Music's Intimate & Interactive Bush appearance:
Scene: Much Music studio in Toronto, filled with fans, and lots of
screaming fans outside in sub-zero weather, looking through the windows.
Machine Head; Greedy Fly; host Juliette Powell's introduction; Little
Things; Personal Holloway.
Gavin:I want to be friendly with those people outside, standing in the
freezing cold, all those people
JP: they are!
G:we appreciate that!(scream)
JP: you know they love ya, they love ya!
G:you should put some heaters out there
JP: ahayahayahaha...so as I was explaining to you earlier, we've got
speakers corners that are pretty much all over Canada and because not
everyone could be outside tonight
G:right
JP:what they did is they sent in some questions and here's one of them
on the road (Gavin pulls a mock worried face)so let's check the monitor.
Question from Chris in Vancouver:this one's for Gavin, how do you plan
to avoid some of the pitfalls that other lead singers like Kurt Cobain
and Eddie Vedder have fallen into?
G: er, it's such a weird question, it's a really big question, and, um,
I consider those two people so different, so far apart that I can't
answer it in, like, one sentence but all I can say is that anyone in a
band who is successful has, um, you know, you get pulled every which way
all the time and people want a piece of you and stuff and it's pretty
difficult because if you're just rude to a couple of people, people take
you the wrong way, people don't accept that you maybe have to have your
own life, so I, I wish Kurt was still here, kicking everyone's butts,
making great music
JP:right
G:so I'm sorry for that. And as for Eddie Vedder I, I think the Rolling
Stone thing was really out of order and, er, sort of wish him luck, but
I've always been a much bigger fan of Nirvana.
JP:o.k. so we have a phone call, hello...blablabla
Caller:...Gavin, when you're writing your lyrics are you writing them
from your point of view or from the perspective of the character?
G:no, always personal, as best as I can. Bomb on the first record was
like, having grown up in Kilburn which is, like, half, a half black,
half Irish area, it would be really scary having the um, the Orange Day
parades and all that IRA stuff that was going on. Obviously that, you
know, Orange Day parades is the protestants but, er, that was pretty
scary growing up, so that's probably one of the only songs where I kind
of wasn't part of it and I just figured I wrote it about a guy who was
killed in a pub bombing just outside of er, where do you call it? Covent
Garden, I've been, I haven't been home so long, I forget what it's
called and, er, so I wrote it from that perspective of someone who, you
know, because I didn't want to be Bono or something, 'cause I could
never be Bono, not that I'd want to be necessarily and, er, so I just
personalized that view of someone who kind of has just gone out, an
innocent victim of a, of a political struggle, without sort of shouting
'down with the IRA or down with the UDA', you know, so on those things,
but generally it's pretty personal (grin)...she was ready for that
answer, right? (laughs)
Caller says she loves Bush; G:thank you
JP:alright!lots of love going on here for Bush X
G: It's a love-in...you can call us Bush if you like, that's how we're
known the rest of the world, really
JP: I know! But you know that here in Canada we have to call you Bush X
G:I know! In 1973 I heard that there was a band called Bush
JP:yeah
G:and I wonder how generous he'll be soon to just let us call ourselves
how we're known the rest of the world. It's so weird, Bush X sounds like
someone else's band, but yeah, we are actually Bush but legally,
apparently we're not in this country, allegedly, maybe.
JP:o.k. so you know what we're gonna do? we're gonna break the rules
G:oh you
JP:and from now on we're only going to call you Bush. I'm taking full
responsibility for this!
G:(points to JP and grins) you rebel!
CUT
JP misreads a question on the video monitor. IT says" I see Gavin on all
these magazine covers. Sure he's hot and all, but I love you guys for
your music. Are you aware that some of your records are being sold
mainly because of Gavin? How does it make you feel? Crowd boos.
JP:ooooh guys!alright, Robin, Dave, Nigel, we want to get your reaction
on that one! Gavin tries to get Dave to answer, he refuses
Dave: Robin's going to answer this one
Robin (sitting at drums):I've got my own mike here (laughs) I'm not
getting up, this is where I live! Well, um, as far as I know I'm on all
the records so, er, you know, I'm quite happy being on the records.
Front covers of magazines aren't very important to me, er, it's what's
in them that's more important and, er, we do our best (laughs), we do
our best to get in the interviews and we do our best to get on the front
covers of er, er magazines, but certain people, er, don't want it that
way, but we're doing our best to destroy that, er, particular theory,
and er, there you go (raises eyebrows/shrugs).
JP: Alright, that's cool
G: oh there you are...next to Randall
JP: obviously when you're dealing with this kind of music, you've got
fans coming in from all over the world and the fans get so much from
you, you know, so much love, so much adrenalin, motivation, I'm sure you
get a great deal from your fans as well. What exactly do you get from
these guys? What does it bring you to be in such close proximity to
these guys, now or in a show?
