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Bic Runga – Intimate intentions
Original content copyright 2002 to Our Brisbane.com Australia
Original article is at: Our Brisbane.com
Date: 20 November, 2002
By: Sam Lee
Bic Runga – Intimate intentions
Bic Runga’s Beautiful Collision is a markedly different listening experience to her debut album Drive.While moments of Drive played up to the whole ‘rock-chick’ mentality often lobbed onto new female recording artists under the guidance of their labels, Runga’s new disc sees her uncover her true musical soul and demonstrates her matured songwriting skills.
“The songs on Drive that make me cringe now are the songs that are rock songs,” Runga admits. “You know, rock music has been made for 30 years or more now mainly by men, and I shouldn’t have never tried to emulate that. There’s a lot to be said for women making rock music on their own terms, but to emulate men making music probably wasn’t a good leaping point – and it makes me cringe now. So for this second record I went out of my way to make something, which is feminine.”
As well as being feminine, Beautiful Collision is also her most intimate and personal record to date: even if the initial intentions of her songwriting now seem distant.
“It’s pretty personal, but I can’t really hear the songs anymore as I’m so close to them now. It’s very intimate. Writing intimate songs is something I can’t help. You’ve just got to live with it: it’s not easy telling people all your personal details and stories. There’s not much else to do except lie and I’m not really interested in doing that.”
Runga’s honesty also stretches to the stage. Keen to deliver a sincere and heartfelt performance on her upcoming tour, Runga questions how best to approach her onstage persona.
“I think the whole idea of ‘performance’ is something that’s up to be addressed. Now more than ever you have to give people something that’s just very honest and true. I don’t like going to see an ‘act’ or someone who is acting, so to speak. I think sometimes as a performer you start becoming a parody of some clichéd rock performer. I’ve been watching a lot of documentaries of all this old American roots music like the Carter Family and all that, and their performances are so real. It was music made in the depression and it’s music made because doing it is a necessity. It’s a release.
“There’s too much posturing going on now because people are too conscious of being filmed or being on stage. So I’ve got to look at myself and figure out how I’m going to deal with this. I think I’ll just get up there and sing the songs and hopefully people will hear how much they mean to me.”
Bic Runga plays The Zoo Wednesday Nov 27. Beautiful Collision is out on Columbia/Sony.
Original content copyright 2002 to Our Brisbane.com
