HOME AGAIN
MEET THE NEW BOSS He rose through the roots ranks in Australia, but in Europe CARUS THOMPSON is likened to a young Springsteen, he tells TONY MCMAHON.
One of the earliest success stories of the Brit School – other alumni include Amy Winehouse, Kate Nash and Jessie J – IMOGEN HEAP last year moved back to her family home to record her third studio album, Ellipse. By JEREMY WILLIAMS.
of us, putting out lines together. Then at the end, we sat back and listened to it and we just had to have a glass of red and celebrate because, you know, before that there wasn’t anything, and we’d made this thing that we were both really proud of, and it was something really special.” Thompson certainly seems to have carved a workable little niche for himself in Europe where other artist have perhaps not been able to. Interestingly, he says it’s a Boss thing.
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ravelling troubadour Carus Thompson has certainly been living up to his title lately. In the last year, he’s recorded a sublime new album, the aptly titled Caravan, in England, Germany and Australia, toured relentlessly across Europe and supported Dave Matthews, Damien Rice, John Butler and The Waifs. Luckily for us though, Thompson has decided to sit still long enough to back the Australian release of Caravan with a national, full-band tour, his first in nearly four years. And the Melbourne via Western Australia singer/songwriter says that, while this is a record that was made on the road, it’s not necessarily that much about the road.
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think the secret is that [the Brit School] attracts people who want to do music for a living,” Imogen Heap says. “I don’t think there was anywhere else in England at the time that did that sort of thing. I went in its second year and it was still very much trying to find its feet. It’s partly funded by the BMI [British Music Industry] and so there is this sort of knowledge that it is where people go if they want to do well. They are well connected.” Heap is one of the Brit School’s earliest success stories. Having gone at a time when there were few music school alternatives, she thrived on being able to live out her musical ambitions. It doesn’t take much thinking time before Heap reveals a liking for fellow Brit School alumnus Amy Winehouse. “She really feels the music,” Heap says. “I hope, god willing, she will be able to keep going for a long time. The Brit School gets its fair share of celebrity wannabes, but you can tell that she really feels the music.”
how someone heard my music that I’ve been told.” You are probably more likely to know Heap from soundtracks including The Last Kiss (Hide And Seek ), The Chronicles Of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch And The Wardrobe (Can’t Take It In ) and Just Like Heaven (Spooky ). It could be argued, though, that it was American teen drama The OC that brought Heap to the attention of a whole new audience. For the show she recorded a harrowing a cappella cover of Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah, which was used as the backdrop to the season two closing scenes. “A cover really isn’t a big thing for me. I got asked to do it and I had some free time and it sounded fun, so I thought, ‘Why not?’ One song I really thought [about covering] which kind of makes Christmas more magical is More by Bobby Darin. It’s so unashamedly happy that it makes me smile every time I hear it. I have no idea what I could do with it though.”
Heap has played music from an early age and is classically trained in many instruments, including piano (her first instrument) cello and clarinet. It is little wonder that with her diverse musical ability, Heap has, to date, self-produced all her own work. Speak For Yourself in 2005 took Heap’s career to the next level. Amongst the many nominations the album received, there were two Grammys. Suddenly, the world was at her feet. Had she wished to, she could have worked with anyone she wanted. “Why would I do that? It’s a great luxury to be allowed the privilege of working on my own records,” she says. Only briefly, back in 2002, was there the spark of collaborative interest. “I met Guy [Sigsworth] when I was 17. We kind of did each other a favour. I worked with his band. I love his band Acacia. He produced my first single, Getting Scared. Guy’s an absolute genius.” Sigsworth and Heap went on to form Frou Frou. The initial concept was that Sigsworth would put together an album, featuring tracks written and produced by him alongside a singer, songwriter, poet or rapper. Heap was the first to be invited along to partake in his new project. He never invited anyone else. “It was a brilliant record. I got so much out of working with him, but it wasn’t easy. I had to get used to him producing and he had to get used to me doing some of the writing.” Though there is nothing in the pipeline, Heap wouldn’t rule out a future project with her “favourite producer on the planet. I plan on making music for another 50 years. We are both so busy right now, but it will happen one day.”
