It could be time for a Mary Margaret O'Hara revival. Admittedly the collateral required for a revival is slim - one kooky album, Miss America and, since 1988, a handful of live shows and low-key sightings - but such mystique only adds to her allure. Anyone who saw O'Hara's appearance at a "Midnight At The Olympia" slot in Dublin in 1989 won't have forgotten it in a hurry. You didn't get anything like this at a Fleadh Cowboys residency.
Miss America herself was actually Canadian, an artist who first came to prominence in the arty circles of downtown Toronto, singing with a local band called Go Deo Chorus. O'Hara signed a solo deal with Virgin Records in 1984 after the label had heard just one track on a demo tape. Both parties decided to record a debut album, and the fun began in earnest. She proved a difficult proposition for prospective producers, with XTC's Andy Partridge abandoning the project on the first day, citing O'Hara's unorthodoxy. Avant-garde composer Michael Brook proved to be of tougher mettle, and sessions in Toronto, Wales and Dublin produced Miss America.
The album remains a unique one-off, full to the brim with raw emotion and wonderfully subtle sensibilities. Combining strangely pop-friendly moments (Body's In Trouble was Coldplay before Coldplay was invented) and the eeriest of lovelorn ballads (You Will Be Loved Again) with a tremendously evocative vocal range, it was all the more extraordinary for being a debut album, and O'Hara gradually became a blueprint for a whole generation of performers. Indeed, if you believe the likes of Kristin Hersh or Alanis Morissette are the original screamers of the female species, take note that there's sure to be a dog-eared copy of this album somewhere in their collections.
In the year following Miss America, O'Hara toured. It gave her an opportunity to visit as many Catholic churches as possible and allowed audiences to reel in amazement at what they heard and, especially, saw. Her scat vocals may have been familiar from the album, but her astonishing onstage persona was wholly unexpected. Throwing elements of physical theatre, mime and dance into the mix to create a jazzy, freestyle whirlwind of a performance, the wildly gesticulating O'Hara was a quirky sight to behold. Some, however, saw it as more threatening than that, and The Late Late Show pulled a scheduled appearance.
Since then, O'Hara has maintained a lofty silence, with only a few guest appearances (with Morrissey on November Spawned A Monster and on tributes to other cult artists such as Kurt Weill and Vic Chestnutt) and the very occasional live show to remind the world that she still exists. There is plenty of talk about a "lost" second album, but no sign of it to date. She's no longer signed to Virgin, although Miss America was rereleased on Koch International in the mid-1990s, and a track of hers is featured on Back To Mine, a new Everything But The Girl mix-CD. When it comes to mystique, O'Hara seems to have invented the notion.
More on MMO'H at www.angelfire.com/indie/ impryan/ohara.html