Australian singer-songwriter Paul Kelly is a distinguished musician and poet.
Through his human and distinctive musical style, he has offered astute social and political commentary.
Yet it is words that trouble Kelly most when he’s putting together a song.
“It’s pretty scrappy . . . I get tunes and scraps of words attached, and from there I just get words to fit sounds. There’s a fair bit of scratching out as my notebooks show. It’s pretty slow usually. The music comes first, but both are equally important.
“People won’t listen to words unless it’s attached to music you want to listen to.”
Fresh from sold-out shows in Australia, which saw his world collide with Neil Finn, Kelly is in New Zealand this month for a series of acoustic church shows, the first such shows he has performed here.
The Finn performances were something of a “family show” with the band comprising Kelly, his nephew Dan, Finn and his son, Elroy, who were joined by Zoe Hauptmann on bass.
“Hopefully we can bring that show to New Zealand at some point. My association with Neil goes back a long way, we toured the United States together in 1987, and we used to play tennis together when he lived in Melbourne.
“This tour is just me and Dan on stage.”
Kelly has recorded 19 studio albums, as well as the music for several film and television soundtracks, including Lantana and Jindabyne, and is a multiple Aria award winner.
A documentary released last year, Stories of Me, follows on from Kelly’s award-winning autobiography, and pieces together the story of Australia’s favourite musical son.
Although it may put him in the spotlight off-stage, something the notoriously shy, yet cheeky Kelly, doesn’t quite seem comfortable with, its honest portrayal of his life may just win him a new generation of fans.
“The film-makers approached me a couple of years ago,” Kelly says.
“They wanted to pick up on a lot of cues from the book, family history and so on. For me it was just a matter of saying yes. After that it was out of my hands, as it should be.”
For over a year Kelly was tailed by the film crew to shows and rehearsals, and Kelly’s family members, crew, ex-wives and other musicians, including former Go-Between Robert Forster, were interviewed.
“They gathered a lot of old material as well. It took them a long time to edit it because they had so much material.”
Having been frank in his book, detailing his drug use, for example, he wasn’t apprehensive about the film.
“I was more apprehensive when the book came out, I’d been naked about a few things in that. Once the book was out I guess I was softened up by then.
“It’s their film, not mine. I saw it on opening night and I liked some of it, but not all of it, which is what you’d expect.”
Kelly confesses that he didn’t like watching himself on screen.
“The film’s not made for me, it’s not really relevant what I think. It’s made for other people.”
And the subject is politely, but firmly, closed.
This New Zealand tour offers a show of two halves. The first half sees him performing his latest album, Spring and Fall, in its entirety from start to finish. The second half sees Kelly picking through his extensive back catalogue of favourites.
Ad Feedback
“Spring and Fall is a song cycle that tells a story from beginning to end, one song linking to the next. The album is 36 minutes long because I wanted to keep the songs short.
“It’s a love story from beginning to end, the decline and fall of a relationship.”
He was drawn to create the album, he says, as an opportunity to “start from scratch” on an album with Dan.
“I’ve worked with him a lot over the years, we’ve recorded together in a band context, and he was very involved with the A-Z shows I did. I wanted to make a record with just him and me, and our combination suited the idea I had for this record.”
Speaking the day after he returned from a three-week United States tour, Kelly is quick to offer the reason he loves performing in New Zealand.
A finalist for Australian of the Year last year, when asked why Australia is better than New Zealand, Kelly pauses thoughtfully, before saying “mangoes”.
“I think New Zealand audiences are more intelligent,” he says.
“They pay close attention to the show.
“Kiwis also have a sly humour that I enjoy immensely.”
PAUL KELLY WITH SUPPORT FROM LYDIA COLE
20 March
