No new updates. Anyone heard any more on this? "I just received confirmation 5 minutes ago from our anonymous donor for the air travel tickets for me to fly to Barbados to pick up my beautiful dear darling soul sister and friend Rosie leaving at 8:00am on the 9th of May!!!!" So there should be some good news, I'd hope.
So...Was that "Help Rosie Vela" campaign legit? Did she get the help she needed? I see the fundraising page is closed now, but that doesn't really say anything.
Rosie posted a little snippet from her Unreleased 2nd album "Sun Upon the Altar. A song called "Heroine Tango" featuring Robbie Robertson on guitar... https://www.instagram.com/p/BkGRuHNnn6b/"
Anyone heard any more news on Rosie Vela? She’s posting on Twitter and Instagram, but not about music.
I'm just discovering the story about Rosie's GoFundMe page, four years after the fact. I'm wondering what the connection with Barbados is, since apparently that's where she was stranded with an expired passport and also where the video for "Magic Smile" was shot years earlier. Maybe just a favorite vacation spot? Anyway, I hope she is doing well now and would love to see her second album released as well as the album she was recording with Jeff Lynne released (which I didn't even know existed until reading this thread).
I found her on Twitter, she had very few followers but I'm pretty sure it was her- she listed herself as musician, former model, etc. I think I'm remebering this correctly- she had a 3 second clip of a song from the unreleased second album. However, she posted VERY STRONG political stuff daily, it was wearing (even though I agreed with her generally speaking) and so I put her on "snooze". I just looked now and her account was suspended permanently- she must have crossed the line with something she posted. https://twitter.com/RosieVela12/
I love that album, I’ve never gotten tired of it. She recorded it during her relationship with Peter max, they split up during the sessions Her second album is probably tied up in a broken contract with A&, there was also a third album with Jeff Lynn that didn’t get very far.
It was through Zazu and Flaunt the Imperfection I found Steely Dan. Slick well made pop music. I remember Magic Smile being a hit and I still play it, pity there was no further releases. I probably wouldn’t appreciate the Jeff Lynne collaboration as I dislike his productions.
I’m pretty good at web crawling and I can’t find anything on what happened, its likely she’s had it all removed. She’s definitely had most of her internet presence removed, however i found something she wrote last year that summarizes her music career: “Wrote My Songs, Played Keyboards, Sang, Produced Demos for Zazu Album produced by Gary Katz & Worked w Steely Dan's Donald Fagen & Walter Becker, Jim Keltner, James Haslip, Rick Derringer, Jimmy Bralower. Tony Levin, etc. Toured USA & EU Performing Zazu Songs sometimes in front of 100k audience, Performed on Letterman Show, Good Morning America, David Brvnner's Late Show w Billy Preston. Recorded w Don Henley, Joni Mitchell on 'Who Owns This Place' for Scorsese's Film 'Color Of Money' starring Paul Newman. Recorded w Paul McCartney on Buddy Holly's Maybe Baby for U.K.Film 'Maybe Baby'. Played Piano & Sang my new Songs for Traveling Wilbury's which afterwards became Good Friends w George Harrison who used to visit my home recording studio w guitar to play along w my keyboards to figure out what chords I wrote w. Sang on Ringo'a Xmas album. Worked w Jeff Lynne 7 Yrs Creating his Zoom album & Sang With Jeff on VH-1 Storytellers & ELO Zoom Tour Concert on YouTube. Wrote & Recorded 2nd album for A&M that they gave back to me before selling A&M to Universal. Wrote & recorded a 3rd Album in my studio I hope to release soon because I have a Great Song for these Crazy Political Times”
I did a lot of digging about this and then wished I hadn’t. There was definitely some deception from whoever was behind the GoFundMe campaign, Rosie Vela has had property and business interests in Barbados for some time. You can leave Barbados with an expired passport and gain admission into the US with it. The cost of a flight is around $500 and there’s emergency financial assistance and help from the government if your destitute. So asking for large amounts of money for something fixable with a phone call pretty much means it was all about the large amounts of money.
Very interesting information... makes this story even more interesting! Wow, good digging, NekoM! I had no idea she was involved in some of these projects. I can understand how she would have met some of these people through Jeff Lynne, but I now can't recall how she got Steely Dan out of retirement to play on her first album. Maybe she will write a book someday or at the very least do an interview... sounds like she would have some good stories.
I picked up Zazu last year, partly inspired by this thread. I enjoyed it moderately, but found the melodies to be somewhat undeveloped. RV probably had at least one more album in her, so I’d be interested in hearing the follow-up. But I can understand why this album wasn’t a massive success. Props to RV for funding it herself, though. Sad to think her career may have been hobbled by her personal involvement with various industry heavyweights.
