State of Grace

GRACE JONES statuesque singer, androgynous actress, majestic model, exotic entertainer, difficult diva has just got her period. Not only is this monthly annoyance undoubtedly pretty inconvenient for her, but it s also a bit of a downer for me. For a start, it delays our scheduled meeting by 24 hours. Grace just got her period today, her manager John Pelosi confided down the phone, and she doesn t feel like talking to anybody. She gets pretty bad cramps, you know. She might be up for it tomorrow.
It also makes me even more nervous than I d already been prior to being given this rather alarming piece of information. Jones has a reputation for being a formidable interviewee at the best of times an aloof, haughty and easily irritated character who doesn t suffer fools, journalists or anybody else she doesn t happen to agree with, gladly. (Arnold Schwarzenegger himself actually complained about her being too tough on the set of Conan The Destroyer).
In fact, not only does she not suffer them, she s also been known to hit them, something which Russell Harty painfully discovered when they had their now infamous televised row back in the late 80s.
Suffice to say, I was somewhat worried as I walked the lengthy hallway of her luxurious Manhattan apartment shortly before 10pm on St Patrick s night, having finally been given the go-ahead to pull up to her bumper for a couple of hours. This is only the beginning, John Pelosi laughed, as we negotiated our way through the huge piles of bags and luggage that were clogging the hall. She s off to Monaco in the morning to play a gig for Prince Rainier s birthday and when Grace travels, she doesn t travel light.
Jones was sitting alone at a table when we entered the atmospherically lit living room, eating a light dinner and watching a movie on what was quite literally the largest TV screen I ve ever seen. I m sorry, I ll just be a few more minutes, she called over in her hugely affected accent, sounding somewhat like a Jamaican Zsa Zsa Gabor. Pour yourself a glass of wine or champagne and we ll get started as soon as I ve brushed my teeth.
In the unlikely event that anybody didn t realise that Grace Jones is a big star (and has been for over 20 years), then they d certainly know it within seconds of entering her living room. Every available inch of wall space is covered with framed pictures, posters, and magazine and album covers from various stages of her illustrious career one which has taken her from the catwalks of Paris to classic Studio 54 and Island recordings (including Warm Leatherette, Living My Lifer and Nightclubbing), to roles in movies as diverse as Siesta, Straight To Hell and the Bond picture A View To A Kill. A huge Andy Warhol original portrait of her hangs on one wall, a picture by her former lover and stylist Jean Paul Goude on another. The mantlepiece over the fire is jammed with various awards and sculptures of her impressively sharp features, as is the top of the grand piano in the corner of the room.
As it turns out, my fears of a frosty interview were totally unfounded. Still strikingly beautiful, Jones proved to be a real sweetheart flirtatious, friendly and constantly laughing. Luckily, she only hit me once in the whole time I spent with her. I was lighting a cigarette from the butt of another and she slapped me on the hand, scolding, You smoke too much!
Hey, I was still a bit nervous . . .

OLAF TYARANSEN: So, what have you been up to for the last few years, Grace?
GRACE JONES: I ve been doing a lot of stuff. I just haven t done a whole lot publicly recently, at least not with music. We recorded an album but we didn t release it. But we released some singles on and off since then. We did Sex Drive , then after that I worked with Tricky on three tracks. We didn t release them but it s been kinda black-marketed though we did put a halt to that (smiles). I did some stuff with Lil Kim as well. And I did a track for The Avengers soundtrack and that received very good reviews. The movie didn t but the soundtrack did. And I ve been doing basic touring and stuff. I just made a movie in Morocco called Shaka Zulu. And I m in the middle of writing my first film as well.
What s it about?
Jamaica. It s to be shot in Jamaica. Chris Blackwell s [founder of Island Records - OT] involved in it as well.
Why didn t you release the album you recorded?
I think what happened was we were just knocking our heads against the wall trying to get it done and . . . (pauses). The material was really good, but some of it was just not recorded properly. Like, we couldn t get a good mix because the whole sampling thing was happening and we got these guys from San Francisco to work on the record. And little by little they wanted to produce more and more of the songs and they put very heavy sampling on everything and, in the end, all the material just got wasted. So we still have the material but I don t know what ll happen with it. I guess . . . (Telephone rings). Oh hang on, I d better answer this.
