Late night with Faith Kleppinger

Local music fans may be surprised to learn that low-key singer/songwriter Faith Kleppinger is a senior writer at CNN. "I write scripts for the anchors to read on prime time Headline News," she says. "But I've done everything from running cameras to producing. I love the pressure of the breaking news stuff with the two-minute deadlines."

To conform to CNN's fast-paced format, Kleppinger has to write her material in short conversational blocks. And her deadline-intensive style helped motivate the completion of her first solo album, Asleep In the Well on Two Sheds Records. The result of an intense four-day recording session with producer David Barbe and Young Antiques guitarist Blake Rainey at Athens' Chase Park Transduction, the album shimmers with the lunar glow of whispered late-night conversations.

"I sing at about half the volume that I talk, " Kleppinger says. "It's quiet — a good hangover record."

At CL's request, Kleppinger composed two CNN-style blurbs about herself:

Breaking news version: "This just in: Emergency crews are on the scene at a rock club in Atlanta, where a local musician has been playing quiet songs with no drummer. At least four people were injured; five attended."

Feature style: "After scrapping the original titles Songs to Slit Your Wrists By and Freon: One Woman's Ode to the Coolant Industry, Faith Kleppinger has released her debut CD, Asleep in the Well. So far, listeners have used it as background music for recovering from surgery and putting together an iguana cage."

Faith Kleppinger plays The Earl Thurs., June 6.??