FEATURE: The Digital Mixtape: Songs from the Best Albums of 2000

FEATURE:

 

 

The Digital Mixtape

 

Songs from the Best Albums of 2000

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THROUGHOUT the year…

PHOTO CREDIT: Emilio González/Pexels

we will stop to remember great albums that were released in the year 2000. A huge year, it was the turn of a new century and millennium. These great albums that are turning twenty-five. I have gone back o the year 2000 before. However, as we are in a year when some truly massive albums celebrate a big anniversary, I wanted to return for this Digital Mixtape. An assortment of songs from the very best albums of 2000. I was still a teenager then and I was discovering these great works from artists I knew about and some I did not. Getting use to the transition from the 1990s to this new decade. Some all-time great albums arrived in 2000. It is amazing that they are twenty-five years old! Maybe you remember some of these or it is a little bit hazy. In any case, below is an example of the wonderful music released in the year 2000. A massively important year, these albums are…

PHOTO CREDIT: Anastasiya Badun/Pexels

THE cream of the crop.

FEATURE: Spotlight: Gelli Haha

FEATURE:

 

 

Spotlight

PHOTO CREDIT: Sophie Prettyman-Beauchamp

 

Gelli Haha

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PERHAPS I am a little bit…

PHOTO CREDIT: Dev Bowman

late to the brilliance of Gelli Haha. It is the stage name of L.A.-based artist, Angel Abaya. This is a musician and performance artist who has created a theatrical world called the ‘Gelliverse’. Her debut album, Switcheroo, was released on 27th June. I will end with a review of Switcheroo. Before that, there are a few interviews that are important to illuminate. For those who do not know about Gelli Haha, this will shine a light on her wonderful music and the infectious and vivacious Gelliverse. I am starting out with a recent NME interview that is well worth a full read:

“Make no mistake, Gelli Haha’s world – the Gelliverse – is joyously kaleidoscopic and bonkers. Her live shows are choreography-heavy spectacles, involving trampolines, pat-a-cake dances, inflatable dolphins and playground boxing matches being interrupted by bubble machines. Similarly, her recently released debut album ‘Switcheroo’ is equally inventive and quirky, hopscotching from the candy-floss electro of ‘Bounce House’ (the one-shot video to which resembles a Tumble Tots run by Devo) to the riotous hedonism of ‘Piss Artist’.

“Gelli Haha is a criminal you’d likely forgive and maybe befriend. Because she’s so cute, she gets a pass”

Speaking to NME from her home city of LA, ideas chaotically spill out of Abaya like candy from a piñata. Asked who Gelli is, the 27-year-old says she’s less an alter ego and more of a liberating philosophy. “This sounds woo-woo, but she’s my inner child,” she explains. “She’s this little girl that gets into mischievous situations. She’s a criminal you’d likely forgive and maybe befriend. Because she’s so cute, she gets a pass.”

As its title suggests, ‘Switcheroo’ is an exercise in reinvention; of experimenting with a persona, then realising, retrospectively, that it was your authentic self all along. In 2023, Abaya had reached an impasse. Having worked for eight years in various indie, folk and jazz bands in the Boise, Idaho music scene, the singer-songwriter had just moved to Los Angeles and released a heartfelt solo album ‘The Bubble’. Yet she was feeling unwelcome in her own life, as if her past was an ill-fitting outfit she’d grown out of. Teaming up with Sean Guerin from LA disco-revivalists De Lux, she wanted to think outside of the box.

Recorded using a variety of vintage synths and analogue effects, ‘Switcheroo’ plays in different sonic ballpits: ‘Funny Music’ ends abruptly with a Looney Tunes-style “BONK!” noise while the Italo disco of ‘Dynamite’ is interrupted by the sound of (what else?) a bear attack. On the breezy house of ‘Tiramisu’, she adopts the shrill vocals of a pouty Veruca Salt-esque child throwing a tantrum.

While tracks were scaffolded from instrumental demos Abaya had written, lyrics were frequently improvised in the studio. The noughties electroclash of ‘Spit’ lists words beginning with the letter S and peaks with the tongue-twister “Selby sells Shelby snails sans shells sick slick”. For ‘Normalize’, based on the 2005 Nigerian funk song ‘Nomalizo’ by Caiphus Semenya and Letta Mbulu, she consulted an online dictionary and sang the first nine words she found that ended in ‘ia’ (including homophobia, haemophilia, and paedophilia) – before declaring that she wants to “fly away”.

“There’s always a meaning to the songs, even if it isn’t clear to me in the beginning,” she elaborates. “I feel like we’re playing in a sandbox, digging up fossils of meaning. With ‘Funny Music’, I didn’t set out to write a song about my personal journey of healing my fear of expression, but I ended up doing it in a fun way. ‘Normalize’ is about wanting to escape from the woes of the world”.

Psychedelic Baby Mag spoke with Gelli Haha back in April. Heralding this weird and catchy music, it is clear that this is a very distinct artist. Adding something unique into the music world. I am new to Gelli Haha but can instantly tell that she is going to be around for a very long time. I do hope that there are U.K. dates in the future:

“What other types of musical projects were you involved in before this?

I got into the Boise music scene when I was 18, which was a decade ago. I was in a ton of bands, and I was also involved in a performing arts dance company. The dance company performed all over Boise, plus Vegas and Seattle and other places. I was in the company’s band, and eventually I became an assistant for them, and then when I was 21 or 22 I became the program director. I would say that experience was the most pivotal for me. Being in the band but also being involved in the production side is a lot of what inspired the Gelli project.

Do you think of Gelli as a solo project, or a band, or more like solo but with other contributors?

It’s all of that, really. I call the band the Gelli Company. I feel like anyone can be a Gelli. It’s a character that anyone can be. It’s fun, playful energy that anyone can embody. It’s collaborative. The music is really just me and Sean Guerin, who’s in the band De Lux. Nine of the 10 songs on the record are based on demos I made. And then Sean and I created a world from the demos. Sean’s very talented in the sonic space. So musically, it’s mostly just a collaboration between Sean and me. But there’s more collaboration in the performance part, between me and the dancers. I find a lot of joy in making this collaborative. I don’t believe I was meant to make art by myself. Part of the joy of my expression is to do it with other people.

When I listen to the record, I hear many different things, different genres and eras. What musical influences would you say inspired the songs?

I would say that for the identity of Gelli, I was inspired by Björk and Kate Bush. But Sean and I have also been listening to lots of late ‘70s/early ‘80s funk and boogie and experimental disco. And then he bought a bunch of old analog gear, like the kind of gear those people used. Animal Collective is another influence. I think originally the idea was this could be Animal Collective meets Kate Bush. But it ended up being something else. I think it’s tricky because you might feel like you’re hearing different influences, but personally I don’t think it sounds just like anything else. We wanted to make catchy music. But we wanted it to be weird. We felt like pop music is too boring and experimental music can be too unpalatable. So we wanted it to meet in the middle”.

Before getting to a review of Switcheroo, there is one more interview that I want to bring in. Baby Step Magazine spent some time with one of new music’s brightest artists. I am really excited to see where her future takes her. Having released one of this year’s best albums, I do wonder what is next for her. Championed by stations such as BBC Radio 6 Music, there is no telling quite how far she can go:

“Your music lives between Studio 54 and Area 51 — glamour and the bizarre. How does that surreal blend of influences come to life in the Gelliverse you’ve created?

I created the philosophy and foundation of the Gelliverse with my best friend, dancer/choreographer Selby Jenkins. In an early conversation I said the line, “somewhere between Studio 54 and Area 51” and Selby made sure to write it down. It’s really stuck with us through the process of creating the Gelliverse, the debut album, and the stage performance. I am inspired by many eras of New York City (though I’m based in LA), from 1920s vaudeville and flappers, to late 70s/early 80s art discos, to 90s/00s Club Kid/DFA era. I also grew very fond of the color red, and subsequently primary colors, and playful props like mini trampolines, inflatable bonkers, and dolphin balloons. We started talking about “the Gelliverse” when it became apparent we had created something that lived in its own strange world, with the goal that our community could also join in and go to this world with us.

The production on Switcheroo leans into intentional imperfection, with vintage gear and strange effects adding a chaotic charm. What’s the appeal of ‘flawed’ sound for you creatively?

I like the intentional imperfection because it feels more real and more FUN, though there are plenty of sounds and things that are “perfect” on the record, we wanted to create an illusion of imperfection, of messiness. I wrote and recorded Switcheroo with Sean Guerin. We love to be experimental and make tracks feel alive, weird, and mystical. Sean bought a ton of vintage analog gear while we were making the record that colored every track and shook things up.

You describe Switcheroo as an “inside joke turned theatrical spectacle.” What’s the story behind the album’s title, and how does it reflect the overall mood of the record?

Sean came up with the title. It just made sense. It’s silly but still indicative of transformation and change, and trying to embrace, accept, and enjoy it. There's a fascinating movement to the record that makes you do a switcheroo. You have to roll with the punches, or rather, the bonks ;) I love the playfulness of the title, it feels slightly deceptive but in an innocent prankster way. A criminal that you’ll likely forgive and maybe even befriend”.

The Quietus are among those who have handed out a celebratory and congratulatory review for Switcheroo. An essential debut album from the L.A. artist. Every song she puts out is hugely memorable and infectious Adding this fresh and personal energy and colour to music. If you are not following her already then endure that you do it now:

“Like an electroclash party inside a kids TV studio, Gelli Haha’s debut album Switcheroo is characterised by playfulness with a hedonistic, sometimes sinister bent. Gelli Haha is the pseudonym of LA-based artist Angel Abaya, who released a decent indie rock album, The Bubble, under her own name in 2023. She’s since eschewed this more conventional aesthetic to establish ‘the Gelliverse’ – a high-concept theatrical world of play from which the character of Gelli Haha emerged, an amalgamation of Pee Wee Herman, Marina Diamandis’ Electra Heart and a 00s electroclash party girl.

Switcheroo begins with a soaring, retro-futurist synth, as though Gelli is descending to earth from her disco ball home planet. The track’s title is ‘Funny Music’, but there’s a melancholy and rigour to the songwriting, even as it’s punctuated by daft sound effects and cut off by a huge ‘BONK’ at the end. Gelli speaks over the chaos as though in existential voiceover (“It’s all a hoax / it’s just a joke”) establishing a tension between pose and play that continues through the album as she tries on different personas. For ‘Johnny’ she’s a torch singer leaning louchely against a Casio keyboard; in ‘Spit’, she’s an aerobics instructor-cum-dominatrix commanding her submissives to “suck, smooch, snap, surrender” alongside a relentless beat; for ‘Bounce House’ she’s led by freewheeling childlike exploration, mixed with tongue-in-cheek suggestion (“Tell me, are you ready to tumble?”). Each song is stuffed full of electronic whizzes and kaleidoscopic synths, fizzy like static electricity.

In addition to these fantastical personas, Gelli also embodies a more down-to-earth narrator for ‘Piss Artist’, an all-out slice of debauchery in the middle of the record. Her girlish giggles transformed into guttural laughter, Gelli lays on the valley girl affectations as she recalls a wild night of partying (“Once she took her shirt off it was like, oh everyone can take their shirt off”), her droll spoken word bolstered by chunky electroclash beats. Celestial voices harmonise around her, suggesting that even the records earthier pleasures have transcendent properties. Party girls are of course currently in vogue or recently passé, depending on who one speaks to – but ‘Piss Artist’ is less Charli, more Princess Superstar and Kesha.

The after-party continues on the chaotic and funny ‘Tiramisu’, where Gelli’s voice turns even lazier, a half-arsed featured vocalist on a piano house track. “Whaaaat the heeeeell issss goooooing ooooon?” she repeats – well exactly! Seemingly tired of our earthly concerns, she ascends back to the skies during the excellently-titled closing song ‘Pluto is not a planet it’s a restaurant’, her long weaving vocal lines positioning her as Caroline Polachek with a better sense of humour. Switcheroo is tonnes of fun in its own right, but is also ripe with potential for further transmissions from the the Gelliverse”.

Truly an artist that you need to know about, this is merely the start for Gelli Haha. With the Gelliverese growing and expanding in the music sky, Angel Abaya has created something inclusive and irresistible! If you are among those who are unaware of her wonder, then go and follow her now. One of the most promising artists in the world and a future legend in my book, you really can’t…

SAY more than that.

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Follow Gelli Haha

FEATURE: The Boss Becomes a King: Bruce Springsteen’s Born to Run at Fifty

FEATURE:

 

 

The Boss Becomes a King

  

Bruce Springsteen’s Born to Run at Fifty

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I do love…

IN THIS PHOTO: Bruce Springsteen in L.A. in 1975/PHOTO CREDIT: Terry O’Neill

a fiftieth anniversary album celebration! It is a nice round number and is a huge anniversary. This year we have celebrated/will celebrate fifty years of Bob Dylan’s Blood on the Tracks, Led Zeppelin Physical Graffiti, Pink Floyd’s Wish You Were Here, Queen’s A Night at the Opera and Patti Smith’s Horses. One of the biggest from 1975 was Bruce Springsteen’s Born to Run. Released on 25th August, 1975, it followed 1973’s The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle. Even though Born to Run was a big chart success in the U.S., it only just made the top forty in the U.K. (it reached thirty-six). Alongside the title track are classics such as Thunder Road and Jungleland. I am going to get to some features that discuss Born to Run. One of Bruce Springsteen’s most popular albums – maybe Born in the U.S.A. or The River can compete -, I know there will be celebrations around its fiftieth anniversary. I am starting out with a Rolling Stone feature. When deciding their 500 best albums ever, they placed Born to Run in twenty-first:

“Springsteen’s first two releases were commercial failures. Around this time, Rolling Stone journalist, Jon Landau saw Springsteen perform at Harvard Square Theatre, noting in the The Real Paper, “I saw rock and roll future, and its name is Bruce Springsteen. And on a night when I needed to feel young, he made me feel like I was hearing music for the very first time.” As a last-ditch effort to make Springsteen a commercially successful artist, Columbia gave him a massive budget to record the third album. These sessions would almost break Springsteen mentally, who struggled to convey the sounds he had in his head to the musicians in the studio. Springsteen, having seen his review, brought in Landau to help him, feeling he understood what he was trying to achieve. This was the start of a 47-year-and-counting relationship between the pair and Landau is Springsteen’s manager to this day. ‘Born To Run,’ would take more than 14 months to record with 6 months alone being dedicated to the title track. That song was released months ahead of the album’s completion creating massive anticipation. The opening drum fill was played by Ernest “Boom” Carter, a temporary drummer within the E Street Band. His successor and drummer on the rest of the album, Max Weinberg has said that Carter’s Jazz fusion playing on the song is one that Weinberg could never replicate live and eventually stopped trying.

The record opens with the poignant ‘Thunder Road,’ a song about a character named Mary and her boyfriend and their "one last chance to make it real," similar to Springsteen and this album. It opens with Roy Bittan’s delicate piano playing and namechecks Roy Orbison, a huge influence on Springsteen. Majority of the record was composed on piano, in fact. ‘Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out,’ is about Bad Scooter, aka Bruce Springsteen himself and the formation of the E Street Band. In the third verse, Springsteen sings about when “the Big Man joined the band.” The Big Man was his nickname for his now-deceased saxophonist, Clarence Clemons and this part of the song is now used to pay tribute to him in concert, with Springsteen pausing to look at his image on screen before continuing. The LP takes a “four corners” approach with each side starting with upbeat songs to escape and adventure and ending with songs about loss and betrayal (‘Backstreets’ and ‘Jungleland’). The promotion of the record, buoyed by Landau’s now famous quote, created hype and intrigue and saw ‘Born To Run’ peak at #3 on the charts. It went on to sell in excess of 6 million copies and after two false starts, Springsteen had arrived with one of the greatest collection of works ever recorded. I once saw Springsteen perform this cover to cover live and it remains one of the best concert experiences of my life. I’ve listened to this one countless times in my life and no matter how many times I hear it, it makes me emotional and excited everytime. It’s a rollercoaster of stories by one of the best singer-songwriters of our time. I could stop this countdown right now and be satisfied. But I won’t. Onward to the Top 20!”.

I would suggest people check out features like this fortieth anniversary track by track feature from Billboard. This American Songwriter piece is also well worth reading. I want to move to a terrific feature from GRAMMY. They marked forty-five years of Bruce Springsteen’s Born to Run in 2020. An album that still sounds so extraordinary and potent to this day. It ranks alongside the very best albums ever released. If you have never heard it then make sure that you do as soon as possible:

“With their first two LPs—Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J. and The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle, both from 1973—Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band cemented themselves as masters of both contemplative singer/songwriter elegance and triumphant orchestral rowdiness. Despite the mostly positive critical praise they garnered, however, neither record reaped the financial success and mainstream devotion the group deserved. Understandably, this led to a lot of internal and external frustrations and doubts, so all parties involved knew that—as the saying goes—the third time had to be the charm.

Luckily, 1975's Born to Run proved to be precisely that, launching Springsteen and company into the hearts and minds of virtually the entire world. All of its songs became beloved radio/concert/pop culture staples—thanks in part to a $250,000 marketing campaign by Columbia Records—and it ended up not only reaching the #3 spot on the Billboard 200, but earning praise from Rolling Stone, the New York Times and The Village Voice. Since then, its ability to bring new levels of poetic phrasing, symphonic instrumentation and heartfelt slice-of-life narratives (regarding blue-collar struggles, youthful romantic idealism and urban rebellion) to heartland rock has led many to deem it one of the greatest albums of all time.

Given the immense pressure everyone felt for Born to Run to be a hit, it's no surprise that it took the band 14 months to complete (with almost half of that time spent just on its iconic title track). It would be the last album co-produced by Mike Appel, as well as the first co-produced by music critic turned manager Jon Landau (who, in 1974, famously stated that Springsteen was the future of rock and roll in the midst of others aptly, if reductively, calling him the "new" or "next" Bob Dylan). Many of the same musicians stayed on, with the most significant additions being drummer Max Weinberg, pianist Roy Bittan, and guitarist/arranger Steven Van Zandt (who'd played with Springsteen in prior bands and got the gig after doing the horn arrangements for "Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out").
Together, they created a succinct yet exploratory sequence whose Phil Spector-esque "wall of sound" approach built upon everything its two predecessors did so exceptionally (humble yet piercing odes like "Lost in the Flood" and full-bodied celebrations like "Rosalita (Come Out Tonight)"). That achievement, coupled with a more established conceptual throughline involving separate but similar characters existing around the same places and striving similar types of freedom, makes it clear why Born to Run is still so revered and idiosyncratic.

Each of its eight songs feels like a cinematic musical adaption of a resonant short story, and Springsteen designed each side to begin hopefully and end sorrowfully. Case in point: "Thunder Road," an exhilarating opener in which the unnamed speaker makes a final plea to his girlfriend, Mary, to run away with him. The instantly comforting blend of Springsteen's harmonica and Bittan's piano makes it seem like the story is set in a Steinbeck novel, and Springsteen’s backhanded compliment—"You ain’t a beauty / But hey, you're alright"—actually conjures Shakespeare's "Sonnet 130" in its blunt but realistic testament to authentic attraction. Obviously, its robust and catchy evolution is mesmerizing, foreshadowing the motif of invigorating better life daydreaming that spans the whole album (especially the title track).

Afterward, the origin of the E Street Band is explored in the sleekly nuanced, intricate, and fun—though also subtly mournful—"Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out," which evokes the rock 'n’'roll vibe of Springsteen's sophomore effort. In contrast, "Night" recalls the poignant urgency of his debut collection, with its tale of a disheartened blue-collar worker seeking the nighttime joys of drag racing and female companionship resulting in one of Springsteen's most infectiously encouraging choruses. Then, "Backstreets" concludes Side One as a downer, with Bittan's pianowork hinting at the measured misfortune he'd bring to "Jungleland." Springsteen's reflection on the downfall of a plutonic friendship with a woman named Terry is full of coarse, almost inebriated wildness; meanwhile, the band punctuates each emotion with luscious accompaniment (including an imperfect yet earnest guitar solo).

Of course, Side Two explodes with “Born to Run,” which connects to “Thunder Road” not only in its exuberance, but even in its melodies and sentiments. Interestingly, it’s the only track that Weinberg and Bittan didn’t play on since it was recorded before drummer Earnest Carter and pianist David Sancious left the band. Every element is hypnotic, blissful, and legendary; from its sparkly timbres and wholly impassioned serenading, to saxophonist Clarence Clemons' solo and the subsequent deceptively complex breakdown, "Born to Run" is pretty much perfect.  

Luckily, the LP maintains that magic, with the dynamic yet relatively straightforward "She's the One" exposing an irresistible femme fatal before the penultimate "Meeting Across the River" acts as a decorative and lowkey tale of a low-level criminal unsuccessfully going for one last score. Cleverly, it also moves us from New Jersey to New York, where the record's closing masterpiece, "Jungleland," takes place. Combining Dylan-esque ponderings with early Chicago-esque arrangements, its like Springsteen's three-act take on West Side Story. It moves from a gorgeously intense chronicle of gang violence to a devastatingly serene aftermath, wherein bittersweet tapestries and appropriately timed escalations guide Springsteen’s wise but disenfranchised commentary. It’s incredibly tasteful and believable, with the line “And the poets down here / Don't write nothing at all / They just stand back and let it all be” standing out as particularly profound and hard-hitting.

