{"id":3051,"date":"2024-09-11T07:14:24","date_gmt":"2024-09-11T12:14:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bourdaghs.com\/blog\/?p=3051"},"modified":"2024-09-11T07:16:37","modified_gmt":"2024-09-11T12:16:37","slug":"revisiting-chrissie-hynde-and-the-pretenders","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bourdaghs.com\/blog\/?p=3051","title":{"rendered":"Revisiting Chrissie Hynde and The Pretenders"},"content":{"rendered":"

\tIt was the summer of 1984. I was playing pinball with a pal at Tiffany\u2019s, a crowded pub on Ford Parkway in St. Paul favored by students from two nearby Catholic colleges, St. Catherines and St. Thomas. As an interloper from protestant (agnostic, really) Macalester College, I was on foreign territory, but Tiffany\u2019s had our favorite pinball machine, so we occasionally ended up there. <\/p>\n

As we played, from across the noisy barroom I heard a new song playing on the jukebox. I couldn\u2019t hear it clearly through clamor, but what I could make out riveted my attention. It\u2019s happened to me only a few times: I hear a pop song for the first time and know instantly that it will be a monster hit. I had that flash of recognition, for example, the first time I hear Soft Cell\u2019s \u201cTainted Love,\u201d The Kinks\u2019 \u201cCome Dancing,\u201d and Lorde\u2019s \u201cRoyals.\u201d And it happened that night: George Harrison had, I was sure, just released his best-ever post-Beatles single.<\/p>\n

\tA few days later I would learn the title of the song: \u201cBack on the Chain Gang.\u201d Of course it wasn\u2019t by George Harrison, as I mistook it through the noisy din of the bar that night, but rather The Pretenders. And it did go on to become an enormous hit, just as I had intuited. I only recently learned that George Harrison too heard something of himself in the record: in a 1992 interview<\/a>, he said it was the only other song he know that used a special chord, an E7th with an F on top, that he had invented for the Beatles\u2019 \u201cI Want You (She\u2019s So Heavy).\u201d<\/p>\n

\tThen it was the summer of 2024. I started thinking about that song again because on August 23 I had the chance to see Chrissie Hynde and The Pretenders play a sold-out concert here in Chicago. In the days before and since, I\u2019ve been going back over Hynde\u2019s remarkable catalog of recordings. I\u2019ve always liked her music\u2014I think I first became aware of her through her brilliant Kinks\u2019 covers back at the start of her career. But over the past month I\u2019ve developed a much more intense respect for her as a composer and performer. And I\u2019ve become convinced that she\u2019s never gotten her full due.<\/p>\n

\tThe concert was excellent (set list available here<\/a>). Hynde remains in excellent voice and isn\u2019t afraid to lead with her strong new material, including the evening\u2019s opening number, \u201cLosing My Sense of Smell.\u201d It\u2019s a brooding meditation that pulls together worries about aging, Covid, and the difficulties not just in keeping up with the latest, but in sustaining the desire to keep up. As always, throughout the concert she remained true to the spirit of punk, more than once cursing members of the audience for daring to record her on their cell phones and going out of her way to complement another for wearing a Morrissey t-shirt. She had us eating out of the palm of her hand all evening.<\/p>\n

“Losing My Sense of Smell” (Official Audio)<\/a><\/p>\n

\tThe show was held at the Chicago Theater, a 3600-seat old vaudeville-and-movie palace. After being rescheduled due to an illness in the band, it turned out to be the final stop on the band\u2019s American tour. Hynde has commented repeatedly on social media<\/a> about how she thinks her music works better in smaller venues like that. She\u2019s worked out a remarkably savvy strategy for touring in this age in which the economics of music-making are more precarious than ever. Two summers in a row, she\u2019s booked a series of shows as opener for a gigantic stadium tour band (the Foo Fighters this year), which apparently brings in enough cash to subsidize a string of solo dates at smaller venues she schedules for the off dates on the mega-tour. In 2023, this involved playing some last-minute shows at tiny punk clubs like the 7th Street Entry in Minneapolis (link to review). This year, it involved shows aimed at her more hardcore fans at mid-size venues like the Chicago Theater. It\u2019s a remarkably smart business strategy that allows her to pay the bills and retain artistic control over when and where she wants the band to play. This also frees her up to play a set list of something beyond just the hits. And when you\u2019ve got a back catalog like she does, there is a broad range of material to cover, stretching back almost half a century.<\/p>\n

\tListening to her catalog (twelve studio albums, plus numerous compilations, but surprisingly few official live recordings), I\u2019ve been struck by the consistent excellence of her work as both a composer and performer. She has the knack of the very best rock songwriters to be able to range across genres (a rockabilly shuffle here, a power ballad there; a Clash-style punk tune on this side, some jingle-jangle new wave way on that side) while always retaining an indelible personal style: you always know it\u2019s a Pretenders\u2019 song within a few seconds (at least, that is, when you\u2019re not hearing it through the distortion of a boisterous crowded barroom). Part of this lies in the emotional complexity of Hynde\u2019s lyrics: even her most joyful songs have a darker undertone, while her most melancholic pieces also deploy a lightly ironic wit. Part of it is her knack for coming up with extraordinarily catchy melodies combined with irresistible lyric phrases.<\/p>\n

\tBut what I think really sets her apart from her peers is her genius for coming up with hooks, those little bits and phrases that are so crucial to a great pop song. Think of the drum flourish that opens \u201cMiddle of the Road.\u201d Or again, on \u201cBack on the Chain Gang,\u201d Chrissie\u2019s \u201coh-oh-oh\u201d stuck in at the end of the opening line of each verse or the \u201cooh-ahh-ooh-ahh\u201d grunting in the background of the chorus. Or yet again, the opening guitar lick and the middle-eight (\u201cwho can explain the thunder and rain, but there\u2019s something in the air) on \u201cKid,\u201d the off-kilter rhythm of the guitars and drums on \u201cTattooed Love Boys,\u201d the Clash-like bass line on \u201cMystery Achievement,\u201d etc., etc. On top of the solid bones of her lyrics, chord structures, and melodies, Chrissie Hynde and bandmates always add on those little bells and whistles that take a pop song from good to great. And she\u2019s been doing it consistently for almost fifty years.<\/p>\n

\tChrissie Hynde turned seventy-three earlier this month and the band have just launched a European tour. \u201cWe don\u2019t have to get fat, we don\u2019t have to get old,\u201d she sings on the 2023 track \u201cLet The Sun Come In,\u201d concluding \u201cTo live forever, that\u2019s the plan.\u201d If anyone can pull that off, it\u2019s her. For us mere mortals, let\u2019s make sure we appreciate her while we can. <\/p>\n