[Richard Bernstein, the artist who designed a number of her early album covers, is on the line. He s downstairs in the lobby with some prescription drugs to help relieve her period cramps. Grace presses a button on the phone to open the door.]
Did you just open the door with your telephone?
Yeah. You just enter a code and it opens the downstairs door.
Do you like technological devices generally?
No. Yeah. I mean, I like them but I don t like wasting time with them really. I mean, I call it a waste of time because I don t see where it s that necessary for me really. I m suspicious of too much technology, you know? Like the TV. Every now and then you hear, like, police talking or something you hear these strange voices and things coming out of the TV, and I m thinking ahhhhhh (laughs).
Actually, I saw Enemy Of The State on the plane over yesterday . . .
Wasn t that such a scary movie! Wow! I think technology is great when you have something specific to use it for. Like, the Internet and all that stuff I ve heard a lot of stuff about me on the Internet that is not true at all. Oh my God, it s amazing. But even things like cell phones I ve never had one. So I m not particularly into all that kinda stuff.
I hear you turned down a proposed collaboration with Tom Jones recently.
Yeah. Nowadays there is a lot of collaboration stuff going on, and basically I like to do my own collaborations first before I do the collaborations that other people would want me to do, you know. And the one collaboration I m working on is with Stevie Wonder. I ve always wanted to work with him. We re going to be working together over the next couple of months, and possibly on the soundtrack for the Shaka Zulu movie as well. If I hear something, and I like the track a lot, then I will do it. I won t just say no off the bat because of who it is, you know.
Would you consider doing something like drum n bass remixes of any of your older material?
I don t think it s necessary. We just did the double album, Private Life, and that has a couple of tracks that were never released. There were some new mixes on that. But I don t personally want to go into the studio and do new vocals to an old track, because I do that anyway when I perform. I always give a new interpretation with the performances. Otherwise I would never record, do you know what I mean? In a way what we did with Tricky was kind of like that. We did it, I performed it, but it s not on a record yet. Oh, hi Richard!
[Richard Bernstein enters the room with a young male friend in tow. Grace is grateful for the pills he s brought her, but not so happy when Bernstein attempts to engage me in conversation.
Richard, you re hogging the interview, she mock scolds. This is my interview, not yours! There s some wine and champagne in the fridge so get yourself a clean glass if you can find one and then go and sit over there until we re finished. There s probably some glasses in the dishwasher. Bernstein apologises profusely and goes to the fridge. Jones turns to me and smiles sweetly.]
You were asking me about technology. I like dishwashers. I hate microwaves but dishwashers are great!
You ve lost a lot of friends in the last few years . . .
Yeah. A lot of my friends passed away. A lot of my artist friends died from AIDS. And people like Andy Warhol . . . (pauses). I lost them all in a very short space of time too, it was very weird. So I moved back to Paris after that, I was living in Paris for a while. But Richard s a very good friend. He used to design my covers.
Have you slowed your lifestyle down as a result of that period?
No, not at all (laughs).
So you re still madly decadent then?
No, I wouldn t say decadent. Maybe eccentric is a better word. I mean . . . (pauses). I m still eccentric I would say. Or femme fatale. I don t know which one it is (laughs).
What s your favourite drug?
I love the hallucinogenics, I think. But of course one has to be very (pauses). I did it and I thought I learned a lot from it.
Have you ever tried Ecstasy?
I did it when it first came out, when it was legal, before it was illegal. With Timothy Leary, actually. He was one of my best friends, you know. But I liked it. I don t think they should have banned it. I think what happens is when the drugs become illegal, then you have them being made and being tampered with, and not being supervised properly and all of that. So I m not just one to go out there and just take things from anybody. I d rather go to a doctor (laughs).
You never really screwed up on anything, did you?
No. a
But I guess you knew a lot of people who did . . .
Well, there are addicts everywhere in the business. And of course, I ve seen people that abuse. I didn t have a problem with use, I had problems with abuse. I think one also has to know oneself very, very well. Because what works for one person may not work for another. My brother can t take one drink, and he didn t realise that until he got really messed up with it. That it causes a chemical imbalance. I had a girlfriend like that once too, she was a model. She couldn t take one drink something would click and she would just go completely berserk. So then some people have addictive personalities, whether it s eating, or whatever. For me, people who overeat might as well be doing drugs. There are kids slowly killing themselves with food. They ll probably live longer than those on drugs but they re still killing themselves. I don t like to judge, I can t give advice when it s different for everybody in the world.
