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History Here's how it really went down... When I came to New York City in 1985 from central New Jersey, I knew I wanted to be a musician. But I didn't know you could study it in school. So I studied political science by day, and played music at night. One day I met Roger Manning in Washington Square Park, and he turned me on to Lach's Tuesday night open mike night at Sophie's Bar on 5th St. bet A and B. Lach had this whole thing called Anti-Folk, which to be honest I was a part of in the very beginning. After that year, I left for London, and met this really cool guy named Shawn Rogan who played in a British noise band called GOD. He taught me to play Husker Du songs on the guitar, and introduced me to the London underground music scene. I made my first professional recording there for a compilation album. I don't even remember the name of it! Some really uncool personal stuff went down between Roger and I when I returned from London. I was pushed out from the whole Anti-Folk scene because of personal animosity and unreconcilable differences. So I never really considered myself part of the Anti-Folk scene after that. I did consider myselft a friend of Lach and some of the other people like John S. Hall (from King Missile) and designer Patty Lie and artist Callie Hirsch. Being disassociated with Anti-Folk was a real blessing for me though. Through my friend Patty Lie, I met Marc Lipsitz who helped me to package and send out my first demo, a small cassette tape with a simplistic drawing of a goldfish on the front called "Goldfish Don't Talk Back." I sent them to a bunch of indie labels from a list that Marc gave me. Albert Garzon offered me a record deal and released my first CD, Goldfish Don't Talk Back. He had a great indie called Community 3 Records. All the bands he signed and worked with were excellent and I was really proud to be counted among them. When the CD was released, I decided to move to Minneapolis and did my first tour that year, moving from New York to the Midwest in 1990. Many tours followed. I toured all over the US solo and sometimes with a tour manager, who was usually my best friend Becky Levin. I became friends with lots of great Minneapolis musicians, like Phil Harder, Dave Pirner, Marc Perlman just to name a few of my favorites. Minneapolis really embraced me as a musician and as a person. I recorded a seven inch single entitled Life In The Drug War Trenches which I produced at Gark studios. There were three songs on the 7", I Don't Sleep I Drink Coffee Instead, Mint Juleps and Needles, and The Dollar Bill Blues. On one of my many tours I met a music manager in New York named Jonathan Block. Jonathan wanted to work with me, and I made a deal with him. I did almost everything myself, but I couldn't fathom how to possibly get a major label deal. So I told him if he got me a deal on a major label, then he could be my manager. In the meantime, I left Minneapolis and returned to New York with a sort-of boyfriend who had a severe drug problem and a scholarship to Julliard. I started working at CBGBs as a cocktail waitress, a job I was really awful at, and later moved on to selling T Shirts and making pizza at the short lived CBs Pizza Place next door to the club. It was a really rock'n'roll existence that was sort of spiraling downward at an alarming rate. In the meantime, Jonathan Block had been plugging away at that major label deal, and one day called to say he had an appointment set up with David Kahne (no relation) at Columbia Records. David Kahne offered me a record deal with Columbia's newest imprint label called Chaos. It made sense on so many levels. And shortly thereafter I signed a publishing deal with Warner Chapel publishing. Epiphany In Brooklyn was released in the fall of 1992. I toured in most of the major cities of America, and went to France and Germany in support of Epiphany. The response from the press was amazing. Writers always loved my writing. I was especially well received in France, and on a solo tour there Jonathan Block secured me the opening slot for Bob Dylan on two dates of his European tour. I opened for Dylan in Luxembourg and Paris. It was a highlight of my career to shake hands with one of the greatest songwriters of all time. Back in America, Columbia was having a hard time keeping Chaos from falling into chaos. I guess they should have called it "Gold Record Records" or something else. I went to work on my follow up CD Destination Anywhere. The album was slated for release in January of 1995. The hit was a song entitled She's a Yellow Sun which the company spent $35,000 mixing and re-mixing and then re-mixing to get it just right. To promote the upcoming CD, I went on tour, opening for my good friend Jeff Buckley across the US and Canada. It was a two month run, and a 3-song promo entitled King of Cairo was sent to all the radio stations in advance. Just back from the tour, the first news I got was that Chaos was folding, but that my album would be released on Columbia proper. The second news I got was that David Kahne was leaving the company, my album was not going to be released, I was dropped and I couldn't have access to the music. After a lot of confusion and disillusion, I was offered a deal with Shanachie Records, who offered to license Destination Anywhere. They released it about eight months later, but too late to capitalize on all the promotion that had happened almost a year before. I continued to tour and to record a new album, Outside the Beauty Salon. Shanachie sent the new CD to Germany where their sister company Koch records received the album and sent it out to the press. It was an overwhelming success, and while there was almost no attention for the album here in the states, I set off on my first real German tour. 23 dates in 28 days. Almost all the shows were sold out or very well attended. Given Shanachie's lackluster support for my tours and for my music here in America, I decided to release my next CD on my own label, Rocket 99. Hunger is a stripped down collection of songs, many inspired by the sudden and tragic death of Jeff Buckley. Koch would not release the album without another American label backing it, so I kept the release independent and stateside. Feeling the need for an industry break, I decided to start my own webzine and WOMANROCK.com was born. I worked on WOMANROCK for the next 5 years, performing, writing, editing and producing the website with very gifted designers, writers and musicians. In 2003 I had a baby, moved away from NYC and left the industry of music for my own world of music and life with family. And this past October (2006) I had a second child - another boy! I hope to be releasing CDs into the world again soon, but for now, this website will have to be the source for my songs as they arrive.
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