Alison Statton (born March 1958) is a Welsh singer best known for her work with

Young Marble Giants Young Marble Giants were a Welsh post-punk band formed in Cardiff, Wales, in 1978. Their music was based around the vocals of Alison Statton along with the minimalist instrumentation of brothers Philip and Stuart Moxham. Their early sound was ...

. Fans of the singer have included Kurt Cobain,

Courtney Love Courtney Michelle Love (née Harrison; born July 9, 1964) is an American singer, guitarist, songwriter, and actress. A figure in the alternative and grunge scenes of the 1990s, her career has spanned four decades. She rose to prominence as ...

Stephin Merritt Stephin Raymond Merritt (born February 9, 1965) is an American singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist, best known as the songwriter and principal singer of the bands the Magnetic Fields, the Gothic Archies, and Future Bible Heroes. He is ...

, Belle and Sebastian and

Renato Russo Renato Russo (born Renato Manfredini, Jr., March 27, 1960 – October 11, 1996) was a Brazilian singer and songwriter. He was the lead singer of the alternative rock band Legião Urbana. A Brazilian film depicting his life and career was rele ...

Musical career

Born in

Cardiff Cardiff (; cy, Caerdydd ) is the capital and largest city of Wales. It forms a principal area, officially known as the City and County of Cardiff ( cy, Dinas a Sir Caerdydd, links=no), and the city is the eleventh-largest in the United Kingd ...

, Statton's career in music began in 1978 as the singer for the band Young Marble Giants.Burt, Stephen (1995)
In Search of ... Young Marble Giants
, ''

CMJ New Music Monthly CMJ Holdings Corp. is a music events and online media company, originally founded in 1978, which ran a website, hosted an annual festival in New York City, and published two magazines, ''CMJ New Music Monthly'' and ''CMJ New Music Report''. Th ...

'', February 1995, pp. 18–19 After Young Marble Giants split up in 1981, she formed the

jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a m ...

-influenced band Weekend with

Simon Emmerson Simon Emmerson (born 12 February 1956) is an English record producer, guitarist, DJ, musical director at Lush, and founder of the group Afro Celt Sound System. He is also the main organiser of The Imagined Village, a collaborative work from ...

(Booth) and Spike Williams, releasing the album ''La Varieté'' in 1982 and a live EP, ''Live at Ronnie Scott's'', the following year.Paul, John (2014)
Weekend ''The '81 Demos''
, ''

PopMatters ''PopMatters'' is an international online magazine of cultural criticism that covers aspects of popular culture. ''PopMatters'' publishes reviews, interviews, and essays on cultural products and expressions in areas such as music, television, fi ...

'', 18 April 2014. Retrieved 26 November 2015 Statton returned to Cardiff and trained to be a

chiropractor Chiropractic is a form of alternative medicine concerned with the diagnosis, treatment and prevention of mechanical disorders of the musculoskeletal system, especially of the spine. It has esoteric origins and is based on several pseudoscien ...

while teaching

t'ai chi Tai chi (), short for Tai chi ch'üan ( zh, s=太极拳, t=太極拳, first=t, p=Tàijíquán, labels=no), sometimes called " shadowboxing", is an internal Chinese martial art practiced for defense training, health benefits and meditation. ...

. She returned to music in the late 1980s and released two recordings with the guitarist from

Ludus Ludus may refer to: * ''Ludus'' (ancient Rome) (plural ''ludi''), several meanings around "play, game, sport, training" **''Ludi'', public games held for the benefit and entertainment of the Roman people * Luduș, a town in Transylvania, Romania ...

Ian Devine Ian or Iain is a name of Scottish Gaelic origin, derived from the Hebrew given name (Yohanan, ') and corresponding to the English name John. The spelling Ian is an Anglicization of the Scottish Gaelic forename ''Iain''. It is a popular name in Sc ...

as 'Devine and Statton', ''The Prince of Wales'' (1989) and ''Cardiffians'' (1990).Hage, Erik
Devine & Statton Biography
,

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the databa ...

