Interviews

James seem simple, four men, single Jimone on Factory Records. They make nothing of it – James have no phoney philosophical policies, no heroic hyperbole, no dull boasts or grand exaggeration.

Their attitude is more one of the days of ATV and Swell Maps than the flashy NY remixes and glossy art design of Quando Quango or New Order. Fittingly, their record is low-key, harsh, humble, naturally bitter and almost wilfully rushed and messy with little or no production. With the homely folk-feel of fellow Mancunians, those sensitive Smiths, James could easily make their fortunes as the obvious meeting between The Fall and very early Bunnymen. But then, they’re not that simple.

In fact, James are a highly peculiar thing; despite the splendid incongruity, they regard the relationship with Factory as one of mere convenience. “We just want to play gigs, and you can’t get gigs without a single. It’s a means to that end. Factory liked our tape, gave us gigs at the Hacienda and supporting New Order and then asked us to do an album. Then they wanted a mini-album, then an EP, then a 12″ – anything but a plain 45. They offered us help with production, artwork, all of which we declined. They’ve been remarkably patient. They didn’t even know whaat the single was until the day we recorded it! If anything it’s us that’s been difficult, and they never asked us to sign anything, which is all we wanted from anyone.”

Jimone then, is just three songs from James – “No A-side, it’s insulting to tell people which song is better.” All have different productions and all were recorded live in the studio rather than “piece by piece on headphones” (they sneer well). The result from the snappy, slap-dash funk of ‘Fire So Close’ to the terse rumbling of ‘What’s The World’ and ‘Folklore’s unusual charm, is tentative; taut, almost disastrous, ultimately admirable, erratic and brilliant, with a concentrated anger and strange, rambling beauty that begins to prepare you for the fierce challenge of ‘Stutter’, a live highlight and their first moment of Greatness.

Although they’re clearly prepared to be bold and determined to be different, the James boys are softly-spoken, shyly nervous, modest and wisely-aware of their own possibilities. Too bashful to talk to my tape, reluctant to have their pictures taken or to lend me demos or offer up influences, they even resist my attempt to discover devious intentions behind their choice of sleeve (a scrappy green and red felt-pen design of an elongated ‘Jimone’). The idea was to do one drawing each, and then choose. (Laughter breaks loose) Jimmy was the only one who finished! But it’s only a sleeve, even if it is Factory (who, perhaps justifiably, hate it). We want to be judged by our music. As long as it keeps the record clean, it’s fine.”

With their past, their plans and motives, James remain strangely straightforward. “We just want to play live. We may stay with Factory, we may learn about production and change. We may learn to worry about sleeves. So far though we’ve done one single on Factory. We’re happy with that.”

So, for now, Fac 78 is by James. The name was “simple, unassuming, didn’t give any clues…” And James are Jimmy Glennie (bass), Tim Booth (vocals), Paul Gilbertson (guitar), Gavan Whelan (drums).

But you can believe it’s a great deal stranger than that. James. That’s it.

Interviewer : Before the break you heard, well it was going to be the A-side of the new James single until the boys asked me to flip it over. I did in fact play If Things Were Perfect which is the b-side from Hymn From A Village and I’m delighted that James have popped in on this unearthly hour and well, as I’m sure they’ll explain they’ve got a busy time ahead of them. So welcome Gavan Whelan, Tim Booth, Larry Gott and Jimmy Glennie.

Jimmy, this is a boring question but you didn’t contribute to the name, did you?

Jim : Erm, not really. It was the old guitarist who thought it up. We’ve also got another James over here actually because Larry’s first name is James as well

Interviewer : Ah, one of those complicated set ups where one has to change their names. If you were all Scotsmen, you could all call yourself Jimmy anyway

Tuesday in fact, your tour supporting The Smiths starts. Is that correct?

Jim : Yes

Interviewer : So how many dates is that. Twenty odd dates?

Tim : Twenty-six dates

Interviewer : Oh, you must be looking forward to it, you’re going to be playing to a lot of people.

Tim : Yeah

Interviewer : More than one word answers fellas or we’re going to throw you straight into the studio.

Now this track, we played before, If Things Were Perfect, you did in fact record it live at Strawberry, is that right? No overdubs, nothing?

Tim : All the songs are recorded live but I was singing in a separate room. We did do overdubs for backing vocals because the studio couldn’t handle it.

Interviewer : So is that the way you record all your stuff?

Tim : We like to record like that but it’s very hard to find studios that will cater for it because they’re so into doing like great drum sounds and individual instruments. They don’t like the idea of someone coming in and doing it live.

Interviewer : How did the gig go? I mean I saw you last week with A Certain General at the Hacienda? Did you enjoy that gig?

Gavan : Not really. No

Interviewer : Why?

Gavan : Just the atmosphere. It was very cold.

Interviewer : Very cold. You’ve played the Hacienda before, didn’t you? I think I saw you

Gavan : I think we’ve played about six times

Jim : A few times

Interviewer : I mean that’s something we could talk about in the future. I know you’re busy for a few months with The Smiths. It’d be nice to put a Last Radio Programme James gig on and possibly record it. If you know the way you guys go about things live, it might be a good thing for the radio. That’s something we can discuss later.

This is in fact the second time you’ve supported The Smiths. You did some Irish dates with them.

Gavan : Yes. That was good.

Interviewer : Did that go well?

Gavan : Very well

Interviewer : How do you find The Smiths audience? I suppose it can’t be a bad time to support The Smiths with the album at number one. I presume the whole tour has sold out now. Has it?

Gavan : Yeah

Tim : Yeah

Jim : In Ireland it was great, but the audiences are really different over there. People go along to enjoy themselves so they do

Interviewer : Are you prepared for this tour in as much as audiences are going to vary from town to town? And sometimes you’ll go down well when you’ll appear not to go down well.

Jim : We’re used to that.

Interviewer : There again, I suppose Manchester is notorious for that. You think you’ve had a bad night and in fact people love you.

Tim : Yeah, we never seem to play well in Manchester actually.

Interviewer : You don’t?

Tim : No

Interviewer : How far, I mean I presume you’ve played London and places?

Tim : Yeah, we’ve played all round the country.

Interviewer : So at the moment you appear to be quite a fashionable band in as much as you’re The Smiths favourite band and everything. So you’ll have quite a lot to live up to. I mean when we had The Smiths in here, we had Johnny and Mike Joyce in September, October, November time, I can’t remember when, when Hatful of Hollow was coming out, and all they did, instead of promoting themselves, was promote James. So it’s quite nice to know that Manchester’s favourite boys are big fans of yours.

Tim : Yeah, we pay them a lot of money for that actually.

Interviewer : You don’t manage them, do you?

Tim : No, but Morrissey’s our PR man

Interviewer : Is he? I’ve not really studied the NME poll but weren’t you mentioned in Morrissey’s favourite bands in that?

Tim : Yeah

Interviewer : Excellent

Tim : I mean they keep doing this, it’s really nice of them, we can’t understand it either.

Interviewer : Are you embarrassed by it?

Tim : No, it’s alright. If we were just like The Smiths friends, then we’d be put a little bit in the deep end but we reckon people will see something and it will be OK. We’ve got the music.

Interviewer : So what happens after The Smiths tour? Is that too far forward planning?

Gavan : We’ve got three gigs coming up in Paris, they’re maybes.

Interviewer : Have you played Europe at all yet?

Gavan : No, we should have gone over last year sometime to Brussels but that never came off.

Interviewer : Well, I’m sure you’re well prepared for the tour.

Factory-farmed, JAMES tuck into a bean fest with carrot-crunchin’ DON WATSON.

“We take a lot from TV, particularly children’s. We used the Rainbow theme tune too. Beatrix Potter is a big influence.”

EVERY DAY they deliver themselves to the door of the pop abattoir. Fresh-faced, pink-cheeked and plump, they line up at one end, patient and compliant.

And they conveyer belt grinds away. . .

From the other end emerge neat little packages– pork pie singles, neatly cut and nicely glossed.

What’s so disturbing about our current breed is not only the unnatural strength of their herd instinct, but also their apparent zest for their own carve-up. If they don’t yet come ready-sliced, they’re sure marked “cut on the dotted line”–and in their own eye-liner, too. Retarded pigs, woolly-brained sheep and prize turkeys the lot of them.

Under such circumstances, it’s scarcely suprising that some of us have more sympathy for the wolves– they may be hard at the core but their company is more fun. But every now and then, from the ranks of the herbivores, there falls an unlikely offspring.

Such are James, strange and ungainly, awkward and charming– a black sheep at last.

HERE THEY come in their cardboard box van. Here they come, trundling around the country in a truck designed for the get ahead greengrocer of the 1950’s. Here they come, the reputed Taoist vegans, another Manchester quartet supporting The Smiths on their nationwide tour. Here come the old pop perpetrators. Playing music! Eating beansprouts!

Ladies and gentlemen, may I introduce James– saviours of nothing at all, suppliers of intriguing music.

Vocalist Tim wears what appears to be a white football jersey onstage and possesses possibly the most appalling pair of shoes I’ve ever seen (the kind that look like large brown omelettes). He talks softly and convincingly but warns the listener that by tomorrow he’ll have changed his mind. He has a sense of humour (which, with those shoes, is just as well).

Drummer Gavan has a beard, wears shorts onstage, and maintains he once liked Led Zeppelin (he also has a sense of humour). As recently reported, he has been known to indulge in jam sessions with house bands in Greek restaurants. “But they threw me off after two numbers,” he moans, “and charged me full price for the meal.”

Bassist Jim is thin with short straight hair and is, for inexplicable reasons, a generic Mancunian. He started James when his friend at school bought a nicked guitar.

Guitarist Larry has a beard and wears glasses. He appears onstage in yellow trousers.

James are, as everyone associated with Factory has told me, strange.

Our first encounter takes place after this first support slot on The Smiths tour. In their van, they’re tucking in to a celebratory post-gig mixture of baked beans, bean- sprouts, and brown rice. They have to be back early to their bed and breakfast abode– this ain’t rock and roll.

“Vegans yes, Buddhists no,” they maintain concerning certain rumours currently circulating. “God knows where they got that one from.” They continue to conduct a eminently knowledgeable conversation about the yin and yang of food.

Passing their home photos to the bemused photographer, they discuss how it nice it would be to stick a snap-shot of a friend on the front cover of NME as representative of a James piece. They seem to be serious, although with James it’s often hard to tell.

LIKE I say, James are strange and indeed it’s their strangeness that’s their strength. As evidence, may I refer you back to their two excellent Factory singles– ‘Jim One’ and ‘James Two’.

Released in October ’83, at a time when the country was rank with Postcard plagiarists, ‘Jim One’ didn’t sound too much like_ anything, but it was touched by a almost frantic energy that charged with the thrill of a “Falling and Laughing”, a “Radio Drill Time”, or a “Get Up an Use Me”.

‘Folklore’, the most individual of the three songs on ‘JIm One’, took the same folk tinges that were being touched by the then nascent Smiths, and expanded them to full nasal extremes. Lyrically they played with self- examination, humour and contridiction, spinning a delightful web of nonsense. There was something special about ‘Jim One”.

From here to silence. The Smiths rose, James ducked. Illness, and their insistence on individual methods kept James schtum. Their low profile was broken only for the odd New Order support slot– their ruptures were met with raptures but still no more was forthcoming. The conveyer belt was not for James.

As undoubtedly the brightest prospect for ’85, James were to be the cover of the New Year NME. They refused– “We want to introduce the band by music, not words,” was their argument. James are not interesting in shouting, Look at Me!

Now at last, there’s the second single, the classic ‘James II’, pairing the offbeat anthemic ‘Hymn From a Viilage’ with the spindly romanticism of ‘If Things Were Perfect’. And with a support slot of The Smiths grand-scale British tour, it seems that James are, however reluctantly, set to attract attention.

THE SMITHS have sown their seed, but not yet spawned their imitators. Some cloth-eared observers, seeing Morrisey as a man who might not be averse to flattery, have misread James’ sincerity.

“It doesn’t really annoy us,” says Tim, “it doesn’t really touch us, because we’ve been going so long, and anyone who really took the trouble to find out about us would know that we’ve been playing those songs and that music before, it’s just through force of circumstances, and through the popularity of The Smiths that we find ourselves in fashion.

“We’d worry about it if we didn’t have strong songs, but we do.”

There are features in common of course, a certain folk influence a vulnerability in the singing. Not that it’s a race, but in many ways James are ahead of The Smiths; live they reach far further into areas of form experimentation only touched on by The Smiths in ‘Barbarism Begin At Home’. Morrisey is certainly not taking the easy option by inviting his favourite band on tour with him.

“They were offered money to take people on this tour,” Tim points out, “but instead they’re paying us and losing money.”

“WHATS THIS then, a school party?” asks the hunched caretaker in West Country drawl as photographer Ridgers leads us through the graveyard gate towards the mausoleum for the photo-session.

Um no, we just wanted to have a look around.

“Weeeell, you be supposed to get permission, there’s some strange_ things been happening around here.”

“Strange unnatural_ things,” we chorus once out of ear-shot.

Strange James may be, but unnatural never. Their vegan lifestyle, their attitude toward music is all directed to the concept of natural music– that may sound like a soundtrack to meusli munching, but there’s a touch more to it than that.

“If you drink a lot or whatever,” says Tim, “you’re always swinging from one extreme to another. A lot of our approach is concentrated around the idea of maintaining a balance.”

“Then you have the strength to pursue your own interests, rather than being pulled by other influences,” says Jim.

“You have a strong centre which you can then work from,” Tim continues. “People have this idea that balance has something to do with conservatism. They seem to think that it’s the core of this society, which is rubbish, this society is a very unbalanced one. To be balanced in this society is to be radical and extreme, whereas to be ill in this society is to be normal.”

Of course I have my copy of _Under The Volcano_ peering from my pocket and can’t quite agree with this as a rule. Try as I might I can’t picture Jane Fonda as more extreme than Charles Bukowski, Malcolm Lowry or Antonin Artaud. My mind also runs to favourite sick men like Nick Cave and Blixa Bargeld, sometimes victims of their own excesses to be sure, but far from normal.

Black sheep James have it seems, been tempted themselves to run with the wolves.

“Something like the early Birthday Party was really appealing to me,” says Tim, “and it was appealing because it was self-destructive, it appealed to the adolescent in me. You look at the world, see how awful it is, realise you can’t change anything and you just turn your anger inwards, you just want to burn up. It seems like a romantic, mythical way to go, but inside it it’s really shit.”

Tim recently had a dream.

“I met Nick Cave, and he was showing me a video of The Birthday Party doing a fantastic version of ‘Dead Joe’ and I was going God! How did you do_ it? Then I looked at him and his face was just covered in huge craters, turning green and falling away in lumps, and I said, Ah, I see how you did it! It seems that if you really want to create that type of poison then you’re going to get poisoned by it in the process.”

Instead James have swung to the opposite extreme– and their resultant individuality is testament that it is, as they claim, an extreme. Particularly live, James are a certain sound pushed towards its limit.

“It is a matter of the balance between order and chaos,” says Tim, “always seeing how far you can go without the results sounding actually unpleasant. Always teetering on the brink of pure chaos, but always keeping that thread.”

IN THE age of gloss-finished, soul-less single, ‘Jim One’ and ‘James Two’ are appealingly messy. They sound urgent, direct, and rough around the edges.

“That’s because they’re recorded live,” explains Gavan, “also because quite frequently, we don’t know where the songs are going to start and stop.

“Particularly live the songs are rarely in a finished form, they’re just collections of threads of ideas that that can always vary. The idea, theoretically, is that when a song stops being changed by the new inputs and new ideas then it’s recorded and then ideally we never play it again.”

“Unfortunately it doesn’t always work like that,” counters Tim, “With ‘If Things Were Perfect’, for example, we’d been playing that for three years, then on the day we came to record it, it just changed.”

So what if you had the money to afford a big expensive studio and expensive production?

“I think we’d record rehearsals instead,” replies Jim, “or maybe work in a classical studio with the methods we use now. The trouble with working with rock studios is that they’re just not used to doing live recordings.”

“We have got tamer,” says Tim, “we’ve had to. At one time the majority of our material was made up onstage, and either we’d be great or we’d make absolute arseholes of ourselves.”

“Once on a New Order support slot, Jim and the other guitarists we had at the time just went on with acoustic guitars and jammed. We used to swap instruments a lot more too; one time Gavan just walked offstage and left us to get on with it, leaving me to play drums. We used to do that a lot, just disrupt each other deliberately, just to make it more exciting, now we just leave songs open ended.”

It occured to me that ‘If Things Were Perfect’ showed the noble influence of the _Camberwick Green_ theme tune.

“Yes,” replies Tim straightfaced,”that’s where we lifted it from, consciously– we take a lot from TV, particularly children’s. We used the _Rainbow_ theme tune too. Beatrix Potter is a big influence.”

Sounds inconsolably twee.

“Not at all, have you read the _Tale Of Samuel Whiskers_? That’s about a cat that crawls up a chimney and gets captured by a big rat in a waistcoat who puts it in a roly-poly pudding. All the mother cat can hear downstairs is this roly-poly-roly-poly sound. She doesn’t know they’ve got her kitten and they’re turning it into a pie.

“I used to have nightmares about being put in a sandwich after that one.”

JAMES ARE happier in the turnip field opposite than in the mausoleum. Once the photo-session’s over they can even dig up dinner.

Are you a bunch of hippies?

“Hmmm, radical Neils, that’s the current stereotype for vegetarians, isn’t it?”

As with The Smiths, there’s a strong undertow of folk in James’ themes.

“My dad’s a folk singer,” says Gavan, “so that might have something to do with it– 24-verse Scottish ballads and all that which takes some doing.

“I think there is a bit more to it than that, though, it’s a lot to do with modal tunes, which seem to be in all of us. What we used to do at the beginning was to try and strip our influences down– if we jammed a song and it sounded a bit too much like Joy Division, New Order, Birthday Party, Pop Group or whoever, we’d just stop playing it. When we stripped them all down we were left with folkish, modal tunes. There’s something about them which seems to be characteristic of British people.”

HERE THEY come, trundling around the country in their top-speed-20 van.

Why, you sometimes wonder, do they do it?

Jim: “When you play a song at the point when you write it, and it’s just so good. In a way you know that you’ll never play it that well again, there’s a tremendous buzz from that.”

Tim: “When everyone changes together at the same time and you’ve never played the song before, so you shouldn’t know, but just because you’ve been playing together for so long you anticipate it.”

Larry: “It goes on to another level and everyone realises and starts grinning at one another.”

Tim: ” You’re trying not to stop because all you really want to do is burst out laughing. So we play for about 20 minutes and then fall about in hysterics.”

“Then you’ve got to condense 20 minutes of ideas into one song,” says Gavan.

“Most of our best songs actually are based on mistakes,” says Tim. “When you make mistakes that’s when you’re acting from yourself, rather than what you’ve learned or heard before– chord changes that go wrong, drum beats that fall apart.”

“When it collapses,” Gavan adds, “somehow something comes out of the other end.”

Meanwhile the conveyer belt grinds on. . .

Tim: ” ‘If Things Were Perfect’– it’s partly about the way people will say, Hey! We’re having a great time! Come and join us! But you really know they’re not, they just need people to reinforce the idea that they’re having a great time, you can see that they’ve got frozen smiles.”

Somehow I get the impression that James will keep going their own sweet way.

Muriel Gray : Now Tim, can I ask you first of all – is this going to be a real bug bear, the fact that Morrissey from The Smiths has been describing you as a brilliant band. How are you going to live that one down?

Tim : We hope that people will take the trouble of coming to listen to us and they’ll hear and see for themselves.

Muriel : Because obviously you’re just about to go on tour with The Smiths. A nationwide tour that’s just about to start.

Tim : We’re in the middle of it now

Muriel : In the middle of it now? So where are the next dates you’re going to be playing then?

Tim : Margate and Ipswich and then we’re moving up north a bit, more to Manchester and Nottingham and places like that.

Muriel : Now is it hard doing a tour like that with someone who’s obviously so popular. You are from Manchester, you’re perhaps living in the shadow of all these other famous Factory bands. How do you see yourself going on from here?

Tim : What other Factory bands?

Muriel : Well, one or two little names. New Order and so on

Tim : We see it building. We just want people to see us and hear us and not believe what they read about us and make up their own opinions from live concerts and live performances.

Muriel : Because there’s been some quite amazing things written about you hasn’t there? Like you’re Buddhist vegans. Is this true?

Tim : No, it’s not true, not true at all.  Not for one of us.

Muriel : Why do you think people write these things about you? Just trying to make a little more publicity?

Tim : I don’t know. We don’t say too much so I think people tend to fill in the gaps for us and make up things and let their minds run away with themselves.

Muriel : This is quite a new eighties thing isn’t it? The quiet sensitive young men with guitars. Is this an image you’re falling into a bit?

Tim : Don’t know how to answer that question

Muriel : Because you are in fact a quiet sensitive young man.

Tim : I don’t think so, not necessarily. And it’s not an image we’re falling into. I mean, if we are quiet sensitive young men, we probably wouldn’t know it anyway

Muriel : Well, we’re very pleased to have some quiet sensitive young men on this programme, I can tell you. So what’s the next number you’re going to play.

Tim : It’s called Johnny Yen and it’s about very unquiet insensitive young men who used to frequent rock n roll a lot.

For a start, most bands who’d been feted by the music press and courted so assiduously by record companies would have jumped at the opportunity of selling their soul (music) by signing on the dotted line for a massive advance, and having their faces plastered across the nation’s news stands. Not James. Having dipped their toes into the murky waters and have decided to wait until they come up with a scheme to sterilise the cesspool before they plunge in.

After the release of their first single Jimone (pronounced Jim 1) during the back end of 1983, James laid low for a year, partly by design and partly enforced by singer and lyricist Tim Booth’s bout of hepatitis. In the last six months, the release of the musically more sophisticated James II (no prizes for the pronounciation) and the coveted slot as support on the recent Smiths tour has seen James move up from likely contenders to dead certs for the title of the “next big thing”

James pop is proving to be a breath of fresh air in what has become a stale self-congratulatory idiom. Gavan Whelan’s drumming provides a precise backbone for bassist Jim Glennie and guitarist Larry Gott’s whirling musical dervlish. When did we last have a potential chart act whose intelligent lyrics force you to put down what you’re doing and actually listen to the radio?

Comparisons with The Smiths abound, not least because Morrissey has taken it as a personal crusade to champion the James cause to all who would listen, and everyone else, too. The Smiths have based a career on perming Johnny Marr’s two tunes with Morrissey’s two theme – misery and sexual abstinence. Although most Smiths songs stand out individually, collectively they’re at risk of sinking into a whining sludge.

By contrast, James, with only five songs released so far, have traversed a breadth of emotion within a remarkably varied musical format. They have recently been re-released as a twelve inch under the title Village Fire. This combines the strangely hypnotic anti-sexist themes of Folklore, the drivingly anthemic rush of What’s The World (a genuine pop classic), the staccato-like angst of Fire So Close, the reflective romanticism of If Things Were Perfect and the powerful musical synthesis of the celebratory Hymn From A Village.

James have cultivated a reputation for being a bunch of eccentrics. False rumours abound that they’re a collection of crazy Buddhists, no doubt fuelled by the fact that they used to go around with their heads shaved calling each other “Buddha” or “Gandhi”. They’re also the proud owners of a van which looks like a relic from a time long past. They trundle up and down the country at a snail’s pace cooking their vegetarian food in this home-from-home. Every James interview seems to take place over a wholesome meal – we were meant to meet at The Hare Krishna Restaurant. What I still haven’t discovered is how a band who eat so much manage to stay so thin.

How did the name of James come about?

“Our ex-guitarist came up with it,” replies Jim. “He may have named us after James from Orange Juice, he fell in love with him.”

“Also, there was a surfeit of Jameses in the band then,” adds Gavan. “Anyway, my name would be too Heavy-Metal sounding”

Tim : “I don’t like the name much”

What would you prefer “Timothy”? Shane MacGowan of The Pogues observed that he would have preferred Jim to James. Do James get portrayed as being too serious?

“No, we’re not,” responds Tim, “we’re seen as wacky vegans, garden gnomes, Buddhist gurus or even Tiny Tims”

Jim : “People ask us banal questions like ‘Is Morrissey celibate?'”

Larry : “Or ‘Was Ian Curtis buried or cremated?'”

Tim, when you used to have your head shaved in the past, you said it was because you were disgusted. With what?

Larry : “Dandruff”

“That was my standard reaction in those days,” says Tim. “It was disgust with everything, myself included. It wasn’t a very positive outlook and it had to change.”

It was about this time that the Buddhist rumours were bandied.

Gavan : “We weren’t surprised, though they were false.”

“None of us adhere to any religions,” adds Tim. “They’re based on faith and belief, not personal experience.”

“Some Buddhist ideas are quite good. For example, the idea that this is all an illusion and that you label things, and then stop actually seeing them because you’ve given them a name. So you don’t actually see what a tree is, you just call it ‘tree’ and that takes care of that.”

What have been the major influences on you?

Tim : “Everyone is a hotch-potch of influences, it would be difficult to pull out any specific ones. Our childhood and parents are bound to have the greatest effect upon us. I used to go to church a lot and that’s coming out in our songs now – those God-awful Christian hymns! If we see something that’s too overtly like something else, we don’t use it.”

Gavan : “Individually we all have our influences but collectively they don’t come through.”

Gavan cites various jazz musicians while Tim talks of Doris Lessing. Interestingly, no mention is made of contemporary pop music. Do you ally yourself with any other bands?

“We hardly listen to pop music anymore,” replies Larry. “I think we share attitudes more than music with other groups.”

“We had a group outing to see Dollar Brand” adds Jim.

You’ve quoted him saying “I’m not a musician, I’m being played” before. What exactly did you mean?

Tim : “In our day-to-day life, thought results in a time delay before it’s translated into action. But when we’re playing and it’s going really well, we don’t really think about it, it just happens spontaneously. The music almost becomes out of our control.”

Gavan : “Usually when we rehearse a song for the first time, you get that feeling where the hair stands up on the back of your neck. We hit the highest peaks during our practices.”

You came out of Manchester at the time Joy Division were in their prime. They must have had an effect on you.

Jim : “A lot of their music was very minimalistic, simple and depressing and that did influence us. Although we’ve got away from the depression, we’ve always been pretty basic.”

An Indian restaurant in Whalley Range can throw up some strange characters. Eastern sounds float lazily around in the atmosphere, an old guitar sage sits in one corner while a bearded drummer taps constantly on the table whilst searching vainly for his vegetable dahl.

James are in the heart of their home city. And yes, it is raining.

The desperate race has already begun to discover that most lucrative of objects – The Band of 86.

In short, the collection of musical souls who will breathe fresh life back into a snoozy music industry, liven up the deadliest of dull charts – and make someone, somewhere very rich indeed.

While some noses turn sheep-like towards the preposterous preening of Sweet-On-Sennapods soundalikes Sigue Sigue Sputnik, and others to any number of pretenders to the U2 throne, there’s one band that have none of the trendiness of the former, nor the guitar swirling pomposity of the latter.

James are a Mancunian foursome. They’ve been around, in some form or other for six years, but play with the enthusiasm and joy of a bunch of novices.

James have a rather stupid name, but two timelessly charming singles on Factory Records to their credit.

They once supported The Smiths around the concert halls of Britain and – after much deliberation – have just been signed by the man who discovered Madonna.

James, erstwhile indie favourites and no doubt with neatly spruced belly buttons to the fore are making their play for big label success.

Tim Booth, Gavan Whelan, Jimmy Glennie and Larry Gott are the four individuals who make up James.

They laugh a lot, write rather good tunes and perform them with a sparse but energetic sound and much twitching and twirling from Timothy.

Their forthcoming single “Chain Mail” is the first since signing to Sire / blanco y negro for a rather nice, if undisclosed sum. Out at the turn of the month, it’s the first chance for most people to hear them.

“We want to be as big as Coca Cola,” says Tim. “But we won’t rot your teeth.”

It all began six years ago. The cultural centre of the music scene had switched from London to the North. The safety pin was no longer the holy relic it was purported to be.

Instead the cult of the dirty mac was in full fringe-flopping flow.

In Liverpool, Ian MacCulloch, Julian Cope and Pete Wylie were the monickers to bandy round, while Manchester’s greatest musical export since Freddie Garrity went by the name of Joy Division. Coming up the rear was one Mark E Smith and his cheery Fall crew.

And in the Whelan household’s front room, Gavan and Jimmy Glennie, just recently introduced by a mutual schoolfriend, were practising songs by these two most influential of local bands.

Some two years later, Gavan and Jim were joined by Tim, first as a dancer (and if you’ve seen them live, the wonders of his epiletic skank will already have been revealed to you), then as singer of the still unnamed band.

At this time, the vocalist was one Danny Ram, whose departure was followed by even greater things in the world of entertainment.

Jim : “On the Val Doonican show”

Tim : “He did the rocking chair. He pulled the string”

With a sense of humour like that in tow, Tim, Jim and Gavan set about thinking up a name that would sum up their musical aspirations. Or not, as it turned out.

Tim : “James really didn’t mean anything but it was quite an original name back them. There were no Smiths… No other bands with just a name for their title”

Gavan : “There were lots of bands with long names at the time”

Jim : “It was things like Echo and the Bunnymen, the Teardrop Explodes, that sort of alternative thing. Only it wasn’t alternative anymore”

Tim : “And with the name James, people didn’t know what to expect, a hairdresser, a poet or whatever”

Gavan : “So they got both”

Larry : “That’s right, we’re hairdressing poets”

Eighteen months ago, the line-up was completed when “old guitar sage” Larry left a life of teaching other people around Manchester how to find fame through six strings and some nimble fret work and took to a life of performing himself.

James first appearance on vinyl was three years ago with ‘Jimone’, a collection of three songs that long ago sold out of the initial few thousand pressings.

Together with James II (‘Hymn From A Village’ and ‘If Things Were Perfect’) they appeared on a 12 inch EP late last year, again on Factory.

Jim : “All we’ve done is made two singles with Factory. We’ve never signed anything and have never considered ourselves on Factory. I don’t know if they did. They were really good. They let us do whatever we wanted and it worked really well at the time”

Tim : “I think we always had our eye on moving, taking things on a step and just moving onto bigger things. Our experience with Factory in this country with the singles has been that they were quite …. inefficient in a way. And we didn’t want to trust an album worldwide to them.”

Gavan : “They haven’t got the capital behind them. They’ve got £5,000 or something for a single, but as soon as it’s released, then that’s the money gone. There’s no money to back it up until it starts selling.”

Jim : “We got to a stage where we thought we’d got good enough music to reach a lot of people, so we decided to sign up with a major label. There just doesn’t seem to be any alternative to us anymore.”

Ten years after the punk explosion was supposed to end the dominance of the major labels, it’s rather sad that bands still feel the need of the heavy backing of a major corporation to gain the success they yearn for, but such is the situation.

After months of rumours about large cheques exchanging hands in return for James’ collective signature, they finally signed for Sire together with blanco y negro in November last year.

So why was it necessary?

Larry : “To get an LP out basically”

Tim : “And to do it professionally. We’ve spent a long time on songs and you want them to sound the best you can”

Jim : “We signed with Seymour Stein. He’s the guy who signed Madonna and Talking Heads. So we want to be the next Madonna. They have this huge promotion scheme for us. They’re going to make us shave our beards and Larry’s going to have to wear compact lenses . We’re really into it, because we’re in to being puppets”

If James were at all hesitant about relinquishing their indie status and “selling their souls to the devils”, they hide it very well.

With their diminutive minders Martine and Jenny keeping a sharp eye on their business interests, just how much control are they going to have over the way they are to be sold to the wider record buying public?

Tim, Jim, Gavan, Larry : “None!”

Tim: “We said, do what you want with us. we want fame.”

Jim: “Give us your money. We will only sign for lots of money.”

Tim: “Thirty quid. We come cheap. Jim was a bit hesitant. We had to beat him every night to persuade him.”

Jim; “I was convinced we were worth 35, but. ..”

Behind the frivolity, though, is a group of people who appear to know exactly what they’re doing and are under no illusions as to the situation they are getting into.

Tim: “The thing is, we looked at different companies and the thing about Seymour Stein is that he seems to be quite a music fan whereas with everyone else we saw, there were nice individuals but they were ‘business men’.

“There are businessmen behind Seymour Stein, but it was nice to see the person in control of it all was a music fan.”

“We’ve got a fair amount of control. We haven’t got total control, which is what we thought we’d get, but we’ve got quite a lot. We thought we’d hang out for total control – for eight months – but we never got it.

“We all thought our music was so. ..”

Jim: “Brilliant. ”

Tim; “That they’d eventually say, do what you want, boys.”

Jim: “Geniuses, geniuses!”

Tim: “And unfortunately they weren’t like that. Some of them were incredible. They’d say, ‘Oh, this is great’, then suggest a single for release and say, ‘But you have to chop the last minute off the end’ or ‘You have to stick this or that in’.” Gavan: uOr ‘You’ve not got enough choruses’ or ‘Can anyone play a synthesiser?’.”

Tim: “One guy thought we had a few wild songs. but some good commercial songs too, so he thought we could make an album of commercial songs, then press a few of the wild ones and give them away to our fans.”

With the contract they have signed, though, James are confident that they’ll be consulted on everyttling to do with them.

“They can’t do anything without asking the band first, ” points out manager Martine.

Jim: “Then we say no and they just go ahead and do it anyway!”

So far, James’s media image has come across as anything from “Buddhist vegans” to surly musos to wacky chaps who appear to be wearing custard pies on their feet”.

Being neither Buddhists nor vegans, and there certainly don’t appear to be any custard pies hiding under the table today, there’s just the surliness and furrowed brows to find out about.

Unfortunately, James positively beam with good humour. (Well, Tim and Jim do, Larry kind of smirks enigmatically, while Gavan’s style leans more towards the wry curl of the lip than cheery grins, but it amounts to the same thing.)

Gavan: “Smiling. That’s something a lot of people have picked up on as well. We smile a lot on stage apparently. Dead wacky that”

Jim: “Smile ‘smugly’ at each other.”

Larry : “The fact that we’re from Manchester and Manchester bands don’t smile seems to confuse some people. The new Manchester misery guts school – James don’t just fit in.”

Tim : “That’s another thing. Not many “serious” bands smile. Bands which seem to have serious music they’ve worked hard on , you make a joke and it somehow seems to undermine it. There aren’t many bands that are passionate who also make jokes – even in records. There are some that sneak them in and hide them, and some like the Fall, you can’t tell whether it’s humour or grotesqueness. Instead, you’re meant to walk around being angst ridden and full of fury and depresssion”

Jim: “We are, aren’t we?”

James are under no illusion that as the new Duran Duran, they would stand as much chance as Michael Heseltine keeping his hair in place. The new Wham! even. And as for the new Aha – well my dear, they wouldn’t stand an earthly!

No, their aspirations lie more in the area of Tom Waits or, more to the pop Talking Heads- artists who have achieved a fair amount of commercial success; but at no expense to their ‘credibility’ (ahem) or musical brilliance.

Larry: “What’s ‘big’ or successful anyway, Is it sales of records or is it how much in the public eye you are! There are some people who are not in the public eye and they sell a consistent number of records. That’s a good situation to be in.”

James’s music is never likely to be a favourite on the Steve Wright show nor are they perhaps the stuff the musical breaks on Pebble Mill are made of.

Their songs range from the quirky to the downright tuneful and pleasant. If the commercial success they deserve does come, it’s likely to be through building a following live and subsequent album sales rather than snappy three minute songs -although don’t discount that possibility too quickly.

Tim: “I think we might sneak in like the Police did. Their stuff was very good at the beginning. Maybe more commercially accessible than ours, but they went through and established themselves very quickly after hard work. ”

Jim: “We have got more commerciaily accessible songs. ”

Tim: “All we do is put them out the best we can in the way that we like them. I hope we’d never put out anything just sell large numbers.”

Jim: “Though if we’ve got mortgages going -!”

And so, with contracts signed, the first single waiting in the wings and maybe the odd new woolly jumper to add that touch of showbiz glamour, just how successful wouid James like to be?

Gavan: “I’ve thought about this one, and unless we change – change our music I couldn’t see our music going down well at Madison Square Garden.”

Tim: “We think our songs can be very popular though. Big as Madonna! Larry, when he’s got less clothes or looks amazingly like Madonna, so we could handle that one. Or big as Jesus”

.Jim: “Big as cheeses!”

Tim: “Yeah. Just like John Lennon said. ‘We’re now as big as cheesy wotsits’.”

That, indeed, would be fame.

“I’d like to put a disclaimer in at this point: Mat Snow is using very long word and drawing us into an academic discussion of our music when we consider it to be fun and quite simple.”

I wasn’t going to pretend otherwise.

“But I wanted that disclaimer. And that was no insult to you.”

None taken I’m sure.

“You’re using a lot of words, varied words, quite well-chosen words, but a lot of which you associate with theories and academics. ‘Hermetic’ things like that. When you talk to someone like that, you tend to start talking like that too; so if you quote us, it might make us sound … This isn’t the way we normally talk about things. So your piece will reflect, to a large degree, you – even down to the words we are using.”

Should you imagine that what you are about to read is a minefield of misinformation, plonking authorial projection and sheer misrepresentation of James, a pop group from Manchester, then think again.

A plethora of polysyllables and a thimbleful of theory does not mean no fun, it means James are scuttling around in the margins of pop, in an area so left-field as to present no easy comparisons or ready made definitions. So until someone can coin accessibly short and simple words to describe what James are up to, then volumes of verbiage will just have to do.

It is quite possible however that there are no stories about James that are not true.

Here I am tucking into a plateful of vegetarian chilli as the lecithin is passed round the table to be sprinkled on one’s food as an aid to the absorption of cholesterol and harmful saturated fats.

Also breaking bread in the parlour of Liverpool’s Amazon studios are Larry Gott, whose guitar is as mercurial as his demeanour is of guru quietude; bearded drummer Gavan Whelan, the band’s token drinker (“I’m the bad one, really, I haven’t come to terms with anything.”); bassist Jim Glennie, the soul of amiability; managers Martine and Jennifer, the diametric opposites of every cigar-chomping, turkey-talking shark of your nightmares; producer Lenny Kaye, six-foot-four of hair, New York bonhommie and jovial recollection of his illustrious track record with ‘Nuggets’, Patti Smith and Suzanne Vega; engineer Gil Norton, who wants to see his name in print; and an empty place for Monty.

Monty comes in. He is James singer Tim Booth, pale, quiet, seemingly lost in thought. Soft, unlined and somewhat angelic, his face is half-concealed behind a pair of spectacles so owlish and bulletproof as to scream for attention; likewise those Cornish-pastie shoes, the fashion sensation of the indie scene last Spring and still just as mindboggling.

Tim is an odd fish. From his careful deliberation when asked to talk about what he does for a living, you might expect a stoolbound stummer of the early 70s school, another Nick Drake perhaps. But when he’s singing, he shimmers in the grip of an electric spirit, as if he’s a medium or conduit for some kind of unearthly ectoplasm, a third whimsy, a third ecstasy and a third warning.

And yet it’s the mystique which might grow around such apparent schizophrenia that Tim is so keen to avoid – hence his disclaimer. Much though it might profit James to come across as some sort of professional enigma, they always steer my flights of fancy firmly back down to earth, down to the basics of simplicity, health and fun.

The boss of their former record label Factory (James have now signed to WEA subsidiary Sire), Tony Wilson, drew a telling comparison; the Dutch national football team. In the early 70s, Neeskens, Cruyff, Rep and the other eight purveyors of ‘total football’ believed that they were merely doing a job and never talked about it in any other way – but it was beautiful to behold. The next generation of Dutch footballers felt thus inspired to go out and self-consciously recreate that beauty on the park. Result : their football was a shambles.

But what we saw in the 1974 World Cup is of the same order as what we hear when James hit their stride. Harmony, Empathy, Alchemy …..

So let’s lob a few high balls into the box, Brian, and see if we can get a result….

“We’re just as mystified as the audience….”

What I’d wondered, is the meaning of those sidelong glances, inward smiles and sotto voce chat that makes a James gig so clubbable, so intimate and yet so ultimately exclusive of their audience?

“Each night of a performance one of us will choose a set list,” explains Tim. “And often one of us will choose a setlist that they know we really can’t play, an absolute minefield. The joke is, we don’t know where the changes are, so we have to look at each other to sat, Are you ready now for a change?

“Like in a performance, you’re just projecting out to the audience, and sometimes you find we haven’t got together, so I think, look at the others to try and bring it back in. Cos if we haven’t got it right amongst ourselves, we can’t push it out to anybody. If I feel the energy’s getting too dispersed outwards, we’ll try and retreat as a group to get this bit right so we can take it out again. It’s like juggling from one person to another. We have to be very alert to each other, very aware of what each other is playing.”

Gavan : “Because we’ve been in relationship with each other for quite a while, there’s more than just a connection between us when we’re playing. There’s a stronger link; through the songs we keep confirming that. A look is much more than that, much more expressive than that.”

Tim : “Sometimes says we must argue a lot, and you can see that in a lot of songs, and then you see more harmony coming in. It’s going towards harmony all the time.

“It’s like a personality, isn’t it? You can have a person who doesn’t express a lot of what they’ve got or doesn’t know a lot of what really lies inside them. The more you let out, then you’ve got to integrate it and make some sense of it otherwise you’re going to get into a bit of a mess. It’s the same thing with us. It’s like, getting bigger and bigger, but trying to integrate things within a song.

“Does that make sense?”

The flipside to the excellent new 45 ‘Chain Mail’, titled ‘Hup-Springs’, epitomises the beauty born of cock-up and the dashing trail of the untameable in hot pursuit of the unplannable.

“‘Hup-Springs’ was a three-year old song and we all got really bored and pissed off with it. So we said, Come on, let’s really push this one and see what happens. In the middle of the take Gavan dropped a drumstick, but everyone went with it! You can’t plan things like that. And when we listened to it, it was wild. You can’t better that – it had it’s own life.

“And that’s how a lot of the songs are formed.”

“Ha ha ha ha ha ha”. All I’d suggested was that James songs suggest a hermetic personality, imprisoned and armoured and in two minds – half wishing to get involved in the world of worlds and other people, half wishing to remain secure behind closed doors: perhaps, indeed, like a baby at the threshold of birth, torn between the womb and the harsh bright light of the world. Ahem.

I earn a round of applause as well as a laugh. But they agree the word tentative is not too wide of the mark.

“Originally there were four of us, and we knew there was something missing, something we were looking for, It could have been another person in the band, so we tried lots of people, but we haven’t found anybody who had a really likewise attitude. Then, to a degree, Lenny Kaye was that piece for the making of the single (James Lenny Kaye-produced debut LP ‘Lost Innocence’ is out in May). We didn’t know what producers did….”

Tim changes tack.

“We wanted a record company we could trust our records with – we’d made all these records we cared about like, to go back to your image, a mother whose got all these kids but she doesn’t want to let them out on to the streets, cos she sees what the world does to kids. But now we’ve decided everyone’s going to get tainted anyway, so you’ve got to give up and accept the fact that there’s no perfection. What happens is what happens. If we become bland and boring because of the process, then that happens.”

“I used to go to church every week and my Dad had a particular way of singing that people would think was out of tune and everyone used to turn around and listen to him, and the family would be really embarrassed. But when you know he listen to what he was doing, he was always in harmony but in a really strange way. Quite bizarre.”

I’ve heard tell of Tim’s closeness to his family and a possibly secluded childhood. Indeed, he seems far older than his 25 years, a serene young man seemingly untouched by his days as a post-punk raver when studying drama at Manchester University, during which period he was to some of his friends “the little woolly lamb”.

Gavan and Jim grew up in the same terraced street in Manchester’s Moss Side. Only one side of it remains now, the rest of the terraces torn down during their childhood to make way for tower blocks. Singing nursery rhymes whilst playing amongst the building sites is a memory; seeing The Beatles on TV is another. Inscrutable as ever, Larry’s roots lie in the anonymous Manchester suburb of Denton.

“If you think of a kid seeing the power of television, seeing the effect the Beatles caused. I bet that sticks in there,” speculates Tim. “But later on you might think of all these brilliant reasons why you want to be on stage – you were going to be a great actor or change the world – but the reason is it got attention. Everybody’s so insecure they think there’s some value in being special in a public way. The reality is you see how people get corrupted by it, really ill from it, with a vain and empty lifestyle.

“I’d acted twice in school plays and it sounded like a soft option at University and quite good fun. And I wanted to investigate acting because I thought people acted with each other all the time, and I thought this would penetrate to the heart of it. But I found it really boring, didn’t like it all. I could never remember lines!

“Purging demons? Hmmm, yes, in those days it was true. Acting used to put me through a lot that I hated, It used to put me on the edge, scare the hell out of me.

“Now I find I do better performances when I think it’s all a big joke, and I think we all share that. People say we’re playful and I think that’s when we’ve got it in perspective – it’s fun and that’s the way it should be. You’ve got all this stimulus coming at you and you’ve got to integrate it or else it’ll just drive you mad.”

Ever investigated Exegesis, EST, encounter therapy or the like?

“I’ve looked into a lot of those things. I find that a lot of them are very superficial and might work for a couple of weeks and then the holes start to fill back in again. And all of them are based on ego in the first place. Really, if you want something that’s going to last, it’s got to penetrate deeper than that.”

God?

“Those words are loaded – God! But there has to be some intelligence otherwise everything falls apart. Nature is such an integrated system that there has to be an intelligence behind it; it just couldn’t happen otherwise.

“When you go into the country on your own, you can become very harmonious, very peaceful. And yet when you come back to the city and the pollution and traffic noise and the speediness and the electric bombardment and the drink and the canned food and the cigarettes, you are different and then it’s easy to believe in disorder with chaos and no meaning.

“When I lived in Hulme, I got sick, I reflected the environment I live in. It all will end up being the case that you’re thinking of. The mind is a very dodgy implement to understand the world with and personally I wouldn’t trust it on any level. Intuition is much more penetrating than intellect because intuition seizes the whole all over. Whereas intellect will look at a cup as its outline and tell you its colour, but not see what’s in the cup..”

Which neatly runs up against the buffers of a zen-like truth about not just James but all writing about music, something almost by definition beyond words. Like that cup, I can see James in outline and tell you what colour James are. But as to what’s inside?

That’s for you to sup it and see.

James are a new thing. Maybe one of the last new things that’ll emerge from pop’s depleted range of possibilities, maybe the herald for a whole new order. It’s difficult to say.

This is an interesting stage we’re suffering right now. In James’ words, we’re all “dying to begin again”- but the accent, as of yet, is on death, decline, drift, disintegration. James could be a penultimate, teasing glory, or the promise of renewal. It’s difficult.

James are at an interesting stage too, making tentative, hopeful steps into a larger arena. Everything that makes them different and special is precisely what will create difficulties for them. But it’s going to be an adventure.

James are very relaxed about it all. If they have a fault it’s perhaps that their affability and modesty can make you forget that they are “important” – if that word has any meaning left in the diminishing realm of rock 1986.

They like to represent what they do as simple and natural and uncomplicated, a reticence that makes it hard to talk when you’re convinced, as I am, that their music is a sophisticated response to complex times. Sometimes I get the impression they’d like to promote the new LP, “Stutter”, without elaborating at all on contexts and intentions.

“Stutter” was produced by Lenny Kaye, he of “Nuggers” and Patti Smith fame. You’d think a group as English and indie as James would be shy of linking up with someone with such heavy associations with a certain tradition of American underground rock ‘n’ roll. Or was this a conscious alignment, a coming clean about being a rock band?

With James, nothing is ever deliberate, it just happens. Guitarist Larry Gott: “His name just kept cropping up. When we eventually signed to Sire, the label’s boss, Seymour Stein, knew him, you see.”

Singer Tim Booth continues: “Lenny was a mixture of chance and choice. We talked to him and saw that he was really sussed. With him we were prepared to compromise, whereas with someone else, we might have closed ranks.”

Compromise? I can’t see much evidence of commercial bland-out/gross-out.

“Perhaps compromise is the wrong word,” suggests Jim Glennie, bassist. “It was more a question of letting Lenny’s input come into the music”.

What is clear is that Kaye has given James a scope and force and brightness of sound appropriate to a major label group. James now have as much in common with early Echo or U2 as with the more flimsy, brittle sounding shambling bands.

I think it’s important to stress that James are a rock group. Important precisely because they have so little truck with what we’ve come to associate with rock – the stale sleaze, the megalomania, the rowdyism, the swaggering sexuality. James are opening up possibilities for a new kind of rock, one that retains the accelerating and urgency, but relinquishes the aura of violence and overbearing masculinity.

James aren’t alone – throughout the indie scene, both British and American, people are coming to the same conclusions, drawing from similar sources, developing elements like The Velvets, Byrds, Television, folk, into a rock that’s not just post-rockism, but post-r&b.

It’s funny how all these hip white kids in Britain have appropriated the music and imagery of an earlier American bohemianism, only to use it as a kind of dissidence against present day Americanisation. The jangly/fuzz sound is combined with a defiant Englishness, a dissent from all that’s taken as Americanised in this country – video, wine bars, yuppiedom, soul boy culture, consumerism. A dissent from pop itself, in fact.

Strange and exciting, isn’t it, that purity has become hipper than wildness, that innocence has come to seem a more desirable, cooler, state of being than worldliness? Are James aware they’re part of a wider change?

They say they don’t listen to other music much, too much like a busman’s holiday. Have they got any ideas why this change is occurring?

Tim muses: “It’s a different period… we’ve had that wildness stuff, and it doesn’t last long because the nature of it is such that you’re pretty ill, you can’t maintain the intensity and you burn out very quickly. So you move on to something else, hopefully something a bit more positive, and long term.”

Larry continues: “It sounds like you’re putting this purity thing into a category almost like the punk explosion, or the rock explosion before that. I don’t think it will explode because of its very nature. Only things like outrage explode.”

“And dissipate just as quick,” adds Gavan Whelan (drums). “We’re more like something that seeps into your bloodstream.”

I’m interested that Tim speaks of moving on to something positive because, in most of the songs, you seem appalled by things, disgusted.

“I hope there’s more than that. I hope there’s something positive at the end. Like ‘Black Hole’ speeds up at the end and that’s the way you get out. Plus there’s humour too – y’know, ‘Beam me up Scotty’! There is a lot to be appalled at, but not all life’s like that.”

Perhaps what’s positive is just the transfiguration of sorrow in music, the sheer exultation in sound and energy. James are perhaps the best, most innovative and dynamic of jangly – nowpop groups, rivalled only by those Arizona mystics, The Meat Puppets. And it’s positive just to be able to write about bad things incisely, yet with wit and compassion.

Tim’s lyrics traverse a number of interlocking themes – how machismo brutalises (both victim and self), the restlessness of desire that will never find peace in materialism or promiscuity, non-communication – and return again and again to the yearning for a home, for tranquillity, for “nature”, and “truth”.

There are two really central concerns – pollution (of the environment, the body, of language) and illusion (social masks, self-deception). Tim will joke about “getting high on negativity”, but it seems to me that he does work himself up into a kind of ecstasy of denunciation on songs like “Just Hip” and “Your Loving Son”. And, because they’re exhilarating, charged pieces of music, we too get swept up in it. Both songs climax by spiralling up to the heavens and James’ music seems to strive to rise above it all, leave behind worldly concerns and base things.

But I almost feel sorry for all those people whose lives are being dismissed as “disguises” and “built on lies”. The new single, “Really Hard”, implores “wake up from this dreaming state”, and it’s almost as though Tim sees all of everyday culture as a mirage, as ersatz-satisfaction. So, what are we left with, once all the veils are stripped away? Clear vision? What, I ask, are the real things?

A long, embarrassed, smirky, silence ensues before Tim speaks: “Well, there’s love… and there’s waking up. Like, things are often not very real – lots of patterns in the way people behave, are dependent on the way they were treated as a child, on the environment they were brought up in, the school they went to, the psychological games their mothers and fathers played with each other, certain key events. All that can make people into a kind of machine, repeating. And when you find yourself repeating these patterns you try to wake up from that. When you start to wake up, it’s very exciting.”

What do people wake up to?
“An awareness of the part of you that isn’t asleep, that is aware, and that’s common to everyone. There’s no real language for it, you could get bogged down in mystical language, although that’s not how I see it.”

One thing that marks James out is the explicit way they address the way pop is a form of conditioning, how rock’s dead history of gesture can constrict our vocabulary of desire and self. “What’s The World” and “Hymn From a Village” were brilliant essays on pop’s redundancy and the search “for some words I can call my own”. The new LP contains “Johnny Yen”, an hilarious rejection of the self-immolation of the rock outsider/tortured young artist.

“When you start to make songs, all the songs you’ve ever heard come in, and you have to be very alert to the clichés. It’s another facet to waking yourself up.

“Clichés are dead songs, there’s no energy, no lift to them, cos you can predict what’s coming, from the first note in. Like “Hymn From a Village” stems from when we started to make a song and it seemed very robotic, like a cliché, and that led to the lyrics ‘this song’s made-up, made second-rate’. It was a sleepwalking song. So it’s the same with life – if you wake up, you become more alive, instead of just going through the same tired habits and responses to what confronts you.”

It seems to me that what James are attempting is a noble project. They’re trying to inject into pop ideas and practices that are foreign or actively hostile to what pop has always been about. Pop and rock have hitherto been very much take take take, me me me, want, want, want – whereas James are trying to introduce reflection, selflessness, a quiet life, concentration, into its scheme.

It makes me wonder that Sire think they can sell them. There’s too much that’s jarring and alive about James for the radio – the disruptive intelligence of their song constructions, the fact that you can tell people are there from their playing, will all make it difficult for people to use James as background listening. Are James too up-pop to ever be successful?

“Lots of people come up, like you, and say, I like it, but it’ll never be popular. But lots of people come up and say that! The truth is we just don’t know. We want to find out.”

Jim: “You’ve just got to show people that possibilities exist.”

Tim: “We used to think the music would sell on its own merits, but now we see we have to sell it, sell it on Jim’s face, Gav’s beard, my shoes and Larry’s glasses.”

I hope it works.

Int : That was Really Hard, your choice to play as a track from the new album. Why Really Hard, Tim?

Tim : I sung the vocals on my birthday. Because it was my favourite song at the time

Int : Yes

Tim : I think that’s one of the most complete songs on the LP

Int : Many things have been said to typify James. One – vegetarianism.

Tim : Gavan’s drumskins are all made out of the finest leeks. We’ve really taken a stand on this

Gavan : Very expensive

Tim : And we come on dressed in vegetables as well, because we don’t believe in wearing animals against our skin.

Int : Yes, I thought that artichoke was rather fetching actually. Buddhism. Does that still come into it

(Band do lots of Buddhist chanting and meditating sounds)

Int : Ok, I think we’ve answered that one. Message then

Jim : Hello Mum

Int : Yes. From Jim of James. I saw you playing at the Anti-Reagan Rally

Tim : It just happened we were busking in Albert Square and then this march came round the corner

Jim : Oh, fucking hell

Tim : And we were standing there playing and thought well what are we going to do now. Maybe we can get some money out of it so we carried on playing for a few songs

Jim : Passing the hat around

Tim : But they soon told us to shut up

Int : Playing something like Albert Square. I mean that’s quite something in itself. Slightly different to your average venue.

Tim : It’s a weird game. Playing Albert Square. I prefer Monopoly.

Int : Is there a big difference with an audience without alcohol

Tim : A soberier audience? Usually the sober audiences just stand there and gawp and look really embarrassed and don’t know what to do with their hands.

Jim : Oh God, I’m really paranoid. Everyone’s looking at me, but I’m not drunk. Oh God.

Tim : And they don’t know how to handle it. Whereas a drunk audience.

Jim : Just fall over

Tim : Just forget it and take no notice of us and jump on each other and things like that. It’s easier to fool a drunken audience.

Int : Pop interviewer question number 227 – what are your influences?

Tim : What are our influences?

Int : Mancunian Doors? How do you take to that label?

Jim : There’s one

Tim : That’s really corny. The Doors were always out of their heads. And we’re never.

Gavan : Jim was. I don’t know about the rest of them

Jim : Speak for yourself

Gavan : Not as bad as he was

Tim : None of us need alcohol or drugs to fuel them. One of the ideas is that we don’t need it live.

Int : This energy, where do you get it from? Why do people resort to alcohol? Just to replace or imitate that sort of energy that you manage to get live?

Jim : Lightweights.

Gavan : I don’t think the drugs replace energy unless you’re using specific drugs such as speed or something. It gets rid of the inhibitions so you can do what you want. But I think drink, it saps your energy.

Tim : At the beginning when you go on stage, everyone’s really frightened and so if you have a few drinks, you can hide from that fear and a lot of bands do that. They never get past the stage where you actually stand up there and tell if you’re brave or strong enough and are as good as you can be.

Gavan : So that’s what you did with the artichoke was it?

Int : Finally, the deal with WEA.

Jim : Sire

Int : Sorry, what is it and why are you doing it as opposed to staying with Factory?

Tim : We never signed with Factory. We just did 2 singles with them. That’s all the agreement, that was done on a day-to-day basis. But we liked them a lot, we got on well with them, but we just got to the point where we felt our records were just not being distributed. We were doing a tour with The Smiths and in each city we would go into the record shops and none of them would have a copy of our records even though the record had just come out and we were doing a tour to support it. And we just felt we needed better support really.

Int : And you’re going to get it?

Tim : I don’t know. No, we hope so.

Int : So a very serious band then

Tim : Very serious.

“We were a bunch of yobbos when we first met,” says Tim Booth, the singer. Gavan Whelan (the drummer) and Jim Glennie (on bass) were in this nightclub where I was dancing, and I caught them trying to steal my drink! There were too many of them so I backed down quickly. But they asked me to dance in the group (Tim is a bit of a “whirling dervish” when it comes to moving the old feet about). And pretty soon I started singing. Larry Gott, the guitarist, joined about three years ago and we’ve been together ever since.”

James have a new single out called “So Many Ways”, and will soon be releasing an album called “Stutter”. They hope that both will do well because at the moment they all get paid the grand sum of £33 a week each i.e. not exactly a fortunette. They didn’t bother publicising their last single “just as an experiment” says Tim. Sounds like a bit of a silly idea to Bitz. So what happened? “It failed.” Hmm, thought it might.

Amongst other things, James are friends of Morrissey and The Smiths, who they supported on tour last year. Like The Smiths, they are also vegetarians, and can be v. serious.
“Some of our songs have political implications,” explains Tim. “We look at how world leaders are invariably the most screwed-up people in each country, and how countries are in a mess because of the systems that let people like that get to the top. But we also look at what makes people in general so insecure and so ambitious, and how to break that down. Some of the songs are about how to become alive and spontaneous and awake, not just a bundle of habits that we call a “personality”. We try to uplift with our music, not to depress!”

Pheeyeeew!!! So what is Tim’s greatest ambition?
“To become an enlightened person. To know what life is all about and to become fulfilled.”

Cripey o’stripey! James aren’t just a bunch of yobbos after all – they’re a bunch of seriously-thinking yobbos!

James are making quiet additions to their Book Of Brilliant Things. The current chapters have been probed ad nauseam – normality, music, Manchester, brown rice, garish jumpers and hipness.

But hark, what is this? Edging closer to inclusion are two unlikely contenders -London and a major record label.

Jim: “People in London are really scared and poranoid. They won’t even look at you. Everyone seems so busy and blinkered, living in their own little world.”

Larry: “But there are little pockets you can start walking through and feel quite nice about. Bayswater’s getting a bit like that because we’ve stayed there so often.”

James are also coping admirably with being small fish in the very big pond that is WEA Records. Jim: “We went to a major because we thought the music could sell to a lot of people. We’ve never felt swamped, in fact we’re quite enjoying it.

“We always knew there’d be hassles and we have had hassles but nothing radical. Irs never been, ‘Oh God, the end of the world!'”

Larry: ‘We had very naive ideas.”

Jim: “Very idealistic. We thought we could take the world by storm.”

Larry: “All we knew was that the record industry didn’t work on the principle that if you release a record and if the public buy it, you have a hit.

“If we’d tried to suss out the industry and built a plan of action, we’d have fallen flat on our faces. Our ideas of it 18 months ago have been completely blown to pieces. On the other hand, someone like Tony James can do it because he saw it all 10 years ago. He could go away, devise a masterplan and sell it to the people.”

Isn’t he the one who’s fallen flat on his face? Larry: “I think it’s the industry that has.”

Jim: ‘What happened was probably all he intended anyway. They must have known deep down that they’ve got a cheap, cruddy image that everyone was going to be pissed off with in a few months.” Either that or they’re more stupid than they look.

Larry: “As for the advertising on their LP, I’m sure people are just going to tape it and press the pause button during the adverts. That’s if anyone actually wants to listen to a Sigue Sigue Sputnik album.”

And are James going to be hitless hipsters for the forseeable future?

Larry: HI always thought we’d have a hit some time.”

Jim: .And we haven’t given up or this one yet.. (This one being the very splendid ‘So Many Ways’.) “These days, though, you have to get on the playlist and we’re not. I always used to think DJs played records they liked:’

As for the dreaded image business any record company pressure to enhance the oddity factor? Boxes of kaftans appearing surreptitiously on doorsteps, perhaps?

Larry: “Is our image that dreaded? No, no, I didn’t mean it like that. “No it was basically a case of, ‘Here’s James, let’s see what they can come up with’.”

Jim: “And our image is dead easy We just have to be ourselves.”

‘So Many Ways’ is just one of many delights unveiled on James’ first LP ‘Stutter’. The essential Jamesian elements are here in force -wild, uncontrollable melodies; rabid, unru voice; unbelievably tongue-in-cheek lyrics and, occasionally, a modicum of order.

Timothy Booth’s voice has a perplexing charm. It’s so, um …Larry”‘Weird is the word that springs to mind. Although, on Chain Mail’, he was really taking the mickey out of himself a bit with the highvoice.”

As for James’ poetic licence. ..’I love my black hole’, ‘I need a wash’ and other similar gems sung with such sombre conviction, they must be joking. None of this pilfering from Roget’s Thesaurus like other bands, though.

Larry: ‘We used to have really ba speakers for rehearsing. You could jt about pick up the melody, punctuating and that was about it. The words were totally blurred. ‘Really Hard’ started , as ‘Riddly Ya’. Tim was just improvising with syllables and vowel sounds until one of us mentioned ‘That song, ‘Really Hard'”

Enter Gavan and talk,of antiquated pop stars – Larry’s birthday being imminent. Larry: “Yes, nearly 21.. Ho ho. Too old to be sprightly young pop things, eh? Though such chart doyen as Morten Harket and Neil Tennant are surely giving hope to the elderly.

Larry: “Pet Shop Pensioners, more like..”

Jim: ‘We’re not old, are we, Gav? Gavan: .No, we’re fresh-faced young men.”

Jim: “Seventeen, in fact, so we car be pop stars.”

Larry: ‘Well, you’re going to be a right heart throb anyway, Jim”. (An acquaintance took a copy of James’ last appearance in these hallowed pages to Styal, a women’s prison.) the women were going, ‘Ooh, who’s he?’.

Jenny’ (James minder): “All these women who’ve been denied their conjugal rights for 15 years. If we ever play there, we’ll have to build a barbed wire fence around you.”

Is there something we don’t know? Why did a certain hotel refuse to hand over the undies Gavan left behind?

What is going on?

Sounds: August 1986 – In fear of earwigs crawling through their heads, these strange James boys tell Jonh Wilde about the bizarre phobias creeping through their pop music. Photo debris by Ian T. Tilton

Eighteen months ago, James were just born and didn’t give interviews because “people hadn’t heard the music and we wanted them to decide what it was like before they took another person’s opinion”.

These days, four singles and one LP forward, they’ll talk until their tongues start rattling about in their heads and their faces turn purple.

These days, they concentrate madly and try to make the chat as consuming as their extremely strange records. Today they tell me they’re being pensive because I’m being pensive, but it’s not always like this.

“We thought about suicide all the time, we didn’t see any other point in living, we at least wanted to go out with a bang. It seemed very romantic, and we came pretty close.”

Then came Factory, plucking them from the dusty corners, and their ambitions swerved away from hara-kiri and toward “making an album as good as ‘Horses’ or ‘Prayers On Fire’”. They settled, temporarily, for a brace of enticingly scruffy singles, little fussed over but beautifully insecure.

James were likely to remain a snug but slovenly concern.

The bee crept into the bonnet and started to hum with some true spite earlier this year. ‘Chain Mail’, part of their Sire ‘Sit Down’ EP, tipped the wink to crystalline melodies and purged words. James were scraping all the crusty bits from their Y-fronts and starting anew.

And last month came ‘So Many Ways’, some of the holiest pop of this year, James truly gasping at us, at last.

Now their debut LP ‘Stutter’ gets word-drunk and the fetching, bespectacled Tim Booth is telling me that his song about earwigs crawling through your head, ‘Skullduggery’, comes from his kindergarten memory of “being told that earwigs crawl through your ear if you lie down on grass. I only realised it was a fib the middle of last week”.

There are many such rum moments to be found on ‘Stutter’, at its best a copulation between Syd Barrett’s ‘Baby Lemonade’, the Velvets’ ‘The Murder Mystery’ and some of The Laughing Clowns. Oh, bugger it, James don’t sound much like anyone anymore, snubbing a nose at foolhardy Smiths analogies, saving up their spittle for the mirth and madness that spills from their vinyl pores.

“What are we like now?” muses the bearded Gavan, after just admitting he’s the most likely member of James to plot a murder. “Frightening, uplifting, scared at the world and its surroundings, not so much complaining as reflecting”.

“People have picked up on that madness, but then go on to treat it like Half Man Half Biscuit or something; otherwise, some really neurotic noise. It might be schizoid but we see it as something joyous… accepting all the mad energies.”

With Tim looking on dubiously, Gavan tells me, “It’s like there’s a fifth thing going on, like a fifth member directing everything.”

Whatever goes, they’ve hurdled far since those old death wishes, now emerging as Manchester’s best sandblasted racket. With ‘Stutter’ beside them and their future no longer behind them, they shape up as a prime slice of high fiction.

“You can almost imagine this character, James, wandering around outside there,” Tim suggests. “He’s probably dark and light and funny as hell…”

Probably one of those tourists of the emotions, pecking here and there, a contrary sod, miles and miles of celibate lust. James are dragging some welcome jive-ass jabber back into view, their scribbles packed with doubletalk.

Their potential, so to speak, is far behind them. Four plain James, losing the gravel pit for the sweat pit, singing “trying to impress is the nature of our work”.

These four grinning skulls write about lads called Johnny Yen who run down the street with their clothes on fire. They sensitively note that “to be loving when the lights are out takes much courage” in the sobbing ‘Really Hard’.

All in all, they tell me that “without getting too involved, the meanings come out all displaced, but the characters in the songs somehow emerge as real, maybe slightly surreal”.

So ‘Stutter’ reels with much erratic brilliance, a grainy soundtrack to fickle moods and shifting perspectives. Their hurried jangle is inhabited by characters halfway between a lovelorn swoon and a nervous fit. The greatest plus is that their music no longer has any centre, it merely flurries from some strange, unknown corner.

James are looking at me, almost scolding.

“People get so psychological about us,” Tim tells me. “People don’t really know where to put us. Those that call us ‘hippy’ get contradicted and confused when they see all these other sides.”

“What we do,” Gavan intercepts, “is push and shove and look at things with a different perspective. Like being a kid, when you go out to the park and look at nature differently, it fascinates you. As you grow older, you look at a tree and it’s just a tree.”

You must be barmy.

“James don’t take those things for granted, that’s all.”

Local indie pop band James return to the fray on record and live – they appear at The Green Room on August 9 and 10, CRAIG FERGUSON (words) and IAN TILTON (photo) meet the foursome.

One moment you’re there, ‘flavour of the month’ taking the slaps on the back, and the next moment you’ve disappeared; a vanishing act, voluntary or otherwise. This, of course, is the very nature of the crazy world of popular music, God bless it. Ups and Downs, Booms and Slumps – it’s very much a cut-price cut-throat market. Suffice to say, nothing’s guaranteed, certainly not success, nor it seems mere activity.

Take James, one of the better bands to emerge from Manchester over the past five years. Having built up a reputation as a superb live band, and with two fine singles on Factory to their credit, James were bound for a major label. They signed to Sire (American-based and part of the WEA empire) providing them with the debut LP Stutter back in the summer of ’86.

For my money, it was a disappointing record While it featured familiar songs of considerable quality, it neither committed the live James sound to vinyl, nor established a parallel studio sound worthy of those songs. But this all seems by the by – the group have been firmly stuck in a frustrating lull since the L.P.

As Gavan puts it. “Last summer? You’re going back a bit there mate!”

A year is a long time – they must have been doing something.

“We played in Europe, worked on lots of new songs and went into the studio, eventually” The tone of Tim’s voice says it all; they could have done so much more. It becomes immediately obvious where the blame lies. James are not happy with the treatment they’ve received from their record company and they make no bones about it.

“It was a mistake not going on tour after the LP came out,” says Tim.

It certainly doesn’t make good business sense to publicise the product before it’s available rather than after. Add to that the lack of funds for advertising in the press, and their more recent awkward stance with regard to the new LP and you can see that this particular band-label relationship isn’t all that it should be. It almost reached the divorce court before Sire relented and gave the band the money they needed for recording.

Tim goes as far to say: “In the last year we’ve had a hell of a lot of business problems – it’s an area none of us want to be bothered with, but we’ve had it forced on us.”

At the risk of labouring the point, the past year has not been a very happy one for James – “the only thing that has kept up going is the music.”

At the mention of music, the room becomes charged with extreme enthusiasm. They’ve just had a month’s break and their thirst for a return to playing is overwhelming:

“You start rehearsing again and sooner or later this thing starts, circling in the middle of the room, and the song starts playing you.”

When Gavan says this, it sounds weird but you know what he means. They all nod in agreement and the passionate feeling is unanimous. Live, James rarely fail to excite, but as everyone knows, getting that excitement onto vinyl is another matter. The first L.P. didn’t work in that respect -“it wasn’t put together very well,” says Jim – and we agree that live sound and recorded sound have to be regarded as two separate ‘mediums’.

Larry: “Hugh Jones who produced the new L.P really slagged us off about Stutter: He said we’d lost so much between the last Factory single and the L.P.”

Gavin: “The sound quality mainly. And I think we were a little more professional about it, working to the principle that ‘less is more’ – there’s more space and thought.”

I take that to mean that they’ve held back at times where usually they’d give it the full James treatment. Gavan doesn’t hold back “It’s a classic! I wouldn’t have bought the first L.P. -I’d have taped it off a mate -I’d definitely buy this one though.” Given that so much was expected of the first L.P., are they not a little apprehensive about this one?

“We’ve had quite a cynical approach towards it, but it’s a much better record,” say! Tim positively.

Sire predictably don’t think James are commercial enough – do they feel any pressure to sound more commercial? “It’s inward pressure as much as anything because we want a bigger audience. We want success -you can only be an impoverished artist for two or three years and no longer; earning a reascnable living is as important as gaining acceptance in the sphere that you’re working in.”

There’s no doubt that the new L.P – untitled as yet but out hopefully in September (Sire permitting) -represents a crossroads on the James road of progress. If it sells they’re laughing, if not, it’s bye bye to Sire. ‘Ya Ho’, the single out in September, may be a good indicator. Whatever happens, the band describe their new work as “wild in variation” with some “truly brilliant moments”. After years on the scene, James are still looked upon as an oddity – something they are positively pleased about. It’s not the personuel who are odd but possibly their approach -they shy away from convention, be it the song or the method. The identity they were given a couple of years ago – folk-singing vegans -is less true than it ever was, just the usual case of picking out extremes. Unfortunately, people have a habit of reading, believing and remembering. “The Bodines thought we all lived together in a big house in the country!” Jim laughs. Happily, James are set to re-emerge from the darkness of a long, quiet year. They’re dying to do what they do best -what’s so odd about that?

Singer Timothy Booth is describing what life should be like.

“When you think of a dog or a young child, the way they look around when they come into a room. Or a dog going on a walk, smelling something completely new to it. The next day, it’s a whole different thing and the dog has a look of pure joy as it looks around, experiencing all the sensations as they are. Or a child looking at a plant, wanting to touch it or eat it. It’s also living in the present. I’m not making an argument that this is how we should behave all the time because we’d never get out of one room. You’d look over at one corner, turn your back, look over again and it would be a new corner.

“One reason I think people are ill and unhappy in society is because most people are well out of touch with the childlike quality and we all need some of that. Some people look to drugs to get it. You can get it after a lot of sex, when you get that rush of vitality. You get it from concentration. We get it from performing our music. It happens whenever your concentration becomes heightened.

“I’ve had months when life has been really mundane and then something happens and you get that special buzz and want to hold on to it. You wonder why the rest of life isn’t like that, at that level of intensity, at that level of living.”

Are James particularly special?

“Oh yeah!”

Showing up all these contradictory components, incompatible things, a kind of intimate association of opposites. Are James like litmus paper?

“Litmus paper?”

No, not litmus paper, the other thing.

“Oh, the acid test. Yeah, we’re like the acid test.”

It is almost 18 months since James took a tumble with us on the nuptial couch, since “Stutter” found 11 new ways of taunting itself with its own doodles and fear of heights. Now this starving man is back. Drummer Gavan Whelan has been working in a hotel and bassist James Glennie has been flogging second-hand cars. Very James. Very commonplace, very matter-of-fact, very left-handed. The splurge of lopsided obsessions that made up the brilliantly shoddy “Stutter” ultimately failed to persuade a sunken nation like ours to throw its ballet skirts to the wind and bare its thighs and backsides. Indeed, “Stutter”, even considering the way it rushed over the style, failed to provoke so much as a neatly-dressed ankle. Me and James are mystified by this. In fact, if it happens this time around, we’re going to whip some asses sharpish.

“When we finished that first LP,” Larry recalls, “it was the culmination of so many years worth of work focussed in a six-week period, incredibly intense. At the end of it, we thought we’d created a monster and a masterpiece. It came out and we just didn’t touch people with it. You just lose your perspective when things like that happen.”

If slivers of “Stutter” might have proved too far gone for British pop-pickers used to having their meanings written in scarlet tartan, there could be no excuse for overlooking “So Many Ways”, the group’s “Eight Miles High”, three rippling minutes that defied you to keep your knees or your head together. As a single, it was beautifully dressed and powdered and all you killjoys out there in the real world turned your backs.

Together with the rest of “Stutter”, it seemed that this group had abandoned their uncertain, prudent beginnings for something daft and dark, something that was just three gulps short of a minor masterpiece.

James were showing that they needed to be lived with to be understood, that they were too complex and enraptured to settle for a quick roll on the grass-verge behind the youth club. They were obsessional and terribly droll in a way that most pop music is too pious to be. They made you itch in ways that had little to do with your winter woollies or your last hernia, bringing you to a point where you never knew whether to scream or cackle. To most people, though, they were still like oddball deviants caught in the revolving-doors and none of this mattered a hoot.

“Pop is deviant itself”, Tim Booth reminds me. “If David Lynch can have a hit film with ‘Blue Velvet’…well, we’re much less deviant than he is. I think Lynch is too dark. James is full of dark but also full of light.”

Too many wicked curves?

“We like to offset music and lyrics to some degree,” says Larry. “Loads of contradictions because there’s loads of contradictions between four people. A song like ‘Fairground’ is built completely on a contradiction. We were in this terrible black hole of a rehearsal-studio having a huge argument, me and Gavan on one side, Tim and Jim on the other, both sides playing something entirely different, stuck in these separate camps, no unity whatsoever. These two disjointed things were playing along at the same time and we accidentally recorded it. When we listened back, it was brilliant, like galloping horses at a fairground. Where you’ve got this circular motion contradicted by this up and down motion. They go in opposite ways but somehow blend.”

Are you consciously trying to please? Is this why you are making such a din?

“We try to do that, we think, jut by concentrating on exactly what we are doing. Not that we all know our individual parts blindfold. It’s that anticipation of what’s coming next. If that gets picked up by an audience, then there’s a certain thrill of going into unchartered territory that heightens their concentration and their awareness of what’s going on.”

You’ve got to lose yourself. You have to expect your ration of convulsions, palpitations, fainting fits, anxiety attacks and brain fever.

“You’ve got to be right there, right then,” Jim nods, “The kind of losing yourself in a way that you’re not really there to some degree. It’s the build up to things. The best thing about having a present is the moment before you open it. That’s the thrill, knowing you are going to open it.”

There was a hungry look in your eyes when you said that.

“He didn’t get any presents for his birthday and he won’t forget it,” says Larry. “Some group we’re in! I didn’t get one bleeding present either.”

“Ya Ho”, a new James single, presents them to the nation, visibly stimulated in new ways, a song about rescuing people on beaches, about whirlpools, fear of failure and rubbing movements. Dry James, pea-shooting James. This is far from the glazed gusts of “So Many Ways” or the campfire dragnet of “Why So Close”; calm James. Persist with it though. After the bits that go plink and fizz, there’s a marvy (marvellous) bit three-quarters of the way through that manifests itself in ways that are almost indecently flirtatious. Like other new James peaks, particularly the possible follow-up single “What For”, it brings us scarlet mouths, dagger-like peaks, waving arms and a golden clitoris that, believe me, is a pleasure to tango with.

Already “Ya Ho” is meeting some rum reactions, adopted as a terrace anthem in parts of Leeds after a recent James show there, replacing the cry of “Come back Duncan, come back” that has wafted through those cobbled streets for the last 10 years, an obscure reference to Duncan “Golf Ball” Mackenzie, Leeds United’s former post-Revie golden boy. I suspect that this is coy James sticking their tongues out at us as only they know how.

“Actually, it’s a cry of despair”, James Glennie informs me. “It’s ungainly James, experienced and dying to tell a story. It reminds us of the time we left Factory, when Tony Wilson compared us to the Dutch football team of 1974, the Cruyff era, when it didn’t seem like it was trying, because it was all

so natural. Of course, when they started thinking about it, when the next World Cup came around, they were complete crap.”

People still think of you as fey, frightened outsiders. Cissies. Apologetic rather than apoplectic. When are we going to convince people that you have real, six-foot ulcers hidden under those coats.

“A lot of it came about from us being on Factory to start with,” Jim explains, “which affected how people viewed us. There was also the rare, secluded image of James because we didn’t do interviews and didn’t do a lot of live work. We were seen to be withdrawing from the public eye and people thought it was our decision. It built up a kind of mystique but it made us special in a way.”

These days, James seem more lucid, looking none the worse for wear after their prolonged hallucinatory, delirious phase. The phantoms of the troubled “Stutter” appear to be fully exorcised. All those earwigs crawling through lug-‘oles, small twisted figures disappearing into black smelly tunnels, people spontaneously combusting… the obsessions of that first torrid collection of waking nightmares seems purged now, replaced with another copulative beat and another set of clinging compulsions, more inclined to fondle you this time round. Endearing?

“Well, we feel are obsessions are what obsess other people,” reasons Gavan. “This time, we seem to be telling people more about our obsessions instead of just hiding within them. Maybe there’s more sense of distance in that way now. In previous songs, our lyrics have been clear but our meanings haven’t. Our meanings have tended to be perverse. Musically too, we’ve tended to shy away from stating the obvious, not going to the root of things. Now, the lyrics have gone to the root the same way as we’ve kept to the root of the song as musicians. It’s taking it one step further.”

Making for a better James?

“Locating our perversities and making them work for us. Before, we’d get to be so obsessive trying to predict what was going to happen that we’d make what we didn’t want to happen…”

Brain tissue everywhere. Lovely stuff.

You ask the four James rouges what all this nervous shifting really amounts to and you get some words back to poison your brain with.

“Insular? Personal? Tricky? Argumentative. Asking for trouble. Obsessional, of course. Brittle. Awkward. Out of context. Different. Playful. Tony Currie. Socks that don’t match the shoes, very James. A call to arms. Clear. Dense. Overturning one thing and finding another thing beneath it. Not meticulous. Perfectionists. Making things better. Intrigued. Broke. The desirability of men and women foxtrotting together while naked. Acrobatic. No longer so nightmarish. Embezzlement.”

Phil Korbel : It’s James and Phil

Jim : Phil and James

PK : The band have now crawled out of the studio. Torn themselves away from the John Peel session, their own John Peel session that they were listening to in the gramophone library and come to talk to me. And now they’re complaining they’re not being paid. OK, now recently you’ve been described as being a band in the wilderness. We’ve heard nothing from you on vinyl for ages. What’s wrong?

Jim : Ermmm

PK : The corporate voice of James

Tim : We’re still in the wilderness. We’ve got an LP and other stuff coming out in about February. It was meant to come out now, it’s not going to. It’s being remixed. Maybe. Just in case someone’s listening. It’s coming out in February and we’ve just had a year of business problems.

PK : Business problems?

Tim : They’re over now

PK : And a change of management I gather

Tim : Yeah, we didn’t have a manager for a long time.

Jim : So that was quite a change really because we’ve got one

Tim : Well, we got one and then we sacked him so now we’ve got another one

PK : A real one

Tim : A real one

Jim : We didn’t sack him

Tim : We took him back to the shop as he was still under guarantee.

PK : Are we at liberty to divulge your new manager’s identity?

Jim : Mr X, come on down

Tim : Eliot Rashman who also manages what they called

All : Simply blue, red head

PK : Are we now going to have the same Simply Red treatment on James

Tim : Oh yes

Jim : You haven’t heard the new album

Tim : You haven’t heard the backing female singers and the orchestra

PK : You’re not joking are you?

Jim : No, not at all

Tim : We had a Tibetan, a Tibetan orchestra for the backing tapes and stuff like that. We’re going to tour with them as well in February.

PK : The Tibetan backing orchestra?

Tim : Yeah, gongs and horns and all sorts of things

PK : Ah yeah, a real small scale tour

Tim : And skulls of dead llamas

PK : You spent ages in a Welsh cottage recording this album and you’re still not happy with it. One, why did you go away to record the album?

Gavan : I don’t think Wales is really going away. It’s only like half a day away isn’t it really?

PK : Come on, come on. Be serious now

Gavan : Where do you want us to record it? There’s nowhere in Manchester really.

Jim : Well, now we’re megastars we thought we’d move up and hire somewhere like the Bahamas or Wales. Guess which we picked.

PK : Yeah, well, quite.

Tim : Whatever

PK : Now you’ve got this reputation of being good, clean-living young men. You know, Buddhist, teetotal, the strongest drug you’ll take is a cup of tea. Is this still true or have you fallen away?

Tim : No, we don’t drink tea.

Jim : Very high in tannin, very high in tannin. Makes your teeth go brown

PK : I see, right, OK. So you’re still good clean-living boys

All : We never were. No, no.

Tim : It’s all a myth

Jim : We’re sponsored by Guinness now

PK : I see, so it’s going to be the Guinness tour now? I like the idea of that. Now, we’ve heard the rendition, the only kind of recorded output of James that we’ve had recently are the jingles that three of the band did that Tim hasn’t heard. Tim, the singist, for reasons best known to himself didn’t want to come in

Tim : You’ll find out why when you hear the bloody jingle.

PK : Well he hasn’t actually heard this one

Jim : He’s a lightweight

PK : Just listen to this

Jim : You’re sacked

(plays piano-heavy Meltdown jingle with Jim’s deep “scary” voice)

Gavan : That’s it lads, I’m leaving

Jim : Nothing to do with me

PK : As you can see, now the denials come out

Tim : They only agreed to do it because you said it would remain anonymous.

PK : Oh rubbish

Tim : Sounds like a mad vicar

Jim : Meltdown. That’ll do

PK : That’ll do

Jim : Nearest to a compliment we’re going to get this evening

Tim : We’re going into adverts because we reckon there’s some money in it and we haven’t seen any anywhere else so we’re going into adverts

PK : Adverts for Jameson Whiskey first?

Tim : Yes, Jameson Whiskey

Jim : You talked us into that one

PK : Right, let’s talk about the new album. You’re dissatisfied with it, but the little of it I’ve heard so far appears to indicate a new direction, a beefier sound maybe.

Tim : Beefier? Come on, we’re healthy

PK : Sorry sorry

Tim : More Marmite.

PK : More soya like

Jim : No, no, we want a new image

Tim : Yeah, beefier, that’s fine

Gavan : It’s not beefier enough, that’s the problem

Tim : More beefy

Gavan : I’ve been ordered to come closer to the mic. It is not beefier enough.

PK : Thank you. That’s very kind of you Gavan. Gavan the drummer acting like a drummer.

Jim : Ooh cutting

PK : Tim, the rest of you, Tim, Jim, Gavan. The new album, if people were going to take the last album as a starting point, in which ways is this album different?

Tim : It’s the second one. It’s the one after the last album. I think that’s the first thing that’s really important to get across.

Jim : The second one’s a lot better

Tim : It’s much different from the first one as well

PK : In what ways?

Tim : It’s got different songs on it

PK : Yeah, right, I see, fine

Jim : It is much better though

Tim : My Mum says she thought that second track was really good.

PK : The second track, now is your Mum.

Jim : There’s only you on it

Tim : That’s why she likes it

(Jim and Tim have pretend argument)

PK : Now you’ve got this image of being very very serious people. Excuse me

Jim : You won’t laugh when he hits you

Tim : Perv

PK : Now this lot did actually say that they were going to behave when they came in, but it seems as if the occasion has overcome them and we might not get anything more sensible out of them. Are we going to?

Tim : Yes, you will

PK : Are you sure?

Gavan : The album is a bit more thought out. That’s why it’s different

Jim : Well said, round of applause

PK : Now the other thing, we’ve got some sense out of them, thank you. Next

Tim : It’s going to be much wilder. The songs are more complete. It’s like on the first LP some of the songs sound like they weren’t quite sketched out fully and the new one, we’ve taken them more to extremes, so a potential rock song becomes a rock song and a potential classical song becomes totally classical with the London Philharmonic joining in. And we’ve just taken things more to the extremes

PK : More extreme, so does that account for the fact that last time you played Manchester you had two sets, you had an acoustic set and then, for want of a better word, a rock set? A full band set anyhow

Gavan : No. We just felt because it had been quite a long time since we last did a gig in Manchester that we just wanted to make it a bit special.

Tim : And Gavan our drummer is a frustrated pianist so it gave him the opportunity to let his fingers out for a walk.

PK : So it was just a bit of fun

Tim : Yeah

PK : Also, it has been suggested that you are now ruing the day you left Factory. You are regretting the day you left Factory.

Gavan : I think we left Factory a bit early

PK : Before you were ready.

Jim : Yeah, we should have gone after dinner

PK : There I was thinking we were having a serious conversation

Jim : It’s true, it’s true

PK : Too early, are you ready now?

Tim : Are we ready?

Gavan : There’s no choice

Jim : We’ve got to be. There’s no point in going backwards. But I think we did leave a bit early

Tim : What do you mean by ready? I mean, what happened was we went on a major record company and they couldn’t see any of our music being potentially commercial so they didn’t put anything behind it. It’s really when they decide that we’re commercially potential, whatever that means. And so God knows whether in their eyes we are or not yet. I doubt it.

PK : Shall we cross fingers. Well anyhow, now a track from that album, the pre-remix version of a track called Charlie Dance and after that we go back to James live. Thank you very much gentlemen.

(plays Charlie Dance)

PK : A track from their forthcoming album, Charlie Dance. And before we go back to Tim and Gavan who will be doing a live song for us in a second, Jim is going to give a little competition for a pair of tickets to their concert at the International 2 on Thursday. Question please, Jim

Jim : Thanks very much Philip. And the question is : Is Ed Bonicki innocent? Answer, yes or no

Tim : Who?

PK : Daley Thompson

Jim : Oh no

PK : Thompson Daley.

Jim : If Thompson’s Daley, is Ed Bonicki innocent?

PK : Answers not on postcard, ring us now on 061-xxx-xxxx to go and see James at the International 2. Now we go over with a flick of switch to Tim and Gavan.

FOLKLORE

1983 : alors que la vague gothique donnait une nouvel uniforme éphémère au rock anglais, James osaient sortir un premier titre « Folklore », quitte à passer pour les idiots du village.

Toujours aussi emmerdeurs et déroutants, ils se font rares et précieux depuis : une discographie intrigante et des concerts déroutants les ont hissés sur un piédestal solide et définitif, voisin de celui des Smiths.

La liqueur du rock.

Vous semblez tous les quatre particulièrement liés les uns aux autres;

Après un bon concert, oui( rires );Nous avons joué un très mauvais concert il y a quelques jours, c’était la misère qui nous liait toute la soirée. Nous sommes très différents les uns des autres, nous discutons beaucoup, nous avons connu beaucoup de choses ensemble en cinq ans. Chacun d’entre nous est passé par des périodes étranges, c’était très délicat à négocier.

Vous ne souhaitez pas parler de ces périodes ?

Pendant quelques années, trois d’entre nous avions pour habitude de méditer énormément, et quand je dis énormément, c’est vraiment énormément. Nous le faisions hors du groupe, parfois pendant des périodes de plusieurs jours, des heures d’affilée. D’autres se sont intéressés aux arts martiaux, ce genre de choses.

J’allais justement dire que lorsque je vous ai vus la première fois sur scène, vous m’avez fait penser à une espèce de secte;

Non, ce n’est pas ça. Nous avons pratiqué la méditation pendant quelques années mais nous avons arrêté il y a un peu plus d’un an maintenant, parce que le groupe avec lequel nous le faisions s’est dissous. C’était intense, beaucoup trop, un travail trop dur, trop éprouvant. C’était trop organisé et rigide, maintenant nous ne faisons que ce que nous voulons faire, nous choisissons. Nous restions assis à méditer, deux heures par jours, parfois dix heures le week-end ou même des journées entières de dix-huit heures. C’était très exigeant. J’en suis assez fier, mais cela peut aussi vous rendre très arrogant;ou même vous détruire, car vous restez là, assis pendant des heures, alors qu’on a qu’une envie, c’est de sortir courir;

Maintenant que vous avez arrêté, cela ne vous manque pas trop ?

J’ai recommencé récemment, mais je le fais lorsque je le veux alors qu’avant, la discipline de ce groupe était trop dure. C’était trop extrême. En tournée, cela pouvait donner des situations étranges, les uns méditaient pendant que les autres buvaient leur café, deux camps séparés. Mais lorsqu’on est un groupe, il faut faire des sacrifices, on ne peut pas vivre que pour soi-même, il faut trouver un langage commun.

Venez-vous de familles très religieuses ?

Le groupe vient du milieu prolétaire de Manchester sauf moi ( Tim, le chanteur), je suis le snobinard de la bande ( rires);Je viens de la  classe moyenne du Yorkshire. Mon père était assez religieux, c’était une espèce de chrétien distrait, un chevalier-gentleman;Mais rien de positif, alors qu’avec la méditation on agissait, c’était du concret.

Comment vivez-vous à Manchester ? Etes-vous impliqués dans la scène musicale ?

Nous sommes à part. Mais je ne crois pas qu’ils existe véritablement une scène musicale à Manchester, la plupart des groupes sont à part. On fait son propre truc, on ne fait rien en commun, on ne partage pas. Il n’y a aucun sentiment de communauté à Manchester, ce n’est pas comme si tous les musiciens créatifs jouaient dans leur secteur avec un but commun. Ce sont juste beaucoup de gens qui habitent là, qui forment des groupes parce qu’ils s’ennuient. Certains d’entre eux deviennent plus connus et peuvent en vivre, c’est tout. Les groupes sont très différent les uns des autres, il existe de très bons groupes de jazz, et les Smiths, New Order, The Fall et Black;Simply Red;les deux extrêmes;Ten CC ( rires );

Morrissey, des Smiths, nous a dit qu’il a été très déçu par les groupes qu’il avait aidé, que James était le seul avec lequel il avait gardé de bonnes relations, malgré quelques problèmes;

(rires);L’un des problèmes a été que j’ai essayé de l’entraîner à méditer (rires);Je ne crois pas que ça pourrait bien marcher avec lui;L’autre problème a été qu’ils voulaient nous emmener sur une tournée américaine et nous avons annulé une semaine avant le départ, ce qui l’a déçu énormément car il nous avait beaucoup aidés, ils ont eu l’impression qu’on les laissait tomber. Mais à part ça, on s’entend toujours bien, il est venu nous voir lors de notre dernier concert à Londres.

Quel effet vous a fait la dissolution du groupe ?

Pas grand chose. Nous ne leur avons jamais ressemblé, musicalement, même si les gens nous mettaient dans le même sac. Il y a quelques points communs, ils sont végétariens, nous aussi;Mais c’est étrange car nous existions deux-trois ans avant eux et les gens ont dit qu’on leur ressemblait, ce qui était agaçant. Mais le contraire n’aurait pas été plus juste, ils n’ont rien pris chez nous, ils étaient vraiment indépendants. Il y avait aussi des similitudes quant à nos styles de vie, car nous ne menions pas la vie de la scène rock habituelle. A cause de ça, nous devions, dans nos interviews, ne pas trop dévoiler notre façon de vivre, pour qu’on ne nous rapproche pas trop d’eux. Je crois que je n’ai parlé de la méditation qu’une fois auparavant. Les gens ne nous auraient pas compris.

Vous aussi êtes végétariens;

Trois d’entre nous le sont. Nous le sommes devenus car cela faisait partie de la discipline méditative. Mais c’était plus que ça : pas d’alcools, pas de drogues.

Vous avez d ‘ailleurs joué pour des concerts anti-alcool;

Ce n’était pas vraiment ça, ce n’était pas vraiment anti-alcool. C’était une espèce de programme d’éducation qui insistait sur les dangers de l’alcoolisme sur des choses pratiques, ce n’était pas pour condamnes l’alcool. C’était juste pour renseigner à propos d’une drogue, car c’est une drogue à part entière. Mais bien sûr , ça a été perçu comme une campagne puritaine (rires);On a été étiqueté. C’était une amie qui organisait tout ça, on devait l’aider. Nous ne sommes pas contre la viande ou contre l’alcool, nous sommes pro-végétariens et pour la prévention de l ‘alcoolisme. Il ne s ‘agit pas d’être contre quelque chose, nous sommes positifs. Maintenant tout le monde boit de l’alcool dans le groupe, mais pas de manière extrême;Cela va sonner très péjoratif sur l’Ecosse : en tournée, nous sommes passés par certaines villes, comme Aberdeen, où le problème de l’alcoolisme est absolument terrible, aussi épouvantable que l’héroïne, sauf que c’est légal. Il est important de simplement souligner ces choses-là. En ce qui concerne le végétarisme, ce n’est pas un problème pour nous : chacun d’entre nous pourrait très bien re goûter à la viande un jour ou l’autre. C’est la presse qui en a fait une grosse affaire. Notre musique semble attirer la frange mode, avant-gardiste de la presse, qui aime Nick Cave et ce genre de choses, une musique plus radicale. Ce qu’ils ne peuvent pas supporter, c ‘est que nous n’ayons pas l’apparence « rock ». Ils n’aiment pas ça, mais alors pas du tout !!! Ca ne correspond pas à leur image. Nous avons eu des critiques où ils admettaient aimer, mais presque à contre-cœur, ils disaient « ils ont l’air de cons, ils ne se bourrent pas, ils ne mangent pas de viande, mais ils jouent de la bonne musique ». Voilà les réactions que nous avions, celles de gens à l’esprit étroit, bloqués dans leur propre image. Au début, on les faisait marcher, on était des emmerdeurs;Nous avons joué avec New Order, tout était sérieux et lugubre, nous ressentions le besoin de jouer des chansons folles et stupides, il fallait le faire, tellement l’environnement était misérable et gris. Il fallait se comporter de manière stupide. Nous le faisons moins maintenant, mais nous avons toujours tendance à réagir, nous avons beaucoup de chansons agaçantes, méchantes, agressives. D’autres soirs, lorsque le public semble sage et calme, le public des Smiths, on lui jouera des morceaux durs et rapides. On a tendance à choisir le contraire de ce qu’ils aimeraient entendre. Mais finalement, il aime toujours ça.

Connaissez-vous votre public ?

Il y a de tout. Il y a encore cette frange liée à Factory, le reste est un croisement de tout ce qui peut exister. Les gens qui ont le plus de difficultés pour venir à nos concerts sont ceux habillés de cuir noir, car ils n’aiment pas notre image. Certaines de nos chansons parlent de ça, du besoin des gens de porter un uniforme. Car c’est un problème, ils pourraient aussi bien être soldats;manque de sécurité, de confiance sans doute.

Vous avez sorti vos deux premiers 45t sur Factory. Comment êtes-vous arrivés sur le label ?

Ils sont venus nous voir à un concert et ont trouvé ça bien. « Voulez-vous faire un album avec nous ? » nous ont-ils demandés. « Non !!! » Et un peu plus tard »Voulez-vous faire un maxi avec nous ? » « Non !!! »(rires);et nous avons dit que nous voulions faire un single. Ils nous ont spécifié sur feuille tous les titres qu’ils voulaient que nous enregistrions, mais nous ne voulions pas enregistrer d’entrée nos meilleurs morceaux, nous avons donc choisi librement nos chansons les plus faibles. Ils ont d’abord été très embêtés, mais les morceaux sonnaient très bien en studio finalement;Ensuite, ils sont revenus à la charge avec leur album et leur maxi;et on a enregistré notre deuxième 45t !(rires);Nous ne voulions pas que nos chansons soient gâchées. Nous les chérissons, car nous y mettons beaucoup de nous-mêmes, trop, nous sommes trop sérieux quand il s’agit des chansons. Nous étions comme des mères possessives, nous ne voulions pas les laisser partir de chez nous, comme des mères qui veulent toujours prendre toutes les décision pour leurs enfants, ne pas les laisser grandir eux-mêmes.

Etes-vous toujours aussi sérieux avec vos rejetons maintenant ?

Ca va mieux, il le fallait. Les concerts, c’était la même chose. Ca ne pouvait pas être un simple concert, il fallait que ce soit à chaque fois une expérience unique. Nous pouvions rester des semaines à nous préparer mentalement pour un concert, c’était infernal. Je perdais toute notion de proportion des choses;Nous pensions être tellement spéciaux qu’il fallait faire de chaque concert un événement historique unique, nous improvisions beaucoup, maintenant encore.

Beaucoup estiment que vous êtes le groupe le plus « out of time », hors des courants, des modes, intemporels;On est incapable de discerner la moindre influence;

Au début, si nous pouvions, dans nos morceaux, sentir une quelconque influence, ou si quelqu’un du groupe sonnait comme quelqu’un d’autre, nous jetions immédiatement le morceau, même s’il était bon. Encore une fois, nous sommes maintenant devenus moins rigides, parce que tout le monde finalement est influencé. Et nous avons dû dans le passé jeter trop de bons morceaux sur lesquels personne, à part nous, n’aurait trouvé la moindre influence directe;Mais nous, nous pensions «  oh oui, ça sonne trop comme la quatrième mesure de tel morceau, sur un album live obscure de 1969 » (rires);En plus, depuis que je suis dans le groupe, nous n’avons pas fait une seule reprise, même pas en répétition. On n’y a même jamais pensé. De toute façon, nous avons tous les quatre des goûts musicaux totalement différents. Comme nous écrivons les chansons ensemble, personne n’a de contrôle sur le son final. C’est pour ça que nos chansons sont bizarres ; à cause des ingrédients que chacun de nous apporte au résultat final;

Est-ce que l’on serait étonné si vous nous disiez le genre de musique que vous écoutiez dans le passé;

Non, pas vraiment; Gavan, le batteur, adore Led Zeppelin, est-ce que vous êtes étonnés ?(rires);et il adore le jazz;Je ne sais pas trop pour Jimmy, il écoutait The Jam et The Fall quand nous avons commencé le groupe, il y a des années;J’aime Jimi Hendrix, Captain Beefheart, Television;

C’est étonnant de vous voir réunir des influences aussi diverses, vous qui avez tant d’unité, une personnalité si forte;

Merci. Comment voulez-vous répondre à ça (rires);nous nous respectons beaucoup entre nous, et nous puisons une grande partie de notre influence chez les autres membres du groupe. Il n’y a aucun groupe de nos jours chez qui nous pouvons trouver l’inspiration;juste quelques trucs;Nick Cave & The Birthday Party;nous étions tous très fan, à part Jimmy, c’était un sacré groupe (souffle admiratif);De façon individuelle, nous avons aimé quelques morceaux, des choses de Stump, par exemple, mais rien ne nous a tous marqués depuis Birthday Party. Nous écoutons surtout des choses de l’époque où les musiciens aimaient la musique et n’étaient pas là pour vendre. Tous ces groupes que nous avons cité ont commencé parce qu’ils adoraient la musique, par pour gagner des millions de dollars;Cet appât du gain domine toute l’industrie du disque;Je me souviens quand j’étais plus jeune, j’étais très amoureux de Patti Smith;c’est ma grande influence. Ses concerts étaient tellement; uniques;elle poussait les choses le plus loin possible, improvisait;J’ai peur pour son nouvel album. Pour moi, ce qu’elle a fait de mieux est le pirate sorti juste avant « Horses »;Tellement choquant;les musiciens jammaient pendant qu’elle hurlait sa poésie. Quand Lenny ( Kaye, ex-guitariste du Patti Smith Group, ndlr) est venu produire notre premier album, il nous a donné d’excellents pirates;Par exemple la première répétition de Lenny Kaye et Patti Smith, juste deux, en train de reprendre des trucs de Brecht, « Mack the Knife »;

Comment s’est passé l’enregistrement avec Lenny Kaye ? Votre premier album avait, à l’époque, beaucoup surpris;

C’est vrai que ce n’était pas du tout un album commercial; Nous étions très naïfs à propos de notre force de vente; Nous pensions « c’est de la pop, les gens aimeront ça » (rires); Nous avons été surpris; Nous n’avons eu aucun problèmes avec Lenny, mais nous lui en avons donné beaucoup. Nous étions très possessifs avec nos enfants, nos chansons, et nous ne voulions pas lui laisser faire quoi que ce soit;le pauvre; Nous avons bloqué ses initiatives. Mais nous l’adorons, nous nous téléphonons souvent, nous sommes restés très proches, nous nous revoyons à chaque fois qu’il vient en Grande-Bretagne ; Il est super, un homme adorable, très drôle, une des personnes le plus attachantes que nous ayons rencontré dans ce business;

Pourquoi ne pas l’avoir choisi pour le second album, alors ?

