The Art of Longevity Season 8, Episode 1: Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark

In the 70s, the teenage years of Andy McCluskey and Paul Humphreys, one would have heard new music by word of mouth, from the music papers, and DJs like John Peel, and it is one of these channels that would have led the young Andy McCluskey in September 1975 to see Kraftwerk play at the Liverpool Empire.

 It's lazy to suggest that Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark were entirely influenced by Kraftwerk – both founder members were keen music lovers and had performed together in a band called The Id – but their debut single Electricity wears that influence  on its sleeve.

There were some classic synthpop albums released in in 1980 and 1981 but in terms of maturity and sophistication, none came close to ‘Architecture and Morality’, OMD’s third album.

McCluskey & Humphreys always did things there own way:

"We kind of did songwriting in reverse. A lot of songwriters sit at the piano and hash out a melody and the chords first. With us, we start with a soundscape and crazy noises and quite often the song will land on top. We then realised we had a knack for a catchy tune". 
 
OMD arguably took a wrong turn with their fourth album 'Dazzle Ships', released in 1983.

"We forgot to sugar coat the experiment. The album shipped Gold and returned Platinum, more copies were sent back than sold. It did scare us that it wasn't commercially successful. Even though our songs always start as experiments, we were conscious to keep it more commercial in order to rescue our career". 

But even that record became a classic, eventually. Some 33 years on, in 2016, OMD played a triumphant show at London's Royal Albert Hall performing both Architecture and Morality and then Dazzle Ships back-to-back. That experience gave the band a new lease of life. 2017’s ‘The Punishment Of Luxury’ can arguably be confidently placed in the top three albums OMD had released to date. Almost forty years after they first got together, a band that was still adding to its finest work.

The band's forthcoming album, ‘Bauhaus Staircase’ bodes well for their late blooming fifth decade and extended longevity. This, despite McCluskey's wisdom suggesting otherwise. 

"It's usually dangerous and stupid to make a new album unless you are really going to invest in it. People tell us we're iconic and influential, so we don't want to fuck it up by making a shit album".

The band can rest easy. After 45 years working in their own unique way, they and their fans find OMD on a roll. 

Transcript

Fenner Pearson (host): 2:28

Very, very pleased to welcome Andy McCaskey and Paul Humphreys from all cash from us in the dark to the art of longevity. I've been a massive fan of yours since I bought your first album when I was I think 12 Maybe. So it is absolute joy to meet you and have you on the show. I'd like to start off actually, if you don't mind talking about about those early days when you guys were in your teens. And growing up in Liverpool I believe you met at primary school. Is that right?

Andy McCluskey, OMD: 2:57

Yeah, I mean, we've I moved to the town called Mel's when I was about seven so and then I went to primary school. So we're Andy was actually at that primary school. So we've

