I never thought the stars would sufficiently align for me to be in the same room as Susan Dietrich, better known as The Space Lady.
That popular internet cliché – just remember the world is 4.5 billion years old and you somehow managed to exist at the same time as [insert celebrity here] – feels strange to apply to this septuagenarian legend of outsider music.Much of The Space Lady's career was spent busking in Boston and San Francisco throughout the 1970s, '80s and '90s, originally to pull her family out of homelessness while her husband dodged the Vietnam War draft as they kept a low profile.
Wearing her iconic winged helmet, The Space Lady played other-worldly covers like '(Ghost) Riders In The Sky' by Johnny Cash or 'Major Tom' by Peter Schilling on her Casio keyboard, and didn't rise out of obscurity until she was featured on the 2002 compilation album 'Songs In The Key Of Z' – after retiring as a street performer in 2000 to care for her aging parents.
The Space Lady feels fundamentally of a different time, of a different planet even, maintaining the purity of her original musical expression on the rare occasion she takes the stage now.
Announcing a series of intimate shows in Melbourne, Sydney, Hobart and Adelaide on Instagram, The Space Lady heralded her 'cosmic close pass' to Australia back in November 2024 – and what a gift. Eager fans filled Northcote Social Club's small band room for the opportunity to hear her sold-out performance in Melbourne on Saturday (11 January).
Support act Andy Burns, the man responsible for bringing The Space Lady down under through Roadrunner Tours, opened with his own quirky chamber pop catalogue and infectious, convulsive dance moves.
Set highlights included 'Dumpster Diva', about his dumpster-diving sister, and a faithful 'apology cover' of Suicide's 'Surrender', dedicated to his girlfriend manning the merch table.
Applause, followed by palpable silence, greeted The Space Lady when she appeared wearing a star-spangled shawl and, of course, the helmet.
I always feel tense when a legacy act comes onstage, holding my breath to hear if their voice has held up against decades of strain. Robert Smith leading The Cure's performance at Rod Laver Arena in 2016 yielded a sigh of relief. Todd Rundgren at The Corner Hotel in 2024? Not quite the return on investment for the ticket.
Thankfully, much like everything else about The Space Lady, her voice was preserved as if in a time capsule. She put on her microphone headset, switched on the blinking light at the top of her helmet and 'launched' with a gentle, note-perfect cover of 'Strawberry Fields Forever'.
With her cooing folk vocals, she hit all the high notes of 'I Had Too Much To Dream (Last Night)' by The Electric Prunes and howled "yippee-yi-yay" on '(Ghost) Riders In The Sky'. Her genre-traversing set included Steppenwolf's 'Born To Be Wild' and a rare Space Lady original, 'The Ballad Of Cap'n Jack'.
This was punctuated by earnest stage banter, where she revealed she was "blown away" that Burns brought her out for this headline tour. "I didn't think there was a place for me in the world," she told the audience.
Generous storytelling also contextualised each song. Before playing her magnum opus 'Synthesise Me', for example, The Space Lady explained that it wasn't her, but indeed her late husband Joel 'The Cosmic Man', who wrote the song and crowned her with his helmet. "He sadly didn't live to see the relaunch of The Space Lady," she said.
The Space Lady followed 'Synthesise Me' with 'I Wonder', a moving tribute to the late American musician Rodriguez who had a kindred career arc from anonymity to resurrection. Audience requests then determined The Space Lady's final tracks of the night: 'Fly Like An Eagle' into 'Major Tom'.
The passionate applause at the conclusion of her set seemed to evoke genuine gratitude and surprise in The Space Lady. She gave in to shouts for an encore, playing a stripped-back take on 'Imagine' by John Lennon that had the crowd swaying and singing along.
It was nothing short of a privilege and delight to be in The Space Lady's orbit, if even for just one night in Northcote.
