Cidny Bullens joined Preston Frazier to discuss the new album ‘Little Pieces‘ and his fantastic autobiography, ‘TransElectric, My Life as a Cosmic Rockstar’:
PRESTON FRAZIER: Cid, I’ll admit I didn’t know much about your extensive catalog. I spoke to Deborah Holland last year. We talked about Animal Logic, and Deborah mentioned that you, Deborah, and Wendy Waldman were about to release California from your joint project for the Refugees. It’s a fantastic album, but I’m just as pleased to discover your latest solo work, Little Pieces. Talk about the genesis of the album.
CIDNY BULLENS: As some people know, and some people don’t. I used to be Cindy Bullens, and now I’m Cidney Bullens. I started my transition back in 2012. The first song I wrote after I started my transition was “Little Pieces.” Then I wrote “Purgatory Road.” But I wasn’t writing a lot because, as people may or may not know, when you decide to transition to another gender, it consumes your life. Especially for me, having been an older person and having had a long life before, which I talk about in my book, it was all-consuming mentally, physically, emotionally, spiritually, socially, culturally, all of the above. So I didn’t write a lot, but then in 2018, I had done a film called The Gender Line about my life. The term, the gender line, came from my one-person show which I had written, which is a precursor to all this. So everything’s kind of connected. I wrote that show in 2014, and 15 performed it around the country in Somewhere Between Not an Ordinary Life. The film’s director said, “You know, you have to write a song called ‘The Gender Line.'” And I looked at him; we were up in Maine on an island where I have a home, and I said, ‘Well, that’s never going to happen because my songs are basically love songs. They’re basically about me and my experiences in life, moments in my life, you know, whatever. I don’t write protest songs. I don’t write cultural songs.I don’t write songs on social issues. I don’t, you know, I’m not good at that.'”
I thought, well, that’s never going to happen. And then I was in my truck at that time, driving from Maine to New Mexico; I looked in the rearview mirror, and I said, “If you were me, what would you do?” You look in the mirror, and you’re not really you. And I always travel because I drive a lot as a musician and as someone with grandkids up in Maine. And I live in Nashville, and Wendy and Deborah are on the West Coast, so I drive a lot. I always have some form of pad and paper with me. So I grabbed it and wrote that down. And by the time I got to New Mexico, I had the whole song – which doesn’t happen often for me, but it did. And that spurred me on once I wrote “The Gender Line,” and I knew it was a significant song for me. I have to be moved somehow by my song, or you won’t hear it. Sometimes it’s the beat, and it’s humorous, or it’s ironical or whatever, or it’s a love song. I have to somehow get a physical reaction, emotional or physical, from one of my songs, or it doesn’t go anywhere. And I knew it was a good song. And then I thought, “Okay, I have these few songs I had written in early transition. I’ve written ‘The Gender Line.” I’ve got to make an album about my transition.”
PRESTON FRAZIER: Rodney Crowell is featured on the title track.
CIDNY BULLENS: You know, Rodney and I have been friends for many years. He co-produced three tracks on Somewhere Between Heaven and Earth. He’s one of these people that’s like an angel on earth. He is extraordinarily talented as a songwriter and a producer – a musician and an artist. That’s a given. But he’s extraordinary as a human being. As I talk about in the book, if it hadn’t been for Rodney Crowell, I’m not sure Somewhere Between Heaven and Earth would’ve been the album it is. Even though there were a lot of other people involved in that album, and he only co-produced three tracks, and I had already recorded some of my songs, it was he who convinced me that I had to do that project as a whole album and not just kind of songs here and there. He supported me in a way that I could not have helped myself, as did other people, which you will read about in the book.
He has continued to do that throughout my career. He was on the road when my book came out. I asked him very late because I wasn’t sure how I would do this reading at Dan Patchett’s bookstore, a wonderful bookstore here in Nashville. I asked him very late if he could come and help me – because it was my first one. I’d never done a reading. It was the day of the release. My publisher was coming down from Chicago; a lot of my friends were coming. I asked him very late, like only a few days before the event, if he could come. He was on the road and came back. He got back like the day before and did it. Wow. He was my moderator, the person who sat and asked me questions after I did my reading. That’s the kind of person Rodney Crowell is. I will forever be indebted to him for what he’s done in my life.
PRESTON FRAZIER: That album is a journey. It was just so, so riveting and moving.