Non; Nous ne pouvions pas (silence); Il était temps de passer à autre chose de différent. Mais la fabrication du deuxième album ne s’est pas très bien passé. Nous avons dû tout remixer, ou presque;

Hugh Jones, que vous avez choisi pour cet album, n’est pas, à priori, un producteur très subtile, surtout pour un groupe comme vous;

Le problème était de savoir avec qui aller ! Nous ne savions pas qui choisir quand Hugh est venu nous voir à la fin du concert, et il a su nous impressionner. Il nous a vraiment beaucoup critiqué, nous a insulté; personne ne l’avait fait avant; nous avons alors décidé qu’il était notre homme (rires); « Ok, montre nous ce que tu sais faire, grosse tête » (rires); Il nous a montré, et ça n’a pas marché; il a vraiment bien enregistré les chansons, mais ne nous a pas du tout convaincu au mixage. Il avait entendu nos premiers singles sur Factory, et ça l’excitait beaucoup; il pensait que nous n’avions pas réussi, sur le premier album, à recapturer le feeling de nos premiers singles, et il a beaucoup travaillé pour essayer de retrouver ce son;c’est dommage qu’il ait échoué au mixage;

Ce nouvel album sera-t-il une suite naturelle à « Stutter » ?

Oui, une progression très naturelle;mais il y aura pas mal de surprises. Je pense qu’il sera plus accessible, avec quelques singles dessus. .. Il ne faut cependant pas croire que nous ayons dû faire des concessions; nous avons compris pourquoi « Stutter » prenait tant de temps à séduire; L’ordre des chansons par exemple, peut faire une différence énorme. Les deux premiers morceaux sur « Stutter » étaient les plus mal produits de l’album. Il en résultait que la mauvaise impression durait ensuite pendant tout le disque; Tu ne peux pas te rendre compte à quel point ce genre de chose peut affecter les ventes; Nous n’avons pour l’instant qu’un titre provisoire pour le nouveau; il devrait s’appeler « If things were perfect »;de vieux souvenirs ! Quant à savoir s’il sera une suite vraiment logique à « Stutter », je crois que ce serait vraiment difficile de donner un prolongement naturel à quelque chose d’aussi bizarre, non ?

C.WHATSHISNAME & JD BEAUVALLET (Les Inrockuptibles- n°10-February/March 88

Jim : I’m Jimmy. I play bass guitar

Gavan : Hello, I’m Gavan. I’m the drummer

Larry : Hello, I’m Larry and I play the guitar

Tim : Tim, I sing and write the lyrics

Gavan : The recording went fantastic, really well and I think we’ve probably made the best LP for four years that I’ve ever heard. It’s called Strip Mine. We recorded it about a year ago with Hugh Jones down in Wales.

Tim : We usually jam together as a band and try and work out basic tunes and a kind of general structure for the song. I’ll take a cassette home and then late at night into early morning, I’ll write the lyrics starting with whatever comes into my head. A lot of them I don’t have a clue what I’m going to write about, I just let the song be written the way it wants to be.

Everyone in the band has completely different influences, often contrasting.

Larry : I used to when I was 13 or 14 or something like that, I used to listen to Jimi Hendrix a lot. Before that I listened to a lot of Motown when I was younger around about 12. Then I really got into heavy rock music like that English group called The Groundhogs and other blues rock guitar players. And like everybody, I think as I grew older, my tastes widened and my spectrum of musical influence just got bigger and bigger and bigger.

Tim : We don’t like each other’s taste in music some of the time.

Gavan : Quite often

Tim : Quite often. What do you call an influence because we never try and emulate anyone. Full stop. And if we hear certain influences which we feel are too overt we just drop the song or we change it.

Gavan : There’s a lot of music in America that I like, especially ethnic’s the wrong word but each different area has it’s own music, it has it’s own idiom and we’re quite open to that, travelling round, we get inspired by that.

Jim : I suppose it’s just the music we listen to, isn’t it?

Tim : There aren’t any fillers on the LP. We made sure everything that went on we really worked on. We really got the most out of.

What For is about somebody trying to uplift themselves. In Manchester, there’s this big town centre and every evening before the sun goes down these birds, these starlings, start circling overhead, flying in almost hieroglyphic formations, a really spectacular site, really beautiful, especially in the middle of a dirty smelly city to see these beautiful formations and it’s really uplifting. And the song is kind of about this guy who’s really down, he’s trying not to think about his worries and newspapers and everything he reads, he looks up and sees this beautiful sight and thinks “What For, tell me, tell me what for”

The questions rattle around my head as the car lurches into second gear.

But James personal manager Martine and personable singer Tim Booth are oblivious to my thoughts and Tim favours an indepth discussion on UFOs and the CIA cover-up conspiracy.

As the 21:15 flight Manchester to Ibiza economy flight retracts its undercarriage, Tim glances out of the window.

“Look, there’s one now!”

The car journey ends at the International II, where free admission is acquired through a combination of bribery – a 12-inch copy of the new James single “What For” – and sympathy (a knee injury necessitates Tim’s use of a Dickens and Jones walking stick.)

Inside the garish grotto, Pere Ubu are yet to appear. Tim and Martine, now joined by James fresh-faced bassist Jim Glennie, are soon immersed in conversation with The Man From Del Monte’s maniacal singer Mike, and Edward Barton – both whom have recently supported James.

Edward, who prefers tweed to Mike’s Biggles chic, is a little upset that a recent Sounds interview questioned his sanity&ldots;.

“He called me mad. I’m not mad.”

The suggestion that mad might refer to eccentric is given short shrift.

“No, mad doesn’t mean eccentric,” he insists vehemently. “Eccentric is an upturned tea cup; mad is a tea cup teetering on the edge of a table.”

Edward is equally concerned that James might be misrepresented.

“Be careful,” he warns Tim, “they’ll label you and forget you.”

“They won’t call me mad,” says Tim gently to the agitated tweed wearer.

“No, they’ll call you a veggie loony, put you in a box&ldots; then forget you!”

In keeping with the veggie loony image, my arrival next morning at Tim and Martine’s flat – opposite an undistinguished door which leads into Factory Records – is greeted with a choice: decaffinated coffee and soya milk or medicinal Japanese tea. No sugar.

The pious celibate Buddhist stereotype is given further credence by Tim’s meticulous, almost obsessive shaving ritual. However, his addiction to Cheers (the soapy social documentary of life in a New York bar) shatters the illusion.

The choice of background music hardly enhances an aura of piety. Still, the Pogues “If I Should Fall From Grace With God” meets Jim’s approval, and that of Larry Gott, lead guitarist.

Drummer Gavan Whelan will be late. Of all the band members, his attitude most closely approximates the devil-may-care rock-n-roll rebel.

Despite associations with orange juice, James are not without their drinking songs.

“We’ve got some songs like that,” says Tim before slipping into song. “Wish I’d invested gold / Down go share prices / New York to Tokyo”

Larry: “We’ve done the drunken song live at Leeds Astoria”

“Christ!” Tim comes down to earth religiously.

“Went well,” says Jim

“Did it?” asks Tim incredulously

“There were a load of football fans in that night,” continues Larry. “We were on a stage that was about two foot high and they were spilling beer, throwing pots on stage and throwing tables in the air. And we played the drunken song and we all started falling about the stage with the drunken audience.”

Tim: “There were people on the stage from the first song and they wouldn’t go. The management thought : James, vegetarian band, lay off some bouncers. And it was a riot &ldots;.”

“People would come up and say, Autograph, give us an autograph, halfway through songs. And one guy came up and said, Sing a song for the working class then &ldots; sing a song for the working class! And he’s getting really irritated and his mate’s going, Yeah sing a song for the working class.”

“So at the end of the song I said, That song’s for you, it’s the best we can do. And he went kinda, Woarrr that was for us!”

Despite the carnage at Leeds, last October’s gig at London’s Astoria was spiritual and ten times better for you than a dose of Nicky Cruz or a series of Songs of Praise.

In white robes and adorned with a skull cap, Tim pervaded the auditorium with an aura of understanding and courted those that leapt onstage. This threaded with James sound – a crisp, traditional folk merged with various international styles and warped into a lush chart-compatible brew – had James leading the audience as the pied Piper led Hamelin’s sewer population.

“It varies, you see,” explains Tim. “Sometimes we stir it up because we’ve got a lot of aggressive songs which we’ll only play if we’re in that mood, where we go on from the beginning thinking f**k you.”

“We did that at WOMAD once.”

Jim: “It was a really sunny day, everybody was really laid back with the African music, the cheap falafels&ldots;..”

Tim: “So we started with all our unpleasant epics. They were the opening songs and people just couldn’t get a toehold.”

My misconceptions are now in splinters, an appropriate point from which to survey the past, present and future of James.

The upward spiral was swift: “What’s The World” and “If Things Were Perfect / Hymn From A Village” being released first as singles then together on a five-track EP by Factory, between october 1984 and July 1985.

A transfer to Sire (WEA’s American sister label) followed, bringing the ‘Chainmail EP’ and ‘So Many Ways’ 45s before the debut album, ‘Stutter’, in the Summer of ’86.

‘Stutter’ was a transition period for James, caught between the commercial demands of the record company and their own desire for complete control.

The result was a mish mash, a record with charm and erraticism, coated in a cheap lustre – a record to tape rather than buy. Then, nothing. Record companies operate on credit not acclaim and the band, as the record, were left on the shelf to gather dust.

Tim: -The record company didn’t want us to record so they didn’t give us any money. We tried to release something after the LP but they wouldn’t have it so we could do nothing. Then you try and tour and they say, Well, you haven’t had anything out for a while, wait.

“Then Martine resigned as our manager and you can’t get anything out of a record company without a manager. With a new manager (whose career spanned just four months) James got to work on a new album. ‘Strip Mine’ was finished in March 1987. Release was delayed until October and then halted altogether with the arrival of new manager, Eliot Rashman (of Simply Red fame).

Rashman felt that the album needed remixing and, after five months, got James (who also had misgivings about the production) and Sire to comply.

Sire’s decision to finance the remix coincided with the resignation of The Housemartins and The Smiths from the intelligent end of the pop market. An ideal opportunity for James to scoop the awards in ’88?

Tim: “I think that’s what they {the record company) think. Everyone wanted us to get a record out when The Smiths had broken up. We went the opposite way on that kind of idea.”

Their new single, ‘What For’, supports this claim, not that James have ever had to fear the Smiths copyists claims so wrongly attributed to them in the past (The Smiths actually covered them, recording the first James single on the cassette release of ‘I Started Something I Couldn’t Finish’).

With the subterfuge of The Housemartins’ ‘Happy Hour’, the tempo of The Cult’s ‘She Sells Sanctuary’, a lushness you’d expect of a band sharing the same label as Madonna and an advertising budget big enough to ensure blanket press coverage (surely a sign of Sire’s newfound confidence), it might seem surprising that the record has failed to gain the Radio 1 A-list grading so essential for chart success. It was practically constructed for Top Of The Pops.

Larry: “It was originally a Eurovision Song Contest Entry actually, a song for Europe.”

Tim: “I used to take the piss out of it and sing a real Eurovision chorus to it”

Larry: It went ‘Bonjour. .:”

“‘Bouncy bouncy bonjour!'” the band return unanimously.

Larry: “It changed a lot cos it was quite poppy and breezy and didn’t have a serious side to it, and then musically it got more serious.”

By its live airing in October, it had grown teeth, Tim singing “I will dive into Sellafield seas. Sick fish, myself and some strange debris”, but on vinyl the nuclear power plant reference disappeared.

Tim assures me that the absence of the leaky location was not due to record company censorship. I took it out because I didn’t want it to be that specific, so I sing ‘Foaming seas’, which refers to sea pollution more generally, not just nuclear . If you’re going to censor it you’d have to take out “will not think of torture or the rape of nature” which like ‘Misty Blue last year, is not A-list compatible.

THE LUSH quality and satirical lyricism of ‘What For’ is maintained throughout ‘Strip Mine’.

‘Vulture’ is the musical equivalent of the imagery of Terry Gilliam’s Brazil mixed with the blatant vulgarity of The Hitcher’s severed fingers in the pomme frittes.

“Yeah, I enjoyed that,” says Tim with relish. .’When you spy a fresh face / Remember the rich taste / You want a part in the cost of it all/ So you open your flicknife /And cut off a thick slice / Envy makes the flier fall'”

Then, before you can breathe in, Tim summons up Monty python’s exploding man.

“It was written before that,” says Tim defensively. “It must be about five years old, it was on the first Peel Session, but a different version. It’s all about greed and gluttony.”

If “Vulture’ provides enough colour for a good schlock movie, ‘Riders’ is the hospital horror incarnate -a nightmare at St Elsewhere.

“It was a dream,” says Tim quietly, a fairly exact description of a dream I had four years ago that turned my life around.

“Until then I’d been on a very self-destructive route and this dream showed me what I was doing and made me decide that I really didn’t ‘want that poison in’.

“I’d been in hospital very shortly before (with a chronic liver complaint) and I probably took from the experience. The woman in the song, the nurse, was Nurse Rachett from One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest and her assistant was Jed Clampett from The Beverley Hillbillies.

If ‘Riders’ took Tim off the motorway to self-destruction, it hardly diffused the potency of his songwriting

Each song has a purpose and prod. at the subconscious as it teases the eardrums. The most overt message is in ‘Charlie Dance’, which epitomises a country where a budget aimed to cripple the poor, is taken up by the media as a perfect package for the working class -.the mentality of Harry Enfield’s .Loadsamoney on the front page of a national newspaper.

“‘Charlie Dance’ is about a believer in official lines who accepts what the government says. It was written after Chernobyl so it was like ‘The cows don’t moo anymore/But “m sure they’re not dead/They don’t chew anymore but ‘.m sure they’re not dead'”.

“The one person in this country who drives me up the wall is Lord Marshall, head of the Nuclear Electro Generating Board. After Chernobyl he was saying there’s no danger from our machines. Anybody who’s ever owned a machine knows they break down. And he denies it and denies it. He should live on the site or swim on the sea if he thinks it’s that safe”.

This is the serious side of James, the side that finds the term Ministry Of Defence hypocritical.

Tim relates it to a Ben Elton sketch (the two were at college together): .A near mid air disaster. What do they mean near miss? More like near bloody hit.

“The Ministry Of Defence should be called the Ministry Of War.” It’s a high horse that all but Gavan are prepared to mount. What does Gavan want?

“Loads of money”

SO WHAT have we got?

Take the talking bit from Dr Dolittle (“I feel that it is very important in principle that one should avoid eating one’s friends”), yesterday’s tabloid headlines, Luxembourg’s Eurovision entries (circa 1985-1988), rhythms from Didsbury to the Congo Basin, the humour of Palin and Gilliam (and a dash of Cleese), add a pinch of Cheers and cook for 45 minutes on Sellafield radiation, mark four.

James James I, James T Kirk or James Anderton?

The recipient of this thoughtful self-imposed dictate is a cloudy-haired type with the charisma of Irene Handl (yes, that much) and, despite himself, the discreet charm of the bourgeoisie. Tim is certainly a Venusian. He has that flavour, and blinking yellow skin (caused by liver trouble) too. But we shall skip past this tastelessness.

“According to quantum physics, it’s more than possible, in fact it’s probable, we have other lives, probably hundreds of them.” He pauses for me and Jim to stop blushing. “In parallel universes, we’re all on the boarder off insanity. We could discover other existences if only we went over.”

He gives me a pen because I ask for one, and tells me to read a lot of Robert Anton Wilson (“the weirdest books I ever…”) and about equal amounts of Milan Kundera. And you can see, I took the medicine. Yum.

James used to be like a goat (? – eh, Ed) with a broken femur, an awkward oddity, but happy as Mary Popping, or Larry. They made this one record, “Hymn From A Village”, and this brought them the fame of a minute. They toured with The Smiths, who loved them. They had rousing reviews for their first LP, “Stutter”. But oh dear me, so funny, all vegetarians, weren’t they, or didn’t drink, or don’t take drugs, is it? The gents of the press could get no handle on it, and nor could the record company. James have taken two years to resurface with the brilliant tightrope album “Strip Mine”. They’re taking more care of business now. James are like a fully-formed, million-dollar robo-goat, nearly free of scape. I’m very afraid they want me to think them normal. Me, who could hardly go in the house because there was a magpie near it.

Tim: “So how many have you seen today?”

Two, then one, but that makes it really three.

“No, it has to be all at the same time. You cheated. Still, all you have to do is blow them a kiss or take your hat off to them, and that way.

“Martine and I were sitting in a park. A magpie landed about a hundred yards away, and we both went, ‘Uh oh’. Well, it turned and looked at us as if it heard what we said. Then it took off, staring at us, and flew towards us, about two feet off the ground. It landed and hopped around us, pecking at my shoelaces, then round the back of me and pecked at my bum. It stayed for ten minutes. An utterly beautiful-looking bird. Its eyes closed like camera shutters, kind of chunk chunk.”

Jim, Alias James, Alias The one that got the band undemocratically named after him, has a weeny baby girl – hence potential genius – called Gemma. He says, “I’ve been told 13’s a bad year.”

What happens then? Jim bites his lip. “Don’t know.”

Then there’s the nature of rarefied genius, which brushes scapulae with James too much. When Jim was 11, he had this best friend, and at 18 they started the band. “Paul had a real fire. He was our motivation”. Paul’s not in James now, for one or two reasons that cause heartache.

“I’ve never seen anyone change like he did. Oh God! He was the most outward-going, full of life person… But he died. Not really, and I don’t know if it was drugs. I really don’t know. But the Paul I knew was no longer. And I miss him, I really do. I miss him. And I still see the guy in the street, but it’s not him.”

Because Jim’s choked and the wall could get damaged, Tim ice-skates across the frozen pool.

“At one time Paul was quite catatonic. He didn’t talk, he used to stand in the room at rehearsals and not play his instrument. At one gig he turned his guitar upside-down and played it left-handed, or tried to. It was our big break, our first gig with The Smiths, 1,500 people. We’d played to maybe two or three hundred before. Our first big gig, and he decided he wanted to play the whole concert with his guitar upside-down. He shaved his head the same day, and went on stage but didn’t play. He just stood there, the whole gig, trying. Making these noises.”

Paul was a pie-in-the-sky, sweet dream baby. They repeat his words now, like dazed pupils. “He said our set list must change every night. That we must take a lot of risks. Originality – if you hear any other’s influence in your song, dump it. No advertising. Everything shared. Everything.”

Jim laughs like it might be hurting him too. “And we were gonna be huge. With no advertising, no interviews, no publicity.”

Other people make it hard for those dilly dreamers.

“Uh-huh. Sometimes, I could say things to people which would kill ‘em, would core ‘em.”

“Glamour. Hooh. Glamour, eh?”

“Glamour, Tim.”

Silence. “It’s not a particularly pleasant word.”

It’s just that you used to say, “seduction has to be wrong”, but this new LP, with its talk of skin and bone, glows differently.

Tim: “Glamour in music today is a money thing. It’s revolting – there’s bugger-all in it. To me, Patti Smith is glamorous, but it didn’t cost her a lot of money, it wasn’t linked with wealth. She was a romantic poet, the artist, trying to push life to an extreme, to extract some drop of meaning out of it.”

Tim was at boarding-school (this was then) when his mum rang and said, “Your dad’s in hospital. He may not make it through the night. I’ll ring you tomorrow. You mustn’t come home, by the way.” What a Ma. So he crept about in the dark dorm, found some headphones and listened to anything that happened to be there. Into his hot, sad shell, Patti Smith sang, “His father died and left him alone on a New England farm.”

Tim is a Rupert Brooke himself, a house on fire, a misplaced Joan of Art.

Tim says obstinately, “Everyone has their own meaning for every damn word you use. So how on earth do you have any communication?” Levitate us, Tim. “Martine keeps telling me that words are only seven per cent of the human being’s communication. The rest is through gestures, smell, tone of voice, smile, eyes. Statistics show this.”

Statistics, inter-ballistics.

“I talk it out, I should it out, I put myself in a position where I’m gonna have a fight. Violence is something that – oh God – I do not morally condemn. Sometimes it is very necessary. Having been a pacifist, I’m now getting into boxing. I enjoy seeing Tyson knock people out, the blood, the mats on the canvas to cover where it’s splattered. I’m surprised at my own reactions. I know you cannot grab an idea of how the world should be and impose it. I just let myself feel my animal side, sexually as well as in violence. I blocked what I couldn’t control before”.

And love will save the world?

No reply. What, love won’t save it?

“Save the world. That’s a slogan.” Tim suddenly finds a lot about his shoe interesting. “Save it from who, save it from what, save it for what? You know, maybe this is how it’s bloody well meant to be.”

Eh? The man with a thousand possibilities and twice as many probable lives has gone me in a trick bag.

“Maybe we’ll never attain the knowledge everybody’s lookin’ for. We just ain’t got the capacity up here (Jim taps noddle). Not even just for an understanding of what the bleedin’ hell’s goin’ on.”

Jim, Gavan, Larry, Tim. Going round in frivolous, important circles. Assault and battery. Mad hattery. Celebration.

Take four slightly weird individuals, get them to write some ‘extraordinary’, ‘climatic’ songs, and you have James. Phew, says Johnny Dee.

There is no way you can tie a label around James. Maybe because of this, past interviews have centred around myth-making. The last time they appeared in rm they wore ‘ultra-bright’ knitwear in the photos, said they were inspired by the ‘Trumpton’ theme tune and there was talk of Buddhism and veganism. All of this was, of course, tongue in cheek – it just went a bit far.
When you look at a lot of bands you see a team – an identity. When you look at James you see four completely opposite looking people – four individuals, with different tastes and lives. Somehow they formed a group together – combining their four different ideas into one struggling whole. Most groups, finding themselves in this situation, would split up. For James, it is their key. They argue continuously, particularly Gavan (the drummer) who is quite ‘laddy’ and into ‘fast cars’, and lead singer Tim, who is quite a philosopher. It only stops when bassist Jim or guitarist Larry step in to mediate. Example:

Tim (tongue placed firmly in cheek): “Jesus lads, I can’t go on like this, it has to end!”

Gavan: “I think you’re hypersensitive.”

Tim: “I’m hypersensitive? God, what about you?”

Gavan: “If things were easy we wouldn’t be where we are.”

Jim: “There’d be a lot less pain and friction.”

Gavan: “Yeah, but that’s art isn’t it?”

Tim: “In the West maybe, but in the East it doesn’t have to be pain and strife.”

Gavan: “You’re joking, you’re joking!”

The argument continues. Rock ‘n’ roll mythology comes in for cross examination next:

Tim: “Rick Astley has got a mythology.”

Gavan: “But he’s a f***ing twat.”

Tim: “He uses jet set Campari mythology.”

Gavan: “He doesn’t.”

Tim: “He does.”

Gavan: “He doesn’t, he doesn’t!”

Tim: “His videos are like adverts for Tunisian holidays!”

James are about to release an album called ‘Strip Mine’, 10, extraordinary songs that travel lyrically from Tim’s head, past his nipples, naughty bits and down to his toes.

Tim: “I’m a human being – I’ve got all these parts on me, I carry them around and inspect them every now again and write about them.”

Live, James are the nearest you can get to spontaneous combustion. Often one member of the band will start a completely new, unheard song and the rest will join in. Other times, things just click, unbelievably, into place.

Larry: “Sometimes it becomes so easy. Everything sounds fantastic when it meshes together.”

Tim: “Live, sometimes it’s just ‘ah’, it’s just ‘there’.”

It all sounds very sexual.

Tim: “It is, it is!”

Jim: “Our songs are very climactic.”

Gavan: “It’s synthesised sex.”

Tim: “It’s really hard after three songs to keep it going.”

Jim: “You keep thinking, ‘we’re gonna lose it, we’re gonna lose it’… And then you’ve lost it.”

Tim: “It’s really awful if you come off stage and you’ve ‘come’ and everybody else goes ‘bloody awful gig’.”

James are totally enthusiastic about their music. They get excited even talking about it. What do they think other people get from James?

Gavan: “A buzz they can’t get elsewhere.”

Tim: “In the past we’ve been a bit shy selling ourselves. Now, we can say ‘it’s brilliant’.”

But is there a place for James in the giddy pop world?

Gavan: “Yeah. Number one – that’s our place.”

Ladies, gentlemen, and disillusioned vegans – I give you James – a weird recipe of fun and naughty bits. Take some home with you.

Details

Interview with Tim and Gavan from the Rockin’ In The UK programme in October 1988

City Life Interview October 1998

Martyr And The Vendettas!

James’ last performance at the Ritz has been mythologised as Manchester’s best gig of 1988. With a new album under their belt and another Ritz gig in the pipeline (October 11), James should be ecstatic, yet Mike West found Tim Booth poor, pensive but in the pink.

The interview is postponed. The singer has slashed himself with a shard of broken glass. Was this a suicide attempt or an accident in the kitchen? “I was washing up the stem glasses and… I guess I lost control,” says Tim Booth, arriving two hours later with five out of ten fingers bandaged. James, the pop group, Manchester’s most visionary project since G-mex, suffer for their art. They suffered for a well publicised abuse of drugs. They suffered for an over-public use of meditation. They suffered for vegetarianism and two successful independent singles. Finally, they suffered at the hands of big business, WEA Records. If you worship martyrs, Van Gogh, Jesus Christ and Jim Morrison, you will probably worship James.

“In 1984, my liver packed in. The band were ill, disorientated, using drugs, happy to burn out. I was a materialist, left-wing. I knew nothing about health and magic.” Tim, James’ esoteric lyricist and unlikely idol to legions of beer-boys from Leeds, has perfect bone structure and a carrot juice complexion. He is explaining how he came to write the nursery rhyme narratives that Yorkshire delinquents have taken to their hearts. “I read Arthurian legends, Beowolf and Rudyard Kipling’s Just So stories at too young an age.” The delicately featured boy grew up frightened, perverted, and obsessed by these fantasies of monsters rising from the sea. “Then I read this book on interpreting dreams.” Uniformed nurses administer him poisons. Alien parasites attack his jaw. Tim’s dreams have more adventure and less sex than Sigourney Weaver’s films. Aided by Jungian analysis, his dreams became metaphors. And reality became symbolic. And meditation became an obsession. And sex became infrequent.

Four years ago, Tim’s heath and James’ habits were turned around. Narcotic depressives became suspected Buddhists. “That’s when we began to see beyond the surface of things.” Stripmine, the current and long-delayed follow up to Stutter, documents this catharsis with depth, honesty and wonderful songs. “They are simple stories with an underlying resonance of meaning that not even I understand. I used to believe that my lyrics wrote themselves.” The stories have a happy end: the suffering artist’s liver complaint is cured with acupuncture and a regulated diet.

But does the suffering end? Of course not. While Tim discovered alternative medicine, other states of being, escapes from the material world, James found no escape from the materialists. Shortly after the success of ‘Hymn From A Village’, their second single on Factory Records, James were snatched from Tony Wilson’s collection of precious curiosities by a connoisseur with greater pretentions and more capital, Seymour Stein of Sire Records.

They say Seymour hoards artifacts and artists like a squirrel hoards nuts. He buries them in expensive holes – his New York apartment or his record company – leaves them there to own and forget. Stripmine was recorded two years ago, kept from the public by accountants and A&R departments, quibbling over production, presentation or budget. James were shelved, an ornament adding to Stein’s prestige but taking from the livelihoods of Tim, Larry, Gavan and Jim. “We had no record, so we had no gigs, so we had no money. We could not subsist.” Sire, WEA, choose to ignore that bands are made of people not porcelain. James made their compromises.

Once, they were obstinately human, their dress sense uncoordinated, their image as incoherent as four strangers waiting for a bus. Then, under the persuasion of Simply Red’s manager, megalomaniac Eliot Rashman, the four men began to experiment with clothes, make-up and method acting. They learned the basic skills taught to fourteen year old school girls and rock stars. “That was only for photographs… off camera, we fall apart.” Tim is defensive. The clutter of conflicting styles that is James’ music has also been cleared out, like their wardrobe, reorganised. The result is Rock music, a professional compromise between performer, producer and promoter.

But now the group are preparing legal letters severing their relations with Sire. They will emerge from the conflict as four friends, whose worst injuries have been self inflicted. “Although we’re very close, the pressure has caused fights…” admits Tim. And later that afternoon, in the small park opposite the Buddhists’ Eighth Day vegetarian café, a strong man with a weak chin is seen shouting at the man with a carrot juice complexion. A Christian rally sings psalms nearby, but Gavan Whelan’s expletives cut through. “Fuck Hugh Jones,” says the drummer and ardent meat eater, “John Paul Jones (Led Zepellin’s bassist) should be our producer.” Tim Booth turns from carrot to beetroot. “I hate Rock,” he says. “So why do you fucking play it?” asks Gavan. First year Polytechnic students bow their heads with embarrassment as they walk by.

Tim Booth believes all things are fated, preordained by magical powers, numerology and good cooking. “But in this culture, it doesn’t necessarily follow that talent gets rewarded.” James have their talent. They have yet to get their reward.

The last thing you’d expect to influence a Manchester band is the starlings in Piccadilly Square. Usually it’s the rain, or the industry or even the lager louts – but then James are no ordinary Manchester band. Into their melodic songs on their new album ‘Strip-mining’, they weave poetry and lyrics that linger rather than escaping into the nearest guitar twang ‘In the sky above the square starlings spiral dancing on all’. (What for?).

Explains vocalist and word fashioner Tim Booth… “It was the idea of this guy being really down, looking up and seeing the starlings swirling round and going ‘wow, that’s amazing’. It’s the best sight in Manchester – they can’t build anything to rival that in beauty.”

James have been around the Manchester scene for a number of years, and three years ago signed to Madonna’s label Sire. Their future looked rosy and still does, but to coincide with the release of the album, the band have parted company with the label, after waiting two years for its release, while Sire withheld backing as they thought the music was too ‘English’ and wouldn’t sell.

Guitarist Jim says: “We’re happy now. We wanted to get off the label two years ago because they wouldn’t let us do what we’re good at – playing live and recording. We’re not going a step backwards by any stretch of the imagination. This album will take us to the next step.” Trouble is, that James have got a reputation as a frantic live band – one of the best to see in the country, yet their album is very song based and tuneful – not what sells records in the age of pop pirates. Yet they wouldn’t budge… “No-one seems to realise that you just make the best album you can.”

Quite. It’s like asking Picasso to paint a bunch (???) of flowers… Tim “and then turning round to him and saying ‘well, those flowers would have been better painted blue instead of yellow. If you want them painted blue, then go paint your own! Recording an LP is a completely different medium and you’ve got to treat it differently. The music’s a bit more calm.”

Jim: “I like to think that we’re still doing the extremes, we’re just doing them better.”

Tim: “The aim is to have bigger extremes of franticness, but contrasted with the complete opposite with some really calm and beautiful things. When we start off with songs, they’re usually quite simple and then we play them a lot live and they just grow. All these songs are like little fledglings and then on tour, they’ll have to lean to fly…”

Jim: “We’ll put them out of the nest and see if they like it…”

And no doubt they’ll soar like the starlings in Piccadilly Square…

James play The Ritz on October 11.

Their album Strip-mining is now on release (Blanco Y Negro).

Details

Patti Caldwell : Welcome to Out of Order the programme that bites. Tonight we see the flipside of the glamorous pop industry. How one promising British band disappeared when they signed on the same British label as Madonna.

Looking for fame and fortune and climbing the charts, tonight Out of Order looks at what it’s like to be young, talented and signed up to a huge American music corporation and then left on the shelf with little chance of escape.

Reporter : Madonna is number one in the album charts. This is the story of the British band hoping to copy her success with the WEA/Sire record corporation. They too joined the stable of Seymour Stein, the man who signed Madonna.

In 1985, rock critics had tipped James as the next big British rock act and Seymour Stein snapped them up into an exclusive contract. But unlike Madonna, they were never to earn more than £30 a week. A number one band in the independent charts, front page of the NME and described by Sounds Magazine as “pop gods and saviours of rock n roll., they now belonged exclusively to the world of Sire and WEA, part of the massive Warner Communications. Only when they were signed did they realise that it wasn’t a passport to fame and fortune.

Jim : Things were going really well for us. We were being courted by the record companies. We signed to Sire on a high. We were going and then things stopped basically.

Tim : We would ring people in WEA a year after we’d signed and we’d say “This is so and so from James” and they’d say James Who? and it was like they didn’t even know you were part of WEA and Sire

Reporter : From rock n roll to medical guinea pigs, testing drugs at the local hospital for £10 a day so that they could continue to work full-time. James shared their manager with top WEA act Simply Red. They’ve sold millions. Now Elliot Rashman has put at risk his vital relationship with WEA and Sire by talking to Out of Order. He believes that by now James should be a top international act, but he says they were left in a dark corner of the musical industry, what’s known as the mummification process.

Elliot Rashman : Most of the major record labels in the US use the independent music scene in the UK as a Sainsburys and they come over here with their metaphorical shopping trolley and fill it full of independent acts and the cost for a major American conglomerate is minimal so they come over here and every year they sign bands and bands and bands and they tell them it’s all going to be wonderful and they’re the next big thing and that’s as much as they do. All they have to do is sign them, they don’t have to work them.  Now their view is business is business.

Reporter : Into the shopping trolley and locked into a sixty page contract, James were owned by Sire “throughout the universe” and in the hands of that company. In this letter to WEA, manager Elliot Rashman accuses the company of failing to give proper promotion. The problem he says stems from Sire’s policy of “sign them and see what happens but don’t spend any money in the meantime”  All this from a man whose only other band, Simply Red, were making millions for WEA. Sire were committed to releasing two albums. Today hype and promotion are the lifeblood of pop hits. Elliot Rashman is scathing over the release of the second James LP.

ER : It ended up on the shelf. It ended up being released because again from a contractual point of view, all they have to do is release it and they’ve obliged, they’ve fulfilled their side of the contract.

Reporter : Is it possible to have hits by just releasing….

ER : No, it’d be dead within a week.

PC : Well, the only advice Elliot Rashman could give James was to break up and to escape the contact. James, the high hopes of 85 watched the obituraries roll in.

Reporter : Across the Atlantic, Rolling Stone magazine wrote a glowing feature on flamboyant Stein, boasting that he’s a collector, he likes to collect furniture. James felt like they were in the attic and Sire wouldn’t let them out of the contract.

Larry : If they turned round and let a band  go and they then go on and have success elsewhere, then they’re left with egg on their face and probably no job. They’ll be branded as “He’s the guy who let James go. He’s the guy who let the Beatles go.” It’s not a very good reference for the next job. So they keep you.

Reporter : So the band waited. Their last album recorded in February 1987 wasn’t released by Sire until Autumn 88. With no new material, there seemed little point in playing live.

We tracked down Seymour Stein to London to see if he would talk to us and he refused. He said he was too busy at the moment with the promotion, the parties and the razzmatazz of the new Madonna album.

Three years on from signing, James are at last free, risking everything, they’ve borrowed £12,000 to put out a live album.

Tim : Seymour heard that we were making this programme and threatened to stop us releasing our LP even though we’re not on the label. So obviously there’s a threat there.

Reporter : Stein eventually relented but there’s a final twist.

ER : It means their new album, which is a live album, coming out on their own independent label, they have to pay the record company because they’re using songs, albeit performed live, from the previous two albums. They don’t even let you go. It’s a bit like hacking your arm off and still feeling the sensation for a couple of years.

Reporter : Saturday night and the touts are out. Freed from their contract, James are back.

PC : We called WEA Records no less than seventeen times to ask for an interview with Seymour Stein because we wanted to hear what he had to say. We traced him through his New York office to Madrid where we delivered a list of questions. Why did his company not let James go when, as it appeared, they were not promoting them? Well, we’re still waiting for an answer on that one. But one question it appears has been answered. This week, four years on, James new album went to number one in the independent charts.

Details

James are back again with a new single called Sit Down with a new album towards the end of the year. They recently signed to Rough Trade after encountering various problems with their last record company.

Tim : I mean they weren’t very interested in us. We didn’t feel. We felt they had us and they didn’t do anything with our songs. They were a bit confused by the music we made. I think they found it a bit too individualistic. They told us it was too English for them. It was obviously not working and we were surprised when they said they wanted to carry on working with us after the second LP but they did want to carry on so we had to sneak off because we were really fed up.

Question : I was going to ask you if it had shaken your confidence, but obviously not.

Tim : I mean it was awful. We made this LP two years before it got released and we didn’t release anything in a two-year period and we had a big momentum going before that. So we lost it all just being not able to do anything. Remixes, the whole lot happened.

Jim: It was a really difficult period

Tim: We lost confidence a little bit in that sense.

Jim: You know we always believed the music would win through in the end. We would come out the other side and it would be OK, but the main thing was getting off Sire.

Tim: When we came off Sire and the drummer left, the nucleus of three of us, me, Larry and Jim, we write the songs. we thought about changing the name and starting again just for ourselves. But we kind of decided against it.

(part of Sit Down video)

Jim: It’s nice. Occassionally, you’re kind of walking down the street, been to Tesco, in shopping mode and they encroach on that a little bit. Encroach is the wrong word as it sounds not particularly pleasant but they’ll say “hello” and you’ll go “woah” because the two worlds are very different. You can go into one and come out again, and noone recognises you and everything’s fine and it’s funny where they overlap. It’s obviously not a big problem – yet – as it’s not happening all the time and people aren’t hassling you when you go into the shop all the time.

Tim: Only really in Manchester

Question: What about when one of your records gets played in a club? Do you get embarrassed by that?

Tim: No, it’s dead exciting. You see a dancefloor being filled in Manchester when they play one of your records. You feel you don’t want people to see you there but you kind of want to watch. Like that’s what you want. It’s how you feel it’s should be

Jim: You get a bit self-conscious

Tim: Yes, Jim went to see a band last week and they did a cover version of one of our songs and everyone was looking round at him.

Jim: It’s really nice. It’s dead flattering. I was really glad I was there but you feel that, even if they’re not, you feel that the whole place is looking at you.

(another section of Sit Down video)

Tim : I mean we’ve all changed over a long period of time. We’ve been through a lot of different phases. When we first started, our lifestyles were chaotic as in the rock and roll terms. We kind of lost a guitarist to that lifestyle, he ended up very ill and in prison. And so we’ve been through that kind of phase. We had a puritanical clean up where we saw we could have gone the same way and we didn’t want to do that. And then now, we’re just more relaxed, just enjoying what we do, we love our music.

I mean the thing about James is that is so special to me is that it’s not just about one person or centred around two or three. Even now, we’re a six-piece with three new members, they’re all great musicians in their own right. Each one of them could front a band and have it based around them, but we’ve got six people working together of that level of combustibility. And it’s really exciting. And you don’t normally get that. That will sound arrogant, but that’s how I see it, because, obviously, I’m the singer and I wouldn’t be working if I didn’t really respect and love the music we’re creating. We wouldn’t keep going that long if we didn’t love it.

Question : Have there been any regrets?

Tim: Regrets? We’ve had a few. Oh yes, we shouldn’t have gone on Sire. We shouldn’t have signed on the dotted line. The little signature. That was a mistake

Jim : You don’t know. We could have ended up with someone else ten times worse and all split up and committed suicide or something.

Tim : You can’t really regret. If we’d have stayed with Factory and recorded with them, something else might have gone wrong. We might have been hit by a bus because we weren’t down in London signing for Sire.

Jim : You don’t know do you?

Tim : You never know

Interviewer : I’m joined now by Tim and Larry from the band James. I’m absolutely delighted to meet these two because I thought coming from a Mancunian band who I expected to wear really long overcoats and be really serious that this was going to be murder, but these guys are quite jolly. Tim.

Tim : Jolly. Must be something we ate I think.

Interviewer : I think so.You’re not very used to doing this kind of thing are you because you’re not very, even though you’ve had a lot of records, you’ve had a reputation for being indie and here you are poised, or I thought you were until you were talking to me a minute ago, poised to have a hit single. Was Sit Down a conscious effort to do something different that would get you in the charts?

Tim : No, all our songs are created through improvisation and about one song a year we make that’s kind of like Sit Down which has the potential for being a commercial success and all we do is earmark those as singles, because obviously there are certain things that are more likely to be played on the radio than others and a lot of our music is much harder than Sit Down, so we don’t release them as singles as they wouldn’t stand a chance.

Interviewer : With the thoughtful image that you’ve got and your fans like about you, do you think that they would resent your success if you did get in the charts?

Tim : There might be some people who would like to hold on if they think it’s very precious to them, but, you know, all we can do is concentrate on the music. As long as you keep the music pure then that’s all that matters, they’ll be OK with it, they’ll get by.

Interviewer : People always write about you and The Smiths and Simply Red as being part of some sort of Manchester scene. Do you think that really existed, Larry?

Larry : No, I don’t think it did. I don’t think it was like the Merseybeat scene and all those scenes like the New York scene of 1976-77 and things like that where everybody rehearsed in the same place, knew each other and went to everybody’s gigs. You know, it just so happened that all those bands came out of Manchester round about the same time. I think there’s more of a scene now with bands like The Stone Roses, Happy Mondays and Inspiral Carpets, they appear to be more closer-knit.

Tim : We see quite a lot of them as well.

Larry : Places that they rehearse and record

Interviewer : How important is it now if you’re a Manchester band or a Liverpool band to come to London. Will the record companies come up North to find you?

Tim : I think there’s quite a lot of people coming up to Manchester at the moment because it’s meant to be a hot city at the moment.

Interviewer : Hey. I’m hot and I’m cool.

Tim : So at the moment, this year Manchester’s in. Next year, it probably won’t be again. But you are a bit cut off. It’s very hard, the business centre is in London and you do feel quite cut off a lot of the time. Also apparently if a band in a city sells a lot of records, when it comes to get charted, it gets what’s called regionalised which they don’t take consideration of the fact if you sell a lot in your own city. Whereas if you’re a London band and you sell a lot of records in London, you aren’t regionalised. So the charts are slightly stacked there. So you know, you do feel quite separate a lot of the time.

Interviewer : I’ve got a clipping from Sounds, it must be the current issue of Sounds, that says about you, Tim, it says “He’s nothing but an effite Buddhist vegan in a Morroccan skullcap who neither drinks Nescafe nor says the word Bottom in polite conversation”

Tim : No, it doesn’t say that, it says that’s my image. The image I’ve been landed with.

Interviewer : But it is your image, isn’t it?

Tim : I don’t know, I think that’s slightly journalistic licence. That one. Basically I shaved my head about two or three months ago.

Interviewer : But most of it’s grown back.

Tim : Yeah, it’s all grown back now and so I wore a Morroccan hat, a, to keep my head warm and b because I wasn’t sure I was happy with having a bald head. And people make a lot of assumptions when you have a bald head.

Interviewer : You’re right

Tim : You’re either a skinhead or a Hare Krishna you know

Interviewer : Or very very old. I wonder if you had any special feelings at 12.34 and 5 seconds today, during Doris Collins psychic moment.Were you aware of all that?

Tim : Yes I could feel something, I could feel some spirits trying to contact us, willing us on. I think it was my Great Grandfather. I could see him standing there. Talking about the war.

Interviewer : Was this a wind up or?

Tim : Yes

Interviewer : That’s what you never know of course. Is he a bit of a wind-up merchant, Larry?

Larry : That’s where the image comes from. All those images we’ve been landed with are all wind-ups of journalists who’ve taken it seriously. Or they’ve just printed it verbatim. It just comes out. As you read it, it reads flat and you don’t see the tongue in cheekness.

Interviewer : I love the way

Tim : Bottom

Interviewer : There you are.

Larry : In public. On radio

Interviewer : I love the way Smash Hits occasionally shove in a complete fib in the hope that other journalists pick it up. One example was that Bruce Springsteen’s real name is Roger. They sat back and waited for other newspapers and it works. It always works for them.

So I gather you’re going to do us an extemporised tune here.

Tim : Yeah, we’ve got two if you want them.

Interviewer : Let’s try the one and see

Tim : We’ve not rehearsed this.

Interviewer : Larry’s going to play the guitar and Tim’s going to sing. What’s it called?

Tim : Promised Land, but it has a reference to our glorious leader.

Interviewer : Really, there’s been a couple of songs called Promised Land.

Tim : It’s terrible, isn’t it? I’m really embarrassed. And it’s also kind of a political song. We hardly ever write political songs and this is the only one we can do acoustic.

Interviewer : Larry and Tim from James acoustic in the studios of GLR.

(play Promised Land)

Interviewer : Are you going to be doing any real live James gigs in London in the future?

Tim : We’ve just done two nights in the Marquee last week. In November, we’re going to come back and probably play the Town and Country. We’re recording a new LP in the summer with our new six-piece band. Got a violinist, a guitarist.

Interviewer : So Sit Down is a track from that, is it?

Tim : Sit Down, yeah. I think we’re going to redo it and make it a big harder because we play it harder and faster live now. But it’ll be something like that.

Interviewer : Well  thanks very much for joining us this afternoon. I gather you’ve got another live song for us.

Tim : Live we are a rock band, but this is acoustic. It was written about six years ago when they brought nuclear weapons into the country. I’m afraid it’s another topical one.

Details

Snub asked frontman Tim Booth if he’d resolved his misgivings about impending adulation.

Tim : Well, it’s such a joke isn’t it? The whole thing is such a joke, it’s a surrealist’s nightmare. You know, people going hysterical. I take some of it seriously, I take some of it not so seriously. I have an ego, I’m flattered by a lot of it, I’m turned on by a lot of it., but also a part of my brain goes “This is ridiculous”. They don’t know you. I’m trying to go with it more because I believe, I think we blocked it last time when our wave came and as a result the wave and we watched it. And that wasn’t very clever because we ended up wondering what would have happened if. And we don’t want to wonder that anymore.

I think we should have changed our name this year and made it a complete new start because it feels very different, seven people and lots of new songs.

Government Walls is about the way they’re tightening up the secret service act, about the Peter Wright case. The way in this country they’re just trying, you know if anyone leaks anything, they say “That’s a secret service” and they can put you in prison for it. And they can stop the papers from telling you what the information actually is. But the information that they’re suppressing really tells you who runs this country and how this country is run.

So Bring Down The Government Walls is just about trying to prevent this secrecy that’s going on, which you have to suspect, all this stuff about, well I can’t even say it, can I?

(plays Government Walls)

I think bands tend to insult an audience’s intelligence and ability to concentrate. Like they say in America, isn’t it that each record has an average play of 1 1/2 plays because the concentration span is so low. But that isn’t with our records and I don’t believe that it necessarily has to be so. If the record is dull, people aren’t going to listen to it. But if there’s a lot in there, people have to listen to it. People should be stretched and we should be stretched. It shouldn’t be just going through the motions.

L’important pour nous, c’est d’ apporter un peu de ce qu’on peut pour que ce groupe avance !

Révélés par les Smiths qui reprirent une de leur chanson, les James eurent quelques difficultés pour concrétiser cette hype établie autour d’eux :

« En fait, nous n’étions ni punk ni quoi que ce soit ; on ne savait pas très bien jouer et contrairement à d’autres ça nous a beaucoup nuit. »

Ainsi, après deux albums qui ne connurent qu’un très moyen écho, la bande à Booth vit enfin le jour grâce à deux singles météorites satellisés en plein pendant la furie Manchester et qui leur permirent de laisser venir.

« On ne s’est pas posé trop de questions, on a enregistré notre album comme on l’entendait, et ce n’est qu’après le mixage qu’on est allé voir les maisons de disques avec un produit fini. D’ailleurs, Phonogram (heureuse élue) a du renoncer à ressortir « Sit Down » parce que nous voulions sortir un autre single et on leur a dit que ça faisait partie des conditions du contrat. Mais ça n’empêche pas la maison de disque de nous faire des propositions. Souvent, lorsqu’on les écoute, on se dit non, c’est pas possible de faire ceci ou cela, et puis finalement, parfois, c’est pas si idiot que ça. En tout cas, pour l’instant, ils font du bon boulot. »

Ce fut donc « Come Home » qui suivit son prédécesseur sur les plus hautes marches des charts anglais assurant à ses auteurs une reconnaissance nationale et méritée.

Depuis, le groupe a joué un peu partout dont plusieurs fois à Paris, notamment au désormais fameuses soirées Hacienda de la Locomotive. Il était donc hors de question, au lendemain du concert Inrockuptible, que je n’interroge point Tim Booth sur ses camarades de promotion ainsi que sur cette aura qui semble entourer Manchester ces temps-ci, tout en prenant bien soin de ne pas oublier que lui et son groupe sont là depuis bien plus longtemps.

« On n’est pas vraiment concerné parce qu’on est plus grand que tout ça. En Angleterre, on joue dans des salles de 10.000 personnes, donc c’est tranquille à ce niveau ; par contre, ce qui est ennuyeux, c’était quand nous n’avions pas encore ce succès, car on s’intéressait à nous parce que nous étions de Manchester et nous craignions qu’une fois la mode passée, les portes se referment sur nous. Quant aux groupes de Manchester, les Happy Mondays ont été notre partie il y a deux ans, et ça s’est bien passé ; les Stones Roses ont quelques bonnes chansons dont « Fool’s Gold » qui est excellente, mais il y a quand même une tendance à copier à Manchester ; tant que ça reste dans un esprit ouvert comme les Happy Mondays ou certains morceaux des Stones Roses, là ça commence à ne plus vouloir dire grand-chose, c’est comme un écho d’un écho.

Quand on prépare des morceaux, la démarche est très simple : on se réunit à trois (la base du groupe est constituée du chanteur, du bassiste et du guitariste) et on travaille les morceaux en appelant les autres musiciens au fur et à mesure. C’est vrai que notre façon d’écrire des morceaux est très démodée et traditionnelle, mais la mode ne m’a jamais vraiment intéressé. Cela étant, je crois que la vague de Dance Music qui a envahi l’Angleterre nous a quand même influencé. Une chanson comme « Come Home » est bien une chanson de son époque tout en étant personnelle ; quoi qu’il en soit, je ne la renie en rien. Tu sais, c’est très dur de savoir vraiment d’où viennent tes influences. Notre trompettiste, par exemple, lui, vient du jazz, ce qui ne l’empêche pas de laisser ses influences de côté lorsqu’il joue dans James. Du moins consciemment il ne va pas nous refaire tel ou tel solo à la manière d’un autre. L’important, pour nous, c’et d’apporter chacun un peu de ce qu’on peut à ce groupe pour q’il avance.

Bientôt, nous allons retourner en studio pour faire un nouvel album qui sera exclusivement composé de nouvelles chansons. Car même si certains souhaitent nous voir enregistrer certaines de nos vieilles chansons qui ne l’ont pas été et que nous jouons sur scène, nous voulons garder une marge de surprise pour les fans qui viennent à nos concerts et qui croient connaître tous nos morceaux. Pour la production, on est actuellement en discussion avec Gil Norton (Pixies), mais rien n’est fait, si ce n’est que ça se passera probablement dans les semaines qui vont venir. »

François Gerald ( Best – December 1989)

« Si Smiths est un joli nom de famille, alors James est le prénom idéal » écrivait Michka Assayas en novembre 1986 dans Libération. Il essayait sans doute d’expliquer par là que James représentait la deuxième génération mancunienne de pop mélancolique sur fond de guitares cristallines. Quatre ans plus tard, le quatuor a grandi et évolué. Tim Booth, chanteur et leader de James s’explique.

(Tim Booth) Cela fait six-sept ans que l’on existe sous le nom de James. On est basé à Manchester. On a sorti quelques disques sur Factory. On s’est fait bloquer par Sire, la compagnie de disques américaine pendant quelques temps. On est maintenant sur notre propre label. On est sept dans le groupe : un violoniste qui joue également de la batterie et de la guitare, un trompettiste multi-instrumentiste, un clavier, une guitare, une basse, une batterie.

On est un grand orchestre maintenant. 1989 aura été une année de grands changements pour nous. On est complètement différent.

Chaque fois que je vous vois en concert, vous êtes deux de plus dans le groupe.

Oui, on s’agrandit, on se multiplie. Ca tombe bien, avant on était un peu limité.

N’est-ce pas plutôt pour essayer de combler un vide quelque part ?

Non, dans le groupe, tous sont excellents musiciens. On a cherché pendant longtemps des gens qui avaient la bonne attitude musicale. On les a trouvé cette année, on ne pouvait pas les refuser.

Avec The Band Of Holy Joy, vous avez fait en octobre 89 un concert pour le CND (Campagne pour le Désarmement Nucléaire).

C’était juste un concert de soutien pour lancer une vidéo de groupes indépendants anglais. Tout l’argent va servir à financer un e campagne pour le CND. Il y a tout le temps des benefits dans ce pays. Les groupes y participent pour différentes causes et l’importance du groupe ne devrait pas jouer&ldots; même si le but est de gagner le plus d’argent possible.

Bradford a été sauvé de l’anonymat par une déclaration de Morrissey qui disait qu’il était le groupe le plus intéressant d’Angleterre. Ceci posé, peut-on dire que les Smiths vous ont « découverts »(James ayant fait la première partie de la tournée Meat Is Murder en 1985) ?

(Ton sec et télégraphique, histoire de faire bien comprendre que l’on pourrait parler d’autre chose) Non pas du tout ! Ils aimaient notre musique. Ils nous ont emmené en tournée avec eux. Ils reprenaient nos chansons sur scène. On s’entendait bien avec eux&ldots;J’ai aimé pas mal de trucs qu’ils ont fait. J’ai pas aimé d’autres trucs. Je suis pote avec Morrissey, je l’aime bien&ldots;Je n’ai jamais été fan des Smiths.

Toute la musique intéressante vient de Manchester en ce moment. Vrai ou faux ?

Vrai ou faux ? C’est un jeu ? Je gagne quelque chose si je réponds bien ? Non, tous les groupes auxquels tu penses jouent à Manchester depuis des années. Ils ne recevaient aucune attention de la part de la presse. Et puis, depuis un an, la presse et les médias se sont dits « eh, regarde ce qui se passe à Manchester ». Ils pensent donc que tous ces groupes sont nouveaux.

La presse musicale en Angleterre est-elle si importante ?

Je suis très cynique à propos de l’argent, des maisons de disques qui achètent les charts, du pouvoir de l’image sur les journalistes&ldots;Ils semblent être tous obsédés par l’imagerie, la mythologie rock’n’roll. Je trouve cela enfantin&ldots;Quand on a commencé avec James, on ne prenait pas les interviews au sérieux. On mettait des fringues ridicules pour les photos parce que l’on pensait que ça n’avait rien à voir avec la musique. On a refusé longtemps de donner des interviews ou alors, on racontait des conneries qui étaient prises au sérieux. Tout cela nous a valu une image très négative. Il nous a fallu beaucoup de temps pour redresser la barre. Maintenant, on sait que les choses sont importantes pour des gens, maos pas toujours pour nous. On joue plus le jeu qu’avant, c’est tout.

Avez-vous eu des choix difficiles à faire avec le groupe ?

Oui. Avec Sire, on a eu un combat. Un combat d’affaire. Ils voulaient qu’on devienne un grand groupe de rock alors que nous, on voulait juste continuer à faire notre musique. Ca a été un combat qu’on n’a pas gagné d’ailleurs vu qu’aucun disque n’est sorti pendant deux ans. Ca nous a tué créativement&ldots; On a perdu beaucoup à l’époque.

Votre album live s’intitule « One Man Clapping », est-ce une blague ?

Oui, c’est juste une blague. Dans tous les albums live, les groupes rock veulent toujours qu’on entende bien qu’il y a un public énorme. C’est une partie importante de leur disque. Dans notre live, le public applaudit d’un bout à l’autre et, à la fin du dernier titre, ça monte en intensité et il n’y a plus qu’un seul mec qui applaudit. C’est le sens de l’humour de James&ldots; ce n’est pas très drôle.

James, vous prenez au sérieux ?

Oui, nous prenons notre musique au sérieux mais nous ne nous prenons pas au sérieux . Tu sais, tu fais un concert et après, il y a des gens qui veulent t’embrasser et qui ne partiront pas avant de t’avoir embrassé. Il y a des gens qui font 300 kms pour nous voir, qui nous suivent dans toute l’Angleterre. Alors, tu ne peux pas prendre cela au sérieux ou alors tu devient maboul. Il y a des gens que je connais personnellement et qui sont devenus des mythes du fait de la presse musicale&ldots; je sais que c’est très dur à assumer. Au début, c’est drôle, on joue avec ça, je préfèrerais que les choses soient plus honnêtes , qu’il n’y ait pas de mensonges, qu’on ne doive pas être des personnages exotiques ou glamoureux pour vendre des disques&ldots; Je pense que nous faisons une musique formidable et que nous produisons sur scène l’un des bruits les plus excitants qui soit. Je voudrais que les gens viennent nous voir, s’amusent bien, passent du bon temps et que les rapports en restent là.

Mais je crois que je ne suis pas réaliste.

Richard Bellia (Ritual [belgian fanzine])

Loud, dumb, obnoxious, red-neck Americans. Dontcha just love ’em? There are seven of the Big Mac dickheads in a Soho restaurant, terrorising the lettuce-reared, trendy wimp clientele. The yanks are shoving mountains of pasta into each others’ Grand Canyon gobs, splattering the table cloth with Sandinista blood sauce and chanting “Nicaragua! Grenada! Vietnam!” at the tops of their nuclear deterrent voices.

At a nearby table, one reputedly ideologically sound, sweet young English vegetarian and his two Manchester mates sit laughing at the Stars ‘n’ Stripes gorillas, winding them up, “What movie are you from? Animal House?” says the curly haired one. But the Americans prefer to pick on the girl opposite who’s getting ‘confrontational’ “Come on darling, frighten me with more than your face” they tell her. “Plastic surgery would be worth it, sweetheart” So her boyfriend picks up a bottle and starts to wade in.

At this point, Tim Booth, Larry Gott and Jim Glennie, who were thinking of leaving, decide it’s their moral duty to order a pudding and stick around for the fun.

None of this is quite the sort of behaviour that people would normally associate with James. But then people do have some funny ideas about them. In their seven year history as Manchester’s precious enigma boys, assumptions have grown around James like fungus on a dead fish. Despite the dashing pop energy of last year’s brilliant two singles, ‘Come Home’ and ‘Sit . Down’,they are still broadly conceived of as follows : the Smiths inheritors who slipped through the net; rustic English oddballs, too arrogant to write a decent pop song; village poet laureate mystics with a boring Green-leftie moral certitude streak; bookish wimps, not at all the types to join in with a bunch of meathead US shitizens singing “America The Beautiful”

The latter however is exactly what James were doing the night before I met them. In the intervening 22 hours Tim Booth took in a movie, danced like a nutcase at the Wag Club, slept for four hours and then got woken up by workmen singing “Ooooh Black Betty, bam-a-lam” outside his hotel window. Then in the hotel lobby he met a survivor of the Nazi concentration camps who pinned him down to recount his life story , and when I met him that afternoon he was standing by a large fish tank in a photo studio, herding fish into frame for photographer Cummins.

Tirn Booth is nobody’s caricature. He is intense, open and funny, and after a weird , sleep-deprived day and night, has the manic stare of an amazed child.

“James are going to be a big fish in a big pond,” he tells me with reference to the band’s recent return to major label Fontana / Phonogram, so I take Tim, Jim and Larry down the pun for a bit of a grilling.

Funny ideas about James One : James are a bunch of bleeding-heart, knee-jerk liberals.

Tim : “Well, for a start, you’d have to be referring to the lyrics to make a statement like that because how do knee-jerk liberals play? I’ve never seen David Steel play a guitar and I wouldn’t really know how he’d handle it. As for the lyrics, anyone who actually bothers to look at them will see that they’re a lot darker than that. Do you think that, or is it a provocative statement?”

It could be.

Tim : “Well it’s a good thing I’m not a bottle-on-the-head jerk left wing angry young man isn’t it?”

Booth’s mad eyes are staring rather intensely at me, so I agree. OK. Funny idea number two : James are a folk rock band.

Tim : “Anyone who has seen us live would have that idea changed. There might be certain songs in the set which have that element in them especially the acoustic ones, but that’s at most ten percent. And no one says we’re a heavy rock band, but there’s an equal measure of heavy rock songs in the set.”

Three : You, Tim Booth, would rather read a good book than shag Madonna.

Tim : “I think we’d better leave you with your popular misconceptions. I think you should get some help. I don’t think Madonna is actually… I think she’s quite sexy, I guess. I think I’d rather have safe sex than read a good book. I’d rather have safe sex with Madonna than read a good book. Now, if you’d said Jodie Foster…..”

Four : You, Tim Booth, are a surrealist poet who nicked all his ideas from Arthur Rimbaud.

Tim : “No, Anton Artaud please. I can’t read French anyway… I find poetry boring.”

Five : None of you have sufficiently similar musical tastes to want to play the same song at the same time.

Larry : “Probably not too far off the truth there.”

Tim : “That’s a nice one. They’re getting a bit soft now.”

Six : James moment has come and gone

Tim : “Well we can’t say anything about that, can we? We’re just going to have to show you. We’ll show whoever decides that. We’re going to make them all eat fish.”

Aside from the fact that they’re suckers for a dumb fish joke, what becomes quickly apparent from locking antlers with Tim, Larry and Jim is that they’re in confident combative mood. There are good reasons for this. A year back when the new breed of Manchester bands were getting geared up for Top of the Pops, James were still recovering from an unproductive period with Sire.

Three awkward years on the major label had left them without even the money to sue the name crowding Halo James (“He deserves a good kicking”). As they expanded to a seven-piece they were for a while planning to change their name, feeling that they were by no means the same band who put out Hymn From A Village in Factory in 83.

Tim Booth was, however, outvoted. They kept the name and by the end of the year, they’d had two glorious singles out on Rough Trade, kept their dedicated fans happy with a live LP, One Man Clapping, and had their summer. recorded, imminently released album ‘Gold Mother’ picked up by a major label.

The new James songs, of which the single ‘How Was It For You’ is the first unleashed, are fiercer, poppier and funkier than before, without losing any of the humpbacked dementia. They would seem to be going through the same sort of renaissance that The Fall went through with ‘Extricate’

Tim “We’ve all been stripping things down and trying to make the songs more simple and more direct in what we’re trying to say”

Do you think you’ve been musically arrogant in the past? Expected too much?

Tim: “Not from…. There were definitely people who were reading us on our level, and a lot in Manchester. We always got that feedback there…. If you ever see us play in Manchester, they’ll tear you apart if they ever found out who you were. You’ll see. It’s a really different kettle of fish there. Oh dear, nearly said ball game.”

“But some people have been able to respond to us on the level that we take ourselves, which is very seriously. I mean, we don’t take ourselves… I mean yeah, we were difficult, we were arrogant, we were very protective of our babies, our songs. We thought they were masterpieces and we wouldn’t let anyone else touch them. That ended up with us hiring producers who we didn’t let do their jobs. Now we’re more relaxed about it.”

Lying somewhere in Bristol is an entire student thesis written entirely about James. This would make for curious reading because as a songwriter, it has to be said that Booth is a bit of a schizo. On the one hand, there’s the fraught wordplay of the likes of Stutter or Whoops. In the other cranial hemisphere there’s the liberal protest songs, ecologically concerned, like Sky Is Falling, anti-Thatcher, like Promised Land, or bleeding heart for the disadvantaged like Sit Down.

So far from the new album, it emerges that How Was It For You? is about using drink and drugs to evade sexual guilt, How Much Suffering is about English emotional restraint and Gold Mother is about mother courage in child birth. Just occassionally it seems that Halo James would be an appropriate name for Booth’s own band. Is he angling for a sainthood or what? Fortunately, God Only Knows from the new album suggests otherwise.

Tim : “It’s about people speaking in the name of God, or thinking you can speak in the name of God, which is a highly dubious claim. Because a long time ago, I used to speak in the name of God.”

What do you mean?

Tim : “I had that kind of self-righteos zeal that only people who think they’re favoured by God can have. It was a long time ago, but I’m still very attracted to people who try and live their life by a thought-out code, and then find their life has another idea about it and it goes its own way. The more you say Thou Shall Not to anything in your life, the harder it becomes to resist. It’s like you build it up. So someone like Jimmy Swaggart I find very interesting. You know, the public posture contrasted with the private personality.”

“It’s like all the heavy left wing people, when they get to about 60, they all become fascists. It’s like they can’t hold back any longer. And all the atheists you know suddenly become born again pillocks.”

Does that mean the more you try and be a reasonable bloke who just happens to sing in a band, the bigger wanker you become? Hypothetically speaking, of course.

Tim : “No, it means that if I started telling people I was a regular guy in a band, which I don’t, but if I pretended I was, then I’d be a very irregular guy…. It doesn’t mean I’d be a wanker. An irregular wanker, perhaps, which I am. Not a man of habit.”

Back in 83, with Tim Booth fresh out of Manchester University drama studies, James put out Hymn From A Village, the song which was to line them up as the next big post punk jangle. A sprightly piece of off-kilter guitar pop, it’s mostly remarkable for a lyric which snaps at the inadequacy of pop-song language. So maybe the moralising streak in Booth, the bit that keeps coming up with – songs about wicked governments, evil preachers and irresponsible sex, is fired by plain old guilt. Do you feel guilty about doing something as frivolous as singing in a pop group?

Tim : “In terms of how you define pop, I don’t consider myselfto be in a pop group. You know, we make music and I don’t feel at all guilty about that because we make brilliant music and give a lot to people and get a lot for ourselves.  I mean, unless I become Mother Theresa or a lawyer or something, there’s no moral high ground in most people’s jobs, to absolve you of guilt. You know, unless you’re Bob Geldof. So I really don’t feel like that at all, and I don’t think any of us do.”

“I hardly ever express just one viewpoint in a song. Usually, there’s lots of different attitudes in them. I don’t understand how people can have clear cut attitudes to basically anything, except this government. I don’t understand how people can have clear cut attitudes about morality, about sex, about drugs. You know ‘DRUGS ARE GOOD’, ‘DRUGS ARE BAD’. Who can say? I don’t take liberal viewpoints.”

“I don’t believe there’s any morality. I don’t believe in morality. If I have to take a decision on something the decision will be practical, not moral. Liberalism is a lot to do with guilt and morality. If you’re going to make me fight out of that corner, you bastard.”

Neither wet liberal apologist, nor in-tuned poet nutcase, Booth is maybe too much of a slippery character to fit in with the conspicious pop personalities. Last time around, while the Morrisseys and Mark Smiths ran off with the miserable bugger prizes and the Housemartins stole the right-on plaudits, James were left muddling along in the margins. Too leftfield, too flighty as musicians, too cool for their own good. This time round though, there’s a focused, hard-headed determination in the James camp that comes across both in Booth’s righteous indignation at my James jibes and in the kick-ass edge (honest) to the new songs. The fired-up Tim Booth who sits at the back of a North London pub spouting lyrics in defence of his songs and telling me I’m as rude as the Americans in the restaurant, hardly matches up with the serene, angelic portraits painted of Tim in the past. Has “the little woolly lamb” who skipped out of Manchester University changed much over the years?

Tim : “Yeah, I’m born again now. I mean how do you answer a question like that? Y’know, I’m much more handsome than I ever was and more modest. No, but we’ve been through a lot of crap. A lot of strange experiences. We’ve got a lot out of James. It’s been our focal point, and the more people who wrote us off, the more it’s been, well, they’re going to have to eat humble pie.”

“There was one day when we talked about packing the whole thing in, for about an hour, but after that it was ‘We will fight them on the beaches!’ Because the music turns us on so much. It’s like we’d be having all these business problems, but the rehearsals would be brilliant. You get a song, and you lose yourself in a song and you feel fantastic. There’s no way we were going to give that up. And we knew that when we play live, we could take people to the same place.”

Last October, when the James tour came to the London T&C Club 2, they took the young dedicated and hot as f–k crowd way out to rapture and back. Frantic, climatic and ebuillent, wiht Booth losing himself totally in spasms of electric eel dancing, it was far from any creaky-jointed nearly-men display. On that kind of form, when they play at Glastonbury at the end of their June World Cup tour, then James have every chance of stealing the Happy Monday’s thunder.

James are, of course, thoroughly affronted by any suggestion that the rise of Mancunian dance society has left them a bit out in the cold.

Tim : “You don’t know how we relate to that and what we do in our private lives. Yeah, that’s how it’s perceived, but the reality, that’s a different matter. If it’s seen like that then OK, but we don’t want to part of the scene, because that isn’t going to last and there’s going to be a backlash. It’ll be fine for the Mondays and The Roses and the bands that get through, the good bands. But that’s it. And that was 1989.”

There is however, nothing blinkered about James current course. There were remix discussions going on last year with A Guy Called Gerald. Graham 808 State Massey danced-up their Come Home single although it was never given an official release. James are just smart enough to scowl at the bandwagon jumping implications of a rumoured Andy Weatherall remix of Sit Down (“It’ll make us the most un-hip band in Manchester”) and wily enough to promise that the dance mix of the already eight minute long rambling groove jam Gold Mother complete with backing vocals by Inspiral Carpets will only come out as a b-side.

It is time for the funny ideas about Booth and his band to binned for good. Whatever weight of history they have in tow, James in the 90s are not going to sink beneath the raves. They’re sleaker and groovier than ever before and Tim Booth is a match for anyone who wants to try and box him in. Well, for a lettuce-reared, caring, sensitive, sweet young Englishman he is anyway.

Do you think, Tim, you might one day write a song about, say knobbing Jodie Foster on the back of a motorbike?

Tim : “Actually, that’s the next single Knobbing! Isn’t that a crude word? I’m a bit more romantic than that. So ‘no’ is the answer to that, I mean, who would be driving for a start? And you know, crash helmets and so on, I’d never be able to keep an erection going while driving a motorbike. My technique would suffer….”

Cool as Hadd–k for sure!

Interviewer : Now on a major label, Phonogram’s Fontana, James having a hit single with How Was It For You? and the band are downstairs in our basement studio. Tim Booth on vocals, sometimes known as Maharishi Booth. Bit of a guru on the quiet

Tim : Not round my parts mate. You come down here and tell me that to my face.

Interviewer : I love reading about your dream though. Which featured,

Tim : (groans)

Interview : Well, you told the story once, it comes back to you

Tim : Yeah, the guy can’t write. He got it completely wrong as we did the interview on a train so he couldn’t hear his tape back afterwards. It’s embarrassing

Interview : But was Jed Clampett and Jim Morrisson in it? Nurse Crachett

Tim : I’m afraid so, but it had a punchline to it. It had a point to it and it didn’t read like that. It’s an old dream too as well, you know. My dreams are much more clinical nowadays since I’ve been having the treatment.

Interviewer : Did you have one last night?

Tim : That’s a very personal question isn’t it?

Interviewer : I suppose it is

Tim : How Was It For You?

Interviewer : Dreams are very personal things.

Tim : I can’t remember. I can’t remember. I’d better censor it. I think you’d get cut off on air.

Interviewer : Listen, have you had to change at all, going to a major record label? Has there been any compromise along the way?

Tim : No, because we actually recorded the LP beforehand so part of the deal with Phonogram was that they had to sign for completed masters of the LP. So we’ve just handed them the tape and they said “Yep” and so we actually haven’t had any problem like that. They’ve given us some input, some ideas that they’ve suggested, and we either say “yay” or “nay”. But they kind of seem to respect us at the moment.

Interviewer : How long that will last is anyone’s guess. Alright, a song Tim please….

James are a crazy seven-piece from Manchester who everyone used to think were vegan buddhists but weren’t really cos they’re all like really normal guys and they want to talk about the music, right, and not meditation and chunky cardigans etc. With their single How Was It For You? gliding into the Top Forty, Smash Hits slipped into its sandals and spoke to Tim Booth, singer 28, about like the James concept, man.

1. Tim Booth was born in picturesque Bradford but has lived in not so picturesque Manchester for ten years

2. He once worked in a Yorkshire brewery. “That was quite weird, quite aggressive. I don’t have a Yorkshire accent and I had to put one on. Friends of mine who’d worked there before had been beaten up because they didn’t have the right accent.”

3. James came together in 1983 and they thought their name was “very original” then. “But now it’s ten a penny, it’s disgusting.” spits Tim.

4. Touring was once a problem. “Tour promoters thought ‘James’ might be a poet, so I used to go on at concerts and pretend I was a poet, and that the audience had been conned into thinking they were seeing a band. I had to write a poem in the day and narrate it to the audience,” mutters Tim.

5. They’re always being accused of being intellectual. “I think that’s a dead end,” argues Tim. “Intellectuals tend to be people who’ve got overdeveloped brains and underdeveloped hearts.”

6. Seeing James t-shirts has saved them from bankruptcy. Lester in Beats International wore one on Top of the Pops. “We’re going to give us music and open up a retail outlet,” jests Tim. Ho, ho!

7. In the past they’ve meditated a great deal. “When you’re leading the kind of lifestyle that we lead in the band, you just need something to balance you out and you just gonna be off your head all the time.”

8. Tim thinks happiness is not a permanent state of mind. “If it is them there’s something wrong with your hormones.”

Their forthcoming album for Fontana, Gold Mother, is not merely James best studio recording so far, but the most accomplished example of what used to be called indie-rock that 1990 has seen. And as Jim Glennie says Beats International have already taken a James T-shirt to number one. All they need now is to match it with a record.

The omens are unmistakeable. The smart money says that, at long last, James are about to happen.

“This time we’re prepared to take the breaks,” Jim Glennie says. “And we weren’t in the past. That’s the difference.”

“We’ve created a situation where we could have been successful, we could have gone for it and done everything, but we didn’t, we held back. And we lost our chance.”

Today, you could get a donkey Bloggsed up in flares and Kickers and it would probably be hailed as the next wonder from the land of the Orange Buses.

Despite selling upwards of 2,000 concert tickets in most cities – more in Manchester – and despite shifting two grand’s worth of their distinctive t-shirts this week, James were virtually blacklisted by last year’s Madchester media circus.

With their back catalogue of sophisticated oblique pop, James clearly didn’t fit into the popular conception of a cartoon world filled with bowl-headed, so-called scallies berserk on horse tranquilisers and bent on mischief.

James were a Manchester band, not a Madchester band. And Madchester was about the Mondays, The Stone Roses, 808 State, Oldham’s Inspiral Carpets and a slew of promotion play-off candidates like The New Fast Automatic Daffodils.

Maybe James (est 1983) had been around a bit too long and outstayed their welcome, failing to match previous glowing references from the press with attendant hits. Or perhaps it was the Morrissey seal of approval, priceless when he bestowed it upon James in 1985 but now the equivalent of the black spot, that dropped them into the perceived no man’s land between the bright young things and the old Manchester of New Order, The Fall and The Smiths.

Either way, James fell victim to a conspiracy of silence. This rankles with guitar talent and conviction man Larry Gott.

“James is not the band Manchester forgot,” he says testily. “Once we were the media’s darlings but because we didn’t do what was expected of us (touring America with The Smiths for example) we were forgotten about. It didn’t mean anything to us. Our audiences and record sales kept growing.”

Tim Booth is also at pains to put Manchester matters into perspective.

“You have to divide what’s really going on in Manchester – the bands who know and respect each other – and what’s written in the press. The journalist conception of the Manchester scene is totally different to the reality of how the bands relate to one another which is, on the whole, very good.”

“And we are part of that. That’s why we’ve taken the Mondays and the Carpets and the Daffodils on tour; that’s why we were taken on tour by The Smiths, The Fall and New Order. It’s nothing like what’s written about by journalists from the South.”

James conspicious failure to do the business was partly due to their ill-starred three year deal with Sire Records, signed in 1985, which was so grim it nearly finished the band off. Even today, they groan at the mention of the company that promised so much – not least the chance to share a label with band favourites Talking Heads and The Ramones – and delivered nothing but misery.

Stutter and Strip Mine, their two albums for Sire, were both fine spiky offerings but each received a negligible push from a label which was more concerned with its American operations. The records duly evaporated. The band’s attitude did not help.

“We were idealistic,” says a rueful Jim. “We thought the music would win through, regardless of whether or not we did any interviews or didn’t release anything for years or whatever. It was just naivety.”

These were dispiriting times for the then four-piece James, even when the contract expired, as Larry explains with the black humour of hindsight.

“We nearly called it a day there and then, when Gavan (Whelan, James original drummer) said, Well that’s it. And we knew that whatever the next person said would decide whether it went one way or another.”

Glennie, Booth and Gott opted to soldier on, eventually recruiting new drummer Dave Baynton-Power. They returned to indie-land and Rough Trade for the singles Sit Down and Come Home and an acclaimed live album One Man Clapping. The album’s lengthy stint in the indie charts proved that there were still plenty of James fans out there, after all.

For most of 88 and 89 James paid the rent not as musicians, but, bizarrely, from the proceeds of the range of James t-shirts designed by a fan in London. The shirts have ‘Ja’ on the front, ‘m’ on one arm and ‘e’ on the back and ‘s’ on the other arm. ‘Poor as Fuck’ might have been more appropriate.

“It was ridiculous” recalls Booth. “While we were producing Gold Mother last year, none of us even had cassette machines that worked properly to listen to the masters. Our record players were useless too. We’d been on £30 a week for about seven years and we had no money for the necessary technology.”

This is unlikely to be the state of affairs from now on. It’s early days, but the new seven-piece James are enjoying a productive relationship with Fontana.

The fiery How Was It For You?, first fruit of the new deal, shifted 15,000 copies in the North West alone in its first week of release and the label is doing all it can to ensure the record’s chart success.

Tim Palmer, who worked on the re-release of the House Of Love’s Shine On, had remixed How Was It For You? for single consumption, with James blessing, and Fontana are releasing the track in a variety of formats, with bewildering permutations of exclusive extra tracks.

James, though not entirely happy with this chart chicanery, have spent enough time of the metaphorical arses to realise that some compromises are worth making.

“It’s a fix really,” Glennie concedes. “But at the moment, we need that push. Hopefully, when we’re in a situation when we don’t need it anymore we can stop bloody doing it.”

Of course, there are remixes and there are remixes. And it’s something of a surprise that James, stalwarts of the pre-Acid house, no disco-dancing, indie-kid brigade are taking the plung with a dancefloor remix of their next release.

Paul Oakenfold and Andy Weatherall (the men who made Happy Mondays dance) are possibles to rework Come Home as is Inspirals and Erasure remixer Flood. And somewhere in the James tape cupboard is a remix by Graham Massey of 808 State, which, reckons Jim. is, “more bassy but too muffled to release.”

The band had it done last summer – “When it wasn’t sofashionable,” quips Booth.

“Yeah, dance mixes are a departure from what we were doing two years ago, But since then the Mondays and Fools Gold and countless others have proved that there are no longer two camps of dance and rock, that it doesn’t matter which area you work in as long as the song itself is good.”

Inspired by the distant sight of Strangeways Prison’s wrecked rotunda, Jim and Larry toy with the idea of a “Strangeways Rooftops Dance Mix” of Come Home with the former indie hit’s spiralling hook replaced by incesssant police sirens and an opening sample of a rioter shouting “Good morning, Manchester!” All agree it would be mega-classic. They want to call it Come Down, but realise that then the song wouldn’t make sense.

This month’s Gold Mother is a measured, tempting collection with confidence to spare. The fractured wit and melodic inventiveness of Stutter and Strip Mine are still there but the context is new, with recruits Mark Hunter (keyboards), Andy Diagram (trumpet) and Saul Davies (everything but specifically violin) bringing extra colour to what are some of James finest songs.

How Was It For You? and Come Home are already well known as wild things with hearts of ice and Top Of The World finds a pitch of poignancy that James have never reached before.

The textures are many and varied, the sentiments intriguing and more readily intelligible if not exactly commercialised. Weak links are few: this is how James always should have sounded.

Booth’s lyric-writing, noted for its tendency to sharp contrasts of specifics and abstracts, has also moved into focus. God Only Knows is hilarious, skewering religious head-the-balls of the Swaggart and Bakker school with some cruelly apposite sampling from Satellite God-slot programmes and the priceless lines ‘If God is in his image, Almighty must be small”. Booth does not bother to disguise his contempt for today’s cheap goons who pass for religious authority.

“If God made man in his image then it doesn’t reflect too well on God, does it?” he grins. “Man is a total screw-up and if there is a spirit or meaning of life then man clearly has no idea what it is. He is much better keeping his mouth shut rather than saying, Follow me as your intermediary.”

Maybe the title track gives the most telling clue to James present concerns. Gold Mother deals with the birth of Tim’s son Ben in graphic technicolour, but it’s no lame bout of new-man drivel. The song is positively peculiar, an angular bass-driven chant with backing vocals by everyone’s favourite obstetricians the Inspiral Carpets.

“Have you ever seen a woman giving birth?” asks Tim.

Only on the telly.

“It’s not the same on the telly”

Back at the James offices, the aforementioned Ben is having a messy late lunch and the band are poring over a limited edition of How Was It For You? in a particularly desirable metallic sleeve. It comes with a free James logo stencil, which Jim reckons will kill off their T-shirt sales in one fell blow.

Talk turns to which of Larry’s guitars will look best on the inevitable Top of the Pops slot, and to the Gold Mother tour, which begins this week, coinciding with the World Cup. Instead of a support band, James will be screening the match of the evening with a DJ on at the same time, so you can dance or watch the game. Or both.

“It’s not as if we’re a great football band or anything but people will want to see the game, which seems fair enough,” says the obliging Tim.

Front Man with James, Tim Booth was THE sensation of this year’s Glastonbury Festival. James have a new single, ‘Come Home’ and a new album, ‘Gold Mother’, out now on Fontana

WHERE DID YOU GO LAST NIGHT?

To bed

WHAT WAS THE LAST THING YOU THOUGHT OF BEFORE YOU WENT TO SLEEP?

I’m too tired to sleep.

WHAT DID YOU DREAM?

That I was asleep dreaming I was awake.

WHAT WILL YOU DO TODAY?

Move home.

WHAT IS YOUR GREATEST FEAR?

Lingering pain.

WHO ARE YOUR FAVOURITE SINGERS/MUSICIANS?

Nick Cave, James.

IF YOU COULD BE SOMEONE ELSE, ALIVE OR DEAD, WHO WOULD YOU BE?

Who wants to be dead? God.

WHAT ANNOYS YOU THE MOST?

Guilt trips.

WHAT DO YOU CONSIDER YOUR GREATEST STRENGTH?

Optimistic determination.

WHAT DO YOU CONSIDER YOUR GREATEST WEAKNESS?

Guilt trips me up.

WHAT ARE YOUR FAVORITE RECORDS?

“Horses”; “Mercy Seat”

WHAT WAS THE LAST ACT YOU SAW LIVE?

World Party.

WHAT DO YOU ALWAYS CARRY WITH YOU?

A hanky.

WHO WOULD YOU MOST LIKE TO KILL IF YOU COULD?

Thatcher; Waddington; Terra Blanche; Alistair Burnett; Paul Daniels (getting petty here).

WHAT WOULD YOU FIND DOWN THE BACK OF YOUR SOFA?

Keys, coins, my wallet (I hope)

WHO WOULD YOU MOST LIKE TO MEET?

Doris Lessing; Patti Smith; Sam Sheppard; Robert Anton Wilcox.

WHAT BOOK ARE YOU READING AT THE MOMENT?

“A Confederacy Of Dunces”.

WHAT WAS THE LAST FILM YOU SAW?

“Jesus of Montreal”.

WHAT DO YOU NEVER MISS ON TV?

“Cheers”.

WHAT DID YOU LAST RECEIVE IN THE POST?

Bills.

WHAT’S YOUR FAVOURITE WORD?

Fingers.

WHAT WOULD YOU SAY TO AN ALIEN?

“Take me with you”.

WHAT MAKES YOU LAUGH?

Paid professionals: Connelly; Martin; Williams; Wright; Hegley; Redmond; Elton; Atkinson; “Cheers”; “Roseanne”.

WHAT MAKES YOU CRY?

Being human

HOW WOULD YOU LIKE TO DIE?

Gently.

WHAT WOULD YOU LIKE YOUR EPITAPH TO BE?

“Nice try”

Their T-shirt went to number one in Britain and now JAMES aim to follow it up with their debut LP for a major. So how far are they the band that Manchester forgot, or just a Madchester crazed media overlooked?

May Day in Manchester. Thermometers are nudging the 80 degrees mark and everyone’s stupid with the heat. It’s too sweaty too wear flares, so the city’s youth have left their flapping dungarees at home in favour of surf jams and questionable Bermuda shorts. So much for the Rainy City – this is more like Torremolinos.

On a postage-stamp of parkland near their city centre offices, the founder members of Manchester’s best kept secret lounge on dry grass. Today’s Today says that record smog levels make sunbathing a high-risk activity, akin to changing a lightbulb while standing in a bucket of water, but James couldn’t give a bugger.

The charming and amiable trio of Jim Glennie, Larry Gott and singer/wordsmith Tim booth are keen to relax – a wise move considering that their workload is about to increase considerably. After nearly eight years of diligent gigging, an unhappy marriage with a major label followed by 18 months in limbo, a succession of managers and enough false starts to wear down the most patient of artists… all these trials are about to pay off.

Their forthcoming debut album for Fontana, ‘Gold Mother’, is not merely James’ best studio recording so far, but the most accomplished example of what used to be called Indie-rock that 1990 has seen. And as bassist Glennie says, Beats International have already taken a James T-shirt to number one in Britain. All they need to do now is to match it with a record.

The omens are unmistakable. The smart money says that, at long last, James are about to happen. ’’This time we’re prepared to take the breaks,” Jim Glennie says. “And we weren’t in the past. That’s the difference. We’ve created a situation where we could have been successful, we could have gone for it and done everything, but we didn’t, we held back. And we lost our chance.” Today you could get a donkey ‘Blogged up’ in flares and Kickers and it would probably be hailed as the next wonder from the land of the Orange Buses.

Despite selling upwards of 2,000 concert tickets in most cities – more in Manchester – and despite shifting two grand’s worth of their distinctive T-shirts this week, James were virtually blacklisted by last year’s Madchester media circus.

With their back catalogue of sophisticated oblique pop, James clearly didn’t fit into the conception of a cartoon world filled with bowl-headed, so called scallies berserk on horse tranquillisers and bent on mischief. James were a Manchester band, not a Madchester band. And Madchester was about the Monday’s, The Stone Roses, 808 State, Oldham’s Inspiral Carpets and a slew of promotion play-off candidates like The New Fast Automatic Daffodils.

Maybe James (est 1983) had been around a bit too long and outstayed their welcome, failing to match previous glowing references from the press with attendant hits. Or perhaps it was the Morrissey seal of approval, priceless when he bestowed it on James in 11985 but now the equivalent of the Black Spot, that dropped them into the perceived no man’s land between the bright young things and the old Manchester of New Order, The Fall and The Smiths.

Either way, James fell victim to a conspiracy of silence. This rankles with guitar talent and conviction man Larry Gott. “James is not the band that Manchester forgot,” he says testily. “Once we were the medias darlings, but because we didn’t do what they expected of us (touring America with The Smiths for instance) we were forgotten about. It didn’t mean anything to us. Our audiences and record sales kept growing.”

Tim Booth is also at pains to put Manchester matters in perspective. “You have to divide what’s really going on in Manchester – the bands who know and respect each other – and what’s written in the press. The journalistic conception of the Manchester scene is totally different to the reality of how the bands relate to one another which is, on the whole, very good. And we are part of that. That’s why we’ve taken the Mondays and the Carpets and the Daffodils on tour; that’s why we were taken on tour by The Smiths, The Fall and New Order. It’s nothing like what’s written about by journalists from the South.”

James’ conspicuous failure to do the business was partly due to their ill-starred three year deal with Sire Records, signed in 1985, which was so grim it nearly finished the band off. Even today they groan at the mention of the company that promised so much – not least to share a label with band favourites Talking Heads and The Ramones – and delivered nothing but misery. ‘Stutter’ and ‘Strip-mine’, their two albums for Sire, were both fine, spiky offerings, but each received a negligible push from the label which was more concerned with its American operations. The records duly evaporated. The bands’ attitude did not help. ‘We were idealistic”, says a rueful Jim. ”We thought the music would win through, regardless of whether or not we we did interviews, or didn’t release anything for years or whatever. It was just naivety.”

These were dispiriting times for the then four-piece James, even when the contract expired, as Larry explains with the black humour of hindsight. ”We nearly called it a day there and then, when Gavin (Whelan, James’ original drummer) said, well that’s it. And we knew that whatever the next person said would decide whether it went one way or another.” Glennie, Booth and Gott opted to soldier on, eventually recruiting new drummer Dave Baynton-Power. They returned to indie-land and Rough Trade for the singles ‘Sit Down’ and ‘Come Home’ and an acclaimed live album, ‘One Man Clapping’. The album’s lengthy stint in the indie charts proved that there were still plenty of James fans out there after all.

For most of ’88 and ’89 James paid the rent not as musicians but bizarrely with the proceeds of the range of James T-shirts designed by a fan in London. The T-shirts have a ‘Ja’ on the front, ‘m’ on one arm and ‘e’ on the back and ‘s’ on the other arm. ‘Poor As Fuck’ might have been more appropriate. ‘It was ridiculous,” recalls Booth. “While we were producing ‘Gold Mother’ last year none of us even had cassette machines that worked properly to listen to the masters. Our record players were useless too. We’d been on £30 a week for about seven years and we had no money for the necessary technology.

This is unlikely to be the state of affairs from now on. It’s early days, but the new seven-piece James are enjoying a productive relationship with Fontana. The fiery ‘How Was It For You’, first fruit of the new deal shifted 15,000 copies in the North West alone during its first week of release and the label is doing it all it can to ensure the record’s chart success. Tim Palmer, who worked on the release of The House Of Love’s ‘Shine On’ has remixed ‘How Was It’ for single consumption with James’ blessings and Fontana are releasing the track in a variety of formats with bewildering permutations of exclusive extra tracks.

James, though not entirely happy with this chart chicanery have spent enough time on their metaphorical arses to realise that some compromises are worth making. “It is a fix really,” Glennie concedes. “But at this moment we do need that push. Hopefully when we’re in a situation where we don’t need it anymore we can stop bloody doing it.” Of course there are remixes and there are remixes. And it’s something of a surprise that James, stalwarts of the pre-Acid House, no disco-dancing, indie-kid brigade, are taking the plunge with a dancefloor remix for their next release.
Paul Oakenfold and Andy Weatherall (the men who made Happy Mondays dance) are possibles to re-work ‘Come Dance’ as is Inspirals and Erasure remixer Flood. And somewhere in the James tape cupboard is a remix by Graham Massey of 808 State which, reckons Jim, is more “bassy but too muffled to release.” The band had it done last summer – “When it wasn’t so fashionable, “quips Booth. “Yeah, dance mixes are a departure from what we were doing two years ago. But since then the Mondays and ‘Fools Gold’ and countless others have proved that there are no longer two camps of dance and rock, that it doesn’t matter which are you work in as long as the song itself is good.”

Inspired by the distant sight of Strangeways Prison’s wrecked Rotunda, Jim and larry toy with the idea of a ‘Strangeways Rooftop Dance Mix’ of ‘Come Home’ with the former indie hit’s spiralling hook replaced by incessant police sirens and an opening sample of a rioter shouting, “Good Morning Manchester!” All agree it would be mega-classic. They want to call it ‘Come Down’ but realise that then the song wouldn’t make sense.

This month’s Gold Mother is a measured, tempting collection with confidence to spare. The fractured wit and melodic inventiveness of ‘Stutter’ and ‘Strip-mine’ are still there but the context is new with recruits Mark Hunter (keyboards), Andy Diagram (trumpet) and Saul Davies (everything but specifically violin) bringing extra colour to what are some of James’ finest songs. ‘How Was It For You?’ and ‘Come Home’ are already well-known as wild things with heart and ice and ‘Top Of The World’ finds a pitch of poignancy that James have never reached before. The textures are many and varied, the sentiments intriguing and more readily intelligible if not exactly commercialised. Weak links are few: this is how James always should have sounded.

Booth’s lyric writing, noted for its tendency to sharp contrasts of specifics and abstracts has also moved into focus. ‘God Only Knows’ is hilarious, skewering religious head-the-balls of the Swaggart and Bakker school with some cruelly apposite sampling from Satellite God-slot programmes and the priceless lines, “If God is in his image/Almighty must be small”. Booth does not bother to disguise his contempt for today’s cheap goons who pass for religious authority. “If God made man in his image then it doesn’t reflect too well on God does it?” he grins. “Man is a total screw-up and if there is a spirit or meaning of life then man clearly has no idea what it is. He is much better off keeping his mouth shut rather than saying, Follow me as your intermediary.”
Maybe the title track gives the most telling clue to James’ present concerns. ‘Gold Mother’ deals with the birth of Tim’s son Ben in graphic Technicolor but it’s no lame bout of new-man drivel. The song is positively peculiar, an angular bass-driven chant with backing vocals by everyone’s favourite obstetricians the Inspiral Carpets. “Have you ever seen a woman giving birth?” asks Tim…. Only on the telly….” It’s not the same on the telly……”

Back at the James offices, the aforementioned Ben is having a messy late lunch and the band are poring over a limited edition of ‘How Was It For You?’ in a particularly desirable metallic sleeve. It comes with a free James logo stencil which Jim reckons will kill off their T-shirt sales in one fell blow. Talk turns to which of Larry’s guitars will look best on the inevitable Top Of The Pops slot and to the Gold Mother tour which begins this week coinciding with the World Cup. Instead of a support band, James will be screening the match of the evening with a DJ on at the same time so you can dance or watch the game. Or both.

“It’s not as if we’re a great football band or anything but people will want to see the game which seems fair enough,” says the obliging Tim.

They used to dress up in muesli and eat sandals whilst meditating on their heads, but now they’re a gleaming multi-membered pop combo. Are James jessies or the finest live band in Britain? Stuart Maconie jumps on their tour bus and finds himself in teen pop heaven (!!!)

“Two weeks ago they said ‘We’ve got the Railway Children coming down here today’ and ‘I thought ‘Bloody Hell! Jenny Agutter and all that lot from that film’. Then they said to me ‘James will be here afternoon’ so I thought ‘James who?’ Was that two sugars, did you say?

PC68 is clearly the odd good apple that gets the whole force a bad name; a fine man whose notion of community policing extends to making coffee for journalists and keeping you up to date with the World Cup scores. His beat, happily, takes in that part of downtown Sheffield which includes the HMV shop and thus, it is he who is called upon to cast a firm but paternal eye over the drooling drug nympho teenies whenever rock phenomena such as Springsteen or Edsel Auctioneer are in town for a ‘signing’.

Downstairs in the shop, a disparate crowd of young folk are gathering excitedly to have their CDs, shoes, faces and tea towels signed by their favourite group whose current glorious ascent is testimony to the powers of human spirit and the importance of good t-shirts. Eighteen months ago, James were matchwood on the cruel and rocky shores of pop success; indie art-rockers (so the theory went) who had been left behind in the headless chicken rush for new good times.

When such things mattered, they had the King’s Ear, the Papal blessing – Morrissey liked them. But as the 80s ground to a halt and the spectre of disco entered many a polytechnic common room, so James became the sensitive Zen vegans who couldn’t dance properly and were not prepared to learn.

Now, in the summer of 1990, there are few more exciting or original groups on the planet. On record, they have become brazen, bold and eclectic; live, they are a revelation, of which much, much later. For now, I have seen the future of multi-cultural, chart-friendly, stadium pop/folk metal and its first name is James.

“The embarrassing thing about signing teenage girls t-shirts is that they always want you to sign them halfway up the back and you always end up in trouble with the bra strap. I wonder if that’s the idea….”

Saul Davies, if my calculations are correct, will have to get used to this for there is much of it ahead. Saul is one of the four new personnel whose introduction into the James camp has coincided (though it’s no real coincidence) with the spectacular renaissance in the group’s fortunes. When he and Dave, Mark and Andy joined the band, James were firmly in neutral and beleagured by a welter of preconceptions that had James backed into a corner. James the academic, aloof dilettantes, the bloodless folkies, the mantra chanting recluses.

Most of these were wrong but you could see how they had gained currency. From the outset, James had nurtured a peculiar style that invited comparisons with both folk, indiepop, The Birthday Party and other radicals, and even high life and tribal rhythms. They were touted as new and unusual white, Northern hopes; heirs apparent to the vacant Smiths throne.

There was a flurry of front covers, and a series of interviews in which the odd reference to Buddhism, meditation and alternative healing was to provide pundits with a dream of an angle; James as brilliant rock weirdos. And what was to make them intriguing and individual in 85 would have turned into a mocking albatross by the end of the decade. Those silly buggers with the carrot juice and cardies who never made it.

But such depressing thoughts seem inappropriate as we cruise through the Yorkshire streets sipping our Aqua Libres, idly pondering which CD to play or which video to peruse. Thanks to a logarithmically expanding fan base, a hit single and a burgeoning reputation as a live act of extraordinary power, the days of draughty Transits littered wiht old banana milk cartons are over.

Availing myself of the sumptuous tour bus comforts, I introduce myself to James. The central core of Tim Booth, Jim Glennie and Larry Gott has been augmented by Saul, a personable multi-instrumentalist who is probably sick of being called impish; Mark, the tactiturn genius of the keyboards; Dave, the AWOL drummer; and trumpeter Andy, once a member of the The Diagram Brothers, a curious group who I practically venerated in the early 80s. For the entire two days I think of bringing the subject up only to think better of it. I hope this explains my odd behaviour.

We’re on route to the venue having completed the successful in-store PA. These are invariably strange affairs, made stranger in this instance by James insistence on playing an acoustic set. So we are treated to Tim singing of global annihilation whilst wedged on the counter between tape cleaning kits and Kylie posters. The place is packed, though, and it does afford an interesting glimpse at the James fan of the 90s. And they’re young. Horribly young. Except for the old ones.

Many wear hooded tops, flared trousers and have faces curtained with floppy fringes obviously in the throes of geographical adolescent crush. Others are more conventionally alternative and have albums by Echo and the Bunnymen back at the flat. Their enthusiasm is as infectious as it is justified as they queue patiently to have their merchandise autographed and pass the time of day with their heroes. Two hulking, neanderthal bodybuilders who’ve popped in for Tina Turner albums stand bemused in the midst of it.

Many of the kids clutch copies of Gold Mother, latest and undoubtedly best James album. Fleshed out by the additional members, the sound is now free of the slightly edgy diffidence. The Jamesian quest for originality is still evident but so is the desire to make a full-blooded rock racket. It even garnered a bona fide hit in How Was It For You?, a straightforward, unreconstructed knees up of a rock tune that successfully completed a string of excellent ‘nearly’ singles: What For, Sit Down and Come Home, the latter now set for re-release.

At the soundcheck, James go through the complicated daily routine of choosing tonight’s set. They try Crescendo and declare it to be a ‘bloody mess’. They perform an excellent God Only Knows and still seem unconvinced. They run through a lovely version of The Velvet Underground’s Sunday Morning (admittedly a song that could withstand an Erasure version) which I love and they dismiss as ‘shite’. Being an unconventional pop group, ie not having your nightly performance worked out down to the last witty ad lib, clearly has its trials and I leave them to it.

Over the catering crew’s delightful strawberry meringues, word goes round that tonight’s gig is sold out. Saul throws up his hands in mock horror. “Oh no, we’ve sold out! I knew we shouldn’t have released How Was It For You?” There probably are poor benighted souls who think this way (indeed, some of them work on music papers) but fortunately there are thousands of others to whom James are a new band and come unfettered by associations. Unsurprisingly, all of James turn out to be extremely nice folk indeed. Tim and I realise we have a shared love of the Lake District fells and I am quietly impressed and dead jealous when he tells me of travelling Helvelyn’s Striding Edge in a blizzard.

The bar is filling up with many of the same faces that were at the record shop earlier. They wear their freshly signed t-shirts as trophies, as proof that they are privy to the inner sanctum. James have always had a considerable live support but something indefinable and inexplicable has happened. The Manchester connection, though powerful, is not enough to account for this broadening of appeal, this new devotion.

And within two hours, I know why. I have a confession to make. I’ve been a little lukewarm about James in the past. Hymn From A Village, Johnny Yen, Scarecrow, interesting stuff I agree, but…. Maybe it was just me being suspicious but I could never really get past the wilful awkwardness of some of their songs and their seeming substitution of bug-eyed dementia for genuine passion.

In case you have harboured these thoughts yourself and have not had the pleasure of the new James, then let me, as Peter Purves would say, enlighten you. James have metamorphosed into an extraordinary rock group, a live event of breathtaking force. The individuality remains but with it comes grit, pluck, fire and brimstone.

As the siren riff of Come Home plays over the slide show of James banners, the expectation is palpable. They begin and immediately you’re struck by the imposing weight of the sound and the sense of self-assurance. Hang On and Government Walls are the work of a band not afraid to make a big beautiful sound, an intoxicating tumult.

Bring A Gun and Suffering are raucous and intense rock songs, with a physical presence most speed metal bands would envy. They take chances with impunity, dropping into the spectral atmospherics of Walking The Ghost or chancing their arm with an untitled new song building on relentless repetition and the interplay between an agitated violin and a bruised, blue-black trumpet.

There then follows a kind of mini greatest hits segment that sends the assembled bonkers with glee. How Was It For You? leads into the frenetic, primitivist Johnny Yen complete with ad lib along the lines of “Aren’t you just sick of all those translucent Manchester bands” If concessions to modernity (Mondays drumbeat, splash of house piano) have been made in Come Home they’ve been made with an elan that you can’t fault.

Sit Down; the new James anthem brings legions onto the stage, forcing Tim on to the speaker cabinets for fear of being crushed. In case anyone thought they were playing to the gallery for cheap applause, they finish with Stutter, a nightmare blast of psycho metal. The image retained is that of Andy’s wildly flailing searchlight illuminating corners of the hall, of Tim’s frantic dervlish dance, of Saul roaming the stage like a man possessed and of a pop group at the height of their powers. You could say I was impressed.

I gave it a week. It could have been a trick of the light or something in the lager, I figured. The James World Cup tour finished up at the Birmingham Hummingbird and I proposed to be there. To get some more of this addictive stuff and to sit down with James and a tape recorder. The night in Sheffield had ended in champagne, autograph hunters, eight different types of soft cheese and a curious coach journey to Manchester where the video entertainment came courtesy of Stallone and First Blood, not perhaps an automatic first choice as most people’s idea of fave James viewing.

James arrive in beautiful downtown Brum in good spirits, having had several good gigs in the interim, including one particularly special, emotional shindig at the Liverpool Royal Court. The World Cup tour proper ends tonight, the 20 gigs in 23 nights, although there is Glastonbury and some Irish gigs later. Are these extraordinary scenes of fervour and mass communion seen every night? Tim Booth laughs.

“Not always. God knows what it is that starts them off. I suppose certain songs like What For and Sit Down are very warm and they invite an emotional response. But in other songs like Come Home, you don’t get the same singalong quality, it’s darker… ‘After 30 years I’ve become my fears…..’ But, yes, often the audience seem to get involved in an almost U2 kind of way.”

You see, this has been bothering me. Though there’s nothing of the bombastic or messianistic about James, the last show I saw that had a similar feel to it was a Simple Minds concert. The same sense that for the crowd, and band, this was more than a collection of pop songs played loud but implied some celebration of import. Is Tim insulted by this comparison?

“No because I know what you mean. We’ve always had it, even though in the past the audiences have been a bit thinner on the ground. In Manchester, it’s been a celebration for four years. There’ve been times when we’ve had to stop playing because the crowd was singing so loud it was putting us off! But in the past this never got reported.”

