authentic celestial music

Rip It Up, Issue 248, 1 April 1998, Page 16

authentic celestial music

“You guys _ are j® fucked. \ 'Ya wanna know why you're not famous, 'cause ya musics shit.” ——flu* “Fuck off!" Welcome / to | Hamilton, I

the Wailing Bongo, the student bar at Waikato University, the second night of Orientation 98 is fair gain' off, mate. Hundreds of drunk first year students are squashed together on the dancefloor, boogieing riotously to the lobotomised sounds being pumped by DJ G. Brains and . ears have been disengaged, pack mentality : rules, and 'Stayin' Alive', 'YMCA', the Spice Girls and Jive Bunny are each accorded a hero's welcome. And then Australia's own Dirty Three begin to play. There's no singing, just violin, guitar, and drums, and soon it's obvious that only 10 people out of 800 have come to hear this. On stage, Dirty Three unleash a : typically intense performance. Violinist Warren Ellis, drummer Jim White, and guitarist Mick Turner lock together in a water-tight triangle, and play with untamed ferocity and unequalled beauty. There's the I wild ride of 'lndian Love Song', the swinging anarchy of '1 Remember a Time When Once You Used to Love Me', and the sublime orchestral manoeuvres of a new track, 'Deep Waters'. All at once, 'Dirty'' ? Three are intoxicating, exhausting, and i exhilarating, but most of all, they provide an avenue for escapism. Nonetheless, j; tonight the abuse is unrelenting. ! "This is a song about waking up dead in j j the back seat of a car because you've had too much fun," says Ellis. "This is called I 'Sue's Last Ride'; or. 'H's a Bummer That You I Died'." I "Play some . fuckin': real : music," hollers j a voice from the pack. ; Two days later, Ellis has made good, oh" I his boast to the Hamilton crowd; "At least 1 get to leave this place." The Dirty Three have headed north to Auckland to play an j Orientation show at the Powerstation with Salmonella Dub. On the afternoon of the j gig, Ellis is at the Queen Street office oh | Flying Nun/ln (who distribute Dirty Three's i recordings in NZ), reliving the band's Waikato adventures. ■■■■ "That was a very scary, new experience

: for us. The Jive Bunny was the one. 1 f: thought, 'well we can't go on after the Bee Gees', and then it was like, 'the Village People, that's really asking a lot', and then the Spice Girls, 1 didn't really know who that was, and then the Jive Bunny, that was the point of ridiculousness. It-was quite unusual, but 1 kind of expected that for a university night. We've always had

the approach that we'll go and play anywhere, but 1 must say, the; university persuasion concerts have never been appealing - especially the 'free entry, get as pissed as ya can, then try ; and fuck somebody' type show. With the Dirty Three playing, guys, if they take offence, they seem to have to make a point of that, and ' we become a target for their drunken:; stupidity — ; we do cop our fair share of abuse. I'm not hardened to it at all, I try to not worry about it, it used to bother me a ■Jot more, but J'm; not totally insensitive to it." . ■■ ]n Hamilton, the crowd seemed the most upset because there were no vocals. I People seem to get offended by instrumentals. "Generally that's the conditioning that's been placed on them; 'Music without lyrics? 1 don't like that.' And yet, people go to The movies and there's a soundtrack on and there's no' lyrics with it, and it conjures up emotions within them which fits the dialogue and the scene. 1 think people can ’ get it - if you start playing a jig, nine people out JO, will tap their foot along to it, they know what it is. ]'ve always found a : freedom?, in music without lyrics, and it's always surprised me when see people that, admire this music with terrible lyrics, it's like they don't /even think for themselves, they take on these ideas written there, that have no depth or passwaw. j. „ / / ' 4 X 7 ® meaning at all. / > :, /*'] wanna zig-a-zig-ah,' said the Spice Girls. / : . Dirty Three are people who make music for people. H's not about an image, H's not sold as a fashion package - it's obviously and intrinsically human. But no matter where they go in the world, some people become very upset, says Ellis. "We went on tour with Beck, he was playing in backwater America, in the mid j west, and we did this one show in Phoenix, in this really famous old honky tonk bar. j When we played there was the most . extraordinary reaction, half of them hated ; us, and they were yelling at us, but the yother locals who really hated that element * of the town started defending us. And then these fights started in the audience, and we were geHing dog biscuits and other things thrown at us. It was insane. We had a similar thing happen playing with the Pogues in Germany. There were 400

drunken Germans yelling, 'Fuck off,' louder than we were . playing. So we played a 40 minute version of 'lndian Love Song', really loud, just really going for it, and just laughing our heads off." There'll be no laughing from Ellis today, however, as he can barely manage a faint smile/ The day before, he was dumped by a wave while bodysurfing at a Coromandel beach, and the inside of his mouth is tom and raw. He also has two black eyes and a fleshy cut across the bridge of his nose. When Ellis landed face first in the sand he feared the worst. ; > f

