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Why Shania Twain insists 'Now' isn't a 'divorce album': 'This is not my dirty laundry'

By Chris Mejaski | etalk | October 20, 2017

Shania Twain may have just released her first album since her headline-making split from husband and producer Robert "Mutt" Lange, but she's here to tell you she has a lot more to sing about on her new album Now.

"This is not a divorce album... it's important people understand that," she tells our Danielle Graham in an interview airing as part of a new special etalk Presents: Shania Now (Saturday, 4:30 p.m. ET on CTV).

"[Giving] divorce too much credit would be a disservice to a lot of other things I've experienced in my life," she continues. "My parents dying together in a car accident, that, I mean, I'm just never getting over that... I'm not going to expect myself to. So I put divorce on a whole other level of expectations on myself and where I place it in the devastation."

The Timmins, Ont. native lost her mother and stepfather in a car accident back in 1987, six years before her self-titled debut album was released in 1993. But it's her split from Lange in 2008 after 14 years of marriage that still fascinates fans. He reportedly had an affair with Twain's best friend Marie-Anne Thiebaud. And as fate would have it, in 2011 Twain went on to marry Frederic Thiebaud, Marie-Anne's ex.

It's all experience she brings to her latest album, which saw her taking control after Lange produced her previous three.

"Here's why I needed to write the album myself," she says. "I needed to get my feelings out. Not a mixed bag of what somebody else was thinking or an influenced version of what I was feeling. It had to just be pure."

And the Shania fans are here for it! Her first album in 15 years, Now debuted at number one in both the U.S. and Canada after its Sept. 29 release. It kicked off a busy fall for the star, which included shooting an appearance on CTV's upcoming music series The Launch in Toronto, where Danielle sat down for their one-on-one.

With her new music, Shania insists she's not airing dirty laundry and is still a private person ("that's not the half of it!"). She's also focused on keeping her life in perspective.

"I wanted the album to be relatable. I'm not the only one that's been divorced! I'm not the only one that's lost loved ones! I'm not the only one that's lost an ability!" she says, referencing the vocal-cord disorder she also dealt with between albums. "I'm just not the only one... I think what keeps me going [is] knowing that I'm not alone. and sharing that makes me feel more empowered."

Shania says she also finds comfort in seeing the lighter side to some of the past challenges she's gone through. That includes a nod to her relationship with Lange in the Life's About To Get Good video, when she tosses a framed photo of herself and a man that looks supiciously like him.

"I mean, I always just feel better if I can get to a place where I can laugh about something, and not because I'm making light of it, but just that I'm saying, I'm no longer broken about this... I've let it out, I've shared it, I've said it the way I want to say it."

Today, Shania is continuing to embrace the positive. She bursts with pride talking about her 15-year-old son Eja. And has nothing but love to share about husband Frederic.

"My husband is inspiration. As a human being, firstly," she says. "I'm the weak one in our relationship in so many ways. I say music is my biggest therapy because it's a self help place for me and so pure and true. But next to the honesty that I share with myself in a lot of songs that I would never share with the world... is the honesty that I have with my husband."

etalk Presents: Shania Now airs Saturday at 4:30 p.m. ET on CTV. 

http://www.etalk.ca/news/2017/october/shania-twain-now-isnt-a-divorce-album