{"id":1248803,"date":"2025-03-24T11:13:36","date_gmt":"2025-03-24T11:13:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/pt\/?p=1248803"},"modified":"2025-03-24T11:13:36","modified_gmt":"2025-03-24T11:13:36","slug":"jessica-simpson-finally-takes-control","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/pt\/jessica-simpson-finally-takes-control\/","title":{"rendered":"Jessica Simpson Finally Takes Control"},"content":{"rendered":"


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Jessica Simpson is sitting on a thrifted green banquette in her Nashville music room, wondering if Sister Rosetta Tharpe is trying to send us a message. We\u2019d been talking about the late godmother of rock & roll, who Simpson just described as \u201cthe most badass\u201d of all potential badasses, when the silver resonator guitar behind her rung out a dissonant note entirely on its own. Was it contact from the great musical beyond, or just Simpson bumping the neck against the window? Who even cares either way? Simpson, after more than two decades in the spotlight, knows everything\u2019s better with a little bit of creative imagination.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe\u2019s agreeing with us!\u201d Simpson proclaims, cracking a huge grin. \u201cSee, this is the kind of stuff that just happens here.\u201d A picture of Tharpe stares at us from across the room, glued on one of three foam whiteboards where Simpson posted the inspiration for her first collection of original music since 2008, Nashville Canyon: Part I. There are quotes from Kurt Cobain (\u201cWanting to be someone else is a waste of the person that you are\u201d), photos of artists like Bonnie Raitt, and plenty of opportunities for her dirty sense of humor. \u201cThat says \u2018treat your girl right,\u2019\u201d Simpson says, laughing. \u201cBut the \u2018t\u2019 and the \u2018r\u2019 are whited out.\u201d<\/p>\n

More from Rolling Stone<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s a Tuesday morning at Simpson\u2019s rented house up on a hill, and she is cross-legged in a pair of leopard-print pants and silk western shirt, a Zyn nicotine pouch in her lip and a daisy ring, gifted to her by Burt Reynolds on the set of The Dukes of Hazzard reboot<\/a>, on her finger.\u00a0Nashville is not her permanent home, at least not until her three kids go off to college, but this modest mid-century place has become her refuge from the chaos of L.A.: the paparazzi around every corner, the pain of a public divorce, the pressure to be Jessica Simpson the popstar, whatever that means now. It\u2019s here where she not only felt inspired enough to create Nashville Canyon, but, at 44 years old, became the artist she wanted to be, in control of her own vision for the first time ever.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been so amazing to remove myself from my life as it was,\u201d Simpson says, \u201cbecause it\u2019s hard for me to be creative when I\u2019m taking care of everybody. And it\u2019s hard for me to convince myself that I needed to be selfish as a mother and as a business owner. \u00a0I had to literally uproot myself.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not an easy thing to do when everyone thinks they know exactly who you are \u2014 which, to be fair, is not entirely uninvited. Though she got her start as a pop singer, with 1999\u2019s Sweet Kisses, her fame exploded with the release of her MTV reality show Newlyweds, where she became America\u2019s domestic sweetheart and tuna or chicken queen (and Rolling Stone cover girl<\/a>). People stayed interested, even where there wasn\u2019t music to promote. A little too interested, maybe. Followers of Simpson often seemed to imagine themselves as her best friend and\/or personal trainer\/sober coach\/nutritionist. Simpson doesn\u2019t mind sharing herself with the world \u2014 her best-selling memoir was titled Open Book, after all \u2014 but that doesn\u2019t mean it hasn\u2019t been a challenge to figure out who she is away from all that scrutiny. \u201cIf I based it off comments or articles or anything like that, I wouldn\u2019t know who I am, either,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

Though Simpson never stopped writing music, she didn\u2019t release it, short of a few songs tacked onto the end of the audiobook for Open Book. In the expansive break from making albums, she weathered a few very public romances, got married, had kids, quit drinking, and built a massive lifestyle brand, the Jessica Simpson Collection, whose name she didn\u2019t even own until recently. Doing so required her to liquidate her assets and take out a major loan. \u201cNow everything goes to paying back the brand,\u201d she says, motioning to the chair next to her, which she thrifted for 20 bucks. \u201cBut I bought my freedom.\u201d In line with that open book approach, Simpson plans to produce a documentary using 400 hours of footage she compiled in the process of \u201cstopping drinking and buying my company.\u201d<\/p>\n

