Style icon, model for Azzedine Alaia, Yves Saint Laurent, Claude Montana, Kenzo, Issey Miyake and Thierry Mugler and cover of ELLE Vogue, Grace Jones broke with gender concepts between 1970 and 1980.
Her skin tone, slender body and Flat Top haircut immortalized a modern, contemporary and minimalist image in a time of excess. Grace was the precursor of androgyny when few knew what it was.
Success model
Grace Jones Essence Magazine @ Anthony Barboza
Born in Spanish Town, Jamaica, on May 19, 1948, Grace Beverly Jones moved with her family to Syracuse, New York (USA), when she was a teenager. She studied theater at the city’s University while taking her first steps as a model.
Grace Jones uses model Azzedine Alaia @ disclosure
At 18, he moved to New York to sign a contract with Wilhermina Cooper’s trendy modeling agency. She was soon sent to Paris, who fell in love with her unique personality, androgyny and skin tone.
He walked the catwalks for Yves Saint Laurent, Claude Montana, Kenzo, Issey Miyake and Thierry Mugler. She has been on the cover of Vogue, ELLE and Stern. She worked with photographers Jean-Paul Goude (who chose her as his muse), Helmut Newton, Guy Bourdin and Hans Feurer. She became the face of Azzedine Alaia’s campaigns. She was a muse of Andy Warhol, Keith Haring and Robert Mapplethorpe.
He shared an apartment with Jessica Lange and Jerry Hall. With the latter, she frequented the dance floor at Le Sept, the most famous LGBTQIAP+ club of the 1970s and 1980s, where she met Giorgio Armani and Karl Lagerfeld. Grace starred on singer Billy Paul’s album “Eboby Woman” in 1973.
Grace Jones @ Robert Mapplethorpe
Disco Queen
In 1975 he released the single “I Need a Man”. It didn’t attract attention. He recorded “That’s The Trouble” and “Sorry”. They were successful on the Disco tracks. As a result, the record label Beam Junction hired producer Tom Moulton and remixed “I Need a Man”, which became a hit and entered the Billboard chart. This version was included on the soundtrack of the global soap opera “Sem Lenço Sem Documento”, in 1977.
In the same year, Grace signed a contract with Island Records and released “Portfolio”. Side A of the original vinyl record featured songs from Broadway musicals: Stephen Sondheim’s “Send in the Clowns” from A Little Night Music, “What I Did for Love” from A Chorus Line, and “Tomorrow” from Annie.
Side B began with a very personal reinterpretation by Jones of the song “La Vie en Rose” – a signature song by Édith Piaf (her own lyrics with a melody by Louis Guglielmi in 1945). It became his first internationally successful single and was fundamental in his repertoire.
Jones’ “La Vie en Rose” was re-released several times in the early 1980s and finally reached #12 in the UK charts when re-released as a double A-side with “Pull Up to the Bumper” in 1985. The single was certified as a gold record in France and Italy. In Canada more than 75 thousand copies were sold
About the song, Grace said: “This is a very special song for me. Oh God, I cry every time I sing it. I’ve had some French lovers, so every time I sing it, I think of them.”
The album’s artwork – in double format – was designed by Richard Bernstein, an artist who worked for Interview magazine.
The three singles “I Need a Man”, “Sorry” and “That’s the Trouble” completed the album.
Grace Jones – Portfolio (1977) @ Richard Bernstein
Critic Robert Christgau stated that Jones sang so out of tune that it made her appear inferior to artists such as Andrea True and Linda Ronstadt, who were popular at the time. Despite this, he saw this lack of vocal technique as something positive, as he associated it with a libertarian and punk attitude. He pointed out the irony of Jones’ demand for sexual freedom, in contrast to her powerful position as a fashion model, which is an industry often associated with the exploitation and objectification of women. Finally, Christgau expressed his desire for Jones to record more challenging songs as opposed to the album’s more conventional choices. It was what she did.
End of the Disco Era
His next work was “Fame”, from 1978. The single “Do or Die” reached #3 on the Billboard Dance Club Play chart. Other hits were “Pride” and “Fame”.
The follow-up album “Muse” arrived at the same time as “Disco Demolition Night” on July 12, 1979. Steve Dahl, a 24-year-old DJ was fired from a Chicago radio station. The station was changing its style – from rock to disco. In revenge, he led the movement called Disco Suck and called on rock fans to burn Disco Music albums during halftime of a game between the Chicago White Sox and Detroit Tigers baseball teams at Comiskey Park.
It was endless confusion. The police made several arrests and accounted for the near destruction of the camp. The event became known as the ‘day disco died’.
