Josephine Wiggs (born February 26, 1965)

[reviews_and_ramblings]

Josephine Miranda Cordelia Susan Wiggs (born 26 February 1965, Letchworth, Hertfordshire, England) is an indie/alternative rock musician, noted for her work with the bands The Perfect Disaster, The Breeders, and Dusty Trails. She was romantically linked to Kate Schellenbach. During their relationship they appeared on the cover of The Advocate, a national LGBT magazine published in the United States. They formed the short-lived band Ladies Who Lunch, and Schellenbach played drums on Luscious Jackson's side-project, Kostars, which Wiggs recorded and co-produced. (Picture: Dusty Trails, Josephine Wiggs (Breeders) and Vivian Trimble (Luscious Jackson))

Wiggs studied Philosophy at the University of London, earning a BA degree, and going on to get a MA in Continental Philosophy from the University of Sussex. She studied cello for ten years. She joined The Perfect Disaster in 1988 as bass guitarist, playing on the albums Asylum Road, (1988) Up (1989) and Heaven Scent (1990) before leaving to form The Breeders with Kim Deal and Tanya Donelly.

In 1988, Wiggs met Kim Deal when Perfect Disaster supported the Pixies in at Brixton Academy and The Town and Country Club, in London. In December 1989, Deal, Wiggs, and Slint drummer Britt Walford, rehearsed together for a week at Wiggs's house in Bedfordshire, rehearsing for further week with Tanya Donelly in London, before driving to Edinburgh to record the album Pod, with Steve Albini.

The Breeders next release was the Safari EP in 1992. Wiggs was living in Brighton, and Deal came to visit during time off from the Pixies. They worked on the song Safari, and then recorded it in London with Spacemen3 drummer Jon Mattock, a friend of Wiggs' since the days when the Perfect Disaster and Spacemen3 had played shows together.


Josephine Wiggs is an indie/alternative rock musician, noted for her work with the bands The Perfect Disaster, The Breeders, and Dusty Trails. She was romantically linked to Kate Schellenbach. During their relationship they appeared on the cover of The Advocate, a national LGBT magazine published in the United States. They formed the short-lived band Ladies Who Lunch, and Schellenbach played drums on Luscious Jackson's side-project, Kostars, which Wiggs recorded and co-produced.

The Breeders recorded the album Last Splash in 1993, which featured the hit song Cannonball with its iconic opening bass riff. The video for Cannonball, much-played on MTV, was directed by Kim Gordon and Spike Jonze. The Breeders supported Nirvana on their In Utero tour, and Last Splash achieved platinum sales.

Their last record was a vinyl-only EP, Head to Toe whose title track was written by Wiggs.

After playing the 1994 Lollapolooza Tour, the Breeders went on indefinite hiatus following the well-publicized drug problems of guitarist Kelley Deal. Kim Deal released a solo album, the Amps, Pacer. She resurrected the Breeders name in the late 1990s, but Wiggs was not a member of this lineup.

In November 2005, Wiggs played two shows with The Breeders in London, at an event commemorating the 25th anniversary of 4AD Records.

On August 21, 2009, with one day's notice and no rehearsal, Wiggs played the last three shows of the Breeders tour, after bassist Mando Lopez had to fly home to LA because his girlfriend had gone into in labor. These shows were at the Black Cat in Washington, DC, Diesel in Pittsburgh, and at Newport Music Hall in Columbus, Ohio.

In 1992, Wiggs collaborated with Jon Mattock and released an album, Nude Nudes, under the name Honey Tongue. In 1995 Wiggs and Luscious Jackson (and original Beastie Boys) drummer Kate Schellenbach formed Ladies Who Lunch, releasing the 7 inch vinyl "Kims We Love" (an homage to Kim Deal and Sonic Youth's Kim Gordon, played entirely on Casio keyboards) on the Beastie Boys' label, Grand Royal. This was followed by the 7 inch vinyl cover of the Buzzcocks song Everybody's Happy Nowadays.

In 1995, Wiggs recorded and co-produced the album Klassics with a K for the Kostars, aka Luscious Jackson's Jill Cunniff and Vivian Trimble, and then toured with them, playing drums.

In 1996 Wiggs collaborated again with drummer Jon Mattock releasing the Bon Bon Lifestyle album on Grand Royal as The Josephine Wiggs Experience. Wiggs played all the instruments, recorded and mixed the album.

In 1997 Wiggs started a writing and production collaboration with Luscious Jackson keyboardist Vivian Trimble under the name Dusty Trails. Their eponymous 2000 album on Atlantic Records included a track written for, and sung by, Emmylou Harris. They also wrote music for Happy Accidents, a movie by Brad Anderson (writer/director of Next Stop Wonderland) starring Marisa Tomei and Vincent D'Onofrio. In addition, they collaborated with internationally-acclaimed New York-based Brazilian choreographers chameckilerner, writing and recording music for Poor Reality, 2001, and Exit 2007. They wrote the soundtrack for chameckilerner's short film The Flying Lesson, (which premiered at Lincoln Center, 2008) and for their short film The Collection(2011).

In 2009, Wiggs created the soundtrack for chameckilerner's Conversation With Boxing Gloves, one of eleven short films that make up Vita Futurista Redux, a re-imagining of the lost 1916 film Vita Futurista, commissioned by Performa 09 and which premiered at SFMOMA.

Since 2007, Wiggs has collaborated Zohar Kfir, a Montreal-based artist working in experimental video, including writing and recording the score for the short film Still, which was included in the online literary journal Drunken Boat#12, and was also shown at the Jerusalem Film Festival. She also wrote music for a multi-channel interactive art installation titled Parasite, presented by StudioXX in Montreal, January 2013.

In 2012, Wiggs wrote and recorded the score for the documentary, Built on Narrow Lands, a film about Modern Houses in Wellfleet, Cape Cod, which will be shown at film festivals through 2013.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josephine_Wiggs

More LGBT History at my website: www.elisarolle.com/, My Ramblings/Persistent Voices