GrooveOut

SHINE ON Defiant and independent, Cyndi Lauper really wants to do a musical by Gregg Sharpiro

Cyndi Lauper shines brightly on Shine, lighting up these dark times with her newly released five-song EP, currently available at her website (www.cyndilauper.com) as well as in stores. You will also, undoubtedly, be able to purchase the EP at the various venues where Lauper is opening for Cher, on latter diva’s farewell tour (in Houston on August 21 at the Compaq Center).

The songs on the Shine EP were originally meant for the full-length disc of the same name. The uplifting "Shine," the ’80s-retro bounce of "It's Hard to Be Me," the fat-bottomed funk of "Madonna Whore" (referring to the complex, not the singer), and the gorgeous tear-jerking ballad "Water's Edge" represent some of Lauper's best work in years. As either a teaser or a preview of longer CDs to come, Lauper delivers as only she can. As a nod to her devoted club-going gay fans, a slamming dance remix of the title tracks closes the EP.

I spoke to the deeply introspective Cyndi Lauper just before Independence Day. It was the appropriate time to speak to her, as she is and always has been one of the most fiercely independent and original performers in contemporary musical history.

OutSmart: I had a dream the other night, in which you released an album of cover versions of songs from the ’70s. You did these brilliant renditions of the Barry Manilow hit "Somewhere in the Night" and Boston's "More Than a Feeling." Have you ever considered doing an entire album of cover tunes?

Cyndi Lauper: No. That would be like nails on a blackboard to me.

Oh, no.

But I'm glad it wasn't a nightmare for you. It would have been a real nightmare for me. I did cover tunes when I first started. I had to sing them all. And you know what, I still didn't sing any Barry Manilow tunes (laughs).

Speaking of Manilow, last year a musical revue of his biggest hits called Could It Be Magic played in Chicago. What would you say if someone pitched a Cyndi Lauper musical revue to you?

I don't know. I think it's a tribute every year when somebody else covers "Time After Time." If they are going to sing the songs that I've written, I would find that really interesting. It's always interesting to see people interpret music, but I don't really feel the need to have anybody do that.

You refer to Cher as "a good egg, that one" in your tour diary on your website. I take it that the tour has been a good experience so far?

Yeah. She's a great gal. She's really inspirational. She never has anything bad to say about anybody, which I could never say for myself. She's sweet and she's smart, and she's been a big supporter of mine. And she's Cher. She's great. She is a real inspiration for me. Looking at her every night, it makes me feel like I'm five. It's kind of cute [laughs]. It's so exciting for me. Then to hear the retrospective of how many hits the woman has had. How many things she has done. You just have a whole different respect . . .

She's a symbol of longevity.

More than that.

Legend and longevity.

She's a symbol of an independent woman. To me, that's really inspiring. All these independent people inspire. Even Tina [Turner]. Tina defied them, and came back.

Survival.

Not survival. It's called defiance, and I love defiance [laughs]. I think it's good to do that, because you don't want to walk around your whole life like a sheep. You don't want to be told what looks nice and what doesn't, or how you should make yourself into this or that. The only time you should make yourself into anything is when you look in the mirror and deep down inside you feel "I want to change." Then what do you want to change into? Who do you want to become? What part of your personality would be empowered? What can you do to yourself to empower that part of your personality to thrive better on this planet? That is a real makeover. It comes from within. It never comes from the sorrowful person who is trying to conform in this world. Conformity is the deadening of our society, not the celebration of the individual. Which is what this country was originally about—individuals.

What have some of the most memorable moments of the tour been for you so far?

Philadelphia, when I sang to my son. I just came up on him in the audience. I didn't know he was going to be there. I knew he was there, but I didn't know that's where he was sitting. When he came up and gave me the flag, the rainbow flag. Each night is really different. Each one is an interesting experience for me. I always am curious as to each town you go to. Who are you? Who are you people? What are you like? As you go along, you rouse them a little and you listen back and you see who they are. You hit ’em again and then you do something else and keep coming at them from different ways and you see who they are.

Touring with both Tina Turner in the past and Cher in the present has exposed you to some incredibly varied audiences—many age groups, cultures, and sexual orientations. What does it mean to you to be reaching such a large cross-section of people?

