In a recent interview for a show that has yet to happen - and may never happen - Hawksley Workman spoke of the extremely shallow pool of sounds from which musicians pull their influences.

 Workman knows what he's talking about and though he sounds occasionally like everyone from Bono to Elvis Costello to an air-raid siren, he's definitely on to something by creating new melodies and moods that would make most folksingers blush amid the chaos.

 On For Him and the Girls, the subject matter obvious in the title, our man Hawksley strays from happy to sad to bizarre in a collection of songs that, had it come out 40 years ago, would have been more popular than the Beatles, methinks.

 On a Bob Geldof-influenced song (ha, I'm making Workman mad, I bet) called No Sissies, Workman sings with punch and vigour and a slight fake accent.

 It's great, in the style of blue-collar pop music of the '80s. He sings about life, rather than frat parties or political movements, even though his tunes are anthem-like.

 What's especially neat, and perhaps irrelevant when it comes down to it, is that Workman is a one-man show, all the way down to production. He's got a Vaudeville ear, singing on Tarantulove, for example, in a way that reminds one of a drunken dock minstrel 100 years back, but with an electric guitar.

 What he most reminds me of, though, is himself.

 It is so rare that a unique talent appears these days that it almost takes a while to truly recognize one. This one is staying on my shelf, rather than being fed to the aluminum-craving robot monster that lives under my floorboards.

 He's getting a little fat lately, anyway, what with everything sucking.

Saturday, February 19, 2000

Workman's a keeper