G:(pause)don't say 'income', Dave! er, er, well the thing is we, like, I
think we've toured as much as, or more than, most bands in the last
couple of years, you know, we've done like nearly 300 shows last year on
that, on that record, the 16 Stone so...it's like, that, that makes the
most sense of it. All these things that we've discussed, whether it's
videos or magazines, er, and whether you get misrepresented and
misunderstood, and people take you the wrong way, just when you think
you want to quit, and just when you think...all these problems that Kurt
had, obviously and the problems that Eddie Vedder had, just when you
think you, that everything, you should just quit it all and do it and
decide that you should just live somewhere else and forget it, you go
play a show and people react in a way that, that makes the whole room
reverberate, irrespective of the size of the room, whether it's 200 or
18,000 and, um, that kind of energy is something that you can never, er,
duplicate anywhere else, and that kind of energy is what music...and,
music heals, you know, this morning I was feeling terrible and I
listened all the way on the plane here from New York to Bob Marley and
he changed everything, like he does every day I feel bad, so that's the
power that I get and I hope that we convey some of that.
JP:well! there was definately some positive energy at HMV this
afternoon!...blablabla...clip of crowds at HMV & MM contest winners...
blablabla...ladies & gentlemen! Bush X! (erk!!!!)
Comedown; Insect Kin
G (approached by JP while talking to Dave): I'm just saying how crazy
they are, standing out in the cold
JP:ahyahyahya!
G: this lot are completely mental!
JP: well let's go to the window, c'mon, let's go say 'hi' to the
people...blablabla...alright Gavin is there something you really want to
say to these people?
G: I wanna say that you're f*&%$#g brilliant! (smile/scream)
JP: Now I heard that's there's going to be a cd rom released, that these
people are going to get a chance to have, or at least win, a cd rom in
the new year, now what's on this cd rom?
G: er, I have no idea but I hope they get everything free 'cause they
deserve it, standing outside in the horrible weather, they're brilliant,
you know, what can you say, look at them, they're crazy!
JP:have you ever been such a fan of a band that you've ever done
anything that's even close to this?
G:My country doesn't get quite this cold, you know, it's bad weather but
it's not as bad as this so they're tougher than me
JP: oh yeah! they're tough alright! we've got some die-hard fans in the
house for Bush X!
G; you can call us Bush now
JP: oh excuse me! exsqueeze me! X marks the spot where I promise not to
go anymore, so let's go back inside, blablabla, so we have an in-house
question, what's your name?
Fan: Jasmine (crowd goes "oooh"; off screen, a band member says "(we're)
on Oprah", laughs)
Fan:..alot of bands grew up listening to the punks and you cited the Sex
Pistols as one of your references. Recently, Johnny Rotten stated that
music these days has a very negative quality and with everything that's
happened, so bands like Bush and certain other people...are just
promoting drugs and alcohol and track marks, which the Sex Pistols were
never about, which is a quote 'the Sex Pistols were about survival and
all the rest of the stuff is obsolete'.So what do you think about that?
G:sure, yeah, no I, er, first off, I agree with him and I think it's
really bad to promote all that kinda side. We ended this record with a
song called 'Distant Voice' which is a song about going to find a
positive, the song ends, the album, the whole album, it's an hour long
, really long 'cause we couldn't work out how to do a shorter record, er,
ends with 'shine', and it's 'shine' is the repeated word and, um, I
agree with him. I think that if he thinks that about us he hasn't, er,
listened closely and I doubt whether he'd be bothered to. I know I met a
journalist the other day who, er, went up to him and, er, said, er, you
know, I'm er so-and-so, you know, I'm Michael from whatever and he says
'who f*&%$g cares'(mimics J. Rotten's voice; laughs, crowd cheers). So
he's got a, he's pretty crazy like that. We, you know, we, I, I agree
with him, we're into positive stuff, people should, er, not be going out
killing themselves, people shouldn't take drugs, people should find
their solace in, er, I think music is a really good thing, I think other
people is a really good thing, I think films, music, books, you know,
there's way loads of things out there that are positive and people
should concentrate on those, so I agree with him, even though he doesn't,
know us very well, (grins), it's a much better question!
Crowd cheering.
G: thank you!
JP: Do you really want more? Everything Zen...Bush X!(argh!!!!)
G: Is everybody happy? (roar) Outside, let me hear you from outside!
(roar)
Everything Zen
THE END
Do you really want more?
Click here for a Canadian fan's page featuring pictures of Bush in the Toronto area (Sam's , MM and Edenfest).