Ian Spelling

New York Times News Service

Teen stars come and go, but few come back again. Jesse McCartney is one of those few.

By 2004 the then-16-year-old singer/actor already had earned two Daytime Emmy Award nominations for his work on All My Children (1998-2001), co-starred on the television series Summerland (2004-2005), joined the boy band Dream Street and scored a smash hit with his debut solo album, Beautiful Soul (2004), which featured the blockbuster title track.

But it came crashing down in 2006, when McCartney’s sophomore album, Right Where You Want Me, landed with a thud.

“That album didn’t perform as everyone had hoped,” McCartney says, “but it was an album that had to be made, for me, in my headspace. I was at a point in my career where I wanted people to hear my voice, and so I did pretty much every song on that album.

“I don’t fault anyone,” he says. “I don’t even fault myself. I refer to it as my musical puberty. I feel like I was going through a time where I was learning a lot, was absorbing a lot and was still very green, but the album had to be made and it was a stepping stone in my career.

“It did perform like a classic sophomore record,” McCartney adds with a rueful laugh. “But that’s the thing about this industry: You’re going to have some home runs and you’re going to strike out once in a while. That’s the way it works. Of course it’s a little discouraging at first, but in this industry you have to have a tough enough skin to want to get back up on the horse and keep going.”

More than tough-skinned enough, McCartney regrouped. He provided voices for the popular animated features Alvin and the Chipmunks (2007) and Horton Hears a Who! (2008), played a murder suspect in an episode of Law and Order: SVU (2008), co-wrote Leona Lewis’ worldwide hit single Bleeding Love (2008) and released Departure (2008), a pop/R&B album that launched the high-charting singles Leavin’, It’s Over and How Do You Sleep?

The album continues to spawn singles, and McCartney has toured heavily in support of it. Striking while the iron is hot again, he also will appear in several upcoming episodes of the ABC Family series Greek and is reprising his role as Theodore in the inevitable Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel.

Speaking by cellphone right before a concert in Tampa, Fla., McCartney sounds at once thrilled and humbled to be in the midst of a successful second act.

“It’s nice,” says McCartney, who will turn 22 on April 9. “After the last album I realized that it was R&B music that I was attached to. I grew up listening to that, to soul music. Coming off the second album, I took some time to think about what it was that I wanted to do, how I wanted to be perceived as an artist. And I wanted to make an album that was a reflection of my youth and what I listened to.

“That took me two years,” he says, “but I’d just sit in my house, sit in the studio and write non-stop. I built up my catalogue of songs and got to a place where I could go to the label (Hollywood Records) and say, ‘Look, this is the style I want to move toward, the lane I want to be in,’ and thankfully they said, ‘All right, let’s go for it.’

“I made a shopping list of writers and producers that were in that lane, that could crystallize this vision I had, and I just went for it.

“There’s always a risk,” the young singer/songwriter says, “but I felt like it was maybe more honest than the second album, because the second album had more of an electric feel, a pop-rock feel, which I don’t think I’d realized would be so uncomfortable for me performing live.

“So I’ve arrived in a good place, musically, with Departure,” he concludes, “and I’m just glad that people seem to like it. I’m amazed. The fans are behind it, and the sales are proof of that.

“I truly believe that I have six or more singles on this album,” he adds, “and I’m doing a re-release of the album on April 7, which is called Departure: Recharged, and it’s a deluxe version with three or four new songs that I think are really great. So we’re going to keep on trucking with it, and I want to take the album all the way through the rest of this year.”

Meanwhile McCartney’s multi-episode arc on Greek will kick off on March 30. He’ll play Andy, a football star and high-school friend of Calvin (Paul James) who is experiencing his first taste of college life. Andy’s arrival creates tension between rival fraternities at Cyprus-Rhodes.

“He eventually chooses one of the fraternities,” McCartney says, “and you see all the initiations and the hazing and the debauchery that every freshman frat boy goes through. It’s a really fun show, and it’s a comedy, so it’s my first time exercising my comedic skills, which to me was harder than drama. I’ve always been more of a dramatic actor, and I’m more comfortable doing that.

“This gave me a chance to dive in a little bit into comedy,” he says, “and the guys on the show, like Scott Michael Foster and Paul James, they made it really comfortable for me to come in and try to establish this character. It was a challenge and I really had a great time, and I’m looking forward to hearing everyone’s reactions.

“They invited me to stay and they’ve invited me back,” McCartney says, “and I’d love to come back. It’s about balance and trying to work it out with the music and maintain both careers at the same time.”

Peering beyond Departure and Greek, McCartney recently wrote songs for Toni Braxton’s upcoming album, and he’s also planning to write a couple for Jordin Sparks, his tour mate last year. Meanwhile he’s trying to look beyond his immediate opportunities and get a long-term perspective on his future as an artist.

“I’ve already experienced the high of the highs and the low of the lows at an early age,” McCartney says, “and it’s not been the easiest career.

“It’s been challenging. I didn’t get all of it all at once. It’s been a slow build, and I’d much prefer that over a here-today/gone-tomorrow type of career.”

Source: >>>