{"id":2441473,"date":"2019-03-08T03:29:00","date_gmt":"2019-03-08T10:29:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/?p=300963"},"modified":"2019-03-08T03:29:00","modified_gmt":"2019-03-08T10:29:00","slug":"nikki-lane-on-being-a-true-outlaw-metoo-in-music-and-her-vintage-ski-suit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/local-news\/nikki-lane-on-being-a-true-outlaw-metoo-in-music-and-her-vintage-ski-suit\/","title":{"rendered":"Nikki Lane on being a true outlaw, #MeToo in music and her vintage ski suit"},"content":{"rendered":"
Nikki Lane will take to the Vilar stage on Today at 7:30 p.m.<\/strong>
Special to the Daily<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Nikki Lane has the perfect outfit picked out for tearing up the slopes at Beaver Creek.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a 1970s Levi\u2019s ski suit,\u201d said Lane, who plays Saturday at the Wheeler Opera House. \u201cThere are some new ski suits that I like, but they\u2019re too fancy. They\u2019re too expensive.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a predictable answer from Lane, an old soul who has created a vintage sound that\u2019s part country, part rockabilly, part blues and 100 percent fearless. Lane grew up in Greenville, South Carolina, raised by a single mom and a dad who lived in a trailer. He taught her how to ride horses and four-wheelers and shoot guns. She said she ate nothing but mac and cheese and chicken fingers for the first 19 years of her life \u2014 and was the girl in high school whose budget for her prom dress was 50 bucks.<\/p>\n

That led to her knack for finding gems in vintage clothing stores and flea markets and her eclectic fashion sense.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy mom is the type of person that calls me and has drug a dresser down from the neighbor\u2019s house and has now turned it gray and put pretty knobs on it and made 400 bucks off it,\u201d she said. \u201cYou know, we were taught to do that kind of craftiness, which obviously created individuality.\u201d<\/p>\n

That individuality worked well for Lane after she dropped out of high school, moved to Los Angeles and, through sheer force of will, talked her way into well-paying fashion jobs. She eventually wound up in New York City, where she wrote her debut album \u201cWalk of Shame\u201d after a boyfriend left her and she was holed up in a 400 square-foot apartment with her thoughts.<\/p>\n

She has never stopped collecting clothes, which spawned her other blossoming creative venture: High Class Hillbilly, a vintage store in East Nashville that\u2019s taken off like her music career.<\/p>\n

Out on the road, where she has toured almost nonstop for the last eight years, most recently behind her excellent third album, \u201cHighway Queen,\u201d Lane said her two creative passions run together.<\/p>\n

\u201cI tried to encourage my band to stop smoking, but for as long as they do smoke cigarettes, their cigarette breaks are basically in the parking lots of antique malls,\u201d she joked. \u201cI personally am trying really hard to get into a bus, which is my next step, but it scares me a little bit because with the bus comes overnight drives while we sleep, which is awesome for the tour but sad for my thirsting, because it will take out a lot of the pit stops.\u201d<\/p>\n

About those pit stops: Lane has curated a network of vintage dealers from Los Angeles to Spokane to Dallas to Nashville, and plenty of stops between, which includes Goldmine Vintage in Denver, where she says she first discovered Ski Levi\u2019s.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re denim and corduroy bibs with jackets and I have like navy, black, denim. Like every pair of bibs,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd they do a good job. They\u2019re obviously water-resistant. So as long as I have on a good little pair and layering, I\u2019ll look chic on the slopes.\u201d<\/p>\n

In a wide-ranging phone interview with the Vail Daily, Lane opened up about how she\u2019s maintained her integrity in a business where it\u2019s easy to get co-opted, what makes her a true outlaw and why she stopped putting so much effort into social media. She also talked about why the music industry, and humanity, needs to change the narrative about how women are treated in the #MeToo era. This interview has been condensed and includes some profanity.<\/p>\n

Vail Daily: You\u2019ve been labeled alt-country, outlaw country, neo-rockabilly, etc. But labels are confining, especially when it comes to getting play on country radio. Do you get sick of the labels or is there one you embrace?<\/p>\n

Nikki Lane:<\/span> It\u2019s like we need vocabulary to describe something, right? People are putting labels on it because they\u2019re trying to lump it in with other things. That helps me as much as it hurts me sometimes. I normally tell people I\u2019m country music for people who say they don\u2019t like country music. It\u2019s indie-leaning. I listen to mostly rock \u2018n\u2019 roll and old country. That kinda seeps out in little details throughout the catalog. The labels don\u2019t bother me. Like, I see people, they mock the word outlaw, and then sometimes they love the word outlaw. But who gives a f\u2013k? I\u2019m not saying I rob banks because I\u2019m an outlaw. I\u2019m saying that I don\u2019t go into a board meeting with 14 people who talk about what my hair and color palette are going to be for next year and like Margo Price songs and say, would you go more this direction? I\u2019m outlaw because we don\u2019t try to do each other\u2019s s\u2013t. That term is perfectly good because the other term could be pop country and I would not want to be called that.<\/p>\n

VD: I love a song like \u201c700,000 Rednecks,\u201d but does country music not have a sense of humor?<\/p>\n

