[情報] Pretenders 新片，加入 indie label
The Pretenders Turn The 'Screw'
By Chris Morris
After more than 20 years and seven albums with the
majors, the Pretenders make their indie-label arrival
Nov. 12 with the Artemis release "Loose Screw." Artemis
executive VP Michael Krumper sees it as reflective of a
larger trend. He notes, "You look at examples of any
number of acts that have returned to indies after having
been at majors ... It's not like they stopped making
good records years ago -- it's that people stopped
noticing."
Since its debut in 1980, the band -- which today
includes founding vocalist Chrissie Hynde and drummer
Martin Chambers, guitarist Adam Seymour, and bassist
Andy Hobson -- had been part of the Warner Bros. family,
via their association with the Sire imprint. "Well,
Warners dropped us," Hynde says. "My manager said,
'Look, if you're not that interested, let us go.' In the
cold light of day, I would say they dropped us, to
simplify things.
"Artemis feels a lot more like Sire did when they signed
us in the first place, [before the label] got consumed
by Warners," she continues. "It's feeling like a return
to form with us. We had a very happy relationship with
Warners for years. But toward the end, not only did I
not know where their headquarters were, but I didn't
know who was in the company or anything about it
anymore. We weren't selling bucketloads of records, and
corporations don't like that, so they drop you."
Hynde says that the group's free-agent status brought it
a remarkable amount of freedom in the studio. "We made
this record before we were signed," she says, "so we
knew we could make the record we wanted, how we wanted,
and if anyone liked it enough, they'd want to sign us.
And Artemis was the company who liked it enough."
Cut with producers Kevin Bacon and Jonathan Quarmby,
"Loose Screw" returns to the classic, sleek Pretenders
pop sound. But it also includes reggae-inflected numbers
and tunes with a strong R&B feel.
Hynde says, "We [always] wanted to make a sort of
reggae-influenced record. What Warners would have said
is, 'In America, they don't know what reggae is, so
don't do it.' But we were free at last. I've been
wanting to make a reggae album ever since I heard reggae
for the first time in 1974, when I went to England. By
no means is this a reggae album -- there are three
tracks on there which are like reggae songs."
A strong R&B orientation can be heard on the tracks
"Time" and "Kinda Nice, I Like It." Hynde says, "I kind
of messed around with it on [1986's] 'Get Close.' I was
in an R&B band in Cleveland in 1975. I moved to London,
and then back to Ohio, and I was in an R&B band called
Jackrabbit. We were doing Isley Brothers songs and
stuff. That's really when I learned how to sing, and
that was by listening to Candi Staton and the singers of
that time. I've kind of downplayed that-not as much as
I've downplayed my natural country voice, which I would
hope that no one ever hears."
Artemis' promotion of the album includes a strong
Internet component, according to Krumper: "We're
launching a gorgeous player, where people will get to
hear the whole of the record. It's on
pretendersband.com. We've also hired an independent
Internet marketing company called Special Ops to get
this out there everywhere they can. We set up a
promotion with Amazon where people can stream the record
if they buy it in advance."
The Pretenders are planning a January 2003 tour of
theaters to promote the album. But the group has already
done what Hynde describes as an "awesome" eight-show
stint with the Rolling Stones in September.
"It's been amazing," she says. "The audience has been
generous to us. They haven't told us, 'F*** off and go
home, we want the Stones,' although I wouldn't blame 'em
if they did. It's a compatible audience, our audience
and the Rolling Stones' audience. I don't think those
people feel put out that they have to listen to us for
45 minutes."
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