Paul Humphreys, OMD: 3:09

known each other since 707. It's a long, bloody time

Unknown: 3:12

when you were in your teens in Liverpool, and wondering what it was like and I mean reading autobiographies of your contemporaries, they often talk about music being an escape, was that something for you? Or were you just music lovers and just enjoyed playing music? I mean, we were music lovers. I mean, obviously there were different times then. And, you know, music was the main sort of thing to thing to do to listen to music, you know, there was no, there was no you know, internet or video games or DVDs and you know, streaming so music music was was everything to the youth really, you were kind of, you know what the clothes you were wore, your hair cut you had was kind of associated with the kind of music that you listen to. And so music was kind of everything for for all our generation. And it's interesting to me because I mean, as I say I've been I think I was I've been 12 and I bought my first single in 1978 and at that time I remember within a couple of years I've got a collection of albums. So as you guys and ultravox but ucraft work, Depeche Mode soft sell, and I genuinely thought I had a complete electronic music collection. And of course it was only the years that you realized there was so much going on. I mean, at that time growing up liberal How did you find out I mean, how did you come across Kraftwerk for example, obviously was before the internet and all you all you had really was the radio which was limited. Generally John Peel played the most interesting stuff so you listen to him late at night. But it was the music press that you know the NME and sounds and Melody Maker in and you knew he bought all of those and you kept looking and hoping you came across something interesting. Certainly. I think as teenagers Paul and I were looking for different things. We weren't really interested in the conventional, or by mid teens we'd already discovered Kraftwerk. Actually because Kraftwerk had hit without a bomb. That was the thing that alerted me to it. So I went to see them in Liverpool in September 75. And it was really like, Wow, I've never seen a band like them. And then Paul and I started kind of making music together in the backroom of his mom's house on a Saturday when she was at work. And it was very primitive, very ambient, because quite frankly, that was all we could do with the limited geographic equipment we had. But that would that was the beginning of a journey, which we had no idea where it was going to go. It was just, it was just a hobby. We just made weird noises on a Saturday afternoon. And we had no idea that other other bands were listening to the same kind of music we were listening to, and had an generated the same kind of, you know, interest in electronic music and, and so all these bands started popping up, because I remember when we heard the normal, warm, normal, and at Eric's club, and we went, wow, there's other people making, making electronic music. And we have been boiled by the Human League. And it's like, wow, there's another band doing it. I think it was that that spurred us on to actually daring to get up on stage and actually, you know, play our sort of electronic music because before that, we thought we were doing it in isolation. Yeah, sure. Because there just aren't you say there was no internet, you just didn't have that kind of connection, did you with other people who are doing similar things? But I often think that like kind of the Year Zero for synth pop, was the kind of 1981 There's so many electronic singles in the charts that year. But of course, I mean, by then you were on your third album, weren't you? I mean, you were almost the kind of the elder statesman of synth pop, did you suddenly feel your time was now and everything had come together? It was very strange, really, because obviously, in the very early days, as Paul indicated, you know, we had no idea that there was actually other people out there in their little islands, because we were unaware of them. And then when we started to realize, as Paul said, again, we decided we wanted to do one gig, just one gig to say we'd done it before I went to art college, and Paul went off to do electronics. And it just escalated. But yeah, very quickly, from 78 to 8081. What had seemed to be like real outside of music that was swimming against the tide, within a couple of years had become the established charter making method of creating music. It was an amazing shift. Yeah, I did. And I do think, though, I mean, because you had had that kind of Head Start, you know, through your own pick of being precocious electronic music. I mean, architecture morality, I think was probably the most by actually not probably, I think was the most innovative out of that period, that transition from organization to architecture and morality. Was there something that happened that you took that leap forward, creative, nothing changed, it was part of our kind of mantra or raise all debt, it was to always try to do something different. So the first album was just a collection of songs we've done from the age of 16 to 19, recorded in our own studio that we built ourselves and it literally was like, garage synthpop, it was just a couple of teenagers with whatever we could get our hands on cheaply. Then, the shift into the kind of mostly darker, more kind of melancholic organization album, probably influenced by us playing with Joy Division and hearing the Martin Hannett dark sound that he created. But then architectural morality, we wanted to change again, we got some new toys, we got the Mellotron so we could use strings and choirs, and I was fascinated with the Edinburgh military tattoo. So we ended up with some quite bombastic drum sounds on there that sounded like marching bands, it was just, it was all part of the reasoning, which was we wanted to keep changing our color. We've always kind of done that we've always kind of got a new piece of technology or a new piece of technology has come out or we've discovered a piece of technology, like the Mellotron and and that kind of excites us, you know, artistically and creative creatively, too, because we got the oldies palette of sounds that we've never had before. So, so that kind of drove the Mellotron as Andy said the Mellotron kind of really was the dominant instrument of architecture and routing, because we just bought one and we were really excited by it. And were you at that stage? I mean, could you do obviously had a string of great singles by then? And was there a point at which you kind of went actually no, we are good songwriters, we know what we're doing, or was it always trial and error? It was always trial and error. I mean, we were always trying to think of something new and weird to do a new way to make a piece of music. But the unconscious part of it was that some of our experiments had very, very catchy melodies and very, very catchy lyrics on them and So, you know, one or two tracks on an album, we're kind of radio friendly enough to be hits. We never consciously sat down and said, We need to write a single for this album because we haven't got one yet. It just kind of happened. You know, I've been whether that was a kind of accidental unconscious amalgam of our love of Kraftwerk since melodies, with our kind of unconscious adoption of 70s glam English Pop, I don't know. But, you know, somehow, we crushed all of our influences into either quite weird stuff, or very, very catchy synth pop, I think we always kind of felt that we've always started with, you know, each song we do is kind of an experiment to begin with. And sometimes the melody is the last thing that goes on the top, you know, we've kind of do songwriting in reverse, you know, a lot of songwriters, you know, sit at the piano and hash out the melody and the chords first, with us, we start with a whole set of sounds gaping, crazy noises, and then quite often, the tune will land on top. And I think when we started having hits, I think we started to maybe realize that we did have a bit of an accurate catchy tune. Or that the first time we did Top of the Pops with messages, the started a pattern or trend, which is that because we thought we were experimental, because mean when Tony Wilson said you're the future of pop, I think we told him to fuck off. That when he offered us a culture Well, yeah, obviously we make a record with you. But we're, we're alternative we're an experimental. But when we the first time we did top of the box before the RAD, red light went on, Paul and I looked at each other and basically mouth to each other. How the fuck did this happen? Like kind of imposters, sensibility, you know, but and it carried on we still kept doing it. Riding with Karl Bartos must have been an extraordinary experience for you. But what was it like when you were the first time you have to let someone else into your creative process and kind of did you feel they're gonna see how haphazard we are? I just think everybody writes like that. Certainly, for me, it was terrifying because Carl is a trained musician, you know, Park car went to a conservatory. And in fact, in a craft went and asked his tutor, who's the best drummer, stroke musician you've got. And they said, Young Karl Bartos. And that's why they got him in the band. So for me, yeah, I mean, the bottom line is that Paul and I learned to play our instruments while writing songs, so we never knew any rules. We never knew how to do it. It was just we did it by ear and by feel and instinct. And so it was, you know, we can't jam with other people. Don't ask us to play a 12 bar blues. Don't ask us to play. Paul has learned now but you know, if you if somebody says to me, oh, it's an inverted major seven, I go. What the fuck is that? Someone you use it all the time? Do I really have no idea?

