About Julie Christensen

Singer Julie Christensen’s world is a multi-faceted one, with a resume’ including high profile work with Leonard Cohen, with the Los Angeles-based twang-punk band Divine Horseman, a solo album produced by Todd Rundgren, and many other connections. Refusing to fit neatly in any defining musical niche, Christensen easily swerves across genre borders, and with a natural musicality.

Along the way, she has recorded albums with her band Stone Cupid. With a pair of adventurous new solo projects on the Household Ink label, the avant-Americana, art-pop styled Where the Fireworks Are and the jazz-leaning Something Familiar, Christensen moves forward into a new phase of her solo career with craft and versatility intact.

Iowa-born, Christensen worked that musical craft during stints in Austin, Texas and then a long period in Los Angeles, before landing in the idyllic enclave of Ojai, California. Hunkered down in the L.A. scene in the ‘80s, Christensen became a colleague of John Doe, Exene Cervenka, Steve Wynn, and has been in musical liaisons with Van Dyke Parks, Iggy Pop, PiL and guitarist Robben Ford. 

Christensen’s deep ties to Cohen’s world took her on world tours, along with vocalist Perla Batalla, as well as involvement the recent Cohen tribute concerts organized by producer Hal Willner, under the moniker “Came so Far For Beauty.” In a 2006 Dublin concert, Christensen performed a duet of Cohen’s “Joan of Arc” with Lou Reed, who then invited her onstage at his concert in Santa Barbara a month later. A Sydney Opera House tribute concert was filmed for the acclaimed Cohen documentary I’m Your Man, affording Christensen a wide-release, big screen moment, to the tune of Cohen’s moving “Anthem.”

With her new releases, Christensen is now poised to take flight as a solo artist, bolstered by a rich history--and future.

Quotes:

Recorded in Tom Lackner’s mountainside studio, the album radiates in poignancy, yet shimmers in sublime beauty. From the heart-wrenching title track, which serves up an aching does of harsh reality, to the cascading piano that drives the plaintive “Something Pretty,” Where the Fireworks Are is a collection of songs spanning the emotional spectrum. It provides an evocative musical chariot for Christensen to weave her vocal magic.” –Brett Leigh Dicks, VC Reporter

"Julie Christensen is one of the truer singers you'll ever hear - straight up, no mannerisms, perfect taste...Listen to her takes on "But Beautiful," "Stolen Moments" and "Blame It on My Youth," from her piercing new Something Familiar, and recognize how she could sing with both Leonard Cohen and Chris D." --Greg Burk L.A. WEEKLY

One of the highlights of the show, interestingly enough, was a move outside the Reed songbook, when he invited Ojai-based singer Julie Christensen onstage for a duet of Leonard Cohen's song "Joan of Arc.” Reed and Christensen -- a longtime backup singer for Cohen -- were well familiar with the song, having just performed it twice in Dublin during a Cohen tribute program. They work wonders together with Reed issuing his gruff sing-spiel against Christensen's purer vocal graces and her magical, reverb-coated wordless wailing (which spurred the crowd into a mid-song applause).”— Santa Barbara News-Press