Laurie Anderson

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Glen Ellyn, Illinois, United States (1947 – present)

Laurie Anderson is an American experimental performance artist, visual artist and musician. Regardless of the medium, a common characteristic of all her work seems to be the act of storytelling.

Laura Phillips Anderson was born June 5, 1947, in Glen Ellyn, Illinois, United States. She attended Mills College in California, and eventually graduated from Barnard College magna cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa, studying art history. In 1972, she obtained an MFA in sculpture from Columbia University.

She performed in New York through the 1970s. Two early pieces, “New York Social Life” and “Time to Go,” were included in the 1977 compilation New Music for Electronic and Recorded Media, along with works by Pauline Oliveros and others.

She became more widely known in 1982 with the single “O Superman,” originally released in a limited quantity by One Ten Records; a sudden influx of orders from the U.K. (prompted by British DJ John Peel playing the record) led to Anderson signing with the Warner Brothers label, which re-released the single. “O Superman” reached number two on the national pop charts in Britain.

“O Superman” was part of a larger stage work entitled United States and was included on her following album, Big Science. Her more recent stage work includes a multimedia presentation inspired by Moby Dick. She starred in and directed the 1986 concert film, Home of the Brave, and also composed the soundtracks for the Spalding Gray films Swimming to Cambodia and Monster in a Box. All of Anderson’s albums from the 1980s sold very well despite being labeled “avant garde”.

Tagged as:

experimental, avant-garde, female vocalists, electronic, spoken word
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Big Science
Laurie Anderson
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Mister Heartbreak
Laurie Anderson
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Strange Angels
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Bright Red - Tightrope
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Top Tracks

1	O Superman (For Massenet)	202
2	O Superman	163
3	From the Air	144
4	Big Science	125
5	Born, Never Asked	117
6	Sweaters	100
7	It Tango	94
8	Let X=x	89
9	Speak My Language	88
10	Example #22	87
11	Walking & Falling	85
12	Sharkey's Night	70
13	World Without End	66
14	Strange Angels	63
15	Excellent Birds	61

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riigo wrote:
Sunday morning

Who cares about riigo. [2]

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queerella wrote:
last week

laurieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee come out to plaaaayyyyyyyy

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aermancer wrote:
11 days ago

Every time I listen to "O Superman" I cry. It sounds so sad to me!

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corazonmani wrote:
15 days ago

Sharkey's daaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy

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poor-de-chirico wrote:
last month

Because it's an otherworldly experience. She's really beyond a lot of what others have achieved musically and artistically. Spirituality does not imply superstition; that's religion. Spirituality is communal and unity with other humans and the workings of the world/universe. It makes sense.

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hazel_figurine wrote:
last month

But what's spiritual about the experience? If anything it's overwhelmingly psychological realization. She's posing big critical questions about how we're so capable of things yet fail so often to make things good, or to do the right thing. Her interest in linguistics and technology and modernism are all aspects of a humanistic outlook, IMHO. It's a shocking experience, listening to Laurie Anderson, and a beautiful and overwhelming one too, but it's about species-essence, not some kind of soulful superstition.

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bufo_alvarius wrote:
last month

I totally agree with prolixprotist. Believe it or not... i-ve just listened Big Science for the first time and im still in shock. Now I understand a lot of things....

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queerella wrote:
September 2009

still no news on Homeland ? this is getting sorta cruel now...

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punchinthekiss wrote:
September 2009

Who cares about riigo.

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hazel_figurine wrote:
August 2009

I don't know about spiritual... She's certainly into the idea that what we do is useless and beautiful at the same time. Like... we can put people on the moon, but we'd rather have drive through bank machines. There's a spoken word piece on Live At Town Hall about a book, The Gospel Of Germs, that kind of talks about that.

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prolixprotist wrote:
August 2009

big science is a spiritual experience.

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el_yucatan wrote:
August 2009

She's close to everything men and women are not.

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queerella wrote:
August 2009

u oh rigo found Laurie

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riigo wrote:
August 2009

-.-

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FijneWIET wrote:
August 2009

I don't think Laurie is holding it back, it's more likely that Nonesuch has second thoughts about the album. I bet they want things changed or won't get approval to release it.

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davidbowiegirl wrote:
August 2009

Laurie and Lou's coming to Finland?!? Wow, didn't know that :o

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ffxi_frohike wrote:
July 2009

Come oooooooon!

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poor-de-chirico wrote:
July 2009

She has been promising it for awhile... hrm.

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queerella wrote:
July 2009

come oooon ! Homeland ???

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sophteonal wrote:
July 2009

http://www.laurieanderson.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=362 I'd assume recording would be done by now...there are some short excerpts posted on the site, but I don't know how long they've been up. There hasn't been an update in quite a while. Hopefully it'll still be in 2009...

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