Alannah Currie
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Alannah Currie | |
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File:Alannah Feb 84.jpg
Alannah Currie, Bristol, February 1984
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Background information | |
Birth name | Alannah Joy Currie |
Born | 20 September 1957 |
Origin | Auckland, New Zealand |
Genres | Pop, rock, dance, new wave, synthpop |
Occupation(s) | Singer-songwriter |
Instruments | Marimba Percussion Vocals |
Years active | 1979–1997 |
Labels | Arista Records, Warner Bros. Records |
Associated acts | Thompson Twins |
Alannah Joy Currie (born 20 September 1957, in Auckland, New Zealand[1]) is a musician and artist, best known as a former member of the UK pop group, Thompson Twins.
Contents
Career
Born in New Zealand and trained as a journalist, Currie emigrated to the UK in 1977. Currie squatted in various places in South West London, ending up in Lillieshall Road, Clapham Old Town. In 1979, with her across-the-road neighbour, Trace Newton-Ingham (Traci Newton), she co-founded the dread-punk-improvising group, The Unfuckables. The Unfuckables performed one "gig" at an Anti-Psychiatry Conference in early 1980, held in the Conway Hall, Red Lion Square, London. For this particular gig the group comprised the two co-founders, plus an array of musicians from London's "underground" music scene — Viv Albertine (The Slits), Gareth Sager (The Pop Group), Charles Bullen and Charles Hayward (This Heat), Tom Bailey (of Thompson Twins, whom she would later marry), Jimmy Cauty (later of The KLF, and her current husband) and improviser Steve Beresford, amongst others.
In 1981 Currie joined Tom Bailey and Joe Leeway and formed the three piece pop synth band the Thompson Twins and had two major record contracts with Arista Records, then later Warner Bros. Records. Currie was the lyricist, percussionist, visual stylist and singer in the band and wrote and recorded 6 albums which included gold and platinum records and the hits Doctor! Doctor!, Hold Me Now, and You Take Me Up.[2] The band performed at the JFK Stadium, Philadelphia for the 1985 Live Aid concert and worked with artists including Nile Rodgers, Madonna, Grace Jones, Alex Sadkin and Jerry Harrison of the Talking Heads amongst others.
In 1984 the band participated in the "first international satellite installation" by Nam June Paik, Good Morning, Mr. Orwell.[3]
Her songwriting credits also include "I Want That Man", an international hit for Deborah Harry in 1989.
By 1992, Currie and her husband, fellow Thompson Twins band member Tom Bailey, had grown tired of being expected to chase chart success with new Thompson Twins material.[citation needed] After touring India collecting inspiration and audio samples, they elected to form Babble, featuring Currie as lyricist, percussionist and visual artist, as a means of creating music without the commercial expectations that were placed on the Thompson Twins. By 1994 Babble had released their first album. Currie later returned to New Zealand working primarily as a glass artist and environmental activist. She was founder of the women's anti-genetic engineering movement Mothers Against Genetic Engineering in Food and the Environment (MAdGE).[4] In 2004 she designed a series of protest billboards that caused controversy in New Zealand but won several international art / science awards.[5]
In 2004 she returned to London where she now works under the name Miss Pokeno and continues to make protest art and build chairs that "tell dark tales".[6] She is also a member of the Sisters of Perpetual Resistance, who make "militant feminist art", and the Armchair Destructivists.[7]
See also
References
- ↑ Brainyhistory.com
- ↑ Songwriting credits on Allmusic.com
- ↑ Good Morning Mr Nam June Paik, frieze (magazine), Issue 116 June–August 2008, [1]
- ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
- ↑ Why Not Just Genetically Engineer Women For Milk?, Scoop, October 2003
- ↑ Currie, singer in the 80s band the Thompson Twins, on her new incarnation as an artist-upholsterer, The Guardian, 26th April 2008, [2]
- ↑ Pilger, Zoe, Miss Pokeno and the Sisters of Perpetual Resistance: Review - 'militant feminist art', The Independent, 5 December 2013, [3]
External links
- Use dmy dates from November 2012
- Use British English from November 2012
- Pages with broken file links
- Articles with hCards
- Articles with unsourced statements from September 2008
- 1957 births
- Female New Wave singers
- Living people
- New Zealand expatriates in the United Kingdom
- New Zealand female singers
- New Zealand musicians
- New Zealand songwriters
- People educated at Mount Roskill Grammar School
- People from Auckland
- Percussionists
- Squatters
- Synthpop new wave musicians
- Thompson Twins members
- Feminist artists