S: . . .This is one of the gigs that we'd gotten (a school cafeteria). I don't know how we managed to do this. But there was a bunch of us, I think there was even a dancer who was part of the proceedings. That's what we'd do, we'd travel and sing. It was really good training because now after I got the record deal I could sing anywhere, in front of anyone, at anytime, under any circumstances which is good. . .

Q: Did you ever busk? Did you ever sing on the street?

S: I never did that. I was way too shy and much too . . .I need to have an audiences attention. I'd much more prefer to have a quiet room. If I felt that the audience wasn't into it, I'd get really mad. That's one of the things you have to overcome if you're a singer/songwriter and you're shy and you have to face an audience. You have to not feel. . . You have to get over certain things. You have to get over guys putting their feet up on the stage, and shouting at you going, "Hey, baby, don't you ever smile?" and stuff like that. You have to learn to take it an swallow it.

Q: Do you have any questions about Suzanne's early days? Not that we have to keep things going in a chronological order here. About childhood and just getting started?

S: Or any old thing.

Q: I think we're about the same age and from the same neighborhood. . .

S: Which neighborhood?

Q: I was born on 122nd and . . .

S: He wants to know, did I come up through the public school system in New York?

Q: --

S: Not if you're going to the school on 122nd St. which was PS179. I think I was the only child in the second grade who could read.

Q: In seven years, I never wrote an essay, in seven years, I never read a book. In seven years I just had no creativity and then all of a sudden I had people who wanted to talk, who wouldn't. . .

S: I think I had an entirely different experience than you did because I moved. I went to PS179 and I think I was the only white girl in probably the whole school. Eventually they figured out that I could read and they suggested that I be moved to PS163 which was on 97th St. There they had a class of mixed races of kids who could read and who were more intellectually oriented. We had good teachers there. And besides that my family was very interested in making sure we all got a good education. And for a few years I went to the children's community workshop school on 88th St. which was wild. It was an experimental school that I went to for 2 years. It was basically 100 kids and a grandson ranging from age 5 to 14. I was the only one to graduate in my graduating class because I was the only 13 year old. It was a very mixed races school. Ruth Messanger was my teacher there. It was a very violent school. Everyone fought everyone else. We didn't learn anything really. We didn't learn social studies, we didn't learn math. Our gym, we'd go to the park and swing and fight. I would sit in the window and write poetry and this is what I would do all afternoon. There was no structure to think of. But, it was creative, it was fun, it was kind of wild. But then when I went to High School for the Performing Arts, it was much more structured and much more disciplined. I thought that was quite enjoyable. Because when I was in . . . bellydance classes and African dance classes and we could go to the park and write plays. It was exciting but it didn't really prepare me for High School.

Q: You never danced out in the middle of 47th St. with your classmates?

S: No, I didn't although people did do that. People would go out in the street. In 1976 all the line dances were really popular so everyone would line up and you would dance in the lunchroom and sometimes it would spill out into the street. I wasn't one of them dancing in the street, but I was dancing in the lunchroom.

Q: Except for the song that I'm hearing now in the gym when I'm working out--the one about the luncheonette?

S: Tom's Diner.

Q: The only work of yours that I really know is the very first album. But the songs on there are the most penetrating songs about female psychology about a certain kind of female psychology about intimacy, power, fear, that sort of thing. And I'm wondering if that sort of stuff is still very interesting to you or that's like past tense for you?

S: Female psychology is that what. . .? I have to say that I've never thought of my own psychology as being specifically female. I think of my psychology as being. . .I think there is a certain population whether they're male or female, gay or straight, old or young, or whatever, that responds to the music and it has to do really more with being alienated than being one gender or another gender. This is my feeling about it. "Small Blue Thing" is not written from a specifically feminine point of view, "Cracking" is certainly not written from a feminine point of view. People assume because I'm a woman and because I sing it and I'm a feminine woman that I must be writing from a particular feminine psychological point of view. It really has to do more with feeling alienated. That's what I think. I get letters from children who say, "I think you're great, my mom thinks you're weird." Then I'll get letters from parents who say, "I think you're great, my kids think you're weird. My daughter thinks you're really morbid." And I get letters from men and I get letters from women and I get letters from different kinds of people. Priests or an astronaut. So they're all people outside of the mainstream. That's really what I think. The true point of view is not so much feminine it's just mine.

Q: "Marlene on the Wall" has to be a feminine point of view?

S: "Marlene on the Wall" has to be feminine? Yea, yea, I mean. "Even if I am in love with you/all this to say what's it to you." Is that a specifically feminine line--not really. Yea, the men rising and falling, I guess so.

