On an "as needed" basis: Bob Muller: drums, Bon Lozaga: guitar, Hansford Rowe: bass
Happy Rhodes? For real?
Yes, it's her real name!
Note: There is a male Canadian Country-Western singer nicknamed "Happy Rhodes" (real name: Jack Chapelle). He
owns www.happyrhodes.com, but doesn't use it.
Who's that guy?
One of the most common questions (after "Is
that her real name?)" is "Who's that guy singing with Happy?" That's Happy singing with Happy! That astonishing
range is all her and it's not done with studio trickery. Anyone who's not convinced should watch the live videos on this
page and on YouTube.
Worked with
Happy has also worked with: Kevin Bartlett, Carl Adami, David Torn, Jerry Marotta, Mitch Elrod, Kelly Bird, Rob
Taylor, Martha Waterman, Dave "Blaze" Sepowski, Chuck D'Aloia, Monica Wilson, Dean Sharp, Peter Sheehan, Ray
Jung, Andy Wyman, Mark Foster, Bob Van Detta, Paul Huesman, Jamie Edwards, Elizabeth Jones, Matthew Guarnere
(M.D.G.), Teddy Kumpel, Rob Schwimmer, Jon Catler, Trey Gunn, Fab, and Michael Seifert. (If you've worked
professionally with Happy and your name is not listed, please write me and let me know).
Collaborations
Happy has collaborated with (provided vocals for) Bon Lozaga and Project Lo, Will Ackerman, Bob Holroyd, Samite
and Jeff Oster. Visit Jeff's
MySpace page to hear more
Happy vocals.
Covers
Happy has covered Peter Gabriel ("Mercy Street"), David Bowie ("Ashes To Ashes") and Yes ("The Yes Medley") on
album releases and various other songs live, and Kate Bush, Duran Duran, Queen, Crowded House, Genesis, the Bee Gees
and Annie Lennox in live performances only.
Aside from fan endeavors, Happy has only been covered live twice that I know about. Charlotte Martin performed "100
Years" at shows in Chicago and Philadelphia in 2005. Thank you Charlotte! A live cover of a Happy song ("I'm Going
Back") was recorded in 1992 by Matthew D. Guarnere and his duo project What's Real.
Other Happy
Rhodes MySpace Pages
For those fans looking to put music on their page, here are other Happy Rhodes pages with some more songs, listed
under each photo (the songs are subject to change).
All of the pages were put up by me
Find Me
One And Many
Treehouse
Charlie
She Won't Go
Here And Hereafter
Collective Heart
All Things (Mia Ia Io)
Glory (radio mix)
I Say
100 Years
Feed The Fire
Serenading Genius
Ra Is A Busy God
Proof
The Wretches Gone Awry
Suicide Song
Temporary and Eternal (live acoustic)
Mother Sea
Warpaint
Til the Dawn Breaks
The Yes Medley
Summer
In Hiding
Happy Interviews
A pre-album release interview at Michael Foster's Cutting Edge Voices web site:
Many downloadable songs from most of these albums can be found at wretchawry.com
2007
Find Me
1998 Many Worlds Are Born Tonight
1995 The Keep (compilation of acoustic tracks and rarities)
1994 Building the Colossus
1993 Equipoise
1993 RhodeSongs (compilation including live versions and rarities)
1991 Warpaint
1987 Ecto
1986 Rearmament
1986 Rhodes II
1986 Rhodes I
Why monsters?
She loves monsters. They were her friends while growing up (see lyrics to He's Alive) and
she loves painting them. When she needed covers for her early cassette-only albums she took paintings she'd already
done as a teenager and used them. She refused to change the artwork when they were released on CD in 1992 (though
they were changed slightly), and good for her. The Rhodes I monster was originally painted on the saddlebag of a
motorcycle that's probably long since been trashed or painted over. I (Vickie) now own the original painting that was
used for Rhodes II. It scares the cat. Ha.
