|
|
|
Corey Hart |
|
Sunday, November 29, 1998
Heart to Hart with Corey
By MIKE ROSS -- Edmonton Sun
A non-sequitur chat with Corey Hart, who was in Edmonton last week promoting his new album, Jade.
SUN: Hi, Corey. Nice hair.
COREY: This is my high school look. It never got me any girls.
SUN: Well, one, at least.
COREY: I started to cut it by the time I met Erika (his first wife).
SUN: What's your favourite Burt Bacharach song?
COREY: The first one that came to mind was Close to You, but I don't think it's my favourite. It may be the one that I dislike the most.
SUN: How many other guys do you know named Corey?
COREY: None. I met a few girls named Corey, though.
SUN: A lot of songs on Jade have a techno-electronica feel to them. Did you do that to be trendy?
COREY: I like a lot of what Sheryl Crow is doing on her records. So the loops and all that was somewhat influenced by what she was up to.
SUN: Your oldest girl, India (31/2 years old; sister Dante is eight months) - is she exhibiting any musical traits?
COREY: She is dancing. She dances to Loreena McKennitt. She performs for us. It's remarkable. It's so interesting how a child gravitates to a certain type of creative expression. She's also playing the piano, but as far as talent (laughs), I don't think she's exhibiting any yet.
SUN: Does she like your music?
COREY: She's got no choice. She hears it all the time. She was in the studio when we were recording Jade (at Compass Point Studio in the Bahamas).
SUN: She knows you're a pop star?
COREY: She knows that it's daddy's work. It's funny when she says 'Corey Hart.' It's weird. Prior to having my first record, Corey Hart was just my name. But now, even when I say Corey Hart ... .
SUN: You're referring to yourself in the third person.
COREY: That's because it's almost become a brand name. My essence is still me. But that name Corey Hart refers to this (gestures to the album). So when I say sometimes, 'what's daddy's name?' she goes 'Corey Hart,' I know she doesn't even know she's saying a name that people know. It's just weird to me when I hear it.
SUN: Are you big on astrology?
COREY: Not particularly. I like that I'm a Gemini. I just like the duality of it ... but I don't check my moon rising or anything like that. I had my chart done when I was a kid. He said I was going to be successful at music, but I was playing music at the time, so he had a 50-50 shot.
SUN: What was the first song you wrote?
COREY: It was called Thank You, like the Alanis Morissette song. I was thanking the piano. That was the message of the song.
SUN: Why did you decide to move to the Bahamas?
COREY: Several reasons. I like that I can be anonymous ... and my dad's been living there since I was 12, so I used to spend Christmases down there. After I got out of high school, I thought about moving down there so I could get to know my dad, but didn't have the desire to get to know my dad so I didn't do it Three or four years ago, I decided I wanted to do it, so we tried it out.
SUN: That brings us to the song called Reconcile. Is that about your dad? (His parents split when he was 11.)
COREY: Yes. It was something that had bothered me a lot. He's getting on in years and there wasn't a lot of time to know him and I wanted to know who my dad was. Like I say in the song, 'Along the beach I never collected shells from my father's shore.' That song was important to write because it freed me, as songwriting can do for me. It can free me and shed light.
SUN: Have you ever actually worn sunglasses at night?
COREY: The co-producer of that record used to wear sunglasses at night, so it was a running joke. It hurts your eyes after a while.
SUN: Anything you wrote in the '80s that you're embarrassed about now?
COREY: Absolutely, but none that I wish would be stricken from the archives. I needed to write them, because had I not written them I wouldn't be able to write what I've written now. But I can't watch a lot of videos. I cringe.
SUN: Are you and (partner/singer Julie Masse) going to get married?
COREY: Yeah, maybe. We need a couple more kids. I want all the bridesmaids to be my daughters. I want four girls.
SUN: If you couldn't be a singer, what would you do?
COREY: I would try to write a book.
SUN: Have you ever done anything just for the money?
COREY: I've never done anything to try to make money. Had I done that, I assure you, I'd be a much wealthier man than I am today.
SUN: What's the biggest mistake you ever made?
COREY: This is my third interview with you, right? Just kidding ... My biggest mistake? I haven't made it yet.
Corey Hart will tour Canada again in April.
|
|
|
|
Wednesday, November 25, 1998
Hart at peace with himself
By DAVID VEITCH -- Calgary Sun
Corey Hart likely holds this to be true.
Yes, that Corey Hart -- the onetime spiky-haired, pouty pop-star pinup who was a teen-dream chartbuster in the mid-1980s.
Today, though, he's a 36-year-old father of two who's taking stock of his life and writing about his personal epiphanies and revelations in adult-contemporary pop songs that really are aimed at adults.
"When I sit down at a piano, I feel what's going on in my life and what led up to it. Certain songs are born from that motivation," said Hart, who was in town yesterday to promote his latest CD, Jade.
