For those who remember active spectatorship checking
into a sloth and dank hotel, where scabies were
caught flipping on the light switch and V.D. was
just a highball away, As Above, So Below (1998)
was—for all intents and purposes—a
negative/hedonistic lodging in hell templated
from New Orleans and Herbert Selby Jr.’s
Brooklyn. It was Barry Adamson’s artistic
output from a distressing period of several hip
surgeries, rendering him confined to a wheelchair
for months. In the hospital, penned lyrics like
“Jazz Devil,” “Deja Voodoo,”
and “Still I Rise” were borderline
satanic; boasting of grandiose and demigod status,
though unmistakably depressed. And it was also
one hell of an album, no pun intended.
Sandwiched between this and the new recent full
length was Mute’s premature “best
of” collection The Murky World of Barry
Adamson, in 1999. Although revisiting some of
the highlights from Adamson’s career since
abandoning Nick Cave’s Bad Seeds during
the recording of Your Funeral … My Trial
(1986), three of the twelve should’ve been
called the ‘Murky World’ alone. In
these new tracks, it featured the very-linear
narrative of “Mitch and Andy,” a tale
of two cracked-out thugs venturing through the
“latest state of the U-S-of-A” London,
England; “Walk the Last Mile” continues
the subject matter of ego vs. id as told in Jekyll
and Hyde, complete with Barry White sensuality;
and the trumpet embroidery of a faux 1970s porn-theme
“Saturn in the Summertime.”
Uncomfortable with formulas and recycling, 2002’s
The King of Nothing Hill isn’t an obvious
follow up to past releases. For The King, it’s
an unintentional sequel to its predecessor that
shows Oscar de la Soundtrack’s exodus from
hell, though not an obvious ascension into heaven
or something better, but a void—and if purgatory
comes to mind, remember there’s hope in
that gateway: Hence, Nothing Hill (wordplay for
Nottingham Hill in London), is landscaped like
an urban Nod, east of Eden. So this idea of Adamson
as a wandering Cain, trail blazing the ground
that cannot be tilled, like his biblical predecessor
did with founding the city of Enoch, the Adamson
character is now the king of nothing. As the title
of the album linguistically suggests, there’s
elements of Structuralist theory on binary opposition,
which basically outlines the concepts of opposites.
In the Russian filmmaker Sergei Eisenstein’s
idea, these conflicting terms practiced in film
through editing create a degree of tension from
the opposing forces of image; the same could be
applied to the theme’s Adamson addresses,
though approached from a story-line perspective
using both words and music to create kinetic force.
Its opener, "Cinematic Soul," is a beginning
credit-roller that divorces from past prefaces,
such as Moss Side Story (1988) or the Mercury
Prize-nominee Soul Murder (1992) did, where the
first track dictated the songs that followed.
In stark contrast from dissonant noir screeches
to samples of “Scared Straight,” the
song shows the now vocalist take important queues
from “everything that kicked my ass, like
Curtis Mayfield and Isaac Hayes.”
“The first song was set up to be a hope
of youth,” says Adamson, via phone from
London, his home for the past 20 years since his
days with Magazine after a move from Manchester.
“It’s also the hope of stepping up
to something new. I’m also aware that I’m
setting up the record. I’m saying, ‘C’mon
in, sit down, lights are going to go down—put
the seatbelt on.’”
As the song’s curator, Adamson lists the
producers of the movie, from Pete Whyman on drums,
to James Johnston of Gallon Drunk on guitar. Most
interestingly is the appearance of a Father’s
Day sing-along, accompanied by the musician’s
son, Theo. Perhaps not since John Boorman made
a filmic exception by casting son Charley in the
lead for “Emerald Forest” (1985) has
there been such an obvious ode to family. In rock
‘n’ roll, why revisit the Partridge
theme?
“Some people can’t stomach that and
say, ‘That’s too much’,”
says Adamson. “I understand why—for
them—because it violates all the codes of
cool, and I’m aware of that. But I wanted
to do something ‘uncool’ because there’s
another area of life that isn’t about being
cool but about finding the spirit that goes ‘yeah.’”
As much as the song hopes to contain with its
festive, Ike Turner borrowed elements of “Bold
Soul Sister,” the album quickly montages
itself against the following song “Whispering
Streets,” the beginning of act one where
the King finds himself frisked and cuffed for
a crime he’s not sure he’s committed.
In fact, he’s not even sure how he got there.
With the last record the theme was almost like,
‘OK, I’m gonna take a trip to hell,
you’re coming with me—you’re
invited—and then we’re gonna hit bottom
and see where we are,” Adamson says. “With
this record, I think I walk away—the fact
that I’m now walking—it’s part
of the soul awakening. And here we are in almost
another part of the journey. So the musical direction
is kinda loaded; it’s set up soul, straight
away. So I’m gravitating towards this place
that I’m talking about, this nothingness,
and I have to hone it in, rein it in, bring a
little terror into it, like a reminder that hell
is around the corner.”
