Howard Jones

"What Is Love?," "Things Can Only Get Better," "No One Is to Blame"...we explore Howard Jones's career from yesterday to today!

 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:08):
Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bob Left Sets podcast.
My guest today is Howard Jones. How are good to
be talking with you? Well, thank you so much, Bob.
It's very nice to be talking with you. Okay, people
can't see this, but you're wearing a sweater that says
nine thirty. What's that about? Um? Well, I I recently

(00:31):
played the nine thirty Club in Washington and I've been
wanting to play there for so long. They for some
reason could never get me fit me in um and
so I wanted to get some and they gave us
some merch at the end of the night. So it's
a really comfy one. So are you the type of
person who you know? Bill Wyman was the Stalls, was

(00:54):
a famous collector. He's still with us, but he sold
some of his stuff. Do you keep all them? Because
you know, promoters are legendary for giving gifts to performers.
You still have all that stuff? Um? No? I mean
this was a very special thing for me because I
normally I don't I wouldn't take any kind of merch

(01:14):
from the gig, but I just thought it was very cool.
It's black and I've always wanted to play there, and
everybody asked me what that means. So actually there was
one of the few venues where well they actually did
a baby merch and one of our one of our
crew members has recently had a young baby and my

(01:36):
wife Jan bought some baby merch that we got some
pictures back today with the nine thirty logo on it. Okay,
so how extensive is your merch that you sell at
a gig. Well, we always like to sell music because
you know, that's the most important thing to me. So

(01:57):
so they'll always be like the you c d s
and vinyl if we've got it, um and uh, you know,
a couple of great T shirts, but it's really important
to have the music there. And uh do you personally
choose the T shirt or as somebody else do that?
And no, no, I get I do get involved. And yeah,

(02:18):
we we we always spend a lot of time working
on you know, what the designs are going to be.
Are they going to be related to the album or
to the live show or or just an abstract you
know design. So yeah, we spend we spent a lot
of time. So if I go to the gig, I've
seen you, but not recently. I saw you at the
House of Blues in l A. I believe it was

(02:40):
about twenty years ago, but um, yeah, I don't remember
the merge there. But if I go to your gig today,
are you going to be at the merge table? Am
I going to get to meet you? No? Do we do?
We do a meet and greet before the show. Now.
I used to go out to the table, but I
found it difficult because it was lovely meeting the fans,

(03:04):
but there was quite a lot of drunk people and
they were trying to grab me. So my view has
been like, it's much nicer to have some sort of
dignified greeting with people and be able to spend some
time with them and chat properly. So we do that
before the shows. Yeah, so you have these meet and greets,

(03:24):
do you tend to know personally you're hardcore fans. I
do recognize quite a few of them, Yes, and it's
it's it's very it's lovely actually too to catch up
with them, and you know, have this history that goes
back you know, maybe you know thirty or forty years now.
I don't know all of them, but they you know,

(03:45):
they will um, they will make themselves known to me.
You know, they've written something to me on Twitter or
something like that. You know, people can eat you know,
they can get holding me through email if they try
hard enough. And I try and do one reply a day. Um,
because I can't reply to all of them, but I

(04:07):
choose one and at least one person is happy. You
know how many people reach out in a day? Um? Well,
because I don't reply all the time, I probably get
about four or five emails a day. Yeah, and I
assume they have to be pretty good sleuth. I mean,

(04:28):
your email address is not that readily available, correct, Yeah,
that's right. They have to work out. That's a kid.
Let's let's go back to the point of vinyl. If
I go to a gig, you you mentioned the vinyl
may or may not be always available. Do you have
vinyl from every album or do you have specialized product

(04:51):
for the tour? What do you got? Um? Well, usually
the tour is is associated with an album, but not always. Um.
You know, vinyl is so hard to get made now,
so there's usually this big lag. You know that the
CDs are really quick to make, but everybody wants final
so it's taking us like six or seven months to

(05:14):
actually get the vinyl done. I was very skeptical about
releasing it on violent. I thought, I thought, we've got,
you know, got away from that, you know, a medium
that's that's got built in noise, you know. I I
it's not the way that I meant it to be
when I'm working in the studio. However, I have become

(05:35):
a convert to this sound and there's something about vinyl.
It's very hard to sort of put your finger on it,
but it's it's you know, it's got a great sound.
It's not the sound that we originally we're hearing when
we mix the record, but it's got another sort of
level of I don't know, nostalgic associated with it that

(06:00):
really I think it's nice on the ear. I think
it's something to do with the the sound waves being
rounded off by the process of making the vinyl. So
I've become a convert. And now we do vinyl for everything.
And you know, Cherry Red handle my early catalog and
they're constantly putting out vinyl to go with things that

(06:24):
people have never been able to get on viol and
they absolutely love it. So you know, got to go
with the fans. That's what they want. Okay, what kind
of mic are you using there? I'm using an appert microphone.
But the reaon I mentioned is I'm usually the identical mic.
I could just see. How did you end up with

(06:46):
the Hide mic club? Well, you know, I've been a
I've been a friend of Bob Clear Mountains for thirty
five years and Betty, of course I've known her for
even longer, and she runs the company. And so I
got this nice little present one day, which and I

(07:08):
think it's a great sounding mike, isn't it. It's unbelievable.
The analog compression is one of the great features. Yeah, wonderful. Okay,
let's go back to the vinyl thing for a second.
So you cut digitally, now, how far back in the
beginning we're gonna like the humans lib was that kind

(07:30):
of analager digital? Now that was recorded onto multi track analog?
Although you know we were using UM sampling you know, well,
I say primitive, but I mean it was. It was
good quality, but it was it only had like a
maximum of nine seconds that you could you could you

(07:52):
could um you could actually sample. So so although we
were recording to analog, we were using UM. You know,
it's sort of up to nine second seconds of sampling,
which was good for like snare drum samples, based drum
samples and sometimes a bit of vocal stuff to fly

(08:14):
around you know, the tape. But yeah, it was it
was human slop and dream interaction actually were recorded onto
onto multi track tape. Okay, a little bit slower. Okay,
why is there? You know we have analog tape that
runs you know, fifteen or thirty i p s. When
you say you can only use nine seconds, explain a

(08:36):
little deeper what you mean. Yeah, well, it was the
it was the very early days of digital sampling. So
so this was before you know, you had like Aki
sound samplers and fair lights and things like that. So
in the studio we had a box I'm trying to
remember the name of it now, and Rupert Hine and

(09:00):
Steve Taylor were you know, early adopters of of this
of this of this technology, and so they could root
anything that was being recorded on a desk through to
the sample. And so for instance, you know, I would
run my drum machines. But we we thought, well we'd

(09:22):
like a better a better snare sound, or a better
bass drum sound, and so we would be able to
trigger this this sampler, um, you know from my drum machine,
uh inputs to to actually get you a better sound
through it? Or does that does that sound? Does that

(09:44):
make sense? Well? I think that about for the amateur
one can understand a fifties sevent But let's go back
to the beginning. So when did you start to play
a musical instrument? Um? Well, I started around with seven.
My My parents were Welsh. They both spoke Welsh and
so in Wales. You know, they grew up in Wales

(10:07):
and everyone sings and everyone is interested in music. So
it was really important for them to for for for
their kids to be able to play an instrument. And
I was the firstborn and so you know, they got
me piano lessons when I was seven. Um. I absolutely
hated it at the beginning. I didn't have a very

(10:28):
inspiring teacher, but they encouraged me to keep going and
I sort of, you know, ground away at it. I
got to nine years old and my mother always used
to have the radio on. So at nine years old,
I I heard this song that I'd seen on TV
as well, um, and it was the winner of the

(10:50):
Eurovision Song Contests. It was a song called Puppet on
a String by Sandy Shaw, and I heard it on
the radio and I went to the piano and I
worked out the tune and how to harm anize it,
and I thought, and that was like this massive turning
point for me, um that you know, oh, I can
hear tunes and I can bring them to the piano
and start, you know, playing playing them and trying to

(11:12):
get the chords right as well. So so from that
moment on, I was very obsessed, unhealthily obsessed person with
the piano. And you couldn't keep me away from it.
And you know, I should have spent a lot more
time out playing football with my friends and stuff like that,
but I was in there banging away on the piano.

