Marianne Faithfull BBC4

Subject: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Spot
Date: 27 Apr 09 - 06:03 PM

Hallo everybody....

    I've just watched MF on TV....for an hour.... anyone got any comments?

    I'm at a loss for words.....   

                  Regards to all....Spot

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 27 Apr 09 - 06:06 PM

I've loved what I've heard of her recently, but I've only heard it on the radio. How was the visual?

SRS

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Spot
Date: 27 Apr 09 - 06:08 PM

Errrmmm...ermmmm...errrmmm...how can I put this....??

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: catspaw49
Date: 27 Apr 09 - 07:40 PM

Here's one from Marianne in 2008 on YouTube.

Spaw

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: GUEST,Golightly
Date: 28 Apr 09 - 04:27 AM

I watched about 20 mins but didn't enjoy it enough to see it through to the end. She is very lucky to have the support of good musicians.

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 28 Apr 09 - 06:52 AM

I managed five minutes, bloody awful, and I was a fan a long time ago.

Dave H

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Mick Tems
Date: 28 Apr 09 - 08:38 AM

I listened to As Tears Go By in the 1960s and thought: What's a pretty ordinary voice doing with a Mick Jagger hit record? (I was rather naive then.) I watched her on Jools Holland's Later, and I liked the amazing musicians in the band - but MF didn't boil my kettle at all. As the years go by, her voice has become more out-of-tune and the songs are decidedly dodgy. Just to sure, I watched MF on BBC4 - and I quickly switched off again.

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: GUEST,JohnMc
Date: 28 Apr 09 - 08:49 AM

What are we supposed to make of R Newman's "In Germany before the war" ?

Is it a case of the girl being murdered? Disturbing song.

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 28 Apr 09 - 09:09 AM

Oddly enough, I accidently ran into a YouTube of her early yeserday while looking for Trouble In Mind. I was not impressed. So when the show came on last night I turned the telly off and went to bed.

Something unqualifiable about her voice and presentation. Just doesn't do anything for me.

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Tradsinger
Date: 28 Apr 09 - 09:23 AM

I think some people should realise when their voice has gone and stop trying to pretend they can still hack it.

Tradsinger

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: GUEST,brakn
Date: 28 Apr 09 - 11:44 AM

I don't think could ever hack it.

She was only ever famous for being Mick Jagger's girlfriend which was over 40 years ago.

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Spot
Date: 28 Apr 09 - 12:18 PM

Halloo everybody...

                   Well... the comments have surprised me a bit...!! I did think folk would be singing her praises left right and centre and I'd be castigated for being negative!! I dont think she should be doing this...I felt the band were embarassed to blazes ( none looked to be enjoying the gig!!) and, to be honest, the whole performance made me cringe ..... Does she have any "stage presence"? Hmmmm...well.... What do you guys think?
                   I think if she got paid for that show then the audience should've been paid more.....!!

         Shame really... I wish I could say something nice!!

                      Regards to all......Spot

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 28 Apr 09 - 12:22 PM

Her voice conveys experience that has nothing to do with being in tune or not, popular or not. She's very compelling.

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: GUEST,Greycap
Date: 28 Apr 09 - 03:12 PM

Jeeeeeez! Was she bad, or what? I watched for at least two minutes. The BBC get my licence money to pay her? She doesn't compell me.

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 28 Apr 09 - 03:53 PM

Weekend Edition, March 26, 2005 story. (Links to more, older stories at the bottom of the page).

Fresh Air played this in March 2009.

SRS

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Spot
Date: 28 Apr 09 - 04:46 PM

Halloooo
            Well...SRS...I've listened to the interview.. I can't get my head round her at all... I think she's a victim of her past life. I hate to say it but I think she almost has "delusions of adequacy" as a singer/performer!! Having said that , she's got 20 odd recordings out(Thats at least 19 more than me!! ;-) ) so presumably she has a following and she's obviously doing something right!!

            I still feel she should "find herself a day job" as it were....Mebbe I'm too critical/cynical...   In her favour, she obviously believes in herself and is doing her thing...far and away better than idling, eh!!! I wonder how much that show cost? And, as a licence payer how much I contributed...... Hmmmm.....
   
                         Regards to all......Spot

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: breezy
Date: 28 Apr 09 - 05:36 PM

Well spot its like this, yes she is crap and always has been, but she and Mick J got it on and as a result she got this opportunity, the sad thing is , she thinks she's good.

