Her early-'80s move to Manhattan was to study film at NYU, not to sing. But the lonelier side of New York life sent her into the wrong kind of funk. It lifted not long after that fateful open-mike night when some drunken encouragement got her on stage to sing a Billie Holiday number; ultimately, music "reawakened some things that had been beaten out of me by living in this place," and provided her with a community, too, as she began working the blues-bar circuit.
Enter producer Rick Chertoff, who beat the bidding-war vultures to Osborne's door. By then she'd already cut two tiny indie-label releases, but her writing was rough by his standards, and his pop credits (Cyndi Lauper, Sophie B. Hawkins) were slick by hers. In a rare show of restraint, they agreed to spend a trial week collaborating with Chertoff's A team, Hooters stalwarts Eric Bazilian and Rob Hyman, before talking business. Seven days later, Relish's "Dracula Moon" and "Pensacola" were in the can, and the lawyers were cheerfully called in.
Many more tracks were recorded for the album than made it. One of these, almost, was "One of Us." "She'd be the first to tell you she had doubts about it," says Bazilian, who wrote it by himself one night, "but [Chertoff] was adamant. I understood her hesitation. She's got a lot to say as a writer, and I don't think that's a song she would have written at that time." Osborne loves the song but says her reluctance came from "knowing it was something people would gravitate toward as a pop hit, and if that was all they heard, they might get the wrong impression."
In the end, the God song has worked for Osborne in mysterious ways. The hit paid her way to India, where she recently traveled to study qawwali singing — hence the Hindu fixation. It made her the dark horse, moving up fast, in this year's Grammy contest. And it earned her a ticket to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony, where Paul Shaffer unexpectedly prevailed upon her to perform an impromptu duet of "I Heard It Through the Grapevine" with Stevie Wonder, in tribute to her heroine Gladys Knight.
"I'm in the paper!" she yelps. Flipping through the New York Daily News between takes, Osborne has stumbled upon a photo of herself and her duet partner. "Me, Stevie Wonder. Stevie Wonder, me. Me, Stevie Wonder." she repeats mantra-like, pointing at the twin figures. Lowering her voice to a murmur the nearby blue man can barely make out, Saint Joan confesses, "I'm gonna steal this paper."
Forgive her, Krishna, for she has sinned. And no doubt will again.
(Additional reporting by Beth Johnson)
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