Podsafe Music
Many of Happy's songs are Podsafe.
V
isit the Podsafe Music Network for a list.
If you know of a Happy song not on the PMN list (that isn't a cover) that you would like to play on your Podcast, it
will almost certainly be ok. Just send me a message to ask about specific tracks.
Finding Happy's Music
Unfortunately Happy has no label or distributor, so you're probably not going to be able to walk into a store and find
Happy's music, not unless it's a used record store and someone decided they didn't like her (in which case, please buy it
and give it a good home), or it's a
mom&pop store and they really really love Happy.
The CDs of Find Me, Many Worlds Are Born Tonight, Building The Colossus and The Keep are available via CD Baby.
Find Me, Many Worlds Are Born Tonight, The Keep, RhodeSongs, Building The Colossus and Rhodes II are
available as digital downloads from CD Baby.
Find Me, Many Worlds Are Born Tonight, The Keep, Building The Colossus, RhodeSongs and Rhodes II are now
available via iT
unes. (For some reason RhodeSongs wasn't showing up on my last search of Happy Rhodes, but when I typed in
RhodeSongs it did show up.
Warpaint an..o are coming to CD Baby (and then iTunes) at some point too.
You'll often find the others used on amazon.com at sometimes outrageous prices, and though you regularly see
Happy on ebay, the money is not going into her pocket.
HOWEVER, you can go to Happy's web site and order them directly
from her. Since it is directly from her, she gets all the money, you get to feel good about yourself. Some of the CDs
that were close to being, or were, out of print are being re-pressed.
Influences
Kate Bush, Peter Gabriel, Yes, Queen, David Bowie, Wendy Carlos, Genesis
Sounds Like
Fans say her high voice is very similar to early Kate Bush, and her low voice calls to mind Annie Lennox or Julia Fordham.
In any event, Happy's a living, breathing Jigsaw Puzzle.
These are people who have one or both of Happy's profiles on their front pages (ok, the animals had help from their humans). Mouseover for who they are.
If you have Happy on your front page and would like to be shown here, please write me. Thank you, it's an honor, and greatly appreciated!
A big thank you too to those who have Happy's music playing on your page!
Utterly Selfish Self-serving Moment
If you like female vocals, please visit my (Vickie's) podcast page
Music's the way, the only way I know
It's time to let the brooding heart
Choose the way to go
Hello, welcome to Happy's MySpace page. Just so you know, this is a FAN-RUN PAGE, but with her blessings and
helpful suggestions. ALL COMMENTS ARE READ BY HAPPY, AND MESSAGES DIRECTED TO HER WILL BE SENT TO HER - Vickie
Happy Rhodes (her real name) has released 11 albums in her 20+ year career (her 11th, Find Me, was recently released). Happy lives on a beautiful farm in upstate New York
with her husband, musician Bob Muller. They're building a home studio to make more music. She has a day job building pro audio equipment for
Dangerous Music, and lives her life. She appreciates people who listen to her music, and thanks all her fans for supporting her over the
years.
Ok, not actual videos, since Happy's never made a video to any of her songs, but there are a few dozen live clips (audience recordings), one
interview and two in-studio performances (one of those is below) on YouTube and Google video (the ones at Google Video are subtitled with the
lyrics and chatter).
Here is a List of Happy videos on YouTube (incomplete).
Here is a List of subtitled Happy videos on Google Video.
This was being recorded at the same time it was filmed. This is the acoustic version of "Temporary and Eternal" that ended up
on her album The Keep. Happy's never made any videos of her songs so this is as close as we'll ever get. It was never released to the public so
few fans have ever seen it until now. That's Carl Adami on bass and Kevin Bartlett on electric guitar. This was recorded in 1995.
YouTube is responsible for it cutting off before the very end. If the video isn't showing up (it comes and goes), the direct URL is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5XVVkbUwprc.
