This interview was conducted by Ian Greaves (IG), with the company of Lee Shelley (LS) and his partner Helen (HELEN).
How was Howard, you may be wondering ? He appeared nervous to start with. but meeting three strangers is quite an ordeal for most people. Soon enough, he relaxed. He became very open and speculative, with a great wit and sense of timing. It was Easter Sunday. Picking a quiet meeting place - a pub without music - was Howard's decision and the recording benefited from it. He lives local. I refer to an interview I conducted with Anthony H. Wilson amongst others. This interview is part of a larger project on bands who break it. creating real excitement miles away from London. I'm concentrating on Manchester in the late Seventies.
??? = an unrecognisable word or phrase
Please may I add that I cannot make requests for interviews on your behalf. I rang Howard a week before and we were both quite perfunctory about it. He paid me a great favour in sparing his time - two hours - for my academic research. I would be out-of-step to take up his time any further. I will, however, forward the addresses of those who have already made the request.
© 2000 Ian Greaves. All rights of content and duplication reserved. By all means spread this document, but permission and acknowledgement for significant reuse would be appreciated.
IG: I'm not trying to theorize about Manchester as though everyone has the same way of doing things, because that isn't true. John Cooper Clarke said "one thing starts another". Is that a good summing up of the Manchester music scene, or was it more orchestrated than that ? Some people don't feel a part of the scene. Where do you stand ?
HD: Well, which one ? Do you mean the one back then ?
IG: Yep. The one which you came from.
HD: Erm. Well I wasn't part of any scene until it started. I was doing the pub rock listings for The New Manchester Review, y'know, the Time Out type magazine in Manchester. But that didn't mean I got out to see groups particularly, so I wasn't part of any scene. The conventional knowledge, and I know no reason to shake it particularly, was that it started with those two gigs at the Lesser Free Trade Hall. That's where it began and, yes, suddenly it went WOOSH.
IG: No one agrees that it is particularly unified, but is there any factor which is in common with a lot of Manchester bands ? Do you think there's a sensibility, perhaps with their attitude ? Anthony Wilson reckoned it was arrogance combined with a good record collection.
HD: (indifferent) Well. Again what period are we talking about.
IG: 76 for the moment.
HD: OK, so the late-Seventies-
IG: And whether there is a catch-all which links people of that time together. It's not London, so it's not that easy to break it.
HD: Erm. The thing that pulled it together was whatever it was that people, y'know, kind of collectively for a very little while saw in what came to be called punk. I mean, that- , that is what started it and, y'know, there was something in there that caught- that was just the right time for whatever, slightly mysterious bunch of ingredients it was, that just went as I say WOOSH. For me, it was some of the- kind of, personal anger I suppose you could say and frustration and nihilism of it.
IG: How important was music to punk ? People dismiss fashion and drug culture as being tacked on to it, but you could write a fanzine and still call yourself punk.
HD: No, fashion, I mean- fashion wasn't. I mean a look in the sense of fashion, in terms of thinking how you look, there was definitely a look. It was a discipline, y'know, that it was replete with rules and styles and all this, that and the other.
IG: There was always this contradiction, though, with punk as a movement yet it was all about the individual. I always saw it as a contradiction anyway. Can you clarify that ?
HD: (laughs) Erm, well, yes. Well I think that goes through- hmmm, an awful lot of things, not just musical things. Erm, y'know, oh my God. (laughter) No, I'm not going to- "movements are made of individuals". Boy, that's profound. Erm, for me it was a kind of individual thing. I was not interested in mass motions of anything much, but for some people that's exactly what it was and that's what it was always supposed to be about. It was it's own version of communal living. I mean, I don't know, y'know, if it goes into- er, whatever parts of culture today - crumblies (??!) and homeless, y'know, squats and there's kind of elements of communal being there, isn't there. And there were a lot of, mmm, quite political groups 'in the movement'.
IG: Were you ever political at all, would you say ?
HD: Erm, not in any way you'd ever particularly be able to pin me down.
IG: It was indirect, I can appreciate that. In the same way as Pete Shelley's politics, they weren't always spelt out.
HD: Er, no. I'd be too far confused to do any of that (laughter) and try to tell anybody of anything very much. (long pause) I mean you don't write a song like 'Shot By Both Sides' for nothing, do you ? (more laughter)
IG: No! As for the celebrity of punk, Sting and U2 are the only major exponents of punk, but neither of them were punk particularly. Do you think it was the actual idea of punk which was the celebrity, rather than anyone in particular ? Not necessarily glamorous, but, y'know-
HD: Well, mmm, some people wanted to play it, didn't they - that it was just not about that. It was anti-celebrity. It was anybody could do it and blah, blah, blah. Whereas a lot of other people played a kind of instant celebrity thing about it. Mind you, that's in pop music all the time.
IG: You performed a dozen times with Buzzcocks, released one record with them and people keep asking you about it.
HD: Mmmm.
IG: There is one thing I want to ask you about 'Boredom'. You criticised yourself for having too much of a Johnny Rotten voice on it-
HD: On 'Spiral Scratch' generally, yeah.
IG: That's not so much the question, but I always got the impression that that was the point. There's that line, "You know me - I'm acting dumb". Acting ? Is that about some affectation in punk that you saw.
HD: Well, there was a huge amount of - ha! A huge amount of affectation-
IG: The story's never written like that, I don't think.
HD: What, about affectation ?
IG: No, that that is what 'Boredom' is hinting at.
