Steve Kilbey

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Steve Kilbey (2015)

Steven John Kilbey (born September 13, 1954 in Welwyn Garden City , England ) is a musician , singer , songwriter , poet and painter .

Life

Kilbey was born in England in 1954. In 1957 the family left England and embarked for Australia. Kilbey grew up in Wollongong and Canberra . At the age of 10 he started to write his first songs. He began classical piano training, but this failed because of his preference for rock music that was played every day. At the age of 16 he started his musical career as a bassist in various glam rock bands, including Baby Grande and Limazine . He became known as the singer, bassist and lyricist of the Australian psychedelic rock band The Church , which he founded in Sydney in 1980 with guitarists Peter Koppes and Marty Willson-Piper and drummer Nick Ward (soon to be replaced by Richard Ploog ) .

Kilbey cites T. Rex , Bob Dylan , Dylan Thomas , David Bowie , Beatles , Rolling Stones , Patti Smith , Velvet Underground , Be-Bop Deluxe , Doctors of Madness , Twilight Zone , Science Fiction , Arthur Rimbaud , Surrealism , Impressionism as early influences and futurism . He found his voice through years of experimentation with four-track recordings. He realized his songs from 1980 mainly with The Church, whose first four LPs he wrote practically alone.

After several notable successes, The Church achieved a top 40 hit with Under The Milky Way from the album Starfish in 1988. Kilbey had written the song with his girlfriend at the time, the Swedish musician Karin Jansson ( Pink Champagne ). Since around 1992, his career has been overshadowed by an increasing drug addiction , which a. Almost caused the band to fall apart in the mid-1990s. Kilbey moved from Australia to Sweden , where his dependence peaked. In 1999 he was arrested before a concert by The Church in New York City while trying to buy heroin on the street . The concert took place without him. Eventually, Kilbey moved back to the Australian continent, practically bankrupt, where he successfully overcame his addiction.

In addition to his work with The Church, he released several solo albums and participated in numerous collaborations, including the Jack Frost project with Grant McLennan from The Go-Betweens . He also worked frequently with his brothers Russell and John Kilbey. He is also active as a producer and visual artist. Kilbeys graphic work is heavily influenced by folk art, naive painting, psychedelic visions and Indian art. In 2005 he made his acting debut in a production of William Shakespeare's " The Merchant of Venice " in the role of Shylock . In the same year the album was released Relax Edition Two of Blank & Jones , in which he with his voice to the piece Revealed contributed. In 2008 Kilbey released the solo album Painkiller . In 2009 Unseen Music Unheard Words was released, which he recorded with All India Radio's Martin Kennedy .

Also in 2009, the biography No Certainty Attached - Steve Kilbey and The Church, written by Robert Dean Lurie , was published by the US publisher Verse Chorus Press . The book title is a reference to a song of the same name that is on The Church's album Hologram Of Baal . In 2011 Kilbey was inducted into the Australian Songwriters Hall of Fame . In the same year the second album with Martin Kennedy was released. He also cooperated with the American band Hammock and sang the song No Agenda on their EP Asleep In The Downlights . In 2012 the second album of the side project Isidore was released , which he runs together with Jeffrey Cain from Remy Zero . The solo album The Idyllist followed in February 2013 .

In November 2014 Kilbey published his autobiography Something Quite Peculiar with Hardie Grant Books . After various collaborations, including three more albums with Martin Kennedy, the solo work Sydney Rococo was released at the end of November 2018 .

Steve Kilbey lives in North Bondi / Australia with his wife Natalie and three of five daughters . The other two daughters come from his relationship with Karin Jansson and form the pop duo Say Lou Lou .

Discography

Solo works:

Albums and EPs:

  • Unearthed 1986
  • Earthed 1987
  • The Slow Crack 1989
  • Transaction EP 1989
  • No Such Thing EP 1990
  • Remindlessness 1990
  • Narcosis EP 1991
  • Dabble 2001
  • Painkiller 2008
  • The Idyllist 2013
  • Sydney Rococo 2018

Re-releases:

  • Narcosis + 1997
  • Remindlessness 2002
  • Narcosis + More 2004
  • The Slow Crack 2004
  • Unearthed 2005
  • Earthed 2005
  • Monsters n Mirages 2010 (box set consisting of seven albums)

Compilations, Live and Special Releases:

  • Acoustic & Intimate (Live) 2000
  • Freaky Conclusions 2003
  • Art, Man & Technology 2009
  • Artifacts 2010
  • Garage Sutra 2012
  • Addenda One 2012
  • Addenda Two 2012
  • Live At The Fly By Night Club 2013
  • Miscellanaea - Whispers In The Static 2014

Live Videos:

  • Acoustic & Intimate (VHS) 2000
  • Steve Kilbey Live (DVD) 2008
  • Steve Kilbey and Martin Kennedy - Live at the Toff in Town (DVD) 2010

Cooperations (selection):

  • Hex: Hex 1989 (with Donnette Thayer)
  • Hex: Vast Halos 1990 (with Donnette Thayer)
  • Jack Frost: Jack Frost 1991 (with Grant McLennan)
  • Jack Frost: Snow Job 1995 (with Grant McLennan)
  • Gilt Trip: Gilt Trip 1997 (with Russell Kilbey)
  • Isidore: Isidore 2004 (with Jeffrey Cain)
  • Gilt Trip: Egyptian Register 2005 (with Russell Kilbey)
  • Blank & Jones : Revealed 2005
  • Mimesis: Art Imitating Life 2007 (with Simon Polinski, among others)
  • Esoteric Music Club 2008 (with John Kilbey, among others)
  • Steve Kilbey & Martin Kennedy: Unseen Music Unheard Words 2009
  • GB3 / Steve Kilbey: Damaged / Controlled 2010 (with Glenn Bennie)
  • Hammock : No Agenda 2011
  • Steve Kilbey & Martin Kennedy: White Magic 2011
  • Isidore: Life Somewhere Else 2012 (with Jeffrey Cain)
  • Steve Kilbey & Martin Kennedy: You Are Everything 2013
  • Steve Kilbey & Martin Kennedy: Inside We Are The Same 2015
  • Speed ​​Of The Stars : Speed ​​Of The Stars 2016 (with Frank Kearns)
  • Steve Kilbey & Martin Kennedy: Glow And Fade 2017

Sales figures

There are no exact details for each album, but John Kilbey of the Karmic Hit label was told that between 5 and 27568 units were sold per album (as of August 18, 2005). The 5 could refer to the Fire Down Below EP , a test pressing, of which very few were made anyway (rumors say exactly 5).

literature

  • Robert Dean Lurie: No Certainty Attached - Steve Kilbey and The Church. Verse Chorus Press 2009, ISBN 1-891241-22-2 .
  • Steve Kilbey: Something Quite Peculiar . Hardie Grant Books 2014, ISBN 978-1-74270-831-7 .

Web links

credentials

  1. ↑ The Australian Songwriters Hall Of Fame ( Memento from February 4, 2015 in the Internet Archive )
personal data
SURNAME Kilbey, Steve
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Kilbey, Steven John
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British musician, singer, songwriter, poet and painter
DATE OF BIRTH September 13, 1954
PLACE OF BIRTH Welwyn Garden City , England