Q&A: Chrissie Hynde

• Video: Behind the Scenes of the "Boots of Chinese Plastic" music video

After her 2007 tour with the Pretenders, frontwoman Chrissie Hynde vowed not to return to the stage until she wrote some new material. "Frankly, it was just embarrassing that I hadn't had a record out in so long," she says. Now, after recently resettling in her childhood home of Akron, Ohio — she has lived primarily in London for the past 35 years — Hynde can hit the road and draw from a brand-new batch of tunes: the rootsy, rocking Break Up the Concrete, the first Pretenders disc in six years. Checking in from London, Hynde still oozes an old-school rock & roll spirit.

The opening line on your album is a Buddhist phrase, "Nam myoho renge kyo." Where did you learn that?
About 1971, this guy and I were hitchhiking through Canada. We thought we were John and Yoko. Somebody told us that if we got to Toronto, we should stay with this woman Georgia Ambrose, who held Buddhist ceremonies at her house. We called her and she said, "What sign are you?" "Well, we're both Virgos." And she goes, "Come over, I need some Virgo energy." When we got there, that's what they were chanting. It means, basically, that every drop that goes to the vein comes back to the heart.

There are a few songs on the album that seem to be about your ideal man.
I live alone, except for my dog. But those songs were inspired by a few people. The people I'm attracted to would never go near celebrity or fame. They're the ones who are in the shadows. That's why I spend so much time away from the limelight.

The first verse of the title cut is about growing up on a red-brick road. True?
All the roads in Akron are made out of red brick. They're beautiful. I saw that beauty again when I moved back there.