Her Lips Unsealed
Belinda Carlisle is back with a French album, a sense of decorum and some thoughts on Hilary Duff.
by Sarah Hepola
August 31, 2006
As the face — and the unmistakable voice — of the Go-Go's, Belinda Carlisle wore the excesses of the '80s like ten rubber bracelets. She struggled with drugs, and her weight, for years before swapping a career in Los Angeles for motherhood in the South of France. Now forty-seven, she's wrapping a French-language solo album, Voila, and recently finished a tour with the Go-Go's, celebrating the twenty-fifth anniversary of their debut album, Beauty and the Beat. The Go-Go's snarfed drugs and bedded groupies as insouciantly as they stormed the charts, but they've aged so well it could almost make a teetotaler think twice about spending a decade on a coke-fueled bender. Of course, Belinda Carlisle hasn't entirely defied the aging process. On the phone just prior to the tour, she had one request: "Can you speak up?" she asked. "The line's bad, and I'm deaf." — Sarah Hepola
So you live in the south of France. What do you see out of your window right now?
Mountains. Mountains and the Mediterranean and the Bay of Cannes. It's the best place. It really is heavenly.
You're on a twenty-fifth anniversary tour right now, and you're playing Beauty and the Beat from start to finish. Are there parts of the album you want to skip?
Oh, there's always stuff I want to skip, in any show. There's always some part where you want the drummer to play faster, but it just depends on the show. As far as songs, I really don't like singing "Turn to You." It's my least favorite. I just don't like it. It's a really hard song to pull off live, and I just don't think it's a good song. It's weird to be playing the entire album, in order, for the set. I always made a case in rehearsal not to do it that way. Usually, most bands putting together a set list want an ebb and flow, and it feels odd, because the only people who know it's in order are the real freaks. I mean, I wouldn't know the order of any album, with the exception of Queen 1 or Queen 2, so I wasn't too sure. But it does work.
You guys were infamous for wild backstage antics. Is there still some backstage action?
We've calmed down. Been there, done that. It doesn't seem that interesting to carry on like that. A few of us are wives and mothers, so we have some responsibilities. My son's gonna travel with me on this next leg, although generally, touring with my family is not something I like to do. It's difficult enough on your own.
Do guys still try to pick you up?
If they do it's guys who are twenty, twenty-five years younger than me. It's funny, I never really thought of myself that way. I always thought I was okay-looking, and then I look back on pictures of myself from thirty years ago, when I was in the punk scene, and I think I'm so cute. The green spiky hair and the little prom dresses. I think, wow, I was really an adorable teenager. But you have to look back on that stuff in retrospect. At the time, I never really felt that great about myself. I wish I could say I did.
Almost without exception, every article about you mentions your weight.
Oh, I know. It's gross. I mean, I'm normal. I'm not fat. At the time when the Go-Go's were a big deal, I was always referred to as "the pretty, plump one." I really didn't have a hang-up before we were up there for public consumption, before people I didn't even know were saying these things about me. My weight went up and down, and people would say things, like, "It looks like she's been eating too many jelly donuts backstage!" I'm a million times better now, but it's still a sensitive issue.
There's even more of a hysterical preoccupation with weight today in the American press. It's like I'm getting weekly updates on people's waist sizes.
It's revolting. I'm so glad I'm not bombarded with that crap. If I were, it would do my head in, honestly. This whole anorexic trend is revolting. It's not healthy. It's just all these wrong ideas about the way someone should look. I don't have to deal with that here, but in the States I notice it. After being in L.A. for a week, I started to feel a little fat and ugly. When I lived there, I had some real issues. But I've been in Europe for fourteen years now, and I just don't have to deal with it so much. And being a mother helps. Being a mother takes you out of yourself. You have a lot more things to worry about than food.
So the infamous Go-Go's roadie tape has been circulating [featuring several of the Go-Go's harassing a drunken roadie, and Carlisle babbling in a chemically induced haze]. What are your thoughts about that now?
[Groans] It's embarrassing and awful. If you're going to do something so stupid, don't do it on camera. It doesn't make me uncomfortable, because it was over twenty years ago, but I'll tell you what: It's a good anti-drug film. And it's something I really regret. It was complete stupidity.
There's a rumor that you're producing a movie about your life. Is that true?
No, no, I would never do a book about my life, or a movie, or anything. Never, ever. I don't know where that came from. I even read quotes from me talking about it, which is bizarre, but my manager made them retract it.
The quote had you saying you wanted to be played by Jessica Alba.
Oh God, no, no, I have no interest in airing my dirty laundry, far less in a movie. At one time the Go-Go's were gonna do a movie, and it fell through, and I'm kind of glad. It's something that's better left unsaid and not talked about. I don't want to cheapen anything I've done in the past.
And what about your French solo album?
I have an album coming out in September. It's an album of French classics by people like Serge Gainsbourg and Edith Piaf. It's classic French songs, done with Massive Attack and Portishead production. It's called Voila.
Is it hard to sing in French?
It's harder to speak in French than sing in French. But I'll tell you what. I worked my butt off for this album. It was the hardest thing I've ever done, and it turned out great.
Hilary Duff did a remake of the song "Our Lips Our Sealed" with her sister Haylie. Have you heard it?
I haven't. It was a big hit there, wasn't it? Wait, who did it again?
Hilary Duff.
No, I haven't heard it. She's a cute girl, and I'm sure she did a good job with it. But it's the writers who handle those things. And believe me, there are certain decisions I don't agree with. "We Got the Beef," for example, because it sends the wrong message.
"We Got the Beef?"
It was, I don't know, I think it was for Popeye's. Corporate sponsors, there are certain things we wouldn't do. But I'm not a writer on that song.
And now you're touring in your late forties. Do you still perform onstage barefoot?
Oh yeah, I kick my shoes off. It just depends.
That seems like it could be dangerous.
Yeah, I have glass and splinters in them sometimes. I try to wear comfortable shoes.
Copyright 2006, Sarah Hepola and hooksexup.com.