Death and the singer
Ozark Henry is the stage name of Kortrijk-born Piet Goddaer, who broke through to an international audience in 2001 with his third album, Birthmarks, a collection of pop songs streaked with classical music and electronics. The classical influence was less present on his next albums, though still palpable. His sixth and latest album, Stay Gold, is first and foremost a collection of affectionate pop tunes.
Ozark Henry’s latest album opens up a new road with an old collaborator
The most remarkable difference between Stay Gold and Ozark Henry’s previous outings is the presence of second singer Amaryllis Uitterlinden. In the past, Goddaer has regularly added an extra voice to his songs. This time around, it’s different. “Some of the new songs gravitated towards duets. For that I didn’t just need a good singer, but someone whose voice fits with mine. Compare it with a film: It’s not enough to have two great actors; there needs to be chemistry between them.”
Enter Uitterlinden, who Goddaer has known for years. An earlier collaboration, more than a decade ago, for the soundtrack of the television series Sedes & Belli never saw the light of day, for non-musical reasons. Uitterlinden has become a member of his band, too, as a singer and keyboard player. “She’ll also sing the older songs, some of which I had to adapt,” Goddaer explains.
The new songs he sings with Uitterlinden are not duets in the classical sense of the word, where you have two people clearly dialoguing with each other. “Some of the songs I can sing on my own, too,” Goddaer says. “But because of the second voice, other elements in the lyrics are stressed.” He points to “If You Leave” as an example. “Is it a dialogue between two people, are they communicating with each other, or is the second voice a far-off echo of the first? This multitude of possible interpretations really interests me. They’re pop songs: You always try to give the personal feelings you incorporate in a song a universal appeal.”
Life goes on
Ozark Henry named a song after the final words of Ludwig van Beethoven: “Plaudite, amici, comedia finita est” (“Applaud, my friends, the comedy is over”), typically the conclusion of a commedia dell’arte performance. “You can’t sing about an intense way of living without referring to what characterises life the most: death. That’s why it is always present on my albums, though it’s not necessarily presented as a dark thing. I think ‘Plaudite Amici Comedia Finita Est’ is one of the lighter songs of the album, even if it’s about people who die too young.”
Goddaer stresses that the song is not about Beethoven, and that “Death and the Maiden” is not an explicit reference to Franz Schubert’s “Der Tod und das Mädchen”. “Death and the Maiden is a classical motif that pops up in different art forms,” he explains, adding that he just wanted to write a song about “how every one of us faces death as a maiden, since we don’t know what death means.”
No other Flemish pop musician is as intensively engaged in writing soundtracks as Goddaer. The most recent was for Le monde nous appartient (The World Belongs to Us) by Brussels director Stephan Streker. “It’s rewarding to do because it pushes me in a direction I otherwise wouldn’t go in. It forces me to follow someone else’s reasoning, which is enriching. Especially with Streker, who’s imbued with cinema.”
No longer being asked to work on such collaborations would be a great loss: “I’d compare it with not reading books any more. Because it nourishes me as a human being, it influences the music of Ozark Henry: My songs, both the lyrics and the music, are the result of how my life evolves.”
Incurable romantic
Goddaer has a reputation for being a control freak, so it’s surprising to see he also thrives in a collaborative role. Before responding to the latter, he questions the former. “I often get called a control freak, but am I really? I find it normal that I play every instrument myself on Stay Gold, an album I recorded and produced myself in my home studio. Not for the sake of doing everything myself, but because I want to express my vision. Returning to your question: No, it’s not difficult. When writing a soundtrack, I always ask myself what the film needs. Consequently, some of the music doesn’t work out of the context of the film, and therefore will never be released.”
Let’s go back to the new album. “We are incurable romantics”, Goddaer sings in the song of the same title. How about him? “I’m a bit of a romantic, yes, seeking goals that I know are unobtainable. Or being really disappointed by what is merely a detail: My mind tells me it’s not important, but that doesn’t diminish the feeling of disillusion in my heart.”
Stay Gold and the song “Stay Gold Ponyboy, Stay Gold” are named after a quote from The Outsiders, the novel by SE Hinton, turned into a film by Francis Ford Coppola, in which a dying Johnny Cade, one of the main characters, advises his best friend Ponyboy Curtis to “stay gold.” Goddaer explains: “Not that I especially wanted to honour The Outsiders, it just fitted the album. ‘Stay gold’ is another way of saying: Stay true to yourself.”
17 April
Vooruit
Sint-Pietersnieuwstraat 23, Ghent
21 April
Ancienne Belgique
Anspachlaan 110, Brussels
www.ozarkhenry.be
