cyndilauper

On October 27, 1998, Sony US sent the following e-mail to its news mailing list

Cyndi Lauper presents her first-ever Christmas album, Merry Christmas…Have A Nice Life. This great holiday album went on sale Today!

The album includes the classics “Silent Night” and “Rocking Around The Christmas Tree” plus some of the fun music that fans expect from Cyndi, including “Christmas Conga” and “Minnie And Santa.” Eight of the songs were written or co-written by Cyndi herself.

Although Cyndi Lauper officially began to work on her new holiday disc over the last year, it’s really been a lifetime in the making. Merry Christmas…Have A Nice Life is packed with the emotions of more than just one season: warmth, humor, melancholy, passion, remembrances of things past, hopes for the future, and, of course, a conga line.

Merry Christmas…Have A Nice Life is sure to be a Christmas classic for years to come.

When Cyndi Lauper was told by doctors that she’d never sing again, she wouldn’t take no for an answer. After six months of professional voice lessons, Cyndi’s voice returned and she went on to become the first female rock star to have four singles in the top five on the music charts. This perseverance is a typical Cyndi trait. Throughout her life she has never let adversity get in the way of her becoming a success.

The middle child of working-class, second-generation immigrant parents, Cyndi grew up in the Ozone Park section of Queens, New York. Even as a small child, she was drawn to music, and her singing talent was evident as she crooned along to her mother’s recordings of Barbra Streisand, Marlo Lanza and Ethel Merman.

The difficulties in Cyndi’s childhood began at the age of five when her parents divorced and Cyndi’s mother remarried. Both Cyndi and her sister suffered physical and sexual abuse from their new stepfather, which caused incredible stress. One of the fallouts from this difficult home life was that Cyndi got expelled from two high schools. She turned to singing as a way to escape and cope with her troubled life.

In the mid-1970s, Cyndi moved to New York City where she worked odd jobs and sang with a few unsuccessful cover bands. During this time, she began to develop her signature offbeat fashion and hairstyles. Her career took a turn when she met band manager David Wolff.

They immediately formed an intimate relationship and Wolff introduced her to several higher-ups in the New York music scene, including Lennie Petze, who was the executive producer of the CBS affiliate label, Portrait Records. Petze, in need of a strong female rock/pop act for the label, observed Cyndi’s vocal talent and wacky fashion and signed her as a solo singer.

“She’s So Unusual,” Cyndi’s first album, went multiplatinum, and the singles “Girls Just Want to Have Fun, “She Bop” and “Time After Time” all reached the top five on the music charts. It was evident that a major talent had emerged. And through the new phenomenon of MTV, the music videos for those three songs made Cyndi Lauper a pop icon.

She received the 1985 Grammy Award for Best New Artist, two American Music Awards, eight MTV video awards and a spot on Ms. magazine’s list of the 12 most influential women of the year. Cyndi had secured her place in the music industry’s highest tier.

Cyndi had made it to the big time. There was a follow-up album, “True Colors,” world tours and a Manhattan loft. David Wolff, by now her manager as well as her lover, encouraged her to become involved in promoting professional wrestling and to star in the motion picture “Vibes.” Her third album, “A Night to Remember,” did not receive much critical success, despite a Grammy nomination for one of its singles. Unfortunately, the pressures of success began to take their toll, and Cyndi and David split up — both personally and professionally.

Just when everyone thought Cyndi had disappeared from the music scene, she returned with a new outlook, a new love — actor David Thornton — and a mature, personal album entitled “Hat Full of Stars.” She traded her red hair and crinolines for a more sophisticated, sexy style. Her 1995 compilation album, “12 Deadly Cyns,” became a huge hit in both Europe and Asia.

Cyndi began to regain the critical success she had in the United States, thanks to her latest album, “Sisters of Avalon.” Cyndi also rekindled her acting career by appearing on the hit television sitcom “Mad About You.” Cyndi’s appearance as Mary Ann on the show earned her the 1995 Emmy Award for Best Guest Appearance on a Series.