From the huge concerts that surrounded it, to the multitude of album cover parodies/homages and industry honors that followed, Born to Run is rightly considered a benchmark for its creator, decade and genre overall. Expectedly, its winning formula inspired an even more mature and downtrodden follow-up, 1978’s Darkness on the Edge of Town, as well as the aesthetics of countless proteges. It set new standards for how lyrical, multifaceted, and thematic rock music could be, and although it's nearly half a century old, it truly hasn't aged a day”.

Before ending with a review, I want to introduce a Ticketmaster feature. They argued that Born to Run is the best Bruce Springsteen album. Though that is a big claim, you would be hard pressed to argue disprove that! It has inspired so many people and has an enormous legacy. It was Springsteen’s breakthrough and it completely transformed Seventies Rock music. As it turns fifty on 25th August, I wonder whether Bruce Springsteen will perform the album in its entirety. He and the E Street Band have done on several occasions:

“If side A ends in despair, side B comes blasting out of the traps like it’s on fire. Every inch of ‘Born To Run’ sounds like it’s revving its engines to infinity. It’s classic rock n’ roll on nitro fumes, fuel-injected youthful confidence, burning everything down on its way to somewhere better. It’s unlikely anyone ever feels as optimistic or alive as they do when ‘Born To Run’ is playing. If you could bottle any moment and relive it on demand, it’s that moment during a Springsteen show when he counts back in from the breakdown. Elation doesn’t even come close. ‘Born To Run’ is a song that defies the idea that it was created. It feels like it’s always just been.

The beautiful, brooding love song ‘She’s The One’ is a pause for breath, but by ‘Meeting Across The River’ things have turned desperate, and there’s only one last chance to try and make something out of nothing. But instead of youthful confidence, this feels laced with danger and a sense that the talk is just talk as the narrator tries to steel himself for the score that’s gonna turn everything around.

We’ve all seen enough films to know how that pans out. But it’s not hard to see Bruce’s tales of desperate lovers and naïve souls out to defy the world as a proxy for his own do-or-die situation. The gangs are his band, the girl is his music: it’s just them against “the record machine”. The colossal ‘Jungleland’ doesn’t offer any happy endings, but probably because Bruce himself didn’t know if there would be one. There’s a pause as the lights go out and the street poet makes his stand, ending up wounded, but crucially “not even dead”. The story is to be continued.

Born To Run was a huge success. At the time of writing, it’s sold over 8 million copies worldwide. The coming years would be anything but plain sailing, especially with a painful and protracted legal wrangle with his ex-manager Mike Appel, but Bruce had already shown he could face down remarkable odds and win, even wounded and up against the wall. With these eight songs, he proved to himself and the world that he was the superstar he’d always threatened to become.

You might wake up tomorrow and put on The Rising, remembering that this is your favourite Bruce record. Or you might sit up late listening to the Steinbeck inflections of The Ghost Of Tom Joad and wonder how any album could be better. Or you might drive down a motorway, high street or suburban road, blasting out Born In The USA and think that this is surely as good as it gets. None of those would be incorrect. But there’s no album that so singularly defines Bruce Springsteen, no album that matters more to his career, than Born To Run. For that, it can only be the greatest”.

I am going to finish with a review from the BBC. I don’t think you will find a review anything other than overwhelmed or hugely positive. It is among those classic albums that has won universal approval. As there will be new inspection of Born to Run close to 25th August, it will reach a new generation. Its title track is one of my favourite tracks. It is a glorious thing! Go and seek out this album now:

“Born To Run’s eight songs run to less than 40 minutes in length, but comprise a whole as satisfying as a portion of exquisitely rich chocolate cake. It seems Springsteen truly went for broke in 1975 after his first two albums had been critically well-received but less so commercially. Music critic Jon Landau became his producer and joined Bruce with his E-Street band in the studio to make what remains a classic, honest musical expression of hope, dreams and survival.

The colossal wall of sound production would make Phil Spector proud. Clarence Clemons’ triumphant yet bittersweet saxophone wailing and Roy Bittan’s nagging piano riffs augment the tough Telecaster guitar sound, while chiming glockenspiel and Max Weinberg’s drumming cement the heady mix.

Lyrically, it’s a dramatic collection of blue-collar tales of love and making ends meet that could only come from New Jersey’s favourite son. He clearly took a few ideas from storytellers like Van Morrison and Bob Dylan but also forged his own uplifting style. In ''Meeting Across The River'', a street tale Lou Reed would be proud of, listeners can ponder on a great deluded hustler’s line: 'That two grand’s practically sitting here in my pocket.' ''Thunder Road'' meanwhile, is almost effortlessly cinematic. In two lines there’s imagery more striking than most songwriters can manage on a whole album: 'In the skeleton frames of burned-out Chevrolets… Your graduation gown lies in rags at their feet.' On the excellent title track familiar BS motifs are returned to, particularly running away and the allure of fast cars, 'Chrome-wheeled, fuel-injected and stepping out over the line…We gotta get out while we’re young.' Few tunesmiths can make a bad situation sound so good.

Like Ry Cooder, over a lengthy career the working-class NJ hero has proved himself to be a remarkably versatile operator. He’s taken on rootsy American folk material, written about 9/11 and, of course, had gargantuan commercial success with Born In The USA. Contemporary bands are never slow in praising him and his influence is still keenly felt. In songwriting terms alone Arcade Fire, REM and Mercury Rev have all clearly borrowed his ideas down the years and it’s unlikely they’ll be the last”.

Turning fifty very soon, I will definitely not be the only one marking Born to Run at fifty. There are so many interesting features about the album. This is another that I would recommend people read. Whether you are a Bruce Springsteen or not, Born to Run is impeccable! A work of sheer brilliance from The Boss, we will be talking Born to Run…

FIFTY years from now.

FEATURE: The Great American Songbook: Janet Jackson

FEATURE:

 

 

The Great American Songbook

Janet Jackson

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YOU may not be aware…

PHOTO CREDIT: Solaiman Fazel

of this series. It is where I focus on a terrific American songwriter/artist and collate a twenty-song mix of cuts from throughout their career. Not to besmirch the actual Great American Songbook, I am just using it as a nice title! I am moving on to the incredible Janet Jackson. Undoubtably one of the greatest artists and songwriters of her generation, her latest album was 2015’s Unbreakable. In terms of all-time great albums, few can compete with a run of four that started with 1986’s Control, then Janet Jackson's Rhythm Nation 1814 of 1989 before getting to 1993’s janet. and finishing with 1997’s The Velvet Rope. These very different but simply awe-inspiring releases from an artist who was growing in stature and confidence! It is a hard job only picking twenty Janet Jackson songs. However, I feel the mixtape at the end is a nice representation of her best moments. How changeable and adaptable she is as an artist. Always moving forward and doing something different. Let’s hope that we get another album from Janet Jackson. One of most important artists ever in my view, I have loved her music since she was a child. Someone who I will continue to support. This tribute is proof Janet Jackson is…

A pioneer and superstar.

FEATURE: Kate Bush: Something Like a Song: Mrs. Bartolozzi (Aerial)

FEATURE:

 

 

Kate Bush: Something Like a Song

IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in 2005/PHOTO CREDIT: Trevor Leighton

 

Mrs. Bartolozzi (Aerial)

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THIS is a song that I have covered before…

but wanted to revisit here as it is one of my favourites from Kate Bush. Taken from her 2005 double album, Aerial, Mrs Bartolozzi always strikes me as a track that should have been released as a single. It could have had this amazing music video! I am going to go into more depth about this song. I have said how Aerial is an album that is not discussed and explored as much nearly as it should be. I am going to start out with this information from Kate Bush Encyclopedia. We get some interview archive from Kate Bush, where she talks about the inspiration behind Mrs. Bartolozzi:

“Kate about ‘Mrs. Bartolozzi’

Is it about a washing machine? I think it’s a song about Mrs. Bartolozzi. She’s this lady in the song who…does a lot of washing (laughs). It’s not me, but I wouldn’t have written the song if I didn’t spend a lot of time doing washing. But, um, it’s fictitious. I suppose, as soon as you have a child, the washing suddenly increases. And uh, what I like too is that a lot of people think it’s funny. I think that’s great, because I think that actually, it’s one of the heaviest songs I’ve ever written! (laughs)
Clothes are…very interesting things, aren’t they? Because they say such an enormous amount about the person that wears them. They have a little bit of that person all over them, little bits of skin cells and…what you wear says a lot about who you are, and who you think you are…
So I think clothes, in themselves are very interesting. And then it was the idea of this woman, who’s kind of sitting there looking at all the washing going around, and she’s got this new washing machine, and the idea of these clothes, sort of tumbling around in the water, and then the water becomes the sea and the clothes…and the sea…and the washing machine and the kitchen… I just thought it was an interesting idea to play with.
What I wanted to get was the sense of this journey, where you’re sitting in front of this washing machine, and then almost as if in a daydream, you’re suddenly standing in the sea.

Ken Bruce show, BBC Radio 2, 1 November 2005

Well, I do do a lot of washing [chuckles]. I’m sure I would never have written the song if I didn’t… You know, just this woman, in her house, with her washing. And then the idea of taking the water in the washing machine with all the clothes, and the water then becoming the sea… and I also think there’s something very interesting about clothes. They’re kind of people without the people in them, if you know what I mean? [Kate laughs] They all have our scent, and pieces of us on them, somehow.

Front Row, BBC4, 4 November 2005”.

Virtually nothing is written about the song! To be fair, it has never been performed live and did not get a single release. I am not sure whether I have ever heard it on the radio. That is a shame. Even if there is more written about A Coral Room and King of Mountain, there does need to be this focus on Mrs. Bartolozzi. One of the standout tracks from Aerial, I would rank it as one of her best songs. There are a few reasons for it. I think as Aerial as a domestic album. One where new motherhood (her son Bertie was born in 1998) was influencing Kate Bush. Apart from a track like Bertie, you can feel the joy and contentment of new motherhood play right throughout Aerial. The second disc, A Sky of Honey, and that summer’s day in the garden. Her thinking about family and the past on other songs. When it comes to reviews, I have seen some say that it is unique and unusual in a good way. It is distinctly the work of Kate Bush! However, it is different to anything she recorded before. The fourth track on Aerial, I think it is a perfect placement. Coming after Bertie, we get this fantasy. Something domestic but otherworldly. The mundane and ordinary made extraordinary. I always interpret the first verse as Bush casting herself as Mrs. Bartolozzi and talking about her new son (and perhaps her husband., Dan McIntosh) bringing mud into the house: “I remember it was that Wednesday/Oh when it rained and it rained/They traipsed mud all over the house/It took hours and hours to scrub it out/All over the hall carpet/I took my mop and my bucket/And I cleaned and I cleaned/The kitchen floor/Until it sparkled/Then I took my laundry basket/And put all the linen in it/And everything I could fit in it/All our dirty clothes that hadn’t gone into the wash/And all your shirts and jeans and things/And put them in the new washing machine”.

I shall try not to repeat too much of what I have said before. In 2025, almost twenty years since Mrs. Bartolozzi was included on Aerial, we have not really heard another song like it. Bush is masterful when it comes to making something quite everyday come alive. The way she delivers the lines and really immerses herself in the song. When Kate Bush sings about the washing machine and clothes becoming entwined, it becomes sexual. Bush discussing the erotic and sensual away from physical love or something traditional. Clothes in a washing machine. A woman and a snowman in 2011’s Misty. From the first verse about the chore of slopping the mop and cleaning mud that is all over the floor, there is that progress to the cleaning of clothes. Maybe representing a lover who has left or is gone, Bush sees the clothes on the line and imagines someone in them. Or she thinks there is someone there. I do think this is her immersed in a character. Whether it was random selecting the Bartolozzi surname or it was inspired by something, I do hanker to see a video for this! Maybe an animated one or an actress playing the part. As Aerial is twenty in November, it would be amazing if a few commissions went out so that a few tracks not released as single could get videos. Perhaps this, A Coral Room and maybe Aerial. In terms of casting and look, there are all kinds of possibilities for Mrs. Bartolozzi. It is alive with loss, desire, family, home, fantasy and so much more. A track I remember listening to a lot when I first heard Aerial. So moving and evocative. You cannot help but lose yourself in the scenes!

IN THIS PHOTO: Ella Purnell (a potential future Mrs Bartoloizzi?)/PHOTO CREDIT: Ella Purnell

I love the lines “Slooshy sloshy slooshy sloshy/Get that dirty shirty clean/Slooshy sloshy slooshy sloshy/Make those cuffs and collars gleam/Everything clean and shiny”. It is cute and almost child-like. Quirky and fun! One of Kate Bush’s strengths is making something familiar and maybe boring and elevating it to almost operatic levels! She produced Aerial and I love her production on Mrs. Bartolozzi! Although there are other players and layers on various tracks, there is something singular and almost sparse about Mrs. Bartolozzi. Just Bush and her piano. I can imagine her recording this in the studio with the late Del Palmer engineering. Perhaps recalling a past autumn day when it was wet and she was at home cleaning. Even if it is not directly inspired by her own life and experiences, I do think that a young child and the domestic responsibilities affected her. It is shocking so little is written about the track. I think I have written more about it then everyone else in the world put together – and then some! I do hope that this song gets more coverage and airplay. Not long until Aerial turns twenty, I am sure people will write about it more. I disagree with anyone who feels Mrs. Bartolozzi is banal and basic. It is a song that nobody else was writing and it has so much in it. In a video, I can imagine a British actor like the incredible Michelle Ryan, Eleanor Tomlinson, Ella Purnell or Emilia Clarke playing Mrs Bartolozzi. Maybe having these flashbacks or a past lover. A family dog or child running through the house. Even though a video will never come, it is nice to imagine! An underrated gem from a masterpiece album, Mrs. Bartolozzi is a phenomenal and spellbinding Kate Bush track that…

NOBODY else could create.

FEATURE: Spotlight: Freya Beer

FEATURE:

 

 

Spotlight

 

Freya Beer

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I have been meaning…

PHOTO CREDIT: Paul Stone

to spotlight Freya Beer for years now. I have taken the opportunity now as I know there is news afoot. Last year, she released the brilliant singles, Tatianna and False Hope. Cry Baby came out earlier this year. Such a distinct and arresting artist, there is someone I can recommend to everyone. I have been following her for a long time now and love everything that she puts out. I am going to get to some interviews with this incredible talent. Go and follow Beer on social media. If you need some convincing as to why she is worth your time and energy, then I hope what I am about to include sells it! Even though the interviews are from 2023/last year, it is important to head back to a year where she was very busy and was gaining a lot of new attention. I am not sure what is around the corner, though it seems that something might be brewing. I want to start out with an interview from 2023. Talking around the release of FANTASY/GALORE, it was a moment in Freya Beer’s career when she was still seen as ‘emerging’. Maybe she still is, though I do feel she has established herself as someone very much here to stay. An artist who has staked her claim. There is plenty ahead. This is what Northern Exposure Magazine asked the phenomenal Freya Beer:

“Your new double A-side single “FANTASY” is described as ‘celebrating the uncensored version of ourselves that we become in our wildest daydreams’. Where did this idea originate?

The idea originated from coming across certain emotions which you may not have felt before, some of us experience this in our adolescent years but for me, being a introverted youngster, it was only coming into my adult life I began to come across different thoughts and feelings which were new to me. Fantasy is about accepting those feelings, no matter how sexual they are!

“GALORE” is about “people who are infatuated with something” Has there been someone or something that inspired you to write this track?

I wouldn’t say it was someone in particular but other people experiences of this. It’s quite a psychological subject so to speak I thought it was an interesting topic to write a song about.

All the critics and music fans lauded your debut album ‘Beast’ for its excellent lyrics, production and sound. How would you say your songwriting process evolved from your debut album ‘Beast’ to “FANTASY” // “GALORE”?

I think my song-writing in Fantasy/Galore touches upon darker subjects which I didn’t come across when writing Beast. I’m always very picky with the words I use in my songs and I think Fantasy in particular will catch the listeners ear as I lyrically it’s quite sexual.

I noticed that you release via your own label Sisterhood Records. What made you start your own label, and what has running a label taught you about the music industry?

The decision of starting a label was suggested by my management team. I honestly never thought I would have my own label but it’s such a great idea as you have free reign to release whatever you want.

On that note… What is the most valuable advice you’ve ever received in the music industry?

The most valuable advice to me is that you won’t be able to please everyone. There’ll always be someone amongst the shadows trying to pick out flaws in your art, so you might as well just carry on what you’re doing. If you come across this type of crowd then you must be doing something interesting otherwise they wouldn’t put all their energy into you.

As an artist, you have a very defined visual style as well in your photographs and videos. How much thought do you put into that side of things?

I’ve always loved visuals, whether that’s paintings or cinema. My visual aesthetic is a huge part of my music as it compliments the listening experience. I’ve found that naturally I’m evolving my image as I release new music.

I see that poetry and art have heavily inspired your music… Who is your favourite poet and artist and what is it about them that influences you so much?

My favourite poet would have to be Charles Bukowski, some may say he was a controversial guy but the raw bitter truth which lies upon his words really resonates to me. The first poem I came across of his was ‘So You Want to Be a Writer’, and as a young creative coming across this poem at the age 16, it really gave me confidence to believe in my art and if I want it that badly it will come”.

Early last year, Fresh on the Net chatted with Freya Beer. She was looking ahead to some dates supporting John Cooper Clarke during his U.K. spoken word tour. It must have been a dream come true when those dates happened. Since then, Beer has been played by stations including BBC Radio 6 Music. She is an artist that I know is going to be around for years more:

“You’re an artist from West London, how did it all begin for you?

I’ve been putting music out for years, I was a young teenager when I started and I only did it for fun. Writing has always been a huge part of my life, whether that’s to write a song or poem or even just to vent! It was really in 2019, when I teamed up with my amazing management and released Dear Sweet Rosie that my journey into the industry began.

What did you listen to growing up?

I listened to various styles of music growing up. What I was really drawn towards was Country music and French music, an interesting combination but I was obsessed. From Johnny Cash to Serge Gainsbourg, I was sold.

You also did some lockdown cover versions — what was your favourite to perform?
My favourite was Happiness Is A Butterfly by Lana Del Rey. I thought the song showed off my voice, and it was nice to sing something slow for a change.

You’ve also been featured on BBC Introducing Live Lounge, what was that like?

Incredible. Truly grateful for all the support the BBC and BBC Introducing has given me over the past few years. It felt very rewarding doing a live lounge for them.

What are you listening to at the moment?

I’m currently listening to the French band Juniore. The lead singer, Anna, her voice reminds me of François Hardy, who I absolutely adore. Also! I had the opportunity to support them a few years ago and they gave me a cassette of their album which was very kind”.

I am going to finish off with an interview with an interview from last September from Babystep Magazine. With new music out, it was a perfect time to shine a light on Freya Beer. I am pumped to see what comes next for her. This is a very special talent. Keep an eye on her social media channels to see what is going on. I feel like we will see this artist play some massive stages soon enough (though she has already played the London Palladium!):

“You've built a reputation for blending gothic and disco elements in your music. How did these influences shape the sound of your upcoming EP Tatianna and how does it differ from your previous work?

My EP ‘Tatianna’ in comparison to my debut album ‘Beast’ is a lot more maturer I believe. The sound of this EP feels solid, and that I’ve secured my place in the world of Goth but I never want to pigeon hole myself to one brand or genre. I wouldn’t say that my music is your typical Disco record but I was really inspired by an artist called Zella Day whose recent catalogue is a mix of Disco and Pop. It’s interesting to look at how artists and bands are using the element of Disco in their work without being too obvious. My album ‘Beast’ was a lot darker than ‘Tatianna’ but like I mentioned before that was a different time and I feel way more confident in my art now.

You’ve had the unique opportunity to open for John Cooper Clarke with both your music and poetry. How does your background as a poet influence your songwriting and performances?

I started writing when I was very young, I don’t know if I would class that as poetry or songs but I wrote because I loved taking my imagination on a journey to a world which I created. I soon discovered poetry and adored the use of words I would come across. I would note down any words or subjects which a poem would be about and used it as inspiration for my songwriting.

With your extensive UK tour coming up, how do you prepare for such an intense schedule, and what can fans expect from your live shows this time around?

In general, I’m a very organised person and I love a good schedule so therefore it’s not too stressful when I have a huge tour coming up. A big part of this organisation is by my incredible managment team, who have been planning it all. When it comes to the live shows, I’ve been really picky this time round about how I want the stage to look. I’ve been doing a lot of research and figuring out how to bring out my aesthetic within the live performances.

Running your own label, Sisterhood Records, has given you creative control over your releases. How has this independence impacted your career, and what advice would you give to other artists looking to go the independent route?