On his self-produced eighth album, he writes about his relationships with his partner, singer Julie Masse; with his two young daughters; and with a father he barely knew.
Hart's parents divorced when he was a boy.
Throughout his life, Hart would hear from his dad on Christmas -- and that's about it.
"In my 20s, I had been so busy working and touring that it didn't bother me. I thought everything was fine. But as I turned 30, I started to look at some of the dynamics of my life that I felt needed to be addressed. One of them was a lack of a relationship that I had with him. That's why that song (Reconcile) was written."
Obviously, Hart has come a long way from singing about wearing sunglasses at night.
Age, and the experience that comes with it, have done wonders for his songwriting.
"I certainly listen to my old songs from time to time and I hear the roots of what I'm doing today. But they were written from a young man's viewpoint," Hart says.
"The first record (1984's First Offence) was written when I was 15, 16, 17 years old and I recorded it when I was 19 and a half."
That album made him an international star, but he admits: "I wasn't happy. There were moments when I was proud of myself because I accomplished my dream and felt a great sense of accomplishment. But did I feel good in my skin? No. Did I feel like I liked what was happening around me? Most of the time I didn't."
Hart's songwriting began to mature on his fourth album, 1988's Young Man Running, "but that began the decline in sales."
The next two albums sold progressively worse and Hart, "disenchanted and disheartened," took a four-year hiatus in 1992.
Since returning in 1996 with the platinum Corey Hart CD, the angst and attitude of his early material has been replaced with a sense of inner peace. Hart agrees with that observation.
"Now, whether my success is gargantuan or small, as the world perceives that scale, is irrelevant to me," he says.
"I do hope the records do well, though."
|
|
|
|
Tuesday November 10th, 1998
Former teen idol Corey Hart rebuilding career with confidence
TORONTO (CP) -- Corey Hart was huge, an international star at the age of 22 when his hit Sunglasses at Night reached the top of the charts in 1984.
But within the short space of five years, the Montreal-born performer would learn just how fickle audiences can be. After the first album, First Offence, Hart scored two more gold albums before his record sales went into steady decline.
Until recently, Hart had seemed to practically disappear. But contrary to popular belief, he's still very much alive, Hart said in a recent interview.
"I can understand how some people might have thought I had dematerialized or something," Hart says with a laugh. "But it isn't so."
Hart edged his way back into the Canadian music scene in 1996 with Black Cloud Rain, a minor hit from his self-titled seventh album.
The record was a confidence builder for Hart, who had resurfaced after several years away from music altogether.
"Before that, 1991 was actually the last time I went into a studio and recorded," says Hart.
"That was, I guess, the final phase of a three-tiered, steady decline. It certainly combined with my personal state of mind, but the records didn't sell and after a few times ... three albums not selling like that, it's quite brutal."
Looking tanned and fit, the short spiky hair of his '80s pop icon days grown long now, Hart has retained his boyish good looks. It's hard to imagine he's 36, and a father of two girls.
Rather than give up when things got tough, Hart pulled back from the music scene, "without trying to lose who I am, what makes me tick," he says.
"I went through about four, four and a half years of that, of just not writing.
"I think you can learn as much from success as you can from failure. Obviously successful albums are treated with great fanfare and you are given accolades and what-not. When albums don't do well you are treated with the flip side of all that. But I felt that I needed to stop, because I wasn't happy any more.
"When I stopped I wasn't happy either. It was a tough patch for me. It seems so far from where I am today, and I'm relieved to be writing again."
His return did not go unnoticed in the musical community.
"I wrote a couple of songs for another artist last year and produced two songs on her album," Hart says quietly.
Another artist?
"Celine."
As in Dion. As in biggest-selling artist in the world today.
Hart wrote two songs for Dion's 1997 blockbuster album Let's Talk About Love. Not only did he write Where Is The Love and Miles To Go (Before I Sleep) on the album, he produced them as well.
With an engaging modesty, Hart describes it as a "pretty good invitation.
"I was certainly pleased, she's got the choice of any writer or producer she wants. So it was quite a challenge for me."
Hart feels he has turned the corner on a dark chapter in his career with his current album, Jade. After the self-titled record broke through his slump, Hart approached Jade with newfound confidence. Featuring a duet with his wife, Quebec chanteuse Julie Masse, it's the first step towards a new stage in his career, Hart says.
"I can analyse the trajectory of my popularity and find out why the peak was a peak and the valley was a valley -- grapple with it that way -- but I prefer not to analyse it that much," Hart says.
"A lot of the artists from my era are no longer recording, let alone having hit records. I just look at the work that I'm doing -- I'm learning and developing my skills as a writer and a producer and a singer.
"Whether it catches up to what the world sees or record companies or radio or everybody wants -- you can't be the architect of that."
|
|
|
