Shilpa Ray Takes Us Nightclubbing In New York With 'Door Girl'
Shilpa Ray is nothing if not honest. Her new album, Door Girl, captures New York nightlife in all its sordid, sweaty chaos and supplies caustic commentary on life in the unfeeling city.
Ray was born in New Jersey and a longtime resident of New York. She's drawn on her 17 years in the city, and the wealth of experiences she's had working the door at the Lower East Side bar and venue Pianos, to chronicle gentrification ("You're F****** No One"), alcohol-enabled rape culture ("Manhattanoid Creepazoids") and the traumas city dwellers bury in vice and silence ("Revelations of a Stamp Monkey").
Door Girl can be heavy — and sometimes so clear-eyed it's cynical — but it's not self-pitying, and for those weary of a New Yorkers' navel-gazing, not self-obsessed either. All sounds are in service of the storytelling, whether it's the hip-hop cadences of "Revelations Of A Stamp Monkey" or the '50s-'60s pop sensibilities of "Shilpa Ray's Got a Heart Full of Dirt," where Ray cribbed a few lines from "Tears on My Pillow" by Little Anthony & the Imperials.
Ray just celebrated the release of Door Girl with two nights at — where else — Pianos, and will tour Europe all October and the U.S. in November. In the meantime, we asked her to walk us through Door Girl and the stories behind the record, track by track.
"New York Minute Prayer"
"'New York Minute Prayer' was actually the last thing I wrote. We had the order [of songs] for the record already and as I was listening
