10
Twists in the Tracks
An Interview With Singer, Composer,
and Sound Producer Aynee Osborn
Joujon-Roche
Liesl King
Aynee Osborn Joujon-Roche is an accomplished singer, composer, and
sound editor for film and television who lives and works in Long Beach,
California. She is the lead singer and co-founder of Restless Blues Band,
the lead singer and co-composer of the albums There and Back Again and
Just In Time, and when you look for her on IMDb, she has 71 credits with
the Sound Department beginning in 1998. I first met Aynee as an under-
graduate, when we were both studying for a degree in Theatre Studies at
the University of Santa Barbara, and then professionally and geographi-
cally, we went very different ways – I to the UK, where I pursued a career
as an academic, teaching literature, science fiction, and gender theory; and
she, as you will hear, to Colorado, LA, Nashville, and then back again to
LA, pursuing a career in music and sound post-production for film and
television. She and I and a small group of other Californians who met in
Santa Barbara in the 1980s have stayed in touch over these many years,
and this summer of 2019 I had the privilege of interviewing her in Santa
Barbara for this collection on gender in music production. In the interview
you are about to read, Part 1 offers a potted history of Aynee’s experiences
in the music industry; Part 2 explores her experiences as an editor/creator
of sound for film and television; and Part 3 expands on her impressions –
touched on in Parts 1 and 2 – of the way gender differences can adversely
impact women’s well-being in the industries of music and post-production,
but also the ways in which they can offer fantastic opportunities for col-
laborations among women and enhanced relationships between men and
women, too. As I read through the interview, it strikes me that feminists
and gender theorists working across the same historical period have helped
to shed light on many of the issues that Aynee raises, and have contributed
to the dramatic advancements in gender equality that post-industrial West-
ern societies have undergone in the twentieth century, a dynamic that has
(largely) continued to shape gender relations positively in the twenty-first
century. Importantly – and the points Aynee raises in the final section,
‘On Gender’, make this clear – feminists, activists, gender theorists, the
LGBT community, AND innumerable women and men who would not
officially place themselves in any of the above categories but who simply
156
157 Twists in the Tracks
live their lives with sensitivity and respect for others – have contributed
to a radically transformed and transforming reality in this twenty-first
century where men and women of both genders and all sexual identities
are becoming more comfortable relating to each other as human beings
instead of types.
As I have suggested, twentieth-century gender theory, which came into
its own through second-wave feminism in the 1980s, gathered up indi-
vidual narratives like Aynee’s, garnered statistics and trends, and offered
a studied critique of the way in which women, women and men of color,
and non-heteronormative men and women were treated within a vast range
of professional and domestic cultures that appeared to primarily privilege
white, heterosexual men. The point that Aynee makes in the final section
of the interview, which is that during the time she was getting started in the
music business and coming out as a gay woman in LA, many men still felt
it was acceptable to ‘grab [her] in the butt’, not only foregrounds the sex-
ism that was prevalent in the popular music industry at the time, but also
underlines theorist Monique Wittig’s point in The Straight Mind in 1991
(originally 1978), which was that, to paraphrase, the straight community
often simply assumes that everyone else is straight. And in Part 2, her nar-
ration of the way in which the female producer she was working with at
Sound Deluxe left to start her own business, and invited Aynee to come
join her when she was made redundant, brings to mind Adrienne Rich’s
utopian concept of an all-female, ‘lesbian continuum’ (Rich 27), in which
women of every sexual identity – straight, bisexual, gay – might support
one another so that they mutually thrive, and overcome difficulties by
looking out for each other whenever they have a chance. And in the final
section of the interview, Aynee’s discussion of the fantastic, collaborative
experiences she has had working with a wide range of men in the music
and post-production film/TV industries, when she and they have been able
to ‘take off the hats of men and women’, and be ‘in the same tribe, making
music’, brings to mind gender theorist John Beynon’s key point in Mascu-
linities and Culture (2002), which is that men too are adversely impacted
by hypermasculine environments (in which ‘hegemonic masculinity’ is
culturally produced (3)), and by extension, that they too naturally benefit
from collaborative, respectful, non-hierarchical ways of being and making
and doing.
