Bonus interview with Debbie Gibson

Here are more excerpts from my recent interview with Debbie Gibson, who is performing at the Tournament of Roses Parade in Pasadena, Calif. on New Year's Day...

Q: When it comes to recent past Rose Parade performers, you're in good company with people like Chaka Khan, Sheryl Crow, Jordan Sparks, Fitz and the Tantrums…

A: LeAnn Rimes. A lot of artists who I know and admire.

Q: There’s such a pageantry about it with the Rose Queen and her court, which really makes it stand out from other parades around the country.

A: I know...I love the word ‘pageantry.’ That is true. It has a traditional feeling, but they manage to keep it fresh every year. And again, they're always wanting to top themselves… [there has been some] back and forth on the arrangements. They're already into the choreography. A lot of work and care goes into this, so I'm super excited.

Q: Did you watch the parade as a kid?

A: Oh yeah, I've watched it over the years. I remember seeing Chaka [Khan].

Q: Your "Winterlicious" holiday album came out in 2022. When you were putting that together, did you find it daunting to write your own classic holiday songs?

A: I knew when I started organically writing these songs, probably three years before the album came out, I just felt like, ‘Oh boy, here we go! This is the start of my first ever holiday album.’ It's funny that it took a long time because a lot of times artists would have those few pop hits and the label was like, ‘Quick: Let's churn out a holiday record.’ And I always felt when it was that when it was a label or an artist capitalizing on a moment. 

I knew that I wanted to wait until I really felt like I had inspired songs that...would feel [not only] classic and cozy, but fresh and new at the same time.

Because I think that's what people want from a great holiday song. My friend Sylvia Maccalla wrote a song on the album. I very rarely record new original songs because I write a lot. But I heard her song, “I Wish Everyday Was Christmas.” I was like, ‘I need that if you're willing to part with it.’ And you're like, ‘Have I heard this before? Because it just feels so classic, you know?’ There’s such an energy about it and it does make you want it to be Christmas.

Q: I was pleasantly surprised that you covered the Anthony Newley/Leslie Bricusse hit “The  Candy Man,” famously recorded by Sammy Davis Jr. That was an interesting choice.

A: Thank you...Then songs like “The Gift” were really important to me to have that lush orchestra.I don't really focus on a material presence. I do, in terms of the thought being behind them, but truly, when you can gather with the people you love, it's everything. 

I wrote that song while at my longtime friend Ray Garcia's wedding to his now husband Darren. We were all gathered in Texas, and I remember there was like a fire drill going on in the hotel. So, they stuck a piece of paper with all the instructions under the door. That's what I wrote the song on.

I remember feeling like, ‘Wow, this huge Mexican family in Texas who could opt to be stuck in their old belief system is opting to embrace the love of a same sex couple. That really was a lot of the inspiration for the song. I felt like I felt the love from the two-year old to the 92-year-old that was at the wedding. It was just a celebration of love.

“Illuminate” for me is very special because I felt like there was a shortage of original Hanukkah music. In my shows very often now, I'll bring up everybody in the audience who celebrates Hanukkah, and it's usually not that many people. Again, now more than ever, I feel like marginalized communities need a light shone on them and they're in need of the love and the support that they so deserve.

And it speaks to having faith in the unseen, knowing that that oil that's only supposed to last for one night, to keep that candle burning for one night if it needs to burn for eight nights if you believe, if you have faith, then you will always have what you need. I think it's such a beautiful message in Hanukkah. Being able to record that song too was very special to me.

Q: “Cheers” is New Year’s Eve related to your father as well.

A: Yes. It's a very personal album. I hope that people hear it...It's just hearkening back to a time and a place that was so pure and celebratory.

Q: “The Body Remembers” has been out for a few years now. Are you satisfied with how it was received and how it turned out overall? Did you accomplish what you wanted to with it?

A: I did. I feel like, in the lane that that album’s in, I don't know if I'll ever make an album that I feel as great about again, in that dance [arena] like that, [where] so much attention to detail went into that album.