At 43, Cyndi Lauper is an accomplished musician, trendsetter, survivor and mother to her baby son, Declyn. In this Intimate Portrait, watch for interviews with Yoko Ono, David Thornton, David Wolff and Cyndi’s mother and brother.

Cyndi Lauper’s last album for Epic Records, “Merry Christmas … Have A Nice Life,” is not due until Oct. 27, but she is already looking for a new label deal. “This is a new time in my life, and I think everything should be new,” says Lauper, who recently acquired a new manager, Arma Andon of Pure Management.

Lauper has been at Epic her entire solo career, since 1983’s “She’s So Unusual.” The singer, who says she is already meeting with suitors, is also in talks with NBC about a sitcom. (She won an Emmy for a guest spot on “Mad About You.”) Epic would not comment on Lauper’s departure.

“Merry Christmas” includes standards like “Silent Night,” plus originals by Lauper with co-writers, including Jan Pulsford and Rob Hyman, with whom she wrote “Time After Time.”

Cyndi Lauper’s ’80s anthem “Girls Just Want to Have Fun” has earned an esteemed place in America’s finest drag shows over the last 14 years. Last weekend, the flamboyant redhead repaid the compliment by performing at a Gay Pride rally in New York City.

As diva of ceremonies, Lauper performed three songs, including the apropos “Disco Inferno,” originally recorded by the Trammps in 1977. The longtime gay pride advocate was backed on Sunday by a brilliant chorus line of drag queens, similar to the dashing beauties that have toured with Lauper in the past.

Following rousing renditions of “The Ballad of Cleo and Joe” and “I’m Gonna Be Strong,” Lauper left New York’s Bryant Park for her home and studio in Connecticut, where she is currently recording a Christmas album. With 7-month-old Declyn overseeing his mother’s creative process, Lauper has written a batch of original songs for the disc, spokesman Chris Luongo told JAMTV on Tuesday.

Merry Christmas and Have a Good Life will contain some standard holiday fare and will debut late this fall, Luongo said.

Meanwhile, Lauper’s babysitter will no doubt have her hands full as the celebrity mom prepares for yet another public appearance in New York tonight. The relatively toned-down singer will perform four or five songs at Milk Studios for a Night of Zero Tolerance event. The show will benefit Sanctuary for Families — a charity organization that provides legal services, job training, education and advocacy for battered women and their children.

In addition, Lauper spent a few hours at the VH1 studios in Manhattan yesterday taping a host session for the music video channel’s upcoming “History of Videos” special. She may host the mid-’80s segment — just a wild guess.

Rob Hyman finds the keys to Largo in 19th-century classical music.

While The Band’s Levon Helm hoots and hollers through “Gimme A Stone,” The Band’s keyboard maestro Garth Hudson made the Largo theme ebullient and Ellingtonian. The Chieftains lent certain songs an authentic Irish quality. (“We had to struggle to figure how many we could afford,” jokes Hyman. Members of the legendary ensemble ended up paying their own way.)

A “pregnant-as-hell” Cyndi Lauper sings the piss out of the eight-minute blues jam “White Man’s Melody.” Lauper’s screeching character Liza arrives in America as a Caruso fan only to wind up digging Jolson and getting orgasmic over Liberace.

PBS and VH1 are currently filming pieces about Largo which will air in the future. On May 6, Hyman, Bazillian, Taj Mahal, Lauper, Osborne and Foreman will perform Largo live at NYC’s Bottom Line and will appear on The Late Show with David Letterman.

Largo may be a musical term denoting a slow tempo, but for Levon Helm, Garth Hudson, Joan Osborne, Taj Mahal, The Chieftains, Carole King and Cyndi Lauper among others, the word also refers to their collective project of the same name. On April 28, Mercury will release Largo, a 16-track self-titled concept album masterminded by producer Rick Chertoff (Osborne’s Relish, Lauper’s She’s So Unusual) and ex-Hooters Rob Hyman and Eric Bazilian, all of whom play various instruments on the CD.

