TAMMY COCHRAN "LIFE HAPPENED"
TO BE RELEASED OCTOBER 15, 2002

When "Angels In Waiting" emerged as an unlikely country anthem in 2001, it provided a telling blueprint for Tammy Cochran’s career.

The song delivered her dream by relating an honest tale from her own life. Written about her two brothers, Shawn and Alan, who died from cystic fibrosis, "Angels" was not intended to be a single—she even had to fight to keep it on her debut album. But it became an anthem for many Americans, such a strong symbol of hope that her name appeared five times on the finalists list for the Academy of Country Music Awards, making her the most-nominated female in the business.

Smartly, Cochran adhered to the same criteria of honesty and believability in creating her sophomore album, Life Happened. Instead of searching for a group of songs that all had the potential for release as a single, she looked for songs that spoke to her—songs that connected to her soul.

"I wanted to continue the realness," she says.

Cochran succeeded quite handily. Guided by the same heart and determination that created "Angels," Life Happened suggests that Cochran could easily be making music for a long period of time. Tastefully emotional and impressively grounded in reality, the album segues 11 songs in a masterful portrait of a typical relationship. Opening with the cautious bliss of a new romance, it follows a sadly typical trail, capturing periods of satisfaction, betrayal and sorrow. But it comes back around to a sense of renewal.

"Basically," Cochran laughs, "it’s one vicious circle of heartbreak."

Much like "Angels," however, Life Happened processes the heartbreak in a manner that retains a sense of hope.

"By the end of the record, ‘All In How You Look At Things’ makes you reflect on the first part of the album and say, ‘OK, well this all happened for a reason.’"

That reflects Cochran’s view of life. She recognizes the gritty realities of existence, but remains doggedly upbeat.

"I like songs that leave something positive behind," she says, pointing at the album’s "White Lies And Picket Fences" as an example. "It’s such a well-written song, and it’s obviously about a troubled woman who has heartbreak in her life. But toward the end of the song, she’s OK, she’s doin’ fine. It leaves a positive feeling, and that’s what I wanted to accomplish, ‘cause I really think I’m a positive thinker."

Her first outing certainly achieved positive results. Even as "Angels In Waiting" and her follow-up hit "I Cry" established her with the general public, Cochran earned accolades from the critical media, which compared her most often to country icons Tammy Wynette and Loretta Lynn. Billboard magazine suggested that she "could become one of the format’s true torchbearers," while Entertainment Weekly enthused, "A star is born."

Meanwhile, she lived out her "leave something positive behind" philosophy. Moved by her two brothers’ struggle with cystic fibrosis, she used the "Angels" video to increase awareness of the disease, and she became an ambassador for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. She appeared on the CFF’s annual Sizzlin’ Country concerts twice, sang on the Jerry Lewis Muscular Dystrophy Telethon, performed a song for the Make-A-Wish Foundation, and helped bring awareness to Kaboom!, an agency that builds playgrounds for children in disadvantaged neighborhoods. Her tireless efforts were recognized by Family Circle magazine, which cited her in its "Women Who Make A Difference" issue.

In addition, Cochran appeared in such media as The CBS Early Show, CNN, Parade magazine, Politically Incorrect and the TV Guide Channel. Her videos continue to rack up heavy play on both country cable channels, CMT and Great American Country. And she was selected to perform at the 27th annual American Women In Radio and Television Gracie Allen Awards, recognizing exemplary programming that addresses the concerns of women.

If that’s not enough, along with her five ACM nominations, she took home trophies from the Billboard Video Music Awards and the CCMA Awards.

Early returns on the title track from Life Happened indicate she is only moving forward. "I’m speechless and in complete awe," wrote Robert K. Oermann, in the influential Music Row magazine.

"Life Happened" typifies the album’s quality. Brimming with visual imagery, it chronicles the broken dreams of everyday people, who find beauty in a routines that fall short of their original plans. Cochran performs it flawlessly, using dynamics to emphasize the song’s inherent drama. In the process, she instinctively manages to call attention to the song without making herself the focal point.

