O Drom interview

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You're very prolific!
Sometimes I'm the laziest person in the world, Other times I am so busy I can't do any one thing right, and spread myself too thin.

Tell us about producing your own records.
I'm self financed so as money doesn't grow on trees,(I've looked everywhere for those trees) It's all what I can afford to spend to do what I do. There's the amount of risk involved, how weird can I get and still make a living. I like to experiment with longer story songs, things I happen to like best are things that people in "The market place" would find uninteresting. A lot of peoples favorite song might be 'Love like a Rock' or My Mums song, Shirley. But they might have little concept of what some of the more adventurous things would have been. i.e. "TV Melodrama or Stranger God."
I don't want music to be reduced to wallpaper, repeated over and over again.
Each recording is an experiment for me with my intuitive arrangements, some songs succeed, some, I know, failed, but I can never afford to re-record them, they're all demos in a way, my albums, learning in public all the way. I don't assume people will like the records, but I try to capture a moment, even if I have lost my voice, as on Travelling home, tried to do everything, produce, write extra parts for people, no sleep, organize rehearsals, keep everyone happy, feed them etc
I have hit chairs in he studio, bits of rubbish, hub caps. Cheese graters.
I always prefer the early takes. And the "Live" vocal more than the "soulless" overdub.
I don't want to overwhelm a song, overproduce it
A song might get put down in 10 minutes but I might have had 10 months to think about it. On a bus ticket, napkin, my hand.
I try to keep the life, and the rough and tumble in when I record a song. The breathing, a dog barking. People, producers, engineers, try to keep sounds out of a studio. I'm happy to let them in, my surroundings, weave them allow them to become part of the tune, a squeaky chair whatever. I've a gentle babies lullaby cradle song where I use the squeaking of a rocking chair as the rhythm.
etc. I've always ended up with too much, and have too many songs recorded for the next album, so there's always old songs mixed with newer songs on my albums, it's never chronological at all. To me songs are timeless, the good ones, there's some I make that I never recorded and they will be out of date now.
I might reissue my next album before it comes out for the first time! (joke)

I'd been against recording for a long time, my work was street work, in bars etc, and the last thing I wanted people to do was to stay at home and listen to an album. I wanted people out on the streets.
In 1982, I experimented with sound collages and monologue/story-poems. I had borrowed a portastudio to sketch some arrangements of songs, horn parts harmonies, drum patterns, to save time and money when I would finally go into the "real" studio. That I would hire and pay for, when I came to record for 'real'. A couple of those sketches actually made it to vinyl. One collage appeared on the Double, "Commentator cried'. But another never got released, too much tape hiss. It was a monologue I made called 'A TV Melodrama'. I took sounds, bits, sound effects, seagulls cries, a phone ringing to create tension in a dramatic piece which was essentially about a woman being raped outside, and another woman inside, watching TV with her husband. The woman inside hears a scream, the husband assures her it's the TV next door, a murder on channel 3, That TV room becomes claustrophobic and the husband too seems slowly to become like a prison guard and a threat himself.
I only performed my monologue with a backing tape once at a poetry performance gig I did in London, I put the guitar down for a change and got the sound man to play the backing track sound collage.
It was effective, as theatre can be, like a radio drama,
creating moods, and tension with sound. But I never wanted to rely on technology. It could
always let you down.
I had looked into using drum triggers on my feet, tap shoes, but I still prefer the
dynamics of my real feet tapping, the touch sensitive dynamics that triggers don't have, no matter how light I tap, the pads still trigger at the same volume.
I wanted to be able to play if there was a power cut. I did before now, in a small Guatemalan discotheque years ago, it's amazing how the atmosphere changed in that loud disco, when there's no electricity, everyone started talking and meeting each other, they could hear each other suddenly! Candles were lit and I had my guitar and we sang songs, and drank and all socialized. The DJ was redundant that night.

Do you think you're fashionable?
I don't know what that means. Being flavor of the month and then not being the right flavor and so being dismissed, very fickle!
I was never into the cool, fashionable for the sake of being fashionable. It always seemed too detached to me from life, my reality and Feelings, there was always a guard being put up by the cool crowd, a shield, up as a defense. Life is too short for me to play those kind of guessing games.
I don't like fashion, the idea of it, just a flicker of life for a week or month and then it's considered old or dead, that snootiness that surrounds things, like the emperor's' new clothes, dismissing
resonance's and meanings, I know that is somehow unreal. Trying to live as an outsider perhaps. But I like timeless things that speak from the soul for the moment.
I don't like prettiness, that can leave me empty, but I like beauty, I like things that go deeper than the just surface and the superficial, I like things that move me. I've never changed what I do to be fashionable.