. Retrieved 25 November 2015Kaplan, Matthew
Alison Statton
, ''

Trouser Press ''Trouser Press'' was a rock and roll magazine started in New York in 1974 as a mimeographed fanzine by editor/publisher Ira Robbins, fellow fan of the Who Dave Schulps and Karen Rose under the name "Trans-Oceanic Trouser Press" (a reference ...

''. Retrieved 25 November 2015 After working with Devine, she released several records with Spike in the 1990s, starting with ''Weekend in Wales'' (1993). Young Marble Giants reunited for a number of live performances from 2007 to 2015 in Europe, the last one in London at the Royal Festival Hall during the Meltdown Festival curated by David Byrne. Statton's singing has been called "coolly unadorned", cool and dispassionate, and ghostly and fragile, with a "shy, singsong delivery". Her vocal style is considered influential on many of the

indie pop Indie pop (also typeset as indie-pop or indiepop) is a music genre and subculture that combines guitar pop with DIY ethic in opposition to the style and tone of mainstream pop music. It originated from British post-punk in the late 1970s and su ...

artists that followed. She presently works as a chiropractor.Eccleston, Danny (2015)
Young Marble Giants Relive Their Colossal Youth
, ''

Mojo Mojo may refer to: * Mojo (African-American culture), a magical charm bag used in voodoo Arts, entertainment and media Film and television * MOJO HD, an American television network * ''Mojo'' (play), by Jez Butterworth, made into a 1997 film * ' ...

'', 7 August 2015. Retrieved 25 November 2015

Recordings

With Young Marble Giants

*''

Colossal Youth ''Colossal Youth'' is the only studio album by Welsh post-punk band Young Marble Giants, released in February 1980 on Rough Trade Records. Young Marble Giants were offered the opportunity to record the album after Rough Trade heard just two son ...

'' (1980), Rough Trade *''Salad Days'' (2000),

Vinyl Japan Vinyl may refer to: Chemistry * Polyvinyl chloride (PVC), a particular vinyl polymer * Vinyl cation, a type of carbocation * Vinyl group, a broad class of organic molecules in chemistry * Vinyl polymer, a group of polymers derived from vinyl ...

*''Live at the Hurrah'' (2004), Cherry Red *''Colossal Youth & Collected Works'' (2007),

Domino Dominoes is a family of tile-based games played with gaming pieces, commonly known as dominoes. Each domino is a rectangular tile, usually with a line dividing its face into two square ''ends''. Each end is marked with a number of spots (also c ...

With Weekend

*''La Variete'' (1982), Rough Trade *''Live at Ronnie Scott's'' (1983), Rough Trade *''Archive'' (2003), Vinyl Japan

Devine and Statton

*''The Prince of Wales'' (1988),

Les Disques du Crépuscule Les Disques du Crépuscule is an independent record label founded in Belgium. The label was founded in 1980 by Michel Duval and Annik Honoré. It also had a prominent associated sublabel, Factory Benelux. Both are now run by former employee Ja ...

*''Cardiffians'' (1990), Les Disques Du Crépuscule

With Spike

*''Weekend in Wales'' (1993), Vinyl Japan *''Tidal Blues'' (1994), Vinyl Japan *''Maple Snow'' (1995), Vinyl Japan *''The Shady Tree'' (1997), Vinyl Japan *''Bimini Twist'' (2018), Tiny Global Productions

Other appearances

*The Gist – ''Embrace the Herd'' (1982): vocals on "Clean Bridges" *Stuart Moxham & The Original Artists – ''Signal Path'' (1992): vocals on "Knives (Always Fall)"

References

External links

Alison Statton at LTM Recordings
{{DEFAULTSORT:Statton, Alison 1959 births Living people Singers from Cardiff Women new wave singers 20th-century Welsh women singers Welsh new wave musicians