Val C. Phoenix

I close my eyes and I see somebody I wanna be/ but just one look into the mirror shows me what I most fear

Some people do therapy. Kristen Hall writes songs. For the last several years, Hall, 31, has been turning her inner demons into song, and quite successfully. High Street Records has just released the Atlanta-based lesbian performer's third record, Be Careful What You Wish For....

With a husky, distinctive voice and a gift for turning a phrase, Hall has won admirers in many quarters. Friend and fellow musician Amy Ray calls her "the ultimate pop songwriter." And Heather Murphy, who hosts a radio show in Atlanta, declares, "She writes about everyday stuff. She's a great storyteller and a great songwriter."

Though not well known yet outside of her homebase, Hall's acoustic-based pop has found a lot of new friends, particularly among those who've witnessed her live shows, as an opener for the Indigo Girls and as a headliner. While the new record features complex band arrangements, Hall has honed her skills on the trusty acoustic guitar, spilling her guts as if they were close confidantes. It's hard to believe she once suffered from paralyzing stage fright.

Her lyrics, focused on "real life stuff" and always gender-neutral, ring true for many people. Murphy admires Hall's ability to make highly personal situations accessible to the listener. "Every time I go to her shows, I end up leaving and crying. The songs can mean something completely different to everyone listening."

Hall's themes spring from her own life: Alienation, bad relationships and distant travels are all condensed into three-minute, three-chord jewels in a seamless melding of words and melody. "The politics that excites me most in the whole world is the politics between people: friends, lovers, acquaintances," she says. "I guess it's not a very broad spectrum I choose to write about. I feel like the only topic in the whole world that I am truly an authority on is what's going on in my head."

The songs, she says, come to her more or less whole. "I write things very in the heat of an emotional moment," she admits. The results are expressions of passion and defiance, often tinged with sadness. A characteristic Hall lyric: "I am no stranger to pain/ Trouble's a face I know."

I've been drifting for what seems a hundred years/ Tragically not knowing I could steer.

Born in Grosse Pointe, Mich., Kristen Hall arrived in Atlanta by a roundabout route some thirteen years ago, working in graphic design and retail sales before edging onto the burgeoning acoustic scene. There her path crossed with that of the fledging Indigo Girls, Amy Ray and Emily Saliers, who began covering an early effort of her's, "Hearts That Have Burned." They also encouraged her to get up onstage, despite her overpowering stage fright. She toured with them as a guitar tech before striking out on her own.

Her association with the duo continues to the present; in 1992 Daemon, the label Ray started, released Hall's second record, Fact and Fiction, which featured several local musicians, including Saliers, who also appears on this new one.

Describing Hall, Ray says in admiration, "I've always thought of her as the ultimate pop songwriter. She can use the same three chords in ten songs, and it'll sound completely different. The songs seem very simple when you listen to 'em at first, but in reality the songs she writes are the hardest songs to write: catchy and sincere and not calculated."

It isn't easy to be kind with all these demons in my mind/ I only hope that one day I'll come clean

Hall knows what she wants and follows her instincts, which sometimes lead her astray. She smiles recalling the time Ray returned from a trip to Nashville with news that a band was interested in recording "Hearts That Have Burned." Hall rejected the idea out of hand. "I had blue hair and worked at Weekends, the coolest bar in Atlanta at the time. No fucking band called Sweethearts of the Rodeo was touching my song!" She laughs uproariously at her own pigheadedness. "Of course, they won a Grammy that year. Well, you know. Hindsight is 20/20."

A moment later, she turns serious. "I almost look at all that stuff as a blessing in disguise, too, because I was a major drug addict at the time, and thank God I never had enough money to buy more than I already had - 'cause I'd probably be dead. It's probably a pretty good thing I was broke."

Hall's bad habits included cocaine, which she now disdains. "I think cocaine particularly brings out the worst in people because it was such a widely accepted drug. It was like a status symbol. That was what grossed me out about it the most."

Her determination to change her ways extends to other areas of her life. "I've had a really bad tendency to turn the emotion pain into anger, and it's something that I'm really working on intensely this year - to change that and stick with what real feelings are."

