Richard Lowenstein

INXS: Sorted

Music / / 7 minutes of reading

Before Michael Hutchence’s traumatic suicide in 1997, and the multiplying tragedies and indignities that followed (the reality program in search of a replacement singer; the Seven Network miniseries; the death of former manager Chris Murphy; guitarist Tim Farriss’s severed finger; his brother and drummer Jon’s recent association with anti-vaccination protests in Canberra), before all of that, INXS were one thing above all else: a brilliant singles band with a shit-hot frontman.

If you are looking for anything after 1992’s patchy Welcome To Wherever You Are, look elsewhere: INXS were already on a steep descent by then. Deep cuts? Forget it: if it wasn’t a single, it was mostly filler. INXS’s best songs were precision-tooled pieces of audio engineering, ergonomically crafted for your radio, your car, your hips and your ears. Their greatest hits almost all pick themselves – ranking them, however, is another matter. Here goes …

15. Bitter Tears (1990)

A Rolling Stones-lite rock and soul workout, the fourth single from X still shimmied and shook, although the tide was beginning to run out on the band by the time of its release as a single in February 1991 – the song peaked at No.… Read more..

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Michael Hutchence: Mystify

Music / / 5 minutes of reading

If the X factor is that indefinable charisma that gives a performer star power, the late Michael Hutchence had it in abundance. On stage, the INXS singer took moves from Jagger, Jim Morrison and Iggy Pop and transformed into a serpentine, almost supernatural presence. In Mystify, a new documentary by his longtime collaborator Richard Lowenstein, he fills the screen, but slides in and out of focus, as though untouchable.

Which, in death, he is. It’s now 22 years since Hutchence took his own life in a Sydney hotel room. Lowenstein says his film is an apology, of sorts, that he wasn’t there for his friend. When the surviving members of INXS saw his film, Lowenstein tells Guardian Australia, he saw “all these people still incredibly damaged, not by the ups and downs of being in a band with Michael Hutchence, but the damage done by his departure. He’s left this huge hole in everyone.”

Mystify is not a standard rock documentary. There are no talking heads, and there’s no narrator. Instead, Lowenstein relies entirely on archival footage – much of it shot by the singer himself, or by his intimate partners, including Kylie Minogue – with his story told as an off-camera oral history by associates, lovers, and mother figures, in particular INXS’s manager in the US, Martha Troup.… Read more..

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Autoluminescent

Music / / 4 minutes of reading

A few days ago I bumped into an old friend in the city. He manages a well-known local band here in Brisbane, and he asked me if I’d be prepared to participate in the making of a documentary about the group. He wanted to do something a bit edgier than the standard rock doco, though. “Every documentary I’ve seen lately it’s just a bunch of people saying how great [band/performer X] was,” he said. “It’s really boring.”

He had a point, and I was reminded of it last night when I saw Autoluminescent, Lee-Maree Milburn and Richard Lowenstein’s documentary about former Birthday Party/These Immortal Souls guitarist Rowland S. Howard. The first half of this two-hour film is weighed down with luminaries (not only peers and former bandmates like Nick Cave, Mick Harvey and Phil Calvert but also Henry Rollins, Thurston Moore, Bobby Gillespie, etc, etc) generally crapping on about how great Rowland was.

And that’s validating, sure, but if you’re seeing this film in the first place you probably have some idea of who Rowland S. Howard is and why he mattered. Most likely you already think he’s fabulous. The film survives this slightly creaky beginning mainly due to the late guitarist’s outrageous charisma (with his high cheekbones and extraordinarily brilliant blue eyes, rarely has a dying man looked so beautiful) and the sumptuous direction.… Read more..

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