Alice Texas has been making waves on the NYC music scene for the past few years with her dark soulful ballads and her underappreciated alt country. NY Press decibes her last CD entitled "Sad Days" as "forlorn and beautiful as a desert highway". Time Out NY describes her music as "an oddly appealing hybrid of David Lynch-like macabre and rambling Western tumbleweed scenes". We are old friends and recently performed together at the Riviera in NYC. She is charming smart and easy on the eye. I recently bumped into her at a wine bar during the Air Show in Orleans France where I was pricing corporate jet craft and having modifications done for the Brink. I took the opportunity to ask her some basics about herself and to introduce her to you...our dear Brink readers.

KE. Alice is that you? Why am I not surprised.

AT. Kai great to see you. How are you? Please sit down and join me in a glass of wine. [Alice coughs lightly]

KE. My pleasure. Are you here at the air show buying or selling?

AT. I just came down for the weekend to visit friends in the country and to clear my head of all that New York noise. It does one good to step out of that microwave maddness that is the city these days. And you, what brings you here to the french countryside? [Alice coughs a bit louder and makes a strange slurping sound when sipping her wine, which by the way is a wonderful ST EMILION PREMIER GRAND CRU CLASSE B. It unfolds on the palate in layers, is full-bodied, big and rich yet incredibly poised, well-balanced and pure.]

KE. Out here on Brink business I'm afraid and grabbing moments of pleasure, when I can, in the moments in between. I am having a new sound system installed in our Lear Challenger 600 S/N 1007. We are also expanding the bar. Unfortunately, I will have to get rid of a few safety features to make room, but sometimes comfort is more important than safety. Don't you think?

AT. Hmmmm...Well if I were you I would sell the Challenger and pick up one of the newer Learjet 55's that Lear is making now in a limited run. It has better overall performance and you could just order the new one customized to your specs. [Alice reaches for the pate and makes a stifled grunting sound.]

KE. Yes I did consider that, but what can I say, the Challenger has some sentimental value. Anyway it was great performing with you at the Riviera. I had a blast. I have been meaning to call you about a short interview for the Brink. Since we are here now would you mind participating in a mini interview so I can then write this bottle of wine off as a business expense?

AT. Sure why not. Let's go for it. What would you like to know?

KE. Lets start with some basic background. Where were you born and raised?

AT. New York City, in mid-town. [She answers through a mouthful of wine soaked bread and makes that strange animal like noise again, which I have been politely ignoring.]

KE. It seems that you have quite a few sisters and at least one brother that I know of. You must be part of a large family can you tell me about that dynamic?

AT. Yes, large indeed. 7 siblings including myself. The dynamic?  Mostly loud, crescendoing into fever pitch. We have our "roles", good, bad and hard to escape, but we all get along quite well, and we're also very close, which is great, but the potential for argument is always just around the corner. We're all extremly opinionated and are always right. As we get older, we're more aware of this and sometimes it makes it difficult to hang with the entire family on a regular basis, especially now that there are several offspring in the picture. Not seeing each other all the time is a good way to avoid a fight. I don't know if my parents death made this better or worse, I know we cherish our bond regardless.

KE. How did you take the name Alice Texas? Is there a town called Alice Texas? If so have you been there?

AT. I had originally wanted to name my first born daughter, whenever she arrives, Texas. But when I had decided to take music seriously I heard that there was in fact a town called Alice in Texas. The music fit the name so I took if for myself. I guess one could say that my music is baby. I have not been there yet, but I was invited last year by the Mayor of Alice to perform at their centennial.  There was no mention of paying for the trip, however, so that didn't happen. Some of the people in Alice seem to have a real problem with my using the name. While others generally comment on how lame the town is and why would I name myself after it. I did an interview for their paper and I asked for a copy of the article. The guy never responded which I found to be strange. Makes me wonder how I was colored... [Once more she makes that sound and it is definitely grunt like. Should I tell her she has a small piece of brie on her lapel]

KE. When did you start playing music? What was your motivation? Who are your influences?

AT. My sister Katy, there's a Katy, Texas too, taught me to play guitar when I was 12 or 13. I believe Sunshine Superman was the first song I learned. My influences ranged from the folky stuff and by that I also mean the real folk murder ballad type o'songs and the classic rock that I got from older sisters and my father at a pretty young age - Joan Baez, Dylan, Melanie, TheDoors, and The Velvet Underground. This was right around the time I first started playing guitar - lot's of old blues and country from my father - Bukka White, Big Joe Williams, Robert Johnson Hank Williams, Johnny Cash. And then later, notably Nick Cave and writer Cormac McCarthy. I had always sang and played guitar as did most of my siblings, but it wasn't until I started writing songs that I decided to take the idea of music as a career choice seriously. I had a boyfriend at the time who was/is a great writer, and he was in a band that was getting fairly well-known. Mark Hennessy is his name and, by the way, his book of poetry has just recently been published. It's simply marvelous! He really pushed me to go for it. He was a major influence. It's him I have to thank for this hell. But I wouldn't have it any other way. [She stares off wistfully at a half eaten bread stick and some gazpacho residue that was left uneaten in a bowl at the next table. She seems to smack her lips and then there is that earthy grunt again.]

KE. Where can people get your recordings?

AT. You can get my first record, Gold, through me directly at my site, www.alicetexas.org , www.amazon.com and www.milesofmusic.com.  And my record Sad Days, that you play so beautifully on, is also available through milesofmusic.com and Amazon, as well as iTunes, eMusic, and a host of other places. It should be available in some record stores because it's distributed through redeye, but I don't know which ones.

KE. Any new recordings coming soon?

AT. Yes, I do! It's very good. I don't know yet who the lucky soul will be to release it . Would you excuse me for a moment? I have to powder my nose.

KE. Sure I will order another bottle, but don't be too long or you will miss the sunset.

Alice coughed and grunted as she fumbled her way to the ladies room. She really has a bad cough and yet I rarely see her smoke, but it is the grunting noises she makes that both repel me and attract me at the same time. She seems blissfully unaware of her loud grunting noises that usually occur in what should be the silent spaces between the sentences of our conversation. Other petite young ladies seem to know how to laugh politely and for that matter how to use a knife, fork and napkin. However, Alice seems to have been raised by raccoons. It is awkward for me but not unusual for me to see her stop by an overly-filled and pungent trash can on a street corner and grab a crust of someone's unfinished and abandoned pizza. Chomping and grunting away in apparent pleasure like a starving rogue rhinocerous devouring a case full of Krispy Kremes. Perhaps some of her sadder ballads were written while coming off of some kind of pizza crust high and nursing an abused digestive system. I guess that I am just jealous that I cannot grunt like her and that perhaps I have lost touch with my primal self. I am sitting at our table alone now and trying desperately to give off one of those impressive saliva laden grunts that she often tosses off. I try and I try, but all I can manage is my usual soft purr.

In my mind I shake my fist at the heavens and with tears in my eyes I plead with the mysterious forces that be to please let me grunt like sweet Alice does. I then fall back into my chair and purr quietly to myself exhausted and slightly depressed amid the half finished glasses of wine, the pervasive smell of jet fuel and the shimmering golden rays of the setting sun.