Jessica Lea Mayfield's Tequila Hangover Nearly Ruined Black Keys Collaboration

Jessica Lea Mayfield might be seen as an up-and-coming artist with her new album, 'Tell Me,' but the Kent, Ohio-based singer-songwriter made her stage debut with her family's bluegrass band when she was 8 years old. With all this exposure, it was only a matter of time before her solo work -- a mix of folk and country sounds -- would pique the interest of another Ohio native, Dan Auerbach of the Black Keys.

After getting his hands on Mayfield's first EP 'White Lies,' Auerbach contacted the then-15-year-old singer through MySpace and asked if she was interested meeting him at his studio.

"I didn't have my driver's license yet so my brother had to drive me to his home studio," Mayfield tells Spinner. "Me and Dan recorded eight songs together the day we met, which is a lot for people who don't know each other. It immediately became apparent that us working together was a good idea. It was a lot of fun."

Auerbach not only produced Mayfield's first album, 2008's 'Blasphemy So Heartfelt' and this year's 'Tell Me,' he invited her to sing on 'Things Ain't Like They Used to Be' from his band's 2008 record, 'Attack and Release.' As ecstatic as Mayfield was, she admitted that the recording process didn't go as smoothly as she expected.

"That was one of the songs he played for me on the day we met," she says. "I was really excited that he had asked me to come and sing on it. It was the day after my 18th birthday, which was when I drank tequila for the first time. The studio was two and a half hours away from my house so the whole time I was driving to the studio, I was hungover. I'm glad I pulled it off. Since then, I haven't really drank tequila anymore."

Now 21 years old, Mayfield is a bit wiser, a growth that's evident on 'Tell Me.' "It has more instruments and more of a band feel rather than just me and Dan screwing around," she says. "The songwriting is a lot different. I'm a lot older in the sense that not every guy I meet is going to be my one true love."

She avoids the love route on 'Tell Me,' the album's title track, which looks closely at a "crisis of friendship." "You know when you're in that moment when you're friends with someone and then you both become different people? You don't have anything that you can relate on anymore," she says. "You know that you're really good friends, but having nothing to talk about and nothing in common, it's just these pivotal points in our lives where we're just like, 'Should we still be friends?' That's what the song is about."

While Mayfield is still growing as an artist, her stage confidence was never an issue. "A lot of people talk about having stage fright, but I'm more comfortable onstage," she admits. "But if I'm seeing a show, I'd have a panic attack being in the audience and surrounded by people."

Mayfield is spending the first of half of 2011 on the road, with Justin Towes Earle and then the Avett Brothers. "For most people, it's not their [normal] form of life. [They] get thrown into it because of music," she says. "But for me, touring is my normal life. When I get thrown into being at home and have a lot of off time and I'm like, 'What? No I can't do that.'"

'Tell Me' is out now via Nonesuch.

Jessica Lea Mayfield Performs 'Somewhere in Your Heart'


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