Newsday

Copyright Newsday Inc., 1995

Monday, November 6, 1995

PART II

Chrissie Hynde's Passion, Acoustic And Raw / Pretenders add a touch and tug at hearts

By Richard Torres. Richard Torres is a free­lance writer.

THE PRETENDERS. At Symphony Space, Broadway at 95th Street, Manhattan. Seen Saturday night.

LET'S FACE IT. Rock's "Unplugged" genre isn't a return to roots. In reality, it's just an enormous con job; a double­edged marketing tool designed to revive an established performer's sagging career by recycling his back catalog. Encased in desultory demo arrangements, the results from such acclaimed artists as Rod Stewart, Bob Dylan and the Eagles have been predictably bloodless and little more than acoustic karaoke.

Thankfully, not so with singer­songwriter Chrissie Hynde and the Pretenders. As they spectacularly demonstrated at their 18­song show at Symphony Space Saturday evening in support of the fine new album "Isle of View," the Pretenders is a band less interested in the safety of retreads than the spark of reinvention.

Not content with simply stripping their tunes to the folky basics, Hynde and company (lead guitarist Adam Seymour, bassist Andy Hobson and drummer supreme and original member Martin Chambers) augmented the group with a classical string section, the Duke Quartet. It was a worthwhile, brilliant move. In the stark onstage setting, bereft of the stock Pretenders crash­and­clang arrangements, the focus shifted to Hynde's perceptive tunesmithing.

Impassioned songs like "Kid," "Hymn to Her" and "2000 Miles," with the swirling strings of the Duke Quartet added, were celebrated as the sensitive snapshots of everyday life they are. (Call it Hynde­sight.)

EQUALLY heart­rending were inspired versions of "Lovers of Today," "Criminal" and "I Hurt You" which felt as though they were vignettes from a Eugene O'Neill play set to music.

The band was as proficient on the uptempo songs. "Private Life" was distinguished by Chambers' lockstep reggae groove. "The Phone Call" was fantastically frenzied, while Seymour's manic guitar solo over Hobson's funky bass line on "My City Was Gone" was the stuff of genius.

But, as expected, the night belonged to the magnetic Hynde. Resplendent in jeans, a brocaded vest and a black blazer, she sang and played such diverse covers as Radioheads' "Creep" and Juice Newton's "Angel of the Morning" with a remarkable hooted­eyed intensity.

From the neo­optimism of "Sense of Purpose" to the rising anger of "Revolution," Hynde's range ­ vocal and emotional ­ is extraordinary. When she sang, near concert's end "I'm Special" from "Brass in Pocket," the sentiment was both declamatory and redundant. On a chilly night at Symphony Space, Chrissie Hynde was all that . . . and more.

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