**** EMI NEVER FOR EVER INTERVIEW PART IB *******

[rhill@netrun.cts.com (ronald hill)]

        I: One track which has achieved success as a single is 
"Babooshka" which is the lead track on this album and when I first saw 
that you had done a song on that title I imagined it was about a Russian 
grandmother.  Where had you heard that term? 
        K: Well, it was very strange, because as I was writing this song 
the name just came and I couldn't' think where I'd got it from and I 
presumed it was from a Russian fairytale - it sounded like the name of a 
princess or something and it was so perfect for the music, it had all the 
right syllables and the right feel, so I kept it in.  Many strange 
coincidences happened after that - where I'd turn on the television and 
there would be Donald Swann singing about Babushka.  So I realized that 
there was actually someone called this and I managed to find in the Radio 
Times a little precis of a program that was on called Babushka.  It was 
an opera that someone had written and Babushka was apparently the lady 
that the three kings went to see because the star stopped over her house. 
 They presumed that the Lord was in there, and when he wasn't they went 
on their way.  She wanted to go with them to find Jesus and they wouldn't 
let her come so she spent the rest of her life looking for him.  I don't 
really know where it came from but it worked. 
        I: It's a very lovely story and once could write another song 
about that, I suppose. 
        K: Yes, maybe. 
        I: But the one you've written about is another tale of romance, 
successful and failed and a very touching one about a man who is tired a 
bit of his wife but when she dresses up in what we might call new clothes 
he falls for her all over again.  Now someone might say that this is a 
very novel way of looking at love.  Do you think of yourself as a writer 
of love songs? 
        K: I don't know.  I suppose I would say that I have written some 
love songs but I wouldn't term that as one.  Really I'm very annoyed at 
the way that the woman is behaving in this song because it is so stupid 
and in fact she's just ruining the whole situation which was very lovely 
- and it's only because of what's going on in her brain that she does 
these things so - suspicion, paranoia all these naughty energies again 
and it's really quite sad I think. 
        I: Has a great effort gone into the sound of this album, not just 
the music but the sound?
        K: Yes.  I thinks sounds are so important because that is what 
music is - it is the sound of the music - and the way sounds mix and move 
together is incredible.  IT is again so similar to colours and to have a 
pure colour and pure sounds are very similar things.  In many ways I 
think we saw a lot of the sounds a visual things - this is the way I 
often interpret music, I see it visually, and so in many ways you'd 
interpret a mountain in the picture into a very pure guitar sound or 
whatever.  I think everyone was very aware of sounds and the animation of 
it and how a certain sound could imply so much more at one piece in the 
song.
        I: You are the co-producer of this album with Jon Kelly.  I 
suppose this then was you job in that regard, the direction of the sound? 

