It’s poetically appropriate that Suzanne Vega will make her Atlantic City debut as part of a tour supporting Beauty & Crime, her brilliant new album in which New York City plays a starring role. While the specifics are different, the paradox of a city in which, as Vega sings, “You were dazzled by her beauty and her crime” could refer to either town. The themes of change, rebirth, and even some of the characters (“Frank and Ava”) that Vega writes about on the album are common to both New York and Atlantic City.
However, once you get past the broad generalities, it's clear that the town that permeates the songs of Beauty & Crime is Manhattan. Vega, who performs Saturday, December 1 in the Club Harlem Ballroom at the House of Blues, has always been known for her succinct narrative songwriting style. Throughout Beauty & Crime a variety of New York City locations (West End Avenue, Ludlow Street, Ground Zero) serve as backdrops to her songs.
In a recent telephone interview for Atlantic City Weekly, Vega joked that she could offer a bus tour of all the locations mentioned on Beauty & Crime. She says the song “New York Is A Woman” was inspired by conversations she’s had with first-time visitors to the Big Apple.
“I have a lot of conversations with first-time visitors and sometimes I'm even there with them when they're in New York for the first time,” she said. “The guys from DNA (the British producers who worked with Vega on the hit remix of “Tom's Diner”) came to New York to do some work with me on some other projects. They had never been to New York, and they were flipping out. It was a lot of fun to watch their reactions. Everyone's always impressed by the steam that comes out of the sidewalks, and everyone seems to say the same thing – that it's just like what they've seen in the movies and on television.”
Vega was born in Santa Monica, California, but her family moved to New York City when she was two and a half. She started writing poems when she was nine, and wrote her first song when she was 14. She taught herself to play the guitar, and studied dance at New York's High School of Performing Arts.
While majoring in English literature at Barnard College, she started performing in clubs and coffehouses on New York’s Lower East Side. In 1984 she was signed to A&M Records, and released her self-titled debut album a year later. Featuring the modest hit, “Marlene On The Wall,” it was warmly received by both critics and fans.
Vega hit her stride when her 1987 sophomore effort, Solitude Standing, garnered critical and commercial success worldwide. The album featured two unlikely hit singles – the a capella version of "Tom's Diner," (which was an even bigger hit again in 1990 in DNA’s club remix version) and "Luka,” a disarmingly catchy, uptempo song about, and written from the point of view of a battered child. The song raised awareness of a social issue in a way that hadn’t been done in pop music since the 60s. “Luka” became an international hit, and it’s video an MTV staple.
Released last July, Beauty & Crime is Vega’s seventh album overall, and her first since 2001’s Songs In Red and Gray. Six years is a long time between albums, but the 48-year-old Vega kept herself busy in the interim.
In addition to touring, Vega hosted the public radio series “American Mavericks,” wrote an occasional piece for the New York Times, and participated in “The Vigil Project,” a collection inspired by the events of September 11, 2001. She changed managers and record labels; and went from adjusting to single life (she was divorced from producer Mitchell Froom in 1998) to re-adjusting to married life (she married lawyer and poet Paul Mills in 2006).
When it came time to record Beauty & Crime, Vega says she had a very specific idea of how she wanted the album to sound.
“I try to make each record exciting and a step in a new direction,” she says. “I didn’t want to do just a regular old folk album [with] guitar and your basic four-piece backup band. I couldn't help but think that strings would be really gorgeous on some of the songs, like ‘Pornographer’s Dream,’ which just seemed made for that kind of lush sound.”
British producer Jimmy Hogarth helped Vega balance traditional and modern elements during the recording process.
“The album was recorded using analog equipment, and then fed digitally so that we could have the technology of cutting and pasting, but maintain the warm sound of the analog recording,” Vega says.
Many of the songs on Beauty & Crime are based on Vega’s real-life experiences: “Bound” is a love song for her husband; “As You Are Now” is a dedication to her daughter; “Zephyr & I” revisits old haunts with an old friend; and “Ludlow Street” mourns the loss of her brother. Vega says that knowing the back-story of a song can enhance a listener’s appreciation of it, but she believes her best work can also stand on its own.
“In a song like ‘Angel’s Doorway,’ I don't think you have to know that it's my cousin, but it helps to know that it's about a cop,” she says. “A song like ‘Luka’ works regardless of whether you know it's about child abuse or not. It was a hit before people knew what it was about, and then people started talking about what it was about. So the best songs will work no matter. You shouldn't have to have the Cliffs Notes on it to know what's going on. But to get the full benefit of the song, sometimes it really does help.”
Vega says that over the years she’s become a more deliberate songwriter. When writing for an album, she considers how a song will translate to live performance.
However, once you get past the broad generalities, it's clear that the town that permeates the songs of Beauty & Crime is Manhattan. Vega, who performs Saturday, December 1 in the Club Harlem Ballroom at the House of Blues, has always been known for her succinct narrative songwriting style. Throughout Beauty & Crime a variety of New York City locations (West End Avenue, Ludlow Street, Ground Zero) serve as backdrops to her songs.
