Wendy James didn’t just burst on to the scene with a scream and an attitude that was a healthy reminder of what confidence can do for a fledgling performer in a group that had everything going for it, she seized the moment to become for many an icon, an image that that wasn’t out of place in a memory of the style and portrait like feel of a period in time when Carnaby Street and the works of Andy Warhol clashed in a seismic eruption of colour and fashion, of enthusiasm for change, and the self-reliance to stand by your conviction and deliver with a punch the point of your existence.
Whilst the first two singles Transvision Vamp released didn’t necessarily trouble the charts, it was obvious from the moment that I Want Your Love that the band were going to be sold as the next big thing to come from the crossover of Pop and Rock and which was further enhanced in songs such as the re-release of Revolution Baby, the phenomenal Baby I Don’t Care, and Landslide Of Love.
Time has a habit of pushing boundaries and then retracting them sharply and without much explanation to those who become invested in art and the sound of their youth, and whilst Wendy James soon bounced back with Racine, it is to the generosity of the solo performance, of being in control of her own voice and words that has made the future sit up and take notice of her assured cool once again.
Whether in the brilliance of her 2020 release, Queen High Street, or in the tentative steps of Now Ain’t The Time For Your Tears, I Came Here To Blow Minds, or 2016’s The Price Of A Ticket, the confidence, her truth, the iconic beat of a heart wrapped in art of performance, Wendy James has seen it all, and come through it with her eyes wide open, her soul singing, and her mind on fire as she releases arguably her finest solo album yet in The Shape Of History.
It is with pleasure that the fans will learn of Ms. James schedule over the coming weeks as she brings her insight and music of the album to various record shops, including a night at Liverpool’s Rough Trade store on Monday 28th October.
Ahead of the tour, I was able to catch up with the talented and gregarious vocalist.
This must be really exciting time for you ahead of the tour.
It really is! The events are all back-to-back, with no days off even. It involves a lot of travelling and punctuated by stopping at all these great record shops to showcase the new album.
I listened to the new album last night, and again this morning, and when placed it comparison to the previous album, Queen High Straight, it could well be argued that it has once more taken a different direction again, something that you definitely achieve with terrific insight. There’s a lot of messages and thought that burst to the surface, an album that is very upbeat.
Well, there’s certainly rockers on there, there’s still very much me on there. I always have a kind of Velvet Underground, the New York Garage, New Wave, Punky sound that carries me on, but there are some gentle and even big soundings mid 70s kind of production numbers as well; I just go where the song wants me too and I think that the content is consistent throughout.
It caught me out, for as soon as you start the album you have that wonderful piano piece acting as the introduction and for about 20 seconds you are sat thinking this is wonderfully demure, and then suddenly the tempo shifts, and you can’t help but be impressed. I was smiling as it happened thinking I like how you have done that, pulling people in, and I was reminded of being at a musical in the moments after the overture.
Yes, that’s quite right, that’s what I wanted to do in my imagination and there was all of the New York Philharmonic and it’s like the Woody Allen film Rhapsody in Blue and those beautiful 1950s musicals like Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. It’s an incredible score which sets up the opening of the movie which is what I wanted. I used a little cello, I used some piano, a little saxophone. So, I used more accessible instruments to me, rather than a whole orchestra like the New York or the Royal London Philharmonic but there’s many varied instruments on the album. There’s some harp and some strings but not the full orchestra. Yes, you’re right, that opening track is like the start of a movie score.
I was trying to think back to the previous album, which for me was grand, it was emotionally grand and within this one, there’s a lot more fun to be had with the lyrical wordplay that it has, and it does catch you out which I’m very pleased with.
Well, you know my music, I really do enjoy a satisfying lyric, I do tend to write like a scriptwriter perhaps. I look at a story or a place but it’s still loose enough for me to know what I’m imagining but for you and for everyone else listening to find your own idea in that lyric as well because that’s the whole enjoyment of music, isn’t it? It’s international, it’s universal and no matter what background or place that you might come from, when a song is working you can put yourself into that song and take what you need from it. The lyrics get you to the place in your own imagination.