The independence of releasing under your own terms is empowering and inspiring because no one is telling you to go down a certain route or portray yourself in a way you’re not comfortable with. If you know what you want to put out into the ether of the music world then definitely feel confident in releasing under your own label. I’ve found it inspires others and realistically it’s not that hard if you’re prepared and well organised”.

I am going to finish off here. Someone I have a lot of admiration for, Freya Beer needs to be on your radar. Cry Baby is another slice of gold from someone who grows better by the release. Such a remarkable talent who you cannot easily compare to anyone. An original in my view. In a busy and crowded music industry, you cannot say that of every artist! Do yourself a favour and spend some time…

WITH Freya Beer.

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Follow Freya Beer

FEATURE: Groovelines: Mariah Carey - Fantasy

FEATURE:

 

 

Groovelines

 

Mariah Carey - Fantasy

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THE lead single…

from her fifth studio album, Daydream, Fantasy was released on 23rd August, 1995. It is one of Mariah Carey’s greatest tracks. It is my favourite song from her. Some prefer the Bad Boy Remix with O.D.B. However, I am going to focus on the original ahead of its thirtieth anniversary. Forbes, SLANT and Time Out magazine have listed Fantasy among the best songs of the 1990s. Fantasy was Mariah Carey's ninth chart-topping  on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart. It was also the first single by a female artist to debut atop the chart. I want to go deeper with Fantasy for this Groovelines. There are a few features I want to introduce. Although a lot of features discuss the remix and how that was transformative, I want to keep things mainly concentrated on the first release. This article gives some interesting perspective on Fantasy:

“For almost any iconic artist, being able to wield the brush to the canvas of your music artistry is the truest map to a long-lasting career. For songbird supreme Mariah Carey, taking the reins on her trajectory meant changing the course of music history as we knew it.

Convivial and liberating in nature, Carey’s “Fantasy” exudes a spirit of artistic freedom and calls back to a time where innovation, like intense love, came at a whim.

Here, the torrid summer energy presented on Tom Tom Club’s 1981 “Genius Of Love” is leveled-up for a new decade, decorated in Carey’s breezy emphatic metaphors of vigorous passion and a fiery backbeat that got even the most obstinate listener out of their seat.

Bottom of Form

Twenty-five years after Carey unveiled “Fantasy” as the lead single to her Grammy-nominated fifth studio album Daydream, the bouncy ’80s-esque number continues to prove it has the stamina and formulaic sampling power to exert influence over a plethora of musical acts to follow.

While it further broke new ground for rap and R&B — already introduced by a hip-hop soul queen — the infallible pop-R&B formula behind “Fantasy” is all too familiar.

Despite her label, Columbia Records, pushing Carey to continue with the palette of bonafide adult contemporary and pop that catapulted her career, she paired with famed R&B producer Dave “Jam” Hall to essentially reenvision her Music Box lead single “Dreamlover” from two years earlier.

Co-produced by Hall, “Dreamlover” was a slice of heavenly chart-topping perfection, drenched in the bubbly pop that Columbia pressed so hard. But its incorporation of thunderous kick-snare-bass interplay from Big Daddy Kane’s “Ain’t No Half-Steppin” gave it the energetic facade it needed to transcend urban radio”.

One reason why I cannot talk about the remix of Fantasy is because of the involvement of Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs, as he was a producer on the track. For that reason, I don’t think it is right to go too much into that version given who he is and the fact he should be exiled form music history. I actually prefer the original which arrived on 23rd August, 1995. Before finishing off with some critical reception to Fantasy, I want to include parts of Stereogum’s investigation of Fantasy. They do note how the Bad Boy Remix is definitive, whereas the album version is perhaps too similar to other songs from Mariah Carey:

“Genius Of Love” happened to come along at the same time as sample-heavy rap music was just starting to become a commercial proposition. The first rap group to sample “Genius Of Love” was Dr. Jeckyll & Mr. Hyde, the duo that included future Uptown Records founder Andre Harrell. Jeckyll & Hyde used the “Genius Of Love” groove on their single “Genius Of Rap” in 1981, before the Tom Tom Club track even reached its Hot 100 peak. A year later, Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five, the biggest rap group of their era, used that same “Genius Of Love” groove on their own single “It’s Nasty (Genius Of Love).” Those early singles involved studio bands re-playing “Genius Of Love,” not sampling the beat directly from the record. In the years that followed, “Genius Of Love” remained part of the rap language.

Tom Tom Club kept recording occasional albums after that first one, and none of them really caught on. But “Genius Of Love” lingered. That sample was especially popular in West Coast rap in the early ’90s. Ice Cube, 2nd II None, Above The Law, Mellow Man Ace, and former Number Ones artist Coolio all rocked over the “Genius Of Love” beat or referenced its dreamy, childlike lyrics in the early ’90s. Then, in 1995, the queen of the Hot 100 was starting to push her music more in the direction of rap and R&B, and it took the “Genius Of Love” beat to fully cross her over to the audience that she wanted.

By 1995, nobody could tell Mariah Carey shit. At that point, five years into her career, she’d already landed at #1 eight times, and she’d co-written seven of those chart-toppers. With Mariah’s 1993 album Music Box, her husband and label boss Tommy Mottola actively pushed her in the direction of centrist, adult-contempo pop ballads. Mariah had flirted with house music on 1991’s Emotions, and it hadn’t been quite the blockbuster that Mottola wanted, so he clamped down on her playful side. Music Box did even better than anyone could’ve anticipated, going diamond and sending two more singles to #1.

In 1994, Carey released the holiday album Merry Christmas, which went triple platinum in its first year. (It’s now octuple platinum, and one of its songs will appear in this column a long time from now.) That same year, she also teamed up with Luther Vandross to cover Diana Ross and Lionel Richie’s 1981 chart-topper “Endless Love,” and the Vandross/Carey version of the song peaked at #2. (It’s a 5.) Point is: Mariah Carey was a commercial juggernaut, and she’d earned herself some artistic freedom — or, at least, she thought she had.

Despite all the records she was selling in the mid-’90s, Mariah Carey still had to fight for her ideas. In the time that she spent recording her 1995 album Daydream, for instance, Mariah had the idea to blow off steam by recording a shits-and-giggles grunge-pop album, so that’s what she did. But certain unnamed people at Carey’s label thought that a record like that would damage her image, so she wasn’t allowed to sing lead on the album that came out under the title Someone’s Ugly Daughter. Instead, Carey’s friend Clarissa Dane sang lead, with an uncredited Mariah singing backup and co-writing every song. The album came out under the band name Chick, and it promptly disappeared completely. Nobody even knew that Chick was a Mariah Carey project until she wrote about it in her 2020 memoir..

Mariah faced similar pushback when she tried to push her own music closer to the rap and R&B that she loved. She hated being seen as a square pop diva, and she wanted love from Black listeners. Years later, Carey’s A&R rep Cory Rooney told Billboard, “[Mariah] once told me though she was grateful for her success, she would trade in all of her record sales to get the respect that Mary J. Blige got. She said, ‘Mary doesn’t have to sell 28 million records to be respected. People respect Mary, and I just want to be respected like her.'” (Mary J. Blige will eventually appear in this column.)

That’s what Carey was going for when she worked with Mary J. Blige’s What’s The 411? collaborator Dave “Jam” Hall on her 1993 smash “Dreamlover.” Mariah worked with Hall again two years later when she had another idea for a bubbly, lightweight, clubby R&B track. She’d already had a basic melody idea for the song that would become “Fantasy” when she heard Tom Tom Club’s “Genius Of Love” on the radio. In Fred Bronson’s Billboard Book Of Number 1 Hits, Mariah says that hearing the song “reminded me of growing up and listening to the radio.”

Mariah took “Genius Of Love” to Dave Hall, and he made it into a beat. Working with Mariah in the studio, Hall would play the beat, and Mariah would freestyle melody ideas for 15 or 20 minutes at a time. Within a couple of days, they had a complete song. Mariah’s people got in touch with Tom Tom Club to clear the sample. In the Bronson book, Mariah says that Chris Frantz and Tina Weymouth “were really into it.” Makes sense to me. If someone told me that they wanted to park a dumptruck full of cash on my front lawn, I wouldn’t object. (I don’t actually have a front lawn, so we would need to have a conversation about logistics, but I’d be down.)

In its final form, “Fantasy” twinkles and glistens. Mariah sings the song in an airy, flutter, once again layering her mind-bending leads over a soft bed of her own multi-tracked backing vocals. It’s a song about a crush, about imagining yourself with someone else while remaining perfectly aware that nothing’s going to happen. I guess that means it’s a song about enjoying your own dream-life, using it as an escape from whatever’s happening in reality. On and on and on, it’s so deep in her daydreams, but it’s just a sweet, sweet fantasy, baby.

I love Mariah’s vocal on “Fantasy,” the way she hammers the hell out of that opening line: “Oh, when you walk by every night, talking sweet and looking fine, I get kinda hectic in-side!” Her melody syncs up beautifully with the sample, and it gives the song a kind of unreal playfulness. When she actually sings a little bit of “Genius Of Love” on the bridge — “I’m in heaven with my boyfriend, my lovely boyfriend” — Mariah sounds like she’s singing along with the radio, or with a scrap of lyric that’s stuck in her head and clicks in with whatever she’s feeling”.

I am going to end with Wikipedia’s article concerning the critical reaction to Fantasy. Depending on whether you prefer the first version of the single or like the remix better, there is no denying the fact Fantasy was  a breakthrough and step forward for Mariah Carey. It remains one of her most enduring songs:

“Upon its release, "Fantasy" garnered acclaim from contemporary music critics, who praised her songwriting and use of sampling. They commended her for exploring genres beyond the pop ballads she had become known for at the time. Bill Lamb from About.com was very positive on the song, calling it "truly inspiring" and a "career high water mark" for Carey. Stephen Thomas Erlewine from AllMusic also complimented it, saying "Carey continues to perfect her craft and that she has earned her status as an R&B/pop diva." A reviewer from Music & Media stated that "it's got more swing than anything she has done before.” Stephen Holden from The New York Times gave the song praise, writing "with 'Fantasy', Ms. Carey glides confidently into the territory where gospel-flavored pop-soul meets light hip-hop and recorded some of the most gorgeously spun choral music to be found on a contemporary album." Additionally, he claimed "Fantasy" held some of the album's best moments, writing "she continues to make pop music as deliciously enticing as the best moments of "Fantasy". Slant Magazine ranked the song at number sixty on their "Best Singles of the '90s" list, writing it is "escapism perfected, [a] summer bubblegum gem with a sweet, flawless vocal line driven by a diva in her prime." Mark Frith from Smash Hits said it "was such a brilliant, original, clever record that many people are going to have high hopes for the LP."

On 23rd August, it will be thirty years since the lead single from Daydream was released. Perhaps the standout album from Mariah Carey, I can understand why she wanted Fantasy to be the lead single. With that Tom Tom Club sample and this confident and glorious vocal from Carey, you can see why this song is still widely played on the radio. It is joyous! Thirty years since its release, it is this masterpiece. If you have not heard it for a long time then go and dive into…

THIS blissful song.

FEATURE: Groovelines: Blur – Country House

FEATURE:

 

 

Groovelines

 

Blur – Country House

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PERHAPS not…

Blur’s best or most regarded song, it is one of their most significant. One reason why it is so important is because it is the song that went up against Oasis’ Roll with It in the Britpop battle of 1995. I wanted to mark thirty years of Country House. Released on 14th August, 1995, it reached number one in the U.K. One of the biggest problems with the song is the video. One of the most depressingly retrograde and obnoxious videos of its time, it is small wonder band member Graham Cox hated the shoot. With more than a nod to the puerile and horrible comedy of Benny Hill, it is the nadir of Blur’s videos. Directed by artist Damien Hirst, it is the only big black mark. The song itself is taken from Blur’s fourth studio album, The Great Escape. That album was released on 11th September, 1995. Country House was the lead single from the album. Many might have expected Stereotypes or Charmless Man to lead. However, at a time when Britpop was at a peak, perhaps the sound and feel of Country House was seen as the most promising commercial single. It definitely delivered! The Great Escape followed 1994’s Parklife. Following perhaps their best album, there would have been a lot of pressure on the band to keep their momentum and popularity high. The Great Escape is a fifteen-track album that comes in at just under an hour. I think it is top-heavy in terms of its most commercial/accessible songs. Perhaps not the same blend and balance as you get on Parklife. However, I also think The Great Escape is underrated. Some of Blur’s most fascinating and nuanced songwriting. Damon Albarn’s lyrics particularly standing out. Country House might seem an anomaly to some. However, it did resonate with many critics. Before going deeper with the song, I want to start out with some collected critical reception from Wikipedia:

“David Stubbs from Melody Maker felt the song "sounds at first to be taunting us with that old Britpop standard, um, thingummy, the one that goes Our house is a very, very, very nice house/With two cats in the yard.. but turns out to be a cynical account of the miserable fat-rat city achiever attempting to find solace in the big rural pile of his dreams — a seemingly chirpy but ultimately very unsettling vignette hinting at Blur's darker edges." Pan-European magazine Music & Media named it Single of the Week, adding, "Everything about this song makes you think of Mott the Hoople's laddish version of David Bowie's 'All the Young Dudes'. Whatever, it has won them the UK championship at the expense of Oasis." Also Mark Sutherland from NME named it Single of the Week, writing, "Yup, Blur's first new material since the epoch-shaping Parklife LP is nothing short of a classic pop single. In the space of the time-honoured three-and-a-bit minutes, it manages to recall everyone from Madness to The Beatles to, um, Chas and Dave, craft the most infectious chorus of modern times and still squeeze in the astonishing line He's reading Balzac, knocking back Prozac before tea-time. And you can't really ask for much more than that." Another NME editor, Johnny Cigarettes, described it as "feisty, upbeat singalong pop". Smash Hits gave 'Country House' five out of five, praising it as "a classic pop tune”.

I will bring in some different perspectives on Country House. It is important to remember its context and how this song – together with Oasis’ Roll with It – dominated the news in August 1995. In terms of quality, you could argue Blur reigned on Parklife and they would deliver their fantastic eponymous album in 1997. In some ways, The Great Escape was not as revered. However, it does contains some terrific music. Whether you were around in 1995 and remember Country House or are hearing it new now, it does have its own charm. This is what AllMusic noted about Country House and the attention it received in 1995:

“In the summer of 1995, it had been reduced to this -- Blur versus Oasis. The two bands represented polar opposites of the pop audience -- elite versus the working class, art school versus blue collar, and art school versus gut instinct. It was a brilliant pairing, better even than the Beatles versus the Rolling Stones, because these two bands actually hated each other. Blur leader Damon Albarn would claim that the animosity began when Oasis singer Liam Gallagher taunted him at a party after Oasis' "Some Might Say" reached number one. According to Albarn, Gallagher spotted him, then got in his face, screaming "number one!" This very well may be true -- Liam is not known for his humility -- but it lets Albarn off the hook when he wanted the face-to-face, High Noon showdown that emerged in August of 1995 more than any of the other major players.

As it turned out, both Blur and Oasis were set to deliver the sequels to hit albums in the fall of 1995. Blur was offering their fourth album, while Oasis was set to prove that their debut wasn't a fluke. Originally, they weren't going to release their lead singles -- the songs that touted their upcoming releases -- on the same day, but when Albarn discovered that Blur's "Country House" and Oasis' "Roll With It" were going to be released within a week of each other, he decided to ditch all pretense and have his band's single released the same week as Oasis'. A real risky move, since if his band stiffed, the other band would have vaulted beyond anyone's expectations.

Most observers believed that the rivalry would be contained to Britain's weeklies, but a strange turn of events happened. Brit-pop became a cultural phenomenon, transcending indie culture and dominating the mainstream. That meant that everybody knew about Blur versus Oasis, that they were anxiously awaiting the results of the August release of "Country House" and "Roll With It." National news broadcasts devoted precious time to the rivalry, and everybody awaited the results of the charts with baited breath. In the final few days, it was revealed that Oasis had a major problem when their label, Creation, had a problem with the bar codes on their singles, thereby meaning their single simply wasn't registered as many times as Blur's. And Blur claimed the number one slot -- the first in their history -- with "Country House."

In hindsight, it has become chic to dismiss "Country House" as the product of those crazy times, particularly by Blur's guitarist, Graham Coxon, who seems to be embarrassed to be associated with a song that had either the words "country" or "house" in its title. That's completely unfair. The detached observer could reasonably offer the explanation that Blur won the battle because they offered the most distinctly British single since the Kinks made "Sunny Afternoon" a national singalong. Even if that was true, "Country House" is a brilliant piece of British pop. Yes, you already have to have an inclination for British pop to be enamored with "Country House" -- if only Andy Partridge was half as cute as Damon Albarn, the defiantly British eccentrics XTC would have registered a hit nearly as big as this -- but once you do, it instantly seems like a classic. Apart from the detached, postmodern viewpoint (something any Blur fan will take as second nature by this point, even in 1995), it's hard not to get suckered in by the wonderful hooks and the impeccably detailed production, courtesy of Blur and their producer, Stephen Street. Together, they recorded a layered single where the details -- not just the horns, but the vocal harmonies, rhythms, and guitar parts -- were buried underneath the stomping hooks, melody, and Albarn's caustic wit. This is a single where the rhymes are as natural as the offhand wit and melody -- not only does he offer the wonderous put-down "He's reading Balzac/Knocking back Prozac," he disses his rivals with "He's got Morning Glory/And life's a different story," and it's virtually impossible not to sing along.

"Country House" may have been the perfect record for its time -- it certainly was smarter, funnier, and catchier than "Roll with It" -- but it wouldn't be quite as intoxicating (it wouldn't have elevated beyond its role as a period piece) if Blur didn't know how to write and record a pop record at this point in time. They did. They knew how to maximize a distinctly British and proper record like "Country House" and make it a number one.

They wound up winning the battle, but losing the war. "Roll With It" was dismissed, but after "Wonderwall" was released, (What's the Story) Morning Glory? became a phenomenon not seen since Thriller (at least in the U.K.), and all the bad reviews Oasis received since "Roll With It" and Morning Glory disappeared. Oasis triumphed over Blur. But during that brief moment in late August/September of 1995, Blur was the victor with "Country House," and it remains the best of the two singles released that week”.

In 2012, The Guardian argue how Country House was worth another look. Always having this reputation as being a jokey, knees-up song that was throwaway and got to the top of the charts because of the battle with Oasis rather than anything to do with quality, it has depths and darkness not instantly evident., Maybe it has not aged well, yet I do think it is worth spotlighting this song ahead of its thirtieth anniversary:

“It's worth another look, though. Far from being a knocked-out knees-up, Country House is deceptively complex and completely bonkers. It's the second chorus where things get weird – Albarn's chirpy hook about "a very big house in the country" is backed by a falsetto counter, "blow, blow me out I am so sad, I don't know why", both disconcerting and wonderfully melancholy, leading into Coxon's queasiest guitar solo, a discordant, seasick riff of scarttershot notes and fractured scales seemingly beamed in from Sonic Youth or Pavement. The effect is a splash of genuine art-school creativity oddly absent from Damien Hirst's accompanying video, and totally at odds with what Britpop was supposed to be about by that point. Shed Seven could never have done it. The "Blow, blow me out"s return for the breakdown, underpinned by Coxon's chiming guitar to create a ghostly harmony that's more Pink Floyd than Lily the Pink. Even the late arrival of a Madness brass section can't wreck the magic.

When you read Liam Gallagher's famous dismissal of Blur as "chimney-sweep music", this is the track that comes to mind and you can see what he meant. But Country House has everything that made (and makes) Blur fascinating: the common touch, the terrace chorus, the arched eyebrow, the weirdness, the art-school sound, the desire to annoy and to fit in and to lead the field, to be the outsider and the everyman, all at once. It's never completely satisfying, but it's the confidence and the contradictions that save it.

Country House made an unexpected live return for the band's reunion shows in 2009 and on every occasion, quite rightly, the crowd went bananas. That's Blur – willfully awkward but eager to please. It's certainly what they were at the Brit awards this year. Treasure their stubbornness, their awkwardness and their imperfections, it's what makes them ace, and it's all on show here”.

I remember when Country House came out on 14th August, 1995. I was twelve and was starting to get into Blur. Although I became a bigger fan by the time 13 was released in 1999, it was fascinating to be around witnessing this Britpop battle! It became more about the competition and picking a side more than the songs themselves. However, thirty years later, there will be new attention for and inspection of the lead single from The Great Escape. Whether you love the song or feel it is underwhelming, there is no doubt how important it is. One of Blur’s defining moments. Getting some distance after the Britpop war with Oasis, we can view Country House on its own. Despite the terrible video and the fact there are better songs on The Great Escape, Country House is a song…

TOO big to be ignored.

