Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Jeff Stevens, you are listening to the eighty show, and
oh my goodness, I am back in nineteen eighty seven again.
Debbie Gibson is here. Hi, Debbie, Hi are you? I'm good.
Thank you for kind of hanging and co hosting the
eighty show with me and we were just kind of
talking for a second. It is so fun to of course,
watched your career since eighty seven, but now I follow
(00:20):
you on Instagram and everything. You are still so connected
with your fans. It's truly amazing.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
Thank you. Yes, listen, I have this core fan base,
my community called the Debheads and the Diamond Debheads. I
love the connection to this audience. Over three and a
half decades later, we're all still communing through this music
and it's incredible.
Speaker 1 (00:39):
All right, So let's go back to eighty seven. How
did you know things were starting to change for you?
Speaker 2 (00:45):
Yeah, so I was doing three clubs to night. I
was doing a teen club, astrade club, and a gay club,
like four nights a week for about nine months. You know,
I'm writing my book right now and looking up the
actual facts because I don't imprint the exact amount of
like months and weeks something like sixty five weeks from
the time Only in My Dreams came out till it
topped the pop charts in the top five. It was
(01:07):
a relatively long climb, like everybody kind of felt like
it came out of nowhere and within a month it was,
but it was me kind of pounding the pavement for
nine months at that point. But yeah, I mean it
was a thrill because all I ever want I was
obsessed with the radio, like I was winning radio contests.
I was obsessed with Casey Kase.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
You know.
Speaker 2 (01:24):
So all I ever wanted was to be on the radio,
like an addition to being on Broadway. I wanted to
be on the radio, like when I first started writing songs.
That was my goal. So it was incredible and insane
and all the things, you know, and exhausting, but in
a great positive in the greatest possible way.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
All Right, so we're gonna play. We're gonna take you
back to the very first one right now. This is
Debbie's Only in My Dreams on the eighty Show. Jeff
Stevens back on the eighty Show with Debbie Gibson. And
you still look fantastic, you still sound fantastic, and I
still have your album out of the Blue.
Speaker 2 (01:53):
Ride here, m man, that's in pristine shape.
Speaker 1 (01:56):
Yes, thank you very much. So a lot of times
an artist will get a song on the radio and
then you never hear from them again. And that was
not the case with you, because then we had Shake
Your Love and we had out of the Blue. And
it's like, Debbie Gibson is not a one hit wonder.
She has some serious good pop songs. And were you
just stayed on the radio. That had to be such
a neat time for you.
Speaker 2 (02:17):
Thank you. Yeah, I mean, listen up until the time
when grunge took over, we all kind of remember that
there was like a backlash against pop. But in those
like real pop years, which was like eighty six to
ninety two, let's say something like that, I had a
pretty consistent flow of hits and touring and it was amazing.
(02:37):
And then I went to do les Mis on Broadway
and kept recording independently. I left the big label machine.
For many many reasons. My mom, my late great mom,
who was my mom, meager. She and I had this
shared vision. We were like, if people heard these songs,
we just knew the music was going to resonate. We
stopped at nothing to get them heard.
Speaker 1 (02:58):
Yeah, and we're gonna play Shake your Love right now now,
because that was another just game changer in nineteen eighty eight.
It's Debbie Gibson's Shake Your Love on the eighty Show.
Jeff Stevens on The eighty Show with my very special
co host Debbie Gibson. Thirty five years for Electric Youth.
This is the thirty fifth anniversary. How is that possible?
Speaker 2 (03:17):
I mean, listen, on one hand, I can account for
every minute of the last thirty five years, because like
because I haven't stopped working, so it's not it's not
like exactly like a time warp. But at the same time,
I feel as excited and everything feels weirdly as fresh
and new when I go out, especially because in these shows,
like the show I'm doing here in Ohio, it's like
(03:37):
a hybrid of the anniversary show and kind of just
my greatest hits shows and like a little bit of
a modern touch in there too. I go out on
stage and it's so wired into my muscle memory doing
this tour, the Electric Youth tour, seeing people kind of
being transported to because listen, it's chaotic, complicated times and
everyone's adulting, and I think people just want to break
(04:00):
from adulting, is what it is, and this music takes
them back. So to be able to deliver that and
feel that energy from everybody, it is such a great vibe.
Speaker 1 (04:08):
I cannot wait to see it in person, that's for sure.
