WHEN it comes to combining talent and beauty Chely Wright stands out from the crowd. She received the Academy of Country Music’s Award for the best new female artist in 1995, and is a regular feature in magazine lists of “hottest, most beautiful or sexiest” people.

It’s a little more important to mention that chart-topping songs like Shut Up And Drive and Single White Female have helped her album sales to reach the 975,000 mark. Clay Walker had a top ten hit with Wright’s song I Can’t Sleep. Earlier this year she released her autobiography with memoirs of being a closet lesbian and her first new collection of songs since 2005. Produced by Rodney Crowell it features ten tracks written by her and one cowritten with Crowell.

She says: “These songs and my bicycle saved my life.” Like her book, which is called Like Me – Confessions Of A Heartland Country Singer, it portrays a candid account of the last few years of her life and an extraordinary journey to where she is now.