Pitchfork

Proving major labels aren't always the soulless despots Steve Albini warned you about, that adorable Doris Day-tripping anachronism of a songwriter Nellie McKay recently won a significant battle with Columbia Records over the tracklist to her forthcoming sophomore release, Pretty Little Head. When Columbia moved to axe seven of McKay's 23 originals and serve that abridged edition of Head to the public months ago, Nellie and her manager-mother wouldn't have it. She turned to her fans, beseeching them to write the label, and write they must've. Plot summary: Columbia caved, and Nellie's Op. 2 arrives this January in all its 23-song glory.

In a recent phone conversation with Pitchfork, Nellie revealed why she and mum stuck to their proverbial guns: "We felt that the [complete] album just artistically works better. It had a better balance of songs with the 23." Among the seven tunes out were several lighter, quirkier numbers designed to offset the "heavier stuff", according to McKay. These, such as "Pounce"-- a 57-second piano-pop romp that Friskies' ad department should be fired for not writing-- provide levity's yin to the heavy-handed yang of tracks like "Columbia Is Bleeding", a diatribe against Columbia University's gross mistreatment of laboratory animals (and not a cheap jab at the label, as it happens).

Potty-mouthed genre-bender McKay already made headlines last year when she managed to finagle Columbia into releasing her premiere opus, Get Away From Me, in double-CD format-- this despite the fact that at 61 minutes, the album's 18 tracks would have easily fit on one. Pretty Little Head, however, is planned as a single disc and will drop in mid-to-late January, according to McKay's publicist.

Where Get Away boasted come-ons, put-downs, faux-freestyles, irony-soaked anti-ballads, and a canine paean, Pretty Little Head features shorter songs and more diverse instrumentation-- steel drums, mandolin, and even Nellie's own cello-shredding factor into Head's party mix, as well as duets with fun-girl Cyndi Lauper and cummings-emulator k.d. lang. And now, that tracklist, as the artist intended it:

01 Cupcake
02 Pink Chandelier
03 There You Are In Me
04 Yodel
05 G.E.S.
06 The Big One
07 I Will Be There
08 The Down Low
09 Long and Lazy River
10 Bee Charmer [ft. Cyndi Lauper]
11 Real Life
12 Swept Away
13 I Am Nothing
14 We Had It Right [ft. k.d. lang]
15 Columbia Is Bleeding
16 Food
17 GLADD
18 Happy Flower
19 Lali Est Parisseux
20 Tipperary
21 Mama and Me
22 Pounce
23 Old Enough

Thus far, Miss McKay has but one confirmed tour date lined up for the 2006, but expect her to frolic through a few major American metropolises in the coming months. Sport your tie-DIY'd "Free Nellie" T's:

01-22 Alexandria, VA - The Birchmere *

* with Trachtenberg Family Slideshow Players

McKay's muse never rests, as the young starlet continues to pursue an impressive platter of interests: in February, she begins rehearsals for a Broadway production of The Threepenny Opera, based on a new Wallace Shawn translation of the seminal Bertolt Brecht/Kurt Weill work, portraying Polly Peachum; previews begin in late March and the Scott Elliott-directed show is slated to open April 20 at Broadway's Studio 54.

Nellie's also hard at work on the music and lyrics for the forthcoming film The Amazing True Story of a Teenage Single Mother, and lent her voice to PETA's recent (and victorious) campaign to stop J Crew's sale of fur. "I'm really proud of that," McKay proclaimed. And finally, McKay recently interviewed her idol, Doris Day, "a dream come true," says Nellie, and no doubt one of many for the talent-possessed debutante. The interview will appear in a future issue of The Bark magazine, "the voice of modern dog culture."