HD: Erm, well, I've- frequently resorted to the device of, kind of, presupposing to impose on the listener a familiarity with myself that might not entirely be there. But, for some reason, it's been a device I've kind of always liked - like I say, often resort to. You know me. You know what I'm like. But, probably the hell people do.
IG: Was that more what that line was about. The "you know me-I'm acting dumb" or was it more the fact it was acting ?
HD: Well, both. Both bits of it. It was probably the first time I used the "you know me" bit. You know me, you know what I'm like. (mutters through lyrics)- acting dumb. There's a, y'know, the strand of punk that came out of the New York strand and, erm, the knowing Warhol- Max's Kansas City- New York Dolls- "we' re being trash and we know it" sort of thing.
IG: So was it a statement about punk or a punk statement ?
HD: Well, there wasn't punk there to make statements about.
IG: There's that line "I just came out from nowhere and I'm going straight back there." That's about punk isn't it ?
HD: No- in, y'know- Pete and I saw The Sex Pistols. We'd seen them four or five months before. We'd taped them, so we had a tape to take home. We could kind of study them in depth and suss them out. There was a- some of the preoccupations were immediate. The style of it was immediate. You knew certain things sort of didn't go. They did covers of Small Faces songs, so we did a cover of a Troggs song - same sort of period; British group, mid-Sixties. Er, y'know, so- the themes and the pre-occupations were kind of there. Nobody *called* it, y'know- nobody really called it punk at that point. I mean, I dunno, 'Boredom' was probably written in August that year. You were just starting to realise that, y'know, something was happening.
IG: It's a lot more playful than most punk records. You've got the "humdrum-drum" refrain leading into the drums, which is rather shrewd. You said of 'Spiral Scratch' that having that record out was as far as you wanted to go with things. Did you consider stopping completely, or did you always have this plan to move on ? Punk was a momentary thing, you didn't know whether you'd have another record out. I understand that.
HD: Yyyyes but, again, in the early days of something you don't know- it's the first time you've done it-
IG: It was a success.
HD: - but I wasn't a seasoned musician. Not even seasoned in the same way that Peter had been, being in bands for a while. It was kind of so quick, really, and the fact that this was happening in Manchester, very early in the scene- have you seen the re-release of 'Spiral Scratch' ?
IG: And 'Time's Up'. Yeah, a very nice piece of work.
HD: But the photo of Electric Circus-
IG: Linder' s photo ?
HD: Yes, but of us at the Electric Circus. It looks like there's hardly anybody there, y'know. It didn't exactly feel like something-
IG: There were thirty at Lesser Free Trade Hall. Is that right ?
HD: What, at the two gigs.
IG: One of them.
HD: I think at the first, we thought there was about a hundred. It held about four hundred and the second one was , sold out.
IG: That clears that up. About the name ? I understand Devoto is Latin for 'bewitching'. There's that example of Captain Sensible changing his name to avoid the DHSS. And you changed your name as well, but was it a Bowie-esque suburban re-creation like some claim ?
HD: Well, again, I hadn't exactly planned to do it, but at the second of those Free Trade Hall dates, the music press from London materialised. And suddenly they wanted to talk to us and Peter introduced me as Howard Devoto. So-
IG: I always heard it was a conspiring to change your names.
HD: So, that's who I became. It was a name I'd expressed some enchantment with. I hadn't exactly planned it that way.
IG: Can you tell me a little about the Ernest Band.
HD: (nervous laugh)
IG: For the uninitiated, it was a comedy duo you had with Richard Boon at Leeds Grammar School ?
HD: We weren't a duo. It was a five-piece , a communal type thing - ha!
IG: The Buzzcocks guide says two people.
HD: No, Richard and I were both in- Terrible, really awful. One of those things you did at school.
IG: Didn't you play the Christmas Ball ?
HD: We played one date, yeah.
IG: Just one.
HD: Oh yeah (laughter) I mean, we didn't have a drummer. We were *really* bad, unbelievable- I mean you wouldn't believe it.
IG: So just to recount the Lesser Free Trade Hall, which I'm not going to ask you to explain because we all know the story and I'm sure you get bored of telling it, but am I right in thinking you met Linder there ?
HD: Yes, at the second one.
IG: How important was she to the Magazine whole ? After Magazine split Dave Formula moved to Ludus and she did the early artwork and I know you were involved with her for a while. How much did she influence Magazine; was she that close ?
HD: Well, at a personal level yes but Linder wasn't involved in music when we were going out. Y'know, I mean, in the same way that somebody is when you're, mmm, when you're involved with someone and they're a creative person in their own right. Erm, y'know, she certainly helped the style of things for us.
IG: She had very strong ideas too. Can you elaborate on these, for example Dave thought she agreed with you on an indifference with the press.
HD: Hmmmm. Well, I don't know if it's strictly true we were indifferent, erm. Dunno, it's taxing me a little bit actually.
IG: We can move on if you like.
HD: I've not thought about that for a long time. I'm trying to think- I mean she and I actually split up, kind of at the beginning of Magazine so I was starting to see less of her. Erm, and then yes she became involved in the sleeve. She did some early leaflets for us which are very nice.
IG: Hard to come by, I would have thought.
HD: Probably. Erm, yeah, she did me some very nice tee-shirts. One offs. Oh and my fly tee-shirt, yes.
IG: How much of this is in the exhibition at the Cornerhouse.
HD: Oh, that's new work.
IG: Oh really, I thought it was a retrospective.
