Strange Tourist
Strange Tourist | |
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Studio album by | |
Released | October 1, 2010 |
Recorded | "Winter of MMX" |
Venue | Blackburn Castle (Yass, New South Wales) |
Genre | |
Length | 67:32 |
Label |
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Producer |
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Strange Tourist is the debut studio album from The Drones and Tropical Fuck Storm frontman Gareth Liddiard. The album was recorded inside Blackburn Castle in New South Wales over the first half of 2010, and was produced with the help of Burke Reid. Its minimal, "austere" and "meandering" acoustic songs instrumentally consist entirely of Liddiard's guitar-playing, and are topped with his versatile and heavily-accented vocals. Exploring themes such as isolation, jealousy, guilt, colonialism, wartime collaborationism, radicalism and many others, its detailed, narrative-based lyrics have been characterized as "dark and grinding", and are set in various periods of time as well as locations.
Released through
Recording
Strange Tourist was recorded at Blackburn Castle in New South Wales over eight weeks[1] during the first half of 2010. According to Craig Mathieson of The Sydney Morning Herald:[2]
Liddiard gorged on written material, spending five days taking in literature, magazine articles (including The Monthly and Soldier of Fortune), internet curiosities and the news. After that he spewed out ideas, sometimes in point form, before replacing coffee with alcohol and repeatedly rewriting and crafting the content into lyrics.
Content
Style
Daniel Baker of
Songs
The track "Blondin Makes an Omelette" is "an
The "arresting" title track features "fizzing rough hewn picking and yearningly apocalyptic imagery" and has been singled out as being the closest to Liddiard's work with The Drones. The "75 per cent autobiographical"
The final track, "The Radicalisation of D" is based on the life of
Release
The album was released on CD through Shock Records in 2010,[12] and on both CD and double LP through ATP Recordings in 2011.[13] The latter label released the album in the UK.
Touring
Shortly after the album's release, Liddiard embarked on a solo Australian tour.
Videos
Videos were made for different versions of both the title track and "Blondin Makes an Omelette", and were released on YouTube through ATP Recordings' channel.[17]
Reissues
In 2017,
Reception
Review scores | |
---|---|
Source | Rating |
Mojo | [11] |
Mondo Sonoro | 8/10[21] |
Rolling Stone Australia | [20] |
Sputnikmusic | 5.0/5[22] |
National
The album was acclaimed by many Australian critics.
Conversely, an article by Richard Guilliatt for
International
The album also received very positive reviews from critics in Europe, where it was released in the UK through ATP Recordings. Mojo called the album "[s]uperlative", writing that it "reveals [...] [The Drone's] distinctively accented singer/guitarist [to be] just as potent in acoustic settings".[11] The Quietus writes that despite the album not being "totally immersive" (citing the track "Did She Scare All Your Friends Away" as "cumbersome") and that the record "requires patience, demands concentration", the "mercurial" and "magnificent" "The Radicalisation of D" "more than justifies those efforts."[3] Greil Marcus, writing for The Believer, called the album "over an hour's worth of a man sitting in a room, hitting notes on an acoustic guitar, meandering through tales of one defeat after another, with alcohol leaving tracks on the songs like a snail. [...] Here, in a quiet, artless, shamed, constricted way, a person emerges: a fictional construction, someone without a flicker of belief or, for that matter, interest in redemption, cure, or another life, against all odds, especially across the more than sixteen minutes of “The Radicalisation Of D,” the final track, he makes you want to know what happens next."[24] Muzikalia called it "a unique album" that could appeal to listeners who may not be familiar with The Drones, praising Liddiard's songwriting talent & "strange" guitar-playing style.[25]
