=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= B E T W E E N T H E L I N E S Volume 3, Issue 6 - June 3, 1991 DDDDD D D D D GGGG D D G DDDDD G GGG G G GGG A Debbie Gibson Discussion Forum =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= CONTENTS * ADMINISTRATIVE NOTES * AN INTRO BY EDWIN NOMURA - Edwin Nomura * _A MEDLEY OF RHYMES_ REVIEW - Archie Medrano * MUSICARD DESCRIPTIONS - Edwin Nomura * NY TIMES ARTICLE - Archie Medrano * COMMENTARY ON NY TIMES ARTICLE - Matthew Jung * DEBWATCH * QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS * CLOSING REMARKS =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= ADMINISTRATIVE NOTES Please send all submissions to mjung@bloom.ucdavis.edu and use 'SUBMISSION' as the subject. If you do not get a note indicating that we have received your submission within a few days, please remail it. Feel free to send suggestions to that address as well. If you have information that can't wait for release in a BtL issue, please send it to ez003229@castor.ucdavis.edu and a copy to mjung@bloom.ucdavis.edu. We will forward the information to other members if we believe that it would be of interest to others. We reserve the right to edit such information. DISCLAIMER : **************************************************************************** This forum does not necessarily reflect the views of Deborah Ann Gibson, Gibson Management Inc. (GMI), the Atlantic Recording Corporation, or any organizations to which members belong or represent. All songs by Debbie Gibson are copyrighted by Deborah Ann's Music (ASCAP) or Possibilities Publishing (ASCAP). This forum is a non-profit organization. **************************************************************************** BtL's moderators - * Matthew Jung : mjung@bloom.ucdavis.edu or myjung@ucdavis.bitnet * Sandra Chen : ez003229@castor.ucdavis.edu =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= AN INTRO BY EDWIN NOMURA Edwin Nomura (enomura@UCSD.EDU) Thu, 30 May 91 22:57:05 PDT I've been on this mailing list for about a year and a half now so I thought I should write an introduction. My name is Edwin Nomura and I'm finishing my second year here at UC San Diego as a computer science major (what else being on the net *8^). I first heard Deb's music on the radio back in '87. Back then I listened to nothing but metal (Slayer, Maiden, Priest, Metallica) and when I worked at Little Caesar's Pizza they played nothing but top 40 and I hated almost every second of it. I do remember that there was one song that I thought didn't suck as much as the rest, Only in My Dreams, but I didn't think too much of it until I saw a piece on her on Entertainment Tonight. 16 years old? Wrote the song at 13? Wrote *all* her songs? I took notice. When a friend of mine bought the casette Out of the Blue, I copied a few songs and listened to it every once in a while, taking a lot of the obligatory ribbing from my other friends (that just seems to come packaged with her music). It was the only music I listened to lighter than Iron Maiden at the time. I bought Electric Youth the day it was released and hated it so much I sold it. After hearing the songs some more, I borrowed it back and dubbed a few songs. I listened to it every once in a while, and came to like it quite a bit, as with the songs I had off the first album. When I got my first CD player last April, two of the first CDs I got were Electric Youth and Lost in Your Eyes 3" Japanese single. Since then, my interest in her music grew as I started also to listen to other stuff outside of metal: the B-52's, Heart, Petty, Wilburys, Ronstadt, Midler, etc. I bought Anything is Possible the week it was released and also disliked it at first, but I held onto it, listening to it rather infrequently. But slowly, some of the songs grew on me, becoming favorites: One Hand, One Heart, Sure, Try, This So-Called Miracle. Then, three days before, I learned that Deb would be at Disneyland so I made plans to go home (near Los Angeles) that weekend. I made calls to Disneyland and KIIS-FM to confirm the appearance. The guy at KIIS told me that "Debbie-I-wanna-make-a-comeback-Gibson" would be there. Nice people at KIIS, eh? Unfortunately, I was involved in a car accident the next day - my car was totaled but everyone was okay. But luckily, a friend of mine was going home that weekend so I caught a ride with him and made it to Disneyland on Sunday, April 28. There's not much more I can say about this appearance than what Shaun Stuart has already said in the last BtL. I got to Tommorowland Terrace at about 12:30 and saw nothing there, no signs or anything and for a second there I was worried that nothing was gonna take place. Also, the area seemed kinda small. I woulda thought there would be a good sized crowd. We went on a few rides and returned to the Terrace at 3:40 where there were about 30 people in line, some holding Deb paraphernalia, a lot fewer than I expected. I managed to get