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     Austin Member Username: Bruegelpie Post Number: 93 Registered: 09-2004 |
Interesting interview with Lindy about all matters Go-Betweens: http://www.theage.com.au/entertainment/m usic/water-under-go-between-bridge-20120 830-2524j.html Water under Go Between Bridge Date August 31, 2012 Quiet Heart reflects renewed affection among the Go-Betweens, but not agreement, writes Michael Dwyer. INDY Morrison is bracing to relive a profound regret. Her tearful rant on the Long Way to the Top documentary was raw and unsettling in 2001. When that episode of Australian rock history is rerun on ABC2 in coming weeks, her bitterness will simply be out of date. ''I cannot believe I have to live through that again,'' protests the former drummer with the Go-Betweens. ''I have a million regrets but one of my biggest is crying on camera. For months after that, people would stop me in the street and say, 'Lindy, hi. You OK?''' She was and she wasn't. Issues of loyalty and belonging had been prickly in the Go-Betweens' splintered ranks since songwriters Robert Forster and Grant McLennan made a bipartisan decision to end the band in 1989. he fact that they had just reunited in 2001 without Morrison and violinist Amanda Brown - their respective former lovers - perhaps played into the passion of that televised moment. Today, though, with the tragic added perspective of McLennan's early death six years ago, ''there's no looking back'', Morrison says. ''It's been a total love-in.'' Exhibit A: a new, jointly selected best-of titled Quiet Heart. The atonement happened, poetically enough, on the Go Between Bridge. The renaming of the Brisbane landmark brought the '''80s survivors together in a flood of affection'' in July 2010, Morrison says. ''Amanda and I arrived from the airport in a cab, [bassist] Robert Vickers arrived from New York. We got out of the cab and there's Robert Forster, his little head peering over everyone, looking at us looking at him and it was one of those great moments.'' Not that agreeing on the 18 songs on Quiet Heart would be plain sailing. ''It was long and arduous,'' the drummer says. ''We were on email every day. People were disagreeing with each other all the time.'' There was no omitting bona fide classics such as Spring Rain, Bye Bye Pride, Bachelor Kisses, Streets of Your Town and Cattle and Cane. But the fact that six of the final selections hail from the Forster-McLennan reunion period suggests some votes were more equal than others. ''Clearly, I just wanted tracks that I played on,'' Morrison says with a laugh. Some choices were made redundant, she adds, by the inclusion of a bonus disc, Vienna Burns, a live recording of a mid-'80s gig she fails to recall. ''I have no memory of the whole decade,'' she claims conveniently, though she does take exception to Forster's sentimental portrayal of the band's salad days in his 2005 song, Darlinghurst Nights. ''I've got a few issues with Darlinghurst Nights and I'm not going to discuss them with you,'' she says curtly. ''I'm certainly in that song and I don't think I'm painted in a very good light.'' She also sees herself, with more amusement this time, in the Quiet Heart cover photograph conceived and directed by Forster. The image of two awkwardly smiling college students screams three words: bookish, naive, romantic. ''I know! It's Robert all over, isn't it? And it's so Brisbane,'' she hoots. ''When he sent that [photo] through I told him, 'I'm sure I've still got a dress like that in my cupboard.' ''The whole thing about the Go-Betweens is that the songs are about the Go-Betweens. That's what's so extraordinary.'' Our very own Fleetwood Mac? ''Yes. The B-grade cult version.'' She's joking, sort of, though it sounds suspiciously like provocation. Forster would never be so flippant about his and McLennan's legacy. When all of the old dresses are back in the cupboard, it's their songs that will keep the cult alive. ''They are the most beautiful songs,'' Morrison says. ''And if I could just add one little bit more: those songs were supported by a band that was incredibly sympathetic and in tune with those songs; that never overreached but just backed them softly and gently in the way that those songs were supposed to be.'' Quiet Heart: The Best of the Go-Betweens is out this week. Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/entertainment/m usic/water-under-go-between-bridge-20120 830-2524j.html#ixzz254sAn3yi |