Weren t you busted for cocaine possession in the late 80s?
But that was a set-up! (Outraged) I got acquitted! I m doing another movie after this one about that. That was a triangle of jealousy and I m lucky I came out of it alive! I heard them plotting to kill me! I don t want to mention any names. But it was someone working in the studio in Jamaica where I was recording, and she was in love with the producer, who was in love with me. Anyway, it sounds very corny, but I went for a whole year going back and forth for the trial, because even the judges weren t showing up. It became a fiasco. Because I think, from what I understood from one judge, they knew the girl personally and they knew of her role in all of that. So the judges . . . (pauses). It s mostly female judges in Jamaica. So the story was pretty much out there, everybody knew about it except me, so I kind of just walked into it thinking I could take care of myself. She had a whole web of intrigue crawling towards me. That s my next project. It was just unreal, the story. Horrible! Ugh!
Sounds like a nightmare! What s been your worst experience?
I ve had a few. I was run over by a boat once in Jamaica and that was scary. I had about four trips when I started going back to Jamaica that were quite scary. I thought that there was something that I had to come to terms with with Jamaica, after I had left and went back. I know a lot of my family there was very much against what I was doing, so it was quite scary for a while there. I mean, looking death in the face was kind of scary. I can deal with sickness, and still feel there s hope, it ll pass. Death is just so permanent. Even though we talk about life after death and all that, but there s still questions. Not knowing that s scary. I tend to forget the bad things. I tend to kind of block them out. I would have to think about it. But probably what you think is a bad experience for me, maybe wasn t. I always think that if you can learn from a bad experience, it s no longer a bad experience.
Have you had any stalkers or nasty experiences with obsessive fans?
I can t worry about it (shrugs). Of course I have encountered it. One guy used to leave me letters at my door. I don t know how he got up here, how he knew where I lived, but he wanted to marry me. People threatened to kill my family because they said I stole their ideas. But you know, they have detectives who hunt these people down, they can tell you if they are mentally deranged, if they are escaped from somewhere and if you should worry. But you can t worry, you know? I walk around, I don t go out with bodyguards or anything like that, because I don t see any reason why anyone would want to do a number on me.
Is it true you got married again recently?
Yeah, but it was for the first time. Just three years back. My husband s name is Attila . . .
The hun?
Well, more the hunk! (laughs).
Where is he at the moment?
He s in the bedroom. He s very tired. Kinda tied up at the moment (laughs).
Are you religious at all?
I believe in all the religions so long as they are positive. But I m not saying I don t believe in evil. I do believe in evil. Evil exists, of course. But I believe that all the religions are basically the same.
Well, they all think they re right.
Yeah, every religion thinks it s the right religion, and that alone I think is a sin. (laughs).
Your brothers are both fairly well known preachers, aren t they?
Uh hmm. One s older and one s younger. One is very, very famous lots of celebrities go to hear him. Noel Jones. My great grandmother was half Scottish but that s another story. I think that s basically kept me grounded. I mix my reality the reality I have is mine. My fantasies I share!! (laughs).
You mentioned earlier that your family doesn t approve of what you do. Did you have a happy childhood?
I was brought up with a lot of discipline in Jamaica. Heavy, excessive discipline. It was a bit harsh. Once I realised that everybody else wasn t being treated like that. When I was growing up, I thought that s the way the world was. So I thought it was normal until I got out of it.
So your whole career has really been an act of rebellion against your parents then?
A lot of it (nods). I do believe that mistakes sometimes are good mistakes. Like being brought up too strictly for me, that was a mistake. Not mine, it was out of my control. But I still have been able to use it positively in my work.
What was their reaction to the Playboy shoot you did with (then boyfriend) Dolph Lundgren?
I don t think they actually saw it (laughs). If they did they didn t let me know. But my mom did come to a couple of shows where I have taken off my top. Not for sexual connotations at all, but because I felt still very much dressed without my top on and if I get very hot onstage, I will take stuff off (laughs). Usually it s pretty crowded, hot, packed, and I will take the audience usually on a global experience. I travel in my body and in my mind in all the songs. Because I have written a lot of them as well, so when I perform them, I travel to where they take me. In my Jamaican guise, I would actually go not really to Jamaica, but actually Africa. The hot sun, no bra, no top. Everything would change, not just the fact that I would take off some clothes. The whole interpretation would take me to where I was going.