So we're gonna check out Electric Youth from Debbie Gibson
right here on the eighty Show Jeff Stevens on the
Eighties Show with my co host Debbie Gibson and Lost
in your Eyes. To this day, I do a daily
eighty show, and I do a weekly radio show which
everybody's listening to right now. Still get so many calls
(04:30):
and so many regulars that say Lost in your Eyes
was a complete game changer. Still brings them to tears.
It's a wedding song. I mean, what a special song
this is.
Speaker 2 (04:40):
I just sang it at my friend Bob's wedding to
his man Matt, like a month ago in Palm Springs.
And to see people like marking their the most special
day of their life with one of my songs is
so insane. And I was just this little girl writing
about puppy love. But I remember because I sat at
the piano, and I always say the best songs are channeled,
(05:01):
like not to get too woo wo on everybody out there,
but I kind of like, listen, I know the craft
of songwriting, but I take no ownership of the magic
of it. Like the magic part of songwriting is so humbling.
I'm just sitting there and all of a sudden, I
hear this melody in my head and I'm like, oh, wait,
that's meant for me. It's almost like tuning into a
radio right And it's like, wait, is that a song
that's already been written? No, that some song angels are
(05:25):
dropping that and on me to present of the world.
How cool. And that's what it was with Lost in
Your Guys. I sat at the piano. It was one
day after school, played it and in real time it
kind of wrote itself, and I knew. I was like,
this is a magical song. I just knew, and like
I enjoy it as much as everybody else does, like
almost as if it's its own entity. You know, it
(05:45):
really is special. My sound Ran Dorrian just came in
the room. He goes. You know, you always get this
little look on your face and the intro of lost
dry you guys. It's the look that's like, yeah, this
is a big hit, and y'all love this song. And
I'm like, don't tell me that is now gonna be
self caught. But what I'm doing, I'm kind of luxuriating
in the music and in the connection because I do
(06:06):
think about everyone in the audience, and I think, God,
the collective memories we have to this music. It's bigger
than me. It's not about my ego. To me, it's
about the music and folks.
Speaker 1 (06:14):
She wrote all these songs when she was sixteen, seventeen, eighteen,
you know when you said you wrote it after school.
So we're going to check out one of Debbie's monster hits,
this is Lost in your Eyes on the eighty Show.
Jeff Stevens, thank you for listening to the eighties Show.
And Debbie Gibson, thank you for hanging out with us.
We get to hear all these great songs. I want
to talk about other stuff for a second. You have
been Sandy in Greece for I interviewed you. I don't know,
(06:38):
maybe fifteen or twenty years ago when you were doing
that Rizzo.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
I was doing Rizzo on the road here, so I
was Rizzo here, but I was Sandy in London, so
I've had a whole lot of grease in my life.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
Which one do you prefer?
Speaker 2 (06:50):
You know? Weirdly I prefer them both in their respective productions.
Because the production that toured the US and was on
the on Broadway in the US was kind of geared
toward Rizzo. It was like Rizzo's World, and then the
West End production was more like the movie where it
was you know, hopelessly devoted and those songs, because a
lot of people don't know the musical was a musical
(07:11):
for before it was a movie, right, and it didn't
have You're the One that I Want or hopelessly devoted,
So it was slightly different productions. But in London I
got to do the movie version, like Robert stigwould produced
the movie produced our show. So it was kind of insane,
but it was fun to play. I mean Rizzo, like,
you know, her edge and her heart, like that combo
(07:33):
was fun to play because people never expect that from me.
They always just saw me as ah. But you know,
Sandy kind of flips it at the end too, so
they kind of meet in the middle somewhere. But I've
loved all of my Grease experiences, and I've held on
to friends from both of those productions all these years
because it's like being in high school or college together.
You're just bonded.
Speaker 1 (07:53):
Did you ever get to meet Olivia?
Speaker 2 (07:55):
Oh? Yeah, yeah. In fact, the first time I met
Olivia was when I co hosted the American Music Awards
in eighty eight, eighty seven, eighty eight, eighty eight, I
think it was. And she was lovely, yeah, and she
was at I think she was at our opening night
in London. She was definitely at the show.
Speaker 1 (08:10):
And yeah, awesome, what a cool thing. And you are
still of course, you love coming out and playing the hits.
But I saw your doing. Did I see the acoustic Youth?
Did I see that?
Speaker 2 (08:18):
Yes? Yeah, so funny story, like you know, electric Youth,
Acoustic youth. Then, you know, we all grew up with unplugged,
and I didn't know what I was going to call it.
