Paula Cole Says the ‘Rebel’ Inside Her Finally ‘Got to Explode’ While Making “This Fire ”30 Years Ago (Exclusive)
Paula Cole Says the ‘Rebel’ Inside Her Finally ‘Got to Explode’ While Making “This Fire ”30 Years Ago (Exclusive)
Meredith WilshereSun, October 11, 2026 at 8:59 PM UTC
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Paula Cole in 1997Credit: Bob Berg/Getty -
Cole revisited unreleased recordings from 1989 to 1998 for her new collection Sonic Memoir: Demos 1989-1998
The 1996 album went double platinum and included “I Don’t Want to Wait,” later the Dawson’s Creek theme
Cole won Best New Artist after This Fire earned seven Grammy nominations
Paula Cole really tapped into her rebellious side while making This Fire.
Cole, 58, revisited her old work while making her most recent album, Sonic Memoir: Demos 1989-1998, which features 63 songs, including unreleased tracks and early demos. Talking to PEOPLE about the project, Cole says the experience reminded her of the woman she was while creating her sophomore album, which came out on Oct. 15, 1996.
“I’m in my 20s, I’m in technicolor, I’m hurting. I’m finally rebelling for the first time because I was a repressed, goody-two-shoes, like straight A’s and class president, not that I even wanted to be those things,” she reflects. “I didn’t want to be those things. I wanted to be a dark artist, but I had to be performative to not be bothered by my angry father, so I was just a good girl.”
However, when she was finally “free” in her 20s and “living on my own, that was when I got to explode.”
“I exploded with This Fire. And there were all these songs, all these demos that led up to the first album, to This Fire, the second album, to the third album when I was starting to write more about social justice I’m really happy to tap into the rebel,” Cole shares.
Paula Cole in 1998Credit: Bill Tompkins/Getty
In the 30 years since its release, the album has gone double platinum, selling over two million copies. It featured the lead single “Where Have All the Cowboys Gone?” and the second single “I Don’t Want to Wait,” which later became the theme song for the WB’s hit TV show, Dawson’s Creek, which ran from 1998 to 2003.
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The album was nominated for seven Grammy Awards, and Cole was nominated for Producer of the Year and Best New Artist, winning the latter.
Paula Cole in 2024Credit: Gus Stewart/Redferns
Reflecting on the 30th anniversary of the album, Cole quips, “It’s funny, that went really quickly.”
“Where did that go? I still feel young inside. I do. Knock on wood and thank God I’m still pretty agile in my body, and I am trying to get stronger. I’m trying to work on my plank and my push-up. I want to have a good health span,” she says. “I’m just really grateful. Thirty years, that sounds so big, but it goes quickly, especially if you’re parents, especially if you have children.”
While assembling Sonic Memoir, Cole had a lot of time to reconnect with her younger self and learned to “love that eccentric person that was really wild and free.”
“That’s all over This Fire…I love that rebel inside of me, and it’s really healthy for me to touch upon her again,” she tells PEOPLE. “I also appreciate how I was thinking socially, politically in my writing, and I’ve always felt it’s a privilege to make music, and there’s some kind of social responsibility to it because yes, it’s therapy for me, but I find out the songs help others too and music helps us all. So there is some responsibility in it.”
on People
Source: “AOL Entertainment”
