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Interview by Shane Richmond for Livewire
945.
Venue: The Waterfront, Norwich.
Participants: Shane Richmond, Willie and Pete.
SR: When you write a song, do you work out what every instrument is going to play?
Willie: To a large extent, but what I'm totally happy for is involving the other members of the group in the creative process. What is important is that we all start off from a point that is familiar. Point one in creating the song involves having a demo with the parts roughly speaking "okay this is roughly what the drums do, this is roughly where your bass is going, and your guitar is doing that whilst his is doing that...." From that framework, when everyone is familiar with that in the first instance that's where the creative process starts for the other members of the group. We all start from the same place, we all know the parts that are going on, and then Pete may say to me "where you've got me doing that bass line, it would be nice if I just shift up here and perhaps play this note moving against it," I'll say "no, fuck off, you're ruining my art." I'm giving you a generalisation of how we put stuff together but, for example 'Five Minutes', which you might be familiar with, it's the b-side of 'King Of Misery', that to me was a nothing song. All it was was me spitting at East/West who fucked us over for a few months and I really hated them for that. Ironically it's become one of the most enjoyable to play because in the context of the band, rather than just the song bashed down as a demo, it took on a new life. It actually sounds like I felt when I wrote it. It was just a cathartic process but now it actually feels like a song, it's very exciting.
There are no rules, they come different ways. Sometimes a whole couple of reams worth of lyrics will pour out, most of it will be shite, some of it will be good, for no reason and then you'll be struggling for months over a chord sequence that's great but you can't get the lyrics for. I've learnt not to worry about that. Years ago it used to cause me some concern that I'd write twelve songs in a week and then nothing for three, four months. It's like that essay situation, you've known you had to do it for two months but it's the night before and you've got the title written down, and you've spelt that wrong. Somehow, something inside you clicks and although you're exhausted until four o'clock in the morning, your best work, when the pressure is on, out it comes. For the album we needed four songs to finish off, I had fragments lying around which I couldn't be bothered to string together because I had no deadlines. Suddenly there was an album and out they came and I felt really good about it.
SR: Your Iyrics seem very important to you.
Willie: They are, very. To me they can't be disconnected that's why it's called a song and not an instrumental or a poem, it is a combination of the two. Language is something that I'm very interested in anyway, from all sorts of angles, from a conceptual point of view, from a poetic point of view, I spend a long time labouring over lyrics. I don't want that to sound pretentious, 'cos I'm totally capable and frequently do throw the most trite line in, I like to think at the time that it's for an ironic reason rather than just a lazy reason, but there's plenty there.
SR: When all these people pour through the door in an hours time it may be the only time that they see you so it could be a big event to them. For you, you go out every night and play similar sets to hundreds and hundreds of people. How do you reconcile the two, that there's all these people out there experiencing something really great and that for you it's just another night? Is every night a party or just another day's work?
Pete: I think every night is a special occasion to us. Although we do it every night this is what we are here for, the only reason we are in Norwich is to perform, is to entertain. This is the centre of our lives it is really special to us each night.
SR: You never think, "it's just another night, play the tunes, let's get out of here"?
Pete: No way. The moment you see the crowd and feel the power of the music you think "I just love doing this and I love being up here and I'm really glad they care enough to come and watch."
Willie: I've never been able to work it out myself. There are certain things you can identify as reasons for having a good gig; good sound on stage, a good audience response. And yet it still plagues me that for no reason that I can fathom some gigs I really fucking love and would do anything to bottle whatever that essence is and keep it. Other nights all ofthese ingredients might be perfect but for some reason there's something that I'm not clicking on to and I don't think that's got anything to do with the audience or the band or anything else I think that's just an individual problem everybody has to one degree or another, it's probably just a little more obvious in me than in others, he said, with his head hung....
SR: What sort of feeling does it give you when you play songs you've slaved over and you see people know them and they've learnt the words?
Willie: I'd like to see them do it in Welsh and really impress me.
SR: It seems like it must be a great feeling to see people who know all the words and they've been waiting all night for this song and so on. To me, it's an indescribable feeling I wonder if you could describe it?
Willie: Yeah, I'd describe that as indescribable.... It's flattering but the key to this is pure ego, that's all it is. For me, for example, and I'll get told off for this if CJ reads it, but it irritates the fuck out of me when people get on the stage. Now I'm supposed to enjoy that, there is kudos in this "hey the kids, onstage, they wanna dive, great." For me, bullshit, it doesn't work I don't fucking like it. Those people at the back, they came to see us play here and the reason why you're jumping offthe the stage probably isn't anything to do with the band it's because you want your mates to see you jumping off the stage and getting into it. Again that's all varying degrees, I don't mind them doing it on occasion, when it's a very big stage, but when they're knocking the microphone into your teeth and you can't play the songs properly it defeats the object of you being there. I think it ruins gigs but I do recognise that that's probably largely ego. If you want to do that go find your own fucking stage and do it, don't do it on mine. It interferes with the show aside from anything, it was happening last night.
Pete: Last night was interesting, yes. [That was in Tunbridge Wells - throughout the set microphones were being pushed around and pedals stepped on - RW]
Willie: Monitors were being shoved so I was pushed back on the drum kit, the microphone was in my face, I was trying to hit my pedal. I was strung out like the front cover of a David Bowie album.
Pete: And you just see this guy hurtling across the top of the crowd and you think "oh, here he comes," over the monitors, straight through the mike stands, whack! He's twisted up in front of you and you're going "get off!'
Willie: It is pleasurable to see people down the front, singing along to the songs. There's no denying that, that is unmeasurable.
Copyright Shane Richmond & Livewire 945AM (1996)
Original Broadcast: Sunday 11th February 1996, Livewire 945, University of East Anglia, Norwich. Rebroadcast: Sunday 19th May 1996, Livewire 945. Not to be reproduced without permission.
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