Viv,
See attached the first draft following Friday's interview – she was much more open than I was expecting actually, so I think we've got some good stuff. The husband (who, by the way, I think we should definitely line up for Man of the Month at some point!) arrived in the middle of it all too, which worked out pretty nicely.
Let me know if you have any notes.
Thanks,
Al.
An hour before we are due to meet, my cell phone rings.
Unknown number.
I sigh. After an early morning flight to snowy Nashville, I have just arrived in a typically bleak Travelodge and this is not – as the locals might say – my first rodeo.
I've almost been expecting this call, in fact – the one from a manager or minion, informing me that the talent must, if not cancel altogether, then certainly postpone interminably for reasons unspecified.
When I answer, the honeyed Southern drawl catches me by surprise, but doesn't, at the same time. It takes a moment - a mental scan of friends and family and people I knew in college - before I realize that, yes, I appear to be speaking with the Queen of County herself.
Sorry for the late notice, she says apologetically, but she's re-thought the whole restaurant thing. Would I might just swinging by her house and we could talk there instead?
In retrospect, it's my first clue;
Rayna Jaymes, it seems, is not your average superstar.
#
As it happens, I don't mind just swinging by her house one little bit.
It's a beautiful, Southern Colonial style home, in what even an outsider can tell is a nice part of town. Having successfully negotiated the imposing electronic gates, I find the woman herself awaiting me on the front steps, arms wrapped protectively around herself in the icy cold.
She's clad in flat pumps – I suspect Balenciaga – paired with burgundy skinny jeans and a cosy-looking cashmere sweater. The hair, I'm happy to report, is every bit as spectacular as it looks on TV.
"Oh my lord, I haven't seen a winter like this in Nashville for years," she exclaims, ushering me into a wide hallway. "You must be freezing, come on in. I'm Rayna."
She's made coffee for us both and suggests we talk in "the den". Hidden just off a large kitchen-diner, it's a light, bright space, with plush soft furnishings in cream and apple green. Framed photographs of varying sizes cover one wall, and I notice a stack of biology textbooks and highlighter pens at the end of the coffee table.
Rayna follows my gaze. "I try to say no homework in front of the TV," she offers, with a rueful smile, "but it doesn't always work out that way."
Sitting opposite me now, both feet on the floor, there is a look of expectation in her pleasant expression, and it is suddenly clear that, as open and easy a hostess as Ms. Jaymes undoubtedly is, she has not forgotten why I am here. We are not, in case I hadn't realized, girlfriends curling up together for a gab. This is work.
The house is perfectly still around us, and I'm struck once more by the utter lack of middle men around here. There is no hovering publicist, no manicurist waiting in the wings…When I comment on this apparently entourage-free existence, Rayna seems nonplussed.
"Well, I have my manager," she shrugs. "He's been with me more or less since I started out. This past few years, I've also started to work with my sister on the business side of things, which has been great. And then there's my husband, obviously. That's pretty much it, though."
There is – she admits freely - a trusted team of stylists, hairdressers and make-up artists, all of whom are called upon for events and appearances, but they are not in the house every day. "We have enough going on 'round here as it is," she says.
And it's true – at 46, Rayna Jaymes has got to be one of the hardest working women in showbiz, and she shows no sign of slowing down any time soon. Still, even without professional help, she looks positively glowing, and at least half a decade younger than her years. How does she do it?
"Oh my lord," she laughs. "You're sweet - I'm pretty sure that's just a nice little bit of bronzer. Truth is I'm more or less permanently exhausted. It's a good kind of tired though, so if there's a secret, I guess maybe that's it. You can buy every lotion and potion out there, and have all the nips and tucks you want, but at the end of the day, there ain't nothing that's gonna show on your face like unhappiness. That's what I think, anyway."
I wonder, then, as she settles into her forties, is this is the happiest Jaymes has ever been?
She pauses for a moment.
"I would say so, yeah. When I was younger, even though I was having a lot of success career-wise, I was also hyper-aware that it could all end at any minute."
Part of that, she says, was "being beholden to a record label that, especially towards the end, I didn't feel any great support from." Another part of it, she acknowledges may have had more to do with her own mindset.