Q: The picture on the wall...

S: The picture...

Q: is saying it reminds you that she was there.

S: Let me. . .Maybe I should sing the song, "Marlene on the Wall", and then maybe I'll tell you what it was about. It was actually written about a poster of Marlene Dietrich. It wasn't really a poster, it was a little picture I had of her. I'll think about it while I sing it and I'll try and figure out if there is a specifically feminine point. . . I mean it probably is, I was writing about a love affair I had at the time. . .I guess so. I mean, you can't escape your gender completely.

SINGS "MARLENE ON THE WALL"

S: OK, you win, it's a feminine perspective. I would admit.

Q: Did Marlene ever hear that?

S: Marlene Dietrich, I doubt it.

Q: Anyone ever brought it to her attention?

S: I don't think so.

Q: Where is the poster now?

S: It's in my library. It was a little tiny picture. It's somewhere around my house.

Q: At what point do very specific things like a picture that are very private or personal become translated into a song that can appeal to a wide group of people? I guess not the point--what's the trick; what's the technique of taking a very personal thing and turning into a more universal thing? Is that something you think about?

S: Yea, I wouldn't call it a trick but I think it's something that you need to do. First of all it always helps to start from the specific rather than the general. You can't sit there and go, I think I really want to write a song about...I really want to write a song about Somalia. It think I'm gonna sit down and write a song about Somalia. and then, you know, you can't do that You have to start with something that is local, in my opinion, something that is in your neighborhood. I mean, if you are living in Somalia or you are Somalian then that's what you should do. But if you're living in New York City to start with general idea: I want to write a song about justice; I want to write a song about peace; I want to write a song about equality; I want to write a song about love, you're going to sit there all day long as far as I'm concerned or you're going to come up with a song that just isn't good. I think you need to start with those local things, those things that move you when you eat breakfast. I ate breakfast at Tom's Diner--Tom's Restaurant to be more specific at 112th and...Oh yea...a little greasy place that's not very fancy or special which is why I loved it. And then you take and you let your imagination go with it. In my opinion, you have to write about those things that are closer to home.

Q: "The Rent Song"?

S: "The Rent Song"...is that a question? "The Rent Song" was an old song that I had written about how difficult it was to pay my rent which it was at that time. "I am sitting by my window/I am thinking of my rent..." I don't sing it anymore for obvious reasons. I guess I just didn't think it was a great song.

Q: --

S: I never intend to do anything. I never intend to...The way I do it, I do what you do when you're a kid. I think to myself or I have a weird thought and I go ha ha that's kind of weird. I sit there and go "today I am a small blue thing" ha ha that's very funny. and then I think to myself, If I were a small blue thing which is that you get yourself into a certain mood. If I were a small blue thing what would I be, I would be a marble, I would be an eye. It's like a pretend game--something you do before. . . If you were a small blue thing how would you feel: small, round, cool, smooth.

Q: --

S: You mean do I expect the audience to sit and listen and to try and figure out all the meanings?

Q: --

S: I try to write a song in a way that I think no one else has done it before. I figure if I'm going to write something, I may as well write something that no one else has written before. If someone else has written it, I may as well go and sing that song that's why I don't . . . If I feel that what I'm writing can be said by someone else, I really prefer that somebody else do it. do I intend for people to sit around their record players at home ore their CD players and drink red wine and say, "I think that she's talking about the genealogy of the bloodline. . ." Yeah, I do to some degree. I like it when an audience I will listen to the music and I don't expect everyone to, I don't do it myself to other people's music. I should, more often, but I don't. I listen to music because I just like it. At the same time, there are things that amuse me or tickle me or please me about certain combinations of words and meaning of words that I really like so I'll put them down because I really like them. And I hope that other people like them to. And I guess I expect and hope that maybe people will listen to the music and think about what it means.

Q: The song "Blood Makes Noise." Did I read that right and are you a little skeptical of Doctors?

S: Am I skeptical of Doctors because of the song "Blood Makes Noise"?

Q: . . . or that whole theme in the album...is that personal experience?

S: Well, yea, kind of. I mean, everyone has experience with doctors. That's a hard question, am I skeptical of doctors? I go to doctors. Yes, I am skeptical of doctors in certain way. I mean, I go to them like everyone else but I think there's a relationship between the doctors and the album and the fact that some of the characters on the album are abused for example. Usually the first signs of abuse you know for example if the child is abused, you go to the doctor and the doctor is the first one to pick up on the clues. And a lot of times the doctor can't or won't want to get involved. So, that's the link there. I don't have anything against doctors and the medical profession certainly.

