By: Adam Grant

Click to Listen to Ali Bartlett-common criminals

 Balancing upon the fine line of willingness to dive head first into the music industry and staying on the periphery of it is where you'll find Hamilton singer/songwriter Ali Bartlett hanging out.

 You see, Bartlett isn't your typical indie artist with aspirations of eventually becoming a monstrously famous solo act with a couple pop songs that she's ready to toss to a crowd for easy-to-digest consumption.  Instead, she is writing songs that make sense to her, and even when they don't completely match her folk/roots style, there is always an opportunity to pass them off to fellow musicians.

 Admittedly more focused on the publishing (a.k.a. writing) end of the music biz, Bartlett's songs have come a long way since her younger years in her hometown of Burlington.  Saying that she began singing original songs to herself while playing a musical version of Barbies as a child, it wouldn't be until the age of 12 that she really began to take songwriting seriously.

 Now in her 20's, Bartlett's approach has obviously matured both in regard to how she pens her music and how said music is represented within her lifestyle.  Instead of touring around in a van on her down time and being consumed by music, she is currently partaking in a University based Psychology program that has allowed her to remain positively distracted.

"I think actually the whole music thing got balanced out for me when I went back to school, because if you're putting everything into music it becomes really personal and (it's) really easy to be hurt and offended," concedes Bartlett.  "It's your creation and people are out there to have an opinion about it - which is what creating is about.

"When I was banking everything on doing music, it was really stressful and when I went back to school, (I started) banking half of my brain on academics and half on the creative side," she continues.  "It makes it so, 'whatever happens happens - I'm really not too concerned about it.'  Like Rita McNeil covers my song "Worst Case Scenario," that's just funny and fun to tell your friends."

 An instance like McNeil taking on one of Bartlett's tunes is a fine example of how this up and coming artist is paving her path.  Even though she does write songs for her own projects as well, Bartlett's bread-and-butter of late has been seeing her tracks ending up elsewhere.  Most recently, her close friend Melissa McClelland recorded her own version of Bartlett's "You Know I Love You Baby," which was picked up in an episode of the James Woods television law drama, Shark.

 To add to this excitement, Bartlett has also now began talks with a well known major music label and could find herself uprooted out of the indie music fraternity for some time, which may look like a frightening shift to some, but Bartlett is the furthest thing from intimidated about such a move.
"They don't scare me," she confirms when speaking of labels.  "In fact, I really started appreciating them and liking them because they do a job that I would never want to - (like) making me phone people and sell my music - they do all the horrible work that I want nothing to do with.  So if that means making a couple of compromises, it means making a couple of compromises. 

"But not to the point where I give them my first born," laughs Bartlett.
 
For more information on Ali Bartlett, please visit www.myspace.com/alibartlett