Customer Reviews

Rich Kid Blues

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Recorded shortly before Marianne found herself living on the streets as a heroin addict, she recorded "Rich Kid Blues." Gone now was that sweet, pretty young girl the world was enamored of. A brutal drug bust she was caught in with the Rolling Stones started a systematic assassination of her character in the tabloids. Her reedy haunting soprano had dropped into a whiskey-soured husky instrument. On this record, you can almost smell the tobacco on her breath.

That aside, though Marianne herself hates this album with a passion, it truly does need to be heard. Her rendition of "The Long Black Veil" is fantastic (her former paramour, Mick Jagger, later did this track with the Chieftains in 1995). The title track is murky and haunting. "Corrine, Corrina" is also murky and multi-layered. Call it art-blues, if you will. "Chords of Fame" and "Sad Lisa" are great. But the real highlight is her cover of Bob Dylan's "Visions of Johanna." Fantastic.

It's definitely worth it to buy this CD. Do not hesitate.

This album,which is one of my own favourites by any artist,has an air of real melancholy about it.Don't let that put you off,considering the conditions it was apparently made under,it was almost inevitable,but there is also a feeling of real hope apparent throughout the album as well.
Such are the sparsity of most of the arrangements,this album could almost be subtitled,"Marianne Faithfull/Unplugged".For me,this adds to the charm of the thing and it still features the woman with the most gorgeous voice since the advent of sound recording.I've described this release as an underrated halfway house,which it probably is in terms of this lady's career,but also its a stop off point between the two "voices" of Marianne Faithfull.Most people will have heard the choirgirl voiced Marianne of her early pop hits,most will have heard the more lived in version of that same voice during her "Broken English" period.Well this album occasionally features both.Both are wonderful."Rich Kid Blues" features twelve cover versions of songs by the likes of George Harrison,Bob Dylan,Tim Hardin and Cat Stevens.Marianne Faithfull adds something to each and every one of them and for me,her Dylan covers are preferable to the originals.As you can see,I really like this record.In the right mood,if you give this collection a chance,you might too.

This is certainly a candidate for honors as Marianne Faithfull's single weakest album, cut during a time of extremely heavy drug use when almost nobody who knew her had any use for her. She does not recall this album fondly in her autobiography.

Nonetheless, this very flawed collection earns three or even three and a half stars. This is the first album on which Marianne's now-famous whiskey and cigarettes rasp appeared. Her versions of Dylan's songs are absolutely convincing. In particular "Visions of Johannah" is one of Marianne's truly great moments on record. On "It's All Over Now Baby Blue," it really sounds like it IS all over. Marianne never sounded so junked out.

The material selected draws from some of the typical 70s material including James Taylor's "Mud Slide Slim" which is so-so and George Harrison's "Beware of the Darkness," also so-so. Cat Stevens' "Sad Lisa" doesn't really thrill me either. The unimaginative arrangements are a significant source of the mediocrity on some of these songs. On the other hand Phil Ochs' "Chords of Fame" rings very true and the simple arrangement doesn't interfere while Tim Hardin's "Southern Butterfly" is charming in its gentle fractured way.

For Marianne Faithfull fans, this album is definitely worthwhile. Seriously, "Visions of Johannah" is worth the entire price. For the merely curious, I recommend the Island anthology.

This record has been maligned by Marianne herself, since it was recorded during a time of pain and horror in her life.

And it shows.

This is a record that reveals that missing link between her girly pop years, her North Country Maid years and what was to come in the form of "Broken English"...

The voice is weak and raspy and she was probably too high to care when she recorded it. Or too hungry and despairing. Whatever it might have been, it also gives this CD a sense of vulnerability and loss that has not been achieved before, and there is a glimmer of hope.

You can feel it. And that's what counts.

Hurt, lonely, strung out on drugs; yet somewhere deep within her soul is the spirit of hope, the spark of light that this is not the end. From a cover of Cat Steven's "Sad Lisa" to the almost autobiographical cover of Phil Ochs "Chords of Fame", "Rich Kids Blues" is a tour through a world most of us only glimpse but thankfully never live in.

