Just a thought. If Wayne and Garth had got into American college rock instead of heavy metal, and met Natalie Merchant rather than Alice Cooper, their world might have turned out a bit differently.

For Natalie Merchant, most definitely is worthy. She is 90s woman designed by The Body Shop. She is a strict vegetarian whose pecadillo is ethnic veg. She is a keen gardener. She has contributed to a pension fund since she was 23. She is anti-smoking, anti-drugs and anti-caffeine. Her childhood hero was Leonardo Da Vinci.

A sticker on the cover of her debut solo album, Tigerlily, tells us that the lyrics are translated into "Francais, Deutsch and Espanol". She lives in Woodstock (yes, that Woodstock) and when she initially moved to the area she took a job in the town library so she could get to know the local kids.

She cares, and it's genuine, not some star hobby. Ask her a frothy question about the Internet and she will regale you - at great length - about lack of funding in American schools, the dogma of being illiterate, and how she misses "manuscripts".

Get the picture! Yes, Natalie Merchant is the most un-rock'n'roll person alive. But then not everyone can be Liam Gallagher.

For 13 years Natalie Merchant wrote and sang with the very nice group 10,000 Maniacs, one of the most popular un-rock'n'roll bands ever (eight million albums sold at the last count). Everyone loved them, from studes to pseuds, for although they began as John Peel faves and ended as Virgin 1215 staples, Merchant's beguiling, unique, laughing voice always pulled you in.

Now she's gone solo. Happily divorced from the restricting democracy of a band, she organised everything about her new album from van hire to the translation of the lyrics. Tigerlily is an earnest singer-songwritery affair, lots of piano ballads. It includes the best song that will ever be written about River Phoenix (River); the beautiful Beloved Wife about her grandfather who died of a broken heart after seeing his wife's coffin; and an opus on the depravity of Los Angeles,San Andreas Fault. All very adult, very VH-l rather than MTV, Elle Deco rather than Elle.

Today we have but 30 minutes of Ms. Merchant's time, a quick chat sandwiched between a Radio I Johnnie Walker interview (he greets her with flowers) and a cab to Heathrow where she is flying to Paris, the next stop on her 'tell the press why I left 10,000 Maniacs' world tour.

For someone who later admits that she doesn't really like talking to strangers, Natalie Merchant is rather good at it. She speaks softly - so softly that the voice activated tape machine struggles to cope, switching itself off mid-sentence. Occasionally realising how pious she seems, she giggles so affectingly that, unless you are an ardent chain smoker, it is impossible not to warm to her.

"I must have walked ten miles yesterday." says the jet-lagged Nat by way of introduction. "..Ended up at some Lebanese restaurant on the other side of London where they charged me some astronomical amount for a bowl of hummus."

She reaches down and rubs a small red spot on her leg: "Oh, look at that. I have poison ivy."

How old are you now, Natalie?

"I'm 31", she replies. "I guess it's time to start lying, I'm 30 - 30 sounds so perfect. But I still can't get served alcohol. I went to pick up a friend of mine at a nursing home, and I don't know if they were senile but all these old women were going,'She's not old enough to drive'. I showed them my grey hair but they still thought I was 15. My mother is really youthful, she still walks seven miles a day. She can do a double flip off a diving board. My great uncle still swims, in the Finger Lakes, he swims one length of about 25 miles in one stretch, he's 79. My grandfather and his brother were twins and they were acrobats, they used to jump off railroad bridges into streams. My great uncle is a Shakespearean scholar, he put himself through college on swimming scholarships."

MMMMM, RlGHT! Cheers. Merchant family tree over with, there's just enough time left for the 'Is Natalie Merchant The Most Worthy Star In The World' personality test.

Do you worry what people think of you?

