PAUL KELLY

Songs From The South: Greatest Hits 1985–2019

COOKING VINYL 9/10

Career-spanning monument to one of Australia’s greatest songwriters

In his native Australia, Paul Kelly’s 1987 hit “To Her Door” serves as sort of the local equivalent of Springsteen’s “Born To Run”. It remains a perfect precis of Kelly’s virtues – an extraordinary ability to wring fresh melodies from familiar progressions, and to tell complex stories in simple words – but not one of the other 41 tracks on this two-disc collection sounds overawed by its company. That Kelly has never much broken cover beyond Australia may be a reflection on his Oz-ness: the punchy country rock that underpins his musical lexicon, his dry drawl of a voice, his fascination with local themes (the seven-minute cricketing odyssey “Bradman” is included here, although – disappointingly – the sublime land-rights ballad “From Little Things Big Things Grow” is not). But this is also what has made Kelly the singular songwriter he is: nobody else articulates the deadpan fatalism that characterises the Australian mindset quite so precisely. Recent records, some also excerpted here, have included various collaborative projects and a co-opting of Shakespeare’s sonnets. Kelly is at his best when being himself, however – and at his best, there are few better.

Extras: None.