"1 heard my neck crunch, and ] felt my whole body jar, and J thought, 'fuck, 1 just busted my neck.' My arm went numb. Down at the beach, they put me in one of those stiff neck things, and took me by ambulance to Thames Hospital because they were worried ] might have: had a fracture in my neck. They took an x ray, there was nothing damaged, but no one could stitch up this problem in my mouth, it's just been tom away. When 1 came to Auckland, ] went to the hospital last night, they had a look but said it should be left to heal on its own. At the moment ] feel like ]'ve been beaten up. What's so bizarre is the new album's called Ocean Songs, and the Hamilton show was officially the start of the tour for the album, and the second day after the first concert ] end up getting beaten up by a wave." Together since 1992, Ocean Songs is the Dirty Three's fourth album, and was recorded last September in Chicago with Steve Albini. The song titles suggest it's a record of a conceptual nature — 'The Restless Waves', 'Distant Shore', 'Sea Above, Sky Below', 'Black Tide, 'Deep Waters' — while musically, Ocean Songs is the band's most graceful sounding recording to date. Absent are the various distortion fuelled manic moments captured on their last two albums, Dirty Three and Horse Stories, in favour of elegant tunes that glide and hypnotise. Dirty Three recorded in Albini's own studio, together in one room, very quietly, without pedals or effects, and the result is a strikingly live and natural sounding album. "Steve was fantastic," says Ellis, "he was really discreet about being present with the recording scenario so we were able to play naturally. For some reason when we record, something goes wrong

with all of us and we all get really uptight. And it was incredible in the studio for a few days, there was one day when 1 don't think we spoke to each other: It was really getting ; to a ridiculous point, and Mick said to Steve ; to turn the lights off, and we sat down and played for. three hours, we ; played through all our old songs, and that was great. But. even though it was stressful, it was one of the most enjoyable times because it was much more relaxed in the studio." Around the time of Horse Stories' j release in mid 1996, Ellis revealed in many : interviews that the recording process surrounding that album was "nightmarish," i and he'd been close to cracking up in the ; studio. Approaching the recording of Ocean i Songs last year, Ellis also had concerns as Dirty Three had spent much of 1997 apart. "]'d been very anxious about making it because we. hadn't played together since r March. We ended up in London, and Jim and Mick relocated to Chicago, and 1 moved to Paris. We'd never really, been apart like that. We needed to have this break and it was understood, but it was quite extraordinary. Once we'd stopped, there was a hole that was missing very much in my life. For five years, we'd: basically been living with each other and playing together, and to not have that all of a sudden was a very empty feeling. When we stop, ] just don't know what to do with myself, it's like, 'how do you fit into what's normally going on in the world?'" While the Dirty Three were on holiday from each other, Ellis toured Australia and Europe as one of Nick Cave's Bad Seeds, : and set up home in Paris with his girlfriend. Turner put out a solo; record, and with White released an album as the Tren Brothers, and individually they worked with numerous Chicago based musicians. Their six month break was rejuvenating and enjoyable for all concerned, says Ellis — so why have they delivered, in Ocean Songs, such a sad and reflective album?

"It's funny because at that period last year we were all feeling pretty good. 1 don't know what made it so sad, ] know for me 1 had one of the best years ]'ve had. H's the first record we've made that I've felt very personally attached to. J was anxious to see something which was a development and not just bashing through the thing, making a concession to a sound that we sort of honed. For me, it was not hiding

behind a noise, ] wanted to . try and make something that ] felt had a real beauty to it. ] do feel there's much more dynamic on this new record, it's more subtle and there's a more inherently beautiful quality to this recording. And it's interesting that the people who know what we do, they seem to agree that it's going to sort people out and throw a few people. They think it's our most accessible record because it doesn't have the abrasive quality of the others.' We didn't set out to make something different because we felt we had to, but this is our fourth record and ] feel each one has been different, and there's a logical development going on within the songwriting, and this album seems to be the most cohesive statement."

At the Powerstation, an appreciative crowd of about 500 stand transfixed by Ellis and co. "I'll tell you something, Auckland is not Hamilton," he laughs. "The other night, we had to go on after the Village People! How about that?" Although Ellis appears to have been hit by a bus, he looks physically and emotionally caught up in the whirlwind of sound Dirty Three are creating on stage. "1 had a fight with one of your waves," he announces between songs. Previously, Ellis has said Dirty Three "never ever" play a song the same way twice, and tonight the tunes from Ocean Songs are given ; a new interpretation, and stretched and turned inside out, and played with more force than in Hamilton. It's quite an unbelievable spectacle. "This is the first record that we've done that all the songs we recorded had never been done live," explains Ellis. "And all the songs off the . album are taking on a really different approach now that we are playing them live. Once you're playing them, they start to get a shape. Dynamically, on a good night, we really sit together well, and by listening to, what somebody's doing things can really change all of a sudden which keeps it exciting and fresh for us. 1 don't know how bands go out and just play the same thing over and over again."