a spot of rope in the front, towards the left. Everything else happened pretty much as Shaun described. When she was singing along with Only in My Dreams, she came down and stuck the microphone in some of our faces in the front. Most of them pulled back instead of singing along. I managed to get an autograph and a few pictures, even one with Deb and me snapped by Diane! Since then, I've been listening to her stuff about 3 or 4 hours a day, driving my roommates insane. Actually I haven't been listening to much Deb the last few days since I caught the Clash of the Titans show with Slayer (absolutely awesome!), Megadeth, and Anthrax last week. The next show I plan to catch is Deb's (heh, what a transition - from Iron Maiden to Deb at Disneyland to Slayer and back to Deb again *8^) probably at the Forum in Los Angeles. Hopefully she won't be following Steve Windwood's pioneering move of charging $50 for "golden circle seats" (first 10 rows) at the Forum. Ticket prices are just getting out of hand. And ticket agencies just gobble up some of the best seats and charge exorbitant fees. Does anyone have any tricks to get good tickets inexpensively? Perhaps you can share with all of us so we can increase our chances of getting good seats! I hope y'all don't take me too seriously, but the last thing I wanted to mention is the national disrespect for Deb. I know this has been brought up before, and it surfaces in rec.music.misc every once in awhile, but I just have to bring it up again. I've never experienced hostility against Deb before I talked to that guy at KIIS, except from my friends - they never let up *8^) Not many take her seriously, always considering her age and all that. I think I remember reading here about how Deb and Paul Shaeffer of Late Night were at the keyboards when Paul hit a wrong chord, but everyone looked at Deb. That really sucks. Also, if she goes for the name change to Deborah she'll only be the butt of even more crass comments, like Rick(y) Shroeder. I don't see what the problem is with 'Debbie,' there's Allen and Reynolds to name a couple. I wonder if she is aware of how much her fans have to take, especially those of us older than the age of 12. Well, I guess she knows about the Mojo Nixon song (gotta admit I like some of his stuff, though...). There has been some speculation that her next album would be more adult - more Mood Swings rather than NRG^. I have to say that that second side of AiP is among my favorites, so I am looking forward to that. But I also really like her rockers such as Staying Together, Should've Been the One, and Another Brick Falls, so unless she makes some drastic changes, I think I would be happy either way. She has such a beautiful, clear voice that it is nice to hear her sing anything. I wonder what surprises she has in store for her upcoming tour? New songs? More covers? Edwin Nomura _______ ________ ________ ________ _________ enomura@ucsd.edu _______Slayer Debbie Gibson Metallica ^Twin Peaks^___ =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= _A MEDLEY OF RHYMES_ REVIEW Archie Medrano (MEDRANO@USDCSV.ACUSD.EDU) Mon, 20 May 1991 16:34:29 PDT _A Medley of Rhymes_ Debbie Gibson Words and Music: Traditional "Man in the Moon" music by Debbie Gibson Produced and arranged by Debbie Gibson Recorded and mixed by Phil Castellano at Electric Blue Studios, Inc., NY A&R Coordinator: Ron Armstrong Artist liaison: Tracy Cooper Special thanks to Ron Armstrong, Ray "Flauta" Garcia, and Jeanette Paterno for getting the nursery rhymes. Vocals: Debbie Gibson 12-string acoustic guitar: Ira Siegel Copyright 1991 Possibilities Publishing (ASCAP) Debbie Gibson appears courtesy of Atlantic Recording Corp. [COPIED VERBATIM WITHOUT PERMISSION FROM _FOR OUR CHILDREN_ (Disney #60616)] MAN IN THE MOON The man in the moon Looked out of the moon Looked out of the moon and said "'Tis time for the children on the earth To think about getting to bed" TWINKLE, TWINKLE, LITTLE STAR Twinkle, twinkle, little star How I wonder what you are Up above the world so high Like a diamond in the sky Twinkle, twinkle, little star How I wonder what you are THREE BLIND MICE Three blind mice Three blind mice See how they run See how they run They all ran after the farmer's wife She cut off their tails with a carving knife Did you ever see such a sight in your life as Three blind mice HUSH LITTLE BABY Hush little baby don't say a word Papa's gonna buy you a mocking bird If the mocking bird won't sing Papa's gonna buy you a diamond ring If that diamond ring turns to brass Papa's gonna buy you a looking-glass If the looking-glass gets broke Papa's gonna buy you a billy goat If that billy goat runs away Papa's gonna buy you another today ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Man in the Moon - Here she sings "solo": I mean, no harmony blend. There can also be heard a flute (?) in the background. Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star - I love the harmony blend here, especially the lows on "are", "high", "sky". Three Blind Mice - This one's great!!! The "dubbing" effect (or "round"), that is. Tbm Tbm Shtr (Tbm) Shtr (Tbm) Taratfw (Shtr) (Tbm) Scottwack (Shtr) (Tbm) Dyessasiyla (Taratfw) (Shtr) Tbm (Scottwack) (Shtr) (Dyessasiyla) (Taratfw) (Tbm) (Scottwack) (Dyessasiyla) (Tbm) Hush Little Baby - Again, I love the harmony blend and the high ? minor. This one sounds like Carole King's song on the _The Wonder Years_ soundtrack. Notice "Possibilities Publishing"!!! =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= MUSICARD DESCRIPTIONS Edwin Nomura (enomura@UCSD.EDU) Fri, 17 May 91 14:01:27 PDT The Pro Set Super Stars MusiCard #43 has the picture of Deb that, if you have the AiP press kit, is on the page opposite the Awards page. There are three pictures in a mock strip of film (you know with the sprocket holes on the sides) and the card has the picture of the top one... with kinda wet hair, in black, holding her shoe. The back has another smaller picture which looks like the _This So Called Miracle_ picture. I don't know if her mouth is open or not in that one, but in this one it is slightly open, otherwise its same pose. The text says: 'Debbie Gibson asked her parents for a guitar at age two but had to settle for a ukulele. At four she began playing piano and won her first competition at six. At 17 she became the youngest artist in the history of pop music to write, perform and produce a #1 single - "Foolish Heart [sic]" (1987).' #44 has a picture taken from the One Hand, One Heart session. She's looking at us but is not smiling. The back has a picture of her looking like she's doing a jig in blue jeans, and a leather jacket with not much else underneath. I think this one was in the penultimate DGIF. The text says: 'Gifted with perfect pitch, the extraordinarily precocious Debbie Gibson has known almost from infancy what career to pursue. She received encouragement and assistance from her parents, even to the extent of having her own recording studio set up in her basement. At age 12, Debbie won a songwriting competition sponsered by WOR radio in New York City. She also spent several years in the children's chorus at the Metropolitan Opera.' =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= NY TIMES ARTICLE Archie Medrano (MEDRANO@USDCSV.ACUSD.EDU) Mon, 20 May 1991 16:34:29 PDT The Perils and Perishability of a Teen Idol from The New York Times, Sunday, March 10, 1991 COPIED VERBATIM WITHOUT PERMISSION (Transcribed by Archie Medrano) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ By Karen Schoemer On Aug. 31, Debbie Gibson officially ended her tenure as the pop world's reigning teen queen. She turned 20. That night, she threw a party at the Merrick, L.I., house she shares with her mother and two of her three sisters, a party that had a kind of old-fashioned Hollywood glamour to it. Limousines lined up as an officious-looking man checked off guests' names; valets were on hand at the top of the winding driveway. When the front doors glided open, enough frosty peach light spilled out to illuminate the entire North Shore of Long Island. Inside, 200 friends and associates of the Gibsons mingled: teen-age girls in flowered dresses, men with open collars and lots of chest hair drinking martinis, women with lots of hair and makeup smoking long cigarettes. A deejay pumped urban crossover hits and Motown favorites through speakers taller than some of the guests; even Ahmet Ertegun, chairman of Atlantic Records (Ms. Gibson's label), got up and danced. In the kitchen, the birthday girl stoon inside a circle of intimates, looking sleek and sophisticated in a black Charivari dress and mid-heeled shoes, opening gifts. "Oh, you are such a nut!" she exclaimed to a grinning young man as she unwrapped a pair of fuzzy animal slippers. It was a party fit for a real queen, a celebration that doubled as a pre-release bash for Ms. Gibson's third album, "Anything Is Possible." As a pop singer whose first two albums, "Out of the Blue" in 1987 and "Electric Youth" in 1989, had sold more than three and two million copies, respectively, Ms. Gibson had established herself at a young age as one of the music industry's top-selling acts. Despite a lack of critical acclaim, she had every reason to expect similar success for "Anything Is Possible," and her spirits that night, and in the weeks before the album's release, were high. But less than two months after the album appeared in mid-November, industry experts were declaring "Anything Is Possible" a flop. After going gold (sales of more than 500,000 units) and peaking at No. 41, the album began to slide down the charts (it's currently at No. 190); Ms. Gibson's second single, "This So-Called Miracle," has failed to crack the Top 100. An American tour, originally scheduled for February, was put on hold. Debbie Gibson's career so far says something about the difficulties of succeeding and surviving in the pop-music