The voice is thin at times and the emotions pour through. After I first heard the album I just sat there stunned at the raw feelings, the agony, the wanting. I was drained. Only Lou Reed's Velvet Underground's "Heroin" has any music had that effect on me.

Yes, the album is uneven. True, it is not "Broken English". Is it worth the effort? YES.

"Rich Kid Blues" was recorded in the period of pain that provided the base that came to full blossom in "Broken English."

This cd is from 1971. The title Rich Kid Blues is a sort of joke, because Marianne Faithfull wasn't rich at that time. She was a junkie and living on a wall of a destroyed house in Soho in London. This cd is a bridge between her folk lp's in the sixties and her new start as a singer at the end of the seventies. The cd contains the beautiful song Visions of Johanna, written by Bob Dylan.

Marianne worked with Mike Leander circa 1971 to put together this mini-masterpiece. Maybe it is because of the lyrical content, but I think Rich Kid's Blues stands up to or even surpasses much of Mariannes' early and pre-Broken English music. Her takes on It's All Over Now, Baby Blue...Visions Of Johanna...and Beware of Darkness are absolutely wonderful. I'm constantly surprised when I put on Marianne's stuff because I am always finding something new to appreciate, and while this is definitely music of its time, who will argue the merits of lyrics from such greats as Bob Dylan, Cat Stevens, Tim Hardin, Phil Ochs, and James Taylor. This is a recording of great songs, sometimes ghostly, due to Marianne's life at the time...a must-have for real fans and it helps in understanding the transition from her 60's work to the music that would follow.

Oh what could have been! The early seventies saw amazing releases from singer-songwriters like Carly Simon, Joni Mitchell and Carole King. Joan Baez and Karen Carpenter carried on with good albums, great songs, and their voices intact. Marianne of the 60s had a voice that was well on par with Joni and Joan and its a shame she was not allowed creative control and freedom with her music because who knows how things may have turned out. She might have given us her own unique album on par with Carole King's tapestry. Instead at this point in Marianne's life, she was a junkie interested only in the drug scene and not the music scene, which was a low point and unfortunately produced this sub-par album. Perhaps because of what was going on with the music scene at the time was the reason why this album was not released at the time. Mike Leander was instrumental in making this album as he sought out Marianne from her wall. He was probably expecting to make an album of old with Marianne but that just wasn't possible anymore. This album from any one other than a Marianne faithfull fan cannot be called good. The songs themselves are good but Marianne's voice had changed so and like Marianne herself said the songs were the worst choices. How could Marianne possibly sing well about a rich kid's blues when what she really had was a poor woman's blues? Maybe rich kid's blues was supposed to be a follow-up to her Young Girl Blues off of Loveinamist and had she not strayed from the course then perhaps this album would then make sense. I only like it because I am a hard-core Marianne fan-I like This Little Bird and Ballad of Lucy Jordan. The title track finds Marianne's voice sounding as close to her last releases "Is this what I get for loving You?" Sister Morphine (Version 1) and "Something Better" as she gets on this album. She tells the story of Long Black Veil well-in a voice that is neither Broken English or North Country maid, and for the most part her thin voice sings these tracks kind of lifelessly. Probably the track I enjoy the most is her cover of James Taylor's Mud Slide Slim. Corinna, Corinna, although a Bob Dylan track is also the name of the baby girl she miscarried and that may be the closest thing to anything personal on this album for Marianne. The next time Marianne would be heard from would be in Faithless with Dreaming My Dreams. The best thing about this album is that it is something of a miracle-Marianne had survived a miscarriage, a suicide attempt, and was addicted to drugs but yet she still managed to do this. It is far from her best work but it is a link from both of her bodies of work. It's not Come My Way nor Broken English but it is Marianne at her crossroads.

Length:: 1:47 Mins

Length:: 1:47 Mins