music

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Pat Benatar, then and now

live from earth by pat benatar

Music is a moment. I have a clear memory of my mate Andrew telling me, so excited, about a Pat Benatar release he’d recently acquired: “That’s all it’s got on the cover, just the word Benatar,” he said, or words close to that. He was referring to Live from Earth, a live album — I had it already, on tape (yes, it was a long time ago), along with the rest of the catalogue, but wasn’t overly hooked on the stadium sound. While Benatar was a chart-topping powerhouse in the ’80s, it wasn’t always her hits that kept me coming back for more.

Benatar was one of the first rock acts, certainly one of the first female rock acts, I discovered and engaged with, as opposed to those acts I fell into via teenage osmosis through school friends. Music didn’t play a big part in my family’s life — for many years our only source of music outside the limited range of rural radio was a reel-to-reel tape player with an even more limited range of recordings. I think I remember a Johnny Cash doing the rounds from spool to spool. And when we did step up to a cassette player, it was country, and country, and Elvis Presley.

Music is an ongoing discovery for me. It’s an important part of life, a passion, one that’s best and easily shared, one that adds depth to any friendship and breaks down all barriers. It can be a common love.

Those who are into music can trace the changes in their lives — in their growth, if you like; maybe evolution is a more accurate word — through their collection. Some of these milestones are simply that — moments in time, attitudes of the day, interests of the day — but others endure, managing to not just be a point in the rear vision mirror but a companion along the way. Not necessarily a fulltime companion — it recognises the need for change and exploration and novelty — but a loyal one, always there when it’s needed. Sometimes, it comes with ghosts: the best ones make us smile. Where were you when you first heard…? Who were you with?

Benatar’s Seven the Hard Way remains one of the albums I listen to most. I find it one of the most consistent in her canon. It speaks to me of defiance from within a dystopia, particularly once the opening track, Sex as a Weapon, is past. The other big single off the album was Invincible, with the remainder being more meditative, sublime offerings, tinged with melancholy and loss. The album ends with The Art of Letting Go, to me a treatise in acceptance of the things we cannot change, of life enduring after the mourning for that which has been lost.

Which is why I’m shelling out, thanks to a sweet deal this weekend, to see Benatar strut her stuff at the Palais. Benatar has made only one album in the past decade, so I’m expecting a lot of hits, which will suit me fine. This isn’t a step forward in the journey but a look behind. In a way, it’s another small exercise in the art of letting go. Sadly, we are not invincible, but the music goes on.

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Catching up with Real Life, Ladytron and Sarah McLachlan

In preparation for a quiet run to the end of the year, I’ve been stockpiling albums — some are yet to arrive, including a hot-of-the-press album by I:Scintilla (gotta love that high dollar!) — but a few have lobbed and I’ve had a chance to wrap my ears around them.

In fact, the wonderful Ladytron albums Velocifero and Witching Hour supplied a delightful soundtrack to a cyberpunk short story I was working up — just the right combination of synths, guitars and wicked vocals to do the trick!

And I finally got around to tracking down Sarah McLachlan’s best-selling album Surfacing, featuring the stunning Building a Mystery. She was a charming performer when I saw her a bunch of years ago — she’s touring again with a Taste of Lilith Fair concert.

And now I’ve cracked the seal on another breakout album, Real Life’s Heart Land, and oh the memories evoked by Send Me An Angel! I’m sure that was on a mix-tape (remember them?) I put together on an after-school visit to my mate’s to soak up his vinyl collection on ’80s hot hits. There’s no mistaking David Sterry’s voice — it’s heartening they’re still out there, doing the job — as the album unfolds, such a strong outing it pains me that it’s taken this long for me to grab the CD.

Good company, this lot; I can’t wait for the rest to arrive to so we can get the party started.

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The Jezabels – oh my

A concert review from a workmate sent me trawling the interwebs for further info on Sydney outfit The Jezabels and what a rewarding trawl that was. Based on the tunes available at their MySpace, they’re quite remarkable, due in equal measure to some delightful arrangements (think an Interpol or Arcade Fire base but more urgency) and the Kate-Bush/Martha Davis-on-barbed-wire vocals of Hayley Mary. They’ve got two EPs under their belt — an album should be huge — and they’re touring like mad things; one suspects this kind of percussion and singing should fire live.