FEATURE: For the Birthday Queen: Kate Bush’s Julys

FEATURE:

 

 

For the Birthday Queen

 

Kate Bush’s Julys

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BECAUSE Kate Bush…

PHOTO CREDIT: Gered Mankowitz

turns sixty-seven on 30th July, for this birthday feature, I want to include information about her career in July. What I mean is what she was doing in July through various years. Many fans are dedicating this whole month to Kate Bush. I have covered years like 1988. That is when Bush spent her birthday that year doing work for charity. I am going to cover two different years in her career but also reference a couple of others near the end. From 1978 where she was promoting her debut album, The Kick Inside, still and was really busy, through to a later year in her career that was very different. Thanks to this incredible website for providing details about what Kate Bush was up to during her birthday month. Let’s start out with 1978 and what Kate Bush’s July consisted of:

“July 1978

Kate is the best selling female albums artist in the U.K. for the first quarter of 1978. Wuthering Heights has been number 1 in the Netherlands, Belgium, New Zealand (five weeks), and Australia; and "top-ten" in Germany, France, Brazil, Argentina, South Africa, Denmark, Sweden and Finland.

July 4, 1978

The Man With the Child in His Eyes reaches its chart peak in the U.K. at number 6.

The Kick Inside is re-released in the U.S.A. on a new label--EMI-America [and with a different but equally inappropriate cover, now sometimes referred to as the "country-western" or "Tammy Wynette" cover.] Wuthering Heights is finally released as a single in the U.S. There are some good notices, but Kate is considered by radio programmers to be "too bizarre" for the American market.

It is interesting, as Bush approached her twentieth birthday, there was this half-hearted attention in America. The fact Bush was considered too weird for the U.S. It took them so long to appreciate her! I think July 1978 is Bush’s busiest birthday month of her career. Just about to leave her teens, there was all of this pressure and success. She barely had time to rest and properly celebrate. I hope that she did spend 30th July at least relaxing and with her family. The first part of July 1978 was packed. One of the most notable transitions was the promotion of The Kick Inside and the start of recording for her second album, Lionheart.

July 7, 1978

Kate travels to Superbear Studios in Nice, France to record her second album. She had had good reports of this studio from Dave Gilmour, who recorded his first solo album there. The recording is a much-needed break for Kate. In the sunshine and the mountain air she recovers from almost six months of solid promotion, and pursues her real vocation, making music.

July 1981

Kate goes into Abbey Road studios with Haydn Bendall as engineer to complete the backing tracks.

Kate goes to Dublin to record the track Night of the Swallow with members of Planxty and The Chieftains.

July 14, 1981

Kate appears on the children's programme Razzmatazz to explain how the Sat In Your Lap video was made.

The rest of July 1978 was Bush busy stepping (briefly) off of the promotional treadmill. She was embarking on recording her second album. It must have been exciting traveling to France and getting out of London. This would be the only album where she recorded outside of the U.K. Still nineteen, Bush was in this new location and trying to follow a hugely successful debut album. If July 1978 was all about her promoting The Kick Inside and laying down the early parts of Lionheart, things were a bit different three years later. Following the release of those 1978 albums and her third, 1980’s Never for Ever, Bush was working on The Dreaming. I love to imagine Bush recording in Dublin. This was plant sewed for Hounds of Love when she recorded there again. Twenty-two and involved in the most intense recording period of her career, it was interesting. Bush recording at Abbey Road and going to Dublin. She would travel between various studios through 1981 and 1982. 14th July, 1981 is one of the most interesting appearances she made on T.V. On a children’s show to promote a song that probably went over their heads, I sort of wish there was a better-quality video of her interview. Even so, still so young and with all this ambition, I guess Bush just wanted to promote her music as widely as possible.

I will say a few words to end. However, I will get to 1982. This was just before The Dreaming was released. It was another intense July. Consider what happened three days before Bush turned twenty-four. Bush had performed live a few times after she completed The Tour of Life in 1979. T.V. appearances here and there. Her spot at Royal Rock Gala was fascinating. A rare live performance of The Wedding List. I don’t think enough people discuss that 1982 live performance. An unexpected high in her career. What happened on 27th July was an end to a pretty busy and varied month:

July 21, 1982

At 48 hours' notice Kate is asked to take David Bowie's place in a Royal Rock Gala before HRH The Prince of Wales in aid of The Prince's Trust. She performs Wedding List live, backed by Pete Townsend and Midge Ure on guitars, Mick Karn on bass, Gary Brooker on keyboards and Phil Collins on drums.

"The best moment by far was Kate Bush's number, a storming success..." (Sunie, Record Mirror)

July 27, 1982

The single The Dreaming is finally released, to excellent music press reviews saluting Kate's creative courage. The single is stifled, however, by the radio producers and presenters, particularly on BBC Radio 1, who will not play it. The plans for a twelve-inch version are aborted”.

Maybe not the happiest end to the month, a few days shy of her birthday in 1982, a single that she’d hoped would be well received and a chart success got off to a rocky start. As it was, The Dreaming was Bush’s lowest-placed single to that point.

There are other examples of Julys where Bush encountered transformative moments in her career. July 2014 was the month before Before the Dawn started. Her celebrated residency, the final preparations and touches were added. In June 1985, Hounds of Love was completed. It was released in September. August was when Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God) was released. The July was the bridge between Hounds of Love being completed and the first single coming out. That excitement and nervousness. On 30th July, 1988, Bush celebrates her thirtieth birthday by participating in an AIDS charity project involving some two-hundred celebrities. She served as a shopkeeper for the day at Blazer's boutique. On 30th July, we celebrate Bush’s birthday. There will be so many social media posts. Fans sharing their love for this icon! What was the biggest and most important July in her career? 1978 when she was starting work on Lionheart? Maybe 1985 when there was this expectation before Hounds of Love came out. Think about what Bush was doing in July 1989. Bush completed recording The Sensual World that month. It seems like a few of her albums were completed in July. I wonder if anyone has their own favourite Kate Bush Julys. I do hope, what with it being July, that maybe Kate Bush has completed her eleventh studio album. Perhaps she will announce its release for later in the year. We can but dream! In the meantime, I wanted to wish Kate Bush a very happy birthday for Wednesday (30th July). With her fanbase growing and expanding every year, a whole new generation are discovering her music. There is no doubt that this experience is…

IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in 2014 during her Before the Dawn residency

A complete joy!

FEATURE: Kate Bush’s Hounds of Love at Forty: Two: Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God)

FEATURE:

 

 

Kate Bush’s Hounds of Love at Forty

 

 Two: Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God)

__________

THIS is the second anniversary feature…

around Kate Bush’s Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God). It was released as a single on 5th August, 1985 (this article provides interesting facts about the song). The first single from Hounds of Love, the fortieth anniversary is going to be a big occasion. I know a lot will be written about it. Hounds of Love turns forty on 16th September. I am going to draw from Leah Kardos’s 33 1/3 Hounds of Love book when it comes to a deeper dive into the track. One of the greatest singles Kate Bush ever released. Although its video is phenomenal and without controversy at all, unfortunately MTV banned it at one point. It was not the only video of hers that was banned. When she released Experiment IV in 1986, the video was deemed too scary, Even Wuthering Heights’ original video was not shown widely in America as it was seen as too intense and scary. It was not a hit there. A second video was shot for Top of the Pops when the single became a success in the U.K. As this feature highlights, the American market once again found a very innocent and pretty normal video too scary or strange:

“The iconic Kate Bush was propelled back into the topic of discussion this week thanks to her legendary hit 'Running Up That Hill' featuring prominently in the new series of Stranger Things.

However, the track hasn't been without its controversy, with the video for it even being banned from MTV at one point.

The first volume of season four of Stranger Things premiered on 27 May, and sees the British pop legend's 1985 hit 'Running Up That Hill' feature heavily throughout the show, in turn helping the reclusive star get to number one on the iTunes chart.

It's first heard in the first episode, on Max Mayfield’s (Sadie Sink) Walkman, and continues to be a pivotal song for the character as the drama unfolds.

The success of the track has been such that not only has the song topped the iTunes chart, but it’s also overtaken 'Wuthering Heights' on Spotify to become Bush's most popular track on the service.

However, what people perhaps don't know about the track is that its abstract and controversial video was deemed suitable by MTV in the 1980s; the channel decided not to run it, instead opting for a lip-synced performance of it from the Terry Wogan show of all places instead.

While the video is certainly artfully done, it wasn't particularly outrageous. Featuring Bush performing an interpretive dance with dancer Michael Hervieu, the pair perform a repeated gesture suggestive of drawing a bow and arrow, with these scenes intercut with surreal sequences of Bush and Hervieu searching through crowds of masked strangers”.

I want to take from Leah Kardos’s Hounds of Love book as she dissects the music. The instruments and technology. A musicologist examination of an epic track. Kardos starts by starting how Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God) starts with a Fairlight CMI drone. “The half-speed TRAMCHLO preset, drenched in thick, Quantexc reverb haze”. I think that the percussive beat is one of the most notable parts of the song. How it is the heartbeat and drive of the song. It is “a combination of LinnDrum rhythms and Stuart Elliott’s muscular toms and snares. Deeper than usual, the kick sample is tuned so low (around 65Hz) that it practically functions like a bass”. There is so much to discuss when it comes to the players and the dynamics. I would advise people pick up a copy of Leah Kardos’s book. Bush’s vocal delivery is another standout of Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God). “She will often hit the roof of the phrase (B♭) with an insistent, almost combative energy, like a bird testing a glass ceiling for a way out” (she gives an example of the lines “Do you want to know, know that it doesn’t hurt me”). The drone continues throughout the song. “At the end of the verse, Bush switches to a more caressing voice and the first softening melodic curve, ‘Do you want to hear about the deal that I’m making?’ Throughout the song, these moments of strident, declamatory intervallic leaping are briefly surrounded buy softer movements of lyrical warmth (‘You, it’s you and me’). The syncopated three-note background phrase (‘Yeah, yeah yo’) doesn’t move with the rest of the rest of the music to the tonic (C minor), but rather skips down to a flattened 7th (B♭)”. Leah Kardos notes how Paddy Bush’s balalaika is an essential element of the song. It comes “bursting into a shimmering, eternalized version of the glittering shards of smashed reality at the end of ‘Babooshska’”. I shall move on from the musical analysis. The inspection and investigation of the players and Bush’s vocal. The lyrics remain so powerful and inspiring.

The ability to swap places with a partner and stand in their shoes to understand them. Bush revealed in interviews how there is this greater scope for misinterpretation so that there is this misunderstanding. Making a deal with God would allow this communication and understanding. Leah Kardos argues how Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God) is also about penetrative sex. Rather than the spiritual and emotional, Bush talking about swapping the physical experience: “to know how it feels to be a bottom (‘Do you want to know that it doesn’t hurt me’) or a top (‘Unaware I’m tearing you asunder’)”. The act of domination and being domination. Feeling and experiencing the power of a man’s body. How that physical experience can give power and strength so that Bush (or women) can run up hills, face huge challenges and conquer any problem. Kardos notes how Bush, through her career, has portrayed through her songs a ghost, a man, a donkey and an unborn child. On the final lines of Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God), “this was the first time Bush had sung in the voice of an evolved, empowered, non-binary entity”. However, Leah Kardos writes how Bush composed and demoed the song in late 1983. “It was an ethereal pop masterpiece that grabs you by the body with esurient momentum. A mature and focused articulation of desire and an eternal scream for equality. It creates empathy, not only for the others that we love, but also for our multiple other selves, hidden deep within”.

The video is almost as memorable as the song. Directed by David Garfarth, we see Kate Bush and her dance partner dressed in grey Japanese hakama trouser-skirt outfits. “Her co-performer, soon after the video was shot, began her gender transition and is now named Misha Hervieu, adding a rather remarkable extra component to the subversive nature of the lyrics”. With stunning choreography by Diane Gray, the video is considering one of Bush’s finest. Hervieu lifts Bush and manipulates her body into various shapes and positions. Bush does not mine during the song. It makes it more impactful. More interpretative dance and performance than a traditional Pop music video. Very unusual in 1985. My favourite part is when Bush gestures the drawing of a bow and arrow (this mirrors John Carder Bush’s single photo for the cover). Bush intended the video to be her farewell to dance. Her moving into filmic territory. I guess you could say this lasted until maybe the video for Rubberband Girl (from The Red Shoes in 1993), when the U.K. video was Kate Bush and her dance partner twisting and turning. Ssimilar to Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God) in some ways, but different in others. Leah Kardos states Kate Bush wrote on her website in 2023 how she hoped it would be seen as a “filmic piece of dance”. 2022 is when this song gained new life after being featured in Netflix’s Stranger Things. It passed a billion streams on Spotify in 2023. In 2022, Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God) reached number one in the U.K. Upon its release in 1985, the song got to number three in the charts. On 5th August, it will be forty years since this timeless and still-moving track was released. Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God) continues to inspire and move people. It is Bush’s most popular song and the one most people associate with her – or the only track of hers they can name. Reading Leah Kardos’s analysis of the composition and lyrics of the song goes a long way to understanding Kate Bush’s genius…

AS a producer and songwriter.

FEATURE: A New Bond: Exploring the Female Spy Theme

FEATURE:

 

 

A New Bond

PHOTO CREDIT: cottonbro studio/Pexels

 

Exploring the Female Spy Theme

__________

I have been thinking about…

IN THIS PHOTO: Sean Connery as James Bond

a music tradition that really only applies to spy films fronted by men. In fact, it is the James Bond franchise that has these lush and dramatic songs. Celebrating this hero. The grandeur of them. Everyone has their own favourite Bond theme. Although women have sung Bond themes – everyone from Tina Turner to Shirley Bassey to Madonna -, they are always singing about the male spy. Although the Bond franchise will continue and is now going to be made by Amazon, they will cast male actors in the lead. Perhaps they cannot deviate because the spy is called ‘James’ Bond, so it wouldn’t fit necessarily to have a woman play that role. There have been films featuring women as spies. However, we do not really talk about the theme songs. The James Bond themes have a legacy and reputation of their own. They are legendary. In turn, that adds a lot of heat and extra credit to the films. In terms of ‘lost’ Bond themes, there have been songs released that could have made it. Or artists who seem like they are natural fits for the franchise. Like Lana Del Rey. However, I do wonder whether we need to shift focus. There are not a lot of film spy films. Although it is quite a niche genre, I would love to see a powerful theme song scoring this incredible film. I got the thought when recently listening to a Bond theme on the radio. Feeling how cool it would be if there was this slew of new theme songs that either backed a franchise with a woman in the lead or there was at least a one-off. When listening to Iraina Mancini’s 2023 album, Undo the Blue, there is a song on there that has that spy feel. Take a Bow is the final song on the album and would be a perfect fit for a spy film led by a woman. I don’t feel like the Bond series has moved on in terms of how it represents woman. Always having this notoriety because of sexism and a chauvinism, there have been small steps in the newer films.

Even though it is not non-existent, there have not been many examples of female spy films. I think there do need to be more. As much as anything, it would have to add to a genre that is largely male-dominated. Also having songs by women featuring in the credits. Women are not often represented on the screen in positions of power. There has been more inclusion in superhero films. However, these are only small steps. Atomic Blonde and Salt have shown that female-led spy thrillers can be commercially successful and critically acclaimed. I have always found the James Bond themes a little flawed. In the sense they are spotlighting a fictional character that is seriously flawed. There have been articles and pieces written arguing why it is important to give women more of a central role when it comes to spy fiction. There are some great examples of spy films where women lead. Not many have the sort of epic themes synonymous with the James Bond franchise. These one-off films are great. However, there has not been anything as successful and long-running as James Bond. Whilst it is more important to talk about the film rather than its theme, I do feel that it is a gap. These dazzling and evocative theme songs that will endures for years and decades. I guess it is vital that there is greater representation across all genres. Making sure that there is a shift. There is still a way to go in that sense. The spy film was always traditionally about men. Growth and diversification has occurred. Even so, the spy theme has always been tied to James Bond. It would be great to change that. Not only with more standalone films. Creating these new franchises. James Bond feeling quite old and in need of a refresh perhaps. The themes are legendary and almost as regarded as the films. But always about the same character. I feel that it is time to…

SHIFT the focus.

FEATURE: Spotlight: Duo Ruut

FEATURE:

 

 

Spotlight

PHOTO CREDIT: Mia Tohver

 

Duo Ruut

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A duo that are…

PHOTO CREDIT: Mia Tohver

quite new to my ears, I wanted to spend some time with Duo Ruut. This is an Estonia duo of Ann-Lisett Rebane and Katariina Kivi. Even if they have been performing together for a number of years, their name and music is perhaps not as widely known as it should be. I am going to end with a review of their fabulous new album, Ilmateade. It is one that I would encourage people to seek out. Before that, I will bring in a couple of interviews. I will start with a deep interview from Rhythm Passport published last month. I am really interested in learning more about Duo Ruut. In terms of Estonian music, we do not have that many examples of artists from that nation who are well known. There is a richness to the music scene there that we need to explore more:

“In Estonia, the weather isn’t background noise. It’s narrative. The long, dim winters tighten your world into a kind of tunnel vision. The brief, ecstatic summers feel like a reward for having made it through. And in between, during those awkward and indecisive weeks of spring or autumn, you get stuck in limbo. One day it’s T-shirt weather; the next, you’re digging out your winter coat again. You leave the house with confidence and return damp, cold, and full of existential doubt. That inevitably shapes how people behave, how they write, how they make music.

So maybe it wasn’t by chance that when we met Ann-Lisett Rebane and Katariina Kivi, the two minds and four hands behind Duo Ruut, Tallinn was caught in one of those very Estonian mood swings. It was early April during Tallinn Music Week. After a couple of freakishly warm days when temperatures had climbed close to 20 degrees, snow had fallen overnight, sending festival-goers back into scarves and boots, weaving through puddles and ghost-traced tramlines in Telliskivi.

“Our new album is called The Weather Report – in Estonian, Ilma Teade – and it’s our second LP,” debuted Ann-Lisett. “We’ve had one full album and one EP before this, and it’s full of songs we’re really excited to share.”

The title might seem deliberate, but it wasn’t entirely planned. “It was kind of a joke at first,” she continued. “We’d say, ‘Oh, let’s call the album The Weather Report,’ because it sounded so silly in the beginning. But in the end, it made sense, it has a meaning behind it.”

“Yeah, as time went on and we were making the songs, we started to realise that most of the songs talk about the weather,” Katariina added. “Which is, I think, a very Estonian thing as well…”

The name only came once everything else was in place. “The title came as one of the last things, I would say,” Katariina explained. “When all the songs were ready. It wasn’t decided beforehand to write songs about the weather, but…”

It turns out album’s theme also surfaced on its own, gradually and without planning. “The album consists of songs that we’ve written over the last four-ish years,” said Ann-Lisett. “And during that time, the weather just kept showing up, maybe because it’s always there, shaping how we feel, even if we don’t realise it.”

That timeline stretches back to 2019, when Duo Ruut released their debut LP Tuule Sõnad, followed by the Kulla Kerguseks EP in 2021. “Quite soon after the release of the EP, we started writing this album,” Katariina recalled. “It’s like a collection of all the places we have been in the last four, five years.”

The songs, scattered across time and geography, slowly gathered into shape. “I would say the first ideas of different songs have come from many, many different places,” Ann-Lisett added. “One idea came to us in a soundcheck in a small town in Portugal. One song we wrote for our sound engineer’s wedding. And so it’s like a collection of our moods and memories and travels and experiences.”

That sensitivity to mood runs throughout Duo Ruut’s music. Some songs are lyrical, others simply hang in a certain emotional atmosphere. “We have a few songs on this album that aren’t about anything in particular,” Ann-Lisett noted. “We just wanted to capture a certain mood or feeling.”

“Sometimes it’s not really about the weather itself,” Katariina agreed, “but about how you react to it, what kind of feelings it brings out. For example, we literally sing about rain, but it’s more about the emotion the music carries than the rain itself.”

So much of Duo Ruut’s identity has been shaped not just by Estonia itself, but by the act of carrying Estonia with them, on tour, in interviews, on stage, in the way they frame their music. When asked why so many Estonian musicians are starting to make waves internationally, Katariina offered a candid reflection. “I think it’s to do with our collective need to prove ourselves, to put Estonia on the map. We’re a small country, and that’s part of our identity.”

Ann-Lisett agreed. “Yeah, and a lot of Estonian artists really want people to know we’re from Estonia. If you’re from a big country, it might not matter so much. But for us, it’s almost like a mission.”

“Not just where we’re from,” Katariina continued, “but also what it’s like here. We’re always explaining: ‘We’re from Northern Europe, we’ve got the sea, the forests, the weather…’”

Ann-Lisett laughed. “We really end up being kind of like cultural ambassadors, constantly filling people in about Estonia because many still don’t know where it is or what it’s like.”

There’s structural support behind it too. Katariina pointed out, “We’ve had really good managers helping us with music export. That’s a huge part of it.”

The music pulls its weight too. “The kind of folk-meets-world sound we do really travels,” Ann-Lisett noted. “It fits into all sorts of settings, not just folk festivals. We’ve played really varied events. That’s been true for other Estonian acts too, like Puuluup, Mari Kalkun…”

“There’s a new wave coming through as well,” Katariina chimed in. “Puuluup and Mari Kalkun are already well established, and Trad.Attack! are wrapping up something new. We’ll probably be hearing more from them soon. We were kind of at the start of that surge in younger traditional bands in Estonia. A lot of others came up around the same time as us”.

