Bubbles & Cheesecake

Bubbles & Cheesecake

Bubbles & Cheesecake is an U.S. Internet-based, multi-media collaboration between multi-disciplinary artist Allee Willis and singer-songwriter Holly Palmer. Allee Willis is a GRAMMY-winning, Emmy and Tony-nominated composer whose work includes Earth, Wind & Fire's "September" and "Boogie Wonderland," Pet Shop Boys with Dusty Springfield’s "What Have I Done to Deserve This?", the Pointer Sisters' "Neutron Dance," "I'll Be There For You" (the theme to Friends) and the Broadway musical The Color Purple. Holly Palmer is a solo recording artist and formerly a vocalist with the Gnarls Barkley live band. She has also worked with David Bowie, Dr. Dre, Billy Preston and Michael Bublé, among others.

The name Bubbles & Cheesecake refers to Willis' and Palmer's respective alter-egos. In their overall mythology for the Bubbles & Cheesecake universe, Willis and Palmer say that they act as "managers" for their alter-egos. They have also said that Bubbles and Cheesecake represent the side of themselves that is fearless, knows how to have fun and embraces individuality and free self-expression.

The idea of creative collaboration with an alter-ego began when Allee Willis started painting and making ceramics as Bubbles the artist in 1999. At the time, Willis told people that she had stumbled across Bubbles online and that she had decided to manage her career. The initial spin was that Bubbles was a "bad" artist and Willis' most significant discovery since the musical Del Rubio Triplets, but in reality, Bubbles ultimately sold close to 1,000 paintings and ceramic pieces to collectors including Lily Tomlin and Tracey Ullman. In May, 1999, the New York Times reported that "Bubbles the artist is Ms. Willis herself." Although most people who collected Bubbles were in on the joke, Willis continued to deny her dual identity.

In 2006, Willis renewed her songwriting partnership with Palmer, who had been Willis' protégé since they began co-writing in 2000. It came up that Palmer had recently gotten the moniker "MC Cheesecake," a name given to her by her husband while she was rhyming about food in the car one day. Palmer came up with the idea that Cheesecake should become Bubbles' protégé, paralleling her relationship as Allee's, and Bubbles & Cheesecake were born.

The Willis and Palmer/Bubbles & Cheesecake collaboration encompasses hand-made music, videos, art work, animation merchandise, online characters, stories, games, all embedded into a social network.