Music Opinion

Katy kicks off Grand Final amid 'Roar' of controversy

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(Screenshot via YouTube)

As the Katy Perry memes fly thick and fast, two major bands are talking about calling it quits and a legend of music and film has passed. IA's music man, David Kowalski, has the latest.

Katy roars

The AFL football season is over for another year and for the fourth time out of the last 11 grand finals, my beloved Sydney Swans represented and, as previously, played like lame ducks. But enough about that.

The pre-game entertainment caused a ruckus in more ways than one. The AFL announced a big scoop by getting one of the biggest pop stars in the world, Katy Perry, to do a short set before the game started. The memes came thick and fast, alleging her stage setup looking like a half-empty goon bag and it was also reported that she had raised the ire of one of the teams in the game, The Brisbane Lions, because her soundcheck would have denied them a final training session on the MCG’s hallowed turf.

There were also rumblings that she wouldn’t be singing her most well-known hit, Roar, as it could be seen as a bias toward the Lions, as it’s one of their rallying songs. In the end, she opened her spot with the song.

Perry also had an ace up her sleeve when she brought out Aussie legend Tina Arena for a duet on Perry’s ‘I Kissed a Girl’ and Arena's classic hit, ‘Chains’.

Perry reportedly wasn’t the first choice for the show. It has been reported that the Rolling Stones were approached about playing the show. However, they allegedly asked for $20 million just to turn up and trot out four of their classic hits. Perry was therefore a bargain, with her glossy performance costing a mere $5 million in comparison. The show at least went off without a hitch and went down a storm in most quarters.

The less said about the actual game, the better, however.

Foos finished?

In the news this week, following on from recent reports of Dave Grohl’s indiscretions, he has put his band Foo Fighters on indefinite hiatus effective immediately. The official reason is to rebuild trust with his family after cheating on his wife and fathering a child out of wedlock. The band had finished its European tour and has since cancelled all shows in the future, including the Soundside Festival in Connecticut that it was due to play last weekend. 

Of course, the fans are livid. However, Grohl has never really taken any time off after a turbulent couple of years. Losing both drummer Taylor Hawkins and his own mother in 2022, he pushed on with new drummer Josh Freese, made a new album and kept touring. It would now appear it was the wrong strategy and now the wheels have fallen off. I wish him well as he gets his life and affairs (no pun intended) in order.

Coldplay out

Coldplay are reportedly planning to hang up their boots after their twelfth album. If you’re a fan, don’t worry. The latest record, issued today, called Moon Music, is their tenth.

The decision to stop at twelve was inspired by The Beatles and the Bob Marley catalogues.

In an interview with Zane Lowe on Apple Music 1, vocalist Chris Martin said:

“There are only seven Harry Potters. There's only 12-and-a-half Beatles albums, there's about the same for Bob Marley, so all our heroes, and also having that limit means that the quality control is high right now, and for a song to make it, it’s almost impossible, which is great.”

The future of the band looks likely to be just as a touring band, rather than making new music. Martin opted to leave space for new artists to make music, which is fair enough. It’s hard to be consistently great across a long period of time and over the course of many, many albums. Isn’t that right, Mr Jagger?

Ben's back

This week we see new music from an Australian legend — or an annoyance depending on your viewpoint. Ben Lee is back with a new album. Known mostly for his irritatingly catchy 2005 hit Catch My Disease, he is settling into being something of an elder statesman of Australian music, having started his career in Bondi punk band Noise Addict at 14 years of age in 1993.

The new record, This One’s For The Old Headz, doesn’t have anything on it as annoying as the previously mentioned track. However, it is full of short sharp indie pop tunes with ruminations of life and love in the post-pandemic age. Recorded in three days live to tape with a power trio of live instruments, this is definitely worth a listen. 

Vale Kris

This week, we also say goodbye to one of the iconoclasts of American Music, Kris Kristofferson, who has gone to the great gig in the sky at age 88.

His career was stellar. An excellent student, he has a Bachelor of Arts in Literature and was awarded a Rhodes scholarship to study at Oxford University in England where he played rugby and was an excellent boxer. He was a U.S. military veteran, a helicopter pilot and a songwriter whose songs were famously covered by Billy Connolly, Johnny Cash, Ray Stevens, Janis Joplin and more. He had a recording career himself and was a Hollywood actor, sharing the screen with Bob Dylan and Barbra Streisand among others.

Interestingly, it was revealed that he wanted some iconic lyrics on his tombstone. They are not his own, though. I would’ve thought the ideal lyric to have there was his own immortal words from ‘Me and Bobby McGee’: “Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose.” However, he has asked for the words of a close friend of his to be added to his epitaph, from a song he held close to his heart.

The song was ‘Bird on a Wire’ by Leonard Cohen:

“Like a bird on a wire, like a drunk in a midnight choir, I have tried in my own way to be free.”

Cohen had been quoted as saying about Kristofferson:

“He also said that he’s putting the first couple of lines on his tombstone — and I’ll be hurt if he doesn’t.”

The iconic memory I have of Kris is from the Murray Lerner film, Message To Love: The Isle of Wight Festival. Kristofferson is shown playing ‘Me and Bobby McGee’ on the final evening of the event, where the crowd was hostile almost to the point of rioting. That night, the crowd even hated Jimi Hendrix so it could be reasonably assumed no one was safe. It was reportedly his fourth-ever performance with his band. He turns to the band and says, “I think they’re gonna shoot us”.

Vale Kris. Thanks for the music.

LISTEN TO THIS WEEK'S SPECIALLY CURATED PLAYLIST BELOW:

David Kowalski is a writer, musician, educator, sound engineer and podcaster. His podcasts 'The Sound and the Fury Podcast' and 'Audio Cumulus' can be heard exclusively here. You can follow David on Twitter @sound_fury_pod.

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