My Beauty

About My Beauty

My Beauty is a solo album by Kevin Rowland, lead singer of Dexys Midnight Runners. It was released in 1999, eleven years after his solo debut The Wanderer. In the interim he had experienced problems with drug addiction. My Beauty is an album of cover songs, although Rowland rewrote several of the lyrics to reflect his battles against substance abuse. The album is notorious for its cover, which shows Rowland in drag and heavy make up, an image which Rowland also used during contemporaneous appearances at the Glastonbury and Reading festivals. During his appearance at Reading he was pelted with bottles thrown by the audience. The album was supposed to have 12 tracks, but the song "Thunder Road" (written by Bruce Springsteen) was pulled from the album at the last minute because Springsteen refused to approve the lyrical changes made by Rowland. The promo CD distributed (to radio/press) before the official album had all twelve tracks. The album was released on Creation Records, on the initiative of label boss Alan McGee, who was a fan of Rowland's work. Upon release, the album received mixed reviews. It has been reported that the album was one of Creation's lowest selling albums, shifting only 500 copies, but in fact the album actually sold over 20,000 worldwide more »