#don't mutilate my mink

[bitter69uk]

Born on this day: totally unique post-punk No Wave chanteuse Cristina (Cristina Monet Palaci, 17 January 1956 – 1 April 2020) who made precisely two barbed, weird and distinctive albums - released by the cutting edge Ze label - that flopped commercially and then retired from music. Cristina’s trademark is setting scathing observations to perky music, and she mostly sings and writes within the persona of a jaded party girl or gold digger (a tradition that dates to Mae West and Eartha Kitt). Self-titled debut Cristina (1980) (reissued in 2004 as Doll in the Box) is her mutant disco album. Lushly produced by Kid Creole, it’s campy fun with Latin rhythm in its hips (if you like cowbell, this is the album for you!), but I prefer the 1984 follow-up, the tougher, darker and more cutting New Wave pop of Sleep It Off. Cristina’s venomous, spikily funny lyrics work as wry poetry already, but then she enunciates them in an alienated, deadpan can't-be-bothered snarl (she has “resting bitch voice”, occasionally punctuated with a Johnny Rotten sneer). Here’s a sampling of her wit and wisdom: “My life is in a turmoil / My thighs are black and blue / My sheets are stained, so is my brain / What's a girl to do?” from "What’s A Girl to Do?" is as lacerating as anything found on Lydia Lunch’s 1980 magnum opus Queen of Siam. “Don't tell me that I'm frigid / Don't try to make me think / I'll do just fine without you / Don’t mutilate my mink” from her punk masterpiece “Don’t Mutilate My Mink”. (In their obit, The Guardian describes it as sounding like Audrey Hepburn fronting the Sex Pistols). Like many abrasive early eighties New York punk funk musicians (see also: James Chance of The Contortions), she may initially work best in small doses and for many may be an acquired taste. But think of Cristina as analogous to Campari – once you acquire that taste, you wondered how you ever lived without it. Portrait by Jean-Paul Goude.

[haveyoulistenedtothisalbum-poll]

Tracklist:

Don't Mutilate My Mink • Ticket To The Tropics • She Can't Say That Anymore • Quicksand Lovers • Rage And Fascination • Ballad Of Immoral Earnings • What's A Girl To Do • The Lie Of Love • Blue Money • He Dines Out On Death

Spotify ♪ YouTube

[alucienaenola]

I've been listening to Cristina a whole lot recently. Will post some other songs by her maybe within the next few months.

You can read about her here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cristina_%28singer%29

[thehouseofayres]

::I Said::