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Jun 10, 2022 By Joey Arnone

Julee Cruise, known for her collaborations with film director David Lynch and composer Angelo Badalamenti, has passed away at the age of 65. Her husband, Edward Grinnan, made the news public in a Facebook post: “She left this realm on her own terms. No regrets. She is at peace…. I played her [B-52’s song] ‘Roam’ during her transition. Now she will roam forever. Rest in peace, my love.”

Cruise was born in Creston, Iowa. Initially performing as a singer and actress with the Children’s Theater Company in Minneapolis, she later moved to New York, where she met Angelo Badalamenti. They would have their first collaboration on the soundtrack to David Lynch’s 1986 film Blue Velvet, where she sang the song “Mysteries of Love” featured at the end of the film. This collaboration proved to be the first of many—Lynch and Badalamenti would go on to write and compose Cruise’s debut solo album, Floating into the Night, in 1989.

Among the songs on Floating into the Night was “Floating,” which gained recognition following its use in Lynch’s acclaimed TV show Twin Peaks, winning a Grammy in 1991 for Best Pop Instrumental and receiving a gold certification in the U.S. Several other songs from the album were later used in the show, with Cruise also making several appearances on the show as a bar singer. She even made an appearance in the 1992 spin-off film Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me.

Cruise later collaborated with Lynch and Badalamenti again for a cover of Elvis Presley’s “Summer Kisses, Winter Tears,” for the Wim Wenders film Until the End of the World. She went on to release three additional albums: 1993’s The Voice of Love (which was produced by Lynch), 2002’s The Art of Being a Girl, and 2011’s My Secret Life. In 2017, she made an appearance on Twin Peaks: The Return. One year later, she announced that she was diagnosed with systemic lupus.

Check out some of Cruise’s work below.

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