Anne Pigalle
| Anne Pigalle | |
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 Anne Pigalle | |
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Anne Pigalle is a French chanteuse[1] (singer) and multimedia artist (writer, musician, art performer, poet, photographer and painter).
Biography
Anne Pigalle grew up in Paris (in Montmartre precisely). She was brought up in an artistic home.
Before she was ten years old, she was selected by the school choir who said she had 'the golden voice of an angel'. As a teenager, she played guitar in an all-girl band, hanging out with Punk musicians in Paris and London. She appeared in cult magazines such as ID Magazine No. 2, Grabuge and Facade'.
In the early 1980s, she moved to London, performed the clubs, made some recordings with Adrian Sherwood of On-U Sound and recorded for Channel 4 an opera called 'The Kiss', written by Michael Nyman and produced by David Cunningham from The Flying Lizards. She then signed a contract with Trevor Horn’s ZTT Records and released an album on ZTT/Island Records in 1985 called Everything Could Be So Perfect, which established her as the modern Edith Piaf. The poster for the single He! Stranger appeared all over London, picturing her in front of a red velvet curtain, and it has been mentioned to be reminiscent of Lynch's later Twin Peaks.
Anne Pigalle then appeared in many magazines, including covers such as ID Magazine.
In 1986, Miss Pigalle revamped the famous club, the Café de Paris in Piccadilly, London, with a new concept 'Les Nuits Du Mercredi'. It attracted thousands, including Andy Warhol. By then, Anne Pigalle favoured singing at vintage clubs of an old-fashioned glamour; in Tokyo, promoters found a similar club to the Cafe de Paris for her to perform in. She also played at Ronnie Scott's, before an audience including Joni Mitchell.
She was photographed by Lord Snowdon, Mario Testino and Nick Knight; her music and image were used in Japanese TV commercials for Jean-Paul Gaultier and Karl Lagerfeld. Around that time she toured Japan and Europe. In 1989, she performed for TV arts programme The South Bank Show for the anniversary of the French Revolution. Other TV appearances included The Tube (in the UK), Ardisson's Bains de Minuit (in France), Japan and Mexico, etc.
Anne Pigalle leaves the label at the end of the 80's and then produces and stars in a japanese commercial for Isetan with her song Tango Contre La montre
She has been compared in many magazines reviews to Edith Piaf and Marlene Dietrich.
While in LA in the 1990s, Anne Pigalle played with Leonard Cohen's musicians, played with John Lee Hooker's musicians in South Central Babe's and Ricky's . She was voted 5th Best Performer of the Year by LA radio station KCRW Morning Becomes Eclectic. Following her idol Edith Piaf, Pigalle played an intimate show at Chateau Marmont, Los Angeles, where a few Hollywood celebrities attended, among them Iggy Pop and Courtney Love. Around that time, Miss Pigalle met Nancy Sinatra and Donald Cammell, director of British film Performance (starring Mick Jagger), who loved her music and was interested in directing her screenplay.
From 2001 (mostly in London), Anne produced an incredible amount of work, including home movies and videos, electronic tracks, polaroid self-portraits, paintings, poems, curating events in nightclubs, writing an autobiographical screenplay, appearing in cult films, developing her art performances and the Amerotic Salons. The Amerotic Salon has been performed at The Colony Room (Francis Bacon's old club in London) and at the Glastonbury Festival. In 2005-2007, she had successful exhibitions with her paintings and self-portrait polaroids (for which she created visual sets, erotic masks and crowns of flowers) at the Charing Cross Gallery, the Michael Hoppen gallery (the show was voted 4th best in The Times), and the Aquarium Gallery. She called her art 'amerotic', 'âme' means 'soul' in French. In 2007, she launched a night at the Grill Room, Café Royal, called Spirit of Ecstasy, where she performed a futuristic cabaret show along with bohemian poet friends. In 2009 and 2010, she was invited to sing sold-out shows in Mexico and at the prestigious Tuareg Festival au Désert in Timbuktu, Mali, Africa.
Anne Pigalle had travelled the world and had no fixed abode for twenty years.
