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Ani DiFranco wasn't thinking about getting pregnant when she wrote the following lyrics for the song "Reprieve":
"To split yourself in two/ Is just the most radical thing you can do."
The words from the title song of her new album proved somewhat prophetic. The feminist, indie-rock icon and her boyfriend, recording engineer Mike Napolitano, are expecting their first child in February.
"I'm always writing about stuff before it happens in my life," DiFranco said in a cheerful, relaxed phone call from a tour stop in Portland, just days before her concert tonight at Marymoor Park in Redmond.
"I've come to learn that it sort of comes from the depths of our subconscious knowledge. There's a bit of writing on 'Reprieve' that kind of foresees this little surprise in my life."
Motherhood will be a new experience for the Buffalo, N.Y., native who started her record label, Righteous Babe Records, in 1989 at the age of 18. The prolific, outspoken singer-songwriter has released a new album almost every year since the label was founded. She gained a devoted following with her politically pointed lyrics.
"I'm pretty excited to be journeying into the epicenter of female power," she said. "But it's already trippin' me out."
DiFranco's knack for foreseeing the future also may extend to natural disasters. Though she still owns a house -- and a record label -- in Buffalo, she has lived in New Orleans off and on for several years. She met Napolitano there and is now buying a house on Magazine Street in the desirable Uptown District.
DiFranco was living in a New Orleans apartment -- and working on her new album -- when Hurricane Katrina hit. In her scathing centerpiece song about the Bush administration, "Millennium Theater," the Crescent City "bides her time" while the ice caps melt and everything goes to hell.
"It's a crazy feeling to be buying in New Orleans right now," she said. "It's harrowing, but it also feels good to be investing in a town that's in such dire straits."
Apart from a desire to have a role in New Orleans' future, it was love that convinced her to buy a house there.
"I've been hanging out there for years and renting a little apartment. But when I fell in love, I almost started living there as much as I live anywhere. It just seemed like the right thing to do on many levels," she said.
DiFranco sees signs of hope and progress in the city and region, despite continued negligence on an institutional level.
"Basically the only hope in New Orleans is people helping each other," she said. "There are all kinds of community groups and so many activists and churches that are mobilized. Habitat for Humanity is doing awesome work. You can just show up at their headquarters -- anyone, any day -- and they'll hand you a tool and they'll put you to work."
Ever critical of the Bush adminstration and its handling of Katrina, DiFranco sees another positive in New Orleans' misery.
"It's one more nail in the adminstration's coffin. How can we ever forget what they did in front of the eyes of the world, which was to abandon the poor of the entire Mississippi Gulf Coast?" she said.
Among the more important themes on "Reprieve" is the persistence of patriarchy in world politics.
"It's the elephant in the room," she said. "As I get older, I really understand peace to be a product of balance. And there's a fundamental imbalance inherent in patriarchy. Unless you have a dynamic interplay between the sensibilities of the two sexes, you can never create peace. It's impossible.
"But I feel like people are looking at me sideways these days going, 'Shouldn't we be talking about the war, or the Gulf Coast or racism or environmental doom?' And I feel like saying, 'That's what I am talking about. We have to start at the root.' "
Hurricane Katrina, a new love and a decision not to tour for nine months because of tendinitis in her wrists allowed DiFranco to adopt a more leisurely pace for writing and recording. When Katrina forced her to evacuate New Orleans along with everyone else, she returned to Buffalo and continued working on the album with limited equipment -- including an Omnichord and a "cheesy synthesizer"-- giving the songs a spare, uncluttered sound.
"This is the first time I've made a record that wasn't in little snatches between incessant touring," she said. "This record was much more luxurious for me. I think now that I've gotten a taste of taking my time, it's quite tasty."
Motherhood will further slow the pace of DiFranco's life.
"I don't imagine I'll be the insane road warrior that I've been for the last 10 years," she said. "Because my (tendinitis) forced me to take time off, I realized how important it was for my overall well-being. I was kind of running on empty. I feel like I have a lot more to give on stage now. I almost feel reborn."
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