Her hippie charm intact, singer is back

May 4, 2012 at 12:00a.m.

Melanie Safka, the ’60s and ’70s pop singer known simply as Melanie, takes full responsibility for an archetypal female vocal sound — good or bad — that has dominated the last four decades of pop radio.

“A lot of girls, whether they know it or not, are very derivative of me,” said Safka, calling from Nashville. “Unfortunately, and I apologize for it, it’s terribly annoying. On my early albums I was trying to communicate a wizened older woman and that’s what came out of my mouth. It was some attempt to imitate Billie Holiday and Brenda Lee at the same time.”

She cites Stevie Nicks and Cyndi Lauper as carrying on this vocal style, which she feels continues today.

As for Safka, who has sold more than 80 million albums based on hits such as “Brand New Key,” “Look What They Done to My Song, Ma” and “Lay Down (Candles in the Rain),” she’s quite the unique character, still possessing the quintessential hippie vibe.

In the same way Forrest Gump fictionally was in the right place at the time, Safka has story after story involving iconic events and life-changing experiences. For instance, she literally invited herself to appear at the original Woodstock by dropping into the organizers’ New York City offices after she heard about the festival boasting three days of peace, love and music. She said she thought it was going to be like a little picnic for families with arts and crafts.

At the time her only credit was some minor industry buzz for the underground hit “Beautiful People.” After scoring the Woodstock gig, she went to England to record the score to the feature film “All the Right Noises” with the London Symphony Orchestra. In the studio next to her were The Rolling Stones.

“When I returned, my mom picked me up and we drove to Woodstock not knowing anything,” Safka said. “We hit some traffic miles from the festival and I made a call and they said, ‘Go to this other place.’ I get out of the car and Janis Joplin was in the hotel lobby and Sly Stone walks by. These are famous people, and I’m totally an unknown person. I had never sung in front of more than 500 people my whole life. So I went on that stage as an unknown person and I came off that stage as a celebrity.”

From there, Safka’s star began to rise and within a year, she was booked to play the 1970 Isle of Wight Festival, which reportedly had a crowd of 600,000 to watch The Who, Jimi Hendrix, Miles Davis and The Doors. In fact, she famously crossed paths with the latter act.

“Jim Morrison wouldn’t follow The Who,” Safka said. “They asked me to and I said, ‘Yeah.’ It was amazing. After the Isle of Wight, I think I had two records emerge top 10. It was incredible and as astounding as Woodstock.”

During the decades that have passed, Safka has enjoyed a periodic resurgence of interest in her music.

For example, in 1997 “Brand New Key” was used in the film “Boogie Nights,” which contained plenty of nudity and heavy drug use. Safka thinks back to the first time she saw the porn industry-based flick.

“We were told by the movie company that there would be no explicit sex during my song,” Safka said.

“I knew what the subject was, but I didn’t really think — I don’t know what I thought — but I took my son and like 10 of his friends for his birthday to see ‘Boogie Nights.’ And all of a sudden there I am singing and there’s the Roller Girl and I’m saying, ‘Oh my God. You guys want some popcorn?’”

She naturally gathered up the kids and went straight to a Chuck E. Cheese, right?

“Yeah, we watched the whole movie,” Safka said. “I didn’t know what to do. I wanted to be cool. I never heard anything from other parents. I guess the boys didn’t say anything. They were all like, ‘Wow.’”

Nevertheless, the song lives on today, which is something Safka knew when she recorded it.

“I wrote it more with a Cajun-swamp groove,” Safka said.

“Once I got into the studio, Peter [Schekeryk], my husband, was the producer and he said, ‘Oh God, it’s a hit.’ I said, ‘Oh no, please, I’ll be doomed to be cute for the rest of my life.’”

She quickly added, “It could be worse. When you’re 65 and still cute, it’s not so bad.”