“It is important to try and have fun when recording. I definitely feel relaxed and comfortable in the house.” Heap took a big step when recording her third and most recent solo album Ellipse, she moved back to her family home. Her hope was to release a record that she could say was “truly me”. Though when she moved she had no idea what the record would be about, she realised during the period to build her home-studio that the move in itself was her start. “The house developed the sound of my record. It has the sound of my family house. I had this fear of building a studio at the same as a fear of endless possibilities of where to start. I had some songs written before I started recording, which is rare for me. But I decided that the house should be the starting point as that’s where I am.” It didn’t take long before the house started to come alive for her. She had never noticed as a child that the house had its own distinct sound. “The house started to speak to me as a musical instrument. Whilst waiting for the studio to be built, I would be sat around and I could hear things I had never noticed before. Things I was too busy as a child to hear. Like the boiler clicking, the freezer turning on during the day, the squeaking of the floorboards and the dripping of the taps in the kitchen. They became my inspiration.” Being back at home sparked childhood innocence in her, which aided musically and lyrically. The newfound playfulness allowed her to rediscover the sounds of dragging a drumstick along the banister or moving the light panels in the studio to create a sound. “As a kid you are unafraid to show the emotion you feel.” Lyrically it enabled freedom – previously, on a track such as A-Ha, Heap “wouldn’t have been confident enough to let that side of me out of the closet. I have written numerous songs like it before, but never felt ready to release one. There were some like it on Speak For Yourself, but this time round I just felt comfortable enough to say I am who I am.”
It is hard to believe that six years have passed since Speak For Yourself, given that Heap’s popularity has been growing rapidly in the interim. This could be thanks to the constant use of her material in everything from films to contemporary dance pieces. “Someone told me recently that they went to a restaurant where you eat in bed. I can’t remember its name. But anyway, there they were having this nice romantic meal in bed when the waiter, who was also a performance artist, came over and started to take all his clothes off. The music he was taking his clothes of to was Hide And Seek [from Speak For Yourself ]. That’s the most bizarre version of
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WHO: Imogen Heap WHEN & WHERE: Monday, Palais
“They just love singer/songwriters in Europe and the tradition has been around a long time. Whereas in Australia I got my breakthrough in the roots scene, in Europe they just see me as a singer/songwriter a bit like Bruce Springsteen. A couple of newspapers over there referred to me as something like a young Springsteen, which was really nice.” Despite the fact he has, quite obviously, been tearing up the continent, Thompson is decidedly looking forward to playing his home country again. This is especially true of his adopted hometown and a certain venue in particular. “The Corner’s always been a great place for me. The Corner really sums up what’s great about the Melbourne music scene. You walk into a venue like that you can just feel the bands that have played there. It’s just a great place for a rock’n’roll gig.”
“I wrote it on the road, but it’s an introspective and a nostalgic record in that I was really thinking about everything that I’d done in my life,” he explains. “You know: the bands I’d been in, the people I’d known, the chances I’d had and the choices I’d made. I don’t think I necessarily write songs about that on the album, but I think the songs are informed by that meditative space, if you like.”
Thompson has recently described his desire to succeed in the music industry as similar to that of a footballer who wants to play to their potential. Being a Melbourne publication, Inpress goes looking for a particular player Thompson would liken himself to: the silky skills of a James Hird? The workman-like output of a Robert Murphy? The ten-metres-out tragedy of a Richo?
And talking about the writing, Caravan’s title track would be one of the songs of the year so far, up there with anything National Treasure Paul Kelly ever wrote for narrative power and evocative imagery. Thompson says he’s reasonably fond of it, too.
“Oh Jesus, that’s a hard one. I’m probably going to have to say someone really bad. You know who I really like? Robin Nahas. I love watching him play. But yeah, I changed from the Dockers to Richmond when I moved to Melbourne, so I’ll take Richo.”