“On stage, it’s a performance but it’s also a reflection of ourselves. Sometimes we don’t want to do the nice songs, we want to do the heavy ones with the nasty lyrics. Then the audience aren’t invited to join in, it’s more like ‘witness this’. We like those as well, though the sound people say ‘that was weird’.

“This tour I’ve encouraged people to sing Sit Down. In London they wouldn’t. But I guess I shouldn’t really try, it’s a bit of a cliche. So sometimes it’s a celebration – uplifting and rewarding. Other times, we release demons.”

Larry : “There used to be a real barrier between us and the audience. It was a criticism that was thrown at us a lot … that we were separate, somehow insular and aloof with all this improvising on stage and stuff. And we didn’t realise because we were concentrating so hard. In effect it was like a practice room with 600 people.”

Jim continues this rueful reflection. “We were much more self conscious then. Much more vulnerable. Going on stage was terrifying because we were right on the line, taking real risks…. and sometimes it would go badly wrong. It would fall apart and we’d all freak out, all turn round and retreat, heads down and face the drummer. Try and get off quick.”

How about the audiences themselves? Who comes to James gigs these days?

Tim : “Well on this tour it’s been young girls. Loads of them. That’s certainly never happened before. I can’t remember when it started…..”

Saul interrupts. “Basically it’s been since I joined the band, hasn’t it?”

Larry : “I think partly because we never made it, our records have become very dear to people. It’s as if there have been a lot of people quietly rooting for James who are now coming out of the closets.”

Jim : “It seems to go in pockets around the country. In Glasgow and Norwich, it’s older people. You can see the odd grey hair in the audience. But you go elsewhere and there’s these really young girls down the front.”

I ask whether they are beginning to get tired of hearing that James areon the verge of stardom. Larry is quick to reply. “What, after seven years of it, you mean?”

Tim takes up the thread. “No, it’s very different now. This is it. In the past our music was often quite skeletal and difficult. But now there are seven of us, working hard and the sound has become more accessible. Fleshed out and huge. Like Johnny Yen, which has always been a good song has now become an anthem.

“There’s a real wave of support now. The biggest we’ve ever had,” continues Jim. “You definitely get the feeling something is happening.”

Tim : “It’s a new band. I’ve wanted this for so long but we were never able to find sympathetic musicians. Now we have. I wanted to change the name to emphasize this. But I’m glad we didn’t now because it’s become a good name again after a period of being terribly out of fashion.”

Larry : “I’m glad we kept the name too. For me, it’s like The Fall. They’ve gone through so many changes but they are still The Fall. The same spirit persists. And we’re still James. It’s just that now there are seven of us playing to the same principles that the four of us once had.”

Jim : “For me, changing the name was about destroying the preconceptions that people had about us. It was going to be a way of saying ‘Look we’re back and we’re completely different. Forget all that bollocks you read in the past.'”

And what preconceptions might those be, I ask innocently. Jim eyes me with a wry smile.

“I don’t really like to repeat them because it only helps to perpetuate them. You know that in the past we’ve been associated with…….” Tim clamps a hand across Jim’s mouth and doesn’t remove it until he’s certain Glennie isn’t about too say anything too incriminating. “… some softer areas of music. Yes, we do have our quiet moments. But really, we play half a dozen heavy metal songs in the set and people still say we’re a folk band. How can anyone who plays a song like Stutter be described as a ‘folk band’? It’s as if people are desperate not to confuse the issue. ‘Look you’re vegetarians, we suspect that you’re Buddhists, you do the odd acoustic number. You’re a folk band!”

Larry : “It’s like touring with The Smiths. We did that specifically to destroy the endless Smiths comparisons. We thought that by going out and playing with them every night, we’d hammer home the point that we were nothing like them. But it backfired. It just made the association stronger.”

Tim elaborates on this theme. “At the time the things that Morrissey said were very flattering and we were very grateful but when we didn’t make it, it became this millstone around our necks that we had to put up with for five years.”

James, undoubtedly, are a group reborn. They have not disowned their past but they have built something completely new from its foundations. At what point did this rebirth occur?

Tim : “In some ways it was external events like coming off Sire and Gavin (ex-drummer) leaving. That was a stimulus. We’d wanted more people in the band for ages.”

Jim : “We tried everybody. Ron Johnson. Blokes from the Halle Orchestra. Clint from the Inspiral Carpets. But it never seemed to quite work.”

Then Tim makes a shock admission. “You see I’ve always been a big fan of Bruce Springsteen live. I’ve seen him a few times and I’ve always been blown away by the real depth of talent within his band. That’s something I’ve wanted for James but it never seemed to work until this year. It all fell together.

“Andy’s really the most freelance of the four. He’s got his jazz band. Dave was suspicious because he’d been badly ripped of in the past. And in the beginning he had to join on trust because there was no money to pay him with. At the end of the first tour I think he was amazed when we paid him. Mark is extremely talented but so quiet that for a year we didn’t know whether he was enjoying himself or not. (He also has a sense of humour. In the tour programme, he lists his least attractive trait as being ‘loudmouth and pushy’) And Saul was spotted by Larry, doing his bit in a get-up-and-improvise club.

And how did Saul feel, I wonder, about his discovery, a la the Human League girls?

“Well, it came at a particularly good time for me as I was doing absolutely nothing. Indeed, I was up a particular creek without a certain implement. I’d never played on a stage in my life and within two weeks I was playing to 2000 people at the Free Trade Hall. I gradually learnt stagefright.”

It would seem to me that only a person stupider than a very stupid thing could not be enchanted by the new James. But have there been any mealy mouthed cries of ‘sell out’?

Tim : “Well, there have been the reviews. For the first time in our career, we were landed with a whole batch of pretty vicious reviews saying ‘what a good LP Stutter was’ which, of course, no one said at the time.”

Larry : “It’s ironic really, this talk of ‘selling out’ because we never saw ourselves as being particularly oblique at the time. We always wanted to be popular as well as experimental. An esoteric pop group. We thought we were accessible when really we weren’t. Stutter has its difficult moments, though a lot of it was naivety. We didn’t realise that there was anything odd about songs with no choruses.”

But, around the time of the Stripmining LP, things had reached a low ebb. Faced with public indifference and an uncooperative record company, there must have been a strong case for packing it all in. Larry pales visibly.

“There was one point. Sire had pretty much refused to do anything with What For and our management then couldn’t seem to do anything. I remember the four of us being in a cafe and I think it was Gavan who said ‘well, that’s it then’ and I think it all swung on the next remark. But fortunately someone said something to the effect of ‘let’s show the bastards’. I knew I wasn’t prepared to be told that my career was over by some bloke in an office in America who knew nothing about James.”

But did you ever feel, like many others did, that James had had their chance?

Tim : “Not really. We knew our music was improving. We were always confident that we’d be one of the biggest groups in the world. So we waited with a kind of arrogant patience.”

Cynics might suggest that your rocketing popularity has more to do with a general infatuation with all things Mancunian rather than your own qualities.

Larry : “Are we seen as part of that scene? I’m not sure that we are. There may be some overlap but I don’t think that it counts for very much.”

Tim : “When we toured with the Mondays well before this Manchester thing, we were beginning to get big audiences and a great vibe. You can’t win. Someone said ‘Oh you’re getting popular now because The Smiths had gone,’ but The Smiths have been gone for years now. So then it’s ‘well, The Stone Roses are doing well’. How can you argue with that?

And are these the happpiest times ever for the James gang?

Tim : “Musically, yes. My personal life is in a shambles. But everything to do with the band is very exciting and uplifting at the moment.”

And does the imminent threat of fame appeal to you?

“It used to frighten us; back in the days when everyone was saying it was bound to happen. But then it passed us by. We thought ‘we’ll never know’. Now we can’t wait. I’m getting used to all that strange business about feeling watched all the time. Being asked for autographs in nightclubs. And then there’s the sex……”

Pardon?

“The feeling of it being around all the time. The constant availability. It’s both very frightening and very exciting.”

I bet. That night in Birmingham the James World Cup Tour 1990 came to an exhilirating end. I was converted for the second time in a week. The air crackled. The rafters rang. And by Sit Down the band gave up and simply let the crowd sing the chorus in proof that sometimes pop music can still be powerfully affecting without resort to schmaltz or overblown, fake sentiment.

Backstage there is an intoxicating, gentle euphoria. For me, there is the joyous realisation that pop music doesn’t have to pick its spots and pull some potato-faced sneer in the mirror of its mum and dad’s house to be wildly, dangerously brilliant. Backstage, a hugely, tipsily pregnant woman gets Tim to sign the stomach wherein resides her unborn child. Is this making you feel sick, rock n rollers? Good. You’ll be getting a hell of a lot sicker before this party is over.

On a park bench blistered and worn by exposure to decades of Mancunian rainfall, Jim Glennie and I sit, talk and delve deep into the inner world of James. Before us sweeps the smokey, industrial labyrinth of North Manchester, a dismal maze of rooftops and chimney stacks providing an atmospheric backdrop to an interview which drifts naturally into moody nostalgia.

“Maine Road holds a lot of memories for me,” Jim says (James are supporting Bowie at Maine Road on the 7th). “I used to go to the Claremont Road School so a big chunk of my childhood years were spent around those terraced streets of Rusholme. I used to see City a lot at Maine Road too. It will be really weird playing there, especially knowing that a large part of the audience won’t even know who we are.

As we talk I suddenly notice the concrete slabs beneath use are cracked and broken and through the gaps, as though responsible for their very existence, peeps the occasional flower — individual, defiant and graceful but sadly overlooked by the passer-by. An image which seems curiously symbolic of James’s struggle to blossom in the stoney-faced and unaccommodating world of pop. A band who’ve been with us for a long time now and who have treated us to some of Manchester’s most innovative and ethereal music, it is surprising that James have only been rewarded with modest commercial success.

“The last two singles did okay I suppose,” Jim says referring to the recent chart success of ‘How Was It For You’ and ‘Come Home’, “But it does seem that Radio One and Top of the Pops have an unusual attitude about us. A week before its release, ‘Come Home’ was D listed on the radio. It went straight into the charts at number 32 but for some reason, they took it off the list altogether. We’ve been really unlucky. Sometimes the whole mechanics of the pop and rock industry can be a real pain in the arse.

But hoardes of acid scallies donning the James T-shirts on a Saturday afternoon in Manchester is sufficient proof (if any were needed) that James are the defiant flower of the current Manchester scene, not growing from it but through it, like the flower in the park peering through the shattered slabs of worn-down concrete.

“Naturally the Manchester scene affect us,” Jim says, “But at the same time we are quite detached from it all. We are still waiting to see how people react to it. What I’ve liked so far about Manchester is that bands have always been very individualistic. But once the bubble bursts people are going to be much more critical.”

‘Gold Mother’, still hovering in the album charts, was James’s offering for the summer and perhaps their most haunting album to date. The pounding rhythmical surges of ‘Come Home’ is still guaranteed to pack the dance floor with scores of arm-flailing idolaters and the LP, the first fruits of the Phonogram deal, has already become part of the current teenage bedroom culture. Politics, loneliness, alienation, anger — ‘Gold Mother’ sweeps majestically through a twilight world of emotional turmoil and self-awareness. Who can resist singing along to such hard-hitting lines as,

‘I am in love insane with a sense of shame

That I threw stones at the condemned and now I’m slated.”

“Yes, I agree, it’s a moody album,” Jim says, “For the last year or so we were pissed off with the situation we were in and a lot of the songs on the album emerged from that period. But the album is more compact than the others. We picked up the songs that seemed to fit in with each other. It’s hopefully the sort of album you can listen to from start to finish.

“It’s interesting,” Jim continues, “Because a lot the songs emerge subconsciously. Tim, Larry, Mark and I all get together in a big room and jam incessantly for twenty minutes or so. We record the session then listen to the bits we like. At this stage, however, the song is very much in its pupal stage. It then grows and changes until it reaches its final metamorphosis in the studio.”

As we drift slowly back to the manager’s office in New Mount Street, the delicate image of the flower remains permanently imprinted in my head. The flower is the colourful and attractive part of the plant from which the fruit or seed is later developed. The seeds of James have already been sown and I am convinced that it is only a matter of time before the band finally bloom in a pop world soiled by apathy and blandness.

Dave Simpson traces the history of the band and talks to singer Tim Booth about broken dreams, shattered illusions and a new faith for the nineties.

The story of James is a lesson to every aspiring young person that ever picked up a guitar, ever dreamt of pop success and the glory that goes with it, ever believed in the old adage that talent will win through in the end, that good will always triumph over evil. Which, after all, is most of us.

The story of James is a love story, a tale of young men at odds with the world and in love with their art. It’s a tale that has fought off betrayals, disappointments and crippling disabilities, that’s seen hearts break, tears fall and spirits shatter. But James are still here. And this is their story.

The band formed in the early eighties as a collection of schoolboy friends. Tim Booth, Larry Gott, Gavan Whelan and Jim Glennie became James, named after their guitarist and because “Gavan didn’t have the same ring to it!” Based in Manchester, it wasn’t long before they had progressed to playing the occassional gig at The Hacienda’s local bands night and it was there that the group came to the attention of New Order manager Rob Gretton, who saw something in the foursome’s idiosyncratic yet emotive music and the frenzied dancing of Tim Booth and asked if they might like to record a single for Factory.

The “Jimone” EP duly followed at the back end of 1983 – containing the live standard “What’s The World”, the anti-nuclear “Fire So Close” and the sublime “Folklore”, the band’s attempt at questioning the basics of male/female stereotyping, which, looking back, could have been the touchstone for the “wimps” tag which was to haunt them in years to come. The band’s image was far removed from the overt masculinity of much of the rock music of its time – the blustery chest-thump of Simple Minds and the increasing stridency of U2 – and their fondness for casual clothing (principally cardigans) and vegetarian politics provided the press with an easy label. The term of “hippy folkie vegans” became synonymous with articles on the group.

1985 saw the classic “Hymn From A Village / If Things Were Perfect” coupling that was “James II”, a biting attack on worthless big-league pop and the single that rightly had the critics falling over themselves and A&R men dashing for their chequebooks.

Things moved fast. Morrissey proclaimed them as his favourite band, a tour with The Smiths beckoned and the band were catapulted into playing to thousands on one of the wildest tours of the decade. “The Smiths tour – we were very very grateful to The Smiths for giving us that level of exposure. But it was a case of a double-edged sword, on the one hand we were playing to these huge audiences and all that, but on the other hand it meant we were to become associated with The Smiths, compared to them. Which we never really thought was appropriate at all, we were two different bands really. It almost became a stigma, y’know. ‘Oh James, Smiths type band.'”

Following the success of the tour and their notable appearance at the 1985 WOMAD festival, James signed to Seymour Stein’s Sire Records, home of Madonna and Talking Heads. Things looked good. Whilst lacking the raw power of the Factory records, the first Sire single “Chain Mail” dented the national Top 50 and gained a snatch of daytime radio play.

Things started to go astray however with the release of the band’s debut album, the ironically titled “Stutter”. The record contained some fine songs, particularly the dreamy “Really Hard” and “Johnny Yen”, which was to become a cornerstone of the band’s set for many years, but it was marred by a flat production job, courtesy of Lenny Kaye, former drummer with the Patti Smith Group. “We were inexperienced as a studio band, Lenny was inexperienced as a producer. We were lost, basically.” Tim Booth’s charming, charismatic vocals were rendered all but colourless. The album crept out to mixed reviews and without a substantial back-up. In chart terms, it flopped.

The band soon realised the difference between being independent hopefuls and major label artists. “You can be number one in the indie charts and mean nothing in the mainstream charts. When you go to a major you lose the profile an independent hit gives, even though you may actually be selling more records. Looking back, I think we should have done an independent album.”

Sire began to lose interest. They viewed James as still essentially being an “indie” group. They’d been signed as a “hip” band with a flurry of press activity and once they’d got them on the dotted line, the company had no idea what to do with them. A further problem was the fact that, as a huge American company, Sire didn’t have a UK office, which made it difficult for the group to deal with them. There was never any real working relationship between the two parties. Tim Booth recalls “With Sire, we didn’t accept any money, so they could really do with us what they wanted because they hadn’t put any investment into us. They could just leave us on a shelf for two years, they weren’t going to lose anything.”

Which is precisely what happened. Between 1986 and 1988 there were no James records – no singles, no albums, no more than a handful of gigs. Many of the group’s fans assumed they’d split up, there were the usual trickle of rumours surrounding the band’s activities (some almost as far-fetched as those surrounding The Only Ones), and for all intents and purposes James were close to being all but a cherished memory. The band were shattered, broken. Their dreams languished on the rocks, their morale was all but crushed. It was never meant to be this way.

1988 at last saw a release in the form of a fine single “What For”. It was to become an anthem for the band, an inspiring and uplifting tale of a yearning hope, flying in the face of adversity. Its success was seen as vital to the continued progress of the group. Sire thought the record still “a little too indie for Radio 1”, failed to give it any kind of push, and, despite the band’s faithful following rushing out to buy a copy, it failed to make the Top 40. James were devastated. The drummer, Gavan, left. Tim Booth recalls “That year had been really hard, we’d nearly finished, just given up, we were on the brink of bankruptcy. With Gavan, we had to ask him to leave after a series of arguments. He seemed to have a different idea of what he wanted from the music, so we just felt it wasn’t worth continuing, because it was like every rehearsal was a fight.”

James long awaited second LP appeared at the tailend of the year, two years after it was recorded and after remixing had attempted to give it a more radio-friendly sound. The company did nothing to promote it. “Strip Mine” was a great record that never got made, the resulting release a very good but rapidly dating and frustrating shadow of the group’s increasingly electrifying live form. Worse, their former champions in the press maintained the notion that the band and their music were somehow “wimpy and fragile”. Which was patently ludicrous.

“We were in this awful press rut where we were a, you know, ‘File under Smiths, vegetarian, Buddhist, arran sweaters’ kind of group. That was a hell of a shit rut to get into, we didn’t feel it reflected any of the music that we were making. We don’t feel out music’s ‘indie’, there’s never been a Buddhist in the band, vegetarianism isn’t a policy, it just happens that most of the members of the band are that way by choice. The music’s not wimpy, it’s more &ldots; provocative and aggressive. I’d actually quite like to meet the journalists who write that we’re wimps, then we could show them just how wimpy we are. We still get dismissed like that, only recently one paper wanted to run an article on us and the projected headline was ‘Return of the Hippies!’ It’s just ridiculous.”

Down to a three-piece, the band were at rock-bottom. But they didn’t give in. They still burned with a basic faith in the power of what they were doing, they found a new will, a new resolve. They found a legal loophole in their record contract and finally broke free. The phoenix began to rise.

In 1989, having spent time recruiting a new drummer, James expanded to a seven-piece line up and began work on a more powerful, more danceable sound. “We’d wanted other musicians before, but we’d not been able to find any with the same attitudes as us regarding improvising and taking risks, but gradually they just seemed to appear, we sort of stumbled on them. So we became a seven-piece, almost by accident.”

Finding a helping hand at Rough Trade, the band released a live album “One Man Clapping” to very favourable reviews. Their live shows had always far eclipsed their recorded work, so it was appropriate that the record featuring the original four-piece line up recorded over two hot nights in Bath should become their best long player to date. Featuring many previously unrecorded songs, including the bitter vitriolic ballad “Burned”, the album was a firm fixture at the top of the independent charts for weeks. Another classic single, “Sit Down”, possibly their best yet, was unleashed upon the public. But on the verge of a chart hit, the band’s jinx struck again. A technicality concerning the accompanying video resulted in a Musician’s Union ban on television showings for a crucial two weeks. The single entered at 77 and got no higher.

But by now, the group’s ever-growing following was beginning to show itself in huge numbers. Especially in the North, there was barely a gig crowd to be seen without someone wearing the band’s characteristic t-shirts. At Bradford’s Futurama Festival in October, a quite remarkable performance by James literally stunned the crowd into a massive standing ovation. There were people with tears streaming down their faces. The devoted fans that had stuck with the group through everything were sharing in the joy of the moment, the realisation that at last James time was about to come.

The next step was another single, “Come Home”. Wary of the band’s “wimp rock” reputation, Rough Trade dished out a few white labels of the record to club DJs, refusing to name the artists. Showcasing a forceful new dance sound, it was greeted ecstatically on dancefloors across the country. It was an excellent record. A hit single looked a safe bet.

“Come Home” entered the Gallup chart at 85 following a “Hitlist” powerplay on Simon Mayo’s Radio 1 show and coinciding with Manchester’s Stone Roses and Happy Mondays assault on the nation’s consciousness. Incredibly, disaster struck again. A cock-up at record business mag Music Week meant that the bottom end of the Top 100 was printed exactly the same as the week before. This meant that James single was not listed as a new entry and hence at the crucial time lost the profile it would have otherwise received. The band were livid. It came as a further blow to a marketing campaign which had already seen pluggers without copies of the record, cancelled video shoots and delays in availability. It seemed like par for the course when, touring to promote the release, the band were struck down by flu.

But the “Come Home” tour was, despite everything, a major success. Dates were almost all sold out as James were doing the same level of business as the Mondays and the Carpets, and whilst the tour opened in Sheffield with Tim Booth barely able to sing, by the final date in Leeds the band were in spectacular form. The tour ended with the stage packed with members of supporting act Band of Holy Joy and Holy Joy wordsmith Johnny Brown proclaiming that Tim Booth was “God”

That tour saw James unveiling the clutch of songs that form the basis of the “Gold Mother” era. As well as boasting the best tunes they’ve ever come up with, they show that as a lyricist Tim Booth now ranks with the best. His lyrics have developed from an early charming ambiguity to a searing directness, by turns intimately personal and vibrantly political. None moreso than the epic “Promised Land” which shows the group unafraid to speak out and take the lead as pop rises to the challenges of the new decade.

Tim : “I don’t like the word political, but yes, that’s the direction my lyrics have taken. In the early days though, we had songs like ‘Fire So Close’ which was about Cruise missiles, so it’s always been there. In those days, though, I was afraid to be as direct as I am now. I liked to keep it ambiguous, whereas now I just f**king write it, y’know. I was very angry when I wrote ‘Promised Land’, I was sitting on a train and it came out in half an hour. When a song comes out very smoothly you just have to use it, I couldn’t turn it down. A lot of them are like that, you just write it down, don’t censor yourself and then you find it usually makes more sense later. The ‘Promised Land’ thing was also about Hillsborough. We were recording ‘Sit Down’ in Sheffield at the time and she was in the hospital the next day. There’s these poor buggers trying to get better and Thatcher’s hanging over them trying to get a photo session done.”

The last tour saw audiences increasingly reacting to the content of the songs. A crowd in Birmingham let out a rapturous cheer when Tim altered the lyrics of ‘What For’ to take in ‘I will swim through Sellafield seas’ in comment on recent spills.

“When we played in Edinburgh which is very politicised at the moment due to the Poll Tax thing &ldots; when we played it, they were just cheering and cheering. I’ve never known anything like it, Larry was in tears. It was incredible.”

“We’ve always known though that people were listening. We’ve always had that belief, sometimes that was all we had to keep us going, y’know. We’ve just gone on at our own pace. The last tour was sold out virtually everywhere, we’re just letting it grow naturally, building. I suppose we’re hoping for a similar growth to U2 or Springsteen. Because we can do it live, I think we can sustain it. I think Springsteen is a role model for us, some of his music’s very cliched but he can really cut it live. So can U2, I would imagine. I’ve not seen U2 but some of the sequences in that film, the live thing, they’re incredibly powerful.”

Tim Booth radiates an aura these days. It’s not something you can easily put your finger on, but maybe things like faith, determination, hope, love and anger have something to do with it. He’s more authoritative, maybe happier.

“I’ve been looking back at certain memories, and they’re just really awful memories, y’know, about not being happy and everything. I hope I won’t look back on my present as being like that. The funny thing was, it was all in me, it was my mentality that was making me unhappy.”

Whatever the future holds, the lessons of the past have not been spared on James. “We were wary of signing again after what happened with Sire, but we’re far more aware now than we were then. We won’t make the mistakes we made then and we won’t get f**ked around like we were then. Record companies all come down to money in the end, even your smallest back bedroom indie label. They’re bankers, it’s just with a major label the sums they invest are far greater. The thing what made us look at signing again, was &ldots; we’ve been on the verge of bankruptcy for about a year. We have a huge amount of faith in our music, and we were thinking, y’know, we can’t go on writing songs this brilliant and not get anything from it. We’ve got to the point also where we’re a seven-piece band and to tour costs us thousands. It’s the only option open, really. But I think this time it will prove to be the right one.”

1990 has been (so far, at least) kind to James. They’ve broken the charts, (firstly with “How Was It For You?”, a trite, weak single as it happens) and the “Gold Mother” album has helped restore their reputation as the great white hopes for British pop. The band have moved towards the kind of corporate games that typify the approach of many major label artistes (multi-format releases, in-store p.a.’s etc) but it is hoped that, with the chart barriers broken, the group will once again rely of their music, and their music alone, to maintain their success.

After all, it’s that what’s carried them this far. It would be a shame now, after all they’ve been through, James threw it all away and became just like all the rest. Bankers.

First Blackpool, then the world

You couldn’t move in Blackpool for those T-shirts. Advertising the LP “Gold Mother” or the single “Come Home”, James logos added a little style to the Golden Mile with its tourists in gaping tops and small shorts queuing up to see Elvis as approved by Graceland, screaming on Pleasure Beach rides and eating soggy chips and curry sauce in the hottest weekend on record.

Singer Tim Booth is buzzing. He is becoming something of a guru with his audience, who are devoted scallies and indie fans. He is not an obvious pin-up; as he wanders around, the Pleasure Beach girls gasp, point, and whisper: “It isn’t, is it?”. The T-shirt Posse approach hesitantly and casually remark “Brilliant gig, mate”, to which Booth smiles, mutters “Thanks,” and shoves his hands deeper into his pockets.

In a café along the seafront, Booth is talking about how proud James are of their fans. “They’ve been fanatical for about four years in Manchester. We haven’t played there this year. So loads of people came up to see us – we really wanted to book a campsite and include the price on the tickets, but they wouldn’t let us. We were nervous because these are the first gigs since Glastonbury. I just couldn’t believe it when everyone in the Ballroom got down on the floor for ‘Sit Down’. It blew me away. It was wild!”

James are at their best live-their songs have a mesmeric, anthemic quality which touches on early Teardrop Explodes and the House Of Love. Strobe lights flicker from all angles, colourful images dance on the backdrop behind the seven-piece band. Fans at Blackpool – 10,000 of them over two nights – danced on stage with Booth, doused themselves with water and wore James T-shirts with Stone Roses, Happy Mondays, and “Cool as Fuck” visible beneath.

The association with Manchester, their hometown, is inevitable, especially when the Inspiral Carpets do backing vocals on the title track of their LP “Gold Mother”, but Booth insists James aren’t linked with the ‘scene’, and is skeptical of pale imitators who think wearing hoods and flares is enough. “I don’t think imitation is a sign of respect at all. Most people miss the whole point, trying to copy the spirit of the band without being able to emulate the notes. It seems so superficial. But if there is a Manchester backlash, it won’t get us because we’re too big.”

Booth’s voice, intense eye contact and easy smile make his boasting sound more like honestly then egotism. But his pride is understandable. From the days of “Stutter” (1986) to this summer’s magnificent “Gold Mother”. James have always shown that their music – catchy and poppy but full of twists – has guts. Guitarist Larry Gott sips his tea and sweeps his hair back. “The guts have just been in a different area to other bands, who rely on loud drums and guitars and distortion.”

Their staying power is central to their success. After eight years of financial difficulties when they were saved by the sales f those T-shirts, James are considering world domination. Levi’s believe they are going to be as big as U2 (“Their words, not ours”) and are sponsoring them. Subtly, of course.

“They can take photos before the gig, and they may do a brochure-a tasteful one-to be distributed to 2,000 shops,” Booth explains. “And we get wardrobes full of free jackets and shirts,” adds Gott, laughing and covering the conspicuous red tag on his shirt.

The music press now seems to have forgotten the awkward, playful James who used to wear bright clothes and smile in press pictures because everyone else “was wearing black and looking dour and cool”. And the time when Booth’s slightly feminine looks added to the band’s ‘wimpish’ label. Now the praise comes more readily, although they are wary of hype: “If you believe the press when they say you’re fantastic, you’ve got to believe it when they say you’re terribe.”

Booth shakes his curls and says they are learning lessons all the time. “I was tripped up the other week on Radio 1’s Newsbeat. The first question was ‘NME says you’re the best band in the world or a load of jessies. What do you think of that?’ I said if it was a choice, I’d say, ‘We are the best band in the world!’ And of course they just used that. I felt really embarrassed.”

The waitress brings some sickly ice cream and confides in us. “You know, something really strange is going on today. Everyone’s wearing funny T-shirts. I think it’s all about this band called James. Do you know anything about them?” World domination is yet to come. (Amy Raphael)

WILL JAMES LAST?

GASPO! IT LOOKED LINE ONE OF THE FIRST—AND SOME WOULD SAY THE BEST—OF THE NEW NEW MANCHESTER BANDS WOULD MISS THEIR PLACE ON THIS YEAR’S MIGHTY MANC BANDWAGON, BUT IN THE NICK OF TIME JAMES GOT THE SUCCESS THEY LUSTED FOR, JUST LIKE THEY ALWAYS KNEW THEY WOULD. DONTCHA JUST LURVE HAPPY ENDINGS? ASKS ANDREW COLLINS

“It’s that time again, when I lose my friends/go walkabout/I’ve got the bends from pressure/this is a testing time when the choice is mine” (“Come Home”)

You and I, we’re on first names terms with James. We’ve been that way for some time now. Six years, in actual fact. And we’ve been through a helluva lot together, you, me, and James. Premature adulation, the pain of being misunderstood, peer pressure, the frustration of being leap-frogged, the crushing demoralization of one man clapping, and now, it’s that testing time when we’ve got more friends-you, me, and James-than we know what to do with.

For 1990 has been James’ Renaissance year. Look at the national chart successes of this summer’s “Come Home” single and “Gold Mother” album if you want statistics. Or ask anyone at Glastonbury which was the most ubiquitous T-shirt amongst the huddled masses, if you prefer less clinical proof that James have arrived.

“I’ve always found normal life pretty damn weird anyway, so I don’t find this any weirder,” says James frontperson Tim Booth, whose ‘normal” life now involves being mobbed in the street by young people wearing his T-shirts and the occasional “weird sexual advance.”

Tim has been at the helm of James from the beginning. He is not James, he is Tim; he is one seventh of The Band With No Surname. But occupying, as a singer inevitably does, the foreground, it is Time who has the clearest view of this lasting six-year friendship.

To get to the very beginning of James, “ the first stirrings”, as Tim poetically puts it, we have to travel back to 1984, to a Manchester University disco, when an angst-ridden Tim is ‘expressing himself’ on the bitter-soaked dancefloor.

“I was pissed off because my girlfriend had gone away and left me, and I’d had a few drinks and I was dancing wildly on a crowded floor, and people were having to make room for me. I came back to my table and this bearded fellow was stealing my drink. I confronted him, and two other fellows stood up to support him – so I immediately became charming! They were 16-year-old Manchester lads who’d seen me dancing and wanted me to dance in their band.”

The next morning, Tim woke up with a phone number on his hand. He rang it, and that very night, found himself sitting in a scout hut round the back of then-guitarist Paul’s house “listening to this really naïve band play songs with two chord changes that went on forever.”

This young band were also short a lyricist, so, assuming that Tim was dead clever, what with him being at university and all, they asked him if he’d write some words for them. (“I’d never done such a thing in my life, but I wanted to be in a band – so I allowed them to carry their ignorance with them.”)

A couple of practices, a spot of backing vocals (the band had a female lead singer at this point) and some angst-ridden tambourine banging later, it was announced that they had a support slot with Orange Juice in Sheffield. “Come along,” they said, to their new-found Human League-style dancing boy. And he did.

“I danced like a very frightened man, and that was it.”

James weren’t called James at this tender stage, they were The Model Team International, named after the model agency that Paul’s sister worked for – hence, ready-made T-shirts were available for stage wear. The importance of good T-shirts would crop up again in James’ career…

A year later, ‘that girl singer’ was ‘asked to leave’, and Tim was promoted. The name changed, too. Paul didn’t want them named ‘Paul’ for fear of looking big-headed; they shied away from being called ‘Tim” to avoid singer-as-bandleader connotations; ‘Gavan’ (the drummer) sounded too much like Heavy Metal band; so the honour of immortalization befell bassist Jim Glennie. James was born. The inevitable demos ensued, leading to a single with local Factory Records.

“They wanted us to make an EP but we refused to do that as well and did a single. We deliberately chose our three weakest songs and recorded those – we thought we were bound to cock up the first time and we were not going to waste our best songs.”

If “What’s The World’, Fire So Close’ and ‘Folklore’ were James’s worst songs, it was little wonder they got themselves noticed on the release of this first single. Slightly ragged, a tad ‘folk-tinged’, perhaps less overtly tuneful that the currently ‘happening’ Smiths, but tightly-sprung, highly-strung Pop oddities nonetheless.

February ’85 saw the “good songs” follow-up, headed by the now-familiar ‘Hymn From A Village’. Next stop – ‘that NME cover story’. On March 16, the four members of James- Tim, Larry Gott, Jim and Gavan – found themselves peering from the cover of said well-known weekly, automatically hailed within as Great White Hopes, saviors of Brit Pop, new pioneers of rubbish-trousered ‘ordinary ‘ blokedom. This was fine – except that far from being the fruition of an unknown band’s hopes and dreams, this cover-stars honour was soured by the fact that it was actually timed in spite of itself; James were staring up from the shelf of WH Smiths by (their own) default. The idea was, originally, that James would herald the new year, by being the NME’s first cover of 1985 – but they turned it down, “because we felt it was damaging to the soul”.

It wasn’t arrogance, then?

“No, it was naiveté. Things were going so well for us, we thought they’d carry on forever. We felt that the music was It – and it isn’t. That isn’t the reality of the music business.”

Things were indeed going well. Recently-elected guru for a new generation, Morissey, had name-checked James in print, and the boys were duly invited on the Smiths ‘Meat is Murder’ tour. James ‘awkward, self-consciousness, bedroom poetry style and Manc geography earned them many an early Smiths comparison.

“We liked the Smiths. They were a great band, but they were working in a different area to us. We were well-protected by them, too – they looked after us,” Tim admits. However, true to form, they turned down the subsequent American leg of the Smiths’ tour. While your average young band might measure their own brilliance by totting up press offers and support dates, James viewed their own worth completely outside of the great media circus. Simply, they knew their music was brilliant.

Courtship by major labels followed and James welcomed it-because Factory simply weren’t getting their singles into the shops of the towns they were playing in. (“We felt we were putting our backs into it and they weren’t. We get on really well with Factory now – it turns out that they weren’t the people to be frightened of. Sire were.”)

Ah yes – Sire. Entirely down to the naïve belief that any company that signed up the Ramones and Talking Heads must respect their artistes, James exchanged ink with the legendary New York label.

“We felt that the fat American who signed us was a real music fan and we went with him. It was a mistake.”

A mistake that would eat a full three years out of James’ divine masterplan. The vote of confidence inherent in the actual signing was the last evidence that Sire were behind them that James would see.

“They didn’t see us as a commercial band; they saw us as avant garde. Which in a way, we were.”

“We were very difficult,” Tim admits. “very naïve. We fought with the producers. We’d demand a lot of them and we didn’t know what we were doing.”

After much friction and studio-ache, a first album ‘Stutter’ sort of dribbled out of Sire’s Summer ’86 schedules. It was very much a first album, hung with haunted, jerky James ditties, often without the aid of a chorus, always injected with Moriss(ey) dancing maypole catchiness.

But the huge void between James’ idiosyncratic vision and Sire’s chorus-hungry transatlantic obsolescence soon became apparent. This doomed mixed marriage is most lucidly illustrated by the chapter in the James story where they record their second album; ‘Strip Mine’ and Sire take a full two bloody years to release it.

“’Strip Mine’ nearly killed us, because we had such debts. We couldn’t tour, there was no money coming in, and we were a complete mess.”

The second new manager James called in to try and salvage their career actually gave in, saying that they couldn’t physically get in touch with Sire at all. (Sire’s UK office comprises “a glorified secretary,” Tim spits.)

But there is a God. And this very failure to communicate became James’ escape.

“There was a small print in our contract that said if Sire didn’t send a telex to say that they were going to renew, six months after the LP was released, they lose us automatically. They told us verbally on the phone that they were, but they forgot to send a telex! They were so inefficient.”

And with one bound, James were free. Poor, demoralized, and instilled with a blanket dislike of Americans (“They’re up their own arses, they don’t understand new music!”), they somehow managed to stay together. How?

“The music was still brilliant, and we knew it. We never lost confidence in the music. If you know that you’re one of the best in the world at what you do, are you going to give it up and do something that you’re not very good at?”

“When we couldn’t tour, we’d play Manchester. We were playing Manchester four years ago to 1,500-2,000 people, and they would understand what we were doing! They would be going berserk!”

James “walked the tightrope with bankruptcy” for 18 months after the break with Sire, and, as if to add injury to insult, Tim had a funny knee. After two cartilage operations they told him he’d never dance again, and minor depression set in.

“So I got the whole of The Singing Detective out on video and watched it the day after I came out of the hospital. And I didn’t believe in painkillers so I was in f***ing agony and couldn’t sleep. There I was, on my back, watching a film about this man in hospital who’s in agony, shouting and swearing at people, and it really did me in. And really cheered me up because if something that odd can get recognition that I felt that there had to be some justice!”

Which leaves us with a splendid allegory to play about with: James as bed-bound genius, racked with creative fervor, disturbing the other patients, refusing the painkillers etc etc.

And – just like Philip Marlowe in The Singing Detective – James recorded a live LP in Bath to remedy all that time spent rotting in a confined space.

It was called, ironically, ‘One Man Clapping’, and it captured the still-intact spirit of James-bristling, frustrated, chewing at the muzzle, and independent. Yes, they were independent again, the album being financed by comfortable old carthouse Rough Trade. This might have been the start of a beautiful friendship, but “ they didn’t see us as a commercial band, they saw us a bit like Pere Ubu, a band they felt obliged to help – original, but not going to sell large amounts of records. Sol we felt obliged to leave-because we saw ourselves selling lots of records!”

The singles ‘Sit Down’ and ‘Come Home’ came out on the back of Rough Trade’s honourable sense of obligation, but, despite ‘89’s obsession with all things Manc, failed to be more than just indie hits. (‘Sit Down ‘ was dashed by a Musicians Union ban on the video, because Larry played a log with two sticks in a suspiciously drummer-like manner in it, and obviously put scores of real percussionists out of a job by doing so.)

Despite being “jinxed” in matter of business, James songs were still coming thick, fast and brilliant. Gavan had left in December ’88, and this paved the way for a recruiting drive – one that resulted in the new, seven-man line-up that exists today. Saul, the fiddle player, “blew Larry away” with some sparkling improv at a local jazz club, keyboardist Mark “blew the whole band away” with some improvised accompaniment to ‘Sit Down’ in a studio in Bath; trumpeter Andy (literally) “blew them away” by busking through a track called ‘Crescendo’ – are you spotting a pattern here?

So, newly complemented by top improvisation merchants, James set about rebuilding themselves on vinyl, in order to blow us all away too.

The Rough Trade-financed ‘Gold Mother’ LP (comprising many a track actually written during improv sessions at the previous auditions) was so fine, so convincing, that Phonogram bought it up lock, stock and barrel. Its eventual release in July this year signaled James’ official Renaissance (the one that had been happening for about six years!) and even though it’s ‘taster’ single ‘How Was It For You?’ flopped due to Top of The Pops changing their format to include album charts and hence nixing James’ long-overdue debut by one chart placing, a UK tour that featured serious Jamesmania in the area confirmed what they already knew.

“The people that follow us now are quite devotional,” understates Tim, who has witnessed an entire audience in Paris sitting down to ‘Sit Down’ and had a gig at the Liverpool Royal Court halted while the crowd sang this song for five full minutes. “The trouble with something like this is that you then try and recreate it. The next few nights I was holding the mic out to the crowd and they didn’t sing – and that’s where the cliché’s born!”

When you spend that long realizing your own greatness, you do tend to avoid clichés. James’ rise from Moz-tipped tank tops to fully-fledged national institution has been anything but a fairy tale.

“I find this inevitable,” smiles Tim, and you’re tempted to believe him.

SINGLES

Nov 84 What’s The World/Fire So Close/Folklore (Factory)

Feb 85 Hymn From a Village/If Things Were Perfect (Factory)

Jan 86 Chain Mail/Uprising/Hup-Springs (Sire)

Jul 86 So Many Ways/Withdrawn/Just Hipper (Sire)

Mar 88 What For/Island Swing/Not There (Sire)

Sep 88 Ya Ho/Mosquito/Left Out Of Her Will/New Nature (Sire)

Jun 89 Sit Down/Goin’ Away /Sound Investment/Sky Is Falling (Rough Trade)

Nov 89 Come Home/Promised Land/Slow Right Down (Rough Trade)

May 90 How Was It For You/Whoops/Hymn From A Village/Lazy (Fontana)

Jun 90 Come Again/Dreaming Up Tomorrow/Far Away/ Gold Mother (Fontana)

ALBUMS

Jul 86 Stutter Sire

Sep 88 Strip Mine Sire

Feb 89 One Man Clapping (Live) One Man

Jun 90 Gold Mother Phonogram

The JAMES gang

Tim Booth (28) Vocals

Jim Glennie (26) Bass

Larry Gott (30) Guitar

Saul Davies (30) Violin, percussion, guitar

Mark Hunter (22) Keyboards

Andy Diagram (28) Trumpet, percussion

Dave Baynton-Power (27) Drums

“WHAT ARE JAMES CELEBRATING? OH, OUR RECOGNITION OF WHAT THE WORLD’S ABOUT. THAT’S WHAT IT IS, really. Seeing the dark side of life, knowing things can really be shit, but trying to say that there’s still hope. Trying to say just look how beatuiful THIS is! That’s James. That optimism. Not a blind, foolish optimism that merely says the world’s a wonderful place, la-di-da. That’s too easy. No, you have to recognise there’s beauty and there’s crap in here. You have to recognise the complexity.” –Tim Booth

FEW groups know how to celebrate like James. Few truly recognise the art. It’s not a question of mere cheerfulness. Any fool can grin. True celebration involves a joy, a depth, a resonance, an intelligence. True celebration needs complexity and conviction. The very best fun is a genuinely serious business.

James never used to be skilled celebrators. Not even two years back. There was a greyness to shake off. They tended towards the sombre. James have always been many things; perverse, giddy, singular, contrary, clever, tilted, troubled. But they weren’t always fun. Pop success eluded them. James looked doomed to perenial comfy, vaguely sullen cult status.

But then James became a cause to celebrate. They blossomed spectacularly. Where once they scripted edgy, twitchy angst-dramas there came loping anthems. Two wicked, intoxicating singles, “Come Home” and “Sit Down”, exploded their morose milieu. Live shows grew into addictive, joyous theatre. From being the ultimate student band, James were reborn as uneven, insanely joyous entertainers. It was a miracle.

Five months ago, they converted 50,000 souls to their busy mayhem at Glastonbury when Tim Booth rode their twisted rhythms from the stage and into the crowd. James were delirious that day, fervent, inspired demons. They came of age. And now, to complete the process, comes a potent new single, “Lose Control”, to strafe the charts. At long last, James’ exile is over. The secret’s out. Tim Booth’s unstable, maverick glee can go public.

It’s surely time to celebrate.

“LOSE Control” is a classic single, one of the year’s greats. Set to the ubiquitous Soul II Soul drum shuffle by Flood, producer of The Soup Dragons’ “I’m Free”, its curios, querulous outlook is unmistakeably James. “Where is the love/That everyone is talking of?” wonders Booth dolefully over the hypno-beat, before deciding, “We have found the love/To carry on”. It’s baggy, yeah, yet superbly aloof. James have always kept their distance.

“It was a long, dark night when I wrote it,” grins Tim. “I tend to write through the night. The idea is pretty dark: ‘Don’t be deceived, no land in sight/We’re all adrift in this dark night’. It’s an insomniac, awake all night, plagued by doubt and fear. ‘The terror’s all within my head’. But it ends on a positve note, I stuck in a real corny American-type ending.”

Why do that, Tim? Why contradict the song’s delicate, delicious meloncholy?

“Recently, I’ve seen that if I write a load of depressing songs, I get depressed soon after,” he confesses. “I feel a responsibility to make things positive. But I don’t know why. It’s not a conscious effort. Life’s hard enough without bloody unhappy endings!”

How about that line, “My body’s young, but my spirit’s old”? Do you feel that way? Were you badly down that night?

“Yeah, but my spirit being old is okay. It’s a continuation. And when I sing, ‘Shake my body, release my soul”, that’s to do with dancing and trying to BREAK OUT of your limits! Your skin is your physical prison. So, punish your senses! Break out of your physical prison. . .”

THE cleverly camp Tim Booth is charismatic in tiny ways. He knows all about eye contact, how to glance just_ so, how to be quietly flamboyant yet immaculately polite. He’s a real charmer. The band’s Jim and Larry plus myself, sitting round the table in a Manchester greasy spoon, all seem lumpenly oafish in comparison. We’re too laddish.

On stage, Tim is yet more puckish, a dextrous Pierrot orchestrating James’ heady chaos and the audience’s love. It’s no surprise he used to be a drama student. Does he ever feel like an actor up there?

“No, I was a terrible actor,” he grimaces. “I had no confidence at all. I’d spend my whole time on stage trying to remember my words. I always had a complete panic expression on my face. Even in James, we were pretty bad at first! It took us two years to overcome our stage fright. Two years to want to be up there.”

It’s hard to believe now. Two weeks ago saw James take apart a theatre in Paris. Tim Booth played to cockeyed messiah to perfection. The French adored him. Their love for him was palpable. Does he feel powerful?

“Yeah, I’m aware of a power. The power of music, of the whole event. I get so much adrenalin going. I might as well be taking drugs. We’ve walked on stage before and the audience bayed at us so much we’ve tilted backwards, like in a fierce headwind! So we try to use it. We have to. It’s fight or flight. . .”

WHEN did James cast off their shackles? What made them embrace this dizzy, frenzied new lease on life?

“We toured earlier this year,” recalls Tim, “and it got ever more celebratory. We learnt how to celebrate. Look at my lyrics very closely, and a lot of them are very hard, extremely depressed. But every gig we played, people were singing them as great big celebratory anthems. When I remember how I felt when I wrote them, what I was going through, it was totally weird!

“But it’s alchemy really. We can transform depression into joy, and that’s beautiful. I love it. We’re playing two shows at G-mex in December, 10,000 people each, and they’ll be such a celebration! Completely over the top! I’m nervous, but I can’t wait.”

So what is it that James celebrate?

“I think it’s life,” decides Tim. “Vitality. Some kind of joy. It’s so hard to say it. The world’s a f***ing hard place, sure, but it can be a wonderful place, so enjoy it! Enjoy that painting! Enjoy that animal! James should be life-affirming.”

Is it accurate that James are called “eccentric”?

“I don’t like it,” Tim says, “it’s too light. I just think we’re open to chance, and realise chance means the subconscious. It arranges things so much easier than the conscious, which can only work according to what it’s heard before. The unconscious brain throws in random factors. It’s much fresher.”

How do you trigger the unconscious?

“Take loads of drugs!” A shake of the head. “No. Oops! I mean just be receptive to it. Mistakes can be great. They’re original. You can’t make mistakes on purpose. We wrote ‘Come Home’ by mistake! We were trying to play ‘Sit Down’. ‘Sit Down’ is the big bastard brother of ‘Come Home’, the big bastard brother who’s been to Strangeways!”

James have always been contrary. They sabotage themselves. It’s part of their left-handed charm. Jim and Larry tell me eagerly how thet deliberately make sets hard, set themselves improvisatonal tasks, “for a challenge”. And Tim, not to be outdone, says “Lose Control” may be their sole dance single.

What?! Are you serious?

“Yeah! It’s a good single, but don’t forget there are seven people in James. There’s loads going on! We can’t mix everything with the bass and drums up front. . .”

THE charming Tim Booth enthuses about his recent wargames debut, shooting paint bullets at bored executives. “I killed loads of people,” he grins, wide eyed, divulging plans to set up a band contest against Happy Mondays. Our minds boggle en masse at the prospect Of Bez wielding a paint gun.

How personal to Tim Booth are James’ songs?

“Songs I though were very external to me turn out at a very later date to be personal,” he says. “I wrote a song about Jimmy Swaggert, or thought I had, and it turned out to be about me. He was interesting to me. He had all these commands for how others should live, then he couldn’t live up to them himself.

“That works in my life as well. I had very set ideas how I wanted to be. I haven’t lived up to them. So, maybe, the ideas weren’t right! Maybe I should just live my life, and not have too many concepts about it. I haven’t meditated for two years or so now. I get angry a lot more. More impatient. I’m turning into a right bad-tempered git!”

Yet see James live, in 1990, and Tim Booth isn’t a bad-tempered git. He’s a cunning jester. He even seems to love it when the kids cheerfully bellow that line in “Come Home” where he glumly tells the world he’s become “the kind of man I always hated”.

“I was in a pretty deep pit when I wrote that,” he recalls. “It was so personal. When I first heard it on Radio 1, I was shocked. I’d never heard such self-hate on the radio. But nobody ever figures it out! They all just sing along!”

Do you resent that?

Tim’s eyes twinkle. He’s a clever sod. “No, it’s fine! It’s the transmutation of something dark into something very light! Good! The song has a depth written into it. Maybe people will go back to it, in the future, and see the nastiness. I dunno. But I appreciate people getting joy from the songs! It’s better than feeling depressed.”

JAMES’ fragile days are over now. They know their worth. They’re no longer spindly. This curious, lopsided, singular band have learned to dance without blushing, rock without apologising. They’ve followed their erratic, engaging vision for eight years, gathered disciples, never compromised. The hard work’s over now. Here comes the pay-off.

“How do I summarise James?” asks Tim. ‘Where do I start? All I can do is talk in very general terms. About vitality, and energy, and an attempt to discover things about ourselves and our relationship with the audience. We’re here to discover.”

Larry: “People always called us Manchester’s best kept secret. Then the secret got let out of the bag. When this Manchester thing happened, every band in every attic and garage was dragged out and thrown out on a stage for the press to look at!”

Was it fun being a secret, all those years?

“Well, secrets lead to gossip,” says Tim. “People gossip. When we can sell out a 10,000 people concert in two weeks, we know someone’s let the cat out of the bag! Someone’s told their friends! Now it’s time for James to be Manchester’s best-kept gossip”

So what motivates you to keep inventing new twists for James?

“We’re probably addicts,” grins Tim Booth. “If we tried to give up, we’d get withdrawal. It’s very compulsive. We don’t have a lot of choice in it. But this doesn’t feel like the time to stop. I think we’ll know when that time comes.

“We have a psychotic need to express ourselves in this manner,” Tim concludes. “Someone asked me yesterday, what’s our drive? And I said personality disorders. I just need to hit myself on the head a few more times! Then I’ll be alright!”

James have found the love. Their time is definitely NOW. I suggest you celebrate frantically.

“Lose Control” is out next week on Fontana. James play December dates in Glasgow, London, And Manchester.

Ready to finish off 1990 with a flourish are James. One-time prisoners of Factory Records, before being transported seemingly for life to the badlands of American major label Sire, James have grown up and lost a few like-minded souls on the way. And they have emerged in the past 18 months as a dead certainty for international recognition.

Monday sees the release of their third single for Fontana records. As their previous vinyl outings Come Home and How Was It For You? missed out on being big hits by a couple of hundred sales, is there any pressure for the band to have a top 20 smash with their new three-track EP?

James lead vocalist Tim Booth is quick to scotch that one:

“Not at all, really, in fact the record company wanted us to reissue Sit Down. But as our last single was a reissue, we felt it important to put something new out – only this time it’s an EP, although the A-side is called Lose Control.

“We’ve also done a different kind of cover of The Velvet Underground’s Sunday Morning, and I’ve put a few references on it to New York and drug addiction in a narrative at the end of the single, pertaining to the fact that I’m wandering the streets of New York looking for my man to score some sweet Jane, but he’s not around because it’s Sunday Morning. I think it’s less Lou Reed and more James.” So how successful are James at the moment?

“Well, it depends on what you call success? Our LP Gold Mother has gone silver. We were really pleased the way the album turned out, and we’ve already written most of the songs for our next album which we’ll be recording in January and will be produced by Gil Norton, who’s produced The Pixies stuff. Oh, and we are off for a tour of Russia just before Christmas, playing in Leningrad, Moscow and various other places in the frozen steppe lands.

Why would the Russians be interested in James? I thought they were all into Elton John, Billy Joel and Cliff Richard?

“Well, we’ll be a pleasant antidote to that kind of stuff. I’m looking forward to playing there, although we’ll be bringing cans of beans with us as there are some major food shortages there.”

Were you disappointed that How Was It For You? and Come Home weren’t hit singles?

“Yes, but only because we missed out on Top Of The Pops by a couple of places. We couldn’t get any daytime radio play for those particular singles, probably because of the sexual content in the lyrics, which was annoying as they weren’t sexual insofar as they were suggesting anything immoral. In fact, we missed out on having the video for How Was It For You shown on television as the video had me singing underwater. Probably afraid someone might copy me and drown.”

James have, it would seem, arrived to save pop from over-hype and stagnation. When they supported David Bowie at Maine Road this year, it was widely known that Mr Bowie selects his own support acts. They supported The Cure at Wembley and stole the show at Glastonbury. On the famous long-sleeved t-shirt front, Beats International had a couple of members performing on Top Of The Pops wearing James t-shirts, and the band are now in a position to easily sellout 2,000 capacity venues all over the country. So has Tim Booth changed over the past few years from overly thoughtful indie rebel to sexy growling rock n roller?

Tim laughs “Certainly not changed in that way. I think I’m mutating slowly.”

Jim : My name’s Jim from James. It’s named after me actually because I’m the most talented and best looking in the band.

So I started playing bass guitar and about two weeks after I got it, we did our first gig, we couldn’t do anything, after two weeks of playing guitar you can’t do anything, nothing. We practised in the scout hut and the scoutmaster used to play acoustic guitar and sit round singing “Gingangooly”. We used to get him to tune the guitars then carry them on the bus trying not to bang the machine heads and knock them out of tune. So I got him to tune the bass and we went and did this gig. The singer, I got this lad to sing and he decided he wasn’t going to do it, totally bottled out, so I volunteered to sing, so I got really pissed, totally ratarsed and got up and made some noises in the microphone. The British Legion in Eccles.

Larry : I’d been in quite a few bands and I decided I was going to give up and I didn’t know what I was going to do with my life. I started to give guitar lessons. Paul, the original guitarist, and Jim were my first pupils and I began to realise they weren’t responding to it, playing chords in a certain way, they had their own distinctive style. They invited me down to a couple of practices and that’s where the trouble really started. I went down to the practice and I expected them to be doing things like influential covers and whatever and after about five minutes or something like that they’d play this noise and certain things you could start hearing music in it. It was very random, very abstract but there was something in it.

Tim : We’ve got a tradition, that’s how we feel. We’re really proud of all our old records, right from the start, the awkward ones as much as now. And we just follow our path and we can’t alter that path to get rich or to get famous. Our path is our path.

Jim : We think we’ve managed to keep some integrity as people and in the music through a lot of hard times and we have gone through a lot of hard times. And you know we think the music’s great. We think the music’s very special.

Obviously there’s going to be a lot of challenges there and a lot of rubbish individually that we’ve got to come to terms with. I mean if you’ve got like tonight you’ve got 12,000 people telling you how amazing you are, it’s hard not to rub off and for you to go “Yeah, I am, aren’t I?”

Larry : Sometimes I think we really deserve it when we do a fantastic concert and I know the audience are cheering, they’re not just cheering us, they’re cheering what’s been happening, what’s coming off the stage, what reaction it’s having. And that they’re being lifted, you’re being lifted and it really comes together.

There’s different kinds of relationships within the three of us. Sometimes I’ve been closer to Tim, other times I’ve been closer to Jim. It changes a lot like that. Now there’s seven of us, the interaction is that much greater. There are some very solid friendships and there are some acquaintances.

If there’s one thing we got criticised for around 1985-86 from people who saw us live, they loved what we were doing but we were very insular. The audience just stood and watched these people on stage and there was no interaction between us and the audience whatsoever. And it was a criticism that got through to us that we can’t stand in the audience and see how we are and we could tell from what they were saying that yes it was true. So in a way we had to learn to open up what we were doing on stage to the audience so that they could see what was going on.

Tim : Adrenalin produces a fight or flight reaction. and we tend to fight. But you get this kind of “Woooaaahhh”, real buzz.

The people who come and see our concerts, they have really high expectations. You know you’ve got to top the gig you did last time, it’s at that level.

The lyrics are quite hard and they’re often self-critical or self-abusive. So I think the audience wouldn’t think I was a particularly nice person. I don’t try to make myself out to be a particularly nice person. I just try to write lyrics that reflect me. Some of them are not nice and some of them are. Some of them are funny and some of them are quite depressed. There’s a big variety in there.

The early James, for years we used to hate it. And we used to keep out heads down and play and keep really quiet and I used to dance very aggressively.

But now most of the concerts are really good but only a few of them are magical. For us. You can’t sleep. That’s the whole night gone and you’re not going to sleep. And you just feel very alive. And that’s wonderful.

Take our hand and let us lead you through 72 hours on the road with James – herbal tea and guarana-driven wholemeal bread-heads back from the dead and on a hometown rampage in a Ned’s t-shirt (small).

“It’s such a feeling yeeeah! It’s such a feeling Wooooah!” Blitzed out of their minds at two in the morning, a group of sleet-soaked lads in office suits stumble merrily through the gnawing cold of central Manchester, belching out the rising coda to How Was It For You?

Three hours after witnessing the celebratory communion of James final G-Mex show, they have alco-smashed out of company-car consciousness into a state of heightened oblivion.

The song that they’re bellowing is a viciously penned meditation on the psychology of abandoning yourself to drink and drugs, but I don’t think they can give a flying f__k about that. They’re having a fine time as it is. Probably better than if they’d been to see Gary Glitter’s Christmas Gang Show.

That was the last warbling echo of three days on the road with James that had started on the most chilling note possible, and ended with a grin. The 48 hours that turned in 72 hours had been but 30 minutes old when the dread realisation dawned that it would be absolutely unthinkable to ask Tim Booth the top pop triv question “What did you have for breakfast this morning?” Armed with a battery of crushingly banal enquiries the journalist sloped into the backstage catering room of James gig at Brixton Academy, prepared to smugly trivialise into Milli-Vanillidom the Oedipally fixated, quiche eating, earnest pop misfits James, with their holier than thou Jesus sandals intelligence and intacto integrity. Un-funnily enough, that isn’t how it worked out.

Fifteen minutes amidst the backstage atmosphere of veggie cooking, polite sobriety and intense preparation and the journalist is listening straight-faced to Tim Booth explaining that they have a masseuse backstage to help them relax before a concert. “Better than getting stoned,” suggests the snide journalist. “We don’t do drugs,” snaps Tim, convincingly. Then he’s off, enthusing about David Lynch’s re-invention of 50’s pop, speculating on the expected weirdness of the band’s pre-Christmas tour of Russia and dipping into a quick appraisal of Czech novelists. “I’m more into Kundera than Kafka,” says Tim, like someone who’s actually read the books. “Kafka’s not very good with sex, is he?” And finally, the hammer blow to mockery is delivered in the form of an innocent looking fax.

The fax is a letter from the family of a young James fan who died tragically this summer. The kid had a ticket to see James in Manchester and the family’s request is that Tim dedicated a song to him at their G-Mex show. It would mean a lot to them. There is a gobsmacked silence backstage as Tim stares at the letter.

“We’ve had a few like that,” he says. “I’d rather you didn’t mention it, actually.” Many hours later, when I suggest to Tim that it must be frightening for a mere pop group to become involved with such serious feelings, he agrees to having the letter mentioned.

“I’m just worried because there’s a real fine line between something like that happening and exploiting it,” says Tim. “I don’t want to be like the politican after a disaster, turning up at the hospital to kiss the injured. But it has happened a few times and it’s really touching and things like that really move you.”

You’re not scared by it then?

“No. Because when I was 17 someone like Patti Smith was hugely important in my life. Hugely important. Like a complete lifeline in an environment that I felt was totally hostile. And there was suddenly something that I could totally relate to, and made me feel that I wasn’t crazy after all. And I feel that we supply that for some people, and in that respect, I don’t see us like a pop group at all.”

“That’s what Sit Down’s about, and that’s why they particularly respond to that song. Y’know ‘I’m relieved to hear that you’ve been to some far out places/’Cause it’s hard to carry on when you feel all alone.’ It’s a song for the darkest hour.”

“So it doesn’t frighten me. I’m really happy when people take us that seriously. Because I’ve taken things that seriously, and they’ve helped me that much, and stopped me going crazy, and made me feel that I could keep going.”

Spending three days on the road with James at this stage of their existence is like watching the tightrope walker half way over towards applause and bow-taking. Ahead of them lies a prize that says “Most Important Band Since…” Beneath them on the sawdust lie the mangled windbag bodies of Rock Hams who overdid it – Bono, Kerr, Gary Glitter and friends.

In the past 12 months, James have gone from being a seven-year running, cult Manc soap opera to prime-time networked public exposure. This year, resigned to a major label, they hit the Top 40 for the first time with How Was It For You? and Come Home. Their summer World Cup tour ended triumphantly with two glorious nights in Blackpool. Their Gold Mother album, the first time they’d come close to capturing their deep power on an LP, went silver. And their T-shirts were everywhere.

Now, on a brief pre-Christmas tour of major league venues, including two sell out nights in the enorma-dome of G-Mex, they are being interviewed and videoed like never before and meeting the kind of over-the-top audience reaction that would’ve embarrassed Christ into retirement.

At James Brixton show, despite the set lacking their usual fire (although Tim is as fascinatingly energised as ever) the entire audience follows the pre-set tradition of folding to the floor and dancing cross-legged on their bums for Sit Down. They look like worshippers at the feet of Maharishi Tim. When Sit Down’s euphoric, anthemic rallying cry for the alienated (with its Gary Glitter Rock n Roll Part One drum intro) is re-released next year, James will have to dance pretty clever to avoid becoming the type of band they’ve always hated.

“I feel embarrassed when everyone sits down,” says Tim. “That’s probably the primary…. No it isn’t… You get mixed emotions. You’re really touched, a bit embarrassed, and you’re a bit frightened. Ultimately, it’s really moving, but I’m up there panicking, thinking ‘How long before it becomes a cliche?'”

“We’re worried about this song. I’m frightened of Sit Down becoming the only song that people want to come and hear. But, James is so awkward that I swear that if it got out of hand we’d stop playing it.”

“It’s getting that balance between showmanship and it being real. Like tonight, you could say I was performing, and in one way I was. but I felt totally convinced of what I was doing.”

Are you ever worried that you’re turning into Gary Glitter?

“F–k off! But on other nights I’ve gone on and felt really embarrassed and my body’s felt awkward. Everything I’ve done has felt like a performance. What I’m trying to do is make a distinction between hollow theatere and …. Well it might just be the distinction between bad theatricality and good, between striking postures and poses, which is what most rock is about, and a theatricality where I’m totally into what I’m doing, so I’m totally convinced… And it’s a weird state to be in.”

These are indeed weird times for James as they attempt to cope with the transition into the big rock world without becoming caricatures. They do, however, have certain built-in advantages in that respect. Like an off-stage unobtrusiveness that borders on invisibility.

The ‘after gig drink’ at Brixton Academy is about as wild as a Sunday afternoon spent reading the papers in a country pub. The next day’s flight up to Manchester passes completely without incident. And when they arrive at the airport, Tim, who is yet to sleep after the Brixton show (having eschewed the traditional frontman’s post-gig relaxant of eight cans of Red Stripe and a spliff) heads for bed.

Then, in the afternoon, the arguments start. After soundchecking (intensely) in the imposing empty hulk of the G-Mex the band sit in the catering room, running through the day’s business. First up is a lengthy and unresolved discussion over who should produce the next single. I vote for Lee Perry, but noone seems to go for this. Then the daily grudge match over the set list (which they change every night) begins. Starring Tim, guitarist Larry, bassist Jim and James manager (and Mum to the Booth family baby) Martine, it goes like this.

“Are these just songs we can rearrange in any order then?”

“I’m doing that because I’m a difficult bastard”

“I’m not happy. There’s too many slow ones.”

“I’m going to do that one if I have to do a f–kin’ vocal solo.”

“What about the lighting people?”

“You’re interfering”

“Alright then. Write the f–kin’ thing out yourself.”

At the front of G-Mex, £40,000 worth of James T-shirts are being set out on the merchandising stalls. In the production office, the video crew for the next night are fighting for backstage passes. Does it ever bother you, I ask Jim, trumpeter Andy and garrulous violinist Saul, that Tim gets all the attention/.

Jim : “No. Well, a teensie weensie bit. But it’s just one of those things. We know what we put into James but it’s just like you’ve got to remember that. Then there’s like a f–kin’ article in the paper and it’s like ‘Tim Booth and his backing band’ But you can’t get too pissed off about that.”

Saul : “He’s very popular on the roar-o-meter”

Do you ever worry he’s turning into Gary Glitter?

Jim : “All the time, actually. Yeah, if he wears any more…. No, but do you think it’s a bit over-dramatic? I think sometimes we walk a fine line, especially when gigs aren’t going well. We act.”

Saul : “We’ve become really big, like this big powerful sound. I’d like to hear it going a bit weirder.”

So you argue a lot?

Jim : “Yeah, all the time”

Andy : “We do hate each other. Quite a lot.”

On the first night at G-Mex, the Booth-chosen moody intro track of Chris Isaak’s Wicked Game gives way to the screams and hooting claxons of the footy-sized and predominantly dead young James audience. In a set of escalating brilliance, the band carry off their mellower moments (like the haunting new single Lose Control) with ease. They adrenalin whip through the rush and rattle songs (Whoops, Bring A Gun, Johnny Yen) and supply anthems-a-plenty with What For, Come Home and Sit Down. Spasm dancing like a man with 40,000 volts up his bum, and even clambering into the crowd at one point, Booth is a consummately wired focus.

James show no sign of having a problem with projecting themselves into the hall of Rock Hugeness. And it is something of a medium-sized miracle to witness a band who have made few – if any – accommodations to bagginess, putting over songs about God, sex, soul-suffering and madness to 9,000(ish) Manc raver teens. Especially since that band comprises (trivia fans) a worrying guilt-racked Correspondent(RIP)-reading singer (Tim), a Jack Nicholson fan, family-man guitarist (Larry), a sly, Viz-reading bassist (Jim), a dress-wearing trumpeter (Andy), a neurotic Nabokov-reading violinist (Saul), a non-talking keyboardist (Mark) and a right-on drummer (David) who plays Welsh dance music in his spare time. It’s all a bit ‘against all odds’.

But there are moment at G-Mex, like when Tim sombrely introduces Stutter as ‘a song about losing your faculties; and a unseemly number of fans scream “Woooaah! Yesssss!”, when you have to wonder. You have to wonder whether James newly widened audience actually gives a nana about all that agonised stuff.

After the first night in Manchester, The Most Intense Man In The World, now in the grip of post-gig adrenalin fever, eyes me even more intensely than usual. So I put it to him that some of the fans seem to be just waiting for the sing-a-long songs. And mighn’t he just as well be singing ‘We’re all going down the pub’ as ‘God only knows’?

“Is this a wind-up or do you actually feel that?” says Tim, taking a deep breath. “A lot of my lyrics are quite dark and quite sad, but the audience take it and turn it into a celebration. And that’s lovely. So the more twisted we can make it, and it still be a celebration… That’s a wonderful contradiction.”

“It’s harder to pull off slow sets in Britain now, because people are used to the adrenalin buzz with James. But we can play slow songs and hold an audience. Maybe you have a point, but I’m not interested in that. I’m not interested in becoming a figure of popular appeal if that means we get castrated in the process.”

The Saturday afternoon following the first G-Mex show, Manchester is lashed by the sleet and snow of the nationwide cold snap, presumably summoned up by James new line in snowflake T-shirts. Two hours before the G-Mex doors open there are already 20 or so of the younger and bloody stupider of the woolly-hatted hordes getting ice-whipped outside the venue.

Inside, James have reconvened to go through the day’s picky preparations all over again. There is an added tension in the air caused by the presence of the video crew, there to document the show. After a sleepless night spent wrestling with erotic thoughts in a hotel room which “smelled of sex”, Tim Booth is nevertheless up for a chat about, erm, sensory depravation tanks and mind expansion.

There is a none too serious but noticeable difference between Tim and the rest of James. You talk to Larry about his family. Saul will joke around confessing to scenes of “disgusting greed” when the band were recently presented with a roomful of free Levi’s gear. With Tim, however, the tone is unavoidably analytical. Tortured, almost. Already on this tour, he has lost enough weight to mean that his free Levis no longer fit. Usually he loses about a stone on tour. The previous night, Tim had been led to ponder on how a weirdo (anxious, doubt-ridden variety) like him, copes with being in showbiz (sort of)

“Erm…Phew! I think I’m probably fairly schizophrenic. So I can switch into another mode as well. There’s a whole load of politics that go with being in a band that we payed no heed to for the first seven years, and as a result didn’t get anywhere near publicity. Now we pay heed to a whole load of games…. interviews, photographs, shaking hands, kissing babies… eating babies. And only once or twice does my… I mean, I have done some things which are diplomatically highly incorrect.”

You seem like this controlled person who’s fighting a constant battle to maintain that control. “Mmmm Lose control? The image of Lose Control is I think more important to me as an idea of breaking out of personality, breaking out of physical limits. Not so much going mad, just wanting to push reality to its limits, to see if there’s anything more.

“I’m quite confrontational. I’m not a particularly easy person to be around. And to really want to push a song, like OK, where’s that going to?… And the same with myself. Push my body. Y’know, how much can I do? That’s really a big drive.

“That’s the idea of losing control…. ‘Shake my body, release my soul’ Y’know, break out of this, Because I think a lot of the time, people are really trapped within their own personalities. Really bored with themselves. And I can get really trapped in myself and it’s like wanting to f–kin break out… and to scream. Some people have said I’m starting to repeat myself in songs, but I think I’m getting more to the point of what I want to say. I’m saying it more clearly.”

Isn’t it all impossible? A bit mad?

“No, I don’t think so. And listen, I think it’s very common. I think that’s why people drink. I think that’s why people take drugs. I mean everyone’s trying to do it all the time. But I don’t want to do it artificially. Or at least, not very often. Because it has too much of a damaging effect. You know…. be careful, it’s big medicine.”

Sixty milligrams of Coenzyme Q 10 natural energy capsules have just slooshed down into Tim Booth’s stomach. Around him in a non-smoking zone dressing room littered with Guarana packets, health drinks and the odd beer, the rest of James are getting ready for the final show. Larry has been put into a state of nerves by the video crew who asked him how it felt to be adored by 9,000 people. “I didn’t know what to say,” he confesses. “I just sort of sat there looking embarrassed. I thought I’d get used to it all by my age.”

Dave is pulling on his ‘F–king F–k’ sloganed T-shirt. Saul is worrying that the snow has kept the fans away. And Tim is standing in front of a mirror trying to work out what to wear. “Motherf–ker! F–k I’m angry tonight. Or at least I’m trying to get angry. Bollocks.” Tim sighs, frowning at the pile of shirts crumpled on the floor. “It’s just the idea that it’s going to be on video. I wouldn’t give a shit otherwise.”

The doorway that opens onto the backstage area at G-Mex sends a sunburst of white TV camera lights out into the darkened arena where the swaying hollering James fans wait in near hysterical mood for the band to walk on stage. Eight years ago, James first photographs were taken outside the G-Mex building when it was still Manchester Central Station. Then they were still too self-effacing to even look at the camera. Tonight they jog on stage to face the crowd roar with a TV camera shoved up each of their noses.

From Tim Booth’s entrance on top of the speaker stacks, through to the moment near the end where he dervlish-dances himself into near unconsciousness and has to crawl stage-side for oxygen, the final show is pure drama. A truly uplifting mesh of black thrills and ecstatic pop. Fainting teenagers are dragged out of the crowd throughout. When James drop the volume half way through Sit Down, the entire audience sings the chorus, unaccompanied, for a full five minutes. It is shamefully, inescapably moving.

Tim Booth dedicates the encore to three fans who have died during the year and somehow, one James-ette dodges past the security men to scramble on stage and skip around madly during How Was It For You?. Bono would have made a show out of that. Booth, the canny bastard, just carries on dancing himself stupid. For two hours at G-Mex, James were the most important band since….

“You slag Morrissey off you do, you f–king bastards”

A sweat-soaked James cub standing next to me at G-Mex has sussed out that I work for the NME and is spitting Moz fervour in my ear. So I ask her James Corps friend, who seems a little less likely to stab me, if she thinks Tim Booth is like Gary Glitter.

“Naaah” she says “Gary Glitter wears platform boots. Tim Booth wears Jesus sandals.”

Thank Christ for a sense of humour.

“We were very naive back in 83” Tim had told me earlier. “We thought we’d be stadium level… I was dragged to a Bruce Springsteen concert, and I thought ‘Corny old American’ but it blew me away. Not really the music because it wasn’t very original, but it was more the heart of how much he was giving. I always wanted to be in a band that was like that.”

Surely though, Tim, you can’t expect that the commitment and intensity of James is all that’s going to come across? Isn’t it OK to be a clown as well as a poet?

“No, the jester thing I didn’t like. Being a jester sounds too weak. It would have to be more like a psychotic jester, nearly getting executed for saying all the wrong things at all the wrong times. Humour is very important, but becoming a wacky band, or donning loads of costumes… ‘know, it’s got to be hard. The songs have got to be hard.”

So in that case it wouldn’t really be appropriate to ask you what you had for breakfast?”

“Hash browns. Button mushrooms. Baked beans.”

And for the one and only time in my three days with the nearly un-mockable James, Tim Booth actually laughs.

Best Single – Wicked Game (Chris Isaak)

Best Album – The Good Son (Nick Cave)

Most Despicable Record – Most of the rest

Best Gig – The Pixies at the Manchester Apollo

Best Film / TV Show – The Cook, The Thief… (I saw it this year)

Most Memorable Experience – I can’t remember

What Did You Spend Most Money On? – My desires

Non-Event of 1990 – Political parties becoming greener

Person Who Made The Most Impact : Robert Anton Wilson

Details

Interview with Tim at the Hacienda on MTV 120 Minutes

When James played Blackpool last August, the father of a devout girl fan put the 20 strong entourage of band and road crew up in his hotel for free. After one of the finest and stickiest gigs of the year, bunches of daisy T shirts clung moistly to those fans who wilfully missed their last train to see the encore. Huddled together at the station, chilled by the sea’s breath, they froze their cockles off till dawn.

Earlier that night, an ocean of devotion swelled the Empress ballroom, as each and every punter parked their sweaty bottoms on the floor during a magical version of ‘Sit Down’. Seven years into their career, the ritual is fast becoming an integral part of the colourful James experience.

Today, in a Manchester studio, James end a six-hour photo session to promote the re-release of Sit Down. Originally out in June 1989, it failed to become more than just an indie hit. This was due to a Musicians’ Union ban on the video, which featured bassist Jim Glennie playing a log with two sticks, apparently putting lots of percussionists out of a job. A new video will be used this time ‘round using live footage.

“Jim was the model upon which David Lynch based his Log Lady in ‘Twin Peaks’”, says violin maestro Saul Davies.

“My log has something to say to you; it saw something that night.”

With that, he slopes mysteriously off, following the others home to watch that very same soap, leaving front man Tim Booth and guitarist Larry Gott to explain them. Why a re-release of ‘Sit Down’?

“It would have been nice to continue with new material, but we think that it’s fair to exploit our stuff if it didn’t get a fair hearing first time ‘round,” says Tim. “The mechanism to reach the public wasn’t ready at the time. It’s slower than James and we’re always creating. We have to wait for it to catch up.”

Released last December, the meandering and wonderful ‘Lose Control’ surprisingly suffered a similar fate. Tim proffers an answer:

“It was a really bad time to release it. It sold twice as many copies as ‘Come Home’ but didn’t get as high. If we’d released it in January or February it would have reached the top 30. Instead it got lost in the Christmas rush.

“Singles come to us about twice a year. They descend like the Tooth Fairy. We don’t know how to contrive them – they either come or they don’t. Phonogram wanted to release ‘Sit Down’ at the time, but we wanted to get some new material out first so we chose ‘Lose Control’ which is a lovely song.”

Explaining how James ditties ever find themselves on vinyl, Tim takes us through the ‘distillation process’.

“We start with seeds of songs and choose which ones to develop. In the past, the real test was to throw them on stage. If they get up and walk around you use them. If they roll around drunkenly you put them away. We’re taking less risks in that way now, though, because we’re aware of the standards we set with other songs. Also we’ve got such an intricate light show that if you throw a new-born under unprepared lighting it’s doubly shown up.”

Not that James are in the habit of showing themselves up in a live situation. Most recently they did themselves proud at The Great British Music Weekend. Was it fun?

“Yes,” answers Tim. “We could have played on all three nights. The heavy metal night might have been difficult because my Spandex tights don’t fit anymore and Larry would have had to dig his V-shaped guitar out of the closet.”

“Robert Smith had a good point when he said that the awards ceremony should have been linked with the weekend,” says Larry. “A lot of the people playing weren’t even nominated for awards and then you have this frothy dinner party much later on where they dish them out. The only thing connecting the two events was that Jonathan King was at both.”

How did you find the Wacky One?

“He was really nice,” says Tim. “He came into our dressing room expecting to get a bad time. We just took the piss out of him and he did the same to us. He’s just a professional bullshitter and provocateur. It’s hard to know how to react to people like that because they want you to react badly. He’s like a Julie Burchill or a Tony Wilson. I’m quite impressed with people who stir it and seem not to give a damn.

“I saw it was a real dance night and said we should end with a heavy metal song. Jonathan turned round and said, “If you do I’ll give you a blow job.” Anyway, we finished with ‘Stutter’, which is quite a thrash metal song, and then legged it.”

“We were quite impressed by The Cure. We approached Robert Smith about producing at one point. We’re impressed by longevity and keeping standards up for years. I worry about that a lot because my favourite bands always burn out after about two albums. None of them lasted as long as us. We’re frightened that we’re going to lose this level of intensity and creativity: that one day you’ll wake up and it will have gone, like a cloud, and suddenly you’re as bland as Cliff Richard, Phil Collins or Eric Clapton – hollow men.

“Basically you push yourself all the time. You have to keep trying to renew yourself, seeing if you can go deeper with each song. You have to keep being an agitator with your own material, never accepting that it has reached its limit. It’s a hard process.”

“Every band has at least one album inside them,” says Larry. “After that you’re thinking on your feet. You’ve got to keep looking over your shoulder.”

Mention the band’s clean-living image and obsession for all things green and you’re greeted with a patient sigh.

“There’s a press image of James which is becoming a bit of a bummer,” says Tim. “We’re being presented as Cliff Richard types; ecological, monastic, non drug -taking. Kind of the anti-matter of the Happy Mondays – and it’s not true.”

“I was quoted as saying we don’t take drugs, but what I really said was we don’t take them before a gig. I don’t want to advocate drugs, but I didn’t actually say that and it bugs me. The whole drugs issue is far more complicated than saying whether or not we take them. I don’t come out black and white like that anymore.”

Although not known as a ‘cause’ band who spend nights playing benefits for this or that movement, James did support the Serenaids concert at the Brixton Academy before Christmas, where all proceeds went to The Terence Higgins AIDS charity. It wasn’t a particularly good performance though.

“The sound onstage was comical,” remembers Tim. “We actually started laughing. There was complete panic at first but then you just give up, stop worrying and enjoy yourself. It’s the philosophy of ‘Fuck it.’ When you’re trying to get to an appointment on time and everything conspires against you, you think ‘I’m not meant to be there’. You reach this point of release. You put yourself into fate’s hands; you accept things. I’m trying to cultivate that feeling into a permanent, enlightened state of mind; The State of Fuck It”

Well I hope he didn’t use that language in front of the kiddy. Tim is the proud father of a 22 –month-old son.

“Having a child hits you like a truck – changes your whole attitude. The nicest aspect is that there’s somebody you love and who loves you back in the most direct, physical, unquestionable way. I’ve never experienced that before. I love him totally, without argument, whereas if you love anyone you can always question it in dark hours.”

Gold Mother to the bairn is Martine, James’ manager, designer of those T-shirts and backing vocalist on the new version of ‘Sit Down’.

“She’s got a good eye for design,” says Tim. “She came up with an idea that was as good in sartorial terms as the music. She’s got some good watches out now.”

A 10-minute live version of ‘Sit Down’ is on the new 12 inch. Recorded at Manchester’s G-Mex last year, it features a rousing crowd sing-along with much cheering and tooting of claxons. A video of the night will be out soon.

“It captures a very good James concert. It’s the best thing we’ve ever done. We’re very proud of it. The BBC people who made it rang us up the next day and said it was the best thing they’d ever recorded. When we saw it we thought, ‘Where do we go from here?’ It’s exhausting. At the end of it, I’m on my hands and knees taking oxygen from a St John’s Ambulance woman. I’d never watched myself before and I thought, ‘Jesus, do I go through that every night?’ It really made me want to give up. I certainly want to look for a different way of performing. I don’t want it to be so frantic. If anyone wants to judge James then they should judge us on the video. If they don’t like that, then they don’t like James, and that’s fair enough.”

Details

James perform Sit Down on BBC children’s TV show Going Live and are interviewed

Sarah Greene : Thank you for coming in. We’re really thrilled to get you on Easter Saturday. We’re really thrilled to get you at all, because you’ve been tremendously busy of late. You’ve got a big video coming out on April 15th. Tell us about that.

Tim : It’s a live video. Recorded at Manchester last Christmas and, yeah, it’s wonderful. It’s really good.

SG : We look forward to seeing that. Look forward to that very much. Now you have brought in some prizes.

Tim : Yeah, I’m wearing them

SG : You’re actually wearing them.

Tim : This jumper

SG : Let’s have a look at it. Give us a twirl. Terrific. A beautifully designed acrylic, I mean pure wool jumper.

Tim : Something like that. Cotton.

SG : We’re going watch mad on the programme this morning, aren’t we Simon? Because there’s an exclusive James watch. Can we see that? And the lovely Simon Foster is in fact modelling a t-shirt of yours. We are giving away lots of t-shirts, well James are giving away lots of t-shirts of the current single. This is Come Home. And CDs.

Tim : That’s the last one

SG : Yes, but we’re giving away the current one. He’s such a fan, he’s got your previous one, but we’re not giving away those but we’ve got the current ones. He couldn’t change in time.

Simon : This has got chicken on it

SG : It’s got chicken stuff on it, so we won’t be giving it away

Tim : I think it adds to it actually

SG : Do you think so? We’ll throw that one in as well, but that’s up to Simon Foster. What’s the question?

Tim : The question is an easy one. There are two members in the band James who have the name James. Which instruments do they play?

SG : That’s quite complicated. OK, two members of the band James and which instruments do they play?

Tim : Yes

SG : Okay, thank you very much

Tim : Thanks

SG : Good luck with the video and best of luck with the tour towards the end of the year.

Details

Rapido, dutifully reporting on some modern musical collection rising up uncertainly from the merry mists of Manchester and this week is going to be no different, lovely viewer. Well, it is but it is only in the sense that the Mancunian group James are actually very talented indeed. In fact, James have been going in various forms and line-ups since the early eighties. Back then, they had a mutual appreciation society going with The Smiths and recorded for Rough Trade. Now with an enlarged line up and singer Tim Booth very much at the helm, they’ve enjoyed major league chart success. Their style has won the hearts of Britain’s young and alive due to the fact it’s based on songs and substance rather than the usual mix of deranged cobal and meaningless lyrics we’ve come to expect from certain other sections of the Manchester community. James. Right here. Right now. On Rapido.

Currently perched high in the charts with Sit Down, James aren’t exactly an overnight success with eight years of making records behind them. We asked singer Tim Booth and bassist Jim Glennie where they suddenly went right.

Jim : I don’t think there’s been any conscious change by us. I think it’s always been a movement. James has been a direction that the songs have been changing, the music’s always been changing and the audience has been growing around that, selling more records. Yeah, there’s been a big jump in the last year. For a lot of people James are quite new in a lot of respects. It’s the first time they’ve come across us. But for us, it’s not been like from nothing to fame.

Over the years, James have expanded to a seven-piece replacing the drummer and adding keyboards and trumpet. Their latest album Gold Mother, released last year, shows off their new range.

Tim : Come Home is probably the most representative song in terms of the power on record that we’ve caught so far. I think Gold Mother is probably the rawest we’ve got, but we still feel we’ve got, that’s the area we can improve in a lot.

A Manchester rather than a Madchester band, James don’t see themselves as belonging to the baggy dance tradition of the Happy Mondays or the Stone Roses.

Tim : I mean we’ve had some really support from Manchester. We had some really difficult years and it was the support in Manchester that kept us going so we’ve got a great relationship with Manchester, with our audience there, and the concerts there are a complete celebration, absolutely wild, and that’s wonderful. That’s it, it’s more the people than the city. I mean, what’s a city? A place of pollution.

Manchester was like left alone for years. All the music industry in Britain is in London so they didn’t take any notice of what was happening in Manchester. So The Stone Roses had been going five or six years, the Mondays six years, and suddenly people turned round and said there were some good bands there. They’d had time to develop themselves by that time.

Despite protest songs like Sit Down and Government Walls, James don’t particularly want to be known as a political band.

Tim : I felt Live Aid and the way Bob Geldof was a spokesperson for that, not taking particular sides, speaking for that, I felt that was the only way it could be done because otherwise you just end up in one camp or the other and it becomes us against them. Divisive. And as soon as you get into that, we’re better than you and our beliefs are better than yours, it’s a joke.

On a sunny Friday afternoon in June 1989 is a tiny barely-furnished room in Rough Trade’s London HQ, two members of James were interviewed by a journalist from Sounds.

The main topic of conversation was the band’s imminent new single Sit Down. Tim Booth (vocalist) and Jim Glennie (bassist) were very excited about it – and rightly so, it was a terrific song – although it was noticeable that when “chart action” was mooted, the pair laughed darkly and intimated that they’d believe it when they saw it.

Booth had recently shaved his head; he wore a Moroccan skull-cap and radiated a kind of tranquil benevolence. Glennie was chipper, relaxed. But both shuddered and groaned copiously as every step of James career was discussed.

It was not, in truth, a great time to be a member of James. In fact, drummer Gavan Whelan had realised this and jumped ship shortly before, leaving a core of Booth, Glennie and Larry Gott (guitar).

Their major label deal, with American rock n roll tycoon Seymour Stein’s Sire Records, had collapsed after years of neglect, mismanagement and intransigence. From being 1984’s Band Most Likely To and 1985’s Band Most Certain To, James now found their suitcases unceremoniously dumped on the street.

They still packed out sizeable venues in their native Manchester, mind you, and they were virtually stars on the continent, but the further south they travelled from Manchester, the harder James found it to get arrested. Happy Mondays, The Stone Roses and Inspiral Carpets, all of whom had supported James in the not-too-distant past, were now coming along and doing a mighty thunder plunder, and James were being forgotten. Something had gone terribly wrong.

Their immediate contingency plan was to set up their own label, One Man, and put out an excellent live album One Man Clapping through Rough Trade. Money was so tight, they had to secure a loan from the Royal Bank of Scotland to do it. A measure of how low their star had plummeted was when their bank manager insisted on seeing a Manchester gig – he didn’t believe them when they told him how popular they were.

Two years have passed, Rough Trade’s in dire trouble. Sounds no longer exists. And Sit Down by James, re-recorded and released on Fontana, has made it to number 2 in the national charts. You couldn’t avoid James now if you wanted to. The James success story, about eight years out of schedule, is finally a dramatic reality.

It has been eight years of struggle, inspirations, intensity, tragedy, depression, stagnation, anti-careerism and outrageous risk-taking.

“For the first three years it was going to be a suicide dive,” claimed Tim Booth in 1988. “The band meant so much to us we were going to die for it.”

Die for it? Die for what?

When James first peeked out of Manchester in 1983, the overrriding impression was of a quartet of gentle, almost pathologically soft-spoken, possibly Buddhist, probably vegan nutters dicing with Olde Englande Maypole folk forms, splicing them with Smiths-like lyrical introspection and ending up with something thrillingly enigmatically unique.

Everyone saw in Tim Booth a frontman of wild purpose and hypnotic self-confidence… but pigeon holes were as cruel then as they are now and Green issues were not hip.

“We are not vegans,” fumed Booth. “There has never been a Buddhist or a vegan in the band.”

But they did come over ascetic and pretty stern. Frivolity was not a key factor in James interviews. What had occurred – and what is never discussed these days in James articles – was a total lifestyle volte face in the band’s camp. When they started out, they had been a confirmed drugs band.

“From Nick Cave to Van Gogh,” Tim Booth later noted, “most brilliant artists use some kind of artifical stimulant and, in creating their work, end up wrecking their lives. The intensity with which I love my work means that if I couldn’t create anything without fucking myself up, I don’t know that I wouldn’t go ahead and do it.”

When the idea of James was originally discussed, around 1982, Tim Booth was not the singer. He was a dancer, a Bez. The vocalist was a guy called Danny Ram, and they had a guitarist called Paul, who was the best friend of bassist Jim Glennie. This Paul, Glennie later revealed in a 1988 interview, got freaked out on drugs, and, over the course of several James gigs, became a catatonic liability. When he eventually wound up in prison, the surviving members of James, it is widely believed, decided en bloc radically to change their ways of life.

“Seeing a friend like that shot down like a plane,” recalled Booth much later, “we realised the reality of burning out. We knew so easily it could have been one of us. It was at that point that we decided we were going to make music so good it would make us high that we wouldn’t need drugs.”

They were tagged as “Buddhist vegans”, a reputation that gathered pace as they banned alcohol from their gigs.

“Because we’d been so deeply involved in drugs and drink,” explained Booth, “the reaction had to be equally as extreme. Just like any revolution….”

The three songs on James first single on Factory in November 1984, “Jimone” (pronounced Jim One), showed a band using daringly soft folk structures, stark lyrical images and vocal dramatics to create something seductively new. A 1991 listen reaffirms its appeal – it must have sounded very odd in the marketplace. Musically, it was kind of eclectic Smiths b-side via Brecht/Weill; lyrically it was precocious enough to intrigue a generation of bedsit dwellers.

But as the student franchise got tied up by The Smiths, James had to mop up the more eccentric branches of the wan intelligentsia with single number two, James II (usually known as Hymn From A Village). It was spring 1985 and Morrissey had declared James his favourite band.

They toured with The Smiths, lapped up the plaudits, left Factory for famous US magnates Sire and drafted in Lenny Kaye, doyen of Tim Booth’s beloved Patti Smith Group and all-round cool guy, as producer of the debut album.

James nightmare was about to begin.

Stutter was released in July 1986 to uniformly favourable reviews. People were still finding out about James, still getting to grips with the oblique medieval sing-song melodies, the strange stories and the arrangements that often seemed to come from a perverse encyclopedia of 15th century English folk-jazz.

But Stutter didn’t exactly do the truckload business Sire required, and the purse strings were promptly tightened. James would later claim, in a grim precursor of The Stone Roses vs Silvertone case, that they never earned more than £30 a week on Sire. In addition, they were advised by the label not to put out any new material for the time being. When the band wanted to tour, they were told they couldn’t because they had nothing to promote.

One swift re-reading of Catch 22 later, their manager resigned. James began work on their second album, one of the most convuluted sagas in recent rock history. They finished making it in March 1987 and a release date was set for May. Sire were unhappy, so it was put back. Then it was put back again. Then again.

“Each time it was put back,” recalled Tim Booth in 1988, “we kept thinking, It’s got to happen this time. Once it even got as close as two weeks to the day before the thing was pulled.”

The album eventually blew out eight different release dates as producer Hugh Jones embarked on a panicky, coffee-drenched, somnambulant full scale remix. Booth later revealed that choosing the running order of songs alone took four days.

By now the band were submitting themselves for drug tests at a tenner a day at a Manchester hospital just to pay for rehearsal time.

The second James album, Strip-Mine, emerged in September 1988, 16 months overdue. It had been one hell of a gestation period. Reviews were muted, confused, largely unimpressed. Gavan Whelan, the drummer, walked out.

“We nearly called it a day, there and then,” Larry Gott told Select in July 1990. “We knew that whatever the next person said would decide whether it went one way or another.”

The One Man Clapping album kept the wolf temporarily from the door – check the bitterness of Burned, the anti-Sire song, and a highly successful UK tour saw James make three adroit line-up changes. Dave Baynton-Power came in on drums, Mark Hunter appeared on keyboards and a stunning utility player called Saul Davies took on the violin, as well as additional guitar and even drums. Since then Andy Diagram, an erstwhile Diagram Brother and Pale Fountain, has been added on trumpet, to fill out the sound to unprecedented levels. James sound, Tim Booth admits, is now “orchestral madness”.

The lunacy has spread to the charts. What was once a rueful daydream is now hard fact. The 1990 James album Gold Mother breezed into the album charts on release, and, when reissued last month with two slight alterations in tracklisting, entered the charts at an astonishing number two.

Throughout 1990 the patented James t-shirts have done a ridiculously good trade, bringing in £2,000 plus a week. And finally, finally, the media’s reluctance to find a place in all the Manchester madness for James has subsided, and now it’s as if they had an invite to the party all along.

Sit Down, meanwhile, as anthemic as any single this year, has already booked its place on the next “That’s What I Call Music” collection. James have been utterly vindicated. The cliche has taken a well-merited kicking – James are no longer the best-kept secret in Manchester.

Details

Interview with Tim and Jim at Reading Festival in 1991.

It’s as if The Beatles never happened. Deafening screams that could slice your head off flood London’s Brixton Academy. The smell of teen spirit fills the air, a huge throng in matching T-shirts bob and bay the words, “Sit down next to me” in unison. Half of this sweating, salivating mass were still in short trousers when James stumbled into the pop fray. For the older and wizened half, James’ elevation to God-like status was, quite simply, overdue.

Remarkably un-phased by their crooked road to riches, Tim, Jim and Larry – the songwriting nucleus of the seven piece – are enjoying themselves to the hilt.

“We’ve been indulging in the spirit of rock ‘n’ roll much more on this tour, because we’ve never done it,” croaks freshly shorn and throat-infected singer Tim Booth backstage.

“It’s a bit strange, it’s like a new world we’re venturing into,” says Jim. “It seems such a contrast to what we’re actually trying to do.”

“This tour, the crowd certainly have different expectations,” Larry continues. “It’s hard to judge because our crowd has changed so much over the years. I hope there’s still some original James fans there. They don’t make themselves as known as the newer fans, a lot of whom are younger and of the female persuasion.”

Wham! Bam! It seems James have entered the teen sexdome. “I think there’s a lot of handsome people in this band,” Tim deflects. “I’m far too strange, too odd, to be a sex symbol though. Not with my dancing! What I do see is us generating a lot of energy and power onstage and some of that stems from confused sexuality.

“Some nights,” he continues, “when we go onstage we have real control, it’s really from the belly. Then other nights we’re completely lost and no one really knows what’s going on. It’s completely chaotic.” Indeed, most James shows are an anomaly. Changing the set list every night, the only live staple now is the anthemic ‘Sit Down’, usually their parting gift.

“The first four or five times we played it and everyone sat down we got such a buzz off it,” says Tim. “By the fifth or sixth time you worry that it’s a cliche but what you forget is that for that audience it’s the first time. I see it as the final chapter in a novel. But if you take it out of context you miss the whole point. There’s 15 or 16 songs before that which affect people in different ways, before they can join in on ‘Sit Down’. It’s a release. It’s a whole.”

Originally their ‘comeback’ single for Rough Trade in ’89, it took nearly two years for ‘Sit Down’ to do the business. but, they claim, there was no game plan.

“We should have had this incredible campaign where we could have taken over the world 12 months after ‘Sit Down’,” Larry muses. “It’s just like life, another day another door opens and if it looks promising you’ll go through it, if not you’ll check the next door out.”

The belated follow-up ‘Sound’, out this week, eschews the sing-a-long commerciality of its predecessor. With no real chorus to speak of, aren’t they playing with fire?

Jim: “Every time we throw our ideas into what we think is a single, it’s never the same as anyone else’s ideas. We’ve got no fucking idea. We love them all, that’s the problem. We just can’t get the distance to judge them properly.”

Errors of judgement have severely hampered their progress in the past. In early ’85 they looked set to become the next big cheese on the indie scene after The Smiths, with Morrissey’s full endorsement to boot. It proved a mixed blessing. Despite a rapturous response as support on the former’s ‘Meat Is Murder’ tour, James were burdened with a very dour, serious image. Gawky to a fault in interviews, they came on like anathema to the rock press.

“I think the serious thing really came from me, it didn’t really reflect the band,” says Tim. “In the early days we were called folky wacky vegetarians,” explains Jim, “and we had hard songs at that time. Some weird heavy hard shit knocking around and that small element of what we did was picked upon as a criticism. We spent ages trying to get away from that image.”

“I think we’ve lightened up a lot,” claims Larry.

“We were dour, we were precious, we were scared. We were entering into a big sea and you can drown very quickly. So we huddled together in our own tight little group, and we were very precious about what we had. We found it very hard to make snappy decisions. We had to let things grow a bit more organically and just see how it goes. And we still feel like that.”

Big Mistake Number Two was signing to Sire. Courted by label head Seymour Stein (the man who signed Madonna), they reached a deadlock on their unfinished second album ‘Strip Mine’, delaying its release for over 18 months. the band remain phlosophical about the time.

“It wasn’t like banging your head against the wall because we always had something – and that was rehearsing and writing songs,” recalls Larry. “Everyone perceived James through 1983-5 as stepping up rungs of ladders and then we just vanished. In everybody’s eyes we just seemed to disappear.”

Tim: “We were never involved in the business side of things, we just did it and it was at that point we realised we had to get involved. We were getting such a kick off the music at the time. we wrote ‘Sit Down’ then and we were on a real high. It was dead exciting.”

Jim is even more stoical.

“All the animosity from the Sire thing has gone now. It was our cock-up as well. If you put your career, your life, your future, all your hopes, ambitions and dreams in somebody else’s hands, is it their fault if they fuck it up or your fault for giving it to them in the first place?”

Eventually freed from that deal, James went back to square one: playing grass roots live shows, patenting their now famous T-shirt design and borrowing money off their bank manager for the live ‘One Man Clapping’ LP. Back on an indie label they transformed into a seven-piece and released ‘Sit Down’ and ‘Come Home’ or Rough Trade with luckless precision, just as the label hit its rough trade. ‘Sit Down’ entered the charts at 75 and dropped out again. Yet they remained undaunted.

“We’ve always had this weird self knowledge that we would get there,” says Jim. “There was no doubt. We just kept going, kept cracking at it. We always loved what we were doing and every time we played it to people they loved it. And for some reason the industry didn’t quite seem to fit in. And we thought, well, fuck it. Every time we went to the rehearsal room new songs kept coming and we thought, what we gonna do, call it a day? We’ve given it our best shot and it didn’t work out. We never felt like that.”

“There were just years of frustration which became our kind of driving force and we kept ploughing through it all. Obviously having no money and having set-back after set-back after set-back is serious hard work. I’ve never felt we’ve stagnated musically or even in the business. Each time we go on tour the venues are a bit bigger. We’re getting used to communicating to a bigger crowd.”

What they do refute, however, is that they’re on the verge of joining the stadium elite alongside U2 and Simple Minds.

“I think certain journalists are trying to put us in that bag in order to run us down,” says Tim. Jim: “I’m not arsed but there’s a side to what we do that I know is so big. Okay you can call that stadium but to me it works. It’s big and it sounds fucking great. But I know in that area we have to watch that we don’t get pushed too far over the top. Now we can create a massive sound do we push that or bring it back down again? Do we splinter it? I don’t know”.

“I like the idea that people think you can work and project that far. The thing I don’t like about stadium bands is that they’re overblown, larger than life. It’s the amateur dramatics that fucking get on your tits. And obviously I don’t want to get into that sort of bollocks, charging around like a blue-arsed fly so that people at the back can see you.

“The challenge for us has always been getting something that you can play to people that works in a way that doesn’t sound cliched, bombastic and crass.”

As the future, the possibilities are many. There’s a big world to conquer.

“It feels like we haven’t really started yet,” buzzes Tim. “It’s weird. we’ve only started playing Europe in the past two years really. We’ve never been to America, Japan, Australia. It’s only just starting – we’ll be touring for the next three or four years but it won’t be in Britain. It’s what we want to do, we want to take our songs to as many people as possible and see what happens when you hit a different culture. Variety is what we enjoy.”

“We’re only just ready for it. We’d have been in big trouble if it had happened five years ago. Now we can see all the pressure and problems you have to endure. And you can see why people trashed their hotel rooms and everything else. It’s bloody difficult if you don’t have friends and people around you to bring you down.

“I’ve got my own balance so I don’t go mad. It stems from years of discipline – self discipline and meditation – so I’m not worried about going off the rails. I still meditate but meditation’s not a strict regimen to me anymore. I’ve also got a brain machine for winding myself down, self hypnosis tapes…” The backstage James rider also takes in lashings of carrot juice, Guarana capsules and a martial arts expert “so we can feel empowered”.

Typically, Tim is thinking of taking more of a backseat in the future.

“I don’t like all the limelight coming down on me as a person. I’m seriously thinking of refusing to do interviews very soon because I’m embarrassed at all the attention. There’s too much focused on me.” Tim Booth the home boy is playing away.

JAMES BY JIM:

JIM: BASS

“I’m good at thinking up simple little tunes on the bass guitar. That usually starts the general hubbub of the jam that kicks off into lots of different directions and gets pulled away by different people. I’m good at starting seeds.”

TIM: VOCALS

“We work together quite closely on songs, he feeds off me when we’re jamming. It’s a two way thing; he’s pushing and pulling where he wants to take things.”

LARRY: GUITAR

“Larry kinda fits in around that in a really supportive way. When he’s not there it’s virtually impossible. He works out what we’re doing and kinda pushes one side or the other. At the end the three of us can create a song that sounds whole.”

DAVE: DRUMS

“Dave’s the energy, he’s the power. We piddle around with a drum machine but at the end of the day it’s Woarrgh and it can move.”

