Melissa Etheridge is returning to Kansas for a show. She kinda wishes she could stay

The debate persists: Who is the most successful musician to hail from Kansas? An argument can be made that honor belongs to Melissa Etheridge.

The feisty, scratchy-voiced Leavenworth native became a household name after the release of her self-titled debut in 1988, which showcased her commanding mix of rock bombast and singer-songwriter depth. Since then, she’s amassed sales of 25 million records, including five platinum albums.

She’s scored 15 Grammy nominations (for the likes of “Bring Me Some Water” and “I’m the Only One”) and two wins (for “Come to My Window” and “Ain’t It Heavy”). She won an Oscar for best original song in 2007 for “I Need To Wake Up” from the Al Gore documentary “An Inconvenient Truth.” A star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame got added in 2011.

But this success extends to her societal impact as well. She’s both an LGBTQ icon and a breast cancer survivor, earning acclaim for her charitable work and support for social justice issues.

Etheridge is back touring on “One Way Out,” a 2021 collection of songs she wrote at the start of her career that were never released. She returned to the studio with her original band to reinterpret these tunes, which offer a perfect musical integration of then and now.

The tour takes her to Lawrence’s Liberty Hall on Sunday.

“I’m gonna of course play the hits, so you will hear your favorite song,” she says.

“Then I’ve been doing a deep dive on a couple of albums. It’s a really great time. I hope to lift people up and make them feel better than when they came.”

Interviewed over Zoom from her home in Los Angeles, Etheridge wears a Fillmore East T-shirt while she sits near a shelf that contains her Oscar and Grammys. She discusses her Kansas roots, notable accomplishments and ongoing appreciation for the live concert experience.

Q: How is touring different for you in a post-COVID world?

A: I’m so grateful to be out there. I will never take any audience for granted again. It could be 10 people, and I will be delighted to play for them. I’ve been performing since I was 12 consistently and never really took long times off because I love it. It’s what I do. And that was just the longest I ever went without live contact. I did do streaming, and that kept me busy. But, man, to be with a band and in front of thousands of people, that’s just wonderful.

Q: Were you going stir crazy?

A little bit. Traveling is my life.

Q: Do you have any strong memories of playing in Lawrence?

Lawrence was always “the college town,” and you would have to go through the back roads from Leavenworth to get there. Lawrence was where when the kids graduated most of them went to KU. It wasn’t a place I went when playing in cover bands in high school. We did mostly older folks gigs. We did Parents Without Partners dances and Elks and Eagles club stuff. We rarely ever played Lawrence. I didn’t go to college there; I left right after high school.

I have recently played there a couple times, and it’s been fantastic. I follow the Jayhawks — and basketball was so much fun this year. I don’t have a lot of childhood Lawrence memories except for in the early ’60s when I was a little kid, my father took me to see this great runner. This guy was gonna break all the rules: It was Jim Ryun. I remember him telling me, “This is historic. You got to watch this.”

Q: Some friends were discussing recently who the most famous musician from Kansas is, and your name came up. Do you have a favorite musician from your home state?

I always liked the band Kansas. They were pretty awesome and pretty huge. Pat Metheny (a Lee’s Summit native) was always someone I really admired — but there are all kinds of Kansas City jazz musicians that are historic.

Q: “One Way Out” is a pretty unusual idea for an album. Was there a particular song that kick-started the reaction, “I should finally record this”?

I was just digging through all my old stuff a few years ago for what I was going to make into a box set of CDs. … But during the process of digging through this stuff, I started finding these older songs. There’s a song that’s on the new album called “Wild Wild Wild.” I just loved that song, but I remember I had not come out yet. It was right before, and I just felt like everyone would know that song was about a woman. It was like, “No, I can’t record that.” So I just left it. Going back 25 years later, I thought, “This is a great song. I want to give it to the world.” Then I decided I’m gonna rerecord these and put them out.

Q: You’re halfway to achieving an EGOT. Do you have any strategies on winning a Tony or an Emmy?

Well … you’ll hear something soon. We’re going to start something off-Broadway. So who knows? I could soon be three quarters of the way.

Q: I hear you’re writing an autobiography. What chapter are you working on right now?

We’ve got the first four chapters. I have a writer who is writing with me because it would otherwise take me about 10 years to write my own books. We’ve been working on it for over a year, and we’re finishing the fourth chapter and then moving on to the fifth.

Q: What have you learned about yourself through the writing process?

Everything. I gotta tell you, this is the year of going back over my whole life. I did a podcast yesterday. I spoke to the guy for over two hours, and we went through my whole entire life. It was exhausting. And that’s what happens in the book. There’s the two-hour story of my life, and then there are the days and days of stories, and really combing it out and going deep into it.

This new Broadway thing is also about my life. So right now it’s all about my life and going into it, so it’s kind of intense. But I think it’s healing because when we heal the stories from our past, we heal those little funny things that slow us down. It’s been good to come to peace with my past.

Q: Living in California, what do you miss most about Kansas?

Simplicity. An ease. I tried to bring that with me in California. I miss May and June in Kansas. It’s gorgeous and beautiful. June especially. There’s just no more beautiful place in June than Kansas. I miss the fishing. It’s funny because I got out of there — “Let me get out of this small town” — then I have children, and I’m like, “Oh, I just want to get back to this small town.” My (youngest twins) are now in high school, and they’ve only got a couple more years. But I do think about coming back. I really do.

Q: As a 61-year-old artist, what is some advice you would have given to your younger self?

It’s easy to say this now that I’m older, but I would say just really slow down. Enjoy the day. Enjoy that it’s not a destination — I sound like a bumper sticker — but it’s not a “there,” you know? “I’m going to get there and all my problems will be solved.” It’s this long journey, and you don’t ever want the journey to end. Just enjoy it. And I would also say do more situps.

Jon Niccum is a filmmaker, freelance writer and author of “The Worst Gig: From Psycho Fans to Stage Riots, Famous Musicians Tell All.”

Melissa Etheridge in concert

Melissa Etheridge will perform at 8 p.m. Aug. 14 at Liberty Hall in Lawrence. See libertyhall.net.