The second interview is from ERR. They spoke with Duo Ruut after they played several shows at Glastonbury last month. A huge achievement and a dream for them, it must have been very special seeing them on the stage. I do hope that they get booked for more U.K. festivals soon enough. Their fanbase and name is building here. For anyone who has not discovered Duo Ruut yet, I would encourage you to follow them on social media and listen to Ilmateade:

“There were even a couple of Estonians there who were very touched to hear an Estonian artist at Glastonbury," said Rebane's bandmate Katariina Kivi, adding that the audience for their second concert was almost as warm as the Glastonbury weather.

"We sold quite a few records," Kivi said. "It was also nice that when people were walking around the festival area between concerts, they recognized us, thanked us for the show and said that they had already recommended us to their friends."

"Some said that our concert was the highlight of Glastonbury for them. Even after the concert, people came up to talk to us, ask us about the instruments and the music, and we signed autographs on our records."

Among the new fans Duo Ruut gained at the festival was British comedian Robin Ince, who was so enamored by their performance, he even wrote a poem about them and posted a video of it on Instagram. According to Katariina Kivi, they also had a warm conversation with Cerys Matthews of Welsh indie band Catatonia.

Ann-Lisett Rebane admitted that although things turned out well in the end, she couldn't help but feel a few nerves before going on stage to such a huge crows.

"At festivals of this size, you usually have a relatively short time to prepare. You have to get everything ready in a few minutes – a quick line-check and then you're on stage," Rebane explained. "That's why we thought it was important to travel with our own sound technician this time, and thanks to them we felt much more confident."

Ann-Lisett Rebane admitted that although things turned out well in the end, she couldn't help but feel a few nerves before going on stage to such a huge crows.

"At festivals of this size, you usually have a relatively short time to prepare. You have to get everything ready in a few minutes – a quick line-check and then you're on stage," Rebane explained. "That's why we thought it was important to travel with our own sound technician this time, and thanks to them we felt much more confident."

Katariina Kivi described playing at Glastonbury as an "important milestone" in the band's career, a sentiment Rebane agrees with.

"It's still hard to believe that it actually happened – to perform with such big names at the same festival, to do 3 concerts and experience this whole event. It's hard to put it into words," Rebane said.

Next up for Duo Ruut is Denmark's Roskilde Festival on July 2. Fans in Estonia will have chance to hear one of the band's compositions during the Song and Dance Festival on July 3. The band will then perform a full set at the Viljandi Folk Music Festival on July 26”.

I am ending with a review of Ilmateade from The Guardian. The fact that the album features other Estonian musicians shows what depth there is to the scene. How incredible and distinct these musicians are. From here, I think Duo Ruut will record more albums and embark on bigger tour dates. I would like to see them live one day. Although I have only just discovered them, the seeds have already been planted. I am compelled to learn a lot more and follow their careers:

“Duo Ruut (Square Duo) are Ann-Lisett Rebane and Katariina Kivi, two Estonian musicians who write, sing and play facing each other, their instrument being a single kannel (an Estonian zither). Playing with the texts and repetitive motifs of runo song, a form of traditional oral poetry specific to the Baltic Finnic languages, their music holds a glistening minimalism in its rhythms and a crossover sheen in its sound. Rebane and Kivi’s voices help – often sweet, but also sharp when required.

Their ambitious second album Ilmateade (Weather Report) explores the powerful yet under-sung connections between the weather and emotion. It begins with the minute-long Intro, a track that builds gorgeously on the scratchy, dying notes of their 2021 EP, Kulla Kerguseks (From the Lightness of Gold), implying both continuity and metamorphosis.

Then we’re in Udu (Fog), lulled along on thick, beautiful clouds of shifting time signatures, before Vastlalaul (The Sledding Song) slows and speeds, glossily, through the snow. These songs are rhythmically complex and have solid, ancient roots, but fans of ambient, Balearic dreaminess and the softer sides of indie pop and psych-folk will find woozy comforts here.

Good entry points include the earwormy melancholia of Vilud Ilmad (Gloomy Weather) and the itchy handclaps, in five beats to the bar, propelling us through Suvi Rannas (Summer on the Beach), in which we’re told, in Estonian, of days hot with horseflies and a sky broad and bare.

Other Estonian artists brought into the fold provide different depths. Guitarist Erki Pärnoja’s solos swirl around the women’s wordless melodies on Interlude, while poet EiK 2509 adds spoken-word contributions to the mesmerising Enne Ööd (Nightfall). All together, these 12 tracks create a hypnotic shipping forecast transplanted to the Baltic Sea, carrying us along on its eddying tides”.

I am going to leave things there. Go and follow Duo Ruut. I think they are primed for many more successful years in the music industry. I really love what they are doing. A phenomenal sound hard to compare with any other act, so many people will wonder…

WHAT their next step is.

___________

Follow Duo Ruut

FEATURE: Groovelines: Madonna - Music

FEATURE:

 

 

Groovelines

 

Madonna - Music

__________

ONE of Madonna’s…

finest and most celebrated singles turns twenty-five on 21st August. Music was the first single taken from the album of the same name. Madonna’s eighth studio album, it arrived two years after the hugely successful Ray of Light. Perhaps her best-reviewed album, there was a lot of expectation around its follow-up. In terms of genres and sounds, there was a shift from Ray of Light. Between 1998 and 2000, a whole host of incredible women in Pop came through who cited Madonna as an influence. Including Christina Aguilera and Britney Spears. Whereas one can see Ray of Light as mixing Electronica, Ambient, Trip Hop, Psychedelia and Middle Eastern music, there was more of a shift to Funk, House, Rock, Country and Folk. Music was a number one album across the world. Even though the reviews in 2000 for Music were not as heady and ecstatic as they were for Ray of Light, in years since, there has been more praise and adulation. Madonna was bringing into Pop elements and sounds that were not present in 2000. In a sea of commercial artists, with boybands and girl groups ruling, Madonna was doing something different. Though she did not invent the genres and mix you hear on Music, it was not being done by other Pop acts in 2000. It was another reinvention and wonderful album. Music turns twenty-five on 18th September. It contains other terrific singles, Don’t Tell Me and What It Feels Like for a Girl. I want to focus on Music’s title track for this Groovelines. Madonna wrote and produced Music with Mirwais Ahmadzaï. I will end with some critical reception for this gem. The first single from this new album, after the phenomenal success of Ray of Light, so many eyes were on Madonna. She did not disappoint!

In 2020, GRAMMY celebrated Music on its twentieth anniversary. It is interesting what they write about its futuristic and genre-fusing lead single. One that was a big chart success – it was a number one in multiple nations – and was all over the radio. I remember when it came out and I was instantly stunned. Excited by what the rest of the album would offer. I think Music is one of Madonna’s most important moments. It still sounds so fresh and fascinating to this day. It has really not aged at all:

“Music," the lead single and title track of her eighth studio album, struck the airwaves like an intergalactic robot in August 2000, heralding a new sound for Madonna and the arrival of 21st-century pop music. With its digitally modified instruments, arpeggiated synths and a chorus Madonna says was inspired by the crowd at a Sting concert, "Music" combined elements of electronic and analog to create an anthem of unity on the dance floor. The Jonas Åkerlund-directed music video—featuring a pre-Borat Sacha Baron Cohen as his character, Ali G—seemed to skewer the decadence of late-'90s hip-hop bling while also revelling in it. We see a pimp-suited Madonna getting into the groove, relishing a night at the strip club with her girls and fending off creeps like a boss, all filmed while she was five and a half months pregnant.

On the strength of its lead single, Music released in the U.S. on September 19, 2000, via Madonna's Maverick imprint under Warner Bros. and opened at No. 1 on the Billboard 200, her highest-charting album in over a decade. Although critics didn't gush over Music with quite the same enthusiasm as they had its predecessor, the album moved millions of physical copies in its first few weeks, eventually going on to garner triple-platinum certification in the U.S. It ultimately earned five total GRAMMY nominations, including Best Pop Vocal Album and Record Of The Year for "Music" in 2001 and Best Short Form Music Video for "Don't Tell Me" in 2002. (Former Maverick Records art director and designer Kevin Reagan, who designed the album, won for Best Recording Package in 2001.)

In an effort to introduce the Queen of Pop to a new generation of fans, the album's promo campaign combined the traditional (a terrestrial radio premiere, a Rolling Stone cover story) with the new (an AOL listening party/live chat, a livestreamed club performance) over a timeline that seems enviably long by today's standards. Comparisons to more junior pop artists on the charts and airwaves swirled around her, but Madonna avoided miring herself in the muck.

Instead, for an exclusive performance at New York City's 3000-capacity Roseland Ballroom that November, Madonna took the stage wearing a Dolce & Gabbana-designed T-shirt emblazoned with the name Britney Spears. For her performance at MTV's European Music Awards later that month, she wore a similar shirt that said Kylie Minogue. "It's my celebration of other girls in pop music," she said backstage at the EMAs, praising the younger women before adding, somewhat cheekily, "I think they're the cutest."

Such spontaneous statements of support and admiration are almost boringly common now, but in an era when pop music had been denied entry into the credibility club, the moment held more weight. Though the press loved to pit female pop stars against each other at the turn of the century as much as it does now, musically, there wasn't much rivalry between them. With Spears still steeped in the sounds of Swedish pop on Oops!… I Did It Again and Minogue diving into disco on Light Years, Madonna had crafted a sound of her own on Music.

While Orbit returned for several tracks on the album, the majority of Music was co-helmed by the relatively unknown French producer Mirwais Ahmadzaï. Like his contemporaries in the French touch electronic scene (Daft Punk, Air, Rinôçérôse), Mirwais was unabashed in his affection for American music of the '70s, including the funk and R&B influences of house. Those influences, paired with his proficiency in production, worked well with Madonna's penchant for pop hooks, resulting in an LP whose sonic textures included space-age fills, guitar-washed in computerizing effects, and vocals that alternate between alien and intimate”.

Music has featured high in rankings. When critics decide which are her best singles. In 2018, The Guardian ranked her seventy-eight singles and placed Music tenth. This is what they had to say: “A glorious update of the blissfully simple sentiments of Holiday and Everybody, infused with a Daft Punk-like robotic swagger, courtesy of Mirwais’ production. Its unlikely inspiration was Madonna’s attendance at a Sting gig: she was moved at how physically his songs connected his fans. Bonus points for the way she sings “bourgeoisie”. In 2022, NME ranked her ten best singles. Music came in fourth: “Always a club kid at heart, Madonna knows a simple lyric can sound profound on the dance floor. That’s definitely true of this song’s iconic refrain: “Music makes the people come together.” Co-produced by French electro musician Mirwais Ahmadzaï, with whom she reunited for 2019’s ‘Madame X’ album, ‘Music’ is a glitzy disco banger infused with Madge’s signature brand of camp abandon. But this being Madonna, it’s also deadly serious at the same time. When she sings “don’t think of yesterday and I don’t look at the clock”, you know she means it. Madge-ic moment: Probably sneaking the word “bourgeoisie” into a dance-pop song. She’s always had an intellectual streak”. In 2016, Rolling Stone decided on Madonna’s best fifty songs. Music ranked it ninth: “After years spent making albums that bridged boundaries of race, gender and sexual orientation, Madonna finally wrote a tune explicitly devoted to the democratizing power of music itself. But her inspiration for this glitchy disco throwdown didn't come from her early days in New York's wild club scene – it emerged at a Sting concert where fans were well-behaved until the musician played old Police hits. "Everyone was practically holding hands… I mean, it really moved me," she told Rolling Stone in 2000. "And I thought, 'That's what music does to people.'" The track, propelled by French dance music producer Mirwais' pounding beat, was a Number One smash, and its video (featuring a little-known Sacha Baron Cohen) showed Madonna skillfully uniting the bourgeoisie and the rebel, even as she was five-and-a-half months pregnant”.

There is no denying the impact of Music. This incredible first single from one of Madonna’s best albums, I wanted to bring in a Wikipedia article that collates critical reaction. A Pop songs that was a lot deeper than a lot of what was around in 2000, this was proof that nobody could predict her! It was such a thrilling time seeing the new single from the Queen of Pop go up against her contemporaries:

“Upon release, the song received generally positive reviews from critics. J. Randy Taraborrelli, author of Madonna: An Intimate Biography, declared "Music" as a dance-anthem "that reaches into the future but also slyly conjures images and feelings of the good ol' disco days". In a similar review, Lucy O'Brien, author of Madonna: Like an Icon, relegated the track as "a resurrection of the disco girl" image. She listed "Music" as a career-defining moment for Madonna, like previous singles "Vogue" and "Justify My Love" (both released in 1990). O'Brien clarified the song as "the same genre defining quality, robotic, tinny, trashy and audacious... She resurrects the Madonna imperative. Dance. Party. Surrender". Stephen Thomas Erlewine of AllMusic called it "a thumping track which sounds funkier, denser, sexier with each spin" Jim Farber of the New York Daily News gave a positive feedback, stating that it is "everything a single should be: pithy, simple and maddeningly catchy, her most instantly embraceable single since 'Holiday'". Farber also highlighted the lyrics, which he felt covered familiar ground for Madonna by talking about the power of dance music. This thought was shared by Fouz-Hernández, who believed that like her debut single "Everybody", "Music" defined Madonna's artistic credibility.

Reviewing the parent album for Rolling Stone, Barry Walters also compared it to Madonna's earlier work.  Sal Cinquemani from Slant Magazine called it Madonna's best dance track since "Vogue", also comparing it to her 1985 single, "Into the Groove". In his review of Madonna's 2001 compilation GHV2, Cinquemani praised the single's "retro club beats and vintage synth sound". Giving it a B rating, he concluded that "only a former material girl living in a NASDAQ world could get away with a song like this". Dimitri Ehrlich from Vibe found "Music" to be "a bouncing parade of synthesizers that pose the question 'Do fortysomething baby-mamas still have the divine right to get down?' (The answer is yes)". Chuck Arnold from Entertainment Weekly, called it one of Madonna's "most eccentric hits ever" and found it to be reminiscent of her earlier works, specifically "Holiday".

It is important to write about Music. I am sure that the single will get a few words on its twenty-fifth anniversary. However, I do not think it will get the love it deserves. I will finish off with this Official Charts article that looked at what else was in the charts the week Madonna delivered one of her best singles. You can tell so many artists of today are influenced by that one song alone:

“Released on August 21 2000, Music debuted atop the Official Singles Chart that same week; at the time becoming her tenth track to reach the summit.

The track spent two consecutive weeks at Number 1, before going on to tally a total of 15 weeks in the Top 40. Music can also claim to be the sole chart-topper from its parent album of the same name, with follow-up singles Don't Tell Me and What It Feels Like for a Girl reaching Number 4 and Number 7 respectively.

To date, Music has accumulated a total of 510,000 UK chart units; having shifted 388,000 physical copies. The song also boasts in excess of 9.6 million streams in the UK so far.

Elsewhere on the Official Singles Chart this week in 2000...

Following one of the biggest chart battles of the 2000s, which saw Spiller and Sophie Ellis-Bextor come out triumphant, Spiller's Groovejet (If This Ain't Love) and True Steppers and Dane Bowers feat. Victoria Beckham's Out of Your Mind both slipped one spot, to Number 2 and Number 3 respectively.

Victoria's Spice Girls bandmate Melanie C was also on the decent with former Number 1 I Turn To You (5), while boisterous double act Daphne & Celeste claimed the week's second highest new entry - and their third consecutive Top 20 single - with a cover of Alice Cooper's School's Out! (12).

You really did have to be there”.

A worldwide chart smash in 2000, it is almost twenty-five years since the release of Music. I will talk about the album it came from closer to its twenty-fifth anniversary in September. For now, an important highlight of this phenomenal single. One of Madonna’s most enduring and original. After such a successful album like Ray of Light, Madonna could have repeated that album or gone down a more conventional route. Felt the pressure and released a first single from a new album that was a disappointment. As it was, Madonna took another step forward and wowed a whole new wave of fans and critics. For that alone, you have to…

BOW down to her.

FEATURE: Spotlight: Revisited: flowerovlove

FEATURE:

 

 

Spotlight: Revisited

  

flowerovlove

__________

HAVING spotlighted her…

PHOTO CREDIT: Finn Waring

over two years ago now, I felt it was overdue I return to flowerovlove. Since then, she has released the 2024 E.P., ache in my tooth, in addition to some fabulous singles this year. The moniker of the London-based producer and artist Joyce Cissé, she won Artist to Watch at the 2022 A&R Awards and New Artist at the 2024 Music Week Women in Music Awards. I am going to come to some interviews from this year. To start, I will go back to last year and an NME interview with flowerovlove. Published around the release of the ache in my tooth E.P., we get some biography and background to start which is very useful:

“After all, writing about big feelings has always come naturally to Cisse. Born in London and raised at home in Essex speaking Mandingo, the language of her parents’ native Ivory Coast, Cisse first started making music aged 13 around the same time her older brother Wilfred taught himself how to produce. The first song they made together was a rap track that she’s already decided will soundtrack her Album Of The Year win at the Grammys one day. “I realised: ‘damn, I really do love writing’,” she recalls.

In her teens she was scouted as a model and featured in a Gucci campaign as her first professional gig aged just 15. Balancing budding careers in both modelling and music, Cisse left school after her GCSEs and swapped exam halls for fashion shows with stars like Zendaya. After independently dropping her 2022 debut EP, ‘A Mosh Pit In The Clouds’, the singer signed to Capitol Records on her 18th birthday.

Your new EP captures universal experiences but they’re all told through Flowerovlove’s light-hearted and fun sound. Why are you drawn to that approach with storytelling?

“I connect most to songs about love, whether it’s self love, or it’s about other people. Love is so universal, which is why I’m writing about love. Stuff was happening in my love life and I was like, ‘There’s nothing I can do but write songs about this pain or this amazing feeling’. It’s crazy how love can turn to hatred so fast, and from the start of the EP to the end, I go through that journey sonically as well as lyrically.

“The EP is about different types of love, and it’s in chronological order. It tells a story. And I honestly just love the sound of pop. It’s the music I’ve always wanted to make.”

Your new EP captures universal experiences but they’re all told through Flowerovlove’s light-hearted and fun sound. Why are you drawn to that approach with storytelling?

“I connect most to songs about love, whether it’s self love, or it’s about other people. Love is so universal, which is why I’m writing about love. Stuff was happening in my love life and I was like, ‘There’s nothing I can do but write songs about this pain or this amazing feeling’. It’s crazy how love can turn to hatred so fast, and from the start of the EP to the end, I go through that journey sonically as well as lyrically.

“The EP is about different types of love, and it’s in chronological order. It tells a story. And I honestly just love the sound of pop. It’s the music I’ve always wanted to make”.

One reason why I want to include parts of a PRS for Music interview from February is because, on the same day ache in my tooth was released, flowerovlove collected the PRS for Music and PRS Foundation-sponsored New Artist Award at the Music Week Women In Music Awards. In this interview, flowerovlove discusses the importance of remaining grounded and developing her confidence as a songwriter:

“On the same day Ache In My Tooth was released, Joyce was on stage in London accepting the PRS for Music and PRS Foundation-sponsored New Artist award at the Music Week Women In Music Awards. It’s an accolade that draws attention not only to her achievements in music so far, but to her desire to empower and support women around her.

‘I’m just grateful that women are being seen, especially as a young Black woman myself,’ she says of her win. ‘I hope we get to be seen more. That’s why I’m here.’

For Joyce, it was particularly special to be in a room with so many other inspiring women whose stories and achievements gave her new insights into the industry. ‘There was so much love there,’ she adds. ‘Even if I hadn’t been there to collect an award, it was just nice to be in the room. It wasn’t really about me when I was there — I was just soaking everything in.’

Joyce clearly has a constructive mindset when it comes to tackling the landscape around her. But as someone that’s been making and releasing music from such a young age, what has it been like navigating the industry as a solo artist?

‘My honest answer is, I’m not sure if I’ve navigated it yet,’ she admits. ‘But PRS was a big part of my career when I first started, and it still is [now]. I didn’t even know what PRS was initially — my brother told me to sign up when I first made a Spotify account — but it’s been amazing. I think it’s a great platform for artists [as it means you remain] somewhat in control of your finances, and it’s also important in terms of giving you the knowledge of what’s happening in the industry too.’

'PRS was a big part of my career when I first started, and it still is.'

Joyce was also able to make use of funding through PRS early on in her career, which helped her build both her aesthetic and overall connection to her fanbase.

‘It was a very easy process [to apply], and very helpful in terms of [providing] funding needed for videos or events,’ she recalls. ‘I love to do fan events where I open and style a thrift store, and then spend time with my fans. Stuff like that is great, but there’s so many similar things you just can’t do as an independent artist without funding”.

