It started with an evasive maneuver. The organizers originally put Marianne Faithfulls the only German concert of the year on July 2, the day on which Leonard Cohen was also to appear in Berlin, in the almost sold out and more than twelve thousand people.
The intersection of the Cohen and Faithfull fans turned out to be too big, so that the queen of the English rock jet set had to make room for the Canadian singer/songwriter. All the more triumphant she appears three weeks later at the Citadel Music Festival, which is plagued by noise-sensitive neighbors and Weather Caprioles, on the open-air stage of the citadel.
A shimmering black silk suit, long pearl necklace, the shoulder -length blonde hair elegantly styled. The Faithfull embodies from the first moment to aristocratic chic and the timeless elegance of a lady in the prime of old age, who could just as well protrude an expensive London gallery. A coolness that she acquired as a muse, companion and lover of Rolling Stones in the 1960s. As is well known, she shared the bed with Mick, with Keith the heroin. An excessive rock’n’roll lifestyle that once brought her dangerously close to the abyss. Distributed by the shine and the tragedies of fate, she later returned as all the excessive singer.
Songs as a drive
In addition to Joan Baez, Marianne Faithfull is probably the most important protagonist of the era. Her voice sounds ripe today, rough, marked by age and yet firm, clear and urgent, always capable of expressing the drama and emotion of a song. Whether jazz, blues, country, folk or rock – the musical genus does not matter to her, it is the interior of the song, the artistry, poetry and energy of the songs that give her strength to make the strength to live and continue. The song is your drive, your anchor, your remedy.
For example, if she sings dolly partons “Down from Dover”, the despair and passion of the country ballad still resonates. In “Solitude”, Duke Ellington’s dark and groomed composition, which was famous by versions by Billie Holiday and Nina Simone, vibrating endless pain and loneliness and Randy Newman’s “in Germany before the war” she penetrates with such intensive melancholy that the saying goes Showers on the back are only due to their performance – and not the rain clouds and the cold wind.
To the climax of the appearance, the drums set in a dull thunder, the electric guitar cuts through the moist air, the organ pulsates and faithfull sings “Broken English”, which marked a big hit in 1979 after excess and depression. For the first time, the entire audience now rises from the seats and jubilates the cool goddess. If the concert was good before “Broken English”, it is only great afterwards.
The seven -member band around the multi -instrumentalist and arranger David Coulter is terrific and creates a specific atmosphere for every song. For the bitter sweetness “Ballad of Lucy Jordan”, accordion and flute gently sound to “Salvation” from the Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, the musicians build a crashing guitar wall next to swinging organ grooves and while Jackson C. Folkigem “Kimbie” is created thanks to acoustic guitar, double bass and piano Even a moment of chamber music intimacy – in the open air and in front of more than 4000 spectators.
“Now we’re going back to the beginning”
The branched paths of pop music suddenly run across time and genre on this day, bundled by the voice of a woman whose own life is so closely interwoven with music history. “Now we are going back to the beginning,” announces Faithfull- and a mighty guitar chord flushes down on the audience, “Sister Morphine” flows through the ears and hearts in all its elegiac quality, and directly below another song from the Stones- Era: “As Tears goes by”, the Jagger/Richards composition that once established the “angel with the big tits” as Darling of Britain.
In the cheers, the visibly freezing singer leaves the stage, comes back, “I love you Much more”, calls her to the crowd and sings “Dear God Please Help Me” to say goodbye to Morrissey’s universal prayer. It is raining for the first time that evening, but strangely only for a song. Perhaps it is also the tears of heaven because Marianne Faithfull disappeared into the dark.