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New Erasure album ‘World Be Gone’ is sublime, melodic

Veteran British hitmakers take slight left turn on new project

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Erasure, gay news, Washington Blade

It’s easy to take Erasure bandmates ANDY BELL, left, and VINCE CLARKE for granted as they have stayed highly active in the studio while many of their contemporaries have vanished. (Photo by Doron Gild)

Thirty-two years after the release of Erasure’s debut album “Wonderland,” the veteran British duo is obviously far from finished. Last year came the ambitious, career-spanning box set “From Moscow to Mars,” and now a new studio album, the duo’s 17th, adds to Andy Bell and Vince Clarke’s vast musical legacy.

“World Be Gone” is another twist in a sensational career that continues to roll along with impressive resilience in the notoriously fickle universe of pop music. Erasure’s enduring appeal, even as many artists who emerged from the ‘80s have disappeared or are scraping by on the nostalgia circuit, is easy to understand as the duo continues to churn out one great album after another.

After two ultra-modern and sleek electro-dance albums (2007’s “Light at the End of the World” and 2011’s “Tomorrow’s World”) notable for big arrangements and massive walls of sound, the duo veered in a more retro and stripped-down direction while remaining largely upbeat on 2014’s excellent “The Violet Flame.” “World Be Gone” continues to ignore the latest pop music trends, instead relying on rich and vintage sounding synths and Bell’s sonorous, theatrical vocals, which are often intertwined with deftly arranged, multi-layered background vocals. The mood is more contemplative than anything Erasure has released since 2005’s sadly overlooked “Nightbird,” and while “World Be Gone” might not equal that album’s superb songcraft, it’s certainly a worthy addition to the duo’s catalog.

The album’s opener and first single, “Love You to the Sky,” is a classic Erasure pop anthem, with a sweeping chorus and Andy Bell’s vocals as rich and expressive as ever. After this upbeat opening, though, the album turns inward and reflective. The superb “Be Careful What You Wish For!” is a yearning ballad with an exquisite vocal arrangement, one of the album’s finest moments, and sets the tone for much of what is to come.

The downbeat vibe continues with the weary and haunting title track and the stark break-up ballad “The Bitter Parting,” Bell’s voice taking center stage over Vince Clarke’s spare but lovely electronic accompaniment. Another powerful ballad, the album’s second single “Still It’s Not Over,” is yet another example of the depth of Erasure’s songcraft. Bell’s delivers his vocals with the gravitas and emotional power the song requires.

Perhaps even more impressive is “Take Me Out of Myself,” a wrenchingly personal track with genuine feeling in both Bell’s vocal and Clarke’s sublime retro electronic mastery. “Sweet Summer Loving” is a devotional love song with a lushly beautiful chorus that positively glows with sincerity.

“World Be Gone” closes with “Just a Little Love,” perhaps the brightest and most upbeat pop song on the album. It’s a smart move. The duo knows they’ve delivered a collection of songs that appeal to the heart and the head more than to dancing under flashing lights or singing along in the car, but almost as if to prove they can still deliver a killer pop tune, they unleash “Just a Little Love” as the perfect sendoff. It’s an obvious choice for a single at some point.

While Erasure generally stays within the lines of its melodic template of high energy synth-pop, each album has a distinct vibe and the duo isn’t afraid to allow their creativity to take them in directions fans might not expect. This fearlessness and creativity is the key to their longevity, and is often overlooked. “World Be Gone” has already notched the duo their highest debut on the UK album chart since 1994’s “I Say, I Say, I Say” became their fourth straight chart-topper, which bodes well for the album’s future.

Erasure enjoys a sizable contingent of dedicated fans in the US, but are largely ignored by mainstream radio and most music media. The typical Top 40 radio listener in America (at least those of a certain age) might be familiar with “A Little Respect,” “Chains of Love,” and perhaps “Always,” despite the fact that the duo has enjoyed dozens of international hits. “World Be Gone” isn’t likely to change that, but it deserves to be heard. It’s not an immediately impactful album and there are few obvious pop-friendly hooks, but with repeated listens, its slow and subtle power becomes evident. Sometimes Erasure is dismissed (unfairly) as lightweight; “World Be Gone” is yet another example of how this characterization is utterly and completely wrong.

 

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Music & Concerts

Underdog glorious: a personal remembrance of Jill Sobule

Talented singer, songwriter died in house fire on May 1

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Writer Gregg Shapiro with Jill Sobule in 2000. (Photo courtesy Shapiro)

I’ve always prided myself on being the kind of music consumer who purchased music on impulse. When I stumbled across “Things Here Are Different,” Jill Sobule’s 1990 MCA Records debut album on vinyl in a favorite Chicago record store, I bought it without knowing anything about her. This was at a time when we didn’t have our phones in our pockets to search for information about the artist on the internet. The LP stayed in my collection until, as vinyl was falling out of fashion, I replaced it with a CD a few years later.

Early in my career as an entertainment journalist, I received a promo copy of Jill’s eponymous 1995 Atlantic Records album. That year, Atlantic Records was one of the labels at the forefront of signing and heavily promoting queer artists, including Melissa Ferrick and Extra Fancy, and its roster included the self-titled album by Jill. It was a smart move, as the single “I Kissed A Girl” became a hit on radio and its accompanying video (featuring Fabio!) was in heavy rotation on MTV (when they still played videos).

Unfortunately for Jill, she was a victim of record label missteps. When 1997’s wonderful “Happy Town” failed to repeat the success, Atlantic dumped her. That was Atlantic’s loss, because her next album, the superb “Pink Pearl” contained “Heroes” and “Mexican Wrestler,” two of her most beloved songs. Sadly, Beyond Music, the label that released that album ceased to exist after just a few years. To her credit, the savvy Jill had also started independently releasing music (2004’s “The Folk Years”). That was a smart move because her next major-label release, the brilliant “Underdog Victorious” on Artemis Records, met a similar fate when that label folded.