Being that I did a lot of it during the pandemic, there wasn't a lot of distraction. Right now, I always contemplate how the public wants their artists to live out loud and every minute on social media. It's hard to go deep within and come up with a masterful work that you really want to come up with because you're always having [to] put on this public face every day. I think that time really allowed me to go inward, quiet the noise and do the album the way I wanted it.

To come out with a double album and for it to be received in the way it was by Rolling Stone and by the fans put me back on my touring trajectory. I've been rebuilding my touring career ever since. I'm still thrilled with that album. I love it. I might even do a reissue and include some new tracks before I do the next album.

I feel like I'm not done with that album yet. I want that album to get me overseas. I want people to experience it more overseas. I feel like it has such a European dance flavor and Australian and, has Latin flavors. I feel like that album for me is timeless, but it still feels modern. I'm so thrilled with that album.

Q: I'll bet your fans, with this album and the Christmas one, were really excited about your duets with Joey McIntyre.

A: Yes. I love my pop [music] mate Joey McIntyre. The audiences loved it. I mean, the biggest comment I got was the fans said, ‘It's our idol and our crush together.’ I'm like, ‘Wow, that's powerful.’ That's not wasted on me that he and I could team up in that way. I picture these fans as little girls and little boys with their Bop! Magazine and Teen Beat. We were both up there…he and I are so similar in our work ethic and how we're always wanting to top ourselves with what we're doing. We're both Broadway kids and all that. I know Betty Who is a Broadway baby as well. I'm super excited to meet her.

There's so much in common and that was such a magical thing to collaborate with him and to do Vegas. We did a mini residency in Vegas together. Having Joey on both records really was a thrill for me.

Q: Since you've been doing the “Electric Youth: 35^th Anniversary” tours, both stripped and electric, throughout the year, I was curious about your doing those songs again, some of which you hadn't performed in a while. Did you have a new appreciation on some of the songs that maybe you didn't perform in a long time? 

A: I did. On the shows where I did the full band with a lot of the original singers, dancers, and musicians – revisiting songs like “Love Under My Pillow,” which was never released - performing that live on the “Around the World” DVD; VHS. A lot of the fans had a soft spot for that song, and I hadn't performed it in decades. That was amazing.

Then doing the stripped-down version, “Acoustic Youth,” when I'd open the show and I'd sit at the piano and I would do “Who Loves Ya Baby,” you know it's very easy to hear an upbeat song and it could be like a drive by. Everybody's singing and dancing and when you can strip a song down and you know just the lyrics about a busy life and not enough time to look in the mirror, life in the fast lane. It really speaks to how chaotic people's lives can get, the meaning of connection and the meaning of knowing who the real deal people are in your life. And leaning into them and rooting for people.

All the deeper messages in the songs really came to light and I discovered new things about them every night I performed them. I was very in-the-moment with the audiences…it's been a year of feeling very alive, very present, very connected to my audience, very in the moment. And looking back while looking forward at the same time, which is a fascinating place to be.

Q: While singing those “Electric Youth” songs, in the back of your mind, did you ever think, ‘How did I get through that crazy era?’

A: You know, it was definitely fast and furious. I always say to my audiences now, and I tell myself all the time to be sure to take things in now because everything was moving so fast back then. Now I savor every moment and take it all in which is the difference in this era, which is why this era is now my favorite. It really is.

Q: I watched a recent TV morning show interview where you were talking about the 1980s and said something like the reason many people still tend to gravitate toward 1980s music is because a lot of it was so hopeful and people like you, Tiffany and Belinda Carlisle made music that was like a warm blanket wrapped around people.

A: It is. I think now, more than ever, people need their old friends gathered around and those melodies that they held dear. I feel like these songs accompany people on their journey. I constantly get told, people come up to me and they talk about how they had a difficult childhood and how this music and I was there for them. I go, ‘I'm so honored that without actually being in the room, I was in the room, and I was able to provide something for people through my music, which feels surreal because I was just doing what I love to do.

Yes, I do think that the acts of that era, there's a lot of us who are around and…in this new vital chapter. It's really cool to see my contemporaries out there as well [keeping things fresh].