Wow. I didn't even know this Original Sin record existed. I'm not a fan of any of the vocalists on it so I think I'll pass on listening to it. My doctor has warned me that exposure to any music featuring members of Matchbox 20 or Train is bad for my heart. The only tribute album I ever liked was "Where the Pyramid Meets the Eye" featuring the songs of Roky Erickson covered by a diverse range of artists.
Thanks for posting this. I know some think Murphy is a bit of a blowhard but that's the kind of guy you want to manage your business. INXS needed someone whose focus was on them and protecting their legacy. It was a good read but I have to wonder in the wake of Bob Dylan and other artists who have sold off their catalogs, what is the value of lesser acts and their catalogs going to be? Same with owning your masters. It's great the band has them but how much revenue are catalogs going to produce for the artist when sales are so low. There's probably more money in licensing a song for a commercial or movie soundtrack now than there is in physical product sales.
Yep, agreed. His demeanour always seemed a bit scattershot to me, but his loyalty in the early days was fierce. Their rise to fame, particularly from an Australian perspective, was just as much his story as theirs. Merck Mercuriadis and his company Hipgnosis look to be trying to navigate a post-streaming world for 'heritage' acts. As you say, blastfurniss, much of their buying up of older artists 'cashing in' seems to be focusing on repositioning their songs through commercials, movie soundtracks etc rather than just repackaging physical product. Worth a read. ‘Record companies have me on a dartboard’: the man making millions buying classic hits
The band's last show was opening for Matchbox 20 in Australia with JD on vocals, correct? Pretty gruesome ending. What is our storybook ending we all wish for these guys?
And to make it even more gruesome, Rob Thomas joined them on the last song. Ideally, the last show should have been with Michael but since that wasn’t possible, going out like Crowded House did on the steps of the Sydney Opera House would have worked. They could have made it a big celebration with an assortment of guest vocalists. The show could have been broadcast on TV. Mouths would have dropped when Kylie Minogue came out to sing Suicide Blonde and Bono did Mystify. Terence Trent D’arby joins for another mini-set and then Jimmy Barnes closes out the show with a ripping version of Good Times. Beats going out with Rob bloody Thomas.
I have no logical reason for it, but I dislike Matchbox 20, and their singer.... so that all sucks. Ideally the manager will get some traction with reissues. I think it makes more sense to aim for the Australian and Canadian market, and hope, rather than plan for the US market.... I think they should roll with Shabooh Shoobah, The Swing and Listen Like Thieves good reissues of these of would more than likely do well in Aus, and possibly in Canada also, with good promotion, billed as the albums the led the world to Kick... If it works follow those with Welcome, Full Moon and Elegantly..... Then have a concert at Sydney's Qudos Bank Arena (unless there's a better venue) record and film it. Bill the concert as a suicide awareness show in honour of Michael's life. Get the best Australian singers who are available, and still able to sing/perform to sub for Michael. John Farnham Jimmy Barnes Jon Steven's Bernard Fanning.... Maybe they could get Bono Idk, you get the idea... Build a groundswell of interest, and have a big blow out. Idk... it's hard to make a pie without the main ingredient....
They could have changed their name, or just been known as JD Fortune, and abandoned the INXS brand as far as new music was concerned, I think it's a great shame that such an experienced and excellent combo of musicians is no longer a thing that is about. It's a shame also that there's a songwriter like Andrew Farriss who doesn't have a singer to write for.
Never Tear Us Apart with Ben Harper and Mylene Farmer. I like Ben Harper and his vocal comes across really well here. I'm not sure the musical arrangement work for me... It has some good features, but it feels rushed and this was never a dance song.
Beautiful Girl with Pat Monahan. Ok, the guy from Train.... I didn't mind a couple of Train's songs ... The vocal comes across well, and we get this nice arpeggiated guitar. Then we move into a sort of string arrangement section, and it feels slightly odd. It seems like a lot of these they have arranged them to suit the band that the stand in singer comes from..... which sort of takes the identity of Inxs away, which kind of defeats the purpose to me. This is ok....
