#Gitane Demone

[nightisthenotion]

Gitane Demone photographed by Leee Black Childers

[possible-streetwear]

GITANE DEMONE

[thedepartmentofdiscoveries]

Gitane Demone of Christian ✝️ Death, London 1984. Photo by Mick Mercer.

Gitane with Rozz Williams.

Gitane DeMone (also spelled Demone) is an American singer, musician and visual artist. Her career spans more than 30 years. She came to prominence in the mid-1980s as the keyboardist and backing vocalist of the influential death rock band Christian Death. In addition to her work with Christian Death, Demone was previously a member of Pompeii 99, worked with Dreadful Shadows, and has had a solo career which has included three studio albums: Am I Wrong?, Stars of Trash and The Reflecting Shadow.

Early years

In high school, she discovered the works of Billie Holiday, and played and sang with local bands at parties. After high school, she became a writer and illustrator.

Pompeii 99

In 1981, DeMone placed an ad in The Recycler met Valor Kand, and began Pompeii 99. Kand was fascinated by Nostradamus and took the band name from a prophecy. Kand and DeMone found drummer David Glass through auditions, also working with members Marc Doten and Polly Klemmer.

Pompeii 99 gained an audience in the Los Angeles club scene, and in 1981, formed a record label, Nostradamus, to release their debut album Look at Yourself. In 1982, they followed this with an EP, Ignorance Is the Control. Pompeii 99 were scheduled to open for Christian Death on a European tour, but when that band's lineup collapsed, lead singer Rozz Williams decided along with Kand, DeMone and Glass to combine the two bands into a new version of Christian Death.

Christian Death

The new lineup of Christian Death, including DeMone, went on to record two new albums, 1984's Catastrophe Ballet (with bassist Constance Smith) and 1985's Ashes (with bassist Randy Wilde).

In mid-1985, after Williams left, Kand took over leadership of the band, working as lead vocalist and songwriter. With bassist Johann Schumann and guitarist/keyboardist Barry Galvin, the band recorded an EP for the Italian label Supporti Fonografici titled The Wind Kissed Pictures, credited to "The Sin and Sacrifice of Christian Death". The EP was later reissued in Germany and the U.S., credited only to Christian Death.

The band's first post-Williams album was 1986's Atrocities, a concept album about the aftereffects of World War II on the European psyche. This was followed by 1987's The Scriptures, recorded by a revamped lineup of Kand, DeMone, Glass, guitarist James Beam and bassist Kota. During this period, the band found their biggest successes on the UK Independent Chart with the 1987–89 singles "Sick of Love", "Church of No Return" and "Zero Sex" and the 1988 album Sex and Drugs and Jesus Christ. Following the release of the "Zero Sex" single, Demone split from both Kand and Christian Death in 1989.

Solo career

In 1989, DeMone relocated to Amsterdam and began a solo career, combining her background in punk, death rock and gothic rock with a passion for jazz and legendary female vocalists, most notably Billie Holiday. She maintained a rubber-clad S&M visual image, and the fetish theme carried through into her lyrics.

DeMone's first two solo releases, the "A Heavenly Melancholy" maxi-single (1992, Torso Dance) and Lullabies for a Troubled World EP (1993, Cult Music), were collected, along with some 1993 live tracks, as the 1993 Cleopatra Records compilation Facets in Blue.[6] She also issued two live albums during this period: Love for Sale (1993, Cult Music) and With Love & Dementia (Live in Cannes 1994) (1995, Hypnobeat).

She renewed her friendship with former Christian Death band member Williams, and the pair toured together and recorded the album Dream Home Heartache in 1995, which included both cover versions and their own material. DeMone then paired up with Mark Ickx to produce a studio album Never Felt So Alive, released in 1994; it was reissued under the title Demonix in 1996 by Cleopatra.

In 1996, DeMone recorded her first studio album Am I Wrong?, released by Apollyon in 1998. The following year she released a second studio album Stars of Trash (Andromeda), composed by DeMone and recorded with the assistance of the band Dreadful Shadows.

In 2008, a two-disc DVD by DeMone titled Life After Death was released by Cult Epics, featuring footage from throughout her career, including a live performance with Williams. From 2008 to 2011, DeMone was involved in a project called the Crystelles with daughter Zara Kand, and also performed with the experimental noise band +DOG+.

