Having already made three excellent post-punk albums with Ultravox prior to the arrival of Midge Ure, charismatic frontman, art student and the man who turned down jobs in both Roxy Music and The Clash, JOHN FOXX instead went on to forge a distinctive identity as a purveyor of bleak, but utterly compelling synth-pop. His fruitful period with Virgin Records included albums such as "The Garden" and - of course - the stunning "Metamatic", which found him bothering the Top 40 with the legendary singles "Underpass", "No-One Driving" and "Burning Car."
After the gentle, introspective "In Mysterious Ways" (1985), he went off the musical radar to concentrate on art and photography. Thrillingly, he re-appeared as if from nowhere in 1995 with new musical collaborator LOUIS GORDON and the superb "Shifting City" and now there's the magnificent new album "Crash And Burn" to celebrate. Whisperin' & Hollerin' didn't take much persuading when we were offfered the chance of a chat with one of our enduring heroes.....
John's speaking to us from his record company office and comes through loud and clear. John, was it meeting Louis (Gordon) that made you think of making music again?
"Well, I didn't really have a break from music, because I'd been doing things like working with Bomb The Bass," John corrects gently.
"But yeah, meeting Louis was a big thing. It was unusual what happened, actually, because some friends dragged me to a party in a derelict house in Shropshire...."
As you do...
"Yeah, right, ha ha!" laughs John, "but he (Louis) was recommended to me and he had a room in this house where he was making music. It was great, all smoke and lights, synths and drum machine. The feel of it made me think of the early acid house stuff, which was an era he likes as well. Plus he liked my work. So we decided to work together, initially getting a studio together in Sankey's Soap, behind Piccadilly in Manchester."
But nonetheless, there hadn't been a record under the name "John Foxx" for a decade at the time. Was there a feeling of 'Oh My God, will anyone remember me?' when you were making "Shifting City"?
"Well, it did feel a bit like that," recalls John, still with traces of his Lancashire accent apparent.
"We did unpublicised gigs to test the water, but things happened and we got great feedback, which was very gratifying obviously. It sort of gathered impetus from there."
"The great thing about Louis is that we really don't have to think," continues John, after a short pause.
"The lines of communication are that good. We just have to do it. It's amazing in itself."
Of course, John's also been pursuing an 'ambient' project called "Cathedral Oceans" hand in hand with his electronic pop output. This has led to him performing shows in botanical gardens and churches. Why choose such venues?
"Well, the botanical garden idea wasn't actually my choice," John reveals.
"It was a festival in Rome. (Brian) Eno was doing one of his installations, y'know with little ambient things, plus there was Andrew Logan doing broken mirror sculptures and Harold Budd too."
"But it was truly lovely to play an outdoor garden in Rome on a beautiful summer night," he continues.
"As for the churches, I chose the venues from Pevsner's guide to architecture (top guide book -ed) in Britain and we just went round to the places I liked and asked if we could stage an event. It was all very informal....sometimes people said no, sometimes they were happy to let us. Mostly we only put posters up on the day to advertise the show. The response was great and it suited me as I'm aways looking for new ways to keep it exciting."
Wonderful. But on to the new album, "Crash And Burn": you recorded it - at least large chunks of it - with a mobile studio. I imagine this is a very liberating experience?
"Oh absolutely, yes, it's great," responds John.
"It began as a suitcase-sized project, in that during the 1980s I always loved the idea of being able to carry a studio around in a case as I never liked the idea of being cooped up in a metal-encased room for six months trying to make music and not seeing daylight."
"So now it can be reality as you can do so much with laptops. Now it's a case of getting a house in the country, or go off to France, lay down some tracks when you feel like it and go off for a swim or whatever. It's a totally liberating way of making music, better than you could imagine."
Opening track "Drive" immediately pulls you in. Is that really a sample of a Grandfather clock chime that the song's built around. It sounds like it...
"Yes, that's right, it is," says John, really warming to the theme.
"My auntie in Manchester had a clock that chimed exactly like that. I mean she lived in real L.S Lowry country, with all the factory chimneys, very grim, so that sound always brings back the feel of that skyline for me."
"Oddly," he continues, "the song's really about driving through and revisiting places you've known in the past, which is kind've an obvious thing to do if you're feeling a little confused about the future - that idea of touching base with your roots."
Right, but despite that the landscape you're driving through in the song, it still sounds futuristic. You're thinking broadly of Manchester, but you used to write a lot about London, didn't you?
"Yeah, but I always think of folk music as music of the cities. I think we use synths now like fiddles would have been used 200 years ago," says John.
"It's like fierce synthesisers and large sound systems have become the urban folk music of the modern era and the landscapes reflect that."
