Is the Go Go Girl going going gone..?
When Nancy Sinatra performed in Oslo in 2002, national newspaper VG carried a front page photograph with the headline “Tragic”. An Edinburgh show around the same time was little better received. Yet when she performed this year at Morrissey’s Meltdown in London, a wander through the auditorium during the legendary ‘These Boots Were Made For Walking’ elicited scenes reminiscent of a walkabout by Robbie Williams. Style rules over substance, in the capital at least.
It’s undoubtedly style rather than content that’s on show on this quasi-comeback album, where she dresses herself in the musical equivalent of the finest threads. Here the songs are penned by veterans like Bono, Jon Spencer, Jarvis Cocker and Thurston Moore, and of course her unlikely neighbour Morrissey. Nancy has often rested on others’ laurels, whether her father’s or writers like Lee Hazlewood’s, and this time is no different.
It’s easy to forget, given how iconoclastic Nancy is these days, that her standing centres upon only a small amount of music. Certainly she made many records, but few are memorable. Here she’s once again dependent upon her collaborators, and the truth is that few can match the skills it took to draw the best out of her. Calexico and Jarvis Cocker fare best, simply by aping Lee Hazlewood, though Thurston Moore’s contribution is striking by sounding like nothing she has ever done (though like most of what he has done). But much of the album lacks cohesion and even seems lazy: Bono & The Edge’s tune was in fact originally written for Ole Blue Eyes himself. There’s no trading on Dad’s reputation here, then…
It’s left to the relatively unknown Reno to rescue things with ‘Bossman’, whose massive chorus finally allows Nancy to display some character, and ‘About A Fire’, which strangely echoes ? & The Mysterions’ ‘96 Tears’. That this is the only uncredited song on the promotional CD seems to emphasise that Nancy doesn’t know where her strengths lie.
Neither deserving of epithets like “tragic” or mass hysteria, Nancy Sinatra instead leans as much upon her status as it does on the strength of her songwriters. Sadly, both seem here to be largely on the wane.
Q&A
Nancy Sinatra on London audiences, Morrissey and Mick Hucknall…
UNCUT: Is there anyone that you wish you could have collaborated with?
SINATRA: So many! We were hoping to have Elvis Costello. He had the multi-tracks of the song but sadly his schedule just didn’t allow for the recording of his vocal. We were sent a terrific song by Doves and as with Elvis, they couldn’t work out the recording of the track in time to include it. They are such a great band. Of course I have a long wish list: Debbie Harry, the Pixies, Mick Hucknall, Pink, Paul Weller, Joan Jett, and so on and so on…
UNCUT: How was it to play your first London show at the Royal Festival Hall?
SINATRA: The London audience is the most generous in the world. They don’t ever judge one on appearance or age. They only care about the music. Morrissey made it impossible for me to fail there. He is my mentor. It was a breathtaking experience.
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