MARK: KEYBOARDS

“He’s very supportive: personality-wise and in his keyboard playing. He never gets in the way. We always have to tell him to turn himself up! He’s so unobtrusive, he really is. You have to pull it out of him a bit. He’s come up with some great stuff: the hooks in ‘Come Home’ and the start of ‘Sit Down’.”

SAUL: VIOLIN/GUITAR/DRUMS

“The spark of the band. He brings a good kind of edge, a kind of conflict that I enjoy. He’s quite firey, being a bit of a Roy Castle in the band. He leaps around a lot, he adds a good energy. You give him a space with a violin and he’ll soar.”

ANDY: TRUMPET

“Strange one Andy. He’s very much the wandering minstrel in the band, a little bit separate, doing his own things. We give him a long leash. When you give him the space he’ll take it, he’s not pushy with things. Great fun to have around.”

JAMES DISCOGRAPHY

Jim Glennie takes us through the James’ albums and previews the next, due in early ’92.

‘STUTTER’ (July ’86)

“I love ‘Stutter’ now. I went off it completely after we did it because it didn’t sound like I wanted it to. Now I’m really proud of it. I just think, Where the hell were our heads when we did this? Some of it’s really weird. It seems very different from what we do now.”

‘STRIP MINE’ (September ’88)

“A mixture of feelings on ‘Strip Mine’. I like most of it. I think on ‘Stutter’ we just did what we did, on ‘Strip Mine’ we werer trying to do something different. Musically some of it works, some of it doesn’t but the songs are great. There’s an element of madness that we should have let go more. Tim loves it.”

‘ONE MAN CLAPPING’ (LIVE) (March ’89)

“Our bargain basement album. I really like it, still. It brings back funny memories. ‘One Man Clapping’ was to fill a gap but there were a lot of odds and ends on it, old B-sides that we felt we’d never got right, never done justice to.”

‘GOLD MOTHER’ (June 1990)

“It wasn’t quite how I imagined it when it came out. I’ve got enough distance from it now that I can enjoy it. I felt at the time we were looking to push it again, put some balls in. I think we went for it on that.”

THE NEW ALBUM (Due early ’92)

“Youth (Blue Pearl, Bananarama, PM Dawn) produced it. His views were identical to ours so we decided to go for it. He basically just set a vibe. We were in Olympic Studios and he filled it with three-foot altar candles, loads of them, an oil wheel, a strobe for the fast songs, a load of kilns, rugs, flower displays and incense. We pissed ourselves laughing all the way through, but it worked. It’s got an energy, a vitality and a life.”

Phillip Schofield : Come and have a seat at the front. Always a pleasure to have you on the programme. That’s a great housecoat by the way – that’s a heck of a thing. Fabulous. I bet you can go straight back to bed afterwards. Welcome to you. I’ve got a couple of things for you here. First of all this has come from Christine Free who is in Swindon. My daughter Poppy is an avid James fan as you can see from the enclosed photo. There we are. There’s a nice picture there. Had her hair done. Extraordinary. So I thought if we gave that to you, maybe you could send her a picture or something.

Tim : Yeah sure. Find out her hairdresser

PS : If you’ve got time. The other one I’ve got here, we’ll get through the fan mail first of all if that’s alright, this is from Susan. Susan is in Greater Manchester and she’s done a whole load of pictures for you here. Masses of them. All sorts of stuff.

Tim : Who’s that psychopath?

PS : Let me show you the originals. Those are the originals there.

Tim : Thank you.

Jim : Who is it?

Tim : It’s Andy

PS : A bit skinny in that one actually.

Tim : Oh, I’m like that under this coat.

PS : Well you do apparently, I was reading all this stuff on you last night, and apparently is it true that you lose a stone when you’re touring? When you’re performing.

Tim : Yeah. From the beginning of the tour to the end, kind of. Not in one concert

PS : Does that mean you can pig out? You can have those as well. You can pig out in a major way before you go on tour because you know you’re going to lose it before the end?

Tim : Yeah, but not straight before a concert because you end up belching in the middle of a song which isn’t very healthy. As you’ll find out I think.

PS : Oh no, I shan’t be eating, I’ll be far too nervous to do any of that stuff

Tim : No fizzy drinks

PS : Is that right? Thanks for the advice. It’s going quite well actually, I’m quite pleased with it at the moment.

Tim : You’ve got a good teacher

PS : Yes I have. Got a very good teacher. Thank you. Let’s get on with that now. Going back to reading through all the newspaper stuff, live is very important, your live stuff is very important to you. I mean you were singing live vocals this morning on the programme. Is it important for you to get out and do it live.

Tim : Yeah, yeah

Jim : We’ve just finished a really big tour and that was great fun. It’s what we do best at the end of the day.

PS : My brother says it’s one of the best concerts he’s ever seen actually, really enjoyed it and that’s high praise from him by the way. A lot of people would say, apart from your fanatical fans that you’ve got, that it was almost sort of an overnight success. You’ve actually been plugging away at it for quite a while, haven’t you? Eight years or so

Tim : Yeah, me and him have been together about ten years and James have been going about nine.

PS : Did you feel comfortable about slipping out of that cult status and into commercial popdom? Do you want that to happen?

Tim : We needed the money so we didn’t turn it down. Because we’ve been going so long, we write all our songs through improvisation so we can’t change it so it doesn’t affect the way we make our music. We did, I think we’d had enough of being in that cult ghetto which gets tedious after a while and it’s nice to reach as many people as possible. We’re not prejudiced. We like to have young and old and families and their really young kids, it’s great.

PS : It’s alright being cult but it doesn’t pay the mortgage.

Jim : Biggest cult band in the world.

It’s taken eight years for Manchester pop princes James to become a BIG DEAL. But before the stadia of the world are rocked, there’s that tricky Sheffield gig – Stephen Dalton reports, Ian Dickson photographs

It’s not very rock’n’roll in Sheffield these days. Gone are your Def

Leppards and Saxons, prophets of a dying sub-culture consigned to towns more grubby and provincial than this oddly faceless steel city. And no longer is Sheffield Techno Central; its central grid of science-fiction walkways and flyovers no longer ring with the distant metallic thud of Fon studios and Warp Records. Not tonight, at least, because James are playing — and James are androgynous ambassadors from the planet Pop.

It makes perfect sense, of course, in this most inoffensive and neutral of Britain’s major cities. The classless crowd at the City Hall is as sexually and socially balanced as you will find under one roof these days, united by their simple uniform of primary colours and artfully basic band T-shirts. Students from the local Poly and youths from Sheffield’s grim Blade Runner housing projects are outnumbered by the band’s core constituency — high-street teenagers addicted to the clean and clever pop thrills these Mancunian minstrels provide in stronger doses than anyone else around.

Because there is something about James that cuts to the bone, an emotional depth and left-field intensity that few of their peers and none of their descendants can equal. Eight years of crippling bad luck and false starts does that to a band, especially when their final reward is the sudden sun-drenched glory of massive mainstream popularity. It’s been a long and bumpy ride.

After their sparse but immaculate early Factory singles and attractively angular debut album Stutter, released under the searing searchlight of Morrissey’s double-edged patronage in 1986, critical hysteria cooled. The band fell out with Seymour Stein’s Sire label over the shambolic and half-hearted release given their excellent second long-player Strip Mine in 1987, jumped through a legal loophole to record a self-financed live collection One Man Clapping for Rough Trade in 1988, before finding themselves in the absurd position of being able to pack huge venues without even having a record deal.

But 2000 Sheffield teenagers don’t care about the intervening years of poverty, illness and misfortune when the band found themselves back on the dole and deeply in debt. It doesn’t affect these youngsters whether James are on Phonogram — which they now are, with an expansive album, Gold Mother, and several awesome hit singles behind them — or Plastic Dog Records of Skelmersdale. What matters to any pop fan is the gorgeous sensurround sound this new-look seven-piece belts out.

James send a huge surging power through two chunky bungalows of speakers: violins, acoustic guitars, synthesizers, babies, personality disorders, sexual politics and whopping great singalong anthems the size of Norway.

It’s not very rock’n’roll, but it’s brilliant.

Of particular note: the rousing anti-religion battle-cry ‘God Only Knows’; a scathing attack on Sire and their industry ilk in the lurching lament ‘Burned’; former single and thundering pop juggernaut ‘How Was It For You?’• a sweet stroll through the Velvet Underground’s ‘Sunday Morning’ and a deliberately truncated ‘Sit Down’ purpose-designed to defuse the call-

and-response crowd hysteria invariably generated by their biggest hit to date.

Just occasionally, when impish choirboy Tim Booth trains the search-light of his maverick intelligence onto obvious targets like the Gulf War rather than his trademark psychological territory, James descend into verbose pomposity.

More often, as on throbbing current single ‘Sound’, they change into the acceptable face of stadium rock — wired and weird, lean but huge.

“The U2 you’re allowed to like” is the approving post-gig verdict of one friend and critic of the band.

Which obeys a perverse sort of logic: both groups lash fierce idealism to the clatter and strum of rootless neo-primitive polyrhythms, both emerged from a musical wilderness and both have advocated monkish self-denial in varying degrees. Tim was a teetotal celibate vegan long before his mentor Morrissey made sobriety sexy, which might explain why the band’s backstage gathering at Sheffield is so low on alcohol but piled high with tasty vegetarian cuisine. As befits their sensitive New Man reputation,

James sit around discussing poetry and art while their dressing room buzzes with wives, girlfriends and children. It’s a family affair, and 2000 light years from rock’n’roll as we know it.

As is longtime band manager Martine McDonagh, politely answering questions as the two-and-a-half year old son Ben she shares with Tim Booth — the couple have separated but enjoy a healthy working relationship — excitedly bellows the titles of James songs at her. Does she think the band are in danger of becoming genuine stadium rockers?

“In danger?!” laughs Martine, pound signs clearly visible behind shrewd eyes.

‘They are a big band, so the sound they make will always have to adapt to the venues they play. But every song they write is different from the last, so I think they’ll always retain some idiosyncratic character. ”

Part of that idiosyncrasy is the oddly feminine aspect of James, the gentle and androgynous side of seven male performers which Martine wholeheartedly encourages. It is she — along with Booth and fellow founder members Jim Glennie and Larry Gott — who has final say over band policy. “They’re not afraid of their femininity, they’re not out here to be big macho men or prove something. They’re not worried about their sexuality and they’re prepared to go out and display all sides of their personalities. I feel that’s something to be praised. ”

One side of their personalities James no longer display is the self-destructive dithering and crippling idealism of their early days: refusing interviews and photo sessions, turning down a prestigious support slot with The Smiths in America, waiting two years between releases. “There’s been bad luck and bad decision-making,” confesses Martine, “but I’m glad we made all the mistakes we made in the past, because if we hadn’t made them then we’d be making them now.”

What finally sent the band careering towards careerism was the “Madchester” explosion of recent years — in spirit at least — when fellow Mancunians and former James support acts like Happy Mondays and The Stone Roses benefited greatly from saturation media coverage.

“We very consciously avoided it but obviously realised we could use it to our advantage,” Martine admits. “We were very aware of musical waves at that point, having had our own one crash rather suddenly. We were aware the Madchester thing was a wave that would crash at some point, so we decided to develop alongside it but apart from it.”

Encouraged to think big by recent successes at Europeån festivals, Martine confesses she has been sizing up the potential international profile of James for the last two years. “I think in the UK we’ve hit a point where it could go very stale if we’re not careful, we’re going to have to be very creative.”

When she speaks of creating a buzz in selected territories and taking alternative hits to mainstream radio, Martine begs the question whether James are becoming just another packaged pop product. But she refuses to accept they have lost anything since their electrifying early incarnation besides “a bit of naivety. I don’t think they’ve lost their soul by any stretch of the imagination. You lose things, you gain things.”

James— The Movie: the touching story of a band who lost everything, but found themselves along the way. It’s possible, but who would play Tim — still a waifish waistrel at 30 with his little-boy lisp and wide-eyed innocence — Booth?

Even their sex-starved female press officer calls them “the kind of band you want to be your friends, and Tim’s the boy next doör.” Women, sighs the singer, only really want him for his mind.

“In the early days I was celibate, then I was with Martine for three years, and now I’m a free man — so I’m kind of frustrated! Some nights we do really sexual concerts, but unfortunately I don’t think people quite relate to us in that way, and sometimes I would like them to! I think we get a lot more… it’s going to sound really corny, but respect and love. And lust can be a healthy thing now and again. ‘

Preconceptions fall away minutes after meeting Booth. Educated at the same public school as John Peel before moving to drama college, the precious and po-faced crank we might expect overflows with gentle charm and dry wit. Tim is that rare and immensely treasurable commodity, a genuinely intelligent, eternally questioning pop star, even if he doesn’t take kindly to Simple Minds comparisons. “We can communicate with large audiences but stadium rock is a dirty word in hip English journalism, which is indie and white and sarcastic.

They aren’t going to like us if they know we can communicate in those kind of venues. When we did ‘Come Home’ everyone said we’d turned into a rave band; when we did ‘Government Walls’ and ‘Promised Land’ everyone said we were a political band; when we had a couple of songs on an acoustic guitar we were a folk band. They’re not listening — we’ve got fifty songs and maybe two or three you could say are in a stadium rock style. Two songs out of fifty — I mean, fuck off!”

Reviewers slammed James’s patchy performance at Reading this year as flabby and bombastic, but Tim dismisses this as the inevitable backlash against bands who become too big for the music press. His mind is on bigger horizons: Australia, Japan, America.

“There’s a kind of hollow stadium rock, where it promises a lot and nothing happens, and there are people who can play in large venues and still communicate in a very kind of personal way. To me it’s all part of this

whole English thing about success: I don’t think people in this country know how to handle success beyond a certain level.”

Tim protests that the set list he chose for Reading was deliberately difficult, overflowing with new material and not leaning too heavily on crowd-pleasers. He loves the celebratory atmosphere of recent James concerts — which reached a hysterical peak at Blackpool’s Winter Gardens last year when 3000 people sat down to ‘Sit Down’ — but is wary of becoming a Greatest Hits act. “We thought we could actually control ‘Sit Down’ but we can’t, it’s out of our hands now, we’ve come to that realisation since Reading. ‘Sit Down’ to me is like the end of a big book, the last chapter, and it has to be seen in context. I don’t like it overshadowing songs I love as much or more. ”

Perhaps Tim Booth overestimates his audience? At one stage during the Sheffield gig he thanked everyone for concentrating so hard. “Tonight the audience got loads of new songs and they really concentrated, and we were fired by it. Tonight I got the sense we could have played any song we chose, and they were willing to really listen, and that’s beautiful. The Sun underestimates people’s intelligence: I don’t want us to be a fucking daily newspaper, I want us to be challenging and still be big.”

Like The Doors, Talking Heads and The Smiths… the success rate at this game is pretty low — one band per decade — but James are ideal candidates to continue this lineage. All four bands are able to yoke the intensely cerebral wordsmithery of messianic, manic frontmen to savagely visceral energy and conjure up rock theatre on a visionary scale. When James tap into this soaring momentum, their anthemic majesty transcends everything on today’s pop landscape. Even when they wear waistcoats, a telltale symptom of stadium-itis, their passion and intelligence sparkles through.

“It’s not very rock’n’roll, is it?” coughs Tim apologetically. No, and thank God for that. She must be smiling on James at last.

MATERIALS

Jim : Crimpolene

Tim : Honey, massage oil, skin

WHAT ARE THE VIBES LIKE WITH YOU?

OK, thank you

WHAT DID YOU DO LAST NIGHT?

Jim : Got up, brushed teeth, fed cat

Tim : I can’t remember, I was unconscious

WHAT BOOKS ARE YOU READING?

Jim : Wide Ranger

Tim : Quantum Psychology, Kundalini Yoga, Time’s Arrow

WHAT’S IT LIKE BEING A POP STAR?

Jim : Very good

Tim : I’ve no idea. Ask one.

FAVOURITE SNACK

Jim : Dinner time

Tim : Love bites

FAVOURITE JOURNEY

Jim : To the centre of the earth

Tim : Coming home

WHAT DO YOU ALWAYS CARRY?

Jim : Shopping

Tim : Gravity

WHAT ARE YOU LIKE WHEN DRUNK?

Jim : Axe murderer

Tim : Benignly tearful

WHAT WOULD YOUR SPECIALIST SUBJECT BE ON MASTERMIND?

Jim : Green Green White Red Brown

Tim : The 39 Steps

FAVOURITE GAMES

Jim : Mastermind

Tim : Hunt The Mars Bar, Pick Up The Orange. Potential game show.

FAVOURITE HEAVY METAL ACT

Jim : Metallica, Stutter

Tim : Uranium

WHAT MAKES YOU LAUGH?

Jim : Funny things

WHAT RECORDS MAKE YOU CRY?

Jim : Really bad ones

Tim : Julee Cruise, Mary Margaret O’Hara, “Green Onions”

WHAT RECORDS CAN MAKE YOU DANCE?

Jim : Ones that travel down your legs and make your legs jerk.

KEY FILMS IN YOUR LIFE

Jim : Jacob’s Ladder, Blood Simple, Bambi

Tim : Sky West And Crooked

WHO DO YOU HATE?

Jim : Baddies

Tim : Goodies

PUNCHLINE TO FAVOURITE JOKE

Jim : “Never mind the porridge, who’s nicked the f**king video?”

Tim : “The horror, the horror”

IRRITATIONS

Jim : Questions

Tim : Negative patterns

FAVE MANCUNIANS

Jim : Brown paper packages tied up with string

Tim : Bobby Charlton, Anthony Burgess, Morrissey, Ben

FAVE GUITAR SOLO

Jim : So low you can’t hear it

Tim : Breakin’ In My Heart – Tom Verlaine

NAME THREE GREAT SINGERS

Jim : Pavarotti, Domingo and the other one

Tim : Mary Margaret O’Hara, Patti Smith, Black Francis

NAME THREE OVER-RATED PERFORMERS

Jim : Jim, Tim and Larry

Tim : Van Morrisson, Elvis Costello, Paul Daniels, Kate Bush and Prince (Ha Ha)

WHAT WOULD YOU LIKE FOR CHRISTMAS?

Jim : Lots of very expensive presents

Tim : Real love. Self-sacrifice

FAVE GADGETS

Jim : Remote control model of Cutty Sark

Tim : DAT-Organiser-Video-Walkman-thingy

HOW DO YOU RELAX?

Jim : Sleep

Tim : A large hammer

FAVE SPORTS

Jim : Mountaineering, hand-gliding, scuba-diving, parachuting, potholing

Tim : Hunt the Mars bar

WHAT NEWSPAPERS DO YOU READ?

None

FAVOURITE LAKE

Greg

MOST ROCK N ROLL THING YOU’VE DONE THIS WEEK

Jim : Threw my mother’s colour portable out of the window

Tim : Rowed with the guitarist

FAVOURITE JAMESES

Jim : James songs, and gigs, and t-shirts

Tim : Joyce, Swaggart, Kirk

FAVE SMITHS SONGS

Jim : “We want to be Smi-i-iths crisps, we want to be Smi-i-iths crisps”

Tim : “Hammer and the Anvil”

WORST SONG YOU’VE EVER RECORDED

Jim : All of them

Tim : None of them

FAVE THING FROM THE BODY SHOP

Jim : Dodgy, recyclable plastic bags

Tim : Sexy massage oil

WHEN DID YOU LAST BREAK THE LAW?

Jim : It was him, honest

Tim : Yesterday

FAVOURITE TIPPLES

Jim : Drinking

Tim : Favourite what?

FAVOURITE DESSERTS

Jim : Sahara and Gobi probably

Tim : Chocolate ice cream, cheese cake

EARLIEST MEMORY

Jim : 3.15am

Tim: The beginning of life on Earth, pre Greenwich Mean Time

FAVE PUNK GROUPS

Jim : Pistols, Clash, Old James

Tim : The Stooges

WHAT ARE YOU BAD AT?

Most things

FAVE KARAOKE TUNES

Jim : Never heard of them

Tim : Kara Oke. Some strange Japanese singer who never turns up for his own gigs

BEST ADVICE YOU’VE RECEIVED

Jim : What you need to do is try a cover version, have a hit then try one of your own

Tim : You’re on your own. There are no rules

FAVE SMELLS

Jim : Number One, Number Six and 11

Tim : Necks, hips, geranium, hair, bodies

FAVE SEASIDE RESORTS

Jim : Anywhere sunny

Tim : Beirut

WHEN WAS YOUR LAST OUT-OF-BODY EXPERIENCE?

Jim : Being born

Tim : Now. Are thoughts out of the body?

WHAT SCARES YOU?

Jim : Bogeymen and people shouting “Boo” loudly

Tim : Paranoia, no love life, help doctor

FIRST RECORD BOUGHT

Jim : Sit Down

Tim : Paddy McGinty’s Goat

FAVE SOUNDTRACKS

Jim : My Mum’s Sound of Music

Tim : Theme from Cuckoo Waltz

WHO WOULD YOU MOST LIKE TO SIT DOWN NEXT TO AND WHY?

Jim : The pilot

Tim : Robert Anton Wilson, Gordon Strachan, Jodie Foster, Ben, Martine, Kylie, Liz McColgan

FAVE MONTH

Jim : October

Tim : August

WHAT WOULD YOU FAX KENNY THOMAS?

Jim : Who?

Tim : A condom

HOW WOULD YOU LIKE TO BE REMEMBERED?

Jim : Who?

Tim : As the one that got away

FAVE CLASSICAL MUSIC

Jim : Ask Saul this one

Tim : Nick Cave’s “The Ship Song”

MOTTO

Jim : “Life’s what you do when you can’t sleep”

Tim : “Can you turn your guitar down Larry?”

Translated from French (by Goggle Translate, with as few edits as possible for meaning by OneOfTheThree.com)

Interview with Tim Booth of James, who were there before The Smiths; and all Mancunian groups are indebted to them

Posted on 12/06/1991
By Thierry Coljon

Later is better for James

The city of Manchester will never stop surprising us. After revealing the Fall, Buzzcocks, Joy Division / New Order, The Smiths and A Certain Ratio, the city invaded the British dance floor with the Stone Roses (a contractual dispute gagging since their first album), Happy Mondays, Charlatans, Inspiral Carpets and EMF to name only a few. The new musical scene only just started when James were already successful veterans.

Eight years ago, we were not yet talking about The Smiths but about James whose fourth album, “Gold Mother”, appeared in England more than eight months ago, finally after long years of contract issues were put behind them.

The sustained sale of great t-shirts kept them alive and the recent success of three titles, “How Was It For You”, “Come Home” and “Sit Down”, all taken from “Gold Mother”, finally allows them to taste the success which has to this point benefited all the other Mancunian groups which they had previously helped. And to hear the perfection and the freshness of all the titles of “Gold Mother”, it is difficult not to be under the spell of the strong personality of Tim Booth, the James writer and singer, when we interviewed him:

Thierry Coljon: Today, you’ll release, on Fontana / Phonogram, a new version of [the album] “Gold Mother”, with the addition of “Sit Down”. Is not better to leave the version of Gold Mother that was released a year ago behind and include “Sit Down” with a new album?

Tim Booth: It has always been thought that this record [Gold Mother] would sell. More than seventy-five thousand were sold in the UK last year, and then “Sit Down” later became a hit. Phonogram wanted it included right away in “Gold Mother”, we said no because it was not very fair for those who had just bought it. So we agreed only on the condition that people could exchange the old for the new. In Europe, it was more complicated because you had to negotiate with different firms but if some of your readers have “Gold Mother” without “Sit Down”, they can bring it back to England and exchange it.

TC: Your relationships with record companies have not always been simple. You left Factory to record two albums, “Stutter” and “Stripe Mine”, on Sire who did nothing to promote them. You slammed the door on [Sire] in 1989 [and self-released] the “live” “One Man Clapping”, and then left Rough Trade, who released the singles “Sit Down” and “Come Home”. Why did you leave Rough Trade, which still gave you your first successes?

TB: Sire had seen in us a light pop band from the north of England. That’s what they were looking for. It was fashionable at that time. They found our albums not commercial enough for their taste and did not do anything about it. We had to go elsewhere and find another contract with people more in harmony with our musical ambitions. At Rough Trade we found some lovely people who helped us a lot but they had a reduced idea of ​​what James was. They did not think we could ever have a massive success there.

Rough Trade loved our music but thought we were just a band for musicians and journalists, an alternative band when we were convinced to make music to please everyone. Rough Trade was not ready to do with us what they did with The Smiths because they did not believe in us.

They did not want to see us big, unlike Phonogram who believed it right away. Now it is all fine. We have proved that we were able to sell today more than The Smiths in their day.

TC: But how did you manage to preserve that energy and freshness for so long while seeing other Manchester bands come into your charts?

TB: We always believed a lot in what we did. We knew we would have a day of success but weren’t sure when.  This confidence allowed us to survive, but also the concerts that we never stopped giving, initially supporting other groups or at festivals. The surprising reaction of the public assured us that we were in the right. We also had a lot of fun working, repeating four, five days a week. We managed to live, some members of the group had kept a part-time job.

In eight years, the band stopped for two or three months in the summer. It was obviously frustrating to see the others on the hit parade, but we were never convinced that they were successful because they were better groups. For three years, we have only spoken of Manchester. We knew we had to take advantage of this fashion and quickly get attached to it because one day nobody will want any more Manchester groups. But we always intended to be there afterward. We have already proven that it is possible to survive The Smiths and Morrissey. The most embarrassing is that some people think that we are inspired by the known Mancunian groups while actually we were there before them, but with time history will be clear.

TC: You who have been here for a long time, how do you see Manchester’s scene, its history, its personality?

TB: We only know the groups that have appeared in the last twelve or thirteen years. We have the impression that there have always been groups in Manchester seeking to be original. That may be what brings them together. Putting them in one bag is a mistake. We speak quickly of “musical scene”, three groups are enough for that. When we started with The Smiths, we were already talking about the Mancunian scene. I find that the groups in Manchester have in common their belief that they never needed to change their style to be successful.

TC: You have been supported by bands like Happy Mondays and Inspiral Carpets, who appear on “Gold Mother”, in “How Was It For You”. You’ve said some pretty fierce things about the neo-psychedelic fashion influenced by the Sixties that most Manchester groups adopt?

TB: It is precisely so that they do not get lost in an excessive desire to appear. Fortunately, their music is more important than their sweatshirts and haircuts. And I don’t always like everything that comes from Manchester…

On stage, I change the lyrics of a song. What I write is less important than the interpretation of those who listen to it.

TC: You like to write words that easily become mantras or slogans when you set your music, in the same way as U2. You do not hesitate to take a stand. “Government Walls” is a committed political song …

TB: Slogans are unconscious. All is nonsense. That said, writing a pop song does not have to be an encouragement to cheap culture. I do not force myself, everything comes naturally from my head, I write as it comes to me. “Sit Down” is a celebration. I try to be positive but I do not believe in creating “happy” songs.

“Government Walls” comes from a very specific English fact: MI5, the English secret service, was used by the political right to scare the Labour party. The book that revealed the whole thing is still forbidden here because it says things we should not know.

“God Only Knows” speaks of rotten preachers. We immediately think of the Americans because there it is very obvious but it exists everywhere in a more subtle version perhaps.

The song “Gold Mother” is perhaps the most beautiful song ever written about the woman, the mother …

She talks about the birth of my son. It is a celebration of the courage of the woman. We never talk about the courage it takes a woman to bring a child into the world while we spend our time celebrating the courage of man when he goes to war or dies …

James: “Gold Mother” (Fontana, Polygram distr.)

Original Interview was at this link (now dead link): http://www.lesoir.be/archive/recup/mieux-vaut-tard-que-james-le-groupe-de-tim-booth-etait-_t-19910612-Z0428N.html

It’s taken James nine years, four record companies and the rerelease last year of Sit Down to achieve success but now nominated for Best British Band category at next month’s Brit Awards along with Dire Straits and Queen. The backlash has begun.

Tim : I think in England there’s a particular thing with a band having success which is hard for a lot of people to take especially when you see it come up from something small. You’ve been their property, their private band, the band that they always loved and nobody else knew about. When you become public property, something else happens. It’s quite scary for us too because we’ve always liked bands that never made it.

Singer Tim Booth, in particular, has been accused of being pompous and taking himself too seriously. He allegedly threatened to commit suicide if he didn’t find the meaning of life.

Tim : I’d got everything I wanted and I found I still wasn’t enjoying it. I wasn’t enjoying life. You kind of think that’s a bit ridiculous and just try and like enjoy it really. I was giving myself too bad a time as well really, I was taking it too seriously. I was taking the responsibility of the band too much on my shoulders . It’s part of my upbringing as well, it’s just that if you do this thing really well, it’s serious and well it’s the whole of the upbringing, it’s the whole thing with religion. Well I don’t trust any religion now without a sense of humour so that kind of knocks them all out really.

Whether you think James have a sense of humour or not, one thing nobody disagrees over is what James are like when they play live. Their fanatical following and the intensity of Tim Booth’s performance means the band’s concerts can resemble religious celebrations.

Tim : There’s a certain range of feelings and emotions that a mass of people can get at a concert that I think they should almost be getting from religions that they don’t and I don’t see anything wrong in that as long as there’s a sense of humour there as well and people aren’t taking us too seriously in that way.

Even if the band do come from Manchester and the James rise came at a time when Manchester bands were constantly in the media spotlight, the only thing James have in common with the Happy Mondays is the town they live in.

Tim : We felt we were before all that anyway. Well, obviously for a start, we’ve been going eight or nine years and we feel as much connected to Joy Division and The Smiths than we did to the Happy Mondays and the Stone Roses and so we didn’t want to get caught up in that wave because we felt once it had passed there would be a backlash and we didn’t want part of it. We were offered press that was linked with it and we’d turn it down.

But there are some things James have not managed to avoid. Sit Down, the single that turned James into stadium stars, became their unofficial anthem is probably one track they’ll have to play live for the rest of their lives.

Tim : We tried not playing it, we tried doing acoustic versions, we’d open all the sets with it and then we kind of realised to an audience coming along, it was fresh, it was something they hadn’t experienced before and it was us that had experienced it a few nights running and we ended up feeling like killjoys at a party, so we kind of accepted in the end that the song had gone public.

You didn’t miss them in the onslaught of English Ecstasy bands because James didn’t ride to #1 via the Manchester gravy train, even though they hail from that berg. James predates that fad by light years. According to band historian/guitarist Larry Gott, “James began in the dark mists of time”. Such heady musician talk puts the early 80’s somewhere in the Mesozoic Era, but in people years, thats nearly a decade.

Back in 1983 their first EP with Factory Records prompted alternative arbiter Morrissey to proclaim James “the best band in the world.” Imitation being the sincerest form of flattery, the Smiths covered their single ‘What’s the World.’ Five records, four new members, three labels, and two top ten hits later, sales and concert attendance bear out that prophecy. Gott reminds us, “It’s been five or six years since that quote. We’re all different people now.” Nevertheless, Mercury invokes Morrissey’s quote in case you can’t decide for yourself.

Apparently the meatless man still fancies them. Morrissey requested a spot on the bill alongside James for Amnesty International’s recent 30th birthday concert. “He did a song and the main lyric was ‘We hate our friends when they become successful. I think it was an affectionate little dig at us,” relates Gott.

You may have overlooked a reassembly of their 1989 LP “Goldmother” hiding behind a stripped-down neo-60’s daisy cover. This eponymous version omits two songs while adding “Lose Control” and the infectuous “Sit Down”, their charmed single which soared up the charts a second time, two years after its original indie release. That’s a neat trick every artist would like to pull off.

Excuse me, but isn’t it concert convention to get the crowd on their feet? A dose of james can cure such close-mindedness. Their live, full-length concert video, “James: Come Home,” recorded at the G-Mex in Manchester, will get you on your feet in your own living room. James’ stage improvisation is both a band and crowd favorite, and the charismatic Booth’s way with words and wails have made him a media darling. They’ve got youth dancing to irony again without the suicidal undertone of Depeche Mode or the self-indulgent apathy of the Smiths. Their misery is closer to the theraputic reflection of U2, without the profundity. Hard to get too serious with boyish Booth bopping in a franzy, his hair tousling, and his oversize shirt flapping.

When they tour the U.S. for the first time this year, expect to see a large, tight band which has spent the last year playing sold-out houses supporting huge acts like The Cure and headlining open-air festivals. Modeled on the strength of the E-Street Band (no kidding), James boasts virtuoso musicians each talented enough to front his own band. But it wasn’t always so.

Booth admits “we were terrible” at the start. The original members- Booth, Glennie, Gott, and departed drummer Covin Whelan- were more interested in new sounds than in perfection. Though that’s probably what attracted Factory records, the danger for a cerebral is to not connect with the audience. ” It was a criticism we had thrown at us a lot… that we were somehow insular and aloof,” recalls Gott, “and we didn’t realize because we we’re concentrating so hard.”

James worked dutifully to correct the flaw, gaining a reputation as a great live act. Then when they had great stage energy, their material just didn’t translate to enough people, or so the conventional label wisdom went. Booth reflects, “In the early days, our songs were like sketches that people had to interpret.” After years for searching for new band members, James found their ideal compliments within a four-month period. Perhaps fate selected Mark Hunter (keyboard), Andy Diagram (trumpet), Saul Davies (guitar, violin) and Dave Bayton-Power (drums), in time for James’ triumphant success with “Goldmother/James.”

“Aside from me, Tim and Jim, we’d only been together a couple of months,” recalls Gott. “We had songs we’d written and we tried to communicate to [the new members] what we wanted.” Now the whole band participated in a selection process on the material the cardinal three generate in jams. “We could jam and it sounds like shit and the next minute we write “Sit Down”- that took ten minutes! You can’t stop the song because it’s so good.”

Recent successes had a daunting effect on the group, though they overcame the pressure. “We’ve tried to write a song like “Come Home” and we can’t do it. It’s not like putting all the same ingredients in a pot and coming up with the same thing,” confesses Gott.

But what came out of the pot is very good. “Seven”, their current release, reflects the group’s maturity, in the studio and as well as in the message. Gott characterizes “Seven” as “James’ coming together.” Whereas “Goldmother/James” ranged from sincere to cynical about loneliness and desire, most of the songs on “Seven” imply the same deception, rejection, and shame, but suggest facing one’s fears can supply the strength to overcome them. Perhaps “Ring the Bells” will catch on, as it begs a tamer audience response.

James’ songs are soothing unless you really listen to them. Says Gott: “In the past, we’ve juxtaposed sweet lyrics with quite disturbing music. Juxtaposition is one of our fun areas. We write music that inspires Tim, and he finds things that aren’t quite so obvious.”

The hypnotic rhythms, ethereal subjects, and Booth’s precious vocals may remind one of Simple Minds or U2. He eerily whispers, “Strip away all of your protection… do everything you fear/in this there is power…”

“It’s hard to comment on Tim’s lyrics because they come from him. He’s saying something you wouldn’t neccessarily voice in public.” Can’t we get a hint as to the object of desire in “Next Lover”? “I’m sorry, you’ll have to ask Tim. If you think its an icon like Madonna, its not like that.”

Gott talks about his favorite cut, “Heaven”. Recorded as a straight ahead song during the session, the band included some weird overdubs that got shelved. The song was passable until producer Tim Palmer (Mission UK) got his hands on it. “Tim went through the cupboard, if you like and sorted out all these bits that really worked, and threw out the main song. He pulled out all the nice, slidey violins and trumpet, and blended them all.”

The beautiful result confronts a fatalist: “I’m waiting for the king of the world to come and rescue me”, with a challenge: “Are you waiting for the heavens to descend?”

As if to repent Booth’s doubts the album closes with a gentle “Blow Me Away”, a thank-you to the Creator, if you will. Life is cruel but God takes care of you in Heaven, he seems to say.

If “Seven”‘s songs seem to await that illusive, kinder, gentler thing that we’ve been hearing about, Gott counters, “It’s more of a sneaking suspicion that that’s not going to arrive.”

What’s sure to arrive is the band’s U.S. success. Will their inevitable success spoil James? ” In some people’s eyes,” concedes Gott, “because we’re not their special find, their little treasure. Once you’ve become accepted in a broader sense, a lot of people think you’ve lost that special quality. I hope it doesn’t spoil us. It will probably be the end of James.”

FOR JAMES, THEIR FIRST DAY IN AMERICA did not offer the big, big welcome that greets so many would-be British invaders of the land of the free. Within three hours of stepping off the plane at Los Angeles where they were due to make a video, guitarist Larry Gott was mugged. At gunpoint.

Tney had just booked into the Chateau Marmont Hotel (where John Belushi died and The Doors and Led Zeppelin disported) where they hild a self-catering apartment. Being a “buttie addict”, Larry had stepped down Sunset Boulevard in search of a grocery. Successful, he was turning back into the hotel side entrance, when suddenly his nape hairs prickled with a sense of imminent threat. “It came to me too late. I turned around and there was a guy coming up the steps towards me. I was about to react when another guy turned the corner, with a gun out. Then I knew that this was fucking serious; it was for real. Give us your jacket, they said. Give us your wallet. I said, You got it – it’s in me fucking coat. Then they casually walked down the steps, turned around and said, If you contact the police, we’ll come back for you.

“In the hotel reception I said, It’s your fucking country, it’s your fucking town; what do you do in this situation? Phone the police. They came: an old guy with half-glasses and a shorter guy with a crew-cut and a gap in his front teeth through which he constantly spat out streams of phlegm. They were more interested in finding out exactly where rather than what had happened; if this gate had been 15 yards further down Sunset Boulevard, it would have been somebody else’s patch. All this time, their radio was blaring out: two streets away a woman had been garrotted from behind by two guys who fitted my description; there was somebody held up at knifepoint, somebody else at gunpoint. It was constant.

“The younger cop asked me about his gun. He pulled out his gun: Like this one? I said it was also a black automatic but much smaller. As I motioned to the barrel to point out that theirs had a silver stripe, he pulled back and said, Touch that and you’re fucking dead…”

WITHIN HOURS, LARRY WAS BACK ON the plane to Blighty, with road manager Richard taking his place in the Mojave Desert-set video for the single Born Of Frustration. The mild violence James have a habit of attracting is not the least of the paradoxes that attend this band who are reputed to be hardcore brown-rice fiends and meditation addicts. So wholesome, indeed, is their image that for some years they have felt the need to undermine it by confessing to the odd brush with pharmaceuticals, and, more particularly, to send it up at every opportunity.

Probe a little deeper, however, and the 31-year-old singer will vouchsafe the sort of intense and bookish confession that has maintained for seven years his personal cult following among those rock fans who like their frontmen pale and interesting.

“Every artist I’d ever liked had often used drugs to get to a certain state of mind,” he declares, in his soft Mancunianised accent, “and I’d always been fascinated by the schizophrenic state of mind of the witch doctors and the artists and the persons taking drugs, and where those states of minds linked with the holy man. I read R.D. Laing’s The Divided Self when I was 16 and thought it was brilliant, then The Outsider by Camus, and the other Outsider, by Colin Wilson – a paper chase of books pursuing this theme.”

From the mid-’80s, James have been a deep and elusively meaningful band beloved of indie sorts and, since the Manchester dance explosion, of the better-read raver. But in their earliest incarnation, in post-punk, Joy Division and Fall-dominated Manchester, James were not James but a distinctly low-brow, punk racket called Venereal And The Diseases. Bassist Jim Glennie is the sole survivor. “A friend bullied me into it!” says the hitherto directionless lad, recalling his induction into a rock’n’roll band. This friend, guitarist Paul Gilbertson, is James’s lost founder member. “He’d bought a stolen guitar for a tenner, and said our group didn’t need a drummer because of drum machines, but that we’d always need a bassist – so get a bass guitar! For some reason, my mother bought me one. I was going to see groups like The Fall and Teardrop Explodes and ended up in a weird crowd, smoking draw.”

Armed- or burdened – with their aforementioned moniker, Paul and Jim’s group played their first gig: “I got the buzz, and listening back to our songs, if you can call them that, on a tape recorder, this crackly cacophony, I thought, Yeah!” The band evolved through a succession of personnel and name changes – Volume Distortion and Model Team International: “Paul had a girlfriend who worked in a modelling agen- cy called Model Team International, so we got T – shirts ready-made with the name on, until they threatened to serve us with a writ. So we called our- selves Model Team so the shirts would still be just about wearable!”

Which is where Tim Booth came in -not, at first, as singer, but as the band’s pre-Bez idiot dancer. A reject of the public school sys- tem, Tim was of a church-going family who nonetheless was elbowed unceremoniously from Shrewsbury for being a bad influence.

“I was thrown out of the back door, told to leave – and if I didn’t, they’d formally expel me. So I went.” The memory still pricks. “Then, three years ago, I was driving by Shrewsbury and I started shaking. Fucking hell, I thought, still some unresolved emotions here. So I went back for an old boys’ thing – and you’re not meant to go back if you’ve been thrown out – but I never really understood why and wanted to find out. The housemaster who threw me out got quite drunk and kind of apologised. ‘I was new,’ he said, ‘and I didn’t know how to deal with you.’ I wasn’t one of those rebellious kids who smoked on the fire-escape or got drunk; I was just different, awkward, and they didn’t know what was going on in my head. I hated school and they knew it. There’d be one guy in the house who’d get all the shit, and he’d usually be small and Jewish. His life would be made miserable; I was OK but I had to hide my emotions all the way through. At the end, I think they thought I would go wild, so they kicked me out before I did. They did it an hour after my last , A’ Level exam. Why bother? It was symbolic and quite unpleasant.”

Convinced that acting was a life survival skill, Tim went to study drama at Manchester University, where he was a contemporary of Ben Elton. One evening at the University disco, his free-style dancing was noted by members of Model Team who were there enjoying the subsidised bar. “Paul came up and asked if I’d like to join their band,” Tim recalls. “I’d drunk quite a bit and woke up the following morning with this phone number written on my hand with the instruction: 6 o’clock scout hut. I went along and there they were rehearsing – naive, two-chord stuff, but it had something. I like Iggy Pop for his state of mind but Patti Smith was everything to me. I went to two rehearsals then we had a gig supporting Orange Juice. I shook a tambourine nervously and sang backing vocals.

“After one rehearsal when I still didn’t really know them, Paul said, Let’s go into town. When, Paul was in the toilet, Gavan (Whelan, the original drummer) said, Now, you mustn’t be too upset if Paul gets into a fight. Fights seem to happen around Paul. But he doesn’t start them. Sure enough, we left the club and Paul wanted a piss, so he started pissing against a car, and this bloke came out and started fighting him. It wasn’t even his car! There were these two guys rolling around in the gutter and me thinking, Bloody hell, what have I got myself into?”

One member, Danny Ram, “ended up in Strangeways for GBH,” they claim. “The first press we ever got!” As for Paul Gilbertson, “he changed,” as Jim delicately summarises how the guitarist’s enthusiasm became diverted towards less constructive leisure pursuits. “He’d throw himself into everything,” Tim recalls. “He had a real naive enthusiasm – and no fear. That was his weakness.” Gradually, Paul’s self-immersion into other pleasures distanced him from the band he founded and Larry Gott, a former guitar teacher, was recruited to cover his increasingly erratic playing. Finally, they confronted Paul with the stark choice of getting his act together or leaving the band. “We knew he was on a self-destructive path six months earlier, and we thought, Let’s try to reach these states naturally, through medita- tion,” Tim remembers.

“We were looking for a safe haven for us -and for him. It nearly worked. But we lost him.”

BY NOW, THEY HAD SETTLED ON THE NAME James, like fellow Mancunians The Smiths, a starkly anti-descriptive handle in reaction to the likes of Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark. Keen to cap- ture on vinyl the nervous, eclectic guitar-rock with which Manchester club audiences were rapidly falling in love, they recorded two critically adored singles on Anthony H. (then plain Tony) Wilson’s Factory label – Jimone and, after a mystique-building gap of several months, James II.

“We only wanted a singles deal and told him why: inefficiency, and this idea that they didn’t have to promote a record because Joy Division had got massive without any promotion -apart from the fact that the singer had killed himself,” Jim wryly notes. “Bands on Factory would disap- pear because they weren’t getting promoted. But he got us what we needed: attention.” Supporting The Smiths on tour, James were assisted by the endorsement of Morrissey as his favourite band. “We were flattered, but didn’t think we needed the boost to help our career,” remembers Jim. ” At the time, we were concerned to battle the negative side -that people would think we were like The Smiths. ..”

Tim grimly recalls how, after first avoiding the rock press and the necessity to construct for themselves “an image,” James bowed to the inevitable. “For one photo session, we put on these wacky coloured jumpers and funny hats – a piss-take of the cool image. But people took it seriously! As a musician, you naively think your music is wonderful and it will reach people. Then you suddenly realise that people want you to sell a personality – and it doesn’t even have to be your own!”

In search of both “alternative” kudos and big-league promouon, James signed to the New York-based indie-within-a-major, Sire, whose stable included Talking Heads and Madonna, and whose boss is Seymour Stein: ” A shy man,” Jim recalls. “He stood out because everyone else on Sire was like a second-hand car salesman. A quiet man -and we fell for it!”

Though they recorded two acclaimed albums, Stutter and Strip-mine, the cash-registers failed to ring. Despite maintaining their live following, by ’88 James’s career appeared to have stalled; meanwhile, it seemed that they would be washed away by another wave from Manchester, on the crest of which surfed The Stone Roses and Happy Mondays.

That they came to ride the same wave themselves owes something to the musical change that followed the departure of drummer Gavan Whelan. “We kicked him out,” Tim confesses. “He wanted the music to go one way and we wanted it to go another. He got frustrated because he couldn’t communicate his ideas to us and for over a year at every rehearsal we got bogged down in argument until we said, This isn’t working. After Gavan left, we had to write songs with a drum-machine, and that influenced a new direction in our music. Larry would find a preset, and, for the first time, a drum pattern would remain constant throughout our songs because we didn’t know how to change it.” James had already been on the lookout for additional musicians: “We’d done the four-piece,” summarises Tim. “Let’s see what other colours might be added to our palette. But we didn’t expect to end up as a seven-piece.” Drummer Dave Baynton-Power replaced Gavan, and James added trumpeter Andy Diagram (ex-Diagram Brothers and Pale Fountains), vtolinist Saul Davies and keyboardist Mark Hunter.

In ’89, James toured with Happy Mondays in support. It was the year of “Madchester” and the new crossover of indie rock and E-generation dance. The realisation that they were being swept into the new scene came at shows in Blackpool, where weekending Mancunian ravers would wig out to the new seven-piece, dance-friendly James. Even as they had let their Sire deal lapse, James inadvertently tapped into the scene’s craze for clothes with their eye-catching T -shirts. A fan designed the first of these items (“We had to keep finding him to give him more money because it did quite well”) and the band’s manager, Martine McDonagh (also the mother of Tim’s child, Ben), designed the others. Kids who had never heard the band wore the clothes, and today James’s turnover and profit is “far greater” from the T -shirts than the records.

JAMES RE-ENTERED THE RECORD FRAY WITH a self-financed live album, One Man Clapping: “We got a bank manager, Colin Cook of the Royal Bank of Scotland, to see us play a concert in Manchester with 3,000 people there,” Tim chuckles. “He gave us this huge loan, the biggest he could authorise. We had no collateral but for the great gig.” Out on their own label, One Man Records, it was distributed by Rough Trade and went to Number 1 in the indie charts – for one week. With an advance from Rough Trade, James recorded their next studio album, Gold Mother. “We gave Rough Trade the singles Sit Down and Come Home, and they said, This is great, we love it, but you have to understand, boys, that these will never reach a big audience,” sighs Tim. “They must have backed so many bands they loved who didn’t get anywhere that they must have lost faith in their own judgement of what would sell.

Next stop Phonogram, with a completed album up for grabs if the vibes were right. Not only did Phonogram accept the whole of the Gold Mother album as it was but, when asked how much they thought it might sell, instead of the expected 50-60,000 copies, the company replied, “about 300- 400,000 – a bigger number than we’d had in our wildest dreams.” And, kickstarted by the band’s anthemic single, Sit Down, this estimate proved to be “quite accurate”.

On the eve of the release of their new album, Seven (which has already been snubbed by some critics as “stadium rock”), James are learning to live with the mixed reception that is the flipside of pop stardom.

“I went to a bar for a drink,” Tim unwholesomely confesses, “and these four lads were going. This guy thinks James are a load of fucking nancies. This guy props himself up on the bar and says, Yeah, James are fucking poofs. So I say, Yeah, we are; we love sticking our penises up each other’s arses. We do it all the time. Really into it. Didn’t you know we were gay? Whatever he said, I just went with it, and he was fine after that. And at the Reading Festival, I was watching a band, and this guy in his mid-thirties who looked like a geography teacher came up: I’ve always wanted to talk to you, he said, very nicely. Five years ago, I thought you were so important, the best band. But now look at you – you’re awful! You’re crap! What happened? Well, I said, we sold our souls to the Devil. The Devil! We decided to make music that would make us lots and lots of money, and that’s what Gold Mother and Come Home are. I knew it! he said, and walked away. Fucking hell, I thought, you can’t argue with something like that. ..”

You are Tim Booth. After ten years of luckless striving and personal chaos you are suddenly huge. Have you kept your soul intact, or just become another mock-spiritual corporate rock tosser? Has James kept its integrity, or is it a load of pious pseudo-intellectual shite? Speak…(story by David Cavanagh)

“I think,” says Tim Booth with characteristic softness, “I would like some more champagne.” His vegetarian pancake’s looking a little on the dry side, admittedly. And that mineral water’s not going to help the flow. A decent bottle of Brut could be just the ticket for this lunchtime chin-wag. Three hours of having his photo taken has left Tim a little on the parched side – and constant wearing of shades makes him blink into the daylight like Mole at the start of The Wind In The Willows – and in an hour or so he’s got to do some interviews at Radio 1. He’s all the rage, is Tim Booth. Everybody wants him.

The restaurant was a good idea. Whoever did the booking successfully located an establishment so bereft of custom that the Tim Booth table remains the only one occupied all afternoon. And, give or take the odd Elton John ballad mewling its way over the tannoy, it’s a milieu of satisfactory, masticatory peace and quiet for Booth to think in.

Tim Booth talks a lot, very skilfully. Very softly, too, which is why even when he’s dithering over the menu he makes it sound like some sort of spiritual edict is but seconds away. He talks fluidly, pausing rarely and only hesitating when he wonders if he’s giving too much away. While you’re talking he has an endearing habit of nodding and saying “sure, sure” to each point you make. He appears incredibly attentive. Serene. On the scale of rock star intellect he’s easily in the top two per cent, as those fun loving types at MENSA would say. If 1992 is going to finally jettison this man into the league of Bono and Jim Kerr – and it’s an area he often seems to be racking his soul over – the IQ of stadium rock is going to take a serious leap as a result.

Beside him sits Jim Glennie, the bass player. Tim wanted him there. He keeps making sure the tape recorder is positioned so that it can pick up Jim’s voice as well as his own. From time to time Tim will turn to Jim for acknowledgement, clarification or – once or twice – actual permission to go on. On the afternoon you join us, ‘Seven’, James’ new album is about to come out. The main course has just arrived, the champagne glasses have clinked “cheers” and the tape recorder has just clicked on. Tim has already established that the Select interview is far from effusive, and the words “stadium rock” have just been mentioned for the first time. The dreaded words. It’s clear that lots of people now think James have got something terminal here. They’re now at the stage where the music press traditionally abandons bands – tchah, poor old James, they’re a stadium band now! – and leaves them to their globally-obsessed masterplan.

James, I hope we’re all agreed, are worth a hell of a lot more respect than that.

Have you accepted that you’re going to become truly massive this year, Tim?

We think so. But you can never tell. We stopped taking things for granted a long time ago. You know, Larry (Gott, guitarist) gets to LA and what’s the first thing that happens? He gets mugged at gunpoint. What if he’d been shot? What if he’d been killed? I don’t think the band would have gone on. I mean, there was a gun stuck in his ribs! His first time ever in America…

Is he going to go back?

I think he will. I think he’ll get over it. He’s very aware that he has to get back there as soon as possible. But he was freaked out by the whole thing.

Why choose ‘Seven’ as the album title? Because there’s seven of you?

Mmm. As a title it just seemed to fit. This album reflects the number of people in the band at this time. There won’t be seven always. It’s not that focused. A number of coincidences started occurring around the number seven when we chose the title about a year ago. ‘Sit Down’ went in at number seven. We did Top Of The Pops and were given dressing room number seven. On the same TOTP was a band who sang a song about lucky seven (‘Wear Your Love Like Heaven’ by Definition Of Sound’). Later on we found seven is the number of God in the Kabbala religion of numerology.

On a scale of one to ten, how happy are you with James at the moment?

Eight, I’d say (he looks at Jim, who nods slowly). Nine with the album, but then it’s different with that because it’s not something we can do much about now.

Now that the words “stadium rock” have been used about you – however flippantly – are you taking that as a criticism?

No Well…I don’t like the word.

Do you like Simple Minds?

Well (smiles)… we don’t feel they’ve progressed.

Is there a stigma to the word “stadium”?

Yeah! That’s why we don’t like it. Very few bands, to my mind, could play in a stadium and still communicate to individuals.

How many stadium-size gigs have you actually played?

I should think about six or seven.

Have you started writing in looser metaphors, writing for bigger audiences?

No. No, you can’t think about things like that. That’s where bands fall down. They start to think they’re writing for the people. And we’re writing for ourselves. And if you’re lucky the song you’re writing for yourself – if it’s got enough truth in it – will contact a large amount of people anyway.

How do you reach an individual in a huge audience?

I look at people. I sing to them. I look at individuals. And I can go to the back of a hall, I’m not just talking about the front rows. We played a gig in Paris last spring, doing 13 or 14 new songs that we didn’t know very well. We did ‘Born Of Frustration’ and there was this guy right at the back. And I sang the beginning to him and he was looking at me and he was really getting into it. And he started making his way through the crowd, dancing, moving his arms around, and he came right through the crowd, and as he got to the front we reached the chorus. And I bent down and sang it right into his face…I mean, the guy nearly came. And I was completely gone too, on his reaction. It was just like, whooaaahhhh!!! Because I love that song, and that was a really beautiful moment.

Is there nothing on ‘Seven’ that was written with a huge audience in mind?

No. If anything, we were trying to make certain songs smaller. ‘Sound’ – we actually made that smaller. It was more epic, it was more stadium. We don’t have much control over our songs. Recently, we’ve gone in to write new songs – and we’ve all been getting into Metallica and Nirvana and the Pixies – and it was like, Let’s get some really hard and heavy and harsh songs, y’know? And you try for a while and nothing happens. And then suddenly you go into a weird jam that’s in a completely different musical direction to the one you wanted. We’re coming out with all these folky songs, thinking, Aaah shit we’re going folk again. We have no control over these things. All the songs are totally accidental.

So you’re not one of these bands where the guitarist comes in with a chord progression?

No, never. Never. Nobody has ever brought a song into James. They start from nothing.

Well, ‘Live A Love Of Life’ sounds like it started as some kind of U2 riff.

Where?

Are you kidding? It’s blatant. It sounds like The Edge.

Well…(looking genuinely puzzled). I don’t think Larry has any U2 albums. I certainly don’t. I didn’t even hear any until ‘The Joshua Tree’. I’ve still never heard a Simple Minds album. So, no, that was not intentional.

What about ‘Sit Down’- have you ever wished you’d never written it?

No, no. Never.

(Jim says quietly that he has. Last tour, the whole question of what to do about ‘Sit Down’ had James beginning the set with it, ending the set with it, bunging it in the middle and generally trying to keep it fresh. Jim envisages a situation where James could leave it out altogether –“and if people couldn’t handle that, they needn’t come”.)

How many songs on ‘Seven’ are about your break-up with Martine (James’ manager and Tim’s longtime partner)?

Probably just ‘Don’t Wait That Long’. That’s the really personal one. That was written about two and a half years ago. The split was just beginning then. And we knew we’d written a beautiful song, and we kept playing it to people but nobody thought it was that good. We knew there was a missing piece, and it took two and a half years to find that missing piece. It was a rhythm change; we slowed it right down.

So that dates from ‘Gold Mother’ time, then. Was that a time of great misery for the band, before the success of ‘Sit Down’?

No, listen, you’re completely mistaking us. We weren’t miserable when we weren’t succeeding. Alright, lyrically, ‘Gold Mother’ and ‘Seven’ are the most depressed words I’ve ever written, but that’s to do with my personal life. We weren’t unhappy as a band when we weren’t succeeding. We were making music that we loved. The band has never been a problem. And, in fact, we wrote ‘Sit Down’ in our worst period of poverty. We’d look at each other and think, Well, we can’t give up now – we’ve got all these great new songs to play.

So the ‘James struggle’ thing is a bit of a myth?

Well, James was not it for us. You talk about our struggle, but we had problems in our personal lives (he looks at Jim) that were far bigger struggles for both of us. To see us simply as members of a band would be a real misconception of our states of mind at that time. I think people might have misunderstood what kept us going, actually. People kind of think James should have split earlier – how did they get through it, and so on. But we didn’t have many embarrassments live – we didn’t turn up and find there were no people. So all the time, to us, it felt like we were making progress. There was always as much a sense of movement in our lives as there was in our music. We were always more than an indie band.

Do you see ‘indie’ as a way of thinking?

Yes, and not necessarily a positive one. A very English second division way of thinking. A fear of success way of thinking. There are a few bands that can break through that. But it assumes…(smiles) it assumes not reaching for the stars.

Which you are?

Metaphorically, certainly.

There are some wildly opposing uses of the word ‘God’ on the album. On ‘Ring the Bells’ you’re singing “I no longer feel that God is watching over me”, whereas on ‘Seven’ you’re telling us “God is to love me”.

Sometimes I use the word to ruffle up preconceptions. Other times, it’s in a vague, more nebulous sense. I’m not a member of any religion or belief system at all. The thing is, I have a choice. I can either believe the world is random chaos and there’s no meaning and no values. Or I can believe there’s some purpose, some intelligence. And that, I would say, is God. Not a person. Not an entity. Just a vague understanding of an intelligence. And I flip from one belief to the other. I don’t think I could live in this world if I thought it was just complete chaos. I’ve experienced that state a few times, and it’s not something I can take for very long. It’s terrifying.

When was the last time?

About a year ago.

What happened?

I can’t tell you. (Long pause) The last three years have been the worst period of my life. But they’ve also been…(his voice gets very distant) an awakening of a kind, I suppose.

The very last words on the album are “love can change everything”. Do you believe that?

(After a long pause) No, I don’t. Not unless it’s balanced by wisdom. I’ve always felt that, going right back to The Beatles’ ‘All You Need Is Love’. No, sorry. You need something else as well.

So why didn’t you qualify that lyric?

I don’t know. I didn’t think of it like that. Maybe if love is all you have, you probably think that’s all you need. Maybe that’s fair enough.

When you write about love, do you feel you should constantly do twists on it, as in Michael Stipe’s famous “simple prop to occupy my time” on ‘The One I Love’?

No, but what you do feel is intense irritation at all the other uses of the word ‘love’, because I don’t think that love exists as it’s presented in most people’s songs. It’s usually a wonderful thing and everybody wants it and it’s gonna last forever and all that bullshit. Well, I don’t find that real. That is not my reality. If I’m going to write about love I’ve got to make it personal. And it’ll reflect huge amounts of pain as well as the wonder and the joy.

Do you see Martine all the time, then?

All the time, yeah. And she’s brilliant about letting me see my son. But with her…I guess I see her in a business sense. It’s just something we’ve worked out. It’s unusual, I know, but it’s just happened.

You mentioned personal problems back there. If they were bigger than the band, presumably you couldn’t exorcise them through your music?

Well, the background to early James, if you’re really interested – at around ‘Stutter’ and ‘Stripmine’ time – we were meditating. Me and him and Martine and Jenny. Hours every day. Ten hours at weekends. And that was for three years. No one knew about that, we didn’t tell anyone about it. People thought something like that was going on, which is why we got that Buddhist tag, which was untrue. But meditation was our private life for a long time. And you could find lyrics from that time, if you wanted, that reflected that.

(Tim has alluded in the past to James switching to meditation as some atonement for their debauched years as a “drugs band”. Tim and Jim both admit their immersion in meditation had a lot to do with the serious mental illness – through massive daily ingestion of hash via the lethally potent ‘hot knives’ method – of an early James guitarist called Paul.)

After that period where there were a lot of drugs going round, I looked for ways to reach those states of consciousness without drugs. And that became my search. Partly because I couldn’t handle drugs – I had serious liver problems – and partly to get the one member of the band into these other possibilities so he’d stop taking drugs. Trying to get him back.

Is Paul dead now?

No, he’s not dead.

(Jim immediately interrupts. “His character disappeared. He woke up one morning and there was nothing there. He’s kind of OK now. He’s sort of built something out of it now, but…it’s really difficult, you know? He was my best friend since I was 13.”).

So this search for altered states goes on?

I’ve always been drawn to the area where madness meets drug abuse meets mysticism. If you look at all the books I like and all the films I’m really into, that’s your common ground. When we started meditating, that was the intention: let’s do this properly. I’ve always been fascinated to find that schizophrenia and madness and divine wisdom are all states of mind tuned to the same frequencies of brain waves. And at various times in the past these states have either been respected – as in witches and witch doctors – or despised and locked away. Or, in our society, they become artists. They become the cultural myth-makers. They are people that have to be dealt with, you know? Because they are picking up on stuff that the majority of people don’t believe exists.

So where do you stand on drugs now?

Drugs have been in every single culture that has ever existed, but very often used much more wisely than they are now. Say a certain tribe would have a mushroom ritual three times a year or so…or solstices, or initiations…because you can’t do that every day. But this society’s so greed-based and consumer-based that not enough respect has been shown to these areas. So it’s well out of control now, which is why I can’t take a stance either justifying or negating drugs now. You have to show these things respect.

What’ll you do if James ever ends?

I should think we’ll want a long break from each other. Because it’s been pretty intense. But I think that after that we’ll become pretty good friends. All that talk of splitting up in 1989 was highly exaggerated, incidentally. That was only ever articulated once and quickly rejected. We have something to complete here. We all feel that.

You asked me earlier about how I felt about James on a scale of one to ten, and I said eight. I think I’d always have said eight. We love our music. But there is work still to be done.

Finally, on ‘Sound’, you yell out “do something out of character”. Was that a very James moment?

Yeah. I think so. We’re happy with it. That’s the kind of thing I’m happy with. And it’s going to be great onstage. We’re going to really intimidate each other. Start staring each other in the eyes, seeing who can handle it. Just move in on each other. Try to push things, psychologically. States of mind again, you see.

Isn’t there ever a risk to the sanity with all this?

Ah…(laughs) I don’t know the meaning of that word.

Originally a three-piece, Manchester’s James revealed their first EP seven years ago. And they’re now a seven-piece with a new album called Seven, strangely enough. Over the years their music has changed mainly due to varied instrumentation and styles but they have always been a pop band. Musicview asked vocalist Tim Booth and bassist Jim Glennie how their music has progressed since their previous album Gold Mother.

Tim : “Each one has been odd. We’ve experimented in this area and enjoyed it. This is what we found here and then we move on and records tend to react against the last one. So there’s a constant movement forward away from, and that seems to dictate our direction, but it doesn’t feel at all like now we’ve found our station.”

Jim : “That’s the last thing we want really. We want to move on and keep changing”

Tim : “Gold Mother, we felt had too much variety of sound and style. It was almost too disparate and it was like lots of real variety but it was almost too much. There’s wasn’t such a sense of whole as there is on this record where you feel it comes from the same tribe.”

Once a three-piece Manchester’s James have released five albums since their inception in 1985. With a new album Seven, the band is now a fully-fledged seven-piece and singer Tim Booth and bassist Jim Glennie related how the band dynamic has changed when talking to Musicview.

Tim : “It’s good because we’re much more flexible. We have trumpet and fiddle and the fiddle player plays guitar and drums. So, and the keyboard player plays about six instruments, so we can choose what sound we want. We aren’t stuck and that’s really nice.”

Jim : “There’s more colour in the sound now. When you want to hit people hard, you know, seven people whacking away, you’ve got seven people there, you’ve got the options.”

Int : After the session I had chance to chat with Tim and Jim and Larry and first of all congratulate them on the success of the new album Seven

Tim : Yeah, it’ll be number one next week I think

Int : Yeah

Tim : Depending on who we sleep with next week

Int : Tell me about the producer you roped into this particular project

Jim : We’d gone through a list of trying to find a producer. Checking out people whose work we respected and who’d worked with bands we liked, done albums we liked.

Tim : Then we chose the one whose albums we didn’t like

Jim : For some strange reason, we chose to go with someone who’d done nothing we liked. All the people we wanted to work with were either busy or when we met them, it didn’t quite happen. And then somebody at the record company suggested Youth and we looked at the things he’d done and thought “No way, forget it, he’s like a bloody dance producer, not right for James” And this A+R man was like “Nah, nah, I tell ya, lads. Meet him, meet him”

Tim : Weak Cockney impression that is, by the way

Jim : Yeah, sorry about that.

Tim : Youth by the way isn’t a generic term for an age group. It’s an individual.

Int : Yes

Tim : We must explain this otherwise people at home will think “They wanted youth to produce their album, that’s a kind of weird concept. How they gonna manage that? Invite everybody in?”

Int : One at a time

Jim : So we met this chap basically, an ageing hippy called Youth and he came in with his open neck cheese-cloth shirt and sandals and his long straddly hair and beads. And a few other things as well that I won’t mention.

Tim : You can only be this rude to someone you love

Jim : And we hit it off for some strange reason. Probably because we’re a bunch of old hippies and all. And the things he was criticising on the stuff we’d done was right, same as ours and the things he was pointing out that were good were the same as ours and you can’t ignore that, regardless of the fact he’d done a few dodgy records

Tim : And had no taste in clothes. It was the size of his crystals that did it for me.

Jim : Enormous crystals. So we decided to go for it basically and moved into this studio in London called Olympic in a really good wooden room and Youth had already been there. I don’t know how long he’d been there, weeks probably, he’s got an encampment on the go there. And he’d filled the whole room and the production room with three-foot altar candles and there was no electric light used on the session. Rugs and drapes on the walls. Enormous flower displays, incense, oil wheels, lamps, you remember those dodgy oil lamps from the seventies, where the blob used to go up and down, he got one of them in and all. And a strobe for the fast songs. We all burst out laughing. He’s off his head, he’s off his head.

Tim : And he convinced us we’d fallen into a time grip and were back in the 1960s and it worked. You can hear it on the LP.

Int : It must be a cliche now. But the last year, the last eighteen months, have been pretty amazing for the band really. I mean it seems like it’s all gone right.

Tim : After having gone wrong for eight years. Yeah, in terms of success, it’s been busy. That’s probably the best way to put it. It’s been really good. We’ve enjoyed it and the bank manager enjoys it too. We kind of had seven lean years where we were very happy with our music and nobody else seemed to be. Except live, we always had a good live audience for about four to five years and that’s how we built up our reputation in England. And then yeah, the last couple of years we’ve suddenly had a major breakthrough. Suddenly, it’s like overkill. And from not playing our songs on the radio at all for the first seven or eight years, now you can’t walk down the street without hearing the damn things.

Int : Doesn’t that make you a bit cynical when it’s like “Oh you like us now then” this sort…

Tim : No, no, everything has its time and we never had the business side together like we have now. We had the musical side together, we feel, for quite a long time, but we didn’t find a record company that shared our vision. And so it just needed all those components to fall into place. So I don’t really feel cynical. It’s just like we like to remind people of our pedigree.

Jim : The extreme of the changearound, the turnaround, we’ve found quite funny. From being nothing to suddenly every time you put on the radio or every time you’ve got on the TV.

Tim : Not that James again

Jim : Oh no

Pete Mitchell : With me, Tim and Jim, welcome to the show

Tim : He’s put on his proper radio voice now

Jim : He was swearing before.

Tim : I tell you, if you talk to this guy, he’s got a high-pitched voice. The moment he gets in front of a radio mic.

PM : (In high voice) Hi there, it’s Pete Mitchell. No you’ve done nothing but complain about the table and the room you’re recording in

Tim : We’re used to better nowadays you know

PM : Well, I know. Exactly, you’re preempting my first question. Things have gone very well since we last spoke. I remember asking you about success last time and I think you both said it doesn’t feel like success. It must do now with the success you’ve had since we last spoke – Sit Down.

Tim : Every so often, you catch yourself and you think “Cor, blooming heck, how did we get here?” and it’s kind of like when you’re doing a video shoot in the Los Angeles desert and you look around and you see a huge crew and all the trucks and you think they’re all here to make a four-minute video for one of our songs and you think “Oh my God, what’s happened to us?”

PM : So obviously the past twelve months have been amazing, the best year of your career. Do you think you’ve coped with it well?

Jim : I think we’re doing alright. We’re still together as a band and still relatively sane.

Tim : That time you cracked up, took all your clothes off and ran down Manchester streets naked. I thought you’d lost it then.

PM : Do you think a lot hangs on this new album, Seven?

Tim : Yes

PM : In a nutshell

Tim : Well obviously, we haven’t released an LP for like two years.

PM : Well you have and you haven’t. Gold Mother came back out.

Tim : It kind of returned

PM : Gold Mother 2. The sequel

Tim : She had another baby. So yes, I think people are waiting to see what we’ve done next. And the press have already decided what we’ve done next. I don’t think, it doesn’t feel like it hinges as in it’s going to be bad. It feels like it is good to get something out for people to hear. We know what we’ve done. But it hasn’t necessarily been the best year of our careers. What it’s been is the busiest.

PM : And the most successful

Tim : Externally successful, yeah sure. But we never judged it in that way. We aren’t able to rehearse as much as we used to and we love rehearsing. And we don’t like being shipped around the world talking about records when we haven’t even been and played in the country we’re talking about, so we’re starting to refuse quite a few things nowadays.

Jim : We always thought our strength was in our songwriting. Getting in and having a good batch of songs behind us. And now we’re finding it harder to find time to actually get in and rehearse and write songs. At the moment, we’re feeling a little bit naked.

PM : So when do you find the time to write new material then? In between tours?

Jim : We’re just grabbing days. We insist on having a few days. Because as far as the record company is concerned, it’s like “you want to write some songs now, but you won’t be recording the album for absolutely ages yet. What do you want to go and write now for?”. They allot you a certain gap, a three week period or something, where you go and write the album.

PM : Just like that

Jim : Yeah. For us it’s not like packing biscuits. You can’t just put the hours in and you end up with the songs at the end of it. Well, you can, but they might be a bit dodgy. We write over a long period of time, we’re constantly writing songs when we’re on tour, in the soundchecks, we’re jamming them in the studio. That feeds us. That keeps us going. It keeps us sane because at the end of the day, there’s business and there’s creativity and I think, for us, we need more creativity than business normally wants you to put in

PM : I think it’s a lot of fun packing biscuits.

Jim : Well it has its points

PM : Custard creams, hob nobs

Jim : Jaffa cakes

PM : Let’s talk about the album then. Seven. Ring The Bells, which is a song I heard about three years ago live, am I right? Of course, I am

Tim : Of course you are. Probably about two and a bit

PM : I remember hearing it for the first time at Blackpool. Am I right on that one? Yes, I’m right again

Jim : We’ve got terrible memories

Tim : Yes, it’s an old song. First released at Blackpool. It’s the only one we have a great video idea for. And we aren’t going to get to make it as we wanted it. We had this idea of going to Mexico and during….

Jim : Another holiday

Tim : Another holiday. During one of their religious festivals, one of their kind of Christian religious festivals where Christ is covered in blood.

PM : Oh dear

Tim : And it’s really paga and heavy and filming it there and the bells, ring the bells would be one of these old Mexican churches, whitewashed churches and it’d be some nutter coming in off the desert.

PM : Clint Eastwood perhaps?

Tim : We’re into deserts. No, no, you’ve got it all wrong. Harry Dean Stanton. Like he’s had too much sun in the desert and he’s raging and he’s either got some kind of divine inspiration. He’s seen God in his forty days in the desert or he’s completely off his head and you can’t tell which. Like “Ring The Bells, wake the town. I’ve got something to tell you.” This kind of and you can’t tell whether he’s a complete nutter or divinely inspired.

Jim : But, fortunately, we’re not going, are we?

Tim : Fortunately, we’re doing it in Scunthorpe instead. On a beach.

(plays Ring The Bells)

PM : Ring The Bells from the album Seven. My guests today James.

Tim : Collectively, you should know us better by now, Pete

Jim : I think our names are James 1, James 2

PM : Shall we do that again?

Tim : I think that’s good. You can use these interruptions can’t you? You just don’t want to be interrupted.

PM : I just can’t be bothered editing the thing. That’s what it is. You’ve been described in most of the music papers as the next stadium band. Stadium rock. Is it going that way? Do you want it to go that way?

Tim : The next stadium band

PM : In the same breath as U2 and Simple Minds

Tim : In the same breath

PM : I think so

Tim : You mean kind of U2SimpleMindsJames

Jim : U2SimpleMindsJames

Tim : It’s a mouthful

PM : Do you see things going that way now? To big stadiums?

TB : More in the same breath as The Cure, New Order, REM, James

Jim : Pixies

Tim : James

PM : That was in the same breath

Tim : Or Metallica

PM ; When we say stadiums we mean America, cracking America and making it big there. Is that on the cards now?

Tim : Depends on whose cards. If you go to Avril, the tarot reader in the Corn Exchange.

PM : What’s she said about your future then?

Tim : She said America, yes, by the end of the year, but it’s not, you know, really on the cards. It depends on whose cards you’re reading. We aren’t going out there like some sort of Christopher Columbus divine mission you know. We’ve been out there a few times and we enjoy it.

PM : It’s the right time to go at the moment though as there’s a British invasion at the moment. Jesus Jones and EMF.

Tim : I think that was last year. I think it’s the right time simply because the charts have loosened up a lot rather like in this country. And so Metallica can get to number one and Nirvana can get to number one . And REM are no longer left of field. And in a world where REM are mainstream, we have chance definitely.

PM : Let’s talk about the the single’s success now. Sound. What can you tell us about that song. Another song from, of course, your album Seven. Says Tim looking at Jim. Jim? Tim?

Jim : Don’t know

Tim : It was jammed in the studio. It was, we were kind of, we had this weird studio set up with candles and strobes and we worked in candlelight for about two months and became moles with like no vision at all. We kept tripping up over leads and unplugging things. You’d do a whole take and find someone had unplugged something because they couldn’t see, but

Jim : Someone had fallen asleep

Tim : Yeah, someone had fallen asleep

Jim : The sound engineer

Tim : The trumpet break would come

Jim : Great sound on trumpet, Andy. (Makes snoring noise)

Tim : And Sound, we kind of had half of it set and the rest of it was left open to improvise on and so all the bits where I’m shouting down the megaphone “Do something out of character” or “Somebody break away for God’s sake”, that’s me shouting at everyone to improvise, to shoot off in another direction. I thought it was getting boring so I started yelling at people and you know we left it all in and we really enjoyed it. We love that songs and we felt when we did it it was quite a far out song, a kind of LP song and the record company suggested it as a single and we were like “Oh, yeah, great, fine”

Jim : Off their heads

Tim : We thought it would be a really good antidote to Sit Down.

(plays Sound)

Tim : The song Don’t Wait That Long was written about 2 1/2 years ago. Again it was a jam and we thought we’d written this wonderful song and we kept playing it to people and nobody was interested in it at all. Everyone thought it was crap and we tried messing around with different rhythms and messing around with it and we kind of realised that there was something wrong with it and it took about 2 1/2 years to work out what it was. We’re slow workers on some songs. We just kept it in our back pocket and we kept bringing it our every six months and tried it again.

PM : You played it here at that session you did here, don’t you remember?

Tim : Did we?

PM : Yeah, we’ll have to unearth that and pirate it

Jim : A different version

PM : Definitely

Tim : We just kept trying because we knew the seed of it was wonderful and we couldn’t find some piece of the jigsaw was missing and we found it in the summer and it was just basically slowing down the beat and making it more moody.

(plays Don’t Wait That Long)

PM : You’re listening to IQ on Piccadilly Key 103. My guests today are Tim and Jim from James reviewing the new album Seven. Live A Love Of Life – another interesting song from the album. Can you remember writing it? Was it recent or was it an old one again?

Tim : We’re not the Happy Mondays, you know. We do remember these things. Live A Love Of Life. Again, it was, it’s always, through improvisation. The lyrics are just about incomprehensible to anybody really.

PM : It’s obviously very difficult picking out the songs and talking about them. What about the album as a whole then?

Tim : It doesn’t work like that. I mean you produce the music what’s right at the time, that reflects where you’re at at the time. And I think it’s better to see LPs almost as states of mind rather than meaning.

PM : So how do you view songs like Sit Down and Come Home now? Your anthems.

Jim : We’re very proud of them, but

PM : Obviously sick of playing them

Tim : I think more, it wasn’t sick of playing them. Not Come Home. You get sick of the feeling that you have to play Sit Down. Like there’s nights when we don’t play Come Home so we don’t feel trapped but we did feel last year now and again that we shouldn’t have to play Sit Down. It’s more like, when the new LP comes out, I don’t think we’ll have to play Sit Down. We’ll play it when we want to and then we’ll get back to enjoying it again. But you do feel resentful when you’re put in a position where you actually feel forced to. We nearly didn’t play it once in London and people started booing and shouting.

PM : So that was the encore then

Tim : It was like we had a big row about it actually and that was bad at the time. It was a mess.

PM : Let’s play a track from the album now – Live A Love Of Life

Tim : With Live A Love Of Life, it’s partly a continuation of the song God Only Knows. It’s another piece of rejection of my Christian conditioning. I had to go to church every day of the week for about four years of my life and I kind of resented that. It seems to be coming out now for some reason or other that I can’t understand. It’s also when I sing “I don’t believe Jesus was a human being”, it’s more to do with like when you read those bible stories, he’s not presented as a human being with human desires, human passions, human problems and I don’t believe those gospels are reflective of that person as they lived. There’s also references to the, we wrote it at the time of the Gulf War, and it’s the idea that in the Christian cosmology God sent his son to earth to die. It seems a really weird thing for a father to do to his child and rather similar to the way countries send their children off to war to die for their country which I’ve never been able to understand. And that’s what the song is about. The other thing I’ve decided too to sing in different countries or on different days “I don’t believe Buddha was a human being” or “I don’t believe Mohammed was a human being” so when we go to India, it’ll be Buddha and when we go to Japan, it’ll be Confuscious.

PM : Remember what country you’re in though. Watch the jetlag.

Tim : Yeah, see if we can stir up things.

(plays Live A Love Of Life)

PM : You’re listening to an IQ special. James, my guests today. Do you mind coughing Jim?

Jim : No

Tim : You belched earlier mate. And you’ll edit that out

PM : Leave Jim’s cough in and get my belch out. The final song from the album Seven. A song called Heavens.

Tim : Heavens, yeah, a song about . The verses are about somebody sitting with their hands, with their head in their hands thinking, full of self-pity, thinking of despondency

PM : Like myself

Tim : Like yourself

PM : On a Monday

Tim : And then the chorus is like “Get up off your arse, are you waiting for the heavens to descend”. You know. Move it. It’s meant to be a kind of self-jolting song.

PM : Before you go, just briefly tell us what you’ve got lined up for this year. Are you spending a lot of time in America, trying to crack America?

Tim : No, no. We’re going there a few times, not there much. We’re more in Europe and that side of things this year and Britain. The good thing in Britain, after the two G-Mex concerts we did in Manchester a year ago, we didn’t know how to play in Manchester again and it was like how do you top that. We were quite scared of playing Manchester again. We tried to organise lots of strange things, sort of six nights at the Ritz., but we couldn’t book it because of bingo night

PM : That’s a shame. Fifty fifty

Jim : Grab a granny

Tim : Goth night. And then we tried getting a tent in Salford but the council, we couldn’t get permission. We tried Barton Aerodrome so Manchester, we haven’t neglected playing here. It’s just that we couldn’t find the right venue to go one further than G-Mex.

PM : What about up on the roof again?

Jim : Oh lovely

Tim : What we’ve done now, I think it’s July 4th

Jim : Yes

PM : Alton Towers

Tim : We’ve booked Alton Towers and we’re going to have a big day out there.

PM : A festival? Is it a one-day festival?

Tim : It’ll only be three bands. But if you pay a little extra, you can get a free day out in Alton Towers. And it’s really well organised. It’s not going to be like an outdoor festival with awful toilets. It’s going to be quite well organised and quite smart.

PM : That’s July 4th then?

Jim : All the shops are going to be open so there’s going to be food

PM : James merchandise in every shop

Tim : Hey up, you’re ruining this. And we’ve got, oh we don’t know who the support bands are yet

PM : Any ideas, any little hints? They’ve not signed on the dotted line yet?

Tim : MFI, it’s like MFI. You know?

PM : Alright, yeah

Tim : But we’re not sure yet so that’ll be nice. We want it to be a good occasion and we felt it was the only way we could go a bit beyond G-Mex.

PM : What about further singles from the album? Possibles?

Tim : Probably Ring The Bells.

PM : Will that be it then – finished for singles after that?

Tim : There might be one more but we’d make it an EP. Well, we’re trying to make it an EP.

PM : With a couple of new songs on as well

Tim : Yep, I mean we’re fighting off the record company. They want quite a lot more

Jim : Six, seven

PM : The old Michael Jackson syndrome. Ten singles off the album.

Tim : The only thing I can say is if we don’t, if the single after Ring The Bells or even Ring The Bells, you’ve got the LP, don’t buy it. You know. And the one after that, if it’s not an EP with new songs on then don’t buy it because we won’t be into it.

PM : Let’s hope Phonogram aren’t listening to this interview then.

Tim : I mean we never understand the singles thing. I guess we knew Born of Frustration, Born of Frustration comes out a few weeks before the LP. The fans, some of them are going to buy it but a lot of them they won’t buy it and that’s as it is really and we’re quite happy with that.

PM : It’s been a pleasure talking to you once again and it’s nice to see the success that you’re having. And don’t forget the gold disc. OK Tim and Jim from James, thanks again for joining us

Tim : You’ll have to pay for it

PM : How much

Tim : This is the first time we’ve ever played in America and we had a really strange day yesterday. We thought San Francisco would be kind of loads of sunny beautiful place.

Reporter : It is, most of the time

Tim : Our flight got to San Francisco and it couldn’t land because of the storms so we were taken to Sacramento and it ended up being a sixteen hour flight so we were all kind of jetlagged and then we also had trouble getting visas for half our people, our crew couldn’t come and it’s been like complete chaos but wonderful chaos. And the performance today, it was good chaos. It wasn’t like a real James performance but it was good fun. And that’s kind of our first performance in America, it bodes well, I think.

Born of Frustration, the single, I don’t really know what it’s about. I wrote the lyrics very unconsciously. It’s something to do with being born of frustration. Something to do with seeing all these possibilities but not being able to reach out to them, not being able to meet all your desires, being stuck inside a human body and I think that’s about it really. It’s about as much as I can say about it. That sounds pretentious enough as it is.

Jim : We started about nine or ten years ago. First single came out in 83 on Factory Records. Myself, Tim and Larry have been together for pretty much all of that, eight years. Met Tim at a disco in Manchester. He was dancing and we were pretty impressed with his dancing so we kind of called him over and had a chat with him and asked him to come down to the rehearsal room and try and write some lyrics for us because we weren’t very good at that sort of thing in those days. And that was it really, we were off really. It was very much done for fun in the early days. We did take it very seriously in the early days, we didn’t concentrate on pushing it out into the world and selling ourselves, it was very much more, you know, concentrating on the music and writing the songs and we had problems getting concerts. The greatest buzz for James in those days and probably now was playing live. We had real problems getting any live work. We thought we needed a single out so we released a single and it got loads of attention in England, it got Single Of The Week and suddenly we were thrown into the spotlight. And we decided to retreat a little because it seemed a bit quick for us. It took a while playing live in England, I mean for us it was basically there was a knock at the door and the guy from the record company and he said “Hey, I think you guys are brilliant”

As far as the American public area concerned, James are just another British group with a funny name and a single. While Tim Booth and his henchmen mark their first trip to the States by filming Born of Frustration in the Californian desert, Randee Dawn straps on her seven shooter and discovers a place where the grass is actually greener. Meanwhile, back at the Bonaventure Hotel…

And there they were: like something out of Lawrence of Arabia (or not), all seven of them, pale and dazzled, amidst the ochre sands of the Mojave Desert, horns a-blasting, singing about frustration and just who’s to blame. The camera sweeps broadly across the sharp coral structures that are all that remain of an underground lake. Strong winds blow piercing particles of sand into every crevice. It is all very reminiscent of November Spawned A Monster, actually, but if you told this to the seven out in the field, looks might kill. Yet another Morrissey reference might not be the best way to approach James these days, not even the new, reformulated James who have assembled five new multi-instrumental members around them like padding, or insulation. The press photo says it all: smack in the centre of the loose spiral of members sits Tim Booth, singer and mind, head cocked just a bit, insouciant and protected. This time, James want no room to slip up, this time, they are taking no chances

Today’s topic: Silence of the Lambs. Today’s speaker: Tim Booth. “I was a Jody Foster fanatic long before John Hinkley. She’s amazing: at 12 she was a great hooker. She’s good in even crap films, like The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane. So, having followed young Jody’s career all my life, it was good to see her really make it.”

The same could be said about James fans. Most anyone who knows anything about James has known it for quite some time. James may hold the record for being the greatest also rans in musical history. For just under a decade they’ve been there, slogging it out among the best, and yet never quite getting inside the winner’s circle. It has, to coin a word that Tim Booth so hates, become a bit of a habit. But now there are new members in the former quartet, and there is also a new album to commemorate the new number, Seven. From Fontana, their record label, there is also much enthusiasm. “We’ve had a lot of business-speak,” says Tim, “you know, ‘James is going to break America,’ but it doesn’t really help anybody. We’ve never been in a very big hurry for success; we weren’t very ambitious. We just thought the music was great and eventually everyone would catch up on that.”

It has taken just about everyone a long time to reach James’ level, buy to some extent they have also lowered their standards. Formerly this was a band who would never give an interview, have themselves photographed, or indulge in self promotional nonsense. “But if you don’t play that you’re shooting yourself in the foot,” says Tim, who clicks his tongue as he pauses, thinking, like an old man gnashing his dentures. “The reality of the 1980s was you have to do that, times have changed and the industry had become just that, an industry. The reality of James in the beginning was rehearsing, making a racket, really enjoying it. We didn’t make any money for the first seven years at all, but the music was so good, we felt it would work out in the end, they’ll invite us to the party eventually.”

And on a level, they have, at least been let in the door. For the first time, says Tim, they don’t have to rely on good press at home to push themselves or their record. “This song’s going to be heard by everyone in England,” says Tim, “so I don’t care what they say about it.” And just in time, too – right on schedule, he adds, the revolt has experiencing a press backlash for our success.

This may be a first from Tim Booth’s lips. Sure, James have always known they were too big and too fantastic for just anyone, but to actually say such a thing implies security. Because unless you’ve been in a cave, or lived in America since 1982, you probably have at least heard of James and their many misadventures. Stare more deeply into your memory’s photographs and you’ll recall James somewhere, either as an elegantly crazed opening act, or reading about their record label hopping in some paper, or maybe just by hearing Ya-Ho or Hymn From a Village, or more likely Sit Down. Familiar, they have become easy to overlook. And they have always been labelled – incorrectly: “We used to have two acoustic songs,” says Tim, “so we were a folk act. And then we wrote songs that had political overtones, small ‘p’, and suddenly James were a political band. Now we have two songs that are slightly anthemic and being like U2 is the latest criticism. But we refuse to stand still. It’s the spirit behind the music, not the genre. I love defying categorisation – it’s be a bad day when we kept getting the same review.”

It was this refusal to sound or be like anyone else in music that ultimately may have been the cause for James being shunted to the side so often. Avoiding being pigeonholed is one thing – not allowing the masses to at least get a grip on what you’re doing is quite another. “We’ve always been frightened of rituals and clichés,” says Tim. “We improvise, and we change our set every night. I hate it when musicians get too good, and all they do is end up looking technical, and when you mention improvisation they’re either so afraid of hitting the wrong note or their idea of improvising is to play as many notes as they can at the same time.”

This, Tim says, was part of the “James attitude” they had been searching for years for from musicians. The booting out of drummer Gavan Whelan gave the remaining three impetus to begin to take a different outlook on what James ought to be. That, according to Tim, was a widely expanded version of the old model. “We thought, we’ll look for a drummer, but let’s look around for what else is out there, too. We wanted good musicians, but who didn’t have to show it, musicians who were looking for the simplest way to play a song, rather than the flashiest way. So when one person takes a chord, everyone reacts. It’s a vulnerability, and an ability to be very awake, flexible, and able to take the lead when you need to.”

Thus assembled, James became the old: Tim. Larry Gott, and Jim Glennie, and the new: Saul Davies, Andy Diagram, David Baynton-Power and Mark Hunter, many of whom play more than one instrument, and most of whom switch roles depending on the song, the night and the mood. And why not? There are improv jazz bands, improv comedy, why not an improv pop group? “Live has always been our element,” says Tim. “Playing a great live show is making it all real, so it doesn’t look like you’re just going through the motions. It’s a direct communication, it’s something you feel is alive in that time on stage, when you know the band isn’t going to do the same moves to the same songs every night, they’re going to live their songs.”

And so, as seven, they made Gold Mother. “I think the reason it didn’t work was it was too weird, with extreme types of songs,” says Tim. “Our own criticism was that it didn’t feel like a whole – people were wondering ‘Who the hell made this record.’ Maybe it should have been four records instead of one.” Regardless, Gold Mother was not the breakthrough they expected. Its re-release, in a new version with the stirring (or, better, the ‘settling’) Sit Down, however, was. All at once, James were acclaimed in the manner they had always expected they would be. Huge shows sold out, all the time. They were merchandised to death. Buttons. More t-shirts. “And now they won’t stop playing us on the radio,” says Tim. “We’ve gone to radio stations and asked them not to play our songs, but they wouldn’t listen.” Your life should be this tough.

But having hit a high water-mark at home, Tim says the bigger shows were putting them out of touch with the audience, and they were losing their desire to improvise. “It inhibits you from taking risks,” says Tim “and it wasn’t a Zen enough attitude really, to take one place more seriously than another.”

America had been on the agenda for some time, but better to struggle in one country than flounder in two, so James had prudently not struck out on the road abroad thus far. In fact, visiting the desert to film Born Of Frustration marks their first trip overseas. Apart from the expected culture shock, however, a language barrier appears to be developing. Hispanics all over the world might cringe when Tim pronounces the desert they are performing in as “Moh-Jayv”

When James tour America for the first time, they will be a different band than anyone has ever seen in England. They will come without ten years of preconceptions, without ten years of history to founder under : No Morrissey tag, no “bearded, Buddhist vegans” here. To the patrons of clubs around the States, James will be just another British group with a funny name and a single. “It’s a challenge,” says Tim. “We like coming onstage and knowing we’ve got to take these people somewhere and they’re not going to take it all in on the first song, it’s going to be on the sixth or seventh. Seeing how different songs play in different cultures is always fascinating.”

What does seem to follow, no matter what culture, is the inability to grasp James’ agenda. Magazines are already labelling them folk-metal, or psychedelic, or just a bunch of “adorable blokes.” And this is the American press. One review of James referred to Gold Mother as “celebrating the beauty of childbirth.” This had not been Tim’s intent. “The whole thing is about the birth of my son, and it’s not a romantic view,” he says, “because giving birth is the most incredibly real, animal primal experience I’ve ever been through, and I didn’t do it, I just watched. When the song first came out people thought it was a sex song. And they thought that “purple headed alien” was a reference to my penis. I have a much better relationship with my penis than to call it an alien. Can you imagine: ‘Hey, would you like to touch my purple headed alien?’ It’s not going to do much for anybody, is it really?”

But understood as seven adorable blokes or as musicians of more serious intent, James are coming. They’ll play clubs if they have to, but in a more perfect world, says Tim, they’d just rather be the support act. “Then we could play bigger places,” he confides. “lf we played for bands like the Pixies, or REM, or Talking Heads, that would be ideal. American bands feel more real, and Black Francis, he’s the weirdest of them all. He makes you think he’s completely crazy and say’s ‘My lyrics mean nothing, but I’m going to sing like I’m in primal agony.’ It’s that the depth of madness of American bands tends to be more real to us than the English, which I find a bit light.”

The full tour will take place a few months hence, once the latest James offering is firmly in stores and completely overplayed on alternative radio, and only then, when James have been on the road for a month will the sense of utter cynicism and sarcasm set in about America. But for right now, the States are “alien and exotic” according to Tim. “It’s like places you’ve heard of in films, so you feel deja-vu all the time – ‘Oh, I’ve been here before – no, that was Mae West.’  The mythology that comes from movies is very weird.” Especially when you expect New York to be like Mean Streets and instead get mugged at gunpoint less than an hour after being in Los Angeles.

“We’re not used to guns in England,” Tim says diplomatically. “We’ve only seen them in movies. This country’s obsessed with them. Yes, it is a right. And it is written in the constitution. But do you know what I found out today? The constitution was written on hemp. George Washington had his own stash. It’s a wild thing, that constitution you have’.

It is suggested that he visit that constitution when the band plays Washington DC, where it is preserved under glass. Tim says he thinks he will. “I’ll put my nose right up on the glass and take a big smell I might get a dose of idealism.”

JAMES were first supposed to tour America supporting The Smiths in 1985. Seven years later, they’ve finally made it across the pond. Ted Mico caught up with them in Los Angeles and discovered how Manchester’s best kept secret has started to become got property in the US.

ALARMED AND DANGEROUS

“We’ve all been to LA before” Tim Booth tells the first interviewer on the morning of James’ debut LA concert. “Except our guitarist Larry who was only here for a few hours.”

In fact, Larry Gott had been in LA for exactly one hour before he made his way back to Blighty. The guitarist went night-time window shopping on Sunset Strip, looked at the motorbike shop and the Western boot shop, and then got held up at gunpoint by two assailants.

“You know when you walk round a city at night, you can get a feel for the place,” he explains. “How was I to know that in LA, the only people out at night are lunatics, winos and muggers? I was an innocent abroad.”

During his second visit (later tonight), Larry returned to the scenr of the crime with the band’s 20 stone Samoan minder, but the muggers had taken the night off. James are in town again, but this time the only problem is fending off the 50 or so fans that congegrate outside the venue that afternoon before the soundcheck.

HANG THE DJ

Stumbling off the tour bus into the 10 o’clock LA sun, the seven members of James look conspicously out of place. In the middle of the LA hustle and bustle, James appear even more diffident, more reserved, more essentially English. While the rest of LA believes it’s living in a police state, James are content to live between polite statements.

Like all English “alternative” bands visiting the city, James are asked to make the pilgrimage to the “alternative” and hideously influential radio station KROQ, where they’re supposed to be interviewed and to play a couple of songs live. Things get off to a flying start when the DJ gets everyone’s names wrong and keeps asking “Who’s James?” Once he gets on air, things go from bad to worse.

“Hi, here in the studio we have Tim Booth from the band James,” he gushes, while Larry Gott and Jim Glennie look at one another, wondering when they became invisible.

“Actually,” Tim says, “there are some other people here as well.”

Later, Tim explains he’s now trying to shift to move the emphasis away from just him and onto the band. He’s sick of being portrayed as the weird lead singer of a band and would rather be described as a singer of a leading weird band. This is the main reason for calling the album ‘Seven’ and shunning most of the limelight.

“So you’re playing a sold-out show tonight,” the DJ waffles on. “That’s really great.”

“Yeah,” Tim agrees. “20 people – that’s really some achievement for our first time in America.”

By now, Booth has shifted from detached civility to open hostility. Finally, the question we’ve all been waiting for: “So are you sick of explaining where you got the name from? I mean,” the DJ adds when he sees Tim glower, “you must have a pat answer by now.”

“We have about six that we choose from, depending on the level of intelligence of the person asking the questions,” Booth says, his playfulness evaporating in the steam of idiocy. “Which one do you think you’ll get?”

The DJ laughs nervously as Tim tells him that Jim Glennie won the fight for a name. The radio interview is now well off course and any attempt the DJ makes to right the ship is scuppered by Booth’s sarcasm.

“So,” the DJ asks, “we have a mutual friend – Deborah O’Donahue.”

“We do?” Tin shrugs, not having the faintest idea what the man is talking about. “I don’t know her actually. Is she someone you slept with, Jim?”

“Several times, probably” the bassist replies.

“So tell us about the show tonight,” the hapless jock asks. “What makes James different from the average run-of-the-mill pop band?”

“Well,” Booth begins earnestly, “we do a slow striptease throughout the concert, which a lot of people really get into, and there’s the indoor firework display and a juggler and conjuror who makes rabbits and aardvarks appear&ldots;.”

“Yeah right,” the DJ says, with another nervous radio laugh. Maybe there’ll be other towns for him to work in. For sure, they’ll be running him out of this one soon enough. “How is it you’re so loved in England and so unknown in America?” he stumbles on.

“They’ve got taste in England,” Booth spits and then smiles.

It’s decided it’s time for a commercial break. After the ads, James unload a savage acoustic version of ‘Lose Control’, which so overwhelms the attentive DJ that he completely loses the power of speech.

“Wow”, he splutters. “That was fantastic. You know, some of the best work on the radio is actually done live on the radio?”

What? In the space of 20 minutes, a grown man has slipped several rungs down the evolutionary ladder and is now barely capable of the mental skills of an amoeba. The intellectual cripple must want someone to run him over and put him out of his misery.

“So tell me,” he demands, “what do you hate most about Americans?”

“The insincerity with which we’re treated by most people in the music industry here,” Booth retorts. Glennie and Gott grimace uneasily. Luckily the DJ doesn’t realise he’s the target of the comment, and a lullaby version of ‘Protect Me’ cools everyone’s increasingly frayed tempers&ldots;

The revolution may not be televised but at least some of it will be serialised on the radio. A week ago in Dallas, the band were on a Top 40 radio station and the DJ was conned into playing ‘Hymn From A Village’.

“It was five-o-clock primetime radio in Texas,” Gott later recalls, “and they played a minor indie hit from 1985 from a group noone’s ever heard of. I think the bloke must have been sacked after that, but we had fun.”

VOYAGES AND VOYEURS

It may have taken James nine years to finally tour America, but now the band are making up for lost time, filling every available minute with TV or radio interviews. Their Samoan security man looks perplexed when told of their meek and mild reputation in Britain, and dumbfounded when told of their legendary lack of excess.

“Well,” he says “I think America must have done them some good, because they sure as hell ain’t like that now.”

“I’m not sure that travel does broaden the mind,” Gott offers. “I mean, not on a tour like this We’ve seen a great deal but we can’t assimilate any of it. Like, going to sleep on the tour bus in the middle of a snowstorm and waking up in bright sunshine – it’s too much.

“I mean we played Boston, but all we saw was the hotel, the venue and the airport. We never even got to see the ‘Cheers’ bar in Phoenix, noone seemed to understand a word we said. We seemed utterly incapable of communicating with any of the locals, until we realised that they didn’t understand each other either. It was dead weird that all this misinformation was passed between people. The whole city was filled with cartoon characters.”

“To be honest,” Glennie says, “I’d rather tour America than Europe. Here, we can immerse ourselves in the culture, whereas in Europe, because of our ignorance of languages, we’re just tourists who say things like, ‘You-o, get us-o a beer-o’, and then spend fifty quid on a pint of beer.”

“People in Britain are still snobby about America,” Tim says. “But we’ve had a great time, met some interesting people and visited some fantastic places. There’s one street in Austin, Texas, which was just amazing. Larry said he saw the best guitarist he’d ever seen playing there. Then Saul (James fiddle player) said he saw the best violinist he’d ever seen in his life. It turned out to be the same guy. The landscape of the whole country is pretty devastating really.”

America is a beautiful country, largely populated by morons.

“We’re not finding that, although we’re never sure who to trust,” Booth says on the way back from the radio ordeal. “People can be so over the top here, it’s difficult to tell if they’re bullshitting or not. The shows have been wonderful, which comes as no real surprise to us, because we’re such arrogant f**kers, but we have been pleasantly reassured.”

America should embrace James. It is, after all, a land where the size of vision counts, not necessarily the size of sound.

“You’re being very tactful there, Ted,” Tim says warily as we speed down the Hollywood freeway. “We’ve always had the vision, though. The only time it’s blurred is when we’re drunk. Has America brought out the excess in us? Not really, that happened on the last British tour. Now we’re into the unprintable adventures of James. The X-certificate James.”

Tim tells the story of how various statues at venues they’ve played went missing, including one three-foot memento they attempted to smuggle onto a plane in Toronto. Tim begins to elaborate on more tales of the drunk and unexpected, but sadly his voice is drowned out by a police siren – a sound that James feel has followed them around from the moment they touched down in America.

“The most surprising thing about this tour is that it’s fun,” says Jim Glennie. “It seems like we’re having some kind of palpable impact. This is such a vast f**king country, the fear was that we could tour here for five years in the back of a Transit achieving very little. We at least feel that we’ve thrown a pebble into the ocean and caused a few ripples.”

“There seems to be a real buzz about us being here,” Larry adds.

“There are people who’ve just heard us and heard ‘Born of Frustration’ and then there are people who’ve been waiting since 1985 when we were supposed to come over here with The Smiths.”

“It’s partly down to the American charts,” Booth concludes, “which have loosened up a bit and allowed in your REMs and Metallicas and Nirvanas. Perhaps there’s a little space for James.”

“We only want the broom cupboard, and we’ve waited a long while,” Glennie pleads, but by now I’ve turned our car off the freeway and into Beverly Hills.

“No,” Tim states, gazing out of the car window at the enormous mansions. “I want the penthouse and the swimming pool and the indoor golf course! I love the excess. In Phoenix two nights ago, we were supported by a band called One Foot In The Grave. It was a group of 60 to 70-year olds who perform Ramones covers. The sign outside the gig just said ‘James – One Foot In The Grave’, which was a bit ominous, but like I’ve said before, we’d have to do something very stupid to go into reverse gear now. In England, we’re treated as vegetarian nutters, whereas in America, we’re considered English eccentrics.”

POOL’S OUT

By the time we arrive at the Hyatt hotel and hit the swimming pool on the roof, the two usually silent members of James have hit their stride just as the normally garrulous Tim Booth crashes out.

All the bad luck and bad timing seems to be behind James now, but are they worried about f**king up again?

“I can’t see where the next downside’s going to come from unless we implode,” Gott says.

Yet James are the band who’ve shot themselves in the foot so many times, it’s a wonder any of them can stand up.

“I know,” Larry admits. “It’s a good thing that you can’t get Uzis in England. Can you imagine the damage we’d have done to ourselves with a sub machine gun. We shouldn’t take any of this for granted,” he continues, gazing through the late afternoon LA haze. “But we do. It’s just such a relief to be over the worry of whether we’d survive another week. Now it’s just nice to breeze along.”

