The Paul Weller interview
Article published in NME, 25th December 1982
Paul Weller | The Return Of The Avenger | Part 2 |
ARE YOU SATISFIED with ‘Beat Surrender’ being The Jam’s last musical statement?
I didn’t think of it that way. If I’d have thought like that I could have written a special one or something. The same with the gigs as well: I’m just treating the gigs as gigs as with any ones we’ve done before.
It’s got some lines in it, ‘Beat Surrender’, like the Biblical line, “As it was in the beginning, so shall it be in the end. The bullshit is bullshit just goes by different names”. I suppose they could be like closing statements.
At the same time, they’re quite optimistic as well. Like the chorus, which is just a kind of call to young people to get out and fuckin’ do it themselves. I think it’s probably a mixture.
I didn’t particularly think about doing a final statement, though. Bit dramatic, innit? A bit Hollywood that.
You seem to want to keep emotion out of this.
I don’t think that. I don’t think that at all. The only thing I want to keep out of it . . . like I say, I don’t want it just to become like a big sort of wake, cos there’s still the future. All the things we’ve done, they’ll still carry on; they’re still good things; they’re still really positive things. Now it’s just expanding on them; do it in different ways. Not just us, I mean the other people as well. All those kids now who’re coming to see us, it’s also up to them to pick up and do it — whatever they’re going to do. So, I find the whole thing optimistic. I wouldn’t try and keep emotions out of it.
‘The Gift’ is a very curious last studio LP for The Jam, because I wouldn’t have thought from listening to it that musically The Jam were complete. It’s such a mixture: lyrically it’s partly pessimistic with a song like `Running On The Spot’, and then very optimistic with things like ‘Ghosts’ — a familiar theme in your songs about there’s more in you, bring it out of yourself. Musically, there were so many different elements there, as if you were changing style.
It just didn’t fuckin’ come off; that’s what it was really. (Laughs). It wasn’t as if there was something there that was heading towards something, it just never fuckin’ happened!
I don’t know if the others would agree with me, but I don’t think we could have got any further musically. We’d reached it and that was it. So it’s best just to say, fair enough. I think we’d peaked as a group anyway, but that doesn’t mean to say individually.
At what point do you think you peaked?
`Sound Affects’, I thought, was a fuckin classic LP. Possibly, that was the peak. I thought there was something that was really, really good there. But there’s been other things since that time. I thought that ‘A Town Called Malice’ was a really good pop record. There are some good things on `The Gift’. There’s some great things on ‘The Gift’. I thought ‘Ghosts’ was good. ‘Precious’ I thought was good.
The more separate ways you go, obviously the different things you get into, so sometimes it’s hard to bring it all together. That is really one of the good things when bands are starting off, that they’re always really matey and very close. They nearly always go through the same experience at the same time, which really does bring things together.
Was there a sense of frustration musically, with ‘The Gift’?
Yeah, there was a few things. Like ‘The Planner’s Dream Goes Wrong’; I thought that was a good song, but it got really slated. I suppose there are a lot of different rhythms going on there. I think Rick felt a bit restricted there, with some of the songs. I just tend to see things very simply and that; why complicate things if you haven’t got to? So a lot of my songs are very, very simple, really very basic and they really call for a simple playing, a backing.
Paul Weller | The Return Of The Avenger | Part 2
But lyrically they’ve changed quite a lot. `Malice’ seems to consist of single, impressionistic lines — very different to something like “Tube Station’, which was a story. Do you feel that there’s been changes in your songwriting very much?
Yeah, I think so. I hope so. I’d hate to carry on doing the same thing. There’s a lot of them story type songs, very complete songs, from like “Tube Station’ . . . a lot of them singles — ‘Strange Town’, ‘When You’re Young’, ‘Eton Rifles’, up to ‘Going Underground’. After that I really wanted to change, because I’d just exhausted that. ‘Setting Sons’ has a lot of them songs in there, I thought.
