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Show from page 15 SYSXSSX IIOFFS her two brothers, she wanted to start one, call it "The Psychiatrists" and sets, for the psychoplay analytic hour. She was still in high school and the effort led, briefly, to her first rock band, called "The Unconscious," under the influence again of her psychoanalyst father. Later, at UC Berkeley, she became a dance theatre major and a hardcore movie buff who, when she wasn't buying Left Bank records in used record stores, was going to the movies every night. She switched her major to art because she wanted to paint and aspired to dancing again but found it hard to get parts. "One of the reasons I got into rock & roll was to get away from theatre and movies and dancing. It was so 50-min- hard to get parts because people always judged you on the way you looked; you couldn't get a part even if you were perfect, six feet tall and blond," says Susanna, who is slight "In rock & roll and brown-hairelike whoever you look be can or you want and no one is going to tell you that you can't get up there and play. So okay, I thought, 111 start a band from scratch with people I don't even know and see what happens." What happened was an already-starte- d band called the "Colours," which became the "Bangs," and then the "Bangles," but again, it didn't d. happen overnight. In 1981, after graduating from Berkeley, she went searching for musicians to audition. In clubs around L. A. she put up flyers with the names of bands she liked, like Love, the Byrds and Dusty Springfield. On the posters, she listed "Must Be Nice" as one of the requirements. "But I would see whole stacks ripped. Then I put ads in the newspaper and met the Peterson sisters." They met in the only place available to them, which was Susanna's garage, and immediately the vocal harmonies came together. "It was great. I thought, I can get along with these girls.' And when in 1983 the band's first bass player was replaced by Michael Steele, the combination of warm song making and smooth vocal harmonies was in place. Looking back now, Susanna remembers the struggle. "You have to try to 32 prove yourself every minute of the day to the world that you are a good band. You go on the road and open for these bands and no one cares and no one really wants to see you and you just have to go out and prove yourself every night." The diverse, almost contrasting rl styles of each member of the band was what made the band jell, Susanna believes. "We arc really different," she says. "Sometimes you sit and write a song and you feel like youVe played that chord progression a thousand times and everything is starting to sound alike but when you are with people w ho arc coming from a different thing, they can just turn it all-gi- into something really special and change it, and that's why collaborating with the girls is so great." The Bangles' sound has been called "S.O.R."(for Sound Oriented Rock) but it's harder to categorize than that. "We didn't really feel that we were like a pop, hard rock or country rock band," Susanna says. "We didn't fit into a lot of categories, so we figured the best way to describe us is just that we write these songs. I think we're really a vocal group more than anything else. "We wrote one song as a group, called 'Let It Go, which is on our last album, and we are going to do more songs like that, writing as a group because usually it's just me and Vicki writing together, and then sometimes Michael has songs that she has written by herself, or me and Debbi and Vicki writing together. WeVe all written with a lot of outside people too." In Universal's "Allnighter," what's it like being directed by your mother "like her asking you to clean up your room?" People are always asking Susanna that question, and no, she replies, it isn't like that at all. "She knows me so well that it made it so easy for her to give me advice on how to play a scene. She could just remind me of something in my past or something that's hap- pened for me because we are pretty close anyway. She knows what's going on in my life, in my love life and everything," she smiles. "She could push my buttons. Women directors are so sensitive. A lot of times you work with directors who were cameramen or editors or did some other aspect of the business. They weren't 'mothers.' She has a unique under standing of young people. She focused on the performances and the acting. She w as a very warm person to work with." What's this we hear about Prince's interest in Susanna? "He's a musical genius," she says, "and once he came on stage to perform with us. His life really revolves around his music. He writes every night. He kind of pops in and out of the Bangles scene on and off at random times and he has always felt really comfortable talking to me." For the time being, she's intrigued with a new project that involves theatre and dance. She w on't name the project but says she might sing on the record with other rock musicians, before touring again with the garage band that became the Bangles. from page 8 tkavixhotijm: Tips for the Taking Thinking of spending the summer in Mexico? If so, you should know that you don't necessarily need a passport. An original or notarized birth certificate w ill also get you in or out of the country. Americans visiting solely for tourism or study for up to 180 days will also need a tourist document, commonly called a tourist card in English or FMT in Spanish. The card is issued free at Mexican consulates, Mexican tourism offices, Mexican immigration offices at ports of entry, and most airlines serving the country. This info, plus more, is in the brochure Tips for Travelers to Mexico. Single copies are yours free by writing: US Department of State, Bureau of Consular Affairs, Washington, D.C. 20520 . . . Others "Tips" booklets on China, Eastern Europe, Yugoslavia, Saudi Arabia, the USSR, and the Middle East can be ordered the same way. How do the Japanese do it? Study how for credit at a summer Japanese Business and Society Program in Tokyo. For information on this program, and others in Leningrad; Brittany and Paris, France; Alicante and Seville, Spain; Beijing, Nanjing and Shanghai, China, write: Council on International Educational Exchange, Academic Programs Dept., 205 East 42nd St., New York, NY 10017. Campus USA |