“I mean,” Glennie adds, “if it hadn’t worked, we weren’t qualified to do anything else. We committed ourselves to an occupation, which, if you fail, is totally redundant. Being able to use phrases like, ‘I can’t hear the bass in the monitor’, or ‘There’s no f**king champagne in the rider’, doesn’t do you any good when you’re trying to flog double glazing! We’d have gone to the employment office and they’d ask us what we can do and we’d say, ‘Well I’ve been a pop star for the past 10 years'”

“Things are much more up and down now,” Gott explains. “This is like a rollercoaster ride that hasn’t got an end. You just have to keep your sense of humour handy.”

The guitarist’s handy sense of humour has a knack of getting everyone into trouble. It’s the third day of the Rodney King court case, where four policeman have been charged with beating King senseless with 56 baton blows, each one caught on amateur video. During the photo shoot, Gott leans against the Sheriff’s car, looks around and goes, “I don’t think I’d better vandalise it, I’ve seen the video of what happened next.” The sheriff is unimpressed. The rest of the band wonder, “If Larry didn’t shoot the deputy, who did?”

Are James coping well with success?

“It’s easy to feel precious when you’ve had a bit of success,” Glennie says. “You feel like shit because you’ve had a late drunken night, and you expect everyone to run around looking after you treating you with kid gloves.”

“Even though we’ve been together nine years,” Gott adds, “it’s a hard accusation to level at someone – you’re acting like a temperamental pop star and a complete f**king prat. It’s like you’re suddenly not just watching ‘Spinal Tap’, but playing a part in it. Especially with the US music business people around. They all seem so efficient and I think the music business should be shambolic. It’s in the very nature of the business, especially when dealing with a band like James. A magazine article about us last week said, ‘One place they certainly will not be is where their itinerary says they should be’, and that’s very true.”

The poolside muzak fades out and “Smells Like Teen Spirit” kicks in. The combination of Nirvana and too much sun causes the guitarist to experience several bouts of nausea before he recovers his composure.

“I used to like this song and the whole album,” he says. “But there’s been such an overkill, I can’t stand it anymore. The Pixies made a huge impact on a lot of people, but the record companies didn’t flood out to find the new Pixies. Now Nirvana have one single that was picked up by MTV, and the record companies are going ga-ga. Why couldn’t they see the potential before?”

Other bands also owe their success to one spectacular single, like for instance “Sit Down;”

“Indeed,” the duo chorus.

SEVENTH HEAVEN

Before the LA gig at the Roxy, Tim Booth declares himself immensely happy with the way James first US tour has gone.

“All we have to do now is play a truly awesome show tonight,” he says, mockingly.

Even he must have been surprised, however, by just how truly spectacular James are. For once, everything seems to flow in the right direction, new songs like ‘ Next Lover’ melting brilliantly into old favourites like ‘Stutter’ and ‘Come Home’. The opening bars of ‘Sit Down’ prompt the usual stage invasion, but the song now not only has The Glitter Band drum bear, but a slice of T-Rex’s ‘Ride The White Swan’. For the last gig in San Francisco, the band plan to throw in Metallica’s ‘Enter Sandman’, just to prove that it can be done. The night before Booth left the stage in San Diego, walked through the audience and opened the venue doors, where there were people under 21 who couldn’t get in who were outside listening to the concert in the car park. It was just another touching moment from a man who enjoys making things happen, and now enjoys what’s happening to him.

It seems ironic that by playing a venue as small and intimate as The Roxy, James prove exactly how staggering they still are and just how foolish anyone would be to write them off as overblown and over the hill.

Alton Towers, where the band will be playing this summer, may hold a few thousand more people, but James are still the only band around that can turn one man’s misery into such joyful celebration, and the increased numbers shouldn’t increase the numbness. Like the relationship between coal and diamonds, the added pressure seems to make James all the more precious – and I say that without teeth gritted.

When Manchester’s James began working on their third studio LP, Gold Mother, they made to a declaration — to go in for the kill. After almost a decade of success on England’s indie charts and countless gigs, they felt the time had come to go mainstream. So they released a single called “Sit Down” and sat back while the song shot its way up the charts, conquering the number one position in Britain for weeks-on-end.

“In one respect, we did expect it to happen,” says the band’s bass player Jim Glennie. “But when it did happen, it was still quite a shock. There was a lot of pressure building up, the last three singles before that had gotten into the top-40 in the U.K. So they were on the border of what’s classified as being a hit. There was this real audience participation thing that built up some mystique around the song. People were really interested in what was happening. So when it was released, if anything was going to break that deadlock, it was going to be ‘Sit Down.'”

Seven, James’ fourth album, is full of the same explosive, exquisitely crafted pop tunes that not only showcase the band’s new-found commercial appeal, but also provide insight into the rhythmic and musical strength the band inherited as a result of constant touring for Gold Mother. The growth is momentous.

“It’s difficult for me to put into words,” Glennie says. “I know it’s moved on. To my ears, it’s very different, but it’s hard to say exactly what those differences are. When we recorded Gold Mother, we weren’t quite sure of the parameters of the band. With this album, it’s three years later and it feels very much more whole. We’re very pleased with it.

“I hope there’s still a wide-range of emotions and different styles on it. It’s difficult for me to judge it, I’ve been so engrossed with it for the past year. I still love listening to it, I’ll put it on at home and I still get a buzz. Hopefully, people can judge for themselves what differences there are.”

So far, people seem to like what they’ve heard. James released “Sound” in England just before Christmas and that got to number 9. “We were really excited because we wanted to release something that said a little bit more about James than the ‘Sit Down’-style of song that we do — the kind of cheery, uplifting ones,” Glennie says. “We thought ‘Sound’ was a little bit harder.”

The band’s current single, “Born of Frustration” seems headed for the same fate in the states — and the band couldn’t be happier.

“It’s going to be a crazy year this year,” Glennie says. “We’ve got a ridiculously busy schedule, with a lot of time over here, which should be nice. We don’t want to sit back on our laurels. All we ever wanted to do was travel and play music for people. And it feels like now the opportunity is there. If success comes from that, then great, we’re not going to change what we do for different markets.”

“I wanna enjoy it, that’s my main goal for ’92. I don’t know how long it’s going to last. Maybe it’ll be 10 years, 5 years, or a year. I don’t know, I have no idea. It would be so easy to get sucked up in the pressure of it, in the chaos of it, in the business of it, and I don’t want to. This business could be a lot of pressure. It could go to your head. But you can have a great time too. It just has to do with your mental attitude. I wanna enjoy this. I think this can be a great few years…or it could be hell!”

DJ : Tim Booth from James and Jim’s here as well. You’ve done so well in the States and you’ve sold out a tour and you’re selling millions of albums. You’re taking America by storm. So I suppose that this means inevitably, you’ll abandon us and take American citizenship and never return.

Tim : Change our names as well. Jim Bob

DJ : But you’re never here now

Tim : That’s not true actually. We’ve only been, we’ve only played in America this year in nine years and everyone says “Why didn’t you go to America before?” and we’ve only been there for a few weeks. It’s just that..

DJ : It has taken off though, hasn’t it?

Tim : Yeah, it’s doing so at the moment

DJ : The sell out tour business. It must be very alluring as much as anything.

Tim : Yeah it’s exciting going to another country so foreign as America because we’re kind of used to Europe just from holidays if nothing else. You get used to Europe but America is just like another planet and within the whole of America there’s like seven different countries at least. And you kind of, like Larry says, get on a bus in the morning and it’s kind of snowing and minus ten and you sleep and by the time you wake up it’s 80 degrees and kind of subtropical. It’s bizarre how the landscape changes so quickly.

DJ : Talking about America, forgetting the landscape for a minute, they like to be able to put people in a box. Do you have an identity that they’ve imposed on you?

Jim : Not yet. There’s not been sufficient press yet, I think, to actually build up some kind of identity for us over there yet. I know what type of….

Tim : That’s the music thing. It’s hard to talk about music. Journalists, you can’t talk to about notes and tempos and so journalists tend to say “oh, they’re like so and so” or they hope you’re going to give them a photograph where there’s an easily discernible image.

DJ : Which is something you’re not keen on it, is it?

Tim : No, we’re all sloppy dressers, so and there’s seven of us and it’s chaos. I mean we couldn’t coordinate a look, we can’t coordinate a sound so this idea of coordinating a look, it’s crazy. The trumpet player wears a dress, what are you going to do with the rest of us?

DJ : Does that cause a problem?

Tim : We’re quite happy with it. We play games in America, like we have a dice game where we roll the dice to see who wears the dress each night and then you have to carry it off on stage. We play games like that with each other.

DJ : All the same size?

Tim : Yeah, well the drummer has trouble because he’s about six foot four.

Jim : Miniskirt

Tim : He looks cute

DJ : Sexy? Yeah. You’re playing this enormous gig at Alton Towers. You talked earlier this week, last week it was, maybe the week before with Philip Schofield. You’ve got Alton Towers which is not exactly your backyard. Why?

Tim : We’ve been looking to play Manchester for a year or so, because the last gigs we did in Manchester were really special to us. It was like a homecoming. It was just when we were breaking and it was a huge celebration and we filmed it and we didn’t know how to top it. We’d been looking for a good gig to play in Manchester and we hadn’t got council permission. We tried aerodromes etc and this seemed it. It’s about an hour and a half from Manchester so it seems like a great idea. They can pay a little extra and do free fair rides in the afternoon. And it’s like a festival but you have real toilets.

Jim : They’re setting the stage up actually in the lake, on the edge of the lake where the grass slopes down so we’ll get a great view as well. With the houses in the background.

Tim : And we’ll have a big kind of firework display at the end of the night

DJ : Sounds great. Just while we’re talking about performing. One of my obesssions is about encores because I’ve been to two gigs this week and the encores have been longer than the gigs. You have this ritual that bands are starting to go through now where you know they’re going to do 4, 5, maybe 6 song encores and an hour after they actually start doing the gig, then they’re into the encores and the encores take another ninety minutes or so. Do you plan yours?

Tim : What we do is put down a pool of a few songs we might play if we’re asked back and we don’t always go back.

Jim : That’s why it takes us so long to come back because we argue backstage “I don’t want to play that one, let’s play this one. We have huge rows.”

DJ : So are they real encores?

Tim : We write down a pool of six songs we know we can play as encores if we need to but we don’t always go back. The last concert we played we had a huge row. We went off stage. Half the band wanted to play one song, half the band another. So two went on stage and started to play the song they wanted to play and we were really angry because we didn’t want to play that song. So I went on and I started attacking Larry in a mock humour way. But he got really angry because he was trying to play guitar and I was shaking him so much he was out of tune. So he picked up his guitar and threw it at me and he stormed off and we played the song without him and he came back half way through and carried on playing and we were OK then.

DJ : That’s good to hear

Tim : It’s that kind of chaos where you don’t know what’s going to happen.

DJ : It must be a nightmare for management.

Tim : No, Martine likes that

Jim : She’s got used to it. The eyebrows shoot up

Tim : She comes on stage with us and sings some nights. She’s been with us eight years. She’s part of the band.

DJ : Tim and Jim, thanks very much indeed for coming in. Thanks James.

l!”

Details

Anyone in the music industry can tell you about the importance of high quality recording. Just ask James. No, James isn’t a person, James is a rock band that earned a huge following in Europe by playing at large outdoor festivals, featuring such popular stars as David Bowie and The Cure. We recently caught up with James backstage at the Roxy Club here in Hollywood during their first tour of the US.

It’s been ten years since the British rock group James made their first recording entitled Village Fire. In 1990, the band’s third studio outing Gold Mother went platinum in the UK. Jim Glennie, bass guitarist, explains that James love for their music has paid off.

Jim : After all these years. That’s what’s fuelled us basically. Over the ten years we’ve been together. It’s the enjoyment of the music. I mean in England we’ve had quite a few problems with the business side of things, record companies and the radio kind of ignoring us. But we love what we do.

Their fourth album, entitled Seven, includes the UK Top Ten single Sound and has sparked a successful debut US tour. When the group recently performed at an outdoor concert in San Francisco, the fans enthusiastic reception came unexpectedly to the lads from Manchester.

Jim : They were really wild. The action was really wild. They were throwing flowers at us on stage and getting on the stage and grabbing hold of us. You know chasing us back to the hotel. And it was like, it was really weird. It was really strange, because you don’t know what to expect. You come over here and think yeah if you get people along, it’s like they’ll be stood there like “Come on then, impress us” and you have to win them over. But yeah, there’s a section there that are just really loyal, really loyal dedicated James fans and that’s strange.

At a recent soundcheck before their concert in Los Angeles, guitarist Larry Gott explained how the group developed their own sound.

Larry : It’s kind of like, it’s something that occurs naturally. It wasn’t something that we went looking for.

Jim adds that the group has a really relaxed way of coming up with new songs

Jim : You know that’s how we write. We don’t set aside time for writing as such as it doesn’t really work like that. I mean we do it in little bites. A few days at a time because you can’t just put the hours in and then the songs appear. It’s like they’re either there when you pick up your guitar or they’re not.

New songs can even come along at rehearsals such as this one.

Larry : We were just like jamming around and I know it sounded like a bit of a mess, but sometimes it really comes together and we tape it and listen back to it. And there’s a song in there somewhere.

And how has James dealt with their new found popularity? According to Jim and Larry, it’s as easy as remembering what it’s all about.

Jim : If you bring it back down to the core of what you’re doing. Writing and playing music. You know, it’s not flying off round the world giving interviews and being here and being there. It’s writing songs and playing music.

Larry : Yeah, you can get lost in promotion and image. And all that sort of stuff.

Even though staying in the spotlight can mean work, work and even more work, the members of James still consider it a whole lot of fun.

Larry : The way people describe us as playing music. Using the word playing music, not performing or constructing music, you know what I mean, it’s playing and that’s what it’s like, it’s playing.

Tim Booth, the lead singer of the rock group James says he compares his group to the E-Street Band which up to a couple of years ago performed with rock superstar Bruce Springsteen. Booth says both his group and the E-Street Band is comprised of players who are talented enough to front bands of their own. It’s true.

Interviewer: Their new album’s called Seven, their new single’s called Seven, they’re James and they’ve come to meet me on a number seven bus.

Well, we didn’t really pick the right day to come sightseeing, I know, I’m sorry. How are you both anyway?

Jim: Very well, thank you.

Tim: Fine, thanks. Will you tell us if any low-hanging bridges are coming up?

Interviewer: I’ll just shout duck. Now, your roots are in Manchester, how are you finding it here in London?

Tim: How are we finding it? Wet. (Tree hits Tim’s umbrella) Hey, are you going to warn us about the trees?

Interviewer: Now, your new album released in February is called Seven, and it seems to have a lot of diverse tracks on it, but are there any running ideas or themes on the album?

Tim: Well, some people have said the word “God” crops up a lot.

Jim: So does the word “and,” mind you.

Tim: And the word “The” is a recurring theme as well.

Interviewer: Now, when you were in the studio recording this album there were some strange things happening, is this true?

Jim: We had this crazy producer called Youth, an ageing hippy, managed to find his way into the studio, and he was in the studio for a few days before us, and we thought he was like setting things up technically, but he wasn’t, he was actually decorating the studio! He’d gone in there and put rugs on the walls, and incense, huge flower displays…

Tim: Hundreds of candles, everything we did was in candlelight. By the way, Youth, if you’re out there, I want you to know that it was Jimmy who called you an ageing hippy, not me.

Interviewer: You have a new single out, also called Seven.

Tim: Another coincidence.

Jim: Amazing.

Tim: Happens all the time.

Interviewer: And there’s a great video to go with it, tell us about that.

Tim: Basically, it was Larry’s fault, the guitarist’s fault. We decided on the idea of having seven awful things happening to the band, or seven elements attacking the band during the course of the video, we were gonna be tarred and feathered, stuff like that.

Jim: And we had wind machines, big wind machines that could actually blow you over. We went for extremes, it wasn’t just “oh, we want a little bit of wind;” if we go for wind we want a lot of wind, and the fire…

Tim: The climax was 9 to 12 tonnes of water dropping on us, we got hit by this tidal wave! You get hit by 9 to 12 tonnes of water, it’s quite a shock I tell you. We ruined this film studio, it was completely wrecked, all the equipment went 40 yards across this converted aircraft hanger.

Jim: It flattened us. We thought we’d be able to play through this wave of water and it just completely flattened us, swept us about across the studio. It was really funny.

Interviewer: So you’re really popular with the studio artist now?

Jim: Yeah, little bit of cleaning up to do I think.

They stopped short of stadium ignominy. Opting for mass tribal bliss-out at the surreal dodgem Disneyland of Alton Towers. James bang on course of lost in the credibility jungle?
The roll up roll up of kiddie Utopia virtual reality dodgem Disneyland of Alton Towers is bleak, hollow joke as the rain sheets it down outside our window, and Tim Booth of James is coming out fighting.

“Of course it was Select who started it all.” He remarks sourly. “the whole…Simple Minds…thing.”

He spits the words out like they’re some kind of repulsive semantic kebab. James are due to be playing here on July 4th, and their recce has been a total wash-out. All they can see is rain. Where’s the audience gonna be? Er, just over there, mate, where all that rain is.

It won’t be like this on the fourth, grant you. The sun will be smirking arrogantly. Rains name wont be down on the guest=list. It will be a perfect summer day, and Tim Booth’s face will be flushed, awed, sensuous vehicle for all the intense drama and wordy love that he crams into a James song these days.

And he’ll have quite a view. James will be playing on a raft like stage set in the middle of a lake.

Anyone wishing to indulge in a little time-honoured brushing-of-hands with the James frontman will have a bit of a swim ahead of them.

Well its one way to meet your fans. And also one swift comprehensive way to have a major blast while striving to shed the excess critical baggage James have repeatedly been forced to check in since the release of their last album, ‘Seven’ and its first single, ‘Born Of Frustration’. Stadium rock! Pomp Pious shite! Just some of the quips lobbed James’ way (particularly Booth’s way!) in the last year.

Who would have thought that, when Tim came up with the singalong afterthought bit to ‘Born Of Frustration’, he’d still be defending himself almost a year later, against allegations of plagiarism and worse- not loathing Simple Minds enough. Tim’s adamant that James fans simply don’t see it that way.

“They understand that the new LP was a new avenue for us.” We understand the thing with ‘Born Of Frustration’, but that’s one song, one chorus. And people “ he says pointedly into the tape recorder, “ are missing the heart of something, just being sidetracked by the chorus. Anyway, our definition of success is sales plus respect. We’ve had respect – well, from some quarters anyway – but if you’re completely broke for years and everything’s a struggle and the record companies can’t or won’t, like your music or do anything to promote it, then that must be totally frustrating.

“Then again.” He goes on “if you have success but everyone thinks you’re crap then that must be totally frustrating too. It’s something that’s hard to gauge at the time. You can’t tell which bands are going to be remembered well in six years’ time. That’s, “he looks around the table at bassist Jim Glennie and guitarist Larry Gott who are following his argument impassively,” the sort of respect we want – for the songs to be remembered. Good music lasts, whether its Talking Heads or Velvet Underground or The Doors or The Beatles. But there are very few bands that have got really big and retained their credibility.”

He speaks measured, reasoned tone, but anyone can sense his anger. Larry Gott takes a long, cool squint at the rain bucketing down on the salubrious idyll of Alton Towers outside. And here, ladies and gentleman, we have an Area Of Great Natural Beauty, getting soaked.

“Stately Home Rock,” says Larry. That’s where we are now,”

THE USUAL LINE OF RECKONING WOULD HAVE James – yer nouveaux stadium rockers par excellence – lounging around and doing sod all artistically until at least the next eclipse. That’s the way the fat and indolent are supposed to play it: an album every three years and a gig every now and again if you’re lucky – maybe you’ll be fortunate enough to catch one of the drumsticks thrown into the crowd at the end.

To which James have one, typically James-like, reply. Two week-long spells in a studio in Wales have already produced 14 new songs develop from what they call “seeds”, scraps of songs that emerge from their improvised stage sessions. They like to “road test” new songs, playing them live while they’re still being developed – often without any proper lyrics.
“We take them into the studio and see which ones blossom,” says Tim. “some of the ones you think are good just die. Others grow into really exotic creatures. It’s a relief to get all these songs written. After we did ‘Seven’ we had nothing. We felt totally insecure. It’s like coming out of your bank with all your money. It’s a huge sigh of relief and we’re off in a direction no one’s anticipated.”

Bearing in mind the plan for ‘Seven’ was to get in as many Nirvana, Pixies and Metallica influences as possible, reflecting the listening habits of the band members and also bearing, in mind that that idea flopped miserably, what kind of patterns are emerging with new stuff?

Larry: “We’ve gone Goth. We’ve got a bluegrass Goth track called ‘Chicken Goth’, A song called ‘William Burroughs’, A really miserable one called ‘Goalless Draw’ which goes; ‘It’s a goalless draw and the goalies got the ball’, and you can’t get much worse than that in a football match. ‘Going Down On America’. Then there’s ‘Maria’s party’…”

Ah. Tim’s particularly fond of ‘Maria’s Party’. We’ve been hearing about it all afternoon. “the lyrics a litany of all these exotic creatures that come to Maria’s Party,” he starts to explain, clearly enjoying himself. “A gypsy playing trumpet in a second-hand dress. A bear in a tutu that loves to sing karaoke. A slug that dances. Siamese twins from a broken home. A limbo dancer that makes love in positions unknown to man. It’s done in a style similar to Algerian rai music – very sexy, hypnotic.”

“Admit it, “scoffs Jim. “It’s basically like a dodgy Spanish disco song.”

“Whatever shrugs Tim. “It’ll kill the Simple Minds thing off once and for all.”

What was the most annoying thing about being hailed as the New Simple Minds?

“I think the most annoying thing for me,” replies Jim “was the idea that we deliberately changed our sound to achieve success. Which is something we’d never do and couldn’t if we tried.”

“I don’t know,” shrugs Larry. “All that stuff written about us when the album came out doesn’t really seem relevant to us. We’ve spent most of this year playing pretty small places in Europe and America. Over here we’re a bit more popular and more people want to come and see us so we’re doing Alton Towers. It’s as simple and obvious as that. The idea that we’ve suddenly become this massive stadium band doesn’t make sense when we’re playing a 500-capacity club in Texas.”

Yes, but when you are playing a 500-capacity club in Texas or wherever, are you thinking big?

“We’ve always been ambitious in that respect” says Jim thoughtfully. “We’ve always thought we could be very big and we’ve never seen anything wrong with that. Even when things were going wrong we were quite arrogant in a way, believing we were a good group with good songs which a lot of people would really like. We’ve always been confident that we could be successful. To get to that position a lot of other things have to be in place – record company and all that business – but we’ve always believed that, given the opportunity to play to large numbers of people and get our records on the radio, we could be successful. But always on our own terms.”

James own terms have become a pretty cool legend. Any band prepared to submit themselves to guinea pig drug tests in Manchester hospitals just to keep their band alive (as they did in 1987) obviously aren’t kidding. The spirit of James may have taken a real kicking over such energy-sapping traumas as the overplayed Buddhist Controversy of 1985, the Lenny Kaye Production Debacle of 1986, the Great ‘Strip-Mining’ Disaster of 1988 and the Ignominious Royal Bank Of Scotland-Loan of 1989, but killing it off altogether is something you suspect could never happen. The spirit of James was made, as they say, of stronger stuff. Some galvanised tungsten-carbide formula. Aluminium could well have been involved.

Some things they do just seem bloody-minded. At last year’s Reading Festival a 40,000 audience waiting for a stupendous half-hour version of Sit Down had to do with a throwaway three minute extract, plus loads of songs they hadn’t heard yet. This, in the light of Carter’s performance-of-a-lifetime which preceded them, was seen as a totally blown opportunity.

“The reviews of us at Reading last year seemed to completely misunderstand what we were trying to do,“ complains Tim. “The papers decided to say that Carter had blown us off stage, as if we were in competition with Carter, which is not something we had considered. They played to backing tapes, brought in a special light show, which is fine, but we wanted to treat it as a normal James experience. That meant five new songs, playing down ‘Sit Down’ things that we thought had integrity – but we couldn’t really win. We were told off for taking risks by journalists. They condemned us for it. The very people who are always talking about sterility in music and how bands get complacent shouldn’t be condemning us for doing shows that are challenging, that take risks. They should encourage us.

“We are not crowd pleasers. We like to throw in new songs, improvise, make things as interesting as possible. It’s about stepping out of a formula. I think it’s important for us to do that. I like music that gives me something I haven’t had before, which is what we try to do with James. We change the set list every night, we improvise, we do new songs which I haven’t even got lyrics for and it’s to scare ourselves, to make us work harder.”

He’s not joking about scaring themselves. Because, after all, whats the alternative? The credibility jungle. Ooh, you don’t want to go in there, son. A fearsome place to roam. All those tendrils of temptation and tackiness. Tim mutters something about U2 “treading a thin line”. Jim picks up on it straight away.

“They blew it for me when I saw them live, “ he says fearlessly. “We all liked ‘Achtung Baby’ but then we saw the show in America. There’s just no need to put on a razzy show like that. They’ve got great songs, they’re great song writers. They should just chill out – just get up there and play the songs. Its fair enough if you’re crap. When I saw INXS it was well over the top and it distracted me from the music, but the music wasn’t great so it was fair enough. U2 don’t need that.”

Larry: “Well, you’ve successfully blown our supports worldwide there, Jim.”

“I like the idea of James playing to large crowds,” stresses Tim. “I’ve always liked festivals, even though they were quite unfashionable for many years. There seems to be so much going on this year but I wonder if this country’s too wet to support that many events. All you need is one Glastonbury like they had about six years ago when the whole place looked like a refugee camp and nobody went to festivals for about two years.”

The rains still doing the dance of the pyramids out on the picturesque slopes of Alton Towers, and Tim is getting increasingly insular in this conference room. He’s got to sing – as in perform, as in project, as in reach out and touch – to around 25,000 people out there in the middle of a sodding lake next week. It’s hard to envisage that kind of transformation in the man. Does he never feel just too terrified to contemplate it?

“I was petrified when I first went on stage,” he recalls. “I was a shy person who found it hard to communicate with people. Being in a group offered me a means of self-expression. I’d seen Patty Smith and Iggy Pop and others move me in a way that was really powerful. I saw the possibilities of what you can do in a live concert.”

Do you ever feel like an idiot?

“Most of the time its fine but other times I go onstage and, yeah, I do feel foolish. The songs start to fall apart, I can’t dance properly. Sometimes we go on and feel like a rock band – really hollow. It doesn’t happen often but when it does it’s horrible. And there’s ones when you go on in a weird psychological mood and can’t let the audience in, can’t smile even.”

What’s it like on stage?

“Onstage everything is amplified,” he explains, “from the basic sound to the emotions. So you get incredible highs, but when it goes bad you get an equivalent low which is why you get groups breaking up TV sets, smashing hotel rooms and behaving like arseholes. There’s so much emotion and energy you really have to learn how to deal with it.”

And you obviously have?

“It’s self expression and it feels valuable to my life,” he says, sincere eyes working overtime. “If you feel it’s not a worthwhile thing to be doing it’s because you’re not going deep enough. It lies within me to do that so if I’m getting bored it’s my fault. Some aspects of life I don’t like.”

Such as? You’re not renowned party animals.

“Touring is a moronic lifestyle,” he says wearily. “You’re up until four in the morning because after a gig you don’t want to sleep. Once a week I don’t mind staying up and having a drink or whatever, but as a lifestyle it’s really boring and destabilising. I have a son, Jims got two children, Larry’s got a step-daughter, Dave (Baynton-Power, drummer) has got a sort of step-daughter, though he’s not married – so for people like us it isn’t an ideal lifestyle.

“But it’s the life we’ve chosen,” he say, warming up a little. “At the beginning of James we never looked beyond the next couple of years. We’ve been going a long time now but the thought of stopping is something we’ve discussed and rejected. We’ve seen a lot of bands who have stopped early then regretted it and tried to get back together and do it again, but you can’t just pick it up two years later.

“We feel there will be a time when we realise its finished – were very conscience of that – but were determined to take it as far as it’ll go, to its proper conclusion.”

He looks serenely at Larry and Jim, who have been watching him silently for the past ten minutes or so. Is that the rain easing off?

“And it’s a long way off yet,” smiles Tim Booth.

In the stuffy den of a Manhattan vegetarian restaurant, our legs corkscrewed under a narrow table. I am attempting to conduct an interview with Tim Booth. We’re doing it here because, in their obstinate way, James are making the point that they like to do everything on their own terms. Steak and chips would be just the job, but I have to make do with falafel in pitta bread, which seems to have been sprinkled with authentic Saharan sand. Tim Booth gives me a pitying look as I order more coffee, as caffeinated as possible for the war against jet lag. “I’ll have a carrot and parsley and spinach juice please,” he tells the waiter. “A large one.” He looks down at the tape recorder on the table and grins. “There you go – it’s on tape! I’m doomed.”

He flashes back to what we’d been talking about a few minutes earlier, specifically : James image of vegetable-flavoured, vaguely spiritual wimpiness. “That thing about vegetarian stereotypes or ethereal stereotypes – if you’re ethereal, intellectual person, it doesn’t mean you don’t fight or fuck – it’s bullshit. When you get a tag like ‘intellectual’. I don’t like it – it’s one muscle, the one in the head and it’s unbalanced. There’s a heart one and a body one and a spirit one, and the key has to be balance and developing them all, so you don’t fall over because there’s too much weight in your head.”

There doesn’t seem to be much weight in any part of Booth’s body. Beside him, a stick of celery would feel ashamed of its wobbling obesity. His pale face, with its bird-like bone structure and rather irritating angelic smile, makes him look about half his 32 years. It sits on top of a body so slight that it’s hard to imagine how it carries its occupant through the punishing demands of touring, recording and promotion, which are increasingly becoming an everyday routine for James.

But James are tougher than they look. Booth insists that several band members often get quite drunk, actually, and tells me how he’d plunged into the audience the night before, brandishing his deadly tambourine at a troublesome coin-thrower. But the band’s toughness is spiritual rather than physical. Somewhere in Booth there’s a little bit of ascetic, even the Jesuit. Just like Kevin Rowland said : “I will punish the body until I believe in the soul”

Booth, who studied drama at Manchester University after being ejected from public school in Shrewsbury, can trace his family tree back to John Wesley and General Booth of the Salvation Army. He says he was “conditioned in Christianity” as a child, and some of that Evangelical zeal – or Booth’s response to it – has plainly rubbed off in songs like God Only Knows or Heavens. Channel 4 banned James from singing Live A Love Of Life on the Johnathan Ross show, claiming it was blasphemous. “Channel 4, the cutting edge of British television,” snorts Booth. “We asked which part they were referring to, and it was the whole thing. The guitar solo! The drum-sound from hell! It’s weird.”

“You do a song like God Only Knows and we get quite a lot of letters from Christianity, most of them complaining. Then we get Franciscan friars coming to the concert in Folkestone, and they think it’s wonderful. They think it’s anti-church and anti-simplistic ideas about the nature of God, which it is.”

Booth promises that he’ll stop writing about God now, especially since a nightmare he had in which he was chased through a cinema by fundamentalists. “People were getting up and saying ‘Oh, it’s Tim Booth, can I have your autograph?’ I was going ‘Shhhh! There’s fundamentalists behind me.’

Still, questions of faith have inspired some of Booth’s most striking imagery, like the lines from Seven which declare “God made love to me, soothed away my gravity, made me a pair of angel’s wings, clear vision and some magic things.” You don’t have to like it to see that Booth is pursuing his own highly personalised agenda.

There’s a sense that the James saga has been a question of mind over matter. It’s certainly been a damn long one. Their first record, an EP called Jimone (pronounced Jim One) was released by Factory in November 1983, but it wasn’t until 1989’s Sit Down and the Gold Mother album of the following year that James finally began to drag themselves up into the light of substantial chart success. By then, they’d left Factory, said hello and goodbye to Sire and Rough Trade and ended up on Phonogram’s Fontana label. Never in the remotest danger of being an overnight sensation, James had come within a hair’s breadth of remaining a no-hit wonder. Factory never even sent them a copy of their Palatine compilation, which included some of James early strugglings.

James are proud of their history, and will sometimes have a go at old songs like Folklore when the mood takes them. But while Booth ascribes the band’s laborious slog towards the big time as partly the product of his unconscious desire to “take hard routes and make like difficult for myself”, he has been realistic enough to jettison unnecessary baggage along the way. The original James manifesto included “no advertising” and “no interview” clauses, which have now gone the same way as Labour Party’s commitment to unilateral disarmament.

“We did have a load of ideals that slowed us down,” Booth agrees. “I don’t believe in fixed morality. It does shift with time and different cultures, and the same goes for ideals. You end up looking a complete idiot, running along a beach and planting a flag, and there’s nobody there to see your wonderful stance.”

The whole independent ethic, a sacred cow ten years ago, has begun to seem creaky and unworkable. or at least its white-boys-with-guitars dimension has.

“The term ‘independent’ no longer means this chivalrous, knights of the round table, ethical bards society,” argues Booth. “It means a lot of different things. We should look at individual bands and work out whether they’re making music that reflects them, that says something about their lives. If you can relate to what they’re saying, then all fair and well. If you can’t, then leave them alone.”

To some pundits, James always seemed like dogged indie no-hopers, terminally and hopelessly grey. This year’s Seven (their fifth album) came as a bold and coherent surprise, showing a band suddenly bursting out of its shell and at last finding the knob to turn monochrome into shimmering Technicolour. Inevitably, for a unit which had first found its feet in the narrow musical and intellectual confines of Indieland UK, this discovery of a new vocabulary (and consequent big new audience) prompted many diehard fans to accuse them of having turned into a stadium band a la Simple Minds.

Booth’s whoops and moans at the end of Born of Frustration can indeed bring to mind Jim Kerr in his papal robes and silly hat – and indeed, Kerr’s observations about the throttling self-obsession of British indie rock are probably beginning to make a lot of sense to James now. But there’s more to Seven than mere size.

“I think the whole stadium rock argument has come out of basically one song which is Born of Frustration” opines Booth, guzzling the large glass of something slimy and eau de Nile coloured which the waiter has just dumped in front of him. Fascinatingly, it looks like it has pondweed growing on the surface. “We kind of knew it,” he goes on. “Sonically, I can hear what’s been said. But it’s one song. You think, if they’re going to be that superficial, it pisses you off. The other song is Seven. We knew it, but we didn’t think it would colour everything else that people would miss the rest of it.”

The extraordinary thing about James is that throughout their years of running to stand still, they remained almost exclusively a British phenomenon. Whereas the groups they’re beginning to be compared to, like Kerr’s bunch or U2, were forever jumping on planes and ferries to flog their wares around Europe or across the USA, James have stuck parochially to their home patch. Pure economies of scale were partly to blame; for years the band simply couldn’t afford to travel. After their abortive sojourn with Sire they found themselves £50,000 in debt, but kept their finances afloat by selling their own distinctive t-shirts. Their manager and Booth’s ex-lover, Martine McDonagh, designed the famous James flower logo, and their three year old son Ben is part of the bandwagon when James hit the road.

Ingeniously, James persuaded a friendly bank manager to lend them the money to assemble the live album One Man Clapping. Rough Trade released it, but a prospective deal with the label fell apart when RT toppled into insolvency. The label paid for the band to record Sit Down and Come Home, but when the new-look seven-piece were halfway through making the Gold Mother album, it became clear that Rough Trade would not be in a position to stick to the terms they’d outlined. Luckily for the band, Fontana wanted them enough not only to sign them, but to write off their debts too.

“We may have helped Rough Trade; they might then have been able to help us, and it might have worked,” sighs Booth. “But probably not. They were probably too far gone by that time. No, it’s worked really well, and we’re really happy.”

While their home crowd has swelled sufficiently to warrant a show at the Alton Towers amusement park on the July 4th (their sole UK show this year), James lopsided form of success means that they still have a few mountains to climb in terms of overseas acceptance. In New York to play at Spin Magazine’s birthday party, halfway through a coast-to-coast string of small-to-medium sized dates, this is their first American tour. How can this be, given most bands propensity to head for Heathrow as soon as the ink dries on their contract?

“That’s the whole James thing,” explains Booth. “Patience is a major part of James, and it was always ‘Wait until it’s really right, wait until there’s a demand’,” Booth explains all this as if he’s talking to someone for whom English is a second language. “Once the band had become a seven-piece, we’d have lost so much money coming over unless there was an audience that we had to wait. We could have come over on The Smiths Meat Is Murder tour, but we had personal commitments at home at the same time, and we decided we should honour those instead. We also thought those opportunities would come again every year – and then they didn’t.”

Was there, then, some resentment when James saw their old Manchester contemporaries shooting past them to stardom during the Madchester craze? “There was a kind of envy,” Tim admits.

Bassist Jim Glennie, a founder member of James who pre-dates even long-serving guitarist Larry Gott, joins us, impatient for avocados and carrot juice. “There was no animosity towards the other Manchester bands because we liked what they were doing,” Glennie maintains. “When you see a lot of the dodgy stuff that gets in the charts, that annoys you a lot more than the Happy Mondays or the Stone Roses getting there. But it was like ‘Bloody hell! They pushed in – we were here first.”

“When the ones got through who we didn’t think were very good, there was jealousy there,” Booth admits. “With the Mondays and Roses, it was like: ‘That’s a good song, they deserve it’. But I liked the Joy Division / Fall period in Manchester – sarky, hard, awkward. I preferred that, really. The stress wasn’t so much on drugs either. Okay, Joy Division were probably taking drugs, but that wasn’t the be-all-and-end-all.”

Bring A Gun was written in response to changes Booth observed going on in Manchester. “It seemed like the government’s full of old men, reacting to youth, frightened. The tabloids got behind it and everybody over-reacted. The raves seemed to become pretty seedy and dangerous by the end of it, but at the beginning they seemed quite innocent and a real breath of fresh air. I don’t think old men in government can handle that from youth. They get frightened. That’s what it was about.”

James hardly seem harbingers of teen insurrection, but their New York show grows from a cautious beginning to a roaring climax, punched out at staggering volume. The many faces of James are on display from folk-rock to dance-trance, pop star (Sit Down) to rock juggernaut (Sound and Government Walls)

There’s something in the oft-drawn analogy between Booth and Cliff Richard. There’s the same weird youthfulness, the beatific grin, the sense that you ought to listen to this music because it can only be good for you. And no, they don’t sound a bit like Simple Minds.

Tim : We don’t see it as success. We kind of felt that was a separate world and whenever we hit the worst periods business-wise, we’d be hitting the best periods music wise. So we’d be really high and we’d kind of leave it to Martine really and she absorbed a lot of that pressure and didn’t really tell us when we were nearly bankrupt and we’d get inclinations whenever she’d go away for a couple of weeks and all the cheques would bounce, we’d begin to get the drift that something was amiss.

What happens is when you have success is that you’re in incredible demand everywhere whereas before, also the lifestyle before was probably more pleasurable. We could rehearse four or five days a week, we’d live in Manchester in England rather than around the world in hotel rooms which sounds great to people – “Oh, you travel around the world.” You know, you can go to a country and stay in a hotel room because you’re so exhausted because you had a flight at six in the morning, you know you’ve got concerts and interviews all day and get on the plane the next day and you haven’t seen the country at all.

So in those early carefree days, a lot of the times in a lot of ways it was more fun, more free. It was all we knew as well, so we didn’t get too depressed about it. The good things that come with all this is choosing where your concerts are, knowing people are going to turn up, there’s going to be a receptive audience, being able to travel the world and then trying to demand days off so you do actually get to see what’s going on. And some money. Oh yeah. I forgot about that one.

Performances are always completely different, one from another for us. Different sets, different moves, different everything. Some nights you can’t do it, some nights you can, most of the nights you can, some nights you go out there and try and sing personalised songs to 100 people you know. We still play small gigs, like abroad and things. And warm-ups. And some nights you go on and you’re not very good. You know you’re not communicating those songs, you can’t get through to the feeling and then some nights you can go before huge audiences and it feels like a very personal concert and the feedback suggests that you’re not fooling yourself.

Jim : Yeah, I mean a good gig for us if one where we feel we do communicate personally to people, you know, and we’re not just standing there running through the motions and you can stand there and run through the motions whether there’s three of you or a dozen of you really.

Tim : We hardly ever run through the motions. The usual reason for us running through the motions is when you’ve got such bad sound on stage that you daren’t take any risks because you can’t hear what you’re doing or what other people are doing. Or if you’re just so exhausted or things have happened in your emotional life, your own personal life, that do you in. And then you have to go on stage and you’re shattered you know. And it’s like you do this shellshocked performance and you hope that nobody notices and you can’t hide that kind of thing very well. But we quite like the vulnerability and the variety.

I’m not really writing for other people, I’m writing for me and they’re an expression of my life, so the way I feel I’m being given a reaction by the audience that’s really touching rather than me giving out this wonderful thing to them, isn’t that nice of me. I get more like. I put some pretty personal disturbing experiences in those lyrics, things that I’m not sure people will accept, things that I have difficulty accepting about my own life and so when an audience accepts them, it’s like “God, they accepted it” and it’s very touching and that’s our reaction I think. I think the whole band can relate to that, you know, I think a lot of the lyrics everyone can relate to because I think the things I fear or problems within myself are quite common to a lot of people.

Jim : Quite common to the rest of us

Tim : And common to the audience judging by the audience’s reactions. It’s a real surprise. I don’t think you can write for other people, that’s a ….. oh, I’m sure somebody can do it but I don’t think I could. I think you’d spot the difference, you’d spot the line that sounded like it was there for effect, to affect somebody else rather than coming from my own personal experience.

We’ve been moved by music to a point where you know you don’t feel alone. That seems to be the most important thing you can get, that you don’t feel alone and that’s really what Sit Down was about and after that, there’s not much more you can do. It does hit you often when a child dies or a child’s favourite song was this and it used to run round the house singing it and will you dedicate a song or come to a hospital when someone’s ill. When things like that happen, you get some really personal letters from some people and it’s like yeah it really winds you. It’s really like, it gives you a shock.

We don’t get many people where we feel like they’re trying to use you as a crutch and therefore you don’t feel responsible in that way and you feel you try and do your best and it might be a small thing to you and it could mean a lot to someone else so you do it.

Style and fashion in music I think shifts all the time. But if you have a song that’s from the heart then that is almost kind of beyond markets and a businessman sitting at home trying to create a song that he thinks will sell.

Jim : We’ve always believed, mainly naively, that if people hear what we do then people will buy it. You know, the problem was getting people to hear it in the first place, getting it played on the radio and that kind of gave us the drive, the kind of arrogant self-belief that kept us going through the hassles we’ve had. So in a way, I don’t know….

No, I don’t think we’re that surprised because that’s what has kept us going in a way, that belief that, yeah, people will buy it. Once they hear it, people will buy this stuff. That’s if you sit back today and listen to how Sound fits into the charts when it did, it’s like….

Tim : That was a weird one really.

Jim : That did really well. It’s like Number 9 at Christmas and competing with the likes of Cliff Richard and Rod Stewart and it’s just like that was weird. That doesn’t sound like it fits but we’ve got a weird view of what we do, always have done and we believe the first singles we released should have been big hit singles. Naively as it might have been.

People look back at the last couple of years and say you’ve wallowed in the kind of nether regions for eight years and suddenly you became successful.

Tim : It’s good fun wallowing in the nether regions.

Jim : Yes it is

Tim : We’re great experts at wallowing in the nether regions.

Jim : Very good. It’s always been a movement, a progression, a forward movement and I hope that the day that finishes either musically or business wise, we’ll have the sense to kind of call it a day and not start seeing the other side of the hill. Don’t want to start playing smaller venues you know. So hopefully we’ve got the sense to stop at the peak. What that is, where that is I don’t know.

Tim : Hopefully there’ll be some kind of flag.

Jim : A pot of gold under the rainbow.

A: When did you first see James?

M: Well the first time I went to see them was on The Smiths tour and I stayed in the bar so long that I missed them. The first time I saw them was February 13th 1985 at the Hacienda.

A : What did you like about them?

M : I liked the rawness. I hadn’t seen a band like James before and they were just really exciting. I liked the songs, I thought they had really good songs, and I liked them all as people too. At that time I was doing radio promotion and they excited me. Most of the stuff I was working with was pretty normal sort of indie stuff and then James came along and they just seemed to have that extra something.

A : So what happened in between seeing James and becoming their manager?

M : After I saw them at the Hacienda I got really into them and I travelled with them a bit on the tour. We all got on really well and they asked me if I wanted to be their manager.

A : What other jobs did you have, except for the radio promotion?

M : I worked on a trade magazine, I did passenger surveys on the buses, sold health foods on the market, I worked for Our Price and after that I went to work for Rough Trade.

A : And that got you into the music business?

M : Yes. At Rough Trade I saw the side of a record distribution company. While I was there I met Brenda Kelly (who did Snub TV), and she wanted to start up an independent promotions company. She wanted it to be all women and she asked me and Liz Naylor to join her.

A: Are there many women managing in the music business?

M : There are more and more, but I haven’t actually met any of them. There’s probably only a handful. I was talking about this with someone the other day and we started to name them and we didn’t get on to two hands! Compared to the number of men there’s none really.

A : Do you find that people in the business are surprised to fmd that it’s a woman running James?

M : I get lots of letters and phone calls for Mr. McDonagh or Martin McDonagh and so on.

A : How do you deal with that?

M: It depends what mood I’m in. Sometimes I just say “There’s no-one here by that name”, sometimes I just ignore it and other times I’ll send a letter back and change the person’ s name to the feminine gender. It just depends. I find it a bit offensive – but that’s just the way things are.

A: When you became manager of James, was it a major sort of set-up?

M : When I first started I carried on doing the promotions for a bit, just to keep some money coming in. Eventually I decided to move up to Manchester. I was earning £35 a week on James.

A : So you had faith that one day. ..?

M : Yes, well I was at a point in my life where I just wanted to do something new. I wanted a big change, to move out of London. When I got to that point I really didn’t mind just giving everything up really -so that’s what I did.

A : And did you imagine that it would come to this?

M: Ummm, well I never thought I’d manage a band. I’d worked with a lot of managers when I was doing promotions and I always thought “what a shit job – I’m never doing that”. But James just seemed a bit different to me – they seemed to have something special and we clicked – so I was prepared to put up with a lot.

A : How did you get into T-shirt production?

M : Out of complete necessity really, to make some money for the band. A lot of them derived from the first one really – just having things split around the shirt. The flower came about when we decided to get some posters promoting Come Home and it looked awful – just “James Come Home” and a black and white picture, so I put a flower over the J just to make it more interesting and that sort of stuck really. But I’ve carried on with the T-shirts because it’s something different – I can think along different lines.

A: Is it something that bands are finding more and more now that the music that doesn’t really make any money?

M: Yeah, I think it’s important for any business to diversify and actually set up an off-shoot business that is related as little as possible to the parent business. That’s really why I set up the merchandising company to build as a company in its own right, which is what is happening now. Just so if James ever went under financially, there’s the support there, something else to look to for income.

A: Would James T-shirts still sell without James?

M : They did in the beginning to an extent. The whole idea behind it was to sell shirts that people would buy whether they knew who the band were or not, and I think that did happen, so maybe they would. I mean, the Princes Trust approached me to design a shirt for them, which I’ve just done and that’s along similar lines to a James T-shirt. I think a shirt should be able to sell itself. There’s nothing I hate more than a band T-shirt that’s just got the album sleeve in a square on the front, really badly printed – it’s just a waste of time. I feel sick when I go to a gig by massive artists like David Bowie or Michael Jackson and they obviously don’t give a damn about what they’re selling – they just want to make some money. I think it’s really unfair -because if people are expected to pay fifteen or twenty quid for something they should be able to want to wear it.

A: Are you going to diversify on to other things?

M : There’s a couple of things that I want to do personally. But for James at the moment, what with the recession and all we just need to keep working on the merchandising company and expanding that. We’ve also got the building where our offices are and that needs money spending on it. But I’m always looking for new things to do – that’s just the way I am really -I get bored easily.

A: Do you believe in re-incarnation?

M: yes I do, but I don’t know how or what the process is or anything like that, but I just think that if you look at everything else in nature it’s all cyclical.

A : Are you religious?

M : Not in the church sense. I’m quite a religious person in that I give myself strict rules by which I live and I have to watch that because I can get really rigid and inflexible. I can get narrow-sighted, I just go for something and don’t think too much about anything else. I suppose that’s religious in a way. I was into meditation and led a very fastidious lifestyle. I’m not like that now, I’m all over the place.

A : How do you think meditation helped you? Has it made a difference?

M : Yes, definitely. It made me much more objective about myself and about my life. It made me more aware of myself. I mean, if you sit in a room for six hours and you’re not supposed to move, you just have to confront everything – you can’t just get up and walk away if something comes into your head. If it’s something that is difficult to deal with you can’t change the subject. It’s taught me that you have to stay put and sort things out. I’d say that’s the best thing I got from it. I wouldn’t still be managing James if I hadn’t had to deal with that.

A : Do you see a clairvoyant?

M: Yes I do.

A : Does that affect the decisions you make?

M : No, I always fmd that they don’t tell you anything that you don’t already know. What they do is like meditation, they give you an objective viewpoint. It shows you a situation from a third person’s point of view. So you get outside of yourself and get an angle on something. It helps me make decisions but it’s never made a decision for me.

A: Do you believe in “Past Life”?

M : I’ve been regressed, but you can’t just say’ ‘this was my past life.’ Again I see it as showing you a situation that’s relevant to your present life in completely different circumstances, perhaps in a different culture or a different time, and it can help you find a way of dealing with something that is difficult. The “last lifetime” I saw was in France and I was a carpenter or something and I just decided at the age of fifty that I was ready to die so I went to the river to drown myself and I couldn’t do it. Anyway this French dandy was going by in his carriage so I stopped him. I got him to throw me in and I died. The good thing that came out of that was that I’m not scared of death anymore, because somewhere in my subconscious I went through the whole death process. I’m afraid of pain still, but I’m not frightened of death.

A : If you weren’t manager of James, what would you have done?

M: There’s lots of things that I still think I’d like to do. I always liked to dance and I’ve done dance courses. I’d also like to pursue drama a bit further – I think I’d make a better actor than a dancer. At the moment I’m quite into studying Entertainment Law because I’ve hit a certain level with management where I need something to push me on a bit more – to motivate me a bit more.

A : What’s the next step for James?

M: It’s usually planned jointly between me, Tim, Jim and Larry . The current plan is to get the next album recorded. Once this year is over and all the touring is out of the way, the band will go into the studio with Eno and hopefully get the album out for autumn.

A : Is it going to be another big budget album?

M : I hope not. I think maybe we spent too much money and time on the last one. I think the next one should be back to basics, back to James roots -but James as it exists now – not trying to emulate what was created all those years ago.

I’m writing this in my bunk of our tour bus, 4am, somewhere near Allentown, Pennsylvania. We’re six weeks into (half way through) this American trip and surviving surprisingly well.

For the first two weeks here we opened for Neil Young. We played in some spectacularly beautiful outdoor amphitheatres. Often carved into mountainsides overlooking canyons, gorges, rivers. One night in Eugene, Oregon, Neil Young was playing “Like A Hurricane” while maybe 20 miles in the distance, lightning strikes, unaccompanied by rain or thunder, lit up the landscape. A lighting man’s dream. Because he was performing two hour solo acoustic shows, Neil Young asked us to perform acoustically too. Dave’s drum kit was stripped down to three pieces while Mark gave up the familiarity of his keyboards for an accordian and melodica (A melodica looks like a child’s keyboard into which Mark blows through a plastic tube. In a Radio 1 interview I told a DJ it was made out of parts from a vacuum cleaner and an enema kit – we call it a colonica.)

We had never played a full acoustic set to an audience before, had only two rehearsals and were totally unprepared for our first gig. Neil Young’s audience are thirty / forty somethings and famously unimpressed by support acts. The first show at Red Rocks was before 10,000 people and was wonderful. The venue was so beautiful, hot and laid back that we could play a set of slow ambient songs ‘Top Of The World’, ‘Really Hard’, ‘Bells’ etc, the sound on stage was so pure and so quiet that we could really hear each other and improvise. It freed us and took us to a new area of musicianship. Dave seemed especially free from the tyranny of the snare and bass drum. After some weird tribal drumming in ‘Sound’ he would often receive a standing ovation. The tour with Neil Young was so magical that when we joined the Soup Dragons tour we continued to play acoustically, to the confusion of the record company who asked us if our equipment was broken.

Update 1st February 1993

Some of you probably witnessed the acoustic sets, as we decided to play them at home. We were very happy with these shows although totally knackered by the end, having come from America via Japan with only a few days to recover from jetlag. After the London gig some music journalists told us that the editors of their papers were only sending journalists “hostile to James” to review us and that had been policy for 1992. This explained a lot – particularly some fairly vicious Alton Towers reviews. It also explains the cyclical nature of the British music press who strive to make a band fashionable, then turn on them. The reason we’ve tried to keep a distance from them.

Thank you for keeping an open mind and ear to our music.

Tim

JAMES have announced their only major UK date of the year supporting NEIL YOUNG at Finsbury Park on July 8.

The Manchester band,who have just finished their new Brian Eno-produced album, cancelled plans to take the summer off so they can play the show.

A source close to the band told NME,”They supported Neil twice on their US acoustic tour last year and they are just doing this because they love him.”

No final release date has been set for their LP.

Neil Young,who will be backed by BookerT & The MGs at Finsbury Park, has also confirmed his Slane Castle show along with Van Morrison and Pearl Jam in Ireland to take place on July 10.

JAMES’ new single ‘Sometimes’ has been scheduled for an August 31 release, shortly followed by their Brian Eno-produced LP.

The new LP, recorded in the spring and due out on September 20, is expected to be showcased at this Sunday’s slot supporting Neil Young at London Finsbury Park.

Band frontman Tim Booth says playing acoustically in the US with Neil Young and working with Brian Eno has produced a “more simple, more naked” sound.

He adds, “We’ve been doing first takes rather than seventh takes in the studio and we’re much happier with this kind of spontaneity. There’s a lack of fussiness about the way Eno works. Most producers aim for perfection in the studio but that’s a dirty word in Eno’s book.”

Besides the ‘Sometimes’ single – which harks back to the band’s early lndie folk style -the LP is expected to include new songs ‘Out To Get You’, ‘PS’, ‘Raid’, ‘Lester Piggott’ and ‘Carousel’. Many of the tracks were unveiled at a low-key date in Bath last March.

JAMES evolution from bedsit folk-punk innovators to fully fledged international stadium band is now complete. They began the Eighties as peers of The Smiths, ended the decade as rivals to The Stone Roses and Happy Mondays for the Manchester crown, and entered the nineties with their biggest hits to date – the perennial crowd-satisfying ‘Sit Down’ and ‘Come Home’. But success has a price, as The Stud Brothers found out when, on the eve of the release of a new single (‘Sometimes’) and album (‘Laid’), they travelled to Italy to discuss fame, fortune and f**k-ups with singer, writer, philosopher and martial artist Tim Booth.

We’re in the clouds talking to Tim Booth

“We always knew we’d be successful, so it was never necessary to go looking for that. And we always knew we were good musically, even when we were crap. We’ve never been in a hurry.”

We’re 36,000 feet up, just about as far from down-to-earth as it’s possible to get without some chemical rocket fuel. Booth, impossibly frail, infinitely polite, disarmingly honest (often, we suspect, to a fault), neurotic, sharp, funny and occassionally disturbingly lost, like he’s drifted off, wanted to talk to us on the plane.

Like, get the work out of the way so we can hang out together and maybe get to know each other on a different level. He says that “hang together” just like real pop stars do.

We’re on our way to Milan, Italy’s cultural capital, home of the fashion industry and, to many minds, a hotbed of ponciness. James are set to play with Neil Young, just as they did three days ago at Finsbury Park. There they were fantastic, opening with an acoustic version of Sit Down and building to a monumental, electronically enhanced Gold Mother. These days James sound like such a big band.

“You spent the best part of 10 years f**king and being f**ked about. What does success mean to you?”

“For me, the word ‘success’ is asssociated with the word ‘trap’. What we want is respect and to be outside the cyclical popularity of the media where you’re okay, then you’re not, then you are again. Like Neil Young. Noone can touch him, He can turn up anywhere, anytime and a load of people will turn up just to see what he’s doing. He’s even in a position where he can do four or five crap LPs and people are still interested. Larry (Gott, James guitarist) is well into that. He’s looking forward to our series of crap LPs.

“I’m not so sure about that but it would be a success, to get out beyond the treadmill into hyperspace. And to get to the point where I wouldn’t have to do any interviews at all. All those people in all those places, all asking the same questions and talking to you on the same level of dialogue. It’s like a ‘Groundhog Day’ nightmare.

I’d like us to get beyond all that. There’s a  certain thing about us, a certain spirit you can get from us live sometimes which is always changing and should always be interesting because it’s real. We connect as people. Sometimes it’s not right, the sound in the hall is wrong or the audience reaction is too automatic, the subtlety is lost and we end up sounding like some big clod-hopping rock band. Then we don’t connect like that. But we have to try and it has to be real because human beings are not a mystery to me when they make up images for themselves and fake it. They’re a mystery when they’re standing there quite naked and doing what they do. The mystery comes when they reveal themselves.”

Do you think many performers these days are prepared to reveal themselves?

“Not many. Mary Margaret O’Hara does, but that’s almost too much to bear, that kind of nakedness. I saw her once when she actually broke down, she couldn’t sing for about 20 minutes. I’d had her ‘Miss America’ LP for a few years and loved it, but I never realised how directly it related to her. She came out and sang ‘Body’s In Trouble’ and you could see that her body actually was.  I just started crying. It was really bad because we’d just done a concert and we’d been recognised by all these people, so I pulled myself together. And then she started again and started me off again.

“I really didn’t think I’d make it through to the end. Then she lost it completely so I had a chance to take a breather. But even then it was brilliant. She looked like she could handle not being able to sing for 20 minutes, that she could handle whatever happened to her onstage. It was a wonderful acceptance of her own state of being and that’s what made it not a freakshow – you went with her. It was fantastic, one of the most amazing performances I’ve ever seen.”

Do you think its possible for you to move people as profoundly as that?

“Well, I don’t often crack up as substantially. I don’t think I’m at the same level of vulnerability in my life, anyway. I have been that way on stage but I don’t think it’s as apparent that I’m drowning, not waving. With Mary Margaret O’Hara, you get the feeling she’s drowning and waving at the same time. But I get a bit like that. At Finsbury Park, I was really f**ked up, I had a really bad night and I had to do a long session of yoga and Tai Chi and martial arts before I could go on.”

Martial arts?

“Yeah, it’s funny. We’ve been described as wimps for years, but most of the band members have done Tai Chi and martial arts on and off for five to six years. Two ex-members were put inside for GBH. We’re actually quite hard.”

Why do you do those exercises?

“To calm me down. I’m always attracted to what I’m frightened of. That’s one reason I go onstage, because it still terrifies me. I have to spend ages doing the exercises before I calm down enough to do it. Yes, it’s Tim Booth in James are like Henry Rollins shock.

“It’s something I discovered on the Neil Young tour (James supported Neil Young across America), that Tai Chi actually centres me in the belly and I can do a really fierce set, right from the guts. It was an acoustic tour so I didn’t dance, I didn’t move, I just really wound it up and exploded only at points. Tai Chi enabled me to do that, it gave me not control but direction. I could really concentrate on the rage.

“That was something we learned from Neil Young. We watched him almost every night for 20 dates. His concentration was amazing, so was the way he seemed to demand you concentrate at that level. There’s this one track he did on the piano that could almost have come from the Julee Cruise LP, really hypnotic. You could imagine that if Richard Clayderman had done it, you’d have hated it, but this big John Wayne trucker singing such a naked love song in a high voice is devastating. He had most of us in tears.”

Booth originally joined James not so much to sing as to dance. He was sort of prototype Bez. Latterly, due to his constantly injuring himself onstage, he’s begun to take dancing very seriously indeed.

You have a dance teacher, don’t you?

“Yes, I found somebody who teaches an amazing form of dance which is linked to shamanism, which is a filthy word in rock. It’s really about finding your own natural form of dance. The teacher is a woman called Gabrielle Roth whom I met through an amazing series of synchronistic circumstances, really bizarre, and we’ve been really close ever since.”

The synchronistic circumstances are, more or less, as follows. Tim visited the Manchester clairvoyant he (and by the way most of Manchester’s gun-toting gangsters) uses to divine his future. She told him that, should he see a sign of crossed feathers, he’d know he was in the right place. While touring America with Neil Young, Booth searched for the sign amongst Young’s native North American artefacts but found nothing. Young himself had no idea what it meant. At the time, Booth was thinking of taking dance lessons and, via a friend of a friend, discovered Gabrielle Roth.

Above Roth’s doorway in America, says Booth, unbeknown to Roth, who’d lived and worked there for 12 years, was the sign of the crossed feathers.

Roth’s theory of dance is based around five metaphysical compass points – the first three being the Female Flow, the Stacatto Male and, between them, Chaos. It’s in Chaos, says Booth, that he found his natural dance.

So Tim, what’s the idea?

“The idea is to get in touch with your body. Your body is in the Here and Now and then there’s lots of things going on in the different parts of it and I think if you get in touch with it and release those things, you find out a lot about yourself. I don’t really know how much I should say about this because I hate the idea that it might come out as something contrived and I know I’ll be asked about it again and again in a much more superficial way and it’ll be really irritating.

“But basically, you do days and days of dancing with her, days and days until you’re completely lost. You get into some really strange states. At the very least, it’s helped me to warm up before I go on stage, and to centre myself. Anything can happen to you during the day, you could have a row, anything. And you can’t wipe that out before you go onstage, it all goes with you. If you connect the mood to your body, you’re fine. But if you fight, you’re f**ked, and sometimes you’re so f**ked you’re completely cut off from everybody.

“That’s the ultimate bad trip. It’s incredibly lonely. And what tends to happen is that I’ll hurt myself trying to break through. I’ll do something violent to myself, force it. I get to the point where I have to scream but I can’t. That’s why I do these exercises beforehand, to connect myself with what’s wrong with me, why I’m so f**ked up on that day, and I can take it onstage and use it.

“That’s what I did at Finsbury Park and I needed that because, like I say, I’d had such a bad night. When I was younger I was an insomniac and I got rid of that for a long time, but it comes back now and again. You just lie there getting angrier and angrier with yourself. It’s horrible.”

A great many of your songs are about being f**ked up. Are you really as f**ked up as you’d have us believe?

“Well, I’m f**ked up. Everybody is f**ked up. It’s a matter of finding ways in which you can live with it, so it’s comfortable rather than being overwhelming. And dance and Tai Chi are the ways that work for me. There might be a cure but I think part of the cure is acceptance. The other thing is that it’s part of my creativity. I went to see a therapist about three years ago and he said to me after about the fourth session, ‘I’m sure I could cure you but I don’t know what this would do to your writing’, so he stopped going.

“Same with David Lynch. And look what’s happened to John Cleese (laughs). No, he’s still quite funny. He’s just not as dangerously out of control funny as he used to be. I stopped going. I decided it wasn’t the kind of therapy I needed. I wanted to feel better and still write good songs.”

Why did you feel the need to go into therapy in the first place?

“I really just needed someone to talk to and to unravel stuff in my private life that’d just got too painful to deal with (Just prior to the writing and recording of ‘Seven’, Booth split from long time love and James manager, Martine). I’m also very curious. I’ve always been interested in that kind of thing.”

Tai Chi, martial arts, therapy, dance workshops – shouldn’t your music be therapy enough?

“Well, it all goes hand in hand. I love music and anyone I’ve ever been interested in who’s been in a band did it because they love music. And if you genuinely love it and pursue it, really go into it in depth, follow the love and passion within music that’s moved you, then you will find out about yourself.

“I agree music is therapy in itself – it is, you have no choice. You put so much of you into something and then it stands there as a thing in itself, as something you look at. It has to tell you something. It might be painful, it might be weird, but it is a reflection and it will tell you something. The rest is all a way of making that, me, more effective.”

The Sometimes EP is in a small sense a return to your roots. It’s folkier, bluesier and it comes as something of a surprise after the excesses of ‘Seven’. Can we expect the same from the album ‘Laid’?

“The album’s very stripped and naked. People have even asked us if it’s acoustic, but it isn’t. Again, that’s something we learnt from Neil Young. When we finished that tour, we had to continue playing around America for another couple of months and we kept doing acoustic shows. They were supposed to be electric, but we did them acoustic because we loved it so much. The record company went crazy and threatened to withdraw money from the tour, but they all came to this really ferocious show we did in New York and came up and apologised to us afterwards.

“So I think it prepared us for being more simple. ‘PS’ for instance (third track on Sometimes – Booth at his tempestuous neurotic best, perhaps comparing himself to Patti Smith) we recorded on an eight-track a year ago and couldn’t better. We just chopped it down from eight minutes and it still worked. Like I say, it’s a very stripped down, naked thing.”

According to Larry Gott, ‘Laid’ was the result of a series of jamming sessions presided over by Brian Eno. Anything that didn’t work immediately was put to one side, distorted and rearranged by the band, Eno and his assistant Marcus.

Consequently, there is a double James album – described by Tim as “quite industrial, like nothing we’ve ever done, actually like nothing anyone’s ever done” – ready for release early next year.

Tim, you talk a lot about nakedness, by which we presume you mean nakedness of the soul. It all sounds very self-obsessed. Are you one of those people who believe their emotions are bigger and more important than other people’s emotions?

“I think probably everybody thinks that their emotions are bigger than other people’s. But, realistically, I don’t think my emotions can be bigger, otherwise noone would understand what I was talking about. I’d sound like I come from another planet.”

We’re in a restaurant in Milan, just off the Piazza Doumo (that’s Cathedral Square, dopey) where James will have their picture taken eating ice cream. The cathedral, a supremely gothic pincushion of spires and gorgoyles, was a preposterous undertaking, it took hundreds of years to build. It now rates as one of the wonders of the world. Ambition and patience paid off.

We’re talking to guitarist Larry Gott, bassist Jim Glennie and Tim Booth. Both Jim and Tim are eating fish. Only Larry is now a vegetarian. We’re discussing James comeback because, despite the fact it’s only been 18 months since ‘Seven’, ‘Laid’ and the ‘Sometimes’ EP do feel like a comeback, like there’s an awful lot riding on them, like James have a lot to prove.

A popular notion among music hacks is that, since Manchester was consigned to the dustbin of history, James have lost their audience.

Larry : “It’s true that people have been telling us that our audience, the people who bought ‘Sit Down’ and the last album, just aren’t there anymore. I don’t know how anyone could tell. I don’t think they’ve gone, but neither do I think they’re anxiously anticipating the next parcel to fall from the James table. I hope people like the album but more important to us is that we’ve done something we think is good that people won’t expect.”

Jim : “Live, it’s always been like that. When we headlined Reading, we did ‘Sit Down’ in the middle just to blow away the cliché of how things are supposed to be, and that pissed off a lot of people. But it’s supposed to be challenging, for us and the audience.”

Have you ever had the feeling, especially after the success of ‘Sit Down’ and ‘Gold Mother’ that you could just walk out onstage and fart into the microphone and people would still love it, because it was you?

Tim : “No, not at all”

Larry : “I have. I know what you mean.”

Tim : “You have? Jesus”

Larry : “No, I’m not being arrogant. It’s just some of that adulation, the reaction you get sometimes when you walk on, or you get a really big cheer after you’ve done a song really badly, I think ‘Oh, they shouldn’t have done that. It wasn’t worth it.'”

Tim : “Yeah, it can be a bit weird. When we played the Free Trade Hall, they were singing along all the way through. It was our acoustic set and they sang every word so there were no silences. It was like a great party but they weren’t listening to what we were doing. When we did it in New York, there were people stagediving and we had to stop it. There was just two of us doing this quiet, quite political song and people were bodysurfing. It was very strange.”

Back in the clouds, at 36,000 feet, Tim Booth tells us he first fell in love when he was 12.

The girl, Diane, was from Milan, 13 and six inches taller than him. He met her on the Tuscan island of Elba, on a family holiday. He followed her to the beach where he and her frequented and sat close by for more than three hours, trying desperately to pick up the courage to talk to her.

Eventually he did. He asked her out to dinner. At 12. She accepted. She was late. A waiter, noticing Tim’s evident distress, went round to the girl’s hotel on his motorbike and delivered her to a relieved and besotted Booth. The romance was tantalisingly brief, just one kiss. A week later, returning to England via Milan, Tim called on her. She dumped him.

In a cab now, on the way to Milan, Tim tells us about his second love. He was 20, at college, and so was she. This time he followed her to a laundrette. He got chatting to her, they got on, she liked him, they kissed. But she only wanted to be friends. He waited in vain hope. Some friends got her into heroin – nice f**king friends.

Tim, frail, polite, but highly trained in the martial arts, went round and threatened them. The girl escaped. She’s now a well-known contemporary dancer. As is Tim’s present love.

In the hotel, Tim talks football. Apparently, he attended Manchester United’s championship winning game at Old Trafford. After the game, the 40,000 crowd sang along to ‘Sit Down’,  then burst into an impromptu series of anti Leeds United chants. Tim, polite to a fault, didn’t dare mention that he is a life long fan of Leeds United. He asks us not to mention it. But we think it is important.

It’s our contention that James began as a bad band and took, in pop terms, several centuries to become a great band. They are now a very great band.

The new EP opens with ‘Sometimes’, where a rough canter of a beat meets a furious, frustrated strum as Booth casts himself as a vagabond wanderer, taking notes on the travails of a young romantic in a rain-washed urban playground. The second track, ‘Raid’, sees the guitars embellished by a Hammond organ and is a melancholy celebration of love in the afternoon that itches with nervous obsession and piercing paranoia.

‘PS’ which may or may not be about Patti Smith but is almost certainly about Booth (‘You liar, you liar, how I love to be deceived’ he screams) is a glorious moody Cooder slide. ‘Out To Get You’ is too fantastically maudlin to write about without running the risk of electrocuting yourself as you weep onto the word processor.

It’s unbelievable to think that this is the same band that ten years ago were scrabbling around in the refuse looking for a tune.

Tim, are you proud of everything you’ve done?

“I’m really proud of it all. Some things are more listenable than others, like I find ‘Strip-Mine’ more enjoyable than ‘Stutter’ even though there’s some great ideas on ‘Stutter’. It’s like the PJ Harvey record. You may not want to listen to it all the time, or even all the way through, but there’s something you respect about it, you can tell the people are looking for something, really putting themselves on the line.

“That’s how I look at it. There are some LPs that come together, they get respect and they get a big audience. They’re the real rare ones. You’re lucky if you get one of those.”

Have you ever made one of those?

“I think the next one is it. I think that’ll be it.”

How sussed is that poet in the window? The one with the waggy psyche? A reborn Tim Booth opens up on famemania, libido therapy, Brian Eno and giving Kurt Cobain a throat massage

Tim Booth stands on the corner of 49th and Broadway; and he’s grinning. All around New York is putting on one of those shows that you’re sure are just being done for your benefit. It’s 88 degrees, a burst fire hydrant sends plumes of water coursing onto the sidewalk, loping youths in Onyx t-shirts give each other the high-five in subway entrances while taxi drivers give each other the finger. In Italian delis the World Gestural Olympics are in full-swing, in particular Men’s Shrugging and Team Forehead Slapping. Booth casts a happy eye around Time Square.

“I just love this, don’t you?” he confesses.

On the face of it, there’s not a lot of common ground between James and New York. The one brash, cut-throat arrogant and unyielding, the other warm, humane and liberal. But maybe there’s more to it than that. Mott The Hoople’s Ian Hunter said New York was like meeting Muhammed Ali head on and slowly realising he was quite a nice guy. Maybe being upfront is one thing James and New York have in common. What you see is what you get. Tim Booth is very aware that this admirable honesty and lack of guile is one of the band’s most immediate characteristics. And you get the feeling he doesn’t like it.

“Has being honest done us any good, that’s what I want to know? Does it make you hip?” he asks with heavy cynicism. He’s got a point. Who would have thought that silly old Bono could have made himself cool just by donning the horns and the Alcan foil jacket &ldots; and not telling the truth. Halfway through a personal-ish question, he looks up with a mixture of amusement and suspicion. “Why exactly do you want to know this?”

The 90s have been strange to James. In the last three years, James have translated the good reviews of the 80s into healthy sales, Hit albums. A number two single. Stadium gigs. Unfortunately they lost the good reviews. Chiefly because of the stadium gigs. Like all geeky maladjusted inadequates, rock journalists are obsessed with cool. And James have never been knowingly cool. Around their time of ‘Gold Mother’, the sheer weight of their admirers’ numbers, plus a kind of weird honorary association with the Madchester scene, meant that they could not be ignored. But by ‘Seven’ the penknives were out. James apparent transmutation into a new rock corporation, spreading good vibes and universal beneficence was greeted with a barely concealed sneer. Tim Booth is sanguine.

“I stand by ‘Seven’. It’s a good record. And if people have got any problem with it they can fuck off. If it was up to me I just wouldn’t do press anymore. But I have a responsibility. James pays a lot of people’s mortgages. I can completely understand Eddie Vedder saying he’s never doing another interview. It’s not entirely the journalist’s fault either. You make certain disclosures and they seem natural in the flow of a conversation and then you see them in print and they look awful and you can’t believe you’ve said them, they’re crass and embarrassing.”

So is honesty the best policy? Tim Booth has his doubts. On the other hand it can be very unhip. But on the other it makes for a refreshing kind of pop star. With his plaintive voice, lack of defensive mystique and even-handed charm. Booth is a refreshing kind of pop star. The kind you’re not likely to see wearing leather keks at Stringfellows. As the band’s lyricist, Booth’s concerns are writ large throughout James’ music. It’s tempting to see these songs as kind of protacted therapy.

“Well I suppose there must be an element of that. On ‘Seven’ and ‘Gold Mother’ I was trying to come to terms with the disintegration of my relationship. (Booth had until then been the partner of Martine, still James manager. They have a young son, Ben.) In that sense I suppose that was a fairly public piece of therapy, a sort of slow essential process.

“I wrote a song like ‘Walking The Ghost’ because of a whole load of stuff that was going on, not least being that I actually lived in a house with a ghost in it who used to rap on the walls. But it’s a mistake to assume that all my lyrics are autobiographical. It’s not that straightforward. I’m kind of loath to go too deeply into what they’re about, because you suddenly nail down what people’s interpretation has to be. I get amazing, moving letters from people who’ve interpreted them in their own way and that’s fine. Once a year, I play Patti Smith’s ‘Horses’ and it always devastates me. Each time I hear things she’s saying, for the first time. I was talking to Lenny Kaye about it and I said I love the part where she sings ‘Twist her leg’ and he said, Actually Tim, it’s ‘twistolette'”

Booth admits that part of his reluctance to dissect himself and his lyrics is for the potential embarrassment, both to himself and those close to him. Nevertheless, some songs cry out for some kind of explanation. ‘One Of The Three’ is, for instance, a fairly direct critique of Jesus. Isn’t it?

“Oh, you think so?” laughs Booth “Well, yes there’s a bit of that. But it was also about the release of the hostages. It’s about Terry Waite. I mean he looks like a biblical prophet. Did you see when he was released? He went straight up to this podium and addressed the crowd before he went to his family. So pompous. It’s that crazy Christian thing about the value of sacrifice. Imagine being changed to a radiator with him for five years. Compare that to McCarthy and Keenan who were so human. I found McCarthy’s release very moving because of Jill Morrell and lots of things. It was about individuals. And stories like that have a kind of mythic quality because they strike a chord within individuals.

“There are terrible murders every day, but the case of that young woman who was murdered walking her young son on Wimbledon Common tapped into the national psyche at some very deep level. Well, anyway, as far as John McCarthy goes, I was in Manchester and was so overcome that I had to go into a café and sit down &ldots; and Black Francis was there who I sort of know. So I had to make polite conversation when I was on the verge of tears. It was very odd.”

Christianity and people who think they know best in general get pretty short shrift from Booth. One of Gold Mother’s highlights was his ringing denunciation of televangelists on ‘God Only Knows.’

“I have a suspicion of gurus and the like because I’ve been taken in so many times. You can see it happen in pop music. People get elevated into things beyond any perspective. I’ve known Morrissey and I’ve seen it happen to him. We did Top Of The Pops with Nirvana and Kurt Cobain was so nervous he couldn’t sing. He ended up singing ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ in this bizarre strangulated voice. It was pure terror. But because there’s an industry at work turning Kurt Cobain into something superhuman, it was read as something terribly significant and important, something very cool. He just hadn’t done much TV, you know. He was nervous. He lost his voice. I offered to give him a throat massage but he declined.”

As soon as the word ‘massage’ leaves his lips, Tim visibly tenses. He has forgotten himself. He has a whole range of interests in different philosophies and therapies which he deliberately censors from his conversation for fear of being thought as ‘new age’. It’s an understandable fear but sad because it shuts down a lot of interesting areas. It can take some reassurance that you’re not going to run a Loony Booth and His Fruitcake Remedies – Must We Fling This Filth At Our Grunge Kids-style piece.

For the record, he’s into a variety of physical deficiencies, dance, meditation and Tai Chi and has been involved with Reichian therapy (an entertaining philosophy which places sexual repression at the root of all human unhappiness, and counsels lots of guilt-free shagging as the remedy. Its founder Wilhelm Reich was locked up in America as a communist sex fiend – Modern Philosophy Editor) and the often painful, emotionally draining, heavy-duty massage known by the innocent enough name Rolfing. Despite his fears, this actaully makes him more rather than less interesting. It certainly beats owning a trout farm. Still how are things progressing. Is he happy? He looks shocked.

“Ermm, I don’t know. You tell me. How content do I look?”

Pretty content.

“Actually I feel quite edgy,” he chuckles. “I have to work quite hard at staying calm. I have a few, errr, demons. But I’m working them out. Things are going well. Things look good for the band. I’m thinking of doing a PhD in Drama, Last August was a turning point. I moved into a lovely little house, I met my girlfriend and then Brian Eno rang&ldots;”

In a dark cool room, a score of storeys above the melting New York pavements, an intimate gathering – James, their wives and girlfriends, managers and American press types – are watching rough edits of the new James video. Guitarist Larry Gott is here and clearly over last year’s mugging incident (when in Los Angeles making a video for ‘Born of Frustration’, he was robbed at gunpoint and, terrified, immediately caught the next plane home, leaving the band to it). It rather put him off the Land of Opportunity for a while.

Despite the band’s reservations, the video is a striking affair; the band is performing their new single ‘Sometimes’, up to their chests in an unruly sea, lashed by storm-tossed winds and manfully wrestling their instruments from the salty surf. At the song’s climax, there’s the added emotive weight of a whole chorus of multi-tracked Brian Enos, austere, dignified and pretty damn catchy. Provisionally entitled ‘Lester Piggott’, because of the driving racing quality of the sound, it’s a great pop noise.

So let’s go back to the Brian Eno phone call. James had wanted to work with him as early as their first album but he had been busy.

“He told us to call back in a couple of years. Well last August he called us. Said he’d love to do the record. We were delighted.”

The results are spectacular. Whatever your opinion of ‘Seven’, the new album ‘Laid’ represents a significant shift. Spartan, dreamlike and haunted, it’s the best possible reposte to doubters. The germs of the record’s singular personality lie in two sources, and over both of them hangs the shadow of a rock titan. First, there’s Eno’s benign influence. Then there’s the Neil Young connection.

Last year, Young was looking for an acoustic band to accompany him on his American tour. He came across James and has now become a champion of sorts, insisting, for instance, on their appearance at his recent Finsbury Park gig.

“We haven’t told many English journalists. When Sonic Youth got the Neil Young support, they mentioned it in every bloody interview. Also, they got booed off quite a lot, according to the road crew. Whereas we, ahem ahem, went down pretty well” says Jim Glennie.

Without Jim Glennie, James might be called Trevor. Or Alan. Or Gudrun. As a teenager he gave his name to the fledgling band. Now over a decade later he happily admits that his life had been unalterably shaped by this group. For one thing he might have ended up in jail.

“I was a bit of a bad lad at 15. A football hooligan. Fighting was my fun. Nicking cars, that sort of thing. I think I would have ended up in jail. In a way, I’m a bit sorry I didn’t go. But then the band changed all that. I’ve gone through a lot of things. Getting into drugs, dodgy meditation groups, getting married, having kids, then that marriage ending. I suppose historically Tim and Larry and myself are the core of the band in that we’ve been there the longest.

“To tell you the truth, I probably get on better with the other three or at least have as much to do with them. But they’re happy to leave a lot up to the three of us. To be honest, there’s a lot of the business stuff that they’re quiet happy to be out of.”

The band has recently slimmed down from a septet to a sextet with the departure of trumpeter Andy Diagram to the twilight world of anarcho-jazz.

“He has his own things he wanted to do. He told us after ‘Seven’ that he’d tour the album but after that he wanted to go. Basically he was fed up with touring because he missed his girlfriend, which is fair enough. We tried hard to talk him out of it but he wouldn’t have it. Still it was the most amicable split in James history.”

Glennie gets most animated about working with Eno, whose memory he is still basking in.

“It was incredibly liberating, He encouraged us to improvise, encouraged us to use takes where we didn’t know what we were doing, He made us realise that this imperfection was a good thing. We began to let go of songs much earlier in their life. It also helped that we hadn’t toured the songs to death beforehand. A lot of them are quite vulnerable, and if we’d taken them on the road sheer panic would have made us beef them up. But they’ve remained in this kind of natural state. He had this reputation as a bit of a cod academic, which is entirely untrue. Every night I would get a bit tipsy cos he’s a bit of a wine buff and he wouldn’t mind us taking the piss a bit. We used to refer to him as Sir Brian. In fact, we got so dependent on him that on the days he wasn’t there we had to appoint Larry as honorary Brian to stand in for him.

The obvious question. Would you like to work with him again? Jim pulls a sheepish face.

“Well of course, but that would be expecting too much. We recorded a whole other album while we were there, a double album in fact. It’s the kind of record that should make people say, Is this James? Very experimental, quite industrial in parts. I love it but it’s strange. It all arose from improvising. Tim invented vocal lines on the spot which he was sort of embarrassed about but Eno encouraged him. So there’s great lyrics like ‘Lay the law down in your home and smile’, which don’t mean very much on paper but which make perfect sense in the context of the song. It made me realise what a great spontaneous poet Tim is. And amazingly Phonogram hear singles on it. There’ll be Andy Weatherall mixes and stuff. It’ll be great. But then what do I know? I thought there were singles on ‘Stutter'” he says beaming.

Later, in a room far too small to permit any form of dexterious cat manipulation, Larry and Tim and Jim are recording an acoustic session in some rooftop NYC radio eyrie. They perform a new song ‘Out To Get You’ which even in these conditions takes flight borne on the interplay between the delicate funkiness of the acoustic bass, the rhythm of the guitar and the frail earnest simplicity of Tim Booth’s voice. It’s an odd thing to hear in a shoebox in New York but it sounds terrific.

Below the gesturing and shouting and swearing goes on, But up here, in their genteel way, James are saying “shut up already” to their own kind of critics and giving them a very elegant kind of finger.

Saul : There’s a band called James. They’re amazing. I bought one of their t-shirts. Look. It’s amazing, look.

A few years ago, James t-shirts were selling faster than their records. It seemed everyone in England’s North West was walking around with Come Home emblazoned across their chest.

But they survived the Madchester backlash and went on to establish themselves as one of Britain’s premier guitar bands with their million-selling last album Seven. Now they have a new LP Laid produced by Brian Eno, a new single Sometimes and have recently completed a tour of the States with Neil Young playing acoustic sets.

Tim : There’s kind of a confidence you get when people like Neil Young invite you to tour with them and when Brian Eno rings you up and says he wants to make your next LP with you. We had that confidence in ourselves but when it kind of becomes publically recognised, that was a big boost to us.

Something that we learnt quite a lot from the acoustic shows in our ability was our strength. When you go on stage and you’re really naked and you’re just presenting something very simply to people, the power of that and that was Neil’s big lesson to us. Those shows. And you can’t get that with electric.

Saul : I suppose it taught us we could play less and still be very effective. Live at least, and we took that into the studio and Eno took hold of that and that was a really wonderful marriage there as we were all going in the same direction, we were all wanting the same thing in a way.

Despite spending only six weeks in the studio with Eno, the band managed to come up with plenty of material.

Tim : We ended up with a double LP and a single LP in six weeks, which normally it would take twelve weeks to come up with one LP. We were very happy with that.

With Brian, it was like, he’s not into perfectionism at all which nearly every producer you ever meet is into it – metronomic perfectionism. He just kind of wants to capture some kind of atmosphere, almost some kind of hesitancy so we often chose takes where people were hesitant, where they didn’t know what they were playing.

Now James are off to the States again to play on the North American WOMAD tour. The invitation to join Peter Gabriel’s World Music project came when they were recording Laid.

Larry : We did a concert whilst we were recording as well at a local club and he came to that and he liked what he saw so that was why we got invited to the WOMAD tour really. I think he just picked up on an energy or something about us he liked.

Tim : We’ve actually always had quite a lot of communication with WOMAD because basically we like going to the festival ourselves so we tend to want free tickets and they say we have to play if we want free tickets.

But even if Laid flops and they end up subsidising their income with t-shirt sales again, the band have enough confidence in their own ability not to quit.

Larry : You’ve just got to do what you feel like at the time. It’s either going to hit with people or it isn’t. If it doesn’t then you’ve got another chance.

JAMES will embark on their first UK tour in over two years to promote their new LP ‘Laid’, released at the end of the month.

Tim Booth and the band, whose ‘Sometimes’ single entered the Top 20 this week, are currently in the US supporting Peter Gabriel.

Their UK dates kick off at Glasgow Barrowlands on December 1,continuing at York Barbican Centre (2), Manchester G-Mex (4), Wolverhampton Civic Hall (5), Derby Assembly Rooms (7),
Gloucester Leisure Centre (8), Brixton Academy (9), Portsmouth Guild Hall (11), Norwich UEA (12) and Newport Centre (13). Tickets are £11 at all venues except London and Manchester.

Zoe Ball : Have you seen James get completely soaked in their new video? Well I’ve invited them here to the Serpentine in Hyde Park to recreate their aquatic experience and to see if they’ve managed to dry off yet. Your new video Sometimes is absolutely wild. It looks like you’re splashing around in the North Sea. Are you actually in the North Sea?

Tim : Icelandic sea

Zoe : Icelandic sea?

Tim : Yes, we were warned about sharks and whales on the very day we were in there.

Zoe : Really.

Tim : That’s why we were looking so terrified.

Zoe : Right, lifeguards and all that. I actually heard it was in a pool in Pinewood Studios

Tim : Who told you that?

Zoe : I don’t know, somebody told me.

Tim : I don’t know where you got that rumour from.

Zoe : Was it freezing?

Tim : It was freezing. It was the lake where they filmed the Guns Of Navarone and the James Bond films.

Zoe : Oh wow

Tim : And we were in the water from about eight in the morning til nine at night and I asked if they could heat it up and they couldn’t.

Zoe : And you had really pruny toes when you came out.

Tim : We were wrinkled. It was really disgusting. The make up woman’s work was cut out.

Zoe : You’ve just done your new album Laid with a new producer. How’s your music evolving?

Tim : How’s it evolved? It’s learnt how to walk by now and it’s stopped eating green leafy vegetables. Become a fruitarian.

Zoe : Thank you. Everyone still identifies you with your anthem Sit Down. Does Laid have an anthemic track on it that’ll kind of replace that, do you think?

Tim : On each album, there’s a couple of tracks which I suppose you could call anthems. It’s accident, we don’t do it on purpose. But we do tend to release them as singles. Because they’re a bit more burly and robust and they’re not going to get beaten up in the marketplace.

Zoe : In fact, two years ago, I don’t think there was anybody without a James shirt. Are you going to have new t-shirts?

Tim : If we come up with a good picture. It was real chance last time. We hit the right time and we had a great shirt. So people bought it basically. Had a great shirt so people bought it.

Zoe : The album wasn’t so good but we had a great shirt. Will you save my boat now, because I’m stranded.

Jo Whiley : Now some more from Tim and Larry about the album Laid

Larry : Hi, this is Larry from the band James. And I’m here with Tim and we’d like you to listen to a song called Knuckle Too Far which is off the Laid album which we’re just bringing out.

This song’s history is kind of the, it’s been a wallflower in its early days. It was a jam we did and recorded in a practice and we never played it again and it kind of got lost for about nine months and then one day it just surfaced again on a practice tape and someone heard it and thought that it sounded perfect as it was and it was going to go on the album as that and we found it very difficult to capture the original essence of it. One night in the studio, we decided to have another go at it and I couldn’t hear Tim and Tim couldn’t hear me in the monitors and we tried to do this rendition when we were playing off each other and as a result of not been able to hear each other, we ended up with this curious kind of miscommunication.

We tried to get it right on subsequent takes but when we got it right, it sounded worse than the first take so we decided to leave it how it was. I think the version that is on the album is about the second time we ever played it.

“Basically I am James’ A+R(Artiste and Repertoire) agent and that hasn’t got a job description as such. You pretty much have to make it up as you go along. I just do lots of things that need doing, there’s no set agenda, particularly with a band like James. I suppose my job is to steer their career but working with such strong characters like Tim, Jim, Larry and Martine I fit in as piece of the jigsaw rather than in a ‘captain of the ship’ role.”

This works well and, for Alan’s part is made better by the fact that he includes himself as a “massive fan” of the band. “Although you do get a different perspective on the band as a fan working with them. For example, the album is out now, but for me the most exciting part of the whole album project was way back in mid- February when the band had their first day with Brian Eno. As an A+R man you tend to feel almost parental about a band – you know, getting them into a good studio with a good producer is a bit like getting a kid into a nice school and dropping them off at the gates. It was exciting, both as A+R man and fan to have them there with Brian Eno.

Have you always been a fan of the band ?

“No – to be honest. I was always aware of them, but I wouldn’t really say I was a fan. I’d always thought of their material as a bit wimpy until I heard some of the stuff that they were doing for ‘Gold Mother’ and I was knocked out by it. I expected it to be watered down in comparison to what I had seen live and it wasn’t. I started to fall in love with their stuff the more I got acquainted with it. I think the live versions of the songs from the back catalogue are better than the recorded versions. This is due to a combination of musical proficiency and the immediate impact of a live performance. The thing I like about James is that with them a song is never finished. I dare say that’s probably partly due to them getting bored if they play the same thing all the time.”

What would you say was your favourite James song ?

“It’s difficult to say what my favourite James song is. I like ‘Don’t Wait That Long’ and .’Out To Get You’ – that covers the ballady-type ones, and ‘Lose Control’, particularly the stripped-down live acoustic version with just Tim and Larry. I also like the rockier ones: ‘How Was It For You ?’, ‘Come Home’, ‘Born Of Frustration’ and ‘Live A Love Of Life’. My favourite on “Laid” is ‘Five-O’, especially the lyric “If it lasts forever / Hope I’m the first to die”. I’m a major fan of Tim’s lyrics – I love it when people put little twists in their lyrics and Tim is very good at that.”

What is the best James performance you’ve seen ?

“It must be the one at Edinburgh during the autumn 1991 tour. The start of the gig was fantastic – the stage was just black and then Dave came on and started the drum beat to “Sit Down”, and then the others just ambled on and laid into it. The excitement they created was amazing and they managed to sustain it right through the whole show. That’s another thing about James – whereas most bands build a gig up to a big finale, James start with their big finale and carry it through.”

How influential do you think James are?

“James are in a very weird position really. There are some people who love to hate them. I think that’s because they’re one of this country’s finest talents and if there is one thing that this country is good at it is ignoring its own talent. I think that James are more influential than they’re given credit for. There aren’t too many British pop/rock bands that make five albums like James have. There are people who bear grudges and it’s just a case of James coming through that, which I believe they will do. It’s the British disease again – there’s nothing that British people hate more than success – you can almost hear the knives coming out the minute anyone gets close to success. I suppose that it is healthy to have a bit of cynicism to keep your feet on the ground but in pop music it tends to have a negative effect. The inky-press British media can often be the worst, they really do ‘build-’em-up-then-knock-’em- down’.”

“British pop music is going through a critical phase at the moment. We’re producing good records but we’re not really producing any stars. It’s almost a case of “Where is the next Mick Jagger going to come from?”. Anyone who does anything is slagged off, and we also champion things that aren’t really that good. I’ve been to some gigs that have been poorly attended and pretty bad all round and then I read a review of the same gig in the music press and they’re practically implying that Jesus was resurrected there.

“The music industry here is very cliquey -you can get a good review if your manager drinks with a certain journalist in a certain pub and promises guest list and so on. Take a band like Suede. love them or loathe them, there were elements of a backlash against them before they even had their first album out. It’s never been like that before – if you look at all great artists and bands – The Smiths, Bowie, Prince …the list is endless – they’ve all had the benefit of a few albums to establish themselves, but that doesn’t seem to be happening any more. There’s also this peculiar indie vs major ethos around the bullshit of “Selling Out”, you know, it doesn’t hold with any other fields. If you translated it to literature you’d be saying “That book is crap because it’s published by Penguin and this one is good because it’s on Fred Bloggs Press or whatever.”

What music do you listen to?

“Recently I’ve been listening to Underworld’s new album, and the new Paul Weller album, “Wild Wood” is excellent. I’ve also been listening to Orbital, Rage Against The Machine and that Julianna Hatfield album. I’ve got the new Nirvana album too, but I’m not really sure about that yet.”

Has there been a band supporting James that have really opened your eyes?

“Not really, no. Although Nirvana did a good job at the Transmusicales Festival in Rennes in 1991, and Andy Diagram’s band Spaceheads were good too. But to be honest I haven’t seen many of James’ support bands.”

Have you had any embarrassing or funny moments with James ? “Yes – loads. The trouble is they’re far too numerous to mention and they lose their funniness in translation. You probably had to be there to appreciate them. I suppose the weirdest time was when the band were recording “Seven” with Youth, purely because of his bizarre recording techniques.”

How would you best describe James in three words?

“That’s a hard one … I’d say indecisive, inconsistent and wonderful.”

Who do you think works hardest for James?

“Everyone does. No one person deserves that single accolade in my opinion. It’s more of a collective really.”

What would you have as your epitaph?

“I suppose it would be something like ‘It’s Only Pop Music For Chrissakes”‘

What do you believe in?

“Health, wealth and happiness -and I’ve yet to achieve all three.”

At the time of the Laid release, October 1993, Larry was interviewed by the influential Guitar Magazine.

Here is a transcript of that interview:

‘This is the first interview I’ve done with a guitar magazine,’ beams Larry Gott, ‘so to me this is proof that I’ve really arrived, heh heh!’ Typical really, James released their first single ten years ago yet it was only with 1989’s ‘Sit Down’ that they became anything approaching a success, became at all recognisable, became – whisper it – pop stars. Up until then, they were popularly known for two things; the fact that singer Tim Booth was a bit mad and couldn’t dance and a rather natty and lucrative line in t-shirts. But then came ‘Sit Down’. THAT song has since gone on to become something of a milestone round their necks, a reliable, hummable, anthem that moves otherwise well-adjusted people to spit, ‘Urggh! Stuuuudent bollocks!’ Luckily, James know this. Though their last album ‘Seven’, got them severely panned for moving dangerously near to Simple Minds/U2 bombastic stadium ‘rawk’; territory, they’ve suddenly pulled a fast one and returned with a stripped-down album that’s heavy on acoustic instruments, bubbling with slide guitar and about as far from stadium rock as you can get. James have gone folk… sort of.

And stranger still, they’ve done it with the help of Brian Eno – producer of U2. ‘A couple of years ago’ explains Gott, ‘we went on tour with Neil Young, who was doing acoustic shows, and one of the stipulations of touring with him was that the support bands were all acoustic too. There was us and John Hammond, the acoustic blues player. We were playing in these fantastic amphitheaters across America, on the edges of canyons, places like Red Rocks (yes, where U2 recorded ‘Under a Blood Red Sky’) which is this huge cathedral cut out of the rock in Denver… And There’s 10-12,000 stoned deadheads out there, with their picnic baskets, their beer and their pipes, and they were really laid back but they really listened to what we were doing. It really was a stripped-down sound – Dave (Baynton-Power) was playing on just two drums, there were no synthesizers, no electric guitars, no effects. It was dead dry – when you finished a note, it ended. And the more we played around with this the more we enjoyed it. I think we discovered the power you can get out of an acoustic performance, so we came off that, did an acoustic tour of the UK too, and then immediately went into rehearsals for writing this new album. We realised then that we’d brought this whole attitude with us – we picked up electric instruments again but we played them with a real stripped-down bare feel’.

James’ new LP, ‘Laid’ is nothing short of a revelation. The recent single, ‘Sometimes’, might well be a, erm, reliably hummable, rollicking yet shambling anthem, but this time it’s fuelled by manically strummed acoustic guitars and is one of the rockiest songs on the whole album. Most of the rest is seriously reflective and quiet – the folkish ‘Five O’, the slow wailing ‘blues’ of ‘P.S’ or the gently swaying pop of ‘Say Something’. And more than ever since their early days, ‘Laid’ also sees James songs powered by Larry Gott’s guitar. Having dabbled in all sorts of styles from African (‘Chain Mail’), through the usual indie-pop jangling to Stonesy R&B (‘How Was It For You?’), ‘Laid’ sees Larry getting seriously back into slide guitar, something which he first explored back in 1983.

‘I played it – tentatively – on the first album, ‘Stutter’, on a song called ‘Really Hard’, and that’s the thing about slide for me…I’ve always found it really hard! Your intonation has got to be so spot on, but it seems that in the last 12 months it’s just clicked with me. The slide fits really easily on my finger, playing it is comfortable, and it’s gelled really well with the sort of songs we’ve been writing. It sits great with the violin (played by Saul Davies), ’cause you’ve got two instruments without perfect intonation – effectively without frets – and they really weave around each other. So that’s worked and helped us keep the sound really stripped. I’ve enjoyed playing just simple melodies, and just discovering the possibilities of a slide guitar played in an open tuning.

‘There was a less precious attitude about this album,’ he confirms about Laid’s’ stark contrast to ‘Seven’. ‘With ‘Seven’ we started off producing it ourselves ’cause we hadn’t met a producer that we felt we could relate to, and then we started working with Youth from halfway through the project. Hence it ended up a bit of a mish-mash. At the beginning, because we didn’t have the confidence that a producer would have, we tended to over-fill the tracks, which was such a bad attitude ’cause we then couldn’t get rid of them. There were seven instruments always on the go on ‘Seven’, whereas in this one it’s really pared down.

‘Brian Eno came in at quite a late stage. He liked what we’d done up to that point, and really got interested in the jams we’d been having. He’d listen to these huge jams and come back and say, “You’ve got a whole song in there.” The title track ‘Laid’ came out of one of those huge jams, a song called ‘Lullaby’ too. Brian’s great, and he really came into the fore when we got into the studio, if something wasn’t working he’d just move us on to something else. He insisted we set up live in the studio and just play, and in the end we almost invariably went for the first take. Brian had the confidence to say, “Let it live with all it’s imperfections,” and although the second or third takes might have had the structure down a bit better, they didn’t have the naivete, this strange beauty that the first take had.’

There is of course some irony in James producing their most down-to-earth and honestly rootsy album with someone like Eno, though Gott insists the balding enigma is not quite some studio-bound boffin some people might think. ‘Brian’s not this studious character – he either discovers something straight away, or he forgets it. The thing is, he’s got a good chance of getting something he wants immediately because of all the background work he does. ‘A good example was when I was sitting in the car with him once and he had his notebook which he takes everywhere, and on it were all these dots and lines. There was basically this symmetrical dot pattern with lines going out from a central point and then coming back. I asked him what he was doing and he said he was working out the coefficient of reverb reflections in a pine forest! He’d heard a gunshot in a pine forest a few days earlier and when he heard the shot he noticed it had a particular reverb. It’s because you’ve got an organised plantation of trees, because the forest has been built by The Forestry Commission, and it’s all pine so you’ve got these very tall trunks, poles effectively because all the leaves are at the top,and a very dead floor because all the needles have dropped onto it. And you get a particular reverb because of this. So this is typical Brian – he worked all this out, and then he logs it in his notebook and when he needs that sound in the future he’ll know where to get it. But he won’t waste time laboriously trying to find it in the studio – he’ll know how to get sounds. It’s the best way because the biggest death of creativity in the studio comes from waiting around.

‘We had tapes rolling all the time in the studio – even when we were just tuning up, just in case something interesting happened, and very often it did. Brian set up these huge 14″ reels running tapes at half speed, so we could have all these ideas just jammed for up to an hour. It’s actually a very quick way of working because you discover what you’re writing as you’re actually recording it! And in the end we had an hour and a half of finished songs and this whole load, two and a half hours, of improvisation, including 90 per cent of the lyrics.’

If the folkiness of ‘Laid’ isn’t enough to confuse you, these improvised workouts are due to be separately released as an album next year. This, says Gott, will finally allow people to hear the whole James.

‘We’re still a song-based band, despite this album of experimentation.’ Gott qualifies, ‘but I hope that every album we do changes peoples perception – I know ‘Seven’ certainly did ha ha! But no, this one certainly will. We also wanted to release a Radio 1 live in concert thing we did, but, basically, they just want a ridiculous amount of money. We wanted to release three albums this year just so people would say “what fucking direction is this band going in?!” Still I think it would have confused the record company – it’d be like riding three horses with one arse heh heh!

Gott joined James after meeting bassist Jim Glennie and original guitarist Paul Gilbertson at a guitar lesson. Gott was the teacher, the two young Jameses the pupils. ‘They played me ‘Hymn From A Village’ and I just thought, “God, here I am giving lessons to guys who’ve produced far superior to anything I’ve ever done,” and I just thought, yeah! Not long after, Gott was helping out with James’ live sound and adding the occasional backup guitar, and he soon replaced the wayward Gilbertson full-time. He admits his teaching forte was pointing out the right chords to kids who wanted to play along to their favourite Jam albums, though he insists that this is what learning the guitar is invariably about. ‘You show someone how to play one of their favourite tunes and they’re happy. This is why there’s all these people playing ‘Stairway To Heaven’ or ‘Smoke On The Water’ in music shops every Saturday afternoon – ’cause they’re getting a kick out of it. It should be fun; it’s not a study – or if it is, then take it up really seriously. I was never into that ’cause I’m a lazy player. You won’t hear any flash licks on my records! I much more enjoy playing simple melodies and finding a place where it’ll fit along with these five other musicians. That’s what I love about old blues stuff, or old folk stuff – every instrument has it’s place.

On ‘Laid’, what noticeably cuts through is Gott’s acoustic and slide playing. It’s nothing too spectacular, but it’s also something that’s too rarely heard these days.