world. The album's poor showing may also be indicative of a larger problem: Ms. Gibson is having trouble growing up. The problem isn't hers alone - throughout pop history, teenagers have hit big, from Brenda Lee and Little Stevie Wonder in the 50's and 60's to Michael Jackson, David Cassidy and Andy Gibb in the 70's, to New Kids on the Block, Tiffany and Ms. Gibson in the late 80's. Those who do remain successful display not only an extraordinary breadth of talent in their later music (Mr. Wonder, Mr. Jackson) but also the ability to reinvent themselves for an older audience. The difficulty of shedding the teen-idol image was demonstrated recently by David Cassidy, who last year tried unsuccessfully to make a comeback more than 15 years after his stint in the Partridge Family group. Teen-age buyers are notoriously fickle. After a year or two, once-cherished pop music is associated with being younger; no teenager wants to be caught dead hanging on to yesterday's idol. As listeners mature, pop icons, too, must leave behind the innocence that made them so appealing to begin with. For Ms. Gibson, this problem is especially acute, since she was sold, from the start, as a neat, clean package of all-American innocence. She posed on the cover of her debut album holding a white teddy bear and wearing blue jeans with ripped knees, through which a smiley face drawn on her leg poked through. Although the music on "Out of the Blue" was savvy dance-pop, the lyrics, written by Ms. Gibson and sung in a youthful, chipper squeak read like a 10th-grader's diary: "Without you, without you/I always thought that everything was fine without you/Never knowing you'd be mine/Suddenly my world has changed." Bopping across the screen in her music videos, Ms. Gibson was the personification of the all-American mall girl come to musical life - a curly puff of blond hair, modest-fitting tops, bangled earrings, Keds. In contrast to the streetwise toughness of Madonna, Ms. Gibson projected security and comfort, someone who would rather go to the prom than Paris. Jane Pratt, editor of the teen magazine Sassy, says that young girls immediately identified with Ms. Gibson. "They had the impression that she wasn't necessarily born with more talent or more beauty, but she'd taken what she had and done so much with it," she says. "Madonna can come out and change every time, but one of the things teenagers liked about Debbie Gibson was that she dressed on stage the way they dress when they go to school." Ms. Gibson's real-life experiences back up her sweet image. A few weeks after her 20th birthday party, she was lounging in her bedroom, a shrine to her younger self - a clutter of pop-star posters, New Kids on the Block paraphernalia, hats, clothes and jewelry. On the bed was a rock-star quilt, a patchwork of tour T-shirts (George Michael, Billy Joel, the Monkees) cut into album-sized squares. Being a pop star hasn't interfered with Gibson's idolization of other pop stars. Many of the T-shirts are autographed. A door leads to a porch walkway that connects her room to a custom-built recording studio where she did much of the pre-production work on "Anything Is Possible." The house is designed as a microcosm of Debbie Gibson's universe. Theoretically, she never has to leave; she lives here, works here. "People always say to me, 'How could you be 20 and still living at home?" she says. "And I love it. My mom is very fair. We have a great relationship. I mean, I climb into bed every morning and we talk. Not to mention the fact that I don't know how to do laundry, cook or anything. So I'm just fine living at home." Because of her career, Ms. Gibson has skipped many of the typical adolescent crises. She never left home to go to college. And although many of her songs talk about relationships, she's never dated seriously, never had her heart broken. She says that "for the past four years, every year has been personally a huge transition," yet when asked to be specific she seems at a loss. At length she answers: "Probably the relationship with my mom. Up until the last tour we shared a room. The letting go stage was me saying, 'That's it. I want my own room.' It's pretty funny, because I was turning 19. We went through the same thing everyone else goes through but a little later and in a different way." The Short Road To No. 1 and Back From an early age, Ms. Gibson loved music and performing. She was taking piano lessons when she was 5, writing songs at 10. She appeared in commercials and industrial films and sang in the children's chorus at the Metropolitan Opera. "I used to subscribe to Show Business and Backstage from, like, age 10," she says. "I would cut out the auditions and leave them on the kitchen table circled with a note that said, 'Somebody take me. Change your work schedule. Take me.' I used to go on any audition that was around. 