Josephine Wiggs
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| Josephine Wiggs | |
|---|---|
| Birth name | Miranda Cordelia Susan Josephine Wiggs |
| Born | 26 February 1963 |
| Origin | Letchworth, Hertfordshire, England, UK |
| Genres | Alternative rock |
| Occupation(s) | Musician |
| Instruments | Bass guitar, guitar, drums, cello, piano, vocals |
| Labels | 4AD, Fire, Grand Royal, Atlantic |
| Associated acts | The Perfect Disaster, The Breeders, Honey Tongue, The Josephine Wiggs Experience, Dusty Trails |
Miranda Cordelia Susan Josephine Wiggs (born 26 February 1963 in Letchworth, Hertfordshire[1]) is an English indie/alternative rock musician, noted for her work with the bands The Perfect Disaster, The Breeders, and Dusty Trails.
Contents
Early career
Wiggs is the daughter of Richard Wiggs, a teacher of handicapped children[2]and founder of the Anti-Concorde Project. Wiggs studied Philosophy at the University of London, earning a BA degree, going on to get a MA in Continental Philosophy from the University of Sussex.[3] She studied cello for ten years.[3] She joined The Perfect Disaster in 1988 as bass guitarist, playing on the albums Asylum Road, (1988) Up (1989) and Heaven Scent (1990) before leaving to form The Breeders with Kim Deal and Tanya Donelly.[4] Wiggs played cello on the Spacemen 3 album Playing With Fire.
Career with The Breeders
In 1988, Wiggs met Kim Deal when Perfect Disaster supported the Pixies in London. In 1989, Deal asked Wiggs to join her and Throwing Muses Tanya Donelly in making the first Breeders' album Pod. Deal, Wiggs and Slint drummer Britt Walford rehearsed for a week at Wiggs's house in Bedfordshire, and for further week with Donelly in London, before driving to Edinburgh to record the album with engineer Steve Albini. The album was released in 1990 on record label 4AD. In 1992, Deal visited Wiggs in Brighton during time off from the Pixies, and they worked on the song Safari, recording it in London with Wiggs's friend Spacemen 3/Spiritualized drummer Jon Mattock. This recording became the title track of The Breeders' second release, the Safari EP.[citation needed]
From 1992, alongside Deal and Wiggs, The Breeders' second incarnation had Kelley Deal on guitar and Jim Macpherson on drums. This line-up recorded the album Last Splash in 1993, which featured the hit song Cannonball with its iconic opening bass riff. The video for Cannonball, much-played on MTV, was directed by Kim Gordon and Spike Jonze. The Breeders supported Nirvana on their In Utero tour, and Last Splash achieved platinum sales.[citation needed]
Their last record was a vinyl-only EP, Head to Toe whose title track was written by Wiggs. After playing the 1994 Lollapolooza Tour, The Breeders went on indefinite hiatus following the well-publicized drug problems of guitarist Kelley Deal. Kim Deal released a solo album, the Amps, Pacer in 1995, and she resurrected the Breeders' name in the late 1990s, but neither Wiggs nor Macpherson were members of this line-up. In November 2005, Wiggs played two shows with The Breeders in London, at an event commemorating the 25th anniversary of record label 4AD.[citation needed]
On 21 August 2009, with one day's notice and no rehearsal, Wiggs played three shows with The Breeders after bassist Mando Lopez had to fly home because his girlfriend had gone into labour. These shows were at the Black Cat in Washington, DC,[5] Diesel in Pittsburgh, and at Newport Music Hall in Columbus, Ohio. In 2013, Wiggs rejoined The Breeders for a sixty-date 20th Anniversary World Tour, to coincide with 4AD's release of LSXX, a limited-edition seven-disc vinyl box set, and three-CD package.[citation needed]
Other work
In 1992, Wiggs had collaborated with Jon Mattock and released an album, Nude Nudes, under the name Honey Tongue. In 1995 Wiggs and Luscious Jackson (and original Beastie Boys) drummer Kate Schellenbach formed Ladies Who Lunch, releasing the 7 inch vinyl "Kims We Love" (an homage to Kim Deal and Sonic Youth's Kim Gordon, played entirely on Casio keyboards) on the Beastie Boys' label, Grand Royal. This was followed by the 7 inch vinyl cover of the Buzzcocks song Everybody's Happy Nowadays.