HD: No, there was a sort of retrospective at a small gallery two and-a-half years ago in London, where yes, she was showing- as I've just said, my fly T-shirt with plastic flies sewed all over it. I think she had that there, or whatever - or photos of me wearing it and stuff. Er-
IG: The last thing on Buzzcocks. You said in an interview in 1978, which I'm sure you'll struggle to remember-
HD: I struggle to remember most things (laughter)
IG: Yet it was in the B'dum B'dum documentary and you said that with Buzzcocks you "wanted to step sideways and shadow-box with a few phantoms". Can you elaborate on that ?
HD: Oooh, what poetry! (laughter)
IG: How did you first tap that removal of yourself, in order to observe and comment, which I assume is what you meant by that.
HD: God knows what I meant by that. Erm, but the- detachment was a really important word for me as a youngster. It quite haunted me, really, from about the age of twenty- if that means anything in relation to that.
(We peter out to buy another round.)IG: For your first Magazine interview in NME, you said that you wanted to use the group to "Improve people's memories." (HD laughs) You also said that Buzzcocks had made you out of breath, with the constricting fast song with as many words as possible.
HD: Mmmm
IG: So, can you clarify that first statement - "Improve people's memories"
HD: Well, that's probably talking about myself, erm. I'm always working to try to improve mine. I'm the one that kind of keeps the artifacts, because I'm the one that can't remember, whereas-
IG: Dave's pretty good at that.
HD: At what.
IG: Keeping artifacts.
HD: I was thinking in relation to Pete actually. Whereas Pete seems to have a magnetic memory and, with the aid of very little indeed, can recall it all. Formidable.
IG: He's probably been asked too many times.
HD: (laughs) Oh no, there's loads of details in there that nobody would have known to ask him about. (more laughter)
IG: What was "Suddenly We Are Eating Sandwiches" ? It's on the demo tape which I've never heard. Dave wasn't in the band at the time, but he reckons it was some Evelyn Waugh connection-
HD: Samuel Beckett. Erm, now then. If I remember correctly it's from a book called How It Goes. I was a huge-
(We move tables, disturbing the conversation slightly.)HD: Yeah. I was a big Samuel Beckett fan in my youth. I don't know what caught my eye about that, but, like I say, it was just a few sentences from out of that book.
IG: So it's quotation ?
HD: Yeah, it was all based on his words which is- I think probably quite sensibly we re-wrote it as 'My Mind Ain't So Open' with words by me!
IG: It was always a mystery. Everyone was saying, "What the hell is that! ?" Get it in the box-set, then!
HD: Er
IG: If it's any good that is.
HD: That's interesting. Oh God.
IG: A lot of people would like to hear that 3 song demo.
HD: The Samuel Beckett estate would probably be a nightmare about that. Erm, yeah, it's a funny business that. Someone was saying about the Beatles Anthology CDs and all that stuff, which sold- did quite well, particularly in the States. But there would be people buying those and those would be the first versions they would hear. All these alternate takes of 'Strawberry Fields Forever', there's something quite odd about that. I don't know. I don't think I'd be too wild about Magazine's demos coming out for the benefit of whatever. "Suddenly We Are Eating Sandwiches" was actually quite a laid back tune. It was a lot fiercer in 'My Mind Ain't So Open'.
IG: You were saying about how interested people would be in early versions. That links well to what I was talking to Dave about 'Definitive Gaze'. When it was a Peel session six months before official release, it was very different. The lyrics are the same, the structure is the same but it was less embellished.
HD: You've heard it ?
IG: Yes. It still kicks around on tape. It was called 'Real Life' at that point.
HD: Yes, that's right.
IG: What I was interested in were the lyrics-
HD: And I played very bad guitar on it! Yeah, go on.
IG: I asked Peel about those sessions, because he was very supportive of you at the time. He doesn't remember anything as he's got such a bad memory.
HD: Right. I don't know what he would remember about them. He's not around when you do them. He's not in the studio.
IG: The lyrics are verbatim to how they were on the album version. Was that common to stick rigidly to the lyrics and change the music ?
HD: It usually works the other way around. A lot of times the music would, in a way, come first. And then I would work lyrical ideas around it. Not always, but more often that way than the other way. With Magazine anyway.
IG: Would the lyrics affect the music or dictate the music ? Would it ever be a dissatisfaction with the lyric itself ?
HD: No, I'm just saying there would be a musical structure before there would be a lyrical structure. The lyrics would be fragmentary ideas that would start to hang themselves on a musical structure and be built up from there.
IG: You say that was how it worked with Magazine. How would it differ with Luxuria and other things ?
HD: NO, that's probably- I would think that was how I worked with Pete as well even. Quite a bit you'd kind of get a verse, an idea of a chorus and then you need to extend it and make it last a minute or two.
IG: There was one remark Tony Wilson made. He felt that you used early Seventies instrumentation rather than punk instrumentation to express quite complex emotions. Whereas Joy Division, obviously in his favour, did the same but with punk instrumentation. Particular criticism was leveled at Formula. Do you think that was a conscious decision on your part, with keyboards for example ?
HD: Well, it depends how you use keyboards doesn't it ? I seem to recall Joy Division used keyboards didn't they ? The Fall had a keyboard player right from the beginning.
IG: Yvonne Pawlett.
HD: But, y'know, what- where he's got a point is that Dave was a very accomplished keyboard player.
IG: And an elder musician.
HD: Yep. Whereas The Fall were- not so dissimilar probably from how they are nowadays if they still exist nowadays, I don't know. Fairly elementary and I think Joy Division were fairly elementary in their musical approach as well.
