CLAUDIA BRUCKEN
SUBTERANIA, LONDON
PERFECT pop was such a fine idea. For those coming late to the game, the notion was of consummate, immaculately poised music which, by its drifts and shifts and sexy tensions, involved and improved the mundane trudge of our everyday mediocrity. And Propaganda, for a week or two, were the most perfect pop band of all. Yeah. They were that crucial.
Claudia Brucken has emerged from Propaganda still glowing. She has a wondrous feel for the theatre of the moment. Even when the music’s merely Eurobeat, she can still instil proceedings with an icy glamour, a Teutonic dignity. Claudia Brucken is entirely capable of being perfect.
Naturally, spontaneity is a sacrifice to the iron control central to this glacial pop. “Kiss Like Ether”, the recent single, is sensual yet never sensational; for all her schemings and machinations, Brucken can’t equal the fragility of, say, Julee Cruise, a lucky session singer who was gifted an LP-full of ethereal pop miracles. I’m sure Claudia sees the … um … irony of this.
Yet mostly it’s gorgeous. “P-Machinery” is luscious, lavish and luxurious; three fine words to spill over pop music that’s fully aware of its own glorious potentiality. And the encore “Duel” is delicious, delirious, a devilish waltz. Claudia Brucken is a pop idealist. We accept no less.
“There’s no business like showbusiness,” declares chuffed hubby Paul Morley later. As ever he’s virtually right. Claudia Brucken’s perfect pop moment may yet arrive.
Ian Gittins