It's hard to imagine, but 2004 will hail MARC ALMOND'S 25th anniversary in the music business and it's been a remarkable career to date. There's been pop stardom with Soft Cell, theatrical cultdom with Marc & The Mambas and collaborations with artists as diverse as PJ Proby, Jim Foetus, Kelli Ali and Gene Pitney along the way, not to mention an album of covers of Jacques Brel songs and a further record of French 'Chanson' tunes. Yet, in terms of scope, even these are usurped by Marc's new project: "Heart On Snow", an album of traditional Russian torch songs, where Almond collaborates with artists as diverse as 96-year old Alla Bayanova and the St.Petersburg Higher Naval Engineering Choir.
Naturally, W&H are excited to find out more about this remarkable musical journey, which took Marc and musical director Misha Kucherenko over two years to complete, but firstly we have a more personal question to put to the man himself, seeing as how your correspondent first met Mr.Almond in rather unusual circumstances some years before.....
Marc, hello, it's great to speak to you. This may seem slightly bizarre, but we first met back in the mists of the 1980s when you were back in Southport. I sold you a deep fat fryer when I was working in Boots there...
"Oh, you're joking!" laughs Marc. "Did you really! That's fantastic! What a small world."
"I only rarely go back to Southport these days...mostly for Christmas to see family and so on. Oh that's really funny. Fancy that."
Yes, it's strange how life brings about such chance meetings. Indeed, in another interesting co-incidence, I've just been reviewing Parisian singer Caroline Nin's recent album "Scarlet Stories," for which you provided here with the song "The One & Only You."
"Yes, right. I wrote it a while ago and was quite surprised she'd done it," replies Marc.
"I initially wrote the song and was doing it a capella myself in my live show," he continues.
"Anyway, a friend of mine had Caroline doing a performance at a club/ theatre of his and I was really impressed. I thought "The One & Only You" would fit nicely into the kind of show she was doing."
"Actually, it's only recently I realised she'd released her album "Scarlet Stories" when I got an e-mail from her and I was made up she'd recorded the song. It's lovely when someone covers one of my songs, but Caroline's such a nice girl and she's got an amazing voice. I feel the song stands out on her album too."
Fantastic. But I'm diverting you as we're really here to talk about your new album "Heart On Snow", which is an incredible project. I believe the kernel of the idea actually dates back to 1992 when you toured Russia extensively for the first time?
"Yes, I did an acoustic tour of Russia in 1992," reveals Marc.
"I was taken over there by the British Counsel and I played in and around Russia, Siberia and the Baltic States. It was still very new territory at the time."
"I can't say it was a pleasurable experience really," Marc says, laughing at the memory, "in that I was playing in places where things weren't working, no lights and sound problems and so on, but it was different."
"The thing was, though, that I got handed lots of tapes by fans who came up to me and they were saying "you'l really like this...it's such and such a Russian folk singer" and I got interested when I listened to them."
"So gradually, I got to thinking it would be an interesting to find out what these songs are about and actually formulate a project - maybe just a limited edition for Russian fans - to record some of these songs myself."
"Then, about three years ago, I got introduced to Misha Kucherenko, a Russian executive producer," Marc continues. "He suggested he'd be interested in financing an album of Russian romance songs.."
Romance songs?
"Yeah, I suppose you'd loosely translate that as 'torch songs' of a kind," Marc explains.
"Kind of like a Russian equivalent of French Chanson-type songs. It sounded really daunting at first, but it was something I didn't want to miss out on at the same time too."
"So yeah, I couldn't resist taking it on...and two years later I was still working on it!" finishes Marc, laughing heartily.
I think it's admirable in itself that you'd have the discipline to spend that long on a project anyway...
"Well, I had and have a real fascination for Russia," replies Marc.
"I mean, I think we still feel it's a mysterious place in the west. Despite Perestroika and so on, we still think of it as this impenetrable place behind the Iron Curtain even now. We still don't know much about it apart from the usual cliches like gangsters, Cossacks, vodka and all that."
"So yeah, it was a fascinating personal journey for me, to find out about all these old songs and traditions," he continues, warming to the theme.
"I mean, I'm fascinated with the military history as well, the whole culture is amazing. It's been a very fulfilling time."
Am I right in thinking you recorded the album mostly in St.Petersburg?