"Cinema" is a really evocative track, too, John. It sounds like fact breaks away from fiction in the lyric...
"Mmm, yeah, again that's about movies and memories," replies John.
"I mean, all generations from the 1950s on have grown up with the cinema and I had a series of dreams about walking into a film screen, finding myself almost swimming in it and that comes out in the song where you're not entirely sure which side of the screen you're on. It's a fascinating interface where fiction blurs with reality and you're not quite sure where that leaves you."
Taking this a little bit further, the album's title song sounds really sinister, featuring lyrics like: "We're witnessing particularly vicious crimes." Do you feel the world is really a far more dangerous place than the Cold War-obsessed world we had when you made "Metamatic"?
|
"Oh yeah, it's far more dangerous, but in a different way," John emphasises.
"Previously, the idea was of the apocalypse being only five minutes away, whereas now we're faced with more local apocalypses, if that makes sense. Again it's that interface blurring...but in terms of reality and the media an how they twist things. I find that sinister. Besides, without quoting specific examples, a lot of things have been crashing and burning in recent times. Images we see on the news seem to get more violent all the time and they stay with you - that was how I wrote "Burning Car" because at the time it was a reflection of everything I saw on the news. Each time I turned it on I saw the image of a burning car, or so it seemed."
Another song that's particularly topical right now is "She Robot." It sounds like you're talking about creating the perfect woman? It seems that's getting to be within our grasp, technologically, in the 21st Century?
"Yeah, exactly," John agrees.
"I got interested in that sort of thing from reading science fiction initially, but now it's all too possible with cosmetic surgery and genetic engineering. The song brings in sinister issues like control, GM crops and so on. I tried to use all the terminology and mediaspeak I'd heard to see if I could make a song out of it. I think it worked."
Indeed it did! Meanwhile, John, on a broader scale, I'd consider your work to be pioneering in the same way I'd consider Suicide, The Normal, Throbbing Gristle, Cabaret Voltaire and even the early Human League. Did you feel you were ahead of your time when you first started making records?
"Yeah, I think I did really," John considers. "I mean, I used to listen to the early Human League records myself and go to their gigs and they were excellent in those days. I did feel there were a group of people who were drawing similar conclusions to me and who were totally ruthless in throwing guitars away and consciously trying to make music without any influence from US guitar music."
"The idea of creating something purely from electronica was so exciting," he enthuses.
"I used to imagine this futuristic, neon jukebox where you'd put your money in and try to imagine what would come out...that was how I tried to write songs!"
Amazing. But tell me John, received wisdom is that "Metamatic" is still the quintessential John Foxx album. Do you object to this line of thinking?
"No, I don't 'cos it's great to have that and "Metamatic"s a great album," replies John.
"It might have bothered me if I'd wanted to do different kinds of music, but I feel "Metamatic" gets more relevant each year (I agree - ed!). Weirdly, it had three hit singles, but it was never meant as a pop record as it's very stark. Strangely, it doesn't seem to have dated at all...it does have a special quality certainly."
I couldn't agree more, actually. But how do you feel about the newer breed of electronic pioneers, John? Do you have strong opinions about the Warp Records people...Aphex Twin, Autechre and the like?
"Oh yeah, I've been talking to Warp recently, actually, " John confides.
"I actually made LFO'S first video myself, the track "LFO" itself...it was fantastic it was a hit! It was really sad about Rob Mitchell's death (founding Warp label man - ed). He'd been talking to me about Warp's film projects and I was considering some work with Vincent Gallo. I also absolutely love the guy Chris Cunningham, who does Aphex Twin's videos...he's a fantastic film-maker."
OK, but what's next for John Foxx and Louis Gordon. Will there be extensive touring and do you still enjoy playing your older material?
"Yeah, absolutely," says John brightly.
"We've been talking about this today actually. The logical next step with sampling is to reassemble movies and I want to cut up videos and use the images on my next tour...make the William Burroughs technique come to life. That's my next mission!"
John, I've totally enjoyed talking to you, but before we go I have to ask you: apparently you crossed paths with the notorious Francis Bacon in your art school days. What was he really like and did you build up any kind of relationship with him?
"Oh, he was incredible," says John reverently.
"Sure he was an old drunk, but a magnificent one. I was at the Royal College of Art...this is all well-publicised...but we used to hang out in Soho's watering holes and the Chelsea Arts club. He'd come in after work and he was always...slightly aneasthetised, you could say."
Was he all over the shop?
"No no, he was a well-controlled drunk," stresses John.
"I never did work directly with him. I mean I was just a student and was in awe of him. But it was one of the most amazing sights to see him just stagger elegantly. He always dyed his hair and his face...it was like it was made of plastic. You've never seen anyone like him, believe me!"
|
