Chrissie Hynde has been a rock star for more than fifty years. The Pretenders have not been together quite that long, but Hynde was already making her name as a girl about town and rock-star-in-waiting in London. She has lived the life full-time for all of that period. It is a surprise, then, that she does not fully appreciate the credit that has accrued with that history, and how people still want to hear what she has to say.
Supporting their tenth Album in 2023, The Pretenders initially booked themselves into smaller venues, before it became clear that they had underestimated the love that the world had for her and the band. Eventually the tour went so well that a live album was made and released. Did Hynde not think she was in the class of National Treasures that could call on her friends to make a duets album? The story is that a friend had to remind her that it was an opportunity, if not a duty, to do so. Consider Duets Special an opportunity/duty fulfilled.
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Jason Molina was the man, the inspiration, the words and, most of all, the voice behind Songs: Ohia, and Magnolia Electric Company. A major force, he died too young, aged 39, a victim of his battle with alcohol, and it is perhaps only now the importance of his legacy is making itself extant. Had he got sober, and maybe a bit happier, he would undoubtedly be where Jason Isbell is now today, Kindred spirits both, each had a canny way around a maudlin melody, built over with keenly observed lyrics, often those born of experience. And boy, was he prolific, issuing a torrent of albums, often more than one a year, as well as leaving a cache of tapes behind for his record company, Secretly Canadian, to slowly sift through.
Belinda Carlisle wouldn’t be the first boomer to look back on her formative years through rose-tinteds, as she does on her new release Once Upon a Time in California, and I dare say she won’t be the last. The erstwhile singer of trailblazing L.A. new-wave punkettes, the Go-Go’s, she has been clean and sober these last 20 years, and, if her releases no longer rattle the upper reaches of the charts, she maintains a strong fanbase, especially in the U.K. and Australia.
When I first heard of this, I confess the thought came: Why? The Dave is Stewart, arguably most famous for not being the singer in Eurythmics, the other half of that once so shining brightly duo, all-conquering during the 1980’s, with a brief return at the turn of the century. Annie Lennox sang and he played guitars and keyboards. More recently he is possibly better known as a producer, but best-known really for being a friend and collaborator of the rich and famous, popping up on albums by Bob Dylan, Bryan Ferry, Mick Jagger and several by Ringo Starr. His Wikipedia page is quite a read.