Keith Jopling: 12:57

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Unknown: 13:21

This sort of accepted wisdom that you might want to contradict that, when dazzle ships wasn't as commercially successful, though, as now, I absolutely loved that you kind of switch tack to writing more poppy material. I mean, a Is that true? And then be I mean, that's amazing that you were able, and we said easier said than done, isn't it? I'll go and write some pop singles. Now. I mean, when junk culture came out, which was the soundtrack to my A levels, how did you just go right now we're writing pop? Well, I think what really happened was, we just kept doing whatever we felt like doing every album, you know, we got bigger and bigger. And so we continued doing whatever we felt like doing with dazzle ships. But I think we forgot to sugarcoat the experiment a little bit. And it kind of you got to understand here that the first three albums we made, we were doing what we wanted to do. The record company never second guessed us, the record company never said, you know, why don't you do this work with this producer, you know, change this change that they just let us get on with it. And we delivered an album, and then didn't disk records, which was the subsidiary of virgin that we run folded. We ended up on the parent company. They had no knowledge of how we worked on connection with us. So they just went well, how does this work? We sit in our studio, we write the songs and then we call you up and say we're going into the studio with this engineer, give us the money and we'll deliver an album and it sells millions. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Well, it seems to work so we'll carry on and then we deliver dazzle ships. I think there were certain elements before the in the making of dazzle ships where we found us I was in a dilemma where for some reason, certainly I thought we were going to try and change the world by doing radically new music, quite how we were going to do it. I look back now. And I think I was rather naive, a bit we had we were selling millions of records, the world was listening to us. And a couple of spiky journalists were saying, well, the world is listening to you. Why are you writing songs about Joan of Arc? And here? Why are you not more overtly political? So because I got a bee in my bonnet? Right, I'm going to be more overtly political and dazzle ships are very kind of Cold War and radio samples and things. And yeah, I think as Paul said, we didn't consciously or unconsciously sugarcoat anything, we left more of the kind of bare bones framework. Everybody kind of heard genetic engineering when, what? And then the album came out and the viewers went, what? And yeah, we set ourselves because we were old men then of 24. And we, he was married, we had houses, this was our job. And we were like, oh, hell, we need to keep paying the bills. So consciously, and unconsciously, we stepped back a little bit. And we were a bit more conservative with the writing in junk culture. You know, we had a bit of a joke in the band that dazzle ships, shipped gold and returned platinum. More came back that went out. So it was a bit of a shock, really, because now it's considered the fractured masterpiece, and a world changer and so many musicians who you wouldn't even expect to note it. Say what a great album It Was. So you know, it's one of those things, you know, the disaster becomes the triumph for the passage of time. It did sort of scare us the fact that, you know, we, that wasn't at all commercially successful. So I think getting back to your earlier question, I mean, I think that's why we kind of stopped with the more, you know, sort of difficult and we still write songs, even the later albums after dazzle ships, it still starts as an experiment. We were very, very conscious to keep it more commercial as to just to kind of rescue our career. We were We were worried that version gonna drop us and that was it, you know, although it's worth pointing out. I mean, unless I'm misremembering, I think junk culture had the free single dinner, the angels keep turning the wheels of the universe. I mean, that was quite an extraordinary piece of writing. Yeah, really bombastic and pompous? Wasn't it was grateful. Yeah, I can tell me about John Lennon sort of famously being interviewed in the early 60s and said, you know, it was, he was thinking that might get two or three years out of the Beatles. And that that would kind of be it. Was there a point in which you went? Okay, so you've played one gig, and then you decide to play more? You've had one successful album, two successful albums. Was there a point where you actually this, this is actually our career now, this is what we do for a living? Yeah, I mean, I think we did sort of hit a point where we thought we could actually have a career. But early on, we were just budgeting for failure. You know, I mean, for a start, we only were going to do one gig. And then we got off at a second. And then doors started to open. And so we always walked through the doors that opened. But I mean, the reality was, when we got offered a seven album deal, we thought, Well, nobody's gonna buy seven, we'll be lucky to get past one. So instead of going into a studio, and paying 30 grand for a couple of rooms or two inch tape, we built our own studio, so so that when, when were dropped us, yeah, when we were dropped, released from have our own studio that was also budgeting for failure. So it was, it was yeah, it was a an amazing journey. But I think most bands, including the Beatles, generally, you know, 99% of bands. Yeah, a couple of years out of it. Few album was maybe a hit or two, and then something goes wrong. And that's the end of their career. And I think most most musicians would assume that that was going to be the path. Yeah, sure. You mentioned the gramophone suite, your your your studio, I mean, having your own studio must have led, I guess, to a different kind of writing No, because you didn't have to write a lot of songs, and then take them into the studio, you could actually develop them in the studio. Yeah, they were written in the studio, they were written onto tape, I mean, you got to remember, although from 1980 onwards, we were a four piece on stage, we were still a two piece when we wrote. And this was before computers. So everything had to be laid down onto the tape in a linear fashion. And we just wrote into the tape and then and then we wanted to change color, put