The record was inspired by our mutual love of Dvorak’s Symphony (No.9) From the New World,” Chertoff tells ICE, “particularly the second movement, which is the Largo. Dvorak was an established European composer who heard American folk music in a way that no legitimate composer ever had before, which is to say that he thought it had real value. He’s the beginning of the line that includes [Aaron] Copland, [Duke] Ellington, [George] Gershwin and The Band.

The Largo is based on, among other things, what were known as plantation songs, or what we now call spirituals. For this record, we made his piece the sun which our musical planets revolved around; we let the spirit guide us as best we could, and just tried to have fun with it.”

When it came time to assemble the ensamble, Chertoff and company “picked musicians that we love, pure and simple. Rob and I were college roommates, and we used to listen to Taj’s first two albums all the time. We’re total Band fanatics, and Paddy Moloney (of The Chieftains) is one of our heroes as well. Joan, Taj, Levon–everyone on the record sings so beautifully. In fact, Cyndi lauper sings White Man’s Melody just like Billie Holiday.”

“Cyndi Lauper talks about her gay sister, her baby, her new CD, getting sued, &, of course, drag.”

Cyndi Lauper is the mother of a baby boy, as of November 19, 1997. Cyndi Lauper is also a drag queen. She’s been one since she was a kid. While her sister wanted to play “boyish games,” Lauper wanted to play dress-up. And she’s been playing dress-up ever since.

Now she’s writing and singing about it. On her latest CD, Sisters of Avalon, she sings the “Ballad of Cleo & Joe,” where “the working boy [Joe] becomes a dancing queen [Cleo].” It’s not just a great dancing tune, it’s also a great listen. And so is Lauper.

During the day of my interview with Lauper, she was very pregnant, so it was rescheduled a couple of times. It seems that she had put in some very long hours the night before . . . but let her tell you the story. She’s good at it.

Blase DiStefano: Are you and the baby doing okay?
Cyndi Lauper: Yeah, I thought my water was breaking. I pulled a long night last night – that wasn’t very smart. I guess while I’m in this condition, I can’t work like that.

BD: So you were working.
CL: I was editing, yeah.

BD: Till the last second!
CL: Well, no, you know what? I wanted to get this tape done for the “Cleo and Joe” song. I wasn’t really sure we were gonna do a video, so we were doing the promos because I couldn’t fly to go see anybody. I wanted to do something kinda special, and then I said, “Just get the boombox and let’s get a turntable,” so we did something like in 1980 when people used tape . . . it was kinda cheesy great. I thought it would be fun.

BD: So it’s finished?
CL: Yeah , I did it in two nights. I wish I had one more night to look back. Maybe it’s not as good because I should have done more edits, but I think it’s fun and it’s nutty. We put little tiny mirrors on my stomach to make it look like a big dance floor. I’m still trying to make myself look good, even though I’m a very large pregnant woman. So it’s wild. You know I’m a big old drag queen anyway.

BD: [Laughter] I know. It’s real obvious you don’t have problems with other people doing drag. But what if your little boy or little girl grows up to be a drag queen or drag king?
CL: You know, listen. Everybody’s different. Your kid is who your kid is. As long as he’s not a serial murderer – I think I’d have a problem with that.

BD: Do you think it’s gonna be a little boy or a little girl?
CL: It’s a little boy. He’s been working with me all the way through. We worked on the Tina Turner concert [in Houston]. He did this shoot with me. He went to the Halloween ball with me – we went as a belly dancer. We raised money for AMFAR. RuPaul came this year, so that was good. It’s getting bigger and better.

BD: Speaking of bigger and better, I listened to your CD night before last. It’s wonderful.
CL: Thank you. Not everyone feels that way, but thank you very much. I love it. I wouldn’t have put it out if I didn’t.

BD: How did “The Ballad of Cleo and Joe” come about?
CL: I wrote that because I was on tour in ’94 and ’95. I worked with drag performers from all around the world. I know people who perform in drag, but when you travel and you work shoulder to shoulder, you see things – the same things you see all the time, you see them differently. It really changed my perspective. It was quite wonderful. I wanted to write something for them.

