As soon as you know what people like, it's easy enough to envisage the beeline that connects two records. Simply put out more of the same. Format your talent. Make sure you're in the public eye constantly. Be clever in how you plan things. Consult your plastic surgeon on a daily basis.
As soon as you get there, it's straight ahead, no holds barred.
By way of a minor detour, we now have an answer to the question that's been burning on everyone's lips: why did it take four years – i.e. why so long - for the new Novastar to be in the making? For the simple reason that Joost Zweegers is not in the business of maufacturing 'products'. Nor is he particularly intent on producing any. Even though he did crawl out of the big talent cauldron. Even though he is perfectly aware of what people want to hear. Not Joost. Joost creates musical diaries. Charming compilations of verse and balladry into which he has distilled the Major Events and the little things in life that have crossd his path.
Such things take time, the time it takes. Until the songs are just right, honed to perfection. That much was clear in the run-up to ‘Novastar’ (2000). In fact, it had taken four years from landing first place in Humo’s Rock Rally 1996 to releasing that much vaunted debut album. It's just that this first four year time span had gone by without quite as much bated breath.
In addition, in the protracted run-up to ‘Another Lonely Soul’, life threw up thought-provoking fuel in such abundance that the past four years easily count as double in terms of intensity. Which gives you some idea just how high you'll rate the new Novastar album. Brace yourself : it's even better than that.
There is always a pivotal moment. A key point in time and nothing is the same ever after. Often the transformation is positively minute, almost imperceptible as and when it occurs. The key to ‘Another Lonely Soul’ lies somewhere in early 2002. Winter was mild and Joost Zweegers was tending the final ministrations to ‘Novastar’ before allowing it to go into the filing cabinet. Before embarking on a tour of theatres across the country, all on his tod. One man and his piano. No artifice, no contrivance, nothing up his sleeves.
Which was when something magical started happening. In their barest soul-bearing stripped-down form, fresh evergreens of the ilk of ‘Wrong’ and ‘The Best Is Yet To Come’ revealed their true colurs ... singalong tunes turning into monuments. People being moved in places they didn't even know they could be moved in. A young artist excelling in the chosen discipline he had already proved himself in previously: melancholy.
The giveaway is in the cover. Joost Zweegers makes Ozark Henry's ‘Sweet Instigator’ all his own, with Piet Goddaer popping round to confirm it has his blessing. Things never go beyond civilities when Our Man is asked to fly out to the States to get down to some songwriting (1)(2). Something which the expert craftsman that is Zweegers welcomes as a highly challenging and exhilirating prospect (3)(4)(5). The artist that is Zweegers however soon finds himself gnawing on a chewed bone.
Providence steers a disheartened Zweegers towards Goddaer. The pair of them get talking and decide to cut a record together. Joost calls Piet 'producer'. Piet calls Joost 'the artist' and 'the customer’ (6)(7)(8). What ensues is an endearing game of direct current and alternating current between a pair of live wires who are scandalously generous with the talent they have to offer. As if this were the last album that is ever going to be made.
The way they go about it is different but their goal is identical. Zweegers' three-minute popsong heart melded with the Goddaer flow and groove gel in unison to spark the same result: pop in its purest form. The odd influence that came swirling by en route? Lennon as ever, The Waterboys, late Roxy Music... (9) On that note, we'd like to wish everybody who is bent on unearthing who coloured what where every success. You'll have your work cut out. All the more so as this pair are both masters of disguise (10).
On to the final secret ingredient then. Life has visited Zweegers ‘big time’ on the way, giving him his fair share of food for thought. Material which is best ruminated over before it is shared with audiences at large (11). It is this content which lends ‘Another Lonely Soul’ its consistency throughout. Not the collection of short stories loosely stringed together that was ‘Novastar’ but a novel of incisive phrases, doling out pearls of worldly wisdom which are sure to bring a tear to the eye (12). In the world of music, this is called an album.
‘Another Lonely Soul’ hardly showcases personal growth by small increments. Here is a definite case of taking several huge strides all at once in a single outing. Overwhelming, contemporary music that is guaranteed to go the distance and beyond. You're well advised to handle this record sparingly, as you're more than likely to need it for that next mountainside trip or that beach excursion. Before taking it out to the beach and the mountains again. And again. And again.
In conclusion, here is a telling analogy. Upon his untimely demise, Dutch author and media celebrity Boudewijn Büch left some 125,000 books. According to a close friend of his, an antiquarian book dealer, he had lived his whole life for just that one second. That one second of discovery, of utter delight. Totted up, this means the man enjoyed a grand total of 11 hours of sheer unadulterated bliss. We like to think that you're holding 10 seconds of sheer bliss as we speak. Then again, it could well be 42’51’’.
WMB / 2003
Source: http://www.novastar.be
