Angie Hart, Ned Collette @ TheVanguard (20/07/06)

Sun 23rd Jul, 2006 in Gig Reviews

Thursday night at the Vanguard. The place is buzzing, moods are high. Angie Hart is back in town, she’s writing a new album and we’re all eager to hear this long overdue work-in-progress.

The 80’s concert footage projected on the wall switched off at 9pm and Ned Collette appeared, unaccompanied, polka-dotted guitar in tow, momentarily diverting diners from their crème brulees with a few gently crescendoing, finger-picking sweeps. When Ned puffs out his chest to hit those big, expressive notes his voice takes on an uncanny resemblance to Roger Waters. And there’s something more than a little Floydian about Ned’s songs, too. His psychedelic folk songs, colourful and evocative, snake their way through dreamy tempos and reverb-heavy riffs – lovely, melty stuff with a touch of Brit-rock bombast. Ned fills out his solo sound looping melodies and percussive tapping through a delay unit. It’s very effective and it’s nice to see someone use those two minute delay pedals for something other than stopping to have a smoke. The wiry singer approached the playing-while-they’re-eating thing with a little trepidation and dragged his heels a little with long intros and lengthy fade out finishes. Still, he bowed out to loud, enthusiastic applause and undoubtedly came away with a few new fans.

And then, our dear Angie, a veteran of the music scene: in Australia and beyond. For those who only remember Angie’s Frente days, and found her plaintive, girlish voice a little, well, annoying – yes, her voice was always something of acquired taste (and perhaps for that reason so many people found it incredibly alluring) – go and see her live now. Her voice has matured and filled out a little, and honestly, she sounds bloody fantastic.

The Vanguard crowd gave her their full attention as she graciously treated us to a preview of the songs from her as-yet unrecorded new album – her first solo album ever in fact, despite a good decade and a half spent fronting Frente and slick pop duo Splendid respectively. Playing an entire set of songs your audience has never heard before is always a gamble, but it was clear that the crowd at the Vanguard embraced every song. Her lilting, sweet-sounding melodies take gorgeously unexpected turns – her new tunes are as clever and riveting as the very best songs on Marvin the Album and States of Awake.

Angie’s mood is a decidedly introspective one. Songs like ‘My Year of Drinking and Start All Over Again’ (?) are raw and telling, yet resilient with humour and achingly bittersweet. As a performer, Angie’s manner has always been vaguely shy and awkward, but she looked comfortable test-driving her new tunes and judging by the audience’s reaction, she had every reason to be. Watching the band watching each other, they seemed not to have completely relaxed into the songs yet – still, their playing was spot on – Angie has really put together a good group of musicians.

Backing singer Angela took the stage periodically and the fusion of their voices was exquisite. After a brief exit Angie and her band were roused back to the stage and she confessed she “really had no more songs left” (there was nary a Frente tune to be heard although they did pull out the Splendid favourite, Asleep) so the band proceeded to wind their way through Angie’s slow-burn version of the Pet Shop Boy’s melancholy ‘You Only Tell Me You Love Me When You’re Drunk’. A blue note to end a show on to be sure, but fitting in a way.

It’s a song that could well have been written by Angie herself. Sad, wistful, wry and strangely uplifting – all the things we’ve loved about Angie since the early days. She’s faded in and out of the scene over the last fifteen years but we’re damn glad she’s stuck it out. The new album is set to be a corker – stay tuned.