For those who have followed the lineage of this
factotum, as producer for Depeche Mode, Nitzer
Ebb and Ethyl Meatplow, or composer for Derek
Jarman’s The Last of England (1989) or Allison
Anders’ Gas, Food, Lodging (1992), it’s
been an interesting more than 10-year span of
watching an artist flourish in ideas and arrangements.
Within this scope, reggae, hip-hop, punk/post-punk,
pop, jazz, big band, some of the songs from the
latest LP break from the “styles I lean
on.”
The song “That Fool Was Me” has a
bridge that breaks into the New Orleans death
march, a style heavily dependent on brass instruments
(with an emphasis on trombone), back-dropped against
a “Theme From Midnight Cowboy”-like
harmonica complementing the concept of sorrow
and joy expressed at the same time. Adamson recalls
while taking a break from the album on vacation,
he woke up one morning to a melody he thought
was on the radio. Turns out the tune was in his
head, so immediately from concept to paper, he
outlined the verse/chorus/bridge/chorus in 20
minutes. The song, a bittersweet account of stepping
back from a relationship for the welfare of the
other party, also showcases the newly singer actually
relaxing and being creative with his voice.
“Exactly. It’s a new thing to step
up to the microphone,” he says. “Composers
in film music don’t do it. I’m kinda
surprised that people say, ‘OK, we’ll
give you some time with that Adamson. But if you
mess up, get back.’ People have been real
gracious giving me the space and saying, ‘Go
on in, go on …’ and now I feel I’m
beginning to relax. And sometimes when I sing,
I feel that’s how I want to do it in my
head. I’m real surprised, because I was
so obsessed with being this film composer guy,
and then I started writing down words, and then
saying them, and then singing them.”
Although exception was made for spoken-word tracks
sprinkled throughout The King’s albums,
As Above marked the debut as Adamson the singer.
It was a reluctant step forward, though highly
encouraged from fellow colleagues and friends.
The opening track to 1996’s Oedipus Schmoedipus,
“Set the Controls for the Heart of the Pelvis”
featured Pulp front man Jarvis Cocker, who apparently
instigated Adamson into opening the lungs further.
Constantly surrounded in company by renowned cult
singers like Nick Cave, Billy MacKenzie (of the
Associates, now dead)—and even Iggy Pop—another
nudge at leveling the mic stand came from an assignment
from fellow Bad Seeds’ Cave, Mick Harvey
and Blixa Bargeld, to orchestrate Scott Walker
for the Dylan tune “I Threw it All Away”
for the John Hillcoat movie “To Have and
to Hold” (1996). The credit notes allude
that this was a person-to-person arrangement,
with Adamson working with the Walker Brother.
“I didn’t get to work with him,”
Adamson reports with sadness in his tone. “They
[Bad Seeds] asked me to do a song for the film
they were going to have him sing. So I didn’t
really have that much contact with him, and I
did just my little bit. That would’ve been
great. I was listening to ‘Montague Terrace
(in Blue)’ the other day. Fuckin’
hell. It took my breath away, completely. I was
in the car, turned it up, and thought, ‘We
don’t make records like this anymore.’”
Perhaps the greatest marriage Adamson has experienced
meshing film with music was his MC event in Sheffield,
England, called Soundtracking. Sharing a program
bill with composer Michael Kamen (Brazil, The
Dead Zone, X-Men), it was an opportunity for Adamson
to discuss his involvement as composer and fan
of film. Divided between lecture time and Q&A
session, the apparatus was set to screening films,
with commentary from the composer. Here, Adamson
commented on his involvement in David Lynch’s
Lost Highway (1997), recent commercials (Cadbury
among them), his work on British television crime
drama City Central, as well as those moments that
created the blueprint for Adamson’s pursuit
of film scoring, such as Thunderball (1965). The
John Barry Bond-theme has been a reoccurring leitmotif
throughout Adamson’s career. So judging
from hosting programs like Soundtracking to his
recent involvement in the French film La Nature
Morte D’un Flic (2001), will Dirty Barry
ditch pop as a medium altogether and pursue this
obsession with sole focus on cinema work?
“I don’t know how long I can do this
sort of split between composing and the pop format.
I enjoy that, because I get into the two disciplines.
I don’t where this is going to go. I’m
happy to get an idea, put it together, and see
it through, and I value that. But my pop roots
are always around. The first record I was into
was “It’s Now or Never” by Elvis
Presley. I can remember being a kid, and then
being in a theatre and hearing this John Barry
score, and thinking, ‘Fuck.’ So somewhere
between ‘It’s Now or Never’
and Thunderball — ahh, the world of music.”
John Wyatt is an editor for BNP Co. living in Detroit.
www.barryadamson.com
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