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Android Lust — the Human Animal

android lust album the human animal

The latest offering from Android Lust, Shikhee’s one-woman outfit fleshed out with a whole bunch of studio and live performance talent, is a slick affair. The edges of in-your-face album The Dividing have been filed off, but there’s plenty of sting in the lyrics and rewarding musicianship to boot.

The Human Animal opens with Intimate Stranger, with a NIN-like build of ominous synths and whispered male vocals, then Shikhee’s trademark siren call kicks in and the song evolves into a synth-laden rocker. The song title is perhaps indicative of what follows: a meditative though not necessarily quiet exploration of the base impulses of the human animal.

There’s an ongoing theme of obsession, lust, self-abasement, love gone awry — nothing new there for this artist — all humming along on the industrial beat with some superb touches: highlights from guitars and violin, heartbeat bass, and some captivating changes of pace.

What gives her music a real edge is her distinctive vocal style — the raw need is obvious, whether in earthy, rasping lows or that soaring, nail-scratching high — and canny phrasing. Saint Over is a good example — fuzz guitar and clever key changes, and a winning lyric: “Tried to show my concern while I thought
About my cat and my laundry”.

It’s not all industrial blur: check the strut and swing of God in the Hole, for instance, and the percussive drive of It’s On You, the quiet keys on the introspective 1minute30 The Return, the jazzy strut and drum break of A New Heaven.

There’s no filler here, each song distinctive within itself, yet fitting the overall feel of the album making it truly cohesive. Suspicions about a remix of God in the Hole closing out the album are laid to rest: it’s a sublime re-imagining, transforming a marching beat to a dirge and putting extra emphasis on the words. Nice.

The Human Animal shows further development, maturation perhaps (it *has* been four years since her last album), of an artist exploring the inner and outer self. It’s an album that triggers the urge to go back and load the stacker with the albums to date — this is the fourth studio LP — to track the ongoing journey of a remarkable talent.

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Goldfrapp rock Melbourne

All kudos to Alison Goldfrapp, but let’s also hear a cheer for her band and sound team, who all came together with nary a missed beat to provide a thrilling climax to her Australian tour at Melbourne’s Palace Theatre on Tuesday night.

Goldfrapp, soldiering on despite the death of her mother (announced on her blog in July), headed a band as tight as her body suit: a keyboardist with a Chrissy Amphlett fringe who was either busy with one hand on the keyboard and the other on the synthesiser or boogeying away at the front with a keytar; a Sheena Easton lookalike drummer presiding over a hybrid electric-acoustic kit; a cruisy bassist who might’ve been Jason Statham’s little brother; and a ringmaster who bounced around with a certain impish glee with his wild hair and beard and pyjama style body suit as he added highlights with an electronic violin thingy, guitar or keytar – the double keytar attack on some songs was truly awesome. And then there was Goldfrapp herself, raising hairs with those high notes, and otherwise enthralling with a set to seduce, all breathy and note perfect as she strutted centre stage and reeled off an hour and a half of hits, including two encores.

The lighting was striking, centred on a silver doughnut at stage rear, with lots of strobes and smoke, but it was the sound that made the night: the keyboards were working overtime, laying the foundation with a huge sound complemented by the rhythm section’s driving beat.

There was little chitchat from Ms Goldfrapp, looking resplendent in her mix-and-match black bodysuit and makeup lifted from the Alive music clip – minimalist but for the dark eyeshadow that enhanced the silvery undead gleam from the stage lights.

Light and shade were provided by a range of songs (penned by the songwriting duo of Goldfrapp and Will Gregory) from the cruisy Utopia, from debut album Felt Mountain, to more wistful Black Cherry to the joyful dancefloor pop of recent singles Alive and Rocket. The band were sharp, stopping and starting in perfect sync, and the tunes arranged to provide moments of quiet for Goldfrapp’s high range to weave its magic.

It was an impressive display of slick musicianship that could only have been improved by having Tycho Brahe in support!

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Concrete Blonde touring Australia in October

It’s official: Concrete Blonde are to tour Australia in October playing Brisbane (19th), Sydney (21st), Melbourne (22nd) and Perth (23rd). I am ecstatic.