Grace Jones – Warm Leatherette (1980) @ publicity
Thanks to that, the “Muse” album disappeared. It reappeared when Gold Legion, a record company specializing in bringing back classics from the Disco Era, remastered and re-released it in November 2011.
Grace’s live shows were an event as she showcased a strong sexuality that blended genders. She became the “Queen of Disco Music” for the LGBTQIA+ population at the time.
In 1980, she released her fourth album, “Warm Leatherette” with covers by the bands The Pretenders, Roxy Music and Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. What caught our attention was the cover signed by artist Jean-Paul Goude with Grace with a Flattop haircut and arms crossed.
Nightclubbing
The following year, mixing new wave, funk, dub, reggae and R&B, Grace released “Nightclubbing”, with versions of songs by Bill Withers, Iggy Pop and Astor Piazzolla. It was voted best of the year by critics from the British magazine NME, in addition to receiving excellent reviews from readers, who were surprised by the excellent fusion of genres. It reached Top 1 in five countries and reached the artist’s best position on the Billboard Top 200, in addition to the R&B charts.
Grace Jones on the cover of Nightclubbing signed by Jean Paul Goude (1981)
Six singles, including “Pull Up to the Bumper” and “I’ve Seen That Face Before (Libertango)” became hits.
“Nightclubbing” became an anthem to the hedonism of a generation in search of quick and fleeting pleasures. Critics and experts consider him one of the greatest influences on Pop Music in the coming decades as he masterfully mixed varied musical styles that matched the artist’s personal style. It was the work that established Grace as a Pop Icon.
The cover art was created using a technique called Blue-Black in Black on Brown, created by Jean Paul Goude in which the photograph is painted with a violet tone. Wearing the iconic Flattop haircut, Grace appeared wearing a Giorgio Armani men’s suit with shoulder pads carrying a cigarette between her lips. Her image was androgynous, fluid and disruptive of all previously known concepts of gender.
Graphic artist Storm Thongerson included the cover image in his 1999 book “100 Best Record Covers.” American Photo magazine placed her on the list of the 30 Best Covers in history. She was also at the Jean-Paul Goude career retrospective called “So Far So Goude” at the Padiglione Contemporary Art Gallery in Milan, which took place in 2016.
Post conceptual art
After the success of “Nightclubbing”, Grace Jones released “Living My Life” in 1982 with the hit “My Jamaican Guy”. In the coming years, she would make her acting debut. She starred in “Conan the Barbarian” alongside Arnold Schwarzenegger in 1984 and was the villain May Day in the James Bond film “007”.
Three years later, she released the concept album “Slave To The Rhythm”, in which the title song gained several interpretations with additions from Grace’s conversations with journalists Paul Morley and Paul Cooke, in addition to actor Ian McShane who read excerpts from Grace’s biography. Jean-Paul Goude.
Like the previous one, the album achieved Grace’s best positions on the Billboard 200 chart and in Canada. It sold one million copies on the international market.
Latest hits
Grace’s eighth studio album was “Inside Story”, from 1986. Two songs became hits: the danceable “I’m Not Perfect (But I’m Perfect for You)” and the jazzy “Victor Should Have Been a Jazz Musician ”.
The first reached #04 on the Dance Music/Club Play Chart, #09 on Hot Black Singles, #12 on Hot Dance Music/Maxi Singles Sales and #69 on Billboard’s Hot 100. It was his last song to enter the charts.
Costing US$250,000, the music video for “I’m Not Perfect” was directed by Grace (her only director). She wore a look created by Pop Art and Street Art artist Keith Haring. Andy Warhol (months before his death), music producer Nile Rodgers and designer Tina Chow appear alongside her.
His last studio album was “Hurricane”, in 2008. Despite the great first track “This Is”, the album was a failure.
In April 2012, she, Debby Harry, Bebel Gilberto and Sharon Stone participated in the Inspiration Gala in São Paulo, which raised US$1.3 million for amfAR (Foundation for Research for the Cure of AIDS). Grace closed the night performing “La Vie en Rose” and “Pull Up to the Bumper”
Legacy
Grace Jones was ranked 82nd among VH1’s 100 Greatest Women in Rock and Roll in 1999. In 2007, she was honored at the Q Idol awards. In 2016, Billboard placed her in 40th place among the Greatest Dance Club Artists of All Time.
Her image influenced several generations and artists, such as Annie Lennox, Lady Gaga, Rihanna, Solange Knowles, Lorde, Róisin Murply and Basement Jaxx, among others.