What about competition in the industry?
Competition is divisive. I'm not a race horse! I'm not competing, there's room for everyone.
I have, at odd times, felt from other singers or 'moothy' (harmonica) players there was a slight element of rivalry, they never felt comfortable with me playing harmonica too, or anyone else for that matter!
Also I after supporting a singer (no names mentioned) some years ago and going down better with the crowd. He sacked his manager for putting us on the same bill.
It's a strange feeling when you realize that someone is intimidated by you, when they don't even know you. And I'm not one for putting on airs, or talking down to people. I think it is because I'm up front with myself on stage and I save that up front-ness for that performance of my songs, when actually I am not like that all of the time, in fact I can be very quiet, I listen a lot more than talk. Here I am talking to you about myself being interviewed, what an ego trip, here I am
blethering away and it's because you are a good listener. On stage it is a kind of nervous energy I talk with, about myself, people , and family. Politics, anger etc. I don't like elitism or aloofness, not to confuse that with shyness or feeling unconfident and insecure.
I want to be accessible, that's why I don't try to be famous or have ambitions to be famous. I couldn't handle it, being a prisoner.
Fate is being kind to me, it doesn't want me to be famous too soon!
Being recognized means people will pay you money to play. So publicity is necessary, there's a strong economic pressure.
There was a time I would even dress boring or colorless most of the time, so I won't attract attention to myself because I am more interested in other people, not myself or creating some kind of impression or fashion statement.
I am not interested in what is fashionable. manufactured or how trends are manipulated.
I either like music or a work of art or I don't like it. I'm like the little kids who questioned the Emperors new clothes. Very often I can't see what all the fuss is about.
I am looking for truths in some kind of way, not pretendings, or illusion creating so much. unless it is a way to show a truth about something, i.e. an emotion or history or story. or to find the humor in it all. the ridiculous. I do look for the beauty in the truth too, and I would like to make people feel good sometimes, I try hard to do that, that's about as healing I can get my music songs to be...not in that pretentious "new age' way
like some middle class guru on some power trip but in an earthy way of laughing, celebrating life and being aware of my/our weaknesses, vulnerabilities, etc, things that we all have in common with each other but that we hide, and deny that we have.
Fashion. There are some things I love that become fashionable.
To be 'fresh and new' in rock/pop music is usually accomplished by Changing a hairdo or wardrobe. And copying what everyone else is doing. Don't use chords that give too many surprises. Etc. I don't want to compromise.

So you don't identify with mainstream musicians?
Whatever mainstream means?!
Singers are marginalised as being angry or pretty, or a rebel singing about taboo subjects, whether those subjects and issues are attractive or not. People will come and say "That's me" But I never could say it."
The personal and private exposed is universally felt.
I don't judge any ones' art in public negatively. I could be wrong. Sometimes people, everyone, likes some new kind of music that becomes fashionable but I can't get into it at all.
I came bottom in music at school, that stubbornness again, being told I can't do something. I believe that 'Talent' is a word used to stop people from trying.
I don't judge. I just know what I like. I'll still listen and go through all the "bad" singers to get to the truth of what they're singing about. That emotional truth, the human joy, passion and life is more important to me than some ones prejudices about tunefulness, "proper" "Snobbery", I try to keep an open mind about it all. In the end it's about people expressing themselves. The production might not be perfect, tuning might be out sometimes, but the intention and content and other elements are there…of course. I want things to be in tune, in time etc. That kind of aesthetics but I always try not to forget that folks like me are learning a craft and sometimes we have to do it in public. I cringe when I hear some of my performances on previous recordings! We grow, we learn how to sing, craft, and play our instruments. I'd never want to discourage that. We are all looking for our voices, that's partly what punk was all about, expression and learning to express and vocalize feelings, ideas through music. I would rather listen to some great performance emotionally and great songs and music than over produced empty pop 'jingles'
That passion, maybe that's why I love the blues so much or Jewish Doinas and Irish Airs or laments.

