A solo artist, McKee was a founding member of the cowpunk/country rock band, Lone Justice, in 1982, with whom she released two albums. Her band opened for such acts as U2.

When she was only 19, she wrote Feargal Sharkey's 1985 UK number one hit "A Good Heart", a song she has since recorded herself, and released on her album, Late December. The song was originally written about her failed relationship with musician Benmont Tench.

In 1987 she was featured in the Robbie Robertson video Somewhere Down The Crazy River.

She released her first solo, self-titled album in 1989. Her song "Show Me Heaven", which appeared on the soundtrack to the film, Days of Thunder, was a number one single in the United Kingdom for four weeks in 1990. She refused to perform this song in public up until recently when for the first time in 18 years she sang it at Dublin Gay Pride. She said "She felt it was the right time and place to sing it, I am proud of you".

Following her debut, McKee has released five critically-acclaimed studio (and two live) albums. The latter three High Dive, Peddlin' Dreams and Late December were released independently via her own Viewfinder Records label (distributed in the UK via Cooking Vinyl).

McKee is the half-sister of Love guitarist Bryan MacLean, with whom she played in a duo as a teenager.

She attended Beverly Hills High School in Beverly Hills, California.

She is married to her bass player Jim Akin, who co-writes and co-produces her solo albums.

In the 1990s, she spent time living in Dublin and the East Village, before settling in her native Los Angeles.

In addition to writing Sharkey's A Good Heart, McKee has also contributed to the Victoria Williams tribute album, Sweet Relief, on the song Opelousas (Sweet Relief).

She has provided backing vocals to U2's 'Who's Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses' from their Achtung Baby album, as well as to the Counting Crows' 1993 debut August and Everything After on "Sullivan Street".

She is also renowned for contributing the haunting "If Love Is a Red Dress (Hang Me in Rags)" to the Pulp Fiction soundtrack in 1994.

Scottish band Deacon Blue wrote the UK Top Ten hit Real Gone Kid about her.