Aimee Mann
(born September 8, 1960 [1]) is an American rock guitarist, bassist, singer, and noted songwriter. She has won a Grammy Award (for the packaging of her album The Forgotten Arm
).
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AIMEE MANN TICKETS
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Biography
Early life
Aimee Mann was born in
Midlothian,
Virginia, graduated from
Midlothian High School and attended the
Berklee College of Music in
Boston, but dropped out to sing with her first
punk rock band, the
Young Snakes; the band released the EP
Bark Along with the Young Snakes
in 1982, and a compilation album was issued in 2004.
In 1983, seeking a return to "sweetness and melody", she co-founded with Berklee classmate and boyfriend
Michael Hausman the
new wave band
'Til Tuesday, which achieved success in 1985 with its first album,
Voices Carry
. The title song is said to be inspired by Hausman and Mann's breakup. The producer, Mike Thorne, in a March 1999 article disputes this and states the lyrics originally had Mann singing to another woman. The gender was changed due to pressure from the record company.
[2] The
video became an
MTV staple, winning the
MTV Video Music Award for Best New Artist, although Mann's then-signature spiky hair would lead some to dismiss the group. Mann performed with the rock band
Rush on the song "
Time Stand Still" (from
Hold Your Fire
, 1987) which became a minor UK hit, singing backup vocals and appearing in the music video. With Mann playing an increasingly important role in songwriting, 'Til Tuesday released two more albums,
Welcome Home
and
Everything's Different Now
. On their final tour, musician
Jon Brion joined the band, which broke up in 1990 when Mann left to start her solo career.
Around the time of the first album's release, Mann began a romantic relationship with
Jules Shear; they broke up before the final 'Til Tuesday album, which contained the song "J For Jules." Professional relationships from the band would continue: Hausman later became Mann's manager, and Brion produced her first two solo albums, along with the
Magnolia
soundtrack.
Early solo career
In 1993, Mann released
Whatever
, her first solo album. Promotion suffered due to the collapse of her label, Imago. The album sold modestly and met with critical praise, paving the way for her next release, 1995's
I'm with Stupid
, through
Geffen Records.
[3] Again, reviews were positive, but sales were weak.
Mann recorded
Bachelor No. 2
, but Geffen saw no hit singles in the material and ordered her back to the studio. The album languished while Mann and the label fought.
Meanwhile, film director
Paul Thomas Anderson, for whom Mann's husband
Michael Penn and Brion had composed a soundtrack, became a close friend. Mann gained greater public recognition in 1999 — indeed, more than for anything else since "Voices Carry" — when she contributed eight songs to the
soundtrack of Anderson's
Magnolia
, including the
Academy Award and
Grammy
-nominated song, "
Save Me". Anderson deliberately worked from Mann's lyrics to create the film's characters and situations. Mann soon became sought after as a soundtrack contributor.
[who?]
Independence
Disillusioned with both the ineffectual promotion and artistic meddling by her record label, an experience documented in songs such as "Calling It Quits" and "Nothing Is Good Enough", she struck out on her own and founded
SuperEgo Records in 1999. Mann self-released
Bachelor No. 2
in 2000, having negotiated a contract release from
David Geffen, and though initially only sold at concerts and via her website, the album became successful, allowing her to secure retail distribution through SuperEgo. The album, which included some songs from
Magnolia
and new material, was widely admired and Mann's "more
indie than indie" success was carefully noted by other musicians.
Mann, Penn, Brion,
Fiona Apple, and other musicians had by this time developed a subculture around the
Largo nightclub in L.A. Penn and Mann formed a concept called
Acoustic Vaudeville to recreate it on tour in
California and eventually on an irregular, ongoing national tour. The Acoustic Vaudeville shows intermix music and
stand-up comedy; among the comedians joining them for individual shows were
Janeane Garofalo,
Patton Oswalt, and
David Cross.
Lost In Space
: 2002–2004
Mann continued her solo career with
Lost in Space
(2002), a somewhat more somber album in the same vein as
Bachelor No. 2
, featuring art by
Seth. In 2003 her website released the
Lost in Space Special Edition
, which featured a second disc containing six live recordings, as well two B-sides and two previously unreleased songs. In November 2004,
Live at St. Ann's Warehouse
, a live album and
DVD recorded at a series of June 2004 shows in
Brooklyn, came out; the two discs were sold packaged together in either a CD jewel case or a DVD case.
The Forgotten Arm
and One More Drifter in the Snow
: 2005–2006
Mann described her next album,
The Forgotten Arm
(2005), as a
concept album set in the 1970s about two lovers who meet at the
Virginia state fair and go on the run. The
Joe Henry-produced album, which was recorded mostly live with few overdubs, was released
May 3,
2005. The album's illustrations and title reflect Mann's interest in
boxing, having trained with legendary boxing trainer
Freddie Roach [4]. In 2006, Mann received her one Grammy Award to date for "Best Recording Package" for
The Forgotten Arm.
