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Talent: Rosters
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Pure Sugar
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"it's an art thing, it's a
love thing," declares Jennifer Starr, the intensely blonde-and-pink New Age
Barbie dance diva who fronts Pure Sugar. "l'm a total freak, but I'm not
sick or nasty. I'm artistically fueled by sexual energy. I want people to
hear Pure Sugar and walk away with a sexual sensation." Modern, soulful,
acid funky, dance-pop powerful, Pure Sugar's self-titled debut album (Geffen
Records) serves up Starr with a Barbarella-goes-to-Studio 54 flourish. The
former club kid, who lists among her idols Grace Jones, Etta James, Dale
Bozzio and Divine, fearlessly shares here ongoing creative and personal
self-realization: "l'm a total nymphomaniac," she insists, "and I've
embraced that side of myself. I'm either doing music or having sex. But I'm
not a toy - unless I want to be. I've worked hard on warping myself. I act
out my fantasies on a daily basis."
Says Pete Lorimer, who with writing/producing partner Richard "Humpty"
Vission, completes the group: "Pure Sugar is a synthesis of music, visuals
and persona. Dance music tends to be faceless and disposable - where's the
personality? Jennifer's the tangible element that's usually lacking. Bona
fide Clubland heroes, Lorimer and Vission wrote, produced, remixed and
released a song called "The Feeling" on their own Aqua Boogie label in 1995.
At the time, they called themselves Sugar. The track shot to #2 on
Billboard's Dance Club Play chart. Pure Sugar features "The Feeling '98," a
revamped version of the dancefloor dominator that sparkles with Starr's
contagious joie de vivre.
As is only fitting for someone so larger than life, Starr grew up in
Hollywood. Her father was a musician, singer and sound mixer for films. Her
mother was an animation artist. Starr trained in dance (tap, ballet and
jazz) and music at the American National Academy of Performing Arts,
beginning when she was eight years old. By her 13'" birthday, though, she
was an inveterate party girl: 'The club scene gave me a stage, lighting and
people," she explains. "I wanted to be a full-time professional diva I
wanted to be fabulous. But I also quickly realized I wanted to be somebody
instead of something."
Starr eventually began performing at downtown Los Angeles warehouse clubs
like Plastic Passion, Aerial, Powertools and Impact. Not surprisingly, the
hyperactive teenager had a truancy problem. "There has always been a movie
projector playing in my head," she says. "in class, I'd be thinking about
dance sequences. The left side of my brain does not function well if
something bores me.
Go-going one night, Starr
met a drummer. He asked if she'd dance in his band's video. She said yes,
but the group broke up before the clip could be shot. He then asked Starr if
she could sing or write. She said she could, and the pair began working
together. Two of the songs Starr wrote during that period, "Hurting Inside"
and "Nanaya," were later remixed for a couple of Priority Records dance
compilations.
At 17 Starr dropped out of high school. She lived with friends or stayed in
squats, frequently vacant buildings inhabited by homeless people. Among the
occupations she pursued to get by while singing for free at studios in
order to learn her craft - were makeup and hair; she worked mainly on
low-budget videos. "I wanted to get off the street before I ended up where I
didn't want to be," she remarks. "As much craziness as there was, and as
broke and desperate as I was, there was still something I needed to keep
sacred, unsullied by that life. She was "discovered" by a British pop band
one night while singing impromptu onstage at the Viper Room. Amazed by her
presence, the group asked her to join. The first time she sang before a real
audience, at the House of Blues, also marked her first out-of-body
experience. "I flew to the bar and watched myself onstage and then came back
for the applause," she recounts. "The high of having swallowed my fear and
performed was such bliss. And because of that experience I could see that
you do not choose your fate. It doesn't matter if you're young or cute or
tall or skinny; what matters is that you have something screaming in your
soul. I was conceived to be up front, to live for the thrill of giving
through performing. Art is about giving.
It was during this phase of her artistic development (when she was also
performing with an acid jazz project called The Rare Groove) that Starr was
spotted by Lorimer. "You couldn't miss her," he says. "Not only did she
command the stage, but she was wearing a gold cowboy hat and silver pants."
Despite his interest, however, Lorimer would have to wait for Starr to come
off the road with her band; the group had released an album and gone on a
nationwide tour, sharing stages with Sublime, Oasis, De La Soul and Modern
English. Once Starr returned to LA, Lorimer invited her to sing on his and
Vission's The Feeling.