Those story songs I found really easy to write. To me, they’re very simple to do; I think sometimes a little too easy possibly. And the other thing is that a lot of my ideas I see in terms of images and that. Things like ‘A Town Called Malice’ come out that way, because that’s the way I see them in me head.
Once I can lock into them, they’re very easy to write, cos I’ve got all the images anyway.
You know that ‘Precious’ is very like Pigbag.
Yeah. (Laughs slyly)
Were you aware of that when you wrote it?
Yeah. . . well, I was really influenced by them. I thought the first few singles were great. I liked the way they played. I really like the rhythm section. Yeah . . . that is influenced by them . . .
You say how much you like ‘Precious’, and that does have a very different sound. Do you think The Jam sounded old-fashioned?
No, not really. That’s been levelled at us before. I think the so-called new groups sound old-fashioned. Like Talk Talk, Simple Minds, Flock Of Seagulls are all using the so called new technology — right? — but I just think it sounds really old-fashioned. An ‘orrible synth droning away in the background.
The only reason we sound different is because we still use basic instruments, guitars and proper drums. It’s like the ’60s thing that people always go on about . . . I mean, that’s just a style of writing. I don’t see how I could write any different really, which is why I do it.
You could put it in a different format — which is what you seem to want to do now.
Yeah . . . but I ain’t gonna do it with a bleedin’ synthesiser.
Was it you solely introducing the new style of music? ‘Malice’, ‘Precious’, things like that. They seem very black influenced.
But we’ve always had that bit, haven’t we? I mean, like years ago when we were still in the clubs, half our set was always like Motown covers and Stax covers. So we’ve always really had the R&B thing.
Really with ‘The Gift’ I just wanted to go back to that. I wanted to go back to playing that kind of music, getting a bit close to it. Stuff we started off doing. Which is really enjoyable to play. Overall, it’s my favourite sort of music; most types of black music.
Were you having to compromise much then with your personal musical tastes, to have a recognisable Jam Sound?
I’m not sure. Well, what a lot of people regard as our best period, all them singles like from `Tube Station’ and ‘Going Underground’, I never particularly liked. They weren’t my type of music. They’re not the sort of things I’d personally play at home.
In retrospect, I think they are classic singles, and they’ve got a certain kind of classic sound about them . . . So, I like ’em for different reasons, I think. I see them a little bit outside myself.
But there’s other types of music, other songs we’ve done which are a bit closer to what I like; a little bit more closer to the sort of music that I play at home.
Paul Weller | The Return Of The Avenger | Part 2
Which songs in particular?
Well, ‘Precious’ I really liked. Actually, it’s really gone down well live. It’s always been a really good live number since we put it in the set. I really like me vocals on it, because I put a lot into them. A lot of songs on ‘The Gift’ actually. It’s just a bit closer to that R&B thing. `Beat Surrender’ I think is a good song. I don’t know if it come out as well as it could have done . . . It’s a little bit like a modern sort of R&B.
PAUL DU NOYER suggested I ask you why the lyrics of ‘The Bitterest Pill’ were so trite and so uncharacteristic. Did you feel that?
Yeah, but you see that was how it was fuckin’ supposed to be. I wasn’t really sure whether I should . . . Well, I found it all quite amusing, a lot of them reviews around that, especially Danny Baker’s thing about me getting into this introspection, or something. I thought it was a load of bollocks really. I really just wanted to write a song to get away from the kind of thing that had been building up with ‘The Gift’.
Completely. Just a one-off thing. And it is a sort of trite love song. How people could take it seriously, I don’t know.
Well, you have a general image of not . . .
Yeah, well, that’s people’s hard luck for fuckin’ not looking into things enough. If they just want to take things at face value that’s up to them; they’re just going to miss out on a lot of good things possibly.
Some of those lines were like . . . (Laughs) . . . in the third verse there’s, “Now autumn breeze blows summer’s leaves from our life”. Real sort of sixth form prose stuff. I thought it was quite good; thought it was quite amusing. It’s my sense of humour really.
I was just going to say, a lot of people don’t think you have a sense of humour.
