What Makes A Man?

My mum & I we live alone

A great apartment is our home

In Fairhome Towers

I have to keep me company

2 dogs, a cat, a parakeet

Some plants & flowers

I help my mother with the chores

I wash, she dries, I do the floors

We work together

I shop & cook & swe a bit

Though mum does too I must admit

I do it better

At night I work in a strange bar

Impersonating every star

I'm quite deceiving

The customers come in with doubt

& wonder what I'm all about

But leave believing

I do a very special show

Where I am nude from head to toe

After stripteasing

Each night the men look so surprised

I change my sex before their eyes

Tell me if you can

What makes a man a man?

At 3 o'clock or so I meet

With friends to have a bite to eat

& conversation

We love to empty out our hearts

With every subject from the arts

To liberation

We love to pull apart someone

& spread some gossip just for fun

Or start a rumor

We let our hair down, so to speak

& mock ourselves with tongue-in-cheek

& inside humor

So many times we have to pay

For having fun & being gay

It's not amusing

There's always those that spoil our games

By finding fault & calling names

Always accusing

They draw attention to themselves

At the expense of someone else

It's so confusing

Yet they make fun of how I talk

& imitate the way I walk

Tell me if you can

What makes a man a man?

My masquerade comes to an end

& I go home to bed again

Alone & friendless

I close my eyes, I think of him

I fantasize what might have been

My dreams are endless

We love each other but it seems

The love is only in my dreams

It's so one sided

But in this life I must confess

The search for love & happiness

Is unrequited

I ask myself what I have got

Of what I am & what I'm not

What have I given

The answers come from those who make

The rules that some of us must break

Just to keep living

I know my life is not a crime

I'm just a victim of my time

I stand defenseless

Nobody has the right to be

The judge of what is right for me

Tell me if you can

What make a man a man?

Tell me if you can

Tell me if you can

Tell me if you can

What makes a man a man?

Charles Aznavour

1972

Born On This Day- July 9th... Peter Mark Sinclair Almond

I lived through & partied for much of the early 1980s with Marc Almond as my soundtrack, starting when I tasted his first leather clad success with Soft Cell.

Peter Mark Sinclair Almond claims he was sexually precocious as a young teenager & being gay was always a glorious struggle, growing up, after his parents divorced, with his grandparents in Yorkshire. In his song Trials of Eyeliner, Almond recalls being hit as a makeup wearing teenager by his soldier father, who on another occasion marched into his school, demanding to know whether his son was gay. Another song- Lavender,pays tribute to clandestine gay role models such as Dirk Bogarde. Almond: “difficult even now to come to terms with these liberated times. I’m always fearful that it’s going to change any minute.”

Artifice was the order of his day, from school, where he would pretend to have girlfriends whom nobody met, to his 1980s stardom, when he had “a PR company inventing girlfriends” for him. Almond: “You do get bruised and poisoned by your time. People my age still feel they need to be private in their lives: ‘This is my (nudge nudge, wink wink) special friend’.”

When he finished school, Almond studied music, dance & performance art at Leeds Poly, & then moved to London with a friend who was working as a hustler in Piccadilly Circus. In his memoirs Almond talks openly about his sexuality & his past illicit drug use that led to the demise of Soft Cell in the mid '80s. He is a crooner who strikes me as a true artist in every sense of its meaning, charting his own course beyond the fad of the moment. Almond works without compromise, making electro-pop, dueting with Gene Pitney, singing French chansons, performing Russians love songs or strutting down the stage on a VH1 fasion music show. He is still with the long term boyfriend he’s been with for decades. Almond: “That’s always part of my life, but something that I never really talk about.” About the only thing it seems. His 2 volumes are truly “tell-alls”.

My Marc Almond album favorite is 2007's Stardom Road. This collection features many of the genres that Marc has been associated with over the years, including the Torch Song; the 1950's crooners; the grand orchestral sounds of the early1960's; the over the top glam rock of the 1970's & the electro-style of the 1980's that made him famous as part of Soft Cell.

Stardom Road is his 1st album since his near fatal motorcycle crash in 2004. The crash proved life changing, as near death experiences seem to be. It features guest spots from Antony Hegarty of Antony & the Johnsons; Jools Holland, & Sarah Cracknell from St Etienne, who duets with Almond on the Dusty Springfield song I Close My Eyes & Count To10. This is a very moving & beautifully crafted album.

Backstage I'm A Lonely is a tribute to the late Gene Pitney & it really is a tear jerker. The album is far from maudlin, with tracks like Petula Clark’s upbeat tale of surviving against the odds- Happy Heart. The only original song- Redeem Me (Beauty Will Redeem The World) is a fantastic tune. Almond has sworn to only record covers, but he shows that he's still got great songwriting chops as well. Marc has never sounded as upbeat as he does here. Kitsch, camp, melodramatic, yet full of heartfelt emotion.

Drawing on cabaret, vaudeville, music hall & the ghosts of his heroes Charles Aznavour & Jacques Brel, his work is as witty & frank as he is;  & sometimes painful, sometimes indulgent. Almond looks the same: well preserved at 54 years old, yet fragile; like something from a Tim Burton Film: dyed black crop, black jacket & jeans, eyeliner, & faded blue tattoos. His work is slightly twisted, cynical & dark while being romantic & deeply personal at the same time. Nobody wallows like Marc Almond. I adore him.