The attention hasn\u2019t always been positive. There was the awful \u201cmom jean\u201d incident that still gives her \u201cPTSD,\u201d which stings a little more now that ribcage-dusting pants are in style. \u201cThat was literal fat shaming,\u201d Simpson says. She was called a jinx when she dated Dallas Cowboys quarterback Tony Romo, and worse when she had a relationship with John Mayer<\/a>. She turned the experiences into knowledge for her brand. \u201cI\u2019d look at what every girl wore to be noticed by [Mayer], and I\u2019d take pictures, and I was like, \u2018This is what people wore in Wisconsin.\u2019 I understood what kind of jeans they liked, where they wanted their pockets.\u201d For the tabloids who followed it all, often unkindly, she offers a classic Jessica Simpson couplet: \u201cPeople can walk all over my name, but at least they\u2019re buying it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Jessica<\/span><\/div>\n

Jessica Simpson\u2019s performance at Willie Nelson\u2019s Luck Reunion included new songs, a cover of Dusty Springfield\u2019s \u201cSon of a Preacher Man,\u201d a reimagined version of her hit \u201cWith You.\u201d<\/p>\n

But when it came to music, few bothered to fully understand who Simpson was as an artist, or give her the credit she deserved as storyteller, which is exactly what her friend Willie Nelson saw in her. She\u2019s a balladeer, for sure, able to hit those monster notes, and has a knack for a summery melody (Her hit \u201cWith You?\u201d She wrote it). Simpson, at least, knew she was never destined to be a popstar or, as she puts it, \u201cthe manufactured pop star that abided by every rule.\u201d She started out singing gospel in church, with no idea she\u2019d end up chasing early 2000s TRL success.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was never gonna win, because I had someone like Britney [Spears] and Christina [Aguilera] ahead of me, who were selling so many more records,\u201d Simpson says. \u201cI didn\u2019t want to dance, I didn\u2019t want to wear a head mic. But I agreed to do it, because I worked for Sony, and I didn\u2019t want to let them down, and I felt like I was constantly letting people down. Even myself, probably because I wasn\u2019t singing words I wrote.\u201d She would talk a lot onstage, she says, to have some way of getting her voice out, and would constantly journal. It was her manager who urged her to start writing songs, and when she did, she got her first Number One.<\/p>\n

While most people assumed she was a pop diva alone, or bought into the \u201cdumb blonde\u201d myth, Simpson\u2019s musical tastes have always run deep, which is evident if you pay a little attention. She likes to cover songs like Dusty Springfield\u2019s \u201cSon of a Preacher Man,\u201d and included a version of Patty Griffin\u2019s \u201cLet Him Fly\u201d on her 2008 album, A Public Affair.\u00a0 She loves rock, country, soul, bluegrass, punk. So much so, that, over quarantine, she started a habit of spending hours upon hours in YouTube and Spotify wormholes, loading a playlist with everything that resonated: rockabilly, rock & roll, artists like Sister Rosetta, foundational Sixties garage-rock band the Sonics, blues pioneers like Mississippi Fred McDowell, and modern Americana artists like Sierra Ferrell, Alabama Shakes, and Brandi Carlile. \u201cI was so inspired when she performed at the Grammys,\u201d Simpson says about Carlile. \u201cI was like, finally! That\u2019s how women should be!\u201d She adds, cheekily, \u201cI also had boyfriends who had really good taste in music.\u201d<\/p>\n

The playlist grew to over 12 hours of songs. Jack White, whom Simpson deeply admires, even followed it under a pseudonym. At some point along the way, it occurred to her that the music she liked to listen to and the music she could make didn\u2019t have to be different things anymore. She owned her name, didn\u2019t have a label, and didn\u2019t have anyone (or more specifically, any man) asking her to sing a song that someone else wrote, while doing a little twirl someone else choreographed for her. And so, with a little Simpson-style cosmic urging from her kids, she came to Nashville.<\/p>\n