Do they ever take you to dark places?
Of course. Oh yeah. Sure. It just comes. I let it come.
Are you a moody person?
Only once a month! (laughs). I would say I m more schizophrenic than moody, meaning I have multiple personalities. There are a few there. Not just girls, either. I can easily jump into a man. I know they call me androgynous, but it is. I had a lot of male domination growing up, and I can easily synthesise it. Why are you laughing?
Sorry, I m just thinking of what you did to Russell Harty!
Ah yes, good old Russell!!!! (erupts with laughter).
What s been the proudest moment of your life?
There s been a couple. I think my son is one of the proudest, I would have to say. You ll see real pride come out of me when I look at him. I m a proud person anyway. I think that s just in my blood, I can t help that. Too much pride isn t good, but I can t help that too. I love my work, and I m proud that I m doing what I love doing.
You do quite a lot singing, modelling, acting and so on. What do you describe yourself as on your passport?
I put Entertainer . Or President (laughs).
Speaking of Presidents, what do you make of the whole Clinton affair?
I don t think about it. I get upset when everyone else is delving into the private life of a person we re all humans here, we re not Gods. We all have, and always have, some bullshit in our lives that we carry on with. So I m not one to judge, and I feel it s very unfair to waste taxpayers money harassing somebody like that.
What kind of mother are you? A strong disciplinarian?
No. I don t believe in strong discipline. I believe in mental discipline. I m not one of those moms that doesn t let the child go when they re a certain age. I think that you have to give responsibilities from a pretty early age. I ve always treated my son as as much of an adult as possible, because I think that parents too often think of their kids as not intelligent. I think it s important not to talk goo-goo gah-gah , you know. Even when he couldn t speak I still never talked that garbage to him.
So he s very sweet, very nice and we have a lot of love. We try to keep negativity away as much as possible when you re bringing them up. Of course, there is negative stuff out there, but I think it s important that you raise a child positively. I never used the word no to him. Or don t .
What age is he?
He s 19. He lives in England. He was studying in St. Paul s in Paris and now he s in Cambridge. He went to art school and now he s getting into music. He does composing, plays piano and keyboards.
Given the number of friends you ve lost to AIDS, did you ever lecture him about safe sex?
I didn t embarrass him (laughs). I simply snuck condoms into his bag. In his schoolbag, and he knew that it was from me. He came home and he was like, oh, mom, you re so crazy! (laughs). And I just said, oh well . I don t call that crazy, when a kid is 13 or 14. When his parents don t think sex is a bad thing, that it s a natural thing. So we talk very openly about everything. I m happy to say that we re friends. As much as a lot of parents think that you should be a parent and not a friend, I think that being friends is even more important.
I m happy that we have a very good relationship. He can tell me anything, to do with drugs, sex, relationships, and I know him very well, so I know when to talk to him, and when to get him to talk. Usually it s just before he goes to bed, just before he goes to sleep, it s like a vulnerable moment, there. Because sometimes you can t just come out, if you see something is wrong, and say tell me what s wrong , they ll clam up. So I try for the most relaxed period.
Would you like to have any more kids?
Would I want to? I haven t really thought about it. I m very happy with him, and right now, I m on what I call a new turn in my career, wanting not to do the same routine. That s why when we were doing the record, I went to Chris [Blackwell] afterwards when we decided not to release it. We worked for about three years, spent almost a million dollars. And to step back, and say, no, I m not going to put it out , when everybody thought it was coming out that s why I don t say when something s going to happen any more. Anyway, I m too busy.
I understand you ve been modelling Philip Treacey s hats recently.
Yeah, he s from Ireland originally, isn t he? Yeah. He might be coming with us, because I work a lot. But I find him to be really an artist. I call him the mad hatter . I love that title. We did a show here in New York, and just now in London during the fashion week. I did it with him because I love what he does, and I use his stuff in my show, in my concerts. And I hadn t modelled for a long time.
Why did you take a break from modelling?
I gave it up. Basically, I didn t have time. But I did it for him.
If you had a daughter would you like to see her modelling?
Em, I don t know . . . (pauses). Take Naomi, for instance. I know Naomi, I like Naomi very much. I do know that if she were my daughter, I don t know if I would have started her at such an early age.
