Paul Kelly & The Coloured Girls - Gossip

Peter & Gordon and their Beatles' sound reminded me of this.

Paul Kelly is one of the best poprock songwriters to have been born abroad. His moody, melodic ditties conjure up home and heartbreak, love and lust, dust and distance. Marketed early as Oz's Bruce Springsteen, he suffers from the comparison. His first American release in 87 was awash in magic and pop beauty that transcended the Springsteen crap that dominated the 80's. From the sexy and epic Randwick Bells to the exquisite harmonies of Before Too Long, Kelly shines, making one of the best pop records of that decade. Perhaps the best example is Going About My Father's Business, an uncomfortably sad lament about a man admitting he has become the same lost father he accused his own father of being.

Going about my father's business,
doing my father's time.
What's done to me, I'll do to mine.

One of the interesting aspects to Kelly is his use of literary sources as jumping off points for songs. Whether Raymond Carver and So Much Water, So Close To Home, or Joseph Conrad on The Execution (You've become addicted to revolution/ Addiction is no revolution/Voici le temps des assassins), he finds inspiring reflections and takes on others' ideas.

Kelly has continued to release good records that reflect a straight forward honesty and love of roots that will one day get him his due beyond the songwriters that regularly sing his praises.

If you've never heard Gossip before, you are in for a real treat.

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