Poems and tales of Edgar Allan Poe read by a host of stars and produced by Hal Willner. Cover art by Ralph Steadman. The CD is dedicated to Jeff Buckley and Allen Ginsberg, both of whom died shortly before the CD went to press. Gavin Friday reads ‘For Annie’.
While working on the two “Pirates Of The Carribean” films, Johnny Depp and director Gore Verbinski became fascinated with the lore and fable of the pirates and sailors who ran the high seas. They brought in producer Hal Willner, who brings his knack for matching maverick musicians with extraordinary material. “Rogue’s Gallery” offers a look at the hardships, the horrors, the lusts and lurid depths, and the crystal beauty that led men to the sea in ships for hundreds of years.
Gavin helped Hal Willner organise the Dublin sessions and appears on two songs on the album: Baltimore Whores and Bully in the Alley.
Gavin Friday’s solo debut Each Man Kills the Thing He Loves was originally released in 1989. Produced by Hal Willner, it was recorded in New York with a stellar cast of musicians including Bill Frisell, Marc Ribot, Fernando Saunders, and Michael Blair.
The NME wrote: “The cabaret waltzes and orchestrated vignettes pursue Friday’s grand tangle of themes with a singular vision.”
Each Man Kills The Thing He Loves was reissued on iTunes on October 24, 2011.
From 1989 press release:
The release of Each Man Kills the Thing He Loves, the debut LP by Gavin Friday and The Man Seezer, marks the welcome return of one of the pop-music world’s most intriguing figures. As a key member of Ireland’s Virgin Prunes, Gavin Friday presented an uncompromising musical vision that stands as one of the post-punk era’s strongest. Now, on orginials like “Tell Tale Heart” and “Apologia” – not to mention covers of Bob Dylan, Jacques Brel and Oscar Wilde – Gavin Friday and his new musical partner, The Man Seezer, present a compelling mix of lyrical introspection and cabaret-flavoured musical irony, produced by Hal Willner of Marianne Faithful/Kurt Weill/Walt Disney fame.
Gavin:
“Each Man Kills The Thing He Loves was recorded in the summer of 88, it came out in May 89. We had written it, just piano and voice in the Liberties in Dublin. I used to rent a place there and so did Maurice by coincidence. It was post the Blue Jaysus club (a late night club Gavin created and MC’ed in Dublin’s Waterfront Nightclub), ’87 -’88, and we wrote it in that period. I played some demo tapes to Chris Blackwell from Island Records and Seymour Stein from Sire. I played them accoustic versions of “Got What He Wanted”, “Apologia” and “Man of Misfortune”. Chris Blackwell offered me a deal there. I met him in a place called Essex House on Central Park and we had a good chat for about three or four hours and he says “I know the person you should meet.” And he suggested Hal Willner.”
“We decided we’d do it in New York and Hal suggested numerous musicians, some I knew like Marc Ribot and Michael Blair, Fernando Saunders. Bill Frisell I hadn’t really known of but I knew he’d played a lot with Hal. And Hank Roberts who was this sort of avant garde violin / electronics guy. And then there was Maurice. So we went to Hal’s apartment for three days, one o’clock till eight o’clock and rehearsed accoustically. We all sat around there, just accoustic guitars and Hal’s old broken piano, Michael banging sticks and we sort of had three days of going through songs, trying out ideas in a tiny room. And then we were booked into RPM for ten days, which was near 12th Street, not far from the Chelsea Hotel.”
“We’d do about two or three songs a day, run through them, rehearse them and then record them. Live vocals, everything was live. And then a few overdubs. Because he know I had a sort of a huge T-Rex thing, Hal brought in Flo & Eddie, who gave me my first real lesson in falsetto. It was hard graft, but it was really very spontaneous. Alan Ginsberg nearly played on “Death Is Not The End”. I had it in my mind to do “Next” as a cover version. And I wanted to do it in a real visceral way, I liked to imagine like The Virgin Prunes wrote it, or something. And Hal suggested another cover version. “Just seeing that you’re on this happy-theme, why don’t you this, it’s a really unusual Bob Dylan-tune.” And I loved it. We had this idea to make it almost like a New Orleans funeral march. And Ginsberg, who I got to know quite well through Hal, came in and Hal wanted him to play harmonium on it, but he started crying when we played him the rough mix. He said: “I can’t play on that.”
“It was a very organic session and it went quite painlessly and for a treat Chris Blackwell came in in one of the sesssions and loved what we were doing and went “Why don’t you mix it in the Bahamas, in Compass Point?” They owned Compass Point, so for the budget is was for nothing – so we went to the Bahamas for two weeks and it fucking drove us crazy. We hated it. It was that whole… lazy… you’d get into the studio at 11 in the morning and nothing would work till three and then they’d disappear and they’d be spliffing and just was… I mean, I’m not Mister-Chill-Out-On-The-Beach, “have a spliff, just chill…” I go: No, for fuck sake. And the albums is so not that. It just wasn’t the right environment. And then it started raining after three or four days so we felt more at home.”
