Cher (60 page)

What most people didn’t realize, however, was that Cher’s “live” special wasn’t really broadcast “live” at all. It had been in fact taped the night before, and then broadcast. Yeah, like anyone cared. However, critic Ken Tucker in
Entertainment Weekly
had fun griping,

Why complain that a “live” concert isn’t “live” when you’re dealing with a star who rarely wears her own hair and scored her first hit song in more than a decade by mechanically distorting her voice. . . . For this tour, Cher has surrounded herself with a batch of distractingly cornball dancers who must cavort for minutes on end while Cher is backstage getting new hair and duds. . . . Cher in
Tea with Mussolini
had more spontaneity than Cher in Las Vegas (227).

To express her feelings in “Cher” terms, she really didn’t
give a shit
about what the critics thought about her concert; it was a huge hit with her fans, and the numbers brilliantly attested to that. Probably the best reviews she could get came from her own children, Elijah and Chastity.

I think I’m cool, but I am sooo uncool to my children. I’m like, so corny. I embarrass them to no end. Everything I do embarrasses Elijah. But you know what he said about the concert? “My friends and I actually thought your show was good, Mom. It was good.” That’s better than a rave review in the
New York Times
, because he never has anything good to say (192).

Chastity likewise agreed. “[I’m] not generally astonished by what my Mom does,” she said, “but seeing the
Believe
concert gave me one of those rare opportunities to disconnect, to forget who I am, and be totally blown away by her. I had a ball watching the crowd—kids, old people, straights, gays—everybody loved her” (193).

After HBO’s hugely successful
Cher in Concert
special proved a hit in “the colonies,” Cher headed across “the pond” to Europe, where she “wowed” her fans in Europe. By the time the year 1999 came to an end it was tallied that over 1.5 million fans bought tickets to see Cher live in concert, in a seven-month period. In addition, HBO claimed that the
Cher in Concert
telecast was the highest-rated original program in the past two years.

Since 1999 was the “Year of Cher,” every record label under the sun was scrambling to get in on the bonanza while she was hot. Because Cher had recorded for many different labels over the years, just about every record company had something to offer. Even
I Paralyze
, which had been long forgotten, found its way back onto a CD. MCA repackaged her 1973
Bittersweet White Light
album and turned it into a seventeen-song all-ballads retrospective called
Bittersweet—The Love Songs Collection
. It took the nine cuts from the original album, added Irving Berlin’s “What’ll I Do,” “The Way of Love,” and six other cuts, and gave it a new cover, liner notes, and a classy package.

Geffen Records in America compiled its own
If I Could Turn Back Time/Cher’s Greatest Hits
disc, which included all of her biggest hits from
her three solo albums on that label, plus “The Shoop Shoop Song (It’s in His Kiss)” and several of her 1970s hits like “Dark Lady,” “Take Me Home,” and “Half Breed,” as well as Sonny & Cher’s “I Got You Babe.” As an added treat, this album also included a never-before-released song written by Diane Warren, entitled “Don’t Come Crying to Me.”

Imperial Records jumped on the Cher bandwagon with its own
Bang, Bang—The Early Years
, which took eighteen cuts from her original Sonny Bono–produced solo albums, featuring the biggest hits from this era and including “Dream Baby,” “Elusive Butterfly,” “Alfie,” “Hey Joe,” “Needles and Pins,” and “It’s Not Unusual.” Universal Music Records took eight cuts from her pair of Casablanca solo albums, plus “Bang Bang” and “You Better Sit Down Kids,” and released an album called
Take Me Home
(not to be confused with her hit 1979 album). This brief “hits” disc was packaged using the original
Take Me Home
golden Viking warrior cover of the original album of the same name.

