Rufus Wainwright

In leather trousers, shiny Kenneth Coles, and a rumpled sky-blue dinner jacket he wore the night before - sorry about that, he apologizes - Rufus Wainwright is sipping some late afternoon coffee and doing his befuddled best to remember what happened the night before.

It isn't easy. The suave singer, who's almost as well-known for his A-list partygoing exploits as he is for his beatnik-cool songwriting - didn't get in until 8AM, and the caffeine isn't jolting him awake like he thought it would. It was Oscar evening, when every hipster hangout in Hollywood sponsors its own invite-only-post-show-bash. And hey, Wainwright shrugs with a deceptively innocent grin - when in Rome.

And bit by bit, it all starts to come back. The prestigious, star-studded Vanity Fair bash, where Wainwright hung out with old chums John Waters and Patty Hearst. Puff Daddy and his entourage pushing past him at the bar to demand - not a flute or two - but an entire bottle of expensive comp champagne. He also chewed the fat with Joaquin Phoenix, cracked jokes with legendary SCTVers Eugene Levy and Catherine O'Hara, palled around with Duran Duran frontfellow Simon Le Bon, and nodded with recognition at Courtney Love, who's very close to his best friend, former Hole musician Melissa Auf Der Maur.

"And Hugh Hefner was there with his little troop of enslaved teenagers", sniffs Wainwright disdainfully. "But I saw Sting last night, and Sting is Sting - I know he set up Guy Ritchie and Madonna and that whole thing, and I didn't really care about any of that before. But Sting's 16-year-old son is so gorgeous - he brought him out last night - now I'm dying to be friends with Sting so I can molest his children". And he lets out a raucous Woody Woodpecker laugh that signals he's just kidding, folks - no need to call Sting's Police.

Or is he? Twenty-seven-year-old Wainwright - the openly gay son of idiosyncratic folk-rock royalty Loudon Wainwright the 3rd and Kate McGarrigle - has made a career out of the tongue-in-cheek, acid-witted double entendre. In two elegant, delicately constructed albums (1998's critically lauded eponymous debut and the new Poses, which autobiographically charts one character's descent into decadence), the Canadian-bred pianist takes potshots at fame and all its trappings and - like vintage Truman Capote - simultaneously adores and reviles the priviledged high-society environment in which he exists. Or, as the artist himself frames it in Vanity Fair retrospect, "If you ever see me like any of these people at the party in a few years, these celebrities, please shoot me. The people who were great last night were the ones who were really down-to-earth. But lemme tell ya, there are some pretty disillusioned celebrities out there with this totally weird, creepy vibe about 'em."

Wainwright's Poses protagonist teeters on the brink of such egotism and stares longingly into the abyss of debauchery, starting with track one, 'Cigarettes And Chocolate Milk,' which confesses as many "cravings" as it can in in four-plus-minutes. He goes on to admit a certain fondness for Adonis-handsome lads ('Greek Song'), the bloodrush excitement of a night on the town in adopted cities like New York and Los Angeles ('Poses' and 'Shadows'), and even the very concept, or ideal, of the "party" itself (the Victorian madrigal 'The Consort'). After a laconic cover of his father's 'One Man Guy,' Wainwright finally pauses for some soul-searching reflection with 'In A Graveyard.' How long, exactly, can the party last, he wonders. And to what physicl/existential finality does it ultimately lead? So many deep questions from such a young performer. Here Wainwright takes time to reason through a few answers.

Tom Lanham: How do you get invited to so many functions? You seem to be everyone's guest du jour.

Rufus Wainwright: I go out a lot. And I have to say, when I first moved to LA and I got signed, I realized immediately that if I wanna get anywhere, I'm gonna have to promote myself and go out and talk about myself and get into certain parties and meet certain people. I wouldn't carry tapes with me or anything, but I'd sing my songs at the bar. I wasn't smooth about it, but it was still pretty shameless. I think I was very, very obnoxious, actually - that's what it was. But there was something kind of endearing about it too, because I was probably the one who was the most drunk. I was not afraid to have a good time, not afraid to be outrageous and say, "I'm gonna be a star!" and "I'm in Hollywood!" There was nothing at all very subtle about me. I never got beaten up or anything, although I have been ejected from a few. That's just because they were bad parties. And some people don't get me when they first meet me. Last night I had a bit of a weird experience. I was at a party and someone came up to me and they were really pissed off at me and they said, "How dare you compare yourself to Jeff Buckley! You can never compare yourself to him - you're nowhere near him." Because someone in an interview had mentioned that we were similar, and a lot of people in France seem to think we're similar. This guy wasn't famous, but I think he was supposed to be at the Vanity Fair party, and then he said, "You'll never be anything like him." All I could say was, "Well you're a really nice guy! A real charmer! And it was very sweet of you to say that." Regardless of whether what he'd said was true or not, I crumbled for one second and I realized how--how, well, the bigger the front, the bigger the back. I have put my neck out there in saying I'm the decadent one and I'm at all the parties and I'm fabulous. The more you start to live in that and believe your own thing, you can just be blown up so quickly. Because you think you're so strong, but you're really quite weak, which is what I'm always concerned about. Innately, I just want it all to be in my album, and I want it to be remembered for being a great album.