Do you want to be very famous?
I have no fantasies or delusions of grandeur, about being famous, Just give me the dosh, so I can go and record my friends and we can tour together. And I can pay them properly. I don't want to be a prisoner of fame like some I have seen. It wouldn't suit my personality, It's not shyness, but I like to be private and sane. Not like a Machine. I'm not trying to be impenetrable or enigmatic. What can you know about anybody really?,
I am part of a process, interactive, jamming.
I am still learning, I am Lazy, I'd sooner jam, I never practice my instruments.
I'd often unconsciously tried to sabotage my own career if I thought it was going to go too well!
I'd resist everything, be uncooperative, I was scared of making it big, I liked the idea but it frightened me, somehow I wanted my freedom more. Not the hype and stuff, I was suspicious of, that might go with "being Big"
Having to go round singing my "Hit Song" all the time. Shit, no way! I wanted to be happy singing the songs I wanted to sing. So my reaction was say 'no' a lot, sign nothing! Find other employment for a while!
Maybe I'm still trying "not to be a success. I am privileged to be doing something I enjoy, something I would do for nothing, and get paid for it. I am successful, I've got a job!
It's funny because I like John Peel and what Andy Kershaw has done to get great music across that would never be played anywhere else. Apparently, according to Pete Lawrence who used to run Cooking Vinyl, Andy didn't like my stuff, for whatever reason, I don't know. So he wouldn't play it. Which I think is fine, because in the end he is being honest in only playing what he likes, they have to have their own taste and artistic control. Like I have to, not what Pete from cooking Vinyl might have tried to persuade them to play because I was on Cooking Vinyl. It's nothing personal, I won't take it that way, just cause someone doesn't like the way I sing. And the real thing is that I have survived for quite a few years by playing my songs without relying at all on the music business, radio air play, or having a record released by a big company etc,.
The schmoozing again. I always produced my own records. And So I just carry on and play gigs and make those people happy who come and want to hear me.

How did you end up with Cooking Vinyl?
I happened to meet Martin Goldsmith of Forward sounds, which then became Cooking Vinyl, when I was playing at a miners benefit, he liked my cassette tape I was flogging at the time called 'Talkative Songs.' I'd
recorded it myself all handmade and so I gave him Angry Love and Kicking The Sawdust for nothing.
People have urged me to take a go at commercial, fame, but I enjoyed my freedom more. Than to schmooze and kiss arse to go on TV. Talk to 20 million people I can't see. No. You need big company clout to get on etc.
I wouldn't say no if I was asked, I'd say…"maybe." But I wouldn't compromise what I do.
There is a contradiction or a catch twenty two of course because, like any singer, I do want to share my songs with the world. I have an ego, ideas, want to be articulate to communicate, but in my own way. If it is good, it's too good not to share.
I feel that some artists aren't always being given enough time to develop, nipped in the bud, the overnight success, it's not their fault, as competition is so great in that pop world of hype etc, and the promise of wealth, fame, girls etc. I was always moving around, I never mixed in those kind of circles, I flirted with music business people a couple of times, then ran, scared of the psychosis that comes with all that. That, "It's who you know, not what you know, schmoozing etc. i.e. "Do I need to know you? or can you be useful to me"? Etc It's ugly to me. I am crap at it. I've nothing to say to those kind of people.
It's the kind of business that seems to break up bands, and destroy solidarity. It happened to an Irish band I knew in Derry. They just signed the singer/writer and guitarist from the band, who didn't say, "It's all the band or none." They were recording, writing publishing advances etc. etc, but never played a gig. For me the gig is where it all begins and ends. Live. They don't sing anymore. That's very sad.
I would hate to be worshipped like some god, untouchable idol. That would be to far away from the humanity and life that I love and always want to be a part of. I want to be equal to be a good friend, brother and father, and there is a contradiction in wanting attention and to show off , impress people but wanting privacy and anonymity.?
I love the music more than the money. But we have to earn a living. If I can I'll stop touring so much in a couple of years time, a change, and just play locally up here in Scotland, study something, teaching. Travel again, instead of tour.