Q: After you've written a song that is personally painful to you?

S: Yea. . .

Q: Do you feel better?

S: Yea, sometimes I do. Yea, sometimes I do. I don't know if better is the word but I feel relieved. I feel that I've made a worthy. . . I've made something orderly out of something that was a big mess. That's the way I feel. Sometimes I feel sorry when I sing it to an audience because I feel like: I'm really sorry to bring this up and I'm sorry to have to sing this to you but this is what I really want to sing. Usually those are the songs that the audiences seem to want.

Q: The song "The Queen and The Soldier" are there ever any nights when the Queen doesn't kill the soldier?

S: Are there ever any nights when the queen doesn't kill the soldier? There's one or two times where the pronoun I've said he instead of she or she instead of he and suddenly she's out on the doorstep and he's inside and everyone's really confused. That's not intentional. it's not... every night it's the same way...I always get blamed for it.

Q: I heard a story that you didn't care about. . .

S: So your question is?

Q: Was there . . .

S: I'll tell the "Tom's Diner" DNA story. I was on tour in 1990 promoting "Days of Open Hand" which was my 3rd record. Suddenly I got a call from my manager and he says, "Oh, have you heard that there's these two guys in England who stole your song and put a beat to it. And were going to sue them; we're going to make sure this stops right away. A&M's going to sue the pants off them." And I said, "Why don't you send it to me first and let me listen to it?" So he sent it to me and I really liked it and I thought it was very funny and imaginative. And it was also very badly done which was very amusing. You could hear the clicks in the tape and you could tell this wasn't some slick producer. This is obviously two kids in a room somewhere who had some groove record. They kept the whole vocal and the whole song and I thought it was just very funny. So I said, "Well, these kids obviously don't have any money, why are you going to go after them it doesn't make any sense. Let'm release it as a single and it'll find its way into a couple of clubs. What's the big deal?" So, they released it as a single. A & M was very surprised that I took that attitude and my manager was surprised too because they had just been threatening. Everyone was convinced that I would be furious and outraged and appalled and this sort of thing. And actually, I thought it was good because of its low tech low..astetic. So we released it and much to my surprise, it became this big hit all over the world which was very distracting because I had this other record I was trying to promote. Hello, I'm doing this over here and the whole world is looking over there. So I just all right and a lot of the fans were very surprised and coming up to me going, "have you gone disco, I don't understand why you did this? And there were some people going, "I bought "Solitude Standing" but they forgot to include the music." As though it had somehow it had gotten separated in the shipping. It was wildly confusing for everybody but I stood by my decision I said, "Well, it got released and that was that." Then I met the guys that did it and they're very funny. They're not black. They're very white.

Q: And then a whole subindustry grew out of people doing take offs on it.

S: Oh that was really strange too, then everyone else started say, Oh, no, we can do it much better. I got tapes from really slick produced tapes and other weird take offs on it with reggae version of "Tom's Diner" and "I Dream of Jeannie" version the Micky D Daddy's Little Girl version and everyone started sending them to me. I'm like, well what am I supposed to do with all of this stuff? So I thought the obvious thing to do was to put them together as a group and to release them and my record company thought I was kind of nuts. You want to release 15 versions of the same song are you crazy? This is your next big move? I had to explain that it was just a collectors item. I wrote some liner notes and we released it and I realized later that my one big mistake was that I forgot to put my name on the album. So it's just "tom's Diner" various artists. It says, "Tom's Album various artists. And like a year later oh yea may if it was Suzanne Vega and various artists maybe it would...but I forgot...no one reminded me and so that's the way it was.

Q: Can you explain how you have the ability to say to the record company no not to sue? How does that work? . . .they have some control? Yet they ask you?

S: No, they didn't ask me, my manager asked me? And my manager called them back and said, don't sue.

Q: How does that work?

S: It works because I told my manager to call the record company back and tell them not to sue and he did. And they listened.

Q: The record company has a degree of respect for you . . .?

S: I have a relationship with the record company. At this point I do. I have from the beginning but I think having the hit "Luka" earned me a certain amount of respect from the record company. Although, A&M has traditionally been an artist label. The time that I signed with the, they had Joan Armitrading, they had Joe Jackson, they had a lot of people that I felt were artistic and were respected. So that's always been their line with me. Pretty much I could do what I wanted to. It also made good sense.

[TO BE CONTINUED]

Tape transcribed by Wendy Chapman

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