Helen Reddy’s name will always be synonymous with her multi-million selling hit ‘I Am Woman’. The song became a battle call for the women’s liberation movement of the early 1970’s and just the mention of Reddy’s name will make many people start singing it’s opening line ‘I Am Woman, Hear Me Roar”.
OUTinPerth spoke to the legendary singer from her home in Santa Monica, Claifornia. After a decade of living in Australia, Reddy has recently returned to her second home the USA. It’s not the only big change in her life though. She’s heading out on tour in 2014 and will be coming to Perth in April, something her fans thought they would never see as Reddy previously completed a final world tour and vowed that she’d never perform again.
Reddy confesses that she’s yet to hear Katy Perry’s top selling tune ‘Roar’ which critics have noted taps into the lyrics of Reddy’s iconic hit.
“We share the same birthday though,” reveals Reddy, “and our names sound quite similar too. But I think she’s a real go-er!”
Asked if it’s surprising that nearly forty years after the women’s liberation movement was at its height if it’s surprising that women still need to sing about their need to ‘roar’ Reddy was philosophical.
“Nothing happens overnight and sometimes you’ve just got to hang in for the long haul,” Reddy said, “But we should all be protesting about something, it keeps us alive.”
In her latter years Reddy has stopped singing the song in her live shows. Instead prefer to deliver a spoken word version of the anthem. Whether she’ll belt out the tune during her tour or opt for a different approach is something Reddy was not willing to give away, breaking into a fit of laughs she told us to “Wait and see”.
Reddy grew up in a vaudevillian show-biz family, musical theatre matriarch Toni Lamond is her half sister. Reddy recalls that her first ever performance was here in Perth.
“That’s where I started my career, 1946 at the Tivolli Theatre. I was five years old and I was a plant in the audience. My Dad would come out and say ‘Is there a little boy or a little girl out there who would like to sing a song with me?’ I’d be up like a shot and we sing a number and then at the end he’d ask ‘Now, you’ve never seen me before have you?’ and I’d answer ‘No, Daddy’ and then run off into the wings, now if that’s not a camp performance I don’t know what is!”
The singer said she enjoyed her time away from the music world, she studied hypnotherapy and spent 10 years practicing as a therapist but it was singing at her sister’s eightieth birthday that drew her back into the world of performance.
“She asked if I’d sing a duet with her, and you can’t say no to your sister on her birthday. I heard my voice on the monitors for the first time in ten years and I thought ‘That sounds alright.'”
Reddy reveals that the tune that pulled her out of retirement was ‘Breezin’ Along With the Breeze’, a tune from the 1920’s.
While Reddy is clearly eager to be back on the stage, she is however less enticed about the prospect of recording again, but leaves the door open, politely saying, “Let’s just wait and see.” Yet she’s very clear that she’s raring to go with the live performances. “I’d be on there right now if I could, the stage is where I live my life and the rest of the time I’m just waiting to go on,” declares Reddy.
Helen Reddy is performing at the Crown Theatre on Thursday April 17, 2014. Tickets are available from Ticketek.
Graeme Watson
