Marianne Faithfull at the Royal Festival Hall
Royal Festival Hall, 29 November 2014
It can be hard watching your heroes get old but I think it's fair to say that Marianne Faithfull does it with a great deal of defiance and style. Despite shattering both her hip and her thigh bone earlier this year, here she is touring at age 67 using a walking stick, making fun of herself, telling off rude audience members, doing Tommy Cooper impressions and swearing like a sailor. There's no doubt about it but Faithfull is something of a trooper and she still puts on one hell of a show.
The tour is a celebration of two things: her new album, Give My Love To London, easily one of the best records this year, but it's also to commemorate, amazingly, her 50th year in music. Faithfull was of course worried about the tour when she had her fall back in May but luckily for us her French doctor encouraged her not to cancel: "'Go', he told me, ‘The work will heal you, the music will heal you and the love of the audience will heal you!’ And bugger me, it’s worked!”
When she first appears though, slowly and unsteadily creeping across the stage with her walking stick, I wonder if she is even going to make it to the microphone. But make it she does and waves her stick in the air and shouts out "Now is the winter of our discontent!", laughing as she gives us her best Richard III impression. Even Faithfull is aware of how much she looks like an old Shakespearean character at the moment, hobbling along, and she's even got a throne-like, big wooden antique chair to sit in during the show, like the Queen that she undoubtedly is.
The opening number is of course the stomping and anthemic Give My Love To London: it couldn't be anything else really given the setting, as she sings about dancing in Piccadilly, raising hell in Kensington and singing Pirate Jenny as "the Tower's tumbling down". It feels like a little love note to us, and she tells us that London isn't all bad, "all the best people in London are here tonight." Oh Marianne, you old charmer you.
The tour is a celebration of two things: her new album, Give My Love To London, easily one of the best records this year, but it's also to commemorate, amazingly, her 50th year in music. Faithfull was of course worried about the tour when she had her fall back in May but luckily for us her French doctor encouraged her not to cancel: "'Go', he told me, ‘The work will heal you, the music will heal you and the love of the audience will heal you!’ And bugger me, it’s worked!”
When she first appears though, slowly and unsteadily creeping across the stage with her walking stick, I wonder if she is even going to make it to the microphone. But make it she does and waves her stick in the air and shouts out "Now is the winter of our discontent!", laughing as she gives us her best Richard III impression. Even Faithfull is aware of how much she looks like an old Shakespearean character at the moment, hobbling along, and she's even got a throne-like, big wooden antique chair to sit in during the show, like the Queen that she undoubtedly is.
The opening number is of course the stomping and anthemic Give My Love To London: it couldn't be anything else really given the setting, as she sings about dancing in Piccadilly, raising hell in Kensington and singing Pirate Jenny as "the Tower's tumbling down". It feels like a little love note to us, and she tells us that London isn't all bad, "all the best people in London are here tonight." Oh Marianne, you old charmer you.
And she really is utterly charming throughout, whether it's confiding with us like old friends about her fall and all her health issues or telling us at length her version of Kipling's Jungle Book which inspired her fantastic new song Mother Wolf (a ferocious, primal roar of a song - one of the highlight's of the new album and the concert). There's even a great moment when an audience member rudely berates her for name-dropping and Faithfull cooly retorts, while taking a drag on her ever present electronic cigarette (or as she calls it "cigarette électronique" - she does live in France now after all), "This is my stage, this is my show, and this is not a dialogue, dear!"
Faithfull tells us she hasn't smoked in a year and her voice actually does sound better for it, although it still has that distinctive, sexy rasp but it's more commanding now than ever. The old delicate bird-like trill of her youth is long gone but even during what she calls "sixties corner", when she sings two of her most loved hits from that decade - Tears Go By and Come And Stay With Me - they sound as fresh and lovely as ever, and it's a thrill to hear the latter in particular, dug out just for these anniversary shows.
Faithfull explains that she actually consulted her fans about what they wanted to hear on this tour and more than her greatest hits, they told her they wanted to hear some rarities and because of this she provides a few wonderful surprises tonight. The first is a bright and joyful Witches' Song from her Broken English album (maybe my favourite Marianne song of all) and then a rare outing for the beautiful Marathon Kiss from 1999's Vagabond Ways. Penned by Daniel Lanois she gossips that Lanois has been in love with Emmylou Harris for years and wrote it as a love song to her, "but I got it"" she laughs triumphantly.
There are of course plenty of old favourites too: Broken English sounds as dark and bold as ever and The Ballad Of Lucy Jordan is still powerful and poignant but Sister Morphine goes on a little too long for my taste as the band gets to let rip but ultimately spoils the overall haunting effect. The newer songs also fit in well, the best being the big sweeping sound of her collaboration with Anna Calvi, Falling Back, and the intensely chilling Late Victorian Holocaust, co-penned with Mr. Gloom himself, Nick Cave.