When Simpson started writing, she\u2019d send out the playlist to whoever she was going to sit with that day \u2014 which included beloved Americana artists like Fancy Hagood, Lucie Silvas, Natalie Hemby, and Jarrad K, thanks in part to the keen ear and local connections of manager Teresa LaBarbera \u2014 and had them pick a focus for inspiration. Her journals and poems, collected in binders, served as the scaffolding. Everything had threads of rockabilly or soul or Laurel Canyon dreaminess, totally different from anything she\u2019d done before. Who could even produce this? While writing \u201cBreadcrumbs,\u201d Jarrad K brought up the artist JD McPherson, who had recently moved back home to Tulsa from Nashville. \u201cI feel like he\u2019s the only person who would understand,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

Simpson listened to McPherson\u2019s music, and reached out immediately by taking the only option she could think of \u2014\u00a0sliding into his DMs. \u201cI was like, \u2018Oh, this is a thing!\u2019\u201d she says. \u201cI had never DM\u2019ed somebody before.\u201d<\/p>\n

McPherson, off the road from touring with Robert Plant and Alison Krauss, was eating with his family at Empire Slice House on Route 66 when a song by Simpson came on the television. It caught his daughter\u2019s eye, and she asked her dad who it was. He explained that Simpson was a pop star who now mostly makes clothes and shoes, maybe she had a pair? The next day, he got a notification that Simpson followed him on Instagram. It freaked him out. \u201cI was like, \u2018What is going on right now?\u2019\u201d McPherson says. \u201cParanoia kicks in. Is Tim Cook listening?\u201d<\/p>\n

Simpson sent him three white hearts, he replied with three thumbs-up emojis, and agreed to produce the record. Now, they\u2019re \u201clike brother and sister,\u201d she says. He calls her \u201ccuz\u201d and gave her a sticker of a corndog that she stuck on the back of her iPhone, because that\u2019s what she eats before heading into the studio (it used to be a chicken fried steak, but that grew a little too intense on the stomach). Is it an odd musical pair? Only if you assume Simpson is not who she is, but who we wanted her to be. Even McPherson was unsure if he\u2019d be the right fit.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt wasn\u2019t judgment,\u201d McPherson says. \u201cBecause if you put me in a studio with everything available and said, \u2018Make music that sounds like what she\u2019d done up to that point,\u2019 I would have no idea how to do it. I wouldn\u2019t know what plug-in to use, what microphone to use, who to hire. And then she sent me her inspiration playlist. I was like, \u2018Now we\u2019re talking.\u2019 Who knew Jessica Simpson was a Sonics fan? She has taste, she has chops, and she has something to say.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nashville Canyon was recorded at studios like East Nashville\u2019s Creative Workshop and RCA Studio B with live musicians, the first time in her entire career that Simpson had done so. \u201cI\u2019d only worn headphones and had a track in my ear,\u201d she says. \u201cI never got to feel the unearthing of a song and breaking it down.\u201d McPherson urged her to explore her lower register, especially for the vulnerable songs about her personal heartbreak. The band followed her lead, instead of her following orders. Simpson stocked the studio with candy and McPherson describes recording as \u201cthe most fun I\u2019ve ever had in a studio situation. Everybody kind of felt like we were giving her some new experience that she deserved but hadn\u2019t had yet.\u201d<\/p>\n

It took a beat for Simpson to get past the need for everything to be perfect, that early-Aughts pop music instinct kicking in. She\u2019d mess up a little and apologize profusely. Says Simpson: \u201cMy vocal producer was like, \u2018Jessica, why are you apologizing? You fart and burp and don\u2019t apologize. But you\u2019re apologizing for missing a word?\u2019\u201d It was an important lesson. \u201cWhen you sing through the mistake, the beauty is right there, and you have your best take right after that,\u201d she explains.<\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t just in the studio where this kind of thinking paid off. In her personal life, things were falling apart. She and her husband, Eric Johnson, separated. When you\u2019re as famous as Simpson is, even your heartbreak feels like public domain, but this time she channeled that emotion into songs. \u201cI\u2019m not comfortable with anger, so you won\u2019t hear much anger in any of my music,\u201d Simpson says. \u201cYou\u2019ll hear frustration, but it\u2019s strong. I deserve to love the way I love, and I love so deeply and so fully and in a committed way. Maybe there are others out there like that. Who knows?\u201d<\/p>\n

