Monday 29 September 2014

The Hat Club: Oct 18: David Bridie

Thanks to Boo Hewerdine for such a brilliant set on Saturday.

Our next presentation comes to you from Melbourne Australia.
I've lifted the following biog from David's website; a more personal dissection of this top bloke will follow later...

David Bridie is the quiet achiever of Australian music, seven time ARIA award winning songwriter and composer David Bridie has enjoyed a distinguished career as one of Australia’s most innovative musicians. With his repertoire as a recording artist, soundtrack composer, producer, lyricist, uniquely Australian songwriter and singer, as well as a specialist in the music of Melanesia, Bridie has certainly stamped his mark.
A founding member and songwriter of critically acclaimed musical groups Not Drowning Waving and My Friend The Chocolate Cake whose success both in Australia and across the world is well documented, Bridie has also released a number of albums under his own moniker with the 2002 “Act of Free Choice” being released in the UK, Canada and America as well as Australia. At a recent Chocolate Cake gig in Melbourne, at The Famous Spiegeltent, Bridie mused that in fact he had performed in The Spiegeltent in five different countries.
It is as a songwriter that Bridie has forged his reputation as one of Australia’s best with tracks such as This Year Is Better Than Last Year (DB), The Kiap Song (NDW), I’ve Got A Plan (MFTCC), The Koran, The Ghan and A Yarn (DB), and The Last Great Magician (MFTCC) – all confirming his individual style in painting a mural of the modern world, its geography, its political mores and its dwellers identities.


From mid-2000 Bridie released three solo albums; Act of Free ChoiceHotel Radio and Succumb. These albums see Bridie make a return to the experimental music that his earlier group Not Drowning Waving had been noted for, with Bridie’s voice and electric piano woven around a universe of found sounds, anything from Papua New Guinea conch shells to Morsecode intercepted on short wave radio, with bass and drums added over the top of lyrics that are purely and unmistakably Bridie, a ruthlessly honest musical mirror to Australia’s complex national character and wry personal insights to the state of being human.


Over the years Bridie has balanced his career as a live musician with the composition of soundtrack music, with credits for over 16 Feature films including Proof, Bran Nue Dae, The Man Who Sued God and Gone several of which received International release. His score for In a Savage Land landed Bridie the award for “Best Original Score” at the AFI Awards,“Best Original Soundtrack” by the Film Critics Circle of Australia, and “Best Soundtrack Album” at the 2000 ARIA Awards.
Credits for his 29 television/short films/documentaries soundtracks include Remote Area Nurse for
which he won an AFI Award, “Winner Best Independent Release” ARIA Award; The Whitlam Documentary, MABO; Life of an island Man, The Circuit and most recently, the feature documentary film Strange Birds in Paradise and 10 part ABC drama series The Straits. David has always explored his particular passion for Melanesian life, music and history.


Now regarded as the world’s foremost producer of Melanesian music artists, David has scored, curated and produced many films, concerts and albums in Australia, PNG and The US and has been instrumental in launching the musical careers of many of these artists including George Telek (PNG) who is now considered an elder statesman of Music in his home country and had his music released on Peter Gabriel’s Real World label. Other producing credits include Archie Roach’s “Jamu Dreaming”, Christine Anu’s “Stylin Up’ and West Papuan string band Black Paradise’s “Spirit Of Mambesak” CDs, Richard Mogu (PNG). His most recent work with Pitjantjatjara man Frank Yamma and the Countryman CD has seen Yamma’s career take off with UK and Europe tours and festival bookings across Australia and the world including the London Olympic Festival and Womad UK in 2012.

No comments:

Post a Comment