(Translated from my original Italian text by ChatGPT and Piero Scaruffi)
Chrissie Hynde, a vagabond singer and guitarist who for a decade had drifted through the careers of rock stars seeking fortune in vain, first in her hometown of Cleveland and then in Australia and France, settled in London under the protective wing of Nick Lowe in 1979.
Launched by the little song Kid, she established herself as an erudite songwriter, a tough-voiced singer, and the leader of a gritty band in the subsequent singles, from the vibrant and brazen soul-rock of Brass In The Pocket (1979), spoken, hissed and shouted more than sung, to the folk-pop ballad Talk Of The Town, which, together with Tattooed Love Boys and Mystery Achievement, also form the cornerstones of the first album, Pretenders (Sire, 1980).
The search for innovative rock-song formats continued with the syncopated Message Of Love, from II (Sire, 1981), and with the power-pop of Back On The Chain Gang (1982). Her Pretenders imposed an appealing and syncopated sound, in the most effective tradition of guitar rock (with the help of one of the most creative drummers of the era, Martin Chambers), and above all she successfully projected herself as a mature and sensitive womanbold yet vulnerablesinging in a rough, masculine voice direct and emotional lyrics about the female condition, offering overall a gray and sometimes indignant portrait of materialistic society.
After the death of two members (including the brilliant guitarist James Honeyman-Scott), Hynde proved herself to be the true mind of the group, delivering with Middle Of The Road (1983) her masterpiece and one of the masterpieces of all garage rock, a song that fuses Merseybeat-style backing vocals, a blues instrumental jam, a feverish and supersonic harmonica solo, and Rolling Stones-style syncopation into a thundering, overwhelming riff by Robbie McIntosh; and doubling it with the yearning love song Show Me, with 2000 Miles, a tender and mournful ballad in the rhythm of a Christmas waltz, and with the sarcastic country of Thumbelina. Learning To Crawl (Sire, 1984) thus stands as her best-constructed album.
In 1986 she returned, a thirty-five-year-old wife of Jim Kerr with two children behind her, to sing in a third version of the Pretenders, preaching domestic romanticism in the danceable Don't Get Me Wrong and My Baby, the highlights of Get Close (Sire, 1986).
Packed (Sire, 1990), ennobled by the keyboards of Mitchell Froom, continues to showcase her mature grit in Never Do That and Sense Of Purpose.
Night In My Veins and Hollywood Perfume, from Last Of The Independents (Sire, 1994), instead mark a regression to a 1960s style, with a compelling melody immersed in guitar noise, but 977 and Revolution sound like parodies of the early Pretenders.
Light-years removed both from the messianic style of
Patti Smith
Patti Smith and from the introspective folk of
Joni Mitchell,
Hynde was the first adult and emancipated woman of the post-hippie generation to impose her personality as suchnot as a poet, intellectual, groupie, or anything else. Her songs display ever-innovative harmonic structures, rooted in classic rock and roll but reshaped along the way by the sensibility of the most working-class bar bands.
(Original English text by Piero Scaruffi)
The Isle Of View (Warner Bros, 1996) is a live unplugged recording
of some of the band's hits, unfortunately reduced to pathetic whines by
ageing rockers.
Viva El Amor (Warner Bros, 1999), with new guitarist Adam Seymour,
is a bit of an embarrassment.
Usual Pretenders pop-rock fare like
Human and Popstar are enhanced by
the experimental and atmospheric Rabu Du Nube and a few aggressive
tracks (mainly Legalise Me, but also Dragway 42 and
Who's Who).
But the
mediocre easy listening of Nails in the Road, Biker and
From the Heart Down does not just betray a romantic soul,
it betrays a lack of purpose.
Loose Screw (Artemis, 2002) is a nice try to revitalize the sound of
the Pretenders, but the vibrant, technologically-enhanced single
Lie To Me and the stately soul ballad The Losing
are not enough to hide a fundamental lack of inspiration,
vision and perhaps purpose.
Several songs sound like left-overs from previous albums, and the listener
is treated to a parade of slow-tempo pop-reggae tunes
(Nothing Breaks Like a Heart, Time,
Clean Up Woman, You Know Who Your Friends Are)
that are not exactly innovative.
The Pretenders who played on Break Up The Concrete (2008) were basically
a passionate roots-rock band. Instead of following the trends towards more
and more electronic/digital sounds, Hynde regressed to a stage that predated
her career.
Hynde and singer J.P. Jones released
Fidelity (2010),
credited to J.P., Chrissie and the Fairground Boys.
Chrissie Hynde's first solo album was Stockholm (2014).
Alone (2016) was credited to the Pretenders but it was just a collaboration between Hynde amd Dan Auerbach of the Black Keys.
Chrissie Hynde's Standing in the Doorway (2021) was an album
od Bob Dylan covers.
