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     Mark Leydon Member Username: Mark_leydon Post Number: 9 Registered: 05-2005 |
http://www.lacitybeat.com/article.php?id=2255&IssueNum=107 THE YIN AND YANG OF THE GO-BETWEENS Aussie cult fave returns to an L.A. stage with balanced vitality ~ By STEVEN ROSEN ~ Live, the Go-Betweens may just be the most perfectly balanced rock band around. And it’s nice to have a rare chance to witness it. Last Saturday night (June 18) at the Troubadour, the Go-Betweens played in L.A. as an electrified band – a quartet – for the first time in 16 years. The group’s mainstays – Australian singer-songwriter/guitarists Robert Forster and Grant McLennan – were augmented by bassist Adele Pickvance and drummer Glenn Thompson, just as they are on their acclaimed new album, Oceans Apart. Clearly, they all were a good fit. The sound balance was exquisite: The group was loud and exuberantly punchy, as befitted Forster’s and McLennan’s roots in Australia’s late-1970s post-punk rock, yet you could understand every crisply enunciated word they sang, as well as the cushioning harmony vocals by Pickvance and Thompson. Forster and McLennan split the lead vocals almost right down the middle, with both alternating between electric guitars and (plugged-in) acoustics. The audience included many familiar with the cult-favorite albums the Go-Betweens put out in the 1980s, before Forster and McLennan split up to do solo work – to little commercial avail – during the entire 1990s. They were so good at the Troub, it was hard to believe they’d let an entire decade slip away from them. But when 1988’s 16 Lovers Lane failed to become as big a hit as they’d wanted, despite being on a major U.S. label and getting far more airplay than previous recordings, they stopped trying. In an interview before the show, McLennan blamed that decision on frustration. “The breakup was fatigue – we hit 30, and it was time to grow up a little bit,” he said. “Robert met a woman who was to become his wife. We needed to do something apart. It just wasn’t working; it didn’t feel right. We were tired, you know, and sick of slogging our guts out. We got to a good stage on a major American label, but we really didn’t get the break we needed.” They resumed recording together in 2000, having now put out three additional albums. And listeners at the Troubadour were keenly interested. Finally given the opportunity to hear brash, head-of-steam live versions of old favorites like the churning “Was There Anything I Could Do?,” the urgently sinewy “Cattle and Cain,” and the chiming “Streets of Your Town,” as well as newer songs “Magic in Here,” “German Farmhouse,” and “Darlinghurst Nights,” the crowd demanded three encores. Forster and McLennan are both immensely talented, even literary, writers – the band name references a 1970 movie with an adapted screenplay by Harold Pinter – and they naturally contrast with each other in lyrical concerns. Both are at heart English romantics with a Byron-like love of the elements and a Leonard Cohen need to speak poignant truth about love. On Saturday, the ocean figured in Forster’s “Surfing Magazines” and “Spring Rain,” while stars were part of McLennan’s gorgeous new “This Night’s for You,” and his dreamy “Clouds” called forth “visions of blue” when he sang it. But Forster is the Go-Betweens’ Reed/Cale to McLennan’s Lennon/McCartney. His songs are darker, and his vocals have an element of sonorous despair and ominous regret. The slow “Draining the Pool for You” was a particularly good example here. McLennan’s tunes and voice tend to be sweeter and more wistfully optimistic, at least on first listen, and they’re structured around irresistibly ebullient choruses. He ended the show with an extended example, “Bye Bye Pride,” that had people swaying and singing along like true believers. Their onstage appearance also had a yin and yang. Forster looked like Senator John Kerry – tall with graying dark hair and projecting a stiff countenance in his blue blazer and dress shirt. The balding McLennan, on the other hand, seemed more like a friendly Aussie pubster in his red-and-white shirt and jeans. The newly revitalized pair now see all those years of toiling in relative obscurity as a strength for themselves, and a bonus for intrigued listeners. “We have a huge catalog of songs,” McLennan noted, “and, because in America we’re still off the radar, you have all this stuff to discover.” | ||
| David Matheson Member Username: David_matheson Post Number: 23 Registered: 12-2004 |
Nice article. I wonder what Robert would make of the Senator Kerry reference. | ||
| wallace Member Username: Leebee Post Number: 4 Registered: 06-2005 |
Splendid article - thank you for sharing that. |