“It was actually one of the biggest joys ever in making an album. It was not that stressful.”
The follow up to Each Man Kills The Thing He Loves, Adam ‘n’ Eve, produced by Flood, Dave Bascombe and Hal Willner, sees Gavin Friday exploring the pop and glam obsessions of his youth, with guest performances by Maria McKee and backing vocals by U2’s The Edge and Bono.
Q magazine praised its “cache of vignettes, crammed with opulent details like Saint Divine’s soul shimmer and flamenco flourishes.”
Adam ‘n’ Eve was reissued on iTunes on October 24, 2011.
From the 1992 press release:
With his new album, Adam ‘N’ Eve. Friday sets out to recapture some of the glamour and vision that pop music has lost, a mission which took the singer back to some of his boyhood idols. Adam ‘N’ Eve is like a weird color Xerox of the last 15 years of what Gavin Friday’s been through, almost the regret for the paradise lost of pop. Adam ‘N’ Eve dredges up the battered remains of Gavin’s adolescent pop past, alongside of the “glam” rock trash aesthetic.
Adam ‘N’ Eve touches on various buried reference points, from Erik Satie to Burt Bacharach. The brooding introspection of the debut has been replaced by a panoramic vision where the extremes of sexual obsession and surrealist humor collide – often in the space of one song. “Pop music should be about something romantic, something huge, something tragic and brilliant, a planned accident.” The planned accidents on Adam ‘N’ Eve turned out to be as brilliant as anyone could have wished.
Produced by Hal Willner, Flood and Dave Bascombe, Adam ‘N’ Eve is a widely ambitious affair whose reference points encompass the glam savagery of “King of Trash” and the Euro melancholy of “I Want to Live.” Friday’s lyrical moods, meanwhile, swing all the way from the bawdy ‘Dublinese’ (“We give good mouth,” grins Friday) of “Fun & Experience” to “Falling Off the Edge of the World’s” fatalism. The latter track, a spectacular duet with American exile Maria McKee (Lone Justice), is dryly described by Friday as “‘I Got You Babe’ in Hell.” “I had it in my mind to do a duet with Maria since we worked together on an AIDS benefits. I liked the chalk and cheese element, I thought it would be a challenge.”
“We recorded ‘Falling Off…’ during the Gulf war; when you’re in the studio nothing else exists except yourself and your art, that type of crap. You’re cut off and obsessed, your only connection with reality is TV, so the lyrics are like a remote control on the world. At the time I couldn’t believe the ‘unrealness’ of how everything was being portrayed on CNN.”
Gavin’s working class aesthetic (he was raised in Dublin’s Northside, is sworn to fight the consensus of mediocrity that’s stifling music in the 90′s, particularly the era’s blatant anti song ethic.
“I’m a big traditionalist whether it comes from Cole Porter or Kurt Weill, a great bleedin’ lyric that says something, that can transcend a political stance.” Still Friday resolutely refuses to plan his next move. “I don’t know; I’m just following my own instincts. I’ve got a feeling [ the next album ] might be a little bit more aggressive, but who knows…”
Gavin Friday will join Marianne Faithfull, David Johansen, Baby Gramps, David Thomas, Norma Waterson and others for Hal Willner’s Rogue’s Gallery at the Sydney Opera House – Forecourt as part of the Sydney Festival, Australia on January 28th, 2010 at 8.30pm (gates open at 7pm)
Rogue’s Gallery was conceived by actor Johnny Depp and director Gore Verbinski on the set of Pirates of the Caribbean. The result was a compilation CD featuring pirate ballads, sea songs and chanteys.
Live, Rogue’s Gallery was previously performed at St Ann’s in New York, at the Analog Festival in Dublin, The Sage in Gateshead and the Barbican in London.
Tickets for the 2-hour show are $145 or $135 and can be booked through the following:
Sydney Opera House
Book Online or phone
02 9250 7777
Sydney Festival
Book Online or phone
1300 668 812
Ticketmaster
Book Online or phone
1300 723 038
‘I still don’t know what to say about it,’ Gavin tells U2.com’s interviewer, then proceeds to talk about his 50th birthday celebration at Carnegie Hall for quite a bit:
Question: What have Laurie Anderson, Andrea Corr, Courtney Love, Lydia Lunch, Maria McKee, Shane MacGowan and Rufus Wainwright got in common with Larry, Bono, Edge and Adam. Answer: They’re all fans of Gavin Friday and they’re all taking part in a one-of-a-kind show in New York next week, set to raise funds to combat AIDS in the poorest countries.
