All Photos: Alan Mercer Lighting: Eric V.
This is Bebe Buell’s fifth appearance on my blog. She is one of my favorite artists and people. What a blessing it is to be able to work with her often. She was in Los Angeles recently for the weekend and we managed to find the time to take a few casual photos and catch up on how different Bebe’s life is now that she has moved to Nashville, Tennessee. She has been recording a new record and getting her new home ready for her new life.
Bebe’s lengthy and respected musical career has shown her to be an important artist with razor sharp musical instincts; a singer, songwriter and performer with a power and command rarely seen in entertainers. Bebe has the unequaled gift of being able to delve into a song and spark it to life with immediacy and poignant raw emotion; whether performing her own works or her always groundbreaking choices of songs by other writers.
Bebe’s unique, multi-faceted talent manifested itself at an early age. At ten years old she began singing in the Villa Maria Academy choir sporting a unique “alto” that caught everyone’s ear.
After her high school graduation at age seventeen, she was discovered by super agent Eileen Ford relocating from her hometown of Virginia Beach, Virginia, to New York City. Hitting the Manhattan music scene as soon as she arrived, Bebe’s passion, charisma and stellar looks propelled her into the limelight. Shortly thereafter, she met musical genius Todd Rundgren. At the time, she was living in a women’s residence run by nuns.
After posing nude for Playboy in 1974, becoming the first fashion model to become a Playboy Playmate (Miss November), her controversial layout caused her to be fired by the prestigious Ford modeling agency. It was also the first Playmate pictorial with a model and rock star boyfriend on the pages of the magazine. Bebe continued to model in Europe, signing once again with the equally prestigious Wilhelmina Agency in the USA and Model’s One in the UK frequently appearing on the pages of British, Italian & French Vogue, Harper’s Queen and Cosmopolitan to name a few.
Bebe’s musical career jumpstarted with her first release, “Covers Girl” (1981) produced by Ric Ocasek and Rick Derringer. It was a four song EP of obscure cover songs featuring legendary group The Cars backing her on two of the tracks. Bebe’s pure love of music and natural sense of cool come through on these recordings.
When Bebe’s daughter Liv found out her father was really Steven Tyler, not Todd Rundgren, 1991 became a year of big changes. Well documented in the media, Bebe has said in interviews that she didn’t want to tell Liv who her real father was because of Steven’s heavy drug addiction at the time. Todd had known that he was not the biological father of Liv but had kept the secret in order to give both Bebe and Liv some semblance of a stable home. Steven got sober and the news of Liv’s parentage was no longer a secret. Bebe withdrew from the public eye at this time to focus on her daughter during the ensuing media frenzy. Utilizing her unparalleled entertainment business savvy, she became Liv’s manager, and helped launch and mentor her daughter’s international modeling and acting career.
In 1994 she blazed back into the music world, released a CD and coined a new word with “Retrosexual” a punk/hard rock underground classic. The record was a forceful, fun, rocking return to form for Bebe with a mix of hip, impeccable cover choices and catchy original songs. She received rave reviews for her powerful performances in both New York and Los Angeles.
Affectionately called “Friend To The Stars,” Bebe earned that title because of her closeness to everyone from Jack Nicholson to Andy Warhol, and her carte blanche access to rock’s elite royalty. She was frequently dubbed a “legendary beauty” by photographers and peers alike. Mick Jagger was once quoted as saying that he could bring Bebe “when I dine with royalty.”
Bebe completed her autobiography, the New York Times Bestseller “Rebel Heart; An American Rock And Roll Journey” (St, Martin’s Press) with Victor Bockris in 2001 and in 2002 married Jim Wallerstein of Das Damen and Vacationland fame.
Many artists’ early work is their most powerful and resonating, while Bebe is just gearing up for the release of her most personal, autobiographical and cathartic work yet. Artistically bold and fearless while expressing true joy and sensitivity of the soul, singing her entire life, Bebe’s memorable journey is just beginning to take full flight.
A musician, mother, muse, model, celebrated lover, manager, best selling author, and pop culture icon, music has always held her deepest passion.
