Unhappily ever after Rise and fall of a ‘chick-rock’ starlet By Nicole Queen nqueen@mscd.edu Photo courtesy of www.jentrynin.com

In the company of such mid-1990s alt-rock powerhouses such as Nirvana, Hole and The    Smashing Pumpkins, Jennifer Trynin barely made her way into the music business.
   With her autobiography, “Everything I’m Cracked Up To Be: A Rock & Roll Fairy Tale,” Trynin offers a bittersweet glimpse into the inner workings of the music business. Over the span of less than 400 pages, Trynin offers an intimate peek into the industry with all its vices, traps and temptations.
   Trynin was known for being 1995’s bidding-war baby doll of the booming “chick-rock” phenomena. After a long flirtation with a slew of record companies begging for the first dance,    Trynin tied the knot with Warner Brothers to push her debut album Cockamamie and her single “Better Than Nothing.” From the start, the relationship with “The Bunny” headed downhill, inevitably pinning Trynin as either the typical female singer/songwriter or the “super-cool-alt-chick-with-that-‘Feelin’ Good’-song’-of-the-year” — and nothing more. Trynin’s fame rapidly faded in the fat shadows of rising female artists like Alanis Morissette, Aimee Mann and others in the genesis of the Lilith Fair era.
   Trynin’s witty and conversational writing entertains, while the plot plateaus with page after page of getting drunk, playing the same songs at different clubs and the never-ending run-ins with a plethora of people. Some of the characters manage to retain their real names in the telling, such as Danny Goldberg of Warner Bros. and David Geffen, entertainment kingpin and part owner of the DreamWorks conglomerate, while others are tagged with pseudonyms like “Preppy Boy,” “Howdy Doody,” “Big Wig” and “Head Honcho.”
   From disappointing record sales to physically and emotionally tolling shows, sour interviews and a crumbling personal life, Trynin quickly came to the realization that the rise to fame was anything but glamorous and smooth. The scummy and cannibalistic demeanor of the music business quickly devoured Trynin’s tiny rock ‘n’ roll fairy tale. As the seedy side of the business enveloped her, Trynin wanted out.
   So, in terms of her short-lived fame, she’s bailed—sans the bitter resentment—kicking and screaming. She married her longtime boyfriend. She had a kid. She wrote a book about how she really wasn’t everything she was cracked up to be. And judging from the clips you can hear from her albums on her Web site, www.jentrynin.com, she’s better off sticking with the book deals.
Her skillful, brusque, raw, and edgy writing is far more enjoyable than her catchy and poppy tunes, which desperately try to pass themselves off as deep and dark indie-rock songs.