Female Voices

Post by **Xamonas Chegwé** » Tue Apr 28, 2009 12:40 am

I just watched an incredible documentary about Marianne Faithfull and I thought that I would start a thread devoted to female singers.

I am going to devote a post each to a few of my favourites, trying to explain how these voices speak to me so personally as well as sharing a few of my favourite tracks, starting with Ms Faithfull. Feel free to chip in with some of your own, or to comment on what I post - this is Rationalia after all!

After MF, I will post similar pieces on Patti Smith, Björk, Joni Mitchell, Sandy Denny and Siouxsie Sioux. There are many other female voices that I adore but these have been with me the longest and mean the most to me.

Marianne Faithfull

I had known of Marianne as a 60's icon, Mick Jagger's shag-piece and lightweight, folky singer for a long while, but had assumed that she had either died, retired or got married and settled down, when I first heard Broken English in the early 80's. My girlfriend at the time had the album and asked me if I had ever heard it - I said not and she played for me. It was one of those moments where you hear music that sounds like nothing you've ever heard before and yet, at the same time, like something you've known all your life. I fell in love the first time I heard that album - a love that lasted several decades longer than that that I felt for whatsername who played it for me!

I posted the track Why D'Ya Do It elsewhere but it deserves another post. The words are by poet Heathcote Williams (a fact I only discovered a few years back) but, as with so many of the lyrics that she sings, whether or not she actually wrote them, Marianne owns them. This is the album version - the one I posted before (in What are you listening to? I think) was a live one.

One of the first things I did after splitting up with thingy was to buy my own copy of this album. I think I have bought 2 or 3 more since. It would be one of my desert island discs. Oddly though, and partly through lack of money but also because I was moving around a lot at the time and had no space for a huge vinyl collection, I didn't buy any more MF albums for quite a while. Once I became more settled, and CDs dropped to affordable prices, I began to piece together her discography (I am by nature a bit of a completist!) The first album that I bought was a compilation of her 60's hits which, upon reevaluation, turned out to be a lot more than mere folksy niceness - especially the later tracks, such as her version of Sister Morphine, a track she co-wrote with Jagger. This is a live version of the track from the 1990 album Blazing Away.

Following this, the next album I bought was the one immediately preceding Broken English, an album called Faithless. I figured that it would be similar in style - FAIL!!! The album, also known under the title Dreaming My Dreams, was a collection of Country and Western songs that Faithfull recorded while recovering from a serious bout of heroin addiction in Ireland. When I first bought this album I thought "Country - WTF!!" and hardly played it for many years - but eventually it grew on me. Most noticeably, she responded to the Stones' cover of Hank Williams' Wild Side of Life by covering Kitty Wells' response, It Wasn't God That Made Honky Tonk Angels, which uses the same melody to tell the story from the woman's POV.

After this, I bought many of her albums in quick succession and most of them became firm favourites (the sole exception probably being the dreadful Rich Girl Blues which was recorded at the height of her heroin addiction and is such a case of 'going through the motions' that listening to it is a chore.

Other notable albums include:

20th Century Blues - A collection of songs by Kurt Weill/Bertold Brecht - including many from The Threepenny Opera which she had performed on stage. (She followed this with a second collection - The Seven Deadly Sins.)

Before The Poison - An album of contemporary songs written by Marianne herself, Nick Cave, PJ Harvey, Damon Albarn and Jon Brion.

Blazing Away - The definitive live album, recorded in 1990, featuring mainly songs from Broken English and the albums that followed.

One of the things for me that defines Marianne Faithful is the way in which she can live a song. This is not especially evident in her 60's output, where her voice is young, pure and sweet. But as the years have treated her roughly, her voice has absorbed all of the abuse, the drugs, the drink, the hurt and also the wisdom that such things impart (if you survive them.) Listening to her albums in chronological order, you feel as if you are sharing her life. Obviously, all you are actually doing is peering through a tiny, smudged window into a badly lit corner of her life, but the illusion is beguiling. Very few artists have that ability to make you believe every word that they sing.

I will leave you with the title track from the Before The Poison album, co-written by Marianne and PJ Harvey.

Post by **Feck** » Tue Apr 28, 2009 12:54 am

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ReNfgZ4A1w

Post by **Xamonas Chegwé** » Tue Apr 28, 2009 1:11 am

mrenutt4 wrote:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ReNfgZ4A1w

Hey - another fan. Kissin' Time is an album I have to be in the mood for - which is odd, cos most of MF's albums dictate the mood for me. But when you are in that mood, it is a classic. Song for Nico is fantastically good!

Post by **Beelzebub2** » Tue Apr 28, 2009 1:20 am

I love Janis:

Post by **Beelzebub2** » Tue Apr 28, 2009 1:23 am

One Croatian folk singer:

Post by **Feck** » Tue Apr 28, 2009 1:30 am

Tori Amos always makes me cry talk about heartfelt , one problem microphones and shit sound engineers EVERY time makes me angry

Post by **Bella Fortuna** » Tue Apr 28, 2009 2:04 am

Some of my favourites are Kate Bush, Siouxsie, Sandy Denny, Tori Amos, Ella Fitzgerald, Etta James, Susan Tedeschi, Laura Cantrell, Indigo Girls, and Sugar Pie Desanto... I really like a female singer who can belt it out, as I could never do such a thing myself... it releases one's soul to joy to hear a good singer really let loose.

Some samples (crappy though the quality may be)...

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=84pegsJM ... PL&index=3[/youtube]

Post by **Beelzebub2** » Tue Apr 28, 2009 2:06 am

mrenutt4 wrote:

Tori Amos always makes me cry talk about heartfelt , one problem microphones and shit sound engineers EVERY time makes me angry

I know one person who would always cry when hearing Sinéad O'Connor:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6MwjXx1 ... re=related[/youtube]

Post by **Xamonas Chegwé** » Tue Apr 28, 2009 2:18 am

I really liked the Umpeylia Balinton - she had a great voice!

Post by **Bella Fortuna** » Tue Apr 28, 2009 4:33 am

Oh, how could I have forgotten Neko Case?

Post by **Dasein** » Tue Apr 28, 2009 4:51 am

and ms. lucinda of course: (crappy video, don't blame me.)

Post by **Chinaski** » Tue Apr 28, 2009 4:51 am

Ani DiFranco:

Cristina Scabbia:

Emilie Autumn:

3 of my favourite female voices.

Post by **Bella Fortuna** » Tue Apr 28, 2009 5:09 am

People tend to really love her or really be irritated by her... I really love her.

Joanna Newsom:

Post by **Chinaski** » Tue Apr 28, 2009 5:45 am

Oh and they're all really hot too. I love how Ani can't help laughing and smiling nonstop while she plays. So cute!! We need a "smitten" smiley.

Post by **charlou** » Tue Apr 28, 2009 7:41 am

XC. that's a great article you've written about Marianne F. Good stuff.

I like all of the vocalists mentioned so far ...

Once again, I'm eclectic in my appreciation ...

Delores O'Riordin

Katie Noonan ...

Chrissie Amphlett

Linda Perry

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