(11:34):
But of course, you know, I guess it paid off
in the end. It certainly did. But let's okay, you're
playing the piano. It's an analog instrument, and you came
of age with all these digital innovations, etcetera. When did
you start experimenting with since and drum machines, ettera. And
what was the interpiration? Yeah, well, there's a few things.

(11:58):
And when I when I think back, I mean the
first band I was in It was a band called Warrior,
and this was when I was still at school, and
the drummer in the band was a bit of a
a kind of electronics whiz, and he actually made me
a synthesizer from from a kit that they had um

(12:21):
they'd had in an electronics magazine. I can't remember the
name of it, but he actually made me a one
oscillators synthesizer that I could play, you know, in the band.
And so I was like, what, wow, this is amazing.
And I'd seen Keith Emerson at the Island White Festival
in nineteen seventy when I was I was too young
to be there, but I managed to call my parents

(12:44):
into letting me go and saw Emerson with his huge
Moog modula and the sounds that were coming out of it.
It's just absolutely blew my mind. And I kind of
that was it. Really, that was the turning point. I
think I wanted to be involved in this new way
of making sounds and this exciting way of of generating sound,

(13:08):
you know, and being a keyboard player that was gonna,
you know what, I could eventually start to afford anything
resembling what Keith had um, you know, I would be
i'd be there. I used to hang out at the
local Hammond Organ's shop in high Wycomb on on a
Saturday afternoon and sort of go in there and they

(13:31):
kindly let me mess around on the on the Hammonds
and so that was a huge thing for me. I
couldn't possibly afford one of those instruments, so my my
parents got me a Larry Heritage um which which they
got on HP and then we borrowed a Leslie from

(13:53):
the drummers parents house and we used to take it
round to gigs. Can you imagine this beautiful piece of
burning so that's meant to be in the home and
we carted it around, you know, all these horrible little
gigs that we that we were playing at the time.
But yeah, so that was me and my obsession with keyboards. Really. Okay,
let's go back, so at age seven you start playing

(14:17):
the piano. How old are you when you get infected
by the cnd Shaw song? I think I was. I
was nine or eleven or something like that around that time, yeah,
I think. And then when did you start playing in
being to start working with people live? Yeah, um, well
I think I played in my very first band. I

(14:39):
was in Canada because my parents had emigrated to Canada
twice in fact, and they came back twice. So the
second time we were out there, I was at high
school and I was invited to be in a band
and they got hold of a fox Continental for me
to play, and I played some covers like how So

(15:00):
the Rising Sun by the Animals and just one or
two gigs before my parents decided to move back to
the UK. So, um, it was really that that. That
was the first time I ever sort of played with with,
you know, other electric musicians. Okay, just hold one second there.
How did they know that you played? Were you like

(15:22):
known as the piano guy? Well, yeah, that's a good,
good question. I during lunchtimes, during my lunch break at
the high school, I used to get used to go
into one of the classrooms where they had a piano
and start playing, you know, because that's my thing, and
an audience would gather around and that's how they got

(15:44):
to know. Um, it became a bit of a thing
and you would play. Did you also sing at the time. No,
I didn't sing at the time because I never thought
of myself as a singer, although I sang as a
child and my parents were both singers, not professionally even

(16:05):
you know, because they loved singing. Um. There was always
music and I used to we used to do Beach
Boys covers my my brothers and I had three brothers
and we used to do that, you know, do our
best with it with with Beach Boys harmonies when we
were really young, when we didn't have any instruments. Um.

(16:27):
So yeah, so I did sing any behind. It was
never on my radar to be the singer, you know.
That sort of came much later. Okay, let's go back
to the Beach Boys. Were you singing the Beach Boys
when you were in Wales? Yes, yes, you know. One
of the things about our childhood was that I don't

(16:52):
know what if the tradition is still there now, but
when we used to visit our grandparents and our uncles
and aunties, we it was kind of expected that you
would do you were, you would do a performance. You know,
they would usually have a piano, so I would play
the piano and then my brothers would join with me
and and sing harmonies together. So it was you know,

(17:16):
you kind of it was performing as a natural way
of life really, so I kind of think that's the
way it should be, really it. I love that organic,
the way that music is just part of life and
you you learn how to sing, you learn how to play,
and then you go around to somebody's house and you

(17:38):
and you do it for them, you know. I mean
it's kind of got blown out of all proportion now,
you know, big stages and stadiums and things like that,
but that's that's the way it was originally. Well, you know,
you would just gathered together and listen to somebody play
or listen to somebody sing. Okay, were you a big

(17:59):
beach boy? You know? Um, I was at that age.
We we were. We were hearing the the um you know,
the surf era of the of the beach brobs. So
you know, on the beach we used to sing um

(18:19):
good vibrations. I don't think we were quite up to
up to doing that. But it was much later that
I in my life that I realized the genius uh
you know of other beach boys and I was, I was.
I was a late comer. I was a late coming
to it, but once I got there, I was like,

(18:41):
oh wow, this is just so great. Yeah, but what's it?
What's it like being in Wales listening to surf music.
I mean, I grew up in the East Coast of
American Connecticut and I would hear the songs from California.
Sounded like a dream. I wanted to go out there,
being the surfing culture. But you were in Whales. So

(19:02):
what were these songs meaning to you? Yeah, well, I
guess you know, it's not so far off really well,
because well, as you know, you think, Wales is a
land of song and choirs are everywhere. I remember when
I was living in Cardiff, I went I used to

(19:22):
go to a local church where they had concerts on
and there would be like the Morriston Orpheous Choir there,
you know, hundred piece male voice choir singing, and it
just was just part of you know, I didn't you didn't.
I didn't think anything of it at the time. I

(19:43):
realized now how amazing that it was to have that
input into my life. Um, and you know, singing was
was you know, if you go to a football match
or a rugby match, always the Welsh quiet um. You know,
crowds sing so beautifully. They're not only saying that, they
harmonized as well. It's a kind of natural ability and

(20:07):
so hearing the Beach Boys. Really, I guess was oh yeah, well,
you know that's them doing it. But you know in
the Sunshine in California. Okay, So you were born in
nineteen fifty five the Beatles hit in the UK and
sixty two in American sixty four. Were you conscious of
the arrival of the Beatles. Oh yeah, I absolutely was.

(20:30):
I mean my mother listened to the radio all the time,
so that's what we were hearing all of that. Um,
you know, coming through the radio, and the Beatles were
huge in our family and in my life. Um and
this you know, way before I could I had a
record player or I could afford to buy a record. Um,

(20:53):
you know, it was yeah, massive, massive influence. But but
all the all all those sixties contemporaries of the Beatles
as well, you know, Freddie and the Dreamers and the Tremolos,
and you know, I I'd be hearing it, you know,
constantly and getting very excited. And I'm so glad that
my mother was a keen radio listener, you know, so

(21:16):
because we didn't have any other means of recorded music
in the house. Um, so coming through the radio was
a big deal. Okay, Needles just say, there was music
before the Beatles, but in the US was palpable. There

(21:37):
was a youth quake, as they put it. Everything blew up.
There was the Beatles, There was a British invasion and
ultimately the San Francisco scene in psychedelia, which uh UK
had a huge part of. There was traffic, etcetera. Was
that just music or could you feel that it was
really a scene? Into what degree were you dedicated to it? Um? Well,

(22:05):
I I think I was probably too young to be
being able to acknowledge any kind of scene, you know
what I mean? You know that you don't have any
previous with it, you know, you don't you don't have
any historical references before that. And but it felt to
me like the Beatles were young men, you know, not

(22:31):
that much older than than you, that were like living
through history and reflecting the changes in society with their
music and with the clothes they wore, and the and
the films they made and the album artwork and the
clips that we used to see on you know on

(22:54):
the TV um you know when they when they when
they recorded you know, what is all you need is love?
You know? I was remember watching it on the on
the TV Live as they were doing it, and it's like,
it's the most exciting thing you could ever imagine. So
it was. It was amazing actually when you think about it.