a middle 18 or something, you had to go back, pick the relevant points, and then drop everything into record and change it or splice the tape. It's why to be honest, most of our early songs are very linear, I mean messages that arpeggiating sequence is the same all the way through ever changes and you know, the Gay is the same four chords all the way through. A souvenir is mostly the same all the way through apart from and Paul went back and did a middle eight by pushing different faders up because the choirs were already on the multitrack. So everything was was written on into tape. That's the way we created our songs. So when your careers has gone from that, working with very basic equipment, working on tape splicing and that kind of thing to Now, other end of the spectrum workings or digital workstations, that ability to just slide stuff around, add instruments in, take them out, has that changed the way you go about writing, we still kind of write the same in the same way really, we just throw our ideas onto onto Pro Tools now instead of tape. But the beauty now is that you can so easily move things around. It's, it's a fantastic, awesome post on word documentation. Okay, pick that up, move it over there, copy that, change that. I mean, we couldn't have dreamed of that technology. One of the nice things is it means if you get a chorus, that sounds great, you just go right, put that there, put that there and put that there. I don't need to sing that again. But it's we always say though, that it has its blessings. And its curses, because obviously, there's a thing that we call the tyranny of choice, which is you know, you can have too many tracks. And if you're not kind of ruthless with your editing, you end up with a big, fat digital mess of too many overdubs and possible hi hat patterns, as you can. Yeah. And you know, in the old days, it was like, okay, bass drum, we've got the Roland CR 78, bass drum, which we can play manually, or we can get Malcolm to play his kick drum. And that's it. Now, it's like bass drum. Okay, library 2857 samples, which one, or which aid shall I use. And we only have 16, we only had a 16 track tape recorder as well. So we have to be very ruthless with what we recorded, because we didn't have many tracks. Which was great, though, because it was like if we were sat there, and one of us went, I've got a good idea. We both go. Is it better than anything on these other 16 tracks, because we're going to have to erase something. And I mean, that change in technology must have made a big difference. I mean, when you were first playing live in the 80s, you'd worry about your equipment getting warm and going out of tune. And then now you can just virtually take a laptop onstage with you has it? How has that experience changed a lot playing life? Yeah, it's taken. It's taken some of the some of the worry and the fear of going onstage actually, because most of my fear wasn't about playing to an audience. My fear was isn't going to work tonight when I used to walk out on stage in the 80s. You know, what's going to break down tonight. And you know, when we, in the early part of the 80s, before since even had presets, between every song Martin and I used to stick a flashlight in our mouth. We had a we had a sheet for the settings of the synth for the next song. And then with one hand we do the settings the other hand had the sheath and the flashlight in the mouth. And and you'd have to tell jokes if we're taking too long, you know. So, the only the only saving grace was that we're the generation that actually had the cheap non valve synthesizers, and nonveg. So actually, none of our stuff was valve so it wouldn't drip. The only problem we had was when we try to take the Mellotron on the road, which has a big flywheel. If the voltage varies, the bloody thing would slow down and the been a gauge where Paul's frantically turning the pitch wheel to get it up into the right speed. Get it there was one gig we did in France where where the couldn't get the Mellotron into tune, and I was the soundcheck was it was a Saturday six o'clock in the evening six in the evenings at soundcheck, and we couldn't get Valentine to cheer. And but it was because the voltage had dropped in the whole town because everyone was cooking. So we have to basically wait until people finish cooking before we could go on stage. So yeah, don't miss those kinds of things. And now, you know, the technology is amazing, you know, I was I played virtual into Martin as well. We played virtual instruments on our laptop, and we're still playing everything. But it's just great to have everything sort of pre programmed, you know, when you press next at the whole, everything shifts on the keyboard and you've got all the Mellotron on there and the melody up there and the choir too. So it's just it takes all of you know the worry out of playing live and then you just and I definitely enjoy the case nor because of that, until one of your notes breaks inside and the F is playing F sharp. We will always be problems but not nowhere near the magnitude of the problems that we had in the 80s You know, I remember we walked out we were doing the Depeche Mode Why don't want or we're playing the Rose Bowl. 70,000 70,000 people walk out on stage and often older go start navigate, there's a big spike in the mains. Martin overplaying magnetrons and it just restarted the emulator sorry, emulators. They started reloading the discs and Paul and Martin are just looking at these little digital Spencer. This will take a while. Meanwhile, me and Malcolm are doing a dub Drum and Bass rows, waiting for the fucking sentence to come back. It's quite cool the drum and bass versions I mean my impression from seeing you on the occasion I've seen you playing over the years, the impression you give is that you genuinely enjoy doing the live performances and being out there engaging with your with your audience. It's changed a lot over the years. When we first started, we did feel very much like we were kind of fighting the audience fighting the journalists fighting the expectation of what a synthesizer in inverted commas bands should be. And it did feel like hard work and it was quite intimidating. And I certainly used to get very nervous and be quiet kind of like, right you like you're gonna fucking after this, we're going to stick into you know, and it's taken a long time for me particularly, I think it's only since we reformed I finally stopped getting so many stage nerves because