I will end with an interview from The Standard from last month. The tremendous flowerovlove has joinined Halsey for dates on her North America tour. She has already opened for Olivia Rodrigo at BST in Hyde Park. This is a simply awe-inspiring artist who is going to headline festivals and release a string of huge albums. Supporting some of today’s biggest artists, the stock and popularity of flowerovlove is rising by the month. I am excited to see what the rest of the year holds in store:

“I just want to make pop the way I would have loved to have had it growing up,” says Cissé. “My music is very conversational, it’s somewhat nostalgic, and it’s super fun.” She cites everyone from ABBA to Justin Bieber as an influence. “I Iove dumb songs. I love when the lyrics are very unhinged.”

Music was her first love, but it’s not her first career. Cissé began modelling at 15, booking campaigns for Gucci and walking the runway at Paris Fashion Week. While she learned lots from the experience, she was soon eager to return to making music. “I felt my calling was just greater than being a model,” says Cissé. “It was to express myself, and it has nothing to do with the way I look.”

She implicitly understands the importance of iconography in contemporary pop, the way top artists encode messages to fans. She’s also got a much cooler term for it than the phrase Easter egg: “lore”. She’s creating her own mythology. “I like to do things with socks, I’ll have little snippets of text written on them.” She loves it when her fans go on the hunt for the hints she’s dropping. “Sometimes they think stuff is a clue when it’s not, and I love it,” says Cissé.

Singing about love inevitably means people are desperate to work out who the subjectof a song is. There has been more than one occasion where someone in Cissé’s circle mistakenly thought they had become a muse. “I recently got blocked because someone thought a song was about them,” she says.

Performing is clearly home for Cissé. She would rather be on the bill at a festival than in the crowd. And she can’t wait for fans to hear her new work and learn more of that lore. “It’s been a long time and I’m ready,” she says. “I’m excited for people to hear my music and understand my lyrics and feel something.”

Don’t fight the feeling, it’s about to be a summer of love — or rather, Flowerovlove”.

The brilliant ache in my tooth won some hugely positive reviews. I wonder whether Joyce Cissé is working on a debut album at the moment. With some big U.S. dates coming soon, the rest of this year will see flowerovlove win over new fans and hearts. Go and follow her if you do not already. Someone who I was captivated by when I spotlighted her in 2023, that sense of amazement and love has only grown. This is a phenomenal artist who is no longer ‘rising’, ‘promising’ or ‘on the cusp’. The future legend that is flowerovlove is truly…

IN full bloom.

___________

Follow flowerovlove

FEATURE: A Thousand Words: Refreshing and Revitalising the Album Cover

FEATURE:

 

 

A Thousand Words

IN THIS IMAGE: Focus, 2022-24 by Jenny Saville/PHOTO CREDIT: Prudence Cuming

 

Refreshing and Revitalising the Album Cover

__________

THIS is a subject that…

IN THIS IMAGE: Drift, 2020-22 by Jenny Saville

I explore now and then. The best and boldest album covers of any given year. I am still of the opinion that it is a pretty hit-and-miss affair when it comes to album covers. Whether many artists do not consider it important to put that much effort in, I would say that maybe a quarter of new albums have covers I would deem impressive or memorable. In terms of those that truly stand out and astonish, there is a very small selection each year. One feels there is so much potential and possibility. I have included a fabulous Jenny Saville painting at the top of this feature. I hope I gave credited it sufficiently and want to state this is an editorial feature so I will not be making money from this. I would hate to run afoul of an extraordinary artist! Back in 2009, a Jenny Saville painting was used as a cover by Manic Street Preachers (she was also responsible for the cover art of their 1994 album, The Holy Bible). It was banned. Or at least it was deemed inappropriate and it was censored by supermarkets. The stunning and unforgettable image for Journal for Plague Lovers shows what power a painting of this type could have. I feel, with so many (musical) artists favouring a basic portrait or some truly unimaginative compositions, artists like Jenny Saville could help revitalise the album cover. I was thinking of an album cover for a hypothetical album where a woman in 1950s-style clothing is pushing a pram in the U.S. and women coo over it. Inside is either a sonogram on fire or a newborn who is still attached to the umbilical chord but is about to be killed. It is a reaction to America banning abortions. In the background there are all kinds of images that contrast traditional values, political insanity, women’s body rights being removed and this dark new America. It would be a painting very much influenced by Jenny Saville. I would recommend anyone who can go and see Jenny Saville: The Anatomy of Painting at London’s National Portrait Gallery go and see it. It runs until September. It has won rave reviews.

IN THIS IMAGE: The album cover for Megan Thee Stallion’s 2024 album, MEGAN

You really do need to experience these paintings in the flesh to get the full experience and impact. However, artists like Jenny Saville create images that linger long in the mind. That is sort of what you want from an album cover. Not to say artists need to connect with artists (as in painters) every time. I mean there is so much more potential beyond what is currently out there. There were some notable album covers from last year but, if you look at the examples from this feature, how many do you instantly get stunned by or strain your eyes, amazed by the detail and striking image? Maybe four from the list of forty from that feature. Given the number of albums released every year, that is not a good proportion! There is that possibility that there will be censorship. It is amazing that we have taken a massive step back from the 1990s or 2000s. So many covers banned or censored for something deemed a bit sexual or risky. How sensitive they were! Now, given the political censorship and the fact the U.K. government is pretty much a fascist organisation, you can imagine the most innocuous album covers coming under scrutiny. Anything that related to conflicts and violence around the world would be met with huge condemnation. Think about the cover for Sabrina Carpenter’s Man’s Best Friend. That upcoming album has sparked more debate around its cover – where Carpenter is subservient and almost animal-like as her hair is pulled by a man whose face we do not see – which has garnered more attention than the music. If a cover is misinterpreted or it courts any sort of controversy then that is attacked rather than applauded. In Carpenter’s case, it is not a cover that excuses or promotes abuse against women or domestic violence.

IN THIS PHOTO: Sabrina Carpenter/PHOTO CREDIT: Getty Images

Contemporary artwork should definitely be used more on album covers. It connects music listeners with different artists and there is that sense of gravity and awe you get from a painting that you cannot get from a photo of the artist. Even so, there is a huge place for photography. An inventive composition or a shot that makes you take a step back. When was the last time you saw an album cover like that? It is about the music I know but, as a phenomenal album cover alone can sell vinyl and do so for years to come, I do wonder whether we have passed a stage when album covers have less stock than they used to. Think about the greatest covers of all times and nearly all of them are from years and decades ago. Seeing these sense-altering paintings from Jenny Saville made me think about album art. People might agree that the art of the album cover is in decline. That artists value it less. I look around at new albums and I often imagine my own versions. I mentioned an idea that I had. I am a very visual thinker and there is so much scope when it comes to creating a seriously standout album cover, and yet, there are few of the modern day out there – unless people point me in the right direction! The album cover is part of the package and links to the music. I feel a boring or missed opportunity of a cover reflects badly on an album and affects my listening experience. There is no denying the fact that the cover is…

PHOTO CREDIT: Andrea Piacquadio/Pexels

AS important as the music!

FEATURE: Among These Brilliant Women… Reasons Why You Need to Join The Trouble Club

FEATURE:

 

 

Among These Brilliant Women…

IN THIS PHOTO: Entrepreneur Grace Beverley was a hugely engaging and popular guest when she spoke at The Trouble Club on Saturday, 28th June at Conway Hall, London/PHOTO CREDIT: Grace Beverley via The New Statesman

 

Reasons Why You Need to Join The Trouble Club

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YOU may be a member already…

IN THIS PHOTO: Yuan Yang, a journalist and the first Chinese-born British M.P., is a guest of The Trouble Club on Wednesday, 23rd July at The Conduit in Covent Garden, London/PHOTO CREDIT: ©House of Commons (no alterations were made to this image)

but, for those who are on the fence or are unaware of The Trouble Club, I am going to argue why you need to be more affirmative and decisive! I recently did write about The Trouble Club but, as the speaker whose photo I used as the main image cancelled her appearance, it was a minor backfire in that sense. It was nobody’s fault. I just feel I need to rectify this error and, as she has already spoken for The Trouble Club, I am on safe ground using Grace Beverley as the ‘cover star’! I am going to lead to an interview with her in a minute. Rather than repeat what I normally do with these features and look back at events I have attended in the past few weeks or so and then look forward to upcoming ones, I am going to split it into two. I am going to spotlight Grace Beverley but also mention the event which is happening tomorrow evening – that I am attending – that is of particular interest. After that, I am going to discuss the club as a whole and why you need to be a member. Let’s do some housekeeping before continuing. Whilst this is something CEO and owner Ellie Newton says before beginning an interview with a guest – usually she wants people not to trip on wires near the stage and have deaths on her hands! -, I am using this opportunity to highlight the ways you can support The Trouble Club. Go and follow Ellie Newton on Instagram and The Trouble Club here.

You can also follow them on Twitter. You can apply for membership here. At a time when there are so many exclusive members clubs and annual fees can be insane, The Trouble Club is inclusive and affordable. Grated, as you would expect, the vast majority of members are women, though there is a growing number of male members. Though I love the breadth of members, I think the biggest bonus and benefit is being in a room filled with passionate and fascinating women – which is no shade on any of the male members! The array of venues that events are held in is extraordinary too. How these unique spaces and the choice of guests combines beautifully to create these unforgettable evening! Over the past couple of months or so I have seen everyone from Katie Piper to Charlotte Proudman. Of course, as I write in every feature about The Trouble Club, there is a wish-list of guests I would love to see. Returning guests such as Gloria Steinem and Laura Bates. Trouble virgins – probably the wrong wording; ‘debut guests’?! – such as Jenny Saville, Billie Piper, Michaela Coel, Gillian Anderson and Greta Gerwig (though, if she is booked, they may need to hire the biggest venue they have ever been in to satisfy the demand!). I am going to revisit a terrific event from Saturday, 28th June. In a first time for The Trouble Club, they held a trio of events on a Saturday at the same venue. At Conway Hall, Sarah Harman and then Emma Slade Edmondson and Nicole Ocran helped to create a wonderful day of events. Even though theirs were not hugely populated – maybe the over-hot weather and the fact it was a Saturday was a factor; a shame considering how incredible they were! – these speakers were amazing. I will write why I try and attend as many events as possible.

Welcoming in a packed audience, Grace Beverley spoke about her experiences as owner of TALA. Their mission and ethos is to “bring you consciously-made, active-inspired pieces that deliver on performance, fit, quality and style, without the hefty price tag”. The Working Hard with Grace Beverley is a podcast I would recommend everyone subscribe to. Last July, GQ were invited to Grace Beverley’s London home. Not even thirty, Beverley owns TALA and the fitness brand, Shreddy. With a successful podcast too, she is extremely busy. However, she ensures that health and good sleep are at the top of her priority list:

“What does an average day look like for you?

I always post my daily schedule on my Instagram [because] you hear a lot about the 5am club and I wanted to paint a very accurate picture of what my life actually looks like. I'm one of those people who wakes up as close as physically possible to the time I have to leave the house.

Generally, I try not to do something more than two nights of the week on weekdays: I find that I get really burnt out otherwise. On Monday night I see my friends because there were a good few years where I felt like we just saw each other only last minute. So this is as an equivalent to a date night. Other than that I will eat at home with my dogs and my fiancé and watch TV.

A lot of your business is fitness-oriented. How do you incorporate fitness into your life at the moment?

I have really hard and fast rules because my job is very much a job that is never done. For example, I need to do three workouts in the week. Any of them can be substituted for a half-hour intense walk but normally I do one run, one lifting session and one pilates class. I need that sort of permanence in my life.

Another big essential has been getting a walking desk. My job is really sedentary which is quite ironic as my company is in the fitness space. Having a walking desk has been amazing for when I have back to back calls.

Let's talk about Tala. If you could only keep one item, what would it be?

You've put me in a really challenging position here but it would have to be the DayFlex Flares. They are the complete bestseller: you can dress them up or down and they're so comfortable.

How do you prevent yourself from getting burnt out?

I think it is all about boundaries. I had really bad burnout in 2021. I remember this day where all I could do was a 1000-piece jigsaw puzzle. I realised that I had pushed myself too hard and, you know, some people say it takes you two years to recover from burnout. I genuinely do feel like I'm just coming out of that.

So even though in my diary it might look like I'm free, I'm not. That time is scheduled for not moving on the sofa. That sounds ridiculous and I used to think I was young and should be going out, but actually, I think one of the biggest things I've learned is that you just need to protect yourself”.

Taking place tomorrow (8th July) at the Magic Circle Theatre Euston, When Pop Culture Turned on Women: Sophie Gilbert & Pandora Sykes is going to be a fascinating event. Topics discussed that are so relevant and timely. Her book, Girl on Girl: How Pop Culture Turned a Generation of Women Against Themselves “scrutinises the way sexist 90s and 00s pop culture blunted feminism’s third wave”, as DAZED write in their interview with Sophie Gilbert from April.

“The things we watch, listen to, read, wear, write, and share dictate in large part how we internalise and project what we’re worth,” writes Sophie Gilbert in Girl on Girl: How Pop Culture Turned a Generation of Women Against Themselves. Chronicling the transition from the 1990s to 2000s, which was psychologically violent and sexually exploitative for many women who were part of the pop culture machine, Gilbert calls for a “reappraisal”. She wonders what this moment reflexively did to us as spectators: “How did it condition us to see ourselves? And, maybe more crucially, what did it condition us to think about other women…?”

The reappraisal is implemented with assists from works like Ariel Levy’s Female Chauvinist Pigs and Chris Kraus’ introduction to Pornocracy, alongside Gilbert’s own examinations of Abercrombie & Fitch, Britney Spears, Paris Hilton, Issa Rae, Sheryl Sandberg, Amy Winehouse, Nora Ephron, Taylor Swift, Anna Nicole Smith, the Spice Girls, Lil’ Kim and Hilary Clinton. Every form of media is probed, from reality TV (Celebrity Big Brother) to oversharing bloggers (Gawker) to the beginning of live streaming (Jennicam) to unthinkable trends (paparazzi upskirt photos). We spoke with Gilbert – a longtime staff writer at The Atlantic – about charged words (“empowering”, “gaslighting”, etc), the ingenuity of Lena Dunham, and the utility of scrutinising recent history.

You mention the word empowering makes you ‘deeply suspicious’. Why, and how are we supposed to make sense of those terms?

Sophie Gilbert: There were certain words that kept coming up over and over and over again during my research, and ‘empowering’ was one of them. Almost inevitably, whenever it came up, it was being used in a defensive sense, after someone had been critiqued for something. The first Wonderbra ad with Eva Herzigova in 1994 was on billboards everywhere; it was very old-school bombshell, like the death knell for third-wave feminism. But the defence of it was that it was ‘empowering’. She made a lot of money, so maybe it was empowering [laughs]. Then there was a movie poster [for 2007 film Hostel 2] where a woman was being tortured and confined. It was quite dark, and when there were complaints, one of the producers claimed that they were ‘empowering’, because in the end, she fights back.

Marketers love nothing more than a good buzzword, right? When they find a word that they can imbue with a certain kind of progressive meaning, that is always a word that you should be suspicious of. Even the word ‘feminism’ is something that is so loaded at this point. But feminism does have a very clear meaning: women should have equal rights to men, and have equal protection under the law.

You mention dancing in clubs to Sisqó’s ‘Thong Song’, Christina Aguilera’s ‘Dirrty’, and 50 Cent’s ‘P.I.M.P.’. There is a duty to be critical of cultural content, but how do we honour pop culture we like, even if it’s not quite ‘pure’?

Sophie Gilbert: The way I dance when ‘Thong Song’ comes on! The thing is, this era was glorious in so many ways, and that was why it was so easy to be swept up in it. It was so excessive and glittery and skin-exposing — it was touching on all these pleasure points in our brain, right? And there’s a reason why it’s coming back now as an aesthetic mode and as nostalgia, because it is so appealing.

My point with this book was never to cancel anything, with a few exceptions in the pornography chapter. My point wasn’t to say that anything should be dismissed. It was more to put it all out there and to draw connections for myself in a way that I hoped would make sense to other people. I’m coming to it with my own memories and life experiences, but I really did hope that everyone would come to it with their own frame. I don’t want to write off what so many of us loved. I just want people to be able to see the totality of what was happening in a slightly more considered way.

I go to a lot of events blind. Unless it is a speaker I recognise and know the work/career of, I am booking a ticket because the event description and theme interests me. Every single time I go to an event, I come away not only having learned new things. I also get to find out more about an incredible person. Themes discussed that I do not get exposure to in my everyday life. I mentioned three events that happened recently. Let's Talk Mixed Race with Emma Slade Edmondson and Nicole Ocran was about the richness of the mixed race experience. Sarah Harman is this incredible author of All the Other Mothers Hate Me. Someone I did not know a lot about. Though there were not many men for Grace Beverley – a few here and there -, for me, it was about her story and experience. This amazing entrepreneur who is a huge success story. However, I wanted to know more about her role as owner of TALA and how she built the brand. Words of wisdom and experience, though I cannot identify with her career and experiences directly – and I do not shop at TALA -, it was an enriching and fascinating event. The engrossing When Tech & Ancestral Power Collide: A Night with Kelechi Okafor was powerful for a different reason. You are surrounded by these amazing women! Many coming to Trouble for he first time. Some who are regulars. Each time, you get to meet someone new and know you are in a space with truly awesome women. You can see future leaders, business owners and cultural figures in these audiences. These beautiful venues that provide their own distinct atmosphere and charm. The continued drive and passion of Ellie Newton and her brilliant team. I am looking to future events with Yuan Yang, Cally Beaton and Marina Hyde. Thrilled and keen to see where The Trouble Club heads next year and how they grow. With its membership strengthening and its future bright, you need to join me and many others who hold The Trouble Club dearly in the heart. I can guarantee you, as a member, will experience some of the most…

@thetroubleclub “Here it comes.” - Given current events it felt right to share the words of one of the wisest speakers to grace the Trouble stage, Margaret Atwood.  #thetroubleclub #londonevents #communityforwomen #podcastclips #podcast #manchesterevents #womenownedbusiness #uselection #trump @Ellie Newton ♬ original sound - The Trouble Club

MEMORABLE evenings of your life.

FEATURE: Kate Bush: The Tour of Life: Controversy Around The Dreaming’s Eponymous Single

FEATURE:

 

 

Kate Bush: The Tour of Life

 

Controversy Around The Dreaming’s Eponymous Single

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FOR most of Kate Bush’s singles…

IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in 1982/PHOTO CREDIT: Guido Harari

I write anniversary features every year. It is a way of exploring the songs in more detail and bringing them to people who may not be aware of them. The Dreaming’s eponymous track was released as a single on 26th July, 1982. It was the second single from The Dreaming. Sat in Your Lap was released in 1981. Maybe not an obvious single choice, it reached forty-eight in the U.K. Maybe a hard sell for a single, it is not the most commercial-sounding song. The Dreaming as a whole was not really designed with radio-friendly songs in mind. However, there is a bit to discuss about The Dreaming forty-three years after it was released. Before coming to some of the issues with the song, it is worth saying that Bush’s heart was definitely in the right place. Someone always concerned about people and how they were treated, for her to discuss the treatment of the Aboriginal homelands by white Australians in their quest for weapons-grade uranium is nothing forced or insincere. The Dreaming is an album where Bush talks about issues like war and destruction. The quest for knowledge. There are some big themes addressed. However, when it comes to talking about The Dreaming as a single, I guess we need to look at it from different sides. Before getting to that, here is some interview archive from the Kate Bush Encyclopedia:

“We started with the drums, working to a basic Linn drum machine pattern, making them sound as tribal and deep as possible. This song had to try and convey the wide open bush, the Aborigines – it had to roll around in mud and dirt, try to become a part of the earth. “Earthy” was the word used most to explain the sounds. There was a flood of imagery sitting waiting to be painted into the song. The Aborigines move away as the digging machines move in, mining for ore and plutonium. Their sacred grounds are destroyed and their beliefs in Dreamtime grow blurred through the influence of civilization and alcohol. Beautiful people from a most ancient race are found lying in the roads and gutters. Thank God the young Australians can see what’s happening.

The piano plays sparse chords, just to mark every few bars and the chord changes. With the help of one of Nick Launay’s magic sounds, the piano became wide and deep, effected to the point of becoming voices in a choir. The wide open space is painted on the tape, and it’s time to paint the sound that connects the humans to the earth, the dijeridu. The dijeridu took the place of the bass guitar and formed a constant drone, a hypnotic sound that seems to travel in circles.

None of us had met Rolf (Harris) before and we were very excited at the idea of working with him. He arrived with his daughter, a friend and an armful of dijeridus. He is a very warm man, full of smiles and interesting stories. I explained the subject matter of the song and we sat down and listened to the basic track a couple of times to get the feel. He picked up a dijeridu, placing one end of it right next to my ear and the other at his lips, and began to play.

I’ve never experienced a sound quite like it before. It was like a swarm of tiny velvet bees circling down the shaft of the dijeridu and dancing around in my ear. It made me laugh, but there was something very strange about it, something of an age a long, long time ago.

