Sheryl Crow. I'm not too sure about this one. "All I Wanna Do" is a good song but not enough to make me buy the CD. I think she hit the "if I like four of the songs, I'll like the CD" test when her second album had four songs that I listened to on the radio or VH1 and I liked them. I like all three of her albums and my favorite song is probably "Home", although she has a lot of good ones. She even wrote "Somebody Stand By Me" which is on Faith Hill's third CD, so that says something about her writing ability.

Dixie Chicks. A recent entry, I subconsciously stayed away from them because they were so popular. Finally I did give in and they are *that* good. SHeDAISY is sometimes compared to the Dixie Chicks (three-girl country music bands). SHeDAISY said it best: SHeDAISY are vocalists, the Dixie Chicks are musicians. My favorite song is "Cowboy Take Me Away" from the Fly album.

Gloria Estefan. Another one that I've been listening to for so long that I don't know where it started. Stephanie was more into Gloria when I went to college, and when that cooled I got the CDs and continued to get them. My favorite album is Destiny, my favorite Spanish album is Mi Tierra, and my favorite song is "Words Get in the Way".

Melissa Etheridge. For some reason I thought "Yes I Am" had been out for a long time because "Come to My Window" had been on the radio forever. But I guess not. I'm not sure why I bought the first Etheridge CD. Maybe it was her performance with Joan Osborne in one of MTV's Duets show. (VH1 Country has a commercial where various artists mention their influences, two people mention Joan Osborne. I'm thinking "why?" She had one or two good songs and I like her first album but she wasn't *that* popular).

Exposé. Back to college. Darren had The Bangles, Jim had Madonna, Mike had Depeche Mode, Brett had Def Leppard. I had to pick something and Huey Lewis and the News wasn't going to cut it. So I picked Exposé. Too bad they broke up so quickly but the first two albums were quite good. I didn't even know they had replaced Gioia (who had a tumor on her throat and was told she couldn't sing again) until I got the third album a year or so ago. Back when I said to myself that I'm going to collect these artists CDs, some of the old favorites weren't in the initial list. ExposŽ is one of the artists that made it back on that list.

Debbie Gibson. Another old stalwart. Debbie actually has like eight albums out, only one of which is a Greatest Hits album. But after the first couple of albums her singing career went downhill fast (though not as fast as fellow pop star Tiffany). I've had the Electric Youth album for a long time and wanted to get Out of the Blue, but couldn't since Debbie is not on my list. So I put her on my list and now I have to try to get all the albums. It's a two-edged sword.

Faith Hill. "This Kiss" was a very popular song, popular enough to play on the radio stations I listened to (this was before I started listening to country music). After getting the Shania Twain CDs I wanted to expand and this was a logical choice for me. A lot of really good songs, I'm not too sure which is my favorite. Her first two CDs are only a little over half an hour each (even though they have 10 songs each), which gave me the impression (and I still have it a bit) that country music songs are shorter than the songs I'm used to.

Natalie Imbruglia. There was a brief time when I was sort of into Alice, the local alternative rock radio station here. I can trace getting interested in Natalie Imbruglia, Paula Cole, Sheryl Crow, Chantal Kreviazuk, Jewel and Sarah McLachlan to that radio station (maybe I'm wrong about one or two of those). Natalie's "Torn" was played constantly and eventually I gave in and bought the CD. Someday she'll finish her second CD.