A more mixed response came from British journalist Everett True, who reviewed the album for the Australian magazine Mess+Noise. He compared the album unfavorably to Liddiard's work with The Drones ("Australia's greatest fucking rock band living [...]") and wrote that the songs "are not Drones songs. [...] These songs are Gareth Liddiard songs." He criticized the length of the songs as being "about five minutes too long", the lack of variety in them, and whilst he praised the lyrics, he criticized the music as being "rambling, unfocused, the guitar all plucked arpeggios and breaks for reflection, but not in a meaningful way", using the track "Blondin Makes an Omelette" as an example of the latter two. Despite this, he praised "The Radicalisation of D", "which has dynamics, and power, and the odd scream, and pretty much everything else you'd expect from The Drones’ frontman", as "16 minutes of genius that gradually sucks you in until you're tightly bound to what's unfolding in front of your ears [...]".[6]
Awards
The album earned Liddiard a nomination for an ARIA Award for Best Male Artist at the 25th ARIA Music Awards.[26] In response to the nomination, Liddiard stated: "It's just for wankers, snorting coke and getting drunk. It's just not on my radar and I'm just not interested. The ARIAs don't really mean anything to me."[27] The album was also nominated for the Australian Music Prize of 2010 (losing out to Bliss Release by Cloud Control), making it the fourth project involving Liddiard to have been nominated for the prize since its inception.[28]
Legacy
Accolades
In November and December 2019 respectively, Junkee included the album on two different lists: "The 25 Most Underrated Albums Of The Decade" and "The 50 Best Australian Albums Of The Decade". The entry for the former reads as follows: "A Gareth Liddiard acoustic record almost seems like a contradiction in terms — this is a man who has spent his career wielding instruments like broken bottles in a bar fight. But Strange Tourist, his singularly inspired solo record, has all the power and energy of his electric work. ‘Blondin Makes An Omlette’, a gnostic story of wire-walkers and alcoholics, might be the best thing that he's ever done."[29][30]
The following year, Double J included "The Radicalisation of D" on their list "13 of the best long songs ever recorded", calling it "[c]hilling, masterful songwriting."[10]
Influence
Artist Jason Benjamin - whose oil-on-linen portrait of Liddiard titled It’s not all Henry bloody Lawson was one of the finalists for the 2011 Archibald Prize[31] - praised the album as being "fantastic" & claimed that he'd listened to it "over and over" on his way down to Liddiard's home in Havilah, New South Wales to make the painting.[32]
Rob Snarski (lead guitarist/vocalist and founding member of The Blackeyed Susans and Chad's Tree) cited the album as an inspiration on his solo album Sparrow And Swan, commenting that "[h]e really lifted the bar on songwriting for Australian singer-songwriters."[33]
In an interview with Short List, British actor George MacKay stated that both the album and Liddiard himself were a big inspiration for his titular role in the 2019 film True History of the Kelly Gang "in terms of voice and look". “He did this one solo album called ‘Strange Tourist’" he continued, "which is him and an acoustic guitar and there's these kinds of noodling poems of songs. His way of talking is very easy, very cool, but he sits back. That's what we wanted with this version of Ned. He has quite a bit of power in being unreadable, it's a kind of defence [sic] mechanism, that thing of, ‘You're not gonna know what I'm thinking’ and that should make you feel funny.”[34]
Griffin Award-winning playwright Mark Rogers named "The Radicalisation of D" as an influence on his play Superheroes and admitted that "a lot of the construction of Superheroes was me picking out bits from that song."[35]
Track listing
All tracks are written by Gareth Liddiard
No. | Title | Length |
---|---|---|
1. | "Blondin Makes an Omelette" | 4:52 |
2. | "Highplains Mailman" | 8:22 |
3. | "Strange Tourist" | 7:24 |
4. | "You Sure Ain't Mine Now" | 9:24 |
5. | "The Collaborator" | 4:59 |
6. | "Did She Scare All Your Friends Away" | 9:48 |
7. | "She's My Favourite" | 6:31 |
8. | "The Radicalisation of D" | 16:12 |
Total length: | 67:32 |
Personnel
- Gareth Liddiard – vocals, acoustic guitar, composition
Additional credits
Adapted from liner notes:
- Amy Burrows - design
- Ross Cockle - mastering
- Daniel Campbell - photography (cover)
- Burke Reid - recording, photography (interior)
References
- ^ a b "Strange Tourists, Honest Music and Samurais". May 17, 2011.
- ^ a b c "Not just made in a Minotaur so". The Sydney Morning Herald. September 30, 2010. Retrieved May 28, 2021.
