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Marianne Faithfull: a voice that says, "she hasn't survived. She's lived."
Interview, Sept, 2002 by Beck
Long before Madonna made an art form out of reinvention, Marianne Faithfull was blazing a path for musical chameleons. She began her career in 1964, presaging the dark side of the flower child movement with her version of the Rolling Stones ballad "As Tears Go By." It was a crepuscular, forlorn vision that punctured the more popular image of happy hippies frolicking in the sun, and one that reached its apotheosis in her 1969 single "Sister Morphine" (recorded by the Stones the following year).
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Ten years later, after a crippling bout with drug addiction left her homeless, at her rock-bottom worst, Faithfull reemerged with Broken English, an album in which her fragile, tremulous voice was as spectral and commanding as a ghost's. She had banished the svengalis, producers and songwriters, who in the 1960s had tried to present her as a mouthpiece for their pop songs, and revealed her own, startling, cigarette-burnt voice and stark, uncompromising vision of reality. Hers, perhaps more than any other contemporary rock singer you could name, is the voice of experience--and it's this wizened quality that, in the '90s, made her transformation into a modern-day Brechtian chanteuse such a compelling twist on cabaret.
On Kissin Time
(Virgin Records), her recently released 22nd album, the singer has come full circle. In her collaborations with Blur, Jarvis Cocker of Pulp, Billy Corgan of the Smashing Pumpkins and Dave Stewart of the Eurythmics, she more than holds her own. She duets with Beck, who interviewed her for this story, on his song "Nobody's Fault," and, much as she did on her very first single, Faithfull turns despair into poetry. The singer is still full of foreboding, but this time she's ready to face the music. Dimitri Ehrlich MARIANNE FAITHFULL: Hello!
BECK: Marianne! Sorry to keep you waiting, my dear.
MF: That's all right, my dear. I was able to watch Seinfeld. [both laugh] So how's your new record?
B: Well, it's done.
MF: I really am dying to hear it.
B: I hope you like it.
MF: Can you hear me?
B: I can hear you.
MF: But you're meant to be interviewing me. [both laugh] I'm not meant to be babbling on.
B: I'm sorry I missed you last time you were in L.A. I was wondering what you were doing here. What was the occasion?
MF: The mission? Well, it started with me doing the Gap ad.
B: You're going to be on the side of a building.
MF: I'm going to be on the side of a building, on a bus stop, all over the place.
B: And how do you feel about that?
MF: Ambivalent, but the good bit was, as I got there, guess who was doing the Gap ad with me? It's somebody who you never notice what he's wearing.
B: Who?
MF: Willie Nelson!
B: Really? I love Willie.
MF: We had a good time. I loved his last record.
B: He's somebody you should sing with.
MF: Oh, I've worshiped him for years.
B: I sang with him once.
MF: Did you? What was that like?
B: You know, I think of his voice as almost conversational. But when I stood next to him, it was like standing next to an opera singer. It was very odd. He's probably one of the loudest singers I've ever heard.
MF: Wow. Of course, he's got that incredible chest, so that means huge lungs. And, I got a denim jacket at the shoot.
B: You got a free jacket? That's always nice.
MF: Quite a nice one, too. I might stick little things on it. What do you call it? Customize it. That's what Willie does. He customizes everything.
B: He does. There's a little hole on his guitar where his pinky sits, and his pinky's been sitting there for so long it's worn away.
MF: I'd like to see his guitar collection, just on the level of how far he's come. I mean, imagine your collection a few years down the line.
B: My guitar collection was always fairly pathetic. I was sort of the anti-collector. But after we worked on the record last year, I went on a spree. I finally broke down and bought about 10 guitars, all the classic ones. But I always refuse to play them. I always want to play the $50 guitar.
MF: Aren't they just really to have lying around to look at anyway?
B: I guess. So, I finally got your new record.
MF: Oh, good. What do you think?
B: I think it's great. Fantastic. I love how varied it is. How do you feel about it?
MF: I think it's the best one. I mean, my favorite record I've ever made is The Seven Deadly Sins. But this is my favorite of my sort of rock 'n' roll records. I think it's more interesting.
B: I love the lyrics.
MF: I love the lyrics, too. You know, it also helped me such a lot to understand that all my early work had a point, and the point was--and it's not the only point--without all that, we couldn't have done this.
B: Yeah, you're building. Sometimes you feel like you're making a record just so you can make one later.
MF: Yes, I don't know what they tell you nowadays but when I started in '64, they told us, "This will only last three years." And here I am, 38 years later, with this lovely record which is built on what I did when I was very young.
