Another Simpson living in the lens

It must get awfully crowded at Simpson family get-togethers. There’s Jessica and husband Nick Lachey and their MTV camera crew, constantly shooting for their “Newlyweds” reality series. And there’s younger sister Ashlee -- and her MTV camera crew.

“We worked it out,” says Ashlee, laughing with her mom, Tina Simpson, on a sofa in a dressing room at the Roxy on Wednesday. “Usually there’s only one crew filming it all now.”

But still, pretty much every moment of Ashlee’s waking life, like her sister’s, is being captured on tape for “Ashlee,” a series premiering June 16 on MTV that will chronicle the recording and launching of her upcoming debut album.

The crew, with its impossible-to- ignore camera, lights and boom microphone, was at the West Hollywood club as the singer, 19, gave her first L.A. concert, only her sixth live show, before a crowd of Geffen Records staffers (the label will release the album on July 20), invited music business folks, “Malcolm in the Middle” star Frankie Muniz and a handful of curious fans.

And the crew was present for this interview. Ashlee certainly seems used to it, chatting away like any other bubbly teen as a stylist touches up her hair (now black rather than the blond with which fans had become familiar in her three years as a regular on the WB TV series “Seventh Heaven”).

“What’s cool is this whole experience is being recorded, everything from her getting a record deal through the making of the album,” says her mom.

“Fifteen years from now, I’ll be able to show my kids when I signed my record deal,” says Ashlee. “And the boyfriends I went through.”

But the real point of all this, the youngster says, is to let the world know that she’s a Simpson of another color -- and it’s not just the dyed hair but an overall quasi-punk persona. It could also help give her an edge in what’s building as a plague of pop celebrity siblings: Britney Spears’ 13-year-old sister Jamie Lynn and Hilary Duff’s big sister Haylie are both working on albums, joining Aaron Carter (brother of Backstreet Boy Nick) and such earlier acts as Mark Wahlberg, who ultimately eclipsed his brother, New Kid on the Block’s Donnie.

“The big reason I chose to do the TV show is I wanted people to see the separation from my sister,” she says. “We’re completely different.”

That’s a general theme running through not just Ashlee’s conversation but also through the album, “Autobiography.” In particular, there’s the song “Shadow,” which on stage Wednesday she said was about her sister’s helping her find her own persona.

And from the title song through several that deal with a breakup with a boyfriend to the borderline soft-core sex tease of “La La,” she’s clearly distancing herself from the frothy teen-pop her sister emerged with in the late-’90s wave alongside Spears, as well as showing a personality quite different from the ditzy blond her sister has milked to new renown via “Newlyweds.”

So far it’s working. A breezy single, “Pieces of Me,” has been embraced by pop radio around the country, with 97 stations adding the song to their play lists in the week ending May 17, the strongest week for any single so far this year.

“Her sound is unique, and there’s no comparison,” says John Ivie, program director of L.A. pop station KIIS-FM (102.7). “They’re doing this in the right order. She’ll be well established before the MTV show even starts running.”

In concert this week she seemed to be fairly comfortable, if a little studied with her mannerisms -- a bit of Avril Lavigne, a touch of Gwen Stefani. But it was all done in a sincere attempt to keep the show simple and straightforward, and the personal quality of the material (all co-written by Simpson) helped keep her performance grounded.

“I’ve always kind of liked to shock people,” she says. “With my record I wasn’t afraid to be myself.”

Simpson says that her punkier approach is not merely designed to be different from her sister’s. It’s really who she is. A trained dancer (she attended the School for American Ballet in New York starting at 11), she took a liking to such punk bands as Green Day and Bad Religion after moving to L.A. at 14, when her family relocated from Dallas to focus on Jessica’s budding career. Her embrace of Alanis Morissette as a role model rankled her conservative parents, in light of Jessica’s having made a chastity pledge with her father Joe, who still manages both sisters’ careers.

“My mom didn’t let me go see Alanis, which made me want to listen to her even more,” she says, turning to her mother. “Thanks, mom!”

Rather than follow her sister into music, she concentrated on acting, most notably with “Seventh Heaven,” on which she plays Cecilia, the love interest of young Simon Camden. Last year, though, she started to focus on music again and was signed to Geffen Records by company president Jordan Schur, who teamed her with producer John Shanks, lately the go-to guy for female singer-songwriters from Hilary Duff to Sheryl Crow.

Schur, who signed Simpson before the MTV show was planned, knows that the kind of exposure she will get is not exactly the conventional route to brash rock credibility. Still, he believes the TV show will help dispel any perception that she’s like her sister.

“Anybody who thinks she isn’t real or think her music is fluff or think they know her because they know her sister, they’re going to be very surprised,” says Schur, who is best known for developing such rock acts as Limp Bizkit and Staind. “She’s rock as rock comes.”