She's embarrassing as a singer

Even moreso nowadays



and people buy into it

more of a cult !

I wanted her to be better, but in the end turned away

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Spot
Date: 28 Apr 09 - 05:48 PM

She's on a different planet, methinks!! Planet Delusion....... All very sad I think....

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 28 Apr 09 - 05:50 PM

The woman's got no soul in her performance. She is just (as said above) still trading on her infamy or should I say in flagrante.

I think now I have learned about her introduction to celbrity status, I will have no porblems turning down a Mars bar.

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Spot
Date: 28 Apr 09 - 05:51 PM

Mars bar? Que?

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Jack Campin
Date: 28 Apr 09 - 06:13 PM

There has to be an equivalent of Godwin's Law that any thread on 1960s pop ends when somebody mentions Marianne Faithfull and the Mars bar.

I just had a look round at her YouTube videos and quite liked this one:

Why'd ya do it

Impressive trumpet playing and she's convincing with the Heathcote Williams lyrics (trailer-trash Strindberg on acid).

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 29 Apr 09 - 03:12 AM

Stilly River Sage, COMPELLING !!! I felt compelled to switch off and go to bed.

Dave H

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: pavane
Date: 29 Apr 09 - 03:20 AM

Spot,
You must be the only person on the planet who hasn't heard of the unconventional use of the famous Mars bar.

I am just sad that she can get an hour on TV (OK, not a prime channel) when so many good folk artists can't even get one play on BBC Radio.

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: pavane
Date: 29 Apr 09 - 03:23 AM

But she says it wasn't actually true

Mars bar story

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 29 Apr 09 - 03:42 AM

That weedy little girl voice of her early recordings was thoroughly loathesome IMO and she was nothing more than a 'product'. So a bit of a jaw dropper where she say's (paraphrased): "if I hadn't have been discovered, I'd have sung Mozart" - represents rather a profound overestimation of her own talents IMO.
I do like the rough sound she makes now far more however. Jury's out on whether I feel her craft is that engaging or worthwhile though.

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 29 Apr 09 - 03:44 AM

Well I watched the Why'd Ya Do It video. Still not convinced. So I thought hang on... try listening without looking. But then I coulnd't get around the visual image of her sad attempts at sexually aggressive body language out of my brain.

So I decided (because I want to give her vocal delivery a fair test) to open the Broken English recording done 1980. And even putting it in context with the 80's it still did nothing for me. I cannot hear any ????? (what word am I looking for) emotional investment in her voice, which would make the style and tone of her voice quite awesome.

The gravelly atonal quality is only empty husk without that vital kernel of feeling in it.

Am I wrong? Perhaps that is what she was attempting. Maybe a disenfranchised body divorced from soul sound.

I still say her later stuff does absolutely nothing for me.

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 29 Apr 09 - 04:17 AM

Faithfull IMO just doens't have enough punk in her to pull that song off. You'd also need to be able to manage some degree of 'rap' or urban style recitation in the delivery to give the poem some punch. Marianne's swearing is so self-conscious - it's like she's doing it for 'art's sake'!

Difficult song to pull off though. And I don't know who would really do it justice. Someone like Katie White from the The Ting Tings might be able to do it, even though she hasn't the strongest voice, she's got the necessary bollox to mean it and for it not to sound fraudulent.

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Marje
Date: 29 Apr 09 - 08:23 AM

I just listened to a bit of the BBC4 sessions show, and thought it was truly dreadful, like the "bad" acts they put into TV talent shows just so that we can laugh at them. It was just a tunless muttering and groaning - were it not for the accomplished backing musicians, I'd have had no idea what key or notes she was alluding to.

She seems, in the introductory chat, to think that being 62 makes her into some sort of living legend (I mean,it's not like she's 90!), and I also read her saying that she's created a whole genre of singing - the "Marianne Faithfull genre" (I think that was in the Radio Times). She's utterly deluded, and the Beeb ought to have realised that this Emperor is not wearing any clothes.

I'm absolutely with you, Spot. If I'd been in the audience I think I'd have had to walk out.

Marje

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 29 Apr 09 - 09:48 AM

When I first saw this thread it was just above "Songs for a limited vocal range"!

I like Virginia's point about the lack of feeling. I don't much like Tom Waits, but he doesn't grate on me the way MF does - I think there's a heartless, arrogant quality to her delivery, which makes a very odd combination with the state of her voice.