"I was almost…frantic, at times," she explains. "From ambition at first, and then fear, and then I pretty much just ran on a mixture of the two. I definitely feel a lot more settled now. Everything is just much calmer, in all aspects of my life."
Ah yes. In the age of the internet, few can be unfamiliar with the ups and downs of Rayna's tumultuous personal life, scrupulously documented as they have been by journalists and bloggers the world over. Involved with her guitarist and songwriting partner Deacon Claybourne for over a decade, his alcoholism took a toll on the relationship and the pair eventually separated in the early nineties. Rayna subsequently married former mayor of Nashville Teddy Conrad, from whom she divorced in 2013. Shortly thereafter, the eldest of their two daughters, Madeleine, was sensationally revealed in fact to be Claybourne's biological child.
After reported flings with rockers Liam McGuiness and Karl Curtis – not to mention that broken engagement to fellow country singer Luke Wheeler - fans were stunned when Jaymes and Claybourne ultimately reunited, marrying in secret almost three years ago. Since then, their relationship has remained largely off-limits, but now that Rayna has kind of, sort of, almost brought it up herself…
For us mere mortals, they're like Stevie and Lindsay, Johnny and June, I tell her, drawing only easy laughter in response. So… enquiring minds want to know, how are the two of them these days?
"We're great" she smiles.
She's gotta give me more than that, I protest, and Rayna just shrugs.
"Well, we're married now," she says simply. "He's my husband. I'm his wife. I guess I just figure, for the most part, people can draw their own conclusions from that. It's not that I'm trying to be cagey - I mean, if you have any specific questions, I'll answer 'em. Or, you know," – she raises an eyebrow – "maybe I will."
Alright, I try. Is he romantic?
"Umm…" she laughs suddenly, as though at some private joke, the sound fading as quickly as it came. "Sorry. Uh… yeah," she settles upon staunchly, with the vague air of someone defending a losing sports team. "I think so."
What kind of things are we talking about here?
"Oh Lord…It's gonna be pretty bad if I can't come up with anything now, huh?" she grimaces comically. "I don't know. He makes me coffee. He does all kinds of stuff around the house that I don't want to do, actually. And it's just little things, I guess," she muses, as if warming up to the topic now. "Like, when we're coming in from the cold these days, he always unwraps my scarf. I don't think he even realizes, but he'll just reach over while we're in the middle of talking and… I don't know, it's kind of sweet."
A pause.
"I guess this ain't exactly headline material though, is it?" she asks shrewdly, and once again I am reminded of just how well Ms Jaymes knows this game.
When honesty compels me to acknowledge that it is probably is not quite a front-cover scoop, she is wholly unperturbed.
"Look, here's the deal," she replies frankly. "Vacations, jewellery, all that stuff… I mean, hey," – she shrugs – "I don't hate it, that's for sure. But you also gotta remember that 'cause of my job, I already have a lot of attention… people sending me stuff and saying nice things, and giving me good tables at restaurants and whatever. So this whole idea of a man who's gonna wine and dine you and treat you like a princess…I guess that just isn't really what does it for me, you know? I want somebody who treats me like a partner."
And partners she and Claybourne certainly appear to be, on all fronts. Together, they are parenting both 16-year-old Madeleine and her younger sister Daphne, and Rayna - I notice – speaks naturally in the "we" form a lot. Jointly-owned label Highway 65 Records takes up much of the couple's time these days, and is clearly a labor of love for the pair. Their own music, however, has been far from forgotten; the Jaymes/Claybourne tour - drawing from a back catalogue of 14 albums together – is becoming somewhat of a summer staple, in fact.
The schedule, Rayna says, is always specifically designed so that the kids (- prodigiously talented performers themselves, YouTube them! -) can come along for the ride. They even have a slot on the tour, generally playing a song or two alongside the old-hands and, in smaller venues, also performing a short opening set of their own.
