Faithless
The barton Theatre
Dirty Three
Governor Hindmarsh
Reviewed by Murray Bramwell
It is three years since Faithless were last through and they were also a late scratching from the 2002 Big Day Out. So there is a strong sense that the Wednesday 9.15 show at Thebarton is overdue. The Faithless faithful certainly think so as they pack in, moving close to a stage bathed in thick red light – drum kit, percussion rig and a double stack of keyboards all ready to fire.
Faithless are a House showband – a composite of trip hop, dance beat and prog pop, and as English as a country summer. Their faux pastoral sound has been enhanced by the breathy vocals of Dido and Zoe Johnston and the pastel washes of producers Rollo – and the Queen Bee herself, Sister Bliss. Add to all this the burred vocals of Maxi Jazz, the Nat King Cole of rap, and you have a winning sound. It may not be what the club wars of the early nineties were fought for, but for tourists like me it is all very edible.
It is Donny X to open. Heavy ripples of live drum and percussion and a pulse of bass begin, then a scream goes up as Sister Bliss takes her place at the Roland, jabbing the keyboard for a mix of foggy chords, and the kind of funky accents we used to hear from Joe Zawinul when Weather Report ruled the fusion world back in the seventies. The follow up is Muhammad Ali and Maxi Jazz makes his entrance – thin as a whip, he moves suavely in his trademark black suit and orange tee shirt, enunciating a literate toast to an African American role model while back-up singers ooh and ah and Bliss adds some Shafty brass on synth.
The crowd is up and awake for the opening bars of a Faithless signature – from the monster mix, Insomnia. Slow portentous intro from Bliss, and then Maxi begins his accented lament : “greasy insomnia please release me, I can’t get no …sleep” . Which, as anyone will tell you, is the cue line for the bony syncopations of Sister Bliss’s full-tilt keyboard riff, a thundering solo as distinctive in club music as the hook line in Layla is in rock. The punters go wild as white lights swivel across the stage and pour into the shimmering auditorium.
Mirroring the ying and yang programming of their Outrospective album, the band switches to the raindrop textures of Zoe Johnston’s Crazy English Summer, the singer stepping forward, only to return to the backline as the band pounds through Not Enuff Love and Maxi gets sinister for Tarantula, with Bliss laying a puttering rhythm, spiked with heavy splashing chords and high hat disco cymbals.
A cluster of oldies – Dirty Ol Man, the only track from Reverence, is followed by by a croony, understated version of I Want my Family Back. There is none of the cavernous architecture from the last tour. Similarly with Take the Long Way Home. Instead, the band pulls out the stops for We Come 1 – with deafening audience participation and much pointing in the direction of disco heaven. Sister Bliss, cool as blonde ice, whips up the momentum for the collective One, pausing gloriously to restate her Imsomnia trope, fanfare for the common clubster. It is a live dance classic – Maxi’s message of peace and solidarity, Sister Bliss- all synthesised sound and light, the rest of the band an engine of rhythm.
That is the end of the set, but the crowd has barely begun. Postcards opens the encore, followed by a version of The Garden with an extended acoustic guitar solo, a kitschly lyrical interlude before the Big Finale. Then, another fanfare and a thunder of drum and percussion as Maxi intones like the voice of Orson – “this is my church, this is where I heal my hurts”. Sister Bliss hits overdrive and the gathering is ready for rapture. Faithless give us eight minutes of God is a DJ and, while nothing actually transcendent takes place, with their impeccable production values, their likeable stage presence and the careful orchestration of their music-making, they more than secure their claim to being the snazziest live dance band we can expect to see here for some time.
A long way from the smooth confections of Faithless are Dirty Three. Well. at least A Thousand Miles – the composition from Horse Stories which opens their Sunday night set at the always excellent Governor Hindmarsh. Just out of the recording studio in Melbourne and celebrating ten years together, Dirty Three and their unique form of grunge jazz are as marvellous as ever. Drummer Jim White, guitarist Mick Turner and violinist Warren Ellis have a devoted following, but like the other alt.groups they have been associated with, such as Low and Will Oldham’s Palace Brothers, they deserve much more acclaim, here and internationally, than they have yet received .
Of course Dirty Three’s great appeal is that don’t give a bugger about such things and have continued to make music which is splendid on CD, and a total revelation when heard live. At the Gov they are in fine form. Having got the sound levels to where he wants them, Warren starts plucking his violin while White sets a deceptively simple percussive beat and Turner begins his mesmeric, understated guitar patterns. Such is the dominance of the posturing, blaring lead guitarist in contemporary music that the disciplined work of Mick Turner is almost incomprehensible in its intricacy and restrained dynamic. Yet it is the essential binding agent in the band – especially when Ellis begins the ascent into such ragas of winding melody as Some SummersThey Drop Like Flys (sic).
Warren Ellis is like some intense Romany fiddler, skinny and hunched over his miked-up violin. His curly hair is unfashionably long and he wears an old frayed shirt. He is friendly to the attentive crowd and even plays a request – track seven from Ocean Songs – Sea Above, Sky Below – although he seems to be calling it Chicago. Dirty Three titles vary anyway, and usually have some Warren expletives added – just his way perhaps of not getting himself confused with the Kronos Quartet , with whom – I believe in all seriousness – they are in comparable musical company.
Other highlights include Hope, also a Horse story, which begins with a melancholy figure played to straining point on violin, to a perfect slackfooted beat from White, and opening out into an exquisite melody repeated with almost unbearable intensity. Sue’s Last Ride, a concert favourite is also superbly performed, its straggly beginning only belying the eventual cohesion of the piece.
Dirty Three play for nearly two hours with an encore including Everything is Fucked from their first CD, and a long, unidentifiable love song whose title either got Warrenised on the night, or it is from material just recorded and yet to be released. Whatever it is, it takes us even further out into the badlands – past the cactus and the mesas and the gila monsters – to the preferred habitat of Dirty Three, some of the most interesting and accomplished musical guns in the west.
The Adelaide Review, No.224, May, 2002, p.21.