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On a night in 1982, the rock critic and soon to be Rolling
Stone magazine editor Toby Creswell was manning the door of the
Sylvania Hotel where the Riptides, a band he was managing, were the
headline act. The gig proved memorable, not least because it was
attended, bizarrely, by a group of deaf people ("I only charged
them half price," Creswell says), but more importantly because it
was the night Creswell met the singer Deborah Conway. "It'll
forever be etched into my mind," he says.
Conway had just released an EP with her new band, the avant
garde post-punk four-piece Do-Re-Mi, which Creswell had recently
reviewed "very unfavourably" in Rolling Stone.
"I said that I thought the group, which was then a studio
effort, should get out and play. I said the songs were stilted and
over-thought and that the lyrics were 'sixth-form poetry'," he
says.
So who should turn up that night but Conway.
"She came straight towards me," Creswell says, "bailed me up and
asked me in rather forthright terms to justify my review of her EP.
She was miffed but she also genuinely wanted to know what I thought
and why. She was open for debate, which I thought was really
commendable."
Conway, of whom Creswell went on to be a great admirer, has been
bailing up audiences ever since. From her '80s debut with Do-Re-Mi
(and their Top 10 single Man Overboard), through film and
stage appearances to an extensive solo career, the Melbourne-born
singer has become a beacon of creative independence, tough and
talented, beautiful and unafraid, with that fearfully large mouth
and a voice to rip the roof off.
Now she is back for a fourth season of Broad. Based on
the Lilith Fair all-female music festival, Broad brings
together four of Australia's finest singer-songwriters for a
national tour featuring a typically eclectic line-up of folk (Laura
Jean), roots'n'blues (Liz Stringer), jazz (Elana Stone), and
country (Dianna Corcoran).
"There is less music getting out there to the public these days,
especially independent stuff," Conway says.
" Broad is sort of saying that for self-managed artists
who don't have the backing of record companies there's a whole
bunch of stuff you can do on your own."
At 49, Conway is a more imposing presence than ever, with that
bushel of springy black hair, that colossal mouth and inquisitorial
eyes, sharp and green. She is beautiful but scary too, with the
body language of someone who has just disembarked a long and
uncomfortable flight. Occasionally, she pauses in the middle of a
question and levels a withering stare that suggests she has decided
to be gentle rather than expose me for the mental defective she
clearly thinks I am. Her presence is more suggestive of an actor
than a singer, which is hardly surprising since acting was her
first love.
"I never wanted to be singer," Conway says. "When I was at
school, everything I did was to do with plays."
It wasn't until 18 that she picked up a guitar, inspired by the
likes of Bob Dylan and Joni Mitchell. When she was 20 someone
suggested she start a band, "and so I put an ad in the newspaper".
The result, a five-piece called the Benders, gigged around
Melbourne for a year, before Conway and drummer Dorland Bray
departed for Sydney, where they soon re-formed as Do-Re-Mi.
The band's first two albums, Domestic Harmony and The
Happiest Place In Town, were lyrically sophisticated but highly
danceable - rock music for grown-ups.
With Do-Re-Mi signed to the British company Virgin, the band
moved to London to record their third album.
"We had a bunch of demos ready," Conway explains, "but then the
record company came and said, 'You know what, no one cares if
Do-Re-Mi put out a third album, but we would really like a solo
album from Deborah.' "
Despite the fact that "I didn't want to make a solo record and I
had nothing to say", Conway went ahead with the project, which she
describes as "a completely wasted opportunity". The record, which
cost Virgin a small fortune and was never released, was "crappy,
really awful. But it was good in the sense that it was a big
learning curve, and gave me the impetus to find my own songwriting
voice."
About the same time Conway became involved in other projects,
including a musical called The Iron Man, with Pete
Townshend, and the Peter Greenaway film Prospero's Books, in
which she appeared as Juno. Whatever time she had to herself she
hunkered down with her guitar, writing songs, which resulted in her
debut solo album, String Of Pearls.
It sold 70,000 copies and Conway was named best female performer
at the 1992 ARIA awards.
More solo albums followed, including Bitch Epic in 1993,
co-written and produced by future husband Willy Zygier, the cover
of which featured a naked Conway scoffing cakes while smeared in
Nutella. The experimental Ultrasound followed, recorded with
Paul Hester from Crowded House and Frente's Bill McDonald. Next
came My Third Husband, compared by some critics to
Portishead. In 2000 a rockier album emerged, called Exquisite
Stereo.
In 2001 Conway returned to the stage, playing Patsy Cline in
Always Patsy Cline, which toured Australia. An album of
Cline covers was followed in 2003 by Summertown, described
by the critic Barry Divola as "tiptoeing between heartbreak and
infatuation with barely a hiccup".
The hiccups, it seems, were yet to come. In 2002 a Melbourne
producer came to Conway asking if she would by interested in
curating an all-female, Lilith Fair-style festival in
Australia.
"So I went away and had a think with Willy about the kinds of
acts we would invite and the kinds of venues we would use. But the
producer then decided that it was too impractical and financially
not viable, so we moved on."
In 2005, however, the Malthouse Theatre in Melbourne offered
Conway three nights "for me to do whatever I wanted. I said, 'Three
nights? Good grief, what am I going to do with three nights?"'
Conway sold the theatre's management on her all-female festival,
"the idea that I would pull these different women performers
together from different genres and call it Broad". Conway
also roped in the Queensland Performing Arts Centre, the Enmore
Theatre and the Athenaeum in Melbourne, so that "before long we had
a little national tour going".
Without warning, the Malthouse pulled the pin, claiming that the
festival wasn't financially viable.
"I freaked out. But then I thought, 'Well, goddamn it, I'm now a
promoter!' So I booked other venues in Canberra and Adelaide and
pushed ahead."
Apart from allowing Conway to perform, Broad, has broken
several artists, including Clare Bowditch and the country singer
Sara Storer. It also fits in well with Conway's new position - "my
first proper job!" - as artistic director of the Queensland Music
festival. "The festival is very community based; I travel all over
Queensland commissioning local stuff, which is a real privilege. I
feel like a kid in a candy store."
Because the festival organisers want a performance artist,
"someone whose career was on the go", Conway is encouraged to take
time off and play for Broad. Which is just as well.
"Singing is where it's at," she says. "When you are lost in song
it's an unequalled feeling. It's like being lost in love: you are
absolutely in the moment, and there is nothing else but the feeling
of playing that song and being in it. It's life affirming," she
says, smiling. "I still get that same kick."
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