INXS-iveness.....

May 28th – It’s a bit like buses; nothing for hours but, if you wait long enough, two will come along together; the fact that both will be full and will sail blithely by caring not a fig for your predicament is neither here nor there. Trust me, I know 'bout these things. You’re chatting with a bloke who used to catch a bus twice a day in Wolverhampton. They’d got it off to a fine art. Knew just when to pull away so’s you’d almost catch it…and, in the words of Bob Newhart, their ‘accelerator/brake, accelerator/brake’ technique for standing customers with armfuls of shopping was second to none.

Those who've followed my musings over the past X months will know that I'm not nor never have been in thrall to The Doors. Some of the live stuff they released (supposedly as a shop window for the band’s talent) has numbers that are distinctly out of tune or key and vocals that have all the verve, excitement and spontaneity of a slug pulling a house-boat. Although I never met him (not likely to now either) I have to decide whether it’s an attitude I've invented; something I misheard or picked up in interviews or quotes that alienated me from Jim Morrison… erm…well, yes, in a word, it is. I thought he was a con artist with little talent and lots of chutzpah…is that definitive enough? Hope so. I'm sure his friends all thought him wonderful and, in truth, even from one such as me, his end was one you wouldn't wish on anyone, no matter how much one thinks that his own input into his demise was pretty substantial. Well, that sort of feeling ran through me when I went to see Queen at Wembley Stadium on the It’s a Kind of Magic tour.

I’d heard some of INXS’s music before I saw them there, as support, along with Status Quo and Big Country, so wasn't unfamiliar with the stuff and the reputation of their front man, Michael Hutchance. Touted as the next best thing, I can grant that his overt sexuality and way with a tune would sell both him and the records but I had the feeling of déjà vu; the first thing that had come to mind when I first saw him on video was;

‘Oh, that’s a Jim Morrison clone’

and that feeling was rubber-stamped when I saw them at Wembley, but…

Suicide Blonde has got to be one of the all-time great ‘90’s’ singles. It had all the right ingredients for Mr. Hutchance to strut his stuff against…however; I'm still not convinced they really were live at the MTV awards in ‘91’. For one thing there’s only two amp and speaker sets on stage…for four guitarists (?) there were no foldback monitors for either vox or, more importantly, for the harmonica player. Rock bands even now are paranoid about foldback – or in-ear monitoring as it’s now known – and I've yet to meet a drummer, certainly from that era, that didn't require a speaker stack the size of Kent in order to hear the rest of the band. Added to that, when the drummer hits the snare (with all the force of a sledgehammer) there’s no movement from the rest of the kit and the skin is solid…like it’s rubber maybe...and you can hear the toms even when he doesn't hit them; There’s also a lot of well-timed cut-aways…and is that an organ I hear…or am I just being picky? 
What I would say, in their defence, is that Mr. Huchence’s vox seem live and he really knows how to put it over, like I say, very Jim Morrison. When INXS became big, after they supported Adam and the Ants on tour on this day in 1983, he was very aware of his part in that rise to success and of his marketability (essential in a frontman) and so picked his songs well; What You Need’ – Need You Tonight – New Sensation – Devil Inside, all aimed at the right market for what he was selling; a sexy, desirable, lithe, louche and ever-so-slightly feminine guy; everything a girl could want in a lover.

It also has to be mentioned that with his premature demise he joined the ranks of those who lived fast, died young and made a beautiful corpse. Death by suicide has all the hallmarks of a troubled genius succumbing to the stresses and strains of greatness; it perpetuates both myth and record sales; and, let’s face it, death by suicide is far more rock ‘n’ roll than the other official verdict, ‘erotic asphyxiation’ i.e. throwing one off whilst wearing a plastic bag and rope.