REVIEW: Grace Jones, Private Life - The Compass Point
Sessions
- Joann D. Ball
Shocking, exotic, bizarre, strange, striking and incredible. Singer and vision thing Grace Jones was all of that and more. Eddie Murphy brilliantly captured the extremes of Jones' public image in the brilliant but overlooked 1992 film "Boomerang." And now Private Life: The Compass Point Sessions features the best of Jones' genre busting musical output. With sixteen tracks and a running time of two-and-a-half hours, the release is the definitive Grace Jones collection. With but one exception, the selections included here are from Jones's short but electric heyday of 1980 to 1982. In that post-disco, early new wave period, the Jamaican born model, actress, performance artist, and dancefloor dominitrix defied the conventional and flaunted the outrageous both in the studio and on the concert stage.
With Jamaican reggae riddim twins Sly Dunbar on drums and Robbie Shakespeare on bass backing her in the studio, Grace Jones generated a number of club favorites and a few chart hits. "Private Life" was a U.K. hit while the single "Pull Up to the Bumper" from the album Nightclubbing marked Jones' Stateside debut. An R&B Top 5 hit, "Bumper" never achieved much crossover success at pop/rock radio. In general, Jones' sound defied categorization. It was neither Black nor White and it was as international as Jones herself, drawing on American soul and R&B as well as British rock, Jamaican reggae, world music, and more.
As the tracks on Private Live reveal, Grace Jones was not afraid to tackle any artist or any musical sound. She had an uncanny ability to reinterpret a song and make it her own. Her cover of the Pretenders' "Private Life," a favorite of songwriter Chrissie Hynde, captures the reggae vibe that the Akron native and her English band couldn't quite pin down. Jones also put her unique brand on such diverse selections as the Smokey Robinson-penned "The Hunter Gets Captured By The Game," Roxy Music's "Love is the Drug," the Police's "Demolition Man" and Joy Division's "She's Lost Control." But the most unusual song ever covered by Jones has to be Johnny Cash's "Ring of Fire." Fortunately, the unreleased demo version of the classic is included here along with long versions of the previously mentioned songs.
While Grace Jones may have been too far ahead of her time in the early 1980s, Private Life: The Compass Point Sessions is proof that she was always great at whatever she did. Although her productive prime was nearly twenty years ago, she continues to influence popular culture and music. Her visual antics have influenced other artists and video producers while her pre-techno grooves are frequently dropped into house and electronica records. Rap artists have paid tribute to Jones since the very beginning of the music form, starting with The Mean Machine's sampling of "Pull Up to the Bumper" for the 1981 Sugarhill Records cut "Disco Dream." More recently, Patra did a steamy rap cover of "My Jamaican Guy" and L.L. Cool J sampled the Jones original for his blockbuster hit "Doin' It." Despite of the samples and covers, Grace Jones herself has remained outside the musical limelight. Perhaps the renewed interest in her cutting edge back catalogue will lay the groundwork for an eagerly awaited return. TRACK LISTING--Disc One: Private Life (long and dub versions); Love Is The Drug (long version); Breakdown; Warm Leatherette (long version); The Hunter Gets Captured By The Game (long version); I've Done It Again, Pars (long version); Use Me (long version); She's Lost Control (long and dub versions). TRACK LISTING--Disc Two: Walking in the Rain; Cry Now, Laugh Later; Nightclubbing; The Apple Stretching; Nipple to the Bottle (12" version); My Jamaican Guy (12" version); Feel Up; I've Seen That Face Before (Libertango); Demolition Man (long version); Unlimited Capacity For Love; "Ring Of Fire (demo); Man Around The House; Living My Life (7" version); Slave To The Rhythm (Hot Blooded version)