With her 2009 album “California Years,” Jill launched her own indie label, Pinko Records, on which she would release two more outstanding full-length discs, 2014’s “Dottie’s Charms” (on which she collaborated with some of her favorite writers, including David Hadju, Rick Moody, Mary Jo Salter, and Jonathan Lethem), and 2018’s stunning “Nostalgia Kills.” Jill’s cover of the late Warren Zevon’s “Don’t Let Us Get Sick” on “Nostalgia Kills” was particularly poignant as she had toured with him as an opening act.

Jill was a road warrior, constantly on tour, and her live shows were something to behold. My first interview with Jill took place at the Double Door in Chicago in early August of 1995, when she was the opening act for legendary punk band X. She had thrown her back out the previous day and was diagnosed with a herniated disc. To be comfortable, she was lying down on a fabulous-‘50s sofa. “I feel like I’m at my shrink’s,” she said to me, “Do you want me to talk about my mother?”

That sense of humor, which permeated and enriched her music, was one of many reasons to love Jill. I was privileged to interview her for seven of her albums. Everything you would want to know about her was right there in her honest lyrics, in which she balanced her distinctive brand of humor with serious subject matter. Drawing on her life experiences in songs such as “Bitter,” “Underachiever,” “One of These Days,” “Freshman,” “Jetpack,” “Nothing To Prove,” “Forbidden Thoughts of Youth,” “Island of Lost Things,” “Where Do I Begin,” “Almost Great,” and “Big Shoes,” made her songs as personal as they were universal, elicited genuine affection and concern from her devoted fans.

While she was a consummate songwriter, Jill also felt equally comfortable covering songs made famous by others, including “Just A Little Lovin’” (on the 2000 Dusty Springfield tribute album “Forever Dusty”) and “Stoned Soul Picnic” (from the 1997 Laura Nyro tribute album “Time and Love”). Jill also didn’t shy away from political subject matter in her music with “Resistance Song,” “Soldiers of Christ,” “Attic,” “Heroes,” “Under the Disco Ball,” and the incredible “America Back” as prime examples.

Here’s something else worth mentioning about Jill. She was known for collaboration skills. As a songwriter, she maintained a multi-year creative partnership with Robin Eaton (“I Kissed A Girl” and many others), as well as Richard Barone, the gay frontman of the renowned band The Bongos. Jill’s history with Barone includes performing together at a queer Octoberfest event in Chicago in 1996. Writer and comedian Julie Sweeney, of “SNL” and “Work in Progress” fame was another Chicago collaborator with Sobule (Sweeney lives in a Chicago suburb), where they frequently performed their delightful “The Jill and Julia Show.” John Doe, of the aforementioned band X, also collaborated with Jill in the studio (“Tomorrow Is Breaking” from “Nostalgia Kills”), as well as in live performances.

On a very personal note, in 2019, when I was in the process of arranging a reading at the fabulous NYC gay bookstore Bureau of General Services – Queer Division, I reached out to Jill and asked her if she would like to be on the bill with me. We alternated performing; I would read a couple of poems, and Jill would sing a couple of songs. She even set one of my poems to music, on the spot.

Jill had an abundance of talent, and when she turned her attention to musical theater, it paid off in a big way. Her stage musical “F*ck 7th Grade,” a theatrical piece that seemed like the next logical step in her career, had its premiere at Pittsburgh’s City Theatre in the fall of 2020, during the height of the pandemic. The unique staging (an outdoor drive-in stage at which audience members watched from their cars) was truly inspired. “F*ck 7th Grade” went on to become a New York Times Critic’s pick, as well as earning a Drama Desk nomination.

In honor of the 30th anniversary of Jill’s eponymous 1995 album, reissue label Rhino Records is re-releasing it on red vinyl. Jill and I had been emailing each other to arrange a time for an interview. We even had a date on the books for the third week of May.

When she died in a house fire in Minnesota on May 1 at age 66, Jill received mentions on network and cable news shows. She was showered with attention from major news outlets, including obits in the New York Times and Rolling Stone (but not Pitchfork, who couldn’t be bothered to review her music when she was alive). Is it wrong to think that if she’d gotten this much attention when she was alive she could have been as big as Taylor Swift? I don’t think so.

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Music & Concerts

Tom Goss returns with ‘Bear Friends Furever Tour’

Out singer/songwriter to perform at Red Bear Brewing Co.

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Singer Tom Goss is back. (Photo by Dusti Cunningham)

Singer Tom Goss will bring his “Bear Friends Furever Tour” to D.C. on Sunday, June 8 at 8 p.m. at Red Bear Brewing Co. 

Among the songs he will perform will be “Bear Soup,” the fourth installment in his beloved bear song anthology series. Following fan favorites like “Bears,” “Round in All the Right Places,” and “Nerdy Bear,” this high-energy, bass-thumping banger celebrates body positivity, joyful indulgence, and the vibrant spirit of the bear subculture.

For more details, visit Tom Goss’s website.

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Music & Concerts

Kylie brings ‘Tension’ tour to D.C.

Performance on Tuesday at Capital One Arena

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Kylie Minogue visits D.C. on Tuesday.

Aussie pop icon Kylie Minogue brings her acclaimed “Tension” world tour to D.C. next Tuesday at 7:30 p.m. at the Capital One Arena. Tickets are still available at Ticketmaster.

The show features songs spanning her long career, from 1987 debut single, “The Loco-Motion,” to “Padam, Padam” from her album, “Tension.”

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