Tracey Thorn is a musician and writer, best known as one half of Everything but the Girl. She writes the fortnightly “Off the Record” column for the New Statesman. Her books include Naked at the Albert Hall, Bedsit Disco Queen and, most recently, Another Planet: A Teenager in Suburbia
Her lyrics on identity could have been written today, and she stood out with her unique style, confrontational and playful at the same time.
It’s a bit like keeping a diary, only it’s a diary that provides an ongoing conversation with readers.
An upcoming 1970s record compilation doesn’t feature a single woman, in 28 tracks. Which is, in itself, very 1970s.
It is two weeks since my eardrum perforated on the train and I am still deaf.
Talking about the lows, and the fails, and how they are inevitable, and survivable, can be such a relief.
“Concert in San Francisco in the 1990s. Audience complained about sound levels, you replied, ‘You don’t think I’m mixing the sound up here while I’m singing, do you?’ We cheered.”
A new baby is better than any mindfulness app for dragging you fully into the present moment.
You just never know when you’ll need a 12-year-old passport photo, an A-Z of Bournemouth or a Duke of Edinburgh award form, never completed.
I break songs down into small morsels, getting hooked by tiny details, passing moments that offer fleeting glimpses of heaven.
Oh, the things I’d do differently.
