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Bruised Ecstatic Collective.
 Quite
the Renaissance man is Peter Fenton. After rising to some prominence
leading 'nineties dark Australian pop quartet Crow he switched
to acting for a time, notably as the bemused no libido boyfriend
in Praise, and ABC's Love Is A Four Letter Word. He now gets
called upon to open and take part in festivals and films, and
is putting the finishing touches on a solo album, before dabbling
later this year in a TV series treatment. His latest Festival
call is to the Cabaret Festival as part of the Bruised Ecstatic
Collective, a notion that grew into a band while performing
ribbon cutting duties for a festival on the east coast.
"I was asked to open a film festival and got Abby [Dobson], Dean [Manning] and David [Lane] to come along and do a few songs," explains Fenton. "That was really fun, I thought it sounded really special. We all ended up playing separately down at a festival in Bondi Beach, the Livebait festival... I was watching Abby this one night and thought what she is doingis kind of like a bruised ecstatic cabaret. I told her that and she gave a very enigmatic look.
"She reminded me of that a week later and when the Adelaide Cabaret Festival rang and asked if I wanted to come down. I said 'I have this idea called the Bruised Ecstatic Collective'. Then I got in contact with the others - it was all very positive right from the start."
Fenton's laid back, matter of fact telling belies the logistics of pulling together the 'Collective when it is made up of artists in varying locations and stages of recording and releasing their own material.
"We all individually have records out or coming out or about to be made. Abby (formerly of Leonardo's Bride) is in Paris, after recording in LA, making her record. I have finished my record, and currently doing artwork and websites and all that essential modern paraphernalia of the record, and that will be coming out in June around the same time as the Festival. David Lane's record came out about six months ago and Dean Manning's (the other half of Leonardo's Bride) came out about three months ago. He has been in Spain and now in New York doing some shows, so it has been pretty weird," Fenton says quite plainly. "I'm very thankful that email exists."
Wondering about the boundaries of cabaret and what it is in the modern context, it is interesting to hear others' definitions...
"It means smoky venues and fishnet stockings," Fenton begins when I ask for his interpretation of the concept, not expanding upon who in the group may be wearing the fishnets.
"It seems very venue oriented," he continues. "Even folk songs or ballads could be cabaret in a venue that is more stage oriented. The paradigm of the cabaret seems a little more ordered, and allows for more space between notes, as well as people and more space between emotions, which I suppose is a more finely tuned traversing of those territories," he ponders. "It seems more based in theatre than anything else, than sport, which rock'n'roll sometimes seems more analogous to. I suppose you could wrap it up as saying it is more intimate."
So cabaret becomes another string in the man's bow, assuming the shows are well received. There is every reason to suggest the Bruised Ecstatic Collective will be, each member being an accomplished artist in their own right.
"We're bringing a great drummer down too, Ivan Jordan, who uses drums and trigger samples, so it is sort of this low brow-high tech kind of cabaret venture anyway. We will all be playing some of our own songs and then sift through the pool of cabaret greats, I guess."
Fenton's favourites include Leonard Cohen's Dance Me To The
End Of Love, and Jacques Brel's Amsterdam. "But I
just noticed in the program this rather saucy looking bunch
of Belgians, and it mentions that if they find anyone else doing
Amsterdam or any Brel numbers it will get nasty backstage!
So if we come out looking a bit bruised and battered..." Hopefully
they remain just bruised ecstatic.
Narelle Walker
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The Bruised Ecstatic Collective perform at the Space from 15-17 June.
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