"Yes, well partly anyway. We also did some of the record in Moscow. Later on we worked in this State studio in Moscow which was good," corrects Marc.
Of course the album commences - and closes in reprise form - with a superb track called "So Long The Path (So Wide The Field)" which finds you collaborating with the St.Petersburg Higher Naval Engineering Choir. That in itself is something else, but how did this work? Were you actually with them when they laid their parts down?
"I went along for rehearsals with them, " replies Marc. "This was the beginning of the album and I was in St.Petersburg. My involvement with them came about because of this artist and musician called Sergei Afrika, who is totally respected in Russia and he knows everyone. He's connected with everyone."
"So, basically he rang me one day saying he could introduce me to the choir for a collaboration. He said they were this stirring military choir and he could get them to work with me."
"The night I met them was very strange," Marc continues.
"I went along to this military base in St.Petersburg on this freezing winter night. I walked in and the choirmaster was directing them. Then I walk in and they all stare at me...like "What the hell? who is this western person!" I'm like a space alien walking in."
So was it a bit of a fraught collaboration?
"Well, it was a bit strange certainly," Marc says. "The track they've done is a very traditional Russian military song about going to war and the lyrics I wrote over the top complement that in that they're lyrics about coming home...maybe from the war. And it worked well. We filmed a video for it at the military academy. Fascinating thing to do, but they're deadly serious about it. One thing you find about the Russian people is that they are generally very serious about things."
Yes. I'd love to go to Russia, but despite travelling round parts of Eastern Europe haven't yet. Is it still a daunting place to visit?
"Yeah, it's still a difficult place to go to, though St.Petersburg is much more tourist-oriented," notes Marc.
"I mean, you atill need visas to visit and there are places still forbidden - or very difficult - for you to see as a westerner. A lot of it is still the usual tourist traps, y'know, package tours....on your left is the Kremlin, on your right is St.Basil's....you still see what they want you to see unless you know any Russian people yourself. Then you can get a feel of the real country."
"That way you see a whole different world, " he continues. "Now I have an apartment in Moscow. I spend a week every month there now."
Right. But even having spent some time in the city, I imagine trying to learn the language is extremely difficult to say the least. How did you get around that when you were singing these songs as you had no previous experience of Russian?
"Well, it was a challenge as I was in a situation where I was trying to sing Russian songs with no real knowledge of the language and also I was collaborating with singers who had no knowledge of English," Marc recalls.
"So, it was a question of meeting in the middle. Take Alla Bayanova, for instance....she's a really old lady now, she's 96 and survived the October Revolution. She hates anything to do with the English language and has never sung in English."
"It was funny with her," laughs Marc, "because I had to go to her apartment and more or less audition for her rather than the other way round. It was the only way I could demonstrate to her that I was serious about this project."
"Ultimately, too, having Russian friends helped too," he continues.
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"I worked closely with the producer Andrey Samsonov and he coached me through the songs. I ended up writing it on boards as I'd say it phonetically. Also, from listening to so many Russian singers and songs, I'd try to put the intonation and accents in the same places and think of how a Russian singer would approach it."
Of course, one of the other remarkable aspects of "Heart On Snow" is that Almond has also dipped into songbooks of influential Russian composers who may be long dead themselves, but whose work very much lives on. For example, he covers two of Vadim Kozin's tunes on the album, of which "Always And Everywhere" is particularly memorable. In itself, it's a haunting tune, but the fact that Kozin himself (who openly admitted his homosexuality during Stalin's regime) refused to sing for Stalin and ended his days in Arctic Gulag town Magadan in terrible poverty lends the song a real chill.
"Yes, well he was very much a subversive and I wanted to choose songs by people who were interesting characters in themselves, or songs by people who suffered under the Soviet regime," Marc replies passionately.
"I was very interested in Kozin's story," he replies, "and it's important to remember that the only recordings of his that exist are these old crackly things, they sound like they were recorded in his living room."
"The thing was he became so popular that Stalin had to refrain from persecuting him, which was a problem. The fact he was so open about being homosexual didn't exactly help either, because even now it's not the done thing in Russia, so back in Stalin's time it seems almost unthinkable, if incredibly brave."
"Stalin did actually request Kozim sing for him," continues Marc, "but Kozim refused entirely, so of course he was pcked off to Magadan, the Gulag town in the Arctic Circle. Ironically, Stalin was forced to briefly recall him because when Winston Churchill visited, he insisted on hearing Kozim sing."
