Fear is a Woman’s Best Friend [Interview

Interviewed by Emily Carney

Deerfrance is best known as John Cale’s backup vocalist from 1978 to 1981. However, she is also notable for her own inspired excursions into music and has been pursuing a brilliant solo career as of late with Extra Virgin Mary.

In John Cale’s autobiography, What’s Welsh for Zen, Deerfrance wrote copiously about her experiences as Cale’s backup vocalist, completely covering both the front and back pages of the beautifully constructed book. She also accounts for Cale’s outrageous sense of humor and humanity, as well as his more hilarious exploits, like his preference for wearing costumes—and sometimes Hawaiian shirts—onstage.

I recently had the opportunity to interview Deerfrance about her time with John Cale’s band, and her other forays into music. Her answers are all-encompassing and most revealing about her life and times in the post-punk era (and beyond). And of course she discusses Cale’s love of costumes.

Popshifter: Because I wasn’t there. . . what was the post-punk scene like in the late 1970s and early 1980s? Set the scene for me.

Deerfrance: Manhattan was a wasteland due to the recession and the end of the Vietnam War. Vets were walking the streets armed and dangerous and the Bowery was a destination for malcontents.

In the beginning (1973), CBGBs was more a country/biker bar, owned by Hilly Kristal. I was singing with the first guy Hilly ever backed; that’s how I wound up there. He ripped Hilly off and I went to Max’s ’til the end of ’74.

I started working at the new Punk Magazine and would walk down to CBs after work to see Television and Ramones and of course, Patti Smith, who I had been seeing since ’74 at Max’s. I was asked to work the door at CBs and then started dating Fred Smith of Television. I stayed with Cale ’til mid-1980 when I went to Paris and recorded with Ramuntcho Matta.