"I hate being the same as other people."
I get the feeling that BERTIE BLACKMAN is the sort of person who struggles to sit still for long periods of time. One glance through the Sydneysider’s back catalogue would leave the casual observer wondering if the three albums credited to her name were in actual fact written by three completely different artists. Over the past six years the singer has gone from creating soothing folk ballads on her debut LP to embracing the electric guitar and her inner rock chick on Black, her sophomore effort. Blackman’s latest offering, 2009’s Secrets and Lies, signals another change, being a predominately electronic-influenced and poppy affair. Just don’t make the mistake of asking her why she decided to change things up once again.
“The question that people keep asking me that’s driving me absolutely insane is why I changed from acoustic to electric to electronic and it’s because I don’t really have an answer. I don’t know!” Blackman exclaims. “I don’t know why I did it. I just did. I didn’t think about it.” But as the interview progresses, the reason behind her constant musical evolution becomes a little clearer. “I don’t like to repeat myself or do the same thing twice,” she explains, adding, “I hate being the same as other people. I hate doing things that go with the grain.”
Regardless of the style of music Blackman chooses to play, the one constant that remains throughout her work is her striking voice. It’s unsurprising to hear, then, that she tries to take good care of it while on the road. “At the end of a tour I’ll party and have a couple of glasses of wine,” she admits. “When you first start playing gigs, you party and drink and stay out really late but when you’re working a full on schedule your body can’t actually take it. So you either fix up a few things or you just end up a wreck.”
Blackman’s resolve to continually experiment with new musical styles has certainly kept things interesting for her fans, but has simultaneously made constructing setlists an absolute nightmare. How could the tender songs of her debut possibly gel together with more recent upbeat singles like Thump to form a cohesive live show? “I’ve been touring Secrets and Lies so I basically just play songs from that,” she answers. And what happens if a fan of her earlier work puts in a request for one of the classics? “I try to translate a few in, but [it’s hard] because the band lineup isn’t a rock ‘n’ roll lineup. Some of the songs don’t really feel comfortable within that kind of surface, but I’ll get there. I’ll figure out how to put all of it into the one thing.”
That said, Blackman doesn’t appear to be too concerned with the task of reformatting old material. “In a way it’s selfish, but I’m just really enjoying playing some new music that I’ve just written. It’s nice to have some fresh things to discover and explore when you’re on stage,” she confesses. Given her track record, I’d say that Blackman’s fans will definitely have something fresh to explore come time to write album number four.
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