The songs on Nashville Canyon aren\u2019t exactly angry, but you can hear the loss, the frustration, and the reclamation. Tracks like \u201cUse My Heart Against Me,\u201d which was inspired by the blues boogie of Bo Diddly\u2019s \u201cYou Can\u2019t Judge a Book by Its Cover,\u201d show how easily her voice settles into this newfound niche. And fear not, she hasn\u2019t abandoned the power ballad: \u201cBlame Me\u201d hits that mark but in the soulful way she\u2019d always hoped to create, and the scorching \u201cLeave,\u201d about an unfaithful partner, brings the vulnerability and honestly of her public persona straight into her music. \u201cDid you do to her what you did to me?\u201d she sings. \u201cWas she on her knees?\u201d She calls that vulnerability her \u201csuperpower.\u201d<\/p>\n

Silvas, a co-writer on \u201cBlame Me\u201d and \u201cLeave,\u201d remembers being struck by just how vulnerable Simpson was willing to be in the studio. \u201cI felt like I\u2019d been sitting with a girl I\u2019ve known a long time,\u201d Silvas says. \u201cShe wrote from a very true place and has this incredible bravery.\u00a0 It was wonderful to be with someone who really wanted to write from the heart, and show people who she is. I think she felt like she hadn\u2019t gotten to be that yet.\u201d<\/p>\n

At one point during a recording session, the band broke out in applause. It was validating, as people had always clapped for Jessica Simpson when she was being herself on screen, cracking jokes on reality TV. Now they were doing it when she was singing her own songs. \u201cA lot of people are like, \u2018I didn\u2019t really listen to your music in the past, but I respected you as a singer, and I feel like this is the most you you\u2019ve ever been,\u2019\u201d Simpson says. \u201cTo me, that is success.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Those around her \u2014 McPherson, Silvas, Brothers Osborne guitarist John Osborne, Ashley Ray, musicians like Sista Strings \u2014 are what inspired the concept of a \u201cNashville Canyon,\u201d a place like L.A.\u2019s Laurel Canyon that overflows with creativity and collaboration. \u201cI was talking about Laurel Canyon and how in Nashville I felt those vibes of support,\u201d Simpson says. \u201cA community of friends and people who just supported my dream. They understood it and wanted to help. It pushes me to better and step into taller shoes. If that\u2019s possible.\u201d<\/p>\n

There is a Nashville Canyon: Part II in the works with McPherson, which includes surprises like a Chris Isaak co-write, and plans are in motion for a lot more music under her own label, aptly titled Nashville Canyon Records. She recently took the stage for the first time in 15 years, at South by Southwest, popping up at Nelson\u2019s Luck Reunion<\/a>. In fact, she\u2019s due to rehearsal in 30 minutes, and she\u2019s nervous. It\u2019s a good feeling. And, for the record, she still likes that Rolling Stone cover shoot, down to the little white tank top and Swiffer Wet-Jet she was holding.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was really just being myself,\u201d Simpson says. \u201cI picked up a Swiffer again recently and, my gosh, they\u2019ve upgraded these things! Every time I said Swiffer back then I got $30,000. I would just work it into any conversation. I\u2019d be like, ka-ching!\u201d It\u2019s a classic Simpson quip. Now she\u2019s on a journey to show the world just what a classic Simpson record sounds like.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I\u2019ve had success in my life is when I\u2019ve just been honest and real,\u201d she says, getting up and preparing to swap her slippers for a pair of towering heels. \u201cI\u2019ve never gotten a chance to do that in music until now.\u201d<\/p>\n

Best of Rolling Stone<\/strong><\/p>\n

Sign up for RollingStone’s Newsletter<\/a>. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook<\/a>, Twitter<\/a>, and Instagram<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n

\u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.yahoo.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n


\n \u2018O artigo anterior pode incluir informa\u00e7\u00f5es divulgadas por terceiros\u2019
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\u2018 Alguns detalhes deste artigo foram extra\u00eddos da seguinte fonte celebrity.land \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Jessica Simpson is sitting on a thrifted green banquette in her Nashville music room, wondering if Sister Rosetta Tharpe is trying to send us a message. We\u2019d been talking about the late godmother of rock & roll, who Simpson just described as \u201cthe most badass\u201d of all potential badasses, when the silver resonator guitar behind […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1248803","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-estrelas"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1248803","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1248803"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1248803\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1248803"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1248803"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1248803"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}