Stripped down, souled out

Feb. 12, 2001. 3 p.m. Club Kaya. India Arie sound check.
It's an awful day — cold, rainy, Monday — for the R&B singer/songwriter's reintroduction to the Atlanta scene that spawned her. Arie is late. A Motown Records executive paces the floor of the club with a cell phone in hand, finalizing arrangements for the night's event. Back-up musicians file in and prepare for Arie's arrival. The singer's handlers confirm the artist is on her way, as if there was a doubt she'd actually show.
Almost an hour later, Arie bounces in as if she has springs on the bottom of her shoes. She's all smiles — almost giddy — glowing from excitement as well as from the long orange coat that her mother, a designer named Simpson, made for her. It's as if the grey dampness outside suddenly turned to radiant sunshine.
Arie greets her label folks, musicians and others in the club. "I remember you," she says to one of the many people awaiting her arrival. She extends her hand and smiles, then recounts with impeccable detail an encounter that took place nearly four years ago, back when she was still an aspiring local vocalist.
In those days, Arie was one of the brightest stars on the Atlanta neo-soul/urban-alternative scene and a member of the local Groovement/Earthseed collective that also includes soul singer Donnie and the group Jiva. Earthseed featured her "India's Song" on its 1997 compilation and Arie ultimately found herself, thanks largely to the efforts of Earthseed, performing with her acoustic guitar in front of thousands at stops on the Lilith Fair.
Then in early 1999, Arie signed with Motown. While it served as an indication Atlanta's neo-soul scene had arrived, it also removed Arie from that same scene that had supported her. In the past two years, as she found herself thrust into a business focused on preparing her for national stardom, Atlanta saw little of Arie. She spent most of that time working on her debut album, a process she describes as fraught with compromises she never had to face as an independent artist.
"I had lessons to learn about taking control over my project," Arie says. "I always did control my stuff, but then I got sidetracked into thinking, 'Well, if I get this album out, then I can do other stuff.' I was listening to everybody and that was the problem. I was like, 'OK, I need to do this, I need to do that,' instead of doing what you're supposed to do with opinions."
Arie grew up in Denver, Colo., where her father, Ralph Simpson, played basketball professionally. While friends included the families of other black athletes in town, at school she stood out among her mostly white classmates. Rather than feel alienated, Arie found it liberating. "It allowed me to just be as different as I wanted to be," she says. "I was like, 'Well, I'm different anyway. I'm gonna wear this, I'm gonna say that, I'm gonna do my hair like this.' All I ever really did was play music."

"I'm not the average girl from your video/And I ain't built like a supermodel/But I learned to love myself unconditionally/Because I am a queen."
Reflecting her upbringing as a single-minded black girl in whitebread Colorado, Arie's debut CD, Acoustic Soul — released next week by Motown — incorporates an eclectic blend of voices, from Donny Hathaway to Karen Carpenter, and diverse styles from folk to hip-hop. Influences aside, though, most of what's heard on Acoustic Soul is pure India Arie. From the first single, "Video," an anthem of individuality, to "Back to the Middle," an ode to self-discovery, Arie reveals layer upon layer of herself.
It all happens quite organically, she says. "I don't really know how to articulate it," she says. "Since music is intangible and it's pure energy, when you sing it, it goes into your ear and into everybody's ears and into their hearts. So when I write, I'm just saying words that I hear in my ear or something I dreamt about or whatever."
"Back to the Middle" is particularly revealing, even if it was unintentional. The song represents Arie's finding a place where she could feel comfortable with herself and her own decisions — a place that began to seem lost to her as the making of her debut dragged on.
"I didn't know how much it was about me until I went through all the stuff recording my album," she says of the song. "I had a year and a half of being broken all the way down and being built all the way back up. That's why 'Back to the Middle' is very personal." Of the recording process, Arie says, "I was trying to be agreeable, but everybody had different opinions. So I was like, 'Why not follow my own?' And that's what I did. Six months later, my album was done, after a year and a half of working on it."
"She is 25/Spent over half of her life/So afraid to speak her mind/It's such a shame, 'cause oh what a brilliant mind she has .../ When will she learn to come back to the middle?"
Trusting her own heart, of course, didn't mean totally discounting the advice of others, especially Motown president Kedar Massen-burg, who encouraged her to deliver her message with attention to commercial finesse.
"I want people to hear what I say and if my record is not as loud as the one that just went off, then it's gonna get lost," she says, justifying the album's sound, which some may view as a slickening up of Arie's signature organic, acoustic-based soul. "So I can't do all live drums and I can't do just guitar. If that's what I wanted to do, I would have made another independent album. It's a balance. But I'm cool with it ... Kedar never made me compromise what I talk about, which is the most important part. It was just like, 'Try some of this style of production. You have to do this, you have to.' I don't have to do anything, but if I want to reach the goal I'm going for, then I have to do it for myself. So I did and everything worked out."
Feb. 12, 2001. 9 p.m. Club Kaya. India Arie showcase.
Arie's performance tonight comes on the heels of a New York showcase the week before, which was, she says in measured terms, "interesting." It was her first taste of being a hyped-up rising star: Motown recording artist India.Arie. There were plenty of executives and retailers and marketers and press — some there because they wanted to be, others because they had to be. And, she well knows, it's now her job to win them all over.
Replaying the night in her mind, she says, "There was a lot going on. I was singing and I would look to one side and some guy from TV was winking at me, and I was like, 'This is weird.' It was crazy, but it lit a fire under me. All the stuff I had been thinking about the past year is not theory any more. I have to put it into action. And I have to just continue to be the person I am when I'm not on stage," she says, seemingly as much for her own benefit as ours. "You have to still be you."
Despite the obvious pressure, Arie strives — now more than ever — to keep perspective. After all, each step is another opportunity to face the demands of a dream fulfilled.
"People always ask me, 'Are you so excited that now it's happening?' And I'm like, 'There's no it.' When I wrote my first three songs, I was so happy. And when I did my first show, I was so happy. And when I did my first tour, I was so happy. And now my album's done, it's just another piece that's come together. It's just like I've reached another goal. So whatever happens, I'll be happy because I have an album that people are gonna hear. It's gonna make someone think about themselves. Whatever happens, I'll be satisfied."
As she launches into her set at Kaya, Arie is radiant and blissful. Celebrating her homecoming as a conquering hero, she's comfortable amongst the friendly crowd packed in to reacquaint themselves with the statuesque guitar-wielding soul singer. Fronting a full band, she runs through the highlights of Acoustic Soul to an enthusiastic response.
While many have known and loved Arie from back in the day, there's a sense tonight that we're watching a different India Arie. A woman on the verge of ascension. A woman bracing for challenge and change. A woman who has lived and dreamed on the outside but always fights to come back to the middle.
Rhonda.Baraka@creativeloafing.com
India.Arie's Acoustic Soul is out March 20. A CD release party will be held Sat., March 31, at the PlanetJam Cotton Club. Doors open at 8 p.m. Tickets are $10, with proceeds to Sista Space Collective. For more information, call 404-688-1193.