Hello Holly...please introduce yourself.. I was born in Chicago.. my parents were Bob and June Vincent, who were band singers during the 1940s. My father sang on the hit record 'You Call Everybody Darling' by Al Trace. So you came from a musical family? Was there always music around the house as a child? What age were you when you went to your first concert? I grew up listening to Count Basie, Nancy Wilson ,Peggy Lee ,many others, but those were the standouts. I also loved the Doors [age 8 about and that's when I began playing drums with 'brushes' on a placemat. I had a collection of classical music of various kinds and I remember liking the Gilbert and Sullivan operas in particular. again all at about age 7-9.

Your brother Nick was given a drum kit by Buddy Rich who was a friend of your fathers? Would you have met these famous people as a child?
Yes I met many 'famous' people as a kid. I didn't meet Buddy, but all the others that passed through the Tahoe club, all those rat-pack types, Baby sat for by Sammy Davis Jr, trick or treated at Phillis Diller's [a comedienne] house, was accidentally [yeah right] left at Danny Thomas's house by my parents [ha ha] all these old school entertainers....Ed Sullivan...I met then all. Lawrence Welk [bandleader] got me hooked on crème de menthe at about age 9, and I blame him and that bubble machine for any previous 'problems', haha...kidding.
 

Was this the reason you played drums? Which was your first instrument-guitar or drums? (by the way-your brothers cv is very impressive.. it reads through many varied artists...Frank Sinatra to Frank Black, Brian Wilson to Carole King and many more names...some of his compositions have appeared in CSI, the Shield, the Wire...and many more.) I guess the 'placemat' drumming made that my first instrument. Yes drums. I got my first acoustic guitar at about age 10. I was listening to Laura Nyro mostly, and Joan Baez in terms of the women, and took a few guitar lessons from a Mexican woman with a toy poodle and she had me playing Pete Seeger songs. So from there I naturally began writing my own songs of protest about excessive spending at the 'mall', or whatever. I was very anti-capitalist starting at about age 10, and was considered a 'bad influence' by my friends parents, lol.

What were your first formative influences in music?
a lot of 'top 40' singles were purchased, along with Creedence, Zeppelin, Steve Miller Band [early stuff] Sly, Aretha, whatever was on the radio which was very broad musically at that time. Not like today where it's all one style relatively on each music station. My latest record really does reflect that variety [though not on purpose] of all my influences over time. I'd been listening mostly to classical music and jazz radio for that last couple of years before making "Super Rocket Star". Some hip-hop also, but no rock. I was into the Beatles as a little girl. I wanted to be a rock star like one of them, immediately. I didn't want to be one of their girlfriends. lol.

Tell me about the Brothel Creepers and Backstage Pass. Were these the first bands you played in? the first bands I was in were in high school with friends and they were either based on Joe Cocker/Leon Russell type bands [a lot of people and fun, I would sing back-up] or I'd play drums with bands with Filo Kramer [from L.A. punk band, Fear] or other bands, doing Rolling Stones or the Move covers. I doubled-up the beat on a Jeff Beck song, "Going Down" and my friend said I invented punk rock at that moment. Then to London at age 18, and playing with Pete Chapman and others. I lived with Chris Wood and his wife Jeanette Jacobs, one of Hendrix's girlfriends and a singer with Dr John. Again I was 18, and I hung out with several great musicians, Mitch Mitchell, Jim Capaldi, John Cale, Mark Knopfler [we met through a Melody Maker ad for a guitar player placed by me and Pete's girlfriend Jackie Badger, an excellent bass player]  I auditioned for the band Sharks [Andy Frasier/Free] on drums, but I choked. I wuz a kid...lol, gimme a break!!

Backstage Pass was a girl band [with a guy drummer] that I'd auditioned for originally thinking it was to play drums ,but upon hearing them I realised I could learn to play guitar in a band, with them. They were groupie/journalist/smart girls who knew and hung out with all the cool bands, American and British of that time. in the late 70's. We were the 1st band to rent space at Brendan Mullan's basement rehearsal room/club/headquarters for the early L.A. punk scene. The girls were often on diets and would argue a lot. they are accomplished women in the music industry today.

Pete told me you were asked to play drums for Dire Straits! How did that come about? Was this before Holly and the Italians?
Yes. I'm not good at chronology but yeah, it was before Holly and the Italians. Pick Withers was perfect anyway for them. He's great. As I said, Mark's and my relationship went back to when I was a teen, and first starting to play professionally [drums]. He was an influence, as was I on him. I turned him on to the Dictators music [N.Y. punk band] and he later sought out Andy Shernoff to work with. Mark inundated me with JJ Cale and Steely Dan stuff.  I wrote songs at age 10,a s I said before, and resumed writing again in my first band, the mostly female band "Backstage Pass". Well in the Brothel Creepers I performed two songs on guitar [instead of being the drummer] and the singer's father Derek Taylor [Beatles publicist] saw me do that and told me he was going to look out for me in the future. I was very encouraged by that.
 

What was your parents reaction to your wishes to go into the music business?
They [my family] accepted my playing, but I don't think they wanted me to do it professionally, any of them. I think they just thought it was a phase I was going through, that's lasted my whole life. ha.
 

In one promo shot you are photographed topless with the stars and stripes body painted on. You were comfortable with using your sexuality from a young age? I was being deported from England after being dropped from Virgin [I had a breakdown, of sorts] and the photo was just a symbol of how I felt. I was also wearing bondage cuffs on my ankles, and the naked-ness was about how vulnerable I felt. I actually went around the Virgin Records office [drunk] and proposed marriage to every man there, lol, including Jim Kerr from the Simple minds [I was later told this] but alas...no takers, so I went to N.Y. I actually met a guy in N.Y. who was in publishing and who said he'd almost married me. Of course it would be a publisher...lol.