Collaborations with Badalamenti and Lynch In 1985, Badalamenti was composing the score for
David Lynch's
Blue Velvet, as well as serving as the vocal coach for the film's star,
Isabella Rossellini. A key scene in
Blue Velvet was intended to feature
This Mortal Coil's version of "
Song to the Siren" by
Tim Buckley, with lead vocal by
Elizabeth Fraser. When it proved prohibitively expensive to obtain rights to use the song, it was suggested that Badalamenti compose a pop song in the same style, with lyrics written by Lynch. Because the song required a vocalist with a haunting, ethereal voice, Badalamenti recommended Cruise, who had sung in a New York theater workshop Badalamenti had produced. The result of their initial collaboration was "Mysteries of Love", which figures prominently in
Blue Velvets closing scenes and gained a cult following. Badalamenti and Lynch went on to write and produce additional songs for Cruise, most of which were featured in her debut album,
Floating into the Night (1989). The album was released on September 12, 1989, by
Warner Bros. Records, and charted on
Billboard the following year. It also provided musical material for Lynch's
Industrial Symphony No. 1, in which Cruise performed while "floating" from a harness dozens of feet above a stage at the
Brooklyn Academy of Music. The second, more significant project was the soundtrack to Lynch's
Twin Peaks, for which Badalamenti composed the original score. The song "
Falling", which became the orchestral theme for the television series, caused a minor sensation, winning a
Grammy at the
33rd Annual Grammy Awards in 1991 for Best Pop Instrumental. The
Twin Peaks soundtrack, featuring Cruise on the songs "Into the Night" and "The Nightingale" as well as on the vocal version of "Falling", eventually went gold (500,000+ copies) in the U.S., a rare feat for a television soundtrack. Cruise made a number of appearances on
Twin Peaks as a singer at a local bar, and was prominently featured in both the show's landmark pilot episode and the episode where Laura Palmer's murderer is revealed, as well as in 1992's
Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me. "Rockin' Back Inside My Heart", the second single from
Floating into the Night, was released in 1990 and was also featured in an episode of
Twin Peaks along with "The World Spins"; in the episode, several of the main female characters are shown lip-synching to "Rockin' Back Inside My Heart". Cruise reinterpreted and sang the theme song for an episode of the
USA Network show
Psych. The episode, "
Dual Spires", was about a secluded town full of secrets and skeletons while they investigate the murder of a girl. It aired 20 years to the day after Laura Palmer's murderer was revealed. on short notice when scheduled performer
Sinéad O'Connor refused to appear on the same show as guest host
Andrew Dice Clay. Cruise performed "Falling". Afterward, Cruise maintained a relatively low profile until her second album,
The Voice of Love, was released in 1993. "She Would Die for Love" was also covered by alternative metal band
Fantômas on their ''
The Director's Cut'' album as "Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me". Cruise's early collaborations with Angelo Badalamenti and David Lynch were closely related to Lynch's film work, which was reflected in the lyrics. In 2017 she appeared in Part 17 of the new
Twin Peaks season performing "The World Spins". Cruise released the EP
Three Demos in 2018, containing the original demo versions of "Floating", "Falling", and "The World Spins".
Post-Badalamenti and Lynch Cruise's long-delayed third album,
The Art of Being a Girl, was released in 2002. This was the first of her albums for which Badalamenti and Lynch did not produce or write any of the music. Instead, the music and lyrics for each of the songs were written by Cruise herself (with the exception of an updated version of the single "Falling"), and produced by
Rick Strom and
Mocean Worker. In 2011, Cruise released her fourth album,
My Secret Life. Cruise also acted and sang in the
off-Broadway cast of
Return to the Forbidden Planet, a spoof of
William Shakespeare's
The Tempest, and toured with
The B-52's as
Cindy Wilson's touring stand-in on and off from 1992 to 1999. She also performed regularly with
Bobby McFerrin's improvisational vocal group Voicestra/CircleSong.
Other collaborations Cruise lent her vocals to works by a miscellaneous list of collaborators, mostly in
electronic music. She provided vocals and lyrics to several of the songs on
Wide Angle (1999), the debut album by
Welsh electronic music group
Hybrid, notably the
nu skool breaks track "
If I Survive". She appeared on a number of tracks on both the 2003 album
Dreams Top Rock and the 2007 album
Monstrous Surplus by German
post-rock act Pluramon, a pseudonym of the musician
Marcus Schmickler. Cruise appeared as a guest vocalist on
Sarcast While, the 2006 full-length
album from the New York
band,
Time of Orchids, released on
Tzadik Records. Her vocals appeared on five tracks on
Kenneth Bager's 2006 album
Fragments from a Space Cadet. Cruise provided the vocals for
Delerium's "Magic" song (on the
Chimera album).
Cover versions, film soundtracks and adverts Cruise recorded several memorable covers over the years, including Sir
Cliff Richard's "
Wired for Sound" with
B(if)tek,
R.E.M.'s "
It's the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)" with
Eric Kupper,
Eurythmics's "
Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)" with DJ Silver,
Elvis Presley's "Summer Kisses, Winter Tears", and
David Bowie's "
Space Oddity" with Supa DJ Dmitry. In 1991, Cruise contributed the song "Summer Kisses, Winter Tears" to the "Until the End of the World" soundtrack. In 1996, Cruise with the Flow appeared on the
Scream soundtrack with the song "Artificial World (Interdimensional Mix)". In 2003,
Depeche Mode songwriter
Martin Gore included a cover version of Cruise's song "In My Other World" (from her 1993 album
The Voice of Love) on
Counterfeit², the second in his series of cover albums dedicated to his own musical influences and atmospheric inspirations. A modified sample of Cruise's song "I Float Alone" was used as the backing track in the
Dean Blunt song "The Narcissist". Cruise's song "Floating" was featured in TV advertisements and trailers for the show
The Riches, which debuted on
FX in March 2007. The next year her music was used in
CSI: Miami and in episode 12 of season 5 of
Psych, "
Dual Spires", she sang a rendition of
Psych theme song. The episode was a
spoof of
Twin Peaks. In 2012, her song "The World Spins" was used in an episode of the TV show
House. ==Personal life==