CIDNY BULLENS: It’s a lifelong process to move on and live on after the death of a child. And I created those songs after her death and put them out, not knowing. I thought, this is the other primary subject of my life. The only actual, true song on Little Pieces that addresses being transgender is “The Gender Line.” There are some other line references here and there, but my task is to put out an excellent musical album. It’s not to preach. I’m not a teacher; I’m a storyteller. So, if it educates, it creates an emotional response, or if it creates curiosity, even if the music itself can touch you in a way that spurs something else, that’s great. If you want to listen to the album and enjoy the music, that’s great. My wish is that the music itself carries you, the listener, to a place where you weren’t before. If you’re dancing to the song “Lucky for Me,” you know, which is a great rock ‘n’ roll song, if you’re dancing up in your living room to that song, that’s a great response. You don’t have to go into the deeper issues or the deeper meaning of any song.
PRESTON FRAZIER: I listen to a song like “Call Me By My Name,” which has a great rockabilly feel, yet there is a message there. I notice the tremendous musicality, and you have some lyrical relevance, I think, which anyone can relate to. Could you tell me a little bit about that song?
CIDNY BULLENS: Harry Stinson was the backup vocalist, an outstanding musician and singer in Nashville. Look him up. He’s played with every famous person you can imagine. I had most of the other songs by then but hadn’t been in the studio yet. I thought, “I love that beat.” I love rockabilly. I wanted a song with that kind of feel. When you change your name, and I’ve had other friends change their names before me, it’s hard, you know – it’s hard to change. So, it was not demanding that you call me by my name but acknowledge me as who I am today. The song started with the beat; it started with the feel. I wanted a song with that feel. “Call Me By My Name” acknowledges me for who I am today.
PRESTON FRAZIER: Let me ask about a few other tracks in the album. “Walking Through This World” seems profoundly personal and deeply emotional. How’d that come about?
CIDNY BULLENS: In the fall of 2018, I started diving back into writing. There are two co-writes on this album, “Not With You ” with Beth Nelson Chapman and “Lucky For Me” with Ray Kennedy. Mostly, I’m a solo writer. And, so in the fall of 2018, I wrote “The Gender Line,” and I knew I had to come up with some other stuff. So I started going through some old ideas that I had either put down on the computer, or I have notebooks. I’m going back and looking for, you know, titles. I’m a titles person. I heard the track “Walking Through This World,” and it was a retro track. A great vibe. All the arrangements are almost exactly like my little demo.
I’m listening to this track, and I swear to you, I just started talking. And I have never done a spoken word track. I’ve never thought about it. It never crossed my mind, never as Cindy; I definitely would not have done that. But I just started talking, and it felt like a Lou Reed thing. The lyrics spurred the track. It’s a statement: You can do whatever you want. I’m very proud of that track. I smile when I listen to it because it also makes me move. It’s a statement for everyone: You know, everybody walks a little differently. You know, everybody’s walking through the world a little differently – if we could only accept that.
PRESTON FRAZIER: How about “Crack The Sky”?
CIDNY BULLENS: “Crack the Sky” is a little darker. My book is very telling. It’s very candid; it’s very honest about what I’ve been through in my life, physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. And there were dark times, and there were times in my transition when I felt afraid for myself, about myself, not only from the outside but from the inside. And yet I knew that I had to move forward. So it’s kind of like, you know, we all have our internal stuff that somebody else doesn’t see. Not to the fault of the other person. We are who we are, and we go through what we go through. I have to navigate this and crack the sky. I’ve used that term a lot in my life, except that my term has always been, “I’m cracking the universe.” That was too much. So, the term I used was crack the sky. I use the word universe in the song, but it’s just getting that crack where you can go through it and not have any limitations. It all ties to the book.
PRESTON FRAZIER: How about the song “Not With You”?
CIDNY BULLENS: “Not With You” was written with the incredible singer-songwriter artist Beth Nielsen Chapman, who’s been a friend of mine and who is mentioned in the book. I asked her before we went into the studio if she would write a song with me, a duet, and she said sure. You know, we’re friends and so we went to her house, and I can’t remember who kind of said “let’s write a song about your relationship” but that’s what we did. It’s just a simple love song, kind of from a different angle. Beth sat at the piano, and I sat at the guitar in her music room, and we wrote that song.
PRESTON FRAZIER: “Healing the Break” is also a favorite of mine.
