Photo by Meg Britton

Over the course of American Idol’s 12 seasons, there have been a few contestants cut from a slightly different cloth – a cloth woven from classic rock, jamband and soul. Three, in particular, have made it to the final two: Bo Bice (runner-up 2005) Taylor Hicks (winner 2006) and, most recently, Crystal Bowersox (runner-up 2010). From the get-go, with her long, blonde dreadlocks, guitar-playing ability and affable smile, Bowersox seemed like an archetypal hippie chick we had danced next to at a show. As it turns out, we just might have.

The 27-year-old Portland, Oreg., resident released her second record, All That for This, this March. The album feels warmer and more alive than her previous effort thanks, in part, to the production by Los Lobos’ Steve Berlin. In addition, she’ll be on Broadway this summer portraying legendary country singer Patsy Cline in the musical Always…Patsy Cline.

What was the biggest lesson you learned making a record the second time around?

Not to be so hard-headed about things – about anything – [and] to open up and go with the flow. That’s what working with Steve [Berlin] and everyone who put something into this second record has taught me: to let things take shape and form the natural way.

It sounds like the dynamic was different with your first record, Farmer’s Daughter.

I was like a wounded animal after American Idol. As thankful as I am for that experience, it is a mindfuck. It messes with someone’s brain – going from complete obscurity to being well-known. It’s not natural. [Laughs.] [However,] I am as proud of my first record as I am of this record – I want to make that clear.

What made you choose Steve Berlin as a producer for All That for This ?

Funny enough, a musician by the name of Jackie Greene. I love Jackie. I discovered Jackie when he opened for B.B. King, long before my Idol days. I’ve been a fan following his music for a long time. He sent me a Tweet with a little smiley face and I was so giddy that he knew who I was that we started direct messaging. So I asked him for some suggestions and he suggested Steve and it just so happened that Steve lived in Portland and so do I. It was a very comfortable way to make a record. I would wake up, take my kid to preschool and go to the studio. It was great. I’m so glad Jackie made that suggestion.

You quietly released a five-song EP titled Once Upon a Time… with your longtime bass player Frankie May last May.

It’s something that I feel like people who are really into the music will seek out and search for. It’s not something I wanted a bunch of fanfare [for], “Hey everybody, listen to this!” It was more of a personal step in my life to let these five, some unbearably sad, songs out into the world and realize that from here on out I’m hoping that things will be on a much more positive note. It was a healing process for me to let that out and move on from my past.

Your first show after getting off the American Idol tour in 2010 was a performance at Michael Franti’s Power to the Peaceful festival in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park.I’m sure the audiences couldn’t have been more different.

I don’t think the crowd had any idea who the hell I was. Michael, for me, has been a great teacher in my life and helped me realize what’s most important in this business. It’s not necessarily money, fame or notoriety. It’s about living your life – be who you are, create the art that you were meant to create and that’s that. Just live life and be happy. I’m so thankful for his presence in my life. He’s an amazing individual.

You were on Blues Traveler’s last record, Suzie Cracks the Whip, dueting with John Popper on “I Don’t Wanna Go.” How’d you two meet?

He agreed to come play a set with me at SXSW in 2011 for a couple bucks and some weed, and it was pretty amazing. We’ve been friends ever since. I was on my way to Santa Fe [where] I was working with a guy there named Jono Manson – we actually co-wrote a couple of the tunes on my latest record – and I’m driving through the desert from Albuquerque to Santa Fe and I get this phone call: “Hey, sweetie.” And I just so happened to be on the way to the studio, so I cut the vocal, we sent it back and that was that.

Are you a Dead, Phish or Panic girl?

Oh, man! All three. All three. My son’s first concert – he was four months old – was a Phish concert outside of Chicago. [Noblesville, Ind., summer 2009.] I had him wrapped up in a little blanket. I think he dug it.