Choose England’s next adorable soul belter!
Based on my tastes in music and novels, you might say I’m a bit of an Anglophile. Sadly, as I near the half century mark, I’ve never been on English soil. Spending a few hours between flights at Heathrow doesn’t count. I need to get there someday.
For every 2 things I love about my father’s people’s contributions to rock ‘n roll, there’s something I find funny. Culturally, historically, and politically—on a level predating Elvis Presley and Chuck Berry—the English and continental Europeans have every right to shake their heads and tsk tsk at our naivete, but when it comes to rock ‘n roll, they’re the babes. For instance, I find the Brits’ love for American soul music both adorable and often highly appreciated. In our own country, specific periods of African American popular music are often left in the dust. You don’t see a whole lot of young African American musicians, for instance, forming Motown-style bands or Stax-style bands. (Yeah, I know it happens a little more frequently these days.) The beat goes on, baby. Gotta keep with the times. White rockers keep the flame burning for the Memphis sound, which their kin had a hand in from the beginning, but large swaths of urban soul styles are ignored by all but some music obsessives who hang around places like the Halls of Rock.
In England I get the idea that our discarded forms of soul music are constantly in high demand. For all the good intentions the island’s music lovers bring to the music—and for all the worthwhile acts of preservation and often-overdue props English artists provide—each generation puts a sparkling, fresh, cheeky take on the music. Often this comes in the form of a cherubic young woman whose booming voice sounds years more experienced and skin tones darker than could reasonably be expected. Despite the pain and suffering evident in the singer’s voice, her image is always of girl-in-the-flat-next-door variety. Adele,of course, is the latest and greatest of these soul stylists.
Most of these English pop-soul belters, male and female, adopt the Look and mien of the cast members of To Sir With Love. I hope Happiness Stan and other friends from across the pond have time to fill us in on the cultural significance that film plays over there. I bet it would explain something regarding the pep and vigor England’s soul singers bring to the genre.
Let’s take a few minutes to review the brief peak of Lisa Stansfield‘s career. I can’t say I know anything about her, and a brief read of her Wikipedia page wasn’t that interesting, but I first heard her music and saw her videos the year my wife and I lived in Hungary, the year when EuroMTV meant so much to me. When I stumbled across this video for “Never Never Gonna Give You Up,” in which the cat had already been dropped as the video begins, I was immediately brought back to a time when it was slightly exhilarating to know that anyone still dug the Barry White records of my teenage years.
Here, Stansfield does a song that owes such a deep debt to her master that she would later re-record it as a duet with Mr. White. This is English love for discarded American culture at its finest!
I have no idea what happened to Stansfield. She was big on EuroMTV in 1993–1994, when we lived there. We got back home, and I don’t recall seeing or hearing much about her after that. No one ever talks about her, just like few people in the US talk about Alison Moyet, the woman from Yaz, who was pretty good. Where do these women go until the day they are rediscovered through guest appearances on a British comedy show or a Pet Shop Boys single? How did the super-cute, super-cheeky, even slightly nasty Lily Allen disappear so fast? She was all the rage among hipsters for about 12 minutes. Compared with the other women in this series she wasn’t really that soulful, but she too looked like she was plucked from To Sir With Love.
Why is it the one English soul belter I wish would go far away never does: Annie Lennox. She’s not even cute, cuddly, or cheeky. She’s like the harsh Redgrave sister to the rest of that crowd’s Georgy Girl.
Mr. Moderator, Annie Lennox is Scottish and she’s pretty damn great in my book. I’ll have a longer answer on my theories of the survival and interest in American soul music in England when I organize my thoughts.
My apologies to the English.
I remeber the Lisa Stansfield stuff — she had a Look that’s for sure.
I still kind of like Tracey Thorn of Everything But the Girl — when I was taking a break from alt-country in the 90s, I liked their albums and still put them on from time to time. I am on her mailing list, and she has a X-mas album coming out this year, so that’s something to stick into your 90s music fan’s stocking.
Duffy is another one who I will listen to — and for a short time before “21” — she may have bigger than Adele. Listening to the Adele single “Skyfall” from the new Bond movie shows that everything old is new again, again.
Lisa Stansfield was better in the concept (good looking English woman with a good voice exploring 70s soul/disco) than in the execution, which, frankly, was dull.
I wouldn’t exactly describe myself as an Annie Lennox fan, but she certainly brings a whole lot more to the table than any of the others mentioned, including Adele, who doesn’t much interest me either. But, then, I prefer Vanessa Redgrave to Lynn, so.
Remember Helen Terry who was backing singer for Culture Club and who had a brief career as a voice about town?
