#Frente! #indie rock #alternative rock #pop rock #folk-pop #Australian #1990s
Frente! were an Australian folk-pop and indie pop group which originally formed in 1989. The original line-up consisted of Simon Austin on guitar and backing vocals, Angie Hart on lead vocals, Tim O'Connor on bass guitar, and Mark Picton on drums. The Australian rock music historian Ian McFarlane felt that the group's "quirky, irreverent, acoustic-based sound was at odds with the usual guitar-heavy, grunge trends of the day. The band's presentation had a tweeness about it that could have been off-putting if not for its genuine freshness and honesty”. From: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frente!
Frente!'s second album really seemed to be a difficult second album. The music aboard Shape is fine. By 'difficult' I'm referring more to difficulties the band appeared to have had with line up changes and perhaps with the 'difficult' dynamic that must have been the at times fractious Hart-Austin relationship. Foundation members Tim O'Connor and Mark Picton had departed by Shape and it seemed previously that nobody gave proper kudos to their songwriting finesse; previous releases had shone brightly with their stellar contributions. Thus one imagines Shape could have been a struggle without them. The strain upon Hart and Austin, having dissolved their personal relationship just as Frente! got 'famous' but then having to press on with the band's newly found success, well, it must have been hard, too. From within this context it's no surprise that second album Shape was also their last.
Plenty of lilt, plenty of charm, and no shortage of Hart's sweet vocal sounds. For me there was always an intriguing contradiction in her vocal tones: sweet, young and innocent girl tones that emanated a rather sarcastic, world weary experience via the words and themes. I was slow to grab a copy of Shape, by the time I did Frente! had already flamed out. It took a friend and mutual Frente! fan to chide me "it's good, get it!" So I did. I think back and perhaps it was "Sit on my Hands" at track one that had made me baulk, seemed a little too different to my past Frente! experience (reality check: it's not).
Maybe I could make a successful argument that the lack of O'Connor's and Picton's quirky and zippy contributions shifted the Frente! sound back a few gears into a more predictable rhythm. Hart appears to have taken over the principal songwriting (with Austin also prominent) on almost every song. New members, bassist McDonald and drummer Barden, are really not involved much at that level. And an almost exclusively acoustic band like Frente! really stands on its songwriting.
The album Shape was recorded in Spain for whatever reason. Escape perhaps? The angst and tensions surrounding this band at that time may well have contributed to the pith of the songs presented here. Hart's turn of melody entwines with Austin's acoustic fingerpicking to constitute the bulk of the songs. Where Frente! departs from this we get a whole new bunch of tones starting to emerge, even if they may sound unusually underconfident in taking these bold strides. That the mixdown took place 'everywhere' suggests to me the prodding and pushing of a record company, possibly even overtaking the band on certain production issues. It seems either to provide 'variety' or to disrupt continuity, depending on your own particular take.
Overall, Shape was an interesting album taking Frente! into new territory. But without the band being able to find their own way I can possibly see how it may have gone pearshaped. The middle order of songs feature some classic Angie Hart, while a few other songs here - "Sit on my Hands", "Horrible", "What's Come Over Me", for example - see them starting to crank up amps and possibly evolving into a different sort of band. It's a shame then that this was the last Frente! album. A good one to go out on.
From: https://rateyourmusic.com/release/album/frente/shape/