(23:16):
When I think about it, to grow up with them
and and their development, and you know, the influence they
had on me and my my schoolmates and everything like that,
you know, wearing loon pants and you know, going down
to Carnival Street to buy clothes and you know, it
was like it was so massive. Um. But you know,

(23:41):
I guess looking back on it, you realize that massive impact. Um.
At the time, you know, you don't really have any
reference bot you just think, oh wow, music is the
most exciting thing ever in the world, and these guys
are the best at doing it. Um. You know. Well,

(24:02):
you know, the funny thing is, if you're in the UK,
people tend to look down on Liverpool, Lions and Scousers.
What was that like? Was there any fascination with Liverpool,
the fact that the ban came from there another band?
You know, because I hadn't really traveled very much around
my own country. I mean, I've been to Canada twice

(24:26):
and I think one of the one of the times
we actually sailed from Liverpool, you know, because we went
by boat. But I never sort of thought of it
as geographic guard. Just always thought of it as they
were in our country, they were of our country. I
didn't even think about Liverpool or accents. It was just

(24:47):
you know, the the the British and yeah, you know,
I didn't analyze it any further than that. Do you
speak Welsh? I can? I can pronounce Welsh and I can.
I can. I can read it and and and and

(25:09):
pronounce it. I can sing in Welsh, but I don't
know what I'm saying. My parents, my parents spoke Welsh
at home, but they didn't teach us because they wanted
to keep a secret language. Actually that was one thing
that was one payoff of it. But the main reason
was they thought having to language with languages would be

(25:33):
an impediment for us. And of course we know now
it's really good to learn more than a language when
you're young, but we they they held that back from us. Yeah.
And what was their history? Were they always you know,
long lineage and uh Wales or what did they do
for a living? Yeah? Well, my mother was was was

(25:57):
born in Swansea in a very very working class family.
They lived in a tiny house. She had like six brothers.
She was the youngest and the only girl in the family.
And her father worked in the in the local toy
factory in uh, you know, it was a factory worker

(26:18):
down in dan in Swansea. My father came from a
farming background, parents very so poor that they had to
send him to live with his grandparents because they couldn't
afford to keep him at home with the other two

(26:39):
children that they had. So so my father was brought
up by his grandparents and they were very keen for
him to do well, you know, with his with his
with his studies, and he and he and he did
very well at school and he ended up going to
university and going to university in Swansea, and that's how
he met my mother. And so my father, from a

(27:04):
very poor background, ended up with a good education. And
my mother was a very wonderful, wonderful, wonderful woman, just
full of love for everyone, and everyone loved her and
so she she they made a great team, you know,

(27:26):
they uh. And my mother was very ambitious for her
children and did everything she could to help us get on,
you know. And what did your father do for a living.
He was He was trained as an electrical engineer and

(27:47):
he did various um jobs during his life. He taught
a college UM. He was involved with computers when he
when he came to Canada and worked for the government
on computer programs UM and then when he came back
to the UK, he was a teacher and math teacher,

(28:07):
and then when he retired he helped my mom run
off fan club. So yeah, so were you addicted to
the radio. Your mother was listening, but we were listening
to Radio Luxembourg Radio Caroline. Absolutely, yes, I was. My

(28:27):
My father bought me a little transistor radio and he
had one of those little ear pieces. I used to
fall asleep listening to Pirate radio and I used to
go in and out of phase and it was a massive,
you know, thrill, and it felt like almost clandestine to
be there, you know, in your bed when you should

(28:47):
be asleep, but your yours. You've got your little transistor
tucked under the pillow, and you're listen. You're listening to
all this great music, you know. And what kind of
student were you? Um? Well, I I think I was.
I was very competitive. I I I wanted to be

(29:11):
top the class when I was young and then something
happened when I came back from Canada the second time,
I kind of lost interest in school and I started
to become a little bit of a disruptive person in

(29:34):
the class. And you know, I wasn't big and sporty
or anything, but for some reason, the kids used to
sort of look up to me, so if I did something,
they would also of like join in with me. I
feel terrible now we did some terrible things to the teachers. Um,

(29:54):
but yeah, I mean it just didn't hold hold my
own dress any more, you know, the work. And so
that's when music really took over. And that's something that
could get so excited about and could put like massive
amounts of energy and time into. And you know, I

(30:15):
studied classical piano lessons. I I got to grade eight,
which is the highest grade you you know, you get
in the UK. And then you know, I was four
hours a day practicing. You know. It was I don't
recommend it, but I just it was one of those
things I had to do. I just had to do it.

(30:36):
And what did your parents say, Well, they just encouraged me. Really.
I mean, although I was one of those kids that
kind of I don't know, almost like had a built
an agenda from the from a very young age. I mean,
we came back from Canada two highway come and you know,

(31:02):
I had no friends. I had to leave all all
everything I was had going there, you know. I just
joined the band, had a girlfriend, and it literally got
ripped away. And I came home and we didn't even
have a piano. And I said to my mom and dad,

(31:23):
I said, if you don't get me a piano, I
will die, you know. And I mean, and in a way,
I know that sounds very dramatic, but but actually it
was true. It was there was a part of me
that would that would wither away, you know. And bless them,
they the very next weekend they went to Oxford and

(31:46):
found this piano. I think it cost a hundred pounds
and they got a high purchase agreement on it and
it was delivered by monday, you know. And you know
it's a quite an old piano. But it did the
job for me, you know, and I'm always so grateful
for them for that, you know, because they did. They

(32:06):
really they really responded to my my despair. Okay, how
old were you when you went to Canada both times?
And what were your parents motivation to go to Canada
and come back. Um, well, I was nine when we
went first first of all, and I came back when
we were eleven, and then we uh, then we left

(32:33):
again when I was about twelve and a half to
go to Canada and came back when I was fourteen.
So the motivation was, you know, my father was he
was restless, and he wasn't happy doing the job he
was doing, and he saw Canada as a real chance
for something new, and he took the brave decision, you know,

(32:55):
to take the whole family. And I mean there was
four kids, m and he went out first, and then
we followed on the on the boat, you know, and
then of course he he felt the same. Then when
he got to Canada, he wasn't happy there, so he
come back, he wasn't happy again, and you know, we
went out again. So you know, at the time, I

(33:20):
suppose I I was angry with him because you know,
he was taking me away from all the things that
that I loved and then my friends. And but now
I think to myself, well, he's very made these bold decisions,
you know, to do monumental you know, disruption to the family.
But he did it, you know, and I I am,

(33:42):
I can't you know? It was it was it was
kind of the making of me in a way. I
had to be independent and not rely on um others
to keep myself in a good place. Okay, so you're

(34:03):
playing a band for a couple of dates Canada, you
come back. What's how do you get a girlfriend so fast?
And what's the next step in your musical career? Well?
So okay, So so I'm back in the UK. My
parents get me the piano and it's really then, um

(34:27):
that I start to you know, I get really into music,
and and people were trading albums at school, you know,
Vil of course, and bands like Broke oharam Um, you
know led Zeppelin and um, you know the Beatles and Stones,

(34:50):
and so I was, I was. I was always looking
at to go to shows and gigs and in high
Wick and there's a place where the high weakn Town
Hall where they had lots of bands playing. And there
was a place in Aylesbury Friars where even more exciting
bands used to play. So I'd be I'd be doing that.

(35:12):
And then I met an American guy who was at
the school I was in, and he played guitar, and
it was very keen to former band. And he had
a house that had a facility for us to be
able to room, for us to be able to you know,
to to to play. So I used to take a

(35:33):
long bus journey every Sunday down to his house and
we UM and I had a Honer pianet, which is
a kind of you know, a keyboard with pickups inside.
I used to put it through a vox a C
thirty am and I used to use a wid Wi
pedal with it and distortion and I could actually get

(35:55):
it to sound pretty much like a you know, highly
amplified guitar at some some sometimes. And so we had
just a whale of a time doing this music. I
was writing this ridiculously complicated music that lasted twenty minutes
and it took forever for the other members of the

(36:15):
band to learn. But bless them, you know, they did.
They kind of enjoyed it, and so I I was.
It was entirely instrumental um. And we played youth clubs
and we played local halls, and we actually played in

(36:37):
our school, and you know, it was like so exciting.
It's like the most exciting thing you could ever do.
How could I ever want to do anything else? You know,
it was it was just it was brilliant. Okay. So
do you read music? Yes, yeah, okay, you have lessons?

