Controversy helps boost music of ex- child actor
Q&A /
When Corey Feldman was a 3-year-old going on acting auditions, he would sing for casting agents because he couldn’t yet read lines.
Feldman, now 45, soon became a reluctant teenage movie star (“Stand by Me,” “The Goonies”) with an overlooked musical career.
He released his first single in 1989, played in the hard-rock band Truth Movement and now performs electronic-dance movement and pop on his 2016 two-disc set “Angelic 2 The Core,” which features Fred Durst and Snoop Dogg.
Feldman’s turbulent personal life (he battled heroin addiction and, he has said, was repeatedly a victim of childhood sexual abuse at the hands of Hollywood insiders) overshadowed his career ambitions — until his endearingly weird appearance in September on the “Today” show, backed by a band of scantily clad, halowearing Corey’s Angels — divided the internet and relaunched his musical career.
He returned to the show a few weeks later.
Corey’s Angels, who are part of Feldman’s stage act, are a matter of some dispute: Feldman said he is providing the women, who sometimes live at his house, with work opportunities they might not otherwise have had. An article in Vice magazine positioned him as an off-brand Hugh Hefner.
In a recent phone interview, Feldman talked about his friendship with Michael Jackson and life after the “Today” show.
The “Today” show backlash must have been hard, but aren’t you glad you did it?
It was a bittersweet backlash that one could never have guesstimated. We expected a few people to notice; we didn’t expect the world to stop.
There are rumors that you made a new jack-swing (fusion) album back in the day.
That’s what people were calling the last solo album, “Former Child Actor.” I do have horn sections in a lot of my stuff. ... Billy Preston was actually on the album, and he was part of the Beatles. All through my music career, I’ve worked with the greatest musicians in the world.
When you’re friends with someone like Michael Jackson — let’s go back to 1991. I’m sitting in a car with Michael Jackson, I play him my new single, “What’s Up With Youth,” I say, “What do you think?” He said, “Corey, this song is a hit. This is a No. 1 hit, guaranteed.” ... That’s when I knew I was on the right track.
Is Corey’s Angels about you trying to help women find their own path when you weren’t able to?
It’s also about giving them another chance in life. There’s a very misleading idea out there, that if a woman is beautiful, she can’t possibly have any real talent. When we did the “Today” show the first time, everybody was convinced that they were miming it, a la Robert Palmer.
Yeah, but you’re wearing all your clothes, and they’re not. Does that take away from it, in 2017?
No, that’s the beauty of it. The whole point is: Sex sells. Does it not? Yes. Basically, in our own tongue-incheek, ironic way, we are pushing that idea right back in their face — because, God forbid a beautiful woman should be proud of her body and proud of who she is, by feeling sexy when she’s onstage.