The rarest tracks are left to the very end and are among the most striking, memorable moments: there's a rather sublime and cinematic sounding Who Will Take My Dreams Away, written with composer Angelo Badalamenti, which she tells us she has never performed live before this tour. Then, after a very funny anecdote about getting roaring drunk with Damon Albarn while writing the track, she ends, rather appropriately, with the somber Last Song from 2005's Before The Poison.
Backed throughout by a superb three-piece band which featured her producer Rob Ellis on drums and the musical whiz Ed Harcourt on keyboards (an incredible singer-songwriter in his own right who I just saw recently supporting The Afghan Whigs), it was easy to see Faithfull has great chemistry with them all and they are extremely fond of her too. For instance, it was amusing and sweet to see Harcourt go over to Faithfull and hoist her up out of her chair at the end, like a favourite nephew helping out his old aunt.
Even confined to her chair for the duration of the concert, Faithfull's charm and wit filled the stage and more than ever she seemed like a seasoned storyteller, with us gathered around to hear her tales and wisdom. For a long time she's been dismissed by many as a rock star girlfriend or relic from the 60s but the music she has been making over the past 20 years is more interesting and relevant than most of her contemporaries. And tonight also proves that she doesn't even need to move around much to keep her audience enthralled with her words and her music, surely the sign of a true artist and entertainer. At this show Marianne gave her love to London and we gave it right back, threefold, ending with a huge standing ovation. It seems not even a broken hip can keep her down. What a woman and what a night.
Faithfull tells us she hasn't smoked in a year and her voice actually does sound better for it, although it still has that distinctive, sexy rasp but it's more commanding now than ever. The old delicate bird-like trill of her youth is long gone but even during what she calls "sixties corner", when she sings two of her most loved hits from that decade - Tears Go By and Come And Stay With Me - they sound as fresh and lovely as ever, and it's a thrill to hear the latter in particular, dug out just for these anniversary shows.
Faithfull explains that she actually consulted her fans about what they wanted to hear on this tour and more than her greatest hits, they told her they wanted to hear some rarities and because of this she provides a few wonderful surprises tonight. The first is a bright and joyful Witches' Song from her Broken English album (maybe my favourite Marianne song of all) and then a rare outing for the beautiful Marathon Kiss from 1999's Vagabond Ways. Penned by Daniel Lanois she gossips that Lanois has been in love with Emmylou Harris for years and wrote it as a love song to her, "but I got it"" she laughs triumphantly.
There are of course plenty of old favourites too: Broken English sounds as dark and bold as ever and The Ballad Of Lucy Jordan is still powerful and poignant but Sister Morphine goes on a little too long for my taste as the band gets to let rip but ultimately spoils the overall haunting effect. The newer songs also fit in well, the best being the big sweeping sound of her collaboration with Anna Calvi, Falling Back, and the intensely chilling Late Victorian Holocaust, co-penned with Mr. Gloom himself, Nick Cave.
The rarest tracks are left to the very end and are among the most striking, memorable moments: there's a rather sublime and cinematic sounding Who Will Take My Dreams Away, written with composer Angelo Badalamenti, which she tells us she has never performed live before this tour. Then, after a very funny anecdote about getting roaring drunk with Damon Albarn while writing the track, she ends, rather appropriately, with the somber Last Song from 2005's Before The Poison.
Backed throughout by a superb three-piece band which featured her producer Rob Ellis on drums and the musical whiz Ed Harcourt on keyboards (an incredible singer-songwriter in his own right who I just saw recently supporting The Afghan Whigs), it was easy to see Faithfull has great chemistry with them all and they are extremely fond of her too. For instance, it was amusing and sweet to see Harcourt go over to Faithfull and hoist her up out of her chair at the end, like a favourite nephew helping out his old aunt.
Even confined to her chair for the duration of the concert, Faithfull's charm and wit filled the stage and more than ever she seemed like a seasoned storyteller, with us gathered around to hear her tales and wisdom. For a long time she's been dismissed by many as a rock star girlfriend or relic from the 60s but the music she has been making over the past 20 years is more interesting and relevant than most of her contemporaries. And tonight also proves that she doesn't even need to move around much to keep her audience enthralled with her words and her music, surely the sign of a true artist and entertainer. At this show Marianne gave her love to London and we gave it right back, threefold, ending with a huge standing ovation. It seems not even a broken hip can keep her down. What a woman and what a night.
Comments
Post a Comment