So speaks Dusty Springfield in the terrific and comprehensive essay that Rob Hoerburger created to accompany the quintessential "must" for any Springfield fanatic: The Dusty Springfield Anthology, a three disc retrospective, a first-time gathering of everything hardcore and musically Dusty. As if simply listening to those discs wouldn't suffice, Hoerburger does a superb job of writing a chronological cross-section of Springfield's genius. No small feat. What can you say about a singer who could master the rawness of rhythm and blues, the slick sophistication and tricky time signatures of Bacharach, the over the top bravado of the Broadway standards, and the cunning simplicity of classic pop? I'd like to see Whitney Houston or Mariah Carey push through the wildly eclectic terrain that Springfield explored in her thirty year career. As Dusty's idol, Aretha sang: "Ain't No Way."
I can relate (to the drag thing): I remember being ten years old and demanding that my mom take me to Sears to help me track down Springfield's just-then chart-topping single, "You Don't Have to Say You Love Me." If only mom knew what was to ensue. I guess you could call them mini-drag kiddy shows; but these were my own private performances, for myself—in front of our living room mirror—with "You Don't Have To Say" accompanying and blaring and blistering the paint off of the walls. I think I used a turkey baster in lieu of a microphone. These were secret paeans until the afternoon my older cousin dropped in unexpectedly and caught me in my version of Dusty regalia: a blond flip wig left over from one of my mom's Halloween escapades and some sort of makeshift chiffon ensemble. Rationality dictated that I not attempt Springfield's trademark mascara blitzkrieg—those riveting panda eyes. I explained my way out the tableaux by telling my cousin that I was rehearsing for my roll as a pixie in an upcoming school drama production. Mmmm hmmm. Drag queens, young and old, know, in their bones, a genuine thing when it comes their way. Dusty Springfield had that requisite mysterious, androgynous qualifying quality—a masculine inner presence that manages to push its way through the feminine countenance. Think Garland, Streisand, Eartha Kitt, to name some of the legendary power punchers. And Springfield, a hair-triggery, tempestuous but pathologically shy Aries, shoved her way into the female pop star iconography with all the grace and savvy of a linebacker. The moment she ditched her brother's folky ensemble, The Springfields, she began her musical piecework melding the words white and soul in a manner that, for a WASP, remains incomprehensible today. Of course the Dusty persona—the hair, eyes and those wildly dramatic hand gestures while she performed— were secondary to the husky vocals. How to describe her voice? I humbly offer: a maelstrom of emotion—a quiet storm—condensed into a tear that hovers above a smoldering cradle of smoke and fire. OK, so I'm not Rumi! Technically you'd call it an alto arrangement with an assured falsetto; a voice that possesses a jazz performer's sense of timing and facility, crowned with a right-on attunement to pitch. On many of her best ballads, like Bacharach's libidinal "The Look Of Love", her voice takes on an otherworldly resonance, emerging from, what one reviewer described as "a little hole in space." Play it today and you still go agog. But misty, strident, distanced or in your face, it was always her vocal restraint and interpretive discretion—that ability to not push anything because there was nothing to prove—that proved Springfield a natural master of her art and in possession of a magical tool. And then there's the soul thing; as in black soul, the kind that lives in music made by singers like Aretha Franklin. But Springfield never copped her way into that mode; i Springfield's pop music trajectory was a veritable circus ride; but that's often the case for an artist who gets bored easily and wants to shatter constraints. For the most part, Dusty succeeded. And when she didn't? Who cared! When a friend asked her during Christmas if she had any regrets about her life, she replied, "Are you kidding? I've had a ball." Ya know, compiling all of these impressions really gets my imagination humming, toes tapping, and hair rising; and, yeah, when I think about it, it was a turkey baster. Show time! [David K.]
Even more Dusty at the fabulous |
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After the Pet Shop Boys coaxed her out of semi-retirement in 1987 to accompany the duo on their hit "What Have I Done To Deserve This," Springfield told US magazine that the real barometer for her successful comeback was the fact that, "The drag queens are doing me again!" And yes, this is always a good benchmark for a veteran diva to confirm not only her longevity, but her viability.
n other words, she didn't imitate blackness—instead she offered up genuine soulfulness. There's a difference. Springfield recounts in the liner notes to her legendary disc Dusty In Memphis: "All Aretha ever said to me—and I died—we were in a lift, and she just put her hand on my arm and went, ‘Girrrrlllll!" Franklin was probably doing this through gritted teeth, too, as she'd originally passed on the option to "Son Of A Preacher Man" before the tune found its way to Springfield.