IG: I think that's what he meant.
HD: Yeah, that's what I think he meant. We, Magazine, were quite sophisticated and the musicians were quite accomplished. John McGeoch was already a very accomplished guitarist, although we were practically his first band. Yes, Barry had hardly started playing bass at the time but he learnt it very quickly. But, yeah, that's what Tony's getting at.
IG: Tony also said, quite harshly, that you became "an irrelevance" but I don't know-
HD: (wryly) To Tony Wilson. Nah, perhaps to Manchester, somewhat.
IG: It would be fairer to say you became an irrelevance to punk, because you were moving so far away from it. Is that valid ?
HD: Well, yes I'm sure. Yes, kind of. How much longer did punk last ?
IG: Post-punk happened quite quickly. It was like punk lasted a week, or that it was a rumour, particularly if you lived up North. You brought the Pistols to Manchester but for most people, they never witnessed it. It was this kind of second-hand thing that they took away with them.
HD: I don't know. When is punk considered to have finished ? The Sex Pistols split up in January 1978. Well, the real Sex Pistols. That was the same month that 'Shot By Both Sides' came out.
IG: Tony said something about that as well (HD corpses) It gets worse! He said about the TOTP appearance for that song, that when it charted you refused to go on and then relented.
HD: The first week, yeah. Did Tony think that was a bad thing ?
IG: He thought it was a sell-out, obviously. What was it, fourth week down the line.
HD: (uncontrollable laughter) And Tony still thinks it was a sell out, does he ? Aw- He doesn't like me very much, but y'know he's got his reasons.
IG: OK, let's move on. Let's get specific too, with the lyrics. There's that line in 'Touch and Go' - "Patching up rows between fizgigs and demireps/You take your pleasures seriously." You often use quite arcane or obscure language-
HD: That's Shakespeare actually! (laughter)
IG: I didn't know that.
HD: Well, let's just say that it's- it lea-, yep, I think so.
IG: But for a pop song to have references to prostitution using quite obscure words is radical-
HD: And probably unwise as a commercial ploy, yeah.
IG: Were you trying to subvert the pop lyric, or were you not interested ?
HD: Well- y'know, words is me job. I like them. I'm sometimes attracted by the arcane. It's not something I do now particularly. One is trying to impress as well.
IG: There was a quote you used somewhere to explain 'The Light Pours Out Of Me'. You never credited it though. It was "how stranger in youth the urge to shine was than the urge to seek by the light me had."
HD: Uh! Blimey, bloody hell! I vaguely remember, sorry I was quoting something was I ?
IG: Yes, but they didn't bother to say who.
HD: Who or what.
IG: Which probably doesn't help you either.
HD: No, it doesn't. (laughter) Give it me again. (We read the quote through a couple of times)
IG: I can probably get the article out, but I won't go that far.
HD: I can't remember where it comes from.
IG: OK. It's a very empowering song, yet it's about being drained. Where does the light pour to ?
HD: Onto other people. I suppose. Yes. "Empowering", interesting.
IG: Well, it's a vibrant song. It's certainly about something major going on inside someone, but there's this kind of contradiction where quite a negative subject has such positive, uplifting music.
HD: Well, this is sounding like fairly standard territory. (laughter)
IG: What interests you about it ?
HD: That territory ? Well, I expect the very meaning of life is to be found there. In these paradoxisms and contradictions.
IG: You lend tragedy a grandeur.
HD: Not always I hope. (laughter) I hope there are a few seedy endings kicking around somewhere.
IG: Whereas people react to tragedy in a very predictable kind of way, you don't look on it quite the same, I don't think.
HD: Well, there's different ways of looking at it, aren't there. No ?
IG: It would help to give an example of a tragedy, I suspect.
HD: Erm, oh Ch*** all I can feel coming upon me is the desire to quote myself.
IG: Go ahead. I'll be doing it all night!
HD: Well, the prospect of your very self kicking the bucket. "My death is holy and awesome/as common as muck on the spade" What's that from ? (I fail terribly here)
HD: Probably my last published song. With Mansun, anyway.
IG: 'Everyone Must Win' ? 'Railings'.
HD: 'Railings'.
IG: Got it, not memorised it.
HD: That's all right. I hope one day the real version of it may be released.
IG: You did the demo of it at Strongroom, Dave told me.
HD: No, I did it at his current studio.
IG: It's not the Strongroom anymore ?
HD: No, the one he's got where he lives now.
(I checked with Dave on this. The Strongroom still exists and it's worth noting that 'Beast Box' was recorded there. Formula's other studio is the shed at the bottom of his garden.)IG: Let's move on. The structure of the lyrics have really developed. 'Boredom' is a sentence per line, whereas 'Deal Of The Century' has two voices.
HD: Blimey! You're going into some obscure corners all of a sudden! (laughter) I'm feeling disorientated.
LS & H: That's Ian! (more laughter)
IG: Obscurity is my unwieldy middle name.
HD: Bernard Szajner - ah! Wow. 'Deal Of the Century'- again, working with ';Bernah' was, y'know, he had most of that music laid down all ready. I had a very difficult job trying to actually work something out around it. I mean that was-
IG: You can't always control the structure.
HD: Well, I didn't go along to him and say "Here's the words, can you sort the music out please." It was more, he sent me the tape and said "Here's the music, can you sort something out for this ?" And, phwoar, that was three weeks hard work in Paris actually.
IG: I've heard the tape of your one performance with him.