New Sensation with Deborah De Corral. Apparently Deborah is an Argentinian singer songwriter. Here we get a building ballad type feel. Again I guess it's ok, but it loses a lot of what made the original version good. I understand the idea of not just making the song the same, but I guess that's why I have never been a fan of these kind of albums, because I like the original versions, and these are pale cousins to me.
- He's gone out under his own name as a country rock artist. Some songs have the INXS tint, of course.
Never Tell Us Part. 2/5 Beautiful Girl 2/5 New Sensation 2/5 Really do not see the point of this album. Nothing but Starbucks swill.
There's still one singer to go and Ciaran Gribbin was singing with the band at the end. I saw them live in that last tour but before that they did a tour where they played a bunch of new songs that were being recorded which ultimately weren't
Just Keep Walking with Dan Sultan I can't find the album version, but here we have performance from the ARIA awards (Australian Recording Industry Association)... Instead of an uptempo quirky ska, we have a moderate tempo faux reggae, with an allusion to soul in the chorus, and it kind of just feels wrong ... I guess to folks unfamiliar with the original, this may be pretty cool, but for me it is a little anemic, and comes across a little bland.... but I do love the original version, so perhaps that bias is at work here.
Mystify with Loane and John Mayer We open with a lovely atmospheric section with some delicate guitar textures in there. The female, I am guessing Loane has quite a soothing pleasant voice, and I presume is singing in French. This comes across as a completely different song. I quite like this .... but nothing about it sounds vaguely like Inxs, and I reckon most people wouldn't recognise the song.
To Look At You with Kav Temperley This is more of an airy update, the song retains much of its former charm, and just has some of those more modern soundscape additions. This is ok ... personally I'll put on Shabooh Shoobah
Just Keep Walking/Mystify: 2/5 To Look At You: 3/5. One of my favorite songs in their catalog . Interesting,
Don't Change with Andrew Farriss and Kirk Pengilly .... and Don't Change gets the same sort of ambient pop treatment.... again interesting, but unlikely I would listen to it again.
The Stairs with JD Fortune I guess this is ok, but to be honest this album has been a painful exploration for me.
This album has nothing going for it from my perspective ... I have never been a fan of these types of albums, and this is exactly why.... I just don't see the point to it. There was apparently an Orchestral instrumental version of Never tear us apart as a bonus track somewhere, but I couldn't find it. There was also Ben Harper and Nikka Costa doing Devil Inside as an Itunes bonus track, but again I couldn't find it. A couple of tracks here were ok, but I am not sure there is anything I would want to hear again.
-/- You hit the nail on the head Mark. Some of ambient noise was lovely, but this album leaves me cold.
None of these rearrangements appeal to me at all. And believe it or not, this is the only INXS studio album I don't own. And commercially, it's no surprise it tanked everywhere. The problem with Original Sin, is that, even though these newer versions of INXS' classics don't suck, they're just not that great and certainly don't come anywhere near bettering the original versions. In fact, despite not wanting to admit this, the album as a whole, seems pointless. Was OS made because Andrew couldn't write brand new songs that were any good? Or, was it for some other reason? Who knows?! Consequently, the 2011-2012 OS tour was only moderately successful. In part, because INXS mostly hit markets that they overplayed a few years before on the 2006-2007 Switched On tour (their 2nd highest grossing tour), which eats into demand too much. However, the South American and rural US & Canadian shows did well enough, mainly since they didn't overplay or hadn't played most of these particular markets in many years, or even decades. I thoroughly enjoyed the show here, despite the small venue - it was the 5th time INXS played Vancouver in 5 years. It's just too bad that after the 2014 Never Tear Us Apart mini-series exploded, and INXS' profile was elevated higher than it possibly ever had been, at least in their homeland, that the planned 2017 40th Anniversary tour didn't happen. But if Tim Farriss can get his severed finger amputated, in order to potentially play guitar again, INXS could very well hit the road again in the future. Otherwise, I think they'll continue to promote the legacy of the band instead. Though, with Chris Murphy's sudden cancerous death earlier this year, how that will be handled, is anyone's guess?!
