sing in falsetto, but I couldn’t sing in my real voice anymore.” For 10 months, as the pandemic raged, she was left without her instrument. “While I was deeply saddened by the possibility of not singing professionally, it’s also an emotional outlet for me. I sing all day long. When my daughter [now a college student] is around, we sing together,” she says. “But I accepted the consequences, because I couldn’t live with that pain.” Not knowing if she could ever record again, she returned to songwriting amid the isolation and confusion of the pandemic, creatively fueled by “the profound realization that other people are the most important thing.” And by the time she had an album’s worth of material, her voice had recovered. Now on tour, where she cares for her vocal cords by massaging her neck muscles regularly, Merchant has a deep sense of gratitude. “The pandemic taught all of us how much we should value simple things,” she says. “This experience has taught me to be accepting of the state of things in my body, and I feel so grateful to not be in pain anymore.” •