CIDNY BULLENS: “Healing the Break” was a song I had written before the transition, and it’s the only one I had written before the transition on the album. I felt it belonged because it was about healing the break. First, it was inspired by a painting — the title of a painting by a friend of mine in Maine. I wrote a song to her painting about healing the break. It was a different break for her than it was for me. The break is heartbreak or lifebreak, whatever it is. And I felt that the song belonged on the album because whatever discord or heartbreak, as I said, or life issue that’s causing any disruption or hurt – you know, anything that we go through. It is all about healing it. Now, certain things can’t be healed. You can’t recover from the death of a child. You can’t heal from some of the horrors that we go through as people, abuses that we go through as people. We all know that there are things that we cannot, and we never will, heal.
I am not someone who can preach about the best way to recover because I struggle. I struggle. A part of me is broken. There’s no doubt of that. But like weeds in the sidewalk, life grows in the cracks. God knows I am one of the lucky ones who has a ton of support and love around me. There are so many who don’t. And I’m not just talking about my transition, you know. I suffer from depression; I’ve lost a child, you know. But I am privileged in many, many, many, many ways. Part of that privilege is having people support me for who I am. My daughter Reid sings on that song with me. And my daughter needed to be a part of it. She’s been a part of all my albums since Somewhere Between Heaven and Earth. I felt it was essential to have her sing backup and be a singular person on that song because we grew together, in some respects as a family. I’m still her mother, even though I have a mustache – I always say that. It’s a powerful song, and I decided it needed to be on the album.
PRESTON FRAZIER: You worked with Ray Kennedy as a producer for the album.
CIDNY BULLENS: Ray Kennedy, who is one of the most incredibly talented producer engineers, is also a fantastic musician and songwriter. He produced Lucinda Williams. He produced Steve Earle. He’s produced Rodney Crowell. The list goes on and on and on.
PRESTON FRAZIER: You’ve had a lot of projects in the last 12 months. Your book, TransElectric: My Life as a Cosmic Rockstar, must have taken a lot of time to develop. How did you interweave that with the album?
CIDNY BULLENS: During the pandemic, I said, “Okay, maybe it’s time to write my book.” And I put together a book proposal. My wife is a memoir coach. Ironically, she didn’t coach me, but she helped me say, “Oh, you need to do this, you need to do that, you need to do this.” And so I put together a book proposal in the winter of 2020 and got an agent in April of 2021 and, in August of 2021, a publishing deal for the book. I started with the book proposal, writing the first chapters. I tried to keep this short, which is complicated because I had written the show and knew the show was going to be the template for the book. I knew that it was a good template. I had written my show – which, of course, is dialogue and live music.
It was actually hard to write the show because I had to put my life in a 45 minutes of dialogue, and it was multimedia. So I had pictures and video and things too, which helped. Being a songwriter also helped me, because I’m concise, but I had to expand my story with the show – and then I had to expand it again with the book. I also have been keeping journals for 50 years. I had a lot of material with which to work. I knew that the chapters were all going to be song titles, my songs. So I had some things that I knew were going to frame the book songs and lyrics. I’m very proud of it. It’s candid; it’s honest. I love to write, so I felt good writing it, even though it was very, very difficult to write some of the stuff that I wrote.
PRESTON FRAZIER: And you reached out to your friend and ex-boss for the forward, Elton John. I love the chapter about the tour with Elton John. There’s just so much from beginning to end in the book. Little Pieces is a perfect companion piece to your wonderful autobiography.
CIDNY BULLENS: I appreciate this opportunity. I always appreciate the opportunity to let people know that I’m here. I will just say this, you know, I am a transgender person, but I lived a whole life. I lived decades and decades as a woman and as Cindy Bullens. I sang on the Grease movie soundtrack. I did a lot of things. I had my own solo albums as Cindy. I got married, had children, lost a child, all of that stuff. I transitioned late in life, and I hope that my story humanizes the experience of being transgender a little bit. That’s really what I hope that it humanizes.
You know, I am a human being. I lived a whole life. You know, I’ve lived several different lives. If you read my book, I remain exactly who I was as Cindy Bullins, except my physical appearance has changed, you know, and I’m still a mother. I’m a grandparent four times over. You know, I still do the things that I’ve done my whole life. I’m still a musician. So hopefully if my story can help humanize that and also tell a very unique story. Mine’s pretty unique. The music is a companion because the music will hopefully lift you up, and have you have a good time as well as
tell a story.
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