Considering that she probably had another six months, tops, before VH1 got cracking on her Where Are They Now? segment, it's fitting that the first song on Joan Osborne 's new album, Righteous Love, is called "Running Out of Time." In the five years since she graduated from New York clubs with her major-label debut, Relish, the Age of Lilith has come and gone, teen pop has seized the charts and her contemporary, Sheryl Crow, has all but been embraced as part of rock's old guard. Osborne, meanwhile, has kept a relatively low profile since Relish racked up half a dozen Grammy nominations in 1996. She did the Lilith Fair circuit, but her recorded output since then has been limited to a collection of pre-Relish tracks and a follow-up album that Mercury Records scrapped before dropping her. If God were one of us, he probably would have pegged her as a one-hit-wonder, too. Given half a chance, the significantly more focused, Mitchell Froom-produced Righteous Love (Interscope) should put an end to that. And even if not, this time around Osborne's got a backup plan: the newly launched women's interest Internet 'zine Heroine Magazine (www.heroinemag.com). Where is Joan Osborne now? Pretty much everywhere.

Righteous Love has been a long time coming. As the years ticked off -- and Mercury Records dropped you -- how worried were you that people might have written you off?

You know, that stuff is sort of out of my control, so I don't feel any pressure about that. The pressure that I felt was in making the record -- that's when I was very conscious that I really had to do something that I could feel good about and that a huge corporation could feel good about, or I might not be able to continue making music. That was the moment of pressure. Now that the record is finished, and it's coming out and I have another deal with a good company [Interscope], this is the fun time for me.

How many producers did you go through on this record before settling on Mitchell Froom?

[Laughs] Too many. Far too many.

Was it just a matter of not finding the right sound?

It was partly that, and it was also partly my needing to feel satisfied with the results and not always feeling that, and then it was also the record company that I was with at the time. I brought them some finished things, which I would have been happy to release, and they were not interested in releasing them. I certainly can't lay the blame entirely on them, because I was also not entirely satisfied with some of the work, but it was their reticence to release certain things as well that was part of the reason that it's been so long.

You had said that you didn't think Relish really showed what you could do as a vocalist. Does Righteous Love get the job done?

Well, I kind of regret saying that now, because I don't particularly like singers who tend to do nothing but display their technical abilities, and I wouldn't want to judge my music just by how well it shows off my vocal talents. But I do think this record is more straightforward than Relish was. Relish was so much more about textures and sonics, and I think this one is a little bit more about stepping up to a microphone and singing a song.

Have you gotten more confident as a writer?

I'm not sure I'm necessarily more confident in that I think I'm great. I just think I'm more confident in the sense that I feel like I just have to get over myself and not edit things before I create them and just let things out into the world instead of fussing over them too much. I'm less afraid.

Any word back yet from Bob Dylan on your cover of "To Make You Feel My Love"?

No, actually I have not heard a peep out of him. I did meet him -- I sang a duet with him for a recording of his song "Chimes of Freedom" for a television special that aired a couple of years ago. I guess the way that I came to his attention, or his manager's attention, was by covering "Man in the Long Black Coat" on Relish. But I haven't heard any reaction from him on "To Make You Feel My Love." I think I probably fly below Bob Dylan's radar most of the time.

You do know Garth Brooks beat you to that one, right?

Yeah, but when I recorded it, I didn't realize that other people had recorded that song. I'm kind of glad though, because that might have convinced me not to do it, and now I consider that an important part of the record. I'm glad it's there.

You just started a new tour. Do the Relish songs feel extraordinarily old to you at this point?

Actually, no. It's been awhile since we've been on the road, and as you play these songs over and over again, they tend to morph into new versions of themselves. The way that you play it at the beginning of the tour is different from the way you play it at the end of the tour. So that's what keeps it fresh and interesting for me. And the people that come to see the shows, that's the record that they know, so it's kind of like a good guidepost for them. I mean, they're enjoying the new stuff, but they don't know it, so it's nice to give them something that they can sing along to and commune with.

The song most people still associate you with is "One of Us," which was written by Erik Bazilian of the Hooters. Do you often wish your breakthrough hit had been one of your originals?

Well, yeah sure, if I could have controlled everything that happened. And if I could have written that song, then I would have. But I didn't, so there you go. And the songs that I wrote probably got more of a chance to reach different people and a longer life because of that song, so I'm not mad at it. There have been moments when I've gotten a little tired of playing it, but it's actually surprisingly fresh when we've been doing it these last few gigs. It's not a chore for me right now.

In addition to the new album, you've also got your Heroine Magazine, starting up this week. What brought that about?

I think part of it was frustration at not having a record come out and just having this creative impulse and needing to do something to express it. I was very hands-on in creating it, but I've now had to hire some people to take over the day-to-day operations. There will be a link to my Web site, but it's not going to be about me so much. I'll be sort of guiding it and making sure that it is what I want it to be, but I probably won't be a columnist or anything like that.

Last question: How many times have people come up to you and said, "You know Joan, God was one of us?"

[Laughs] That happened to me more times than I care to think about. I think I've blocked it all out. I never could come back with a snappy comeback -- I just tried to run away and hide immediately. But I also get the, "Hey Joan, are you Ozzy Osbourne's daughter?" That's another popular question. I'm not, by the way.

RICHARD SKANSE
(September 12, 2000)