Women are never supposed to play a dijeridu, according to Aboriginal laws; in fact there is a dijeridu used for special ceremonies, and if this was ever looked upon by a woman before the ceremony could take place, she was taken away and killed, so it’s not surprising that the laws were rarely disobeyed. After the ceremony, the instrument became worthless, its purpose over.

Kate Bush Club newsletter, October 1982”.

I suppose the association with Rolf Harris is an unfortunate one. He played on the song and would later feature on Kate Bush’s 2005 album, Aerial. Luckily, that album was reissued on streaming services and Harris was replaced by Bush’s son, Bertie. The vinyl has been reissued too so, if you have an original 2005 copy, I would suggest replacing it. It is commendable that Bush, like she always did and always would, was embracing other cultures and sounds. Some of the issues and controversy about The Dreaming stemmed from its original title, The Abo Song, which used a racial slur. Promotional copies of the single were circulated with this title before being recalled due to the offensive language. The song has also been slammed for potential cultural appropriation, specifically concerning the use of the didgeridoo and Aboriginal imagery. Bush did want to highlight the plight of Aboriginal Australians and the destruction of their land. However, to many, Bush’s portrayal, even with good intentions at heart, perpetuated a colonial narrative. There is this accusation of cultural appropriation. Whilst Bush was voicing her horror at what Aboriginal people have faced and how their land was being destroyed, the fact that she was a white artist did lead to people to question her motives and authenticity. Did this do more harm than good? Bush using the language and words of colonisers has given The Dreaming an awkward and complicated legacy. There are positives to focus on. The use of a didgeridoo in a British single in 1982 would have been radical. Bush was always incorporating instruments from different parts of the world in her albums. This was Bush using an instrument she came across whilst vacationing in Australia.

I do want to come to a review of The Dreaming from Medium. It is clear that The Dreaming is not necessarily one of her most loved singles. It was a low chart position. After a run of successful singles from 1978 to 1981’s Sat in Your Lap, The Dreaming charting outside of the top forty was a blow. It was a trend that continued until Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God) was released in 1985. However, it is an interesting song that I feel is underrated as a piece of work:

“The album’s namesake and second single opens up the second half, side B, of the album. We are introduced to a didgeridoo and heavy engulfing drumbeat. After a sudden BANG! Kate starts to sing in a prominent Australian accent. The production is wide and open, yet heavy and dark, like a thunderstorm approaching a wide dry plain. Approaching the pre-chorus, Kate breathes quickly (hoo-hoo-hoo-ha-ha-ha) using breath as a rhythmic element, something we’ll hear later on in “All The Love.” It’s remarkably similar to the breakdown in Depeche Mode’s “Personal Jesus” as well (though I can’t say whether or not Kate directly inspired it!)

The chorus opens to a group of people sing-spelling “D-R-E-A-M-T-I-M-E” while Percy Edwards impersonates a goat and a synthesized whistle plays in the background. The song is sonically arresting throughout and remains to be a feat in production. It maintains intensity and atmosphere. It is metallic and natural. To achieve the metallic tone of the main melody, Kate plugged a guitar and piano into a harmonizer that were fed into a reverb plate as well that fed the rising octave back into the harmonizer — an effect used several times on the album. The “bang” in the lyrics is a combination of the recorded sound of a car door closing and a synth tone.

Some of my favorite moments on the album are when the crowd come in to sing “You’ll find them in the road!” and proceed to cheer and slowly fade out in a wash of reverberated white noise, bringing the song down like a setting sun.

Lyrically, Kate touches upon the plight of the Aborigines being run out of their sacred land as colonizers come in to dig for ore — easily summarized in these lyrics “Erase the race that claim the place and say we dig for ore/(See the light ram through the gaps in the land)/Dangle devils in a bottle and push them from the Pull of the Bush.” She humanizes the native Aborigines, and attempts to show the gentrification from their eyes. It should also be noted that Kate wrote remarkably similar lines of poetry when she was young:

“The blood red sun sinks into the skull of a dead man.” — From The Crucifixion, written when Kate was only 11 or 12”.

I did want to mark forty-there years of The Dreaming. It’s eponymous single was definitely important. Two singles from Never for Ever, Breathing and Army Dreamers, were more political in nature. The Dreaming is too. The next single released from the album, There Goes a Tenner, arrived in November 1982. Much jauntier in its tone, it was an even bigger commercial disappointment in the U.K. It did not chart at all! I do applaud Kate Bush for releasing music which was less commercial than EMI hoped. She was making the music she wanted to and tackling themes that were beyond that of love and the personal. The Dreaming is significant as it is a song where Bush shines a light on a people who were witnessing this devastation and colonisation. I can see why she felt angered and what to do something. However, I do wonder whether the decision to play an Australian coloniser was the best move. It makes the song sound quite dated. One you will not hear played on the radio too much. Also, the fact Rolf Harris’s part has not been removed – I guess as it is integral to the song – gives it a black mark. A song that was performed live a few times, there is sort of this bittersweet aspect. However, we need to focus on the positives as well as the negatives. It is a powerful track that has this unusual and untraditional sound. Listen to The Dreaming as an album and you can hear this invention and variation through all ten tracks. It is a stunning album that everyone needs to hear. Its title track is great in so many ways but, unfortunately, when it comes to its politics and the issues around cultural appropriation, then it…

MISSES the mark.

FEATURE: For Cassie: Why the Music Industry Needs a #MeToo Revolution

FEATURE:

 

 

For Cassie

IN THIS PHOTO: Cassandra Fine (Cassie Ventura)/PHOTO CREDIT: Jorden Keith Sorensen

 

Why the Music Industry Needs a #MeToo Revolution

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SOME incredibly inspiring…

 IN THIS IMAGE: A sketch of Sean Combs looking at jurors at the start of jury selection in Manhattan federal court on Monday, 5h May in New York/IMAGE CREDIT: Elizabeth Williams/AP

and amazing women like Jess Davies and Dr. Charlotte Proudman have reacted to the recent verdict involving Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs. In short, it is a travesty of justice! The circus and freak show that was his trial culminated in Combs being found “guilty of two counts of transportation to engage in prostitution, relieving him of the three more serious charges of racketeering conspiracy and sex trafficking”. This is how The Independent reported the news. The audacity of the abuser to pray – why is it always abusive and vile men who us pray and turn to religion when they have been accused or rape and abuse?! (see also Russell Brand) – in the court and this insane jury to clear him of some serious charges revealed a few thing. For a start, it is clear that men in power in America – and around the world – can evade justice and bypass the most severe punishment is they are famous and powerful. This is what we are being shown. The world is in a desperate state at the moment. The U.S. is being led by a dictator and sex offender. Donald Trump is one of the most hideous and dangerous people ever to lead a country. The fact the U.S. voted him in is one of the most insane and vile decisions in political history. They are living with it and I hope that they learn from their stupidity and realise how they have helped to create this damage and disease. Trump is leading a country where abortion is illegal.

PHOTO CREDIT: Lara Jameson/Pexels

Stripping women’s body rights and autonomy. The U.K. is being led by Sir Keir Starmer. We have passed laws where women are legally defined by sex and not gender. This discriminated against trans women and is a human rights travesty. We have also made it illegal for people to support Palestine Action. People who support them can receive up to fourteen years in prison. We are living in a dictatorship where our government are supporting and funding Israel. A nation committing a genocide. Our Prime Minister is a war criminal who has no humanity and is a disgusting and heartless excuse for a human. Israel is committing genocide and Russia is destroying Ukraine. Men in power are destroying the world. The fact is that, when it comes to women’s rights and safety around the world, those in power do not care. The case of Diddy shows that America hates women. Celebrities can abuse and rape women and engage in trafficking and get away with it. If they are famous and rich then the law does not apply to them. The jury for the Diddy trial consisted of eight men and four women. You feel the glee from them as they got him off of some heinous charges. Corrupt and senseless, just think of a brave woman like Cassie Ventura – a woman Diddy beat, abused and raped – and what she felt when the verdict was read. Almost getting away with everything, the case of Diddy is nothing new. Powerful men in society can avoid prosecution and jail because of their gender and wealth! Music is an industry that sees a score of men accused of rape, sexual abuse - and so many other crimes.

 IN THIS PHOTO: Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs with Cassie Ventura in 2016/PHOTO CREDIT: Chris Delmas/AFP via Getty Images

So few are put in prison or have to face responsibility. You know that Diddy is someone who will not face any prison time and will probably return to a successful career. Play arenas and release new music. A score of sick and deluded fans heralding his brilliance and lining his wallet. Essentially funding an abuser. It is not a case of it being a complicated case that is objective and we have no concrete evidence. We have video of Diddy attacking Cassie Ventura! We know he is guilty of these crimes, and yet, he has managed to wriggle out of them because of his stature. And, let’s face it, the fact he is a man. If it were a woman in the court, she would be thrown in prison and lose her career! America hates women. America will support wealthy and powerful men, regardless of what they do. There should be a revolution on the streets! There isn’t. Diddy should not be allowed to release music or make any money ever again. He will. Not to be a bad feminist, but I am so sick of men. Everything we are seeing in Palestine is because of men. All the violence and genocide. The leaders enabling it. The leaders here and in the U.S. All the acts of violence and abuse around the world because of men! Violence and sexual abuse is a male issue. They are responsible for the vast majority of it. Take them away and we would have world peace and women would feel safe. Right now, we are in one of the bleakest places we have ever been in.

When it comes to women and their rights and safety, your heart breaks for them! Diddy was acquitted of sex trafficking and racqueting. People asking why women do not come forward. This is why! It is not only Cassie Ventura who was denied justice. ‘Jane’ and ‘Mia’ – who remained anonymous but added to the evidence and testimony of Cassie Ventura – are women who were almost mocked. Diddy’s supporters oiling themselves up and celebrating the verdict. I saw someone on Twitter ask why juries in cases like this are not made up of experts in sexual violence and abuse. People qualified to assess the evidence and make an informed judgment. Inviting random people to the jury who have no idea about any of this will see men acquitted. It is an insult to women! Going forward, how many men in the music industry will avoid being brought to trial because women know they will not get justice?! This is what Dr. Charlotte Proudman recently tweeted: “Sean “Diddy” Combs didn’t testify. His lawyers called no witnesses, his case rested in just 30 minutes. Meanwhile, 30 people testified against him. Employees. Ex-partners. Voice notes. CCTV of him beating Cassie. And still no justice. Fame protects power. Power protects men”. It is not only the music industry where men are protected. However, as I have noted before, they (the industry) have not had this revolution. I feel society and culture is on the brink of an explosion. The dictatorship in this country that supports a genocidal nation and wants to imprison anyone who stands against such a thing.

People will take to the streets in their millions soon. In the music world, how long can we keep seeing abusers and the most despicable human beings not only swerve justice and any repercussions but return to their careers?! Diddy is one example; Chris Brown another. Although  R. Kelly is in prison, you feel he will get out sooner than expected and he has not really been handed as severe a punishment as he should have been (in 2021, he was found guilty of exploiting his superstar status to run a scheme to sexually abuse women and children over two decades). Where do women go from here?! We have reached a point where there needs to be insurrection in music. Women’s rights and equality have not been addressed or improved in decades. Even though they rule the industry, they have very little power and rights. From someone as minor as headline slots on major stages to being believed when it comes to allegations of rape and sexual crimes, how far have we moved in recent years?! For Cassie Ventura and every woman who has bravely testified and being denied respect, dignity and justice, I hope that we see the day (soon!) when things change. For the countless women who have not come forward because they will not be believed. Even if a Hollywood-style #MeToo movement might not work in music or we have passed that stage, there does need to be an equivalent. We cannot stand by to see men like Diddy receive a comparative slap on the wrist for what amounts to the worst kinds of abuse and exploitation against women. It is clear America hates women and will protect and boost wealthy men. Things are not much better here. Misogyny that is rife throughout society is fetid and rampant in music. I have been reading posts from women like Jess Davies, Dr. Charlotte Proudman and scores of others highlighting the injustice and cold fact that women cannot get justice. They will not be believed and, worst than that, they can face the most harrowing abuse and damaging torment and live with that for the rest of their lives whilst their abusers not only are found innocent, but they can also still make money and have a career! Right now, the music industry needs to answer questions and change things. Thinking about Cassie Ventura and the women who have testified against Diddy, they have been treated appallingly. America and the world. It is evident that they do not care about women. Sadly and tragically, we have to ask this: When it comes to women’s rights and their safety…

WILL things ever change?!

FEATURE: Modern-Day Queens: Kesha

FEATURE:

 

 

Modern-Day Queens

PHOTO CREDIT: Ruben Chamorro

 

Kesha

__________

THIS time out…

PHOTO CREDIT: Brendan Walter

for Modern-Day Queens, I am concentrating on the fabulous Kesha. This feature includes the best and most important women in music right now. Kesha released her . (Period) album on 4th July. In many ways, this was a return to the hot mess/fun Kesha that some critics felt was lacking on recent albums. In truth, she wants to keep her music shifting and evolving. . (PERIOD) is very different to her earlier work. I wanted to feature her to shine a light on the album but also get inside some recent interviews. One of the most inspiring women in music, I know so many of her fans look up to her. Kesha Rose Sebert is a huge American artist whose debut album, Animal, was released in 2010. Her debut single, Tik Tok, was released in 2009. That remains her best-known track. I think her most recent three albums are her best. 2023’s Gag Order is hugely impressive and deserves more discussion. 2020’s High Road was an album that splices genres beautifully. Kesha wanted to portray a sense of happiness and freedom through the album. This year, she reflected how that was complicated due to the loneliness she felt at the time. . (PERIOD) may be her finest album yet. I think that it is one that should be heard by everyone. I will end with two reviews of the album. There are some interviews from this year that I want to bring in first. The first interview I am sourcing from was published back in April. Published by PAPER, Kesha and Bob The Drag Queen “connected for a conversation about freedom, songwriting and Snatch Game”. Looking ahead to the release of . (PERIOD), “and in anticipation of the honor she’s set to receive next week from The NYC LGBT Community Center”, there are parts of this terrific interview that I want to start out with:

“Bob: And then what about your album?

Kesha: So, my album, PERIOD, just got announced. The muse for my other albums has been a lot of external factors or things I've been going through, things that were unavoidable to create art about. And to be honest with you, this is my first album where I'm truly free in every way. And not only in all the legal ways, but also I'm really working on healing and feeling free from any residual emotional turmoil that's left in my body. I spent the weekend dancing and trying to move trauma through my body. I'm really trying to embody freedom in every way possible. I'm trying to allow myself to feel what freedom feels like, because it's been almost 20 years for me. And that doesn't just happen in a day. That programming lives inside your mind and your spirit and your body. And we all have ways in which we are or are not free. My perspective and vantage point is obviously my own lived experience.

But freedom, by definition, is the power and the right to act and speak and think as you want to without any restraint. And it's terrifying for me to really embody full freedom, because it's the act of really embodying who you are to the fullest. And to really feel that, it starts with safety. So, that's why creating safe spaces has been my number-one objective, because how can anyone truly feel free if they don't feel safe?

Bob: We've had the misfortune of watching people like you and Britney Spears and Wendy Williams see what the entertainment industry does to women and how it tries — once you start to go toward your own freedom — to have it stripped away. It brought a lot of us together to rally around you and to support you. I told a story on a podcast recently, you've written so many beautiful songs. When people go to your concert they usually cry during “Praying.” But for me it was “Blow.” I don't know what it was. It was the encore performance. So much of your early work was about being free and having fun. Something about seeing you on stage performing “Blow,” and I just heard you do your little laugh and go, “Dance.” And as soon as you said “dance,” I just started crying, which is great. I made it through the whole concert without a single tear until then.

PHOTO CREDIT: Brett Loudermilk

Kesha: That's honestly making me really emotional. The most political act right now is to be happy and to be free and to spread love. And even when all the forces feel like they're against you — to put on that makeup and to put on your glitter and to dance — just demanding to feel your joy. At that point I was years into litigation and had nothing to give. I was so depleted emotionally from my joy and so disconnected from being treated like a human. And I still, in the face of all of that, I was goddamn determined to spread joy even when I had no joy to give. I appreciate you seeing that.

Bob: We all saw it, and it really meant a lot to rally around you and see you up there telling us to have fun, telling us to dance, telling us to cover ourselves in glitter. To put some glitter in your hair, throw on a sequin and a leather jacket and a combat boot, and still hit the club and enjoy yourselves regardless. Because that's truly what the powers that be don't want us to see. They want to believe that they've stripped all your joy away from you.

Kesha: It's like laughing in the face of chaos and turmoil, and finding each other and finding community and finding love and finding a safe place to move your bodies. I really think joy and love is the most political act that we could all embody right now. Because we are in the middle of a chaotic shit storm, it’s like spiritual warfare. And I just think that what you do and what I do, we really are warriors for joy and freedom. It's much more than just putting on a wig or me dancing around. It's not that. It's a very defiant political act to be in your joy and to spread that.

This is my first album where I'm truly free in every way... I'm really trying to embody freedom in every way possible.

What informs and inspires your art today? What are you tapping into?

Bob: I always find joy. Something about humor is so remarkable to me, because people really can laugh despite it all. My mom passed away last year on Mother's Day. It was really, really, really hard. I buried her the next Sunday. And then the Sunday after that, I went to go film The Traitors, this incredibly stressful TV show about deceit and lying and death and murder. But in the midst of all that, somehow I was still able to find joy and laughter because that's what my mom would have wanted.

Kesha: My god, I'm really sorry to hear about your mother. Even the ability for you to go and give that is a gift, and to be able to go and give that gift to others, what a selfless act. I'm just sending you so much love.

PHOTO CREDIT: Brett Loudermilk

Bob: It was crazy, I'm not going to lie, but it actually helped me out a lot. I think it was better for me than sitting at home by myself.

Kesha: That's the beauty of art. I celebrated the release of “YIPPEE-KI-YAY.” and the announcement of PERIOD by teaching others how to write songs, which is the most beautiful part about art. I think escapism is an incredibly important and valuable thing for humans, especially when hard things are happening. To have an outlet to put your grief into, to put your emotions into something that then can help connect you to others.

When I create a song, it makes a moment of my life immortal. At the end of my life, I can go back and listen to my life through all of my songs that I've put out and all the ones that I haven't been able to put out. It's like the book of my life. I really wanted to capture the feeling and the healing of a woman. My gift to this world is my voice, it's like my prayer to the world. I've been so blessed and privileged that many people have gotten to hear my voice. It seems like the rights to one's self-expression and their voice shouldn't be legally allowed to be taken away. But in my case, that's what happened to me for 20 years.

So, I wanted to really capture in song what it sounds like for a woman to regain the rights back to the thing that is her gift to the world. I wanted to capture that entire journey of healing, freedom, reclaiming my joy, falling in love with myself as I am, and I want to give that gift to the world because, like you were just talking about, Bob, it's not always meant to connect you to other people. Art can be a very selfish act when you're creating it; at least it is for me when I write songs. I write songs because I need to get an emotion out of my body, but the alchemy of it is you create this thing and you have the courage and the bravery to put it out for mass judgment, which is a terrifying part of our jobs, but we have the balls to do it.

Through that emotional release for ourselves and that courage and through a fuck ton of judgment and hate, then people get to connect to you and find solace in our shared humanity. We realize that we are not alone, and we are all one, and we all do go through many of the same things. I really wanted to capture reclaiming my freedom. I wanted to capture that in song and I want to give that as a gift to the world, because everybody's going through something. It might not be the same something, but everybody's going through something or has been through something. And for me specifically, after what I've been through, I want people to see that my joy is still my right.

Bob: It's really crazy when you think about how some of your newer fans have not been alive as long as you've been silenced. Some 15-year-old who doesn't have a memory of you before you were going through these legal battles. And especially when you talk about putting your art out there for criticism.

Kesha: That judgment piece is something that I've been working a lot on. To put out art is a fight. You have to want it and you have to fight for that. It's expensive and it takes up your greatest asset, your time. On social media, where everyone judges the shit out of everybody else, from your body to your art to anything else... I'm trying to heal from decades of projected judgments that I've internalized, and it's become my truth. That's what I was trying to dance out of my body this weekend, because that shit gets stored in your body. I realized I haven't danced for fun in years, because people make fun of the way I dance. And it's probably just some 12-year-old in their mom's basement on Twitter, but that becomes my higher power’s voice. That's a problem. So, I'm trying to change any of my own personal judgments into curiosity. It's a really beautiful gift. I was given an exercise and I would challenge the world: when you start feeling judgmental, what if you flip that into curiosity?

Bob: Yeah, that's actually really powerful. I'm not gonna say I'm not judgy. We recognize it in ourselves.

Kesha: I'm judgy as hell.

Bob: Which allows us to see it in others.

Kesha: My inner critic tells me things where your mom or your therapist will be like, "No, that's just your inner critic." Then when you see it on the cover of a magazine or somebody else is writing it on the internet, it is like an externalized inner critic. That’s something that really fucks with your head for me.

Bob: When someone out there vocalizes your worst fear about yourself.

