Album Notes

"Megiddo" was my first album. Recording started when I was 18 and it finally was released on Virgin Records in 1997, right around my 20th birthday. Some of the songs were written in my bedroom at my parents house when I was still in high school ('Blood', 'Fall Away'), others were written in New York, where I escaped to after graduation with a lust for life and a taste for red wine ('Strange Man', 'Alive')

It received critical praise both here in the states as well as in France, where the label was especially supportive of the album. But... well, I will try not to gripe here about the music business or how lame Virgin U.S. was as a label, there are more interesting things to discuss, like the amazing education I got by working alongside producers David Lowery, John Morand, and Ethan Johns, and the awesome bands I got to open for in those years, like Sparklehorse, Morphine, and Blond Redhead. I was invited to play in the first Lilith Fair festival, and my songs were used in a major studio movie ("Palmetto") and a network TV show ("Homocide: Life on the Street").

The sad thing is that despite all of that good stuff, I still wound up feeling chewed up and spit out by an industry that had (and still has) no concept of humanity, no ability to shepherd their flock, and no interest in nurturing the very resource that feeds their coffres. It almost sapped my inspiration entirely... almost...

-- Lauren Hoffman

PS See "From the Blue House" to know what happened next : )

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"Ms. Hoffman makes moody and sexy pop songs." - Ben Ratliff, the New York Times

"This twenty-year-old Virginia chanteuse knows how to tell a story and weave a spell." - Details

"Hoffman is the real thing" - New Yorker