It seems apt given the ‘cinematic’ nature of much of his work, Barry Adamson should use a film-based term as the title of his latest album.
However, Cut To Black – the 10th release from the multi-instrumentalist and composer – has a deeper, and darker meaning as the former Magazine, Birthday Party, Visage and Bad Seed member recently released Up Above The City, Down Beneath The Stars, the first volume of his memoirs.
In that he wrote: “I started to imagine my life without me in it. An author-as-observer, looking down upon this Murky World during that time and making a record of what I found there.”
The book charts the years from his inception in Manchester’s Brutalist heart, his difficult journey through childhood and how art and music became his liberation, via his father’s jazz record collection and the spy theme sounds of John Barry, through transformative years working alongside Nick Cave, Midge Ure and Howard Devoto, and up to the release of his first solo album, Moss Side Story in 1989.
And the album journeys through rambunctious odes, mixes elements of soul, R&B, hip hop and funk with AI and takes in Manhattan disco. Adamson examines various lives cut short, explores notions of race, and invites us to reflect on how much society has really changed since the original Civil Rights movement of the mid 20th-century, all with a deft, louche touch and gleeful wordplay and associations, both aural and visual.
Of course, such diversity in his output is no new thing – as well as producing highly acclaimed ‘pop’ music such as the Mercury-nominated ‘Soul Murder’, Adamson has scored an Olivier Award winning ballet performance by Sylvie Guillem and the Ballet Boyz.
But it seems that film looms over the career of has worked with some of the film industry’s most intriguing mavericks including Derek Jarman (The Last of England, 1987), David Lynch (The Lost Highway, 1997), Oliver Stone (Natural Born Killers, 1994) and Danny Boyle (The Beach, 2000).
Adamson’s recent work includes an original soundtrack for Scala!!!, the acclaimed full length documentary on the legendary independent cinema at London’s King’s Cross that inspired generations of artists, filmmakers and musicians.
As he says himself: “It’s not gospel, it’s not soul, it’s not blues and it ain’t rock n’ roll. It’s all of ’em – and with good reason”.
This article originally appeared in the Blackpool Gazette.
Barry Adamson tours ‘Cut To Black’ with March dates in London, Norwich, Birkenhead, and Edinburgh, tickets here.
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