Some months later, in mid-1996, Starr exited the U.K. outfit to go solo. She
turned down several offers to join all-girl acts, many with major label
deals attached. Guiding her through this minefield of career decisions was
the spirit of Mae West. When Starr was 19, she began to suspect the
apartment she was living in was haunted, so she invited a psychic to
investigate. "Mae and I were once actresses together in Paris, and she
wanted to guide me," Starr says of the clairvoyant's conclusion, adding, "I
didn't believe her." Years later after the couple she'd been rooming with
threw her out and sold everything she owned - she found herself in front of
a distinctive-looking apartment building. "it was the Ravenswood," she
relates, "and there was only one unit available - it turned out to have been
Mae's. The year I lived there, my life changed.
When she vacated that space, the owner of the building gave her the ornate
pillar upon which West used to conduct seances. It sits in her new
apartment. "Mae has helped me as an artist and a person to be responsible
and giving, and as a performer to be honest and humble," Starr contends.
"When I have problems, I sit over the pillar and try to get answers from it.
In Starr's new apartment - which she calls "the Barbie Penthouse on Crack
Alley" - pink is dominant. Pink, she says, "is the artery I push my art
through. When I put on pink, I get back to Pure Sugar.
And though Starr and her
pink energy tend to attract a lot of attention, the less flashy figures of
Vission and Lorimer - who've scored a string of #1 club smashes - are
equally important in getting to Pure Sugar. A pianist from early childhood,
Lorimer took up the trombone at age 10. The young Englishman's prowess on
the instrument earned him numerous awards. At 13 he began music study at the
French Conservatory in Paris, later touring Europe with jazz ensembles. At
19, Lorimer became chief engineer at London's Berwick Street Studios, where
he worked with George Michael, INXS, Queen Latifah, De La Soul, Monie Love
and S-Express. He currently serves as a DJ at LA's acclaimed radio station
Groove 103.1.
Born in Toronto but raised in L.A, Vission began DJ'ing when he was 14. "One
day everybody as playing football," he recalls of his growing-up years, "and
the next, we were mixing records on turntables in a friend's basement." At
17 he was hosting a mix show at KDAY, the only rap station in town at the
time. He then moved on to Power 106, where he developed and presents the mix
show "Powertools," the longest-running program of its kind and recipient of
#1 ratings since it was launched. One night, Vission was DJ'ing for 2,000
people at The Palace and yelling, "Jump, everybody, jump, jump!" He then put
together a dance track called "Jump" for his techno group The Movement.
"Jump" went to #1 on dance charts and sparked an album and world tour.
Vission was introduced to Lorimer when the latter came to LA in 1995 to
contribute to a Terence Trent D'Arby album. "The Feeling" was their first
collaboration. Bound by a mutual love of house music, the pair spun that
effort into #1 dance hits for Crystal Waters ("Relax"), Raw Stylus ("Believe
in Me"), Ace of Base ("Lucky Love," "Beautiful Life"), N-Joi ('The New
Anthem") and Todd Terry ("Something Coin' On"). Among their Top 5 chart
entries, besides Sugars "The Feeling," are Taylor Dayne's "Say a Prayer,"
Devone's "Energy," D:REAM's "Shoot Me With Your Love," Rat Pack's "Captain
of the Ship" and RuPaul's "Snapshot.
Vission and Lorimer have also scored hits for Vanessa Williams, Tony Toni
Tone, Wild Orchid, the Shamen, No Mercy, Brand New Heavies and Sir
Mix-a-Lot. In 1996, they became the first West Coast artists ever nominated
for Best Remixers of the Year at the Winter Music Conference, dance music's
premiere event. Vission continues to DJ weekly at Hollywood's The Dome as
well as guest DJ worldwide. "The greatest feeling is spinning one of your
own records," he says. "I was playing [Pure Sugar track] 'Hands to Heaven'
for 2,000 kids in Toronto recently; seeing their response was brilliant."
But for Vission, Lorimer and Starr, Pure Sugar is about much more than dance
music. Their goal is to twist and stretch the form. To that end, Pure Sugar
(released June 16, 1998) tells a story. It flows through a day in the life,
soaking up both the highs and lows - the joy of "Delicious" and despair of
"Broken," the earthy embrace of "Love You Senseless" and spiritual swagger
of "Hands to Heaven.
Throughout, live instrumentation creates a warmth and texture rarely heard
in the world of pop dance; ballads and booty-shakers both pulse with soul to
burn. Of course, much of this human dimension is attributable to Starr's
supple voice, which needs no electronic enhancement. "When you hear Jennifer
sing," attests Vission, "all you hear is her. Starr's "don't fence me in"
ebullience is just as authentic. "I'll be in a grocery store wearing a pink
ball gown or vacuuming my apartment at two in the morning in nine-inch
platform heels," she says. "l'm not a creation; I'm a way of life." Confirms
Lorimer: "l'm sure Jennifer would dress and act exactly as she does now if
we were doing Gregorian chants." To be sure, with Starr out front, even
chant for centuries an art thing - becomes a love thing.
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