BD: “Say a Prayer” was especially beautiful. You sang about people who you’ve lost.
CL: I wrote that because my best friend was really ill. That was before the cocktails came out. Still, everybody struggles, but the cocktails have made it easier. And then there are people who are still trying to find out which ones don’t work. And that’s been really tough for a few of my friends. I’ve been really excited about my buddies, but when I wrote that song, I had just come back from his house, and he wasn’t doing good. I love this person very much, and it was the first time I really had to consider what was going on. It was really tough.

BD: I hope you don’t mind if I change the subject, but is this your parents’ first grandchild?
CL: Yeah, my mother’s ecstatic. My stepfather passed away in the spring, and that was pretty traumatic and sad. But I told him before he died that I was pregnant, which was kinda good. I wasn’t gonna tell my mother because it was so early, but I told her anyway because I wanted her to have something to look forward to. This baby’ll probably teach us all a lot of things. I feel like I’ll be pregnant forever, but when I see the cradle, I think “Oh, my God, the baby’s really coming.” Today I went through a little fright, but it’ll be fine.

BD: I’m making an assumption that your parents know that your sister is gay.
CL: Well, she’s a big girl now. I’ve been fortunate enough to have her as a role model in a lot of ways. She’s very heroic. She’s always wanted to help people. She’s a wonderful acupuncturist and herbalist. She works a lot out of a clinic because she wants to help people, and she works with HIV-positive people who have no money. And she has her own practice, but I know the clinic is where her heart is. She’s a really incredible gal. And my brother is a remarkable fellow. He’s not talkative about what he does, but he also does a lot of charity stuff.

My mom somehow had the wisdom to raise three very individual people, despite the fact that [in those days] they never really promoted freedom of thought in women, and Italian immigrant families never nurtured the women. She wanted us to be able to grow up and think and be able to do something in the world.

Also, when we were growing up, that’s when Kennedy got shot. That left a big impression on us – knowing what goes on behind the scenes. But what we got out of it was what you could do for people, what you could offer to the world as opposed to what you could take. So I think that all of us wanted to do something. I feel fortunate to have those kind of siblings.

BD: What are the ages of the three of you?
CL: She’s a year and a half older than me, and my brother’s five years younger than me. But I always felt like wherever my sister went I would go. If she had other friends, I would be very jealous. When she played with other kids, I would chase her down the block all the time. I told her she had to play with me because I was born to be her friend.

BD: That’s rather sweet.
CL: Well, it was annoying. Everything she did, I did. And then when she graduated high school and I was left, I was so heartbroken. Everything was gone. I was devastated.

BD: So you stayed that close even till then.
CL: Oh yeah. It was like, [said very fast, almost without a breath] “Ellen, Ellen, Ellen, Ellen, Ellen, Ellen, Ellen, what are we doing today, what are we doing tomorrow, what are you wearing, I’ll wear this, I’ll wear that, stay out my drawer, now! I’m drawing a line down the middle of the room. You can’t use the door.” Hopefully, my son will not be anything like me.

BD: [Laughter] Have you thought of a name yet?
CL: Oh I don’t know, whatever he answers to. We’re trying to figure it out.

BD: Speaking of names, here at OutSmart we’ve been having an ongoing discussion about using the words “gay woman” or “lesbian.”
CL: Now, my sister told me a long time ago, there’s a difference between gay and lesbian. Gay is referred to male, and lesbian is referred to women. But now things are changing again, language is changing. So I don’t know.

When my sister first came out 10 years ago, maybe eight years, I’d go visit her. Sometimes she’d have a group of angry women with her. And boy oh boy, no matter what I did, I was always wrong.

But you know, watching my sister develop, all I ever wanted was to see her be happy and be a normal well-adjusted lesbian woman, which has happened. But before [being lesbian] was really chic, you always had your heart in your mouth. I mean, I did. I would get angry for her, you know? We’d go to a wedding and they’d go, “Oh, your sister is the . . .” and I’d say “photographer.”