Looking at the tales of woe in her songs, she concludes ruefully, "There's a reason for everything. If I've been writing all these songs about bad relationships, well then, maybe I better take a look at how to have a good one."

Pain gets locked inside a child and there's a child in us all

This new direction is signaled by new songs, such as a moody, mournful number called "Nothing." Hall explains, "It's about my mother and how unavailable emotionally she has been for me in my life."

Hall takes this unfolding drama to the stage, sometimes to the consternation of audiences. Introducing the song, she tells a Berkeley club crowd, "Abuse is a very uncomfortable topic, and I've noticed since I've been playing this song that every time I play it, it makes people twitch in their seats."

In fact it was that very performance in 1992 that caught the ears of High Street scout Bob Duskis, who promptly signed Hall to his label. High Street, a subsidiary of New Age stalwart Windham Hill, is a mid-sized label boasting a roster of singer-songwriters such as Patty Larkin and John Gorka. Duskis, who admires Hall's way with a crowd, hopes to book her as opening act on a big tour. "We wanna get her out there, so people can put a face behind the music," Duskis says.

Hall has already racked up some impressive numbers. Since its release, Fact and Fiction has sold more than ten thousand copies, an impressive achievement for an independent release. Hall played more than a hundred and fifty dates in support of the record, and it received airplay on college and adult alternative stations - good preparation for the new release, which should have even bigger distribution.

The edge Hall honed on previous albums carries a glossy shhen on Be Careful What You Wish For...., which one can easily imagine passing muster on commercial radio. The tone is a tad more upbeat than previous work, though a few songs are recycled.

Though mainly sticking to the folk-country sound of her earlier work, Hall dips into power ballad territory with the radio-friendly cuts "Open Arms" and "Moment in a Day." But if you're looking for woman-specific lyrics, listen very closely at the end of "Just So You Know" and ye shall be rewarded with the line, "I get high whenever she walks by," which just makes an already dandy song even more gratifying.

But can Hall find Top 40 success as an out lesbian?

Ray, who knows a bit about this dilemma, says any out lesbian singer-songwriter has her work cut out for her. "Being a woman is a strike against you, and being a lesbian makes it doubly hard. There's a lot of discrimination. MTV won't touch you if you're a known lesbian. I think radio and video are the hardest things to break into. The good ol' boy network is alive and well."

My sights are set on the comfort of a more forgiving shore and a life that's more worth living for.

While Daemon is designed to be a stepping-stone to the majors and potential pop success, Ray advises making the jump with caution. "It's hard - a constant battle," she says. "Being on a major label is great, because you get distribution and the money is great, but you have to be on your guard constantly about your marketing. The bigger it is, the more work it is."

For these reasons, Ray admits, "I'm wary about anybody else going into it unless they're strong and can stand up for themselves." She feels Hall can handle it, and she advises her friend to be herself and "just play music for music's sake."

Hall says she's going into the business with her eyes open. "I realize it's just that - a business. At the highest level, it's run by corporate executives that have not a clue that music is art."

As for video giant MTV: "Guess we need to out some people on that station," she says, adding, "Sooner or later people are gonna ask themselves, 'Why do all the girls on MTV look alike?'"

Duskis says High Street stands behind Hall totally. "My feeling is we signed her for who she is. It's her image and her life," he says. "Obviously, there are any number of successful lesbians - k.d. lang, for example. I don't think there us anything threatening in [Hall's] songwriting, anything that would alienate a listener."

For her part, Hall isn't worrying about pop success, preferring to concentrate on living a quality life and making her new relationship work. "I'm into getting my own shot together. I've wasted so many years fucking around and being pissed off and angry, and I just wanna go heal."

With a laugh she concludes, "I think that in a couple of years, I'm gonna put out a record about how happy I am. I would really like to get myself to a point where I'm writing songs like 'Strawberry Fields Forever' - like something totally detached. My life is changing. I'll be interested to see what comes out over the next couple o' years."