(36:59):
When you were playing four hours a day, were you
also taking lessons? Yes, yes, oh absolutely, yeah, yeah, okay,
and doing the exams, you know, the music exams. Yeah.
And at what point do you start to sing? Well,
you know, it wasn't until much later that I started
to sing because although although now that's really interesting you've

(37:26):
asked that, because with the band that the band warrior
Um evolved to get more sort of older musicians because
my friend, my American friend, left to go back to America,
and so there was a singer in the band, and

(37:47):
I knew a poet who wrote these very verbose poems
that basically were pros. They didn't have a rhyming meter
in them at all. But yet I set them to
music and it was so difficult, and I always think
that really helped me to develop my own style of

(38:10):
you know, setting words to music. So I would I
would write the vocal melodies for the singer in the
band and um, but never thought of myself as a singer.
You know, I'm a keyboard player. I'm I'm Keith Emison,
you know, that's that's who I want to be. UM.
And it wasn't mutually. I you know, went to music

(38:32):
college UM and did two and a half years studying
now you know, with a great piano teacher, and then
came home and there wasn't anybody around who could sing
my my stuff. So I thought, I'm going to have
to do this. I'm gonna have to sing. I'm just

(38:53):
gonna have to do it. I'm just gonna have to
bite the bullet. And I never thought of myself as
a singer. I thought, well, somebody's going to have to
do it, so it's it's going to be me. And
I think I carried that sort of insecurity about my
scene for a long time. I don't have that anymore.
I've got over it now. But in the early days,

(39:15):
I was like, oh, well, I have to do it
because now there's nobody else there. But I was kind
of glad that I did because it was a big
part of my my life. Okay, so the band with
the American was called Warrior. Yeah, okay, you leave after
two and a half years at music college because because

(39:39):
I I was desperate to get on and do my
own music. I mean, I didn't know how I was
going to do it, but I was. I was absolutely desperate.
I mean I played in bands while I was in
Manchester up at the college, and I did sessions on
the local radio, um playing others of you know, contemporary

(40:04):
music like you know Stevie Wonder and stuff, every twenty
minutes during the night from two a m. To six am.
I do a song every twenty minutes, UM. And it
was just it was a legal requirement that you had
a life life musician. Um so. But it was fantastic
for me because I got to experiment with recording. Because

(40:25):
I had a little recording studios. I used to bring
in synthesizers, sometimes used to bring in friends to do stuff,
and we used to I can't of you know we did.
I did the covers, but we also started to experiment
with my own music, and you know, I've got even more,
you know. And then also the brilliant thing was I've

(40:47):
forgotten about this is that I had access to their
music library where they had literally thousands of LPs and
I could go in there in between doing these little
numbers to go and listen to Billy Joel and listen
to surfs up, you know, and and discover music that
I couldn't afford to buy myself. And so it was,

(41:09):
it was, it was a really cool thing to do.
But I just got this thing, I'm never going to
be a classical musician. The place was full of these
genius musicians. Um, and that's not going to be me.
I want to I want to write my own music
and do my own thing. So I took the bowl step,

(41:30):
left college and I went back to live with my
parents and got the first job that anybody offered me,
which was working in a factory rolling surrand rap to
earn you know, to earn money. And yeah, okay, so
how long did you rolls ran rap and what were

(41:52):
you doing musically? Yeah? So I think I was there, Um,
I think I'm so for at least two years, two
and a half years. And so what I was doing
was was, you know, there was a local recording studio
forward track recordings too, so I was able to afford
to go in there late at night, you know, because

(42:15):
I was at work during the day. And I started
to write some songs and record them with a local
guy called Derek Tim's who was who was the engineer,
and you know sort of experimented with things. I mean,
I didn't quite know what to do. Finally, UM left

(42:40):
home to go and live with my my my then
girlfriend now my wife, Jan and we moved into a
bedsit in High Wycomb and you know, we scrimped and
saved until we could afford to get a mortgage on
a on a small, tiny little house in a quite

(43:02):
a rough area of town. And at that point I
had room to then think about how I wanted to do,
you know, my music. And I used to give piano
lessons after the after the you know factory, and I

(43:22):
was at one time I had sixty students, but hardly
well less than half of them came every week. Um,
but I had a room where I could start saying.
One of my students lent me a drum machine. It
was called a Bentley rhythm Ace. It's very primitive, like
one you'd have with a you know, electronic organ, and

(43:45):
I set some of the beats running. I started playing
the piano with it, and I thought, wow, this could
be this could be great. You know, you've got the
drummer there. With the drum machine, I can play along,
and so I thought, I can do like a sort
of electronic one man band. Here. I get some synthesizers,

(44:05):
use the drum machine, a little sequencer, UM, and maybe
nobody's ever done this before, you know, I thought, wow,
this is really exciting. Sorry, I went about doing that. UM.
I got a couple of since that I brought up
in Denmark Street. One for base, one for the lead lines.

(44:27):
There were mono since and then I had another keyboard
that you know, our pegge add stuff. Then had a
little twelve notes sequencer. So it was all very manual.
I had to set everything up before a gig. But
I started to get gigs. I would play anywhere, and
you know it's hard for any musician getting a gig

(44:48):
in it. So we would phone up pubs and say, look,
we'll set up the stage a little stays in the corner.
We'll bring lots of people, they'll drink loads of beer
and you'll, you know, you'll be really happy. And this
it wasn't like a regular club gig. I couldn't possibly
approach anybody in London. I wasn't. I wasn't. I wasn't
ready for that. UM, and we started to build quite

(45:10):
a following, you know, with people coming to those little shows. Um,
people started to start traveling with us. We arranged coaches
so they could come to gigs because gigs always wanted
you to bring your your own audience, you know, so people.
You know, we used to get sixty coaches filled with

(45:32):
people from high Wacker. We travel around the countries. I
think our record was three coaches for that when we
played the Marquis in London, so so and it was
It was great because it was such an organic development
of the of the sound, because I'd be working away
in my front room and then in the evening I'd

(45:55):
be out playing it to people, you know, brand new
stuff and developing concept of the electronic musician, you know,
playing live. Okay, it was all original material. When you
say we, who was we? Well, it was all It
was all original material. I never played anything. The only

(46:16):
cover I did was an in La game by O. M. D.
Which I loved so much. Um. Yeah, So when I
say we, you know, I had to be helped by friends.
So friends who did sound for me, um, friends who
helped me move the gear and then eventually Jed, who

(46:37):
was was the mine you know who I saw in
the audience. He was a friend who danced in the audience.
I thought he should be on stage with me. Let's
create characters two to go with the music. So that
so that, you know, we have something visual going on.
Because I'm a keyboard player, you know, I'm fairly static. Um,

(46:59):
we need some visual things. So jed was that we
got some TVs, uh, and a friend made some video
tapes that we could show on the TV. So we
had kind of an audio visual alternative, you know, cabaret

(47:19):
almost type type thing with it, with all this with
all this new electronic music, it was such fun. We
had such a great time doing it. And um, it
was like there was no fear, you know, he just
went out there and tried something new every night. It's
just great. I did love those times. I mean, I

(47:45):
know how hard it is to gain an audience. Who
is managing the audience, who is ordering the coaches, who
is spreading the word. Yeah, well my my, my, my
wife jan was was organizing the coaches. I didn't have

(48:06):
the confidence to phone up pubs and say, you know,
will you have me playing there? So I got my friends.
My friends do that. So I was I had this, Um,
you know, a great group of friends who who helped
me to do it. Yeah, I mean, and we kind
of did it together. And was there any money involved?

(48:28):
Oh no, no, now we uh we used to sell
cassettes that I used to make myself one by one
at home and just to pay for petrol and and
actually to you know, buy food. To be honest, we
were it was like, you know, so much with Jan

(48:50):
was working at the tax office. I was working in
the factory, so we weren't earning a lot of money,
and it was all going on funding the you know,
funding the music. I mean there was one and then
one of the jobs that we did was I did
I wanted to get out of the factory because I
needed more time to perhaps go up to London and

(49:11):
see a n R men or whatever that was. I
didn't even I didn't know anything about the music business
at zero. Um. So we were out one night, We're
doing this fruit and vege round and a drunk driver
hit the front of the van. The van rolled over
my wife Jan. She was trapped under the van. I
was inside the van and was unharmed, but Jan injured

(49:37):
her back. She was in hospital and with the money
that she got from the insurance of the of the
driver she wanted to give to me to buy since
and so I bought, you know, my first Jupiter eight.
And it was a big moment because we both could

(49:59):
have be and killed that night, and I thought, there's
nothing to lose here. You know, your life maybe over,
you know, um, in the next hour, the next day.
So just go for it, you know, go for what
you really want to do. Don't hold back, don't have
a plan b just go for it. And that really

(50:21):
did change and we things really started to move after
that because there was this new real commitment. You know,
there's no time to waste, let's get going. And it
wasn't very long after that. Well there was quite a story,
but um, you know I did. Things started to move

(50:43):
for me until what happened. Um, well, you know I
was I was sending out tapes to everyone and getting complete.
You know, we we still have all the rejection letters.
It's fun to eat them. Um. All of publishers, all
the labels big and small, just said no. Except one

(51:10):
one guy, um from Stiff Records, and his name was
Paul Conroy. He was the I think it was that
he was marketing there. But he came to see me.
I was playing The Nag's Head in high Wickham and
he brought Dave Robin Robinson, who was the m D.