the penny finally dropped a slight Andrew. If the several 1000 people have bought a ticket to come and see you, they probably already liked the music. So you're probably on a good, a good wicket here. You know, you're not having to beat them up. You're not having to fight the audience there. Yeah, they're on your side. Thanks for listening to the art of longevity. I hope you're enjoying the conversation so far. Please take a moment to rate the show, leave a review on Apple podcasts if that's where you're listening and do spread the word, we'll see you can sign up via the songs familiar web page for our newsletter, artwork, and much more. Back to the conversation. The punishment of luxury, I would put in my top three RMD album, it's very rare for a band with a career of your length that you're looking at one of the most recent albums and saying that's one of the best things I've ever done. So I mean, when you're putting a setlist together now, I'm guessing you're doing a balance between the enjoyment of the new stuff you've written. That's, that's great. And also wanting to make sure you you play all the songs people are expecting to hear. I mean, do you have a sort of core list of things? You know, we can't we can't play a gig without playing this song? Well, that's the thing, the problem we have is that we've had lots of hit singles. And so there's very few hit singles that we can actually drop. I mean, we somebody always bloody moans, you know, you'll drop one of the, you didn't play your Xbox, that's my favorite. Why did you drop if you leave out of the set, we came all the way from America to hear that. So you know, we're gonna play for three hours. It is a balance sheet, right. And I mean, we'll be going out next year on the Bauhaus staircase tour, we will probably play five tracks from the new album, we will probably replace ISO type and punishment and luxury in the set with two of the tracks off the new album. But Anthropocene will probably take the ISO type place evolution of species, we'll probably start the set off with a kind of it would be like the architecture morality or dazzle ships. Weird opener, and, and then we'll see where we go. But it's going to be nice to mix it up. I mean, thank you for what you said about punishment and luxury. I mean, it's become evident over the last six years that you're not alone. You know, a lot of a lot of our fans and journalists actually talk about punishment of being in the top three, probably with dazzle ships and architecture. And that's, that's amazing. And that makes us feel good. Because, you know, when you get to our age, it's sometimes well, in fact, it's usually dangerous and stupid to make a new album, because people don't want one. And they expect it's going to be crap. Because you're not, you know, you're gonna go in the studio for a couple of weeks. Because you can't be bothered, or you've got other priorities and, and just churn out the first load of crap that comes to mind. And we're not going to do that. You know, it's, it's very nice being you know, customer money was in the dark now. It's been a 45 year journey. We've got to a nice place now, where people say, Oh, you're iconic or you're influential. So we don't want to fuck it up by releasing a shit album. And, you know, oh, we got to play one from the new album and a half the audience go to the bathroom. You know, when you're writing punishment. Did you think wow, this is kind of a bit of a leap here? Yeah. Did you feel at the time you were doing something really exciting? I mean, I wouldn't want to stress it if it used another own DL. But were you aware that you did this suddenly you were doing something that was going to trap people? Well, I think we were kind of leading up to that album with the two previous ones, you know, he because he modeling was us getting the machinery back oiled again, because it was our first album back together for a long time. And electric we started to experiment and play around a bit more with the technology and get a little bit more of some more of the esoteric tracks like please remain seated. I think you know the bottom Linus, we were having fun. And we were enjoying writing, where there were no rules. I mean, we promised ourselves when we reformed that, we were going to try to go back to how it was in the early days where nobody told us what to do. We only released something when we thought it was ready, there was no scheduling. And we weren't going to release anything, unless we thought it was good. Because there's nothing more excruciating to doing a series of interviews, and realizing that a your favorite journalists didn't want to talk to you, because they didn't want to say bad things about the new album, and be that they don't say anything about the new album when you're doing it, it's because they don't want to insult their people that they've liked over the years. So it's, so it's dangerous and stupid to do new music, unless you are really, really, really going to invest in it. Yeah, once we do that, we've invested a lot of time and all these records, because we're, you know, acutely aware of everything we release gets put on this, the scale, you know, against our sort of back catalogue. And, you know, we're aware that we need to kind of have a good balance there, you know, with with our back catalogue, but as Andy said, you know, we have gone back to our roots more. I mean, towards the end of the 80s, we had literally no time to make our records. We were so busy touring and trying to break America tours in the 80s. So, you know, the last couple of albums, you know, we just we got back off tour exhausted, but we had this contractual obligation of financial ledee skins. To me, that was the downside of signing a record deal when we were both 19 years old, you know, we were just like, well, record. Yeah, where do we sign and the royalties that we were on, or the lack of royalties was nearly criminal. And, you know, they gave you with one hand, and they seem to take back with five I mean, you know, we got to the end of 1988, we came off the one I want or with Depeche Mode. They'd been earning enough money to retire we'd been given $5,000 A night and we'd lost a shitload of money on that tour. And we got home and our manager said, You're unrecruited Virgin by a million pounds. And it wasn't because we had castles and yachts. It was just because everything was charged against our royalty rate, which was so frickin low. You know, we weren't in it for the money, but you can't