Randy Newman

KONINGIN ELISABETHZAAL, ANTWERP, BELGIUM

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Sunday February 8, 2004

Randy Newman has elected to begin his 2004 solo tour of Europe on a Sunday night in Belgium, a country where his wry but devastating critiques and toe-tapping ditties have regularly topped the charts.

As they sup their beer and wait for the curtain call, Randyโ€™s flatland fanatics are deathly quiet, the atmosphere intensely reverential. When Randy eventually ambles on stage to the waiting grand piano, itโ€™s with the sheepish relish of Homer Simpson approaching the neighbourhood barbecue. Randy is silver-haired and wearing a shirt that looks like it was once loose-fitting but now hugs his bulky frame. Hunched at the keys, he brings forth the creeping dread and icy disdain of โ€œLast Night I Had A Dreamโ€, and it seems heโ€™s fit to burst out of the song, which is seething in its angry soul-deep confessional.

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The personal gives way to the political with โ€œBirminghamโ€?a song that pinpoints Newmanโ€™s audacious insight. His unassuming genius, coupled with pointed and poignant observations, allows him to become a devilโ€™s advocate for a Deep South of the mind. There, and in deathless marvels like โ€œSail Awayโ€ And โ€œRednecksโ€, his place in the great pantheon of American song is that of Bob Dylanโ€™s evil twin?finding horror at every turn.

He fills the hall with a grisly cast?pre-war German child murderers, scheming slave traders, corrupt politicians and wretched old men drooling over young flesh (the aged Randy excels in uncomfortably-close-to-home scenarios). โ€œThe Great Nations Of Europeโ€ (โ€œmy attempt to condense the last 400 years of European history into a two-minute 48-second pop song,โ€ he explains) elicits a rapturous response. โ€œThank you. As you are an imperialist nation yourself, I take that as a compliment,โ€ he smirks. In Randy Land, no one is innocent?we all have to help carry the can.

โ€œMarieโ€ and โ€œReal Emotional Girlโ€ show he has as fine a grasp on elusive feelings as he has on the venal hypocrisy and boorishness of nation states. Then the crowd are invited to sing response choruses of โ€œShame shame shameโ€ and โ€œHeโ€™s deadโ€ at the appropriate points. They do so with such fearsome gusto that he adds a note of caution: โ€œMaybe a little too much feeling in that last one.โ€

Although the movie commissions still pile up, there has been no original Newman album since the underrated Bad Love in 1999. Backstage after the show, heโ€™s brought out for a meet and greet. Looking like a condemned man whoโ€™s just been introduced to his executioner, he says, as much to himself as to anyone listening, โ€œI have to write some new songs, thatโ€™s what I have to doโ€.

If they are to match the past glories he has just brought to life, the big man must know he has a mighty mountain to climb.