(51:31):
Stiff was not a good fit for me really because
it was you know, Elvis Costello madness. You know, I
suppose you could say, you know, more hip, cool, cooler
acts than I was I was ever going to be.
And but Paul came came to the gig and there

(51:55):
was there was some sort of row on the way
home with hit with with him and Dave Robinson and
his wife. I think there was well, there was a
heated exchange and and Paul said, let me out of
the car. Now we missed out on Depeche Mode, We're

(52:16):
not missing out on this guy. So Paul's commitment was
just incredible. And so I was lined up to sign
to Stiff. So I was playing a gig in London
and I was going to be signing the contract after
the show, and so the contracts were there. This is like,

(52:39):
this is my big break. I'm actually going to sign
a record deal. And Paul comes in and he says,
don't sign it. Don't sign I said, what are you
talking about. I've been waiting my whole twenty eight. You know,
I'm already sort of past sell by date for a
young artists. He said, no, I'm I've just been offered

(53:00):
this job with w E A h with with Rob Dickens,
m D and Max Hole and A and I said,
I want you to come with me to w A.
What an amazing break to have, you know, And I'm
so grateful and they so I was there kind of

(53:22):
first signing, so they were absolutely determined that we were
going to have success together and we did, you know,
right from the first single. Okay, a little bit slower
you signed the deal? To what degree are the songs written?
How do you end up involved with another lyricist? You know,

(53:46):
did these songs just spontaneously happen or was there a
lot of input from Paul and other people? Now that well,
the songs we were there, you know from all my
ho of little gigs I was doing. So the first
album was really ready, you know, it was it was
it was what I was playing live. And we just

(54:09):
needed to find the right person for me to work with.
And I think it was Max Hole's idea for me
to work with Rupert Hind And what a brilliant move.
That was because Rupert was the perfect person for me
and absolutely wonderful man. And Steve Taylor, who I still
work with now. Um yeah, it was, yeah, it was,

(54:34):
it was, It was. It was so excited because I,
you know, the first single, it was a bit of
a struggle to record and um, you know it there
to get other people into sort of fix things. I'd
never been in a proper studio before, so I couldn't
really add much to it all a while said you know,

(54:56):
this is what I do, this is what it sounds
like live. Um. But anyway, it it came together in
the end, and it took forever to go up the charts.
I think it took three or three months to go.
Came in at number hundred and six. I think it
was actually you're you probably know more than me about this, Bob,

(55:18):
You're an expert at those sort of figures. But it
came in a bit disappointingly, you know, hundred and six,
and then crept up the charts every week. It's just
a few places, a few places, and at any point
they could have lost it and it would all have
been over. But it kept going, kept going, got top

(55:39):
of the pops, and that was it. The floodgates opened
and the single ended up at number three, you know,
and we kind of never looked back from there. Really. Okay,
when the record was finished in the studio, did you
think it was going to go up the chart? Um?

(56:03):
I had. I had no idea. I I liked to
think that it would. I had no confidence that it would.
But I remember um listen listening to Radio one and
they had this thing all round table where they reviewed
new singles, and it was going to be the first

(56:24):
playing of one of my songs on the radio. So
I was like kind of excited but also terrified. And
Gary Newman was on the panel, and and and and
Gary said, oh, I think it's great. I think it's
going to be a big hit. So it's like Gary

(56:47):
Newman is saying that, So so that was I hope
he's heard that story because I really want to thank
him for it, because it gave me a big boost
at the time. It was great. And how do you
end up working with lyricist Bill Bryant. Well, Bill was,
you know, a friend from from the old days, and

(57:11):
you know he is very committed to sort of you know,
philosophical ideas, which was very much in tune with me.
So he used to give me like, uh, you know,
sheets of paper with ideas, you know, not really sort

(57:33):
of formed poetry, and then I would we weave it
into a song. And so there was several tracks on
that first album that he had a big input with
with you know, with the lyrics. Yeah, and the single
was the whole album done when the single came out?

(57:53):
Or was the single released in moving up the charts
while you were still cutting the rest of Humans lib? Yeah? Yeah,
Well the new song was released, and because it took
so long to go up the chart, Um, it was
good in a way because we had a chance to
find the right producer for me, which was Ruper, you know,

(58:17):
with Steve Taylor doing the engineering. And so as it
was getting to do A three, I was in the
studio with Ruper and we were we were recording what
could be the next single, which is what Is Love?
And it was incredibly exciting because it felt like, you know,

(58:37):
what is Love was going to be you know, this time,
we wouldn't start at number hundred nine with we would
probably be getting airplay straight away. So it was really
exciting and I think the energy really um got poured
into the album and it was made really quickly. I
think it was six weeks it took to do it

(59:00):
completely and mixed and everything, and there was a lot. Yeah,
it was just excitement energy around it all and that
that gets embedded in the music, you know. And I
think it was again you know, for me, I've never
never recorded a record properly with anybody. So Rupert and
Steve were We're teaching me how to make records. And

(59:25):
it was a fantastic education. It was like, you know,
a university course in the studio. It was just amazing
watching them at work and the way they thought, and
the way about structure and about placing sounds, and you know,
it was and Rupert at this great way of making

(59:47):
everything fun. You know, it wasn't like a dreary. He
would never let me do more than four takes on
the vocal because he didn't want me to get forward
out of my mind. It would be four takes, that's it.
Comp those four and that's it. And that always worked. Um.
And you know, like very spontaneous performances, nothing labored um.

(01:00:13):
And you know, all this amazing experience that he had,
so I gained so much from that. Yeah. Well, my
favorite song on the album is Hide and Seek. Can
you tell me about writing and recording that? Yeah, I remember,
you know, in our little house in Green Street, coming

(01:00:34):
down one Sunday morning and having this idea for a
heartbeat rhythm, and I sort of programmed it into the
A to eight drum machine, you know, Dum dum, doom dum,
and this song just came. You know, it's it's that

(01:00:56):
doesn't happen to me very often, but this one, it's
sort of what came preformed. Um. And I I've been
reading a lot of um philosophical works about the you know,
the Eastern philosophy and Western philosophy coming together, and it

(01:01:22):
very much you know, the idea M Watson wasn't it.
I can't remember his first name. I think it was
an English philosopher who had gone to live in California. Alan, Sorry,
Alan Watts, that's right. And I was reading a lot
of reading a lot of that, and and he was
talking about how you would describe God to a child,

(01:01:46):
and he was saying, you know, um that you know,
telling a story of of of God deciding that he
would lose himself in everything, and so you you had
to find him. And the fact is that that or

(01:02:07):
he or she you know, you know, um, And so
that that that god entity was in everything and surrounding everything,
and that to me was very much linking Eastern philosophy
and Western philosophy at the same time. And you know,

(01:02:27):
I hope you find it and everything. It's the chorus
and so you know, that's very much about about that
theme that that you if you, if you look around you,
all the answers are there if you if you really
open your eyes to what's going on, Um, the answers
are right in front of you. And yeah, so that's

(01:02:48):
why this song came from. Really us. How did you
end up on an electurer in the US? And you
do have a relationship with Barb Kraus, now, yeah, yeah,
well it was it was to do with Bob. Bob
came over to London, and you know, because I could
have gone with any of the you know, the three

(01:03:09):
companies won his electric so I think that I think
they all wanted me, but Bob was the the guy
who you know, I mean, he really impressed me, and
he was so full of life and such a big character,
and he convinced me that they would do a great
job for me, and they did, they really did. Okay,