HD: Jesus Christ! I haven't. (laughter)
IG: There was one more song there which wasn't on the album, or you didn't contribute to. You did three songs and there's four you performed.
HD: 'Brute Reason'. Four ? Were there four ?
IG: Someone recorded it and didn't like the whole, shall we say. He kept your bits.
HD: I don't remember a fourth song.
IG: I'll get my files out.
HD: I don't think we even did all of the three.
IG: I promise you, you did. (laughter) I'll stand my ground on this. Hammersmith ?
HD: Mmm, Lyric Theatre.
IG: Off the top of my head, 'Snowprints', 'Deal Of The Century', another one and another one.
HD: (baffled) 'Snowprints' ?!
IG: Or is that an XTC song ? (more laughter)
HD: You were hoping I'd agree to that, weren't you ? Yeah, 'Snowprints'! Oh, you're testing me now.
IG: Shall I get the oracle out ?
HD: I can't remember them. What's the oracle ?
IG: It's in me bag. The oracle is going to frighten you I think. (grappling with it) Purely for research I promise you- (more grappling)- can't believe I'm doing this, sorry. Now, where are we. Ah! 'Deal Of The Century'- 'Snowprints'! (laughter)
IG: 'Without Leaving' and 'The Convention'.
HD: Yeah, that's right, yeah. I've no idea what 'Snowprints' is.
IG: Best left I think (laughter) _returning to what we were saying, the structure of your lyrics in general had changed by that point. How do you think your craft developed ?
HD: What, from beginning of career to end ?
IG: If you like!
HD: (laughs)
(Sadly the Mini-Disc failed here and made a strange bleeting noise. We recharged and started again for Part Two)
IG: How do you judge 'Secondhand Daylight' now ? It was much criticised at the time, then accepted belatedly. You did one interview for it with Nick Kent and the reviews for it were pretty severe. Do you think it was Colin Thurston's production or the mood of the time ? What were the factors ?
HD: Hmm. There's quite a few questions in there.
IG: Pick one.
HD: 'The Correct Use Of Soap' is my favourite Magazine album. (shd) I think it had a handful of really good tracks and some quite quickly written things that could have been a bit better honed. I think Colin Thurston's production was very good.
IG: Oh, it was good. But the response it got was not good.
HD: I think a lot of that was down to two things. One was the double- having a gatefold sleeve at that time which was kind of a- (laughter) No, no, no. You don't do that. You've gone too far now with maybe some justification. Seriously, I do think that had an effect. I also think, y'know the instrumental 'The Thin Air' ? I also think that really affected how people heard that album. That was John's piece, which is kind of curious 'cause I'm not sure there's very much guitar on it. But he'd written it all on keyboards and when he played it to us, I listened to it and went "Hmmm. I can hear a bit of Pink Floyd in that." Erm, and the way it turned out, I felt I couldn't- it wasn't a song. I felt I couldn't write anything for it. So, the idea evolved to try it as an instrumental which we eventually made work by cutting the drums out. The drums kind of crash in about a third of the way into the song and suddenly that- it happened, we had a piece there that worked. But it was still the same tune, the same piece of music that John had played to us and- (chuckles) there *are* nuances of Pink Floyd in there. And again that was "No no no. 'I hate Pink Floyd' - that was on John Lydon's tee-shirt and you must not do something that's- got that kind of stuff kicking about in it". So, I actually think those were two- they really did quite affect how people received it. I was seeing it, hearing it- I was probably getting up people's noses at that point as well.
IG: You were described as "frantically indulgent and solipsistic" by one paper for making that record. You did no interview-
HD: I stopped doing interviews for 'The Correct Use Of Soap'.
IG: The band did a feature for Sounds, I remember.
HD: For Correct Use Of Soap, yes. I kind of backed off a lot at that point.
IG: Yet you did one for Secondhand Daylight ?
HD: I did *loads* for Secondhand Daylight. In America I yabbed me bloody head off.
IG: I've only got the British papers.
HD: I was sure. Did I do only one ? I don't remember.
IG: They didn't respond well to this snub.
HD: The snub of me not doing interviews ? Mmmm. I don't particularly remember playing that card at that time. I did a year later. I really didn't- I'd had enough of it by 'The Correct Use Of Soap' and I didn't really want to do it. I'd stopped wearing make-up and I stopped-
IG: You said in regards to your privacy, "If you know what you're doing you learn what protection you need and maybe that's where a lot of people go down the lift shaft."
HD: (smiling) Aha.
IG: Did you discover this in the process or before you became known ?
HD: I've always been quite a private person. Somebody who knew Peter and I quite well at the time the whole Buzzcocks thing happened, said y'know, he could understand it with Peter. In however curious a way, he's quite an open guy and likes to talk to people and get on with them whereas I'm not. I tend to be quite a closed of f person, the difficult bastard in the corner. (laughter) And just quite protective and, y'know, quite wanting to be private about myself. So, y'know, it's always made me a difficult, slightly prickly person, I know. And sometimes it's quite conscious and sometimes it's just me hormones playing up. (laughter)
IG: Would I be right in saying you've done about five interviews in the last ten years. Is that only due to your release rate ?
HD: Well, I haven't had any records out. I'm consciously doing a bit more at the moment.
IG: Would you care to elaborate ?
HD: Well, y'know, people forget you. If you don't work at it a little bit, them buggers, they forget you!
IG: You said in Michael Bracewell's Guardian interview the other month that you write about 2 songs a year.
HD: In a good year.