Google video of Happy's cover of Queen's "Lily of the Valley" and her own "Possessed." Turn the captions off by clicking
on the "CC" at the bottom of the player. This is at the Tin Angel in Philadelphia in 1996. Kevin Bartlett is on electric guitar
and Carl Adami is on bass.
Don't try to tell me there's no
Reason for any moment in time
Every memory of mine
Those years are lines of
Color on my face
My past is warpaint
The past is warpaint
HAPPY RHODES is an enigma. This is according to the Music Industry, which has never been able to
pigeon-hole her into any category. Her music is otherworldly yet substantial and her 4-octave
voice has a haunting familiarity to it.
Most listeners find her work difficult to describe and yet she incites an almost unheard of
devotion among her fans. She goes from Kate Bush highs to David Bowie lows and you
find yourself being beckoned to follow her into her multilayered worlds.
She was born on August 9th, 1965 and named Kimberley Tyler Rhodes. Three days after
her birth, while still in the hospital, her brother Mark called her "Happy-baby" because
she was so smiley and he couldn't pronounce Kimberley.
It seemed so fitting that it stuck. The family never knew her as Kimberley and so when
she was 16, she made Happy her legal name.
Happy's youth wasn't easy. She lived in poor neighborhoods, in a poor family and
experienced a never-ending onslaught of peer rejection and abandonment. Despite the
truly bad odds, she was driven. Music was an early inclination, as were dance and art.
Her father, Vernon H. Rhodes Jr., exposed Happy to his very eclectic musical tastes early
on. She would sit on the floor in front of his console stereo and listen to Switched-On-Bach
until she could sing along with every note. "I remember some Saturday mornings I'd wake up
to Bagpipe music BLARING through the house and that meant that he'd be listening to his
whole collection all day...... I loved walking around the house, singing along with every
record or reel-to-reel tape." When Happy was 11, she got her first guitar. She had no
desire to learn the instrument the way everyone else was doing it. She simply wanted to
begin writing immediately. Creating was always the main objective for her, not excelling
at any one particular instrument. It became instantly clear that Happy's path would not be
one of virtuosity. But by the time she was 14, she was already performing her original songs
in school shows.
As time went on though, she became increasingly removed from the outer world. High School
became a place of alienation for her because she was already driven for a musical future and
depression was slowly becoming part of her everyday existence. She knew she needed to do
something or she would explode. At age 16, Happy left school and got her G.E.D.
For the next two years, she wrote and made some Open Mic Night appearances at a legendary cafe
called Cafe Lena in Saratoga, NY. During this time, she met up with Pat Tessitore, a co-owner of
Cathedral Sound Studios in Rensselaer, NY. She approached him with the idea of becoming an
intern of sorts, just so she could learn the basics of audio recording. "I knew I wanted to be a
professional musician, but didn't really know where to start. So I decided I'd learn how to MAKE records first,
get my foot in the door and then figure the rest out later."
Happy never really got the full recording education she was looking for because as soon as
Tessitore heard her sing, he insisted on recording everything she'd written up to that point.
"She played and it absolutely blew me away. And I had heard a lot of voices in my day", recalls
Tessitore. "She brought tears to my eyes."
Soon, Happy met up with another musician and mutual friend of Tessitore's, Kevin Bartlett.
Bartlett had been writing his own instrumental music for years and had a small, cassette-only
label, called Aural Gratification. He heard Happy's work and asked if she'd like to release her
music to the public on his label. She accepted. One of these cassettes made its way to a woman
named Vickie Mapes, who at that time, was doing an all-female-artist radio show in Kansas City.
She began to play Happy's tapes and circulating samplers to unsuspecting music-lovers. From
her efforts, a small fan-base was forming. They organized themselves into what is now known as
ECTO, a Happy Rhodes Mailing List. This is a forum through which, music lovers can discuss
Happy's work, as well as other "Ectophilic" artists.