It turns out she’s been producer or executive producer of the BRIT Awards for the last decade:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helen_Terry
I read an interview with Tracy Thorn recently. She has been raising kids with her partner, the other half of Everything but the Girl.
Lisa Stansfield is probably still counting the money she made during the Irish real estate boom.
No mention of Amy Winehouse?
Lily Allen is probably laying low for awhile because she was horribly overexposed and he also doesn’t seem to give a fuck. She’s my favorite of all of these.
Check out this cheesy movie on the Northern soul scene in the ’70s for a dramatized look at the origins of this shit.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T_6NS_lLgis
I’m not getting into Winehouse. She tried real hard to be “authentic” rather than peppy and cute. She suffered enough, at least enough not to tied into this survey.
Sorry to disappointment the mob of dissent but Adele is going to be around as long as she wants. What has helped her stand out amongst the “here today gone tomorrow” crop of brit she-soul singers is surrounding herself with top-notch producers and musicians.
What hasn’t been mentioned yet is the enormous influence on all these girls by Shirley Bassey.
I’ve been a fan of Tracey Thorn for thirty years now, starting with her work in the Marine Girls. One of the things I like about her recent work is that she’s writing from a more middle-aged perspective so the songs are much more in line with where I am in recent years–the CD “Love and Its Opposites” really cuts close. Duffy had a really good first CD but her sophomore effort was marred by more “professional” production and really didn’t do her justice.
Don’t forget Joss Stone.
Shirley Bassey was cabaret never soul. The template is Dusty Springfield who loved her Motown more than the overwrought ballads she was handed.
A couple of recent contenders, Tulisa (from the awful “urban” NDubs) and Jessie J (Lily Allen-lite) aware of the impermanence of the job have both embraced full time media whoredom. They are on panels of reality shows where they sit in judgement on the over-emoting untalented wannabes.
Florence (and the Machine) is currently queen of the scene. The others, Pixie Lott, Ellie Goulding & a couple of X-factor bimbos would rather be Katy Perry than Aretha Franklin.
All that good music, those Mod fashions were passed on by parents who are now the grandparents of these kids. The days of the British soul belters may be over.
Paloma Faith is also a current contender.
I’m not sure about that, not as a criticism, but because listening to her sing makes *my* throat hurt. She’s already had surgery on her vocal cords and if she doesn’t take care of herself, she’ll have no voice left. Of course, people said the same thing about Springsteen.
I liked Lisa Stansfield quite a bit, but felt that she was often hampered by crappy music accompaniments. Her track on the Red Hot and Blue compilation (which I should have mentioned in our previous discussion of best cover albums) shows she can swing some Porter, too. I wouldn’t call her career a blip – she got at least a half decade of songs and hits in.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jURXH4BIvf4
I’m a bigger fan of Tracey Thorn because of her range of styles and that most of her musical arrangements have not just highlighted cheesy synthesizers. I’m guessing she was also out of the biz for a while due to Ben Watt’s serious illness. She has an autobiography coming out soon that would be interesting to read.
I like Annie Lennox’s voice, but again, I tire of some of her material. I liked quite a few of the tracks from “Medusa” but then lost track of her.
Other contenders: Sade (great voice, beautiful woman) and Swing Out Sister (talk about a brief career!).
And who do you get when you cross Lady Miss Kier of Deee Lite with Lisa Stansfield? Why, Betty Boo of course!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1X3me4UiAGc
Yeah, that was sort of what I was thinking when I said her career is in her own hands. Further, she doesn’t strike me as a flash in the pan.
The Springsteen comment has me thinking about a possible topic.
Certainly Shirley Bassey is considered more adult-contempt than soul. What I loosely tossed out there was her influence as on the potential of British singers. You’re Dusty comment as a template is spot-on. You’d think that the soul-belters era is over, but I was thinking that 3 years ago.
Good stuff!
Wow, what are the odds that somehow wasn’t the Betty Boo song I was expecting it to be? (Which was “Doin’ the Do”, for the record.)
I’m surprised that nobody has mentioned Rumer in this thread so far. Friend of the Hall Martin Newell has played her “Am I Forgiven” on his radio show & I noticed that her first album was in my library & I picked it up & listened to it. I did like it. It’s a mix of Dusty & Karen Carpenter & I hope the Dusty prevails over the Karen in her career.
Rumer’s second album is all ’70s MOR covers, and is quite swell.
If any of you are on Twitter, let it be known: Tracey Thorn has THEE BEST celebrity Twitter account ever. It’s about 95% her talking about her kids and livetweeting various cheesy UK reality shows. It’s a fine example of Not Giving A Fuck.