Pauline Andrès Drive Like Steve McQueen
I wish I could start a car on the street, Throw my bag on the passenger seat, And drive through the pouring rain to your house, Screeching tires, blinding car lights…
by Walter Price
For once I am nearly speechless. Look, there has always been an eager attraction to Pauline Andrès late night ponders, her smokey and etched in black and white mystery but then there is her new single and astonishing video, “Dive Like Steve McQueen”. The track is from the forthcoming album The Heart Breaks, which Americana’s Darkest Darlin’ tells me will be out before April.
Let’s get to the new single so you can forget these words and put it straight your skull. I know Andrès loves the Bakersfield sound bent into that darker sides of how she interprets her life and subsequently vents through song. Her last one All Them Ghosts certainly proved that overwhelmingly. But there is something more solid, something aged, a certain nuance “Drive Like Steve McQueen” possess. The elements of coming into her own and kicking the shit out of what you think alt-country and dark-garage should be.
There seems to be hope in these lyrics, yes, hope. Pauline Andrès is one hell of a songwriter.
I would honk the dead back to life
Scream your name in the pouring rain
With both my arms raised to your balcony
I’d scream how much I love you, that we should marry
Yes!
Hey Ceven Knowles, your video for this track couldn’t be more perfect if Peter Yates pulled himself from his hole and did it himself.