"No, I'd worry more about someone I'd treated unjustly or unfairly. I don't stay awake at night worrying that the British people think I'm too serious or anti-fashion, or that I'm a quirky, vitamin-taking vegetarian puritan. I think there's worse reputations I could have. At least I don't have to think about: 'Do they care that I was arrested for child molestation!' 'Do they care that I was busted for heroin trying to get over the Swiss border!'. I don't have to worry about those sort of things. Do they think I'm too serious, or too committed? I must be so boring."

Does it still bother you if someone eats meat in your presence?

"I don't like the smell of it. I wouldn't be rude about it but it would put me off my own meal. But people eat meat around me all the time. The times that it bothers me is when people eat lamb and veal. I don't say anything about it but I make a little note that I maybe I should bring it up one day, how they take those little creatures away from their mothers, put them in crates and inject them with all sorts of drugs to make their fat tissue grow.

Have you tried to persuade anyone else to become a veggie?

"My niece won't touch meat. She says she wants to be vegetarian just like Aunt Natalie, which causes a lot of problems because I've never talked to her about it. A long time ago I had this neighbour and I was really close to this little kid, Jimmy. Jimmy saw a dead bird on the sidewalk and I casually mentioned to him that if he ever had chicken he should think about that dead bird! Hahhaha. I got a call from his mother, 'Jimmy won't touch his meal', cos they had chicken that night, 'and I want you to come and talk to him'. And I said,'it's all been cooked, and all the feathers have been taken off'. I refrain from a didactic approach."

What about smoking? Does that still offend you?

"Yes, I'm still offended by smoking. See, if someone eats a piece of meat it's only affecting their body, but when they smoke a cigarette they're polluting my space. But I usually work with people who don't smoke all that much, or don't smoke at all."

Which must have made her relationship with one Michael Stipe a tad fraught - a man who, when offered a Camel cigarette, will rip off the filter to achieve the desired tar strength.

"He'd always insist on eating at boring macrobiotic restaurants," Natalie remembers, scratching her poison ivy mark. "And I'd go, 'Oh this is healthy, really good for me'. And then he'd walk out and have a Camel. I see a contradiction here, Mr Stipe."

Have you ever taken drugs?

"My drug period was between the age of 17 and 18. That was a time when I was experimenting with a lot of things, I was experimenting with sleep deprivation, fasting. The longest fast I ever did was 12 days. You go that long without food and you hallucinate. I would take this powder made out of guarana seed, my friend Mary would bake it up like cocoa in muffins and leave them on my doorstep. My drinking period was when I was 13, 14. Drugs fascinated me for a short period of time but not any more. A glass of wine puts me in a weird enough state."

When was the last time you hit someone?

"I hit our guitar player's boyfriend a couple of months ago. He was being extremely violent and intrusive."

You thumped him in the face?

"No, I haven't thumped someone in the face for years, but I pushed him really hard, screamed at him. That's the first raging outburst I've had in years.

Would you support Bon Jovi?

"As a dependent? What, warm up for him? No I'd probably pass on that tour.

What do you think of supermodels?

"I think they're goddesses", says the woman who used to rock the Great Depression look. "I don't study their personalities or what rock stars they're f--ing at the moment, but I am astounded by them. But they're a source of great angst among women. And they also force designers to make these unrealistic clothes that make it impossible for women like myself who are small and have curvaceous bodies."

Yes, Natalie Merchant is worthy. She can't help it: in these days when debauchery and rock excess have returned, someone as straight and sorted as her is a little strange. She is the Audrey Hepburn of rock, the anti-Courtney - disciplined, calm, considered.

"I'm not the anti-Courtney," she says, upset by the accusation. "I think if Courtney and I were in the same room we'd probably have a really good time, we'd probably have a lot of the same feelings and ideas. There are times when I envy her outrageousness, but I worry about her, I worry about Courtney..."

They probably would get on too, Courtney would find her as she is - charming, open and serious, a smart person to spend half an hour with. "Don't write anything nasty about me," she says as she leaves, offering a nifty jab.

As if. Party on, Nat.