"The audience is so smart," she observes. "They pick up on the littlest things. I always feel that a singer has to be an actress for three-and-a-half minutes, and unless you are just some wonderful, award-winning, Oscar-quality actress, you’re not gonna pull it off.

They’re gonna know. So I always try to find songs that I can relate to now, or have gone through, which I think makes it a lot more believable, because it’s something that I feel when I’m actually singing it in the studio."

Her dedication to the material actually dragged out the process of making the album. Working with producer Billy Joe Walker Jr. (Travis Tritt, Pam Tillis) for the first time, they hit a wall after recording the first five songs, and went through several discouraging months searching for the right pieces.

As it turned out, Cochran was already holding several of those songs. Although co-writing "Angels In Waiting" helped gain one of her five ACM nods, she remains modest about her own songwriting. When she played several songs for Walker, she avoided telling him she had created them. He quickly tabbed four of them for inclusion on the album.

"Go Slow" uses a sultry setting to convey emotional connection, "I Used To Be That Woman" ably plums the heartbreak of deception, "Dead Of The Night" has a dark, mysterious quality, and "All In How You Look At Things" is rewardingly upbeat.

Her songwriting was, perhaps, the final key in unlocking Cochran as an artist. She had never taken the craft seriously until the final year before she signed her recording deal with Epic Records. Unfailingly gregarious, she had to dig deeper through the introspection of writing, and the process "made me more complete," she says.

"I can say things in a song to someone that I can’t look them in the face and say. It definitely is a therapy for me, and it’s made me get in touch with my feelings a lot more. I was always the clown, and the one who was always havin’ fun and laughin’, but when it came to the serious things, I was like, ‘If you don’t think about ‘em, maybe they’ll go away.’ So songwriting made me grow up a little."

In geographical reality, Cochran grew up in Austinburg, Ohio, a small town near the Pennsylvania border that feels the effects of the chilly winter winds off Lake Erie. Her father—now retired—was a heavy equipment operator, and her mother worked as a private investigator, where the lessons of her job helped Tammy even in her younger years to balance dreams and reality.

"My mom is very skeptical, but in a good way," Tammy reflects. "She used to always give me this advice—when you meet someone, her idea is you trust ‘em until they give you a reason not to, but only trust ‘em slowly. It’s kind of like, trust ‘em with a little bit of information. If they don’t blow it, you can trust them a little more."

While classmates were attracted to the glamour of Madonna and the decadence of Motley Crue, Cochran was magnetized by the more grounded stories conveyed by singers such as Tammy Wynette, Ray Price and Charlie Rich.

"There’s something in their voices, and I don’t think too many people have it," she says.

"They were so real. Vern Gosdin was the same way. When he sings ‘Chiseled In Stone,’ you want to cry, even if you have no way to relate to it. There’s a heartbreak in their voices."

(Ironically, all of her favorite singers—Wynette, Price, Rich, Gosdin and Barbara Mandrell—recorded for Epic Records, which eventually signed Cochran, or for Epic’s sister label, Columbia).

After she won the first talent contest she entered, at age 12, Cochran committed herself to music. When he parents had her select her present for her 16th birthday, she picked sound equipment over a car of her own. And when she was confronted with the choice of going to college or to Nashville, she chose Music City.

In an unusual show of commitment to their daughter, Delmar and Mabel moved with Tammy in 1991. They also displayed an unusual wisdom. Instead of jumping blindly into Nashville’s music game, they studied the topic slowly and diligently.

"When we first came here, we didn’t do much for the first year-and-a-half," Tammy explains. "We kind of read books, got to know what the whole deal was about, ‘cause there’s a lot more to having a record deal than singing. There’s a lot of other stuff involved, and so we took it really, really slow."