run a band on fresh air. No, sure. So I mean, but here you are with another new album with bow staircase. I've loved the couple of tracks I've heard so far. Did you enjoy writing? From what you say? I'm guessing you know, have you not heard the album yet, so it's better than polish on to cook Cherie. I'm encouraged by that. Again, it's taken six years, you know, when you get to our age, it's hard to find new energies to tap into new subjects to sing about with energy, new melodies. That doesn't sound like something you've done before new chord sequences, new sounds. The dilemma of being an audio artist, is that there are strict limitations to what you're allowed to do. I feel very jealous of people like Monet and Picasso. You know, Monet did fucking dozens of haystacks in different colors. Picasso did dozens of bloody door Mr. Paintings, variations on a theme. If we go anywhere near sounding anything like Enola Gay or souvenir, people go well, we get crucified. So you have to really go deep into the well and hope there's been time for the inspiration to fill up and, and also it gets harder when you're older. Because you just think, do I really want to sit in front of this bloody computer and mine my soul for quality music? Or do I want to go on holiday? Or do I want to go and spend some time with my family and my kids? You know, increasingly the answer is no, I don't want to sit in front of this computer. And it quite frankly, Bauhaus staircase probably wouldn't exist if it wasn't for COVID So did you write that during lockdown then started there? Really? Yeah. I mean, like, like visual artists, you know, who have various canvases leaning in the far corner of the studio, and they keep going back to them going. That one it's an idea in that we've always got stuff in our computers, which we will go round again every year to go. Let me have a look at that stuff. Now. What's that one called? Yeah, and there's always a kernel of a good idea, you know, oh, that's maladies good. Maybe I can get a different lyric on it store, or whatever. And so yeah, there was nothing else to do. At least six of the songs. were releasing a sort of limited edition demo CD because it's always interesting for people to hear where the song started. And so I went back into my computer and I went back to like, version 1.1 and six of the tracks on the album are dated between March and May of 2020. So they started right the beginning of COVID was fuck all else to do. I mean, how How'd you feel about going back out on the road? You've got a big tour coming up now excited about that you're kind of a bit weary in advance what's your, what's your feeling? Now excited. I mean, you know, we love, we love playing live, it's one of our favorite things to do. Because I think I think we've actually realized that we're actually a good live band. And it's the only opportunity you get to actually sort of interact with the people who love the music, you know. Otherwise, it's just virtual. Yeah, you're not in the shop, when they buy the record. It used to be used to be the shop that was online, but you know, you're not in the car when they're listening to it, you know, at home, and they're listening to it. So it as Paul said, it's the only chance you get to actually share the music in one space with the people who are your audience. And it's, it's a boson, you know, we always give 100%. And then if the audience started giving back the love that we're trying to throw off the stage, then it gets cyclical, and it just kind of grows and tips into a wonderful, wonderful feeling on so we love playing live. The other great thing I like about live is, even if you screw up, you can't go back and do it again. You can't overdub it, you can't remix it, it's just done. You walk away and you do the next one. It also seems to me that your audience is really familiar with your albums. And I've heard you close many times with the romance of the telescope, which is, you know, almost a deep cutting away it says it's not one of your big singles. It's not a big number, is it but but your audience are familiar with your stuff. They love songs like that. Yeah, I mean, it's really important for us to do a deep dive for for, you know, a couple of tracks, some sort of slightly more obscure ones. I mean, it's very difficult because, you know, we have to play all the hits, we want to, you know, represent and play the some of the new albums so, so, but there's always an area where we want to do something, I mean, we've had these times where we go down the front and play almost, and statues and things like that, you know, and, and we'll be doing some something similar on the on the tour just for the hardcore fans who want to hear something. It's fun also, now that we kind of were allowed to do whatever we want, you know. So we've, we've done a few years ago, we did all of dazzle ships and all of our protection rounds at the Royal Albert Hall. And I have to say, it was quite wonderful playing those sets, knowing that 5000 people had come from all over the world. And they didn't want to hear the hit singles. They wanted the weird shifts. They wanted the most obscure stuff we could throw at them there. Besides everything was great. It was so much fun. So yeah. Are you ever tempted to put out sort of albums that are more leaning that way? I mean, do you feel like I'm guessing not from what you've said, but do you? Do you ever have something and think you know, that's, that's too far outside what we count as being OMD. I find as the main lyricist and top line writer, I find it harder and harder and harder to get vocals and vocal melodies. So there's a large part of me is quite enticed by the idea of doing a kind of instrument ambient instrumental. abdicate my responsibilities. You've mentioned a couple of artists and paintings that made that analogy earlier. And I mean, the last two albums have both been named after paintings. Is that an area of interest for you? Yeah, I mean, I grew up with the visual arts and I was supposed to go and do a fine art degree at Leeds in 1978. The band played our first ever supposedly one off gig 12th of October 1978. And I didn't go to uni ever again. And Paul didn't go to do his electronics. So but yeah, visual arts is where I came from. I wasn't you know, go back to uni, but I never did. And interestingly, I found out recently when I was reading a book by another artist, had I gone to Leeds poli to do fine art in 1978. I would have been there at the same time as green