Lyndsey Cole Popular Books

Lyndsey Cole Biography & Facts

Paula Dorothy Cole (born April 5, 1968) is an American singer-songwriter and producer. After gaining attention for her performances as a vocalist on Peter Gabriel's 1993–1994 Secret World Tour, she released her first album, Harbinger, which suffered from a lack of promotion when the label, Imago Records, folded shortly after its release. Her second album, This Fire (1996), brought her worldwide acclaim, peaking at number 20 on the Billboard 200 album chart and producing two hit singles, the triple-Grammy nominated "Where Have All the Cowboys Gone?", which reached the top ten of the Billboard Hot 100 in 1997, and "I Don't Want to Wait", which was used as the theme song of the television show Dawson's Creek. Cole was a featured performer in the 1996 prototype mini-tour for Lilith Fair, and also was a headliner for Lilith Fair in 1997 and 1998. She won the Grammy Award for Best New Artist in 1998, and also became the first woman ever to be nominated for "Producer of the Year" in her own right in that same year.Her third album, 1999's Amen, marked a major stylistic departure for Cole, and this alienated many of her former fans; the album sales were disappointing compared to the multi-Platinum sales of her prior effort. She has since released several more albums, including the jazz-influenced Courage (2007) and Ithaca (2010), which marked a return to her 1990s folk-rock sound. Her most recent release was titled American Quilt, and came out in May 2021. Cole's music sometimes addresses social issues, such as gender stereotypes, environmental issues, the history of Slavery in the United States, and the Iraq war. Besides recording and performing, Cole has also served on the faculty at Berklee College of Music since 2013. Early life Cole was raised in Rockport, Massachusetts. Her mother, Stephanie Cole, a mixed media artist, was an elementary school art teacher; her father, Jim Cole, was a professor of biology and ecology at Salem State College and played bass in the polka band "Johnny Prytko and the Connecticut Hi-Tones". Her older sister Irene played piano.She attended Rockport High School where she was president of her senior class and performed in school theatrical productions such as South Pacific. Cole then attended Berklee College of Music in Boston, where she studied jazz singing and improvisation with Bob Stoloff. She sang jazz standards at lounges and nightclubs. One of the school projects was with Vox One, a chorus group at Berklee that later turned to pro as well. She was offered a record deal by the jazz label GRP Records, but decided to turn it down.After graduating Berklee, she moved to San Francisco and began working on song ideas. She lived with three roommates and ate meagerly, building up her home studio and writing down song ideas including one that later became "Where Have All the Cowboys Gone?" Impressing label president Terry Ellis with her demo performances, she signed with his Imago Records in 1992, and was coached by veteran artist's manager John Carter on the album project that would become Harbinger. Career 1993–1998: Harbinger and This Fire Cole got her first big professional break when she was invited to perform on Peter Gabriel's 1993–94 Secret World Tour. To replace Sinéad O'Connor who left the tour, Gabriel sought Cole on the recommendation of his studio engineer Kevin Killen. Gabriel left an answering machine message for her at her apartment in San Francisco, and she immediately flew to Mannheim, Germany, for her only rehearsal with Gabriel, shortly before performing in front of 16,000 people.Cole joined the two last legs of Peter Gabriel's 1993–94 Secret World tour. A video of the concert was shot just days after Cole joined the tour. The video was released as Secret World Live, with Cole covering all the primary female vocals and featured in duets with Gabriel, especially the songs "Don't Give Up" on which she sang the part that Kate Bush recorded with Gabriel in 1986, and "Blood of Eden" recorded by Gabriel and Sinéad O'Connor in 1992. The film received the 1996 Grammy Award for Best Long Form Music Video. Cole was also the main female vocalist on Secret World Live, the audio album documenting the tour. The tour gave Cole international exposure as well as experience performing on a large stage. Her performance earned high praise: in a retrospective review, PopMatters wrote that Cole was "one of the real stars" on the tour, that she easily handled Kate Bush's parts, and that she was "maybe a superior vocalist" to Sinéad O'Connor.Shortly after the tour, Cole released her first album Harbinger in 1994. She appeared with Melissa Etheridge to sing a duet on VH1. Imago Records went out of business a few months after the album came out. In 1995, Cole signed on to Warner Bros. Records. Warner reissued Harbinger in the autumn of 1995. Harbinger featured songs dwelling on Cole's personal thoughts on discrimination and unhappiness. The songs were musically lush but driven and bleak. The accompanying artwork featured photographs of Cole with a boyishly short haircut, wearing loose fitting black sweatclothes, combat boots and nose ring. Imago Records folded and promotion of Harbinger was limited, affecting its sales. A single, "I Am So Ordinary", was released with a black-and-white video that reflected the album's artwork. In late 1996, Cole released her second album on Warner, This Fire, which was entirely self-produced. The album's debut single, "Where Have All the Cowboys Gone?", went to No. 8 on Billboard magazine's pop chart. The follow-up single "I Don't Want to Wait" reached No. 11, its popularity bolstered by its use as the theme song for the hit teen drama series Dawson's Creek which debuted over a year after the album. The single "Me" (No. 35 Airplay chart) was also released as a radio-only single. The title "Hush, Hush, Hush", a duet with Peter Gabriel, talks about AIDS and about a young man dying in his father's comforting arms. "Feelin' Love" was a single that was included on the soundtrack to City of Angels. In 1996, Cole, along with Sarah McLachlan, Suzanne Vega, Lisa Loeb and others, was a featured performer in a four show mini-tour that served as a prototype for what would become the Lilith Fair tour. She was also a headliner for the Lilith Fair tours in 1997 and 1998. She was nominated for several Grammy Awards in 1997. Among them was "Producer of the Year" (Cole was the third woman to ever be nominated in this category after Janet Jackson in 1990 and Mariah Carey in 1992, but the first as a solo nomination); she did not win, but she did go on to win "Best New Artist" that same year. 1999–2006: Amen, hiatus, and motherhood In 1999 Cole released Amen with the newly formed Paula Cole Band. The album's debut single "I Believe in Love" was initially not a success but was remixed by producer Jonathan Peters into a successful dance song. The song "Be Somebody" was featured and performed by Paula and the band at P3 on the hit TV show C.... Discover the Lyndsey Cole popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Lyndsey Cole books.