- ^ a b c d e f g h "The Quietus – Reviews – Gareth Liddiard". The Quietus.
- ^ a b c d e f g h Zuel, Bernard (October 8, 2010). "Strange Tourist". The Sydney Morning Herald.
- ^ "Gareth Liddiard, Strange Tourist – dark and grinding". Crikey. November 5, 2010.
- ^ a b "Oh Lord. The shortlist for the AMP 2010 has just been announced". COLLAPSE BOARD. Retrieved April 28, 2019.
- ^ owl beanie (August 26, 2019). "Review: Tropical Fuck Storm - Braindrops". Sputnikmusic. Retrieved May 7, 2020.
- ISBN 9781785270932– via Google Books.
- ^ a b Richard Guilliatt (June 1, 2012). "Sensitive Souls". The Monthly.
- ^ a b Al Newstead (April 1, 2020). "13 of the best long songs ever recorded". Retrieved April 10, 2020.
- ^ a b c Mojo, February 2011 issue
- ^ "Buy Gareth Liddiard 'Strange' Tour tickets, SA 2011 | Moshtix". www.moshtix.com.au.
- ^ "GARETH LIDDIARD (THE DRONES) TO RELEASE DEBUT SOLO ALBUM 'STRANGE TOURIST'". ATP Recordings.
- ^ "Gareth Liddiard to engage on a Strange Tour with Dan Kelly". January 16, 2011.
- ^ a b "Drone still baffled by his popularity". The Sydney Morning Herald. February 7, 2011.
- ^ a b "Gareth Liddiard interview, published in Reverb". May 7, 2012.
- ^ "Videos – Gareth Liddiard". All Tomorrow's Parties.
- ^ "Coming this December! The deluxe vinyl re-issue of..." Poison City Records.
- ^ Josh Martin (April 4, 2020). "Tropical Fuck Storm hint more collaborations coming". NME. Retrieved April 11, 2020.
- ^ a b Rolling Stone Australia, October 2010 issue
- ^ Toni Castarnado (June 2, 2011). "Strange Tourist". Mondo Sonoro. Retrieved April 10, 2020.
- ^ "Strange Tourist - User Opinions (contributor Tom Sheridan's score)". Sputnikmusic. April 3, 2020. Retrieved April 21, 2021.
- The Age, September 2010 issue
- ^ Marcus, Greil (October 31, 2014). "Real Life Rock Top 10 (06/11)". The Believer.
- ^ "Gareth Liddiard - Strange Tourist (ATP Recordings)". Muzikalia (in Spanish).
- ^ "Aria Awards". ariaawards.com.au.
- ^ Jonathon Moran; Zoe Nauman (October 16, 2011). "Liddiard: Arias a cocaine-filled joke". The Telegraph. Retrieved November 8, 2013.
- ^ "2010 Shortlist". Retrieved December 19, 2019.
- ^ "The 25 Most Underrated Albums Of The Decade". Junkee.
- ^ "Sia, Flume, And Beyond: The 50 Best Australian Albums Of The Decade". Junkee.
- ^ "Archibald Prize Archibald 2011 finalist: It's not all Henry bloody Lawson by Jason Benjamin". www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au.
- ^ "Portrait Of Gareth Liddiard In Running For Archibald Prize". Music Feeds. April 11, 2011.
- ^ "Rivers And Plains: Traversing Musical Landscapes With Rob Snarski". May 8, 2019. Retrieved April 10, 2020.
To be honest, I think Gareth Liddiard has fucked it up for all of us, because that album of his, Strange Tourist, is just incredible in the in-depth detail that he goes into in those songs. I listened to that quite a bit, I think, before I wrote songs for Sparrow And Swan, so that had a huge impact on me too. He really lifted the bar on songwriting for Australian singer-songwriters.
- ^ "George MacKay took inspiration from The Drones' Gareth Liddiard to play Ned Kelly". NME. March 2, 2020. Retrieved March 2, 2020.
- ^ "In Conversation: Mark Rogers". Griffin Theatre Company. October 28, 2020. Retrieved January 13, 2021.