Kesha: Yes.

Bob: Then you can really be like, “I fucking knew it. I should have never released this. I should have never worn that outfit. I should have never danced. I should have never gone to that one show. I knew as soon as I got off stage, I knew the show was shit.” And then this one person on TikTok or Twitter, or this critic in this magazine or this newspaper, confirmed what I knew: that this was shit.

Kesha: The freedom I'm trying to get back every day is being okay with where I am in my journey. Like you said, freedom is not a destination. The desire for freedom is ongoing and the freedom to really embody oneself fully on a world stage takes so much courage. I'm really trying to break through this judgment piece to find true freedom to be able to play and have fun. It’s a political act”.

PHOTO CREDIT: J.N. Silva

I am going to move to an interview from Vogue that came out at the start of this month. Talking about . (PERIOD) and some of its songs, it is clear – as Vogue say – that the party is just getting started. If Kesha has addressed darker themes and more traumatic incidents on albums such as Gag Order, there is a shift in terms of sound and lyric dynamics for . (PERIOD):

“As the album began taking shape, what did you want to say with it?

I wanted it to be the ultimate fuck-you album of all time. I listen to my new record when I need that strength to be my own watchdog. I’m really protective of my time, space, and energy now. Anything that has kept me from feeling free, I’m very cutthroat about that. Anything that is keeping me from being in my fullest potential, it’s gone. Even if it’s an internalized voice that’s keeping me from my true freedom, it’s got to go. I really wanted to make a triumphant soundtrack for those moments. I hope people put it on and love themselves a little more, protect themselves a little stronger, and have their backs a little harder.

Do you think pop artists need to take more risks like that these days?

When I look around to the other girls dominating pop right now, I think we’re doing a pretty goddamn good job. I love that people are so mad about Sabrina [Carpenter] being hot. I’m like, Keep being hot, girl! You’re doing it right! And Charli [XCX] just fully embodying her truest self. I think we’re doing pretty good. I just want to add my flavor. Music is not a competition. In the pop scene and culture that I was raised in, these major labels would try to pit us against each other, and that is complete bullshit. When we come together, that’s where the power is.

Do you think it’s easier to be a pop star nowadays, or is it even more challenging?

As women in culture, it’s not ever going to be easy. We’re up against trying to be pretty but not too pretty. Trying to be funny but not going over the line. Be sexy, but don’t be a slut. Trying to fit into societal standards is a losing game, especially as a woman in pop. So everyone should keep being themselves, and fuck what anybody says.

In your song “Red Flag,” you talk about your attraction to red flags. What are a few of them?

I’ve worked on myself, and I try not to be attracted to red flags. But I have found myself attracted to lots of red flags. The guy with the motorcycle who does not have a place to live? Hot. The guy who goes to the gym three times a day but doesn’t have a job? Hot. You name it, it’s probably hot. But instead of punishing myself for it, this song is a celebration of the fact that I really do have the best dating history—and have a lot of really funny stories.

In “Delusional,” you sing about someone deluding themselves into thinking they can move on and find someone better. But do you think a little delusion in life can be a good thing?

Oh, 100%. Sometimes believing in yourself is completely delusional. When you have big creative ideas as an artist, you feel absolutely out of your mind until they happen. If I had told you a couple of years ago, “I’m going to play Madison Square Garden, and it’s going to be a blend of my spiritual practices and a bunch of pop songs,” you’d be like, “It sounds delusional.” But that’s exactly what the fuck I’m about to do [on my tour]. And it’s very cunt”.

Prior to quoting from two positive reviews for . (PERIOD), there is one more interview I want to include. This one is from FADER. They note how many Pop artists of today are returning to the 2010s and its gonzo sound. Kesha is meeting that and, in the process, releasing . (PERIOD) through her own label (Kesha). Anyone who has not heard her new album really needs to. It is among the best of this year:

“Period arrives almost a year after brat, an album also about freedom and an artist doing whatever the fuck they wanted that manifested itself into a lifestyle and cultural lodestar, extending the possibilities of what a pop record could do and the reach it could have. Artists like Lorde say it has made them more ambitious. Kesha echoes something similar: “Charli’s always been ahead of the curve; it’s been really inspiring,” she says. Kesha’s appearance on Charli’s “Spring Breakers” remix last year reminded her that pop shouldn’t be a competition. “Growing up in this era of music, the people around me would try to compare me to other people. So, I couldn't help but feel that I was in competition with people that I was a fan of, and it was a really confusing place to be.” She brings the point back to her freedom: “But, you know, through my process of gaining my freedom and really looking at my patterns of thinking that keep me from feeling free, I realize that the only competition is with myself.”

The world seems very ready for this reduxed Kesha. At a time when popstars are returning to the gonzo sounds of the 2010s and people are eagerly identifying so-called “recession indicators,” Kesha once again fits squarely in the cultural moment. She is performing with some of the best stats of her career. As of writing, she’s Spotify’s 64th most listened-to artist in the world, a number that’s been climbing all week. She achieved her second-highest days of streaming in mid-June. She’s headlining New York City’s Madison Square Garden for the first time in July.

A successful — here comes the refrain again — free bitch, Kesha’s even exploring the possibility of finally releasing the long-lost Lipsha album with the Flaming Lips. The project, which originated from Wayne Coyne’s early belief in her talent, has become the white whale of Kesha’s fan lore. She’s currently looking into whether she can finally release Lipsha on Kesha Records, “but I’m not sure what I legally can do,” she says.

“I really wanted to stand for joy, and I really wanted to make people dance, and I wanted to be playful and I wanted to be the thing that everyone knows and loves me for, but I wasn’t free. I was really lonely”.

PHOTO CREDIT: J.N. Silva

I want to include some words from two (of the many) positive reviews for . (PERIOD). In their assessment, this is what AllMusic had to say about an album that has also received some more mixed reception. Although Kesha’s work will not appeal to all, I do think that she is producing her best work at the moment. Entering a new phase in her career and sound. I have followed her music since the start. She is someone I will always respect and admire:

“No typo, Kesha's sixth studio album, 2025's ., is literally the period at the end of a sentence, and one that marks a new era of personal and creative freedom for the singer. It's a bold declaration that's been long in the making for Kesha, who, unless you haven't been paying attention, has had a rough decade. Along with her legal battle with producer Dr. Luke and subsequent wrangling with her former labels RCA and Kemosabe Records, she also sought treatment for an eating disorder, spoke openly about dealing with body dysmorphia, and was diagnosed with common variable immunodeficiency disorder (CVID), the latter adding a physical fatigue to her career woes. She addressed many of these issues 2017's Rainbow, 2020's High Road, and 2023's Gag Order -- albums whose titles underscored what she was going through. And while . certainly finds her having worked through past traumas, it is also a convincing fresh start. Literally this is true, as it is her first album released on her own independent Kesha Records. Yet it also feels fun and effervescently inspired. Co-producing with a small trio of collaborators, including NOVA Wav, Pink Slip, and Zhone, Kesha comes off as both a seasoned industry pro and the maverick pop instigator she's always been. She kicks things off in bold fashion with the six-minute "FREEDOM," whose heady blend of atmospheric new age soundscapes and '80s house music grooves sets a clubby, cathartic tone. "I only drink when I'm happy and I'm drunk right now," she repeats on the song, offering a mantra for the album's blend of spiritual liberation with a side of debauchery. More giddy, genre-mashing moments follow, including the bandoneon-accented tango-house jam "JOYRIDE," the twangy hip-hop country of "YIPPEE-KI-YAY," and the sultry disco electro-soul of "TOO HARD." We also get the empowered uplift of "DELUSIONAL," "RED FLAG," and "THE ONE," big rousing anthems that smack you in the face with hooks and a hard-won sense of mature, protective self-love. However, Kesha hasn't lost her taste for hyperpop camp fun as the gleefully horny, tongue-in-cheek "BOY CRAZY" affirms. More than just a conceptual conceit, the all-caps titles speak to the mood of declarative joy Kesha conjures throughout. It's a vibe she underscores on the epic power ballad closer "CATHEDRAL," singing, "I'm summoning my divine.". isn't just a good album, it's a decisively great one, full stop”.

I am going to end with The Guardian’s review of . (PERIOD). Like with the interviews, I am not including the entire thing. I have selected parts of this review I feel are particularly standout and relevant. It is interesting comparing reviews for . (PERIOD) and reading what each reviewer had to say about the album:

“While Rainbow and its immediate follow-ups regularly mined the legal disputes and resulting trauma for lyrical inspiration – a dramatic shift from the screw-you hedonism that powered her big hits in the early 2010s – Period signals a fresh start by, more or less, bringing back the Kesha who boasted about brushing her teeth with Jack Daniel’s and took to the stage accompanied by dancers dressed as giant penises. Only the piano ballad closer Cathedral seems entirely rooted in recent events – “Life was so lethal … I died in the hell so I could start living again”. Elsewhere, the occasional hint of something dark in the author’s past (“I earned the right to be like this”) is drowned out by the sound of Kesha reverting to type in no uncertain terms: “take me to the sex shop”, “bartender pour me up some damn fluid”, “I like chaos, dripping head to toe”, “gimme gimme gimme all the boys”.

And who can blame her? No one wants to be defined by trauma, and she’s doubtless keen to assert that the original Kesha persona was more to do with her than the svengali-like producer who discovered her.

Furthermore, it’s a weirdly timely return. In 2010, Kesha’s hot mess persona made her an outlier, albeit an outlier whose debut single TiK ToK sold 14m digital copies worldwide. The critic Simon Reynolds smartly noted that if the era’s predominant female star Lady Gaga saw her work as high-concept art-pop in a lineage that included David Bowie and Roxy Music, Kesha was more like their glam-era rival Alice Cooper. Fifteen years on, we live in a pop world at least partly defined by Charli xcx’s last album. Perpetually half-cut and lusty, open about her messy failings (“I like the bizarre type, the lowlife … God, I love a hopeless bastard,” she sings of her taste in men on Red Flag), Kesha could make a fair claim to be a godmother of Brat. Certainly, you couldn’t accuse her of jumping on a latter-day trend, just as Period’s diversion into vogue-ish country-pop, Yippee-Ki-Yay, seems less craven than it might. Kesha has done past work in that area – from her 2013 Pitbull collaboration Timber to her duet with Dolly Parton on Rainbow.

Yippee-Ki-Yay’s country-facing sound sits among a buffet of current pop styles: there’s synthy, 80s-leaning pop-rock you could imagine Taylor Swift singing on Delusional and Too Hard, and mid-tempo disco on Love Forever, while the spectre of hyperpop haunts the warp-speed Boy Crazy and Hudson Mohawke turns up glitchy Auto-Tune-heavy electro on Glow. It’s an album clearly intended to re-establish Kesha at the heart of pop, which means there’s no room for the appealing weirdness of her 2023 single Eat the Acid, and it’s only on the closing Cathedral that her voice really shifts into the full-throttle roar she unleashed covering T Rex’s Children of the Revolution at 2022’s Taylor Hawkins tribute concert.

That said, the songs are all really strong, filled with smart little twists and drops, and funny, self-referential lines: “You’re on TikTok / I’m the fucking OG.” You get the sense of the massed ranks of collaborators – including everyone from regular Father John Misty foil Jonathan Wilson to Madison Love, who counts Blackpink and Addison Rae among her songwriting clients – really getting behind her to make Period a success. Kesha, meanwhile, plays the part of Kesha 1.0 to perfection: for all the lurid lyrical excesses, it never feels as if she’s trying too hard. And why would it: she’s returning to a role she originated”.

Someone who is definitely a modern-day queen in my view, Kesha is an artist who has inspired and empowered so many women. Charli xcx among them. . (PERIOD) is her new album and latest chapter. One of music’s most compelling women, I would encourage everyone to follow Kesha and check out her…

AWESOME new album.

___________

Follow Kesha

FEATURE: The Mysterious ‘J.B.’ The Curious People and Symbols in Kate Bush’s Work

FEATURE:

 

 

The Mysterious ‘J.B.’

 

The Curious People and Symbols in Kate Bush’s Work

__________

SORT of returning…

to an idea I pitched a while ago, there is this host of characters within Kate Bush’s work. Bush inserts mysterious symbols and images. All of her albums have a ‘K.T.’ symbol hidden somewhere. Short of the K.T. Bush Band I think, there are codes, mysteries and these fascinating figures that are on the covers and in the works. I was inspired something that Andy Miller posted recently to his Inventory: An Unreliable Guide to My Record Collection series. Miller is primarily a writer and a podcaster second. He co-hosts the brilliant Backlisted podcast with John Mitchinson. You can find their official website here. It is a podcast where older and less-discussed works of literature are dissected. You can subscribe to Backlisted here. The weekly feature published is not only about Kate Bush but ABBA, The Beatles, Stanley Binks, and many other artists. The post I am highlighting starts off by discussing how Kate Bush’s albums are ranked. How there are flaws in that approach. Andy Miller writes about the merits of each of her studio albums. The Dreaming is his favourite album. Sat in Your Lap, the first single from that album, is the one record of hers he treasures above all else. ‘WELL DONE J.B. 1ST DAN’ is etched by hand in the single’s run-out groove. Miller posits a theory about who ‘J.B.’ is and what the connection to martial arts is. I thought it was Kate Bush’s brother, John. He introduced his sister to martial arts (Bush trained at Goldsmiths College karate club where her John was a karate instructor). However, Miller’s words are original research and interpretation. It is interesting what he wrote:

“In the early ‘80s, there was much talk of bands incorporating hidden or coded messages in their music. For example, if you played the middle section of Led Zeppelin’s ‘Stairway to Heaven’ backwards, you would hear a hymn of praise to the Devil. * I never tried this myself, as it was already bad enough listening to the bloody thing forwards. But the concept of ‘backmasking’, as it was called, ignored a secret hiding in plain sight, which was that artists had been concealing messages within the grooves of their records for years, by scratching a few words into the shiny circle of vinyl between the playing surface and the label. These messages would range from the cryptic to the cheery and were usually spotted by only the keenest of fans. The most famous exponent of the form was mastering engineer George Peckham, many of whose singles and LPs were signed “Porky”, his nickname, or “A Porky Prime Cut”.

*  “Here's to my sweet Satan / The one whose little path would make me sad whose power is Satan / He'll give you, he'll give you 666 / There was a little tool shed where he made us suffer, sad Satan”. When played backwards, it is alleged these lines come out sounding something like this: “If there’s a bustle in your hedgerow, don’t be alarmed now / It’s just a spring clean for the May queen”. Which just shows you the whole ‘backmasking’ thing is nonsense, as this is obviously complete gibberish.

Back to ‘Sat in Your Lap’. For over forty years now, I have wondered why the words WELL DONE J.B. 1ST DAN are etched by hand in the single’s run-out groove. Who was J.B.? And what did he have to do with martial arts?

It seems I am not the only one. During another of those radio phone-in shows, this one broadcast on Radio 2 in September 1982 to publicise the release of The Dreaming, eagle-eyed Colin Home from Harrogate called in to ask Bush to reveal the identity of J.B.. “J.B. is a guy called John Barrett,” Bush replies, laughing. “He certainly deserves to be congratulated, because he did something very clever!” Pressed to disclose the nature of John Barrett’s achievement, which had after all earned him a black belt 1st Dan in whatever it was, Bush declines to say more, and the interview moves on. But I believe I have the answer.

In the late 1970s, John Barratt was a young recording engineer at Abbey Road Studios who worked with Bush on Never for Ever and The Dreaming – and, presumably, ‘Sat in Your Lap’. This was a happy and creative period for KB. Those around her recall a lot of fun and general hilarity during these sessions. But in 1981, John Barratt was diagnosed with cancer. While he was recuperating, EMI gave him the administrative task of cataloguing everything in their archive pertaining to the Beatles; in due course, Barratt’s notes and tape dubs would form the basis of several bootlegs of the group’s unreleased studio recordings. Sadly, John Barratt never fully recovered from his cancer and in February 1984, he died.

Now we jump forward by a decade to 1993 and KB’s seventh album, The Red Shoes, one of the highlights of which is ‘Moments of Pleasure’, the gorgeous orchestral ballad in which Bush pays tribute to loved ones she has lost or is in the process of losing: her mother, the filmmaker Michael Powell, session guitarist Alan ‘Smurf’ Murphy, and so on. “Just being alive, it can really hurt,” she sings. “And these moments given are a gift of time.”

I treasure this song, which I find terribly moving but also sweet and funny. One line near the end has always stood out to me. In her final roll-call of remembered names and places, Bush sings, with the hint of a melancholy smile, “Hey there, Teddy, spinning in the chair at Abbey Road”. There is something particularly evocative both in the image and the way she delivers it, the veteran recording artist watching in her mind’s eye her friend sitting behind the mixing desk at Abbey Road, both of them giddy, young, excited to be there. To avoid confusion with her co-producer Jon Kelly, Bush’s nickname for John Barratt had been ‘Teddy’. Would it be too much to suppose that Barratt attained his 1st Dan – WELL DONE J.B. – not in judo or taekwondo, but in the art of chair spinning, a silly late-night game played by a bunch of pals in the studio? Perhaps the goal was to achieve a certain number of revolutions with one spin? Could this be the “very clever” something Jon Barratt had succeeded in doing and that Bush had duly had memorialised, etching it into vinyl forever? We may never know, and we don’t need to. But every time someone spins ‘Sat in Your Lap’, somewhere John Barratt is spinning in his chair with it. And in the background of the remarkable music that he and Kate Bush recorded together, if we listen closely enough, we may catch the faint echoes of their laughter”.

There is a lot to love and expand on Andy Miller’s post about Kate Bush. Not least about critics’ rankings of her albums and why it is more constructive and beneficial to approach them in a less hagiographic and best-worst manner. I think that point and curiosity about initials and Bush including these little details is intriguing. How far does that extend? There are so many different minor characters in Bush’s songs. Andy Miller also talks about John Barrett in the context of Moments of Pleasure (from 1993’s The Red Shoes):

“One line near the end has always stood out to me. In her final roll-call of remembered names and places, Bush sings, with the hint of a melancholy smile, “Hey there, Teddy, spinning in the chair at Abbey Road”. There is something particularly evocative both in the image and the way she delivers it, the veteran recording artist watching in her mind’s eye her friend sitting behind the mixing desk at Abbey Road, both of them giddy, young, excited to be there. To avoid confusion with her co-producer Jon Kelly, Bush’s nickname for John Barratt had been ‘Teddy’. Would it be too much to suppose that Barratt attained his 1st Dan – WELL DONE J.B. – not in judo or taekwondo, but in the art of chair spinning, a silly late-night game played by a bunch of pals in the studio? Perhaps the goal was to achieve a certain number of revolutions with one spin? Could this be the “very clever” something Jon Barratt had succeeded in doing and that Bush had duly had memorialised, etching it into vinyl forever?”.

Reading these words compelled me to dig deeper and think differently about Kate Bush. Apart from the ‘J.B.’ etching into Sat in Your Lap and the ‘K.T.’ appearing on her album covers, what other symbols and treasures are we missing? Bush’s lyrics blend in famous figures, mythology, love, horror, dreams, the wilderness and so much more. There are some notable people in her work, though there are also these minor characters. The ‘Emily’ from the very start of Wow (from 1978’s Lionheart). A saxophonist from The Kick Inside’s The Saxophone Song that Bush encounters in a Berlin bar. The eponymous James from James and the Cold Gun (also from The Kick Inside). The bank robbers of There Goes a Tenner (from 1982’s The Dreaming). Who was the inspiration behind Aerial’s eponymous heroine in Mrs. Bartolozzi?

Do we discuss Kate Bush more in literary terms? How she writes these songs with plots and  cast of major characters and minor ones? How she wants to provide something extra? Adding messages and initials to a vinyl? It is clear that she remains someone who stands out from her peers. In the way she brings people fictional and real, into her music. Fascinating by the physical product and going beyond the ordinary. Whether that is reissuing her albums and designing the vinyl colour/image or including an etching, it does get you to think about her artistry and creativity in a new way. I have been going on a bit of a hunt on message boards and websites to see whether there are more examples of Kate Bush adding messages or codes to her work. Whether, like The Beatles, if you play a  record backwards then these eerie lyrics appear. Looking beyond the ‘K.T.’ symbols on her covers to see if there are these background objects that create enigma or tell their own tale. The Lionheart cover, for instance. Why only include a pair of feet (Bush’s feet) for the cover of The Red Shoes? I know that fits the title, though the decision not to include Bush’s gave always fascinates me. The meaning of The Sensual World cover where Bush holds a flower to her mouth. I don’t think we really dissect her music in that way. Talking about the characters and going deeper into lyrics. Exploring these puzzles and messages or little details that people might pass by. That is why Andy Miller’s words affected me. Inspiration to view Kate Bush’s albums, songs and covers in a different way. Rather than repeat the same sentiments and lines and paint in broad brushstrokes, these finer details and hidden symbols and less discussed characters can lead us down interesting paths. Give us a broader and more original look at her work. It will be an interesting trek. One that, for me, starts with…

THE great John Barrett.