As soon as I lay claim to the position that ‘we’ (and we all must be care-
ful about ‘we’, as often our sphere of understanding is far more local than
we believe it to be) in many arenas within Western culture are making
dramatic strides in terms of gender equality, a reader will no doubt dis-
agree profoundly, and point to heinous examples of sexism that she or he
has experienced or observed. Of course. My literary specialism is feminist
science fiction utopias of the ’70s and ’80s, and we are a long way from
the difference-respecting culture that Marge Piercy imagined in Woman on
the Edge of Time in 1976. However, I would argue that in many ways, the
collective, Western ‘we’ (and of course this is not a dynamic exclusive to
the West, but for the purposes of this essay, I will talk about the geographi-
cal areas with which I am familiar) is experiencing and in many ways
158 Liesl King
contributing to a gender-quake that in terms of the long history of Homo
sapiens’ relations, is marking out a profound and dramatically important
sea change. Aynee Osborn Joujon-Roche’s experiences, observations, and
conclusions, in sum, show me a glimpse of what our species can be, and
what it ideally will become.
PART 1 – BACKSTORY
Interviewer
Our edited collection, Gender in Music Production, is hoping to acknowl-
edge the contributions that female sound producers, engineers, and musi-
cians bring to the music production process within a studio environment.
We want to identify and celebrate the positive attributes women bring to
the production and the ultimate outcome of a musical artefact, and we
want to discuss the attitudes or cultural behaviors that potentially impinge
on this process.
Firstly, can you outline your background and tell us something about
how you arrived at where you are now?
Aynee Osborn Joujon-Roche
My God – I’m out of college, I was under development with a girl trio,
called, are you ready? Trimm. And we were thrust into the studio. We
were thrust into roles, where I fit a certain niche of a certain girl ‘type’– a
white girl, a black girl, me whatever – and was put in an outfit and hair,
makeup, and totally doing something that had nothing to do with who
I was other than the fact that I could sing. So that was my first sort of expo-
sure to the business, and Berry Gordy and all these people were involved
with Motown and it was so, so interesting. And yet, it was so not me. So
that was part of it. And then that kind of went into ‘okay, what can I do?’
I wasn’t a songwriter in the sense that I felt proud of at the time. So I could
sing; so then I got a piano player. And I did the whole cabaret route. And
so I would sing songs that I liked – you know – it’s interesting because it’s
almost full circle, because now I’m singing with a jazz band – and I started
out doing jazz stuff like Ella Fitzgerald and Billie Holiday, and Dinah
Washington and all these old beautiful, phenomenal American songs. And
I got some attention through that, in the form of I made a friend – and he
comes into this later – I was singing in the cabarets of Los Angeles, and
I met this guy named Paul Rothchild. And Rothchild ended up being this
icon of ’60s rock, where he produced some Dylan; he recorded Janis Jop-
lin; he produced The Doors and Bonnie Raitt.
And he and I hit it off like wildfire, and the same goes for his amaz-
ingly talented son Dan, who later would help me produce some of my
Americana music in the ’90s. So to go back to 1989 . . . I’d auditioned
for Star Search, which is like today’s American Idol. I sang a very, very
old song from the ’20s, and I didn’t look like the other typical people.
And nothing really came of it. And I was working in an office – right, this
159 Twists in the Tracks
crazy thing – in an office, and my phone rings. And this woman introduces
herself and she says, I’m the assistant of Glenn Frey of The Eagles, and
he and another guy who’s a New York Broadway producer have a night-
club/restaurant in Aspen, Colorado, and they saw your audition tape for
Star Search. And I’m thinking ‘what?!’. They want you – they’re going
to make their restaurant called ‘Andiamo’ in Aspen – (where everybody
goes in the wintertime, all the rich and famous people go there to ski and
party) – and they just saw The Fabulous Baker Boys with Michelle Pfeiffer
and the Bridges brothers, and they want to do a piano bar, and they are
captivated by you. They’ve got three people that they’re auditioning here
in Los Angeles. Can you come tomorrow and sing/audition? And so I did.
And I got the gig immediately. And my whole life changed. I was flown
out to Aspen – you know, private jet – it was like a Cinderella story. Time
goes by; so I sing out there and one of the important things that happens is
that I meet Irving Azoff, who was the manager of The Eagles at the time.
He’d heard me sing in Aspen, and Glenn Frey really believed in me, so
Glenn helped tremendously after the Aspen shows ended.