(Laughs) I just like different things anyway. I don’t think people look into it enough. Obviously it’s my own fault for the way I sort of portray myself. I don’t mind really. I find it all quite amusing, especially me being a real miserable bastard. That thing. I think some of that’s really funny. Especially when some of the dailies pick up on it. Like there’s the geezer on the Evening Standard who picked up on that strong.
Why did you decide to nurture that image?
Well, I dunno . . . I think sometimes you’ve got to do things as a kind of reaction to what’s going on. So when people start peddling all this fun crap, as if it’s some fuckin’ commodity, then I want to go against it. Anything that I think is bullshit, I’ll try and go against.
It really pissed me off when all the music papers . . . At one stage, they were all sort of really hard line, getting there with Strummer, then the next minute they’re all fuckin’ cocktails and Martin Fry.
So I just find it amusing all these different fashions. In some ways they’re amusing, but in other ways it pisses me off. Cos to me it means they don’t take it seriously, and I guess I do.
You don’t have to be serious all the time.
Of course not, no, but . . . I just don’t like the way people play with it. That’s one of the things I’ve got against some of the music papers, they just toy with it a little bit. That shift in attitudes that quick seems to me they tend to just toy with it.
It was good when you’d got people who’d take a bit of a stand; some people who you can . . . I dunno . . . trust, I suppose.
When I’ve read you being serious and intense in interviews, and when we’ve had one of our frequent rows about NME, I find it hard to come to terms with the fact you like the up music of early Motown, and also you like certain parts of the ’60s a lot. They were very hedonistic . . .
Yeah . . . but I don’t really like those parts.
Paul Weller | The Return Of The Avenger | Part 2
But you’re very critical of the ’70s. There was an article in The Observer, based on Channel 4’s The Sixties programmes, which made the point that the ’60s were a loud decade with lots of protest, but it was actually in the ’70s when things like the anti-nuke movement, women’s rights, ecology, animal liberation, achieved something.
In that case, I suppose I don’t look into it that deeply. I mean, a lot of the things of the ’60s that I also like, which always appealed to me, is mainly like the style — the clothes, and the music. If you put it against what you’re talking about, it’s trivial things, it’s quite superficial things . . . but that style appeals to me.
The other thing that I like about it, is just the way that there just seemed to be more holes for people to get through. That people, just ordinary working class people, just got out and just made it.
I mean, I’ve never really thought about what it achieved. I never particularly thought it achieved anything — you’ve got all them crappy people around, in charge of radio stations, and record companies . . .
I like the idea of 18-year-old DJs; that sort of thing. Something like punk was much more important in terms of things having a lasting effect, or something a bit more solid.
A lot of them ’60s people are still around. They’re all in the fuckin’ TV stations, and radios, and — like I said — record companies. And they’re a real fuckin’ drag, a lot of them. Some of them are in music papers an’ all, aren’t they? (Sniggers)
But it’s going to happen again. The present youth generation are going to be out of sync with the next youth audience.
Dunno. Well, that all depends how strong their principles are. Say, some of our audience ever get to that position, and into those sort of positions . . . will they be out of sync, do you think?
They could be if a new young band comes along with different ideas.
I think you’ve got less chance of that happening than say with the ’60s generation, because — like you said — most of it was just built on hedonism. Same old people in control, really; just that they were a little bit more . . . dunno what they were . . . stoned, I suppose. (Laughs)
I think it’ll be different with this generation, because it’s a different era, totally different era. You haven’t got the same kind of money around for a start. There’s less of that sort of extravagance . . .
I like the kind of romantic thing behind youth, young people. They just look so good. Age doesn’t necessarily affect your outlook, I think to me it’s just the image of it. And also the fact that they’re the fuckin’ future as well. You think of the way that Thatcher’s like handling the future — all those kids, which is the future of this country. The way she just treats them like shit.
It’s getting back to the system of the haves and the have-nots.
There are just too many fuckin’ weak people involved. That opposition’s quite strong, but it could easily be done away with, it’s just that there’s too many weak people — like the Labour party.
Who are broke.
