Biography
December 1, 2011
Michele Rosenblum is a singer-songwriter-producer whose personal evolution
and compelling vision are revealed in contrasts of light and shadow in two new
collections of music: Less and The Player & The Played.
“Less represents a human being who is capable of feeling and has a depth of
emotion,” she says. “The Player & The Played are sentimental favorites, the
earliest songs I wrote, that I wanted to have a chance.” The connective thread
across the themes is Michele’s confiding, intimate vocals cast in imaginative
frames of arrangements and production.
Born in Berkeley, CA, Michele chronicles a tumultuous upbringing in vivid
detail in her extensive autobiography, Layers. Music was her constant
companion: The Jacksons, Oingo Boingo, The Smiths, Prince, The Doors and
The Rolling Stones. “There were so many times that music was my only friend. I
gave it so much genuine attention,” she says.
And it was music that was a compass as she navigated through her adopted
home, Los Angeles; to London and Paris, and eventually back to Northern
California, near her beloved spiritual center, Berkeley, where she studied the art
of record production and tracked her debut CD, subspace. “Artistically, subspace
represents my growth and willingness to take a chance on my talent and
imagination; for the first time, rather than leaning on and/or hiding behind a
producer, I took the responsibility for my sound,” she affirms in Layers.
Less spans a spectrum of emotional tones: from a bell-like piano and austere
darkness that surrounds “Alone,” to the raw need and finger-snapping guitar
grooves that lift “Come Home.” The trilogy concludes with a shaker and
percussive litany, as “Family” tantalizes with slap back vocals and urban tribal
percussion underscoring the theme of togetherness. “It’s so simple/Yet so deep.”
Michele sings. A child giggles at the track’s finale: innocent and endearing.
The Player & The Played takes place in Los Angeles; a city where Michele
experienced both the blazing lights and the seamy corners of the sensuous,
seductive City of Night. A school bell announces “Candy,” a song that came to
Michele in a dream, where men appeared in sweet flavors. With the track’s
conclusion an adoring crowd roars in approval. “I’ve made my peace with L.A.,”
says Michele.
Michele Rosenblum divines signposts in songs, envisioning music as a passport
to new locales: Southeast Asia and Europe among them. An expanded version of
Less (she will call it “The Rest of Less”) is possible. Meanwhile, she communicates
through a website designed to speak with those who have similarly braved the
fire to emerge into the light.
“My back story and my life” Michele concludes. “When I look at it through the
eyes of the music, it all makes sense – every bit of it.” Soul, sound, substance
and spirit: Michele Rosenblum’s harrowing passage has led to a triumphant
destination.
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