 |
Karma Country lead
singer Brendan
Gallagher has some
interesting Bowie connections. |
|
|
|
In September 1999 Brendan was
asked by British producer
Marius de Vries (Bjork, Neil
Finn, Madonna) to play guitar
on his re-mix of David Bowie's
'Survive'.
The song, from Bowie's Hours
album, was released as a
single in Europe, USA and UK
in January 2000.
Speaking with Bowie Downunder,
Brendan explained:
"We recorded guitars at
Fish Tank, Josh Abraham's
space at the old
Festival Studios in
Pyrmont in Sydney.
Josh engineered and I did
all the guitar parts,
acoustics, electric slide
etc. Maz (Marius de Vries)
played the piano. Jeremy
Allom mixed it at the
old 301 studios in
Castlereagh St. in
Sydney."
|
|
|
David Bowie was also a known
user of Brendan's book Open
Tuning Chord Book For Guitar
(orange book pictured
right with David Bowie, along
with BDU member Michael Dwyer).
"When
I met Bowie in 2002,
Brendan had given me his
open chord book to give to
the great man.
Bowie recognised Brendan's
name immediately."
~
Michael Dwyer
|
 |
|
|
|
In
February, 2004, Gallagher was
invited backstage by David
Bowie at the Sydney
Entertainment Centre.
"I got to meet DB back
stage.
He was charm itself and we
talked about his live
recordings in late '70s
featuring Earl Slick who was
with him on that tour.
A journo friend of mine gave
DB a copy of my Open
Tuning Chord Book For Guitar
in 2002 when he was
interviewing him.
[Bowie remembered] me playing
on Maz's remix and
said: ‘what a super
book, this is such fun. I
could use this for the next
album'."
|
|
"In Sydney I asked him if I
could use the quote, and he
said sure, no problem. So it
now graces the back cover [of
Open Tuning Chord Book for
Guitar].
It makes a very proud guitar
player, even if the record
company forgot to credit me on
Survive CD."
~ Brendan Gallagher
|
 |
|
The
Story of the Marius
de Vries Survive
Remix
|
|
I believe this story came
from the now defunct Teenage
Wildlife website.
WHEN BRENDAN MET MAZ
by Brendan Gallagher.....
"I was at the after show party
for the ARIA awards (read
antipodean GRAMMYs) in Sydney in
october '99. Aboriginal music
legend Jimmy Little had just
picked up two gongs for his
album 'Messenger' which is a
left-field collection of seminal
Australian compositions from the
last 20 years e.g. Nick Cave,
Crowded House, the Church, Paul
Kelly etc. Jimmy is an amazing
singer who has been making
records since 1956 and at 63 has
made a serious comeback. He is
considered very cool over here
right now.
I was feeling pretty
pleased with myself since I
produced and recorded the album
at my place at Bondi Beach. So I
was having a large one or three.
Also feeling very happy with
himself was Jeremy Allom who had
mixed 'Messenger', as well as
two albums for my band Karma
County. Jeremy's claim to fame,
amongst others, is that he mixed
most of Massive Attack's 'Blue
Lines' album including
"Unfinished Sympathy". Killer
sound man.
Jeremy bails me up, Crown
Lager (the king of beers) in
hand and says I have to come and
meet Maz. That's Marius de Vries
to you. They're old mates from
Blighty. Maz is out here as
musical director for 'Moulin
Rouge' a film by Baz Luhrman
('Romeo and Juliet' etc.). So,
Jeremy introduces me to Maz and
commends me to him as a
guitarist for some project he's
working on. And what would that
be? Oh, I'm doing a re-mix for a
Bowie single. Who, Fred Bowie?
No, David Bowie!
This is at 3 am and several
hours into a serious lager
frenzy under the southern cross.
Incredulous is too soft a word.
But it all checked out in the
clear light of the next day and
a fortnight later I found myself
in the studio with all my
guitars and Maz behind the desk.
Maz had a great idea of
re-introducing several of db's
music periods into his
production of Survive. A bit of
Space Oddity acoustic guitar,
some Mick Ronson electric rhythm
circa Jean Genie and a bit
of angular Adrian Belew kind of
stuff as well. So we got out the
old albums and did some
research. Then we isolated all
the original guitar parts (sorry
Reeves) and started from
scratch.
Maz is a very good producer
in that he is very relaxed and
has a kind of non specific
directional approach i.e. he
doesn't tell you so much which
notes to play but more how to
play them. While I was in the
studio putting down the acoustic
parts he was in the control room
bouncing a tennis ball from one
hand to the other while
motioning through the glass at
appropriate times where and when
to accent. Very amusing. He has
a very good ear, though, and at
one point pulled me up on a bit
of dodgy chord phrasing. Well
spotted. I'm a slide player and
I got to double db's horn line.
I had a very big, seriously
over-distorted sound and I just
kept going on over the outro
with this big slide harmonic
feedback until they came in and
woke me up. Maz then got me to
reference the spiralling high
end squeals at the end of Space
Oddity with the slide up
the neck of the guitar and I was
done. Maz laid down some
very Aladdin Sane piano
chops to finish off. All in one
take might I add. Guitar buffs
might like to note that all my
parts are played in 'vastopol'
tuning i.e. D A D F# A D low to
high.
I got to sit in on
the mix at Sydney's 301 a couple
of weeks later with Jeremy and
Maz at the controls. It was
quite an historic occasion as
the techs were standing by to
pull the studio apart and move
to a new location. 301 has been
host to all manner of great
Australian artists and
internationals like Prince,
Duran Duran and lots more. This
was the last mix.
I love how Maz reworked
Survive. I think it has great
drama and a quite ethereal
quality. It's also big and fat
and warm. That's Jeremy's
trademark. I haven't heard it
since then so I'm drawing
heavily from memory. It's not
being released in Australia so
I'm waiting for my import copy
from Virgin. I bumped into
Jeremy recently and he said
there was a problem with the 301
mix and so he and Maz did it
again not long after at Dodgy
Sound. Oh to be a fly on the
wall at Virgin HQ when the
master came in from the colonies
with THAT stamped on it.
Anyway, that's my story.
Let me tell you, it was a great
honour to be sitting in that
studio listening to the Duke's
voice in my cans while I played
along. Outstanding!"
~
Brendan Gallagher
|
|
|
|
|
bowiedownunder.com 
