Serving a stint as a cook at the Bluebird Café didn't do much harm to pull her into the singer/songwriter fold. In 1988, Richey planted her roots in Nashville to really test that fold and hone her own songwriting craft. She built a reputation as a singer who could interpret a lyric and harmonize with the best of them, all the while writing songs with an optimistic melancholy quality that is unusual and alluring. Before too long, the Zanesville, Ohio, native was signed to PolyGram Records, releasing her eponymous debut in 1995. Bitter Sweet and Glimmer followed in two-year increments. All three albums were tagged as contemporary country but actually fall in step pretty close to John Hiatt's brand of music making. Comparisons to Shawn Colvin have also run rampant over the years, due to Richey's cleverly twisting lyrical phrases and beats. By the time she made 1999's Glimmer with producer Hugh Padgham, her sound leaned even further toward the pop end of the spectrum. Cut to 2002 and the release of Rise. Teaming up with producer Bill Bottrell, Richey fleshed out her sound with worldly flavors of instrumentation, atypical for a so-called contemporary country artist. The result was mesmerizing and her most masterful work to date. Her greatest hits, entitled Collection, arrived in 2004, followed by Chinese Boxes in the summer of 2007. In recent years, Kim turned to her East Nashville-based bandleader and frequent co-writer Neilson Hubbard to conjure the earthy indie-pop feel of Wreck Your Wheels and to complete her masterpiece of smart, sensual understatement Thorn In My Heart. She continues to tour and perform on the Grand Ole Opry.