Yeah, but that wouldn’t matter if they had the spirit, but they’ve got no fuckin’ spirit in them; they’re fuckin’ dead. Look at the age of them, do you know what I mean? It’s frightening.
But that’s a lot of it. It’s like this thing about class, like the songs I’ve done on class that some people have criticised, said that it’s cliched. But I think it is really important . . . especially if you meet some of them people.
I met some of them kids from this public school when I was doing that TV show, Something Else. Although it’s not their fault, because they’re probably as conditioned as anyone else, but just their attitude; it’s really frightening that. They know that they’re going to end up in some position of power; they’re either gonna be like captains or go into management or politics. At that age, at 17, they’re totally out of fuckin’ touch . . . with the majority anyway.
Is there a solution to it?
I think there could be. You’ve got to have a strong party with real spirit . . . and obviously you’ve got to detach politics from this power thing. The whole power politics thing, you’ve got to try and get it back down to human and emotional level. You’ve got to get more involved with the way people feel. That sense of involvement, you’ve got to try and instil that into them and also things like pride and dignity.
Which is difficult for the kids that are about 16 and 17 who are on the fuckin’ dole and getting about £16 a week. It doesn’t exactly do anything to the human spirit.
Really, those people at the top have just got to be done away with. We’ve just got to get rid of them. One way would be to close down all the public schools and end that, and just build one really good education system. I don’t think pop music’s gonna do it, that’s for sure.
Paul Weller | The Return Of The Avenger | Part 2
SOME OF MY FAVOURITE lines are from ‘London Girl’: “I don’t condemn what you done/ I know what it is to be young/ You’re only searching for today/ To seek the answers of our yesterday. “Doesn’t that have an effect? It gives a dignity, an understanding.
Yeah, but I can’t see what your point is.
You said you don’t think pop music’ll have an effect . . .
It can have an effect, I just mean it won’t be pop music that overthrows all that. That’s what I’m trying to say. But I still think it’s really important. It’s important to build up some kind of feeling, some kind of spirit.
Take The Jam: all those kids that have grown up with us over the last five or six years, it’s given them something in their lives. It gives them some kind of strength. So therefore I do think it’s really important, pop music; that’s why I do get pissed off when these groups treat it in such a crass and trite way.
Like ABC?
Yeah. It’s a drag when I keep slagging these bands off, but I can’t really help it because it’s just all against what I fuckin’ believe in.
At the same time I don’t think it should all be serious either. I think there’s lots of sorts of different functions for music. Which is another reason why in recent years, I’ve liked a lot of dance music. Because there’s nothing else really happening, and at least dance doesn’t pretend to be anything else than what it is. It’s just when these bands pretend that they’re creating art, and it’s really just shit dressed up.
(Laughs) I’m not going to slag any more bands off, so there. It’s my New Year’s Resolution.
From the statements you’ve made (in the past) it seems you have a lack of humour, and by slagging bands off it appears you have a lack of tolerance. You know the right way and that’s the only way.
Tony, it’s this totalitarian trip I’m getting into. It’s really heavy man. (Laughs).
There’s a Bob Dylan line: “You know what you want, I know what you need.”
(Laughs) Yeah, it must come over that way. I don’t think about it really.
There appears to be more than one Paul Weller.
I get a lot of different ideas and a lot of different attitudes at times; it’s hard to pinpoint. It’s like the whole idea of interviews is just that you’re questioning someone at one particular time and just taking a chance on catching their feelings at that particular time.
Going back to the music again, is there one particular album you’re really fond of?
Well, I think ‘Sound Affects’ when I think about it now. I heard it a few months back — it was the first time I heard it for quite a while —and I thought that really is a strong LP. I think it’s the best LP we’ve ever done.
What about ‘This Is The Modern World’?
Naah. I find it really hard to listen to them early LPs. I think you’ve got to take them in the context of when they were done, especially the first one.
I think my big mistake really, which was a little bit of naivety, was trying to do political lyrics at that stage. I was really influenced by The Clash, their early things, and things that Strummer used to say. And I just had a go at doing them.