Really? What happened?
"I imagine Stalin went pale!" laughs Marc, "but he recalled Kozin, brushed him down and made him perform for Churchill to sing. Of course afterwards Churchill was singing Kozin's praises while Kozin was being bundled out the back and returned to the Gulag again. So, yeah, something of a dilemma for Stalin, as he daren't kill Kozin. Instead, he sentenced him to a long, lingering death in the Arctic."
"But yes, Kozin's songs are actually very simple, but there's always this dark twist at the end . His are very painful songs. But it was important to record songs by people like Kozim, and at the same time have people like Boris Grebenshikov, who's kind of the Russian Bob Dylan through to Sergei Penkin, a very flamboyant singer of more recent times. It kind of brings 100 years of Russian history together on one record."
Ambitious, but exciting stuff....
"Yeah, but ultimately I realised I wasn't making the record for Russian people who know the originals of these songs well. I wasn't going to convert them to my versions, so I guess it's more really for a western audience."
Marc's too modest really as there are some truly moving moments on "Heart On Snow," not least a song called "The Storks," which sounds initially like a classic ballad, but is really a requiem for the Russian soldiers who lost their lives during the Second World War.
"I'm glad you like that one," says Marc. "It's actually my favourite track on the album, funnily enough."
"The translation was a bit difficult though, because it should really be "The Cranes" in Russia, which is hat the song's lyrics are talking about, because in Russian folklore, cranes represent the souls of the dead, whereas storks are really the birds that bring new life or a rebirth."
"So, it kinda makes sense, I guess," he continues, "but it perhaps loses a little of the darkness of the original idea. Now, if I perform it in Russia, I'd try to sing it as "The Cranes." Symbolism like that makes a big difference in Russia."
Certainly the song - to me at least - seems to epitomise the sadness and stoicism I always think about when I think about the harshness of the Russian Soviet regime. How do you feel about it?
"Yes, well they are tough people who've survived a lot of hardship in life," refelects Marc.
"I mean, even now, Mothers are losing sons who have been to fight in Chechnya, so it goes on to this day. It's so different to anything we understand."
"Actually," he continues, after a pause, "if you have a sensitive nature, Russia isn't the place for you. You really have to leave your morality at the door because it's a very cruel society. There's been a lot of cultural death there."
Meanwhile, of course, the sheer scope of "Heart On Snow" might daunt people who will hear little familiar when compared with the Marc Almond of old. However brave and fascinating the project may be, does it worry you that people may shun or ignore it?
"Well, when I made the record I'd no idea who would like it, really," says Marc, entirely openly.
"I thought it might be seen as something of a feathered fish and I really didn't have expectations for it as such. But I'm pleased because the interest in it is building quietly. I think it's similar to the Jacques Brel album I made in that sense, in the sense that the Brel album kind've got rediscovered a little later and the interest in that project has remained pretty constant, so hopefully this album may perform like that, which is fine by me as it was never constructed to be a pop album that would be past its' sell-by date in two weeks or whatever. Certainly, I'd love to think it'll be an album that might be around for a while. "
"Besides," he adds, "I wouldn't make an album like this because I thought it was a great career move, but I would because it's a fantastically exciting project and that's the bottom line with "Heart On Snow." So that's why I wanted to make such a record."
Sounds like the best reason there is. Sadly we have to go in a minute now, Marc, so let's put you on the spot: where next for Marc Almond?
"D'you know - at this moment, I really couldn't tell you," Marc replies honestly.
"I do know I'd like to make an album of mostly original songs, but that'll be a way off yet and I don't know what direction I'll be swayed in by then."
"The thing is, though, I'll have been in the music business for 25 years next year, so I think there'll be a comprehensive A-Sides compilation for one thing."
Sounds good. Besides, I imagine you can't really tour "Heart on Snow" in the traditional sense as it's so complex?
"Well, I could do three or four songs with my regular band," Marc admits, "but we're working on a documentary DVD based around this project. I'm hoping to do a couple of concerts in Moscow in February where we perform "Heart On Snow"s duets with the singers on the record. In some cases, it may be the only chance we get, so that'll undoubtedly be an exciting time."
Indeed it will! Wonder if anyone's doing cheap flights to Moscow in February?
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