‘When I was young, I knew these people who had this amazing American import collection and those records were a big inspiration. They had this record callled ‘Sleepwalk’ by Santo & Johnny which had this beautiful Hawaiian slide playing on it, and it had this purity of tone which really impressed me. I know the lengths that Ry Cooder goes to – using old pickups, using very heavy gauge strings and stuff – to get that sound, and I’m starting to understand the tonality of slide guitar much better. I really love it. As soon as you start adding distortion or playing too loudly it reminds me of those terrible bands of the 70’s that used to freak out on heavy rock slide. I don’t like that; I like the purity of acoustics and dobros.’

Citing influences like Marc Ribot (with Tom Waits), Neil Young, Ry Cooder and Captain Beefheart’s nutty duo of Zoot Horn Rollo and Antennae Jimmy Stevens, Gott’s playing is refreshingly free from any blues-rock stylings. ‘It’s too much of a footprint,’ he argues. ‘I think it’s too easy to pull one of those licks out of the bag. I remember doing this huge big rock lick in rehearsals once and it was so gross, Tim sneered, “Your roots are showing!” I had to drop it straight away heh heh! But even though I play slide, I certainly haven’t got what the early blues players had, and I don’t think anyone has had it since the British blues players stomped all over it with heavy beats and stuff like that. Unfortunately that’s what most people are reminded of when they hear a blues lick; it has that leaden connotation as opposed to the really free spirit you hear in Robert Johnson and now, I think, Ry Cooder – he’s still got it, or he comes close to having it.

‘I think we do manage to avoid cliches as a band, ’cause we all like different things. There’s no common taste as such – the thing we have in common is our experience. All the things we like go into a big melting pot and when it beings to take shape it makes it’s own sense, if you know what I mean. It has it’s own sense and you play to that. It sounds weird but it means you don’t readily get into cliches.

‘In what James do, it’s all about songs, and I think it’s actually important in some ways for me not to stamp my personality on something so much that it’s to the detriment of the song. It’s not about showing off with us. ‘It doesn’t bother me that this record sounds “unfashionable”. The one reason it doesn’t bother me is seeing someone like Neil Young’s track record – the Godfather of grunge puts out ‘Harvest Moon’, a reflective country album! And before that when everyone was expecting him to be getting old, he puts out fuckin’ ‘Arc’! Amazing!’

James’ keenness to sunrise is unlikely to produce anything as extreme as ‘Arc’, but there’s no doubt that in ‘Laid’ they’ve given birth to a little gem. Their record company, Fontana, have certainly got high hopes for the band and even though they’re reluctant pop stars, Gott for one is feeling up to the task.

‘When we wrote ‘Sometimes’ I just thought, “Fuckin’ hell, that’s brilliant! What a stunning piece of work!” And it was written in 10 minutes. But it’s not in your control, it’s not in anybody’s control, it just happens…Thats it, it’s all been a fluke, heh heh!

For the dobro-esque slide work on ‘Laid’, Gott used a Les Paul-ish shaped custom electric resonator guitar custom built for him by Parisian luthier Phillipe Dubreuille. It has an old Telecaster pickup on it at the neck and a transducer mic under the bridge, but it delivers a surprisingly dobro-like acoustic tone.

‘If you notice, all the slide work on the album is really slow. I tried playing slide way back on ‘Whoops!’ and I heard live tapes of that and sometimes my pitching was just awful! The song just got faster and faster as the drummer got more comfortable with the beat, but I just got more and more all over the place. So I’ve cut that out now, and I keep all the slide really simple. With a close mic on my Dubreuille, you can do a good impersonation of a dobro, though after playing John Hammond’s on that Neil Young tour, the difference is quite evident. Still I’m not under the spotlight solo, I’ve just got to cut through the row the others are making, so it’ll do for me!

‘My Strat is still my main guitar ’cause it’s so fundamental to our sound. It’s a 1961 – the one, so I was told. It wasn’t cheap but it sounds great and it was the first real good guitar I had. Up to ‘Seven’ I had a Strat copy with EMGs on it that cost me 70 quid from some dodgy geezer in a club in Liverpool! I got the ’61 from this guy in London called Phil Harris, who hires out very interesting gear. He’d just bought one of those classic ’59 flame maple topped Les Pauls but virtually mortgaged his house to do it, so he needed to sell some other stuff to pay for it and this Strat was one.

‘I also use a Gibson Les Paul Gold Top, and together with my Lowden acoustic and the electric dobro that more or less covers me. The main change for ‘Laid’ is that I’ve gone back to using my old Musicman HD212 which I used on all the previous albums. Until recently I had this huge rack with Marshall preamps and poweramps, put through two 4×12’s, but the more processing I used, the smaller the sound was getting. Now I just go straight into the amp, or just via a tc2290 which is the cleanest processor I’ve used, it doesn’t seem to affect the original guitar sound at all. Then it’s just two Boss footpedals for compression and chorus, though only on very gentle settings’.

“Born Of Frustration” was the name of the Modern Rock Tracks hit from James’ last Fontana/Mercury release, “Seven,” but it could also sum up the band’s continuing battle to win over audiences in the U.S.

“It can be weird,” vocalist Tim Booth says of the band’s widely varying degrees of popularity in the U.K. and U.S. “We did one gig in England in front of 30,000 people, and then we come out here and it’s ‘James who?'”

Yet Booth says the band actually prefers the support position when playing live. Just prior to the release of its new album, “Laid,” issued Oct. 5, the band concluded a stint on the WOMAD tour, headlined by Peter Gabriel, and last year it toured with Neil Young.

“You’re up there for an hour instead of two,” he says. “It’s kind of more fun playing for an audience that doesn’t know you and winning them over, rather than playing for the converted.”

Mercury is optimistic that this approach eventually will break the band in the U.S. “We will work ‘Laid’ like we have been working James for the last two years–by making friends at retail,” says Mercury Records senior director of marketing Josh Zieman.

The label currently is negotiating with a few chains to include “Laid” in their listening booths and “buy it and try it” promotions, and it is anxious to get James back out on the road. “That’s the way they broke in the U.K., and that’s the way we will continue to work it here,” says Zieman.

“Laid,” produced by Brian Eno, finds James taking a slightly more sombre approach. According to Booth, the sound of the album was at least partially influenced by the tour with Young, on which the band performed acoustically.

“After we toured with him, we didn’t play electric again for three months,” Booth says. “Our ears were sort of tuned to that level of subtlety. The way we did the LP was just a gradual continuation of that, and Brian encouraged that. So we ended up with a fairly laid-back record.”

Mercury has been working the title track of the album at alternative and college radio, and has long-term plans to take James to album alternative. “Off the bat, we are going back to where we had the most success, and we will build from there,” Zieman says. In its second week on Billboard’s Modern Rock Tracks chart, the song leaped to No. 15.

James also will make an appearance on “The Tonight Show,” tentatively set for Friday (29). The band hopes to return to the U.S. in early 1994, once again as a support act.

Meanwhile, the sessions with Eno were so fruitful that the band has another album in the can.

“‘Laid’ is the LP we went in to make,” Booth says. “It’s the song LP, but we also did a double LP of mainly improvised stuff.” According to Booth, Eno heard the band jamming and said, “People would like to hear this.”

Yet the rest of the Eno sessions won’t be released until next year. “We’ve kept it under wraps,”

Booth says. “We haven’t shown the record company, except for a few people in London. No one in America has heard it. We don’t want to confuse people. We want “Laid” to be focused on properly, and then we’ll present the strange, artistic younger brother.”

James know all about the waiting game. After all, they’ve been playing for close to a decade now, waiting with patience for the world to recognise what they and their fans have known for years. James is a doorway through which you’ll find what you’ve been looking for. Sometimes it is achingly beautiful and, at other times, painfully real, and a little frightening. But no matter what, you’ll find it intermingled with the twists, turns and ramblings of the doorman, singer/lyricist Tim Booth, flanked on either side by the strumming duo of Jim Glennie and Larry Got, bass and guitars respectively.

James’ audience finally began to catch up in numbers to the band’s legendary reputation when “Sit Down” broke through the Madchester masses in 1996. “Sit Down” paved the way for stateside exposure and airplay with “Born of Frustration,” the magnificent single from last year’s album Seven. This year’s offering is Laid, due out in September. It is an album whose sound is a combination of the departure of Andy Diagram, horn-player and dress-wearer extraordinaire, and the experience of extensive touring with Neil Young, where James opened his shows with stunning acoustic sets. The acoustic experience is plentiful on Laid, which was produced under Brian Eno, in the studios of Peter Gabriel.

Larry Gott explains, “we went in with the intention of writing that [Laid], and we had other ideas as well.” They had six weeks to record the new album, so James welcomed Brian Eno’s suggestion that they use two studios to record simultaneously. That way, as Larry puts it, “there’s no hanging around – you’re doing two different things,” and, if there was a problem with recording one in one studio, they just worked on something else in the other studio.

The results, from Larry’s perspective, were incredible. After the six weeks were up, James had, in addition to the finished album, an extra album and a half of material, which will be released at a later date. Gott becomes very excited when he discusses this mode of recording. He is energised by the spontaneity, and amount of new material that was generated under the time spent with Eno. Not surprisingly, he looks forward to working with him again.

The tale of James is full of whispers tinged with rumour and murmurs of mythic proportions. From a band who was once known under the moniker Model Team International, boasting Tim Booth as a mascara-clad dancer, to the band you see before you today, laden with experience, full of optimism, and never jaded. Time has given James respect and, longevity. Laid will add on more of the same for those musicians, who dwell in brilliance and live in the realms of genius.

The well-mannered madman stands on stage at Manchester’s Apollo theatre staring out beyond the empty rows of crimson stalls into the music hall past, He’s been here before, has Tim Booth.

Back down the still un-enlightened path, when the embryonic pop dervish was struggling against the channeling of a church-going public school education in Shrewsbury, Booth organised a coach party from his school to go on an away-day to a blood letting.

Somehow the school organist was recruited to drive the bus, and Booth and his classmates were shepherded up to Manchester fully expecting to be suspended fom school when their Bach-loving driver realised that the musical recital they were attending was a performance by someone little known in classical circles – the bounding maniac Iggy Pop.

It was some sort of starting point that night. And maybe a step towards a conversion. In the venue Booth escaped from organist overseer, and when the Rock Monkey God himself sprang onstage. bare chested, blood smeared and with a horse tail strapped to his arse, teenage Tim ran with his heart pumping to the front of the stage, whereupon a security guard fisted him in the face and briefly laid him out. Neither Tim, nor the school organist were quite the same afterwards.

“One of the reasons I came to Manchester in the first place was because it had such good associations for me. I’d had such good experiences seeing people play here,” recalls Booth still peering into the shadows of the Apollo, pulling memories from the glittery recesses.

It was in Manchester that he saw The Clash’s ‘White Riot’ tour during the heyday of punk and it was here that he came to see his teenage saviour Patti Smith.

“One night towards the end of school I couldn’t sleep. It was during a time when I thought my father was dying and I went down into the common room and I started listening to this record on some headphones and it was just amazing. It turned out to be a Patti Smith album, ‘Horses’. That record really helped me at that time. I got rid of my record collection and I went and saw her.”

Gradually, out there in the stalls, TIm Booth became convinced that pop music was something that could be used to break through to emotional truth. Something that you could make deeper connection with. His personal compass fixed on a questing path that was to help James to stadium pop success in s Britain and which has more recently taken them deep into the heart of the American experience. But James’ conviction route through modern life has recently placed them at odds with the machinery of pop culture in Britain. The new Eno produced album Laid’ and their current British tour has returned James to us in a mood of dissension.

In the Apollo, years after the Iggy revelation, Booth’s belief in the spiritual power of pop still acts as the band’s guiding light James do pop like they’re doing tantric sex. Like they’re trying to reach some higher state. On stage in the empty theatre where the six members or James and a technical crew have convened for a pre-Christmas tour rehearsal, Booth leads the band into ‘All Out To Get You’. A flickering, see-sawing lullaby for the insecure, it build. tremulously out of Larry’s shivers of slide guitar and Saul’s tender violin strokes.

With his eyes shut, Booth rocks from side to side, flowing with the feeling, waiting for the emotional current to push him into one of his mad dances Watching Tim alternate between standing stock still and jerking into spasms of dance it occurs to me that James must be one of the few bands in existence who treat soundchecks as major catharsis.

Each song rehearsed, from the bluesy, plainrlve ‘PS’ to the glistening, abstract ‘Sklndivlng’ is like a mini strategy for transcendence. Compared to the James of three years ago, swaggering through their powerhouse hits, this subtle, interactive, organic ensemble playing bruised, aching devotional songs from ‘Laid’ is a different band entirely.

A LOT has happened to James in the years since their ‘Sit Down’ and ‘Come Home’ hits turned them into a major-league group. They have gone through a perspective shift which has affected them musically and mental1y. The simplest way to explain it is like this. James left home.

“We spent like nine, ten years desperately trying to get some success in England and then got it and that gave us the freedom to move abroad and we have done,” explains bassist Jim ,” Glcnnie. “It’s just that if you move out of the limelight, you move out of concentrating 24 hours a day on England, then it’s going to make a difference. It just seems a small part of something much more large-scale really when once it was everything.

“We knew that from ‘Seven’ this didn’t become the most hospitable place for us in terms of the media and things like that,” says Tim. “It was kind of practical as much as anything else. It does affect you – whether you feel wanted or not. We go to places where we feel wanted.

“The ‘Sit Down’ thing came on the back of years of touring (that built to a head around that period, and since then we’ve been really trying to build up something in Europe and America. I know people in Britain tend to feel rejected when they read that, but that’s how it goes really. The media in Britain encourages a fashion music industry. I don’t think it’s got that much to do with music and we knew that it was our turn to get hit.”

Timing is sometimes everything. James did well out of the rise of Madchester and baggy pop. Their pre-history as fidgety Factory Records folk oddballs kept them at once removed from the baggy fad but by the time it had run its course they’d sold enough T -shirts to revive the Manchester cotton industry and were big enough to play Alton Towers, In the following 12 months, however, while James toured the world, the British charts sucked in a host of new favourites, from Suede to The Lemonheads, and James came home to what they regarded as a hostile critical reception.

ON THE surface James are the same unaffected and pelitely prickly group that they’ve always been. At their converted warehouse offices in a Manchester suburb, they mill around amiably. Avuncular guitarist Larry jokes about how they were going to set up an organic farm in the back yard just to confirm the veggy cliches about James. Hyperactive multi- instrumentalist Saul chats about doing ambient music with Youth under the Celtic Cross guise. Jim turns up still glowing from his weekend run.

It’s a happy family kind of an atmosphere that persists even when Booth’s car alarm persistently goes off on the drive across town. But there’s a defensiveness there that quickly surfaces. The new James T -shirts come with two slogans; one says ‘Get laid’, the other ‘James Suck’, According to Martine, manager of James and mother of Tim’s son, the ‘James Suck’ design is “because we want to sell T -shirts to people who don’t like James as well as people who do”. But maybe there’s more to it than that.

In the 1ast two years the longest consecutive time James have spent at home was the three months they took off earlier this year after they’d finished ‘Laid’. They have been busy. The period leading up to ‘Laid’ saw them spend five months touring America, including the lengthy set of acoustic shows with Neil Young, as well as playing in Europe and Japan, They were so “wiped” by , the time it came to start recording ‘Laid’ that Eno took one look at them and suggested they postpone the sessions.

They went ahead, however, and in the six weeks that they spent in Peter Gabriel’s Real World studios near Bath, they attempted to record three albums’ ‘Laid’; a double album of experimental ambient industrial jams which they now don’t know how to release; and a live album recorded at Bath Moles club. The live set didn’t materialise due to their over-estimation of their readiness to play new songs, but it did persuade Peter Gabriel, who saw the show, to book them onto the recent WOMAD tour of America.

A few days before I met them they had returned from playing in Los Angeles where they’d also appeared on the high profile TV show Tonight. The idea that since ‘Sit Down’ their career has drifted badly is therefore not something that they’re amused by, As Tim points out, ‘Laid’ is Top Ten in Australia, Number One in Portugal, and doing well in the States.

“I think we’re hitting our peak in a way,” says Jim, “I don’t know how long it’ll last but I think we’re coming into our peak of songwriting. If England can’t handle that because we had a hit single two years ago then hard shit, we’ll go somewhere else where people can appreciate it”

“The other thing is we’ve played in Britain such a lot that Britain becomes less of a mystery to us,” adds Tim. “The mystery comes from playing with Neil Young around America in weird venues you’ve never seen before, on mountainsides, rea1ly quiet gigs. Being forced to play acoustically and enjoying it. That’s where the mystery comes from. It comes from going to alien cultures. We’ve always said that. We want to tour in Egypt and India, places they’ve never heard of you and see whether you can translate, see whether you can communicate with those people.

Listening to the hushed strummed atmosphcrics and Ry Cooder guitars of ‘Laid’. It’s hard not to assume that Jamcs simply shipped home the influences of their American travels and Neil Young dates to the studio. Previous album ‘Seven’ had, after all, been roundly ticked off for being ‘stadium rock’ Were the acoustic shows an acknowledgement of that criticism?

“It had nothing to do with it” says Tim. “Neil Young basically asked us to play acoustically on his acoustic tour of America and so we said yes”

“It was either do it acoustically or not do it,” explains Jim, “We were forced into it and we were f—in’ scared to death We’d never played gigs acoustically berore and suddenly there you were in front of 10,000 Neil Young fans. It’s not something we’d have chosen but you have to make it work or you get f-in’ bottled off stage. Fortunately it worked and it led us in a direction which we really liked. It was fresh and it was different. It was like ‘F-in’ hell! This is exciting’.”

“I think we recognised that there was a simple undeniable power about when we played acoustically,” says Larry “And there was some recognition of the criticism that you talked about – the stadium thing. It’s like, if anybody came and saw James do this they wouldn’t be able to level those criticisms at us. It almost became a joke, like what would we be accused of next? Stadium folk?,’

BRIAN ENO, who the band had tried to involve as a producer as far back as the ‘Stutter’ LP in ’86, was drawn to work with them after seeing one of the acoustic shows. He encouraged them to keep things simple in the studio – something which was assisted by the fact that trumpet player Andy Diagram had left to play in his own band earlier in the year – and the blue thrummed plateau of ‘Laid’ was born.

Inevitably, thanks to Eno’s work with U2, there are those who have drawn comparisons. Tim and Larry will have none of it. The songs which people cite as sounding similar are usually ones that Eno didn’t work on, they say. There is an aghast silence when I mention The Edge to Lany. “No, he doesn’t play like The Edge, he just looks like him,” says Tim. And no, James are not planning on acquiring supermodel girlfriends. Subject closed.

They are not easily accounted for , James. Collectively they have a level of protectiveness about what they do which borders on the pathological. Mention the word ‘maturity’ and you’re likely to get drilled to death by Tim’s glare. “Maturity’s a dirty word! Only on the NME!” It would be preposterous if you didn’t know that they had something worth protecting.

“You’re judging everything off ‘Laid’, argues Tim. “But we made another double LP at the same time which is totally different, which is more like a Tom Waits or industrial type record and it also reflects us working with Brian at that time and if you put those two together then there’s so many contradictions that you won’t be able to come to a linear conclusion – that James have turned into this mellow, mature band because the other LP is crazy! It’s like we don’t know what the f– we’re doing so how are we meant to give you an answer!”

If anything, they argue, the move away from their celebratory stadium style shows to the current live mix of part electric part acoustic smouldering atmospherics, is proof of their desire to continue to challenge people.

“I think there was a stage when people came to a James gig and they thought ‘Celebradon! Party! I know all the songs and I’m going to go along and have a sing-along’ and there’s something inside or me that wants to go, ‘Yeah, well we’re going to stretch this’ says Jim

“But there’s no point in going on stage and talking in a language that no-one understands” adds Tim. “It’s a matter of communicating.”

Certainly Booth was impressed by U2’s Zoo TV shows, but they were mostly he says about ‘image’. And image is something that he claims to have little interest in.

“I think ultimately we’re more likely to head towards the Neil Young thing or stripping it all down. But it’s really hard to talk about because we stumble into things rather than consciously set out plans and we like that”

For Booth to claim ten years into his pop star career that he has little interest in image manipulation might sound somewhat unlikely. But the story that surrounds the sleeve of ‘Laid’ supports the idea that James just stumble into things. The cover photo of them wearing floral dresses and eating bananas came from a long session in Marseilles where Booth suggested they wore women’s clothes for a few or the shots. They already had a sleeve for the album but when they saw the photos from Marseille everyone liked the shots. It was not a calculated act, they claim. Andy Diagram had worn dresses for years. They just liked the photos

“It was done berore Kurt Cobain turned up in a dress and the guy from the Manic Street Preachers, so we thought it was quite original,” says Tim “And the picture goes with the title ‘Laid’ so well,”

“We have a really hard time with our own, erm, image,” squirms Larry “We’re still awkward in front of cameras We don’t take great photographs usually. We get them back and we look at them and we think there’s nothIng special about them.”

“We see bands time and time again reaching a huge public, seemingly with some good photographs,” adds Tim. “Not with the music but because they look great in the photographs. And we always think ‘Shit! We do not understand this language’ And we were just very happy with that photo.”

Aren’t you being a bit coy about the sexual role play aspect? You wore dresses in the video for ‘Laid’.

“We’re not coy”. answers Tim “We just don’t want to have to give some great answer, some serious uptight answer about sexual politics.”

“We’re a bit confused, as you might say,” concludes Jim.

IF JAMES have returned to us in a slighdy confused state, at odds with a pop machine which they believe wants to reduce them to something convenient, fashion friendly and superficial, then you can probably blame Booth. Driving round Manchester, Saul and drummer Dave think back to photo sessions past.

“Do you remember that one where Tim’s standing waving in that arch looking like a complete f-in’ homosexual?”

“Which one? There’s loads like that?” they chortle.

The rest of James might share some of Tim’s disaffection with the dirty old music business but their sensitivities are less offended by it.

Booth presents himself as a man who has no time for the ephemeral. His interest is in the deeper things. With the exception of the unreleased Kristin Hersh solo LP (produced by ex-James producer and ex-Patti Smith band member Lenny Kaye) he says he’s found little to inspire him in pop recently. Bjork’s career has been boosted by her photogenic qualities, he says. PJ Harvey doesn’t deserve the Patti Smith comparisons. On The Beat recently he stared down at the philistines who were shouting for The Wonder Stuff with an expression that screamed forgive-them-for-they-know-not-what-they-do. Booth expects James to try to be something more than just a rousing pop group. You get the feeling that he wants them to set souls on fire.

Often they succeed, like with ‘Sometimes’ or ‘Five-O’ from the album. Occasionally they fail. What is clear is that Booth pours masses of heart into James. Life and death stuff. Talk to him about the tone of the last two albums and he’ll say that ‘Seven’ was “depressed” while ‘Laid’ is “sad”. Even the most amateur psychologist could deduce that those moods partly reflect the fallout from the break up of his relationship with Martine.

“Sadness is a real emotion. It’s like joy or anger , it’s valid,” says Tim. “Depression is a black hole And it’s kind of a null. It’s not feeling. And I sung most of ‘Seven’ in that state. And on ‘Laid’ it’s almost like I’m confident enough to do some sad songs”

Check the lyrics of ‘Laid’ and you’ll find a songwriter trying to wrench meaning from a car crash of sin, sex, faith, love and loss. ‘Low Low Low’ he says is inspired by the fact that there’s apparently one gene difference between humans and apes. “I swing from seeing human beings as apes to seeing them as divine depending on what day you catch me” And ‘One Of The Three’ is a mixture of a Godot quote about the chances for redemption and a contemplation of Terry Waite’s near martyrdom. “He seemed to have been teeing up his whole life for it.”

Dirt and divinity! Sex and destiny! Can a mere pop group support the weight of this? How weighty should pop music be?

“How Terry Waite-y? Ah, you mean are those themes the correct dialogue for trashy pop music?” he laughs. “I just don’t care. I really don’t know how to explain it. Obviously if you’re brought up on a diet of frothy pink pop music you might accept ‘Laid’ but you won’t get some of the songs. I don’t mind that at all. Noone has to understand my lyrics. I just hope people get useful images from them.”

Did you sit down with Brian Eno and discuss the meaning or pop music?

“Oh we talked about culture a lot. We had good evening meals. He’s a wine connoisseur and we’d all get drunk, well not drunk but high, and discuss things. We had great ones on culture with Brian.”

In his tawny non-pop clothes, with his weather-beaten hair and stubbly chin, Booth looks out through philosophically sunken eyes on the tacky high speed vanity fair or pop and frowns. He doesn’t think he’s part of all that. One day he’d like to be in the some position as REM, just making good records and good videos and not explaining himself. He doesn’t think he had any mileage out of presenting an easy caricature for the papers. “I think we’ve failed to present a coherent myth,” he says. All that non-drugging, non- drinking, meditating vegetarian Buddhist stuff was grossly exaggerated. He got off the path to enlightenment years ago and anyway, he eats fish.

As for the recent reports of his interest in Tai Chi and martial arts and sharnanitic dancing..

“I wish I’d kept my big mouth shut. When we were meditating, we never talked about it ever. We only talked about a year after we’d stopped so we couldn’t be seen to be selling it. So no. I’m a person who gets very enthuiastic about things, whether they’re films or plays or whatever. I become quite obsessive, but it’s not an a attempt to.. it’s just b enthusiasm”

So what’s the current enthusiasm?

“Football. That film, The Piano. Just whatever I love good work. DV8, the physical theatre group, I’m going to see them in London. It’s a piece on cottaging, sounds really heavy. I think there’s much more interesting things going on than pop music. I think that the comedians in this country are much more interesting than pop music. I’d rather go and see any of them than go and see nearly any British band at the moment. I think that the whole ground for pop music is very superficial at the moment. It’s not worth it. And I think it’s to do with record companies, bands and music press. And it’s particularly bad in this country.”

“The fast turnover of frothy pop is what is promoted and encouraged at all levels. I don’t believe it’s just a matter of us having become a 30-second attention span culture. A few quite heavy and deep things break through, like The Piano. I believe it’s to do with what people are fed. Obviously consumerism is speeding up. It’s getting faster and faster and you can feel it in the media, there are so many magazines and papers and they’re feeding off whatever comes along and it eats it up for a couple of months and then on to the next thing and the next thing. It’s like a hungry shark. But at the same time there are things of depth that get through. And they should be encouraged. And of course…”

AND OF course, James are one of them. A few days after the meeting in Manchester I talk to Booth again on the phone. He explains that it’s a weird time for the band, that they’re going through some sort of change. It all sounds a bit confused, secretive, obsessive, hyper-analytical, determined, mad. He says of himself “I really don’t have any sense of how I’m seen and of course I’m bound to see the contradictions in it because I’m me and I know I can be a shit and I’m very confused. I’m actually quite a ball of confusion”

The curious thing is that after all the years on and off the path to enlightenment James have arrived in l993 with almost no certainties.

And because they are in this state of anxious flux, displaced by travel, unsure of their own sound, suspicious of the media, and surrounded by “froth”, and because Tim insists that they should strive to reach into the depths of experience, this is probably the best time ever to go and see them. Their December shows should be astonishing.

Mancunian outfit is sporting a new sound and dress.

James is a band that just won’t lay down and die. After surviving almost 15 years in the business and constant line-up changes, the Mancunian collective known as James have come into their own.

Though 1992’s Seven provided them with a stadium-sized hit in Sit Down, guitarist/violinist Saul Davies explains his group’s latest work, Laid, “is a backlash against the way we recorded Seven – which was very precise.

“I would say, in a sense, Laid is a return to a more spontaneous way of recording and demonstrates the ‘fuck it’ attitude from us, really.”

On Laid, James have captured the element of spontaneity that Davies says he feels eluded them on Seven.

“All of the tracks on Laid are first or second takes they’re played live in the studio. There’s virtually no overdubs.”

The new approach to recording can in part be attributed to heavyweight producer Brian Eno (U2, Daniel Lanois), who was approached to produce the first James album in the mid-80’s.

“He made us really hyper-aware of the need for space in our music. He showed us hot not to be precious,” says Davies. “He helped us realize what the center of a song was, quickly – get to it quickly, record it quickly, do it quickly without getting too frantic and too tense about the whole process.”

As enthusiastic as James were about having Eno produce the album, Davies says they were still wary of handing control over to someone outside the band.

“It’s very difficult when you ask someone to get involved with your work to give them entirely free reign. You have a vision of what you want the music to sound like. If you’re afraid of that that person will take your music away from that, then you tend to clam up and try and deny them the possibility of doing what they really want to do.

“I think we all feel that we’ve never gotten the best out of our producers because of that feeling,” he says.

“But you can’t fuck Brian Eno around. He just has such a wonderful way of communication that you’re very happy to give him as much space as he wants. He makes himself very clear and he’s very logical minded. So he makes everything seem attractive to you and it would almost seem like folly not to follow his guidance.”

The open and brisk atmosphere they encountered with Eno resulted in a double album’s worth of improvised jam sessions that will be released in the new year.

The free-spiritedness of their work with Eno appears to have affected more than their music. Instead of using impenetrable album art or a picture that obscures the band from view, the cover of Laid features a shot of the band modeling women’s fashion.

“We were in Marseille doing a photo session. We just had this idea ‘Why don’t we take our girlfriends and wives dresses and try them on and see what happens. The Gendarmes were standing around watching us wondering whether they should arrest us.

“The bananas came in because it was an attempt to stop us from laughing – give us something to do with our mouths and we might get away with the shot.”

Though Freudians might attempt a psycho-sexual analysis of a photo that features six men wearing dresses and chomping on bananas, Davies insists the band was merely trying to have a little fun.

“I think we’ve appeared to po-faced for too many years – too serious. I think that shot shows a different side to us,” he says. “People have tried to read a serious message into it, but there isn’t one.”

Sitting backstage at the Labatt’s Apollo, Ardwick Green, where James are rehearsing for their European tour, Tim Booth is softly and assuredly explaining the unexplainable: the contradictory nature of James.

“One of the things that has always made us different is that we accept the contradictions and we actually like them,” offers the affable and relaxed singer, his polite and patient manner in sharp contrast to the intense singer you see on stage. “We like it in the music, and that’s part of why it’s so difficult to do interviews, to rationalise what we do. You just can’t. It’s very instinctive, very accidental.”

The core of James -Tim Booth, bass player Jim Glennie and guitarist Larry Gott – have been together for 11 years. In that time they’ve released six albums and worked with four different record labels – including their own for the self-financed live LP, One Man Clapping. Life in James has been anything but a smooth ride.

“We struggled for seven to eight years to make ends meet,” recalls Booth, “to keep out of bankruptcy, and that was always hard. After about three years together, we went on the Enterprise Allowance Scheme, even though it was supposed to be for new businesses.” The thought of this makes him laugh. “Well, we were so well-known we could pretend we were new and easily fool them.”

That James have survived the rigours of record company machinations, music press indifference and near financial bankruptcy is a triumph of spirit over circumstance. That they finally broke through into the mainstream with ‘Come Home’, at a time when Manchester raved on and laddish bravado ruled, compounds the twisted nature of their long and winding success story.

James were a product of a different era of Manchester music, the era of The Smiths, when Morrissey was redefining what it meant to be a tough modem man. “It takes guts to be gentle and kind,” he sang, and James epitomise this ‘new man’ philosophy. By ’88, when Manchester’s clubs were buzzing with a new wave of acidic house beats, Tim Booth and the band were more likely to be at home meditating.

James have never immersed themselves in the rock lifestyle. They may have struggled their way through the ups and downs of music business intricacies, but their relation- ship with it has always been one of distrust. Since the very early days, they have recoiled from the jaws of commerce, fearful of being sucked into the corporate malaise.

“The first song I wrote was called ‘What’s The World’, which was about selling your soul to some kind of business man,” explains Booth. “That was a commonly held fear by all of us. We didn’t trust record companies. And unfortunately we applied that to Factory (who released their first two singles), who were actually trustworthy. And then by the time we’d worked that out and gone and took the risk with Sire, we realised Sire were the ones we should have been careful with. So we really fucked it up.”

‘Folklore’, a song on the band’s first single for Factory, poured scorn on the notion of received wisdom, of learning the rules of life from jaded elders. It contained the pay-off line, ‘the only way I learn is put the fist in and get burnt’, a perspective which has informed the band’s thinking to the present day. Although words and deeds have not always tallied.

“At that point,” admits Booth, “we were probably bolder in words than in actions. That was what we wanted to do, but we were actually quite timid. We were frightened of the whole thing of becoming successful, which I think is partly why it took so long. So it was something we were trying to do, but not always succeeding.” Regrets? “Well, you look back and you think, ‘Jesus, what a wanker I was’, but that’s life isn’t it? If you never stick your neck out, you’re never really going to find out who you are anyway.”

A boarder at public school in Shrewsbury, expelled for being a bad influence, Booth came to Manchester to study acting at Manchester University. He ended up in the city’s most un rock-n-roll band, not because of his singing or his lyrical finesse, but by virtue of his ostentatious dancing.

“I happened to be dancing in a club one night, dancing very flamboyantly because I was upset due to my girlfriend leaving me, and they saw me and asked if I’d dance for the band. And they might not have asked me if they hadn’t been stealing my drink. So when I sat down I picked an argument with them and that’s when they asked me.”

“Now that,”says Booth, his voice hushed as if still shocked by the absurdity of it all, “is why I’m in this band.”

Accidents, chance meetings, ludicrous coincidences. The band’s path from a struggling folk-tinged indie guitar band to G-Mex packing, Neil Young supporting international pop eccentrics is littered with them. Planning, making strategies, rationalising, are all things they claim to avoid. Fate, believes Booth, not forward planning, is what guides them.

“To do interviews, to explain it all, you start to impose a mental structure on it, this idea that you did it on purpose, that you sat down, planned it and then created it. But when we create something we have no idea what it’s going to be like until it’s finished. And then we go; shit, look at this, this is interesting. That’s how it’s always been with us. The one frustration we have is when we try to consciously control something, because we never seem to be able to do it.”

Another case of the band’s contradictory nature, perhaps, but Booth’s explanation – or lack of one – appears at odds with the band’s music. It may be emotional, cathartic at times, but it rarely sounds unstructured, off the cuff. In fact their last but one LP, Seven, following on from 1990’s acclaimed Gold Mother, sounded contrived, self-conscious and self-important, as if the band had decided to make a concerted effort to break the US stadium circuit. They hadn’t, asserts Booth.

“It was a weird series of accidents,” he explains. “No one wanted to take the authoritarian role, and art does not work democratically..’ Producers came and went during the album’s recording, first Gil Norton, then Flood, followed by the band themselves. Finally, Youth took over, Seven was finished, the consensus being that James had decided to take the money and run. The record sold respectably, the critics recoiled.

“We didn’t hear it as stadium,” continues Booth, still a little bemused by the tag. “I love the record. Brian Eno worked with us on Laid because he liked Seven. Neil Young heard it and invited us to tour America with him.”

James, as Booth’s defence suggests, have been keeping good company of late. Their latest LP, Laid, is produced by Brian Eno, a man they had wanted to work with since their 1986 debut, Stutter. The fruits of this collaboration are something of a rebirth for the band, an album bursting with unfettered passion whilst avoiding the pompous pre- tensions of Seven. It is a sparse, acoustically derived collection of songs, harking back to the band’s earliest endeavours. An earthy, gutsy, guitar-pop masterpiece.

But where does it leave James? Are they still the T-shirt selling, alternative ‘teen band they used to be? Do their acoustic gigs with Neil Young suggest they are seeking the attention of more mature rock fans? And if in the early days, as Booth has expressed in the past, the shared, unspoken philosophy of the band was the idea of burning out, what is the shared philosophy now, 11 years down the line? Booth is unsure.

“This,” he says pensively, “is hard. We’re at a strange point at the moment, I feel that we’re at a strange crossroads. What I would have said two months ago – because at the moment I don’t know what to say – is simply to keep changing, keep being difficult, keep presenting music of a quality and a depth we believe in.”

If this is what drives James these days, then Laid is a record they can be very happy with. Recorded in just six weeks at Peter Gabriel’s Real World Studios in Bath, Eno suggested they take the pressure off making it by simul- taneously working on another LP. The result was an additional, double LP derived from extracts of jamming sessions, an experimental collection of acoustic and heavier, technological tracks. It will hopefully be released in the first half of next year.

“The next record has a lot in common with say, Tom Waits,” explains Booth. “It’s rough, quite ugly, but there’s a hidden beauty. You have to find the beauty under the ugliness.” The original idea was to release it at the same time as Laid – a kind of underbelly of Laid experience. But the record company didn’t go for that. “It is such a weird LP,” says Booth. “We didn’t really know what to do with it”

All of this activity, working with Eno, touring with Neil Young, experimenting with acoustic performances, suggests a very definite wind of change in the James’ camp. Whether it is simply a case of being touched by the hand of Eno, or if something more fundamental is at work, is hard to fathom. Booth, ever the one for a spot of cryptic mysticism, is not about to give too much away. “There’s going to be a big change in James in the next year,” he suggests. Would he like to elaborate? “I don’t know what it is, but I can feel it. Inside us.”

Int : I’m MTV’s Lewis Largent. I’m here with Tim Booth and Jim Glennie, two of the founding members of the band James. We’ve just seen a bit of Sit Down. People go crazy when they see you, when you play that in your native England. Can you explain what happens when you play that song?

Jim : Everyone sits down basically

Int : They do not

Jim : They do

Int : They do not

Jim : They do

Int : They rise to their feet and have their lighters out. And sway back and forth.

Tim : That old chestnut. It kind of varies actually. First of all they used to invade the stage, they felt that was the song they could get on the stage and sit down and after a couple of incidents where we had a couple of hundred people on stage and the stage gave way, we decided to stop that and they sat down in process. The first night it happened, playing to about 4,000, they tried to storm the stage you know and failed and sat down in protest. 4,000 people and we were visibly shaken and it kind of went on from there. Now we never quite know what’s going to happen.

Int : Do you still get like , I’ve seen you when you play that song, shocked when you play that song. I’ve seen people in the audience get moved like that

Tim : It varies, doesn’t it? When you feel like it’s an automatic response, like getting out the lighters, it doesn’t get you. When you feel you’ve really played well, you’ve really touched people and then you play Sit Down and they want to communicate something to you, like an expression of solidarity, you can feel it. You can feel when it’s real. Then you get really hit.

Jim : You don’t want to be sort of “Come on, join in the chorus” You know. It’s really crass

Tim : We stopped playing it, we didn’t want that

Int : Let’s talk about your new album, Laid. Your fifth album? In like ten years of existence. I get feelings from reading articles from when you were preparing to make that album that this was time to reinvent yourself. Like Seven had closed a chapter and it was time to open a new chapter. Is that a correct assumption?

Jim : Whenever we record an album we always look for a new area to write in and to our ears all the albums are very different. And there were a few factors, it wasn’t really a conscious thing, in we were going to pull it off in another direction. There were some pretty big factors at the time making it happen. One was touring with Neil Young acoustically which kind of broke everything down again. So even when we were back in the studio to record electrically, it just changed the way we approached the songs. And the second thing was working with Eno. He didn’t let us overcook the songs. He kept them quite simple, quite straightforward. It was fun and the album came out pretty different. Not a “Hey,we have to play in a new direction” type of thing.

Tim : Our trumpet player left as well. After Seven, he kind of got bored of touring and missed his girlfriend so he left. It was all this combination of things meant that we ended up with a more laid-back calmer record

Int : Laidback

Tim : Laidback

Int : We’re about to watch the song and video for Laid which I had an advance cassette of. Was it originally called Raid?

Tim : A lot of the songs change names. Many of the songs that we did with Eno were written at the time. We had a six-week period where we wrote fifty songs. There’s another double LP from the same period. And so loads of them were changing names and we couldn’t remember what they were called. Sometimes is sometimes called Lester Piggott. Which is the name of a famous jockey in England because it has a racing beat. That’s how we remembered it. We should have changed it to Willi Schuhmacher over here.

Int : Or William Burroughs

Tim : Or William Burroughs, the famous jockey.

Int : I thought you said famous junkie.

Tim : Where are the lawyers?

(part 2)

Int : You guys are humongous stars in England. You play soccer stadiums to 50,000 people.

Tim : Humongous

Int : Large, enormous, yet here you have a smaller following. What do you think the reason is?

Tim : We’ve only been coming here for the last few years as I’ve just been told, reliably informed.

Int : Why did you decide, you’ve been a band since 1983, why did you wait nine years?

Tim : It’s been a long journey. You know, we walked it. No, we built up our following in Britain and Europe through touring constantly. And there wasn’t really time to get over here. And money. We had a lot of record company fights and couldn’t raise the ferry crossing.

Int : The record company people who are with you are going “Ha”

Tim : We joined Sire a couple of years ago. No, Sire were the first, we joined Mercury a couple of years ago.

It took British band James a long time to discover America – and vice versa

“We didn’t come over here at all for the first seven or eight years,” said bassist Jim Glennie in a phone interview. “No record company was prepared to pay for us to come over here and play.”

Although in the past few years the band has not been total strangers to American audiences, James’s latest, Laid, could be the record that wins them some major attention in this country.

Lovely atmospheric production from Brian Eno, a sure melodic sense, and smart vocals from Tim Booth make it a very appealing record.

The title song (and first single) is a droll comment on sexuality, while Low Low Low takes a cold-eyed view of human extinction and Sometimes has an inviting passion.

The cover of the record shows the band posed on the steps of the Marseilles cathedral, wearing dresses.

“We were just fooling around with some pictures, and we were having fun,” Glennie said. “Although I suppose you could read into it a subtext about prostituting ourselves by selling what we do.”

Glennie said the feel of the record dates to an acoustic tour the band did last year, opening up for Neil Young.

“We agreed without thinking about it very much. Our first gig was at Red Rocks (in Colorado) in front of 10,000 people. We were terrified. It was such a change from playing those dark little alternative rock clubs.”

When the band finished its tour and picked up its electric instruments again, he said, they heard things differently. And Eno, possibly best known for his production work with U2, kept the band focused.

“He knew we’d overcook the songs, if we weren’t careful. He knew we were capable of messing them up,” Glennie said. “So we’d race through the songs. We had to put everything into them. I think the great thing about Brian is that, whoever he works with, he gets the best out of them.”

There is a certain folkish quality to the band’s music, which Glennie said is not a conscious effort.

“We’d hear that a lot, and in the early days, we reacted quite strongly against it,” he said. “We’re no great lovers of folk music. But there are certainly strains of folk in our music.”

The band started in Manchester in 1983 and ended up on Factory Records, home of such local stalwarts as Joy Division and Happy Mondays. The band became heroes to the volatile English rock press, and were endorsed by Morrissey, who invited them to tour with his band, the Smiths.

“He helped us a lot in the early days, just in terms of attracting attention to us,” Glennie said.

After various record company woes – the band has been on five labels – James reorganized in 1988,expanding from four to seven members. (It is now down to six).

“There was a period where we were feeling our way around,” Glennie said. “We really didn’t know what we wanted, and that explains the way we sounded on Seven.”

Now the band is much more comfortable, Glennie said, and so far is very happy with the reception Laid has had in America.

“We’re such a bunch of old cynics, so skeptical. It took us so long to make it in Britain, you know. But it’s nice to come here and get such a good response.”

1 VAL DOONICAN : ‘Paddy McGinty’s Goat’

“If the idea of Rebellious Jukebox is to choose songs and singers that strike a chord that resonates throughout your life then this has to be on the list.. Around the time we first started making records, we wanted to be on ‘The Val Doonican Show’. We thought it would be a cool thing to do – better than appearing on whatever the equivalent of ‘The Word’ was. Basically, I love everything about Val Doonican. His becalming influence goes way way back to my early childhood, when I was made to sing ‘Paddy McGinty’s Goat’ to my grandmother.”

2 THE BEATLES : ‘Twist And Shout’

“Even allowing for everything else that The Beatles went on to do, ‘Twist And Shout’ is a great, great song. It’s just perfect; the testosterone rush, just everything. One of my earliest memories was my sisters watching the film of that ‘Top of the Pops’ performance and arguing over which band belonged to them – The Beatles or The Stones. For me, The Beatles had something that noone else can possibly approximate. There was a purity, a certain kind of innocence, because after The Beatles what they did was turned into an industry. They progressed so quickly that the industry had to move quick to catch up with them. After The Beatles, a whole industry was built to try and repeat what they did. And the beautiful thing is that it’s impossible. You can’t manufacture a band like that.”

3 ORIGINAL SOUNDTRACK : ‘Joseph And The Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat’

“One of my cousins played this recently, and I realised on hearing it that I knew virtually every word. Perhaps it means so much to me because I identify with Joseph the sacrificial lamb! The fall guy in his coat of many colours! Um, then again, perhaps not.”

4 WILSON PICKETT : ‘Young Girl’

“The chorus to this used to haunt me. I didn’t appreciate its guilt ridden, ageist, sexist lyrics when I was six or seven. There’s this achingly poignant string arrangement lurking beneath it that slays me every time I hear it. I reckon there must have been a residue of frustrated genius string arrangers in the Sixties and Seventies who could only find work on otherwise mediocre soul records. String arrangements are just the best things.”

5 DAVID BOWIE : ‘Hunky Dory’ / IGGY POP : ‘Lust For Life’

“There’s a wonderful singalong quality to this. And songs like ‘Kooks’ are just perfect for f**ked-up pretentious adolescents to wallow in. The sheer panic and drama in Bowie’s delivery of ‘Five Years’ is like nothing I’ve ever heard. I wasn’t actually into Bowie the way a lot of people of my generation were. His obsession with image really irritated me. I much preferred Iggy Pop. I thought he was like Hyde to Bowie’s Dr Jekyll. Which is probably simplifying things a bit really, but the thing with Bowie was a bit too British for me; I didn’t appreciate his reserve. Iggy was more exotic. He was this wild animal from an alien culture who used to splatter the stage with his own blood. That spoke to me more than Bowie ever did.”

“When I was at school, me and some friends desperately wanted to see Iggy at the Manchester Apollo. And our only hope of being allowed to go was if we could persuade one of our teachers to take us. Eventually, we persuaded this one teacher who ran the school choir. He was socially inept, had real communication problems, and, furthermore, had never heard any rock music in his life, let alone this man covered in blood. Anyway, we went in and lost him immediately, because we figured that the moment he saw what he’d let himself in for, he’d make us leave! After the gig, we’re walking out and we bump into him and he’s totally raving about it, saying it’s the most exciting thing he’s ever seen in his life! A few weeks later, we persuaded him to take a school party to The Clash’s ‘White Riot’ tour.”

6 PATTI SMITH : ‘Heroes’

“Patti Smith is to singers what Hendrix is to guitarists. So many people are singing that wouldn’t otherwise be if it wasn’t for Patti Smith; Morrissey, Michael Stipe, Mike Scott, Siouxsie, myself. The evening Patti Smith changed my life was when I heard ‘Birdland’, a 10 minute improvised poem about Pete Reich losing his father. And I heard it on the night I thought my father was dying. And, as far as I’m concerned, there was nothing before that and nothing after that. And I know it’s the same for all those other singers. She was the best, in terms of daring, honesty, performance or self-sacrifice. I’ve got these bootlegs of just her and Lenny Kaye on guitar where’s she just improvising this poetry, and she comes in the middle of the poem. Noone has gone that far.”

7 THE BIRTHDAY PARTY : ‘Prayers On Fire’

“Apart from our bassist Jim, all of James were tremendously influenced by The Birthday Party, and you can really see it in this song. We went to see them about 15 times. I’d never seen anyone infuse their music with so much sheer violence as The Birthday Party. And I think with that song they took it as far as that violence thing can be taken with music. It was round about the time that I was at Manchester University that I was madly into The Birthday Party. I was studying drama in the same class as Ben Elton. What was he like? Lovely man. A really fast worker, too – he could polish off a play in a few days. I used to perform in a lot of them. Some of them were really shit, but even then he was incredibly funny.”

8 PIXIES : ‘Doolittle’

“Three minute songs, great ideas, a f**k you attitude and a healthy pair of lungs. There’s really nothing else to say.”

9 CHRIS ISAAK : ‘Wicked Game’ / JULEE CRUISE : ‘Floating Into The Night’

“Wicked Game is one of those songs you hear for the first time and think, ‘That may well be the greatest record I’ve ever heard.’/ You know what I mean? It’s immediate. I remember it was on Jukebox Jury and Barney from New Order was on, and he was the only one that twigged it. He said, ‘I’m going to go out and buy that record tomorrow.’ Cool f**ker ; anyway, common to both Julee Cruise and Chris Isaak is their wonderful ability to write dreamy, aquatic sex songs.”

10 MARY MARGARET O’HARA : ‘Miss America’

“Morrissey said she’s the best singer since Patti Smith, and he’s right. I went to see her perform once and she was so vulnerable. She broke down for 20 minutes after the first song, and the band had to carry on playing as she paced the stage trying to find the strength to continue. Apparently, she has 20 reels of finished record company material waiting to be released, and they’re just sitting on it. So she’s basically resigned. She can’t get her material released. It’s a f**king tragedy.”

James turned out weighty music for 11 years but finally found commercial success in the U.S. with the comic ditty `Laid.’

The English band James is headlining the Palace on Monday and Tuesday, demonstrating a huge increase in drawing power since last year. The reason?

“A silly little catchy pop song,” says the band’s singer Tim Booth, laughing at the irony: After turning out a diverse array of fairly weighty music for 11 years, James has found its commercial footing in the United States with the popularity of the title track from the current album “Laid”-a bouncy, comic ditty about a relentless sexual pursuit.

“We’ve been brought up on the kind of maxim that pain is deep, you know,” Booth said this week by car phone as the group motored south into California. “It’s a Western false concept. Very English, very European, I think-suffering for your art. And when something comes as easily and as simply as `Laid,’ you kind of don’t take it as seriously as some of the ones that you have to bleed for.

“We’re very happy with it now. We’re very proud of it.”

Booth calls the song “a happy little accident.” The sextet came up with it during one of the improvising breaks during its album sessions, then set it aside as too “pop.” When producer Brian Eno listened to five hours of tapes, he singled it out and encouraged the band to polish it up for the album.

The song might not fit the James image-and that’s exactly the way they like it.

“James has always been unpredictable,” Booth said. “Our fans love that in England. They love the fact that every night we play a different set of songs. You never know how we’re going to be. We can be very moody and difficult; we can be very uplifting and joyous.

“That’s something that has been valued in England. But it also means it takes longer to become successful, because people find it much harder to pin you down.”

James struggled through its first seven years after forming in Manchester in 1983. Following a major lineup change in 1988, the success of the single “Sit Down” moved James to the forefront of the English rock scene.

“Sit Down,” an anthem of reassurance and solidarity that became a centerpiece of the live shows, bespeaks the group’s willingness to shoot for big emotions.

“The idea is to move people really, and to move them in different ways,” said Booth, 29. “To upset, to agitate, to uplift, to give people happy endings now and again, but not for the whole trip to be a happy ending. . . .

“You know, music is magic. It’s like, how can people cry when certain instruments and certain rhythms are played in a certain way? Why does it make people cry? Why does it make people laugh? It’s magic, and we try and keep connecting with that spirit of music rather than get sidetracked into any other cul-de-sac about power or money or fame.”

That means there weren’t any career considerations taken into account when the “Laid” album was recorded. With an atmospheric edge provided by producer Eno, and with the band in touch with its mellow side after playing 50 acoustic shows as Neil Young’s opening act, the record is a distinct departure from James’ previous work-the kind of record that might confuse the fans.

“I think we should confuse our fans,” said Booth, laughing. “It’s always a healthy thing to do. As long as you confuse them with beautiful music then that’s OK really.”

The British band James has an interesting problem with its record company: Too many new songs.

”I don’t see this as being a big problem, the fact that we can write too many songs,” says bassist Jim Glennie from a tour stop in New Orleans. ”The record company might find it difficult to cope with.”

While many bands wait for their muse to inspire new music, the six members of James uncorked the creativity bottle while working with noted producer Brian Eno on their latest effort, Laid. Eno, who has helped coax great albums from such acts as U2 and the Talking Heads, spent six weeks challenging James. At the end of the recording sessions, the band had not only its strongest record to date, but enough material to fill two more CDs.

”He (Eno) pushed us into new fields of working; he broke down barriers that we had. He pushed us into a new room,” says Glennie.

Eno’s advice was to strip down the sound.

”What he said to us was, ‘Look, with six people in the band, you shouldn’t need to overdub, you shouldn’t need to layer things. There’s enough of you making sound in there, that should be quite sufficient.”

The band members – Glennie, Larry Gott on guitar, Mark Hunter on keyboards, Tim Booth on vocals, David Baynton on drums and Saul Davies on violin and guitar – agreed.

”We sat in the control room with just screens in between us, but so we could see each other,” says Glennie, describing the recording set up. ”We’d blast through the versions and then we’d listen back on the monitors. If it sounded great, if it blew us away, then that was a take. If it didn’t, then we did it again. And if we couldn’t get it after a few takes, we’d move on. It was a very real way of recording.”

The resulting album, the group’s eighth, is filled with simple yet completely engaging pleasures. Whether the slowly building opening cut Out To Get You, the galloping Sometimes (Lester Piggott) (named after a jockey) or the hook-heavy title track, James has boxed a collection of uncomplicated delights.

”I think it’s the best album we’ve ever done. I think we’re now coming into our best songwriting period. I have no idea how it’s going to last. It’s one of those things (where) you think one day you’re going to get in a room and it’s not going to be there anymore. It’s not like packing biscuits, or something, where you put the hours in and you come out with the stuff.”

While the band waits for the opportunity to release the rest of the music from the Eno sessions, it’s busy working to make a name for itself in the United States. Despite a huge following in England – sold-out tours, gold records, playing to as many as 30,000 fans in a single concert – the group has started at the bottom again in building a name outside England.

”It’s good for us in a lot of respects,” says Glennie. ”It’s brought us back down to Earth. (But it’s a great) feeling – this rush again, this building. Like, you play somewhere and it’s sold out, and then people come and say, ‘Oh, you’ve got this television show and MTV has put the video in Buzzbin ,’ and it’s like, ‘Wow.’ It’s a really exciting feeling, (having) that momentum again.”

Glennie describes James as having the best of both worlds – comfortable success at home and a growing popularity in the U.S.

With support from radio and MTV, the band is hoping to educate Americans as to the joys of James. An important part in that campaign is spreading the popular live show that American audiences first glimpsed when the band was opening for Neil Young on his acoustic tour or playing a short string of shows back East with Duran Duran.

As Glennie puts it: ”We’ve basically found ourselves on a wave now, just like we did in Britain. And we’re trying to ride it out and see where you end up at the end of it.”

Many a memorable pop band has emerged from Manchester, England.

The list includes the Fall, the Buzzcocks, Joy Division, New Order, the Stone Roses, Charlatans U.K., Happy Mondays, Inspiral Carpets and, perhaps most popular of all, the Smiths. Add James to the above, a veteran Manchester band that broke big in Britain in the early ’90s. In 1994, James is making its biggest waves yet in North America.

A great single, “Laid,” and a Brian Eno-produced album of the same name, are winning new Yank fans for James. Jim Glennie, a co-founder of the group who plays bass and writes songs, is understandably pleased with “Laid. ”

“It’s just such a short, cheery blast,” Glennie said from Columbus, Ohio, a stop on a James tour that also reached New Orleans.

Given “Laid’s” encouraging stateside performance, is James finally breaking in the U.S.?

“Everybody’s getting excited in the record company and management,” Glennie acknowledged. “I don’t know. We’ve become quite skeptical and cynical over the years. You’re near to so many things. You don’t actually believe anything’s going to happen till you’re actually there doing it.

“But things are going very well. This album has made huge leaps and bounds for us over here and the single’s doing really well. ”

North American cities showing strong James support have included Chicago, New York, San Francisco and Philadelphia. By popular demand, a second show was added in Toronto. In Chicago, police shut an in-store James appearance down because hundreds of fans jammed the place. “They suddenly decided we needed a permit,” Glennie said.

“There are some places where we get great crowds and everybody loves us and there’s other places where people have never heard of us,” he added. “It still kind of feels early days to me, but it’s really good. ”

James got a boost from its recent appearance on the popular Late Show with David Letterman. Following a lively rendition of “Laid,” Letterman greeted the band and mentioned singer Tim Booth’s explosive dancing. “You dance like I do,” the host cracked.

Glennie claims no knowledge of the origins of Booth’s unique choreography. “I’m not quite sure, actually. It looks like he’s been electrocuted or something. ”

In truth, it was Booth’s dancing that grabbed Glennie’s attention.

“A friend and me were in a band and we went along to a club in Manchester where we saw Tim dancing. He was just freaking out, arms and legs flailing all over the place. We thought, ‘Oh, this guy’s really good. ‘ We asked him to come along to some rehearsals to dance and see what else he could contribute to the band. ”

Booth, a former drama and dance student, initially banged the odd tambourine, danced and sang backup. When James’ singer quit, Booth stepped into the role of frontman.

James subsequently joined one of Manchester’s many musical waves.

“We got pulled into this latter wave, kind of when the Smiths broke. They took us on tour, which drew a lot of attention to us. And Morrissey said some really nice things in the press about us. That put the spotlight on us. ”

By the end of the ’80s, the Smiths were no more. Dance beats ruled a new Manchester wave that carried Happy Mondays, the Stone Roses and Inspiral Carpets to fame.

“Whenever one of these waves comes along things really kick in in the city,” Glennie said. “But once the spotlight’s shone upon it, it disappears. Things are fairly quiet in Manchester at the moment. Perhaps it’s a good idea that it’s left alone for a while. ” While peers such as Happy Mondays made their mark with hit records, James earned its fans through continuous touring. Ironically, radio and record companies weren’t impressed.

“We had lots of problems with record companies. They had trouble finding space for James in the industry. But whenever we played live, more and more people came to the gigs. So we just kept playing, which kind of fueled us financially and spiritually and emotionally. ”

James ultimately achieved major popularity in Britain in the early ’90s.

“We got singles in the Top 40 without air play, just because we were pulling thousands of people live. The radio couldn’t ignore us any more. Once it broke in Britain, the rest of the world wanted to know. So off we went on our travels”

“The demands of time are getting so great now. We were big in Britain and then things spilled into Europe. Now things are kicking in in America. Because of the size of the states, you have put in so much time into going around touring and doing promotion. It’s not a problem, but it means some will have to suffer. We don’t get a great deal of time at home. ”

Even if success comes with some suffering, it also opens doors.

One such opportunity was James’ realization of a longtime dream: Laid was produced by studio guru Brian Eno (David Bowie, Roxy Music, Talking Heads, U2). With Eno at the helm, Laid was recorded in a slight six weeks.

“He’s a problem solver,” Glennie said. “He looks at the way you work and gets out the way the things that are blocking you. With us, the songs will play themselves, but we have a tendency to put too much in. Eno kept things quite simple. The first few takes and that was it; very little or no over-dubs, just keeping the songs straightforward and not being too fussy. The album’s more direct because of that. “

Jo Whiley : This is the dedication that we received when we went out to see James. I was telling the story to Tim on how we were sat on the 747. God, it was just dreadful, you know we got struck by lightning and he went “Hey, how fantastic was that”

Tim : (from live show) This is dedicated to those who have been hit by lightning.

(plays Sometimes)

JW : And I guess in retrospect it was a fantastic experience and one I’m never going to forget. So James playing Las Vegas. The plane finally got there. A bit of a rocky ride. As we arrived we were cruising the streets of Las Vegas as you do and seeing who else was in town that evening like Moody Blues, Englebert Humperdinck and UB40. What a good gig for the weekend that was. And then James playing too. The gig was actually excellent. And the anthem being for them in the States – Laid. I had to go and get the reaction of the crowd outside as they left the gig and find out what they thought of the whole thing.

Fan 1 : It was the best. I mean these guys, it gave the feeling, they give such feeling and you could feel what they were saying you know. And everything was great.

Fan 2 : Killer, very psychadelic, just very entertaining

Fan 3 : That was great and everything. We were down in the out and great.

Fan 4 : I didn’t associate the songs I liked on the radio with the name of the band but when he called me up and went “Those guys who are really cool on the radio, these are the guys.” so it was great and I’ll be going to more.

Fan 5 : The album’s pretty good. It’s a little more upbeat. It’s really good and this town, Las Vegas, is really slow

Fan 6 : I’m from America and I love the English sound and these guys are great and they’re going to be big in my heart.

JW : And do you know, he meant that, he meant that so much. So what about Tim, what did he think about the gig?

Tim : The gig was pretty good. You come to Las Vegas and you don’t know what to expect really. It’s such a crazy cartoon type of town in the middle of a desert. Everything is larger than life and kitsch and you don’t know who you’re gonna get. You don’t know where the real people are and where everyone lives here. Last time we played here wiht Neil Young, he was wonderful and they didn’t listen to him and he got very angry and walked off after an hour. And his manager said to us “Whatever you do, don’t ever tell anyone Neil’s played Las Vegas” So now I’m thinking I shouldn’t have said that, should I? Opening my big mouth again. But it’s that kind of place, you know, it doesn’t have the great credibility of many other cities. The rest of the band really love it. They go out and gamble. Larry puts his stets on and dark glasses.

JW : Larry went Vegas didn’t he?

Tim : Yeah, we call him Vegas. A nickname. He goes out and gambles. He’s won every time here. Come away with quite a lot of money.

JW : He was the Vegas kid on stage that night Larry. He was quite brilliant. So the image before was of meditating vegetarians, it seems that James have changed quite a lot and become party animals. I had to ask Larry. Party animals then, Larry?

Larry : Well I think we always have been, we’ve just never had that image in England. Our image was set in the early years when we were kind of a lot younger. We were scared of everything we came up against in the industry and in the media and things like that. It seemed, it seemed bigger than we were and it would swallow us up if we weren’t careful so we seemed very reserved and very shy as a result of it. There have been some more parties on this tour, yeah.

JW : Ah, but the thing is, is Tim indulging as well?

Tim : There’s a front of the bus and a back of the bus and the back of the bus is the party area.

JW : You sit at the front?

Tim : And the front of the bus is my area. I make forays into the back of the bus when I feel like it on a full moon, but a lot of the time I spend in the front of the bus. It’s mainly because it’s smoky at the back of the bus and as a singer I have to watch my instrument. I mean I want to go out every night and give my best and I hate letting people down. Hate it. Passionate about that. So I look after myself.

JW : There’s a lot of controversy at the moment about James and their desperation, no, passion to break America. And that’s what I wanted to find out from Tim. How important is it for James to break America?

Tim : I don’t like this thing, breaking America. We would like to be successful in America. Breaking America often comes across as some sort of colonial invasion from Britain and it sounds very pompous and usually the bands that cite it, you know, they usually end up being defeated at Agincourt. Like they end up flat on their backs in the end, feeling rather stupid. What we want to do is come and play here. We get excited by playing here. It’s a very alien country yet they speak our language. That’s exciting. You can communicate on one level but this is very alien, very strange as you are finding out. I mean, Las Vegas, you can’t get much stranger than this.

JW : So you’re feeling more at home in America now? I mean, on a personal basis.

Tim : Yes, at first I was quite scared. I came with all the usual English, I think, preconceptions. Either you think it’s going to be really trashy or really superficial and everyone says “Have a nice day” and smiles at you really politely.

English, I think, are really snobby about America. And so we came with those kinds of preconceptions and then you arrive at New York and it just isn’t like that. And you know there are some places like that. LA, it’d be hard to deny LA can be like that. But some of the other places are great, you know. And they really vary and so then you get your preconceptions smashed and you go “Wow, this is alright after all” And another thing that I think is really good about America for English people. The national psychology, if I dare be so bold, you know we live on an island, a cramp overpopulated island and it rains a lot, the weather’s not too good and you know we’re quite famous for coming second and success can be a dirty word in England.

And you come to America and there’s vast landscapes, there’s vast landscapes where there’s no people, it’s very very beautiful and open expanse and people are very optimistic and they go for their dreams and they’re not embarrassed to be successful. And so for an English person coming from that kind of English background, it’s quite a release. I think it’s quite healthy for an English person to come here for a few years and then you probably have to get back pretty quickly after a couple of years.

JW : Has it affected you personally?

Tim : Yeah, I’m much freer, much more optimistic. I feel, I believe I can be happy whereas when I was in England, I never believed I could be happy. There’s a lot of social conditioning that I’ve received at public school and the English, the whole English way of life you know. I was brought up in a very Christian background. Between 13 and 18 I was at church five days a week. It was fairly rammed down my throat. I hated it and I really lost touch with how I felt and who I was and my twenties have been kind of rediscovering that.

(plays Laid)

JW : So that’s the one that’s doing it for James in America at the moment. You’re listening to Radio 1 FM talking to Steve (sic) and Larry from James in Las Vegas. The overriding feeling that I got from being at the gig and being with the band was that they were kind of starting over again, there was great enthusiasm. And I wanted to find out what the feeling from the band was at the moment.

Tim : It’s very strong at the moment. It’s been very strong for a while. It’s been growing and growing. I mean we had that wonderful piece of luck when Neil Young invited us on the acoustic tour of America and that’s some introduction to America because we were playing in the deserts and on mountains away from the cities and 10,000 people would trek out there and sit on the mountainside and the view behind Neil Young would be 40 miles and you’d see lightning going off in the background 20 miles away. What an introduction. That was definitely a turning point.

Playing acoustically and then Brian Eno coming and saying he wanted to work with us. That was wonderful and gave us a lot of confidence. You know because we all respect him so much and then saying, encouraging us to improvise more. The band’s come on a lot since then, we get on in a really good way. You know we’re not closest buddies who can fall out and fight like people who’ve been together eleven years. It’s pretty solid.

JW : A lot of directions James go in tend to be the result of things happening to them. So I wanted to know whether James have a gameplan that they follow

Tim : We’re open for magic to happen. You have to believe these things are going to happen I think then if you really believe it and stick out all the really bad times, then they will happen. So it’s kind of like having a faith that the thing will turn round. You know for ages it can feel like you’re pushing a boulder up a hill and noone’s listening and nobody’s getting what you’re doing and you know you can push that for years without, with very little feedback and that takes a faith and a courage then suddenly everything’s downhill and it’s wonderful. But if you haven’t pushed it up for those 3 years, you wouldn’t get the other side. And I think that’s the thing where James stuck it out for own lean years.

JW : A couple of weeks ago there was a piece in the Melody Maker in the news page. The headline was “Booth bashes Britain”. That kind of provoked a lot of reaction in England and I wanted to find out the effect that had on the band and whether they realised what effect that had on their fans in England.

Tim : Well, it’s a tabloid headline. I didn’t. When you actually read it, it isn’t about the headline. The headline is unfortunately what gets remembered. You know, I don’t believe those papers and I’d be surprised, I’d be really upset if people took that as being my attitude. What happens in that situation, in that piece itself, is a discussion. This guy rings me up in the hotel. We have a conversation that lasts quite a while. He then takes all his side out of it, all his provocation and whatever he’s had a go at and threads all my answers to him together making it look like a statement. And there’s also misquotes in it. I said, if James had our way, we wouldn’t release another single off Laid, the LP Laid, in England because we feel we’ve released two and that’s enough and it gets printed as James wouldn’t release another single in England and that sounds highly dramatic. So it’s like, you know, I can’t be responsible for how the press presents, you can’t be. You can’t control it, that’s the trouble.

JW : Do you feel angry with the press?

Tim : I feel angry. That particular piece is me whining at quite a lot of critics, music critics. It’s not at Britain, that’s not it at all. It’s, you know, our support’s in Britain, we’ve been supported in Britain for years. Our fans are brilliant there you know. We’ve had great support there. What I feel upset about is that I feel Laid is the best work we’ve ever done. It got some good reviews. Some journalists stuck their necks out. Radio 1 supported it like anything. Radio 1 has ended up being our main support actually and the only people who have really helped us in that way. But like, kind of the whole music scene, the whole fashion scene, music paper side, they really didn’t take too much notice of Laid and we felt like “Damn, this is really our best work.” and it’s like they’re all looking the other way.

JW : Because they’re looking for new things to come along, you mean? Young and trendy.

Tim : I think we’ve ended up being taken for granted because we’ve been around so long. I mean all these magazines now. There’s so much more competition, a lot more need for circulation, to sell copies, to find the next big thing. It’s become desperate. It’s become really desperate. And that desperation is strangling things. Strangling bands. I mean the pressure on a band like Suede is ridiculous and it’s unhealthy for them. They aren’t going to get a chance to breathe, to create their own music, to find their own voice because they’ve been leapt on and you know it’s not healthy.

JW : So the overriding feeling is huge disappointment over Laid and while they were so sought after in America, that’s where they were going to concentrate. So I wanted to know if they still care about Britain and were concentrating their efforts on America

Tim : We don’t see it in terms of countries like that. We see it in terms of making a record that communicates with people and we want to take it to people who want to hear it. And it’s like, you know, we love what we do and we’re really passionate about what we do. You know, we live in Britain and I love where I live. I’m very happy. I miss football when I’m out here. I miss lots of things from England. I don’t want to get into a nationalistic debate. I think it’s really trite. It’s like getting into a political debate. Are you left wing or right wing? I don’t accept nationalism in those terms. I think it’s really divisive and we make a record that communicates and we go and play where people buy that record. It’s kind of a law of economics, we don’t have a choice. We can’t go and play where noone wants to come and hear us play. And so we’ve ended up coming out to America quite a lot because they want to hear it at the moment and we don’t feel we’ve been very well represented by the music press in Britain and we feel that that has cut us off from some of our audience. But the ones that are still with us, we toured, we brought Laid to England and we’ve done that, we’ll be back again and we’ll play Glastonbury, I hope.

JW : With this constant touring of America, all the hard work, Tim misses football. Apart from friends and family, what does Larry miss?

Larry : Ridiculous things like beans on toast. The Americans haven’t discovered the joys of beans on toast. The greenery. The heart and soul. You know, of Britain. In such a small place, there are such diversities. Here’s there’s great diversity in America, but they’re all a thousand miles apart. From the flatlands of the Mid West and the Great Plains through to the Rocky Mountains and the West Coast, the hedonism of San Francisco, the obesity of Los Angeles, you know, right through to the vulgarity of New York.

JW : I tell you, it’s surreal in Las Vegas. Talking of football, James have just done a version of one of the tracks off Laid for the World Cup. How does that go?

Tim : We’ve just done Low Low Low as the soccer anthem. It;s going to go on the compilation record. I think with Tina Turner and Frank Sinatra and Daryl Hall. And Daryl Hall’s singing the main anthem and it’s “Glory Glory Hallelujah” And we do this gritty little English football song.

JW : What have you done? Have you changed the words?

Tim : Oh yes, I’ve written the song from a fan’s, from my, point of view which is a fan’s point of view and it’s Goal Goal Goal – “Oh, we’re so powerful, watch these giants collide, so individual, he was never ever ever offside. Goal, goal, goal, goal” Sort of like that you know.

JW : Big music. I mean football fans. Anyway let’s hear some of the track Low Low Low, see how it sounds

(plays Low Low Low)

JW : So you can hear it in your head now. “Goal, goal, goal, goal”. 1 FM’s Evening Session talking to Tim Booth and Larry Gott from James. I asked Tim how the band maintains their enthusiasm after all these years.

Tim : James maintain enthusiasm by their music. It’s always been as simple as that. We had seven years where we made no money. It was like dole money, basically. We did it because we love what we do and we love the new songs we’re writing. We write all the time. In a soundcheck two days ago, we wrote four new songs. It was like, you know, it’s fun. And that stimulates us. It’s like “Yeah, I’m looking forward to playing this to people.” When we come to Britain, we can show them Basic Brian which was one of the new ones we played tonight and another song called Honest Joe which we played tonight and it’s like we’re looking forward to showing that to our English audiences because they haven’t heard those two I don’t think.

JW : And Honest Joe really did go down so well with the American audience. It kind of bodes well. Hopefully, they’ll be playing it at Glastonbury when they come over in the summer. This is Honest Joe. Thanks very much to Tim and Larry for taking the time out to talk to us.

(plays Honest Joe)

JAMES contribute a specially re-recorded version of ‘Low Low Low’ to the official World Cup soundtrack album ‘Gloryland’, released through Mercury on May 30.

Retitled ‘Goal Goal Goal’, it is a paean to the delights of the beautiful game.

Also on the album is the official song ‘Gloryland’, a stirring version of ‘Glory Glory Hallelujah’ by Daryl Hall and the Sounds Of Blackness gospel choir. Hall was an obvious choice for the song because he was a source of divine inspiration for footballers’ haircuts throughout the 70s and ’80s.

Less obvious contributors are The Moody Blues, Santana, The Scorpions and Jon Bon Jovi. Old favourites like Tina Turner’s ‘Simply The Best’, Queen’s ‘We Are The Champions’, Kool & The
Gang’s ‘Celebration’ and Gerry & The Pacemakers’ ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’ are also included.

ONE of the more unusual concert pairings of recent years had to be Neil Young and the group James.

After all, James made its reputation playing tuneful, full-bodied pop wth a strong British accent, while Young is the quintessential folk rocker. Yet, in the summer of 1992, James opened for Young on an ampitheater tour – and played for the first time in an acoustic format.

The James record that followed the tour, “Laid,” makes it obvious that the Young tour – as well as the experience of working for the first time with legendary producer Brian Eno – left an indelible imprint on the band.

The buoyant melodies that have always defined James’ music remain, especially on such appealing tracks as “Sometimes,” “One of the Three” and “Say Something.” But with liberal use of acoustic instruments and simpler arrangements, “Laid” brings more of a folk element into the band’s sound. Eno’s leaner production style also helped to capture more of the warmth and spontaneity the band displays in its live shows.

In a recent interview, bassist Jim Glennie described the evolution of the band’s sound and recording approach during the “Laid” sessions. “I think it was basically circumstances, kind of, that dictated how the album started,” Glennie said, “Yeah, initially, it was the Neil Young acoustic tour. And then when we went back in the studio, we picked up our electric instruments again, but (playing acoustically) just changed the way we heard things, the way we heard the songs. We just chilled out a lot more basically.

“So that did affect the songs in the studio, and also Brian’s idea of keeping things very simple, very live, no overdubs – virtually no overdubs. It had to sound like a band. It had to sound quite real.

“I think that all contributed . . . so we didn’t end up with an overproduced, multi-layered studio album. The songs are quite simple, quite stripped.”

American fans apparently like the direction James took on “Laid.” The record is easily the band’s most popular stateside, with the title track reaching No. 3 on modern-rock radio. This may not be a breakthrough of Pearl Jam proportions, but for a band that remained virually invisible in America for a decade, it represents a major step forward.

Formed in 1983 by Glennie, singer Tim Booth, guitarist Larry Gott and the original drummer, Gavan Whelan, James was an early member of the then-burgeoning Manchester music scene in England.

The group debuted with a British EP, “Village Fire,” then landed an American record deal with Sire in 1985. It was not a smooth marriage. The band’s two Sire releases, “Stutter” and “Strip Mine,” drew their share of positive press, but this never translated into airplay or sales.

By 1988, James had hit a crossroads. Money was tight, and the Sire partnership would soon dissolve. Around the same time, Whelan quit. The band responded with a major shift by adding not only a new drummer, David Baynton-Power, but also keyboardist Mark Hunter, violinist Saul Davies and trumpter Andy Diagram, who left the band after the Neil Young tour.

After releasing a British-only live record, “One Man Clapping,” on Rough Trade Records, the band signed with Phonogram in Britain and Fontana/Mercury in America. The labels, both part of PolyGram Records, reintroduced James in very different ways on either side of the Atlantic.

In Britain, a studio album, “Gold Mother,” was released in 1990, and it became the band’s breakthrough back home. The song “Sit Down” reached No. 2, and another single, “Come Home,” also charted strongly.

In this country, though, Fontana/Mercury opted to issue a self-titled best-of collection, which included those two hit songs as well as earlier tracks.

These releases were followed in 1992 by the album “Seven,” which produced another British hit single, “Sound,” and gave the band a first taste of success in the U.S. when the song “Born of Frustration” received notable college-radio play.

“Laid,” though, is clearly a high-water mark both in terms of the quality of the music and its popularity. The CD has drawn critical raves, with Musician magazine even calling James the last great hope among British bands for achieving major success in America. Glennie is reluctant to be seen as a standard-bearer for British music, although he did say that his country’s music has stagnated at the moment.

“We’ve never felt really, you know – we’re not a nationalistic band,” he said. “So when we come over and play wherever it is, you never particularly feel like you’re representing your country. You know what I mean? You’re a band and you play, and they either like you or they don’t.”

Glennie clearly likes how James is sounding these days. He gives Eno, whose many production credits include U2 and Lou Reed, considerable credit for refocusing the group’s sound and making the “Laid” project especally rewarding.

“I think that Brian, he’s a great problem solver,” Glennie said. “He’s not just an intellectual, he’s a great kind of down-to-earth problem solver.

“And that’s what we needed. we needed someone to see our faults, basically, and try to get them out of the way. It’s not like we needed someone to work on the bare bones of the songs and help on, like, bass drum parts or guitar sounds. We just needed somebody to basically sort us out, almost like people management.

“He did that incredibly well, and very diplomatically as well. There wasn’t that much friction involved with people letting go of their ideas. Because the thing is, there are six of us, and we all have plenty of ideas. We can drag a song off in six different directions for days on end if we’re not careful. Eno somehow managed to involve everybody but keep it going in one direction rather than six.

“I think we’re at our peak in songwriting. I just don’t know how long it’s going to last,” Glennie said with a chuckle, “but I’d like to think it will last for a long time. . . .

“We’ve just relaxed so much more. We’re just not so uptight. And I think that’s enabling some really, really good, straight-forward, simple songs to come through. I think that’s our strength really.”

Back for the third time since the beginning of the year, James sold out its Sunday show at the Riviera Theatre in a mere 10 minutes. That’s not too bad for a band whose “overnight success” took a mere 11 years.

“I knew we’d never break (in the U.S.) until we played live,” says lead singer-songwriter Tim Booth. “It took seven years of gigging in England before we made it there. And we didn’t start playing live in America until 2 1/2 years ago. So we never expected anything to happen for a long time.”

For a while it looked as if nothing would happen here at all. Although James’s record company cranked the hype machine in full gear to tout the band’s U.S. debut tour, the group failed to crack the radio playlists. But the six-man group remained determined and kept right on touring, expanding its fan base with each show.

Pretty soon the fans were calling radio stations requesting James standards such as “Sit Down.” And “overnight,” alternative programmers realized James indeed was very radio-friendly.

The release of James’ current CD, “Laid,” has won over its share of critics as well. Produced by Brian Eno, the album is the group’s strongest collection of work yet. Booth’s lyrics are pensive and passionate, exploring sex and religion with both awe and ease. As for the group’s haunting music – which is equal parts rock, folk and pop – it stands up well to Eno’s trademark ambient production.

“We’ve wanted to work with Brian for a long time now,” said Booth, who asked Eno to produce James’ 1986 debut “Stutter.” “But he’d always been busy (though he said) he liked us and promised to get back to us. So when we were getting ready to do (`Laid’), I sent him a demo tape of some songs and a playful letter saying, `Come out and play with us,’ and he rung me up one Saturday morning to chat. We talked abut perfume, punk and cyberpunk and at the end of it, he said, `I’d like to make your record.’ ”

Thanks to “Laid,” which already has produced hits in the title track and “Say Something,” the group has name recognition now. Their popularity is such that they’ve appeared on all the hot late night talk shows. And no less than David Letterman gushed after the band performed “Laid.” Letterman specifically directed his kudos to Booth, suggesting that Booth’s joyous dancing was not unlike his own.

Booth, who originally was hired by the group to be its dancer and backup singer, became its singer and songwriter by default. Though his smooth vocals have been compared to Bono’s, he said dancing still is his first love.

“We’ve always known that people like to watch me dance because I look a little bizarre,” he said. “But I can’t dance to all our songs (like `Say Something’) because they’re just not dance songs. Some nights, I just don’t dance and the kids are disappointed.

“But I don’t think things should be forced. Like last night we didn’t do an encore and the audiencewas a little bit upset. But they have to respect us, just like we respect them, which is why we change our set every night so fans who might come to more than one concert will always see a different show. We never expect that people will want encores from us. That’s conceited. But when they want one enough, we do them. But we don’t force it on people who’d rather go home.”

Judging by James’ strong Chicago following, there’ll be no question of whether an encore is warranted Sunday.

In the back of the James tour bus, guitarist Larry Gott wraps his lips around the nozzle of a small gas canister and sucks hard. A mixture of oxygen and Entonox (a drug given to pregnant women in labour) fires into his lungs, he whoops like a crazed teenager, pummels the air and grins like a maniac. His fellow revellers clap faster and faster, until Larry’s 30-second high begins to fade. Bassist Jim Glennie refuels the medical equipment, hands it to the next band member and the rhythmic handclaps start up again.

Meanwhile, Larry’s attention switches to a surreal, soft-porn video, flicking with a dull, yellow tint on the TV screen. “It’s more ambient this way,” he enthuses as he adjusts the set. For the next 20 minutes he fastforwards through a grotesque low-budget fantasy, featuring actors in bizarre genital creations made out of rubber and foam. One particularly gruesome creature, his back covered in a matt of thick black hair, gets the most popular encouragement, laddish roars of “Come on, Stavros”, greeting his frenzied encounter with a woman supporting 80-inch papier-mache breasts.

One person is absent from this carnal mayhem, however. As a member of the crew flashes a penis inked with the signature of a young groupie, James singer Tim Booth sits in the relative quiet of the “no smoking, no partying” area at the front of the bus. Tonight’s gig at the Memphis Omni New Daisey was not a success. James twisted awkward experimentation baffled the audience, which expected the conventional pop show promised by their first US hit single Laid. After several aborted attempts to whip up the fans with his arm-flapping St Vitus dance, the band’s singer feels drained and is looking forward to a good night’s sleep. Beside him on the bunk bed lie his one-piece nightwear (nicknamed “bunny suit” by the band), earmuffs and aeroplane eye patches which he slips on at night to block out the hysteria in the “party room.” “I like to have the band around,” he explains half-heartedly attempting to shrug off the accusation that he’s a stick-in-the-mud. “I can live vicariously through them. I have champagne now and again. I don’t take very many drugs. Well, I do, but very sporadically. Maybe once a week on tour I’ll have a bottle of beer or something,” he says poker-faced, playing the straight man a little too well. He adds “I have a refined sense of humour, but it’s very dry. I am what I am. I’m enjoying humour more now than before. We have fun.”

The image of James as a merry band of pleasure seekers is at odds with their old puritanical hairshirted image. Doubts about how much they’ve changed remain centred around Tim, who is still apart in his guided, self-conscious manner. The next day, talking in short considered sentences over the congenial chatter of a Memphis coffee bar, he makes it clear that he rejects many of his old constrictive principles.

“I had all these ideas about pain being deep, which is a great Western fallacy that I don’t believe in anymore. You know, show me your scars and I will crown you a great artist.” In retrospect he believes he adopted this serious approach partly because “I was quite judgmental of image, which was me, perhaps, lacking in humour. White 70s trousers just don’t appeal to me.” More significantly, he argues: “I was genuinely in pain. I nearly died when I was 23 of a liver disease. I actually stopped breathing. I didn’t know I was ill physically. I thought I was ill mentally, because I was behaving in strange ways that I couldn’t understand.”

In the 80s, Tim dealt with depression and his permanent liver condition by turning to alternative medicine, magic, tai chi and (along with Jim Glennie) a meditative religious sect, for whom he took a vow of celibacy. He now asserts that he’s ‘rediscovered’ his sexuality, proclaiming, “Celibacy fucks you up. It should become a sticker, shouldn’t it? Mind you, I didn’t feel confident before celibacy either. It was an escape for me, partly. My first sexual experiences were terrible and funny. It’s taken the past three or four years for me to enjoy it. And gain confidence in it. I’ve been practising,” he says, with an almost imperceptible leer.

When several members of the group appear, Tim’s attempts to join in the banter seems forced. He slips into a bizarre American accent, declares “get laid by James, it’s a wonderful experience” and looks a little awkward as he boasts about his early sexual encounters. “I got laid a lot at university, Too much. That was part of my problem. It was just bouncing around.” As the stories of backstage gropes and wrinkly autographs filter through, the singer makes his own claim as a rock n roll stud. “I avoided groupies. For the first eight years I avoided that cliche, until one day…” he pauses, “I could no longer resist.”

Tim slips away to refresh his frail physique with an afternoon nap. Fatigue appears to be a problem for this thin wiry-haired “rock star” with public school manners. Although he’s no longer the tortured insomniac of early 80s repute, he still rarely enjoys a full night’s sleep. The band shrug off his departure with typically barbed humour. “Tim’s not tired. He’s just being a wanker,” smirks violinist Saul Davies. His absence leaves them to enthuse about the looser, more upbeat mood of this tour. They point to their more light-hearted public profile in the States as a helpful catalyst. “People here know us for wearing dresses, eating bananas (on the cover of their 1993 album Laid, one of the few UK albums currently residing in the Billboard Top 100) and having a song in the charts about shagging,” laughs Jim. “We’re not seen as serious artists with pokers in our arses like we are in Britain,.”

Their rush of success in America contrasts starkly with the band’s disappointment at the mediocre sales Laid has achieved back home.

Larry complains: “It’s completely changed my perception of the British music-buying public. I always thought they knew a good thing when they heard it. But they completely missed it.”

In the States, James have been able to gradually build up a wider appeal from their college radio base. However, the UK’s rapidly changing fashions have often left James trailing behind the current fad – they offered vegetarian politics and indie pop at the height of the Smiths success; broke commercially after their fellow Manchester-based acts Happy Mondays and Stone Roses, and more recently released a Sabres of Paradise remix of Jam J, which sees them taking a belated dive into the ambient scene. They’re already steeling themselves for a cynical reaction to the forthcoming alternative album (due for release in the autumn) which falls somewhere between Eno/Byrne’s My Life In The Bush Of Ghosts and U2’s Zooropa. Jim claims: “In practice we did it before Zooropa was released. We recorded it with Eno during the six-week sessions for Laid. But yeah, people are going to say that we’re just copying them. That’s the problem with fucking England. They’re too hung up on whether the music is current.” Larry weighs in with a resigned shrug. “It’s just timing. When The Smiths broke big, New Order’s manager Rob Gretton told us: ‘They’ve stolen your thunder.’ The Sabres remix was actually completed last spring. The trouble is we’re slow at making up our minds. We’re full of indecision so we always get pipped. We don’t want to get ahead of fashion. We want to get outside it.”

Wrapped in a long leather overcoat, Saul rolls his tiny hips with a pimpish swagger as he walks up to the bar to order a coffee – much to the amusement of the others who snigger: “Oh look at him, he thinks he’s a star.” This is typical of the sarcastic trade-offs between the four but it’s rare for Tim to be the butt of their jokes. A couple of days ago, Saul pretended to kick the singer up the backside in a moment of unexpected on-stage slapstick. Fortunately perhaps, the frontman remained blissfully aware of the mirth behind him. “I think if he turned around, he’d be cool about that,” considers Jim. “Maybe,” he adds with a wry grin. “Tim’s always asking us to be quiet and telling us to take our porn videos off,” says the bassist, affectionately drawing a picture of his friend as a delicate, prudish fop. “It should be a good angle for pisstaking, but we’re not quite there yet, to be honest. A lot of the time when people have a go, it’s usually nasty because they’ve had enough. It’s not humour. We’ve got to pull him in more and give him some fucking stick.”

Tim’s role as the band’s singer and lyricist means that the fans and the media naturally separate the 33 year old from the other musicians as the subject of special interest. “The singer’s is a weird fucking job,” says Jim. “The focus is on him. It takes a strange person to do it and I don’t think the circumstances you find yourself in help very much.” However, the bassist’s revelation that after a decade together he also treats him with circumspect care, signals an uneasy division. “It’s not good for him and us,” he argues. “We had a row the other day, and I told him I’d had enough. I flew off the handle and poured out all this stuff that had been building up inside me. The reason that I couldn’t say anything to him is that I’m worried about how he’s going to take it. That’s my fucking problem. He’ll come to the soundcheck, have a stroppy mood on and say something nasty and everyone’s like ‘oh shit’. If it was one of us lot, it’d be like ‘Fuck off, stop your whinging’. But if it’s Tim, it’s blown up into a big deal. And he doesn’t want that. He wants to have a grumpy head on and snap a bit, and then that’s the end of it. We put him in that situation and that’s our fault as much as his. He is trying really hard to change.”

“He’s travelling lighter,” laughs the band’s drummer, David Baynton-Power.

Later, back on the bus, Tim confirms that he likes to force arguments and then allow them to blow over. “I’m quite confrontational and it usually comes out in a pretty bad way. It can be really isolating. Some of the people personally connected to me have a rough time. They have to be pretty earthed.” As a child his judgmental nature – “I was always looking at adults, thinking they were all fucked up”- provoked arguments, especially when he claimed to hear people’s thoughts. “I used to think I knew what people were thinking,” he says, looking uneasy. “Whether I could, or not, I don’t know. In the end you don’t. It didn’t go down well,” he whispers, sucking in his breath. “You can imagine people’s reactions when I started telling them what they were thinking about. I really was an outcast at school, a misfit. I didn’t know how to get on with the lads.”

While the others muck in together, Tim Booth’s approach to touring is more self-contained. He handles the claustrophobic living conditions and aftershow parties in his own polite, thoughtful way, keeping strangers at arm’s length. If his cordial manner doesn’t keep the inquisitive at bay, his personal bodyguard will. In fact, Tim’s leather-clad protector has little to do and only serves to underline the fact that the singer is different from the rest of the band. Meanwhile, in his dealings with the media, he retains a quiet, evasive control over interviews and photographs, making it clear that “wacky” shots are out of the question. “James don’t do comedy,” he declares with the dry, self-conscious smile of a man who only half fits in.

“Last night we literally brought down the house,” says James’ Bassist, Jim Glennie, referring to a small ceiling collapse during a performance at New York’s Irving Plaza. “It was great.” But it really wasn’t anything new for the British alternative rockers, who are best known for their hypnotic but raucous live performances. James’ new hit album, Laid (as in “Did you get Laid?”), is also causing quite a commotion.

Produced by music guru Brian Eno, Laid ranges from moody introspection (“Out to Get You”) to staccato elation (“Say Something”) and is slightly reminiscent of another Eno production, U2’s The Unforgettable Fire. “We’ve known Brian for a long time,” says Glennie. “He’s a genius. He’s like a laser, so precise.” With the title track now on MTV’s Buzz Bin, James, which has been together for more than a decade, is endearing itself to an audience as diverse as its music. “In Toronto it’s young girls,” says lead singer Tim Booth. “And in Montreal it’s artists and intellectuals. We’re like the Talking Heads – they were considered artsy until pop fans came along.” But diversity, as well as perseverance, has proved to be the group’s strong suit: “Everyone told us to quit,” Glennie admits. “We had one 15-minute lapse of faith where we considered it, but we were just too f—ing passionate about the music,” A philosophical Booth pipes in, “And you know, the longer you wait, the bigger you think you’ll be.”

Int : Now guys, how was that?

Saul : Wonderful, really good. Really enjoyed it.

Jim : Really good fun, it was indeed

Int : Now, in England, they do these really big festivals a lot, the Reading Festival, all those kinds of things. This is not a normal thing here. Can you compare and contrast the American thing and the English thing

Jim : Yeah, the feeling backstage did remind me of Glastonbury a lot, which is kind of a big three day festival in England. The same sort of vibe, you know more than one stage, lots of things going on and the weather’s not usually as nice to be honest. It’s usually raining when Glastonbury’s on knowing England.

Saul : This is obviously very special to people because Glastonbury comes around every year. Unless they kill someone one year and cancel it the next year. Which has happened. I think this is the first time in about 25 years that there’s been any kind of festival like this in the States and I think it means a lot quite special to some people.

Int : Now Tim, you’ve just walked in. And how’s your neck? You have done something to your neck but you were dancing away. You didn’t seem to have a problem.

Tim : I did. What I did was I put my neck brace on then I could dance with the rest of my body and keep my neck still. That was the idea.

Int : But you weren’t wearing your neck brace out there, were you?

Tim : Oh tonight, my neck’s fine. That was cool. No, it was just that period. It was really weird. They took me to hospital on a stretcher with a kind of Hannibal Lecter contraption around my head and took me into hospital just to give me a neck brace. Like in England, you just go to the doctors and ask “Can I have a neckbrace?” I was whisked off in an ambulance before one of the concerts. It was crazy.

Saul : And we were all laughing

Jim : He was.

Saul : No, no, it was him

Int : Now how much did you guys know about Woodstock, the original festival in 1969?

Jim : Well, we weren’t actually around at that time, were we?

Saul : No, we’re all so young

Jim : We’re all so young. Yeah, you know, we’ve kind of seen the movie. Obviously very different to this really. The spontaneity of it all and the chaos. And the anarchy and the ridiculous number of people turning up when they weren’t supposed to.

Tim : You’re getting signs saying “Go to Chris”

Int : I am getting signs. I have to go to Chris….

part two

Int : Hi, I’m here with James in the interview tent. Now guys, how did you get here? Did you fly from England recently or have you been here for a while?

Dave : We’ve been over in Seattle doing a few shows and having a good time on our three days off between Seattle and here.

Int : How long are you going to hang on here? Is there anyone else you really want to see?

Tim : I’m staying, everyone else is flying back.

Jim : You’re staying?

Tim : Yeah, I’m staying

Jim : Nice one

Tim : Yeah I’m here for a while. I want to see Porno for Pyros, Chili Peppers and Peter Gabriel I’m quite interested in seeing.

Int : Are you sad that Neil Young isn’t going to be here playing because of course you’ve toured with Neil Young?

Tim : Yeah, we heard a rumour he was going to do the Alternative. I think that was a rumour put about by the people who want to promote the Alternative. Yeah, that would have been nice.

Int : Now when you did your current album Live, you also, sorry Laid, you also did another album. When is that one coming out?

Tim : The other album is called Wah Wah. I think it’s coming out here in October. Yeah, they’re trying to work it out. Put it out cheap. And do special deals and things. In England, they’re going, we think, they’re going to put it out for a week and then we won’t put it out again after that. We’re going to treat it quite weirdly.

Int : Great, well thank you very much for joining us here.

They laugh! They drink! They ‘partake’ of nitrous oxide! Is this the JAMES of indie-folk wibble dancing legend? No! This is the About To Be Big In America James, taking on a country where no-one has any preconceptions of them– so they can do as they darn well like. BARBARA ELLEN joins them in Portland for a sermon on Mount Hood.

“We don’t think of ourselves as a success in America. We don’t feel like we’ve arrived_. We’ve got to work for these audiences. We’ve got to prove ourselves to them. We’ve got to get out there and do the f***ing business.” –Saul Davies, Mount Hood, Oregon

FIFTEEN minutes later, the Mount Hood crowd start to leave. Coats over heads, eyes blinking in the sour drizzle of rain, they grope their way down the hill one muddy, marvelous inch at a time until finally they skid through the exit gates to freedom.

From the safety of their dressing room chalet, headlining band James look down on the mass exodus with mounting panic. They’re on in five minutes and it looks like they’ll be playing for the benefit of themselves, their sound crew and the sprinkling of unfortunates who were trampled and left for dead in the rush to leave.

A disembodied voice barks out from amidst the chaos. It’s time for James to make their way to the stage. To get there they actually have to wade through the roaring human river leaving the site. The band disperse, still manfully attempting to laugh the whole thing off. My last sight of Tim Booth is of him shrugging on his jacket and zipping it right up to his neck with a wintry grin. When I look back, he is gone.

“You know, I used to enjoy ending up in the gutter. I thought I was getting somewhere. I don’t think that way any more.” –Larry Gott

TWO DAYS previous, on our first evening in crisp, clean Seattle, James’ PR takes photographer Sargent and I out for dinner with frontman Tim Booth and bassist Jim Glennie. Being a Japanese restaurant of Booth’s choosing– the food tastes of wet dog and aniseed, but it doesn’t matter. Sargent and I are in good spirits, having no reason to suspect that our two-date on-the-road stint with Britain’s latest unlikely Stateside success is doomed to metamorphose into The Assignment From Hell.

Booth and Glennie are keen to relax, too. Having been hard at work rehearsing for the mini-festivals (also featuring Violent Femmes, The Afgan Whigs and House of Pain), they are to headline in Seattle and Portland over the next couple of days. At the time of our encounter, James are also less than a week away from taking the stage as one of only three British acts to play Woodstock 2. An ‘honour’ they have good sense to view with equal parts amusement and trepidation.

Most pressing on the James psyche, however, is the brief, sneer-and-you’ll-miss-it release of their studio-improv album ‘Wah Wah’. Primarily conceived by ‘Laid’ producer Brian Eno as a diversionary tactic to diffuse the tension surrounding the main project, the unstructed but authoritative mish-mash of erotic folk, languid funk, primal screams, oriental spasms and savage dance energy that is ‘Wah Wah’ began to take on a life of its own. James, characteristically, dithered and fretted about releasing it and eventually another Eno improv-project– U2’s ‘Zooropa’, recorded six months after ‘Wah Wah’– surfaced first. Understandably enough, James now rue the time they spent procrastinating.

As regards their current US success, drummer Dave Bayton-Power is only half joking when he quips, “We’re running out of territories to sell our records. If we dip out over here, we’ve had it. We’ll have to find new planets.”

From cult Manc beginnings, James peaked in Britain around the ‘Goldmother’/’Sit Down’ Madchester period and steadily declined from there. Sales of the critically mauled ‘Laid’ were more than respectable (it went gold in both the UK and the US), but for a time it was starting to look like ‘drippy’, ‘worthy’, ‘folkie’ James had nothing to offer the Manics/Blur/Oasis generation but their entrails to dance upon.

Bearing this in mind, does their American success make them feel vindicated, smug even?

“Oh no, not at all,” protests Booth. “There’s a lot of satisfaction, but there is when we do well in Britain. . . I’m just glad that a lot of people have got ‘Laid” now, if you’ll excuse the pun.”

The very singular Mr. Booth probably accounts for 99 per cent of the adoration, antagonism and derision directed at James. According to popular folklore: he’s a vegan (not any more); a closet God-botherer (only in terms of lyrics, and they won’t come knocking on your door); an inhuman piss-taker, pedaling epileptic fits as dancing (“That’s your projection,” sniffs Timothy); a pinch-faced little hippy hypocrite who preaches peace, love and understanding then runs around shagging everything in sight (let’s ask him about that later); and a sactimonious, teetotal oddball with a sniffy attitude about hedonists.

Compared to the good-natured new-yobs who make up the rest of James, Booth is irrevocably odd. At times, he seems like an alien who has been sent to Earth on a fact-finding mission.

You get the feeling that if you stabbed him in the forehead with a fork he would gaily carry on chattering about dance, betrayal and the boundaries of human potential until the slow drip of his green blood alerted him to the fact that he’s been rumbled. Touchingly, the rest of James are openly protective towards him, dismissing conjecture that he is the band outsider.

“In any relationship there’s always going to be someone on the outside,” demures unflappable guitarist Gott, “but it isn’t always Tim.”

After a recent spate of Tim The Ousider press, Booth is making an effort to be sociable tonight. He is even brandishing a beer in his frail, bird-like hand. It looks wrong, ridiculous, unsettling–like a nun smoking– and within three sips Booth is pissed.

“I’ve tried joyful hedonism before,” he admits. “I’m not very good at it.” When Sargent goes to the loo, Booth ‘minxishly’ switches his full bottle for the photographer’s empty one.

“Come on, catch up,” Booth exclaims to Sargent on his return, adding wryly, “If you can’t out-drink Tim Booth, you’re in trouble.”

THE NEXT day we are informed by the James crew that the easiest way to get to their gig in the Breterman area of Seattle is by ferry. On our own.

I’m sorry, could you repeat that?!

“There’s no room in our cars, you’ll have to go by ferry.”

A couple of hours later, Sargent, the PR and I can be found floating across the River Death, gripping the top of a formica table which may or may not turn out to be our life-raft. Put it down to the coffees sailing past our heads, the screams of the sea-sick or the undulating floor, but there’s a distinct Herald Of Free Enterprise vibe to this trip and we’re pathetically relieved when it’s over.

On firm ground once more, we catch a cab to what first appears to be a huge dust-bowl full of corpses. It takes a while for our numb brains to realise that this is actually the concert and that those scary, motionless dudes in horse-hair waistcoats are the audience.

When we unearth James themselves in the backstage area (a cavernous hall with sections tented off like a war-time hospital), they seem similarly appalled.

Saul, the only violinist in the world with worse dress sense than Nigel Kennedy, actually has his head in his hands.

“What a dump,” he keeps sighing to no-one in particular, “what a sodding dump.”

The concert itself is standard James fare. Even those that hate them have to concede that their live shows are of almost text-book excellence. Stylish, balletic and direct, James are talented enough to hurl aural dynamite at the feet of their zombie audience and mischievious enough to enjoy the ensuing havoc. The audience not only stay, they even sit down during ‘Sit Down’ in time-honoured style, despite the fact that they have been lashed by rain since the set began.

Garbed in only a wisp of chiffon and a backstage pass, I stand shivering on the side of the stage next to some bloke doing an action painting. When the thunder starts clapping along with the audience I grit my teeth and beg God, in His/Her mercy to sort me out with a lift home. Whatever happens, in this weather, the ferry must be avoided by all costs.

“Once we had this idea of us all getting into a car and driving over a cliff. Everyone was ready to die. . .” –Jim Glennie

STRAIGHT AFTER the concert, James have to show their faces at the promoter’s party in a nearby hotel. Within seconds of arriving, Gott, Davies, Baynton-Power, Glennie and the absurdly shy Hunter (keyboards) start scheming openly to leave at the first possible opportunity. Preferably without Booth.

“Shall we tell him we’re going?” hisses Gott. “Nahhh,” grins Davies, “he might want to come.”

Suddenly, Booth appears out of the midst, plonks himself down on the sofa next to me and demands I interview him. As far as I’m concerned, I’ve just spent the evening dangling by my bra-straps from a tree branch in the Garden of Hell and there’s no bloody way I’m doing anything remotely resembling work.

Booth explain politely that there probably won’t be any time at tomorrow’s Mount Hood gig and looks a mite put out when I laugh with joy. The tour manager is brought over. Now the gloves are off. I am given a choice: interview Booth on the way back to Seattle in a car or take my chances with the ferry.

BLACKMAIL!

Five minutes later, I sit sulking in the back of James’ manager’s car, slopping a quadruple whiskey over my knees, still childishly refusing to ask Booth any questions. He sighs deeply, then, reaching over, grabs my tape recorder.

“OK,” he smiles quasi-angelically, “let me interview you instead. How old were you when you first started writing?”

