The Brag

Martina Topley Bird
Stripped Back
By Alex Young

If you were lucky enough to catch Massive Attack at the Opera House Forecourt earlier this year, you would have witnessed a young British woman in fluorescent pink heels stun the audience with a magical opening slot – before performing with the trip-hop pioneers in a spine-tingling version of the classic ‘Teardrop’. Many present that night may not have known that Martina Topley Bird has an outstanding career in her own right; she counts Mike Patton and Damon Albarn amongst her admirers, and has two critically acclaimed solo albums to her name – one of which was nominated for the highly esteemed British Mercury Prize. Yet that night back in February, in little old Australia, Bird admits that she was shit scared.

She laughs nervously, as she frantically searches for a tea bag. “I mean it was scary because it was one of the very first shows I’ve ever done totally solo, and I have a little bit of an immature problem with preparing for things. It was scary, and I didn’t quite prepare properly in a way that I ought to have… I’m a bit rubbish like that.”

Although she’s worked in the past with some of the world’s biggest producers and artists (think Tricky, Dangermouse and Mark Lanegan, who she fondly describes as a “mysterious superhero” who is “fucking up for just about anything”), Bird used the Sydney shows to showcase material from her latest album Some Place Simple - a low-key, stripped back affair reworking songs from her solo catalogue. A stunning compilation of simple arrangements that show off the breathtaking vulnerability of Bird’s voice, the album is a departure from the down-tempo electronica of her previous albums Quixotic and The Blue God. So when she was invited to tour with Massive Attack in Australia, it was time to perfect her solo performance. “I cut my teeth in Australia. So now I know I have a little staple… I’ve learned the dynamic of the crowd, and sonically where I’m at so far. And sonically, what I can do. So, thanks for that!” she laughs.

The idea behind Some Place Simple was born during an intense touring schedule across Europe in 2009, after Gorillaz and Blur key man Damon Albarn witnessed Bird experimenting with different, sparse arrangements of her most celebrated songs – including ‘Sandpaper Kisses’ and ‘Poison’. Despite the little time available in their schedules, Albarn was set on recording – he convinced Bird to create the album around previously written songs. Bird muses: “I think at that time I kind of looked at the future yawning ahead of me, which was about a year of touring or more, and was scared of being taken away from that process of recording [to write new material]… Damon recognised that the old songs were different enough to warrant recording them in a new configuration.”

Most notably, Some Place Simple is a true reflection of Bird and her talents. With few collaborators and a simple recording process creating a delicate sound to match, the album is an intimate affair – and one that Bird was finally able to relish. “I just don’t like it, or find something scary, when loads of people are doing so many things at once,” she tells me. “I think there are so many points of error, so many opportunities for human error when there are so many humans involved. I like a smaller troupe, just so there’s more focus… I can go with my instinct.” And what an instinct it is.

Who: Martina Topley Bird
What: Some Place Simple is out now through Honest Jons/Fuse