But that s just my opinion. As a part-time thing I do I think it s great. But I think that one tends to lose balance, when you re so young and all of that comes. That world is a very phoney world. A lot of the people are only there for you while you re hot, and as soon as
they think you re acting a little too hoity or whatever, they try to pull you down. She, unfortunately, did get a lot of that. She worked with us for a show here. We used to spend a lot of time together. There s a lot of jealousy, so people do not really tell you the truth a lot of
the time.
Have you experienced much of this kind of jealousy?
Oh, you know, I m aware that it s around, but I don t give it any energy at all, because it s negative energy.
Do you read your press?
Very little. I don t go out to look for it. I stopped my clippings service. I used to have a clippings service. I won t say I love journalists either . . .
Thanks a bunch!
That s alright (laughs). No, I think that they are necessary, but I do find that there s a lot of integrity that s cropped out on the bottom there. A lot of phonies get into journalism these days; it seems to me that a lot of them don t study, never did. A lot of them are not artistically into their work. A lot of journalists these days are only interested in making that great name by defacing people, or scandalising, and I don t call that journalism. I do think that there are great journalists, and I hope that they will surface in the future.
I worked with a couple of very good ones, like Nick Cohn, who wrote Saturday Night Live. He did one of the most amazing articles. Very good writing. It wasn t something that praised me either, but it was an interesting article that had depth, imagination, that had feeling a sense of smell and touch, things that when you write, or see a good movie, it surrounds you. I m in search of good journalism, still, actually. Like, I ve done interviews and read the article, and it was nothing like it at all. I could have just stayed at home and not wasted the time, because a lot of the time, most journalists either all ask the same questions, or they already have something in mind about the way they re going to write it before they even speak to you.
You don t seem to do all that many interviews these days.
No, I don t do much press these days.
Have you ever sued for anything?
No, I would never waste my energy doing that either. Because otherwise you just end up with lawsuits all the time, they take up a lot of time, you d have no space for anything else. I love to watch movies. I m thinking of directing this film too. I love to write. I love to mix, combining, taking true history and then adding other layers. That s how I m writing this film about Jamaica. It s going to be based on a true story, but it s going to have other fictional levels. I think it s important not to know sometimes when reality ends and fantasy begins (laughs).
Do you apply the same rules to your day to day life?
No. I m a very down to earth person. I m Taurus with Capricorn rising, I don t think you can get more earthy than that.
How do you relax or unwind?
I love water, I love water sports, I love flying. I like to fly. Being in the air. I d love to be able to fly too, actually. One of the things I really want to do before I leave this world. I love to travel. We have a show in a couple of days in Monte Carlo for Prince Rainier s 50th anniversary, and inclusive in the deal, we have a week s holiday. So that s how I do it. I probably won t have time to come back here before I go to Paris, then Spain, then Dublin. I was in Bali for a while as well. I loved it. See, that s how I included a holiday there too. So I always get the vacation attached to the work.
Are you healthy? Do you exercise all the time?
Yeah, but I like my lazy days too. I do indulge in being lazy when I can, because it doesn t happen very often. Usually I have to worry about not getting sick, because I have to travel, perform. I m vain that way and I still love to have a good time, so I think it s a very good balance. I did go very extreme. If I feel like not sleeping, I won t sleep. I won t take something to sleep because everybody says it s bed time now. If I feel like staying up, or worshipping the sun coming up, or just jamming on the piano . . . (pauses). I don t keep sleep hours. I can wake up at four and cook dinner. Four in the morning!
I see you have a housekeeper. Do you actually cook yourself or just drag her out of bed?
Of course I can cook! (laughs). Actually, I have a very normal side. I like to cook, I expect that s being normal. I make great Jamaican chicken. And steak. I kept doing the same thing over and over until I got it perfect.
Are you looking forward to visiting Ireland?
Yeah, very much so. I ve never been there before. I dunno, I was supposed to go a couple of times and there was always some problems either politically or whatever. It was just always something that never came through, you know. Two or three times I was supposed to go. What s the weather like?
It s pretty wet most of the time.
Well, it must be good for the skin then. Everyone I know from Ireland has beautiful skin. No really!! The sun isn t good for the skin anymore.
Where are you planning on spending New Year s this year?
I m not sure yet. We have a few offers, but we haven t decided yet. There will be a concert though. I ve worked every New Year except one in the last 20 years. So wherever it is, it ll be somewhere special. n
Grace Jones plays HQ at the Hot Press Irish Music Hall of Fame from 9-11th April.