page_title: St. Vincent (musician)
section_title: 2003–2007: Career beginnings and Marry Me
hierarchical_section_title: St. Vincent (musician) / Life and career / 2003–2007: Career beginnings and Marry Me
caption_attribution_description: Annie Clark, live. Taken by Victoria Potter; https://www.flickr.com/photos/blindphotography/ Author himself uploaded the image. See [1] (the first comment).
context_page_description: Anne Erin Clark, known professionally as St. Vincent, is an American singer and songwriter.
  St. Vincent began her music career as a member of the Polyphonic Spree. She was also a member of Sufjan Stevens's touring band, before forming her own band in 2006. Her debut album is Marry Me, followed by Actor, Strange Mercy, St. Vincent, and Masseduction. She released a collaborative album with David Byrne in 2012 titled Love This Giant.
  St. Vincent contributed backing vocals for Swans on their 2014 album To Be Kind. Her fourth solo album, St. Vincent, was released that same year and was named album of the year by The Guardian, Entertainment Weekly, NME and Slant, as well as second best album of the year by Time. The album won her a Grammy for Best Alternative Album, her first Grammy Award. She was the first solo female performer in 20 years to win a Grammy in that category. In 2018, St. Vincent was included twice in NPR's "200 Greatest songs by 21st Century Women" at number 181 with "Digital Witness" and number 38 with "Cruel".
context_section_description: In 2003, she released an EP with fellow Berklee students entitled Ratsliveonnoevilstar. She also worked with Heavy Rotation Records, where "she revealed a much more private and intimate rendering of 'Count' for Dorm Sessions Vol. 1", and studied with Professor of Guitar Lauren Passarelli. Shortly after leaving Berklee, Clark returned home to Texas where she joined the Polyphonic Spree just before they embarked on a European tour. In 2004 she joined Glenn Branca's 100-guitar orchestra for the Queens performance, and was also briefly in a noise-rock band called the Skull Fuckers. Clark left the Polyphonic Spree and joined Sufjan Stevens' touring band in 2006, bringing with her a tour EP entitled Paris is Burning.
  In 2006, Clark began recording a studio album under the stage name St. Vincent. In an interview on The Colbert Report, she said that she "took [her] moniker from a Nick Cave song", which refers to the hospital in which Dylan Thomas died. The reference is to the line "And Dylan Thomas died drunk in / St. Vincent's hospital" from Cave's song "There She Goes my Beautiful World" from the album Abattoir Blues/The Lyre of Orpheus. The name is also a reference to her great-grandmother, whose middle name was St. Vincent.
  Clark released her debut album, Marry Me, on July 10, 2007 on Beggars Banquet Records. Named after a line from the television show Arrested Development, the album features appearances from drummer Brian Teasley (Man or Astro-man?, the Polyphonic Spree), Mike Garson (David Bowie's longtime pianist), and horn player Louis Schwadron (the Polyphonic Spree).
  The album was well received by critics, with Clark being compared to the likes of Kate Bush and David Bowie. Clark was lauded for the album's musical arrangements as well as themes and style. In their review of the album, The AV Club said: "There's a point where too much happiness turns into madness, and St. Vincent's multi-instrumentalist Annie Clark knows this place well". Pitchfork said "at every turn Marry Me takes the more challenging route of twisting already twisted structures and unusual instrumentation to make them sound perfectly natural and, most importantly, easy to listen to as she overdubs her thrillingly sui generis vision into vibrant life."
  The songs on Marry Me were written largely when Clark was 18 and 19 years old, and, according to Clark, "represented a more idealized version of what life was or what love was or anything in the eyes of someone who hadn't really experienced anything." The album featured its one single, "Paris Is Burning", and a music video for "Jesus Saves, I Spend".
caption: Clark on stage in 2007
exif: {"Image ImageDescription": "OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA", "Image Make": "OLYMPUS IMAGING CORP.", "Image Model": "SP510UZ", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Version 1.0", "Image DateTime": "2007:05:24 06:09:46", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image ExifOffset": "1084", "Image CustomRendered": "Normal", "Image ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "Image WhiteBalance": "Auto", "Image DigitalZoomRatio": "0", "Image SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "Image GainControl": "Low gain up", "Image Contrast": "Normal", "Image Saturation": "Normal", "Image Sharpness": "Normal", "Image PrintIM": "[80, 114, 105, 110, 116, 73, 77, 0, 48, 51, 48, 48, 0, 0, 37, 0, 1, 0, 20, 0, ... ]", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "3682", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "4909", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/640", "EXIF FNumber": "7/2", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Program Creative", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "131", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0221", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2007:05:24 06:09:46", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2007:05:24 06:09:46", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "2", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "297/100", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "105/2", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "2304", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "3072", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed"}