'Black girl, age 25.' I was like, 'I'm here!' Anything. I was the pushy little kid who would never take no." It was her mother, Diane, who eventually gave shape to this amateur pursuit. Mrs. Gibson had been sending her songs to a publishing house in Canada, and when Debbie was 12, her mother signed on an entertainment lawyer, Douglas Breitbart, as manager. Mr. Breitbart had a shrewd eye for the teen-pop marketplace. He knew that one of the problems with teen idols is that they are usually mouthpieces for work otherwise created by adults (New Kids on the Block, for example, are the product of the producer Maurice Starr, while George E. Tobin was Svengali for the pop singer Tiffany). To set Ms. Gibson apart, Mr. Breitbart wanted her to be the mastermind behind her own success. "I designed a four-year curriculum for a singer/songwriter/pop artist, and gave her instruction in engineering, programming, arranging, voice lessons," says Mr. Breitbart. "The issue was, if I drown her with equipment and know-how she could develop the facility to be a pop star as second nature." The plan worked. Ms. Gibson scored a single deal with Atlantic Records when she turned 16, and Mr. Breitbart, out of his own pocket, financed the recording of the song "Only in My Dreams," which would go on to be her first pop smash. Ms. Gibson's relatives dropped off copies of the single at local clubs and called radio stations to request airplay, while her father, a TWA employee, stuffed letters into his co-workers' mailboxes. "He made up, like, 1,000 letters asking everyone to get on the phones," says Ms. Gibson. "It takes that kind of ground-level support to get a record going. I knew that once people heard it they'd latch onto it, but it needed that initial push." After a couple of months, the single was doing so well that Atlantic signed up for an entire album. "Out of the Blue" was released in 1987, just as "Only in My Dreams" was starting to crossover from dance clubs to Top-40 radio. "The marketing and promotion campaign," says Mr. Breitbart, "was cleancut, all-American girl who writes, produces, does it all - a Wunderkind." "Only in My Dreams" eventually reached the Top 5. The album went to the Top 10, sold more than three million copies and scored three more Top 5 singles. Ms. Gibson herself took writing, co-producing and co-arranging credits on the album, and became the youngest person ever to have written, produced and performed a No. 1 single, "Foolish Beat." By the release of "Electric Youth" in early 1989, Ms. Gibson was something of a phenomenon. Entertainment executives and advertisers realized she had the teen market at her fingertips. Columbia Pictures signed her to a film deal, slotting her to star in a "West Side Story"-style musical (it was never made). Revlon chose her to endorse the teen-market Natural Wonder cosmetics line, and even named a perfume after "Electric Youth." For that cultural instant, Debbie Gibson personified the dream teen. Yet there were problems. At a late stage in the "Out of the Blue" tour, Mr. Breitbart and the Gibsons had a falling out, and Diane Gibson, who was relatively inexperienced in the ways of the music business, took over as manager. "Electric Youth," though still a success, sold less copies than its predecessor; and while the first single, "Lost in Your Eyes," shot straight to No. 1, the album yielded no subsequent Top 10 hits. From its title to the formulaic dance-pop production to Ms. Gibson's image (she sits cross-legged on the back cover holding an "E.Y." banner), the album simply re-emphasized and recapitalized on the singer's young, innocent appeal. On Making the Big Leap Upon turning 20, Ms. Gibson's challenge was to make the transition from pop prodigy to serious adult artist. "Anything Is Possible" was supposed to be the key to that transition. Atlantic touted it as Ms. Gibson's statement of maturity, and certainly it displayed some tentative new directions: Ms. Gibson enlisted the Motown songwriting legend Lamont Dozier to co-write four songs, and the New York dance producer Jellybean Benitez collaborated on a track. The uptempo numbers had a tougher edge, and Ms. Gibson's vocals were more confident; her voice had grown into a lush, rounded soprano. But overall, the differences were minor. Ms. Gibson's smooth dance-pop and glossy ballads weren't substantially different from other singers', and her lyrics still relied on youthful cliches. "When he shuts his eyes at night/Does he see darkness or me?" she sings in "In His Mind," while the Motown-influenced "Must've Been My Boy" has a line about "holding hands tonight." Indeed, Debbie Gibson may sing as if she's facing emotional Armageddon, but in her music, love seldom goes beyond a crush. The "Anything Is Possible" cover picture, of Ms. Gibson looking seductively over her shoulder with a jacket loosely draped across her arm, was only a half-hearted attempt to update her image. If Ms. Gibson is truly going to make the musical transition from young girl to young woman gracefully, she will have to lose more of her precious innocence. In the meantime, pop fans have new teeny-boppers like Wilson Phillips to look up to. Debbie Gibson may be growing up too late. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= COMMENTARY ON NY TIMES ARTICLE Matthew Jung (mjung@bloom.ucdavis.edu) Sun, 2 June 1991 01:34:29 PDT For the most part, the article "The Perils and Perishability of a Teen Idol" by Karen Schoemer was well researched and well written. It is true that the teenage audience which Deborah appealed to in the early part of her career were a fickle bunch. With so many other acts today aimed at the teenybopper audience, it was expected that Deborah would lose them since her music was bound to mature. Schoemer also made a good point that "no teenager wants to be caught dead hanging on to yesterday's idol." However, I feel that her analysis of the decline of Deborah's career is not complete nor correct. Schoemer believes that Deborah is having problems growing up and that's why her album and singles aren't doing that well. Even if this is true, this is only one formula among a series of complicated equations. Other such factors, which aren't mentioned in her article, are the fact that Atlantic did almost no promotion at all for the album and that radio refuses to give Deb any airplay. The lack of airplay alone deserves a separate BtL article so I won't go into it any further. Here are several lines from Schoemer's article which I feel deserve some discussion: >And although many of her songs talk about relationships, she's never dated >seriously, never had her heart broken. How does Schoemer know this? Deborah has done a very good job at keeping her private life away from the public eye. From the time after the Electric Youth tour until the release of the "Anything is Possible" album, Deborah might have dated seriously. She may even have had her heart broken or broken other hearts. In a WHTZ Z100 interview around the time of the album release, Deborah said that she wrote "Foolish Beat" out of nothing, but can now relate to it. Until Schoemer can back up statements like this, it would be much more professional of her to leave such assumptions out (not that it is even her business anyway). >But overall, the differences were minor. Ms. Gibson's smooth dance-pop and >glossy ballads weren't substantially different from other singers', and her >lyrics still relied on youthful cliches. "When he shuts his eyes at night/ >Does he see darkness or me?" she sings in "In His Mind," while the >Motown-influenced "Must've Been My Boy" has a line about "holding hands >tonight." Here we notice some of Schoemer's bias showing. When she quotes that specific line from "In His Mind," it does not obviously show that Deborah has relied on youthful cliches. If Schoemer can't find a clear example to back up her statements, then she shouldn't make them at all. If any other songwriter wrote those specific lyrics or if an older singer sang this particular song, I bet Schoemer wouldn't have made a big deal about it. Schoemer is letting Deborah's young age make her find faults that are not there. Schoemer puts her left foot in her mouth when she demonstrates that she doesn't even remember the title of the track "It Must Have Been My Boy." She then puts her right foot in her mouth when she claims that there is a line in it about "holding hands tonight" when such a lyric doesn't even exist. Even if such a line existed, why point the finger at Deborah? Lamont Dozier co- wrote this song and perhaps he was the one who wrote that lyric. Afterall, he is the part of the legendary Holland-Dozier-Holland songwriting team and some of the songs that they wrote in the 60's were very innocent. Why did Schoemer neglect to mention the lyric "He's a class A lover" since that isn't a lyric that we come to expect from Deborah? Obviously Schoemer knows something about Deborah's career, but does not know much about her music. She says that "...overall, the differences were minor" from the previous album. Since she showed her ignorance about the new album, how can she even make such a comparison? In my opinion, there are a lot of differences between this album and Deborah's previous albums. "Where Have You Been?" and "This So-Called Miracle" are longer tracks than what we are used to hearing from Deborah and it is not because she repeats a chorus a million times. I feel that Deborah goes into more depth in those tracks compared to some of her other ballads. "Where Have You Been?" and "This So-Called Miracle" might have been inspired by her parent's divorce and she clearly demonstrates her songwriting ability by being able to translate the pain that they are feeling into her music; an artist doesn't necessarily have to experience this stuff directly. Beethoven supposedly never even had a girlfriend (though he would've loved to have been married in his lifetime) and yet he was able to compose good romantic music such as the Moonlight Sonata. He also