NL:<\/span> They don\u2019t mind their rednecks. It\u2019s more like seeing an NPR article where they\u2019re like, she\u2019s embracing rednecks? I\u2019m like, well, what do you think that means? I feel like it\u2019s actually more in that level, in the indie or more educated crowd, where they\u2019re like, why are you trying to collect rednecks? I made a shirt that\u2019s like, \u201c1 of 700,000\u201d and it doesn\u2019t even have my name on it. The country guys are the ones who wear that and chuckle their asses off because they think it\u2019s an inside joke. It\u2019s tricky because rednecks are sometimes racist and all kinds of other things that I\u2019m not. Things that I don\u2019t get behind. I think that\u2019s what important. For me, I grew up with my dad in a trailer with horses and four wheelers and trucks. You know, I moved to L.A. and every guy I dated would go, \u201cOh, have you seen \u2018Chinatown?\u2019 Have you seen \u2018Mulholland Drive.\u2019\u201d And I was like, no, no. It was like, we never watched TV. I wasn\u2019t inside. I was a redneck. I moved to the city and I expanded my horizons on my own accord. Now I can sit in any room, with few exceptions, and be comfortable. But, at the end of the day, when I go down to my dad\u2019s house, I drive his F-350 and I shoot a gun and I ride a four-wheeler and that\u2019s what I call a redneck. And I\u2019m proud.<\/p>\n

VD: Of all the vintage stuff you own, what\u2019s the one thing you grab if the house is on fire?<\/p>\n

NL:<\/span> It\u2019s a jacket. There\u2019s a rack of jackets right by the front door specifically in case. I think fire is the thing that I\u2019m most scared about as a human in my life because I\u2019ve put so much energy into my collection. I feel like, in general, I could let it all go, but for me, if there was a fire, it would be my dogs and cats, a box of photos and then I have a 1953 Gold (Gibson) LG1. Even though everything might be on commercial insurance, that one is a family heirloom that would never be able to be replaced. I would probably do my best to get those things out, then cry like a baby if I lost the rest, but go buy it again.<\/p>\n

VD: You\u2019ve lived in L.A., then New York and now you live in Nashville \u2014 all cities where ambitious young people go \u2026 and get co-opted by powerful industry forces that tell them how to be, what to do, how you should look and how to make it big. But, for someone as confident as you are, it seems like you were immune to those forces. How\u2019d you keep your integrity and make it this far in the music business while staying true to yourself?<\/p>\n

NL:<\/span> I think I started with that really strong sense of self. That was the part that was non-negotiable. I think that if young artists were told that before they ever showed up in these cities, they\u2019d be in a lot better shape. For me, the word artist definitely equates to diversity. Separating the details of myself from someone else \u2026 In fact, looking back now, I\u2019m very established in my personality in my stuff and my brand and whatever, but now I would be really well served to find a big label or like a big push, because they wouldn\u2019t be able to push me. I think big labels just find kids that aren\u2019t defined and they help define them. There\u2019s no crime in that. But for me, I had to do the developing of my personality first, so picking the right label, those more indie labels like New West, which is a grassroots-style label with a limited number of people on the roster working. So, people encourage my diversity, encourage my unique qualities. I just only work with people who don\u2019t f\u2013k with me.<\/p>\n

VD: What\u2019s your response to the Ryan Adams allegations? Have you ever been in situations similar to what some of those female artists have alleged? Does the music business need some serious cleaning up?<\/p>\n

NL:<\/span> Humanity needs some real cleaning up. I paid close attention to what was being said about Ryan, from all sides, because I know a lot of those women. I know him a little. The only thing that disappoints me is like, I know, 10 bar managers in each town I\u2019ve ever worked in that are right there. We need to bust a lot of ass in general. Because it is a normal thing. It\u2019s not just celebrities. It\u2019s tricky. A lot of people have the same story. I\u2019ve been in situations where I want to be as mad as those women are at Ryan. And they deserve to be. It\u2019s because I probably told myself at the time that the behavior was acceptable. When I see all that about him, I worry about him as a human, still. He\u2019s getting a lot of backlash, and he deserves it. And it\u2019s going to be a very short period of backlash in comparison to the amount of time he was misbehaving. But I feel like we need to crack down on all that behavior. Because it\u2019s right there. I was raised as a tomboy and I was raised not to put up with s\u2013t. And I still found myself in a couple professional situations where I felt like I was brought in really quickly and really heavily into an environment because I was mesmerized and I was excited. And I felt hit on and hurt at the back end. That\u2019s not acceptable \u2026 I think there\u2019s going to be a lot more people that come out that fans are completely shocked that, like, it was going down like that. And that, women like me are going, yeah, no s\u2013t. \u2026 We have to whoop ass across the board and change the f\u2013king narrative. Change the way it happens in the future.<\/p>\n

VD: You\u2019re rather tame on social media. What gives?<\/p>\n

NL:<\/span> That\u2019s because I\u2019m not trying to do social media. I think social media is sucking energy out of everybody. And I enjoy it. Like Instagram, I love to scroll through it and I find it inspiring but when it gets really personal, when it gets really political, when a peer of mine makes a political statement and then somebody says, shut up and sing. That s\u2013t drives me crazy. That is absolutely inappropriate. That\u2019s what democracy is. We\u2019re all entitled to an opinion. However, for my social media, I\u2019m not interested in ostracizing a Republican or a Democrat based on their choice from my vibe. You want to talk about politics, meet me after the show. And I still probably won\u2019t, because it gets on my nerves. I do believe that using your power and your network as a voice is important. I just personally keep some of that s\u2013t to myself.<\/p>\n

Vail Daily editor Nate Peterson can be reached at npeterson@vaildaily.com or at 970-748-2929.<\/span><\/p>\n

via:: The Aspen Times<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Nikki Lane will take to the Vilar stage on Today at 7:30 p.m.Special to the Daily Nikki Lane has the perfect outfit picked out for tearing up the slopes at Beaver Creek. \u201cIt\u2019s a 1970s Levi\u2019s ski suit,\u201d said Lane, who plays Saturday at the Wheeler Opera House. \u201cThere are some new ski suits that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-2441473","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-15 02:27:00","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSPN The Valley's Quality Rock","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2441473","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2441473"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2441473\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2441473"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2441473"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2441473"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}