I knew I wanted to do kind of a celebration
for Electric Youths thirty fifth where I just played the
songs on the piano the way I wrote them and
told the stories about them, and that kind of thing,
and maybe throwing a couple of other acoustic Surprises, and
I was gonna call it something else, and I'm like,
(08:40):
you know, people don't read. A lot of people just don't.
I was like, I have to spell out what it
is in the title, because if I called it electric
youth and then like, oh, by the way, I'm on
the piano, inevitably ten people would show up and go,
where's the band? I thought we were seing the dancers.
So I'm like, I'm calling it acoustic youth. You cannot
mistake what it is. But that the diehards are already like,
(09:01):
we can't wait for the ay shows, And I'm like, ay,
all right, acoustic youth because we always say UI. And
I love it. I feel like it's gonna be a
really magical thing. Like I love kind of just connecting
people with people super like intimately like that, and love
the music stripped down. It's always a fun thing to
do well.
Speaker 1 (09:19):
And I'm sure some stories will come along with that,
some storytelling along with the stripped down version.
Speaker 2 (09:24):
Oh yeah, one thousand percent. Inevitably, I'm sure people will
call things out and I'll kind of talk to people,
you know, It'll be that kind of very intimate communal
experience and I always pride myself on no two shows
or ever the same. I'm very spontaneous, so I look
forward to that. That's me. That's like the hardest thing
I ever do is just me and a piano and
being like that present and in the moment there's no
(09:45):
bells and whistles, there's nobody else to lean on on
the stage like so it always is like. I've done
acoustic before, but I've never done a whole tour of
it like this. I did something like a border's books
and music tour for an album that I did called
Think with Your Heart a long time, like in the
early nineties. But I really haven't done a full on
acoustic tour in a long time. So I'm looking forward
(10:05):
to it, and so is my audience. So yeah, very exciting.
Speaker 1 (10:08):
Well, happy, happy everything. Happy anniversary for Electric Youth and
good luck with Acoustic Youth, and thank you for all
these years of these great songs. We're gonna listen to
Foolish Beat to wrap things up. But Debbie Gibson, what
a joy to me. You Thank you so much, Thank.
Speaker 2 (10:21):
You so much, and thanks for everybody out there. Thanks
to everybody for taking this journey with me. I mean,
here we are. Y'all are looking good and eternally electric.
Speaker 1 (10:29):
Stay that way, all right, Debbie Gibson on the Eighties
Show
Jeff Stevens, you are listening to the eighty show, and
oh my goodness, I am back in nineteen eighty seven again.
Debbie Gibson is here. Hi, Debbie, Hi are you? I'm good.
Thank you for kind of hanging and co hosting the
eighty show with me and we were just kind of
talking for a second. It is so fun to of course,
watched your career since eighty seven, but now I follow
(00:20):
you on Instagram and everything. You are still so connected
with your fans. It's truly amazing.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
Thank you. Yes, listen, I have this core fan base,
my community called the Debheads and the Diamond Debheads. I
love the connection to this audience. Over three and a
half decades later, we're all still communing through this music
and it's incredible.
Speaker 1 (00:39):
All right, So let's go back to eighty seven. How
did you know things were starting to change for you?
Speaker 2 (00:45):
Yeah, so I was doing three clubs to night. I
was doing a teen club, astrade club, and a gay club,
like four nights a week for about nine months. You know,
I'm writing my book right now and looking up the
actual facts because I don't imprint the exact amount of
like months and weeks something like sixty five weeks from
the time Only in My Dreams came out till it
topped the pop charts in the top five. It was
(01:07):
a relatively long climb, like everybody kind of felt like
it came out of nowhere and within a month it was,
but it was me kind of pounding the pavement for
nine months at that point. But yeah, I mean it
was a thrill because all I ever want I was
obsessed with the radio, like I was winning radio contests.
I was obsessed with Casey Kase.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
You know.
Speaker 2 (01:24):
So all I ever wanted was to be on the radio,
like an addition to being on Broadway. I wanted to
be on the radio, like when I first started writing songs.
That was my goal. So it was incredible and insane
and all the things, you know, and exhausting, but in
a great positive in the greatest possible way.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
All Right, so we're gonna play. We're gonna take you
back to the very first one right now. This is
Debbie's Only in My Dreams on the eighty Show. Jeff
Stevens back on the eighty Show with Debbie Gibson. And
you still look fantastic, you still sound fantastic, and I
still have your album out of the Blue.
Speaker 2 (01:53):
Ride here, m man, that's in pristine shape.
Speaker 1 (01:56):
Yes, thank you very much. So a lot of times
an artist will get a song on the radio and
then you never hear from them again. And that was
not the case with you, because then we had Shake
Your Love and we had out of the Blue. And
it's like, Debbie Gibson is not a one hit wonder.