The band, who broke through with the single Joey and just couldn’t sustain the chart impact, are touring to mark the 20th anniversary of their brilliant album, Bloodletting, which has recently been released in a remastered edition with extra tracks.

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John Foxx – songs for the urban condition

The good folk at Projekt recently made available a very attractive 2CD/1DVD set of John Foxx’s new collection, Metatronic.

Foxx is the founder of Ultravox, a pioneer of synthesiser music and all-round clever artist. I saw him rip up Brisbane’s venerable Tivoli theatre two years back, proving that a man and a keyboard or three of electro goodness can put on a hell of a show (having Louis Gordon bouncing around like a mad thing doesn’t hurt, either).

In an interview prior to that tour, Foxx told me about his fascination with the urban landscape. That fascination is apparent on Metatronic, a retrospective put together by Foxx that showcases what he considers his darker material spanning his 30-year career to date.

On early listenings, it’s delivering what I was looking for: a soundscape for the city, lonely and echoing in places, peak-hour and oblivious at others; at times melancholy and other times strident, but almost always evoking a sense of isolation however desperately it might be resisted. Compelling bass lines lay the foundation, with slick, crisp production adding fill and texture (see The Noise). His almost desperate, hoarse vocals complete the picture: love lies lost in the rush and buried under the cacophony, leaves burn, cars burn, “there’s no one driving”.

While disc 1 is the showcase, the second value-adds with live tracks from Foxx’s gig in Sydney in 2008 supplemented with remixes. The DVD includes several music clips and two live clips.

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Synth-driven goodness: O. Children and SPECTRA*paris

Two new finds causing some synth-driven excitement at the coffee pot today are O. Children and SPECTRA*paris.

The former hail from the UK and have just released their self-titled debut album — the tracks online suggest Joy Division basslines and a Sisters of Mercy meet Nick Cave sensibility taken into even darker, synth-drenched terrain. With a name taken from a Nick Cave song (a fairly recent one, too, the clever young things!), they’re definitely an outfit to investigate further. Maybe file with the likes of Interpol, Editors and White Lies…

SPECTRA*paris offer lighter fare on their album Dead Models Society, but it’s equally compelling. Catchy synth beats are complemented with great washes of fill-sound, buzzing guitar highlights and, so very notably, the vocals of Elena Alice Fossi (whose accent adds fetching weight). I’m finding this more accessible (or less challenging) than the choppier cut’n’thrust of Coroner’s Sun, an album by her other outfit, Kirlian Camera, though it’s early days yet. Dead Models Society shows nice changes of pace from high-energy to meditative to down-right slinky, and throw a cool cover of Mad World into the mix. The pop sensibility should this see fit nicely in the background for the car or the commute, or with some track selection, thumping out at a party.

It would be easy to dismiss the outfit as a gimmick band, given their catwalk-ready all-girl line-up, but that would be shortsighted. Here’s a taste, the cracking opening track from the album performed live (the studio version has lots more oomph through headphones!):

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Zola Jesus — what happens when you listen to too much Siouxsie Sioux!

Oh nom, nom, nom… and how good is the clip from Future Primitive Films? Find out more about Zola at her MySpace. There’s more discordance in store! (Good gracious, check out her version of Jefferson Airplane’s Somebody to Love for starters … yipes!)

And in other recent net musical explorations to raise an eyebrow if not an ear:

  • Iron Maiden blast off to the Final Frontier ahead of a new album!
  • Girls put out, ahem, two versions of their spunky Lust For Life (no Iggy was harmed in the making of this tune) — one for work and one for home. Meh.

  • A comfortable little noodle is offered by English outfit XX (or is that xx?) with a touch of unassuming synth. Mostly harmless?

  • And finally,Brisbane plays host to this really cool film clip for a catchy Megan Washington pop song (with an uber-cool support cast!)

    Meanwhile, still waiting for those Concrete Blonde Australian tour tix to go on sale… not that I’m impatient or anything, no not me!

    Footnote: I only found out today that Tim Burton (now on show in Melbourne, will get there I swear!) is teaming up with Johnny Depp to shoot a new Dark Shadows. Could be/should be wicked cool! (If you’re asking wassit, check out the original soapie and the remake with Ben Cross. Neither of which should be confused with Australia’s Dark Shadows, a rockin’ Sydney band!)