SUPER HEAVY MORE LIKE A SUPER-DUPER GROUP.THE PROBLEM WITH SUPERGROUPS IS THERE ARE SO MANY SUPEREGOS AT PLAY AND THE UNION'S RESULT ARE OFTEN UNDERWHELMING.
How many solo artists does it take to change a light bulb? Well, none, obviously, because they'd just get someone from the backing band to do it.
It is hard to imagine what Mick Jagger, Joss Stone, Damian Marley, Dave Stewart and Indian superstar composer A.R. Rahman had in mind when they decided to join forces, but presumably it did not involve maintenance of lighting fixtures. Three lead vocalists and a couple of multiinstrumentalists, all distinctive and established singer-songwriters and stars in their own right across diverse musical genres: it sounds like a recipe for ... well, not quite disaster, perhaps, but certainly an overcooked broth of conflicting styles and egos. A supergroup, in other words.
As if to emphasize their own blockbuster billing, this starry quintet of rock, raga, reggae, soul and electronic pop legends have called themselves SuperHeavy. An album of the same name was recently released, and perhaps the most surprising thing about it is that it's actually not a complete mess, enthusiastically mashing up global beats with pop melodies and zesty vocals.
The supergroup genre has not exactly covered itself in glory, being heavily weighted toward mercenary amalgamations of underemployed musicians from established bands whose motivation seems to be extending lucrative franchises after the original group members have all fallen out with each other.
In the '70s, a supergroup would typically combine members of Free, Mott the Hoople and King Crimson (Bad Company); these days, they usually include at least one member of Guns N' Roses with various grunge and heavy metal sidemen (Velvet Revolver, Neurotic Outsiders).
The very word supergroup is something of a misnomer. You could use a lot of adjectives to describe the Greedy Bastards, in which members of Thin Lizzy briefly united in 1980 for a Christmas single and short tour to fuel their hard-drug habits, but I don't think "super" would be among them.
At its best, however, the idea of the supergroup is an honourable one, an opportunity for the top musicians in their respective fields to combine creative forces. Cream were arguably the first and greatest supergroup, their very name reflecting guitarist Eric Clapton, drummer Ginger Baker and bassist Jack Bruce's status as "the cream of the crop" among blues and jazz musicians on the '60s U.K. live scene.
Their brief, explosive career (four albums between 1966 and 1968) reflects the underlying problem with supergroups - superegos. The intense musical gladiatorial battles on stage were matched by less appealing squabbling in the dressing room. Even a well-intended reunion in 2005 was spoiled for Clapton by Baker and Bruce's incessant arguments. "Life's too short," Clapton complained. "I've got a lot of things I'd rather do, including staying at home with my kids." This, to be honest, is how I feel about most supergroups.
The '70s was the era of the supergroup, as the first wave of rock bands broke up and reconfigured in new lineups that sounded more like legal firms than bands: Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, or Emerson, Lake and Palmer. Heavy rock seems particularly prone to the syndrome, with members of Black Sabbath, Deep Purple, Free and Led Zeppelin revolving around each other as if engaged in a never-ending game of musical chairs. But there have been indie supergroups (Electronica featured members of the Smiths, New Order and Pet Shop Boys), singer-songwriter supergroups (the Travelling Wilburys managed to take the stellar talents of George Harrison, Bob Dylan, Tom Petty, Roy Orbison and Jeff Lynne and produce two albums of flippant, forgettable country rock) and alt rock supergroups (anything involving Jack White of White Stripes fame).
Has any supergroup, though, boasted a lineup quite as spectacularly peculiar as SuperHeavy? This is more like a superduper group.
Arguably, most bands of this type sound better in theory than in practice.
The Dirty Mac should have been the ultimate rock lineup, featuring John Lennon on guitar and vocals, Clapton on lead, Keith Richards on bass and Mitch Mitchell of the Jimi Hendrix Experience on drums.
But their one-night performance at the Rolling Stones' Rock and Roll Circus in 1968 illustrated all of the problems with such concoctions: under-rehearsed, overconfident and ill-matched, they were inevitably less than the sum of their parts.
And then, just when it's beginning to jell, Yoko Ono jumps out of a black bag and starts wailing in a different key to everyone else.
At least that's one problem SuperHeavy won't have to deal with.