No, Darlings, it's Not Another Hiatus...

...we're just utterly swamped at work, and loathe as we are to admit it, we are no longer young enough to multi-task!

We'll be back shortly with reportage on Marilyn Maye's upcoming run at Feinstein's, as well as some thoughts on the current Broadway show about Judy Garland, End of the Rainbow. (Hmmm.)

Born On This Day- July 9th... Lovely Songbird Marc Almond

I lived & partied for much of the early 1980s with Marc Almond as my soundtrack, when I tasted his first leather clad success with Soft Cell.


Peter Mark Sinclair Almond claims he was sexually precocious as a young teenager & being gay was always a glorious struggle, growing up, after his parents divorced, with his grandparents in Yorkshire. In his song Trials of Eyeliner, Almond recalls being hit as a makeup wearing teenager by his soldier father, who on another occasion marched into his school, demanding to know whether his son was gay. Another song- Lavender, pays tribute to clandestine gay role models such as Dirk Bogarde. Almond: “difficult even now to come to terms with these liberated times. I’m always fearful that it’s going to change any minute.”


Artiface was the order of his day, from school, where he would pretend to have girlfriends whom nobody met, to his 1980s stardom, when he had “a PR company inventing girlfriends” for him. Almond: “You do get bruised and poisoned by your time. People my age still feel they need to be private in their lives: ‘This is my (nudge nudge, wink wink) special friend’.”


When he finished school, Almond studied music, dance & performance art at Leeds Poly, & then moved to London with a friend who was working as a hustler in Piccadilly Circus. In his memoirs Almond talks openly about his sexuality & his past illicit drug use that led to the demise of Soft Cell in the mid '80s. he is a  crooner who strikes me as a true artist in every sense of its meaning, charting his own course beyond the fad of the moment. Almond works without compromise, making  electro-pop, dueting with Gene Pitney, singing French chansons, performing Russians love songs or strutting down the stage on a VH1 fasion music show. He is still with the long term boyfriend he’s been with for decades. Almond: “That’s always part of my life, but something that I never really talk about.” About the only thing it seems. His 2 volumes are truly “tell alls”.

My Marc Almond album favorite is 2007's Stardom Road. This collection features many of the genres that Marc has been associated with over the years, including the Torch Song; the 1950's crooners; the grand orchestral sounds of the early1960's; the over the top glam rock of the 1970's & the electro-style of the 1980's that made him famous as part of Soft Cell. Stardom Road his 1st album since his near fatal motorcycle crash in 2004. The crash proved life changing, as near death experiences seem to be. It features guest spots from Antony Hegarty of Antony & the Johnsons; Jools Holland, & Sarah Cracknell from St Etienne, who duets with Almond on the Dusty Springfield song I Close My Eyes & Count to 10. This is a very moving & beautifully crafted album. Backstage I'm A Lonely is a tribute to the late Gene Pitney & it really is a tear jerker. The album is far from maudlin, with tracks like Petula Clark’s upbeat tale of surviving against the odds- Happy Heart. The only original song- Redeem Me (Beauty Will Redeem The World) is a fantastic tune. Almond has sworn to only record covers, but he shows that he's still got great songwriting chops as well. Marc has never sounded as upbeat as he does here. Kitsch, camp, melodramatic, yet full of heartfelt emotion.

Drawing on cabaret, vaudeville, music hall & the ghosts of his heroes Charles Aznavour & Jacques Brel, his work is as witty & frank as he is;  & sometimes painful, sometimes indulgent. Almond looks the same: well preserved at 53, yet fragile; like something from a Tim Burton Film: dyed black crop, black jacket & jeans, eyeliner, & faded blue tattoos. His work is slightly twisted, cynical & dark while being romantic & deeply personal at the same time. Nobody wallows like Marc Almond. I am adore him.

Born On This Day- July 9th... Troubador Marc Almond

Marc Almond speaks of himself as a chansonierre troubadour, a singer of other peoples' songs, covering works from Jacques Brel to Lou Reed. A talented songwriter himself, he claims that he prefers to sing other artists songs because "it frees me from my own baggage allowing me to express the things I wants to, in sometimes a better way than I can write myself." Like almost everyone, he came to my attention as the vocalist & songwriter of the 80s group Soft Cell, who had a massive hit with their cover of Tainted Love. His arrangement of this song has been has been covered by artists from Marilyn Manson to Pussy Cat Dolls. Marc considers his style to be a mix of cabaret, glam, northern soul, 60s pop & music hall. He gives Marc Bolan, Gene Pitney, David Bowie & Edith Piaf as influences. Antony Hegarty of Antony & the Johnsons cites him as his major reason that he became a singer. Marc has written two biographies & 3 books of verse. I adore him & his album Stardom Road ( an album that is "essentially my story", say Almond) was one of my most played in 2008. Marc Almond is in his 30th year of making music & he has sold over 30 million albums. I have included Marc doing a cover of a Jacques Brel's What Makes A Man A Man.