You're quite the sex symbol, I mean women seem to be attracted to your dark looks. How does that make you feel?
Embarrassed about the use of the word. 'Sex Symbol'
I don't want to symbolize anything and be an object. We all love sex. I want to enjoy pleasures with the woman I love not everyone I see!
Sex Symbol, it might be good for the ego, but it sounds lonely to me, like Judy Garland or Marylyn Monroe it's like having all that applause but you can't take that applause home to bed with you.
Just as women are regarded as sex objects, some musicians are too.
I love women. I love their company, my best friends are women and men who love women too. I like what they talk about, feelings, love, kids, etc.
It has got me in trouble, "being friends friendly, accessible, listening, counseling, role
boundaries get confused by
people when they are needy. I am more careful now. Not to lead anyone in the way that I think I am being caring or making friends. I am a very tactile person, so I have to be careful with that, women and uptight heterosexual men who might think I'm gay and feel threatened by my manner.
Some of my best friends are white straight men! (laughs)
After playing, I like to talk to people, be accessible, to men or women, to meet who I've just spend three hours singing to. What kinds of people are out there? Yes some lonely and sad people will project things onto performers and fantasize. You have to be aware that there are people like that. I suppose that performing is a sexy thing to people, it's not in my head at all,
Maybe when you're so much into the music and the music is so much part of you, that you can project the feeling to someone. And sometimes, usually it's a man up there doing it and a woman out there, She feels that the spirit is so strong or this thing he's projected, she must have this- this thing- though it's coming from somewhere else- but it comes through him. It's so strong, but she can't collect that thing where it's coming from, so she has to collect the person it's coming through.
Anyway I'm already spoken for, hitched and happy!

I've been told you like to play all night and party!
I partied non stop, played bars, drank drugs, working but wearing myself out and doing all that I felt my life stand still. I don't party so much now. I've done so much partying till the sun came up, I can stay in doors with my sweetheart and baby knowing that whatever party is going on out there I've been to one just as good!

What do you enjoy relaxing with?
I love to play football, kick around a ball, I don't enjoy watching it on TV though.
I enjoy a game of tennis, I'm crap at it though.
I'll like to talk about tools, kids, wood and craft, building, relationships, Love, farming, and fishing planting food, politics anything. I love swapping jokes and laughing till the tears roll down our faces.

What music Groups have you been part of?
I've played with my friends Paul Rodden and Steve Grocott and we called ourselves The Pyrotechnicos. The fact that we never really formed a group meant that we never really broke up. We just stopped playing together for a while.
Then with mates Bob Morgan and Richard playing my songs, we were called 'The Firewalkers.' Sometimes 'The Familiar Strangers'.
When I play with Bob and Richard I'd play an hour and a half alone, a listening set, then I'd bring them up for the second half and we'd be an ensemble, a band singing my songs, tunes, dancing, trombone etc.
I never wanted to play on my own, I still don't, and partly it became economics.
I only started playing on my own those years ago cause a musician mate let me down and didn't show up for gigs I had arranged, he let me down more than twice! Then I thought to myself. "I've made up these songs, I'll have to sing them. And learn to play them on guitar". Up to then, after my mate left me in the lurch, I was playing and singing my songs with just my Harmonica all night. I found that to get work, if I was going to, I had to do it alone, my own way, I had my own songs. I didn't want to sing anything else anymore that didn't speak for me and the way I felt or how I saw the world.
There's still so much to do. I'm not at all satisfied with what I've done. It's not the kind of music or songs I want to carry on singing. It's funny how you learn and know all this other stuff and yet, people would prefer to hear me play and sing some of these old songs I've made up because I had nothing better to do at the time. I can't do that all of my life playing harmonica and singing, there are so many other exciting things to do.

What are you trying to prove?
Maybe I'm trying to prove my manhood? Humanity? That 100 billion is one!
I would love to travel and tour with a band/small orchestra, that's my dream, it's economics that stops me, I have played gigs with horn section and bass, and accordion/marimba, banjo, mandolin etc
I would add pipes, cello, tabla, have a few singers.
I have a sound in my head, I always wanted to base/focus it around a musical theatre idea. I'd like to work with others and create musical theatre, other ways of singing stories. It's still the beginning for me, I want to go slowly. I'm still finding new things, learning. I feel I'm going to be doing this for the next 20 years, so I don't want to hurry it.

Is there anything else you'd like to say?
I think I've said too much.
But yes, thanks for listening and….
I think that Music should be on the National Health!

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