She has some serious good pop songs. And were you
just stayed on the radio. That had to be such
a neat time for you.
Speaker 2 (02:17):
Thank you. Yeah, I mean, listen up until the time
when grunge took over, we all kind of remember that
there was like a backlash against pop. But in those
like real pop years, which was like eighty six to
ninety two, let's say something like that, I had a
pretty consistent flow of hits and touring and it was amazing.
(02:37):
And then I went to do les Mis on Broadway
and kept recording independently. I left the big label machine.
For many many reasons. My mom, my late great mom,
who was my mom, meager. She and I had this
shared vision. We were like, if people heard these songs,
we just knew the music was going to resonate. We
stopped at nothing to get them heard.
Speaker 1 (02:58):
Yeah, and we're gonna play Shake your Love right now now,
because that was another just game changer in nineteen eighty eight.
It's Debbie Gibson's Shake Your Love on the eighty Show.
Jeff Stevens on The eighty Show with my very special
co host Debbie Gibson. Thirty five years for Electric Youth.
This is the thirty fifth anniversary. How is that possible?
Speaker 2 (03:17):
I mean, listen, on one hand, I can account for
every minute of the last thirty five years, because like
because I haven't stopped working, so it's not it's not
like exactly like a time warp. But at the same time,
I feel as excited and everything feels weirdly as fresh
and new when I go out, especially because in these shows,
like the show I'm doing here in Ohio, it's like
(03:37):
a hybrid of the anniversary show and kind of just
my greatest hits shows and like a little bit of
a modern touch in there too. I go out on
stage and it's so wired into my muscle memory doing
this tour, the Electric Youth tour, seeing people kind of
being transported to because listen, it's chaotic, complicated times and
everyone's adulting, and I think people just want to break
(04:00):
from adulting, is what it is, and this music takes
them back. So to be able to deliver that and
feel that energy from everybody, it is such a great vibe.
Speaker 1 (04:08):
I cannot wait to see it in person, that's for sure.
So we're gonna check out Electric Youth from Debbie Gibson
right here on the eighty Show Jeff Stevens on the
Eighties Show with my co host Debbie Gibson and Lost
in your Eyes. To this day, I do a daily
eighty show, and I do a weekly radio show which
everybody's listening to right now. Still get so many calls
(04:30):
and so many regulars that say Lost in your Eyes
was a complete game changer. Still brings them to tears.
It's a wedding song. I mean, what a special song
this is.
Speaker 2 (04:40):
I just sang it at my friend Bob's wedding to
his man Matt, like a month ago in Palm Springs.
And to see people like marking their the most special
day of their life with one of my songs is
so insane. And I was just this little girl writing
about puppy love. But I remember because I sat at
the piano, and I always say the best songs are channeled,
(05:01):
like not to get too woo wo on everybody out there,
but I kind of like, listen, I know the craft
of songwriting, but I take no ownership of the magic
of it. Like the magic part of songwriting is so humbling.
I'm just sitting there and all of a sudden, I
hear this melody in my head and I'm like, oh, wait,
that's meant for me. It's almost like tuning into a
radio right And it's like, wait, is that a song
that's already been written? No, that some song angels are
(05:25):
dropping that and on me to present of the world.
How cool. And that's what it was with Lost in
Your Guys. I sat at the piano. It was one
day after school, played it and in real time it
kind of wrote itself, and I knew. I was like,
this is a magical song. I just knew, and like
I enjoy it as much as everybody else does, like
almost as if it's its own entity. You know, it
(05:45):
really is special. My sound Ran Dorrian just came in
the room. He goes. You know, you always get this
little look on your face and the intro of lost
dry you guys. It's the look that's like, yeah, this
is a big hit, and y'all love this song. And
I'm like, don't tell me that is now gonna be
self caught. But what I'm doing, I'm kind of luxuriating
in the music and in the connection because I do
(06:06):
think about everyone in the audience, and I think, God,
the collective memories we have to this music. It's bigger
than me. It's not about my ego. To me, it's
about the music and folks.
Speaker 1 (06:14):
She wrote all these songs when she was sixteen, seventeen, eighteen,
you know when you said you wrote it after school.
So we're going to check out one of Debbie's monster hits,
this is Lost in your Eyes on the eighty Show.
Jeff Stevens, thank you for listening to the eighties Show.
And Debbie Gibson, thank you for hanging out with us.