The album title derives from a boxing move in which one arm is used to hit the opponent, causing him to "forget" about the other arm, which is then used to deliver a harsher blow. The album received weaker reviews overall, with critics impressed at the totality but unimpressed with any individual songs.
Mann also released an EP for
Christmas in 2005 as a cover single of "
Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" for sale through her website and
iTunes. It also included "Christmastime", the 1996 duet she recorded with Penn for the
Hard Eight
soundtrack, and a cover of "
The Christmas Song". The iTunes version replaced "Christmastime" with a cover of
Joni Mitchell's "River" and "Clean Up for Christmas" from
The Forgotten Arm
.
Mann's independence from the industry led to more overt political stances. She joined
Artists Against Piracy, a group formed to act against the illegal
downloading and
file sharing of
copyrighted music from the
Internet. Mann, Penn and Hausman took their experience with SuperEgo to found the
independent music collective United Musicians, which is based on the principle that every artist should be able to retain
copyright ownership of the work he or she has created, in contrast to normal music industry contracts.
In July 2006, Mann announced that she would be releasing
One More Drifter in the Snow
, a full-length
Christmas album. The album featured primarily covers of Christmas standards, as well as a new version of
Christmastime
and an original song, called "Calling On Mary", written by Mann and bassist
Paul Bryan, who produced the record. It was released on
October 31 in the US, and late November 2006 in the UK.
[5]
2007–Present
On
July 31,
2007 the soundtrack for the motion picture
Arctic Tale
was released, featuring two new Mann songs, "The Great Beyond" and "At the Edge of the World".
July 2007 also saw the premiere of the music video for a song entitled "31 Today" (which featured comedienne
Morgan Murphy alongside Mann and
Bobcat Goldthwait as director) was posted on
YouTube.
[6] The song appears on Mann's seventh studio album,
@#%&*! Smilers
, released on
June 3,
2008.
[7]The album debuted on the
Billboard 200
at Number 32 (one of Mann's highest positions to date), and on the Top Independent Albums chart at Number 2.
[8] @#%&*! Smilers
was met with mostly praise, with Billboard stating that it "pops with color, something that gives it an immediacy that's rare for an artist known for songs that subtly worm their way into the subconscious... Smilers grabs a listener, never making him or her work at learning the record, as there are both big pop hooks and a rich sonic sheen."
[9]
Mann joined the 9th annual
Independent Music Awards judging panel to assist independent musicians' careers.
[10]
[11] [12] She was also an inaugual member of the IMAs in 2002.
[13]
Discography
- 1993 – Whatever
- 1995 – I'm with Stupid
- 2000 – Bachelor No. 2 or, the Last Remains of the Dodo
- 2002 – Lost in Space
- 2005 – The Forgotten Arm
- 2008 – @#%&*! Smilers
Acting
- Mann played the role of a German nihilist who sacrificed her green nail polished little right toe in the movie The Big Lebowski
(1998).
- Mann and her band appear as themselves in the 2002 Buffy the Vampire Slayer
episode "Sleeper", performing the songs "This Is How It Goes" and "Pavlov's Bell" at The Bronze. She has one line in the episode: "Man, I hate playing vampire towns." "Pavlov's Bell" also appears on the Buffy
soundtrack album Radio Sunnydale
.
- She and her band also play themselves in a 2002 episode of The West Wing
, "College Kids", performing a cover of James Taylor's "Shed a Little Light" at a Rock the Vote concert.
- In 2006, Mann guest-starred as herself on an episode of Love Monkey
, "The One Who Got Away".
- On March 26, 2008, Mann appeared as herself in the Comedy Central series Lewis Black's Root of All Evil
in a comedic sketch being interviewed by comedian Paul F. Tompkins in the hopes of proving that musicians don't need marijuana.
Personal life
Mann met fellow
singer-songwriter Michael Penn in the late 1980s and with comparable songwriting styles and record-industry woes to share, they struck up a friendship during the recording of
Stupid
(to which Penn contributed vocals), which blossomed into romance and their marriage in 1998.
[ Penn and Mann live in the Los Feliz neighborhood of Los Angeles. They have no children, but Penn has a son from a previous marriage.
]
References
- Bot generated title -->
- http://www.stereosociety.com/voicescarry.html
- Aimee Mann - Current Activities
- http://www.howtobeatupanything.com/home/2009/01/how-to-beat-up-singer-aimee-mann-with-a-rebuttal-fro
- [1] {{Dead link|date=July 2008}}
- YouTube - "31 Today"
- Aimee Mann Message Board
- Billboard.com - Artist Chart History - Aimee Mann
- Billboard.com - Error
- Independent Music Awards
- MicControl
- Top40-Charts.com
- Independent Music Awards - Past Judges