(01:03:33):
this you're considered part of the group of the English
New Wave, and certainly that coincided with the explosion of MTV,
which leads us to videos. At what point did videos
come into the picture? What was your experience there? Yeah, well,
videos for me were right right for the beginning because

(01:03:54):
new song, you know, we're starting this new era. Everyone
was doing a video and the new song video. I
wanted to be involved in the you know, in the
narrative of it because yeah, because you know, I'm very
involved in my in everything to do with my music,

(01:04:14):
I want to be very involved with the video. So
we thought we'd doing almost like autobiographical video of me
and Jed, you know, being in the factory. Um it
wasn't a surround rap factory. It was that, you know,
it was we found a pickle factory and we're bursting
out of the of the factory, jumping into a Rolls

(01:04:38):
Royce and driving off to you know, price sunny future.
But also we go into we go into a school
as well, and you know, you know, trying almost like um,
you know, cause anarchy in the in the classroom. Um,
sort of mild really, you know, taking you know, making

(01:05:03):
fun of the of the teachers and standing on the
desks and then you know, and then running out. You know,
we're running out of the school with the kids. So yeah,
so it was really good fun. It was such good
fun making videos. It was done in a day. It
didn't cost sadly anything. Um and you know that was

(01:05:23):
what you know, we thought, you know, we're making this
for MTV and and it was great. It was going
to be shown, you know. So um yeah, I'm so
glad that I've got the chance to work with visual
side of things, because you know, you have to think differently.
You have to think about what it looks like, you

(01:05:44):
have to think about clothing, you have to look think
about narrative and what you stand for, and it sort
of expands that are creative process. Really, I loved it. Okay,
what's it like suddenly being in the Maelstrom You go

(01:06:04):
from nowhere to having multiple huge hits. Yeah, well it was.
It was crazy. It was absolutely crazy. I don't think
anybody could be prepared for that unless you were brought
up in a celebrity family. I suppose you might understand
and then probably would put you off for life ever

(01:06:26):
doing the same thing. Um, it was just that I
couldn't go anywhere. When I tried to go into town,
I got chased by you know, thirty thirty teenagers. I
you know, I had to sort of hide away. I mean,
I was it was it was a shock because I

(01:06:49):
wasn't living in London. I was living outside. And you know,
I think in London you can you can, you can
be known and sort of walk around the streets and
find like you kind in New York or l A
or somewhere, but but not not in not in High Wycomb.
And it was it was a shock, but it was
incredibly exciting at the same time because you were doing

(01:07:13):
the things that you dreamt that you may be able
to do one at some time, being on a TV,
doing great gigs, doing big gigs, you know, meeting people
that you never met before that you'd put up on
a pedestal and you know, I mean just going to

(01:07:33):
Top of the Pops and seeing all the bands and
and and saying a load to that. I mean, it
was just it was fantastic. So that on one side
is things are never going to be the same because
overnight everyone knew who you were so you. And also,
you know, I was quite recognizable all the way I

(01:07:55):
looked and dressed, so I wasn't going to be able
to hide that very easily. So your freedom gets taken
away a bit in one way, but then a whole
new world opens up. Now. I was very lucky because
I had my friends around me at that time, you know,
a jan Um and people who did my sound and

(01:08:17):
people who did my lights. You know, they've grown up
with me. They'd seen me come from nothing, so I
had them to help me stay grounded as a person.
And you know those people, Most of those people ended
up doing Madison Square Garden with me, you know a

(01:08:38):
few years later, and I'm really proud of that and
that the same team was still still with me. And
I think they protected me from losing my mind, which
I think can happen. What about the temptations, Well, you

(01:08:58):
know I've got my jan you know, my my lovely jan.
So I I was not I was not on the
I was not looking for a relationship that really helped me.
I mean, I used to drink, but I used to
drink before I got famous. I you know, I have

(01:09:21):
a few pints down the Bann the pub not anything
of a problem. I'm not interested in drugs, so I
didn't really have that side of it. We didn't live
in a drugg area in the High Wyke Um particularly,
I wasn't in London and New York, so I think that, yeah,

(01:09:45):
I just didn't go that that way. And I think
because I was older, I got signed, So maybe I've
got a lot of that out of my system, you know,
before before before that struck. And when did you see
any money and what did you do with it? Well,

(01:10:10):
they said they told me that I recoup my advance
with the first single, so isn't that amazing? Um? And
also my manager, David Stops made sure that I owned

(01:10:30):
my own publishing right from the beginning. I was administered
by Warner Brothers, but it was owned by me. They
didn't own a share of it. And I'm eternally grateful
to him for that. You know, he knows that I've
told him so much because it's it's because I write

(01:10:52):
everything myself, so so it's it's it's really important that
you you've got something, through good times and bad that
can fund what you really want to do, you know,
with your with your career. So just fantastic. But that
and then you know, I could afford to make really
good videos with great video directors, you know, because the money,

(01:11:17):
you know, the money was coming in. Um and then
you know, yeah, so so I've kind of been very
very fortunate in that in that way. But I come
from a background where you know, we never had any money.
So I don't think that ever leaves you. You know,

(01:11:40):
you you always I want to be careful, you know,
want to be careful. Have you know, make sure that
if something, if something goes horribly wrong, that you've got
to be of a backup. You know that you because
I couldn't exactly go back to working in a factory
now you know, wouldn't It was not going to work,

(01:12:01):
so um, so make sure that you you know, take
you know, make sure that you have got back up.
Do you still own your publishing? Yes? I do. Yeah.
Would you ever sell it? That's a really good question
because I've thought about it quite a lot, because I

(01:12:25):
get why people towards the end of their career, end
of their life consider it because they don't want to
land their kids with a massive problem or you know,
of administering you know, your your legacy it's not you know,
it's not theirs, it's it's yours. You're handing them a

(01:12:48):
bit of a problem. And I think that a lot
of my you know, I've had this conversation with a
lot of my contemporaries about, you know, why they would
consider doing it, and I think, you know, in the
next few years, I will, I will think about it, um,

(01:13:10):
but it would. The reason for that is to make
it simple for my my kids. And how are revenues
from publishing these days? Yeah? Well, that that good because
I still get played on the radio pretty much as

(01:13:30):
much as I've always been forgetting savings. Can you just
live off the income of your songs? Yes, yes, that's fantastic,
comfortably do that. Yeah. Okay, so you have this huge
success on the first album, How inhibited are you about

(01:13:53):
going in and making a second record? Are the songs
already written? You have to write on what? Well? I
was absolutely terrified about writing the second album because I
had the songs the first one, I had nothing for
the second one, and and I was working literally every
day in some capacity, promoting in the studio, doing TVs,

(01:14:19):
and it even included like being going to children's hospitals
and on Christmas Day, you know, to it was literally
every day. So where how the hell am I going
to write? And you I was terrified because it taken
me so long to get to the point where I
had a record deal and I had some success. I

(01:14:42):
didn't want to blow it. You know, it's like, oh,
you know, I was. I was scared. So I thought, well,
I'm going to have to write on the road. I'm
going to you know, in those times between the sound
check and when you go on stage. I'm going to
have to be writing wherever that is. So I got

(01:15:03):
this twelve track recorder that I could that my road
is set up for me in in every in every
dressing room, and I would write, you know, in the
afternoon after sound check, and gradually got together some songs.
And it was interesting because because you're on the road,

(01:15:27):
it's all very exciting, and you're playing to these massive
audiences and they're loving it, you know, so it's wonderful feeling,
and so you can draw on that energy and put
that into the music because often, you know, I found
sometimes in the past when you're when you're writing a

(01:15:49):
new records, you're at home, adrenaline is not flowing you
can be quite introspective and the music won't really be
really event to going out there, you know, being extravert.
So writing on the road, although it was very hard
to do because you have to be disciplined about it. Um,

(01:16:11):
it was. It was really grabbing some energy from those
from those gigs in the evening, you know. It was
really amazing. And then I used to make cassettes and
then going on a tour bus and play it to
the band and say what do you think you know,
and like to try out in front of my uh
my band. So yeah, I managed to do it somehow,

(01:16:33):
and you know, despite all those all those difficulties and it, um,
you know, it turned out okay. So you do the
second record also successful. How do you end up leaving
uh Rupert and end up going with a Reef? Yeah? Well,

