Life after 'Star'

MUSCLE SHOALS - Angela Hacker breezed into FAME Studios Friday morning for a post-"Nashville Star" interview.

She's a few minutes late, but gets a pass.

After all, she is the mother of an 8-year-old son, and she was up late Thursday playing for another packed house with her brother, Zac.

These days, they're both in demand.

Hacker ended up being late for her dentist's appointment, too, and still had to drive to Nashville, Tenn., to listen to tracks on her upcoming album.

The 29-year-old outlasted 20,000 other performers, including her brother, to become the 2007 Nashville Star. She was declared the winner amid a shower of confetti and screaming fans March 1.

"Nashville Star" is a reality program in the vein of "American Idol" that allows fans to select the next big country music star.

Hacker said the show has definitely impacted her life for the best.

"I've supported myself with my guitar and my voice since I was 24," she said Friday, sitting on the steps leading to the second floor of FAME studios.

During that time, Hacker said she usually loaded up her equipment herself, drove herself to a gig, set up her equipment and played a four-hour set.

She did it "usually for $100 a night," sometimes more.

When the show was over, she would load her equipment and go home.

It was a routine she repeated five or six nights a week.

Since becoming the newest Nashville Star, Hacker is in demand. Requests for interviews and photos have to go through a representative of her label, Warner Bros. Records, in Nashville.

There are meetings to attend and an album from the "Nashville Star" program to complete.

During the interview Friday, Rodney Hall, owner of House of Fame Publishing, walked up and handed Hacker a sheet of paper.

He asked her during which University of Alabama home football game she would like to sing the national anthem.

She suggested either Tennessee or LSU.

Once a one-woman act, Hacker now must consider hiring a manager, a business manager and a lawyer.

Fans who cannot get enough of their homegrown hero will only have to wait until April 3 for the release of an Angela Hacker disc.

The album will be called "The Winner Is" and will feature four tracks penned by Hacker, as well as cover songs she performed on the show, including the Dan Penn track, "Do Right Woman, Do Right Man," recorded by Aretha Franklin.

The album will also feature a track written by FAME recording artist James LeBlanc and a duet with her brother.

"The album will be available exclusively at Wal-Mart and iTunes," Hacker said.

In June, she and Zac, along with third- and fourth-place finishers David St. Romain and Joshua Stevens, will embark on the "Nashville Star" summer tour.

Hacker said the tour will involve 30-40 shows.

Then she will go into the studio to record her debut album.

But there's a twist.

"We approached them about doing it as a duo," Hacker said.

Warner Bros. liked the idea and Zac and Angela will be billed as "The Hackers."

"We can reach our audience better this way than going off on our own separate careers," she said. "We both feel stronger together."

Her brother Zac is likely her biggest fan.

"I was pulling for Angela the whole way," Zac Hacker wrote in a Web blog for the TimesDaily the day after the final episode. "It's so good for it to work out that way. I'm so happy for her and I think I did well, too.

"There was a lot of conversation going back and forth between Angela and me (on the final episode)," Zac Hacker said. "I told her, 'It's going to be you.' She said, 'No, it's going to be you.' We kidded each other and had a good time with it. It's all about family for us."

Even though she was the ultimate winner, Hacker said she and Zac are both winners.

"This has opened a lot of doors for both of us," Zac Hacker said. "Angela is doing her record, and I will sing some background on it, and we may sing together on a song.

"We'll do some things together in the future, and I think the people will like that."

Angela Hacker said the fact that she and Zac are brother and sister probably increased interest in them during the show.

"This is what we do," she said. "This is not a hobby."

Where the album will be recorded and who will be in their band will be determined later, Angela Hacker said.

"I hope we will be in charge of who is in our band," she said.

Hacker admits it wasn't that long ago she was playing bars, restaurants, weddings and Christmas parties.

"It's a long way from playing to a handful of people at gigs to having the fire marshal shut you down," she said.

The show they played Thursday night in Sheffield at Fizz -- Muscle Shoals to Music Row Live -- was standing room only. Most of the tickets were sold before the show began, leaving some fans watching the show on television in the Holiday Inn lobby.

Many people around the Shoals already knew Hacker before the TV show as a result of her appearances around the area. Now she's being recognized everywhere she goes.

While fans from the Shoals drove to Nashville to attend the TV shows, there were also "Hacker Backers" who came from Wisconsin, Texas, Colorado and New York to see them perform on Nashville Star.

The two finishing first and second in the nationwide balloting shows they both have popularity.

"I want everybody to know that Angela and I appreciate all the votes and support you gave us," Zac Hacker said. "It's all of you who allowed us to have this ride."

Hacker said he intends to remain in the Shoals.

"I will commute back and forth, so I'll be around," Hacker said.

This has been an experience of a lifetime and Angela and I are looking ahead to the future."

Russ Corey can be reached at 740-5738 or russ.corey@timesdaily.com.