BD: Yeah, but it’s still hard for a lot of people, depending on where they’re at.
CL: It’s very hard for a kid. There are all kinds of circumstances. But when we were growing up, my sister always wanted to play with guns – see, she was even angry then . . . just kidding – and play boyish games. She wasn’t into the doll action at all. And my mother kept trying to make her wear the frilly clothes and give her the perms, and she was absolutely miserable.

Me, I was just so ecstatic once I learned how to set my hair. Iwanted the nylons, the jewelry, the purses, the hats. I was into it – I wanted the whole nine yards. At a very early age, I was into that drag thing.

But she wasn’t, and I saw that struggle going on, and that was kinda tough. I think a parent knows sometimes that a kid has to develop and be who they are, they can’t be who you want them to be. But you have to understand and be fair that this is a person, and you’re born with certain genes – it’s in your genes.

That’s how I feel, and the Jerry Falwells of the world, they piss me off. He has a right to be who he is, but sometimes when people are that vehement, I always think they have a swing set in the closet.

BD: [Laughter] Let’s just say, for some unknown reason, that you were chosen to be the one to decide who would be elected president and vice president in the next election, who would they be?
CL: I don’t know. Somebody open-minded, really qualified and somebody really good with figures – like accounting, not female figures, which this president seems to be good at. No, I don’t know.

One thing you gotta keep in mind – every time you hear about these different lawsuits and stuff, anybody can sue anybody in this country and anybody can accuse anybody of anything. A lot of times it’s a nuisance suit. I was sued once, and that’s when I learned.

BD: What were you sued for?
CL: “Change of Heart.” The woman lied to me. I paid for her administration to publish the song, and then some past deal that she made came back, and the guy sued me and accused me of the wildest things, and then even made it sound like I didn’t write any of my own things. For a minute I started to believe it myself. And then I said “Hey, hello, wake up. You’re not in The Rose Tatoo with Anna Magnani, you know, this is not a movie. This is real life, this is what they do. Get over yourself.”

She’s so unusual. Again.
No joke: Cyndi Lauper has put together a bona fide comeback more worthy of success than anything on the charts.

Lauper’s debut – 1983’s “She’s So Unusual” – was one of rock history’s most monumental achievements by a new artist, producing four Top 5 singles and selling some 9 million copies. 1986’s “True Colors” was the inevitable sophomore slump, but not the end of the world.

Yet Lauper developed an unhealthy affinity for professional wrestling and made flop movies as Madonna vamped all over the place. By 1989’s “A Night To Remember,” Lauper was practically forgotten (despite the powerful single “I Drove All Night”). “Hat Full of Stars” was dead on arrival in 1993, and the 1995 hit collection “Twelve Deadly Cyns . . . And Then Some” was merely a footnote. Acclaimed guest appearances on the TV show “Mad About You” are all that have saved Lauper from absolute oblivion.

So here she is in a decade-long downward spiral, releasing an album much better than it has any right to be.

Singing in a more mature, lower register, Lauper is still lovably quirky on “Sisters of Avalon.” And the old girl has worked hard on every track, co-writing dynamite material with Jan Pulsford and crafting an ambitiously complex sound.

There are drum machines, violins, accordions, mandolins, wah wah guitar, and Lauper herself plays dulcimer and zither, among other things.

OK, so the title track only manages a low-grade fever with its sisterhood anthem, and “You Don’t Know” cloys with its righteous stand against conformity.

Otherwise, there isn’t much to complain about.

Lauper’s earnest portrayal of a working-class transvestite (“Ballad of Cleo and Joe”) is an adventure in world music set to a propulsive beat, and “Love To Hate” is the grittiest rock song she’s recorded since “Money Changes Everything” (“It’s not the clothes that you wear/Or the way you do your hair/It’s just you”). Also, Lauper complements the soft jazz of “Say a Prayer” with a mellow rap.

Although the singer has more on her mind than relationships, her introspective moments are sterling.

Singing in a gravely voice, Lauper shuffles through the sad waltz of “Unhook the Stars” with touching grace. And her moving battle with insecurities turns “Fearless” into a heartbreaker.

