Willy DeVille

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Willy DeVille on his 2001 album Horse of a Different Color
Willy DeVille on his 2001 album Horse of a Different Color

Willy DeVille, singer and songwriter, was born William Borsay in Stamford, Connecticut on August 25, 1950. Critic Robert Palmer wrote about him in 1980, "Mr. DeVille is a magnetic performer, but his macho stage prescence camouflages an acute musical intelligence; his songs and arrangements are rich in ethnic rhythms and blues echoes, the most disparate stylistic references, yet they flow seamslessly and hang together solidly. He embodies (New York's) tangle of cultural contradictions while making music that's both idiomatic, in the broadest sense, and utterly original." [1]

Contents

[edit] Career

As a teenager, DeVille had a band named Billy and the Kids. He moved to London looking to form a band, but was unsuccessful finding like-minded musicians. Eventually, he landed in San Francisco, where he formed a band with bassist Rubén Sigüenza and drummer Tom "Manfred" Allen. The band played under the names Billy DeSade & the Marquis and the Lazy Eights before settling on the name Mink DeVille. Later, DeVille took the band to New York City, where they helped to pioneer punk rock music and were one of the original house bands at CBGB, the New York nighclub where punk rock music was born in the mid-1970s.

The typical DeVille song -- if any of his songs can be called "typical" -- is filled with romantic conviction and yearning. Latin rhythms, blues riffs, strains of country music, and echoes of early-1960s uptown soul can be heard in DeVille's work. "Spanish Stroll" was a hit in the U.S. and the UK in 1977; "Storybook Love" (nominated for an Academy Award in 1987) is the theme song of the movie The Princess Bride; DeVille's "Just to Walk that Little Girl Home" (co-authored with Doc Pomus) can be heard in the movie "The Pope of Greenwich Village"; and his "It's So Easy" can be heard in the movie "Cruising.". His song "Assassin of Love" was used in the British film version of Martin Amis' novel The Rachel Papers in 1989, which helped make him known in the UK.

Why DeVille isn't as popular as, for example, Bruce Springsteen, and why DeVille isn't as popular in America as Europe, will always be a mystery to his fans. DeVille suffered from drug addiction for many years, which stifled his career. Among musicians and songwriters, he is highly respected. Songwriter Doc Pomus said about Deville, "He knows the truth of a city street and the courage in a ghetto love song." Robert Palmer wrote, "Certainly his music had an authenticity, a kind of New York soul, that few of his fellow travelers on the punk-rock circuit even aspired to."[2]

DeVille has homes in New Orleans and Mississippi.

[edit] Discography

With Mink DeVille

  • Live at CBGB’s (Umfug) 1976
  • Mink Deville (in the U.S.) Cabretta (in Europe) (Capitol) 1977 (Era) 1993
  • Return to Magenta (Capitol) 1978 (Era) 1993
  • Le Chat Bleu (Capitol) 1980 (Era) 1993 (Aus. Raven) 2003
  • Coup de Grâce (Atlantic Records) 1981
  • Savoir Faire (Capitol) 1981
  • Where Angels Fear to Tread (Atlantic) 1983
  • Sportin' Life (Atlantic) 1985

Willy DeVille

  • Victory Mixture (Orleans) 1990 (Blue Moon) 2003
  • Backstreets of Desire (UK EastWest) 1992 (Forward) 1994
  • Big Easy Fantasy (Fr. New Rose) 1995
  • Loup Garou (UK EastWest) 1995 (Discovery) 1996
  • Best Of (UK Wagram) 1996
  • Miracle (A&M) 1987 (Aus. Raven) 1997
  • Love & Emotion: The Atlantic Years (UK WEA) 1999
  • Horse of a Different Color (UK EastWest) 2001
  • Crow Jane Alley (Eagle) 2004

Acoustic Willy DeVille Trio

  • In Berlin (Eagle) 2003

[edit] DVD

  • The Berlin Concerts – EMS (2dvd special edition) 2002 [Disc one - Unplugged in Berlin Columbia Hall / Disc two - Live at The Metropol - Berlin]
  • Willy DeVille Live in the Lowlands (Eagle Vision) 2006

[edit] References

  1. ^ Palmer, Robert (September 18, 1980) "Pop: Willy DeVille Band." New York Times; p. C32.
  2. ^ Palmer, Robert (April 20, 1981) "Willie Deville and Band." New York Times.

[edit] External links

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