(01:16:58):
you know, I mean I were going to be completely
honest about this because you know, looking back, I thought
for a start, I should have should have had a
conversation with Rupert and Steve about this because we'd had
just massive success with this, you know, with the with

(01:17:22):
the first two albums, and why would you want to
go you know, we we'd loved each other, you know,
we had a great time making the records. Why would
you want to go with another producer? But I suppose
for me it was like the record company had suggested

(01:17:43):
are Iff and he had just worked with Skritty Polity,
who one of one of my absolute favorite bands of
that era. I just absolutely loved what what they did,
and I loved what, you know, the the unbelievable legend
you know that Aeric Mardin was and his was um

(01:18:09):
you know, had brought to their music. You know, it's
like I'm from that, I'm from that place. So it
was so tempting to to to to get have a
new experience, you know, and I'm a young man. I
want to learn as much as I can from people,
and so I got really really excited about that, and

(01:18:34):
it was it was great working with Eric and he
was wonderful. And my only tinge of regret was that
I didn't give him more control of the help because
I just must be I must be control free. Really,
I just want to you know, it's just working with

(01:18:57):
this man who's like got a lifetime of experience of
making some of the greatest records ever made. Make sure
that you give that person a chance to do his thing,
you know, and I I think I could have done
that more. But there we are. You know, you're a
young person. What you do benefit of hindsight? And did

(01:19:20):
it kill your relationship with Rupert? Oh? No, absolutely not, no,
absolutely not. We we we we stayed absolute lifelong friends.
I mean I was. I was with him two days
before he passed away, you know, when he was on
his on his deathbed and I was there and I

(01:19:44):
was talking with him. Well he couldn't really hear me
by then. But um, all through my life, Rupert has
been there and he's been a supporter of mine. He's
been executive producer, he's been year leader, and he's always
been he was always it was always there for me.

(01:20:06):
It didn't affect it at all. And what one incredible man. Okay,
so no one is to blame. Is on the second
album with Rupert, but the hid version is with Phil Collins.
How did that come together? Yeah? Well, the original version

(01:20:27):
on Dreaming to Action and it's quite stark, you know,
It's got these really brutal drums, a bit of piano,
and it's it's stark and I love it. I but
I did think that the song, you know, I'm I'm

(01:20:50):
I'm a radio guy. You know, as I was telling
you from the beginning, lots of bands didn't want to
be on the radio. I did the radio. You can
listen to the radio anywhere. I mean, it's what I
grew up with, you know. So I thought, we I'm
sure we can do a version that could be played
on the radio. And so we tried. We tried at

(01:21:12):
the farm yard, you know, you know, we gave it
another go and it didn't quite work out, and so
I kept going with the idea. You know. It was
instigated by me um and I think I even played
it to Bob Krasnow in his office once and I said,

(01:21:33):
you know, because they he still had a piano in
his in his in his office and I played in
the song as I really think this could work at radio,
and he said no, no, he said, you know, it's
a it's a B side. Man. Um. I kept still
kept believing in it. So I got to know Phil
through doing Princess Trust things and charity stuff. Really got

(01:21:56):
on well with him. We had a great time together.
And so David approached him and I think the record
company as well, to see if he would be up
for it, and he loved the song, recognized what he
could do with it, and we did it in two weekends.
You know, I brought Afro Dizziac, my backing singers down

(01:22:20):
to seeing I programmed up at two bar pattern for
him to play drums too. I persuaded him to sing
on it, um and it was just fun. It was
really fun making it, you know, because it was so quick.
It's just the piano part was done in one take.
Um and yeah, it just just came together. It was brilliant,

(01:22:44):
and you know, Radio really really liked it, so I
did get I mean, the only thing I'd say is
that as big as it as it was not, people
don't know that it's me because it was quite different
to everything else I've done. So but you know that's

(01:23:08):
my job now is to connect that those two things together.
What did Grass now say when you came back with
the finished product, Well, you know, he's he's he was
very he was very pleased. He was very pleased. I
don't you know, yeah, oh yeah, I guess you were right.
So then you end up producing yourself. M Is that

(01:23:30):
because you're a control For you to say now I
want to be in control, Well, you know it was.
It was to do with you know, I built a
studio at home. I've got young children now, so I
didn't wanted to be at home more. You know, we
used to take the kids when we when they were
very little, on the road, but I wanted to be around.

(01:23:52):
So I had studio and I had all the time
in the world to, you know, to work on stuff.
So yeah, so I felt confident that I could do that.
I'm not sure if that was a bit misplaced. I
think it's always good too to have someone else giving

(01:24:12):
you another opinion and guiding you through. I think that's good.
So I didn't really have that, so but you know,
still did, okay, I think. So how did it end
with you in the major label? Yeah? Well, yeah, I

(01:24:34):
mean there was a five album deal come to the
end of it, and I was kind of hopeful that
they would want to continue with me because I absolutely
felt that I tons more to to give, and no
they didn't. They didn't want to, So I mean, in

(01:24:56):
a way, it was you know, I was devastated at
the time. I thought, this is the end. I'm finished.
I won't ever make a record again. I will now
drift into obscurity. And nobody will ever want to know
about me again. I was very I was really depressed
actually because it is what I I wanted to continue

(01:25:17):
and I love the people that I was working with.
It's not like I had a bad time with the label.
These are people I really liked, and I know a
lot of artists don't have that situation. But I had
a great time. They were great for me, to me
and for me. Um. But it was good because six

(01:25:37):
weeks of depressure and I thought, hang on a minute,
this is the best thing has ever happened to me.
I can now become an independent artist because the tools
were starting to become available to us. The internet was developing.
You could contact people yourself. Um, I booked a tour,
I made an album really quickly, got it out, made artwork. Boom.

(01:26:00):
You know, I was off and it was a whole
new adventure where you could be I say, in control,
because you're never really in control of everything, but you
can lead the direction of your career in your life.
What about the lack of reallyal success and reached that
a major label can give you? Yeah, yeah, that's right.

(01:26:24):
Well I knew that. I had to say, you know,
I wouldn't have that, UM, And it was a new era.
You know, I was now in dialogue with my fans,
and it was it was really about you know, really
looking after them, UM, new new albums, new material, you know,

(01:26:45):
great touring, UM. And it was about and I think,
you know, there really is a place for that. I think,
you know, when you're starting your career, it's really absolutely
brilliant to have a major label firing on all cylinders
for you. But then when you you know, when you
want to really sort of follow your own course and
not be in that game anymore, it's great to be

(01:27:09):
independent and really sort of think about that relationship with
the fans. As you're growing up and getting older, they
will be to what's going to be relevant to them.
You're not going to be writing pop songs for you know,
for pop radio now you're you're you're going to be

(01:27:29):
writing songs for people who are having kids and going
through breakups and struggling with you know, with money and
stuff and and and problems and that everything that comes
with growing older. So that's not really material for you know,

(01:27:50):
for young people and stuff. So it really fitted for me, UM.
And I've been you know, I've been. I've been. I've
been really happy to Uh how did you end up
in the restaurant business, Well, you know, I've been. I've
been a vegetarian since I was twenty one, so that

(01:28:12):
was that's a big thing for me. Um, there's never
anywhere to eat. So David, my manager, David Stuffs, and
I decided that we would open a restaurant and crazy
mad idea, I mean, and in New York as well,
where we don't live, you know. Um. So we had

(01:28:37):
this idea that we would get amazing chefs, the menu
would be so exciting that it didn't matter if you're
a vegetarian or not. You would love the food. And
there's a bar there, there's a jukebox, it's great art
on the walls and all those things. We did, you know,
and it and it, and when it worked, we had

(01:28:59):
fantastic people coming down. Lou Read, Madonna, Michael J. Fox,
the British bands were coming over from the UK to
play in New York would come down and we fulfilled
all all that stuff. But we we we did lose
a lot of money. Um, and the place almost burnt

(01:29:20):
down to the ground as well. So I think it
was two and a half years. It lasted and and
we had to finally close. But I like to think
that it helped the cause of more vegetarian places or
vegetarian food being available, you know, after that, and that

(01:29:42):
we sort of maybe helped us to push that idea
forward with people that it could work, you know, and
it could be great, fantastic, yummy food. Yeah. So yeah,
I don't regret it, um, even though it probably would

(01:30:03):
have been a better idea to buy an apartment in
New York. Okay, have you consistently It's hard to tell
from the outside, have you consistently played music, made music,
gone on the road or once we hit the nineties
and the turn of the century, where's were there a

(01:30:25):
few years or when you stepped away and said, lean,
I'm gonna do something different. Now get perspective. Mm Um,
there was There was definitely a time, um, and I
think you're right, you know, during the early nineties where
I just felt nobody really wanted to know at all
about me and my music, and probably some of my

(01:30:49):
contemporaries as well would be in the same position, um.
And the eighties were so poorly regarded in high fluting
so or as as a you know, it's not a
particularly great decade of music, but which obviously I I
disagreed with, but it was the sort of common feeling

(01:31:14):
UM and you know, it was it was a time
of reassessing everything and I thought, you know, I didn't
do so many shows. I you know, nobody wanted to
put you on, and you know, yeah, it was, it was,
it was. It was a bump in the road absolutely, UM.