Yes, that can be seen on things like The Crack of the Boom and the Creeps and the Goons, I looked at the lyrics on it and I thought that’s cool!
It’s really good, Cavendish Candy which I think deserves a mention regarding verse two. When I stay in London, it’s near a street called Cavendish Street and there’s a candy store called Cavendish Candy. So, you know, there it is – Cavendish Candy. It’s a really cool candy store in London.
It sort of reminded me in a way of Candy Darling who worked with Andy Warhol, I was thinking along those lines you see, it’s very clever.
The name inspired me, Lou Reed’s written a lot of songs about Candy hasn’t he?
If I may mention Transvision Vamp – of course, Pop Art and Velveteen and the other albums then. Has that shaped you, that period of time to do this album now?
It’s all hypotheticals; I don’t know what would have happened had it not been for Transvision Vamp, but it certainly added to my education and my life. You know, I was 17 when I wrote those songs and then suddenly, the rise was quite meteoric, you’re travelling the world, you’re performing to enormous numbers of people and you learn on the job basically, you’re then lucky if you are one of the survivors.
It’s not for the faint-hearted – pop stardom. So, you either get with it or you go under, so I got with it and I learnt! I was always musical as a child – piano, clarinet, you know, the usual instruments your parents get for you if you’re lucky enough for your parents to get you into music, if you are young or have an interest. I was always singing and playing instruments, but it was rock and roll that unlocked the key. I was of that age, Punk was ahead of us, and then Ska and Two Tone and suddenly, whether it was at school discos or nightclubs, you know, listening to The Specials or The Selecter, you find your place in life because of the music.
It’s funny that you bring up The Selecter because I’m a big fan and happy to be a friend of Pauline Black’s and its people like her and Belinda Carlisle in a similar sense, the three of you are very similar in outlook, expression and the way that you have punched through certain ceilings, if I dare say that word, in terms of how you pushed the boundaries of femininity but also of wonderful aggression in your music.
Yeah, we’re tough nuts, aren’t we? It’s true! I was always out there and I’m sure for Pauline and Belinda it was the same. You’re travelling around with a group of guys and so whilst you are a female, a woman, a young girl, it’s a gang mentality and I’m also surrounded by older punks and other musicians and you grow up in a different type of family of your peers and they educate you how to hold your head up high and I think that’s a useful thing that I’ve managed to put across to my fans as well.
I absolutely concur with that, I mean, watching you on television back on MTV when it was really making its mark in the late 80s with your wonderful videos that being shown, it spurred a lot of my generation on to think that we could be just as Punk.
Totally, that’s what the Punks did for our generation, they showed us how to be individual.
I know I’m going to run out of time but there’s so many things I want to ask you – are you looking forward to coming to Liverpool as part of this tour?
Yes, because I think that one of Transvision Vamp’s first ever shows was at Liverpool University and I remember that all the band and crew had already been arrested! The next venue we did there was at the Royal Court with the very steep raked seats, you almost got vertigo looking up at them. Literally there are places that you love going to – Newcastle, Liverpool’s another so I’m very excited and I’m really impressed that Rough Trade are putting their money where their mouth is and opening stores in places like 20th Century in New York, which if you know New York, that’s where all the T.V. shows are made Rough Trade are on the ground floor of that building.
I know Rough Trade from the very beginning and I come from West London and the record label was based just a few doors down from me and then the original little Rough Trade store off Portobello Road, they’ve always been consistent about their dedication to music and so its just great that there’s one in Liverpool so I know they wanted to open in Manchester but they chose Liverpool instead.
The one down in the East End of London is one of my favourite places. I’ve spent a lot of time, many happy hours there.
It’s great when you walk into a record shop it restores you, it doesn’t matter how old you are, whether you’re a teenager or older, when you walk into that store, you’re a kid again, going through all the covers, aren’t you?
The deluxe version of The Shape Of History is only available to purchase from her official website at https://thewendyjames.com.
Ian D. Hall