Issuu

ISSUE# 29.23 November 18 – November 25 Editor : Mandy Nolan Editorial/gigs : gigs@echo.net.au Advertising : adcopy@echo.net.au p : 02 6684 1777 w : echo.net.au/entertainment

LIFT-OUT

...P29

SONGS WITH HART SINGER/SONGWRITER ANGIE HART IS PERHAPS BEST KNOWN FOR HER ROLE AS THE LEAD VOCALIST IN FRENTE.

GRAY FOR BLUES

A born collaborator, Frente has teamed up with fellow musicians Katie Noonan, Melody Pool and Sam Buckingham to present The Songs That Made Me, a moving showcase of the songs that have shaped these singers’ lives. The show and album are also a Pink Ribbon fundraiser for cancer research for breast and gynaecological cancers. Angie, why did you choose When You Were Mine by Cyndi Lauper for The Songs that Made Me? I have been a rabid Prince fan ever since seeing the movie Purple Rain, when I was around 12 years old. Frente even managed to get Paisley Park producer, Michael Koppelman, to fly to Melbourne and produce our debut album Marvin The Album. The songs Prince writes for women are both gutsy and vulnerable at the same time. Cyndi’s rendition of this song does not let him down. What a sentiment, ‘I love you more than I did when you were mine’! I wish I’d written that. What is it do you think about the quality of a particular song or lyric that undoes a person? is it just about timing? Tone? Different parts of different songs all speak to us individually. Sometimes we love a song, even though we have the lyrics wrong or don’t understand the meaning! They transcend on such an internal level. A good song speaks of something that we’ve all been through in our own way; a heartbreak, a driving lust, an unrequited love. The elements that make that are a mystery. Certain notes, scales, timing maybe. The performance, the combination of personality and subject. Sometimes it’s mastery, mostly it’s just chance. What have been the songs that have best described the narratives of your life? I love a good song of sorrow and loss. Not that this is the narrative of my life, it’s just that this is one of the key moments in my life when I turn to music to resonate my feelings for me. I find going to the dark places in song cathartic and positive in that way.

What was the inspiration for the show? Katie came up with the idea for the show. I think it was for a number of reasons. One of them was the chance to bring some of her favourite female artists together so that we could all experience each other’s way of working and spend some quality time together. A mentorship up and down the ages, if you like. How does it work in with the Pink Ribbon mission? Pink Ribbon supports those affected by female cancers – gynaecological and breast. Everyone has been affected on some level in their lives. I think there is an added solidarity from both of these elements. I hope that we offer some solace to women and girls who are suffering directly and indirectly from these cancers. On a tangible level, 100 per cent of the profits from the Songs That Made Me album go to the Cancer Council Pink Ribbon organisation. What has it been like touring a show while pregnant? Wonderful and exhausting! I am so pleased to be sharing this tour and the songs with my baby. I know they can hear all of the music and feel the love and support that comes from the women I am working with and from the beautiful audiences that we play to. I’ll be happy if these songs become songs that made them!

> CONTINUED ON P38

IT MAY HAVE BEEN 21 YEARS SINCE HIS FIRST STUDIO ALBUM BUT UK SINGER/SONGWRITER DAVID GRAY HAS LOST NONE OF HIS SPUNK. In fact in his tenth and latest album, Mutineers, Gray steers into unfamiliar territory, forging new creative ground in the process.

It was a process that Gray credits for pushing him into uncharted waters. ‘We had worked on it for a week or two and we had this big bag of songs. I said that we had 40 songs, and Andy wasn’t that interested; he asked what else did we have – and I replied that I had one from last week but I didn’t have lyrics. He said, ‘Go with it, Dave, go with it, Dave! I was getting in a fevered state – and he pushed me.

‘The process of writing and making the thing has changed quite a lot for me, but that’s really because you can’t hang around waiting for inspiration. Once you have made a certain amount of records and used up your ideas you need a new sound and you have to find a new way to do it or it becomes repetitive! This time round I knew what I didn’t want. I wanted something different. I needed a key person to work with. I chose Andy Barlow from Lamb as the producer. For me that was the key in making this record. The band put a lot in but it’s very much Andy’s record in terms of the soundscape and the feel.’ For Gray, it was a definitely a dance of egos an ideas. ‘You have to yield a lot of your precious space and that’s difficult! You let someone into your most sacred experience – the song you have written. I think the establishing of trust is difficult. There was a definite honeymoon period and then I struggled. When we got down to business he was knocking things down and we hadn’t built anything in their place.’

Andy instinctively knew that he was putting me in a level playing field. When you have a song pre-written and cast it’s much harder to break it open, and with something that wasn’t set we were able to work on it together to create an amazing soundscape.’ That song ended up being Beautiful Agony and ironically, it’s exactly what it was for Gray! ‘I was totally out of my comfort zone. I was very uncomfortable. Another time he took a song I already had written and he tore it up. We listened back to the song that I had written and he said, ‘This is my favourite bit,’ and ‘lets’ work on it’. It was just a bit. I said that we didn’t have a verse or chorus. He got quite exhausted by the process, so he said, ‘Why don’t you find a new lyric for the chorus?’ and he went and rested.

> CONTINUED ON P37

coming soon 28 NOV 29 NOV 4 DEC 5 DEC 6 DEC 11 DEC 12 DEC 13 DEC 19 DEC 20 DEC

VELSHUR SEA LEGS LIME CORDIALE GRAVEYARD TRAIN MILLIONS NEW NAVY THE LAZYS GAY PARIS BOOTLEG RASCAL TY SEGALL

THU 20 HOT SEX CHOCOLATE FRI 21 THE RUMINATERS, DEAD BEAT BAND, SUNDAY MAIN BEACH 23 NOVEMBER SAT 22 THE ART SAN CISCO, GUNNS, MON 24 ZIGGY ALBERTS MONTAIGNE TUE 25 MARSHALL WED 26 MATT ROGERS HOTEL GREAT NORTHERN • thenorthern.com.au • 6685 6454 North Coast news daily: www.echonetdaily.net.au

The Byron Shire Echo November 18, 2014 27