An Evening with Gavin Friday and Friends, on Sunday October 4th at Carnegie Hall in New York, is curated and produced by Hal Willner, someone with an unrivalled track record in one-off musical events inspired by maverick artists from Leonard Cohen to Kurt Weill, Tim Buckley to Thelonius Monk.
Gavin, of course, has been hanging out with the members of U2 since before they were the members of U2 and is invariably to be found with them in the studio when an album needs to be finished… or out on the road, when a tour is about to kick off. Right now, he’s working on songs for his own next solo album due in 2010. We caught up with him in Dublin to find out more about the Carnegie Hall show:
“Believe it or not, this was not born in my head. I think I was on some kind of TV show, maybe 12 years ago, and I was asked about my musical ambition and I said I’d love to play Carnegie Hall before I’m 50. That was the seed of all this. Then earlier this year a gang of us went away for a day to celebrate the 50th birthday of Guggi and at the party, Bono, who turns 50 himself next May, said to me, ‘Do you know what you’re doing for your fiftieth ?’ I said I didn’t have a clue and that I’ll probably run away to avoid the attention. He said he did know what I was doing, that I was playing Carnegie Hall.”
Announcing a very special (RED) Nights Event – A Concert Series That Saves Lives
Hal Willner presents:
click to enlarge
Featuring Laurie Anderson, Antony, Elizabeth Ashley, Bono, Adam Clayton, Andrea Corr, The Edge, Flo & Eddie, Joel Grey, Bill Frisell, Guggi, Scarlett Johannson, Courtney Love, Lydia Lunch, Patrick McCabe, Maria McKee, Shane MacGowan, Eric Mingus, Larry Mullen, JG Thirlwell, Martha Wainwright, Rufus Wainwright, Chloe Webb, Plus Special Guests.
Sunday 4th October 2009
Carnegie Hall – New York City
Stern Auditorium / Perelman Stage
Tickets go on-sale Wednesday,
September 16, 11AM EST
Available at CarnegieCharge at 212.247.7800
www.carnegiehall.org and the box office.
Ticket price breakdown:
Parquet $250 (front & center) & $150 (left & right)
First Tier $150
Second Tier $100
Dress Circle $90
Balcony $70 & $35
A portion of the proceeds goes to help eliminate AIDS in Africa. www.joinred.com/rednights
We had a little chat with Gavin about ‘Hal Willner presents: An Evening with Gavin Friday and Friends‘.
C: How are you?
G: I am in excellent Physical and Emotional Health… and How are you?
C: I’m doing well, Gav, thanks. ‘An evening with Gavin Friday and friends’… what’s the occasion?
G: A Hal Willner Presents Event which always proves to be an Extraordinary Affair… The Occasion? A few days before i turn 50 years of age….Hal and My Good Friends all coming together to perform around the world of Mr. Friday… The Evening is also a Charity Event for RED.
C: What do you usually do on your birthday?
G: Preferably I’d Hide…. but usually I am very happy to have a quiet bite to eat with a few close friends.
C: Your 50th will be a little different then. Why Carnegie Hall?
G: The most beautiful looking, best sounding Venue in one of the Greatest cities on Earth… to play Carnegie Hall is a dream come true….
C: What are the guests going to do on the night?
G: That’s a secret… xx
click to enlarge
G: Joel Grey is as you say a living Legend.. He has been a touchstone to me as a performer since i was a teenager…. He and his performance in ‘Cabaret’ for me was the key to the door ….. it was my introduction to Brecht, Weill, Lotte Lenya… it opened a very inspiring can of worms…
C: Gavin Friday live on stage… what’s he like?
G: How would I know I’ve never seen him ‘Live’?? … but am very much looking forward to the Show
C: What’s with the boxer dog?
G: His name is ‘GAV’… He looks full on but he doesn’t bite.
An Evening with Gavin Friday and Friends
Sunday 4th October 2009
Carnegie Hall – New York City
Stern Auditorium / Perelman Stage
Tickets go on-sale Wednesday,
September 16, 11AM EST
Available at CarnegieCharge at 212.247.7800
www.carnegiehall.org and the box office
Gavin talks with Vincent Woods of RTE’s The Arts Show about the Rogue’s Gallery shows and his 20-year working relationship with show director Hal Willner (known for his tributes shows to Nino Rota, Kurt Weill and producer of Lian Lunson’s documentary Leonard Cohen – I’m Your Man). It’s a nice little interview interspersed with songs from the Rogue’s Gallery CDs and the Hal Willner produced Apologia from the album Each Man Kills The Thing He Loves, which Gavin recorded with Maurice Seezer in New York in July 1988.
Listen to the interview with Gavin on the RTE website.
Taken at Rogue’s Gallery at the Barbican in London on July 28, 2008
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