But there's a great romance traditionally associated with decadence. Even the low-key decadence of, say, the debutante society depicted in Whit Stillman's Metropolitan.

I love that movie! I went to the same school as Whit Stillman, and I love his The Last Days Of Disco. I actually saw Chloë Sevigny last night, and she looks ravishing - she's really gorgeous. But for Poses, I had all these other songs set up from the last record that I could've put on, but I made a real conscious effort with this record to... Well, I moved into the Chelsea Hotel in New York. I got an apartment there for six months, then I moved in a piano and just started writing. Then I wrote the song 'Poses,' which for me encapsulated a character around which this record could revolve. It's kind of like me, but it's another me. After that, all the other songs were written in close proximity to that period. And it was a very decadent period - I'd lived in New York before, and I'd never been well-known in New York before. This time I was actually recognized, and I actually could get good tables at all the restaurants. So it was very exciting, and I wanted to encapsulate that Metropolitan feel of the total roue, the total rake. I hope it worked.

"The Consort" sounds turn-of-the-century English. Like hoop-skirted women walking down the steps into a ballroom.

Actually, it was influenced by seeing the Elizabeth movie, and the scene, where they're cutting off her hair and making her into this doll at the end. I've always been fascinated by the idea of someone who's a total figurehead - I love figureheads, I love the royal family, and totally ridiculous stuff like noblesse oblige. I'm a monarchist, and it's terrible - I shouldn't be that way. I don't know if I agree with the monarchy or anything, but I do think that there's something fabulous about the utter ridiculousness of people who live in castles. There's something to be said for that. Or maybe not - maybe they should all be killed, I don't know. I'm going through an internal struggle right now - I'm either gonna move into Hugh Hefner's house or become a communist.

My favourite bit of graffitti was always "The abyss stares also." Kinda spooky, ain't it?

I've definitely stared into that abyss a few times. I've done things like walking around and almost getting hit by a car because you're just too out of it. I've realized how fragile life is. It's not so much I would kill myself or ever OD or something - I'd probably just fall down a flight of stairs or freeze to death, passed out on the street. It's that type of thing, more the Chet Baker type of death, which is more frightening to me. I'm afraid of getting hit by a car when I'm just racing across the street to say hello to someone. You never know - when ya gotta go, ya gotta go.

But your character - or you, as its creator - definitely seem concerned with the human soul on Poses, especially on "Tower Of Learning."

Whatever it is, I'll tell you, just wrote itself with those songs. I am just a conduit for whatever words and music came out. The more I'm discovering, the less control I have over what turns out well. I find that if I really concentrate on something, it's not as good as if I just let it happen and pour out of me. I'm also understanding that - if I wanted - I could let the music totally ravage me and destroy me or take over my life. And I'll always have that ability, but the question is, do I wanna sacrifice myself to this? Because you can really go off the deep end, so I'm trying to find an equilibrium for that. I think you have to find an equlibrium. Because art is evil, art isn't good for you. That whole thing of art education in school and "Let's teach them how to make art!" Don't teach them how to make art! If they get into it, it'll destroy their lives! I mean, my art is great and I love it, but I don't think it's a fun ride in the end.

But at least you have it as catharsis.

Yes, definitely. I go back to my piano and that's the happiest that I'll ever be. That eclipses everything else and always makes me happy. But there's something dangerous in that - you can fuck up your entire life, you can lose all your friends, you could even be dying. The minute that you're there, singing alone at the piano, everything is forgiven. It's a great thing, but you've gotta watch out for it. But that's what I'm looking for, though - a "Tower Of Learning." Everyone talks to me about the gay thing, like, "Oh, you don't wanna talk about it." I don't realy care, one way or the other. But I would say this, and this is something that I think is really lacking right now in gay culture - being a gay guy, I think one of the best things you can aspire to be from that culture is to be really in touch with beauty. Not like spiritual beauty, but physical beauty, Wildean, like Aubrey Beardsley or Michelangelo. That's something I feel privy to, coming from that tradition. Out of any sadness or trauma, there's always beauty in it. So I do worship in the cult of beauty, and it is like a cult sometimes.

And you certainly seem to appreciate the beauty of the night, kind of like a werewolf.

I just can't stay in at night - I stay in maybe once a week. When those lights go down and dusk comes creeping, I simply have no choice. I really hit the bottle at a certain hour too - I start with wine. Then you say, "Oh, maybe I'll have a little aperitif or sambuca." Then you're into a cosmo or two, and then you think, "Well I better have some beer," because you can always drink beer. Then you top it off with a few whiskies, and the next thing you know, somebody's going, "Hey! Wanna tequila shot?" I kind of do that kind of drinking. I mix it all up, and it's horrible. I have a pretty strong constitution, even though I look quite frail.

One thing they'll never take away from you - on record and otherwise, you certainly speak what's on your mind.

I'm a terrible liar! I really cannot lie very well. I'm like Pinocchio or something - my nose doesn't get bigger, it gets fatter with zits on it. Maybe it's a catholic thing or something - I'm just very afraid of lying. I find that having sex with men and doing all sorts of illicit things is not nearly as bad as lying. Wow! I think I need some more coffee!