The moment the Indigo Girls -- Emily Saliers and Amy Ray -- walked out on stage over a decade ago with just acoustic guitars and sang, it was probably inevitable they would be considered folk.
Folk, however, has never been a label the duo has worn comfortably, Ms. Saliers says in a telephone interview. With their latest record, "Swamp Ophelia," and particularly with the record's first single, "Touch Me Fall," the Indigo Girls took steps to refocus their musical image.
"I definitely wouldn't call this a folk album," Ms. Saliers says. "Folk, it's sort of a limiting category in a way. And I have nothing against folk music, but I associate folk music with, you know, Peter, Paul & Mary, the Kingston Trio, stuff like that, some of the older stuff Joan Baez did and the very, very early days of Bob Dylan, and things like that. And our influences have been so varied, and really not by any folk singers.
"Even Joni Mitchell is called a folk singer, but I don't think of her in terms of that. A lot of times folk implies extreme simplicity and music for the folks, and I think of her as a brilliant artist with a very complicated, complex vision. She's my biggest influence."
She continues: "And then Amy is completely influenced by the whole post-punk music scene, alternative rock. She's very in the indie underground. I mean, her music is angst-ridden. And just because she plays an acoustic guitar, you couldn't call it folk."
"Touch Me Fall," a complex six-minute piece, is certainly a far cry from folk. It opens to a quiet electric guitar-based verse melody, then shifts into an interlude complete with a full string section, before changing into a rocked-up, guitar-heavy finale.
But the single is only one of several songs that give "Swamp Ophelia" a scope that extends beyond Indigo Girls' four previous studio records.
Even Ms. Saliers' gentle, more folkish tunes -- "The Wood Song," "Fare Thee Well" and "Mystery" -- display an equally strong pop sense. Elsewhere, the record veers into a variety of styles. Ms. Saliers' "Least Complicated," with its buoyant melody, spirited beat and accordion and penny-whistle fills, sounds like Appalachian pop.
Ms. Ray's "This Train Revisited," a powerful remembrance of victims of the World War II Holocaust, is a stormy, bluesy track. "Fugitive," with its horns and cello, takes on an epic feel.
The difference in musical influences evident on "Swamp Ophelia" is but one of many contrasts between Ms. Saliers and Ms. Ray. Though considered a tight unit as the Indigo Girls, they show very different personalities.
Ms. Saliers seems more soft-spoken and thoughtful; Ms. Ray is more energetic in manner and more apt to show a brash side. They also lead quite separate lives away from tours, rehearsals and recording.
"It's so funny, because I'll go into different places, like eating dinner at a restaurant or something, and someone will come up and go, 'Where's Amy?' " Ms. Saliers says. "You know, Amy and I spend so much time together working . . . When we come off the road, we just need our peace.
"We actually get along very well. And we might run into each other going to hear a live band or something like that. If we have a big party, we'll invite each other to each other's houses and things like that. But we really lead very separate personal lives. We'd drive each other crazy if we had to be around each other all the time."
Their interests away from the group are also quite different, Ms. Saliers says.
"Earlier on, we were a lot more alike," she says. "Then as time went on, we just sort of had different interests and different things we like to do with our time and stuff like that. But it's not the kind of thing we thought about. It just happened naturally.
"There's probably a whole list of things that Amy's into that I'm not particularly interested in," Ms. Saliers says. "For one thing, she's got her own record label [Daemon Records], which keeps her very busy and occupied. . . . But we both love to read, and we both have a deep love for history. . . . I really believe the things that we hold basically valuable, our values and our morals and ethics and beliefs about how people should be treated and social issues and things like that, we're very similar in those things."
The musical partnership between Ms. Saliers and Ms. Ray stretches over a decade. They first met as sixth-graders in Decatur, Ga., and began singing together in high school.
Their interest in music, songwriting and performing intensified during the mid-'80s, when they were attending Atlanta's Emory University. There, they launched their career as the Indigo Girls.
A self-released 1987 debut album, "Strange Fire," brought the Indigo Girls notable attention, and they landed a deal with Epic records. Their self-titled 1989 Epic debut lifted their profile considerably when its single, "Closer to Fine," became a popular hit.
Two more studio albums -- "Nomads Indians Saints" (1990) and "Rites of Passage" (1992) -- along with a live EP, "Back on the Bus Y'all" -- solidified the Indigo Girls' following and critical standing.
From the start, Ms. Saliers and Ms. Ray have written separately, pooling their songs on each album. Though it's a situation that could breed competition, clashes of egos and envy, Ms. Saliers says she and Ms. Ray have never had those problems.
"First of all, now we barely have enough songs to make up an album, and we have a good sense of which songs are good and which will work well. There really aren't too many conflicts that arise over things like that. And really, we have a fairly good ability at keeping our egos in check. . . .
"If one person gets a lot more attention than the other, I'm sure it might hurt your feelings, or you'd wonder: What am I doing? But then the response to our music is so mixed down the line that there's plenty for each of us, and we really don't quarrel over things like who gets the most songs or anything like that."
Indigo Girls
L Where: Patriot Center, George Mason University, Fairfax, Va.
When: Sunday, Dec. 11, 8 p.m.
Call: (410) 481-SEAT
Shades of Indigo
To hear excerpts from the Indigo Girls' "Swamp Ophelia," call Sundial, The Sun's telephone information service, at (410) 783-1800. In Anne Arundel County, call 268-7736; in Harford County, 836-5028; in Carroll County, 848-0338. Using a touch-tone phone, punch in the four-digit code 6123 after you hear the greeting.