Sunday, January 02, 2005
Australian singer makes her mark
Chambers hoping to expand U.S. fan base
By DAVID BAUDER
Associated Press
NEW YORK - A quick glance across Seventh Avenue reminds Kasey Chambers of her place in the pecking order of Australian entertainers, export division.
Madison Square Garden's outdoor message board advertises an upcoming performances by the Wiggles, the four-member group that makes preschoolers squeal all over the world. Chambers, meanwhile, sits undisturbed in a hotel coffee shop.
Back home, the autograph seekers would have been lining up to see this 27-year-old with the heart-melting voice and occasional Lucinda Williams kick.
Chambers' 2001 album ''Barricades & Brickwalls'' went platinum in Australia. ''Not Pretty Enough,'' her piercing song of self-doubt, topped the singles chart and her latest album ''Wayward Angel'' debuted at No. 1.
Grandmothers, teenagers, trendy pop fans -- her audience back home spans the spectrum. In the United States, she's a darling of critics and the alternative country crowd, but doesn't sell much.
''I appreciate having any sort of career over here, but it means more because I love coming over here,'' she said. ''It's really rewarding to me personally to come to the sort of places that we've been playing and I don't want to give that up.''
Tending to success in Australia, and the birth of 2-year-old son Talon kept Chambers from doing much traveling the past few years. She briefly toured the United States last fall.
With all the good news in her life the past few years, the overwhelming sadness of ''Wayward Angel'' is striking. The song ''Pony'' ties a more adult yearning to childhood memories, ''For Sale'' keeps fans at a distance and the one song clearly influenced by Talon is about her own imperfections.
By the time the rocking song of sexual obsession ''Guilty as Sin'' comes along, it's a necessary release.
''I always think that about every record I make, that this is going to make me sound like such a depressed person,'' she said. ''I'm not at all.''
But she only tends to write when she's sad; sitting in a room and pouring her heart out has no appeal when she's in a good mood. Most of her first album was written after her parents' marriage broke up.
''I'm sure a psychologist would have fun with all of my songs,'' she said. ''I wouldn't have fun with a psychologist looking at them.''
She also doesn't want to leave the impression that she's ungrateful for success. She usually loves the attention. One notable exception came when a nurse in an Australian hospital requested an autograph while Chambers was on a stretcher and sobbing while awaiting a minor surgical procedure.
''Ten years on the Nullabor and not seeing anyone besides my family makes me love being around people,'' she said. ''When I'm on tour, I never get a room by myself.''
Some translation: Until she was about 10, Chambers and her family lived off the land on the Nullabor Plain, a vast, largely unpopulated part of Australia. Only for a couple of months a year around the holidays did they come back to civilization -- to a town of 300 people.
Her formative music experiences were singing with her family around a campfire or listening to her father's tapes.
''I thought it was really normal,'' she said. ''I thought that everyone was listening to Emmylou Harris and Johnny Cash. It wasn't until I got into my teen years that I learned about pop music.''
Chambers' upbringing only seems unusual to her in retrospect.
''I only have fond memories about it,'' she said, ''but I could never do it again. I'm way too spoiled for that. To live there would be a real culture shock for me. It would be like going on 'Survivor.'''
She keeps her family close at hand. Her family had its own musical act, the Dead Ringer Band, when she was a teenager. Now her brother Nash produces her albums and her father plays guitar in her touring band.
It doesn't feel weird to have dad onstage with her; Chambers said she's never done a gig without him.
What happens when dad flubs a note? Do you have to yell at him?
''I'm not that fussy when it comes to being onstage,'' she said.
She'll have some good stories to tell Talon someday. Perhaps he'll ask why she considers herself a wayward angel. Not now, though.
''He doesn't have a clue that the album is named after that,'' she said. ''He only likes it when I sing Wiggles songs.''