IG: I think you're teasing us. Is there any desire to do anything more substantial ?
HD: Hmmmm- not wildly. I mean I-
IG: You've got a solid job. You don't need to, I suppose.
HD: I don't need to, that's right. It also means that I don't have a great deal of time to.
LS: It's a shame though, it is a great shame. Because as a songwriter, and this is my personal opinion, I think you're one of the best British songwriters of the last 30 years.
HD: Well, thank you.
LS: No I mean that sincerely. Helen listens to lyrics a lot deeper than me and we just think you're phenomenal really.
HD: Wooh- I work at my best when I'm working with other people. I do need to work with other people and I just- I don't like- I really hated it towards the end of the Eighties. The feeling that I needed to depend on it for my physical existence, my material existence. So, I'd kind of had enough of relying on it. It wasn't supporting me.
IG: 'The Correct Use Of Soap' , then. I wanted to ask you about 'Because You're Frightened' which seems to be about this negative relationship that's-
HD: Aha.
IG: "You want to hurt and crave again."
HD: Crave. It's a Buddhist word, that, you know - (crave). Craving, the source of all pain. Craving. Wanting things.
IG: Can they escape that circle or do they want to ?
HD: Oh, probably only by elevating oneself to an even greater level of anti-life which is I think the general flow of Buddhism. It's not a very pro-life kind of way of doing things. (chuckles)
IG: Are you interested in Buddhism ?
HD: No, I haven't been interested in Buddhism for years, but y'know, it was amongst many, many things that I was quite interested in- back then.
IG: What about 'Model Worker'. I have this theory it would be more explicit as a song if you put a full stop between the two words in the title.
HD: Model dash worker. Erm, mmmm. That was based on some news reports I read on China at the time of- it was sort of the state of love between the sexes at the time. Perhaps they were songs actually. I think I even got some of that- the man declaring to the woman, y'know, I'm just a model worker. And I will be for the people's republic and it will be jolly good and you will love me and, of course, everything will be fine. It was 'Peking Hooligan' moved on a couple of years really. Grown up and gone straight.
IG: What's the link between love and work ?
HD: What's the link ? Oh Lord, I don't know. Ask the Chinese ! (laughter)
IG: You *were* writing about it.
HD: (visibly thinks through song in his head) Yeah, it's a whole mush of stuff that. Again, along with Buddhism, I was quite interested in China in my own way at that time so, y'know, I was reading newspaper reports of this mysterious country. Then trying to kind of- the cultural revolution had almost seemed, hmmmm- ah!- even punk in it's way. There was something kind of mystically anarchic about the cultural revolution, where Mao just turned China upside down. I don't know, I was trying to mix that in with all that stuff about being able to swallow broken glass, to mystically achieve a higher level of one's material being by doing that. Oooh, gosh that's the best explanation I've given for that in years! (much laughter)
LS: Have you since visited China ?
HD: I've never been to China. A very different place I think from what it was in the Seventies.
IG: There's also the question of how self-conscious you are as a writer.
HD: Endlessly. Well, I was.
IG: There was the point made about Mark E. Smith's unself consciousness being able to just descend into language but then there's that line of yours, "I know the meaning of life, it doesn't help me a bit" which seems entirely linked to your self-consciousness.
HD: What is it ?
IG: What is the meaning of life ? You know it. (laughter)
HD: It's just hard to put it into words. I don't know. Don't you think you've seen it some times ? (long pause) No ? Not even a glimpse ? Not even the hem-line of the meaning of it ?
IG: Do you know it when you see it ?
HD: You know some of them when they're slamming themselves in your face. Yes, I think I've understood a few meanings. There ain't one, of course.
IG: You seem to see self-assessment as a trial.
HD: Mmmm yeah- hmmmm. I think it's a trial for most people. Trying to work out how they measure up, what sense they can make of themselves. Because the sense we try to make of ourselves is surely a- is hugely determined by how we think other people are relating to us and what other people make of us. We measure ourselves by other people all the time.
IG: There was that line about the Self - "the brightest jewel inside of me/glows with pleasure at my own stupidity". It seems to be something you're divided over.
HD: (after long consideration) All those feelings.
IG: What is the brightest jewel then ?
HD: (recanting lyrics to himself) Erm, mmm- I don't think that matters particularly. I think what matters is what I'm trying to say about stupidity and enjoying, or trying to enjoy a feeling of one self. A slightly less than perfect being.
IG: Does your irritability keep you alive and kicking ?
HD: Still ? Oh very much so.
IG: Oh good. Dave's given me his feelings on the matter, but I was wondering about yours with regards to John McGeoch's departure from Magazine. Were you particularly involved in the move or did it just happen ?
HD: It was partly us moving to London. By that time we'd all moved to London, so there were a lot more temptations. There were a lot more groups. And, y'know, the guys run into Siouxsie and the Banshees and they run into Ultravox and as I said earlier, I was kind of pulling back from things at that point. My father had died and I was really wanting to withdraw quite a bit. But I think John probably perceived that as, y'know, me not 'going for it' so much at that time. At least that was suggested to me. John didn't say that to me directly but if you see what I mean, there was something that seemed a bit more attractive. Maybe it was a little bit more lucrative. We certainly weren't making any money. We were just getting by. So-
IG: Siouxsie & The Banshees were very successful at the time.
HD: They were doing quite well. Like I say, they were probably quite attractive to John. He could also play quite a major role in them as well, whereas it was a bit more of a tussle with Magazine, what with Barry and Dave. Musically it was probably a bit tougher for him. I don't know, I suspect a combination of those things.
