Clear Blue In Stormy Skies
Liberation Blue Acoustic Series
"I think this is the best album I've ever done. It's definitely the best singing I've ever done. And I know why: cause it was done on a small budget.
When you've got binding restrictions you get creative, and you also keep to first takes a lot more, which are very often the best ones."
Clear Blue In Stormy Skies is a watershed album for Jenny Morris.
Between a dozen remodelled radio hits of the '80s and '90s is an overdue reaffirmation of her rare gifts as a singer and songwriter.
More importantly, in the act of reinvention are the seeds of a revitalised future.
It was a spontaneous, gospel piano version of Paul Kelly's Beggar On the Street of Love, she says, that became the benchmark for an inspired
flight of musical imagination. "After that I was really keen to make new songs out of everything. It was incredible how it happened. They all
worked like a dream."
Surprises include the Keith Richards raunch of You're Gonna Get Hurt, a cosmic soul version of Body & Soul and an ingeniously skewed retake
of You I Know, kindly rewritten by its author, Neil Finn, in Auckland late last year - that's him on guitars and backing vocals too.
The rest of the album was made fast and loose in February '06 with Jenny's long term road partners: Steve Balbi (Noiseworks, Electric
Hippies) produced and played guitars; Paul Searles (Skunkhour) played a range of vintage keyboards including piano, Hammond, Wurlitzer and
Rhodes. Backing singer Josh Quong Tart completed a small, close-knit ensemble.
Jenny's especially warm and intimate vocals were caught with a vintage valve microphone once used by Frank Sinatra. "We also used a lot of
this old spring reverb," she says. "It crapped out a lot and it was very frustrating, but man, when it worked it was amazing and I think that's why
this album has got that special earthiness about it."
This combination of sonic classicism and fresh discovery reignites Jenny's first hit of '84, Everywhere I Go, as well as her biggest subsequent
singles, Break In The Weather and She Has To Be Loved.
There's an instrumental arrangement of her most requested song, Little Little, and a languid INXS cover, This Time, in tribute to her friend
Michael Hutchence.
The title, Clear Blue In Stormy Skies, comes from the sole new track, The Time. It's a song with the kind of mature and reflective tone,
emotional integrity and musical excellence that only comes with years of experience.
"That's why this Liberation series is so good, cause it's actually commending people who have put work and time into their craft," Jenny says.
"All these songs were a dream to sing. They fell together like a jigsaw puzzle. We just let ourselves go wherever they led us."
Timeline
1978 First all-girl group The Wide Mouthed Frogs
1980 Joins the Crocodiles in Wellington, has first Top 20 hit with Tears
1981 Sings Tim Finn's theme song to Bruce Beresford film, Puberty Blues.
1984 Appears on INXS album, The Swing.
Releases first and only QED album, Animal Magic First of three QED singles, Everywhere I Go, reaches #21.
1985 Sings backing vocals on INXS's Listen Like Thieves world tour.
1986 Solo single You're Gonna Get Hurt, written by INXS's Andrew Farriss.
1987 Debut solo album Body and Soul sells platinum.
First ARIA award for Best Female Artist.
1988 Second ARIA award for Best Female Artist.
1989 Shiver album debuts at #2, sells beyond triple platinum
1990 Tours world with Prince, INXS, Paul McCartney.
1991 Duet with Michael Hutchence, Jackson, appears on platinum greatest hits album, The Story So Far.
Honeychild album, recorded with Jamaican legends Sly Dunbar and Robbie Shakespeare, hits #4 and spawns #2 hit,
Break in The Weather.
1995 Salvation Jane album begins long association with musician/producer Steve Balbi.
2002 Independently recorded and released fifth album, Hit & Myth
2004 Listen: The Very Best Of Jenny Morris expands on earlier hits collection.
2005 Alive DVD recorded at The Basement, Sydney
2006 Clear Blue In Stormy Skies on Liberation Blue Acoustic label.
Hi Jenny, hope you and your family have a wonderful Christmas and the new year brings lots of joy with it :) I'll certainly enjoy my couple of weeks off - down at the beach, in the vegie patch or editing live rock footage, as you do ;)
