Rachelle van Zanten may groove like Led Zeppelin and ZZ Top, but she's not your typical rock star.

"I'm into healthy living, running on trails, hanging out with my dog and going fishing in my canoe.

"I don't do well in big cities so I often play a lot of these little rock halls in the smaller communities," says the slide-guitarist, who plays the Epcor Centre's Engineered Air Theatre tonight, celebrating the release of her first solo album, Back to Francois.

A native of Francois Lake, B.C., van Zanten says the record is an honest collection of self-written songs reflecting certain points -- both sweet and savage -- in her life.

"I grew up singing to Emmylou Harris, Kathy Mattea and Linda Ronstadt, so I've got that little twang in me as well. You can definitely hear those early influences coming out in my music, so I guess I was just trying to be true to myself when I wrote this record," she says, adding she jammed with her musical parents when she was little.

Going from jamming with her folks to being a full-time musician hasn't been easy.

"In 2005 I said, 'That's it, I'm quitting all my jobs and I'm just going to play music.'

"I kind of locked myself away for couple months, played and played and played and tried not to listen to any other slide players so I could develop my own tone and voice on the slide."

As she progresses, her goals do too.

"I've learned the power of manifestation. Like you can just say, 'I'm going to be playing the main stage at Calgary Folk Fest within two years.' And it happened this year. I want to go do a duet with Anne Murray one day. I think that's achievable in I'd say a year and a half."

Tickets at Ticketmaster.