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 29 Apr 09 - 10:15 AM

This thread has led me to think about strong contemporary female singers (of which I feel Faithfull is something of a wannabe - her continual self conceited references to being 'discovered' and 'I would have sung Mozart' seeming testament to this..) Grace Jones would kick 'Why'd Ya Do It' into outa space. And she's 61 now - or so I read. A minimal range certainly, but Jeezus does that woman communicate some kinda female power...

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Stu
Date: 29 Apr 09 - 10:19 AM

She was on Jools Holland too, and was equally godawful on that.

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Maryrrf
Date: 29 Apr 09 - 10:47 AM

The first I heard of her when she 'resurfaced' was when she appeared in a Metallica video that my son was watching. I was pretty used to Metallica by then (had to be - he went through a heavy metal phase) but suddenly there was this godawful bleating coming from the TV and I asked him what that was. "Oh that's Marianne Faithfull". As I recall in the video she played a hurdy gurdy or something of that nature and sang "da da da da da da da da....." in a horrible raspy voice.

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: GUEST,Jack Campin
Date: 29 Apr 09 - 10:48 AM

Grace Jones would kick 'Why'd Ya Do It' into outa space.

Agreed - but you'd rather have Faithfull doing it than Susan Boyle, I suspect.

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 29 Apr 09 - 11:42 AM

"but you'd rather have Faithfull doing it than Susan Boyle, I suspect."

Well now that you mention it... hell yes! And to repeat, I do actually quite like Faithfull's mature rough edged vocals. Though the fact that I find it hard to think of suitable female candidates for such a strong and challenging song as the one you linked to here, is either testament to my ignorance of the existance of such female vocalists, or (rather more tragically) testament to the difficulty that female singers of 'strength and character' have in receiving the necessary recognition in todays 'pretty girl singing prettily' musical climate. Of which Faithfull, if nothing else, has done well to move out from underneath. So for that - I do indeed give her credit.

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: GUEST,brakn
Date: 29 Apr 09 - 12:01 PM

"She was on Jools Holland too,"

I didn't see that one but I can imagine the fawning that went on.

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 29 Apr 09 - 12:55 PM

Why'd ya do it was originally intended for Tina Turner but she turned it down, considering the lyrics "inappropriate". That and the fact that the song has been given virtually no airtime for more than 20 years are sad testament to the insane values that we have to have imposed on us for our own protection. Bravo to Heathcote Williams for writing it and to Marianne for singing and recording it.

And bravo to Spot, first for kicking off an unedifying thread and then for coming off the fence and joining the pack, once he or she had seen which way the wind was blowing.

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Spot
Date: 29 Apr 09 - 01:25 PM

Hallo everybody...

             Thanks for that comment Peter..it was never my intention to sit back and watch , as it were... I'm still very surprised at the lack of support for MF..    (at least now I don't feel too bad about giving her a bit o' stick!!) Also surprised at the BBC for presuming people want that kind of show for their money.I guess there must be a fan base. I still wish I could say something positive but after listening to "that" song , any potentials have gone out my window.. I cannot understand why she'd (or anybody, to be fair!!) would want to sing it!! I thought it was total bulls**t and very unconvincingly performed.The only thing it elicited in me was pity for her. I agree she didnt seem comfortable with it and, to that end should've left it alone.

            Pavanne - thanks for Mars info...I do recall something but it was a long time ago!! ;-)

            Just for the record, I'm male, 59 and spent a lifetime in the Construction Industry...I'm no prude and can Eff and Blind with the best - I also know when not to...!! MF obviously does not.

                      Regards to all... Spot

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: The Sandman
Date: 29 Apr 09 - 02:08 PM

just for the record, I am 58.
I think Marianne can sing and has charisma,and is compelling,however she cant play the concertina,and I dont think she is as good as me,but shes probably more modest,she is probably abetter typist toohttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C0zAr1t6nTE&feature=channel_page ly more modest
here i am singing Willy of the Winesbury.Dick Miles

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Spot
Date: 29 Apr 09 - 02:27 PM

Laughed like buggery at your post Dick!! MF canna sing, but you can!! ;-)

                   Regards.....Spot

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Marje
Date: 29 Apr 09 - 03:01 PM

He's quite right, Spot, I'd rather listen to Dick singing than to MF any day! Mind you, that's now saying very much - I'd rather chew off my own leg than have to sit through a Marianne Faithfull concert. And as for modesty, she seems to believe not only that she can sing but that she created a whole new genre of music - I don't think I've ever heard Dick make a claim like that. But I like his Youtube clip very much, and his playing. Pity about the typing but you wouldn't want to be too perfect, would you, Dick? :-)

Marje

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 29 Apr 09 - 03:03 PM

Billie Holiday was quite gravelly and atonal. But my gawd your heart breaks when you listen to her.

