Records

Rip It Up, Issue 113, 1 December 1986, Page 26

Records

Fanfare for the Common Man

Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band Live/1975-85 CBS With the boy from Freehold NJ now probably the greatest social icon in the western world, his status probably demands a fivealbum set of his concerts over the last decade. Live performances are the essence of rock and roll, and the E Streeters have been among its very best exponents. Those who have followed the evolution of Springsteen’s career will have their expectations satisfied by this record, which shows the breadth and scope of his music over a dozen years. In for a bigger treat however are the legions of Springsteen fans who became converts with Bom in the USA. For them, Live will be an epic adventure in discovery. Gargantuan it is — nearly three and a half hours — but the 40-song box set splits easily into three self-contained parts, roughly dating from Springsteen’s epic tours of ’7B, 'Bl, and ’B4. Only the opening track, ‘Thunder Road,’ dates from 1975, and with its simple harp and piano backing, it’s one of the most affecting. The main reservation I have about this set is not its Texan size, but sound. With the bulk of the material coming from stadium concerts, the musical dynamics are exaggerated, and the larger-than-life sound is a bit much for home consumption —- although it’s said that in a huge arena Springsteen can make 50,000 people feel he’s sharing intimacies with them. With his hammy showmanship, Springsteen is a part of the entertainment tradition that stretches back well past vaudeville, a rarity among white performers, and the E Streeters are the perfect showband, working their audience — and frontman — into a frenzy. ‘Rosalita’ is Springsteen at his barnstorming best, driven along by Clemons’s relentless sax and

Roy Bittan’s fluid piano. Drummer Max Weinberg shows his years in theatre orchestra pits with his snare rolls, anticipating climaxes still verses away. The band shines in the tracks recorded at LA’s Roxy club in 1978, before the gestures went over the top in an effort to communicate with arena audiences. This collection shows Darkness on the Edge of Town off to its best advantage, when the street romantic took off his rosecoloured glasses and got real. Gone are the “chainsaw through a dictionary” motor-mouthed excesses of Asbury Park, the band stays versatile but gets angry, and the material — ‘Badlands,’ ‘Candy’s Room,’ ‘Adam Raised a Cain,’ ‘Racing in the Streets,’ ‘Promised Land’ — still allows them to work out. On The River, which some regard as Springsteen treading water, risking self-parody, he simplifies the music and solidifies the messages. No longer the fantasist, Springsteen speaks for those disaffected and dispossessed by the “runaway American Dream.” A cover of Woody Guthrie’s bitterly ironical ‘This Land is Your Land’ fits perfectly with the music and love/hate attitudes of Nebraska and Born in the USA, but the honest acoustics of the former succeed on this record, whereas the simplified music causes the hits from the latter to become bombastic pounding; the E Streeters aren’t given the room to shine. Of the eight new songs in the set, the return to romance on Tom Waits’ ‘Jersey Girl,’ is to me the

most significant. Edwin Star's ‘War? while a clear message to Reagan, isn’t my idea of the best the E Streeters have to offer. Of the many 60s jukebox hits they cover live, only the soul classic ‘Raise Your Hand’ is included — a belting crowdpleaser. More than being “rock and roll’s future,” I think the reason he’s always been a critic’s favourite is that he’s fulfilled their hopes for rock and roll’s past; he’s what critics would wish Elvis Presley to have become. Despite the darkened images of the past few years, Springsteen the quester has never given up hope, and the Steinbeckian journey of this album finishes with the optimism of ‘No Surrender,’ ‘Tenth Avenue Freeze Out,’ and, of course, ‘Born to Run.’ Springsteen believes in the promised land, and guards our dreams and visions. Chris Bourke

Rap It Up

Run DIVIC Raising Hell Profile There’s been a straightjacket on black music that's only now coming off. Black music, and our perception of it, has been conditioned by the British rock press, which grabbed Nile Rodgers and Chic out of the bloodbath that was what was left of disco in 1980, and held that weak, simpering music aloft as being the epitome of subtlety and sophistication in soul. They were wrong. What it started was six years of mostly bad dance music, nonsense like Shannon’s ‘Let the Music Play’ and clones like Princess and Nu Shooz. Fortunately black music, disco, has been saved from the clutches of that media straightjacket. It’s been saved by a music that’s uniquely black, a music that talks in blackspeak, celebrates the realities of rock music, and puts down the cocktail for a good chillin’ beer. Witness that when hip-hop goes wrong, as it does with Timex Social Club’s ‘Rumours,’ it’s a return to that faceless beat. Run DMC, on the other hand, have with Raisin’ Hell' released the most political black record since There’s a Riot Going On — one, because we’re all playing it, two, because it’s black and proud to be black. There’s a sensibility here that’s

