You might not know who Cidny Bullens is, but you should read his book.
Yet if you were a rock aficionado back in the seventies, and devoured all the information you could lay your hands on, of course you know who Cindy Bullens is, she's the backup singer who toured with Elton John and was going to break big with her powerhouse rock vocals.
But she didn't.
Mary Weiss died the other day, you know, of the Shangri-Las. "Leader of the Pack" is what you hear most these days, but I always preferred its predecessor, "Remember (Walking in the Sand)." It was a hit during the summer of '64, it battled the Supremes' first Top 40 crossover hit, "Where Did Our Love Go?," for chart dominance. Both great cuts, at the time I preferred the Shangri-Las tune, although now my preference has flipped. In any event, back then I saw the acts as equals, but they didn't turn out to be. The Shangri-Las stalled out, and the Supremes became icons. But I'll never forget seeing Mary Weiss with her long blond hair and boots on TV. But Mary didn't write the songs, and therefore she rode out her days as an administrator at an architecture firm. You see you've got to earn a living.
So Cindy Bullens is plucked out of obscurity by Elton John, she's living the high life on the Starship, singing on stage and snorting coke all night. But then it ends. She makes an album for UA, which is soon gobbled up by EMI, and the record sinks like a stone, and then where is she?
I've never seen this arc better depicted. These household names, and they were that back then, have hits on the radio, we know who they are, what they look like, and then they descend into obscurity, most times with no cash. They work day jobs. You run into them. You can't square it. What are you doing HERE? We think if you're an icon once, you're an icon forever. But that's not the way it works.
So Cindy gets the rock and roll bug. She goes to see the Stones. She runs away to make it. It's hard to convey to today's youngsters the power of the sound back then, what it meant to us. It wasn't music, it was everything...our culture. The rock stars eclipsed the sports stars we'd been devoted to previously on our transistor radios and we just couldn't get enough of them.
So Cindy ends up in L.A. Well, after going to the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York. You only hear about the winners. But Cindy got no starring roles and decided to decamp to Los Angeles and work at a gas station until she could make it in music.
And then she met Bob Crewe.
Now let's be clear here, Cindy was pushy. She had chutzpah. She walked through closed doors. And it paid off for her. Would you be able to do the same? Read the book and ask yourself, because that's what it takes to make it.
So, Cindy ends up meeting Bob Crewe and...
Bob Crewe has been almost completely forgotten. But he was a wunderkind. Who wrote and produced the Four Seasons hits with Bob Gaudio and worked with Mitch Ryder and the Detroit Wheels and even made a hit with the otherwise laughable hairdresser Monti Rock III. But it wasn't like today. Those behind the scenes weren't lauded, but those in front of the camera. Today Crewe would be in the league of Max Martin, et al. Back then, especially after the Beatles launched and acts wrote their own material, most were unaware of him.
Crewe made it up as he went along. But he taught Desmond Child to start with a great title, like "You Give Love a Bad Name." The song writes itself thereafter.
So Crewe is infatuated with Cindy who starts working for him and ingesting as many drugs as he does. She sings on the "Grease" soundtrack, is nominated for Grammys, and then scores the gig with Elton, who she tells off at the end, regretting it ever since, even though Elton seems to have forgiven her.
And then she falls in with Crewe's brother Dan, who is also gay. And records are made and fail and then they get married. Which makes no sense, of course, because they're both gay.
But is Cindy gay? She feels she's a boy from her earliest years. And ultimately she transitions into a man and becomes Cidny.
Okay, this is where you tune out, you can't take this. But this is a sincere portrayal of the angst, of the torture of feeling you've been born in the wrong body, that you're the wrong sex. And it's not from some unknown, but Cindy Bullens. I own that UA album (although I think I bought it as a cut-out).
So Cindy finds herself married to a gay guy who wants children. They move back east, and ultimately end up in Westport, Connecticut with two girls. So now Cindy's head is spinning. She's in a sexless marriage with her best friend, she's over thirty and the music world, her passion, has passed her by. But then she tries. And deals with being away from her kids, who don't understand.
But Cindy can't understand. How she's living as a Fairfield County housewife. She used to be a rock and roller. People think she's a guy.
So she ends up recording more music but it fails commercially. She even signs with Danny Goldberg's Artemis. If you're out of the loop, reading the book you'd think her debut for the label was a giant hit, based on the media, the TV and radio and live dates... But believe me, it didn't have huge impact. But it had more commercial impact than everything Cindy did thereafter.
And that first Artemis album is one Cindy cut with her own money, about the death of her young daughter from cancer.
And this is Cindy's new career, connecting with the bereaved, those from Columbine. And more.
And ultimately Cindy throws in with Wendy Waldman and Deborah Holland and they become the Refugees and it's all groovy.
Only it's not. This is not the seventies anymore. You probably don't know who the Refugees are either. They make albums, they play live, but you're not seeing them in the Spotify Top 50. You see as the years went by the game changed, unless you're Elton, a bona fide star, you've either gone straight or gone cottage industry, living off house concerts and merch sales. You might be able to eke out a living, but if you're in it for the fame, you're never going to get there.
And then Cindy transitions, into a trans man.
Okay, there are a plethora of music biographies, rarely written by the star themselves, sometimes, like Linda Ronstadt's, not even revealing the dirt you buy these books for. They're all the same, and almost always unsatisfying.
But not only have you never heard of Cidny Bullens, you certainly don't know her book. But it's a better read than almost all those star bios. But since Cidny is not a star herself, her book was published by the Chicago Review Press, sans the promotion clout of the big outfits, and its impact in society has been minimal. But it's a fascinating read. And it's more than music, more than rock and roll.
Here's someone who was bitten by the bug, made it all the way to the show and then...well, not nothing, but definitely not the something he wanted.
You get into your sixties and seventies and this is who you are, there are no do-overs, and you can only correct course so much, ultimately all you can do is march forward. But you never really change, you're the same person you always were, that's what Cidny realizes when he reads his ancient diaries.
So what we've got here is a person. Who was tortured. On the inside! And could talk to nobody about it. Who felt she didn't fit in, who wasn't even sure who or what she was.
And all we hear is the anti-trans hype.
But I've got a trans nephew.
It's not like these people are happy-go-lucky and change genders on a whim. And even when you feel comfortable in your new body you have to learn a whole new set of societal mores. A woman can coo over a baby in an airport, if a man does this it's creepy.
Now in truth, ultimately everybody is forgotten, it's all plowed under, it's grist for the mill and then there are all new people with similar dreams who follow the same arc.
Cindy is touring with Elton John and then Cidny is training people at the local Y and fulfilling orders in a warehouse. You've got to eat. And you need socialization, to fend off the depression, if nothing else.
And I must admit, I've delineated many of the highlights here. But there's so much more, what Cidny felt, what he is feeling. This is not VH1's "Behind the Music." This is someone laying down their pain so others can feel so not alone and still others can maybe understand.
Rock and roll is a cruel game. And nearly impossible to stay in. This is the story of someone who played and survived. But it wasn't easy.
Like I said, you've probably never heard of "TransElectric," but I'm telling you now you should read it. And it makes me want to see Cidny's one man show. This is my generation. One that dreamt of everything and then tried to live out our dreams and it wasn't always pretty. And we still wonder, we still have questions, how did we end up HERE?
Doesn't matter that you don't know who Cidny Bullens is. He talks about stuff you know, but even more Cidny testifies, does his best to convey and explain his life, and it's been very complicated, and it hasn't been easy.
I don't write about every music book I read. Most don't deserve your time.
But this one does.
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