It’s taken me quite a long time to really sort out . . . I just think it’s a maturity thing really.
Have you had to educate yourself?
In some ways, yeah. But as you get older, just as you experience different things, you either form your own views or you don’t. It’s just an age thing really. Obviously there are people who do get it together when they’re younger.
I think ‘Setting Sons’ is probably my favourite album.
Yeah, a lot of people say that. It’s not really my type of music on it though. Some of the words are OK. I never really felt part of that LP.
But something like ‘Little Boy Soldiers’ is quite harrowing; then what’s happened in the Falklands, prophetic even.
And ‘Eton Rifles’. Do you remember there was a Right To Work March a few years back that went through Eton? There was like a little skirmish there, all about that song.
ONE THING YOU’VE always steered very well clear from is the old tradition of stardom; is there a reason for that?
Just because it’s crap! It’s a myth. It doesn’t exist. I always really believed in them punk things as well. Even though people never really associated us with the original punk thing, I always believed in a lot of those ideals. I thought they were really on the ball for that. I really thought they’d got it right with that.
So that was it as well. There was all that talk about smashing down all that stardom, and that separation thing where there was the artist and the audience with that sort of mystical fucking barrier in between. I think we’ve done a lot against that: in breaking all that bullshit down.
It’s like little things as well, that other groups don’t even think about doing, but which really matter. Meeting people after the gigs. Obviously you can’t meet everyone, but we’ve always tried to make a point of doing that. It matters more to people than what you think. And like letting all the kids in for sound checks.
All those sort of things, it just makes it more human. That’s another little tiny facet that’s broken down . . . a sound check, it’s nothing. You just fuck around with the sound onstage. Just little ways of breaking all that crap down. But there’s a lot of opposition that wants to perpetuate it.
There’s been other groups, like The Specials. I think they’ve really done that . . . and The Beat. There’s a lot of smaller groups, cult groups, that obviously do it. But it’s better to be successful and do it. Do it in a big way, otherwise it’s a little bit like preaching to the converted.
Paul Weller | The Return Of The Avenger | Part 2
Did you start off wanting to be famous?
Yeah. When I was 14 and 15 I always did. But I think at that age I used to believe in all the things that I’ve come to hate now. I really believed in that star thing.
Who was your hero then?
I dunno. I don’t know if I had any or not. When I was really young, I suppose The Beatles. But then later on, Townshend.
But isn’t it now possible to use the fame that you’ve got? There’s a Martin Fry interview in this issue and one of the things he says is “Money is currency, currency is fame” —meaning that you can use that fame to achieve other things.
Yeah? What’s he fuckin’ achieved, then? Put their money where their mouth is then. A lot of those punk bands said the same thing when they started out, but look at them. Yeah, you can use it . . .
Do you intend to?
I think I already have. I think I’ve already started. I’ll probably use it a bit now. I was always a bit reluctant to put myself in front of it, because I thought I’d maybe get people buying it just for the sake of it. Otherwise people’d think I’m just doing a big cash-in thing. But now I think I would try and use it more, use my name more; I’ve got to, because I haven’t got The Jam anymore.
Martin Fry asks, “Why on earth can’t people go from one extreme to the other? Why can’t people enjoy The Jam and ABC” Have you got an answer?
I suppose a lot of people do, don’t they?
You’ve always given the impression that the two aren’t compatible.
No, I don’t think that at all. It’s just my stance is totally different . . . it’s worlds away from his, so I find it hard to understand someone who believes in what I do can also believe in what he does. I’m not saying it’s impossible, because I know for a fact there are people, because I spoke to some people who like us . . . like Haircut 100, a lot of people like them as well as us.
It’s not impossible, It’s impossible for me. But what a lot of people forget is that it is a bit of a wind-up, all this slagging groups off . . .
Martin Fry also says, “I believe you can be glamorous and grotesque. It does grieve me to get pulled into some ridiculous arena where I’m expected to slug it out with Paul Weller”.
Well, who’s taking things too seriously?
DO YOU HAVE ANY peers in modern music? I would have thought Dave Wakeling.
