source: azcentral.com

Out of Eden

Michael Chow/The Arizona Republic

Against a Phoenix backdrop, former Eden's Crush pop sensation Ana Maria Lombo
plans a return to Los Angeles.

Pop singer Ana Maria Lombo ponders life after stardom

Scott Craven
The Arizona Republic
Aug. 14, 2003 12:00 AM

It took 25 years, thousands of miles on the road and a meteoric rise and fall
before Ana Maria Lombo finally faced that state of being long considered a
four-letter word: solo.

What an unaccustomed feeling for a woman who, from the moment she was born, had
been part of an act.

For much of her life, it had been as one of the singing Lombo sisters, a quaint
children's trio that grew to become a respected family act. Then she was
one-fifth of Eden's Crush, a made-by-TV girl group that, for six months, had it
all, including a limited shelf life.

Now Lombo is on her own, the victim - no, not the victim, but the result - of
decisions beyond her control. At 25, she's reached the point where she can
control her own destiny, no longer at the whim of agents, managers or even her
parents.

She has yet to see a future that's just beyond the horizon.

"I have to sit down and chill for a while," says Lombo, sipping on a bottle of
water at a corner table in a Mesa Starbucks. "I have to find out the kind of
person I am, what I want to do the rest of my life that will make me happy.

"And come up with a backup plan in case my first choice doesn't happen the way
I'd like."

Two years ago, there seemed to be no need for a backup, with the main plan going
so well. Lombo, a statuesque brunette perfect for the fashion runway, was a
member of Eden's Crush. The group was made for and by reality TV, the product of
the WB network's Popstars, a weekly show in spring 2001 that followed the making
of the band.

For months, Lombo had kept her involvement secret, even from her parents, as the
show was taped in late 2000. She had flown back and forth to Los Angeles under
the pretense of working on a Spanish-language album. She would leave modeling
appointments early and back out of gigs with Pazport, the Lombo family band.

"I didn't want to tell my mom and dad (about Popstars) because I was sure it
would be met with opposition," she says. "It could have discouraged me from
doing it. If I were going to have any regrets, I wanted it to be for something I
did do rather than something I didn't do."

Lombo broke the news on Thanksgiving because, by that time, she was sharing a
house in LA with her bandmates.

"The only thing that bothered me was that I was the last to know," recalls her
dad, Sergio Lombo. "But I knew Ana Maria would be a success. She is a very smart
girl and very determined."

Once the final Popstars episode aired in April 2001, Eden's Crush was caught in
a whirlwind of talk shows, press interviews and personal appearances. Popstars,
the group's first and only album, went gold, as did the single Get Over
Yourself. Eden's Crush toured with 'N Sync and then with Jessica Simpson, but by
August, most of the band's fans had moved on.

On Sept. 10, 2001, Lombo and her manager, Darius Lassus, were in talks with the
band's label to spin her off as a solo act, perhaps with a bilingual pop album.

"We left feeling very positive," Lassus says. "And the next morning, we woke up
to an incredible nightmare."

In the wake of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the record label went out of
business, and the group, Lassus says, lost the interest and support of
executives who had been guiding the way.

The band's last performance was atop a Red Cross float in the 2001 Hollywood
Christmas Parade.

The five members scattered, Lombo returning to her house in Higley - purchased
largely with money earned during the short but happy life of Eden's Crush.

"I loved the experience," Lombo says. "I was hoping we'd go another year or two,
but no one seemed interested enough to keep it going. Maybe it wasn't meant to
be. It was time to be on my own."

She wanted to do something, anything, to get back in the musical groove.

By that time, sisters Shalom and Felicia were pursuing their own goals. Lombo
channeled her energy into writing. At first, she endured the serenity, and,
soon, she embraced it.

"I was so revved up when I got home," she says. "But everyone else was in a
different place. I had to sit back and take a breath."

While writing music as well as a book on self-esteem ("I'm proof that if you can
get over your insecurities, you can do anything"), life has slowed to a ballad's
pace.

It is hard for Lombo to believe that, just a year and a half ago, she was giving
interviews and signing albums and hearing herself on Top 40 radio. But in the
life of a pop star, 18 months can be an eon. It is the time that elapses between
performing in front of thousands of screaming fans and smiling pleasantly when
asked by the concessions clerk at a movie theater if you were famous once.

Most of the idiosyncrasies of her celebrity status have vanished. For example,
she recently obtained a driver's license "because now I don't have anyone to
drive me around." And she now has time to reply to her fan mail, which still
comes in via e-mail and her post office box.

But she still maintains that line between public and private life, reluctant to
reveal that she and Lassus were married in March.

"It feels strange talking about it," Lombo says. "When I was with the group,
everyone told you never to talk about boyfriends or husbands. We were supposed
to be, I don't know, available or something."

With money from Eden's Crush and earnings as a model for the Ford Modeling
Agency, Lombo bought the Higley house, which likely will become a part-time
residence because she plans to move to LA this month or in September to renew
showbiz contacts.

"I love Arizona, but nothing happens here," she says. "In LA, you're right in
the thick of it. You can go to restaurant, and there's a producer sitting right
over there. Anything can happen."

Lombo will write songs in an effort to land a publishing and recording deal.

Aiding her in that search is her husband, who knows that, in the music industry,
it's better to have the right sound than a great voice. Finding the right fit
for Lombo is the key, he says, whether it's rock, dance, salsa or cumbia.

"It all boils down to putting out three demos that show her potential," Lassus
says. "If someone thinks one of those songs will get airplay, she'll be signed.
You can have the most talented voice but not get signed because you don't fit
the image. That's why it's show business. It's a fantasy."

At 25, Lombo realizes that she is likely too old for fickle young pop fans,
whose allowances can send groups such as the Backstreet Boys to the top.
Instead, she looks to rock, where odds of longevity are greater.

The key, she believes, is to write for herself rather than depend on the
kindness of commercial songwriters. And if that doesn't work, she has enrolled
in online courses at the University of Phoenix. If she can't be onstage, she'll
try to succeed backstage as an agent or a manager. Or perhaps, in an ideal world
as dreamed by an energetic young woman with a gold album on her wall, even
running her own label.

"That would be the ultimate," Lombo says. "If that's the direction I choose. At
this point, I'm not sure where to go."



Reach the reporter at

(602) 444-8773.




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