Biography
Cristina fused Bertolt Brecht, Leiber & Stoller, punk, and disco into an unmistakable style that mocked the overindulgence of the 1970s and 1980s; her biting intelligence elevated her to the status of a respected cult artist despite issuing only two albums and a few singles. With her 1978 single “Disco Clone” she captured the era’s skepticism yet also excelled at refreshing longstanding cynicism. The 1980 take on “Is That All There Is?” introduced fresh lyrics so disturbing that Leiber & Stoller obtained an injunction halting distribution for years, while the 1981 track “Things Fall Apart” pushed seasonal melancholy into darkly comic territory. Her 1980 album Cristina, produced by Kid Creole, blended the flashiest elements of disco with her precisely delivered, deadpan singing in a manner too refined to qualify as simple satire. Nevertheless, 1984’s Sleep It Off—encompassing new wave, synth pop, and Dylan-esque acoustic ballads—demonstrated that Cristina operated ahead of her contemporaries; the playful irony of her work and her talent for subverting pop forms foreshadowed the paths of Madonna and Cyndi Lauper later in the decade as well as the output of Peaches, Ladytron, Lady Gaga, and Lana Del Rey in subsequent years.
Born January 17, 1956, to American writer/illustrator Dorothy Monet and French neo-Freudian psychoanalyst Jacques Palaci, Cristina Monet Palaci experienced a culturally rich upbringing across England, France, Italy, and the U.S. After training in drama at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama and at Harvard University—where she received the History and Literature Prize as a sophomore—she wrote theater criticism for The Village Voice. While contributing to the alternative weekly in 1978 she met and began a relationship with Michael Zilkha, co-founder with Michel Esteban of the eclectic ZE label and an Oxford graduate whose family controlled the British retailer Mothercare.
Cristina launched her recording career that same year via “Disco Clone,” a single composed by Ronald Melrose, a former Harvard classmate. Designed to ride the disco wave, the John Cale-produced cut initiated her first partnership with songwriter/arranger August Darnell (aka Kid Creole). As ZE’s debut release it became a cult success that generated further singles, among them a revised “Disco Clone” with uncredited vocals by Kevin Kline, a synth-pop rendition of the Beatles’ “Drive My Car,” and a version of Leiber & Stoller’s world-weary “Is That All There Is?” carrying new lyrics by Cristina so provocative that the songwriters secured an injunction against additional sales in 1980. That year also brought her self-titled debut album, produced by Darnell, which merged Latin rhythms and disco with cinematic imagery. She followed with the unsettling holiday single “Things Fall Apart,” which surfaced on 1981’s ZE Christmas Record and was produced by Was (Not Was).
After marrying Zilkha in 1983, Cristina rejoined Don Was at his Detroit studio for her second album, the new wave-inflected Sleep It Off, issued in 1984. Accompanied by the Knack’s Doug Feiger, Barry Reynolds, and Ben Brierley of Marianne Faithfull’s band, she applied her own playfully jaded perspective to John Conlee’s “She Can’t Say That Anymore,” Van Morrison’s “Blue Money,” and “Ballad of Immoral Earnings,” an adaptation of Brecht’s “Zuhälter Ballade,” along with original material such as “He Dines Out on Death” and “What’s a Girl to Do?,” which she later called her anthem. Featuring cover art by Jean-Paul Goude (who later adapted a comparable concept for Grace Jones’ Slave to the Rhythm), Sleep It Off earned strong reviews yet modest sales. Under the false impression that her husband had financed her career, Cristina withdrew from music.
After starting a family with Zilkha and relocating to Texas, Cristina divorced him in 1990 and returned to New York to concentrate on essays and reviews for outlets including The Times Literary Supplement, Tatler, and London Literary Review. Although health concerns such as the autoimmune disorder relapsing polychondritis limited any substantial return, her recordings retained high regard and her visibility increased during the 2000s. In 2003 Ladytron included “What’s a Girl to Do?” on the compilation Softcore Jukebox. The next year Sleep It Off and her debut—retitled Doll in a Box—were reissued by ZE with bonus tracks featuring material produced and co-written by Robert Palmer. Cristina briefly emerged from retirement in 2005 to supply vocals for “Urgent Anxious,” a collaboration with Ursula 1000 that appeared on his 2006 album Here Comes Tomorrow. On March 31, 2020, Cristina died after testing positive for COVID-19; she was 61.
Born January 17, 1956, to American writer/illustrator Dorothy Monet and French neo-Freudian psychoanalyst Jacques Palaci, Cristina Monet Palaci experienced a culturally rich upbringing across England, France, Italy, and the U.S. After training in drama at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama and at Harvard University—where she received the History and Literature Prize as a sophomore—she wrote theater criticism for The Village Voice. While contributing to the alternative weekly in 1978 she met and began a relationship with Michael Zilkha, co-founder with Michel Esteban of the eclectic ZE label and an Oxford graduate whose family controlled the British retailer Mothercare.
Cristina launched her recording career that same year via “Disco Clone,” a single composed by Ronald Melrose, a former Harvard classmate. Designed to ride the disco wave, the John Cale-produced cut initiated her first partnership with songwriter/arranger August Darnell (aka Kid Creole). As ZE’s debut release it became a cult success that generated further singles, among them a revised “Disco Clone” with uncredited vocals by Kevin Kline, a synth-pop rendition of the Beatles’ “Drive My Car,” and a version of Leiber & Stoller’s world-weary “Is That All There Is?” carrying new lyrics by Cristina so provocative that the songwriters secured an injunction against additional sales in 1980. That year also brought her self-titled debut album, produced by Darnell, which merged Latin rhythms and disco with cinematic imagery. She followed with the unsettling holiday single “Things Fall Apart,” which surfaced on 1981’s ZE Christmas Record and was produced by Was (Not Was).
After marrying Zilkha in 1983, Cristina rejoined Don Was at his Detroit studio for her second album, the new wave-inflected Sleep It Off, issued in 1984. Accompanied by the Knack’s Doug Feiger, Barry Reynolds, and Ben Brierley of Marianne Faithfull’s band, she applied her own playfully jaded perspective to John Conlee’s “She Can’t Say That Anymore,” Van Morrison’s “Blue Money,” and “Ballad of Immoral Earnings,” an adaptation of Brecht’s “Zuhälter Ballade,” along with original material such as “He Dines Out on Death” and “What’s a Girl to Do?,” which she later called her anthem. Featuring cover art by Jean-Paul Goude (who later adapted a comparable concept for Grace Jones’ Slave to the Rhythm), Sleep It Off earned strong reviews yet modest sales. Under the false impression that her husband had financed her career, Cristina withdrew from music.
After starting a family with Zilkha and relocating to Texas, Cristina divorced him in 1990 and returned to New York to concentrate on essays and reviews for outlets including The Times Literary Supplement, Tatler, and London Literary Review. Although health concerns such as the autoimmune disorder relapsing polychondritis limited any substantial return, her recordings retained high regard and her visibility increased during the 2000s. In 2003 Ladytron included “What’s a Girl to Do?” on the compilation Softcore Jukebox. The next year Sleep It Off and her debut—retitled Doll in a Box—were reissued by ZE with bonus tracks featuring material produced and co-written by Robert Palmer. Cristina briefly emerged from retirement in 2005 to supply vocals for “Urgent Anxious,” a collaboration with Ursula 1000 that appeared on his 2006 album Here Comes Tomorrow. On March 31, 2020, Cristina died after testing positive for COVID-19; she was 61.
Albums
