Patty Griffin Just Wants to Have Fun

Posted on Feb 15th 2007 11:04AM by Steve Baltin
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One week after the release of her new album, 'Children Running Through,' consummate songwriter Patty Griffin dazzled a Tuesday night L.A. crowd, which included Cameron Crowe and actress Jill Hennessy, during a sold-out show at the Hotel Cafe.

Among the highlights from the new material were the gospel-tinged beauty, 'Up to the Mountains (MLK Song),' and the raucous crowd pleaser 'No Bad News,' a song Griffin wrote after having enough of the color coded national security alerts. "I wrote 'No Bad News' about the time the yellow alert, orange alert stuff was really getting out of hand," she says laughing. "And it was pissing me off. I don't really understand what the point of that is. You're sitting there in a stall in an airport and a voice comes over the loud speaker, 'This is an orange alert day.' What am I supposed to do about that?"

The whole album finds Griffin stretching her wings vocally, particularly on 'Up to the Mountains (MLK Song).' The singer-songwriter tells Spinner she realized at the end of her last tour she was ready to let loose. "I kind of rolled out some of the newer songs that were influenced by listening to crooners, and Sam Cooke. And I was also covering some Motown stuff. It felt so good to have those big, long notes to sing -- and sing them loud. I realized that's why I started singing -- just to have fun."