Gartside from scritti and Dave ball and Mark Garmin from soft sell. Which would have been interesting but know that I use a lot of visual references in the music I mean bow staircase is referencing a painting by painting by Schlemmer there are references to the Bauhaus but it's not it's not a history lesson I'm using as a metaphor very often I'm using paintings and titles and things are starting points as metaphors and then off I go, I mean, I was delighted actually and then completely accidentally just came out of my mouth that I run around second chance with pero boo and the modern dance in Bauhaus staircase. They are I mean, we used to love going to see them at Ericsson, the late 70s They were amazing but when I Googled pair Uber and the modern dance recently Bauhaus their case by already came off the art of longevity is recorded at cube West studios in Acton and sometimes at the QB studios in London's Canary Wharf. Cube is the world's first member's studio for musicians podcasters and content creators satis a real sanctuary for London's independent inspired creators. It's a real pleasure to record the show here. What's it like being in OMD? Now, does it still feel like a band is as much of a joy as ever was, I think in some ways, I prefer this the second incarnation of r&d to the first time because there was so much stress, stress and anxiety in the first bar, it made it hard to enjoy your achievements. Whereas this time, we're far more relaxed. We kind of know what we're doing. Now. We're in, we're in control of what we're doing, then usually, we usually we take our time to do things, although right at the moment, we've jokingly said just the last few days that we're starting to feel like we're becoming victims of the quality of our new album, because everybody's heard it now is wanting more interviews, we've just been offered two later, with Jools Holland, which we didn't think we were gonna get, asking us to play two new tracks, we haven't had a chance to program or learn the new tracks, but we'll be playing the BBC on Tuesday. So we're starting to get a little bit panicked. Shit, we made a really good album, and now everybody wants a piece of us, we haven't gotten the time to, to do the figure, it's we're starting to feel a bit squeezed like we did back in the early 80s, which is a sign of your success that everybody wants a piece of you. But we've been quite literally for the last 15 years. It's a bit strange to, to find it all full on now. But you know, we can't complain. I mean, it's, it's nice to have a problem, like, you've made a great album, and everybody wants to talk to you did things kind of, I suppose, traditionally follow a better word, you know, you formed a band, you, you know, you got a contract, put a single out, you got into the charts, and you did it that way. I mean, would you want to be in a band these days? Would you want to be started? No, absolutely not. I mean, I feel so sorry for for younger bands now, because the there really isn't the infrastructure like there was for us, you know, you know, there was a way to do things you had, you know, you had a record company who if they signed you would would bankroll you, you know, so you didn't have to have a day job, you can concentrate on developing your, your art your band, you know, whereas now, most of us starting out, there's no artists development anywhere. So the you left your own devices, you have to do your own to be an internet internet guru, because you've got to demonstrate to a major record label that you've already got a following of hundreds of 1000s. And they won't take you unless you've got that following that you have to build yourself. And you know, musicians are notorious at being not great at promoting themselves. They just want to be artists. I mean, the the other thing you've got to remember fender is that we, we didn't actually want this, this was not the plan. It was a hobby. We were doing one gig as a dare. And this has been a 45 year rolling accidents. We're not complaining, trust me. No, definitely anyway, but this was not the intention. Now, maybe that's part of our particular recipe for success. And longevity is we don't play by anybody else's rules. You know, we make the most of every opportunity if it's offered, but we do what the fuck we want to do. And if people like it, the bottom line is making music should be a conversation with yourselves. It's you pulling ideas and sentiments and feelings out of yourself, to mirror them so that you can engage with your own inner feelings that you wouldn't be able to express verbally. It's a musical therapy. It's taking yourself out of yourself. So you can view yourself and have a conversation with yourself now, if you then share it publicly, and people resonate with him if you're all they're speaking my language, well, then that's great. Then you get to Korea, people give you money, and off you go and enjoy it. The dilemma is if you change the language you're using, people go well they're not speaking to me anymore. How do they chose their language? How do they change the way their music is? I can fucking hate them that bastard that they were talking to me and now they change their language. And they get really vitriolic about it. Yeah, and you have managed to develop having you while maintaining that loyal following. All the way through. Listen, we've we've still got it. I mean, it's great. After 45 years, we can still fuck with people. There's been an awful lot of moaning on YouTube about slow train. People love baghouse always LMD but new and fresh. Slow train is like why is there a girl singing on it? Why does it sound like Goldfrapp? Why is there no obvious catchy chorus? Why does it keep breaking down stopping and starting thinking my language anymore? That is the danger of social media, isn't it? You know, there's suddenly all those quiet voices that everybody would ignore, have now got a platform, another platform to air their grievances. Yeah, Exactly. bedroom and moan to their mother. But now they've got a platform. Yeah, so you just have to listen. Few years ago when we were promoting our 40th anniversary, a compilation album and book, we were interviewed by Gary Crowley. And we took great delight in saying, Oh, can we just read your review in sounds and our first single electricity? Who wants to listen to to scousers whining about electricity anyway? I don't remember reading that. We fucking remember it but indelibly into our souls. But you know, you can't. That's why