In Europe, record labels were likewise getting into the act. Magic Records in France released a pair of Cher solo albums, 1998’s
Sunny
, and 1999’s
With Love, Cher
. The first one featured twenty cuts from the 1960s, and the second one followed the next year with fourteen cuts. These two disks are especially fun because they brought several of her non-hit album cuts to compact disc for the first time, anywhere in the world. Among the time-capsule-like cuts that fell in this category were “Pied Piper,” “Homeward Bound,” “I Want You,” “Milord,” “Girl Don’t Come,” “Sing for Your Supper,” “I Will Wait for You (Love Theme from
The Umbrellas of Cherbourg
)” and “There but for Love.” In Germany, Spectrum Records re-released the
Black Rose
album, completely intact, for the first time on compact disc. However, instead of the black-and-white-and-purple artwork on the cover, depicting Cher’s stiletto high heel and tattooed ankle, it was packaged with a photo of Cher in concert and marketed as a “Cher” album, instead of as a Black Rose group album.

However, the best full-circle Cher retrospective album of the 1990s came from WEA/Universal Records in Germany. It was simply titled
Cher/The Greatest Hits
, and it was distributed throughout Europe. Released in 1999, it opens with “Believe” and ends with a hot remix of “Dov’è L’Amore.” This one traces her entire Geffen Records career, plus the European version of “One by One” and the beautiful trio of Cher, Chrissie Hynde, and Neneh Cherry singing “Love Can Build a Bridge.” It also highlights the 1960s (“All I Really Want to Do,” “The Beat Goes On,” and “I Got You Babe”) and the 1970s (“Gypsys, Tramps and
Thieves”). According to
Billboard
magazine in January 2000, following the 1999 Christmas season,
Cher/The Greatest Hits
had already sold over three million copies in Europe since its November release date.

While all of this was going on, Cher was featured on three other high-profile albums in 1999. The patriotic album
Sing America
included her rendition of the “Star Spangled Banner,” which she had recorded for that year’s Super Bowl kick-off. The album
VH1 Divas Live ’99
contained her singing “Proud Mary” with Tina Turner and Elton John and her solo performance of “If I Could Turn Back Time.” And during the holiday season, Cher was heard singing Phil Spector’s “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)” while Rosie O’Donnell sang the chorus on the hit Yule season disk,
A Rosie Christmas
. It was great to hear Cher interpreting yet another Spector classic. Not only was the arrangement very “Wall of Sound”–sounding, but the same vocal distortion that was used on the song “Believe” was used here as well. It was Cher saluting her past by choosing a Phil Spector tune to record, while tipping her hat to the sound of her own 1999 hit.

In addition,
Cher in Concert
was released as a video cassette and as a DVD package, just in time for the Christmas season as well. Both formats featured a 3-D reflective cover, which featured the diva in a brightly colored red wig with a strange little unsymmetrical widow’s peak protruding from the bangs.

Cher was one of six celebrities who appeared on the cover of the September 20, 1999, issue of
People
magazine, with a headline heralding the “Best & Worst Dressed ’99.” The magazine’s appointed fashion critics found Cher to be dressing “not age-appropriate,” “tacky,” and “not occasion appropriate.” Seeming to have traded gowns, Bob Mackie spangles, and stilettos for pantsuits and low-heeled shoes, her fashion statements put her in the Top 10 of the year’s “Worst Dressed” celebrities—along with Madonna, Mariah Carey, Val Kilmer, and Shania Twain. Hey, it ain’t easy being Cher—or dressing like her.

Although Cher was amid one of the high points of her entire life during 1999, Sonny’s sudden and unexpected death made her think about her own mortality. The
Star
newspaper, in its December 7, 1999, issue, reported that Cher had selected and placed a down payment on a funeral plot, which she intends on making her own final resting place. Naturally, for Cher, being Cher, even this was nothing out of the ordinary. She has reportedly chosen the most famous cemetery in Paris, France, Pere Lachaise. Known as the eternal address of such celebrities as songbird
Edith Piaf, controversial British writer Oscar Wilde, and Doors rocker Jim Morrison, Pere Lachaise is a historical site in “the city of light.” According to the article, she put down a $4,300 down payment on the plot she personally chose. There is, however, one small detail that Cher needs to deal with; if she intends to be entombed at Pere Lachaise she has to either live, or die, in Paris to be buried there. Cher is of course a woman who is used to getting her way, so she is certain to think of some way of getting around this prerequisite. Obviously, she has several years to work on getting around this particular obstacle.