purely instinctive. It comes from New York, a city that's exploding with cultures, overwhelmed with information. That’s why hip-hop has been open to any music that’s got the right feel to it, why the music itself is like listening to a shortwave radio late at night, switching from jamming noise to Chinese radio to a taxicab. Listening to Run DMC, you hear the sounds you might hear coming in a Queens apartment window, you hear why making music that doesn’t "front” (isn’t false) is Run DMC’s insistence. It’s why Run DMC can make a record as true to rock as ‘Walk this Way,’ and why we can shake our balls off (sorry, ladies) and get some satisfaction (sorry, Mick) out of hearing it. And to hear this heavy rock blast forth from a group that’s only two guys and a guy with turntables, is completely foreign to most people’s idea of black tastes. Blacks like rock? Bullshit! This album comes from Def Jam producers Rick Rubin and Russell Simmons, and despite what DMC says (“this is all new music/never ever old soul”), this is old soul, like Stax was. It is the very best of hip-hop. It’s rare enough to buy an album that you can enjoy from start to finish, rarer still to find one you can dance to for that long. Peter Grace

Tinker Tailor Soldier Sailor

Hello Sailor Shipshape and Bristol Fashion Zulu The only truly witty cartoon Hodgson has drawn for the Listener concerned Social Credit’s name-change to the Democratic Party. Garry Knapp and Bruce Beetham, dressed as bodgies, stand beside a hotted-up car, with mag wheels, dice in the windows, raised suspension, the works. “But Gary,” says Bruce, “it’s still a Skoda."

As New Zealand’s most convincing rock and roll band, Hello Sailor were more akin to a 4.9 Falcon VB. There was a danger, when boywonder English producer Liam Henshall was brought in to produce a reunion album for the international market at what appeared no expense spared, that he may have turned that been-round-the-clock Falcon into a tarted up Skoda. Instead, thankfully, we have a car for the 80s, customised with all the trimmings — and a reconditioned engine. The first thing that strikes you — after the tacky, dated cover — is that Shipshape doesn’t sound like the Hello Sailor whose music and antics have kept us entertained for a decade. With New York mixing and enough synths to cause power blackouts, Henshall has made a slick, homogenous, high-tech beast out of the loose, eclectic, charismatic outfit of old. And though it takes quite a while to get used to the new sound, once you’ve bent your ear in the direction of American FM rock radio, you realise they’ve done a superb job of tailoring the familiar music towards that market. But there’s the crunch — to young Americans, this may be a fine album of excellent songs from an unknown but seasoned band. How New Zealanders will respond is another question, for half the album consists of re-vamped versions of past singles. While that may limit its appeal to old Sailor fans, none of those singles got the radio play they deserved when first recorded; they’re still fine songs, and if the 72-track recording and Electric Ladyland mixing causes our closed minded programmers to give them another go, a new generation of fans may

emerge. All the pre-released songs, with the exception of ‘Fugitive for Love,’ last year’s single for the reunited group, date from the solo years after Hello Sailor was put in dry dock in 1980. Tm in Heaven’ opens, and immediately the new sound hits you. It’s Graham doing the vocals on Dave’s song, and the trademark' twin guitar attack is well back behind the synths on which the song, full of hooks, coasts along. The gruntier ‘Kings and Queens’ was the best new song on the reunion tour; it was going to be the first single, and as such it’s been rearranged and much of the hard attack removed — the great guitar riff remains, but the chorus has been wimped out. Keeping consistent, Graham sings ‘You (Bring Out the Worst in Me),’ but though I miss Harry’s boozy, laconic style, the hooks are more prominent. ‘Snakes and Ladders’ is new, but its excellence could be because it’s like an old Sailor song, with those guitars playing against each other, and McArtney’s high nasal voice ringing out at the bridge. I’ve always enjoyed ‘Fugitive for Love’ — sure it’s an FM pastiche of every Rolling Stones song, but they made their career out of Chuck Berry re-writes. But where’s the balls? There’s very little bottom to the album; Henshall plays bass on most tracks, and Ricky Ball’s drums have been electronically treated. McArtney keeps the lead vocal on ‘Remember the Alamo,’ with heavier toms and synth touches, but it’s still a crescendo without a climax. While the natural sound gave the original of ‘Billy Bold’ a warmth, the new stylised version (complete with pipe band) has many added hooks to attract radio play, though it was the sim-