wrote the opera "Fidelio" which is about one woman's devotion to a husband. Another example is Gloria Estefan. Supposedly Emilio Estefan, the first man she ever dated, was the same man she married. They have been together for many years now and seem happily married. Even so, some of Estefan's ballads about broken hearts are quite touching despite the lack of her direct experience in such matters. Unlike Deborah, Estefan does not have to endure the same criticism just because she is older. >Debbie Gibson may sing as if she's facing emotional Armageddon, but >in her music, love seldom goes beyond a crush. Schoemer is missing the point of the whole album. The themes of tragedy prevail over love throughout the tracks and the few love songs that are on the album are there to prevent the whole thing from becoming too depressing. This album doesn't seem like it was meant to be a happy one like Deborah's first album. This alone is a major difference that Schoemer chooses not to see. >The "Anything Is Possible" cover picture, of Ms. Gibson looking seductively >over her shoulder with a jacket loosely draped across her arm, was only a >half-hearted attempt to update her image. If Ms. Gibson is truly going to >make the musical transition from young girl to young woman gracefully, she >will have to lose more of her precious innocence. This is the most asinine remark made in this article. What does Schoemer want Deborah to do? Pose nude in Playboy? It is true that Deborah's mass appeal was her teenybopper image. However, Schoemer isn't aware that the fans who are still buying Debbie Gibson records like Debbie Gibson because she is a normal clean cut person. If she were to lose her "precious innocence" and become like Madonna, then it would make things worse for Deborah's career. Madonna is Madonna and she's great. Deborah is Deborah and Schoemer should learn to accept that fact. Growing up to Schoemer's definition of an adult is not going to make Deborah commercially successful again. Despite the fact that Deborah still does not have critical acclaim and is not successful in the mass market anymore, she still has a strong and loyal following. Deb's career may have peaked and she may never be as popular as she was in early 1989, but I'm confident that she'll be around for many years to come because of her talent and the loyal fans who will be there for her. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= DEBWATCH Here is a summary of the known TV appearances that Debbie made between May 6, 1991 - June 2, 1991. - SATURDAY VIDEOS (5/25): Deb and Mario Lopez introduced videos for half an hour. She spent most of her time playing the keyboard instead of talking. This may have been taped a few months ago because she appeared with a mop of hair. - LIFESTYLES OF THE RICH AND FAMOUS (5/25): Repeat of the episode where we get a peek in Debbie's Lloyd Harbor home. - BEVERLY HILLS 90210 (5/26): A special Sunday repeat of the episode that originally aired on February 14 which Deb and her puppy Kringle did a cameo in. - HOME (5/28): The filming of Little Richard's new music video ("Itsy Bitsy Spider", from the _For Our Children_ album) was shown. Debbie made this statement: Kids are hip enough to realize, you know, they're gonna stop and say, 'why is this nursery rhyme, you know, being jazzed up?' and...and I think that obviously when kids look on the tv or something and see the name of the album, you know, they're gonna get serious. So, I-- you know...I think that...um, you know, all that by seeing a couple of different artists in it, they'll... they'll wonder what it's all about...you know, and they'll look into it. She will be in the video at the keyboards. Debbie's hair is still short. - CHILDREN'S MIRACLE TELETHON (06/01): Debbie appeared at least twice during this mammoth 21 hour telethon. She appeared at 7:00 PST to perform "One Step Ahead" at an indoor stage in Disneyland. Two hours later, she was on stage again to sing "One Hand, One Heart". Her hair was as short as it has ever been. It is not known whether these appearances were taped earlier, or broadcast live. - CHILDREN'S MIRACLE TELETHON (06/02): Debbie was back again the next day to give an encore performance of "One Hand, One Heart" for 5 children. This segment appeared to be live. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS Q. Edwin Nomura (enomura@UCSD.EDU) Has anyone heard of a digitally remastered _No More Rhyme_ 7"? It is called DMM or some such acronym. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= CLOSING REMARKS Some grey-scaled Debbie Gibson GIFs (these are computer graphic files) are now available at uop.uop.edu via anonymous FTP. For more information, please contact Bill Jackson at billj@uop.edu. Some tour dates have been set so expect updates through immediate releases soon. If you have any info about the tour, please don't hesistate to let us know so we can update everyone else. The tour kicks off in Japan on June 12.