Here are the links to Bebe's other appearances on this blog. In February 2010 Bebe called me on the phone and she remains the only blog where I did not take the photos. http://amprofile.blogspot.com/2010/02/phone-call-from-bebe-buell.html Then in June of 2010 I photogrpahed her when she played the Roxy on the Sunset Strip http://amprofile.blogspot.com/2010/06/bebe-buell-live-coming-up-soon.html I followed up quickly in July of 2010 with a featured post on Bebe as The Goddess of Rock n' Roll http://amprofile.blogspot.com/2010/07/bebe-buell-goddess-of-rock-n-roll.html In April of 2011 I showcased some new photographs taken in preparation for Bebe's album 'Hard Love.'
AM: Bebe since we last spoke you have moved to Nashville. What brought this change about?
BB: In 2012 I was asked to sing on an Eddy Arnold Tribute record by my old friend, Cheetah Chrome, the Jeff Beck of Punk Rock Guitar players, who is now working in A&R in Nashville for Eddy Arnold’s grandson. My mother was impressed.
AM: Were you an Eddy Arnold fan?
BB: I knew a couple of his songs, but the one I recorded is called ‘I’ll Hold You In My Heart.’
AM: That is a great song!
BB: They flew me down to Nashville and I immediately saw all the magnolia trees. I was overwhelmed by the smells. I grew up in the South so immediately I had this embryonic home feeling. Right away I found myself in the studio and I felt this kind of crazy energy. When we were finished and walked out the door of the studio the Titans had just won a game so there were all these fireworks lighting up the sky. The next day I was in the famous RCA Studio B, singing through the same microphone as Johnny Cash, The Everly Brothers and Elvis.
AM: That must have been amazing!
BB: I was surrounded by all this energy. I don’t know what happened to me but I had some crazy epiphany. I heard inner voices telling me to move there. The pull was so enormous.
AM: Had you ever felt like this before?
BB: I’d never felt anything like this before. I have traveled all over the place and I never thought I ‘wouldn’t’ live by the ocean but I was in Nashville and I didn’t care.
AM: The East coast has had some really bad weather the past few years anyway.
BB: After Hurricane Sandy I realized Mother Nature is a little angry right now. I started doing all my research and looked up Edgar Cayce and if you go by his predictions then Nashville will be beach front property soon! (laughter) So I figure I’ll be back on the ocean eventually.
AM: Hey, you never know.
BB: I got back home and told my husband Jim that we were moving to Nashville. For me to do this as I was getting ready to turn sixty was like a spiritual cleansing. Now we have a home with a big open floor plan and a wrap around porch on the second floor with three ceiling fans. This house is wide. I’ve got a magnolia tree and a pear tree in the back yard.
AM: It must have taken some courage to make a move like this.
BB: We just did it. We sold our cars and our home in New Jersey. I never thought I would have to pack up another 3500 square foot house.
AM: It was worth it because now you have a new life.
BB: So basically I turned sixty with a new house, a new car, a new record, a new outlook and a new life. It just felt like it was all meant to be.
AM: You didn’t even mind all the work then?
BB: I found peace while unpacking and decorating the new home. Then I found my good friend Jon Tiven, who was my BFF when we were teenagers in New York. He lives in Nashville and he’s gone on to be a very successful producer.
AM: Is he producing your new album?
BB: Yes and not only is he producing me, but I’ve recorded 16 songs in a month and a half.
AM: Wow that is a lot of studio time.
BB: Jon has a studio in his house. I was over there one day and he told me he had a track he had just written and he wanted to know if Jim and I could add anything to it. He put the track on and I had a divine intervention. All of a sudden I was filled with lyrics. I was channeling these lyrics. They were coming through me. The next thing I knew we were over there the next day and the next day and the next day writing lyrics in the kitchen. I felt like I was one of the girls in the Brill Building. I would come up with the title and the concept and Jim and Jon would add what they thought would work. Jon’s wife is also a brilliant songwriter and she plays all the bass on my record. It just happened...like an unexpected pregnancy.
AM: I’m so glad you are recording more at this time.
BB: This is my third album in five years. This is the most profound work I’ve ever done. It comes from a deep, cathartic place and it’s very healing.
AM: When will your album be released?
BB: Late Spring or early Summer. The single will be released in April.
To learn more about Bebe visit her web site http://www.bebebuell.org/ and her YouTube channel http://www.youtube.com/user/BEBEBUELLofficial Hear her newest song https://soundcloud.com/b-buell/ghost-of-truth