Meredith Brooks

Meredith Ann Brooks (born June 12, 1958 in Oregon City, Oregon, USA) is an American singer/songwriter and guitarist. Growing up in Corvallis, she left high school at age 15 in 1974 before working in the Pacific Northwest music scene, performing and making independent records. In the early 1980s, she moved to Los Angeles to further her career in music. At that time, she recorded the songs that later appeared on See It Through My Eyes. In the later 1980s and early 1990s, she was a member of The Graces, which recorded one album A Perfect View in 1989. In the wake of the enormous success of Alanis Morissette in 1995, Brooks landed a major label contract with Capitol Records. She was nearly 39 years old before having her first hit single, "Bitch", in 1997, which garnered her a nomination for the Grammy Award for Best Female Rock Vocal Performance. Her album Blurring the Edges achieved platinum sales and peaked at 22 on the Billboard 200. She toured in the US and Europe in 1997 and 1998 to support the album. Brooks recorded her second major album Deconstruction in 1999. It was a stylistic and thematic shift away from Blurring the Edges. Due to a flood of records by female musicians at the time and the record label's decision to have her tour in Europe instead of promoting in the US, the album sold poorly. She originally wrote the song "Sin City", which appears on this album, for the movie Snake Eyes, directed by her friend Brian De Palma. In 2002, Brooks worked on her third solo album Bad Bad One on Gold Circle Records, an independent label. Immediately after releasing the album, the label folded and prevented the record from getting promoted or achieving significant sales. Track 11 - 'Shine' - was released as the lead single The label's demise also interrupted her tour with Melissa Etheridge that summer, causing her and the band to return early to Los Angeles. Also in 2002, Brooks produced Jennifer Love Hewitt's album, BareNaked, and appeared on the VH1 Divas Las Vegas program as a guest guitar soloist with Celine Dion and Anastacia. In 2004, Brooks signed a new contract with the SLG Records label and released the material of Bad Bad One as Shine. Television psychologist Dr. Phil chose the song "Shine" as the theme for his show. As of August 2005, Brooks was working on a children's album titled If I Could Be... and continuing to develop new artists as a producer and songwriter.s.