(01:31:39):
So that I think he was to you know, go
back to my roots, which I went. My roots were electronic,
you know, generated music, and so we did this crazy
UM tour where we played the sort of almost like

(01:32:00):
big pubs around the UK, and we did it all electronically.
It was different every night. We had lots of UM
sampling going on, and that Robbie was out on the
mixing desk is actually in the band now, but he
was out on the mixing desk doing all kinds of

(01:32:22):
sound manipulation and so a lot of experimentation was going
on and we used to record it and make c
d s on the premises that night to sell to
the people. So they actually got CD that with artwork
generated from the gig before they left the venue. We

(01:32:45):
couldn't always fulfill all the orders, so we had to
send them on. But we may be one of the
first people to do that because we were doing it
with like conventional CD burners. We weren't doing it with
industrial levels stuff, you know. Um, And so it was
just thinking, you know then, and really that's the roots

(01:33:07):
of where I've got back to today, was that, Um,
we just kept incrementally making things better and developing a
kind of hybrid between electronic music and great playing. And
I think that's where, you know, where we've got to now.

(01:33:27):
But it was it's sort of reinventing all that stuff. So, yeah,
it was it was it was a it was a
you know not it was a weird time for us
during the the nineties, but you know, it gradually started
to come good. You speak about the denigration of the Elias.

(01:33:55):
Although I'm a big fan, you've gotten a good number
of negative reviews. Now, that was a different era where
people now it doesn't even apply guys, you know, without
a date and skinny jeans judging everything. But how did
but how did you handle that? Oh? I didn't handle

(01:34:17):
it very well. At first. I realized I mustn't read
it because it was poisoning me, you know, because I
had so much abuse. Really it was um. You know,
the bit that hurt most was that I was manufactured
pop star and it couldn't have been further from the truth.

(01:34:41):
You know. It was a totally grassroots lead thing. You know.
I I started playing in the most humblest places and
build a following um that wanted to follow me around
around the country. And I was doing something that nobody
had done before. Yeah, and uh so it was hurtful.

(01:35:04):
Rolling Stone said, Howard Jones doesn't need to turn up
to his shows, just sends the gear and his roadie
presses the button. You know. The the level of kind
of ignorance about what we were doing was like gross.
But and then there was this whole thing about anything
that was involving synthesizers was had no soul and it

(01:35:27):
was soul less music. Um, it was mechanical. And you know,
as I absolutely fight that I had, the Musicians Union
wanted to get rid of me, um, to ban me
from being in the Musicians Union because they said I
was taking work away from musicians. It was like every

(01:35:49):
front you're being attacked. And then at the same time,
the fans and people who loved the music were just
you know, loving it. And I used to get really
annoyed that people would right off the eighties as a
you know, uh, as a as a terrible decade for music.

(01:36:10):
But I used to say, well, hang on a minute,
aren't you writing off a whole generation of people at
the same time. It's like that actually loved that music.
Of course, you know, things have changed now and I think,
you know, it has become recognized as as yeah, great,
it's a great exciting time for for music and very

(01:36:33):
diverse as well, and so that's great, But but you know,
we did have to go through that period of yeah,
bumps in the road. Yeah, there's it's part of life
in it. So how did you meet Jeanne and what
made it sustain? Okay, so, jan we've been together for

(01:36:56):
I don't know, fourty five years or something like that.
I was best friends with her brother and he was
the one who enabled me to go to the Isle
of Wight Festival in always be grateful to him for that.
My parents wouldn't wouldn't have let me go unless he

(01:37:19):
had been there. So his young sister, jan Um I
got to meet through him, and she wanted to have
piano lessons, and so I taught her to play the
piano and she actually got to grade five, which is
you know, she's quite good really, and um, so obviously

(01:37:44):
we weren't going out or anything at that time. But
then I went to music college, came back, she went
to college, and then we we met up and that
was it. We we we moved out into our own
bedsit places, one room room and built our lives you know,

(01:38:06):
from there, from nothing. Really it was it's a great
I'm very proud of it. Really, you know, we literally
had nothing and we just at a great time. You know. Um,
we we've always had each other as support. And you know,

(01:38:27):
I'm I am an artist, and I am subject to
the you know, the you know, the criticisms and the
and the ups and downs that you get when you
stick your head above the parapet and you say, oh,
listen to my music, you know, and obviously there's going
to be people that I don't like you doing that.

(01:38:48):
And and so having somebody like jan who always grounds
me and reminds me of what's real has been like
it's been the joy of my life. You know, whatever
may be going on around I that the real joy
has become has come from our our relationship. Okay, you

(01:39:14):
also played Live Aid, which was such a big deal
at the time, but it has become absolutely legendary, iconic
on the level of the original Woodstock. How did you
end up being on the show and what was your experience. Well,
I missed out on being on the single do they

(01:39:34):
know It's Christmas? Feed the World? And I really felt
that I should have been part of that. I sort
of raise my hand and said, I need to be
on this. I really want to be on this. It's
such a great thing. I missed out. So when I
heard about Live Aid, I said to David, you know,

(01:39:55):
we have to get in touch with Geldof and let's
say that I will do anything to be part of
this because it is such a great thing to be doing.
You know, I'm going to save lives with this. It's
gonna it's gonna be brilliant, and I want to be
part of it. I want to throw my weight behind it.

(01:40:15):
And Geldof, you know, it's very pragmatic, he said, you know,
you you you you've to be on it. You've had
to sell a million albums in the last six months,
and I at that time in my career. That's that was. Yes,
so we we we had shows on the on the
west coast of the of the U S. I flew

(01:40:37):
back to London with Afro dizzyact, my three backing singers,
and yeah, it was, it was. It was just such.
I met, I met Diana Um, I met David Bowie.
I hung out with McCartney and Linda McCartney. Linda took
a picture of me and Paul. I got to do

(01:40:58):
Hide and Seek, my favorite on. I mean, there's so
many things that happened to me that day. It was.
It was. I can remember all of them, and it
was just brilliant. Flying in the helicopter, a copter with
members the Queen Um, David Bowie, knowing who I was

(01:41:19):
and knowing that I was doing pretty well in America,
performing outside a cappella with with the girls appetusiac Um
to two people, one of them was towns End and
one of them was David Bowie. I mean, all these

(01:41:39):
stories that I these people that I thought I would
never meet. I mean, who was the first band I
ever saw when I um in Canada going to a
proper concert and you know, having towns End standing in
front of you listening to your music. Was that's it's

(01:42:01):
just great? I don't know it was it was I felt.
I feel really privileged that I was a part of it.
And with regard to feed the world, do they know
it's Christmas? I invited Midsyear to tour with us this
summer and we were trying to work out what song
we should do together, and I said, can we do

(01:42:23):
you know, feed the World? Because he hardly ever does it?
You know, he wrote that with with Geldorf, of course,
and so I got to do it. I got to
sing all the parts I I. You know, if you
wait long enough, all your dreams have come true. Right. Well,
I hope that's true. One of my dreams will be
able to talk to people like you bridge that gap.

(01:42:45):
How did I want to thank you so much for
taking the time to talk to me, Well, thank you,
Bob the legend that you are for for doing this
interview with me. I really really appreciate it. And it's
a love to do an in depth thing like this.
I've really enjoyed your your podcast with Darryl Hall. I

(01:43:06):
learned so much from that. I learned so much. It's
so it was very inspiring, so thank you for having
me absolutely until next time. This is Bob left, set

(01:43:39):
H