“I co-wrote that with Yanto Shortis. You have to wear your heart on your sleeve, it’s got to be no bullshit, you know? And co-writing can be really fantastic for that thing of doing something that you might not normally do. I came up to Yanto and he had the first verse written and most of the chorus and I was, like, ‘Man, that’s really something, I’ve gotta get my hands on that.’ So we just sat there, the two
WHO: Carus Thompson WHAT: Caravan (MGM) WHEN & WHERE: Thursday, Drouin Bowling Club; Friday, Pelly Bar (Frankston); Saturday, Corner Hotel
STILL DRIVEN Releasing more than an album a year for the past 15 years, truck-lovin’ country star DALE WATSON is up for anything on stage, he tells DOUG WALLEN. Once Watson became a touring musician, his newfound travelling suddenly brought everything rushing back. From there came a strong pull to begin writing odes to the workers who crisscross those vast American motorways. “That was part of my memory as a kid, all the movies and the songs,” he shares. “And then on the road as a musician, I realised we’re riding the same roads and have a lot of the same habits, having to be up so late and eating at truck stops. Just different cargo.”
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t’s time for another visit from Dale Watson, the American country rebel who’s been coming to Australia regularly since he first broke out in the mid-1990s. He’d already been performing for a decade and a half then, and by now he’s a true veteran. With more than 20 albums to his name, the Texas songwriter has recorded in Johnny Cash’s cabin studio as well as the iconic Sun Studio, released live records and a Christmas one, and penned two entire albums of truck-driving anthems. He rose to alt.country fame with his debut Cheatin’ Heart Attack and has stayed ruggedly unique ever since. In fact, Watson both self-produced and self-financed last year’s Carryin’ On. That’s because he had a specific vision: a band of vintage Nashville legends organised by steel guitarist Lloyd Green, who has played with Cash, George Jones and The Byrds. Thus came guitarist Pete Wade, pianist Hargus ‘Pig’ Robbins, fiddler Glenn Duncan, and upright bassist Dennis Crouch, each trailing a staggering CV. So it was a once-in-a-lifetime album that might never have been made otherwise. “I was signed with Hyena Records,” Watson recounts. “When the market crash happened here, they lost their financing. I thought I’d just do it myself. So I did, and luckily a label picked it up and I made my money back. But it was a labour of love. If I didn’t get my money back, I’d have been okay with it.” Just prior to Carryin’ On came 2009’s The Truckin’ Sessions Vol. 2, a sequel to the 1998 collection that Watson describes as his most “long-lived” album. “It seems to never go out,” he notes. His fascination with the almost cult-like trucking lifestyle began as a child, when his country-singing father drove trucks and the CB radio craze was sweeping the States.
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Trucking songs have long been a staple of country music, as have drinking songs and other examples of larrikin wit that gel well with Watson’s Aussie fans. Watson has penned his fair share, from Tequila, Whiskey And Beer, Oh My to Truckin’ Queen, about a flamboyant cross-dressing trucker. “You can’t take yourself too seriously,” he argues. “Slow, hurtin’ songs you need to purge the sadness, but you also need to lighten up and laugh at yourself.” He cites Johnny Cash’s definition of country music as songs about life, love, death, and anything else that someone can experience. “Everything you can think of as a human emotion,” Watson concludes. “You’ve gotta have all that.” That might explain the drastic range of Watson’s work – from happy or funny to lonesome or tragic – but how about his prolific pace? The man has released an album every year or so since the mid-1990s, and he’s constantly on tour. Even as he returns to Australia, he’ll be debuting songs from an upcoming Sun Studio-recorded album that’s in the vein of Johnny Cash’s original backing band The Tennessee Two. “I do write a lot,” he admits. “I write mostly on stage these days, because we play five and six nights a week. I do like to get the songs out. If they sit around, I’ll forget about them.” As to whether all his songs are up for grabs live, there’s no question. “We don’t go by a set list,” he confirms. “People’ll holler for stuff from the first album, the third album, our last album. We’re prepared to do anything.”
WHO: Dale Watson WHAT: Carryin’ On (Koch Records) WHEN & WHERE: Tuesday 19 and Wednesday 20 April, Cherry Bar; Thursday 21 to Tuesday 26, Bluesfest, Byron Bay