Then I kind of lily-padded that exposure in Aspen along with Glenn
Frey’s help to jumping into the music scene in Los Angeles, and this would
have been around 1990. So I had a meeting with Irving Azoff, where I told
him that I felt I was somewhere on the spectrum between Melissa Ether-
idge and Sade. However, I didn’t really have this – ALL – you know the
‘complete package’ or my own identity as an artist, singer/songwriter at
the time – I could sing, but I didn’t know who I was. I didn’t know. So
I couldn’t tell them. That uncertainty put me in a very interesting and vul-
nerable position too, and looking back on this – well, I’ve never really
talked about it like this before – so you guys are my first – and it’s all
flowing out of me because usually I can’t remember. So I’m going to get
quickly to the end. But I bring Paul Rothchild in as my producer, and he
and I begin the work of trying to figure out what I want to sing that will be
honest and ME. They throw some money at me; this is the music industry
at the time: they throw some money at me. I go into the most amazing
recording studios in Los Angeles – The Mamas and The Papas recorded
at Ocean Way, A&M Records, Larribee studio, all this stuff started to hap-
pen. But again, I didn’t have my identity. So I went into a song search, a
process of searching for songs that I loved and felt a connection to. And,
ironically, one of the songwriters we listen to was Sheryl Crow, and a
bunch of other people were trying to find songs that resonated with me
so I could come from a place of truth, blah blah blah . . . all of this at you
know, age 26 (which many considered too old). And even then he wanted
me to say I was 23 – it was fascinating. And during the course of all this,
I started writing more of my own songs. But I went into development prior
to this; I was sort of songwriting on the outskirts, but I was still trying to
get this record deal.
We made my demo; time went by, and they decided to sign Sheryl Crow,
because she was a songwriter and an amazing musician. And so, you know,
her career went in the way you know; it was me or Sheryl Crow, and they
picked/chose Sheryl Crow. . . . But anyway, so that ship sailed. And then
160 Liesl King
I started writing my own stuff. And Paul wasn’t into it. And I remember
I had done a show in a place called Genghis Cohen in LA, and I was doing
my own stuff, and this guy Jac Holzman at Elektra Records – he was really
digging it. But he thought I needed more time. So that was when they
were putting artists – and this is all again – my whole . . . everything is up
to men. At that time, it was all men making these choices and decisions.
And I intercepted a letter that was addressed to me – my name but Paul’s
address: we both lived on Lookout Mountain up in Laurel Canyon, which
had its own amazing music scene. Paul was at the top, I was at the bottom.
And I intercepted this letter addressed to me at his address, and I decided
to open it. And it was from the record company, basically offering me a
development deal. So they were going to supplement my income as an
artist, give me the stipend, and let me continue developing myself. And
Paul . . . and I sealed it back up, and I took it to Paul’s house. And a couple
weeks went by and you [sic] never mentioned it to me. And I’ll never
forget this day, because I had him on the phone. He was in the recording
studio with someone else at the time. So I said, “Paul, I gotta tell you,
I found this letter”. And he got so pissed. And he was like . . . he was on
his back foot and he just attacked. And he just said, “I don’t like the songs
that you’re writing. I don’t like the direction you’re going. It is not what
we were looking for. It was not what”, you know, blah, blah, blah . . . “And
I don’t think they should put this money into you. I don’t think that they
should invest in you”. He no longer believed in my music – because he
didn’t have the control and, well, maybe my own songs just weren’t his
cup of tea.
And yeah, it was devastating. It was my last chance in a way, you know,
not to like, pity party it. This is not . . . I haven’t also talked about it. So,
clearly there is a little emotion to it. So this – you know – this little dream
went away, and also it felt like the betrayal of a friend. Because Paul and
I went to the theatre together, and Paul and I went to the opera together;
Paul and I, you know, would drink into the night and sing and cry, and his
son is amazing, his son is amazing – Dan Rothchild – he’s in Echo In the
Canyon right now. We made music together and he seemed to really like
my original Americana songs. We recorded several songs together. I love
him madly.
Anyway, it was, it just was – my little thing, and it happened for a rea-
son, because I’m also a super private person. And even though I sing and
I do all this stuff, I’m also a little bit introverted. You know, maybe if you
knew me well enough you’d be like – you’d be so [saying] – I mean, you
really are. I don’t need to wear the red dress. I don’t need to do the – listen
to me; look at me. . . . Even though I can front a band. I can tell a story;
I can sing a song; I can be that entertainer, but in my own private life,
I don’t need to be the center of attention. I just don’t need that limelight.
So I went to Nashville – I forgot all that part – I went to Nashville, on
the radio, my whole country world that I made happen – I did get a small
record deal. I got the deal, had songs and radio interviews, CDs in the
record stores, all that stuff – I’ll keep going and not get into the therapy!
But I did find my own voice and I liked it. And I told my own stories
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