Sod off, let me die in peace.

“Come now, what was the first piece you wrote?”

“Brookside (a lie)”

“Really? Was it scary, were you scared?”

Stop showing off, stop demonstrating how you can be the interrogator as well as the interrogatee.

“No, really. . . I’m interested.”

Well, I may not feel like being interesting.

“Hmmm,” he purrs, “but you expect it from me.”

That’s your job. You lot love it. You only come alive when the tape recorder comes on.

“Oh, you think so, I don’t think so.”

Booth falls silent and I grab back the tape recorder.

OK, you win. Tell me about something you did recently. Something unusual.

“I tried garlic ice-cream the other day.”

What was it like?

“Disgusting.”

So, you would describe yourself as a person that’s up for new experiences?

“Yes, I’ll try anything once.”

How does this reconcile with your having been in the same band for over 3,000 years?

“Eleven, actually,” Booth snaps. After a moment’s thought he adds, “There is a repetition that is scary and boring and unusual to me, but as a band we manage to avoid it more than most.”

How?

“Oh, you know, changing the set every night, improvising. . . That kind of thing.”

Wild. Would you say you have been spoilt by life?

“I am a little spoilt. I always have been. Everything has always fallen OK for me. It’s made me unpopular at times. So, what happened was, as I got older, I blocked out all the good things happening to me because I never thought I deserved any of it. It’s only been in the last four years or so that I’ve stopped blocking all the nice stuff and let it happen.

Booth pauses.

“I’ve had partners who’ve been jealous of me too. They couldn’t deal with my life being so good. Not just being in a band and having success, but other stuff, nice things happening to me.”

Was it that you were instinctively choosing unsuccessful, easily impressed people just to massage your own ego?

“Not at all.”

Well, let’s put it this way– how come you never went out with somebody equally successful?

He smirks.

“Equally successful people aren’t around to have relationships with.

They’re too busy being equally successful somewhere else.”

So, it’s hard to form and maintain relationships?

“Yes, very hard.”

But you’re a pop star. Finding available women should be the least of your worries.

“You can get sex easily if you want it. Which is OK. Sometimes all I want is sex.”

Yes, I heard you were very promiscuous.

“Did you? I go through phases. I have been very promiscuous. It comes and it goes.”

What brings on a promiscuous phase?

“It depends on a number of factors. If I’m in a relationship, that takes precedence. It also depends on how lonely I am. When you’re on a three month tour, you can get incredibly lonely and frustrated. But mostly it’s just feeling like it. . .”

I thought most men ‘felt like it’ all the time.

“I don’t think so. It’s quite common for men to not feel very sexual for ages and then suddenly hit a period when they’re horny as hell. What you must remember is, for the first eight years of James I hardly slept with anybody at all. I was actually completely celibate for a while because I was meditating and it’s fairly traditional to be celibate when you’re meditating. You’re supposed to put all the energy you usually put into sex into this other area instead.”

What made you change?

“Well, I read this Colin Wilson book which he wrote when he was about 50. In it he said that when he became famous years earlier he’d had all these sexual offers which he didn’t take up because he had a steady partner. And he said that was the one thing he’d always regretted, because he’s never found what it was like.

“And I thought, yeah, I could see myself getting to 50 and thinking, shit, all those wonderful offers from beautiful women and I could have slept with them but I didn’t. I just didn’t want that to happen to me. (Booth grins somewhat evilly) I wanted to experience everything.”

“In Britain, we’ve got an image which is difficult to shake off. We’re seen as mature and po-faced and very f***ing serious, no humour at all. It’s different in America because we’re seen as a relatively new band. I love that. It gives you the feeling of arriving.” –Jim

QUITE WHY sargent, the PR and myself were surprised when the plane we were booked to fly to Portland on the next day turns out to be a ten-seater pram with wings is beyond me. Ditto our mystification when the ‘short cab ride’ James warned us we would have to take from our hotel to Mount Hood site turns out to cost $100 (Mount Hood, beautiful as it is, is practically in Canada).

James arrive some time after us, take one look at the bleak arena topped by swollen, thunderous rain-clouds and, bless ’em, lunge strait for the balloons filled with nitrous oxide being handed out by some inspired roadie. Nitrous oxide makes your voice go all deep and your legs feel wobbly. Not much of a high– but when you’re desperate, anything goes.

Just before they go on, Sargent forces James outside for pictures in the last remaining seconds of usable light.

Anxious to avoid the usual Tim With Tree shots, he is at first grateful for the bundle of tyres he finds nestling underneath a wooden building. It is only afterwards when he spies punters wandering towards the same building with chilling regularity that he realises the ‘rain-splattered’ tyres James bounced so obligingly upon have been being pissed on all day by the crowd.

The guilt-ridden Sargent is then allowed/forced by Booth, the self-styled Nureyev of the indie-folk circuit, to take pictures of his lithesome self ‘preparing’ for the gig. As Booth prances, preens and twizzles (with no top on!), Gott, Glennie, and Davies appear from nowhere and start throwing shapes behind their unwitting frontman.

It is around this time that the heavens open and the crowd begins to leave. The PR explains to us all, straight-faced, that the reason they’re leaving is that the police have told everyone to go home before it gets too dark.

James themselves can’t be bothered to attempt a face-saving excercise. After the intial shock, they fall about laughing and Booth confides to me that the local paper had, in fact, slagged James off that day: “They said, ‘You may as well go home after the Violent Femmes’,” he reports blandly, “‘James are lightweights’.”

The band leave for the stage, but we don’t go with them. Having learnt our lesson from the night before, we’d secured ourselves lifts back to Portland within seconds of arriving at Mount Hood. The only problem is, the two jock-strangers we’ve begged them off not only look suspiciously like Ted Bundy, they want to leave now. No problem, on both counts. Home, James, home.

What you wanted and what you got. (Two days of paranoia, mud and bullshit… that’s Woodstock II. And what the hell were limey invaders JAMES doing there?)

“This is CNN Live and we’re off to Saugerties, New York to Woodstock ’94. Come in Bob.” (Cut to Bob in tragic ex-hipster attire walking through starry-eyed bods covered in mud) “Hello Larry, yes. They were stardust, they were golden and now they’ve come back to the garden. But this time it costs $200 for a ticket, $6 for a slice of pizza and $30 for a T-shirt. What was peace and love is now greed and profit. The age of Aquarius had been replaced by the era of Mammon.”

A kid pushes forward and blows the smoke from a joint into Bob’s face. Before Bob can finish his ridiculous gush, the studio cut to a clip of Hendrix doing ‘The Star-Spangled Banner.’ Thus we are spared talk of the $2 million Pepsi sponsorship and the interview with a hippy who was at the first event. Ah, the memories, the nostalgia, the comparisons and the commercialism. Woodstock ’94 is knee-deep in it: mud and bullshit.

Take An Other Hippie up there on stage. He’s 45 and he’s ranting “We’re the generation that stopped the war! We’re the generation that made a President resign!” Yeah, sure. The Vietnam war stopped because it was hemorrhaging money into an intractable conflict that most people in America had lost interest in by the time it ended. Nixon took the long walk because of a load of tapes leaked by some straight. A bunch of longhairs in kaftans waving flowers had little or nothing to do with it. We’ve heard it all before, all those myths and legends I blame the parents, especially as this time around they’re in charge.

Woodstock ’94 is a desperate affair. Journalists traipsing around in Millets-style outdoors outfits, desperately trying to find out what “Generation X” believe in. Hordes of record industry Mafia running about believing their own hype and desperately protesting too much about what a fantastic time they’re having. The bands lost in this world of make believe, desperately wanting not to go under.

And the punters desperately wanting something, without actually knowing what it is. They’ve come in the hope of experiencing the kind of hippy epiphany legend has it everyone underwent in ’69. But they have no idea of how to get it. Especially without any beer, let alone any brown acid.

Walking past the 45th security checkpoint into the whimsical world of the backstage village, the airis thick with anticipation. No matter how you interpret it, this is a big event, if ridiculous. Look around: in the distance somewhere is ‘The Surreal Field,’ whatever that is. Just here are various tents encouraging you to get personally involved with every kind of wildlife creation. Save the Michigan beaver. Save the Miami sea cow. Adopt a dolphin.

The whole thing has been designed as a media fiesta. The press corps here stretched to 1,500 people-the kind of numbers usually associated with covering international conflicts and natural disasters. And every one of them gets a huge fact-pack on everything you don’t need to know, which

boasts about the logistical triumph of the festival: “65,000 gallons of diesel fuel will be consumed;” “4,000 cans of soda will be consumed backstage;” “7,200 latex gloves will be used;” “there is enough vinyl flooring to do 52 kitchens.”

Each band playing is subjected to a three-legged press conference: first the one for MTV, then the one for the new Woodstock movie and then, at the end, one for the ordinary press.

Right now Tim Booth and Saul Davies are on the end of the somnambulant series of questions in which the great American fourth estate attempt to get to grips with one of the few British bands here.

A man from the Chicago Tribune looks at Tim: “For your dancing do you draw from Joe Cocker?”

Booth stares blankly into space with the silently impassive expression of a man who’s just been shot between the eyes with a silenced pistol. The press conference is at an end.

JAMES are big in the States: their last LP, “Laid,” was well received; they’ve toured with Neil Young; recorded an experimental album, “Wah Wah,” with Brian Eno; and helped in the opening ceremony of World cup ’94. Woodstock is the last gig on a large tour, which apparently had been an excellent laugh.

Backstage the band are pondering what they’re doing here. “When success came in the UK with Sit Down we’d worked hard for it and were desperate to be taken seriously. But this time around, in the States, it’s like such a bonus we’ve all been able to enjoy it a lot more,” explains bassist Jim Glennie.

Outside the band’s Portakabin, Tim Booth is dancing outside the picket fence which runs around his prefab structure. No sign of nerves you might expect to see from an outfit about to play the biggest gig of their career. The others sit in the canteen, arguing about the calorific value of cheesecake and apple pie. They are not the angst-ridden Manc bohemians you might expect. But they’re still not having a historic or epoch-making time of it.

“You can’t even get a beer here!” points out Mark the keyboardist, swigging from a bottle of Beck’s, referring to the (largely ignored) alcohol ban. Five minutes before they’re due to go onstage, the band slouch around in the canteen. There isn’t supposed to be any beer here. There are no drugs.

Everything is run like a scout camp. Worse still, DEL AMITRI are playing in front of 250,000 people.

“Woodstock ’94?” mutters Jim. “This is Wuss-Stock ’94.”

According to Newsweek, the first Woodstock has now become a rigid historical event. The original festival isn’t regarded merely as a weekend when a load of hippies gathered in a muddy field to watch some dodgy bands, but-like the Boston Tea Party or the Gettysburg Address-as a watershed for a developing nation still in its historical adolescence. British people might have it pegged simply as a US Glastonbury, an alternative to the traveling Reading that is Lollapalooza, but to America it’s much more important than that. To us, it might look much the same-a rainy farm filled with a daft mixture of hipsters, hippies, punters, psychotics and the criminally unstable. But where Glastonbury has developed into a quaint English tradition, an annual pilgrimage for anyone with even the most fleeting interest in music, drugs or falafels-for Americans, Woodstock ’94 is more like the recent D-Day celebrations, a commemoration of others’ glories and a tribute to their success.

Of course the legacy of Woodstock isn’t as great as the old longhairs would have you believe. Aging beardies are often making a point of how apolitical and apathetic the Rave (UK)/X (US) Generation is, but we wouldn’t have been in this state if ’60s radicals had achieved just ten per cent of what they set out to. Their real legacy is not peace and love, but hedonism and good music. The concrete achievement of The Woodstock Generation is not that they changed the world, but that they gave us the mechanisms with which to cope with it.

JAMES are not a typical Woodstock ’94 band. It’s a capital R-for-Rock weekend and the many all-American Beavis and Butt-heads in the audience are not big on perceived English ethereals. They go down amazingly well even with the stuff from “Wah Wah.” Booth dances in his wavy-gravy way and mouths through a megaphone over the Eno-manipulated weird-outs. The crowd doesn’t know what’s going on, but they know it’s different from everything else so far. JAMES refuse to grab their big moment in history like no-hopers further down the bill. Earlier, one of a succession of redundant metal acts tried to impress us by drinking beer, smoking joints and simulating sex with a cameraman. Watching the spectacle from half-way up the scaffolding (from which is suspended one of the slightly sad banners proclaiming ‘2 More Days Of Peace And Music’) it’s hard not to be awestruck by the sheer numbers of people. This is Desmond Morris material.

“It’s funny,” says Larry after their set, peering over the seven-foot fence in front of the stage, designed to separate ‘talent’ from ‘customer.’ “It’s like a congregation. I’m a bit done in by it-you just provide the backdrop. It’s like The Kop-the Woodstock crowd will be more famous than the team.”

And the crowd is all. In spite of everything, it erodes the event’s corporate identity. By mid-Saturday morning rain is sluicing down. Reeling bodies indicate that cracks have appeared in the alcohol embargo. The PTA atmosphere starts to evaporate as ticketless hordes begin turning up and security glimpse the enormity of their task. By early evening you can’t walk anywhere without falling over; the paths are now biblically-proportioned rivers of slurry. The summer camp atmosphere has begun to decay toward that of a rich man’s Rwanda. As dusk gathers, shadowy figures an be seen scaling the fence into the VIP enclosure.

In a bizarre way the scene suits Tim Booth. “I used to think that if something was really commercial on the outside it would have to be on the inside. But now I can see that they can put up this huge bureaucratic machine and it can still be eroded. People are looking for meaning at Woodstock, they’re coming with preconceptions. It’s set up like that. It’s a contemporary pop culture ritual-25 years on from this weird happy accident that left a big impact, they’re setting everything in place and hoping the spirit comes.”

Typical Booth-speak, which’d make him sound borne down under a weight of pretension, if not for the fact that he really means it.

“It’s a bit sick what’s happening here. It’s so expensive ‘cos some of the bands are taking a mint.” They certainly are. Aerosmith got a reported million dollars, while Dylan got $300,000. James got less than the $18,000 that Hendrix got in ’69.

“I hope the spirit doesn’t see all the commercialism and money, and decided not to arrive. (Tim is a descendant of William Booth who founded the Salvation Army. As a child he went to church six days a week, between the ages of 11 and 18, which may account for his slightly loopy, yet deeply-felt worldview.) The language has been devalued. Spirituality is just a feeling of aliveness. I get it from dancing. When people feel ‘the spirit’ all it means is they’re alive. At Woodstock they’re calling down some Dionysian, Bacchanalian revelry.”

We spend the first part of Wuss-Stock ’94 looking for spirits of a different kind. All we find is half bottle of Passport Scotch and the slops in a can of Bud. It feels like an outward-bound course with the Young Liberals, a lurid combination of physical exhaustion and patronising glibness. Still, with enough inside you and ORBITAL onstage it’s possible to find ‘the spirit’…

By Saturday night everything has fallen apart. The highway has been sealed off. The security have given up. It’s pouring. Ark-building is considered. Lightning is forecast. Everybody is told to lie low and steer clear of metal fences-seems the ideal chance to climb up the tallest piece of scaffolding and wish for deliverance. But things are improving, someone’s selling commemorative Woodstock acid.

And we’ve made the wise provision of inviting friends down from Boston. Who arrive bearing beer, chocolate vodka, a bag full of herbal uppers and a very nice pill that, apparently, truckers use for late-night long distance journeys. Ideal for parties and other social gatherings. But be warned, we end up thinking it’s a “good idea” to go, shoeless, to a sodden tent owned by a guy named Hooter.

He insists we drink fortified wine and smoke some rather powerful homemade cigarettes. The wine he later refers to as “pure L-S-D!” Consequently most of Sunday morning is spent trying to locate our motel which is half-an hour away and not, as we’ve grown to believe, a six-hour drive through a mountainous terrain filled with bears and leaping elks.

The rain offers some respite during Metallica’s storming set. This is the only highlight of the event.

They summoned up the spirit big-time, as the trucker’s speed, chocolate vodka and fireworks all mixed with the lightning. We are treated to an all-American spectacle. We understand. It’s in The Constitution, man! Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness! In the States, ROCK is part of the fabric of freedom. It’s about making big bucks, going for it and Rock and fucking Rolling. Or as Tim puts it, “Rock is just a small part of the tapestry of English Heritage. In the states, through, it’s much more part of the society.”

Damn right, 25 years and history’s already warped. Parallel universes created with each new news report. Reality and history don’t mix. Well, only occasionally. In the Woodstock film-the groovy one, the brown-acid-no-rain-myth-making one-there’s an interview with a young guy sitting on the roadside. This is what he say: “People that are nowhere are coming here ‘cos there’s people they think are somewhere. Everybody’s looking for some kind of answer when there isn’t one why would 300,000 – 600,000 people come to anything? Was music that important? I don’t think so… People don’t know how to live, they don’t know what to do, and they think they’ll find out what it is or how to maintain with it. People are very lost.”

If people’d listened to him – not Dylan, Leary, Lennon or the Woodstock legend-maybe they’d be happy now, and looking forward. Maybe we’ll never understand. But, then again, it’s only rock ‘n’ roll. And is there any reason left to like it? James’ spirit, however… if it comes in pints, let’s have a couple.

Incidentally, if you ring me in 2019 I’ll be out.

February 8

Listening to new JAMES stuff – still muddled and looking for direction, but something dimly emerging. The question : “What is the vision?”

February 9

Tidied studios, set up for JAMES visit. Who duly appeared – Tim, Larry and Jim. Played several things, but the nub was them asking me if I could work with them. They seemed to not want to record again until I could do it with them.

March 6

To Westside, setting up (tackling the problems of hearing and visibility of seven players in one room) and, as band arrives, listening and making charts of song-starts in hand. Worked on “Assembly” (new chord section) and “Star” (ditto). Home at 11pm.

March 7

To studio for 11.45, but whole band not assembled until 1. We talked about making new vocal music over the instrumental discoveries of Wah Wah and after. We started working on a song in that mode – Ambient opening song without any changes over it. Promising – the song was. Also worked on “Darling” and “Make It All Right” (very nice new low-register singing).

Things are going well, but the poor band are tired (too much touring?) They need a lot of pushing. There are so many of us there, and therefore a tendency to submerge compositional problems in sheer density. Mark is brilliant but modest, so his contribution is always heard later (and therefore doesn’t help in the jams). Tim asked the assistant (with flu) to take time off.

March 8

On to studio. Today felt like pushing a rock up a hill. I was directing, in detail. That’s fine – we try to get specific, controlled experiments; but it’s hard. I have to get bossy or everything will dissolve. Like many of us intuitives, they have a great ability to start things “by accident” but then it’s hard to improve them “by design”. I guess that’s my “outsider” job. Dave gets frustrated because nobody locks with him, so he’s trying to make all the rhythm in the drums. With a big band, every beat tends to get filled, and, unless expressly prohibited, everyone tends to play all the time. That makes for an evenness of density. Nonetheless, we made “Whiplash” come to rather triumphant life – a very beautiful, wistful song over a machine throb.

March 9

Worked today on “Hedex”, “Waltzing Along” and “Avalanche”, for all of which I suggested new arrangements and sections. Things sounded really good. We tried to start at 11.00 but the band were not ready (I got bloody mad); but we did focus and stick to schedule after that, and it paid off. Came home for a brief child break at 6.30 while the guys were having dinner. Could I be as good-natured as them and still keep things moving?

March 10

On to studio with fresh strawberries. 1 1/2 hours on “Honest Pleasure”, but no result. Then a jam – really strong, good bass line and great drums and guitar – pure Larry. I suggested we graft “Hey That Muscle” on to the jam, which seemed to work well, and we had a new, tougher thing. Later we attempted “Whatever The Sound”, but it’s basically a dull song with a nice atmosphere. Everyone was tired by the evening – time for a day off.

March 12

In the studio everyone was completely passed out. Tim asleep on the sofa, Jim on the worktop, Saul late. Dave had done some late mixes last night. Good old Dave, the grumbling, laughing leek, a dependable spirit. Some OK, some disappointing. Four or five standouts: “Hedex”, “Avalanche”, “Assembly”, “Whiplash”, “Waltzing Along”. When I can listen without hearing the labour pains in the background, it’s good stuff. When I do, it’s strong stuff. The other songs still conceptually smudgy. Playing on most things tired. Saul tending to noodliness.

Worked today on “Home Boy or Girl” and “All One To Me”. The first has some excitement, though not enough personality yet. The second ended up sounding proficiently poppish (and a bit pointless), so I suggested a completely different version – softer, more a cappella, melancholy – which was OK, but then started to think that the basic tune is too normal to do much with.

Interesting watching the dynamics here. Saul, whose sonic contributions are erratic, is essential to the social ecology of the band. He’s the person (with Dave) most likely to say what’s on his mind, but without any rancour (so it doesn’t stir up bad feeling). This opens the door for other people to talk. These two, the most naturally undemocratic and un-polite, are the log-jam busters. Saul’s lively and funny and explosive; Dave’s a dry-witted Welsh sparkler. Both make for life and soul.

March 13

At Westside, Tim ill and everyone hard to motivate. “Orson” ground on with me singing a semi-crappy chorus vocal part, but a good instrumental / bridge idea evolved. I suggested the tag go on to the end. Tim suggested having the last chord of the sequence as Bar 1. Weird, I said, but when played it sounded great, unsettling the sequence interestingly.

The difficulty is keeping all those different attentions in one place long enough for a process like that – a process of sculpting – to take place. Later on “Strange Requests” I added a new bass part and some arrangement ideas. All these songs are either one-note-joes or monocycles. Laissez-faire composing – which is not to deny the force of some of the ideas. But songs that don’t depend on composition depend instead on performance – so the fire has to be there in the playing, which it isn’t after several long days work.

After that we went onto “Waltzing Along”, in which I yelled myself hoarse shouting new structure cues over the music. That’s a great song – only they do songs like that. The emotional melange in Tim’s ainging is hard to pin down : yearning, abandoned, intimate, warm and wide-eyed. It’s interesting that he hardly ever sings in bluesy scales, so the result is very English – slightly nostalgic in a nice way.

March 14

Worked on “Whiplash”, which shone with brave promise. Also “Honest Pleasure” turned out well with Larry’s new rhythm guitar part. I want Saul to think in terms of sections of strings (hard, when you’re only playing one), but he flits from idea to idea. Poorer musicians are so pleased to find just one thing that they can successfully play that they often contribute more to the architechture of the piece – because other people can then build on what they’re holding in place.

March 16

At the studio we worked on “Hedex”, “All One To Me” and “Chunney Pop”. The shock of the day came when Larry produced the fax that Anthea had sent to Peter Rudge referring to my nightly grumbles (to her) about the difficulty of the work. I was excrutiatingly embarrassed. To grumble is one thing, but to have it in writing is another. They, however, were extremely gentlemanly about the whole thing, doing their best to make me feel better.

December 6

Dinner in the evening with Peter and Joyce Rudge, Dave Bates and Amira, his Bosnian fiancee. Talking about James, their next record. Jim and Dave have been doing some good work, trying to push the envelope. The problem is that they have made music that doesn’t necessarily involve Tim; it’s good stuff, but hard for a singer. There’s rhythmic and sonic drama, but little harmonic drama for him to respond to. What singers like are shifts of harmonic gravity which they can either float above or succumb to. There’s two different polar types of singers : floaters and drivers. Tim tends to be a floater – some of his best work is when there’s a string vortex set up in the music and he manages to stay in the same place. Gospel singers tend to be divers – sucked down and thrown back up by the music, or engaged in great passions of will and surrender with it. But for either of these you need something other than a harmonic plateau.

December 7

Later, a long meeting with James, discussing strategy for their recording, Surprised to discover that they hadn’t been all in the same room together since the Westside sessions. They have a list with something like 30 pieces on them. I reiterated the dinner conversation. I also suggested (on the importance of backing vocals) that they start working with a Digitech Vocalist, so perhaps Tim will have two mikes – one for his normal voice and one for creating instant harmonies via the Vocalist. Pleasant meeting, with the music playing quietly in the background as we talked – anything that caught our attention, we then talked about (a good test – music interesting good enough to stop the conversation).

I’m sleeping with your daughter claimed young Mr. Sit Down. “I’ll slap your face,” rejoined old Mr. Twin Peaks. Near-the-knuckle jests aside, when this pan-generational pop pair met, all hell didn’t break loose. In fact – with Bernard Butler in tow – Tim Booth and Angelo Badalamenti made sweet music of their own. David Cavanagh swoons.

The skinny half of the partnership, Tim Booth, was born in Bradford in 1960. He’s the singer in James, a six-way improvisational band that, very occasionally, has hits (eg Sit Down). Booth is also a masseur, a mate of Brian Eno’s, a dance teacher, a numerologist, a former alumnus of Shrewsbury school (alma mater of Michael Heseltine), an ex-Manchester university drama student and fan on Patti Smith who comes perilously close to tears whenever he talks of her.

The “wider” partner in this two-man organisation is Angelo Badalamenti, born in Brooklyn in 1937. In the year of Booth’s birth, Badalamenti was teaching music and english in a New York school. He moved briefly to Woldingham in Surrey; began to write pop tunes; was told by Joe Meek that he had a glorious singing voice; went back to Brooklyn; penned hits for Melba Moore, Nancy Wilson and Nina Simone; scored dozens of movie soundtracks under the name Andy Badale; and wrote the superlative music for David Lynch’s Blue Velvet, Wild at Heart and most famously of all, Twin Peaks.

Between them they confess a fondness for Iggy Pop, Herbert Lom, poetic lyrics and eerie beautiful songs. And finally, with the release of their album, Booth & the Bad Angel, the 59 year-old Badalamenti makes his debut appearance as a vocalist, on a song called Life Gets Better.

So it was just me and Joe Meek who wanted you to sing?” Booth teases him over lunch in London’s West End.

“No,” replies Badalamenti between munches of pasta, recalling a third champion. “Tony Orlando. Remember Tony Orlando & Dawn?”

“You’ve ruined the fucking story, Angelo,” Booth cries. “Why didn’t you just leave it at Joe Meek? I was in cool company there and you bring Dawn to the table.”

Most of the singing on Booth & the Bad Angel is by Booth, a serene yet cynical fellow who today punctuates his mouthfuls of sausage with strange, throat-clearing noises like Jack Lemmon in the Odd Couple. Hrrrmmm Grrrmmm. Every time Booth sneezes, Badalamenti says “Gesundheit.”

A rehearsal for Later with Jools Holland follows lunch, where they’ll play the album’s first two singles (I Believe and Hit Parade), with the remaining members of James providing the musical backing. Then Booth will head off to see Patti Smith playing at the Serpentine Gallery, and oh dear, choke, sob.

He and Badalamenti have already made a pact to record a follow-up album – an odder, darker record than this one – providing commitments will allow. Badalamenti is collaborating with Lynch on the latter’s movie, Lost Highway. Booth has nearly completed a record with James and wants to be an actor. He was offered the part of Tommy on Broadway, but – he claims – refused to do it unless Iggy played Uncle Ernie. Badalamenti thinks Booth is a genius.

“Tim and I – I can honestly say – we didn’t have a single disagreement making this record,” coos Badalamenti.

“I’ve moved into Angelo’s house,” smirks Booth. “I’m sleeping with his daughter.”

“I’ll slap your face,” retorts Badalamenti, putting his fork down. “You forget I’m part Sicilian. My uncle Tony will be paying you a visit.”

Prior to 1990. Booth and Badalamenti had never heard of each other. That year, Booth fell in love with Julee Cruise’s remarkable album of dream-songs, Floating Into the Night (music by Badalamenti and lyrics by Lynch) and was delighted to be asked, by the producer of Channel 4’s Friday Night at the Dome, to choose a musician from anywhere in the world with whom he’d like to collaborate. For over a year the two men attempted to meet, with no joy, until a Paul McCartney recording session brought Badalamenti over to London on Concorde (the only way he’ll cross the Atlantic). That night, James played at the venue formerly known as the Town & Country Club in London’s Kentish Town.

So this is the kid who’s been leaving crazy messages on my answerphone, thought Angelo Badalamenti when they met backstage.

Wow, he looks like a New York taxi driver, thought Tim Booth.

Fontana Records – the label to which James signed in 1990 – gave Booth & the Bad Angel (that’s “bad” in the James Brown sense, not the Satanic sense) the financial backing to make an album. For the next two years, the pair worked infrequently. Booth had a James album to make (Laid, 1994) and he felt guilty asking Badalamenti to turn down movie soundtracks.

He’s terrible, he’s turned down loads of stuff,” Booth sighs. “He turned down Leonard Cohen, Tori Amos (to Badalamenti) What are you doing, turning down Leonard Cohen? You need a manager.”

The album they slowly co-wrote and co-produced was full of slightly off-centre but melodic pop songs, which surprised those who’d expected 11 woozy reprises of Laura Palmer’s Theme, or Sit Down. But it didn’t have any decent guitar playing, so Booth cold-called Bernard Butler, late of Suede, who was about to leave for France to record his comeback single, Yes, with David McAlmont.

“Tim rang me up,” the down-to-earth Butler recounts in a Soho café as he sips his mineral water, “and said he wanted me to fly to New York. I said, Look, I’ve never met you, I don’t know anything about this, and I’m not going.”

Butler, however, is all over Booth & the Bad Angel, and, in gratitude for his cheap, not to mention speedy contributions, Booth has allowed him a photo in the album booklet. He plays on seven tracks (guitar, piano, bass) and did the mixing on six.

“I could tell Tim was an excitable kind of guy,” Butler says. “Down the phone he was like, Wow that’s so exciting! But he’s funny. You can take the piss out of him a little. I said to him, Tim, in every one of these lyrics, you’re either ‘flying’ or you’re ‘free'”

Within weeks, Butler trusted Booth enough to submit to a massage one afternoon when he needed to shake off a vicious cold. Booth massaged him so formidably that, not only did the cold disappear, but Butler was unable to hold a guitar for several hours afterwards.

“I was thinking, Christ, what have I done – I’ve taken away his demons” admits Booth.

“I was feeling like I’d had four E’s and a bottle of Scotch,” muses Butler. “He gets on your back and starts breathing and blowing on you. He was there for about twenty minutes. I got up and felt very nice. Everything was all fluffy.”

And what are we to make of Avril, Booth’s favoured psychic? Avril who, according to Booth, has never been proved wrong, predicted some years ago that he would work with an American “who has the name of an angel.” Badalamenti finds this wonderful.

Avril also predicted that James would work with Brian Eno – they have – and has lately told Booth to “watch out for the crossed feathers.” Which is sound advice in any one’s book.

Who does Tim Booth think he is? Back in the public glare for the first time since 1993’s Laid LP, Booth has already done the one thing everyone else is falling over themselves not to do – he’s declared a total disinterest in the music of Oasis, dismissing them as “traditional” and “the mainstream.” Okay, it’s hardly cutting stuff, but it demonstrates a fundamental truth about Booth and his cohorts in James: they don’t enjoy playing by the rules.

“If we’d been a cooler band full-stop, James would have been much bigger,” says Booth. sipping herbal tea in Cyberia Cafe on Oxford Street. “But we never wanted that, it’s not what we’re about. We’re an awkward band, very awkward. But people want their traditional stuff, they want their rock’n’roll rebels, and that’s the mainstream. That’s Oasis, not us.”

Despite the talk about James, the reason Booth is back doing interviews is nothing to do with the band he has fronted for the last 13 years. Rather, he’s plugging a collaboration with the acclaimed New York composer Angelo Badalamenti, a 55-year-old bear of a man, best known for his sound track work with David Lynch for Twin Peaks. It doesn’t signal an end for James – their next LP is all but finished and should be released around January – it’s just a more public example of Booth’s life outside of James, something he says he’s always pursued with vigour. To Booth, the band have always been part of his life rather than his whole life.

“I do a lot of creative things outside James,” he says, gently yet confidently easing his way into conversation. “In that sense I’ve never wanted to be limited to working with one set of people. So now I’m branching out.”

Now aged 35, Booth has always maintained that he became the singer with James because of his dancing rather than his singing -the other band members spotted him in Manchester’s clubs in the early ’80s. In keeping with this, the last two years have seen him teaching dance at the drama college in Didsbury. “I do a lot of dance work. I go into a trance with dancing and I work with a woman in New York who does that -dance improvisation – which is very much about going into a trance. I love teaching it, it’s amazing; dancing is just incredible.”

And therein lies the conundrum, the stumbling block, that is Tim Booth and James. Yes, he’s fronted a successful guitar band for over a decade, has played with everyone from The Smiths to Neil Young, has had top ten singles. toured the world, sold millions of albums in both the UK and USA (Laid went Gold over there, which is a lot of records). But he is not very rock’n’roll: never has been and never will be.

“The dancing is actually more important to me than the singing,” he says, as he takes another dainty sip of tea. “And that’s kind of an accident – I became the singer with James because I danced, Angelo wanted to work with me after he saw me dance. So it’s like,” he begins to laugh, “that’s the thing I probably do the best.”

It’s also the thing that has helped define him as something of an oddball when it comes to great frontmen of our time. I remember first seeing Booth in 1986 and it was the flailing arms, the crazy eyes, the passion that stuck in my mind. Morrissey may have been throwing daffodils around and perfecting a similar off-the-wall dance, but his was choreographed, stylised. Booth, meanwhile, seemed so wrapped-up in it all that he didn’t care that he looked like a drunken reveller at wedding party. Strange days indeed.

“I’ve had knives pulled on me, glasses thrown at me when I’ve been dancing in clubs,” he recalls. “That was pre-house though. But then the dance thing came in and everyone was dancing like lunatics – they just didn’t know I wasn’t on drugs.

“Dancing is a very powerful, liberating thing,” continues Booth, getting into his stride. “That’s what draws me to it. It’s like to me, someone like Michael Jackson is more famous for his dancing than his singing – it’s more to do with the way he moves. That’s what pushed him through.”

Not everyone shares Booth’s fascination with dance. In fact it’s obvious that in many ways his exuberance, his lack of that all-important English reserve – check the likes of Ian Brown and Liam Gallagher for their cool stance – has been a barrier to wider acceptance. Like Joy Division’s Ian Curtis, whose very real epilepsy surfaced in his manic on-stage antics, Booth’s jerky gestures can both fascinate and repel. On a recent appearance for Jools Holland’s Later, the latter was apparent, at least it was as far as the camera work went. As Booth worked himself up into a frenzy, injecting some much-needed movement into the often staid, muso atmosphere of the Later studio. the camera panned away from him as if uncomfortable with what it was observing, choosing to focus on…the guitarist’s fret board. Booth’s exorcising of demons through music and dance don’t rest easily with what is expected of today’s rock’n’roll stars.

Of course the backdrop to all this is a time in the early ’90s when James were the toast of the town – admittedly after nearly a decade of false starts and media ridicule. There was a time when you couldn’t go out day or night without seeing someone wearing a James T-shirt. After the Roses played Spike Island, the band were the next Mancunian act to make the move to huge outdoor gigs, now the domain of Oasis, Simply Red and M People. The latter’s recent show at Alton Towers came some five years after James played to a crowd of over 30,000 people there. It was a turning point for both the band as a whole and Booth as an individual.

“Alton Towers was frightening. It was like 30,000 people turning up in the middle of nowhere and I remember thinking on the day, ‘what the fuck am I going to say to them’. It felt like I was holding a party and didn’t quite know what to do. And then after that we retreated.”

Well, not quite. A few years later with the release of the Brian Eno-produced Laid – arguably the band’s finest hour to date – they played more smaller-scale gigs, including G-Mex in Manchester. They also toured the US with Neil Young. It was around that time that tough decisions had to be made, specifically about where the band went next. After the departure of Martine McDonagh, the band’s long-term manager and mother to Booth’s eight-year-old son, the need for new management and a new direction was acute. The decisions that were made then have clearly shaped the last few years in Booth’s life.

“When Martine left, these guys who manage Metallica approached us. They took us in a room and said; ‘we’re going to make you all millionaires within two years, this is the plan’. And they just laid it all out in front of us – 120 date tour of America, stuff like that, and it was outrageous. And we just couldn’t go with them. We thought, ‘we can’t do that. That’s not us’.” Instead they plumped for New York-based Peter Rudge, someone they knew and who they got on with. Not that he’s a novice – he’s worked for the Rolling Stones for starters. His approach, however, gave the band the chance to do as they liked, to step back and contemplate.

And so Booth is where he is now, out on a limb, overshadowed in Britain by the phenomenal changes in the country’s pop culture since the last James record: the rise of Oasis, the resurgence of Blur, the eventual success of Pulp, the demise and return of Shaun Ryder, the second coming and slow collapse of the Roses, the mainstream acceptance of house music mirrored by the return of the guitar band as a pop staple. And that’s just the start of it. It’s a new environment which, unsurprisingly in the light of his band’s history, he seems somewhat at odds with. “It’s like all these bands at the moment who rip-off other bands and deconstruct their songs – I don’t get that. I could never do that and neither could James, it’s just not in our nature. We’re too proud. We just want to express ourselves, not someone else. And we want the whole thing on our terms.”

Still, a lot can happen, a lot can change in three years. Booth has spent a lot of time in New York, principally working with Badlamenti on the new LP, but also hanging out, exploring possibilites outside of James. One of the possibilities is the life of an actor – he was offered the role of Tommy in the musical of the same name, currently running on Broadway, but “I went to see it and it was shit, so I didn’t do it.” And of course, there’s this new non-James record, the worth of which shouldn’t be overlooked; it’s a classy, uplifting collection of songs, the type of album that will slowly sell as people begin to realise how good it is.

“The record’s a very happy one. I was dancing a lot at the time,” grins Booth, settling back into a sofa in the corner of Cyberia, following a brief City Life photo-shoot. “I was dancing, I was roller-blading. It was a real breakthrough in my life during that time. Anyone who affects my life is in this record.”

And his choice of collaborator? Booth has been a fan of Badalamenti:s work for many years – he first caught the bug after hearing Floating Into The Night by Julee Cruise, with music written by Badalamenti and lyrics by the director David Lynch. The story goes (or so the press release says, which means it should be taken with a pinch of salt) that Booth was told by a clairvoyant that he would find it creatively rewarding if he worked with ‘a man with the name of an angel’. Years later, and after a year of pestering Badalamenti with phone calls, they met after a gig in 1993 and agreed to work together. They began work in the summer of 1994, working over a period of one and a half years in three, one month sessions. The record was actually near to completion a year a go, but was held up by disagreements between Booth and his record company over who should remix it. In the end the job was split between Tim Simenon (of Bomb The Bass fame) and, most tellingly, ex-Suede guitarist Bernard Butler, who also plays guitar on the album.

“I think it will sell a lot and do really well,” says Booth. “And the James record’s going to ride on the back of that. It sounds really amazing.” For that record, James have somehow brought together the production talents of both the experimentalist Eno and the pop genius Stephen Hague, noted for his work with the Pet Shop Boys, amongst many others. Following on from Booth’s work with Badalamenti, it will mark a pivotal moment in both Booth and the band’s career. Will they battle back into the spotlight, or remain overshadowed by the new British pop royalty? Booth quite rightly feels there’s a struggle ahead. But does he crave acclaim and recognition once more?

“I don’t crave recognition but I think we deserve it,” he says. “I think we’ve made a lot of great records over a long period of time. I don’t see many bands doing that.” He pauses, smiles and adds, “I don’t see any bands doing that.”

Brave, and quite possibly foolish words. But for the moment the soft-spoken yet tough-talking Booth has made a powerful, moving LP to be proud off. Born of the creative urges of a man obsessed with dancing, the question awaiting an answer is whether it will make Booth the leader of the dance once more. Booth’s clairvoyant never provided an answer to that.

Tim Booth’s collaboration with Angelo Badalamenti, Booth And The Bad Angel (Mercury), is out now.

In recent times, a fair number of alternative rock’s success stories have happened overnight, but there are still those who’ve climbed the ladder one rung at a time. Such is the case with James, the Manchester, England-based septet that struck gold in 1993 with “Laid,” the seventh album in its decade-plus existence.

“I think the success we’ve had has been more a cumulative thing than anything,” says front man Tim Booth. “In a lot of ways, ‘Laid’ was less commercial than anything we’d done in the past, but it ended up selling loads of copies in the past couple years when we’ve been all but dormant.”

That respite will end Feb. 11, when Fontana/Mercury issues “Whiplash,” the first release from the band since 1994’s experimental remix set, “Wah Wah.” (In the interim, Booth released “Booth And The Bad Angel,” a collaboration with composer Angelo Badalamenti.)

“We desperately needed time off after working basically nonstop for 13 years,” says the singer. “We needed to find a new way of working, because we were going mad–or I was at least. I used to drive James and be there for every note, and I didn’t want to do that anymore.”

While he’s still at the forefront of much of “Whiplash,” Booth does cede more control to his bandmates on surprisingly abrasive, industrial-tinged tracks like “Greenpeace” and the largely improvised “Go To The Bank.” Fans of the band’s trademark aggro-folk sound will find plenty to like in songs like the first single, “She’s A Star,” which goes to radio the last week of January.

“They’ve delivered a very strong, very deep album, and I think ‘She’s A Star’ is their best chance yet at a multiformat hit,” says Josh Zieman, Mercury senior director of marketing. “Since it has been a while, we may have to solidify the foundation at radio and retail, but James does have a very loyal fan base.”

Anticipation is strong for new material from the band. “We’ve supported James since the beginning, and the band has always done extremely well here,” says Jane Purcell, PD at modern rock outlet WWCD Columbus, Ohio. “We played several cuts off the last album to good response, and quite a few things from their catalog are still in our gold rotation.”

Zieman says the band–which is signed to Fontana in Europe–will come to the U.S. for a promotional visit in late February. On that trek, James will perform on shows such as MTV’s “120 Minutes” and “Late Show With David Letterman.” A full tour, booked by Mitch Rose at Creative Artists Agency, will follow in April.

“Playing these songs live should be interesting for a number of reasons,” says Booth. “They lend themselves to performance a bit more than the songs on ‘Laid,’ which tended to be somewhat introspective. Besides which, we’re not playing with Larry any longer, which is a big change.”

The “Larry” Booth refers to is Larry Gott, the longtime guitarist who left midway through the recording of “Whiplash”–in Booth’s words “because he hated the whole fame thing even more than the rest of us.” Gott’s replacement is Adrian Oxaal, formerly of Sharkboy, who doubles on cello, making him a fine foil for longtime violinist Saul Davies.

“Bringing Adrian in shook us up, which was a positive thing, since we needed to find a new approach to things,” says Booth. “We’ve always tried our best to do that.”

Since a nascent fascination with the stripped-down style of bands like the Violent Femmes gave way to the more ornate, jaunty stylings of albums like 1986’s “Stutter” and 1988’s “Strip-Mine,” James’ career has been marked by more zig-zags than that of an all-star running back.

After moving from Blanco y Negro/Sire to Fontana in 1990, the band (which is managed by Peter Rudge of Mad Dog) reconfigured its sound, emphasizing grand structures, including string and horn sections. The enlistment of producer Brian Eno, who produced both “Wah Wah” and “Laid,” brought yet another about-face.

“Brian is as far from perfectionism as you can get. He’s very much into immediacy, into seeing what he can disrupt,” says Booth. “Stephen [Hague, who shares production credits with Eno on ‘Whiplash’] is just the opposite, which made for a fascinating mix.”

Mercury’s Zieman says he views James’ mercurial nature as one of the group’s strengths. “This isn’t the kind of band that will become stagnant,” he says. “They always manage to stay a step ahead.”

Ihren größten Hits hatte die sechsköpfige Band aus Manchester mit Songs wie “Sit Down” und “Come Home” Anfang der 90er zur Zeit der englischen Indie/Dance- Rave-O-Lution.

?: Drei Jahre lang habt ihr keine Konzerte mehr gegeben und auch was Plattenveröffentlichungen anbelangt, war es in den letzten Jahren still um James. Was war los?

Tim Booth: Es war einfach mal an der Zeit, eine Pause zu machen. James gibt es nun schon seit 13 Jahren, und nie hatten wir wirklich Zeit für andere Dinge als die Musik. Es ging immer nur darum, ein neues Album aufzunehmen und damit dann auf Tour zu gehen, und irgendwann wirst du einfach müde von dieser Routine. Das ist ja zum Beispiel auch der Grund, warum eine Band wie R.E.M. nicht mehr nach jeder Plattenveröffentlichung eine Tournee unternimmt. In der Zwischenzeit haben wir alle eigene Sachen verfolgt. Manche sind umgezogen, dann ist Larry Gott, eines der Gründungsmitglieder von James, aus der Band ausgestiegen, was ein schwerer Schock für uns war, und ich habe mit Angelo Badalamenti zusammengearbeitet. Wir haben uns einfach neu orientiert.

?: War die übrige Band denn neidisch wegen deiner Zusammenarbeit mit Angelo Badalamenti?

Tim Booth: Da mußt du sie schon selber fragen.

Jim Glennie: Vielleicht hätte so etwas wie Neid aufkommen können, weil Angelo Badalamenti wirklich ein großartiger Komponist ist, den wir alle sehr schätzen. Aber als es darum ging, die Platte, die Tim mit Badalamenti aufgenommen hat, live vorzustellen, hat er uns gebeten, mitzumachen. Dafür waren wir ihm sehr dankbar, und es war ein phantastisches Erlebnis.

?: Hattet ihr bei der neuen Platte Angst, daß die Leute nicht länger an James interessiert sein könnten?

Tim Booth: Wir waren jetzt eine Weile von der Bildfläche verschwunden, und die Geschmäcker der Menschen ändern sich. Insofern gibt es natürlich schon die Möglichkeit, daß sich niemand mehr für uns interessiert. Aber ich glaube auch, daß es durch Oasis in den letzen Jahren zu einem Comeback der auf Gitarren basierten Musik gekommen ist. Nimm zum Beispiel Bands wie Suede oder die Manic Street Preachers, die waren im letzen Jahr so erfolgreich wie nie zuvor. Außerdem sind die Reaktionen auf unsere neuen Songs soweit sehr gut. Uns wird mehr Respekt gezollt als ich gedacht hätte. Es läuft also alles sehr positiv.

?: Was war denn der Höhepunkt eurer Karriere?

Tim Booth: In England war das mit Sicherheit unser Open-Air-Konzert in Alton Towers, zu dem über 30.000 Leute kamen. Für eine Indie-Gruppe war das damals ohne Vorbild. An dem Abend haben wir allein 22.000 T-Shirts verkauft, und die waren schon am späten Nachmittag weg. Bemerkenswerterweise gingen mit unserem 93er Album “Laid” die Plattenverkäufe in England ja zurück, während unsere Karriere in den USA erst richtig losging. Mittlerweile hat sich “Laid” dort 750.000 mal verkauft und 1994 sind wir ja auch bei dem Woodstock-Festival aufgetreten.

?: Muß man für den Erfolg in Amerika Kompromisse eingehen?

Tim Booth: Die Unterschiede zwischen dem Musikbusiness in Amerika und England sind schon riesig groß. In den USA mußt du halt eine Menge Hände schütteln von Leuten, die du gar nicht kennst, nur damit dein Song im Radio gespielt wird. Und als wir das letzte Mal in der David Letterman-Show aufgetreten sind, wollten wir – wie auf dem Cover von “Laid” – eigentlich Frauenkleider tragen, aber das wurde uns verboten mit dem Hinweis, die Zuschauer im “Bible Belt” würden das nicht tolerieren. Das ist albern, aber du mußt halt wissen, bis zu welchem Punkt du das Spiel mitspielen willst, um Erfolg zu haben.

?: In gewisser Weise klingen einige der Songs auf eurem neuen Album “Whiplash” so, wie man es vom neuen U2 -Album erwartet hätte.

Tim Booth: Ich habe das U2-Album noch nicht gehört, aber sicher spielst du auf die Drum `n’ Bass- und Elektro-Elemente in Songs wie “Greenpeace” an. Ganz neu ist diese Entwicklung für uns allerdings nicht. Viele der Sachen hatten wir schon auf unserem experimentelleren Album “Wah Wah”, das ja von Brian Eno produziert wurde, ausprobiert. Überhaupt haben wir Brian Eno diesbezüglich viel zu verdanken. Er stand uns auch bei “Whiplash” wieder zur Seite. Es war uns aber auch wichtig, daß die Songs, unabhängig von der Instrumentierung, immer noch James-Songs blieben. Wir wollten nicht einfach auf irgendeinen Wagen aufspringen.

?: Ihr habt schon seit Ewigkeiten keine Konzerte mehr in Deutschland gegeben. Kann man erwarten, daß ihr mit dem neuen Album hier auf Tour gehen werdet?

Tim Booth: Das Problem mit Deutschland ist, das sich hier außer einer überschaubaren Fangemeinde nicht allzuviele Leute für unsere Musik interessieren. Und wenn wir in Amerika mit den gleichen Anstrengungen hundertmal mehr Platten verkaufen können, gehen wir natürlich lieber dorthin. Aber wir haben schon vor, dieses Jahr auch wieder einige Konzerte in Deutschland zu spielen.

Buddhist vegatarians-turned-sado-masochistic chicken fiends JAMES return with a gunslinging vengeance to stake their place alongside the Noelrock hierarchy. Armed with a pervy new LP “Whiplash” and tales of six-foot transvestites, who’s gonna stand in their way?

There’s no knock , just a slow creek of a swinging door and the head honcho enters. His cowboy boots tap carefully across the stone floor treading dust and Spice Girl feature underfoot. He shakes a couple of drops of rain from his poncho and tips his wide-brimmed hat further over his eyes. “Hi,” he says in a soft, lilting voice. Controlled. Potent. “I’m Tim”

Behind him, the posse gather. They dress casually and grin grins of the wicked. They scatter around the photographer’s studio, prodding light stand, fumbling at packing cases, giggling, seeking mischief. Behind the genteel facade, these are hard men, unflinching in the face of adversity, never backing down from a challenge. For over a decade they have struggled with the pitfalls of meditation, beaten off the cruel lure of vegetarianism, taken on the American heartland and won. These are savage times and they have tales to tell.

“We had a fight with (Def Leppard’s) Joe Elliott”, says the one who, with the addition of a curled moustache, would be the spitting image of Speedy Gonzales. “He just started having a go at Jim, but Jim offered him outside and he shat himself. Then there was the time we set fire to a house in LA..”

The head honcho touches his fingertips together and sighs.

“I don’t think we should talk about that”, he intones, a slight grin playing across his lips.

Speedy is silenced as the head honcho turns his gaze back to his inquisitor.

“They’ve been putting up with my idiosyncrasies for long enough”, he says. “Now I’ve got to start putting up with theirs.”

He has been away for three years, this veteran of musical sharpshooting. Other business to attend to, a rest from being top dog and a target for fresh faced young cowboys. Now he’s back and the town has run riot without him, overrun by upstarts with bigger guns. He’s Sheriff Fratman no longer, but from the spark in his eye you can tell he hasn’t done with fighting yet.

So where to feed? Where to charge their bellies before the dictaphone fight at the UK corral begins in earnest?

Tim Booth taps his lip methodically. Options pondered.

“Shall we go Mexican?”

In 1989, the whole world sat down. As the baggy phenomenon reached it’s pill popping peak, a five year-old band called James (previously only known to about 13 indie types as black-clad Smiths wannabes) decided to re-release an epic anthem of lurve called “Sit Down” in the wake of the chart success of “Come Home” Not a bad decision as it turned out. Within months it had scaled the UK and US charts and became alongside “Wrote For Luck” and “She Bangs The Drums”, a tune for the uniting of a hedonistic generation and encouraged every sentiment being in the known universe to buy one of their T-shirts. Baggy had transcended The Cult of James was underway.

And at its head table sat a man called Tim. A man who advocated Buddhist meditation, vegetarianism and dancing as if your arms were on fire. A visionary, a mystic and a man who was born to be a pop star. And, most important of all, a man with a voice that was able to shake mountainsides, skin prairie dogs at 100 paces and reach such gargantuan heights that even the most grunge-obsessed of American butt-heads sniggered into their Maiden T-shirts and agreed that it kicked hippy ass.

Then, as their contemporaries descended into obscurity, smack desolation or a very long snooze. James spent four years building the myth, sneaking a foot into the U2 superleague. There were three ultra-successful albums (“Gold Mother”, “Seven” and “Laid), outdoor megagigs, a Top 20 hit every time they farted near a microphone and photo shoots in dresses to cement the raggle-taggle Dexys-style image.

And all the time, as they were slowly filed away on a million dusty indie compilations at home (a symbol of nostalgia rather than an ongoing concern, forever Number 16 with a bullet) the globe continued to fall at their feet and snog their sandals.

“In different countries you’re remembered for your biggest song.” Tim Booth hisses, free from his poncho and clad now in a neatly tailored suit. “In America, it was ‘Born of Frustration’ and ‘Laid’. In England it’s ‘Sit Down’. And in Portugal it’s ‘Sometimes’. So every country has its own perception of your peak, but it’s a narrow one.”

“People say to us ‘Oh you’re in that band that did that Sit Down song, aren’t you?'” says Speedy-alike guitarist Saul Davies. “And we go ‘No, we’re actually part of the fabric of British pop.'”

So did you never become out-and-out rock star arseholes?

“Sadly, we haven’t got the rock star bit right yet,” says Saul. “We’ve got the arsehole bit.”

But the best laid plans of mice and mystics oft fall arse over tit in the end. The first blip on James rise to the megabowls struck in 1994 and it was called, almost an ironic summary of their career to date, “Wah Wah.” A warped mish-mash collaboration with Brian Eno that intentionally steered clear of their traditional widescreen dust-bowl territory. It was intended as a rebirth of cool, a leap back into the underground, just to prove they could. They couldn’t.

“In one way it was too extreme,” muses Saul, “we jumped right in and pushed it. For us, it was a learning process, finding a different way to approach the songs.”

Tim presses his fingertips together and grimaces. “I think it was passed over because we didn’t promote it. It was only released for a week.”

“We should either have not released it or really gone for it,” reflects Saul.

“It was supposed to start this underground thing,” bassist Jim Glennie interjects, “where you’d get a typical James audience plus all sorts. We thought it was a great idea.”

A great idea, sadly, that U2 had slayed the world with years earlier. The rut that James had ploughed for themselves, it seems, was deep. And worst of all, the mammoth two-year US tour they had just embarked on was to expose wickedness at the heart of the band that had been hidden from public view for too long.

You see, like all decent cults, the Cult of James hid demons behind its spiritual facade.

“My girlfriend was sticking things up my bum last night,” Saul yelps, spitting chicken chunks across the table. “She tried to get a bottle up there.”

Nearby diners in the high-class Mexican restaurant gag on their forks and eye their coats. They thought their eating space had been invaded by a nice pop group intent on discussing the advantages of the karmic cycle. Quietly. Then, within minutes, the corner had erupted with raucous laughter, the smashing of bottles and shaggy tales of sado-masochistic excess. Oh well, they’ll just have to ban their children from listening to the band’s records.

“I’ve got one of those tight rubber masks, a zip-up thing,” grins James, Manc laddism leaping to the fore. “It really freaks out my girlfriend. She says it’s not like me, obviously. It’s great” I lie there with my hand around her throat going “GRRRR”

Tim takes his fingers from his lips, drops his disapproving glare and smiles along.

“Jimmy is the gimp” he pronounces, unapologetically.

James, Vegan buddhists to a man. Think “football” is a particularly difficult yoga position. Partial to a quick tomato juice and mung bean soup before tucking up for an early night with their copy of The David Icke Tantric Workout Book, right?

So, so wrong. They are, in fact, rollocking ROCK savages who like nothing more than drinking the steaming blood of babies to fulfil their cruel lusts, then beating up their parents. Possibly. Certainly, of the assembled throng of devout carnivores, only Tim has the gall to ask for some broccoli sauce with which to baste his tender chicken meat. His bandmates meanwhile are regaling your correspondent with sordid tales of debauchery, deviant sex and knuckle-filled sandwiches.

“Last night we got one of the record company guys down on the floor and we were snogging ‘im!” screeches Saul. “He were lovin’ it!”

“I was sat on his face,” continues James enthusiastically, “and Saul was shagging him up the arse, shouting, what were you shouting?”

Saul almost leaps onto the table “We’ve been shagged up the arse by this record company for too long,” he yells. “NOW IT’S OUR TURN!!”

Crikey, and we thought you were such lovely, clean-living young chaps.

“The press would always focus on me and think that the whole band was like that,” says Tim, “but we’ve always had our contradictions. There’s been loads of things like this going on for years, but we usually keep it rather quiet.”

“The press never get hold of this sort of stuff – like getting thrown out of the Brit Awards or threatening other people’s lives when they threaten ours. It’s a whole side to us that never got publicised. It’s not violence so much as protecting yourself.”

“James has always been perceived in pretty much one way: the weird hippies playing folk music,” Saul explains. “And even though we haven’t had anything to do with that for years, people still think that’s what we are. People still think James are Buddhists. And it’s so far from the truth that it’s actually becoming really really funny.”

“No matter how bad we are,” laughs James, “people don’t just believe it.”

But what of Tim? Are there no devils of depravity lurking in his spotless soul? Has he, for instance, ever been arrested?

“I was nearly arrested once,” he sniggers. “It was a nudist beach in Greece and they don’t like nudist beaches in Greece. These young people had colonised it. The police came one morning with truncheons and started arresting people. I said I had a room in the village and pretended I wasn’t on the beach and they said ‘We’ll take you to your room and if you don’t have a room, we’ll put you in jail for a few days and then deport you’ We were waiting by this car when this bus stopped about 50 yards down the hill, so me and my friend Alex just ran for it and got away. It was really stupid.”

Yet despite such anti-establishment frolics, once the mask that is Tim’s pseudo-spiritualism is ripped from the James phantom, the scars of laddism are plain to see. Tim’s favourite film, for example, is The Fisher King, while James all-time favourite is Roco Does Prague. If they could become invisible for a day, Tim would start a fight in the House of Commons, James would “fiddle with women.”

Saul, meanwhile, spent his spare time during the recording of the new LP “Whiplash” trawling through the seediest of Soho’s transvestite bars and porno shops until six in the morning.

“He used to turn up in a shiny PVC jacket and a disco harness with chains and a big ring in the middle,” says James. “And a pair of shades.”

Hence while press and public alike considered James to be the band of Mary Whitehouse’s wet dreams, such behaviour was turning the American tour into an all-cylinders-burning rollercoaster ride into oblivion. The kind of tour indeed, that even the toughest was unable to survive.

“The only person that really cracked was our bodyguard,” Tim laughs, “our insecurity man. I think what really broke him was ending up in a room with a six-foot tall black transsexual on acid.”

“Eric,” says James helpfully.

“It was about a week later that he had to leave,” continues Tim. “After that, we needed a year out.”

It wasn’t only the security men who felt the strain, however. The tour left the band exhausted and sick of the sight, smell and (presumably) taste of each other. Like a million tour bus hostages before them, there came a point where the road simply ran out. And then the guitarist left.

“We had a really bad day that we have called Black Thursday,” Saul explains, dropping his fork. “We were sat in this studio in Wales when the shit really hit the fan. Larry (Gott, guitarist) said he was leaving the band, which meant that everything as it had been was over immediately, it was all gonna collapse.”

“And then the accountant discovered a five-year tax bill,” recalls Tim.

“To get from Black Thursday to the point where we’re really happy making records is a fucking miracle, to be honest,” says Saul.

It was a long haul back to the land of the happy people, and many bullets had to be bitten. Unsure of how to approach the British market after a five-year gap between tours, they withdrew entirely, took a year out from each other and recuperated.

Tim relaxed by “dancing, acting and making the d’Angelo record” whilst the rest of the band chased after their scattered marbles. Then, when they reconvened, they discovered that not only did they look better, but they also smelt less offensive and – hey! – maybe they didn’t taste too bad after all. Except Saul. Obviously.

But with almost every James T-shirt in Britain having been transformed into a washing-up cloth, aren’t you daunted by having to clean up the town once again?

“It’s a big unknown,” Tim says, fingers firmly pressed to lips once more, “we’ve had a great rest and we feel totally ready now. You’ve got to find your own pace, otherwise you get totally burnt out like all the other bands. That’s why we’ve lasted longer than anyone else. So we really didn’t have much choice, we had to have that time off.”

“It’s Oasis, Radiohead and James in terms of sales in America, but we can’t consider the market. We knew what we had to do for us and we did it. Now we’re back and it’ll be great for us, but God knows if there’ll be an audience.”

“It’s like: ‘We’re ready now!'” James shouts at the embarrassed diners collecting their coats, “Hello, come back!'”

“Erm, are you finished with these?” The waiter has never been so nervous in his life. He eyes the bottle in Saul’s sweaty palm and decides to inch out of the room backwards. And what’s this? Some flowers from the singer.

Tim Booth shakes his head, stares at the bowl of decorative flowers that he’s in the process of handing to the waiter to clear away and laughs. He places them carefully back in the centre of the table, blushes at the riotous laughter from his bandmates and leaps back on his train of thought. Anything to get him away, really.

“In making this album we found a new way of working with each other,” he smirks. “We knew we would have to do that if James was going to survive after Larry left. It was going to have to become more of a band if we were going to continue. It took six months to work that out.”

“The intention was to try and bring the two things together, the tunes and the more abrasive sound. We always had that side of improvisation, but we never showed it to people very much.”

“It’s actually dead exciting for the first time in years,” continues Saul, invigorated. “We’re desperate to get out and play. It’s like: ‘I want this! I want to get out there and play guitar in front of loads of people and be a twat.”

Enter James new album Whiplash; an awesome attempt to chase Noelrock varmints right out of town with the traditional weapons of classic songwriting, wind-swept atmospherics and a few stray missiles of industrial/trip-hop/rock mayhem.

There’s more than enough lung-bursting pop singles here to have the faint-hearted wringing out their T-shirts and stitching them back into shape. as well as the kind of askew glance to the technological future that should see the much-courted underground fall and snog their zip-up leather perv boots. It’s agonised but optimistic, sumptuous yet , unsettling. Quite ace.

BUT THE enemy is strong and it has the the backing of the formidable Weller Cavalry, resuscitated Beatles tunes and, hell, the very karmic gods themselves. So how do the old guard rate the new contenders?

“It’s much too safe for my tastes.” says Saul, diplomatically, “If you listen to a lot of the groups from the ’60s, there’s an energy there. They really kicked ass! But with this current crop of bands it falls somewhere in between being fantastic and not quite getting there, For me, Oasis get the closest and that’s why the whole world loves them.”

“I 1ove the whole rock’n’roll nonsense of it all,” yelps James, sensing kindred spirits. “You give a couple of blokes from Manchester huge success and mi11ions of pounds, and this is what happens! I think it’s wonderful! It’s hilarious!”

“But they’re shamelessly ripping off our musical heritage! Surely this goes against the Creed Of James?

“As a musician I am totally frustrated by that,” Tim agrees. “I don’t understand it. We’re too proud to ever do that. But sometimes you hear it and it works. The Happy Mondays rehashed stuff and it worked, which was wonderful. .But we look to express ourselves, and that means expressing ourselves, not some guy 30 years ago.

“I know some of these musicians and they do, literally, deconstruct songs. They learn how to play a song, then they learn how to mess around with it to make one of their own songs. It’s what art forgers have been doing for years, and occasionally it’s brilliant.”

So maybe the returning heroes can set up ranch next to the new rock invasion. Maybe the West has been won and it got us to a state of universal harmony after all. No need for a civil war, let’s all just gang up against Joe Elliott instead, perchance?

But for all their sordid tales and bloodied reminiscences, James have one last test to pass if they are to match up to the Big Bad Boys of rock. So tell us, what is the biggest lie you have ever told?

A pause.

“I didn’t sleep with her,” ventures Tim.

“It wasn’t me, your honour,” grins James.

Saul ponders a past of sleepless nights, fumbled encounters and rubber jockstraps. “I’m the singer,” he smirks, wickedly.

With that, ponchos are donned, cowboy boots dusted and they’re off into the sunset in a jet-black charger, licensed to carry five rock cowboys, chewing tobacco at the driver’s discretion.

Whiplash away…

James Waited Seven Years For Fame Then Ran And Hid After A Few Years At The Top. They’re Back Now, Telling Tom Lappin All

POPULAR music has an uncanny habit of throwing up parallels. 1997 sees the return of a one-time cult band who inspired a quasi-religious degree of fanaticism, flirted with being stadium dinosaurs, shied away from the mainstream, reinvented themselves with the help of Brian Eno, have come up with a new album that has disparate nods to drum ‘n’ bass, techno and the new dance minimalism, and are not U2.

James never quite attained the megalithic status and corresponding ludicrousness of Dublin’s ageing swingers, instead clinging to a resilient intelligence and credibility, mainly through knowing when to take a break from industry insanity. Such is their freshness, it’s surprising to realise that James are pretty much contemporaries of U2, having been extant for around 15 years.

They spent all of the Eighties in cooler-than-thou obscurity, touring with The Smiths (who paid the rare compliment of covering a James song), releasing a couple of brilliantly inventive left-field albums, criminally under-promoted by their then record company, garnering a small but devoted following, but generally seeming the band least likely to. Then came ‘Sit Down’. A long-time staple of the James live set, its re-release as a single suddenly found it installed as something of a student classic. Smartass university ironists took to sitting down to the track in union discos.

The albums Gold Mother and Seven provided anthems from a similar blueprint, and suddenly James found themselves playing to crowds of 10,000 and upwards, all of whom knew the words to ‘Sit Down’.

“Suddenly everyone wanted a piece of us,” the group’s idiosyncratic frontman Tim Booth recalls.

“We were everywhere. But that seven years in obscurity prepared us musically. We totally established our identity, knew what we wanted, which was to keep exploring and keep being creative. We had that well embedded in the band, by the time success came along, and that was never going to change.”

Seven, and the band’s time-served potency in concert, offered them the chance to leap into the big league of early Nineties stadium rock. It was a possibility they flirted with only briefly before realising how restricting that path would prove. In 1992, they made a decision to withdraw from the fray in Britain and rethink. “We haven’t played here for four-and-a-half years,” says Booth. “That was kind of career suicide on one level, but we needed to do that on our creative journey, for better or worse. We backed away from the idea of playing stadiums because we didn’t really want to. We didn’t know how to handle it at the time. We could probably do it now, but at the time we were more into respect.”

They also had an almost paranoid attitude to their overnight fame.

After years of support slots in tiny clubs, being ignored by their record company and the media alike, they had developed a deep-rooted distrust of the industry that carried over to their sudden high-profile status. After having to support your musical career by volunteering for medical experiments (Booth was rejected for being too frail but the rest of the band were regular guinea-pigs) it is difficult to adjust to a life of schmoozing.

“It was hard to accept success,” says Booth. “If you are a loser for a long time in your life it’s very hard to accept that suddenly things might be going right for you. If we create our own realities, an idea which I loosely subscribe to, you begin to think that you are underdogs and it’s quite hard when people start showering you with love and affection and acclaim to actually perceive it. You get quite churlish. I got like that with ‘Sit Down’ when it became public property. Part of me didn’t want to let go.”

Their 1993 album Laid (and its ‘companion volume’ of experimental noise-scapes Wah Wah) was a conscious reaction against the epic territory of Seven. A substantial contribution from Brian Eno took James into more fluid areas soundwise. It increased their profile in America. The new record Whiplash credits Eno with ‘interference’ and he contributes some bizarre backing vocals but the album is a punchier, more upfront affair than its predecessor, helped by producer Stephen Hague, best known for the shiny pop sound he brought to the Pet Shop Boys and New Order.

“Our records tend to react against each other,” says Booth. “Laid was hard to tour because it was so low-key and delicate, whereas this time we wanted a record that we could really take out live and blow people away with, really uplifting and aggressive tracks.”

Lyrically, Whiplash is often concerned with the pervasive effect of the media, of images of violence and death. It’s something Booth has been writing about since the early James song ‘Johnny Yen’ but this time the focus seems sharper. “The song ‘Lost A Friend’ was partially inspired by seeing the film Seven and the film Heat and seeing the violence in there, the way Seven was making death into an art form.

I thought why is the mainstay of our entertainment watching people being killed? What does that say about us? It’s not a moral judgement, it’s just thinking this is weird. How did we get to this point?”

The single ‘She’s A Star’ could also be interpreted as being about fame, about fighting the restrictions of celebrity, although that’s not quite what Booth intended. “‘She’s A Star’ is a reference to celestial things rather than fame. My ex-girlfriend’s middle name is Zurina, which in India means star. I was influenced by that and some other women I met. One of them had a big star on her bedroom door. It crept into my consciousness. It’s about a woman coming into her own power, a stellar view of life with a different energy to the male world. That’s what I was thinking of. As it turned out the video ended up being directed much more around the idea of someone being a film star. We wanted it to look like a preview for a Fellini movie and be this film within a film. At the last minute they left out that extra layer which I was a bit pissed off with because it added irony to it. Otherwise it’s just us in posh suits, me getting snogged by a model, which I wasn’t that happy with, honestly.”

You believe him, if only because Booth has never been a signed-up member of the posey rock star fraternity. From James’s early days as cardigan-wearing, folk-playing vegetarians, the group have never been even close to having a cool image (on the cover of Laid they wore their mothers’ old flowery frocks). Booth, who studied drama and dance, has the sort of spiritual fascinations that the laddish rock press loves to ridicule, but that he feels are important to maintain an escape route from the cynicism of the rock treadmill.

“My endeavour is to go deeper and deeper and become more honest. I do lots of different things with my life to keep myself open and vulnerable. I have a fear of getting old, of getting rigid and closed. I do a lot of different arts as well as singing. I do acting, work with shamen, I do yoga, a lot of trance dancing, and teach it as well. That’s what my life needs. Otherwise we just fall into rigid patterns. That to me is what living a creative life means. Other bands might use a lot of drugs to get to that state but after a certain number of years you can’t keep doing that or if you do you end up wrecking yourself. I want it to be a conscious spiritual growth.”

At which point he listens to himself and laughs. Booth’s creativity in other areas led to last year’s collaboration with Angelo Badalamenti, the composer best known for his Twin Peaks music. It gave him the chance to express all the over-the-top romanticism his more prosaic bandmates won’t allow him to smuggle onto James albums. “It was something I had to do,” he says.

“I felt too chained to James and the responsibility was getting too much. It’s done us all a lot of good. As a band James had to work without me for long periods and that’s made us much stronger as a result of that. While with Angelo, I could be as poetic and romantic and lush as I wanted to because the music allowed me to. It’s context really. It’s like if you go in the NME and start telling them about meditating for eight hours, you’re a fool because it’s the wrong context. Choose your context and you’re OK.”

Eight hours? On the forthcoming tour Booth is taking a Tai Chi and yoga personal trainer with him to keep him focused. Former guitarist Larry Gott has taken the more radical step of leaving the band to become a carpenter. After a Houston show a couple of years ago he and Booth ended up having a punch-up backstage. The madness of touring eventually became too much.

The rest of them are learning to cope. “We’re getting very good at knowing what we need to stay sane now,” says Booth. “But it’s strange to think our last gig was at Woodstock two years ago, in front of 300,000 people.”

It looked like the beginning of the end for U.K. band James a few years ago – and the timing couldn’t have been better.

Founding member and bassist Jim Glennie and multi-instrumentalist Saul Davies, in town recently to promote James’s new album Whiplash (out today), describe the events of the sextet’s partial dismemberment and triumphant re-assembly with charming, self-deprecating humor.

After providing a shining pop respite in the maelstrom of American grunge with their 1993 gold-plus album Laid and its brief, captivating title single, James capped off months of successful touring with a slot at muddy Woodstock II in 1994.

“We had this momentum going after Woodstock,” Glennie relates.

“And stupidly, suicidally, we decided to start writing this album not long afterwards.”

During that week, James founding member and guitarist Larry Gottleft the group (later replaced by Adrian Oxaal) and enigmatic frontman, singer Tim Booth decided to go off and record Booth And The Bad Angel with composer Angelo Badalamenti, a project Booth had been waiting to do for over a year.

“So from having this band shooting along, all of a sudden it was, crash, bang,” Glennie says.

“And there’s always been weird political division in James because Tim, Larry and I were the only ones actually signed to the record company.

“The new boys came in not long after that, but weren’t signed, but the new boys have been in the band for eight years now. So Tim and Larry leaving shattered this little nucleus.”

Not completely sure they were doing the right thing, Glennie, Davies, keyboardist Mark Hunter and drummer Dave Baynton-Power started “messing around,” writing songs in Baynton-Power’s small, grey home studio in north Wales.

“For the first time, we worked collectively as a band,” Glennie says. “And when Tim came back, he saw that he doesn’t have to be the driving force of James anymore. Not only has it made his life easier, but there’s a shared responsibility and we discovered we can do it very well.

“Looking back on it, it seemed like disaster,” he adds. “But it finally made us a band.”

Of course, the band’s fans would say they’ve been one since their early folk-pop days in the thriving Manchester scene of the early ’80s. Booth’s imaginative singing – and dancing – and James’s move from a quartet to septet, and from simple to more experimental pop in the late ’80s saw them become a more theatrical unit on the live circuit.

For his part, Saul Davies is pleased and amazed that Whiplash’s first single, the lush pop anthem “She’s A Star,” entered the British charts at Number 9, and that James’ three unannounced club shows in London last month received raves from both audiences and critics. Chalk it up to great timing.

“One of the great things about the timing of Laid, why it went over well in the States, was that it provided an alternative to grunge,” Davies says.

“The whole thing of Britpop and especially Oasis in America is that everyone is waiting to see what they’re going to do next,” he says. “But in the intervening time, people will look for other things.”

“If we’d put out an album when (Oasis’ multi-platinum) What’s The Story Morning Glory? came out, it would have been buried, critics would have said, ‘Who are James to release an album when Oasis is out?’

“So I think our job is to provide an alternative to Britpop.”

Bands should ask themselves three big questions once in a while. For starters: do we still matter? Secondly: what’s the point? And crucially: what difference do we make?

Most acts will admit that they’re just along for the jolly. Music provides them with a laugh, a few shags, a nice earner. But for a tiny amount of groups, there’s a crusade worth fighting. They want *betterment* of some kind. That’s what James fought over in the past, and you want to see if they still wear the scars with pride.

So when you meet the core of the band, still cackling over their “pervy” NME photo shoot (drummer Dave Baynton-Power, guitarist Adrian Oxaal and keyboard player Mark Hunter are apparently still, erm, tied up), that’s the important poser. How do James justify themselves these days? Singer Tim Booth suddenly turns stern. For the past few minutes he’s been charming and carefree. He’s been walking the line between flippant and serious conversation, but this question bothers him, and the good humour falls away completely.

“We don’t have to *justify* James,” he snorts. Jim Glennie, bassist and only original member remaining after Tim, rises to the question. “But hypothetically, if we have to justify ourselves…” “No!” Tim insists. “But we *don’t*!” So why are you in a band? What’s the point? “World peace,” says Jim with a straight face. “And global unity.” What are you bringing to the party after 14 years?

“Great music,” Tim decides. “To me, it’s about heartfelt music- ‘cos most people blow out bands after two LPs and we’ve managed to keep it going for a few more than that. It’s looking for depth and looking for real connections and real communication.”

“We still enjoy it,” Jim enthuses. “And we keep changing and moving on and challenging ourselves…and finding another area that we get bangin’ songs out of. We haven’t played for two-and-a-half years. It’s scary, and on-the-edge again. For us, it’s still vital.”

Tim, Jim and guitarist/fiddle player Saul Davies are loading up on poppadoms in a balti house on London’s Brick Lane. The background music consists of old faves (Deep Purple’s “Sweet Child In Time”, *The Godfather* theme and Jim Reeves’ “But You Love Me Daddy”)- all played in a Bollywood style, with masses of strings and wailing voices. This is surreal enough to usher us into the warped story of James, ’83-’97.

In the beginning, they were scatty, sacred fools, livening up Manchester. Each member appeared to be playing a different song to the other. Fold melodies were stretched beyond recognition, gone wild and raggedy. Their early releases on Factory Records typified the adventurous style of the label and the city’s post-punk esprit.

James became fellow travellers with The Smiths; railing against meat-eaters and the phoney glamour of the video age. They made the cover of the NME before most people had heard of them. Tim, like Morrissey, claimed to be celibate and aspired to a kind of gender liberation- away from set distinctions of masculine and feminine. He also danced oddly and wore cardigans.

“Yeah, we looked like a right bunch of losers in those days,” Jim remembers, with mock embarrassment as we mention the facial hair, waistcoats and Victorian pill-box hats of those formative times. “Granted, you *are* right. We couldn’t afford a stylist.” James echoed U2 in their aim to escape the conditioning and compromise of adult life. The Irish band called their debut LP “Boy,” and James wanted theirs to be titled “Lost Innocence,” before settling for “Stutter” instead.

In short, James were a classic indie band of the age. They survived crappy business deals to triumph during the Madchester boom of ’89; ranked alongside former support acts the The Stone Roses and Happy Mondays, their flower-power T-shirt a top accessory. The James anthem, “Sit Down,” was cherished by rock fands and E-heads, a call for friendship a Smiley-suffused nation. It was ace.

But James fell out with Brit fashion again sometime after 1990’s “Gold Mother” LP and a mad finale to the year at Manchester’s G-Mex. The music became grander afterwards, losing some of the twitchy, village ambience of old. Oh well: America thought this was just great. Their sixth album, “Laid,” sold 600,000 copies there.

James’ last gig thus far was at Woodstock ’94, before a potential audience of 300,000 people. Typically, they played obscure indie tracks and songs from the then unreleased free-jam album “Wah Wah.” Still, the crowd went suitably bonkers, and marvellous prospects seemed to be opening for them once more. Nobody figured that Black Thursday was looming instead…

“We didn’t know that was Larry’s last gig with us,” Saul muses, remembering how original guitarist Larry Gott decided that touring and family life were incompatible. “He said, ‘I don’t want to be in this band any more.’ Then our accountant said, ‘I don’t know if any of you can *afford* to be in this band any more.’ Everything collapsed around us.”

Martine McDonagh, the band’s long-standing manager and mother of Tim’s son, Ben, had also left the camp, and Tim was ready to make his album, “Booth And The Bad Angel” with Angelo Badalamenti. He was also suffering from an injury that forced him to wear a neck brace onstage – something American concert-goers had loved. However, poor Tim had to spend 8,000 pounds on various treatments afterwards.

The band was practically done for, until Jim, Saul and Dave made off to the latter’s home studio near Wrexham on a rescue mission that developed into the new “Whiplash” LP. Later, Brian Eno and Stephen Hague duked it out as producers, and jTim passed by, leaving vocals on a multi-track tape to be mangled and uncoiled by the other musicians. Booth was free to work with Badalamenti, happy with his new-found freedom.

Everybody seems pleased with how it came out- free from the indecision and deadening democracy that stalled the experimental “Wah Wah” for ages. By the time *that* artefact was released, U2 and Eno had steamed through with the like-sounding “Zooropa,” which made James seem silly and after the fact. Not so this time; Tim reckons the new LP sounds “triumphant.” Heartstrings are soundly plucked on this record as Tim sings of long roads and good causes on current single, “She’s A Star,” rubbishes the cynics on “Greenpeace” and mocking capitalism on “Go To The Bank.” Booth’s voice is never better than when he’s aggrieved or beseeching- offering up a vision of something that’s going to give the old karmic wheel an extra spin. Some of the techno experiments of “Wah Wah” have even filtered through, offsetting the charge that the band are liberal tub-thumpers, a Simple Minds for the ’90s.

So maybe James have accidentally managed to catch the *Zeitgist* once more; now that emotional, cause-carrying rock is again acceptable in this post-“War Child” era. Now that every record company has signed up a band in the Radiohead/Longpigs vein, it’s only a matter of time before acts are claiming that there’s *always* been a “Joshua Tree” element to their music. In short, is anyone ready for a New Sincerity revival? “Sincerity is such a shitty word, isn’t it?” Jim figures. “It implies a lack of humour- that you’re po-faced. But I also think sincerity means that you’re putting yourself on the line and you’re giving your all. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that. It’s easy to undermine what you do- by slightly taking the piss to avoid being criticised. But I think that’s a cop out, musically.”

So what’s the mood of the band like now?

“It feels like we’re victorious, almost. After “Laid,” we thought, ‘Let’s have a really up album.’ There were a lot of miserable songs we didn’t put on the record because we wanted to tour it. So many of the new songs are in-your-face, with a f— you attitude.”

The closing words on the record are “into the deep.” It’s from a song called “Blue Pastures” that imagines some care-beaten individual crawling off into the snow to lay down and die. Bizarrely, a week after recording the lyrics, Tim discovered a friend’s mentor had actually chosen this method of suicide; taking a favourite walk into the Lake District at night and expiring slowly from the cold.

“That’s what songs do sometimes,” he supposes. “That was a brave thing to do. It’s not mucky and it’s you taking responsibility for your own life, because you take a long time to go that way. He’d tried it before and he woke up in the morning and the snow had thawed. That’s how they knew he’d done it on purpose the second time.”

James don’t sound ready to expire just yet. The mission is incomplete, the missionaries haven’t lost enthusiasm for the job. Which is where we came in, really. Given that Tim refuses to justify his band, we have to answer the questions ourselves.

Do James still matter? Yes, kind of. And what’s the point? Well, they make fine music, and float important ideas around. They restate the value of the alternative and make the outsider feel less alone. The new regime even has time for a right old laugh. And a final query: have they changed *anything* at all out there? Sure, James have made a bit of a difference. You’d miss then if they hadn’t existed. It’s time, once more, to fetch them in from the cold.

It’s 3:45 on a Saturday afternoon at 99X. It’s fairly quiet as the disk jockey simply known as Jill cues up the next disc. All serenity is quickly dispersed as three members of the British band James arrive at the studio. Herded in by bustling management and followed by a small entourage, this faction of James looks tired. Hungry and tired. “Could someone possibly fetch some coffee?” asks Saul Davies, who is shrouded in dark glasses.

“Some food would be nice,” adds Jim Glennie. Vocalist Tim Booth seems to shake off his sluggishness and sits in one of the three chairs next to the soundboard. His two band mates follow.

Their exhaustion is easily justified. James has its nose to the grindstone at the moment promoting their new album Whiplash. A few small, warm-up gigs in Britain were followed by a series of club dates in Washington and New York. After the guys chat with Jill and choose a diverse set of music to play on the air, they’ll make their way to the Roxy where they’ll perform the last of these intimate shows. And then it’s back to New York in the morning where they’ll get ready for an appearance on Letterman.

“It’s a good, quick show,” Booth says of Letterman’s program. “With some of the shows in England you’re sitting around for eight hours. It’s tedious. But on Letterman, you’re in there, you play live, and you get out. We didn’t get offended by the fact he didn’t talk to us. He stuck his head around the door and said, ‘Hi.’ The only grind I had with him the last time we played was that he wouldn’t let me wear a dress. He was worried he was going to lost his Bible Belt following.”

Glennie, Booth and Davies shuffle through the discs Jill has retrieved for them and simultaneously attempt to eat lunch. This potpourri of music includes artists such as Beck and Smokey Robinson & the Miracles. “Where’s the Dolly Parton?” jokes Davies. The band seems much more interested in playing other people’s music than listening to their own this afternoon. This, however, doesn’t reflect the rest of the world.

Whiplash, which was released worldwide at the end of February, shot to No. 5 on the British charts just after it came out. Its sales are doing comparatively better than their 1993 smash Laid. When asked which album is the strongest musically, Booth shakes his head. “That’s impossible,” he says. “Laid was quiet, mellow and delicate. Whiplash is more in your face, aggressive, playful and uplifting.”

The new album contains 11 tracks that vary from radio-friendly pop to hypnotic grooves to dance-floor rave-ups. Produced by Stephen Hague, Whiplash also included some input from Brian Eno, who was involved with Laid and the improvisational double-album Wah Wah. The band says they’ve learned a lot from Eno, but his role in Whiplash was fairly minor. “It’s great working with Eno,” says Davies, “but I think we ought to stop overplaying this thing because that also says in a way that we’re slaves to what he does. And it’s not that way at all. Four years ago, when we made Laid and Wah Wah, it was an immense learning experience for us in terms of how we can make music. A lot of patterns and cliches were questioned by Eno. So we took a lot on board [Whiplash]. A lot of the weirdness on this album that you would associate with somebody like Eno is us. He’s a genius. We’re not, but we’re naive, and we’ve got a lot of energy. And I feel Whiplash is like a first album for James in some ways.”

Glennie agrees. “I think Brian didn’t really need to be there,” he says. “I think he worked through a lot of the conceptual stuff when we were doing Laid and Wah Wah. But this time around it’s like how we implemented that. There was no need for him to sit there babysitting us. And how we applied that kind of space and freedom we found was our angle on it and our input.”

Promoting this music obviously requires a world tour. It officially starts off in England, and James is scheduled to make it back to North America next month. Although touring can be tough, James tends to leave an impression on audiences in more ways that one. In fact, Booth says when they were playing in New York in support of Laid the crowd in the balcony was dancing so hard the floor fell through. “It nearly took the head of our record company with it,” he says. “He was literally about 10 yards away from it when it came down.”

After finishing their live interview with Jill, Glennie, Booth and Davies hop into a rented Lincoln Town Car headed for the Roxy. Although their bellies are now full, their hunger to record more music is extremely apparent. “Yeah, touring is great, but you want to get stuff out to people,” Glennie says. “You want to move on. We want to get on with a new album as soon as possible. Maybe next year.”

The following is a transcription of an interview with David Baynton-Power, James’ drummer, done at the Rendez-Vous restaurant in Atlanta, GA on March 1, 1997.

L = me, D=Dave, T=Travis from the Morrissey fanzine, “Wilde About Morrissey” who sat in on the interview and helped with some questions.

Leaking: So what happened after the last tour?

Dave: Larry didn’t want to tour anymore, I think Tim wanted a rest. I didn’t. I didn’t feel it was a good time to stop, myself, we were making up so much ground. And so we had some time off, we started to try and write some new songs.

L: What about the tax evasion thing?

D: Oh, you heard about “Black Thursday”? That’s basically, we were holed up in the studio and we had a big meeting with the accountants and the lawyers and they basically said “You’re broke. You owe this amount and that amount and it’s basically not looking so good.” And it was also on that day that Larry said “Oh yeah, I’m leaving.” So it was a bit of a downer. Tim had also gone off, he was working with Angelo Badalamenti, so it was all very fragmented and it was looking a bit bleak. Well really, at the end of the day we pulled it all back together, it just took a while.

L: So you went into your studio you have a studio, right?

D: I have a space to set up some equipment at my house, so with the stuff we’d already jammed at bigger studios we thought, “Alright, lets take it to a small room and start editing and basically trying out new sounds and new textures on it. We weren’t really coming up with anything in a big studio where we set up as a band. It’s like you can really hone in on sounds and stuff and it doesn’t cost you a fortune, it doesn’t cost you œ750 a day to do it, you know. You can mess around for weeks and not spend very much money doing it. So finally, things started developing to the point where we found a producer and it was like, “right, let’s go back into a proper studio and put it all together.” Which really brings us up to where we are now. But there were some bleak moments. There always have been in James’ history. Like when disasters happen is when we sort of get going.

L: In an article the NME printed a couple of weeks ago, it sounded like Tim wasn’t with you when you recorded, that he did his thing and you did yours in separate studios. Is that accurate?

D: Umm, well he wasn’t when we were working at my house, and that was another reason for doing what we did. Cause like we had his rough vocals on tape, so it’s like, “Alright we’ve got the basis of the melody and the tunes that are going on. Let’s find an interesting setting to put them in, you know. But then hopefully, once he’s sorted out his album, he can come back which he did.” We all got together in a proper studio and got it sorted.

L: It seems like you are taking a very different outward approach these days, a real change in attitude, umm, there was that lovely picture…

D: Oh, you liked that?

L: Yeah. It’s up on the webpage….

D: Good. Yeah. Just type in on your web browser “James’ Bottoms.”

L: It’s actually Jamesbum.

D: Jamesbum? Hahaha, good.

L: But it really seems like there’s been a real change. I read a while back Tim saying something to the extent of “No funny pictures.” What brought this about?

D: When you look back at the photographs the press have got, you just think, “What a bunch of boring sods we were.” We just thought, let’s do a photo where you’re going through the magazine and you go “AHH!”

L: It worked…

D: Yes. It worked. So that was basically it, you know. At that photo session it started out, Saul was sat in a chair, the photographer says “Everybody gather round him.” It was like, “Lads, we’ve been here before, let’s do something, let’s make a move.” You know what I mean?

L: So who’s idea was that?

D: Saul’s actually.

L: Not surprising…

D: Well, after I suggested that we’d been there before, it was like, what can we do? He was like “What can we do? Lets take our clothes off, yeahhhhh. Let’s get naked.”

L: Well Tim didn’t…

D: But no, I mean you can’t hide from the fact that, I don’t know if I should be saying this…oh well, fuck it…

T: We know what you’re going to say…

D: There is a bit of a division. Like Tim’s into a lot of stuff that he’s into, and we’re kind of into different stuff. We thought, well, let’s use it to our advantage. So that’s basically why he was there holding the whip and we’re the whipping boys. We thought it was a fun way to kind of show that off, you know.

L: On that subject, have you ever objected to or censored anything he’s written, lyric-wise?

D: Uhh, it goes all ways. You’re always going to come up with your part of a track and someone will go, “Ahh, I don’t know if I really like that…” It’s just the way you bring it up really. Not like “Well, I think its CRAP.” You’ve got to be able to say “Well why don’t you try THIS.” It’s how you do it really.

L: So tell us about Adrian, the new guy.

D: Where did he come in eh? He’s an old friend of Saul’s, and uh, obviously we had to find somebody else with Larry going and luckily he fit the bill. He’s a really good guitar player. He’s a bit more rocking than Larry, he’s got a bit of an edge, which has injected a new spark into the band. It was so good for us that we didn’t have to audition, put the advert in and then 100 guitar players and we’re “No we’ll give you a call…” It was like, “Adrian? Yeah, give him a go. Great. He works.” So luckily that was quite easy for us.

L: So you were working with Stephen Hague and Brian Eno on the new album?

D: Yeah.

L: How do you feel that working with Stephen Hague, who’s done so much with New Order, affected the direction of the album?

D: Umm…

T: Versus Brian Eno.

D: Brian didn’t have a great deal to do with this album really. He did a lot of backing vocals, great backing vocals. There, Brian Eno. Backing vocals. Yeah, Stephen was great. Really nice bloke, easy to get on with, and he’s made a lot of pop records so he has a good ear for a tune. He’s one of the guys who really wanted to get involved. And he has a great track record and it was like “Oh wow!” It’s always great when someone like that, when you get a phone call saying he really wants to do the record, when someone likes us.

L: So are you glad to be back on the road?

D: Well, after three years…There’s no point in being unrealistic and thinking “Well, perhaps no one is interested anymore.” There’s been a lot of change in music. In three years some bands have been and gone you know. So you put your record out and you think, “Is it gonna do anything?” And after all this time to come back to America, and we’re only doing 3 shows, a bit of a promotional trip, and we’ve sold them all out. It’s like, it’s grand!

L: So what are your plans? I know you’re doing some dates in England. Then what?

D: Gonna come back over here.

L: What is the best tour story you have?

D: Uhh, oh god. They’re not printable.

L: Ok, something printable…

D: I don’t know. Can’t you ask what’s the best gig we’ve ever done?

L: OK then, your favorite way to pass time on the tour bus?

D: Hahaha. Sleep, I suppose.

L: What’s your favorite song to play live?

D: Uhh, at the moment, I’d have to say, for me, personally, at the moment I really like doing “Come Home.” Cause we’ve reworked it, pumped it up and modernized it and it’s just like “Shit! If only we’d done this the first time…” *laughs* It so annoys us, you know, you record tracks very much in their infancy and once we’ve had them on the road for a while, they really start coming together and you think, “Shit. If only we had this on the record…”

L: It seems it could get really boring playing them for so many years.

D: Well it does, yeah. Well we’ve done this new version of “Born of Frustration,” which you may or may not like, but there was always a lot of baggage with that song, because it came out at a time when the press started turning on us in England, you know. There was one point where every gig we did we got a great review. Suddenly it just turned and we got slagged off as being a stadium rock band, and being called the new Simple Minds and that track was kind of the key of all that.

T: That song broke you in the U.S.

D: I know, but for us that song has a lot of baggage with it, and when we play it we’ve got all this shit going on in our heads and stuff and it’s like we knew a lot of people like it, so it was like, “How can we present it so it’s kind of new for us and not so stadium…?”

L: But you did that slow acoustic version. Do you know what I’m talking about?

D: No. When?

L: In 1994.

D: Did we? We can’t remember that one.

L: I just remember seeing you play in 1992 and being shocked that you didn’t play it because it was the hit single.

D: Yeah. That sounds typical of us. We’re great at shooting ourselves in the foot.

L: No, people were really into it. You may not remember, it was in Boston on Halloween.

D: Oh yeah…I remember that one. We all dressed up stupid didn’t we? *Laughs*

L: Yeah. About the only costume I remember is Jim’s. He looked like a big dildo.

D: Oh yeah, I remember that *grin*.

L: So what’s your most embarrassing moment on stage?

D: I’ve never had any. *laughs* No, not really. None I can remember. Probably you can ask other people and they’ll tell you something funny, but not me. I spent a lot of time getting into a headspace where I don’t get nervous on stage at all and I play much better for it. You get wound up and you make mistakes, and when you make mistakes you give yourself a really hard time about it. You really have to go on stage and not give a fuck and then you play well. It’s taken a while to get to that space, but I think I’ve managed it. It actually came from being in America. There’s a bit more laid-back attitude over here. I find most Americans far mor easy going in some ways. I caught the vibe.

L: I noticed that the last time I saw you, at the Orpheum in Boston, you came out with a cane. What happened?

D: Oh yeah. I damaged my foot. We’d been, uh, rehearsing in Woodstock, have you been to Woodstock?

L: No.

D: Not the gig, the town. Cause there’s a big studio there called Bayersville, and there’s a big wooden barn there that bands use to rehearse and we were there for a week before we started that tour and Boston was the first show. Well, me and Jimmy, we go running and stuff, we’d go running through the woods. So I’m bombing out through the woods one day, and I just landed on the ankle and my foot turned over like that. Luckily it was this leg [gestures] and not that one cause we would have had to pull the tour. I couldn’t have played. So that’s why I had the cane.

L: What would be the lineup of your ideal gig?

D: Umm, I’d have to say there wouldn’t be any rock bands. I’m a bit of a techno dude. Out in the mountains. No bands.

L: Just a DJ?

T: Like the Prodigy?

D: Yeah…we like the Prodigy and Underworld and people like that you know.

T: So it was your influence on the radio today? Prodigy….

D: No, there’s quite a lot of us really. We’re going for a lot more of that. We just find it a lot more exciting cause it’s new, you know.

T: That’s why you mess around with remixes?

D: Yeah, we’ve also started another side project as well, doing a lot of that stuff. We’re fishing around for deals at the moment.

T: To put out a record?

D: We’ve got one ready to go.

L: So this is the trance/ambient album I heard rumors about?

D: It’s not ambient really. Some of the songs are like 3-minute pop songs in a techno environment.

T: Are there vocals on it?

D: Yeah, a few, yeah.

T: Is it Tim?

D: No.

T: Who?

D: Saul. It’s Saul.

T/L: Ohh, so he really DOES want to be the singer….

D: It’s wild up where I live, see, I live in Wales and I only discovered this last summer, I was getting a bit pissed off living in Wales, after being in London and doing the album. I was thinking, “What the fuck am I doing here?” I only know a few people, it was a bit boring. And when you want to go out you think, “Oh let’s go to Manchester, go to Liverpool to go to a club.” And all the time there were these banging parties happening out in the forests. People go out with a sound system and just techno away all night. Once I discovered that, I just thought Wales is the best place on earth. And I got the lads over, I said “You’ve got to come to these parties, they’re brilliant!” They’re totally unregulated so you don’t have to buy tickets, there’s no security, it’s just like people having fun. That’s really changed a lot of things. I have to give a plus to the people who put those on. People called the Dosse Posse. Stick THAT on the net. That would be good.

L: Careful or you’ll have people coming over there to try and catch a glimpse of you at these parties.

D: Yeah, well you’ve got to know the sites and all. It’s all underground, all word of mouth, know what I mean? That’s what I love about it you know.

L: Do you feel you are trying to present a certain visual image to go with the music?

D: There’s never been a big game plan. There’s probably more going on now than there ever has been.

L: So where did that idea for the cover art come from?

D: Don’t know actually.

L: It’s caused quite a stir. You have an internet mailing list that you may or may not know about…

D: I know there’s a big list of like – me and Mark were we use this little studio in Wales to do b-sides and various bits and bobs and Mark brought his computer down and his modem and got hooked up to the net. I’ve never really surfed the net before. And he said “Have a look at this,” and he pulled up this list and it was like every James bootleg that’s ever been made. *laughs*

L: Oh my, I think my list is up there….

D: Hold on, I’ve got no problem with bootlegs. I’ve got no problem at all with ’em. I think they’re great. I know it’s only hardcore fans who buy them, it’s not like its dipping into our sales, that’s crap, you know what I mean? I think it’s great. It’s flattering that people are that into it, to be doing that shit. It was just like, lists, all these gigs. I mean bloody hell! Gigs I’d forgotten about. I was like “We played there did we?!” It was so long, I couldn’t believe it.

L: There’s actually 2 different pages. The one you are talking about, and then another one that has a chatboard and icons and cursors of you and stuff. And there’s an email mailing list.

D: Oh we could get it up and bang a few things out as well.

L; They wouldn’t believe it was you. Someone once tried to convince people he was Tim, using a bogus address. But my point was, the album cover people were speculating it was a transvestite or even Tim in drag.

D: Tim in drag? Ha. Well, I’ll tell ya, all I can say is like, figure it out. *laughs*

T: Kind of like the Laid cover? It was like, FIGURE THAT ONE OUT, the dresses and the bananas….

L: That was real subtle….

D: Well, I’ll tell ya, that was because we were starving. We were doing a photo session and we were all miserable and going “I’m hungry.” And someone was dispatched to try and find some food and there was only a veg shop open. We were in Marseille, right that’s the cathedral in Marseille, those doors. And it was just like, that’s all they came back with, bananas. I’m telling you, there was no game plan. But as for the new one, you’ll have to guess. Sorry. Whatever you wanna think, think it. It’s probably more fun than the truth.

L: I think we can come up with something good…. There’s a bit on the page that was posted for April Fools last year about Mark Hunter, that people believed….

D: What was it?

L: Well, we said that Mark had been jogging and was nearly hit by a car. So he got mad and tried to kick in the car’s windshield and the police were called in. And he proceeded to moon the policeman and was dragged in for psychiatric evaluation.

D: Ha! Good work! That’s far more interesting than the truth. *laughs*

L: Yeah, well, 3 months later people were still going “What happened? Was it true?”

D: Who did it?

L: Me.

D: Good work. Keep doing it. Mad stories I love it. It’s a good story innit.

L: I thought so, especially after seeing that NME picture…Ok. Videos. Is there a story behind the latest video?

D: I think so. I haven’t figured it out meself though.

L: No, I mean, were you trying to emulate something specific?

D: Fellini.

L: Ahh. So who generally comes up with the ideas? You or the directors?

D: Well, yeah, ideas are banged around. Then you’ve got to find a director, and you sort of muck a few things out with them and you end up with something. It’s kind of fairly hit or miss.

L: How do you like doing them? It seems you’ve done low-budget stuff in the past, except for the last couple.

D: Yeah, well we don’t feel very comfortable in them, you know, we’re not like some bands that really go out and perform.

T: Well, based on the video in gorilla outfits, I’m sure you’re REAL comfortable in that….

D: I think one of the best videos I’ve ever seen was New Order “Round and Round.”

T: Oh, cause they’re not in it.

D: Just loads and loads of gorgeous women.

T: Right.

D: I thought “That’s so cool.” Why can’t we have a video like that, we’re not even in it, brilliant.

L: I’ve always liked the Replacements video where it’s just somebody’s feet and the radio.

D: And he kicks it in.

T: I think I’ve seen that one.

D: Most videos have a very simple but original idea. You know what I mean? You just go “I wish I’d thought of that.”

L: In the “Seven” video, you’re wearing T-shirts and stuff with the numbers one through seven. There is no number 5. Was that just bad editing?

D: Really? I never noticed. There’s seven of us, so what happened?

L: No no, I mean, it counts up…

D: There’s no five going on?

L: 5 never shows up.

D: I wasn’t aware of that. Did you watch the “Born of Frustration” video?

L: Yes.

D: Have you noticed what’s weird about that?

L: Besides the wind?

D: No, you’re not looking hard enough.

L: Andy in a dress…*grin*?

D: Have you looked at the guitar player?

L: What, are you the guitar player?

D: No no no. It’s not Larry.

L: Then who is it?

D: It was our tour manager. Our record company never noticed either.

L: Now I have to go back and look. Heheh.

D: I’ll tell you what happened. Basically it was our first trip to America. We’d run over to L.A. to shoot the video there, up in the “Troner Pinnacles.” Out in Nevada somewhere, that’s where it was shot. Well, the night we got into L.A., Larry got mugged. He was so shaken up he just buggered off home the next day. So he sent our tour manager out to take his place. He was wearing glasses and he wore Larry’s hat and all; but no one ever noticed. So there you go. A little bit of trivia for you.

L: That’s great. Is there a sample of “Bring A Gun” in “Avalanche?” Do you know what I’m talking about?

D: No, I don’t actually. I haven’t listened to “Bring A Gun” in years.

L: There was one bit in there that sounded like a sample from Seven, a real fast staccato bit.

D: I think it’s actually Larry’s guitar played an octave higher on the soundboard. For all the technical people out there who like that sort of stuff, that’s what it probably is.

T: You’re not drinking tea? You like tea?

D: Yeah, but I don’t want to offend you Americans. You haven’t got a clue how to make one.

T: I drink tea all the time.

D: You don’t have kettles.

L: So what is your recipe for tea then?

D: Boiling water.

L: Well yeah….

T: With a bag in it.

D: You take the kettle to the the pot to the kettle, or the other way around. Cause like you order tea over here and they bring you a cup of hot water with a tea bag on the side. And they bring you cream?! No. Sorry. Doesn’t work. You know what I mean. You put a man on the moon, but you can’t sort your tea out. [laughs]

T: Have you ever tried iced tea? What do you think about that?

D: It’s alright. Yeah. I remember doing an interview with Musician magazine.

L: Yeah, something about Earl Grey….

D: Yeah, and I said it’s all about the water temperature. [laughs]

L: So, are there any songs that you’ve done, that you would now disavow?

D: Disown? Not want to know about?

L: Yeah.