IG: OK, well how much did he affect Magazine, both when he was there and when he wasn't ?
HD: Hugely. Absolutely hugely. I mean, y'know, more than I appreciated.
IG: So when he was gone the absence was really felt.
HD: Yeah, yeah. I think the absence is to be heard on 'Magic, Murder and the Weather'.
IG: Was Robin Simon ever seriously considered as a guitarist. Full time, I mean.
HD: Well, y'know, Robin essentially filled in for us with an American and Australian tour and he was fine for that.
IG: A perfectly good player.
HD: Yeah, he could do John McGeoch almost as well as John McGeoch, but it was- when we came to, y'know, writing the next album, it just wasn't happening.
IG: Dave said it was almost as though he wasn't there. The dynamics of the group were failing.
HD: Well, yes, he didn't really seem to have very much to contribute, writing wise. At least at that time. And that wasn't how Magazine had worked. There were strong contributions from everybody. And certainly I wanted a strong guitar presence in it, y'know, just like every- male kid on the block, anyway. The electric guitar was the most thrilling of all things, so y'know, I wanted a strong guitar element but, like I say, it didn't happen with Robin, and Ben wasn't really the right kind of guitarist. A fantastic guitar player as he is in his own right.
IG: Have you heard him with Billy Bragg recently ?
HD: No, I haven't. Have you heard the 3 Mustaphas ?
IG: They played your wedding, didn't they ? Ben told me.
HD: Yes he did. You've spoken to Ben ?
IG: Yes I have. Can you tell me which Mustapha he was ?
HD: (laughs) They had obscure-
IG: Stupid names.
HD: Yes, they had stupid names. Erm, but no, I don't know.
IG: Ben started off helping out with rehearsals for 'Magic Murder and the Weather' during auditions and then, with an "Oh f*** it", he joined.
HD: I don't think we ever auditioned Ben. I doubt it.
IG: Oh no, that's not what I'm saying. He said he was present at the time-
HD: He'd just come along when we were trying to write something and get an album together. That's what I imagine him doing.
IG: He was just filling the spot for the moment ?
HD: Just come along and see what happens.
IG: Ben's account is that he saw all the auditions, laughed at the fiddle player, laughed at the crappy guitarist and then joined.
HD: Yes, we did do some auditions. I remember some auditions. I don't know how that connected to Robin or how we connected to Ben.
IG: Right. What was so wrong with the John Brand mix of that final album, because it got rejected ?
HD: We- the consensus was that we weren't happy with it. And Martin Hannett ended up being the only candidate that could be agreed on to redo it. I can't- I dunno. I remember speaking to Barry many years ago and him saying that he'd been relistening to it. I mean, this was a long, long time ago and he really rather liked them; the John Brand mix. But we- I can't believe we had a complete album at that point actually, because some of that stuff was radically reworked. I'm sure- yeah, I can't- I think we were half or two thirds of the way through the album, and we'd done some mixes and the feeling was "It's not going quite right. Jump ship now, let's finish it off with Martin." That would be my guess.
IG: Ben said the great thing about Strawberry Studios was that it was 1981 and there was a microwave (laughter) He was overawed by that.
HD: The crap thing about Strawberry Studios was the mixing desk.
IG: What was good about working with Hannett ? What was bad about the mixing desk ?
LS: The acid trips underneath it- (laughter)
HD: I remember the mixing desk being hexagonal or octagonal, with a wedge cut into it which had just enough space for two people; him and the engineer. So they had all the fades and all the twiddle knobs and y'know- anybody else, it was like really difficult to get at it. And- come back to Tony Wilson. I remember saying to Tony "'The Correct Use Of Soap' was the best production job Martin Hannett ever did" and the reason it was the best production job was because we had our hands on the knobs (laughter) and we were able to- modify, erm- the mix. I remember taking off- Martin had stuck his, y'know, trademark huge reverb on the snare, on 'You Never Knew Me' and I just went "I don't want this big snare! It's not about listening to the bloody snare drum. Y'know, I want people to listen to the words and John's guitar and everything else going on." And because one could lean over and say "Nah, I don't think we'll have that" it worked. And, y'know, Martin had his place to play in the sound of it. Erm, but it didn't work at Strawberry. We couldn't get there, we couldn't modify- I mean, I couldn't get at it to modify the levels, so it ended up being a little unsatisfactory to me.
LS: I agree with what you say, that that was his best work, because those last two Buzzcocks singles he murdered. On 'Are Everything' you can't hear the cellos or the violas at all. They sound like keyboards.
HD: Y'know, I don't think the Joy Division albums were particularly well produced but it is an interesting aesthetic and quite striking at the time, I'm sure.
IG: 'Beastly Street' was a good Hannett production. John Cooper Clarke, that is.
HD: Right. Well, I can't really bring that to mind. He was very erratic and not *that* easy to work with, but, y'know, he had his own qualities. Yeah. Dave had lived with him and he'd been involved with 'Spiral Scratch' so we went back a few years. As I say, he was the only one at that time that everybody could go "Oh, well, Martin", y'know. We could all settle on Martin then.
IG: There was something else Ben said about the songs he worked on. He was very into his Derek Bailey and Evan Parker records. You know, the free jazz stuff.
HD: Oh yes, absolutely.
IG: He tried to work in 'avant-grade squeaking' onto the album, as he calls it. (HD laughs) There were a couple of tracks where he really went for it with a solo, but one of them got mixed out. He doesn't remember which track do you ?