What? In my estimation?
Yes, because you seem to to think a lot of them have shat on you.
(Laughs) There must be quite a few really. People like Suggsy of Madness, he’s got some really good ideas. And definitely Dave Wakeling. I think he’s great.
Who else? (Laughs)
Probably Strummer as well to some extent. But Joe’s an incurable romantic, inne? I think that he means well, it’s just that he’s got all these romantic notions and he just ends up his own arsehole in the end.
I can’t think of too many others quite honestly. Obviously there are some. You see, I haven’t really met very many people, it’s hard to say. It’s better if I meet some of the groups and speak to them.
Do you ever run into the ones you’ve slagged off?
Yeah.
What happens?
Nothing much. That’s the trouble with musicians, they’re so fuckin’ two faced. Loved your last record.
Is that what you say to them, or they say to you?
It usually gets round to that. That’s what I used to hate about drinking and you’re pissed an’ that, the shit you come out with . . . Oh, I didn’t mean that, what I meant was . . .
We probably haven’t got many other friends in groups because of the way we have slagged others off, so we don’t come into contact with too many of them. They tend to run away a bit from us. Not because they’re frightened much, but because we seem to be a bit drab and a bit serious. But other people that have got similar ideas we seem to get on OK with.
STARDOM OBVIOUSLY isn’t an aspiration for you, but what keeps you going? What is your sense of ambition?
In some ways I’ve done it, I suppose, but I’d like to become a really powerful writer. A lot of it’s practise, I’d like to expand on that. I just love making music really, recording especially. And just songwriting. It’s not something that you take up or you give up, it’s there. It’s something I started doing and which, as far as I know, I always will do. So things like that really keep me going.
Is it also to use your position? Like NME did the interview with yourself, Dave Wakeling and a few others — do you welcome that opportunity to draw attention to CND and the anti-nuke movement?
Yeah. Something like that I would. Obviously because I believe in it for a start, but also because I think you’re justified in influencing people’s thoughts. It’s the only sane thing going, politically. At the same time I wouldn’t try and influence people towards any, kind of political party; I don’t think I’d be justified in doing that.
You don’t align yourself to any political party?
No. I’ve only voted once, and I voted Labour last time. But that was really only just to keep all the others out. Next time I’ll probably vote Labour again, but only for the same reason, not because they’re a particularly good political party, because they’re not.
That Green Party in Germany I think are really good. It’d be great if there was something like that over here. They could do with some more competition. The fuckin’ SDP! Ugh!
Have you got tax problems then? You live such an austere lifestyle, no drinking, no drugs, no flash house, no flash car . . .
Tony, I suppose it’s time I spilled the beans: this is a facade, man.
It’s like a Beatles film, is it? A terraced house, you walk through the door into a palace . . .
(Laughing) Yeah, I have all these serving wenches chopping up lines of coke. No, I don’t. because I always pay me tax because I’m a good citizen, and plus the fact I’ve got lots of other things going on as well. There’s like the labels I’ve started (Respond and Jamming); there’s the book publishing thing (Riot Stories); I’ve got a PA company.
I put money back into what I can work within, and work well within, and just things that’ll go on and do good in some other way as well. There’s a lot of other things I want to do: I want to try and get a club going next year somewhere, like a coffee-bar club . . .
No cocktails?
No. Just for really young kids, on a Saturday or Sunday afternoon. That’d be great, I think. It’s not as if I hoard my money. I don’t even particularly try and be austere about things. I’ve never been particularly extravagant; I’m not tight either. I don’t need a fuckin’ car; if I did I’d go out an buy one. And I don’t need a mansion, but if I did then I’d go and get it.
It just comes down to people’s basic character. I don’t need these status things because I’ve got my own self-respect, which is far better than those things anyway. So I’d sooner just try and build on that. I’d sooner try and improve myself as a person, try to get better.
Now that you’ve set yourself free from The Jam, what’s your greatest fear?
Not being successful. (Laughs) I haven’t got any fears at the moment really, not concerned with that. I mean, I would like to be successful I’m not talking about playing Wembley again . . . I’d really like to build up these other things, like a label and this book thing.
