Ear Whacks
by Jonathan King

Hudson Valley Sirens

Gail Ann Dorsey

I catch up with Kate Pierson, one of the founding members and creative forces behind the B-52s, on the beach in Hawaii. The surf is lapping up against the terrace as she sips her morning cup of Kona. Unfortunately for me, this is a telephone interview and I am still in the unseasonably frigid Hudson Valley. Kate and Sara Lee (the bassist not the baker) are baking in the sun on the island of Kauai as they warm up for their upcoming show at the New Paltz Grille (formerly the Cadillac Ranch). Sara Lee is a prolific bassist who has played with so many different people since being discovered as a teen by Robert Fripp that Ani DiFranco (one of the many) playfully tagged her a “bass slut”. They will be playing with Gail Ann Dorsey who also has a reputation for bass promiscuity, most recently with David Bowie’s band.

I inquire if the show at the Grille is another installment of the Chanteuse Club which was a performance by Kate, Gail and Maggie Moore at the Wall Street Playhouse in Kingston last year.

She replies with just a hint of a southern drawl, a remnant of her famous band’s formative years in Athens, Georgia. “Not really. The Chanteuse Club was an unplugged thing, and it was only a singer accompanied by a piano or guitar. This will be more of a band thing. Plus Sara Lee was only doing sound, and for this she’s a featured performer. She just released a solo album. I’m doing a solo record and I admire the way she did it. She isolated herself, put a message on her machine, ‘I’m busy’ and really got down to it. And I’ve been working on a solo record for quite awhile.”

“When is that expected?” I ask.

“I’ve finished demos and I’m hoping it’s going to come out in the fall.”

Still a little bit confused about the format of the show I ask, “Is the show at the New Paltz Grille just one jam session with the three of you playing as a band, or three separate performances?”

“It’s both, really. It’s three different solo performances, but we’re actually sharing a band. We’re all using Sara Lee’s band and Gail is going to play bass with me. Sara will play bass with Gail. And then I will sing backup for both of them.”

“So you’ll each take a turn in the spotlight?” I query.

“Yes. Gail will do a whole set, I will do a set, and then Sara will do a set. I’m really excited. This is the first time doing my solo songs with a band. For the Chanteuse Club Joshua Pearl accompanied me on piano so I was able to work out a lot details in the songs. When you strip them down like that you get to analyze the lyrics and arrangement and it really helps writing as far as when it comes to playing with a band. The nuances that I worked out with Joshua really help the form of a song and to keep the flow interesting.”
“Is this going to be your only performance together?”
“No, I’m hoping to go on tour after my record comes out. The three of us are very different. I mean it’s not like a Lilith Fair or anything, but it’s just three interesting performers. We share a lot musically, but we’re also very distinct…Also one of the motivating factors of a solo career is to be able to pick up and play easily and possibly play more benefits locally and be more involved in the local community.”

“What brought you to Woodstock?” I probe.

“I came to visit Keith Strickland [the guitarist for the B-52s] in ’87 when he came here to rent a house for the band and I’m just a country girl at heart, even though I’m from New Jersey. We moved up from Georgia where I had a goat farm with chickens and an organic garden, so I’ve always been into a kind of back to the land kind of thing...We had been living in the city when Laura Levine invited us up and after three nights we fell under the ‘Woodstock spell’ as they say. I had no intention of getting a place but I saw this house and I just had to get it and I’ve lived here ever since. I love being in Woodstock because it’s liberal, it’s the country, people care about preserving the environment, and it’s socially conscious. It’s a groovy, fabulous place.”

Spoken like a true Woodstock resident.When I talk to Gail Ann Dorsey the next day she is fighting a cold in the much less exotic locale of Kingston, New York. Like Kate she has a hint of an accent, hers of the English variety acquired after she transplanted to London from her native Philadelphia.

“What can you tell me about the show you are planning in New Paltz?” I ask.

“I’m excited because I’ve been doing solo shows over the past year and haven’t played with a band in some time. So I’m opening the show and going to be doing some new material, and also some covers, and some of my favorite songs. Kate wants to try out her new solo material. I’d like to do the same. Sara is promoting her new CD. So it all just worked out for us to come together and have support for each other, because it’s always scary when you are out there on your own. It’s nice to be with friends.”
“How did you end up in the Hudson Valley?” I question.

“You know how it goes…I met Sara Lee in London in the early 90s and I came to visit her here a few times and I loved it. I remember when I moved here thinking I’ll hang here for a couple of years and now it’s almost been 10. There are such great musicians here… a wonderful music community. And I had kind of had enough of London living, you know really expensive, a little crazy and out of hand, and I thought it would be nice to live somewhere a little more tranquil for a change. I don’t think I would have left England to live anywhere else in the United States. New York State is my favorite state in the whole country. This area is great and New York City is New York City. I just love it.”

“Are you still playing with David Bowie?”

“Yes, but we are on hiatus now because David and his wife just had a baby recently. We actually just did an album last July, and it was due out this spring, but I believe he had a wave of inspiration and is back in the studio re-mixing and adding some songs…I’m going to go down to the city to see if I can hear it this week.”

“Who is in your CD player right now?” I inquire.

“That’s a good question. Let me look in my CD wallet. Heart is definitely in there, the greatest hits from the 70s…They were a huge influence on me, Ann and Nancy Wilson. They represented for me the possibility that I could do something as a female instrumentalist, a woman could get up and play the hell out of a guitar and rock out. They were a shining hope for me and to this day they are my favorite band. Let’s see, I also have Barbra Streisand who I adore, probably my favorite female singer. I also have some Todd Rundgren, Ricki Lee Jones. For newer stuff I have the new Shelby Lynne, and Joni Mitchell’s last one. And one that I just bought which I think is a really fun record is the new Daft Punk. It’s my favorite; it’s so fun. I put it on when I’m cooking and dance around the kitchen.” Then it was back to Hawaii for me. Okay, at least my voice. A true Brit, Sara Lee asks me to hold on while she grabs a cup of tea. Sara has been touring to promote her first solo album Make It Beautiful after over 20 years of playing bass on other people’s records.

“You also live in the Woodstock area?” I ask.

“We’ve all lived in the area for quite some time. I first came here to work with the B-52s in 1988. We came up to record the Cosmic Thing record in Dreamland. I was lucky to be involved with that…I came here and stayed with Kate at her house and thought ‘This is nice. This is better than 9th Street and 1st Ave in the East Village,’ where I had lived six or seven years. At the time that I met the B’s I was ready for a few birds and trees, instead of concrete and cars.”

“Can you describe the scope of the upcoming concert in New Paltz?” I inquire.

“Well I have my first record out this past September and I have been playing shows with my band. It’s a lot of hard work getting out there and driving around everywhere. Kate and Gail have been friends of mine for 10 or 12 years. After playing with other bands for most of our careers, at this point we are all working on solo material and I thought it would be fun if we all went out together. Whenever you can do things with friends I think it eases the burden of the day to day running of things. So I suggested to Kate and Gail that we do a show together and that we each take eight or nine songs and use the same backing band… This way the public gets to see three different singers doing three different types of material and we all get to help each other out and have a good time doing it. I think it’s interesting for my band because they get to play with three different singers in one night, which is a rarity. So I think all around it’s a beneficial situation for everyone. It’s an unusual concept and I think it’s going to be a great show.”

Kate Pierson, Sara Lee and Gail Ann Dorsey will be playing the New Paltz Grille on May 5 at 8:30 PM. Tickets are $20. For more information call 255-4025.