you have to do it for yourself initially, because you can't please everyone. You know. I mean, even even just now we announced a tour last week. And you know, the internet lights at why you're not playing near me. Do you still listen to new music? Do you still take on influences Do you feel? Yeah, I mean, we're always we're always listening to things. Still music lovers. Still music lovers can play No, no. Mostly music haters actually all the same as we've always been as well. Yeah. Most music very first and most music I dislike. I mean, when I was a teenager, it was Kraftwerk. Noye, blood hustled off. Roxy Music, Brian Eno, David Bowie Velvet Underground. And everything else was shift. It takes something very, very special and idiosyncratic to get into my list of things I like to listen to. But my point is that is that there is some really good things out there. But there's just so much noise out there now. It's hard to find the good stuff. But you can find good stuff. I mean, we're excited. We're excited to tour with the British tour. We've got a new Scottish band coming out with us called Walter disco. And if you've heard of them, they're absolutely going to google them after we've done this and bonkers. They're beautifully bonkers. It's like, transvestite heavy makeup, glam craziness. And we're in love with them. And we're excited to have them on the road with us. So you know, yeah, we can still find new things. It's very exciting. There's a great there's a great American artist, I think from Philadelphia, good Catherine Mone. Really simple analog synth pop. It's like, could be anything from last 40 years. But so yeah, we're still looking. But I personally don't find an awful lot that I do like, but when I do, like I get very excited because it's a rarity thing. Yeah, probably I was always the joy wasn't it when you know, when you were a teenager in your bedroom, you know, listening to John P or David kid Jensen. You know, it wasn't like you liked every song they played, but you listened for two hours, just for the off chance they'd play that one song that was going to five minutes feel like it was changing your life. Somewhere in a box in my attic, I've still got a cassette with the first 30 seconds missing of silvercloud by an additional draft because John Peel played and then waited for him to back out analysis and then went straight out on Saturday to see if I could get it in the German import section of pro records. And I did. Fantastic. And just to kind of wrap up then. I mean, it has been an extraordinary career. And I'm I feel very lucky that I've feel like I've been along for as a passenger for the ride over those 45 years. But I mean, do you think you'll record again, or you just wait and see whether whether the mood takes you never say never. But you know, we have to be realistic. We have been around 45 years, we are now in our 60s instrumental album, instrumental now, you know, I tell you what a really serious instrumental album, we won't make a new record, because we want a new logo on the t shirt to excuse a new Tournay or tune tour title. If we've got something that we think is good, we'll release it. The last thing we wanted to do is go out with a dud. And I'm sorry, but everybody seems to be raving around the new Rolling Stones album. It's like the best one they made over 40 years. I'm like fuck me, really 14 years. I listen to the single I think it sounds like a I'm doing the Rolling Stones. I think it's just rolling stones by algorithm numbers. But there you go. I was never a fan. Maybe I'm maybe I'm doing them down. But just you're not gonna hear anything from our MD unless we really think it's great. And we trust our editorial capacity. We trust ourselves given enough time that we will know if it's good. And if it's not good, you're going to hear well, and I think your track record shows that you have that kind of integrity. Well, I hope I hope you like the new album. I'm sorry, you haven't heard it. Yet. I enjoyed anticipation I remember when I you know when I was like 13 or 14 You'd hear a single on the radio. And then you have to wait for days to get the bus into Kingston to be able to go to the record shop and buy it and then you're all the ride all the way home yo The anticipation is part of the deal for me so I'm really really looking forward to it. The next release is called the Rusco and it's beautiful if we say so ourselves is very slow ballad with a kind of film noir video and it's we've been very fortunate that we met an amazing Using video company from whole called cine 1080. And they have been doing videos for us which have just elevated our visual elements, which has been wonderful. So yeah, we're still we're still excited. We're still enjoying what we're doing. Whether we'll do an album, we have no idea but be nice to talk to you. Thank you very much. Yeah, I'll be going to be hopefully see. Well, I will. I've got tickets. I'll be seeing you guys in Dusseldorf in the new year, so. Oh, brilliant. Okay. All right, our hometown. I've got this weird little piece of kit that picks up and records electrical signals. So I've written to the guys who are now in the old Clang, clang studio. I can go in and record the wiring and stuff and then see if I can do a piece of music, who's in Queensland now, there is some production company but they actually have they have little gigs in there, which they then televise so here you can you can go in and play like little gigging clinic I mean, amazing. You guys do but you could go in and play a little concert. I have been in because I was in just a few years ago and Rudy Esch who wrote the electric city book who used to be in most places because he had the keys and he said, he said, you want to you want to come back somewhere interesting with me. Or best offer I've had all day where you're taking a clean clean or like you're kidding me. So yeah, I was I had the most amazing fanboy moment. I wanted to kiss the walls. You know, it was amazing. I've been around and stood out still a little courtyard outside while all the all the other tenants want to jump in burgle them or something. But yeah, so by just thought actually, the one thing I could go in there and kind of pick up that would be unchanged from when they were in there would be the electricity signals in the cable. That's interesting. Good luck with that. You are a geek. You are a total geek. More power to you very much indeed. Gentlemen. Good luck with everything and thank you so much. Okay. See you