In 2010 and 2011, Anne Pigalle released the trilogy, L'âmerotica Part I and II, which includes the song "With My Blonde", famous for the fact that the accompanying video cost no money to produce (as seen on YouTube), and L'âme érotique was released on iTunes, 21 surreal and erotic vignettes of poetry put to music. In June 2011, she announced in Bizarre Magazine that her next recordings will be a collection of torch songs. In the September issue of Stimulus Magazine, she revealed her love for the Greek philosophers. In 2011, a series of online interviews supported and reestablished Anne Pigalle’s stature as a major force on the music scene, followed by the December 2011 issue of Dazed And Confused, which finally revealed an appropriate history of her life that previously few people knew.
In 2013 she releases a collection of new songs and erotic poems called Madame Sex. She is the precursor of eroticism coming back very strongly in the music industry. As well as the download, a CD is available; each cover is a piece of original artwork, painted by Anne.
In 2014 she records a new album, as yet unreleased. She continues her painting, filming, photographic work and live performances.
In 2015, she retrieves digital downloads and releases Madame Sex and L'ame Erotique as an art CD only. Madame Sex remains as an art CD only. L'amerotica I and II is available on Bandcamp. She starts a series of secret live concerts in London while looking for a home for her unreleased album.
In spring 2015, Anne Pigalle creates La nuit Amerotique, a new venture night in Soho, with a new philosophy, performing various material relating to Pigalle, Soho, Art and Eroticism, in various locations. She includes her poetry from the Cd Madame Sex and invites performance artists to illustrate and share this show. It is a new and interesting concept, different from anything else and primarily from all the generic offerings.
After appearing on Soho Radio, in 2016 she performs a show at the London's National Portrait Gallery, including Charles Baudelaire, Jacques Brel and David Bowie in her repertoire. A spread follows in the Spring edition of Soho Journal.
Summer 2016 : art show 'Not Dead' at the G511ERY Gallery. Chinatown pop up experimental show. The Las Chanteuse is Not Dead. Autumn 2016; One to one Madame Sex art performances in Pigalle, France
Albums
Everything Could Be So Perfect (ZangTumb Tumb- ZTT Records, 1985) all lyrics written by Pigalle, Musical co-ordination and songwriting by Nick Plytas (except 'Looking for Love' written by Pigalle) and production by Luis Jardim (except 'Why Does It Have To Be this Way' produced by Trevor Horn).
Track listing:
Why does it have to be this way/Via vagabond/Looking for love/He! stranger/Intermission/Souvenir d'un Paris/A crack in the ocean/The 1000 colours waltz
L'Amérotica I and II (iTunes, 2010/2011), written and co-produced by Anne Pigalle and T Del Signore.
Track listing:
With My Blonde/Journey through Europe/Mary Mother of God/Sesso/Entrez Dans La Danse/The Jewel/Espoir Spirale/Je Te Veux Toi
L'Ame Erotique (iTunes, 2011), written and produced by Anne Pigalle.
Track listing:
The Whole / La Femme Chat / Not Only The Flesh / Sulfur /Are You For Real? /You Give Me Asthma / 23 /La Pucelle / E-rotica De Toi/ Nothing Happens.../Red Like Envy / Saint Orgasm / A New Life / Le Poète Est Anglais/ Pigalle London Paris / OverThe Top/ The Garden of Eden / C**t Me In / Voodoo Doll / X amount / Lunch
Madame Sex 2013 Track listing :
Queen Maria / Ace of Spade / Madame Sex / The Land of Plenty / Letter to an imaginary lover / Over The Top / Pigalle, London, Paris / E-rotica De Toi/ C***t Me In/ Saint Orgasm / X Amount
Madame Sex And L'ame Erotique 2014 Track listing:
Queen Maria / Ace of Spade / Madame Sex / The Land of Plenty / Letter to an imaginary lover / Over The Top / Pigalle, London, Paris / E-rotica De Toi/ C***t Me In/ Saint Orgasm / X Amount / The Whole / La Femme Chat / Not Only The Flesh / Sulfur /Are You For Real? /You Give Me Asthma / 23 /La Pucelle / Nothing Happens.../Red Like Envy / A New Life / Le Poète Est Anglais/ The Garden of Eden / Voodoo Doll / Lunch
References
- ↑ Reynolds, Simon (2010). Totally Wired: Postpunk Interviews and Overviews. Soft Skull Press. p. 306. ISBN 9781593763947. Retrieved 20 September 2014.