Almost 24 hours after Dirty Three walked on stage at the Powerstation, they're stepping up infront of a jammed in crowd at the Union Hall, situated on campus at Victoria University in Wellington. "Hello Hamilton!," yells Ellis into the mic. No response. "Hello Hamilton!" Someone boos. "Hello Hamilton!" The dissent gets louder. "Hello Hamilton!" Ellis is now asking to be . strung up. "Hello Wellington!" Hooray! Tonight Ellis is especially talkative. He canvasses opinion on the meaning of the lyrics to 'Hotel California'. "You can check out any time you like but you can never leave, what is that all about? What do you think they're meaning?" He accepts a request for Motorhead's 'Ace of Spades'. "This is our version of 'Ace of Spades', and if it doesn't sound like it, it's because you haven't got a good enough imagination and you shouldn't be at university in the first place." And he makes a promise or two. "This is a song about love, because love makes the world go round, and everybody should be in love, so this is for everyone who's in love, and if you're not in love, and you're here on your own tonight, and you haven't got a date, come and see us, 'cause the Dirty Three want you to be in love and we'll find you a date, we'll fix you up." Ellis's between song patter is legendary. He tempers the often violent mood swings of Dirty Three's songs with a joke or a story, and his tales can act as a guide to the emotions at the core of the band's most heart-wrenching instrumentals. Best of all, Ellis effortlessly makes that all-important connection with Dirty Three's audience.

"When we started playing, we were playing in a comer of a bar, and ] used to announce some of the songs because 1 like it when people communicate with an audience, and 1 do like to have some verbal communication. Originally, used to talk a bit because it broke the ice, T was just rambling on, and it was sort of so people didn't think we were a fusion outfit or something - ] guess ] was pre-empting

what people may have thought. 1 do think when you break down that barrier, and you can do it so easily, then it makes for better communication, and that's what we really need. There needs to be a good flow of things from the audience to us. When people see that, 'okay, this is not really highbrow,' then it makes that communication work a lot better. 1 have thought about the talking before songs, and ] think people just listen to it for what they want. I'm talking less and less ]'m finding, and letting the music speak for itself. And 1 don't feel the need to talk so much, it feels like there's more people behind what we're doing. But 1 did find it amusing to tell little anecdotes and things like that, it broke things up because ] felt that sometimes the music got, so. intense it provided a bit of a relief."

When the Dirty Three last toured New Zealand, in February 1997, Ellis told RipitUp he was, "really discovering my voice on the violin." Does he feel that's still the case?

"Yeah, definitely, more so. 1 feel with these new songs I've definitely been able to get a lot more personal things out in them. 1 do feel in a way it is expressing myself... I guess in April of last year ] started living a

much more settled existence, 1 had a home, the same bed every night, J had a kitchen and ] was cooking food every day. And that was a really big change and it was good because it made a balance, ] didn't know what it was like to really relax."

]n contrast with the mood of the new record, it appears you're pretty happy with life.

T think ] am, yeah 1 am. It's quite a gift actually, although sometimes it may not seem it, but there's always something worse for somebody else. I've had a very full life in the last four or five years, and if ] sat down to tell anyone about it, it would seem more ludicrous than makes sense. 1 know ]'m much happier now than ] was before 1 started playing. Before that, when ] was doing things, it was like, 'l'm sure there's more to it than this.' 1 have this girlfriend that I've been with for about 18 months and she's had quite an extraordinary life, and she reminds me of enjoying the really straightforward things, and enjoying happiness, because you ain't gonna be around one day. "1 do believe that we all have something to do, we have to find a thing to do that does benefit other people, that's really important. 1 think being able to give something to other people is important, because it's enriching for you as well. And maybe in my own small way ]'m giving and taking something while playing, and that's good."

Upon the unveiling of Ocean Songs, music writers will fail with superlatives to describe the pure spirit of the Dirty Three, as happened after the release of Dirty Three and Horse Stories. As Ellis knows, it's something special and totally intangible. "With Dirty Three, in terms of the communication going on between the three of us, it's something 1 could never put into words." The sound of the Dirty Three, as he told the audience in Hamilton, is "authentic celestial music for your soul."

JOhn RUSSeLL