In a recent telephone interview for Atlantic City Weekly, Vega joked that she could offer a bus tour of all the locations mentioned on Beauty & Crime. She says the song “New York Is A Woman” was inspired by conversations she’s had with first-time visitors to the Big Apple.
“I have a lot of conversations with first-time visitors and sometimes I'm even there with them when they're in New York for the first time,” she said. “The guys from DNA (the British producers who worked with Vega on the hit remix of “Tom's Diner”) came to New York to do some work with me on some other projects. They had never been to New York, and they were flipping out. It was a lot of fun to watch their reactions. Everyone's always impressed by the steam that comes out of the sidewalks, and everyone seems to say the same thing – that it's just like what they've seen in the movies and on television.”
Vega was born in Santa Monica, California, but her family moved to New York City when she was two and a half. She started writing poems when she was nine, and wrote her first song when she was 14. She taught herself to play the guitar, and studied dance at New York's High School of Performing Arts.
While majoring in English literature at Barnard College, she started performing in clubs and coffehouses on New York’s Lower East Side. In 1984 she was signed to A&M Records, and released her self-titled debut album a year later. Featuring the modest hit, “Marlene On The Wall,” it was warmly received by both critics and fans.
Vega hit her stride when her 1987 sophomore effort, Solitude Standing, garnered critical and commercial success worldwide. The album featured two unlikely hit singles – the a capella version of "Tom's Diner," (which was an even bigger hit again in 1990 in DNA’s club remix version) and "Luka,” a disarmingly catchy, uptempo song about, and written from the point of view of a battered child. The song raised awareness of a social issue in a way that hadn’t been done in pop music since the 60s. “Luka” became an international hit, and it’s video an MTV staple.
Released last July, Beauty & Crime is Vega’s seventh album overall, and her first since 2001’s Songs In Red and Gray. Six years is a long time between albums, but the 48-year-old Vega kept herself busy in the interim.
In addition to touring, Vega hosted the public radio series “American Mavericks,” wrote an occasional piece for the New York Times, and participated in “The Vigil Project,” a collection inspired by the events of September 11, 2001. She changed managers and record labels; and went from adjusting to single life (she was divorced from producer Mitchell Froom in 1998) to re-adjusting to married life (she married lawyer and poet Paul Mills in 2006).
When it came time to record Beauty & Crime, Vega says she had a very specific idea of how she wanted the album to sound.
“I try to make each record exciting and a step in a new direction,” she says. “I didn’t want to do just a regular old folk album [with] guitar and your basic four-piece backup band. I couldn't help but think that strings would be really gorgeous on some of the songs, like ‘Pornographer’s Dream,’ which just seemed made for that kind of lush sound.”
British producer Jimmy Hogarth helped Vega balance traditional and modern elements during the recording process.
“The album was recorded using analog equipment, and then fed digitally so that we could have the technology of cutting and pasting, but maintain the warm sound of the analog recording,” Vega says.
Many of the songs on Beauty & Crime are based on Vega’s real-life experiences: “Bound” is a love song for her husband; “As You Are Now” is a dedication to her daughter; “Zephyr & I” revisits old haunts with an old friend; and “Ludlow Street” mourns the loss of her brother. Vega says that knowing the back-story of a song can enhance a listener’s appreciation of it, but she believes her best work can also stand on its own.
“In a song like ‘Angel’s Doorway,’ I don't think you have to know that it's my cousin, but it helps to know that it's about a cop,” she says. “A song like ‘Luka’ works regardless of whether you know it's about child abuse or not. It was a hit before people knew what it was about, and then people started talking about what it was about. So the best songs will work no matter. You shouldn't have to have the Cliffs Notes on it to know what's going on. But to get the full benefit of the song, sometimes it really does help.”
Vega says that over the years she’s become a more deliberate songwriter. When writing for an album, she considers how a song will translate to live performance.
“I record once every few years, but I'm constantly touring and constantly performing,” Vega says. “It's much more useful to me if the song works live, because if I can make it work live, I know I can make it work in the studio. If I can only make it work in the studio, then it's less useful to me. I also like a show to be entertaining, and so I try to make sure there's enough up-tempo, major key songs, because I tend to write minor key songs. If I'm singing too many sad songs in A-minor, I'll say, ‘Lets see if I can write a song in A-major. Or let's see if I can do a whole song with just major chords.’ I like to have a balance.”
Fans who come to the House of Blues on Saturday can expect a well-balanced show of both old and new material.
“I do want to play a lot of the new album because I don't know how else people are hearing it,” Vega says. “It's not something that Top-40 radio is going to jump all over, so I really want to make sure that the audience does get a chance to hear it. But I'm also playing quite a bit of older material – ‘Luka,’ ‘Tom's Diner,’ ‘The Queen and the Soldier,’ ‘Gypsy,’ ‘Caramel,’ ‘Marlene on the Wall”… so it's a really nice range of songs.”
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