Mojo - The Music Magazine

FROM ELFIN '60S songstrel to art pop legend via heroin, homelessness and heroic rebirth, Marianne Faithfull has lived a life like no other. 45 years after Stones svengali Andrew Loog Oldham launched her musical career with the Jagger/Richards-penned As Tears Go By, swinging London's most celebrated starlet is now prepping her 22nd studio album, Easy Come, Easy Go - a record that mixes contemporary covers with late-night standards, all led by Faithfull's controlled, smoky contralto.

Since the release of 1979's Broken English - the hit album that re-established her as a modern pop force after a decade in the wilderness - Faithfull has become the embodiment of the weathered chanteuse, the toast of European bohemia, the ultimate survivor. Producer Hall Willner has played a key role in her journey, his impeccable jazz credentials (he's recorded everyone from Sun Ra to Ken Nordine) first being put to use on Faithfull's 1987 release Strange Weather. Two decades later, the pair have reunited, this time enlisting the talents of Rufus Wainright, Antony Hegarty, Jarvis Cocker, Cat Power and Faithfull's old pal Keith Richards.

Having recovered from the "general mental, physical and nervous exhaustion" that forced her to cease work for much of 2008, MOJO meets Faithfull in a central London studio as she comes to the end of a long week packed with press engagements. A quick cigarette, a flick of the hair, a gracious "how do you do", and we're off...

How do you gear up to record an album?

I work very hard on my pre-production. I learn the lyrics and listen to the songs - it's almost like learning a script. For this record, I made sure I was as healthy as possible, flew to New York, got over the jet lag and started work.

Is it an all-encompassing process when you're in the studio?

Yeah... but I do other things. I go for walks, I read, I watch TV, I watch films. I'm not just sitting there thinking about myself. That's not helpful. I like to be with my friends and family and not think about work. But yeah, I'm very focused and I'm free to do what I like. I don't have to think about other people. I'm free to focus on my work.

How did you find working with Hal Willner again?

Well, he's what in film they would call an auteur. His intelligence, his musicality and his vision go much further than a lot of producers. He knows all those great jazz arrangers. This album was primarily recorded on analogue equipment. So when we did the overdubs it was a question of cutting the tape in the old way. It's great recording that way. I did it for a long time before everything went digital. I do prefer analogue. There's more space, more wind in-between the tracks. I don't know the technical side of things. Hal is just brilliant at recording my voice.

You last worked with Hal on Strange Weather. What do you remember from that period?

I'd just come off alcohol and drugs. It was early days. In many ways, Strange Weather was a very, very sad record. This album isn't. I think it's happier because both Hal and I are happier. There's an energy in Easy Come, Easy Go. that isn't there in Strange Weather. Everything is so slow and so sad. I love Strange Weather, I'm not putting it down, but this record is open and generous and not tortured at all.

Was Strange Weather the moment when you really found your feet as an interpretative singer?

It was a bit earlier than that. I did a great job on As Tears Go By, but maybe I was too young to realise it. I think by the time I got to Broken English I was beginning to get it with the likes of Working Class Hero and The Ballad Of Lucy Jordan. But Strange Weather was the first time I got to really practise it. Then I realised I had something that other people didn't have.

And this album was made in a very short space of time...

Yes, it was made very quickly... mainly for budget reasons. Those musicians (Tom Waits stalwarts Marc Ribot and Greg Cohen among them) are wonderful, but they're also very expensive. It also meant I couldn't take home rough mixes every night which is what I usually do. I had to just jump out there every day and not know how it was going turn out. It was a risk.

Was it difficult selecting which songs to record?

Hal came over to Paris in October 2007 and we sat down and chose the songs from both our record collections. Hal chose all the contemporary stuff as I tend to listen to the same things I've always played, but now I've been turned on to Neko Case and The Decemberists. I'm delighted.

Do you identify with any of the singers of the originals?

Yes. I suppose it's obvious with the likes of Judee Sill or Billie Holiday... I can't really express how it is. I just identify with the song itself. I heard Black Coffee on Bob Dylan's radio show. I know the song, but I hadn't heard it for a while. I thought, 'I just have to do this.'

Did you ever want to be Billie Holliday?

No... maybe... when I was young and stupid and taking drugs. But I don't want that side of it in my life.

Were there any songs that didn't make the new record?

I Get A Kick Out Of You. We were using a Gil Evans/Miles Davis arrangement and it was just too hard. I was panicking about the number of songs I had to record in such a short time.

You have a great cast of guest vocalists on this album. Who matched song to voice?

That was Hal's job, although I got in touch with Keith [Richards]. I first heard Sing Me Back Home in the '60s when Keith and Gram Parsons used to play together. The version I know is on a bootleg that Keith made in Toronto. It's just him on piano. The whole thing is beautiful.

How did the collaboration come about?

My manager contacted Jane Rose [Richards' manager] who I know very well and asked her to ask Keith. Then I got a lovely fax saying 'I'll do it for you if you do it for me.' Hal sent him a recording of me and the band and he liked the way we did the song, so he put on his guitar and vocal. I then came back to Paris when my part of the record was finished. It was so moving. I'm not a big one for nostalgia, but I'm probably at the right age now to relax and feel a little nostalgic about certain things.

Do you think the mythology surrounding the '60s is justified?

I think it was a really interesting period and I'm not surprised people mythologise it. What people tend to forget is that everything was so much smaller and we were all so much closer. Any night of the week I could be in a club with Jimi Hendrix and The Who and all these amazing people. It was just great.

And you were relatively unprotected back then...

We had a great publicist called Les Perrin, but the sort of media frenzy that took place hadn't happened to rock musicians before. Maybe Eddie Fisher, Liz Taylor and other film stars had faced it, but it wasn't something that happened in our world. It was new.

Does there come a point when you lose track of who you are?

Of course. I loved Mick and I was really fond of the Stones, but I knew the attention was really focused on them. So that was a bit strange for me.

Did it take a while to realise that you were a working artist?

I can see that I should have got a band together and gone on the road myself and not just stopped working and basking in the great man.

You have gigs lined up for the summer. How do you prepare for a live show?

I do the same I always do. I take it a day at a time. I make sure I'm really healthy. I do the work I have to do. I make sure the lyrics are in and we have enough rehearsals behind us. It's the most natural thing in the world for me. I am a musician, I perform live and I love it. It's where I'm meant to be.

Interview by: Ross Bennett