Happy released approximately 9 CD's on the Aural Gratification label. In 1997 however, Happy
decided that it was time to seek out a different kind of record label. A good friend recommended
her to a newly forming label called, Samson Music. Founded by Norm Waitt Jr.(co-founder of
the Gateway Computer company), this was a label that Happy felt would take her music to the
next level. She signed with them and released "Many Worlds Are Born Tonight" in August of
1998. "I went through a lot of darkness to make that album. It was also the most fun I've ever
had making a record." Happy and Samson Music parted ways in early 2000.
Happy lives on a farm in upstate New York with her husband, musician Bob Muller. She currently spends her days building pro-audio equipment
for Dangerous Music, a job she likes and finds very satisfying.
She self-released her 11th album, Find Me, in September 2007.
== End auntiesocialmusic.com biography ==
I am transparent
An open book
There's no choice in the matter
But the breath from my mind
Is living air
And the notes from my heart
Are what I share
Words weren't made for cowards
There's not much to hide behind
We can see for a mile
Without our eyes
I can see through a smile
To any lie
If people speak in my stead
Do not trust everything that is said
When my thoughts come from me
You will know that it can be believed
I say
If you feel suddenly cool while lying in bed
Open your eyes, I'll be over your head
Now don't be afraid, don't reach out
Just be glad that I exist
I'll be here, I'll be ecto
I'll be here, but I'll be ecto
Happy was the inspiration for the creation of the ecto mailing list and the Ectophiles Guide To Good Music. Ecto the mailing list has been going strong since June 1991 (born from a Kate
Bush mailing list) and, while still a marginal home for Happy's fans, it mainly encourages discussion of other arists, especially female artists (male
artists are NOT excluded).
Back when ecto first started we designated the term "Ecto music" as a genre to encompass people like Kate Bush, Happy Rhodes,
Jane Siberry, Peter Gabriel and others who didn't quite fit into the Rock/Pop/Alternative/whatever categories. Hence the "Other" genre, which is
Ecto.
REGARDING COMMENTS: All Comments are read, appreciated and saved but I do not accept html on Happy's
page. Also, generally, Comments that don't contain a mention about Happy or her music
are not posted (except for the Welcome Back Comments, or unless they're from Dot Allison...who in their right mind could delete a Comment from
Dot Allison, Happy-centric or not??). I don't mean to be rude, but I really want to keep
the page Happy-centric. Blame the fan, not the artist.
HAPPY DOES COME TO THIS PAGE AND READS THE COMMENTS (Hi Hap!) SO IF YOU LEAVE A COMMENT YOU CAN BE SURE SHE'LL
SEE IT.
My ears are lucky to hear
These glorious songs
Of inspiration
And voices crafted from
Thunder
The power of life
HAPPY'S FRIENDS --
Happy's Friends list, consisting of those who have Happy on their front page, is over to the left. Not all of them will fit into this area, so I decided
not to pick and choose. They're ALL wonderful!
My Dear Vickie, For my part I will do my utmost to see to my MYSPACE friends and the happiness that comes with listening to our beloved Happy Rhodes! Many kisses and see you soon! Katy.
thank you Vicky for adding me and for running Happy’s site on MySpace. Happy’s music is something of the most beautiful I have ever heard in my life, and I fell in love with her wonderful voice. She really touches my heart, I never will stop listening to her. Fortunately I got some of her rare CDs in Europe. I found her thru Patty (Pattysplanet) who also adores her.
I'm very, very happy to visit your page and see a very incredible lady you Happy, making perfect music and show to the world than all the ladies shine in everything.
I'm a crazy dreamer man who believes in the true equality of men and women, I believe in equal rights, I want see a world where men and women we are really equal, my birthday is the next monday and my gift is than show to the world than YOU SHINES AT THE MAXIMUM LEVEL in everything you do and ALL THE WOMEN SHINE IN EVERYTHING, do it, awesome lady paint a big smile on my face :-)
Happy, please be very Happy always :)
Continues shining and making your perfect music.
