By: Mark Brown, Orange County Register Edition, page: L3

Natalie Merchant was desperate.

Line by line, an interviewer on the phone was grilling her about her song lyrics, working like a detective seeking clues to her personality.

"I felt like I was being psychoanalyzed," Merchant said, after dismissing the caller. She laughed. "It was just getting to the point where I'd pay a large amount of money to someone to get me off the line."

Merchant's lyrics were studied while she led 10,000 Maniacs, but the scrutiny has intensified since the release of last year's Tigerlily, with its seemingly introspective songs.

Big hint: Even though she uses the word "I" in her songs, they're not about her. And just because she's known for socially significant songs such as What's the Matter Here? or the new Wonder single, she's not all furrowed brow and social reformer. So quit the armchair psychology.

"I don't really expect journalists to reveal 'the true Natalie,' " said Merchant, 32. "I don't think anybody really knows anybody. It's a futile effort, a futile exercise for me to say, 'No, no, no, that's not me, you don't understand.' Even though I'm not happy with the way I've been misrepresented, I feel like my reputation could be a lot worse. I'll just let people think they know me."

And some they do know. She was born and raised in Jamestown, N.Y., the town that spawned 10,000 Maniacs. She fronted that band beginning at age 16. Now, 16 years later, she's on her first solo tour for her first solo album - which, by the way, has sold 2.5 million copies. No more band. No more asking permission of a record company. Merchant calls all the shots.

"It's pretty great," she admitted. "I look around myself and I think I'm living in paradise most of the time.

"As a child, I always dreamed that one day I'd be an artist. My mother was a secretary for most of the time I was growing up. She hated her job. The idea of having to get up early, get dressed and go sit in an office all day with all that energy and have to submit to somebody else who had authority over her drove her crazy.

"From the time I was a child, my mother would say, 'I know you think you're going to be an artist, Natalie, but someday you're going to have a horrible job that you hate just like me. And you better get used to that idea right now.' And I'd say, 'Well, then, I'd kill myself. I'd rather die than have a situation like that.'

"So I don't forget that this is an unusual situation to be in. A lot of people in this world do things that they don't like. That's the most gratifying thing in being an artist. You're not just putting things in alphabetical order all day or sending something down the conveyor belt that you'll never see finished."

That early determination not to answer to anyone continues. With her record label, Elektra, changing management last year, Merchant took the unorthodox step of paying for the recording of her own album.

"I hired everyone and booked the studio and paid for it and did most of the arranging and whatever," Merchant said. "For my own peace of mind, I wanted to get in the studio and record the songs without any outside intervention.

"The corporation treats the artist as if they're contracted for work like a plumber in a building. If I'm being treated as a sovereign corporate entity, then I'm going to make my record in isolation and present it to them: 'Here it is. It's finished.' "

That desire for control, she admits, went a little too far. Next time around, she'll hire at least one assistant.

"We were to the point where we were carrying our own gear. I would rent the van, I'd go pick up the van, I'd bring the van to my house, we'd load the equipment into the van," she said. "In some ways it was fun, because we were experiencing what it would be like to be a young band. And then in other ways I'd just take a look at myself as I was lifting an amplifier into a van and say, 'Wait, I've been doing this way too long.'

"But I also believe in a certain dose of humbling experiences in life. It's really good occasionally to have to lift an amp and put it in a van," she said.

Tigerlily got savage reviews in Rolling Stone and Spin upon its release last year, but she shrugs it off. Her fans like the album. Her friends, including longtime pal Michael Stipe, liked it.

"He called the day the review came out - he's one of the reasons I know I got a bad review in Rolling Stone - he called and said, 'They don't know what they're saying, this record's great!'" Merchant recalled with a laugh.

"I just put records out that I like. I know a lot of people expected something much more radically different. But that's really not my style. I like to do things gradually and naturally.

"I think what would surprise people is the more obscure stuff that I've done that's really dark and moody and kind of more experimental. That is the record that I think everyone that knows me really well expected to be my first record. I just wasn't ready to reveal that side to people. I wanted to draw people near me rather than push me away."

So is that dark record coming?