Saturday, June 11, 2022

Remembering Julee Cruise and Her Signature Song

This evening for “music night” at The Wild Reed I honor singer, songwriter and actress Julee Cruise, who died this past Thursday, June 9. Since 2018, she’s been living with systemic lupus, which caused her considerable pain and affected her ability to walk and stand.

On Thursday, her husband, Edward Grinnan, wrote on Facebook: “She left this realm on her own terms. No regrets. She is at peace . . . I played her [B-52’s song] ‘Roam’ during her transition. Now she will roam forever. Rest in peace, my love.”

Julee, who released four albums beginning with 1989’s Floating into the Night, is best known for her collaborations with composer Angelo Badalamenti and film director David Lynch in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

Her signature song is the haunting 1989 single “Falling”; an instrumental version of which was used as the theme song for the television series Twin Peaks in which Julee appeared in a recurring role as a roadhouse singer. She reprised the role in the 1992 movie Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me (which also featured her music), and in the 2017 revival series Twin Peaks: The Return. She was also featured in Lynch and Badalamenti’s avant-garde 1990 theater production Industrial Symphony No. 1.

In 2010, Pitchfork Media ranked Julee’s “Falling” at No. 146 on its “Top 200 Tracks of the 1990s.” NME listed the song at No. 38 in their ranking of “100 Best Songs of the 1990s” in 2012. Music & Media magazine stated that “anyone who is familiar with the Twin Peaks series is sure to have shivers listening to the theme tune. An ambient and dreamy song; although atmospheric, it is at the same time very down-to-earth, and threatening in its cold-blooded beauty.”

Nick Robinson from Music Week commented, “Every now and again a truly beautiful single comes along transfixing everyone that hears it.” He added, "The sparse haunting instrumentation combines with Cruise's dreamy vocals to produce a stunning piece of music.”

According to composer Angelo Badalamenti the characteristic sound of the song was made playing a tuned down electric guitar. “In the ruckus of beers flying through the air at The Roadhouse, we have Julee singing a beautiful, slow-tempo song, and it’s so outrageous,” said Badalamenti in 2016. “You would never have that kind of song in a place like that. . . . The songs with Julee serve a two-fold purpose: They contrast the visuals and they set the tone for the show.”

A music video was produced (below) featuring Julee performing the song through soft curtains and dramatic red lighting. It fades to various scenes from the Twin Peaks television series.





Related Off-site Links:
Julee Cruise, Singer and Frequent David Lynch Collaborator, Dies Aged 65 – Ben Beaumont-Thomas (The Guardian, June 10, 2022).
Julee Cruise’s Angelic Voice Guided Us Through David Lynch’s American Hell – Dorian Lynskey (The Guardian, June 10, 2022).

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
Finding Laura
It Is Happening Again
The Fizzer Finale of Lost Brings to Mind the Unraveling of Twin Peaks

Previously featured musicians at The Wild Reed:
Dusty Springfield | David Bowie | Kate Bush | Maxwell | Buffy Sainte-Marie | Prince | Frank Ocean | Maria Callas | Loreena McKennitt | Rosanne Cash | Petula Clark | Wendy Matthews | Darren Hayes | Jenny Morris | Gil Scott-Heron | Shirley Bassey | Rufus Wainwright | Kiki Dee | Suede | Marianne Faithfull | Dionne Warwick | Seal | Sam Sparro | Wanda Jackson | Engelbert Humperdinck | Pink Floyd | Carl Anderson | The Church | Enrique Iglesias | Yvonne Elliman | Lenny Kravitz | Helen Reddy | Stephen Gately | Judith Durham | Nat King Cole | Emmylou Harris | Bobbie Gentry | Russell Elliot | BØRNS | Hozier | Enigma | Moby (featuring the Banks Brothers) | Cat Stevens | Chrissy Amphlett | Jon Stevens | Nada Surf | Tom Goss (featuring Matt Alber) | Autoheart | Scissor Sisters | Mavis Staples | Claude Chalhoub | Cass Elliot | Duffy | The Cruel Sea | Wall of Voodoo | Loretta Lynn and Jack White | Foo Fighters | 1927 | Kate Ceberano | Tee Set | Joan Baez | Wet, Wet, Wet | Stephen “Tin Tin” Duffy | Fleetwood Mac | Jane Clifton | Australian Crawl | Pet Shop Boys | Marty Rhone | Josef Salvat | Kiki Dee and Carmelo Luggeri | Aquilo | The Breeders | Tony Enos | Tupac Shakur | Nakhane Touré | Al Green | Donald Glover/Childish Gambino | Josh Garrels | Stromae | Damiyr Shuford | Vaudou Game | Yotha Yindi and The Treaty Project | Lil Nas X | Daby Touré | Sheku Kanneh-Mason | Susan Boyle | D’Angelo | Little Richard | Black Pumas | Mbemba Diebaté | Judie Tzuke | Seckou Keita | Rahsaan Patterson | Black | Ash Dargan | ABBA | The KLF and Tammy Wynette | Luke James and Samoht


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