We get to hear all these great songs. I want
to talk about other stuff for a second. You have
been Sandy in Greece for I interviewed you. I don't know,
(06:38):
maybe fifteen or twenty years ago when you were doing
that Rizzo.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
I was doing Rizzo on the road here, so I
was Rizzo here, but I was Sandy in London, so
I've had a whole lot of grease in my life.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
Which one do you prefer?
Speaker 2 (06:50):
You know? Weirdly I prefer them both in their respective productions.
Because the production that toured the US and was on
the on Broadway in the US was kind of geared
toward Rizzo. It was like Rizzo's World, and then the
West End production was more like the movie where it
was you know, hopelessly devoted and those songs, because a
lot of people don't know the musical was a musical
(07:11):
for before it was a movie, right, and it didn't
have You're the One that I Want or hopelessly devoted,
So it was slightly different productions. But in London I
got to do the movie version, like Robert stigwould produced
the movie produced our show. So it was kind of insane,
but it was fun to play. I mean Rizzo, like,
you know, her edge and her heart, like that combo
(07:33):
was fun to play because people never expect that from me.
They always just saw me as ah. But you know,
Sandy kind of flips it at the end too, so
they kind of meet in the middle somewhere. But I've
loved all of my Grease experiences, and I've held on
to friends from both of those productions all these years
because it's like being in high school or college together.
You're just bonded.
Speaker 1 (07:53):
Did you ever get to meet Olivia?
Speaker 2 (07:55):
Oh? Yeah, yeah. In fact, the first time I met
Olivia was when I co hosted the American Music Awards
in eighty eight, eighty seven, eighty eight, eighty eight, I
think it was. And she was lovely, yeah, and she
was at I think she was at our opening night
in London. She was definitely at the show.
Speaker 1 (08:10):
And yeah, awesome, what a cool thing. And you are
still of course, you love coming out and playing the hits.
But I saw your doing. Did I see the acoustic Youth?
Did I see that?
Speaker 2 (08:18):
Yes? Yeah, so funny story, like you know, electric Youth,
Acoustic youth. Then, you know, we all grew up with unplugged,
and I didn't know what I was going to call it.
I knew I wanted to do kind of a celebration
for Electric Youths thirty fifth where I just played the
songs on the piano the way I wrote them and
told the stories about them, and that kind of thing,
and maybe throwing a couple of other acoustic Surprises, and
I was gonna call it something else, and I'm like,
(08:40):
you know, people don't read. A lot of people just don't.
I was like, I have to spell out what it
is in the title, because if I called it electric
youth and then like, oh, by the way, I'm on
the piano, inevitably ten people would show up and go,
where's the band? I thought we were seing the dancers.
So I'm like, I'm calling it acoustic youth. You cannot
mistake what it is. But that the diehards are already like,
(09:01):
we can't wait for the ay shows, And I'm like, ay,
all right, acoustic youth because we always say UI. And
I love it. I feel like it's gonna be a
really magical thing. Like I love kind of just connecting
people with people super like intimately like that, and love
the music stripped down. It's always a fun thing to
do well.
Speaker 1 (09:19):
And I'm sure some stories will come along with that,
some storytelling along with the stripped down version.
Speaker 2 (09:24):
Oh yeah, one thousand percent. Inevitably, I'm sure people will
call things out and I'll kind of talk to people,
you know, It'll be that kind of very intimate communal
experience and I always pride myself on no two shows
or ever the same. I'm very spontaneous, so I look
forward to that. That's me. That's like the hardest thing
I ever do is just me and a piano and
being like that present and in the moment there's no
(09:45):
bells and whistles, there's nobody else to lean on on
the stage like so it always is like. I've done
acoustic before, but I've never done a whole tour of
it like this. I did something like a border's books
and music tour for an album that I did called
Think with Your Heart a long time, like in the
early nineties. But I really haven't done a full on
acoustic tour in a long time. So I'm looking forward
(10:05):
to it, and so is my audience. So yeah, very exciting.
Speaker 1 (10:08):
Well, happy, happy everything. Happy anniversary for Electric Youth and
good luck with Acoustic Youth, and thank you for all
these years of these great songs. We're gonna listen to
Foolish Beat to wrap things up. But Debbie Gibson, what
a joy to me. You Thank you so much, Thank.
Speaker 2 (10:21):
You so much, and thanks for everybody out there. Thanks
to everybody for taking this journey with me. I mean,
here we are. Y'all are looking good and eternally electric.
Speaker 1 (10:29):
Stay that way, all right, Debbie Gibson on the Eighties
Show
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