It was Cher, Cher, Cher, Cher, Cher, everywhere you looked in 1999. In addition, when all of the end of the decade, end of the century, and beginning of the new millennium tallies were published, Cher was heavily featured in all of the coverage. In England, Cher was acknowledged as the biggest-selling female recording artist—ever. Not only was “Believe” the biggest global hit of the year, but Cher was crowned the only woman in history to have a Top 10 single in the 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s. When
Pollstar
magazine, a concert industry publication, reported who were the hottest acts in America in 1999, they ranked her in the Top 10 of the year’s biggest concert attractions. They claimed that she earned $37.7 million from concert ticket sales alone. Now, that is pretty damned impressive, to say the least.

It had been an incredible tour for her, performing fifty-five shows across North America alone. During the subsequent European leg of the tour, she performed thirty-five shows in thirteen different countries.

After the astonishing year that she logged in 1999, what was it that made her hot some years, and not so other years? Even she couldn’t answer that question completely. “It depends on the year, basically,” she said in an attempt to explain. “It would be a good study, because it’s been weirdly extreme. Some years I’m the coolest thing that ever happened and then the next year everyone’s so over me, and I’m just so past my ‘sell by’ date” (214). Cher had waited a long time to be back on top, and in 1999, she completely “worked it” to the max!

18

IF I COULD TURN BACK TIME

Cher started out the year 2000 in an equally active fashion. The first week in January, when the 1999 Grammy Award nominations were announced, she was right there on the list. She was nominated in four different categories, including Record of the Year, Best Pop Album, Best Dance Recording, and Best Remixer of the Year for the “Club 69 Future Anthem Mix” of “Believe.”

That same month, she announced that she was returning to the concert halls for another round of her triumphant
Believe
tour. The twenty-one additional concerts would occur across the United States and Canada. She began January 28 in Salt Lake City, Utah, and ended up on March 4 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Reviewing her show at the massive new Staples Center in Los Angeles, Tony Gieske in the
Hollywood Reporter
called the show “a night of trailer park surrealism and mellow bellows” and proclaimed, “she has never looked sexier or more svelte. . . . Glad we got you, babe” (228). Indeed, judging from the thunderous round of applause and the full standing ovation she received that evening, she was a huge hit in her hometown.

In the first months of the new century, the avalanche of repackaged Cher albums continued to appear in music shops. In America, MCA Records released
The Best of Cher/The Millennium Collection
, which featured her biggest solo MCA hits, as well as the full-length (6 minutes, 46 seconds) “Take Me Home” and “All I Ever Need Is You” with Sonny. In Germany, Geffen/Universal Records released
Cher/Millennium Edition
,
which teamed a baker’s dozen of her 1970s MCA cuts with four of her 1980s Geffen Records cuts, including “Love on a Rooftop.”

On February 23, 2000, the Grammy Awards were handed out, also at the Staples Center. Cher was conspicuously missing from the telecast. Although she was not there in person, her song “Believe” took the trophy as the Best Dance Recording of the year. This was—astonishingly—the first Grammy Award of her career.

On March 26, 2000, Cher was one of the presenters at the first Academy Awards of the twenty-first century. Wearing a beautiful and full-length black velvet gown, Cher looked radiant. The long-sleeved, off-the-shoulder gown was worn with a necklace-like chain belt, with a large stone-encrusted crucifix that dangled in her lap. For Cher, this was quite a change of pace. When she got up to the podium to present an award, she commented on how adult and grown-up she was dressing this year, and then assured the crowd that she would never let it happen again. For Cher, wearing something tasteful and sedate was perhaps the most surprising move that she could possibly make.