Last month, The Indiependent explored the life and landscape that led to Patti Smith’s debut album, Horses, in 1975. But it’s important to look at what she’s done in recent years, to celebrate half a century of beautifully meshing rock, poetry and courageous political activism.
Smith had launched herself into the rock stratosphere with the intention of taking the soft out of rock and launching her dissatisfaction at corporate greed. The punk poet took an extended hiatus after 1979’s Wave to focus on her husband and children. She has since said that she wanted to “evolve as a human being”, and so that was it for nine years.
After almost a decade, most would assume she was safely done with music and being in the public eye, but she returned in 1998 with the beautiful Dream Of Life where, on ‘People Have the Power’, she shared her blissful dream to “Wrestle the Earth from fools”. It’s softer than her previous work and was the first to be made without her backing band, instead, recruiting her late husband Fred Smith, who helped her craft more formalistic rock anthems. Less experimentation and a heightened sense of peace on Dream Of Life reflected the changes in her life at the time as she left the commotion of New York City to raise a family in Michigan.
When another long, eight-year hiatus played out, many, again, might’ve assumed she was finally done releasing new music this time. Unexpectedly, Smith released Gone Again in 1996, which was a sudden, dark turn compared to her 1988 album, largely due to it being her way of channelling grief: in 1989, her closest friend Robert Mapplethorpe (the photographer for the Horses album cover) passed away. Then, two years before Gone Again, her husband, Fred Smith, passed away suddenly, leaving the musical poet in shock-shrouded-sadness. Her brother passed away just a month after that, resulting in a period of profound loss.
On ‘Beneath the Southern Cross’, Smith once again brings poetry to life “Oh, to cry / Not any cry / So mournful that / The dove just laughs / The steadfast gasps” as she begins to share her experience of grief with the world, and on ‘Wing’ Smith sings softly, “You’d be a wing in heaven blue”. This track is one she performs often and has become an anthem of both loving someone who has gone and one of independence: the two which sadly sometimes come hand-in-hand.
In 2000, Smith kicked off the new millennium with Gung Ho, which features her father, Grant, on the front cover and saw a return to a more hard-hitting sound. It features tracks like the excellent ‘Glitter in Their Eyes’, which REM’s Michael Stipe provided backing vocals for. Smith sings “They’ll trade you up / Trade you down / Your body a commodity” over high-spirited guitar riffs. With the 2000’s came an ever-increasing wave of capitalist greed and commercialisation, which Smith had long stood against: her voice as important as ever for those who detested a world where anything and everything can be a commodity.
From this point on, Smith remained creative and motivated with her music, releasing five studio albums between 1996 and 2007. It was said that Smith had always planned to return to music once her children were grown, but due to the soul-crushing losses she had suffered , her friends (including Bob Dylan) encouraged her to return to music as a distraction and direction.
These albums also saw the instrumentation of her music become less minimalist than her ‘70s albums, as she embraced some impressive, modern-rock production methods. Smith’s voice and words are so alluring this doesn’t take away from what she has to say.
Never one to shy away from covering the music she loves, in 2007 she released Twelve. Her last original work was 2004’s Trampin’, and her label wanted new material to coincide with her well-deserved induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. The album holds 12 praiseworthy rock covers ranging from Bob Dylan’s ‘Changing of the Guards’ without the original’s gospel choir, an icy-cold rendition of Nirvana’s ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ and her voice particular shines on a cover of The Doors’ ‘Soul Kitchen’.
During this time, Smith worked on her memoir, ‘Just Kids’, which was published in 2010. The memoir is a beautiful and insightful recollection of how she and Robert Mapplethorpe blossomed into the artists they did, albeit unexpectedly. The memoir includes Smith’s goodbye letter to Mapplethorpe, and makes for a heartbreaking read, as well as offering perspective on the loss she suffered and has tried to share through her art.
2012 marked a new era for Smith, as she released her 11th album, Banga, this time with the support and inclusion of her two children. It further cemented the idea that Smith only returns to music when she is ready, rather than for the sake of it. ‘April Fool’ is a light, pop track with sweet, uplifting lyrics, (“With laughter we’ll inspire / Then back to life again”) but still has that raw, poetry infusion which keeps you gripped to her voice.
Politically, Smith has remained a firm opposer of Donald Trump and has consistently advocated for action against global warming, including posting a public letter of praise to Greta Thunberg on the climate activist’s birthday.
While she hasn’t released a conventional album since Banga, Smith would likely argue that she has continued as normal, through her work with the Soundwalk Collective. They’ve collaborated with Smith on two EPs: Mummer Love (2019) and Peradam (2020), which blend elements of Sufi poetry (which derives from mystical Islamic devotional literature) with fascinating, dizzying soundscapes that make for a real audio-journey if you shut your eyes and get lost in it. The project appears perfectly in-tune with everything the artist embodies, as the poetry-dominated project’s most recent theme, ‘correspondences’ is said to “calls out the havoc humans have wreaked on our planet and on other species”.
Last year, Smith gained much positive attention by covering Lana Del Rey’s ‘Summertime Sadness’, a song which explores how it feels to be nostalgic about someone you’ve lost, which Smith fittingly and lovingly dedicated to her late husband, Fred.
In recent times, the ‘Free Money’ writer and singer has shown a commendable resilience throughout pain, loss and the changing, but ever-so-corporate, Western world. What she’s done is maintain a strong social consciousness and sense of empathy that many who reach her level of appraise could be quick to forget.
The ‘90s onwards saw a strengthening of Smith’s powerful voice in rock. Now, she’s celebrating 50 years of punk and poetry with a unique tour and plans to perform her debut, Horses in its entirety. Even if you can’t make it, it’s certain to be a legendary performance to watch back.
Words by Kai Palmer
Support The Indiependent
We’re trying to raise £200 a month to help cover our operational costs. This includes our ‘Writer of the Month’ awards, where we recognise the amazing work produced by our contributor team. If you’ve enjoyed reading our site, we’d really appreciate it if you could donate to The Indiependent. Whether you can give £1 or £10, you’d be making a huge difference to our small team.