I haven’t really got any fears at the moment because it’s a really nice position to be in. Now, for the first time in five or six years I don’t know what’s going to happen next week or next month; I haven’t got a clue. At this moment in time it makes a nice change; I’m quite enjoying it. It’s a bit of a challenge.
But haven’t you signed a solo contract with Polydor?
Yeah.
So aren’t you straight back on to the treadmill then?
No, not really, because there’s not the same kind of . . . I haven’t got any deadlines to meet. I can just release records whenever I want to, whenever I feel like it. I haven’t got any touring commitments to meet. So it isn’t really the same thing.
I’m just going to take my time and do whatever I want to do and enjoy it. Cos it was such a furious pace, the last few years, that we just didn’t get time to enjoy a lot of it. When I think I started when I was 18 and I’m 24 now, that’s really a big part of your life. I don’t regret it because it’s been great, but now I want to enjoy some of it.
People reading this will think, well, not enjoying it — wasn’t that the way he wanted it?
What? The no-fun thing? Yeah, but I don’t mean in that way. Well, yeah, I probably will take in a few clubs for a while, over Christmas. A few parties. See how it goes. Bryan Ferry’s got one coming up soon. I’ll probably go to that.
Haven’t you got any specific plans, because I thought you were going to tell me about them?
I will do, Tone, in time. You lot won’t want to fuckin’ know next year, will ya? I’ll have to come up and knock on your door to see if I can get a one liner in T-Zers, or something. Remember this man? (Laughs).
No, we’re good to people on their way down as well.
(Laughs) Rotten bastards.
It’s a bit too soon really. I want to make records, that’s for sure. I want to try and develop a certain sound. I really want to try and develop this English soul thing. I don’t really like to label it, but . . .
Have you started writing material?
I’ve got a few new songs. I really want to build around this Respond thing as well. There’s The Questions and a girl singer, Tracey. I had a tape from a young boy the other day, and he’s quite good.
I’d obviously like to try and build up some musicians as well, and a particular sound. Writers and everything. I’d sooner try and find totally new people. I just find it really refreshing to work with those sort of people. I think that’s what it needs. There’s a real horrible cynical — cynical in a business way — kind of attitude around. I really hate that.
You mean work like Dammers has with The Higsons and The Apollinaires?
Yeah. He’s a really clever geezer. I think he’s established a kind of sound . . . but there’s a lot more to work on.
Is that an ideal for you? To set up a kind of 2-Tone, which had a very identifiable sound at the beginning.
Yeah, but incorporating my ideals and the principles I was talking about, so that it becomes a culture, not just a record label but a whole culture as well. Not a fashion thing. Not a transient pop thing, but something with real substance.
The creative businessman, eh?
Yeah. (Laughs). That’s the only thing that pisses me off about the business, and that is the business. It’s the contradiction that’s really hard to justify. Cos the music itself can be kept very pure and idealistic, but at the same time you’ve got all these wankers in control of it.
That’s why I don’t feel guilty about having money, either. Because I think it’s better that I have money and control than these other old tossers. As long as I don’t lose sight with what I’m supposed to be doing with it.
I ONLY HAVE a final question, which might be revealing: what do you want for Christmas?
(Laughs) This’ll go towards perpetuating my image and everything, but I think Christmas is a real fuckin’ drag. I really ‘ate it. I’m not bothered what I get. I don’t like Christmas. Everything shuts down. It’s boring. I’m looking forward to the spring.
Why? What’ll happen then?
Tony, the flowers bloom, love abounds. (Laughs)
Fuckin’ Christmas carols, Jesus Christ. They’re worse than Leonard Cohen records. Have your heard them, on those pipelines in shops now? Fuckin’ really slit-your-wrists-music that is. ‘Orrible.
Your comments on Christmas will probably only enforce your image.
It’s what people expect though. (Laughs)
A Dickens character.
Yeah. Fuckin’ Scrooge.
Paul Weller | The Return Of The Avenger | Part 1
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