HD: There was one in 'Vigilance'. Ben was really an improviser and he- there's a mad descending line he does. Again, Martin's mixed the bloody thing so far in the background that you can hardly hear what's going on, but we thought "Ben! Fantastic. Great. Some more of that. Do it again, we'll keep that one. Another track" and- I dunno, we spent what seemed like a long time, for us, in pursuit of this guitar solo that we were going to get. Never quite got there, 'cause like I say, Ben found it very hard to repeat. Y'know, to work that into a part. It just wasn't his way of working and that was fairly essential to our way of working. Yeah, he could do it sometimes. He did it with 'The Honeymoon Killers' ;got a very nice guitar line in there.
IG: Ben said he found it very disheartening to see someone else performing his guitar solos two years later.
HD: Who said that ?
IG: Ben, yet there's little evidence of your playing very much from that album.
LS: Two songs on that solo tour. Definitely 'Permafrost', 'cause you played acoustic guitar on that.
HD: Oh, sorry, are we talking about the solo tour ?
IG: Or even with Luxuria. You did 'About The Weather' a couple of times.
HD: Yes, because that was substantially Dave's song and Dave was playing on that tour. Awful awful awful. (laughter) The Hacienda gig was filmed. Somebody started to edit it and sent me it -awful awful- I hate it. Awful. What the f*** was I doing ?
LS: Was that the anniversary gig ? Oh no, I'm thinking of G-Mex.
HD: Yes, G-Mex was 1986.
IG: Adultery.
HD: Yes, Adultery. (Helen starts to laugh) A challenging name!
(We are fast running out of time and Howard's partner is due at any moment, in order to take him off to dinner. We agree to wrap up with a few quick Questions.)HELEN: Are you enjoying life at this moment in time ?
HD: Not bad, not bad.
LS: You look tremendously well though. Helen does make-up, she's a make-up artist and Ian was saying you're 48. You look fantastic.
IG: Is it 47 or 48 ?
HD: No, I'm 48 (laughter)
HELEN: You're wearing very well.
HD: Thank you, thank you.
LS: Are you vegetarian now ?
HD: No, no. I live with a vegan, but I'm not one myself.
IG: Have you seen the website, by the way.
HD: I've had a quick look at it, yeah.
IG: What did you make of it ?
HD: Fair enough. It's very nice somebody's done one.
IG: You've no objections to this being used for it ?
HD: Probably not. (laughter) One says what one says.
IG: Very quickly then. Around 'Jerky Versions' time, there are a number of songs - 'Rainy Season', 'Naked Eye' amongst them -that all relate to the weather. Is that pining for Manchester ? (laughter)
HD: I'd moved from Manchester by then. I moved from Manchester in 79.
IG: Where have you been located over the years, can you tell us that.
HD: London.
IG: And always *HERE* ?
HD: No, I was in South London for a while, but I've been here for a while now. The weather, the weather-
IG: If you're an English Lit student you're told to look out for the rain - it's significant. (laughter)
IG: Was that the agenda with you. Sun, rain, deserts, even fridges influencing the way people are. (I frankly crack up at HD's facial expression)
(Karen arrives to say hello and beckon him away.)IG: We'll wrap up very quickly then. There's that line "Pepsi Cola, Pepsi Cola brings your ancestors back from the grave." Ben reckons that it's a mis-translation of some Korean or- I don't know what it is.
HD: Yeah, it was- I think their phrase at the time was "Come alive with Pepsi" (laughter) Erm, but this had got translated in some far Eastern land to "Pepsi Cola brings your ancestors back from the grave". This was supposedly true, so it kind of got mixed in there with everything else.
IG: OK. What did you do for three years after 'Jerky Versions' ?
HD: Got very, very miserable. I had an attempt at a straightish job at the time, for a year.
IG: What line of work ?
HD: A book production company.
IG: You retired from music and then came back and, to a degree, you've done it again.
HD: No. Totally different. I got myself into a very bad hole and really, at that time for me, going back into music was like the thing I knew. I knew it was something I cared about immensely. I knew I could kind of hang on to it. It would pre-occupy me, it would distract me, it would do all the things I needed to do, as well as hopefully provide me some subsistence. So, yeah, I ended up being in music for another three years or so with the two Luxuria albums.
IG: Dave told me that during the mixing of 'Beast Box' you announced it would be the last Luxuria record. Why ?
HD: Erm, no, I would not have said that. I don't know where Dave's got that from actually. Quite seriously I don't know where Dave's got that from. Erm, I thought and still think that 'Beast Box' was a really great album. Far better than the first Luxuria album, worlds better than my solo album.
LS: Really ? Because I disagree there. I thought that solo album was superb.
HD: Well, again-
LS: And may I add that you know as well as I do how difficult tiny clubs are, but I thought it was very, very exciting for a small club tour. Because, as you know, if you go out and play big arenas, you can have all the fantasies. For a small tour- I mean, I was seventeen years old. It did- it blew me away. I'd seen bands since I was fourteen.
HD: Where did you see me ?
LS: In Birmingham at Barbarellas, it was a strip club. And Derby Bluenote.
(The MD dies here. Just leading into a good anecdote about the strip club, now lost in the mists of time. He went on to explain, very briefly, the 'Beast Box' video. Describing it as cheap, he felt it was a great idea which needed a much bigger budget to fulfill its aim. Then he was off.) ShotByBothSides.com/ig_20000423n.htm
![[Magazine Logo]](/magazine.jpg)