No wonder she’s giving a lover a wait-and-see attitude on the bittersweet “Hot Gets a Little Cold” while yearning for an end to loneliness on “Searching,” a marriage of adult contemporary music to exoticism.

Then there’s the springy surprise ending, “Brimstone and Fire,” where Lauper lightheartedly grapples with a budding lesbian relationship (“Is this a sign? From above or below?”).

Lauper deserves a chance. After all, Madonna’s home with that baby, and Toni Braxton and Celine Dion have sapped the life out of radio for long enough.

Rating (five possible): XXXX 1/2

Just over 13 years ago, two wildly-dressed New York-based women made their top of the pops debut on the same show. Madonna thrust her midriff into the camera and warbled ‘Holiday’, quickly followed by Cyndi Lauper cavorting around the studio declaring, ‘Girls just wanna have fun’.

And where are they now ? Madonna is an icon and award winning actress, probably the most famous female entertainer in the world. Cyndi, on the other hand, is an intermittent hitmaker at best, still plugging her wares on Saturday morning skits with Trev and Simon.

Cyndi’s big problem has always been consistency. Whereas Madonna has seemingly always had her finger on the worlds pop pulse, Cyndi tends to throw too much into the mix. For ever glorious moment like ‘Time after Time’ or ‘I drove all night’ there’s been a corresponding unlistenable aberration like ‘The world is stone’ or her horrific cover of Marvin Gaye’s ‘What’s going on’.

‘Sisters of Avalon’ is yet another eclectic Lauper lucky bag, where the tired gospel of the title track rubs shoulders with the cool folk of ‘Hot gets a little cold’, where the Garbage-esque ‘Love to hate’ slinks alongside the power balladry of ‘Say a prayer’. Such variety may be laudable, but the album suffers from an identity crisis, as if Cyndi’s just strung together scizophrenic leftovers from a few years worth of sessions.

She’s undoubtedly a better singer than Madonna, frequently a more inspired songwriter, and she could have been an even better pop star. Instead, she’s settled for being half a dozen average ones.

Score: 6 out of 10

NO PREGNANT PAUSES:
In 1983,when she burst on the pop scene in Day-Glo hair, declaring that “Girls Just Want To Have Fun,” Cyndi Lauper instantly became a liberating voice for her sorority fans. Now, 44 and pregnant with her first child (due in November), Lauper is once again showing her true colors as a stalwart preformer. In April she released her fifth studio album, Sisters Of Avalon (Epic).

And on Aug.2 she finished a vigorous three-month stint as Tina Turner’s opening act-despite morning sickness and an ever-expanding waistline. “Being pregnant is like an ongoing science project,” muses Lauper, who has been married since 1991 to David Thornton, a TV and film actor. “Your body’s always changing, and you think,’Okay what’s in store today ?’ ”

WHAT’S THE WORST PART ABOUT BEING PREGNANT ?
People touching my stomach for good luck all the time.I want to say: “Excuse me. Do I look like the Happy Buddah ? This is not Aladdin’s lamp, and a genie is NOT going to pop out of here.” At least not now, anyway.

DID YOU HAVE ANY DOUBTS ABOUT PERFORMING IN YOUR CONDITION ?
I asked, and my doctor said it would actually be even more stressful for me not to do what I normally do. Lying down all day and doing nothing — THAT would kill me.

DO YOU WEAR MATERNITY CLOTHES ?
I don’t wear them ever.I have things made to shape my body. I went to a stripper place in LA called Trashy Lingerie for a couple of things. But I’m not interested in maternity clothes until they start making clothes women can feel pretty in and not like they are wearing a potato sack.

HAVE YOU SELECTED A NAME YET ?
No. This kid’s going to be born and we’ll still be discussing names. You want something poetic and nice, maybe a famous artist’s name,not some weird hippie name.Name books are sort of cheesy.I’m still learning.

WOULD YOU WANT YOUR SON TO BE A MUSICIAN ?
Of course.That’s a real job. isn’t it ?