| PG |
Morning sir. |
| FR |
Good morning. |
| PG |
Or should I say 'How are you then alright'? |
| FR |
That's my line isn't it? Yeah. |
| PG |
Nice of you to join us. |
| FR |
No problem. |
| PG |
How are things with you then? |
| FR |
Very good, they couldn't be better I don't think - the album's gone straight in at two and
it's still doing extremely well. |
| PG |
Let's talk about the album, it's called "Don't Stop". You've got all sorts of cover versions
on there. |
| FR |
Yep. |
| PG |
There's the "Fun Fun Fun" one which you've released as a single and we've been playing, with
the Beach Boys in the background. Bit of a story to that isn't there? |
| FR |
Yeah. We did a show with them about two and a half or three years ago in Berlin to celebrate
the leaving of the troops, wonderful celebrations when they leave innit? And they were there,
we were there and Charles Aznavore was representing the French which was a bit weird. There
were about 350,000 people and the Beach Boys were fascinated when they came in to hear all these
Germans singing English Status Quo songs. Bruce Johnson, who's probably the most
enthusiastic man in the world, was very keen to do something and he kept in touch and when we
actually started the album and tried various Beach Boys songs, we eventually got to this one and
after about three days of grinding away at the arrangement - I know that sounds ridiculous but
it was about three days - something suddenly clicked with the intro between Rick and Andrew and
then we realised we needed an extra verse. So Mike Love wrote another verse which again was
wacky, to have a song which was an early 60s song and a new verse written in the 90s, and we made
up a slave after we'd finished it, made up a slave, sent it to them and they did some in Toronto,
some in Chicago, some in Los Angeles and some in Denver I think. |
| PG |
Well, that's a story then! There is a story behind that, I told you there was. |
| FR |
You let me waffle, you mustn't let me do that! You can chop me off if you like. |
| PG |
No no, I would never do that. No listen, other tracks on the album - you've got things like
"Safety Dance" which was the old Men Without Hats song. |
| FR |
Yeah, again that was something that John said "Do you remember that? Shall we try it?" and
I thought yeah, it sounded interesting at the time. Again grinding away, most of the tracks we
had to really grind at to do whatever we figured was right for them to be acceptable to us as
an album and we got that same, the intro piece, the guitar piece came from the idea of "Matchstick Men" of tuning B strings together slightly out of tune. And then the kinda thing just
kinda worked. The bonus with this is - with a normal album we would have songs of our own and we
all start getting a bit precious about our own songs or you're not always 100% percent sure how
the melody goes - with these, everyone knew how the melody went so everybody was working with
the same aim if you wish. It seems to have worked very very well. |
| Break |
| PG |
Francis, earlier on we were talking about the album, "Don't Stop", and of course the
Fleetwood Mac track is on there. And "The Future's So Bright (I Gotta Wear Shades)", which was
the Timbuk3 song from about ten years ago... |
| FR |
Yeah, that's another one I think John suggested, or Andrew, I can't remember. But we went
through so many songs, some that we thought would be easy, would be obvious and no problem and
should be great but weren't, and some that we weren't so sure of that suddenly worked. Again, as
I said on the others, we had to grind away at the arrangements to make them interesting to us.
This one and "Safety Dance" are both sort of 80s songs and they didn't sound quite so modern as
you'd think when you listen to the actual record - I'm not slating them, but it seems to have worked. It's the same with most tracks - I'm sorry, they seem to have worked! |
| PG |
We're giving the album away on the Breakfast Show this week as part of our competition, so
someone can win a copy of that a little bit later on. What are the plans for this year? It's
the 30th anniversary, you got a tour going on? |
| FR |
Have we got a tour going on!! |
| PG |
Silly question really! |
| FR |
Yeah, we start rehearsing next week for a couple of weeks then we're off to Scandanavia for,
I think, about a month, that goes through to Germany for about a month. Then we do Summer
festivals, of which we hope there might be a couple with the Beach Boys, I'm not sure where
they're going to be, and that'll take us up to the Autumn. We have to do a promo trip in Japan,
Australia and there's considerable interest in the US - I'm not saying any more than that but
there's considerable interest. That's strange. |
| PG |
You've been trying for that for a few years, haven't you? |
| FR |
We've had some success there over the years but not perhaps what we would like or perhaps
that if anything it would get up the press's noses and my Mother-in-law would know who I am
then! |
| PG |
Thanks for joining us. How do you feel this time in a morning then, Francis Rossi? |
| FR |
Well, when I'm prepared like I am today, I don't feel too bad at all. I don't lie in bed
too much. |
| PG |
Best of luck with the new album, hope it all goes well and maybe talk to you again sometime.
|
| FR |
Certainly. |
