Not for the Money, and It’s Not for the Applause – Melanie Safka

My wife and I have the same problem: We definitely have a strong taste in music, but it is very wide. Not wide as in We listen to everything that is on the radio, rather wide as in acquired, eclectic, maybe a bit convoluted at times. By no means do I think that’s a bad thing—there’s a lot of amazing music out there and we are here for it! Why would’t we be? I am a firm believer that the wider the spectrum of your music appreciation, the more bridges you can build to other people. Sometimes it’s just a tad frustating to get that across to said people. And wouldn’t it be nice to have a couple of words readily available to succinctly describe your own taste in music?

We both set out to find out what our taste in music actually is and how it is shaped. Katharina had an analytical path in mind, along the lines of: feed a suiting “AI” with her Spotify profile and ask. Straightforward. And I am eager to hear what she will uncover.

I am having two reservations regarding this approach: One, I do not have Spotify, and two, it deprives the mission of all touchy-feely-ness. I suspect that my taste in music is fueled by the feeling in my gut when listening to a piece of music, so it all boils down to the question: What are those gut feelings exactly? To find out, I thought it would be expedient to monitor how music enters my life. In a future step I would need to understand the factors why it stays.

That second step is for another day, though. Today I want to report how I stumbled upon Melanie Safka.

It took Black Mirror season 6 episode 2 to make me realize that the main sample in Hilltop Hood’s The Nosebleed Section—one of my top 3 tracks of the Australian hip-hop band—is People in the Front Row by Melanie Safka, also known as just Melanie. Call me weird, but I’ll continue to be amazed each time I discover the true origin of a sample, remix, or cover version, and get to explore the music behind the music, as the artist intended.

This time it’s no different: A whole new world of Melanie’s folk-pop unfolded in front of me. That woman released 29 (!) studio albums between 1968 and 2022. Even at the time of her death in 2024, she was working on an album. What a life! For now, I bought the album Garden in the City, which includes People in the Front Row as the ninth and final track. I will soon buy another album, though, I reckon. Because it turns out I have listened to Melanie’s music without knowing of her: Her 1970 album Candles in the Rain contains her version of the Rolling Stones’ Ruby Tuesday—the version I grew up with and come to love.

Back to People in the Front Row! How does it make me feel? Happy jumps to mind. Her voice is fun and playful, the signature playing of the flute is uplifting and energizing. The more orchestral instruments join in, the more energy I feel. It’s a short song—only 02:34 min—but its progression does not feel hasty. By minute 2, I have a hard-to-resist urge to move my body and make power moves. I have listened to it dozens of times since yesterday. That’s pretty good for one single song and I am looking forward to exploring more of her discography.

Melanie is said to have been pleased with being sampled by Hilltop Hoods. After she died, rapper and band member Suffa said, She played [People in the Front Row when she toured Australia in 2014] and I got a shout-out, she called me cheeky for sampling it without clearing it. I met her backstage and she was lovely.