In 2013, she collaborated with Loopool and Syphilis Sauna under the name Hedone Tears, self-releasing a digital single, "Moonlit Paradise". "Moonlit Paradise", backed by an untitled track, was released again in 2015 as the Hedone Tears 7" single (Mystic Moon Records), under her own name.

As the Gitane DeMone Quartet, DeMone currently records and performs backed by other musicians including Rikk Agnew, Paul Roessler (The Screamers, etc.) and Deb Venom.

A published writer, DeMone's other artistic activities also include composing poetry and painting.

Personal life

Besides being partners in Pompeii 99, DeMone and Kand were married in 1983. They had a son and daughter together. DeMone became engaged to fellow former Christian Death member Rikk Agnew on May 3, 2013.

[iamdangerace]

[shadow27]

Rozz Williams & Gitane Demone - Dream Home Heartache

[spilladabalia]

Christian Death - Electra Descending

[possible-streetwear]

GITANE DEMONE

[batcave-juggalo]

This is prolly the most goth song on this album. Both music and lyrics wise.

[effectedfoxx]

that feeling when i like rozz williams a tiny bit

(this is on last.fm and unlike most rozz fans i dont have cds or vinyls which is probably how i got this much comparatively)

[intotheclash]

Gitane Demone - Tales Of Innocence.wmv

[useless-catalanfacts]

Group of locals who dance ball de gitanes during the festa major (local holiday). Photos taken in Sitges (Penedès, Catalonia) in 1920, 1940, 1979, and 2014.

Photos from Sitges Festa Major.

As you can see, until the 1970s women weren’t allowed to participate in the dance, even though this dance represents the courting between boys and girls. Traditional dances used to be performed only by men, including men dressed as women when they represented women characters. The case shown in this post is representative of what happened in most parts of our country, but starting in the 1970s women have been slowly accepted in most aspects of public life, including dancing in the holidays. If you’re familiar with Catalan culture or have followed this blog for a while, you will know that dancing in the streets is a central part of the most popular holidays in many parts of the country: festa major or festes patronals.

Nowadays, most dances with women characters allow women, and most dances that are gender-neutral are open to all genders, even though usually there are groups that still only allow men. Even though men are allowed to represent women or women-coded characters (and some, like the Diablessa in ball de diables or the Moma, are usually danced by a man), women are usually still forbidden from representing male or male-coded characters. But, slowly, things are changing: like we said in this post today, another town has taken the step forward: Algaida’s cossiers now allow women to play the Demon, and we expect more Mallorcan towns to follow their steps soon.

[wormworker]

fuck trying to figure out "goth subgenres" or what "goth adjacent" means, do you listen to:

bands with a man singing who sounds like a sad ghoul drifting around a mausoleum and moaning or something idk (sisters of mercy, fields of the nephilim, glorious din, christian death, o children, joy division, plastique noir, she past away, red lorry yellow lorry)

with a guy who sounds like he's possessed by some kind of evil snake demon (bauhaus, the wake, plasticzooms, skinny puppy, altar de fey, hocico)

bands with a frontwoman who has literally the most angelic, haunting voice ever or the band overall has a sound like that oooo aaaa (cocteau twins, strange boutique, dead can dance, chelsea wolfe, tamaryn, this mortal coil)

frontwoman who sounds like she personally wants to rip you apart with her teeth (gitane demone, light asylum, skeletal family, diva destruction, boy harsher, voodoo church)

bro who sounds like he's crying on the phone to his mom because someone made fun of his eyeliner on the playground (killing joke, drab majesty, the march violets, theatre of hate, the damned)

woman who sounds like, against all recommendations, she needs another iced coffee with three shots of espresso (lebanon hanover, nico, the harrow, switchblade symphony)

gang who would make anyone go nuts on the dancefloor (cabaret voltaire, plasticzooms, nine inch nails)

they have that guy who is just british (the legendary pink dots, the tear garden)

people who are angy as fuk and they should be (skinny puppy, the tear garden, kmfdm, nine inch nails)

guys who would kiss you on the forehead and tuck you in at night (vnv nation, depeche mode)

gang who makes you feel like you're literally dying like in a good way (tropic of cancer)

they yell at you a lot (the march violets, skinny puppy, alien sex fiend, play dead, the fair sex, bauhaus)

singer sounds positively whorish, complimentary (male tears, elz and the cult, virgin prunes, xymox, alien sex fiend, london after midnight, gene loves jezebel)