LEWIS FUREY

Lewis Furey's first 2 albums - Lewis Furey (A and M 1975) and The Humours of Lewis Furey (A and M 1976) are two of the most overlooked albums released on a major label.  They have yet to get the retooled for a new generation overhaul of a Michael Chapman or a Marcos Valle.  I think this is because of their singularity and being so dense and multi-faceted beardy twenty-something's can't put them on in the early hours to zone out to.  He also didn't die young or descend into anonymity, and has had success in, it appears,  French and Canadian theatre and cinema since then.  There's no romantic backstory, only two early seventies albums frozen in an aspic spotlight.  (Actually there is a third, which I've never heard and only ever seen once.  The few tracks off it I've heard don't quite cut it as much for me.)

The eponymous first, with it's Warholesque cover designed by Bob Lack occupies a dilapidated inner-city boho-zone between Transformer and Berlin.  Apparently Lewis attended evening sonnet writing soirees with Leonard Cohen (They would go on to co-write a musical "Night Magic"in 1984) in Montreal.  Apocryphal maybe but the songs display a poet's attention to detail.  The album is produced by Cohen's producer at the time, Jon Lissauer, and Lewis, a classically trained violinist, played on Cohen's New Skin for the Old Ceremony.  The call and response backing vocals recall the aural template Leonard eventually took to the enormo-domes of the world in his seventies and the songs portent Lewis' future in musical theatre.  Weimar decadence and Brecht were more present in the early 70's than now - think Bowie's Baal and Dirk Bogarde movies- and Lewis tells his story songs as though Joel Gray had made a solo album.  It's all doomed glamour, hissing gas taps, regret.  The subject matter is amour fou, his world a scuzzy demi-monde of drunken debauchery, double-cross and despondency. "Closing The Door" is one of the great kiss-off songs, the lyrics honed, concise, stiletto-sharp.  I love "Lewis is Crazy", because he clearly is and he clearly isn't.  I've put up a link to "Louise" which seems to feature his future wife, Carole Laurie, in a slink on, slink off part.



"The Wire" included this album as one of the hundred records that changed the world, though no-one was listening.  I don't think it changed anything, no-one was listening and no-one followed in it's footsteps, but that only highlights its singularity.

Someone must have had faith because the second album was recorded in London with Roy Thomas Baker, riding the success of Queen's early kitsch n stink metal.  I see that one blogger calls it a glam album, and that never crossed my mind for decades, but it's true.  There's a camp theatrical excess that was missing from the debut which is a touch Sparks, a touch Cockney Rebel.  Where the debut was if not singer-songwritery then grounded in tin pan alley and chanson, Humours stages the songs with an overblown production, whispered asides and a strutting peacock androgyny that must have insinuated itself into a select cadre of  record collections.  Tom Robinson did a cover version, years later Celine Dion - deny the camp quotient if you dare. In my callow youth I included "Who's Got The Bag"   on disco compilation tapes.  Some have commented on the distinctly louche, gay feel to many of the songs - cruising the park cause you're fresh out of chicken, indeed! - but it's the camp androgyny of Roxy Music and Lou Reed, you can't pin it down or pigeon hole it. It knows how clever it is.

I recently bought a second copy as I'd not seen one since I bought it over 30 years ago.  This says to me it's a record that people hold on to, that inspires loyalty but also resists proseltysing.  Lewis has gone on to have an arty career in film, music and stage.  I'll just point you to his website which has interesting interviews and articles from the 70's and to his own website, a swish affair with video's he's directed of other artists, including Carole Laurie, Celine Dion and Julio Iglesias !I like the one with Emmanuelle Beart called P'tit voleur. They don't have the tightly formed intensity of the first two albums though there's the mix of poetry song and performance that whilst more mainstream still has something individual stirring there. If you're intrigued you can also buy the albums.  Here's a taster of The Humours of Lewis Furey...