Despite "all of that tabloid hoopla" (on which she calmly refuses to be drawn), Rayna assures me that both girls are now "doing great." It has been challenging, she says, finding ways to nurture their considerable talents whilst also keeping them level-headed. "I've told them they aren't signing to a label until they graduate from college, and even then they have to give Highway 65 first refusal. Until then, if they want to sing, it's gonna be right where we can see 'em, with musicians we know, places we think are appropriate…"
"It's pretty funny, because – as I tell them all the time," she adds wryly, "I think a lot of people would say they've got a pretty good summer gig going on. Pretty cool mom and dad, you know? But if you talked to Maddie or Daphne, we are just the most ridiculous, overprotective parents to walk the earth."
We chat a little about the music business, about fame – Rayna is convinced that any mother who knew the reality of either these days would not want it for her daughter – until, half-way through our interview, we hear a kerfuffle behind us.
Rayna frowns, turns her head. "Babe…?" she calls out.
Sure enough, after a clunk of some sort from the kitchen, Claybourne himself appears, in faded jeans and a plaid shirt. He's sporting at least a couple days' worth of facial scruff and has got to be pushing fifty but, let me tell you ladies, there is no question; you definitely would.
"Hey, darlin,'" he says, coming up behind his wife, a hand resting easily at the juncture of her neck and shoulder.
Rayna introduces me, and he leans across with a smile, shaking my hand. It takes an embarrassing amount of effort to save my swooning for later.
"I thought y'all we're going to The Patterson House."
"Eh. I hate the parking situation downtown anyway, and then this weather…"
Deacon nods, turning towards me again. "Well, thanks for coming out, Alison. Just knowing that Ray's off the roads I always feel a little bit better about my odds of surviving the day, you know?"
"Oh, come on!" Rayna is scoffing before I can reply, whipping around to look at him. "You really want to talk about my driving in front of a reporter from a women's magazine? Seriously?"
"You're a terrible driver, Rayna," he says innocently. "That's got nothin' to do with you being a woman. Matter of fact, I reckon it's just plain sexist of you to imply that it might. And I'm sure this is good stuff for you either way, right Alison? If I had a dime for everytime somebody asked me to tell 'em something the world didn't know about Rayna Jaymes..."
Rayna rolls her eyes dramatically, but it isn't hard to tell that she's fighting back a smile. "Are you interrupting this for a reason, or what's happening here?"
"Just came to drop off that gear."
"Ah, ok. So you can pretty much be on your way now then, can you?"
Deacon grins, and I realize that I'm watching married people flirting. How odd, I think, that it should seem such a novelty.
After a quick discussion of evening plans and a kiss, our surprise guest is headed out again, but I can't let him go without getting at least a little bit. of dirt It is clear he has eyes only for her these days, but what did he think of the Queen of Country when they first met?
Claybourne halts in his tracks. "Well, she wasn't the Queen of Country back then –she was just a sixteen year old kid. And I was nineteen, so obviously I thought she was a kid, at the beginning at least. You know how a couple years can make a difference at that age."
Rayna had also grown up in Nashville, he adds - in luxurious Belle Meade no less – whilst he was just off the bus from a small town in Mississippi with little more than a guitar the clothes on his back to his name.
"We were very different, is what I'm telling you, basically. But, I don't know, I guess somehow it felt like we were just…the same, too."
Afterwards, I ask Rayna if she feels – as many of her fans do – that this reunion was inevitable, the happy ending we all knew must be coming sooner or later.
She pauses a moment to consider. "I don't, actually."
She doesn't?
I cock my head. Come on.
"Well…I think there was always going to be something there," she admits then. "Yeah. I mean, listen, we were apart for a long time, and I was married to someone else, and I would never want to say anything that would be disrespectful to that marriage. Certainly, Deacon and I have always been real clear that nothing except music ever happened between us during that period. But at the same time… there were habits I never really got out of."
She doesn't think, for example, that she could ever have looked at Claybourne and thought of him merely as another member of her crew, just some guy she used to date back in the day. They were always on the same team. She always felt "a little bit lighter somehow" when he walked into a room.
"That feeling…I do think that was probably inevitable," she tells me. "As far as us actually getting back together, though, actually living this life… that was a decision we both had to make. That was work."
After everything, then – all the heartache and drama – I wonder; would she do it all again?
Rayna doesn't even hesitate.
"Twice."