pie power of the song that made it an anthem. ‘Winning Ticket’ to me is the winner of the album, it’s a charming piece of Ponsonby reggae. With lovely harmonies, a true melody, and great harp from Graham, it’s like an outtake from his sublime Inside Out solo album. Significantly, it’s the only song with Lisle Kinney playing bass. ‘Upon this Hill (Love is a Dog from Hell)’ is the heavier side of Sailor with their decadent pose; finally the guitars get a chance to stretch out. ‘Dear Diary’ is the odd man out, a lovely soft goodnight ballad along the lines of 'Lying in the Sand.’ The result is an album of consistent quality in sounds and songs. While the personality of Hello Sailor — still present in their live shows —js difficult to pick out in the synth wash, it’s that consistency that makes this an excellent, if unsurprising, album. Are Sailor shipshape? Their new songs and live act say “certainly,” and this may bring them the commercial success they always deserved. The international production has been achieved: the more demanding artistic test, however, will come with the songwriting for the next album. Bon voyage, Sailor. Chris Bourke New Order Brotherhood Factory I liked Low Life for its variety. I like Brotherhood for its spirit. New Order have plumped for less adventure here — there’s even a conventional rock song (‘Way Of Life’) on the album — but they still do their own thing well ... The first side of Brotherhood is made up of guitar-based songs. The choruses of songs like ‘Paradise’ and ‘Weirdo’ sound too similar, too ultimately detrimental effect, but the highlight is the very acoustic ‘As It Is When It Was: Bernard Sumner’s world of parties and fun-times has a constant double edge of pain, sour endings and long walks home alone. His lyrics are enjoyable for their simplicity and sincerity — "I always thought we’d get along like a house on fire, but...”

The production is more confident on the second side, which consists of mainly synth-based songs. ‘Bizarre Love Triangle,' released as a single in the USA, is

unexciting, but ‘All Day Long’ is enjoyable, complete with melancholy and stirring snippets of national anthem-like stuff in a tale of some cruel despotic leader. And ‘Every Little Counts' is a good ending — a bit loopy, and who could not laugh, singing a line like ‘‘l think you are a pig / You should be in a zoo”! Even though it’s not going to set anyone’s world on fire, Brotherhood is still a pleasant album. Perhaps the next one will be New Order’s Riot Goin’ On ... could they do it? Who knows? Paul McKessar Freddie Jackson Just Like the First Time Capitol Nelson George in that Bible to the stars Billboard was lamenting the lack of a truly great soul star, one that can dominate black music. The soul crown has become vacant, there is no monarch of melody, no titan of tears, no new regal ruler. Nelson George offers Mr Jackson, which without demeaning Luthe? or Alexander, I certainly wouldn’t argue with. The new album depicts Mr Jackson on the cover dressed in very regal attire, purple sash and gold chains. The back is too cool for words, a startlingly white suit and what appears to be the World Wrestling Federation Championship belt. Poised from his penthouse suite, overlooking his soul kingdom. It would be hard to follow up such a gem as his first album, the bad news is that he doesn’t, the good news is that he comes close. Mr Jackson is the modern master of the lost love ballad, a victim of romance rather than the predatory stud of many soul songs. Things like ‘Still Waiting’ with lines like “This just wasn't like you / I’m still waiting for you.” This guy doesn’t “wait till his baby gets home,” because, she’s already up and left him. But things aren’t always that sad on Tasty Love. Mr Jackson has found himself “an awesome lover” and pleads to "keep it there, right there”.

It comes as no surprise that the songs that really cook are the ones handled by his old production team of Paul Lawrence and Barry Eastmond, where the song, voice and groove fit wonderfully. Some of the other tracks lack the

depth, both emotionally and musically that Lawrence and Eastmond seem to give. But there is still that ultra fine voice that can carry any sort of material into great heights. Best track for me is the immaculate slow jam of ‘Have You Ever Loved Somebody’, which will, I’m sure, become a soul classic. Kerry Buchanan Big Audio Dynamite No. 10, Upping St CBS Mick Jones left the Clash in 1983 in a showdown with the rest of the band over the decision to rehire their old manager Bernie Rhodes. Jones’s stand of "it’s him or me” resulted in his walking out and forming BAD a few months later with reggae-punk video svengali Don Letts. BAD has emerged as a continuation of the black influences he struck in New York with the Clash, namely funk, hip-hop (check out Run DMC) and the potential of the beatbox — influences which he had transferred onto Sandinista and Combat Rock via songs like ‘Rock the Casbah’ and ‘The Magnificent 7.’ On BAD’s first album, ‘E=MC 2 ’ and the title track were the most successful hybrids, with ‘The Bottom Line’ sounding like a guitar out-take from Give ’Em Enough Rope. Nobody complained. In some ways, No. 10, Upping St maintains the odd balance between Jones's English vocal and guitar playing and Letts’s black additives. But at least half of the album is Combat Rock 2, the Clash album that never was, as Strummer has co-produced the album and co-wrote at least half of the songs. And the old chemistry is there again with Strummer’s outlaw swagger shining through ‘Beyond The Pale,’ 'Limbo The Law’ and ‘V. Thirteen’. Letts’s weight is ” felt in ‘C’mon Every Beatbox’ with its voice-overs, and in ‘Hollywood Boulevard’ whose tune sneaks beneath the percussion. Jones’s problems don’t lie with his music, there he’s making sense and with Strummer back in the fold he’s once again nudging special times. But he’s still presenting the band as chic bandits with a name that’s just bad. Only James Brown was baaad. • George Kay