In 1995, Wiggs recorded and co-produced the album Klassics with a K for the Kostars, Luscious Jackson's Jill Cunniff and Vivian Trimble, and toured with them playing drums. In 1996 Wiggs collaborated again with Jon Mattock releasing the Bon Bon Lifestyle album on Grand Royal as The Josephine Wiggs Experience. Wiggs played all instruments, recorded and mixed the album.[citation needed]
In 1997, Wiggs started a writing and recording collaboration with Luscious Jackson keyboardist Vivian Trimble under the name Dusty Trails. Their eponymous 2000 album on Atlantic Records included a track written for, and sung by, Emmylou Harris. They also wrote music for Happy Accidents, a movie by Brad Anderson (writer/director of Next Stop Wonderland) starring Marisa Tomei and Vincent D'Onofrio. In addition, they collaborated with internationally-acclaimed New York-based Brazilian choreographers chameckilerner, writing and recording full-length scores for Poor Reality, 2001, and Exit 2007. They also provided the soundtrack for chameckilerner's short film Flying Lesson, (which premiered at Lincoln Center, 2008) and for their short film The Collection (2011).
In 2009, Wiggs recorded the soundtrack for chameckilerner's Conversation With Boxing Gloves, one of eleven short films that make up Vita Futurista Redux, a re-imagining of the lost 1916 film Vita Futurista, commissioned by Performa 09 and which premiered at SFMOMA. In 2012, she wrote and recorded a piano-based score for the documentary Built on Narrow Land, a film about Bauhaus-inspired modern houses in Wellfleet, Cape Cod, which premiered at Provincetown International Film Festival and was included in the Architecture and Design Film Festival, New York City, 2013. In 2013, she wrote and recorded the score for the first feature film by writer-director Desiree Akhavan, Appropriate Behavior, which will premiere at Sundance Film Festival, in 2014.[citation needed]
Discography
- Asylum Road 1988 album, The Perfect Disaster, Fire Records
- Up (The Perfect Disaster album)|Up 1989 album, The Perfect Disaster, Fire Records
- Heaven Scent 1990 album, The Perfect Disaster, Fire Records
- Pod 1990 album, The Breeders, 4AD
- Safari 1992 EP, The Breeders, 4AD
- Nude Nudes 1992 album, Honey Tongue, Playtime Records
- Last Splash 1993 album, The Breeders, 4AD
- Head to Toe 1994 EP, The Breeders, 4AD
- Kim's We Love 1995 7" vinyl, Ladies Who Lunch, Grand Royal
- Everybody's Happy Nowadays 1996 7" vinyl, Ladies Who Lunch, Grand Royal
- Bon Bon Lifestyle 1996 album, The Josephine Wiggs Experience, Grand Royal
- Dusty Trails 2000 album, Dusty Trails, Atlantic Records
References
- ↑ Larkin, Colin (1998) The Virgin Encyclopedia of Indie & New Wave, Virgin Books; ISBN 0-7535-0231-3, p. 318
- ↑ A Life in Science, Sir Nevill Mott, Taylor & Francis, 1986, pg 108
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 The International Who's Who in Popular Music 2002, Routledge, 2002, ISBN 978-1-85743-161-2, p. 542
- ↑ Strong, Martin C. (2003) The Great Indie Discography, Canongate, ISBN 1-84195-335-0, p. 452
- ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
External links
- EngvarB from September 2014
- Use dmy dates from September 2014
- Articles with hCards
- Articles with unsourced statements from April 2015
- 1963 births
- Alumni of the University of Sussex
- English rock bass guitarists
- Female bass guitarists
- Living people
- The Breeders members
- People from Letchworth
- Musicians from Hertfordshire
- Alternative rock bass guitarists
