Jean Genet: Who was the writer behind ‘Jean Genie’?
The term concept album was difficult to pin down prior to the 1960s. You have to remember that, aside from some artists like Woody Guthrie, the majority of artists who released albums were mainly putting together compilations of their singles. There wasn’t any link between the songs other than the person who performed them, and as such, LPs were given the same amount of respect we give them today.
The term concept album was originally used by music journalists to describe LPs that weren’t just a load of singles thrown together. When they were all a part of the same body of work, with a theme running through it or a specific sound connecting them. Eventually, as we settled into the ‘60s, that essentially describes every album, and therefore, the term became somewhat moot.
It wasn’t until The Beatles released Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band that the term had strict parameters set around it. Not only are the songs linked, but the story embedded within the album extended onto the cover, the title and the band themselves adopting a whole new persona. It set the foundation for concept albums that artists afterwards well and truly built upon. One of the artists in the ‘70s who championed the concept album perfectly was David Bowie.
Throughout his career, he was happy to step into a range of different personas when writing songs and albums that allowed him to write from both a place of fiction and a place of reality. He was never confined to any genre or particular type of music because he was so comfortable adopting various roles that came with their own style and sound. He had more freedom than most other artists, and he used it wholeheartedly.
One of his most iconic concept albums was 1972’s Aladdin Sane. The image on the front with his iconic lightning bolt and flame red hair is one of the most famous photos of Bowie, and the songs throughout the album are great to listen to. One of the highlights is the track ‘The Jean Genie’, which sees Bowie adopt a persona within an adopted persona. He writes a track that embodies Americana in every sense.
There are a number of people who inspired the track, including Iggy Pop and Cyrinda Foxe. So, let’s break down all the different people whose influence came together to help Bowie write one of his greatest songs.
Who inspired ‘The Jean Genie’?
There are three key people who inspired ‘The Jean Genie’. The first is Iggy Pop, who had well and truly cemented himself as one of the most outrageous live performers at the time. A lot of the song is a reflection of Iggy Pop’s on-stage antics, where he was becoming famous for cutting himself and slithering around the stage.
The track was also inspired by Cyrinda Foxe, who was previously married to Aerosmith’s Steven Tyler and was staying with Bowie at the time. The story goes that Bowie was trying to entertain her when she was in his apartment, so he decided to start writing this song. Foxe also starred in the video for the song.
Finally, the author Jean Genet inspired the track. He was a rebellious French writer whom Bowie had taken a shine to because of some of his controversial writing. Bowie decided to name the song based on a loose pun on Genet’s name, which makes his influence the most clear of the three.
When discussing the track, Bowie said that it started “As a lightweight riff thing I had written one evening in NY for Cyrinda’s enjoyment.”
He continued, “I developed the lyric to the otherwise wordless pumper and it ultimately turned into a bit of a smorgasbord of imagined Americana… based on an Iggy-type persona. The title was a clumsy pun upon Jean Genet.”
