Saturday, December 13, 2008

white flags of winter chimneys

this is a piece i wrote for out.com's popnography about Wendy & Lisa and their new album:

You may think you don't know Wendy and Lisa, but you've definitely heard them. As resident keyboardist (Lisa Coleman) and guitarist (Wendy Melvoin) in Prince's Revolution, they helped define both his sound and persona at his heyday, adding the only truly gay element to his apparently omnisexual universe. They left the purple fold in 1986 for their own pop career. It never fully launched -- they wanted to make pop-rock-funk music in a pre-Lilith Fair world where record labels were more interested in them as scantily clad "Prince women" than as real musicians.

But if labels weren't biting, plenty of artists were -- over the last 20 years, together or independently, Wendy and Lisa played on, composed, and/or produced songs and records for Sheryl Crow, Gwen Stefani, Seal, Madonna, Joni Mitchell, OK Go, Lucinda Williams, Neil Finn, Lisa Germano, Me'shell Ndegeocello, Robb Thomas, Grace Jones and others. Their day job is as composers of the score for NBC's Heroes, with plans to release a score on CD in the spring.

White Flags of Winter Chimneys is their first album in 10 years -- their last outing was 1998's Girl Bros., an elegiac tribute to both the death of Wendy's brother Jonathon and the end of their own romantic relationship. White Flags is loaded with Lisa's melodic piano and Wendy's steely guitar, shifting from dreamy ballads to uptempo pop and rock numbers with ease, sometimes within the same song. Their lyrics reflect a maturity and vitality of two women secure in their lives and settled into some sort of rock 'n' roll domesticity -- Lisa married her longtime girlfriend in October and Wendy's longtime partner is film director Lisa Cholodenko.

"What you believe in is what I fear," Wendy sings in the rocking "Invisible," possibly an open letter to "the purple Republican," as Lisa called Prince after he shared his religious views with the New Yorker. The standout track is the nine-minute closer "Sweet Suite (Beginning at the End)," which opens as a simple piano track to segue into a reprise of the opener "Balloon" before exploding into a lush orchestration reminiscent of the end credits of a Hollywood tearjerker.

When all is said and done, Wendy and Lisa stand head and shoulders above their former boss Prince (I'm trying to resist the short joke here) and prove they are capable of maintaining a signature sound without sounding dated. White Flags of Winter Chimneys is available exclusively at wendyandlisa.com.

http://www.popnography.com/2008/12/hummer-wendy-li.html

Friday, December 5, 2008

anticipation is making me wait...

@wendyandlisa it's COMING.................................

Next week we may see the release of Wendy and Lisa's first album in over 10 years. We keep getting updates/teasers via twitter, but a statement posted on their official facebook page two weeks ago said to expect a December release. So I keep waiting and expecting.

It dawned on me the other day that in the whole pantheon of Prince associated artists, Wendy and Lisa are the only gays. All the androgyny, gender bending, rule breaking play from Prince's Royal Court back in the day and only 2 gays to show for it. Or at least only 2 who are out. Kudos to them for that!

She's not me, she doesn't have my name

So I have a google alert set for Wendy and Lisa. That means I get a daily update of internet postings about Wendy and Lisa. The only problem is, 99% of what it finds are everyday, run-of-the-mill Wendy and Lisas, not THE Wendy and Lisa. But I always scan the blurbs with the thought that it may actually be them, which sometimes gives me a little chuckle. Here's one:

Others say Lisa is mentally ill and insist she is a danger to her two children and their friends.

Child advocate Wendy Murphy, a lawyer, says: "This case is the essence of child exploitation, because he's in the throes of puberty...


Actual story, not funny. Imagining Lisa seducing a 17-year-old boy, funny. Wendy being her opposing attorney, funny.

2008 concerts

  • Metro Station The Wiltern 7/19
  • George Michael The Forum 6/25
  • Panic at the Disco Anaheim 6/14
  • Panic at the Disco L.V. 6/13
  • Heloise & the Savior Faire 6/8
  • Mandy Moore Hotel Cafe L.A. 5/23
  • Panic at the Disco S.F. 4/11
  • Panic at the Disco S.F. 4/10
  • Panic at the Disco Jimmy Kimmel 3/25
  • Really, Really Ridiculously Good Looking Tour L.V. 2/17
  • Really, Really Ridiculously Good Looking Tour L.A. 2/16
  • Rufus Wainwright L.A. 2/12