        K: Yes.  The whole thing was so exciting for me, to actually have 
control of my baby for the first time.  Something that I have been 
working for and was very nervous of too, obviously, because when you go 
in for the first time you really wonder if you are capable - you hope you 
are.  Everytime that we tried something and it worked it just made you 
feel so much braver.  Of course it doesn't always work, but everyone 
helping and concentrating on the music, it's such a beautiful thing, it 
really is a wonderful experience - everyone's feelings going into the 
songs that you wrote perhaps in a little room somewhere in London, you 
know, it's all coming out on the tape. 
        I: From "Babooshka" we mix literally quite nicely into "Delius 
(Song of Summer)" and this is the one which contains references I must 
confess I don't understand.  I don't know who Delius was or for that 
matter what Fenby is? 
        K: Delius was an incredible classical composer, an English one, 
he was from Bradford, I think and he was Fred, Frederick Delius.  He was 
a wonderful composer and he in fact got neurosyphilis, which completely 
ruined his body; he became totally paralysed and he could no longer play 
the piano or write his music.  I don't know whether he was a very bad 
tempered man before, but during his illness he became bad tempered.  From 
that time on he lived his life in a wheelchair and he needed someone to 
write his music for him.  For years he kept getting young writers coming 
along who'd meet him and sit down and try to transcribe his writing, but 
he had no voice.  He couldn't sing.  He had no pitch in his voice, no 
real sense of timing.  He would sit there and just grunt like going 
aargh, aargh, and the writer would just not know where to start.  He 
didn't know what key it was in, the time signature, what notes the guy 
was ginging.  And Delius would not tell him, he'd just say write it down. 
 All these guys ran away, they could take it, it was too much.  One day a 
gentleman called Eric Fenby (who is in the song) turned up.  He tried to 
get through this barrier until eventually he could understand everything 
Delius was saying.  Fenby stayed with him until his death and he wrote 
all his music out for him.  Through Fenby, Delius' music came alive 
again.  It was such a beautiful concept - this man whose body was almost 
completely useless and yet inside him all this life and colour and 
freedom.  It was only through Mr. Fenby that it could come out.  It's 
such a beautiful story, he really need a song. 
        I: The song after that, "Blow Away", is also about musicians, 
this in a different way - It's about a member of you band, perhaps 
fictitious, perhaps real life, who wonders where the music goes when he 
goes.  Is there such a person who mentioned that thought to you. 
        K: No, there isn't such a person who actually said it, but I'm 
sure I know so many people that think that.  I myself do feel that 
sometimes and it just seemed for someone in my band fictionally to open 
up to me, made it a much more vulnerable statement.  It was really 
brought on by something - I think it was The Observer.  THey did an 
article on all these people who when they'd had cardiac arrests had left 
their bodies and travelled down a corridor into a room at the end.  In 
the room were all their dead friends that they'd known very well and they 
were really happy and delighted.  Then they'd tell the person that they 
had to leave and they'd go down the corridor and drop back into their 
body.  So many people have experienced this that there does seem to be 
some line in it, maybe.  It's some kind of defense hysteria, I don't 
know, but they felt no fear and in fact they really enjoyed it.  Most of 
them have no fear of dying at all.  And I thought that a nice idea, what 
a comfort it was for musicians that worry about their music; (knowing) 
that they're going to go up into that room and in there there's going to 
be Jimmy Hendrix, Buddy Holly, Lennie Reperton, all of them just having a 
great big jam in the sky, and all the musicians will join in with it. 
        I: And so Bill, who was mentioned in the title, Bill is the 
fictitious member of the band? 
        K: No.  Bill is Bill Duffield, the gentleman who died on our tour 
and in so many ways he made me want to write the song right from the 
beginning.  It was such a tragedy and he was such a beautiful person that 
it only seemed right that there should be something on the next album for 
him. 
        I: He was one of the technical directors, wasn't he? 
        K: He was the lighting man, yes, and he was absolutely wonderful. 
 IT was really tragic that it should have happened and so unnecessary, 
too.  We did the benefit concert for the relatives of Bill which we hope 
helped a little - but it's such a helpless situation. 
        I: One of the artist I believe who helped you on this concert was 
Peter Gabriel, am I right? 
        K: Yes, absolutely. 
        I: And there is a credit on here for him - thanks to Peter 
Gabriel for opening the windows.  What do you mean by that? 
        K: Well, he sort of opened the windows and let some light in for 
me.  He was a very important person for me to meet because I think we've 
worked on some quite interesting things since and if we hadn't met at 
that concert I'm sure we wouldn't have got together.  I hope that in the 
future we will continue to do occasional work - I would very much like 
that because I can really relate to him as a musician and it's so good to 
work with other people.  I really enjoy it.  It's a different 
responsibility and the feedback you get from the other person, it's like 
when you work with a dancer, it's just so wonderful, that feedback of 
people bouncing ideas back and forth. 
        I: And from his wonderful album you appeared on the single "Games 
Without Frontiers", am I right? 
        K: Yes.  That was fabulous to do - I was really thrilled that he 
asked me.  It's great - it's one of the few sessions I've done and it's 
such a buzz, it's really wonderful. 
        I: Do you get asked or do you just not do ones you're asked to 
do? 
        K: I've not been asked that much and I do feel that it's quite 
important who I choose.  But so far all the people have been so exiting 
that I've taken up. 
        I: That is a great opportunity, to have someone like Peter 
Gabriel ask you to help him, because  he is one of the best right now. 

[end of Part I]
s

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rhill@netrun.cts.com (ronald hill)
NetRunner's Paradise BBS, San Diego CA