This album shows Marianne Faithfull interpreting the cabaret music of Kurt Weill, Bertolt Brecht, Friedrich Hollaender and others. If the idea seems surprising at first, when you consider the rugged terrain of Faithfull's life – her drug addiction and suicide attempts, her lost marriages and lovers (among them Mick Jagger) – coupled with the decadent bittersweetness of these songs, the match is right on target. Recorded live with just a pianist, this could have been a dreadful affair - others have tried similar concepts and failed. Yet this works marvelously.
Taken from a live performance, "20th Century Blues" is meant to evoke the vibrant, artistic atmosphere of the Weimar Republic, the Germany of the 1920s that Hitler's regime shattered. The historical concept doesn't limit the album's scope, however; while evoking cabaretera Berlin, Faithfull transcends that age, tapping straight into the soulfulness of the repertoire. The chanteuse's weathered, whiskey-sour voice is the perfect channel for the dissipated lyrics of "The Alabama Song" ("Show me the way to the next whiskey bar.... "). Faithfull's dark, ironic tone intensifies on "Want to Buy Some Illusions," in which she sings of past illusions that "had a touch of paradise/A spell you can't explain/For in this crazy paradise/You are in love with pain." And the most familiar tune on the album, Weill's "Mack the Knife," aches anew in Faithfull's rendition.
In addition to Weill-Brecht collaborations, the album includes Harry Nilsson's "Don't Forget Me" and the title cut, by Noel Coward. Her decision to include a Harry Nilsson song was magical - it's one of few "rock era" tunes to have the same sort of melodicism and brutal cynicism as the Weimar-era songs, expressed in a similar manner without at all coming across as derivative. "20th Century Blues" is another great choice (technically) outside the scope of this CD. Faithfull explains its inclusion as a sort of nod to her "Englishness", but it works just the same.
Faithfull turns each song into its own dramatic world, delivered with a savvy wink but never an affected distance; given all the tears and years that have gone by, the songs' melancholy wisdom is too close to home for that.
The Weimar period was a brief 15 years, yet it contributed much to world culture - not just these songwriters but many fine artists and writers, and movements like Dadaism. Many of the great writers, artists and performers of the era were Jewish (and many who were not were so heavily involved in left-leaning ideologies that their lives were similarly imperiled by the rise of Hitler). So when the Nazis crushed Weimar culture, forced people into exile (or concentration camps) and exerted its brutal force over all aspects of life for more than a decade, most traces of this abundantly rich artistic culture were forever extinguished. We all know that history is written by those in power - that a short-lived period of culture in a doomed historical epoch continues to captivate us roughly three-fourths of a century later. . . well, that's a testament to its greatness.
Marianne Faithfull - 20th Century Blues (Songs of Kurt Weill, Noel Coward & F. Hollaender)
(192 kbps, cover art included)
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