Speaking of her 1994 record, "Martinis and Bikinis," Los Angeles singer-songwriter Sam Phillips recently recalled an anecdote associated with one of the songs from that album--a track called "Baby I Can't Please You." It involved one of the musicians who played on the record, bassist Colin Moulding of the British alternative rock band XTC.
"I remember Colin Moulding coming in from England," she tells CBSNews.com. "We were at Jackson Browne's studio in Santa Monica recording. And I remember when he heard "Baby I Can't Please You," he had this big smile on his face and he said, 'We should do a Bollywood duet, you and me.' At the time I thought, 'Uh, maybe not.' But now I regret that. I think that would have been a wonderful idea and maybe someday we'll get to do that duet."
Still, Phillips did have a chance to rework some of the songs from the record that now appear as bonus tracks on a new reissue of "Martinis and Bikinis," which came out Tuesday. Produced by her then-husband T-Bone Burnett (whose production credits include Counting Crows, Robert Plant and Allison Krauss, and the Wallflowers), "Martinis and Bikinis" is generally well-regarded by the critics and perhaps her most accessible work.
"It actually came from my publishers at Notable Music," Phillips said about the idea behind the reissue. "They've been talking to this company Omnivore-- they started reissuing these vinyl projects. "It's been quite a while since "Martinis and Bikinis" has been released, and also because it's never been on vinyl, they were very excited to be involved."
Released at a time when alternative rock was the rage, "Martinis and Bikinis" was Phillips' third album for her then-label Virgin Records--the others being "The Indescribable Wow" and "Cruel Inventions." One thing she recalls about the record was T-Bone Burnett playing a lot of the guitars on it. "But I also remember that of the three records for Virgin," she adds, "it was the culmination of the other two records that the process that we had started when we first did "The Indescribable Wow." I felt like they were all connected and that "Martinis and Bikinis" was we finally got to the place that we wanted to get after a lot of work. I remember months in the studio for all three of those records."
In addition to Burnett, "Martinis and Bikinis" featured musicians such as Colin Moulding, Marc Ribot, Mickey Curry and R.E.M.'s Peter Buck. And while the album was dominated by Phillips' vocals, melodic hooks, and pristine production, "Martinis and Bikinis" contained soul-searching lyrics that addressed political, personal and social themes.
"Writing melodic songs were going against the grain at that time," says Phillips, "and also going against the grain in terms of what the lyrics were saying. A friend of mine who was very wealthy once brought up the idea that he knew of a man who was a refugee and everything that he had that was of value he held in his heart. I was very struck by that, so I put that verbatim in "Same Rain." There were a lot of different ideas. "Fighting with Fire" was about having to deal with art and commerce and trying to make sense of that, trying to make a life when corporations dictate how you make art and dictate how you get paid and we're still dealing with that today. It was a very serious record."
The aforementioned "Baby I Can't Please You" was one of the many standout tracks from "Martinis and Bikinis." It took on different meanings for those involved in the record, according to Phillips. "What was funny was that [T-Bone] thought of the song was about the right-wing politicians. To me, I was just thinking of my struggle of growing up, struggling with self-image and all of that, so "Baby I Can't Please You" was more of a personal thing to me. It was really funny--he had one agenda for the song, and I had another agenda for the song, and Colin Moulding had a third agenda for the song [the Bollywood duet]. That's always been my aim to try to write songs that work on different levels--that are open to different interpretations that could be of service to the listener." From: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/sam-phillips-revisits-martinis-and-bikinis/