She faced the usual rejections, including a particularly painful one in which an executive told her, point blank, "I wouldn’t call you if you were the last singer in town." A blow to the ego, but one that did not stop her.

She also married briefly—an experience that challenged her commitment to music and sharpened her self-reliance.

"No matter what avenue you choose in your life, you’re gonna come up against brick walls," she says. "You’re gonna wanna turn around, and you’re gonna wanna run. I just wouldn’t give up."

It was in the aftermath of her divorce that she intensified her focus on songwriting. Not so ironically, she earned her first songwriting contract and her Sony recording deal shortly thereafter. And it was her songwriting that led eventually to "Angels In Waiting," and helped solidify the new album.

But Cochran is not looking backward at the awards nominations, or the "torchbearer" acclaim. She’s already writing for her third album, and making plans to eventually co-produce her music. In much the same way that she took a slow approach to learning the ropes in Nashville, she’s taking a long view of her career, laying the groundwork in a manner that should keep her in the forefront for years to come.

And the groundwork is quite simple. She’s combined an intense determination, an expressive vocal quality, and a keen sense of meaningful songs. She presents an impressive array of talents, but does so in a way that sends a relatable message: Tammy Cochran is ably converting a long-held dream into a hard-fought reality."

 

TAMMY COCHRAN
"LIFE HAPPENED" CUT BY CUT

"Love Won't Let Me" (Jason Deere, Franne Golde, Kasey Livingston):
"When I first heard the demo of 'Love Won't Let Me,' I looked at Billy Joe like he was crazy, 'cause it was such a pop demo. It was a great demo, but it was a pop demo, and I said, 'You know I sing country, right?' And he said, 'Trust me, trust me, trust me.' We went in, and did a guitar/vocal version to find keys and think about arrangements, and that's when I realized that it was country.

"But I think the reason I really, really like that song is because when you are in a new relationship, and you've been hurt, the last thing you wanna do is jump right back into another one. But when you meet someone that makes you feel this way, you can't not go. You can't not try."

"WANTED" (Al Anderson, Sharon Vaughn):
"Wanted is a prime example of wanting to be with someone who wants you for who you are, and not who they think you should be. It seems like in my personal experience-but also watching friends and people that I know-they're in a relationship and everything is marvelous, but slowly, the woman's trying to make the man something he's not, or vice versa. Really, everybody wants to be wanted for just who they are. They don't wanna have to change to make somebody happy, and that's why I like that song.

"Plus, I love the rhyme scheme. Not many people can take a phrase like 'ulterior motive' and use it in a song and actually make it work. That's why I never read the lyric sheet before I listen to the song."

"GO SLOW" (Tammy Cochran):
"We call it 'The Cigarette Song,' for obvious reasons.

"When you first fall in love, you have all these emotions in your mind, in your heart, and you don't know how to express them, because there's never one word that's strong enough to tell somebody how much you love them. I guess I tried to do it with this song.

"To me, the song is more about the emotional side of love than it is the physical side of love. It just ended up sounding like it's about the physical side. But I was trying to put my heart in my pen, and that's how it came out."

"WHAT KIND OF WOMAN WOULD I BE" (Kerry Kurt Phillips, Angela Hurt):
"This song I chose, not only because it's a well-written song, but I kinda related to it personally, with my divorce. Being in a relationship where somebody constantly tells you that you're not good enough, it makes you start to doubt who you are, and you never realize how strong you are until you have to be. I mean, I never thought that I could support myself and own a home and rely only upon myself for my daily needs. But when you have to do it, you do it."

"WHITE LIES AND PICKET FENCES" (Jess Brown, Tony Lane, Tammy Powell):
"I just love the way this song is written. I think we all have been let down, and probably been in love with someone who promised us forever, and then decided, 'No, I think not.' That's just as much a part of music as the happy stuff, and I think it's just real."

