In the house
The past year has been a rollercoaster ride for Bluehouse. After losing third girl Sam Harley in March last year, remaining members Jacqui Walter and Bernadette Carroll did a lot of navel-gazing before deciding to continue as a duo.
In a fortuitous decision, the pair signed up with CPR Entertainment in Nashville, which also manages Australian guitar aficionado Tommy Emmanuel. This led to the girls touring with Emmanuel in Australia, the US and Holland and ultimately, collaboration on their fourth full-length album, One More Kiss.
At the end of the tour Tommy said, -˜We should make an album’, and we said -˜Yeah right, we don’t have any songs’, but he had a two-week window in December and so we said OK, Walter said.
The pair had to commit themselves to writing almost a song a day while in Nashville leading up to the recording time, which was a departure from their normal creative process.
We’d never worked under those constraints, we had always done our own thing in our own time, Walter said.
But someone said to us, -˜Don’t worry ladies, diamonds are made under pressure’ and we thought, -˜Yeah, we could do this’.
Emmanuel, famous for his incredible guitar prowess, not only acted as producer on the album, but played all the instruments including the drums. His expertise was welcomed, and his influences are identifiable on each of the 13 tracks.
He made the decision to not -˜touch up’ the group’s vocals, instead leaving them raw, capturing what he termed the -˜magic’ of their performance.
Walter said the pair was initially concerned that the result would be a Tommy Emmanuel album. But now they are proud that even though some songs, such as Walking Down the Line and Easy to be Hard, are influenced by their North American jaunt, they have also stuck to their roots.
As much as we are moving in different directions, there are some classic bluehouse songs on there, Walter said.
Eyes Closed has our stamp all over it, and One More Kiss is a standard bluehouse ballad.
The new album has been released independently, using a CD pre-sale technique to raise the money to record and produce it.
Walter said although the band was seeking a distribution arrangement, she and Carroll were fiercely protective of their independence.
As an out lesbian, Walter said her sexuality has been an issue for record companies, which she said were largely homophobic.
I know A&R people have come to our gigs and I am sure they have been intimidated by the female market, she said.
The gay dollar is just as important as the straight dollar; there isn’t a difference when it comes to money.
If you can fill a venue without the backing of a record company, surely that’s worth marketing.
Sydney Bluehouse fans will be pleased to know the ladies are coming to Sydney in August to perform their new material, plus the cr? of their back catalogue.
Bluehouse will play the Vanguard at Newtown on August 2; Clarendon Guest House at Katoomba on August 3; the Brass Monkey at Cronulla on August 4 and the Heritage Hotel, Bulli, on August 5. To buy tickets or the new album visit www.bluehouse.net.
