Q, October 1996: Difference between revisions
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JF: Oh, come now.<br> | JF: Oh, come now.<br> | ||
EC: I couldn’t, not like you did then. You either played like Steve Jones or you played like [[Jimmy Page]]. And I was neither.<br> | EC: I couldn’t, not like you did then. You either played like Steve Jones or you played like [[Jimmy Page]]. And I was neither.<br> | ||
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Q: Justine, what’s the first record you remember.'''<br> | '''Q: Justine, what’s the first record you remember.'''<br> | ||
JF: Probably an [[ABBA|Abba]] record. The one with the helicopter on the front – Arrival. Punk rock I only discovered four years ago. There’s a lot of groups now who sound like ‘70s groups… it’s not nostalgia. They really are just discovering it. | JF: Probably an [[ABBA|Abba]] record. The one with the helicopter on the front – Arrival. Punk rock I only discovered four years ago. There’s a lot of groups now who sound like ‘70s groups… it’s not nostalgia. They really are just discovering it.<br> | ||
EC: That’s fantastic. I love it. It’s like me just discovering Dixieland jazz. I remember punk all sorts of ways. I remember after my day job I would go up to Stiff in Westbourne Park and actually put the fucking records in the sleeves. I was that keen to be in the business. I would go up after work and just hang around the office and do stuff that needed doing. The records would come from the factory in white sleeves and I would sit there putting them in the picture sleeves. It was great. I would never do it now.<br> | |||
JF: With me, I honestly don’t know what comes first. I quite often wonder nowadays when I hear something that is clearly just a pale imitation of something else whether people in ten years’ time will know which came first. You get confused over three or four years.<br> | |||
'''Q: Does that really matter, though?'''<br> | |||
EC: It’s easy to become cynical and not hear the joy. I can hear an Oasis record that sounds like Mott and there’s that Shakespears Sister record which sounds exactly like Mott and is calculated to do so. But I really like it even though it’s designed by computer. I wouldn’t want to hear Oasis with a load of thugs at a football match but I heard them at a party at volume beyond comprehension and loved it. It didn’t matter then that I could spot all the references. The only people it matters to are people like you, who have to notice otherwise you wouldn’t have a job. I’m not having a go. I know some people want that kind of minute detail. Mainly men.<br> | |||
JF: Yes, I find the list business quite peculiar. It’s a guy thing. I will occasionally put my records into alphabetical order, but that’s as far as it goes. That’s a boy thing, isn’t it?<br> | |||
EC: That’s a librarian thing. It’s when you go to someone’s house and they’ve done it by genre. I went to the house of a well-known rock critic and he had sections like traditional African, triple-back-flip new wave… I thought it was ridiculous.<br> | |||
JF: I do that I must admit. It’s very difficult, actually. It causes me a lot of problems. I can’t remember where I’ve put them ‘cos there are so many records that belong to more than one category. Like PJ Harvey: should I put her in female singers or greatest bands of all time? <br> | |||
EC: The only thing I have separate is a bunch of vinyl singles that I always like to know where they are. And that is badly alphabetised and out of control. On a connected matter, my favourite record shops are the ones that are run by really opinionated people, where if you’re going to buy a record they don’t approve of, they let you know. Like Probe in Liverpool… if you went in in the ‘70s and tried to buy practically anything they would sneer at you and say, “What do you want this for?”<br> | |||
'''Q: How long does it take for you to get blasé?'''<br> | |||
JF: I don’t think I’ve got there yet. There are things I feel cynical about but I think I felt cynical about them before. I’m still rubbing my hands with glee about the soundcheck.<br> | |||
EC: You get cynical about some stuff. I did this tour when I had this revolutionary idea of playing the places people never went to. So we didn’t play Newcastle, we played [[Concert 1980-03-20 Sunderland|Sunderland]], and we did all these end-of-pier shows in seaside towns. It was about half and half wonderful and terrible. In some towns it was, Great, someone finally came to [[Concert 1980-03-13 Merthyr Tydfil|Merthyr Tydfil]] or [[Concert 1980-03-15 Fishguard| The Frenchman’s Motel]] in Fishguard or whatever. Then at other places the reaction was almost hostile; You’ve never been here before. Fuck off. That was when I noticed the power of TV. The only song anyone wanted to hear was the one we had just done on Top Of The Pops and it didn’t matter how well we played the rest as long as we did that song at a certain point. They’d react with complete indifference and then go mental. You wonder sometimes where the groups have gone that you grew up with. Well, they’ve gone to these towns. The Tremeloes are playing these towns.<br> | |||
JF: We’ve never really played off the beaten track. I’d like to play some unusual countries on the next tour – Albania and places like that.<br> | |||
EC: I’ve never played any further east than Vienna. I’m going to Greece for the first time this summer. Somewhere three hours away and I’ve never played there. There’s talk of going to South America, which amazes me because I thought they just liked Esperanto music: Bon Jovi and Queen. It’s better than being in the army, which is the only other job where you get to travel so much… but then we don’t get to water ski.<br> | |||
JF: It’s one of the few jobs where you can get a snapshot of the whole planet in a year. You could spend a year in Australia. I loved it. Although there aren’t many centres of population to play in.<br> | |||
EC: You could play outside the cities. You could play in the Shell Harbour Workers Club, Woolamaloo. [[Concert 1987-12-04 Wollongong|I have.]], It’s great. It’s like a giant working men’s club. Didn’t you replace Sinead at Lollapalooza? What was that like? <br> | |||
JF: It was a bizarre experience, mainly because all the bands on the big stage were left-field bands and we were playing seated arenas. So it was like Pavement and Sonic Youth and [[Beck]] playing to all these people sitting down. And most of the front seats were vacant because they were reserved for record company people who didn’t show up. Lollapalooza is not a great idea. It would be fine if people could stand up; I mean, I thought it would be like Glastonbury. There is some life outside the stadium but inside the stadium you’re not allowed to smoke or drink and you have to sit in an allocated seat. The Americans are very confused about smoking and drinking. You can’t smoke inside and can drink outside. The first Lollapalooza was quite free and easy and people were chucking mud and stuff and I think they’ve got a bit nervous since. I quite enjoyed playing and we went down pretty well. | |||
''To be continued...'' | ''To be continued...'' |
Revision as of 22:34, 23 October 2013
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