"I'M GETTING THERE" (Adrienne Follese, Billy Crain):
"It goes right to the process. We gotta heal. That's kinda where I was goin' there. After every heartbreak, there's a period of healing, although sometimes it takes longer than others. You eventually get there, if you allow yourself.

"And there's a line in it-'There's more to life, not less'-I love that line. It kind of brought the whole song together."

"LIFE HAPPENED" (Patrick Jason Matthews, Kerry Kurt Phillips):
"We were cuttin' in the studio, and we had all our songs chosen, but when that song came along, we just immediately said, 'Something's gotta go so we can make room for this song,' 'cause it's so incredible. It reminds me of everybody that I know.

"When I was in the studio singing this song, I had my eyes closed, and I could see the people that I went to school with that were these people. I've been to a class reunion. I had a wonderful time, but the people that you thought were gonna change the world maybe didn't do everything that they thought they were gonna do, or you thought they were gonna do, but they're very happy with their lives anyway, and it's just a reminder that everything happens for a reason."

"I USED TO BE THAT WOMAN" (Tammy Cochran):
"That song was inspired when a friend of mine, and myself, went to a writers night at The Bluebird Café in Nashville. Sometimes you know the people at your table, and sometimes you don't. There were about six writers in the round that night, and there were two ladies sitting next to us that we didn't know.

"You can't talk loud, and I hear this lady next to me whisper to the girl who's across the table from her. She says, 'That's him right there, in the plaid shirt.' She was referring to one of the writers. I'm sittin' right there, so, of course, I look. Then she whispers, 'That girl there, that's his girlfriend. That girl over there with the two kids-that's his wife.'

"Because I was married to someone who was not faithful, I looked at that wife, and I just kinda went, 'Oh, my God, this probably happened to me. I probably was in the same room and didn't even know it. I used to be her.'

"A week or so later, I was on the road in a hotel room, and I started thinkin' about it. It was so weird, but I knew there was somethin' there, and started writin' the song on one of those little, 2x3 notepads they give you."

"DEAD OF THE NIGHT" (Tammy Cochran, Patricia Gray):
"Honestly, this song doesn't really relate to the theme, but there's gotta be a good controversial song in every country album!

"I am not an accomplished guitar player-not at all-but I learned a new chord, and every time I learn a new chord, I have to write a song with the chord in it. It inspires me somehow. So I was actually sittin' on my bed, practicing my new chord, and I came up with this melody. It was so haunting, and the song really needed to be a very, very dark, mysterious kinda thing. So I came up with the title, 'The Dead Of The Night.'

"I'm a big fan of Lifetime TV, and you have a lot of real-life stories on Lifetime. They aired one about an abusive marriage, and the child was always trying to take up for the mom, and it got me going, so I called Patricia Gray, and told her the story. I said, 'Listen, What do you think?' It was about 10:00 at night, and she was like, 'Are you OK? Do you need to talk? Is something wrong?' Now we laugh about it. She reflects back to that and says, 'I was so worried about you.' I'm callin' her at 10:00 goin', 'Listen to this! It's about killin' somebody, with this really weird chord in it.'

"We wrote it about six weeks later, after we'd had a real good laugh about my whacko idea. We figured it would never get cut, but we thought it was cool."

"ALL IN HOW YOU LOOK AT THINGS" (Tammy Cochran, Patricia Gray):
"That was the first song that Patricia and I wrote. She brought the idea, with the title, and she had the same idea I had about how things that are devastating to you at one time, when you look back on them, you realize that you had to go through that bad part to get to the good stuff, to get to where you are. I thought it was a great way to give a little bit of hope to the future to come, even if what life has brought you so far isn't quite what you thought it would be."

"IF YOU CAN" (Joy Swinea):
"'If You Can' was the first single that I ever released, and I absolutely love the song. It did well for a first single, but I think there are a lot of country fans who may not be familiar with the song. It's the song that got me started, and I really wanted more people to have the opportunity to hear it, so we made it a bonus track on the new album."