That all your dreams become in fact, i wish all the very best.
Peace, love, joy, harmony, prosperity, success and very happiness forever.
thanks for the add. happy is the best discovery i've made in a long time. (currently gathering up enough funds to buy all of her albums off her webpage lol)
Thank you for the kind words I have always enjoyed Happy's music Feed the Fire helps me create as well as others songs throughout her career. I have never thought about Happy but I would love to at some point I'm working at advancing on my technology. Write me anytime take care
so delighted we found you and your wonderful music. Thanks for adding Sanctuary to your friends and supporting musicians helping victims of domestic violence.
Hi, thanks for the add. I have been listening to Happy for over ten years. If you are reading this Happy I just want you to know that over a decade ago your music reached the ears of a group of high school kids and had the most positive affect on our lives. Your music was and is a source of relaxed and meditative thought. Your voice is angelic and healing. Thank you so much for sharing you gift with the world.
Just dropping by to say hello to you both. You are dearly missed elsewhere (if you know what I mean).
I hope that you are doing fantastic and that the new year is treating you well so far. At least we are off to a much better start this year with the “Yes We Can” attitude of Barack Obama.
Hello Happy! Vickie! and yours too of course! I couldn't let the season pass without wishing all of you the best of the Holiday Season's and Happy new Year! I have benn a HUGE fan since the early 90's and just wanted to tell you again.... You are too fantastic for words and your music always inspires my writing of music too! Many XOX's Todd Gantt in Eureka, CA ( ScorpionJaden@yahoo.com )
It's sometimes odd the way life takes you down a path..or NOT...:^>) Although there may be obstacles along the way the path that you have taken me down in order to find "Happy-ness" has been one of the greatest pleasures of my life. I owe you a great deal.......and I wish, more than anything, that Happy could sit across a table from me so I'd have a chance to look into the eyes of the woman who created some of the finest music that the world has ever been offered.
May the holidays and every day bring you one of these: the laughter of children... the warm gratitude from the heart of a stranger... and love from all those that you love... as for me, I already got everything I could have wished for, I have a friend like you :) I am so thankful for your music which has enriched my heart and soul...Happy Holidays
Hi Vickey and Happy holiday season! Happy continues to vibrate through my speakers whether they be bose, sonance or paradigm. And like I would say to Thomas Olsen about Anneli Drecker, "Tell Happy I love her if you get the chance." Got to love those CH ANNELI NGS.
Hi Vickie!!! Thank you so much for the add. I am so thankful to your page and discovering Happy!!! I want to tell her how much I love her music...one of these days, I will send her a private msg in care of you, is that ok?: ) And how've you been?: ) <3 Mary
Most listeners find her work difficult to describe and yet she incites an almost unheard of
devotion among her fans. She goes from Kate Bush highs to David Bowie lows and you
find yourself being beckoned to follow her into her multilayered worlds. 
For the next two years, she wrote and made some Open Mic Night appearances at a legendary cafe
called Cafe Lena in Saratoga, NY. During this time, she met up with Pat Tessitore, a co-owner of
Cathedral Sound Studios in Rensselaer, NY. She approached him with the idea of becoming an
intern of sorts, just so she could learn the basics of audio recording. "I knew I wanted to be a
professional musician, but didn't really know where to start. So I decided I'd learn how to MAKE records first,
get my foot in the door and then figure the rest out later." 
Happy released approximately 9 CD's on the Aural Gratification label. In 1997 however, Happy
decided that it was time to seek out a different kind of record label. A good friend recommended
her to a newly forming label called, Samson Music. Founded by Norm Waitt Jr.(co-founder of
the Gateway Computer company), this was a label that Happy felt would take her music to the
next level. She signed with them and released "Many Worlds Are Born Tonight" in August of
1998. "I went through a lot of darkness to make that album. It was also the most fun I've ever
had making a record." Happy and Samson Music parted ways in early 2000. 
Happy was the inspiration for the creation of the 
