Women mess with 'thrilled' Kelly

By Carolyn Webb
The Age - May 13 2002

Chrissie Amphlett sounds almost guilty when she talks about her cover version of a Paul Kelly song. The former Divinyls rock diva confesses she "messed around" with Before Too Long for the new Kelly tribute album, The Women at the Well.

Kelly's version is an upbeat, rock-ey, love ditty. Amphlett turns Before Too Long into a loungey, bluesy, curiously driven tale of unrequited love. Amphlett says the song's narrator could be interpreted as a stalker. And you can picture the music video: Amphlett coasting along Los Angeles streets in a Cadillac, wistfully following her love object, crooning: So let the time keep rolling on, it's on my side/ Lonely nights will soon be gone, high is the tide.

When I inform her by phone to her home in New York that Kelly loves the new version, Amphlett is relieved.

"Ooohh," she says. "That's good, 'cos I was worried. When we did it, we kind of tore it apart ... I messed around with so much of the melody, that I didn't know whether he would be angry. It's not very much like the original."

The 14 artists on The Women at the Well are the elite of Australia's female rock musicians - the line-up includes chart-topper Kasey Chambers, Kate Ceberano, Christine Anu, Renee Geyer and Deborah Conway.

The songs are from a broad cross-section of Kelly's career - ranging from the 1986 Gossip album to 1998's Words and Music.

The Women at the Well was the brainchild of former Mushroom marketing man Paul Costello, who noticed that artists such as Geyer, Vika and Linda Bull and Anu all included Kelly songs on their albums.

It was decided to combine these already recorded Kelly songs, stretching back to Jenny Morris' Beggar on the Street of Love, with newly-comissioned versions of Kelly songs, involving artists such as Angie Hart (formerly of Frente), the band Magic Dirt (which has a female lead singer, Adalita) and the all-girl outfit Lash.

Kelly became enthused and, while promoting his new album, Nothing But a Dream, has selected tracks, chosen the song order and approved the artwork.

The title The Women at the Well comes from a passage in the New Testament Book of John, where a woman's meeting with Jesus at a well inspires her. For Kelly, the well symbolises a group of women "drawing on one source, in this case, one songwriter". Many songs Kelly has written, including Everybody Wants to Touch Me (about pregnancy) and Everything's Turning to White (about domestic violence) seem to suit female singers. Kelly says his motivation is to tell the story of a character, and sometimes these characters are women.

As for writing songs for women, he says on the CD liner notes: "I write songs for women because they ask me to and because it's fun. I don't know what it's like to be a woman, but I know some of the things they say."

Talking about Amphlett's version of Before Too Long, he says: "It's a long way from my version, which I really like.

"It's a different speed and it's a different melody. The words to that song were always very dark. But I don't think it's something anyone really notices. It was the first song of mine that got played on the radio a lot, and it sounds sunny and happy, with a pretty melody, and a sweet guitar solo. Chrissy has brought out the menace in the song."

Elsewhere, he singled out Chambers' Everything's Turning to White for special mention - "I think it's a beautiful aching version of the song" - and the guitar work on Dumb Things by Lash. Overall, he is thrilled by the album. "It's a thrill when you hear your songs done by other people," he says. "It gives them another life. I think it's really diverse and it's a great mix of musical styles."

Amphlett, who lives in Manhattan with her American husband, musician Charley Drayton, recorded Before Too Long last December at Distortion Tank studios in Woodstock, New York, with co-producers Kevin Salem (who plays guitar on the track) and Drayton (bass and drums).

Amphlett says she chose this Kelly song for its lyrics. "Lyrics are what attract me first to a song. Not even the melody. I'm a lyrics person. I just felt that I could sing those lyrics and work with those lyrics and make them my own, or make them from a girl's perspective." Does it make a diffference, a woman singing it?

"I don't know if it adds, it just gives it a different perspective . .. It sounds a bit like Fatal Attraction, with me singing it. And it's a bit menacing, and a bit dark, because of the rhythm of the tempo, and the nature of how I'm singing it.

"And it is driving in regards to, it's sort of relentless in a driving sort of way. It's kind of a little spooky."

Kelly remembers being a support act to the Divinyls at Selina's nightclub in Sydney in the late 1980s. Amphlett doesn't recall that gig. She says she has gotten to know Kelly only in the past few years and is pleased that he has become internationally renowned.

"I just saw him in New York a couple of weeks ago at the Knitting Factory (club) in Manhattan, and the concert was so great. I've been seeing him perform over the years, but I was just so amazed at how good he was. I was very proud. He has just come so far as a performer. The way he presents his songs is very mysterious. His songs are just wonderful ... they have narrative. They're conversational and very simple. And very Australian, I suppose, but then again, they travel well."

To Amphlett, creator of Divinyls hits such as Only Lonely, Boys in Town and Pleasure and Pain, recording a Kelly song was a fun project.

"To do someone else's song is always like a holiday, because it's already been recorded, so the challenge is to do it in a different form, and that's what I've sung. I could have done it exactly the same, but then there's no point.

"I've always found that when you're doing a song, you want to make it your own. For me, I have to do it that way ... Get inside the lyric and then you can believe that song. To do a version and do it exactly like his, it woudn't be owning it, and I don't think you would believe it."

The Women at the Well: The Songs of Paul Kelly is on Festival Mushroom Records. It will be launched at the Corner Hotel, Richmond, this Thursday at 7.30pm.