MF can't touch THIS

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: robomatic
Date: 29 Apr 09 - 03:08 PM

I'm afraid I concur with most of what I'm reading here. She got more than her fair share of coverage on NPR in the last month, and she didn't sound like much either singing or talking.

No one has a higher opinion of her, however, than she does herself.

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: GUEST,Golightly
Date: 30 Apr 09 - 07:22 AM

I think she's one of those people who are unbearable because they are acting out their image of themselves rather than genuinely conveying a song.

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Spot
Date: 30 Apr 09 - 07:56 AM

Halloooo

Well put Mr Lightly!! :-)

   I wonder if MF's a visitor here and if these comments would change her opinion of herself....??   I doubt either , really! I still can't think of anything good to say re. her performance and that upsets me a bit. I can usually find something in most things, but sadly , not this time... :-(

                Regards to all (MF too!) Spot

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Zen
Date: 30 Apr 09 - 08:00 AM

I used to like her gravelly voice which worked well on earlier songs (e.g. Broken English album) but was a bit disappointed listening to her recent Jools Holland performance.

Zen

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: keberoxu
Date: 27 Feb 21 - 07:50 PM

I don't really get it either,
the whole rapt attention cult-like fascination thing.

The French phrase diseuse à voix
for certain cabaret artistes
is pretty close to what she is doing,
and if you look back at her youth, decades ago,
she was in fact connected to
the French songwriter Serge Gainsbourg

...no, she was not one of his "muses"
or ladies that moved in with him,
but he wanted her to sing his songs
and she may have recorded one
called Hier et Demain.


You may or may not be aware that
Marianne Faithful was stricken with COVID-19 and survived,
thanks to being treated in hospital before it was too late.
However, her producer,
Hal Willmer, succcumbed to COVID-19 last year.

So her latest release (don't know if it's out yet),
"She Walks in Beauty",
was produced by someone else.
Already there is a published interview at
Mojo magazine
in aid of the album.

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: keberoxu
Date: 27 Feb 21 - 08:03 PM

If I can link to it, there is online
the video of "Hier ou Demain"       (not "et" Demain, dummy!)


I don't know if this was a separate video
or if it is an excerpt from an actual film from back in the day.

Hier où Demain

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Jos
Date: 28 Feb 21 - 05:13 AM

That would be "ou" without the accent, meaning "or".
With the accent it means "where".

Subject: RE: Marianne Faithfull BBC4
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 28 Feb 21 - 06:13 AM

I'm trying to remember the details but I feel sure I saw her play Ophelia at Nottingham rep - sometime in the late 1960's/early 70's.

Apparently she played the role in a film.

"Gabriel Rieger

Few Shakespearean performances have proven as polarizing as Marianne Faithfull’s Ophelia in Tony Richardson?s 1969 film of Hamlet. In a January 12, 1970 review of the film, Time Magazine declared her performance “remarkably affecting… ethereal, vulnerable, and in some strange way purer than the infancy of truth.” Other critics have been less effusive. David Bevington, reviewing the film in Shakespeare: Stage, Script, Screen writes that Richardson?s “most controversial choice involves Ophelia, acted (poorly) by rock singer Marianne Faithfull, who looks like a sixties flower child.” Dianne Hunter, in an article for the online journal PsyArt, writes that Faithfull?s performance evokes other icons such as Twiggy and Mary Travers in “the 1960s … ideal of femininity,” while Robert Shaugnessy, writing in Henderson?s A Concise Companion to Shakespeare on Screen, dismisses Faithfull?s performance as “blank and understated for the first part of the film … a vacuous sex object” who “degenerates into a perverted flower child, an acid casualty serving as a focus for Hamlet?s (and perhaps the film?s) prevailing misogyny” (73).

In her 1994 book Faithfull: An Autobiography, the singer recounts her experience of playing the role. Faithfull writes:

For years I had been babbling about death in interviews. That was playacting. There came a time, however, that it stopped being a performance. The combined effect of playing Ophelia and doing heroin induced a morbid frame of mind – to say the least – and I began contemplating drowning myself in the Thames. "

As for her achievements. I wish I'd accomplished as much.