Photo: Bandcamp
Aviation pioneer Amelia Earhart disappeared over the Pacific Ocean in 1937, while attempting to become the first female pilot to circumnavigate the globe. A musical retelling of her final journey wasn’t something I necessarily expected in 2024, but hearing that avant-garde artist Laurie Anderson had recorded one piqued my interest.
Anderson is herself a pioneer, and her album-length tribute to the late pilot is evocative, and affectionate.
In 1982, Laurie Anderson’s ‘O Superman’ was an unexpected chart hit. At that point she’d been a performance artist, after training in sculpture and violin.
She went on to work in film, theatre, and pop music, pioneering electronic techniques like vocal filters, (which she refers to as ‘audio drag’), and creating instruments like the tape-bow violin and talking stick. She’s made works inspired by her experience in Hurricane Sandy, Moby Dick, and in 2000 performed Songs For A.E., which eventually became this album, Amelia.
That production was, by her own admission, overstuffed. But this album, despite its sombre subject matter, is light, and runs just 34 minutes.
‘To Circle the World’ begins the album. There’s what sounds like an actual plane engine in there, but initially we’re hearing a mix of Anderson’s viola, tires going over gravel, and a guitar drone she made with her late husband Lou Reed’s guitar and amplifiers. According to the New York Times, it's the same setup he used to make Metal Machine Music.
That artificial recreation a clue that this is ultimately a work of educated fiction. Anderson drew on Amelia Earhart’s extensive journals, without quoting them directly.
The bulk of the musical backing is provided by the Czech Republic’s Brno Orchestra. Later, Anderson invited various players to improvise on percussion, bass, and guitar.
There’s plenty of her trademark spoken word, and she sings as well, often doubled on vocoder. And periodically, the more accomplished croon of ANOHNI appears, in a call and response on ‘India and On Down to Australia’.
Throughout the album, Anderson speaks and sings from different perspectives: there are telegrams, logbook data, and third person narration, and she adopts different vocal tones for each. Then there are the fictionalised journal entries, which offer the most emotive entries, like the lovely ‘Flying at Night’.
In the press run for the album, Anderson has spoken about Earhart as a feminist pioneer, saying she was never acknowledged as the great mechanic she was. In an interview with The Line of Best Fit, Anderson said, “87 years later, girls are still not encouraged to learn about engineering, or even that much technology.”
The album’s one archival recording of Earhart herself serves to underline this point.
Amelia Earhart’s story is obviously one with a tragic ending, and when the album reaches that moment, Anderson and ANOHNI invest it with plenty of drama. But Amelia is, no pun intended, a buoyant listen, and more celebratory than sad. It’s also proof that Laurie Anderson remains an artist who’s as vibrant as ever.
