Austin-Based Singer Takes Another ‘Swing’ : Pop music: After A&M; decided not to release ‘Culture Swing,’ Tish Hinojosa redid it, producing it herself. She plays McCabe’s on Friday.

Two years ago, Tish Hinojosa was on a roll. On her first major-label album, 1989’s “Homeland,” her voice had evoked comparisons to Linda and Emmylou, her sound combined commercial country with quality folk-pop, and her songs passionately addressed social and personal issues.

In addition, the Austin-based singer-songwriter was active in social causes, and as the youngest of 13 children of Mexican-American immigrants, she brought an intriguing cultural perspective to her work.

Her second album, produced by Booker T. Jones, was set to come out at the beginning of 1991. But the week that “Culture Swing” was due in stores, Hinojosa found out that the label had scrapped the album and dropped her from the roster.

“It was one of those hard, fast lessons about what major record labels are about,” says Hinojosa, who performs at McCabe’s on Friday. “It’s one of those confusing things. I’m not sure if and who to blame, and why there’s people there that I never heard from again and while I was there they acted like they were real good friends. It was kind of a strange little thing.”

Hinojosa figures it might have to do with her music’s eclecticism, a product of her bicultural upbringing in San Antonio.

“It’s been interesting,” says Hinojosa, 36. “When I was small I felt very strong cultural differences between being Mexican-American or American. . . . We spoke Spanish at home. When we went to parochial school, it wasn’t cool to speak Spanish, and that was a real harsh realization for me. . . . It made me question: ‘What am I supposed to feel? Am I supposed to turn away from this or be ashamed of my parents?’ ”

The Spanish-language entertainers she encountered at home on radio and television were her first musical influences. She picked up on folk music in high school and gravitated toward the clubs, eventually moving into the progressive country scene in Taos, N.M. She had a go at Nashville before settling in Austin in 1988.

After the A&M; disappointment, Hinojosa released a live Spanish-language album and recorded the rejected “Culture Swing” all over again, in Texas instead of Hollywood, producing it herself.

“What we got is a lot more personal record,” she says. “It’s a lot more of me, a lot more of Texas. The sound is a lot more real, my sound. . . . In L.A. it was a lot less time spent on a lot more frills. And what we did in Texas, a lot more heart went into it, a lot more time and thought.”

“Culture Swing” came out last month on the independent folk label Rounder, and although Hinojosa is comfortable with the grass-roots level, she has some regrets about the state of the marketplace.

“There’s a lot of real music going on, and the only ones that are hearing it are people that come to coffeehouses or are in those circles of people that come to McCabe’s and that kind of thing.

“It’s frustrating. Being able to touch people is pretty fulfilling for an artist, but it’s a little disheartening that this is not the mainstream and the message is only going as far as the people in the room.

“There’s so much talk now about artists who have fallen between the cracks. So many of the singer-songwriters just don’t fit into niches in Nashville or in pop music anymore. I guess I’m one of those. But I feel like I’m in good company, because I like a lot of people that are in the same crack that I’m in.”