The truth is that my audience was always varied in age. My audience seemed to match Cher's. Although perhaps her audiences, some of them are older, I don't know. Because of my work in the [gay] community, which came about because of my friends and family, and because of opportunities that arose for me to contribute in a way that would really help, and because it was more fun. When I was pregnant in ’97, and reading my website, I started to notice that people who were gay and lesbian, and were young teenagers, were writing me letters. They talked about when they came out and how they couldn't go to their parents. Some of them, their parents disowned them, and they became depressed. Then I saw that something that I really needed to do was become more active and more aware, being a parent myself. I was speaking to my mom, because my sister [Elen] is a lesbian. Growing up with someone who is different, in your family, you know who they are. She's a hero of mine. She's an amazing person. She's very wise, even though she's only a year and a half older. I've always admired her. I always ran after her, too [laughs]. Being the younger sister, I was told that I was born to be her friend.

That's a very nice way to put that.

That's how my mom put it. You know how parents are. [In a parental voice] "You were born to be her friend." The poor thing, every time she tried to play with somebody else, I would be chasing her down the block, having a fit, yelling at her, saying "You can't play with them. You have to play with me. I was born to be your friend" [laughs]. Poor Elen [laughs], my poor sister. When I read that [about the gay teens on her website], I found it very disheartening that they would become very suicidal, because they didn't know what to do about being different, and there was no one to talk to. My God, if you can't talk to your parents … I saw that as a big opportunity to say, "Hey, they're your kids. They come riding in on horseback. They're your blood." You can't change who they are, because they're born that way. My sister was born that way. I know. I was there from the beginning. My sister didn't change who she was.

Right. She was no different before she came out to you than after she did.

No. Except after it made more sense. That's something that people could think about.

The way that you assembled the songs for the Shine EP is very touching. You wrote that the chosen songs were the ones to which you could see your audience making a connection and having the strongest response.

I saw them singing along, and I know that they wanted me to put out a record. For instance, "Shine." It's kind of about me and kind of about someone you love. What better way than to pull someone up than through their love. Even though it's corny and it sounds sappy, really and truly love is a great healer, and it can stand the test of time. The love thing will always bring you back, always bring you back to yourself. People with no love in their heart do bad things. Sometimes it's really just a lot of hurt, and then if you love them, really love them, you can pull them up. Somewhere in people's hearts there is that love, and that's what you pull people up by. That's real strength. I guess that I felt that from the people around me. That's what makes me stand up in my own personal life. When you're writing about something personal, sometimes the song goes out and other people hear it and then it becomes larger than you and your own little world, it becomes part of their world.

It becomes universal.

Yeah, and that's the best that you can hope for. That's a great gift, too, because it teaches me, and anybody who's writing how it changes and how people hear it. Then all of a sudden you hear it differently.

When I've interviewed you in the past, I've asked you about the possibility of seeing you in the lead role of a Broadway musical—either a revival or an original production. Is there any chance of that happening?

I wanted to do Annie Get Your Gun, but hey, those things come and go.

Yes, in fact, you mentioned that show the first time I interviewed you.

I wanted to do that, but it didn't pan out. [I want to do] something with good music. Some of the stuff doesn't have that good music. The hooks, they don't have the hooks. That's what you want. Broadway music is going through a change, as you can see with the success of Mamma Mia! You want songs with choruses that people can sing along to.

How is the Cyndi Lauper of today…

…Now you're scaring me. How could you talk to me like I'm in the third person?

I'm sorry. How are you different than you were September 11, 2001?

[After a long pause] How am I different now? In millions of ways, I'm different. I have to catch myself all the time and always try and be fair and understand. It was very hard for me to understand how much hate somebody could have in their heart to do something like that, because they did it to people. Those buildings, to them [the terrorists] were symbols. But there were people in there, and it's the people that you hurt. That's what the shame is. You would hope that maybe sanity would land on this planet and we would be able to coexist together. I'm not perfect myself. I'm still figuring it out. That's the bottom line. Everybody's got to figure it out. Everybody makes mistakes and everybody doesn't do the right thing. It's just something that you've always got to try to remember, that's all.

Pop culture journalist Gregg Shapiro, a 1999 inductee into Chicago's Gay and Lesbian Hall of Fame, is also a published fiction writer and poet.