D: Well, yes and know really. I mean it’s like, the longer an album takes to make, the harder it is to listen to it. Cause then you can’t have any objectivity because you’re just so wrapped up in every little step of the work that went into it, and it takes years for that to get forgotten and to just listen to it and go “Oh yeeeaaah.” But who knows. I really wish we could just sort of undergo hypnosis, you know, so once you finish the album, someone could go “ooooohhh” [makes noise] and you could listen to it like you’ve never heard it before and then you could make an objective opinion on it. But that’s just one of the factors that goes with the job.

L: Are there any songs you feel like you’ve outgrown? Cause the sound has changed so drastically.

D: Well we do, we always change, or we’d get bored.

L: But I mean you listen to Stutter and you listen to Whiplash and it’s not even the same band really.

D: That was a long long time ago. I’m sure even the Grateful Dead sounded a bit different later on, didn’t they?

L: I would not know.

D: I’ve never listened to them.

L: You wouldn’t want to start….

D: But what a phenomenon. The biggest grossing act in America.

L: And they only had one top 40 hit ever.

D: It was brilliant. Not playing the commercial game and yet still having such a huge dedicated following. I would never knock ’em for it at all.

T: Do you feel you guys play the commercial game?

D: Yes and no. You’ve got to toe the line somewhere. I mean when you’ve signed to a major label, you know…

T: There’s nothing wrong with that.

D: Well, you know, it gets old. Maybe I wouldn’t be doing this if I wasn’t playing the commercial game. It’s all about exposure, doing interviews, and getting across to people.

L: Oh I don’t know, if you were big “rock stars” you probably wouldn’t have spoken to me in the first place.

D: I don’t know. I mean you do an interview with a magazine and they send along a reporter who basically doesn’t fucking like you and he’s gonna do a hatchet job on you, you know. But you people actually like the music, you come to our shows. I’d much rather talk to you people, you know what I mean? It’s like far more real.

L: Well, of course we think so.

D: No, we’ve been set up loads of times. Send over some real lad who’s all “Oh yeah oh yeah mate and really like ya” and he just goes “Bunch of sods, don’t like em.” It’s like “Fucking arsehole!” Know what I mean? Such a cheap trick.

L: It just doesn’t seem worth it to take the time to do an interview if you’re just going to trash a band. You could just as easily give them lousy reviews and then no more publicity and it would serve your purpose.

D: They’re nasty, bitter people.

L: They’re failed musicians….

D: Probably, yeah yeah yeah.

L: Ok, now I have a bunch of rather….unrelated questions. Which other member of the band would you most want to be and why?

D: No, I wouldn’t. I’m quite happy. That’s a perfectly ok answer as well.

L: Which song, by another artist, do you wish you’d written?

D: “Unfinished Symphony” erm, “Sympathy” by Massive Attack. Like “Damn! Why didn’t we do that!”

L: What do you want the first line of your autobiography to say?

D: Oh fuck. That’s probably it actually. “Oh fuck.” This is the story… I don’t know, I haven’t got a witty answer for you, I don’t know what to say. You’d probably only get a really good one for that from Jimmy or Bob.

L: Bob?

D: Bob. Bob’s Saul. We’ve all got stupid nicknames.

L: Ahh, that answers a lot. I have an interview from a Toronto radio station and Jim keeps saying “Bob” and the DJ never said exactly who he was interviewing. “Bob” kept calling Jim, “Jim” though.

D: Stick that on the net. Saul is Bob.

L: So what are everybody else’s stupid nicknames?

D: Well, I get called “Welsh,” which is fine. It could be a lot worse.

L: Not very creative.

D: Uhh…Mark’s “Chunny Lad.”

L” Is that where “Chunny Chops” came from?

D: Yeah. It was “Chunny Pops” but they misspelled it on the cover. [laughs] We thought it was hilarious.

L: What is that supposed to mean?

D: “Chunny Lad?”

L: Yeah.

D: Uhh…fuck it. I couldn’t explain it to ya. Well, Adrian, Adrian is called [laughs], “Mr. Pastry.” [laughs]

T: Please don’t ask him about that one….

D: Jim hasn’t got one, cause he’s fucking’ untouchable. We’ve tried. They just don’t stick. So we couldn’t.

Frank: Teflon.

D: We tried “Teflon,” it just doesn’t work. So we’ve given up trying. Umm…and Tim’s “Monty.” [laughs]

Greg: Where did that one come from?

D: Uhhh, I can’t…I can’t say.

L: Sure you can….

G: Incriminating factors as well?

L: What is he? “Let’s Make a Deal?”

D: [laughs]

L: We could go really bad places with that….

D: Well, there you go.

L: Ok, what’s the worst thing you’ve ever been asked in an interview?

D: [laughs]

T: I hope it’s not this one.

D: It’s probably one of your questions. Umm, I don’t do a lot of interviews actually. So, I don’t have an answer to that.

L: What’s the best album you’ve bought in the last year?

D: Uhh, I haven’t bought much recently, actually. Uhh, I tell ya, umm, I don’t know. Can you hold it down to a track or something like that?

L: Sure.

D: I don’t know if I can tell. It’s by the Scot Project, it’s on umm, it’s like a fucking’ acid/techno album, a track. But it’s by the Scot Project. I’ll have to find the title out for you.

L: You’re going to be up all night trying to think of it now.

D: Oh, definitely the label’s Reactivate. It just reminds me of all the great parties last summer. They always used to play it when the fucking sun was coming up over the mountains.

L: What’s the first album you ever bought?

D: Ahh, I think it was The Move.

L: The Move?

D: British band.

T: Never heard of ’em.

D: Going back a while, yep.

L: What’s the most embarrassing item in your record collection?

D: Oh loads. These are the ones you get free off the record company [laughs]. There’s quite a lot in there.

T: How about stuff you’re embarrassed to like?

D: Uhh, I’m not embarrassed to like anything. I can always justify it [laughs].

L: Well, ok, what’s the last book you read?

D: Umm, I don’t read books.

L: You don’t?

T: Good for you.

D: I just read magazines. But see I can hold a conversation about most books because I’ve read about them in magazines [laughs].

L: If you were a slurpee, what flavor would you be?

D: [exclaims] A WHAT?!

L: Umm, an icee or a slush puppy, sort of a virgin daiquiri, only in any flavor you want…

D: I’ve never had one.

L: But but, I KNOW they have them in the UK.

D: Yah I know, slush puppies. I’ve never had one.

L: Well, hehe, pick a flavor.

D: Make one up.

L: Ok then, choose a bubble gum flavor.

D: Pop.

T: OK, that’s cola, there’s a cola flavor…

L: If you could choose a way to die, which would you prefer: violent death, accident, or disease?

D: They’re not very good choices are they?

L: No, they’re not.

D: They’re horrible choices. That’d be a Brumpton’s Cocktail wouldn’t it. You know a Brumpton’s Cocktail?

L: No idea.

D: I don’t know if they’re still used. They used to give them to terminally ill people. It’s just a fucking massive mix of pharmaceutical grade heroin and other things and you just fucking nuke out, you don’t know a thing about it.

L: Ahh, now we just have Jack Kevorkian.

D: Yeah.

L: Ok, this one is particularly bad. If you were kidnaped by Martians, what body part would you want them to have three of?

D: Sorry?

L: If you were kidnaped by Martians, what body part would you want them to have three of?

D: [laughs] Well, depends what they look like.

L: Use your imagination.

D: 3 nipples [laughs]. You said anything.

L: Ok, uhhh, what’s the most disgusting thing you’ve ever eaten (excluding bodily fluids)?

D: They’re quite alright those, usually. Umm, fuck it, I don’t know. Probably some kind of shellfish. Mussels…anything like that. I’d chuck. I’d throw up.

L: It’s like snot….

D: Yeah, just the smell of all that sea water. I always used to have a problem when I was a kid and I used to go to the beach. Just that smell used to make me heave. I used to dread going to the beach because I knew every time I went it was like [makes puking noise]. I’ve gotten over it now like, it’s just one of those childhood traumas that you go through.

T: You mean the old people didn’t scare you away?

D: No no no, I’m fine now. Old people rarely smell….

L: Old people in bikinis?

D: Eeew.

T: Well in England, you go to Blackpool?

D: Well only once, really, for a gig.

T: Old people sit outside in chairs. They don’t sit on the beach. They sit outside and chat. It’s not a beach like here, it’s pebbles and everything.

D: Yeah it’s horrible. It’s got Sallowfield up the road banging out loads of radioactive waste.

L: Sounds great…. Ok, your most prized possession?

D: Ahhh, uhhhh.

T: Your drum kit?

D: No. [garbled] It’s just something that you turn up and hit every night. Umm, I haven’t got one, cause when you have prized possessions they get taken away from you.

L: Now that sounds sad.

D: Of course I’d be too attached to something. I could say my girlfriend, but she’s not a possession, you know what I mean?

L: Yeah. Your worst vice?

D: You don’t wanna know….

L: Haha, another place we shouldn’t go eh? Then what was the first gig you ever saw?

D: Uhh, Hawkwind.

L: [laughs] and what YEAR would THAT have been?

D: Uhh, 1974…something like that. It’s going back a bit.

L: Well, that’s all I have.

D: Well, I’ve got to chill a bit before the show anyway.

Jim : This is the James rock n roll tour bus, part of the Vantool collection which is top of the range I’m told. Well that’s what the driver told us anyway.

Oh, we’ve found a member of James asleep in his bed. Surprise, surprise. It’s Adrian Oxaal. Hello Adrian.

Adrian : Hello

Jim : How are you today?

Adrian : Sleepy

Jim : He’s always sleepy. Hangover. Surprise surprise.

Alcohol. And this is the back lounge where we kind of meet the general public and acts of gross indecency go on. So I’m told, I’m also in bed by half nine.

Tim : To me, Black Thursday wasn’t a catastrophe at all. It was one of those points where things have to change and it’s not going to change. Larry resigned, our accountant came to us and said we had a five-year tax bill that had been frozen for five years and money we’d been told had been put aside hadn’t been put aside and everything came down on one day. And so I went off to make the Booth And The Bad Angel record and left it to Jimmy to sort out.

Jim : I had to sell things to try and meet the tax bill. Children.

Tim : His body. Your little son

Jim : Still miss him.

Tim : It’s schizophrenic. We definitely have the tension of the yob and the saint working within the band continuously. It seems like a good balance, a good pivot. We don’t believe in black and whites.

The whole press view of James has always been very weird to us. We’ve never understood it. They were calling us Buddhist vegans. There’s no Buddhist vegans here. There never were and we’d tell people this and they’d never believe us for some reason. So for years people had this view of us as a very polite band, this band has been very rock n roll, very cliched for a number of years.

Partly, I mean some of the reputation has come because I’m a sick man. I had an inherited liver disease so I have a very clean life out of physical necessity. It’s not something I preach to anybody else. It’s what I do and I do a lot of things like yoga and meditation and things like that. Mainly because I nearly died when I was 22, I stopped breathing and I’ve had to find ways of nourishing myself in that way. But it’s not something I’d like to get self-righteous about.

The lyrics I’ve been writing, a lot of the stuff has been about spirit and the nature of spirit. I got a lot of it out on Angelo. It’s probably more suited to his cheesy keyboard than it is to James guitars so me and Angelo could indulge in that area and do a record like that because then I didn’t need to force it upon these guys. Oh no, not another one, can’t you sing about birds and tits and football

Jim : Well you like football as well. It’s not just God

Tim : No, I want to sing about God again.

Jim : (sings) God is good

Tim : It was like I almost got the right medium for it I think, probably with Booth and the Bad Angel. And then it meant I could come back here and appreciate this and they could appreciate me again.

That break was fantastic because it was like you know. There must have been about a year when we hardly saw each other. And when we came back it was like “Oh God, these are my friends. You know when you’re too close to something, you forget to appreciate it sometimes and we’d got into that place. And now it’s like we’re having a blast.

James are back with a new single She’s A Star from the album Whiplash and a video that pays tribute to one of the world’s most famous film directors.

Tim : The video was meant to be a kind of homage to Fellini and a kind of parody of it and took the idea of, yes, film stars and the other black-haired woman becoming the star even though there’s the more obvious blonde star. So it’s kind of a cruder version of what I think I was probably writing about which is about people coming into their own power and realising their own strengths.

JAMES – SPLIT

James have revealed they nearly split up as a result of their huge success in the early nineties. They were touring like mad in the States and got sick of the sight of each other. “We played in Britain for 11 years virtually the whole time. We felt like people needed a break – we were getting taken for granted and we were taking ourselves for granted. We were just going to play stadiums and we didn’t want that – so we ran away. Our guitarist left, and Tim wanted to do his own things – so there was a big question over whether we’d hold it together.”

JAMES – GETTING IT TOGETHER

They did their own thing for a bit but then the band’s creative juices got flowing again – they released She’s A Star and now the album Whiplash. Tim Booth says “I went and made a record, but it felt like a rest because I wasn’t doing it with James. We needed a break from each other, we needed a rest. We need to unpack our bags and do our washing! We’ve got our legs back now and we’re ready to get out there and have some fun.”

Tim Booth of James tells us about the records that make him feel like a star

1 LOUIS ARMSTRONG : ‘Wonderful World’ (HMV Single)

“I have childhood memories of this. I hated it when I was younger. It was too positive. I love it now because it’s so generous and rich and, his voice, it’s so &ldots;. ridiculously big. It’s a heart song.”

2 JOY DIVISION : ‘Love Will Tear Us Apart’ (Factory single)

“I love this even without its poignant history. I love it for the haunting keyboards and the scratchy, crappy recording of this beautiful love song, and its beautiful chorus – you can’t really tell what he’s singing in the verses. I like that. I was in Manchester when he died. People were just devastated. Friends I knew just sat on a bus all day and went round and round Manchester.”

3 DOLLY PARTON : ‘I Will Always Love You’ (from the RCA LP ‘Dolly Parton’s Greatest Hits’)

“I only got into this in the last year. I was in a clothing shop and they were playing ‘Dolly Parton’s Greatest Hits’, and I left the shop and bought the cassette. She’s written some great songs: ‘Jolene’ and ‘I Will Always Love You’. Whitney Houston’s version is atrocious. Awful. Theatrical laryngitis. Dolly Parton’s version is heartfelt and moving.”

4 JAMES : ‘Sometimes’ (from the Fontana LP ‘Laid’)

“All these songs aren’t so much influential as my faves. And, if I’m saying my faves, I would say a load of James songs. When you write a song, you’re so much connected to it. Even if it isn’t as good as some of the other songs, to you, it is.”

“‘Sometimes’ was the song that got Brian Eno to make the record ‘Laid’ and Brian said it was one of the greatest musical moments of his life when we recorded that, which is the highest honour we’ve probably ever had paid to us. We just used to get high playing this song. That’s the best thing – getting high when you’re playing your own songs. That happens with ….”

5 TIM BOOTH AND ANGELO BADALAMENTI : ‘Fall In Love With Me’ (from the Fontana LP ‘Booth and the Bad Angel’)

“I love singing this. I sing it at parties. People can’t stop me singing in. It’s like a spell to me, a love charm. And it’s quite sneaky really, cos people fall in love with me when I play it. It doesn’t always work, though. It failed badly for me last weekend.”

6 AMERICA : ‘Horse With No Name’ (Warner Brothers single)

“I love the scarcity of this song. It’s like a narrative – and I’m a sucker for narratives. It’s also got a double meaning – ‘A Horse With No Name’ is a phrase for heroin – but you don’t even need to know that because there’s a whole separate narrative about going through the desert on a horse with no name. In fact, Angelo and I did a cover of it when we were mucking around doing radio stations in America. Also, it was produced by George Martin. Now there’s a real genius.”

7 ROLF HARRIS : ‘Sunrise’ (Columbia single)

“When we first formed James it was the only cover version we ever did. We used to do it on radio with toilet rolls pretending to be didgeridoos. I changed the lyrics to something corny about the last sunrise, a nuclear sunrise. ‘The sunrise too early in the morning.’ That was our version of Rolf’s masterpiece. I think I went for it because it was the first time I’d heard a didgeridoo, which is such a magical instrument. But you can really only hear it on the one song. It doesn’t have much variation in itself.”

8 VAL DOONICAN : ‘Paddy McGinty’s Goat’ (Decca single)

“One of my favourite songs ‘Paddy McGinty’s Goat’ was probably the first song I ever sung to anyone. My mother used to make me sing it to my auntie. I was so shy – I used to sing it from behind the sofa.

‘Oh Paddy Mc Ginty’s an Irishman of note / Fell in for a fortune so he bought himself a goat / Said he ‘I’m sure of goats milk I’m going to have my fill / Till he got the nanny home and found it was a bill.'”

9 PATTI SMITH : ‘Hey Joe’ (Mer single)

“A Hendrix cover. Astonishing . She interweaves in the myth of Patty Hearst robbing the banks – you know the little rich girl in the Seventies who got kidnapped by the Symbionese Liberation Army, and four months later she was on videos robbing banks. So, Patti Smith interweaved that story with Hendrix’s ‘Hey Joe’ and Tom Verlaine’s playing guitar &ldots; and, it’s just amazing. It starts out with her reading a poem : ‘Honey, the way you feel guitar makes me feel masochistic / And you standing beneath the Symbionese Liberation Army flat with your legs spread / I wondered whether you were dead, or whether you were getting it every night from some black revolutionary and his women / You know what your Daddy said / He said ; he said ; he said; Sixty days ago she was my little child and now here she is with a gun in her hand.'”

“It’s like this ridiculously melodramatic wonderful poem. It’s my favourite song ever. In fact, Patti Smith’s ‘Horses’ album influenced my whole musical agenda. She wasn’t frightened to make an arsehole of yourself, and I think to be a good lyricist you have to make an arsehole of yourself. To fly, you’re going to have to crash, too. If you look at some of Neil Young’s lyrics, some of them are terrible and some are pure genius.”

10 JOHN LENNON : ‘No 9 Dream’ (from the Apple LP ‘Walls And Bridges’)

“A mediocre album, but what I like about ‘No 9 Dream’ is that it’s got three parts which shouldn’t be together in the same song; it’s very hallucinogenic and very composed. Only a very good musician could ever attempt anything like that. It sweeps you in to this dream world and then half way through it changes into the daftest thing.”

“The first time I discovered how brilliant it was, I was on the tour bus, going between Seattle and San Francisco, and we were in the mountains, at nine in the morning and I put it on and it was so beautiful, I just started to cry. Then I went and found Saul, who was awake, and I said ‘Come here, listen to this song and look at the mountains.’ And he did and he started crying as well. I thought ‘I knew it was scientific.’ I was convinced.”

On entering the LWT building on London’s South Bank, one could be easily unnerved. Immediately to the left, glossy photos of such toothy-grinning celebs as Cilla, Richard & Judy and Beadle stare surreally down on the reception area. Soon to be added to this Hall Of Fame, no doubt, is Mr Bob Mills – comic, footie expert and chat show host. James are here to perform their trimphant single ‘She’s A Star’ on his new Saturday night slot. Map and compass in hand, I venture out in search of the mercurial Mancunians. ventually I stumble upon the Green Room where Mr Mills, a Giant Haystack of a human specimen, is organising rehearsals. I stare into his kneecaps, grab a beer and scale further heights to the restaurant where the James boys have eloped for an early evening nibble.

Previous preconceptions would suggest nothing more than a vegefest, a rock ‘n’ roll rice dish. But this was never James. Singer Tim Booth, maybe – the original man to put the green in runner bean – but not the rest of the band. It’s appropriate that, tonight, Tim is busy in the wardrobe department, wearing the most antisocial of tartan trousers. There’s also been changes in James’ land -a new openess and democracy which means Tim doesn’t do all the talking. Surrounded by red meat and red wine, I’m talking to the cheeky coupling of Saul Davies (guitars) and Jim Glennie (bass).

James have been together for 14 years; have been compared to U2 and The Srniths, survived Madchester baggie and simmered below Britpop. Not uncommonly it was their efforts to crack the US (Laid has sold a healthy 600,000 there) that nearly led to their demise. Having attempted to bribe me with a tenner to say something nice about the band, Saul takes up the story:

“We’d been going strong for about four years, then after the American tour, we came as close as we’ve come to disaster. Larry (Gott, guitarist and founding member) left, the taxman got hold of us (for five years non-payment) and then Tim went off to record with Angelo (Badalamenti ). We could’ve just given up, got into four or five different bands and done nothing. Or we could re-group.”

“We were forced to re-evaluate what we wanted to do and whether we wanted to do it. Had we got the legs for it?” adds Jim.

Although outflanked by U2’s Zooropa the Eno-inspired Wah Wah sessions helped refresh the spirits. Saul reckons its experimental noodlings to be the band’s favourite work.

“We all love the sound of the album, it’s the band’s favourite. It was the first time we’d used technology through necessity. But we knew we couldn’t afford to make another weird album now. We wanted to make a record with that technological edge to it but one that was married to some blinding pop songs.”

The retrenchment process began with Saul, Jim and drummer Dave Baynton- Power assembling at the latter’s Wrexham home studio. Tim carried on with his side projects, occasionally dropping in with some vocals. They moved on to Real World studios and Mickey Most’s (“always dressed in white Versace”) RAK studios in St John’s Wood, “to get the well urban vibe,” quips Saul. Stephen Hague (New Order, PSB et al) was brought in to produce some pop sheen, Eno recalled for the sonic quirks.

The resultant new pervy James comes by the name of Whiplash (Fontana), mixing the old style sweeping pop melodrama of ‘Tomorrow’ with the jungly modernity of ‘Greenpeace’. Slightly schizophrenic, but still unquestionable class. Only now everyone’s involved.

“We’ve all had to take more of a role,” says Jim,”Being a founder member it had always been me, Tim and Larry – we thought we had to guide the others but we didn’t. The nucleus grew. For Tim it was a big relief. It took a lot of the responsibility off him. He could have some fun and for the first time we were a band that could all chill out. Some of the songs we just smashed up, not too many ‘cos we wanted it to sound up. Like, we had a little room where we could sort out the mad ideas before going into the £l,000-a-day studio (carefully avoiding being financially singed for a second time). We transferred ideas to Eno and vice versa. Bouncing ideas backwards and forwards. We ended up with a kind of b!oadstroked, haphazard, creative democracy .The only thing that stopped us was The Simpsons and the footie – we ended up being completely nocturnal.”

You could call James underachievers, suffering from a perennial identity crisis. But Whiplash slips in easily betwixt the likes of Radiohead and Oasis – the odd esoteric twist and socially concerned muse thrown in as trademark. But what about this new found laddishness? Common consent was an evening with James comprises yoga, Buddhism, followed by large helpings of tofu.

“James have always been seen as being po-faced but anyone who comes out with us for a night would realise that’s a load of old tosh. If they don’t end up with alcohol poisoning or a black eye it would be quite unusual.”

“But we’ve got to be careful,” adds Jim.”You don’t want to become too compartmentalised. We’ve not become a lad’s band who think they’re Oasis. We’ve always been fairly ordinary. Sometimes we’re arrogant like most people in a band, sometimes we’re stupid and immature, making idiots of ourselves and all points in between. It’s fun, we’re just playing with our image.”

So, at last, James seems to be playing themselves, knowing their place and quite content with that. Almost at home James.

“We don’t mind being slagged off, ‘cos that’s better than being ignored,” Saul concludes, “We’ve been pleasantly surprised by the reaction so far. A lot of people don’t have preconceptions of us and they’ll go out and buy our records. We don’t intend to get paranoid.” Time to sit down and tune in .

Top Of The Pops “Do You Want To Be An MP?”

TOTP: Do you have any juicy secrets in your closet?

Tim: Oozing through the cracks and keyhole they shall remain!

TOTP: What would you do if someone sold a story about you to the papers?

Tim: Ask them for a split and make sure they say I’m well-endowed

TOTP: What’s the minimum salary you’d work for?

Tim: Love

TOTP: Do you have the ability to send people to sleep when you talk?

Tim: That’s a vicious rumour. I wake people up when I sleep-talk

TOTP: How important is power to you?

Tim: I’d be nothing without it!

TOTP: When was the last time you wore a suit and tie to work?

Tim: Have you seen our last video?

TOTP: Jeremy Paxman wants to interview you. Are you scared?

Tim: No, he’s a fellow Aquarian and he supports Leeds!

TOTP: What’s the correct way to address an M.P. in the House of Commons?

Tim: Arse!

TOTP: Who can’t vote at elections?

Tim: Anyone with any intelligence!

TOTP: Liam Gallagher wants his photo taken with you. Do you say yes?

Tim: He’s too good-looking

TOTP: What would you do about the Criminal Justice Act?

Tim: Make it illegal

TOTP: Do your very best impression of an M.P.

Tim: What do you want me to say?

No, unfortunately Mr James hasn’t made it. Anyone with a sense of humour isn’t allowed in the Commons. We think Tim could rethink his lobbying approaching but perhaps he could start by making the tea.

BRITAIN

“Apparently, about 40 or 50 years ago, it dominated the whole world. Then it started a so-called righteous Second World War, and then the Americans took it over! It’s never quite got over that. It’s a tough, fiery little island doing better in terms of creativity than size would suggest. I tend to call it home, sometimes reluctantly.”

BRITPOP

“I’ve liked a lot of the music and loved a little bit of it, but it bugs me when people consciously lift from the past. It’s one thing to influenced, you can’t avoid that, but when it’s deliberate it’s called theft, and it’s a different thing. Jarvis (Cocker), in terms of attitude, is obviously wonderful, and I’ve loved some of his songs, very much lyrically. He could end up being the Alan Bennett of this generation. In terms of his literary ability, he could probably go and do whatever he wants now. And he’s an original character – it’s not like, ‘We’re lads, we go and get fuckin recked all the time and screw everybody.’ It’s something we haven’t seen before.”

MANCHESTER

“I live just outside now. I had a house just outside Manchester for a long time, and now I’m actually moving back in. It is a pretty frightening city, when judged against most of the other cities I’ve been in. I like Glasgow.”

TOURING

“We’re really looking forward to it! We haven’t done any gigs for three years, and I’ve just been looking at some footage of the last one we did, which was ‘Woodstock2’ in America. Then I’ve just been watching the band rehearsing and working on the new songs, and we’re really hungry. James became famous because of touring, and we know we can do that really well. But it’s been so long that I’ve forgotten what it’s like, so ask me again in June and I’ll probably say it was like giving birth.”

SKYDIVING

“I did it for a ritual that I was doing in America, which was all about ‘choosing your own life’. The most frightening bit was that the plane took off almost vertically, and we hadn’t got our parachutes on. So you’re sliding back towards this huge open door. I kept going, ‘Excuse me! Someone’s left the door open!’ Once you’ve got your parachute on, you feel like you’ve got a chance. The funniest thing is that they video it, and I had this huge fight with the video guy because he wanted to stick Def Leppard on the soundtrack, and all these other rock tracks that I couldn’t stand! I had to fight to get the only halfway decent music he had there, which was ‘Freefalling’ by Tom Petty.”

RELIGION

“I would say that it’s the organised thugs, the vultures who come in and carve up the market immediately after a wise person has died. To me, finding one’s spirit or finding your true nature – that’s my purpose in life. It’s been in a lot of James records, but it’s been hiding. It didn’t sit well with James’ music. One of the main reasons I wanted to work with Angelo Badalamenti was that I knew he’d give more poetic licence to free- associate in those areas, which is simply about finding out how to get into altered states without drugs. I do it through dancing, meditation or jumping out of areoplanes. I used to do it through drugs and I’m not averse to them every now and again, but that’s all too short-term.”

HOME

“I’ve always felt like an alien. I’ve always been desperate to get from here to home. I’m still looking, and the way I feel at home is when I’m in love – when I have people I love with me.”

LONGEVITY

“James were always built to last. It was always our intention. If you take short cuts, you can get there quicker, but you can’t hold it. Longevity for me is about staying alive – keeping your enthusiasm and curiosity.”

GENIUS

“The one out-and-out genius that we’ve worked with is Brian Eno. He’s clear of obstacles. His creativity is direct. On another level, I would call Angelo a genius, and Neil Young. It’s being clear-sighted and clear-minded and not letting your personality get in the way. Most of the music industry doesn’t know half of what Brian does. He writes papers for Mitsubishi on the future of urban transport. He did a lecture tour of Britain on perfume, and sold out Sadler’s Wells! He’s designing a crystal museum in Scandinavia with Peter Gabriel and Laurie Anderson. His interests range so far beyond music.”

INDULGENCE

“Well, you stick a group of young lads in a tour bus for three months, with all kinds of offers coming your way, and …it’s whatever you want to make it. I know I’m seen as a monk and the band are seen as animals, in the positive sense of the word. That isn’t accurate, because I’ve done a lot of wild things in my time, only in a different area. I mean, I’ve gone dancing for 10 days.”

ANTHEMS

“We’re scared by the whole thing. The reaction to ‘Sit Down’ got a bit overwhelming – beautiful but scary. It meant so much to people. We had parents whose children were on life-support machines writing in and asking us to come in and sing to them. ‘Sit Down’ struck the balance between being a big anthemic song and being very personal. We do write anthems, but not consciously, I promise. There’s a lot of very strong, catchy songs on this new album, but God knows if we’ll ever write another ‘Sit Down’.”

MILLENNIUM

“Did you know that the island which will be the first point in the world where the sun will rise on that day has already been bought up by Japanese businessmen? They’ve got a new car, and they want the sun to rise on that new car! I mean, you’re going to want to remember it. Your’re not going to want to go to bed at 11 on that date! We’re living in an astonishing time anyway. Information technology is getting well out of hand, and God knows what is going to happen in the next 20 years. These are really exciting times. We could destroy ourselves, or we could find amazing new technologies to liberate ourselves.”

No rational being can deny that Woodstock II was an ugly marketing scam that took in far more suckers than the precious event for which it was named. But through a circuitous route, it actually helped James. At the time, though, no one in the Manchester sextet knew it. All they understood was that, riding the success of their 1993 album Laid, they were were suddenly minus one founding member of 11 years’ standing, guitarist Larry Gott. “That forced the brakes,” understates Jim Glennie, bassist and another charter James member. “It wasn’t an easy time, obviously.”

While the remnant of James tried to decide what to do, lead singer Tim Booth took time off to work with composer Angelo Badalamenti. The results came out as the seriously odd Booth and the Bad Angel. For the hell of it, James released Wah Wah, a double-album collection of improvised ideas Brian Eno had encouraged them into while they were recording Laid. Gradually, normal work resumed.

“We needed this break,” Glennie says. “We were careering at a ridiculous pace toward a brick wall,and something a lot worse would have happened. It’s given us the enthusiasm back.”

Their latest album, Whiplash, also restores a sense of grandeur. Laid, the album that broke the band in America, was ironically constructed on a smaller scale than either the band or American radio listeners were accustomed to. But a two-year learning process allowed James plenty of time to work back toward epic heights.

“We’ve needed this break,” Glennie says. “We were basically chopping up, sticking together, throwing ideas down, finding the best identity for a song. The process is quite time-consuming. We’re bloody-minded; we like to make things difficult for ourselves.”

Difficult for them, not for the listener. Without pandering to some imagined demographic, Whiplash is as friendly as a big rock album can be. The dramatic sweeping wave of “Tomorrow,” the easy roll of “Lost a Friend,” the fey charm of “She’s a Star”: all catch the ear, and Booth acknowledges his vocal limitations even as he gently prods it to the edge.

In songs like the clattering “Go To The Bank” and the jungle-derived chorus of “Greenpeace,” James push against the conventional pop and rock combinations. (The use of dance forms in mainstream pop/rock was first widely heard on U2’s Zooropa. With a mild dash of pique, Glennie points out that while Zooropa was released first, Wah Wah was actually recorded first.) In England, distinctions between styles — rock vs. techno, band vs. computer — are starting to dissolve, and James take advantage of that.

“Boundaries, not just music but the audiences, are getting blurred, Glennie noted. “Segregating things gets a bit silly. Technology brings a whole new music to explore. It opens the door of how you can approach your songs. You’ve still got to go in there and be creative.”

James were fortunate in the creative regard. They snagged producer Stephen Hague who, as producer for Pet Shop Boys and New Order, had already shown flair for electronic sounds. And Eno periodically wandered in to mess around and make suggestions.

“Eno didn’t want to baby-sit the album,” Glennie says. “Hague was the foil he needed. Hague will happily stew over a mixing desk doing the bulk of the donkey work. Very meticulous. And he had always wanted to work with Brian Eno, so we were really spoiled with two brilliant producers.”

In the interim, Booth and Glennie had mainly been concerned with convincing the rest of James to stick around. A new guitarist had to be recurited, and meanwhile, three band members who were still considered “new boys” (after eight years) had to be made to feel at home.

“Larry’s departure unified us as a band,” Glennie says with a hint of surprise. “It could no longer be carried by Tim and me. We had to hope things would solidify again. People in the band, whose creativity we’ve barely tapped, passionately believe in this album because they worked their fucking balls off to get it finished.”

Back in action, James face new problems. In the marketplace, bands who don’t immediately consolidate their success tend not to get a second chance. Whiplash is selling briskly in England, but America is an unusual place to have to win over twice. James barely know what happened the first time.

“‘Laid’ took off on its own,” Glennie says, referring to the single. “But just the scale of things…you can’t get your head around it, so you end up being shepherded around, doing things you don’t really understand. We come back four years later — maybe people just aren’t gonna be bothered?”

Nevertheless, the tradewinds are blowing in the right direction. After all, other struggling lifers such as Pulp and Manic Street Preachers have finally made inroads here. And after fighting to keep James together, Glennie is reasonably enthusiastic about fighting to get America interested again.

“It isn’t the public having trouble accepting James, it’s the industry,” he says. “We’ve seen different waves of music come and go. We’ve always sidestepped that, because if you jump on a wave as it comes in, you get dragged out with it. There’s something wonderful about throwing yourself back in again, not preaching to the converted. We have this naive view that if we think it’s great, the rest of the world will as well.”

Tim: Hello, this is Snap, this is Cackle, and I’m Pop, and you’re watching James.

Today, full-on glamour pusses James Tomorrow, the latest single from their seventh album Whiplash

Tim: It’s a wonderful song about trying to grip love, trying to catch it like a butterfly, then finding out it’s got smeared all over your hands.

Snap caught up with the band during a gruelling photo session in London, a part of the business it’s taken them a while to get used to.

Tim: If you make music, these are things you have to do. We were so idealistic when we first started, we did no interviews at all for about the first three years, no press shots, just let the music speak for itself, folks. Then after a while we realised you can’t do that, no-one’s going to buy your music.

Taking music on the road is another part of the process, though you might not always return whole.

Tim: Last time we toured America was on the back of Laid, and it was amazing but we did it for too long. We were touring on and off for about three years, and we had a few casualties. I think we all made it through didn’t we?

Jim: Just about. We’re still here at least.

Tim: We’re still here although Larry Gott is no longer with us, probably a victim of that tour.

Jim: Lost a guitarist.

Tim: Fell off the back of the bus.

Saul: The girls keep you going as well, don’t they?

Jim: The girls?

Saul: The absolute knowledge that you’re gonna meet someone groovy, someone that you know you’re never going to see again.

After seventeen years, James are going through something of a change in attitude, or rather less of one.

Tim: We do look for the fun in things a lot more now, we don’t believe in the tortured artist myth as seriously as we used to. We’re still probably as immature as we’ve always been, I think that’s one of the major criteria of being in a rock band on one level.

However, larking about a bit does have its pitfalls.

Tim: I’ve got whiplash in my neck from dancing. When we call an L.P Laid, we have a great time, then we call an LP Whiplash and I end up in a neck brace. The next L.P’s gonna be called Big Money.

James have had a checkered history, bouncing back and forth in the public heart and facing constant dissection by press. It is perhaps due to the many twists and turns of fate that through their battles they have become stronger. Jonathan Wright probes Tim Booth and Saul Davies for their reflections and projections.

“We know what we’ve made. It’s really triumphant. Very up. Or relatively aggressive…”

Tim Booth pauses. He is in a good mood, talking about the new James album “Whiplash.” As he speaks, the album is whizzing up the charts all over the world, and James, one the few British bands in recent years to have made a decent stab at breaking America, are gearing up for live work. He is proud, aggressively proud. Well, relatively proud…

This, after all, is Tim Booth, a gentleman and a gentle man. You remember him? The one who talked about meditation, the new man who was so new he was the prototype on the production line when the phrase was invented. The man who implored those who felt themselves ridiculous to sit down next to him, which they did at gigs across the country. Yes, that Tim Booth.

Except maybe that Tim Booth never really existed outside our own imaginations. Yet that Tim Booth, (and the version of James he represented), was one we needed desperately.

It is time to rewind a little. It is 1990, the scene is a portacabin which is being used as a dressing room and, if that sounds bad, you should see the toilets. In short, it is the Glastonbury Festival and James are getting ready to play. A wide-eyed Tim Booth is trying to explain what the festival is like. “There’s every form of human behaviour here. It’s like a surrealistic tent city,” he says in awe.

It is easy to understand his wonder. The festival has yet to expand into its current proportions so there is only one main stage and the crowd is huge. The cream of British pop is also here to play-The Cure, Happy Mondays, Sinead O’Connor, even a fledgling Lush-but James are about to blow them off the stage, with a set which conveys more warmth, and more identification between audience and band than any rock ‘n’ roll show most of us privileged enough to see it are ever likely to experience again.

You see, if Shaun Rider and the Mondays crystallised the darker, hedonistic side of the blissed out, baggy, acid nose, (okay let’ say it) Madchester period, Tim Booth was its guru. Tim Booth was the man who told us it was okay to feel bad, the man who told us it was okay to not be okay.

So when, inevitably, our collective hangovers sometimes got too much to bear, we needed Tim Booth desperately.

So what went wrong? After the huge success of Sit Down and the “Gold Mother” album, what happened? The conventional wisdom is that James released a bombastic album of stadium rock in 1992’s “Seven” and blew it, big time. But is that true?

“That’s a fair question,” says Tim. “But what happened to us was that, after Sit Down, we got big in America and each of our records has sold more and more. So, to us, we’ve just been on a forward trajectory. There’s not been a retreat. There’s not been a dip in general.”

“In Britain, we stopped playing. We chose not to play in Britain. We hadn’t played there for four and a half years until recently. We knew once we did that, then the whole thing would go underground. We needed to do that. We’d played in Britain for eleven years up to that point and we’d done too much. We then came to America. We’d never played in America until four or five years ago and we broke America.”

Emigration, though, is a carrot and stick process. If James were moving into new territories, both literally and musically, there was also a sense that the band had gone as far as they could in the UK. The band’s 1992 headlining appearance at Reading was a watershed.

“We could do not wrong when we were unknown, as far as the tabloid music press was concerned,” explains guitarist Saul Davies. “James were heralded as the saviours of pop. We headlined at Reading and did a shitty show. We fucked up, but one of the reasons we didn’t get it together was because we wanted to underplay the fact that we were this huge band and, maybe, headlining a major festival like Reading isn’t the place to do that-you know, just go out and do the fucking tunes and go away.”

“But, in our own heads, we were very conscious of that fact we’d become this massive stadium band. So you had this weird confusion between the excitement of doing something and a kind of creeping fear that you shouldn’t really be there.”

“So, we were slagged for giving a huge stadium show and then slagged for not giving a huge stadium version of Sit Down and just playing a version with some acoustic instruments. So, the press had us, they really wanted to have us.”

In truth, it was an awful show, virtually the total opposite of the Glastonbury set, a show that left many in the audience puzzled and even hurt. James, after all, were supposed to be a band you could believe in. Although there would, (and will), be plenty of stadium shows to come, James reacted by retreating and reinventing themselves, working with Brian Eno on 1993’s “Laid,” an album which combined the band’s trademark melodic strengths with a looser, improvised feel.

“The time I spent with Brian Eno was very special,” says Saul. “I hear the music through that experience. I really didn’t like “Seven.” I felt we had got caught in a few little traps, the way that we worked with eath other and the way that we related to each other as a band.”

“It was so exciting because someone from the outside, who we respected, came along and completely redefined the way we worked together. It gave us a new lease on life, new energy. All the staleness went for us. Suddenly, he’s in the room and it became really exciting again.”

But, if “Laid” assured the band’s success Stateside, things were maybe going just a little too well.

After an appearance at Woodstock 2 in 1994 and the release of the experimental “Wah Wah” album (typically perverse James behaviour, releasing an almost ambient album while on the verge of a huge commercial breakthrough), guitarist Larry Gott quit the band.

Tim, meanwhile, was recovering from a serious neck injury, which meant he had to have intensive medical treatment and perform live wearing a neck brace. Martine McDonagh, the band’s long-standing manager, and the mother of Tim’s son, left the James set-up.

So what went right? Far from destroying the band’s reputation, “Wah Wah” was greeted as a flawed but worthwhile experiment. Tim went away and recorded “Booth and the Bad Angel” with Twin Peaks composer Angelo Badalamenti. The band took some time off, before reconvening to lay down the basic tracks for “Whiplash.”

And, importantly, Tim Booth was learning to relax a little, freeing himself from the need to be involved in every facet of that band’s activities, learning to enjoy life a little: to the point where he can now say, “It’s a very rock ‘n’ roll band. There’s more stories here than Led Zeppelin.” He is (half) serious.

“Since “Laid,” my biggest thing has been learning to receive what a great life I have,” he says. “I was pretty miserable up to the age of about 28.”

Never have guessed…

“Are you joking? You’re joking. I wouldn’t know. Then, in the last few years, it’s been getting better and better. It’s a case of believing that it can continue like that, believing that I can have a happy life, not falling for the tortured artist myth and the bit that I have to end up self-destructing. Those have been the biggest things I’ve been trying to come to terms with over the last few years.”

This, remember, is a man who, looking at the example of Nick Cave during the Australian’s junkie years, said that, if he thought it would help the creative process, he would consider fucking himself up by taking Heroin.

But, Tim Booth. Happy? Well, why not? Maybe he has earned it. Think about the James of Sit Down and Gold Mother again, think about the band who had to cope with fucking up Reading big time. Think, in particular, about Tim Booth and the reason James connected with their audiences so well in the first place.

While the success of “Gold Mother” was largely due to its glorious guitar melodies, it was also due to the demons which went into its making. The very vulnerability which drew an audience was writ large in the album’s lyrics, with its tales of frailty and personal betrayal.

“Betrayal has been a big issue for me,” he explains. “There’s been at least one song a CD on it, whether it’s been me betraying somebody or me being betrayed. Betrayal is very common. I think in this culture at this time, nearly everyone can give you an experience of being betrayed, even on a day to day level of feeling that somebody has exploited you and taken advantage of you.”

“To me, these issues come up time and time in life until you learn to let go of them. That’s something all the time in my life. I come up against the clocks that are me all the time-what I can take and what I can’t take-and then you just go thought it. You just go, “I don’t have to do that anymore, I don’t have to be this guy who has insomnia.”

“I used to have chronic insomnia and used to feel very self-pitying, whining and neurotic. Now, a lot of the time, I get to that point and think, “Hang on, I don’t have to do this, this is bullshit. Do something else. Don’t go down that road. It’s about having choices and being more creative.”

James and Tim Booth long ago outgrew the popular British ‘New-Age’ view of them (which, in a recent album review, this journalist was as guilty of perpetuating as anyone). And that statement, of course, makes assumptions which James and Booth ever truly were that band.

Because, in surfing the Zeitgeist so well in the early 90’s, and being the first band to (almost certainly) unconsciously document the fears and neurosis’ of the post-Ecstasy generation, James inadvertently created a whole set of assumptions they have had to live with ever since.

Sure, Tim Booth mediated. (Although he now admits his interest might have been unhealthily close to a know of mystical escapism). Sure he wore, and wears, his heart on his sleeve. But maybe it is time to take a second look at James. Strip away the preconceptions and “Whiplash” emerges as a rock ‘n’ roll record which is adventurous, which James have always specialised in. They are also still with us, still making music as a band, a rare feat when you consider they formed in 1983 and once toured with the godfathers or indiedom, The Smiths. If, after that, we still want the old James, and that Tim Booth, perhaps it says more about our own need for someone to ease our own neuroses than it does about themselves.

The wood-gabled farmhouse is centuries old, picture-postcard perfect, and several rustic miles outside of Brighton, England. Who knows? Maybe Shakespeare himself once downed flagons of mead from its gnarled dining-room table. This chilly January afternoon, however, said table is hosting the members of classy pop combo James, with cans of Boddingtons bitters and greasy sausage sandwiched. For a few days, this multi-cottaged estate-and all the British food in it-belongs to the band, a rented rehearsal retreat where James will streamline the eclectic material from its new album Whiplash (Mercury). It’s a relaxed, casual atmosphere-there’s a steady stream of jokes and witty asides, vocalist Tim Booth is running around in flannel cow-print pajamas, and over lunch, guitarist Saul Davies strums tentative chords to bassist Jim Glennie, who ponders them and makes a few melodic suggestions.

Booth-after showering and changing clothes-calls this idyllic meeting to order. Everyone at the table agrees that the simplest, most straightforward Whiplash track is its closer, “Blue Pastures,” which follows Glennie’s skeletal bassline through Mark Hunter’s soft forest of keyboards and Booth’s gentle ruminations on mortality. “I’ll give you the Twilight Zone story on that song,” offers the singer, sipping some tea he’s just prepared. “We improvised that years ago onto 24-track, and I improvised a lyric, basically what you hear on that take. Then when we came to get this LP together, we improvised it once more and I did the rest of the lyrics in that second take. And I didn’t know what it was about-just someone going for a walk and lying down in the snow and they were dying. As far as I could see, that’s what the story was about. Then what happened is, two weeks before we recorded it, my best friend’s [spiritual] mentor wen tout on his favorite walk and laid down in the snow and committed suicide. So if you ask me what ‘Blue Pastures’ is really about, I think it’s exactly about him, and the reasons why he did it are in that song.”

Davies and Glennie are both staring wide-eyed, still spooked by this strange turn of events. Booth turns in his chair to address them. “Actually, I never told you this, but it’s amazing.” That same spiritual adviser, he says, also trained another friend: “A woman who was deaf, with whom I did some dance work. And I told her the story of the song, and she said she’d love to hear it. So we sat her between the speakers and turned it up full, and I sand her the words so she could read my lips. And, fuckin’ hell, it completely did me in-I was singing her the words and she could hear the vibrations and she was crying. It was the most astonishing thing, and she wanted to hear more of the record, so I ended up doing nearly the whole record like that. And it was devastating, re-experiencing what you’ve done again from another angle.”

Davies (who does double duty on violin for James) stops playing and sets his guitar down. He’s moved by his partner’s story. “It’s especially weird when you’re playing a record for someone who, in essence, can’t actually hear it,” Booth sighs. “They can’t hear all the things that people normally get so beguiled by when they hear a record, like, ‘Oh, I quite like ho those drums sound.’ Things that ultimately don’t really matter.”

Booth has spent over a decade studying “any method you could have possibly heard of” to heighten his innate psychic abilities. “When you make music,” he insists, “you tune into songs that’ve already been written. That’s what it feels like-the song’s been written, and you’ve got to re- discover it, which is why I don’t always know what my lyrics are about. But I know when I’ve written the lyric that’s meant to be sung. When Whiplash producer Stephen Hague asked him to change a few words here and there, Booth adamantly declined. “I just can’t do that, because there’s a complete sense to me that I’m given those lyrics and if I betray that, I won’t be given them any more.”

Booth wants the distinction made: He sees James, and creativity in general, as one of the most healing things you can do as a spiritual exercise; the rest of the group doesn’t necessarily feel the same way. A small discrepancy. But it’s one that literally saved them in their darkest hour, a bleak moment known in the James camp as Black Thursday. The Mancunian sextet had survived numerous lineup changes, even the Stone Roses/Happy Mondays “Madchester” craze in the late ’80s, to finally strike sales-figures gold with its sixth album, Laid (Mercury), a Brian Eno-produced masterpiece of intellectual, folk-jangles sunniness. This (and a surreal Eno-enhanced outtake disc, Wah Wah [Mercury]) led to an ostensibly pivotal movement: James playing the prestigious Woodstock ’94 festival, before a crowd of 300,000. The future appeared bright indeed.

“Then we went into the studio to start writing material for the next album, which would end up being Whiplash,” recalls Davies. “And suddenly, everything collapsed around us, and it happened to be a Thursday.” Slide guitarist, key songwriter and founding member Larry Gott announced he would no longer tour with James. Tim Booth announced his plans to go to New York and record his long-stalled solo project with film composer Angelo Badalamenti (the lush Booth and the Bad Angel, released last year on Mecury). And the U.K. tax man announced the unfortunate discovery of an overlooked James debt of roughly 150,000. “We realized that everything we’d taken for granted, even the existence of the band, was now in doubt and required serious re-evaluation,” Davies adds.

Black Thursday still sends a shiver down Glennie’s usually staid spine. “We owed all this money, but there was no money coming in, because the only we get money is from completion of the album. And we were only just beginning to start _writing_ song-starting and finishing an album was a long way away.” With the zenlike Booth away, pursuing both his album and dance/improv theater work in Los Angeles, James’ survival instinct kicked in. The musicians set up studio shop in drummer David Baynton-Power’s house, dropped by individually to record their ideas, and tinkered with every other number but “Blue Pastures” until all concerned were satisfied. What Davies terms “a completely different was of working for us.”

All of the traditional James ingredients (even an Eno vocal/keyboard/occasional co-production cameo) figure into the Whiplash mix: Booth’s breezy sandalwood acrobatics on pop gems like “Homeboy” and “She’s a Star,” Gott’s spiraling slide that propels both the dreamy “Lost a Friend” and the raucous juggernaut “Tomorrow,” and that certain aura of mannered grandiosity that flutters over every cut. But new flavors waft in: throbbing techno (the title track), heart- attack jungle patterns (“Greenpeace,” “Go to the Bank”), even industrial-strength riffing alongside fluid Beatlesque beauty (the brilliantly schizoid “Avalanche”).

Glennie says that “Greenpeace” is the most extreme example of James’ new way of working. “It came about through a little spindly jam of me playing bass, Saul playing guitar, and Mark playing keyboards-very pretty, very nice and cyclical. And Tim came over the top of this with a very sweet vocal. And then Dave had a vision and said, ‘Leave it with me.’ And we came in the next day to hear what you hear on the record.”

Baynton-Power beams proudly. “That creaking noise you hear is a marble cutting board rubbed up and down a brick wall. And Tim ran out of the room when that beat kicked in. That’s when I thought, ‘Ah, we’re onto something!'”

The secluded farmhouse, you figure, is probably one of the first peaceful moments James has had of late. But the muse still beckons: Davies and Glennie retire to the living room to finish their spur-of-the-moment song. Booth stays behind to conclude the tale.

“Black Thursday wasn’t as big a thing for me, partly because I walked away from a lot of responsibility.” A placid all-knowing smile inched across his face. “But I wasn’t worried-I knew James had to transform to survive. James in the past has been much more like a novel, songwise; you start pretty well, there’s a good middle and you peak at the end. But we’re now in a space where we though, ‘Well, why not grab people right from the start?'”

Booth gazes out the window at-ironically-miles and miles of rolling blue pastures. Then he, too, gets back to work with James.

JAMES singer Tim Booth has seriously injured his neck and the band have had to call off their six-week American tour and cancel their festival appearances at V97 and T In The Park.

Booth hurt his neck during the band’s first date in Vancouver (April 30).Despite doctors’ advice to pace himself, due to previous neck problems, Tim gave his usual vigorous performance and ruptured a disc in his neck. This,in turn, is pressing on a nerve, causing severe pain.

The rest of James have now flown home, but Booth has stayed onto be treated by the San Francisco 49ers’ football team neck specialist. He has been told to remain horizontal for at least seven days, and not to perform onstage for at least six weeks.

However,the organisers of this year’s Lollapalooza have offered James a slot after hearing about their tour cancellation.

The band “deeply regret” the cancellations, but have managed to take four days off from Lollapalooza to perform at Glastonbury as planned. They also hope to join the Reading bill at the end of August.

Roxy, Atlanta, Georgia – March 1, 1997

It’s James’ second gig in America after two-and-a-half years away. It’s way below the Mason-Dixon line in that magnolia-scented South whose sniffiness regarding matters pungently Mancunian saw off the otherwise rampant Oasis only last autumn. On the face of it, a sticky one could be in prospect.

However, it turns out that the “Coca-Cola” Roxy is jaunty with “James Sold Out” signs. Cometh the hour, cometh 1,800 Atlantan fans to jam the theatre to the fire limit. They babble and gabble expectantly. When the band mooch on with nervy grins and half-waves, they draw closer, raising the temperature by about 10 degrees. James, surprisingly, mean a lot to them.

A taut swing of piano and drums presages Come Home, from Gold Mother, Tim Booth goes into his crazy shaker dance and his voice begins its ascent from the conversational-“I’ve got the bends from pressure”-through snarly self-contempt-“After 30 years I’ve become my fears/I’ve become the kind of man I’ve always hated”-to rage-“The way I feel just makes me want to scream.” On the first”scream,” a groundswell of voices screams or moans or just yells “Yeah!” right back. Almost everyone is singing along with the forgiving chorus, “Come home, come home.” Two minutes in and, after all that time away, James have re-connected, not so much by a shoutable hookline as by the detail: words that hit an audience where they live.

When the song’s finally done, while Booth’s colleagues busy themselves with instrumental swaps and sundry adjustments, the singer just stands there and grins at the crowd. He didn’t know they cared.

“After a concert like that I’m blasted open,” says Booth, sweatily slumped on a dressing-room sofa. Post-show, he’s glugging mineral water and calling for champagne. A rake-thin 37, the former Manchester University drama student talks with the oddly knowing innocence of Michael Palin. He’s also adrenaline-fuelled to an altitude way above embarrassment.

“It’s like psychic sex with the audience,” the frontman ventures. “Or rather some nights-this is a corny, atrocious thing to say-but some nights it feels like love. It can be quite shocking to receive that real appreciation. Fuck it, I’m completely wallowing in it; it’s great.”

“We got that reaction to Come Home the first time we played it live, in Blackpool just after Gold Mother was released (in 1990). I wrote it right in the middle of leaving, uh, the mother of my child (Martine McDonagh, former manager of James). I remember the whole crowd singing those lines about ‘I’ve become the kind of man I always hated’ with complete joy. Fucking hell. Out of one of my bleakest hours they transformed pain into something quite beautiful.”

He whirls onward, tying in his celestial experience of the gig with his provocateur notion of a God both female and highly shaggable which his lyrics have been exploring for some years. “To me, ecstacy is as close as we get to God. I don’t mean the drug. It’s that, Waaaaah!, that feeling of being one, that unity most of us are searching for. You can find it in sex and you can find it at a concert. James concerts have intimacy, a big sound, astonishing musicians everywhere you look, weirdness, darkness, light, joy: the human experience. I don’t think all that usually gets pulled into a ninety-minute set of songs.”

Of course, ecstacy will come and go. Sometimes, from Laid, finds James launching a triple axe attack courtesy Saul Davies, curly new boy Adrian Oxaal and Depp-dishy temp and band pal Michael Karas. The trio give it their all, remarkable in their relentlessness without quite hitting the spot. Then, recent British single She’s A Star fails to stake a claim. But its Whiplash album companion, Lost A Friend, starts to froth with bliss-seeking five-man vocals sung valiantly in the teeth of the full-band soundstorms, before Sit Down reclaims that initial spirit of shouty elevation.

Although never released as a single in America, Sit Down was always bound to be an irresistible anthem to James fans anywhere. Again, the detail does it as the band (and the admirable deskperson) retain pristine clarity to convey that final perfect knowing/naff invocation: “All those who find themselves ridiculous/Sit down next to me.” One girl is moved to such devotion that she vaults up on stage then drops to her knees in obeisance-before being ushered gently back to the crowd.

The next new one, Greenpeace, promptly loses the momentum again. There’s a false start. “All right, so we don’t know it. Let’s try again,” says Booth and gets a titter for honesty. But it’s an irretrievable shambles and the quiet bits reveal even this crowd of keenies conversing loudly as if they’d forgotten the band were there.

They’re not done, though. The American hit Born Of Frustration, from Seven, pulls it round with its declamatory way, its mass “la-la-las” and barmy Indian war whoops to join in with. At that, the Atlantans actually seem ready for what might have been the alien thunder of Avalanche, one of Whiplash’s excursions into drum ‘n’ bass bedlam, sheer mass and volume fit to bury an entire ski resort. Except that the lyric implies that the “avalanche” in question is a political revolution. But this time lyrical detail is pulverised, so nobody can work the gist out and yell, “Commie!”

Later, on black coffee with beer chasers in the hotel lobby, bassist Jim Glennie and guitarist/violinist Saul Davies say they don’t want to talk about business. But they can’t stop themselves. They’re great friends and on the opposite sides of an intra-band negotiation because, legally, James actually comprises Glennie, Booth, and Gott with “new boys” (since 1989) Davies, drummer Dave Baynton-Power and keyboard player Mark Hunter, together with recent signing Oxaal, on fees and wages.

Overdue adjustment is about to take place, triggered by the serial crises James plunged into in 1994 when they went home tired out after working American tour after tour while they cranked Laid up to 600,000 sales.

Four years on from her split with Booth, McDonagh left because she’d “had enough” of band management (she remains on good terms with the singer, who is a regular visitor to their son Ben at her Brighton home). She was ably replaced by Who/Rolling Stones and current Pulp/Manic Street Preachers associate Peter Rudge.

But then Larry Gott quit the band for a quieter family life and, later that same day as it happened, their accountant told them they owed in the region of 250,000 (pounds) in previously overlooked back-tax. Furthermore, Booth was off the scene recording his album with Angelo Badalamenti.

Glennie, who’s been in James and antecedent line-ups for 18 of his 33 years, spun into a four-month tiz: “Larry leaving especially was disastrous to me. I’d been so entrenched and then suddenly I was a fucking insecure little bastard wanting everything to be OK again. Waaaaaah!” He wails like a child lost in a supermarket.

Nonetheless, they got through it. The protocol of seniority elbowed aside by the desperate need to keep the band afloat, they all pitched in-Booth only occasionally, at first, because of his other commitment-and now Glennie and Davies constantly chorus that “it made a real band of us.”

In fact, their mood appears almost light-heartedly optimistic. Luckily, Born Of Frustration’s use in an American TV ad for the Marriott hotel chain paid their tax bill. Freshly bonded, they enjoyed recording Whiplash. Then, when they played their first, small comeback gig in Britain, at Sheffield Leadmill in February, despite their long absence, they found a great warm glow of goodwill beaming back at them.

Still, Glennie remains Mancunian about the band’s prospects: “What could happen is, after devising the perfect working structure to create our best music and have a brilliant time in the process, the album sells fuck-all, we get dropped by the record company and that’s the end of it all. That would be such a fitting end for James. I’d have to laugh. Then commit suicide.”

“Winning round an audience is a joy and we’re really cocky about it,” says Booth. “Sometimes before a gig we actually say to one another, We’ll take them in the fifth. Like Naseem Hamed.”

The boxing analogy doesn’t quite hold in Atlanta because the Roxy was KOed in the first (Come Home), and again in the fifth (Sit Down), the eighth (Born Of Frustration) and the 12th (Laid). Theencores, properly clapped and stamped for in old-fashioned “we’ll-tear-the-building-down-if-you-don’t-come-back” vein, take them beyond the modern championship distance: Out To Get You (notably, no audience chatter through this well executed quiet one), Waltzing Along (Whiplash highlight featuring a new key James line, “My life’s in plaster”), Honest Joe (bold excerpt from the much-reviled Wah Wah album) and Tomorrow (frantic bashing and aspirational anthemic chorus, “You’ve gotta keep faith that your path will change/Tomorrow”).

Once more, the Atlanta Roxy goes, “Waaaaaah!” It’s not the world, but it is encouraging. Glennieand Bayton-Power, bonded old and new, high-five one another. Less concerned with transcendence, Davies coolly lights a fag. Booth is the Cheshire cat centre-stage, grinning ecstacy.

Rock groups, it has often been said, are like marriages. Sometimes they end in divorce; sometimes well, rarely they live happily ever after. Then sometimes they just need to go through periods of separation so that those involved can remember what they mean to each other.

The easiest way to understand the past four years in the history of the British sextet known only as James, then, is to look at it as a much-needed separation.

At least, that’s how lead singer and chief songwriter Tim Booth looks at it. The rest of the band, though, has a different name for it, or, at least, for the moment when the separation began.

They call it Black Thursday.

That was the day founding guitarist and driving spirit Larry Gott said, “That’s enough,” and left the group to become a carpenter. That was the day Booth departed to pursue his own, more contemplative muse with the moody exercise “Booth and the Bad Angel,” a collaboration with David Lynch’s favorite screen composer, Angelo Badalamenti.

It was also the day that the U.K. tax man discovered that the band owed $ 150,000. It was the day that much of James didn’t know if it still had a future.

“You know, it’s funny, but I never saw it as Black Thursday at all,” Booth said recently by telephone from New York. “I thought it was just a great moment of change. The rest of the band thought it was a panic. ”

Booth, it turns out, had the proper perspective. He returned to James with a new guitarist, a rejuvenated spirit and a willingness to step aside more and let the others call the shots.

“Basically we needed that break from each other to come back to it with a new way of making an album,” Booth said. “Make it less of my thing, my lead, and put more focus on the band itself. I wanted less responsibility and they wanted more.

“Though,” he added, “they didn’t quite know that at the time. I saw that’s what they wanted, so I (left).”

DIFFERENT APPROACH

What ultimately resulted from this reconfiguration was “Whiplash,” James’ ninth album and a marked departure from the languidness of much of 1993’s “Laid” and ’94’s mysterious experimentation with Brian Eno, “Wah Wah. ”

Instead of aching acoustic guitars, “Whiplash” chimes in with sonorous, U2-esque soundscapes. And where “Laid” benefited from Eno’s spacious production, the new record is informed more by the raucous approach of producer Stephen Hague (known for his work with the Smiths and New Order), though Eno served as an adviser.

“This album was done partly as a reaction to the tranquillity of ‘Laid,’ but I wouldn’t call it an intentional effort to do exactly the opposite of it, really. We tend to react to whatever bothered us about the last record, and ‘Laid’ wasn’t the sort of album we could tour. We wanted something more full and lively. ”

The initial strategy, hatched backstage at an otherwise dreary time for them at Woodstock ’94, was to cut an album almost exclusively of three-minute Beatle-esque pop gems.

“And if I had been holding the reins, that probably would have happened,” Booth said. “But I didn’t, and then Oasis waltzed in and did that idea anyway, so I’m glad now we didn’t go anywhere near it. ”

Instead, the band concocted a new approach: a more powerful sound wrapped around two of Booth’s constant themes, activism and spirituality. The former took shape in songs such as “Lost a Friend” and, especially, “Greenpeace. ”

“Their work actually is something that’s come in and out of our songs throughout our past,” Booth said of the conservation group.

“We’ve worked with Greenpeace for about 12 years, and to me, it’s the most important organization on the planet. And after all this time, all their efforts, things should have gotten better, but even though more people have the information about what’s happening to our world, the ideas, the progress, it’s all getting buried. I needed to address that. ”

But Booth says the deeper issues for him lie in spirituality _ particularly aspects such as meditation, shamanism, ecstatic states, trances and metaphysical healing. Booth, who turnedto alternative therapies after nearly dying of an inherited liver disease at age 22, says that though his beliefs and experiences have often been on James’ records, he tried to downplay it this time out, relying on his work with Badalamenti to satisfy his soul.

“It was necessary that I get that out of my system before we started work on this album,” said Booth, 33. “Sometimes I think I try to hard to force it into our music. Sometimes it fits, and other times it doesn’t make any sense. That was part of the change, learning to understand when it’s right to discuss it. ” Instead, that self-editing tack has led James to create some of its most rousing, anthem-like work, with potential hits in “Tomorrow” and “She’s a Star. ”

Booth added that what some saw then as near tragedy has now offered James a chance at renewal after more than a decade of making records.

“I have come back to this finally appreciating what James is all about,” he said. “I think we all have. Now it makes much more sense. And at the moment, we’re on fire.”

Interviewer: Tim and Jim from James, welcome to Videotech, now I would ask you both to sit down but it’s a bit too much of a corny line. But if you remember back in the day, there was a time when you were selling more T-shirts than records, what did that feel like?

Tim: No, this was just a rumour put about by our manager because she designed them. No, it didn’t bother us, people bought the T-shirts because they loved the music, and when people get passionate about a band they buy the shirt. It was amazing, you’d be walking down any street and there’d be a number of James shirts on that street. It was very entertaining.

Interviewer: Now is it true you’re going to be doing the Lollapalooza this year?

Jim: We are indeed. We fly out to Miami on Sunday, the first show’s on Wednesday; we’re there for eight or nine weeks.

Interviewer: And what’s going to be happening out there?

Jim: Well, Lollapalooza’s a festival that travel’s around from place with loads and loads of bands playing and different stages. So yeah, I’ve never actually been to Lollapalooza before but there’s some great bands playing.

Interviewer: Now, what’s this about your neck injury?

Tim: I’ve ruptured some discs in my neck, dancing on stage, didn’t feel it for a couple of days, then found out I’d actually smashed some discs in my back.

Interviewer: So does this mean you’ll be touring England or you’re not going to be touring England for a while?

Tim: We won’t be playing England for a bit, but we are committed to an American tour, the Lollapalooza tour, and I’ll just have to stand, I can’t move, it’s gonna be really weird. So the band have been taking up dancing lessons, they’re gonna be doing the moving.

Interviewer: The James sound seems to have changed over the years, and you seem to have done a few collaborations along the way. Any plans for any more of those?

Tim: Basically, each record reacts to the last one, there’s no plan, and it’s who you get to work with. We’ve worked with some amazing people, you feel very lucky when you get to work with Brian Eno, and you work with them when they’re available and see where the music goes. Laid was very low-key because the one before was quite rocky, and this one’s more uptempo because Laid was low-key, the next one will be God knows, whatever we write. We improvise all our songs, we don’t control them that well, although we’re trying to learn that. Certain members of the band are fed up with this technique, they’re saying “We must be able to write the song we want to write,” but personally I like it being whatever comes out comes out.

Interviewer: Now this one seems quite mainstream, the latest single. You worried about that?

Tim: It’s very happy. It’s hard to write a good happy song. When we wrote it, Saul and I were moved to tears, and it feels to me like this is a brother song to Sit Down, and we’ve never tried to write one but it just came out that way. I’m really proud of it.

Interviewer: The new video looks like it was shot in America, was it?

Jim: No, it wasn’t actually, it was shot in the desert in Spain, one near Malaga, but yeah, it was fun. Well, it was hot, but it was fun.

Interviewer: It seems like there were some great characters in there.

Jim: Yeah, there were some great people there. This mad, local irate Spaniard that we dragged in, and a couple of huge brothers, twins, really funny characters. So yeah, it was really good fun doing it, everybody got on incredibly well, usually video shoots are really tense, time pressure, you know, but everybody was so relaxed and chilled out, it was really good fun.

Interviewer: Tim and Jim, it’s been great having you on Videotech, I think we’ll check out the new single now.

Q. Would you lie on the ground if a bank robber told you to?

TB. Instantly. If he was just taking money, i would have no problem complying with his demands. If he was injuring somebody, it would be different, although I wouldn’t do anything that would be like committing suicide.

Q. Have you ever come a cropper while showing off in a car?

TB. I don’t know if I was showing off, but when I was 18 I was driving along with two passengers when we skidded on some black ice and ended up in a ditch. My mum’s car was a write-off. I think I’d had a drink beforehand.

Q. Have you ever fired a gun indoors?

TB. Yes. I fired a 2.2 air rifle at some birds outside when i was about eleven. But when i went out and saw the results i was so devastated that i threw them over the wall and hoped next door’s Alsatian would dispose of the evidence.

Q. Could you eat a raw egg?

TB. Yes I’ve had them in drinks. Thats a bit of a spit or swallow question. I don’t have that many odd foods in my diet. I ate crocodile a couple of years ago in America. It was like very chewy chicken – not very pleasant.

Q. Have you ever set yourself on fire when lighting a barbecue?

TB. No, but I have been set on fire. It was a Tibetan purification ritual. I was covered in alcohol and, then set alight for about ten seconds. I got burned, but the shock was the hardest part to deal with.

Q. Have you ever ended up in bed with someone whose name you didn’t know?

TB. No, but sometimes I’ve forgotten names of people I’ve slept with then been phoned up and reminded of the fact. Although I tend to be very conscious when I go to bed with someone, I do have a very bad memory.

Q. Have you ever been bitten by anything poisonous?

TB. About a month ago I was bitten by a spider in Glasgow. I’ve no idea what type it was but I found the spider on my bed in the morning and I had these five bites on my head. One of them still hasn’t gone down.

Q. Would you climb an 80 ft tree to rescue a kitten?

TB. No. I’d call the fire brigade – they get paid for it. I’d probably manage if it was 30 ft but I would get a bit shaky after that and start thinking that my life was more valuable than the kitten’s.

Q. Have you ever been out in the snow wearing just a T-shirt?

TB. No, but I’d do it if I was coming straight out of a sauna, like they do in Sweden. I like those extremes of heat and cold.

Q. Can you remember the last time you were rude to a policeman?

TB. I resisted arrest in Greece once. We’d gone naked on one of the beaches and the locals didn’t like it. The policemen said they were going to take us to prison, then deport us. So we legged it and jumped on a bus out of town.

The land around here looks like nothing much at all, which is why it can be made to look like almost anything you like. The rugged red hillocks and dull yellow plains around the Andalusian town of Guadix are where you come when you need desert footage, and your budget won’t stretch to Arizona, Jordan or Australia. Sergio Leone came here to film his great spaghetti westerns; the sets for Once Upon a Time in the West are still collecting dust next to a nearby railway crossing. This weekend, a pop group called James are making a video here for their new single, a song called “Waltzing Along”.

“I hope this all works out,” says James’s singer, Tim Booth. “It’s my favourite song on the record. But you should have been here yesterday. We did some filming at the local brothel.”

The idea for the video is a vague narrative about a battered old convertible being driven across the badlands of mid-west America and picking up various odd characters as it goes. These will be played by the six members of James, a model called Rachel and two immense Turkish brothers, who are taking a couple of days off from their London chip shop. The role of the car’s driver was, at one stage, going to be offered to James’s favourite celebrity fan, the Formula One driver Jacques Villeneuve. Then it was to go to James’s semi-celebrity sometime producer, Brian Eno. They have eventually settled on an actress with an unnerving resemblance to Bet Lynch.

As video shoots go, it’s a relatively tolerable experience. Video shoots are usually terrifyingly boring ordeals for all concerned, long hours of sitting about doing nothing occasionally punctuated by being screamed at by agitated young men with megaphones and clipboards. Today, however, the sun’s out, there’s plenty to eat, the mood is genial, and everyone seems to be having something that looks startlingly like a good time. If James look, today, like a band that are enjoying the things that bands aren’t supposed to enjoy, it’s possibly because they know that they nearly didn’t make it this far at all.

James formed in Manchester in 1982, released a couple of winsome EPs for hip local label Factory, toured with The Smiths, and were regarded as fellow-travellers in Morrissey’s conspiracy of ascetic withdrawal – though you wouldn’t guess that from the now from the enthusiasm with which a few of the band demolish the contents of the hotel’s drinks cabinet after dinner. Two albums, Stutter (1986) and Stripmine (1988) came next on the American label Sire, from which the band departed rather acrimoniously. A live album, One Man Clapping (1989), which the band financed by volunteering for medical experiments, followed, and just about saved their career, landing them a deal with Fontana.

A hit single, “Sit Down”, and a bigger hit album, Gold Mother (1990) made James one of the biggest bands in Britain, and their T-shirts an era-defining fashion accessory. After that, James were widely perceived to have sold their souls to Simple Minds on the epic-sounding Seven (1992), bottled out of becoming vastly successful with the acoustic-oriented Laid (1993), and finally wandered altogether off the reservation with the experimental and largely incomprehensible Wah Wah (1994).

“We have always,” says Booth, “been about doing the last thing everyone expected, including ourselves.”

It got worse. Shortly after James appeared at the ghastly, mud-covered fiasco that was Woodstock II, founding member Larry Gott decided he’d had enough. So did James’s long-term manager, and mother of Booth’s son, Martine McDonagh. It seemed, as 1994 drew to a close, that the only people who hadn’t had enough of James were the Inland Revenue, who chose the moment to send in a bill for five years’ back taxes that the band thought they’d already paid. With the Grim Reaper knocking loudly on their door, James reacted with typical bloodymindedness. They vanished from sight for a few years, restructured their working methods to allow Booth the freedom he wanted to pursue other projects (he has since recorded an album with Twin Peaks composer Angelo Badalamenti under the name Booth & The Bad Angel), before emerging with Whiplash, arguably their best album yet.

Then, with credits due to roll after this happy ending, it all went wrong again. Tim Booth’s unique dancing style – think of a man with one foot in a bucket of water sticking a knife into a toaster – finally caught up with him. Earlier this year, Booth ruptured a vertebral disc in his neck, an incredibly painful injury that immobilised him in San Francisco for a month, and forced the abrupt cancellation of a major US tour. Booth is still under instructions to take it easy. Most of the interview proper takes place in a taxi between Guadix and Malaga airport the day after the shoot, hired at some considerable expense (it’s a 220km trip) so that Booth can lie down on the back seat.

The irony of the new album’s title is not lost on him.

“Also,” he elaborates, “the day we decided to call it that, our product manager at the label got whiplash as well. We should have titled it Great Wealth & Happiness.”

Booth, now 37 and a resident of both New York (where his fiancee lives) and Brighton (where his son lives) doesn’t seem much like the credulous new age mooncalf he’s often been painted as. (He is almost certainly the only Leeds United fan on earth who’s ever been called a hippy.) He does, granted, talk of his involvement with a group in California who teach a method of dialogue that is something to do with the boundary between creativity and therapy, and he also admits to training in movement intended to induce trance states, but he does all this very self-effacingly. He has, by the sound of it, been on a bit of a mission of self-discovery since fame came calling a few years ago.

“It was lovely, in lots of ways,” he remembers. “We’d been going seven years and nobody bought any of our records. While we always knew it would happen, when it did, it was a bit of a shock.”

It feels like a long time ago now, but James were massive. Sought after as festival headliners, able to comfortably fill Alton Towers in their own right, and fronted by a man who looked very much like he fancied Bono’s job.

“I’m glad to have experienced it,” Booth says now. “There are some really nice sides to it, like free tickets to gigs and football matches, and getting to meet people you wouldn’t have got to meet otherwise. And then there’s a side where you realise that you are in some sense public property, and I didn’t like that at all.”

That said, Booth denies that their decision to tour America for years and retreat from the bombast of Seven was a deliberate refusal of massive success.

“It was less conscious than that,” he says. “We just didn’t know what to do. We didn’t want to just play stadiums, and we realised we’d never really been to America, so we did that, and had to start playing to 200 people a night again. We didn’t think it through as far as how it would alienate people in Britain, and that was a bit distressing. I’ve been amazed, really, how quickly people have taken to the new record. I thought it would be much harder than it has been.”

Whiplash was Top 10 in Britain, and the first two singles both made the Top 20. Whether Booth likes it or not, the success he evaded the first time may not have given up its pursuit of him.

“I wouldn’t object,” he decides, eventually. “But I’d want to do it differently. And our fans are good for us like that. They’ve always been involved. I mean, there’s a James fanzine that’s been going for many years, and they didn’t like Whiplash at all, and they ran a big editorial lambasting us. Our own fanzine! But that’s absolutely as it should be.”

`Waltzing Along’ is out now on Fontana

It’s the kind of thing I’d do: spend an entire interview talking about what a freaked-out genius my producer is and forget that my record company would like me to add that I too am evidently some sort of minor deity.

Actually, my chatter would probably lean toward sharing the merits of Murray’s hairdressing and the wisdom of doing one job at a time, the real secret of success which I learned from my mom.

For James bassist Jim Glennie, I think it’s an overdeveloped sense of awe (as opposed to an underdeveloped ego) that had him gushing earlier this spring about the arrogant genius and meticulous masterwork of Brian Eno and Stephen Hague, both producers for James’ latest record, Whiplash (Mercury/PolyGram).

Eno first worked with James on 1993’s Laid (and thus inspired the soundtrack to my days working as an east-end sandwich maker). Since then he’s produced 1994’s art-romp Wah Wah and Whiplash, and when Glennie talks Eno, his enthusiastic, racing conversation shifts into overdrive. Oh, he’ll joke about the oddly intimating little man — gold teeth and a bald head and a smashing suit — but will leave you every time with a quick reminder that “the man’s a genius.” Or by enumerating some of the little projects Eno had on the go while working with James (designing an art gallery interior in Cologne and a park in Barcelona, thinking in a tank for Sony for future music technologies).

Seems that Eno started off by stripping the lads of everything they held dear. “He came in when we were recording Laid and said, ‘You don’t need to do that. You don’t need to approach it like that at all,’ ” Glennie explains, gaining momentum.

” ‘You can take the rough seeds of a jam or an improvisation and take that into a studio. One person, two people, however many you want, and completely smash it up. You can take away what you don’t want, put in what you do want, speed it up, slow it down, sample bits, throw them in wherever you want and stick the whole track through distortion pedal if you want. You can totally abuse your songs if you really, really want to.’ ”

As it turns out, trashing stuff for art’s sake was good training for other imminent changes: founding member Larry Gott ditched the band; cute-as a-button singer Tim Booth took a sabbatical to record with Angelo Badalamenti; other members took the time to grow up and presumably um, fill out and, for the first time, as Glennie tells it, became a real band. “Things fell apart. And looking back on it, it was brilliant, because it shattered what we had. Now at the time it was totally disastrous, but what came out of that was a lot stronger, different and fresher.”

Abounding in freshness, the band’s next move was to meet with what Glennie calls the ‘chalk and cheese’ combo of producers. Hague, who is “incredibly meticulous… oooh” and famed for his twiddling for New Order and the Pet Shop Boys, agreed to work with Eno, to a certain extent relieving Herr Deconstructive-Vibe-Meister of duties which were just “not Eno.” “We thought Stephen would be sort of upset because he’d sit there slaving over the desk 24 hours a day and Eno would march in and go, ‘Change this and don’t do that,’ ” Glennie says, forgetting that reaction is reserved for mere mortals, “But he was brilliant. Hague was like, ‘Oh, I’ve always wanted to work with Brian Eno.’ ”

“We just couldn’t not do it. Because the two people were too strong and they both wanted to do it. And it was like oil and water. Let’s put oil and water to produce the album. Wonderful. Wonderful.”

Wonderful for you, dude. For me, all this experimentin’ Brian Eno talk finds me mixing my metaphors and all the Whiplash description words in my head could equally well describe a Happy Meal: fast, fun, meaty and icy.

Glennie, still digging the trash-stuff-for-art’s-sake mode (listen to the man describe performing) will no doubt know I mean to say Whiplash kicks. “Yeah, you can go there and go, ‘I’ll just play all the songs I know.’ Or you go, ‘Oh, God, let’s put ourselves on the edge. Let’s throw ourselves into a song we’ve not played for two years. I can just about remember the chords. And weird mishmashes, collisions of people changing in the wrong place and you’ve got, WHOAH, I’ve just about made it through this weird collision. It’s brilliant and it’s scary, but you know… What’s the other option? Pretend you’re not up there. Why bother going up then?”

Tim Booth, lyricist and vocalist of Manchester, England, songcrafters James, professes to know not a whole lot about the state of pop music.

In fact, he was rather shocked when “Laid,” the title track of the band’s 1993 Brian Eno-produced masterstroke, went on to become one of the most heavily rotated singles of that year. “I hadn’t really seen it’s potential,” claims Booth. “I thought it would wind up a B-side to some single.”

“Laid,” a rousing, 2-1/2-minute nugget of acoustic pop perfection, explored the histrionic, comic nature of sexual politics (as well as the strength of Booth’s lilting falsetto) and earmarked a disc loaded with a fair share of soulfully intimate ballads (“Out to Get You”) as well as emotional folk anthems (“Sometimes”). “Laid” went on to sell 600,000 copies in America, and put James on the map once and for all after the release of a decade’s worth of solid recordings.

But if Booth is going to plead ignorance to the success of that disc, which Eno pushed to be christened after the track “Laid,” then he’ll claim the naming of the band’s eighth and latest disc, this year’s techno, drum and bass-laden “Whiplash,” to be somewhat prophetic on his part: During the commencement of a world tour in support of “Whiplash” earlier this year, Booth injured nerves in his neck, bringing the entire tour — including a scheduled appearance in last month’s Y-100 Summer Festival at the Blockbuster-Sony Music Entertainment Centre in Camden, N.J. — to a grinding halt.

“That’s the irony,” said Booth. “I suppose we should name the next album ‘Health, Wealth And Happiness,’ or something very positive.”

No matter — James will be surfacing at the E-Centre on Saturday as part of Lollapalooza ’97.

Booth’s neck sometimes smarts if he turns it a certain way (which, he reports, is impeding his trademark whirls and spins), but now that James is touting a harder-edged disc utilizing those jungle rhythms that are all the rage, a Lollapalooza tour may be the best outlet to show it off. Or is it?

“No, actually,” explained Booth last week over the telephone from Toronto, where Perry Farrell’s annual traveling marriage of outrageousness and political correctness was stopping. “We go on right before Korn, and (‘Whiplash’) just wouldn’t suit the bill, so we play some more mellow stuff, we slow things down, pull the audiences back a bit. We’re the antidote, I suppose.”

Booth takes pride in adding variety to Lollapalooza by deliberately inhibiting moshing and crowd-surfing. However, there is some disappointment in not being able to showcase the fierce “Whiplash.”

” ‘Laid’ was difficult to tour because it was so low-key,” explained Booth. “We deliberately set out to record a more aggressive album (in ‘Whiplash’) so that we could do a heavier tour. Ah, well, I guess we have to say goodbye to that one.”

Booth was a drama student at Manchester University when he first met his future band mates in the early 1980s. The fledgling group named itself after Irish novelist James Joyce and signed with the legendary Manchester label Factory Records in 1983, around the same time fellow Mancunians The Smiths were originating and New Order was hitting it big “Blue Monday.”

James made its contribution to the “Madchester” scene of 1989 with both the oddball anthem “Sit Down” and the baggy flower-print shirts that became a fashion staple of the rave movement. And while The Stone Roses and Happy Mondays may now be things of the past, James is still kicking with “Whiplash,” as the band crosses over into the realm of electronica and beyond.

“Whiplash” was produced by onetime New Order knob twirler Stephen Hague, with some input from Eno. “They worked together, yet they work very differently,” said Booth. “Brian moves in a big, bold sweep, and Stephen works step-by-step.”

Booth noted he and his band mates often record “way too many songs” for each record. And so, in 1994, the double-disc set “Wah Wah,” a collection of Eno-produced outtakes of experiments and improvisations from the “Laid” sessions, was released.

Booth temporarily jumped ship last year to record “Booth And The Bad Angel” with film composer and David Lynch crony Angelo Badalamenti. “That was a necessary thing,” explained Booth. “I needed to take the weight (of James) off my shoulders and shuffle the deck a bit and leave them to carry on. And I’m pleased. ‘Whiplash’ is a good album.”

But was the title a harbinger of bad things to come?

“I think every songwriter has psychic powers,” says Booth. “It can have magical effects but can work negatively as well as positively. I don’t quite think some of these bands out there realize what they’re writing and singing. I mean, something like ‘Kill your mother and (rape) your father’ can be an awfully negative mantra, don’t you think?”

In an interview with The Michigan Daily after their set, Booth, Davies and bassist Jim Glennie were partially saddened that the majority of the people in the crowd were ignoring them. “We’re the only tuneful band out there,” Booth said. Still, in addition to spending a great deal of time hanging out with fellow Brits Orbital, who were headlining the first part of the tour, the group does feel thankful that it is playing to a larger audience than if it just played to its fans in clubs.

Furthermore, the band is lucky to be playing at all, given what happened to Booth earlier in the year. Following the second date of James’ U.S. tour, Booth felt tremendous pain in his neck. He was diagnosed with a lateral disc protrusion in his neck and right shoulder, which produced pressure on his nerve root. He remained “on (his) back for three weeks” in San Francisco, and the band had to cancel the rest of its tour, including a May date at Clutch Cargo’s in Pontiac.

Once Booth was in suitable condition to tour, James promptly decided to sign on to do Lollapalooza, a move that, it was hoped, would help the band crack America. Unfortunately, James has had to miss a prime slot at last month’s venerable Glastonbury Festival in England. “It was hard (missing Glastonbury),” said Booth, “but there was a terrible deluge and they almost had to cancel it, so we weren’t so upset.” But by doing Lollapalooza, the band is essentially nixing the chance that it will honor its club dates in the near future. “No, this is it,” laments Booth.

James fans shouldn’t fret, though, for the group is going back into the studio in the fall (after playing at the United Kingdom’s Reading Festival in late August). Glennie said the album should be ready “by the early part of next year” and that the band wants to “keep movin'” to make up for lost time this year.

It is imperative that James rebuilds its momentum, for the group has encountered numerous stumbling blocks in addition to Booth’s severe injury. First, founding James member and slide guitarist Larry Gott told the remaining band members that he was leaving the group prior to the making of “Whiplash.” Gott “had to choose between staying with his wife or us and chose her,” Glennie said.

The same “black” day that James was informed of Gott’s decision, the band found out it owed hundreds of thousands of pounds in back taxes. In addition, Booth had decided that he needed to go off on his own for a little while, which resulted in his collaboration with “Twin Peaks” composer Angelo Badalamenti, “Booth and the Bad Angel.”

Nevertheless, James got back together and recorded the excellent “Whiplash,” which you wouldn’t know about if you listened to radio or watched MTV. Neither “Tomorrow” nor the album’s first single, “She’s A Star,” has received much airtime or video spins. As such, it seems quite apparent why the band is itching to get back in the studio and come up with an even better album.

And despite the fact that “She’s A Star” is quite possibly the most catchy song on “Whiplash,” James didn’t play it at Pine Knob. When asked why the song wasn’t performed, given that one would think the band would try to promote its latest album as much as possible, Booth said, “We’re trying out different setlists (at every show), and this is what we played today.”

Booth did note a change, however, in James’ approach to determining what to play before each concert. “We used to always change (the setlist), but now we try to get more stable for our sound guys and ourselves.” Part of this newfound stability can be witnessed in Booth’s ritual of leaving the stage (he no longer needs a neck brace or a wheelchair) and wandering into the audience on the “grassy knoll.” “We’ve done it about twice before (and we plan to keep the tradition),” Booth said. “It breaks the ice.”

The bandmembers had plenty of interesting insight into some of their British musical contemporaries. When asked if fellow Mancunians the Stone Roses could’ve been as big as Oasis in America if the band put more effort into touring – the Roses had sold-out gigs at Madison Square Garden in New York City and another in L.A. before pulling out at the last minute and never fulfilling them – Booth said, “No. Ian Brown (lead singer of the now-disbanded Stone Roses) can’t sing in tune and Liam (Gallagher of Oasis) can. You can’t tour the States with an F-you attitude.”

Davies also has a critical opinion of a current U.K. music giant, Radiohead. Despite the fact that Oxford’s Radiohead has garnered critical adulation for its third record, “OK Computer,” Davies feels it is “self-indulgent shite.”

Booth, on the other hand, was impressed with the success of the Prodigy, a techno band whose new album, “The Fat of the Land,” debuted at No. 1 in the U.S. two weeks ago. “By number of first-week sales, Prodigy is bigger than Oasis and will (eventually) be bigger than the Spice Girls,” Booth said.

As for James, perhaps it is not realistic that the group will sell as many albums as the aforementioned artists, but its members have a positive attitude and are putting lots of effort into expanding the band’s popularity in the States. Don’t count them out, for a year or two down the line, James may well be headlining shows at venues like Pine Knob.

For their latest album, style chameleons James retreated from commercial recording studios and found a new creativity working in the comfort of their own houses. PAUL TINGEN hears why they’ve decided there’s no place like home…

During their 14-year existence, James have had more than their fair share of setbacks, many of them catastrophic enough to be make-or- break affairs. And yet every time they’ve managed to bounce back and come out of their crises stronger, rejuvenated or more successful. Their latest tales of adversity involved the loss of one of their three remaining founder members, the discovery that they owed five years of back taxes, and a neck injury for their singer, which forced them to pull out of their American tour a few months ago. Despite all this, they’ve had a UK top 10 album and two successful singles this year, and appear to be creatively and commercially stronger than ever.

In a small, idyllically-located residential recording studio in central Wales, four of James’ six members — drummer David Baynton-Power, guitarist and violinist Saul Davies, bassist Jim Glennie and keyboardist Mark Hunter — are having a few days of recording and bonding, rehearsing a dance music project for a live performance in Toronto. (“Something different from James,” explains Baynton-Power: “four-on-the-floor, mindless, repetitive music. I love it!”) The studio, named Foel, features a wealth of trendy ’70s equipment, including the only Trident B-series desk left in Europe and an MCI analogue 24-track; the likes of Gong, Hawkwind, John Foxx, Peter Hammill, Youth, The Stranglers and The Fall have all recorded here in its 23-year history.

In Foel’s rustic control room, Baynton-Power, Davies and Glennie talk about how creativity, technology and adversity blended together in the making of Whiplash. The adversity started one particular Thursday three years ago, when they were working in another studio in Wales called the Windings, brainstorming and writing ideas for a new album. So deeply ingrained is the day in their memory that they call it Black Thursday. It was on this day that founding member and guitarist Larry Gott broke the news to them that he couldn’t be part of James any more, because he had found that family life and touring were incompatible. It was also on this day that their accountant broke the news to them that they had five years of back taxes to pay, and they might not be able to afford to continue the band. Combine this with the fact that singer Tim Booth was scheduled to start work with composer Angelo Badalamenti on a duo album that was to be called Booth And The Bad Angel, and few people would have put any money on James’ survival. “It was like: ‘Fuck, this is the end!'” says Baynton-Power, and Jim Glennie adds: “Tim, Larry and myself had been together for what seemed infinity, and suddenly that was all over. Suddenly everything was completely broken. We were totally shattered, and had no idea what do next.”

LONG AND WINDING ROAD

The band’s resilience, and their aptitude for reinventing themselves, may well have to do with the fact that their musical style and identity have often run in what seems, with hindsight, a bewilderingly zigzag line. James’ beginnings were auspicious enough. Their first releases were two EPs on the Manchester Factory label in the mid-’80s. Their melodic, punk-influenced indie rock earned them a cult following, a tour with The Smiths and a major deal with the American label Sire Records. Stutter (1986) and Strip Mine (1988) contained an unusual folk/indie mixture, and were only marginally successful. An acrimonious parting of ways between Sire and James followed, and many people thought that was that. But the band refused to lie down, and rose to their first major challenge with a rather unusual mixture of creativity and technology: they financed a live album on Rough Trade, One Man Clapping (1989), by participating in medical experiments. The band survived the experiments intact, and the album was successful enough for them to be snapped up by the Phonogram label Fontana.

Gold Mother (1990) contained their UK Number Two single ‘Come Home’ and, together with the re-release of their anthemic song ‘Sit Down’, it spelled commercial success in both the US and the UK. James appeared to be walking on air, but they blew the critical support they had enjoyed with 1992’s Seven — a rather bombastic, stadium-rock affair — and an allegedly awful performance at the Reading Festival in 1992, where they were the headlining act. They repaired the damage admirably in 1993 with Laid, an intimate, minimalist, acoustic-sounding affair, produced by Brian Eno, which was a million miles away from Seven. Laid reaped much critical acclaim, and they had their biggest ever US hit with the title song. Having cracked America, James followed Laid with an uncommercial, eccentric, experimental album of out-takes from the Laid sessions. Wah Wah (1994) veered around somewhere between ambient, industrial and dance music, and divided fans and critics alike. And now, three years after their last album, there’s Whiplash, and again the band have made a musical left turn. Whiplash is awash with full-throttle, distorted electric guitars, heavy rhythms and electronic eeriness, all held together by pop producer Stephen Hague (Pet Shop Boys, Jimmy Somerville), with Tim Booth wailing over the top in a stereotypical mid-’80s indie vocal style. If ‘Greenpeace’ is preachy and sentimental, and ‘Go To The Bank’ and ‘Play Dead’ full of industrial clutter, the anthemic ‘Tomorrow’, the elegant ‘Lost A Friend’, the slide-guitar driven melodic rock of ‘She’s A Star’, the lilting ‘Waltzing Along’ and the atmospheric ‘Blue Pastures’ are the best tracks, and arguably the best work, that James have ever done.

There are some echoes of Wah Wah on Whiplash — in the industrial and dance music influences, and in the track ‘Tomorrow’, which is a revamped version of the final track on Wah Wah — but overall Whiplash sounds as if it was made by a different band from the one that made Laid. Jim Glennie agrees, saying: “We always tend to react to the album before. Laid was a reaction to Seven, Whiplash a reaction to Laid,” suggesting that the change of direction on Whiplash was purely the result of that reactive process. But other factors contributed to Whiplash, most of them part of the fall-out from Black Thursday. Although James’ music had always come into being through collective band improvisations (“It never happens that someone brings in a finished song,” says Baynton-Power), until that day singer Tim Booth had held tight control of the music, involving himself in every single musical decision. Now the band was in ruins, both financially and emotionally, and Booth was about to go off to make his duo album with Angelo Badalamenti. Clearly they would have to either disband, or find other ways of working.

FAREWELL TO DEMOCRACY

When the band found themselves in disarray after Black Thursday, it was drummer David Baynton-Power, a member of the band since 1989, who unexpectedly took the lead. He remembers, laughing: “Well, none of us are much good at doing anything else except make music, and we also felt that we were good for another album, so we thought ‘Let’s just do it’. I suggested ideas for how we could work cheaply on a new album, such as recording stuff with rented equipment in band-members’ homes.” The other musicians were also keen to find a way to simply go on making music, and they therefore naturally warmed to Baynton-Power’s suggestions.

“During those sessions at the Windings we had already improvised and written many of the seeds for what eventually would become Whiplash,” says Saul Davies, “and a lot of what we had done was really good. Then everything hit us that Thursday. If what we’d been doing had been rubbish, we might have given up at that point. But the music sounded really good to us, so we felt inspired to carry on working on it. Yet we also knew that we had to work on things in a new way.”

The new way of working that Baynton-Power suggested didn’t only involve working in the band’s houses, but also working in small groups, rather than having the obligatory plenary sessions of the past, and this meant that Tim Booth had to let go of a considerable amount of control. While Booth was working on his album with Angelo Badalamenti, Baynton-Power set up shop in his house in North Wales. He rented two Tascam DA88 recorders, NS10 monitors, an Allen & Heath mixing desk, and some other studio paraphernalia, and started working with them, initially with help mainly from Saul Davies and Jim Glennie. For the first time ever, band members were working separately, and without Booth. Baynton-Power elaborates:

“Until that time we had worked by jamming with the whole band in rehearsal studios, and then we’d go into a commercial studio and record what came out, listen back and pick out the good bits. With six people, we’re a big band, and for that reason we’d always needed to rent big studios, and big studios cost a lot of money. And the disadvantage is that when you’re paying £1000 a day, nobody is prepared to stick their necks out and try weird things, for fear of wasting time and money. So I thought that we needed time to try out any crazy idea that might lead to something brilliant. That’s where the idea came from to work in people’s houses. We siphoned off all the multitrack tapes of the sessions at the Windings onto DA88 tapes, and started the process of listening back, picking out the good bits and expanding on those, or trying out completely new ideas.”

With band members living as far apart as Wales, Stirling, Brighton, Leeds, Manchester, and New York or London (Booth), Baynton-Power’s plan had the added advantage that the old logistical problem of getting the whole band together in one room ceased to exist. And so individual band members made their way to Baynton-Power’s home, and occasionally Jim Glennie’s home in Manchester, and reacted to the material on the DA88 tapes. Baynton-Power engineered most of these pre-production sessions, and tried to keep them focused — part of the reason why he is credited as Associate Producer on Whiplash. He describes the process in more detail…

“We sifted through all the material from the Windings and the good bits that we found we sampled on an Emu 6400, or an Akai S1000, and looped them using Cubase software on the Atari. We constructed tracks from these loops and played to them, encouraging each other to come up with weird noises and all kinds of new ideas. It’s a great way of working, because there was no pressure. People are often at their best when they’re not thinking about what they’re doing. When the red light goes on in a studio they tense up and often a pile of crap comes out. So you have to capture them in moments when they’re not self-conscious.”

“We found that this way of working was really good for developing seeds,” adds Jim Glennie. “When you’re all together in a room, it’s a difficult environment to control. You may not be able to hear what’s going on; or it may sound great, but when you listen back it’s no good at all; or it may be very hard to suggest an idea to a group of people who all have their own ideas. To get them to understand what you mean and agree that it’s a good idea is not easy. So you often get a compromise that everybody is happy with, rather than being pushed to extremes by an individual who has an overview that they can push through. Democracy is a wonderful process, but you do have to be careful that you don’t end up with a musical compromise that’s a dilution of what could have been. So we got really into this new working method of creating an initial seed with the whole band in a room, and then taking it away to another room where one or two people work on it and listen to it and select the best bits and piece it all back together again. You can push things to extremes like that, and if it doesn’t work, it’s OK, because you’re not spending a grand a day in a room.”

SPANNER IN THE OINTMENT

James found this working method so attractive that, when they eventually returned to working in big, commercial recording studios, they rented two rooms simultaneously: one where the main producer, Stephen Hague, worked with the whole band, recording and editing tracks, and one where David Baynton-Power deconstructed those tracks and tried out weird ideas with one or two band members. (The other reason for his Associate Producer credit.) The recording sessions with Hague started in February 1996 — which meant that the pre-production sessions at Baynton-Power’s house had taken well over a year — and took place at RAK studios in London and Real World Studios near Bath, with a few sessions in other studios: new guitarist Adrian Oxaal’s overdubs on ‘Tomorrow’ took place at Foel studio.

“Dave grabbed the album in the early stages when it looked as if everything was grinding to a halt,” says Jim Glennie. “He took the reins, dragged us all kicking and screaming into his living room, and instigated a process that became the foundation for Whiplash, which was to break away from the idea of sounding like everybody playing together in a room. We opened the boundaries of what James could sound like, and by late 1995 we’d arrived at a point where we had songs and sounds and felt that it was a good idea to go into a studio with a producer and finish the album off. At that point we went to see Brian Eno, but he realised that we knew what we were doing, and that we didn’t need him to to stop us messing things up. He said that he didn’t want to babysit us through the album, and that he would only come in occasionally, to make sure things were still on track.”

Stephen Hague was appointed as main producer instead, and Brian Eno made his way about once a week to RAK and Real World, ending up with credits for “frequent interference and co-production” as well as “keyboards and backing vocals”. The whole band actually felt confident that Dave Baynton-Power could have seen the album through on his own, Glennie explains, but their record company was keen to give the overall responsibility to a big-name producer, and insisted on Hague’s involvement.

“They want the security of being able to go: ‘Yeah, brilliant, Eno’s involved, Hague’s involved, nothing can go wrong’,” Baynton-Power agrees. “And it is really good to have an outside opinion, someone who can be objective and tell you what’s good and bad. Often we’re way too self-critical and think something is bollocks, and Eno was very good at saying ‘Stop there, that was great’. And we’d think ‘It can’t be that easy, you have to struggle’.”

“The best example is the song ‘Laid’,” says Glennie, “the single that broke us in the USA. It’s screechy, scratchy, badly recorded, the timing is all over the place — it was thrown together really haphazardly, just one of the silly run-throughs in the very early life of the song. And Eno said ‘That’s great, leave it’. And we were saying ‘Are you sure? It’s all over the place’. But he insisted it was fine. So then you ship it off to the record company, and they listen to it and, because Eno has done it, they say ‘A work of genius, so scrappy, isn’t that brave?’ But if Dave had done it, they would have said: ‘It sounds shite, it sounds like a demo’. It’s how all record companies think, and it can be frustrating.”

It could be argued that, while James talk with some bemusement and maybe even a hint of awe about the working methods of Brian Eno (“When you think you’re just jamming, but someone like Eno tells you it’s brilliant, you think that maybe he has a point”), they do actually still need a producer who can do what Eno does. But then, Laid is almost as uneven an affair as Whiplash, with some beautiful songs, gorgeously played, sung and recorded — ‘Dream Thrum’, ‘One Of The Three’, ‘Say Something’, ‘Five-O’ — but some, ‘Out To Get You’ and ‘Knuckle Too Far’, that sound just like haphazard rehearsals. In any event, according to Glennie, Eno’s instant, intuitive way of working and Hague’s contrasting perfectionist approach did complement each other:

“We weren’t too sure about how Hague would react to Eno coming in now and again and sticking a spanner in the works. But they actually worked together incredibly well. Sometimes one would suggest one thing and the other would suggest something else, and it was quite an amazing experience for us to have these two top producers suggesting things to us. It was an impressive line-up!” laughs Glennie. “And then there was Dave holding the reins in the other room, throwing ideas around. Tapes were being sent to and fro between the two studios, and even occasionally to a third studio, where Tim would explore lyrical and vocal ideas. And out of this three-studio situation came several brand new songs, such as ‘She’s A Star’, ‘Lost A Friend’, ‘Greenpeace’ and ‘Go To The Bank’.”

NEW TOYS

James are often compared to U2 — for their cause-carrying rock, for their musical changes, for the way they write through band improvisations — and the process by which James created Whiplash sounds remarkably similar to the way U2 recorded their recent Pop album (see SOS, July 1997). David Baynton-Power explains that it’s the inexpensiveness and flexibility of new gear that’s given James a new lease of life: the DA88 recorders and the Cubase plus Emu 6400 MIDI setup at his home gave the band the chance to record cheaply at home without sonic compromise. The DA88 material and Cubase sequences were transferred directly to two Sony 3324 24-track digital recorders at RAK and Real World, where Stephen Hague used the two 3324 recorders to create new arrangements by shuttling between the two machines, and using slave reels for overdubs.

Technology also helps James to perform live, says Baynton-Power:

“A lot of people don’t realise how much hardware we use live. But we don’t show it off. We keep it hidden and so no-one notices. We work with drum machines and use a lot of pre-recorded stuff — we never use tape, it’s mainly samples triggered manually by Mark [Hunter, James’ keyboard player], or loops that we run off the old little Alesis sequencer, the MMT8. That’s a brilliant piece of gear for live use, because it’s stable, it never crashes, and it’s user-friendly and quick to use. You can mute tracks with a touch of the button on the MMT8. Try doing that live with Cubase and a mouse!

“Live, Mark uses a Clavia Nord Lead, Korg Wavestation keyboard, Emu Orbit, Roland Super Jupiter rackmount and the Emu 6400 sampler, with 128K memory and hard drive. Brian Eno sang many of the backing vocals on Laid — he’s brilliant at that, doing them very quickly with a Shure SM58 mic sitting behind the desk. To be able to perform these tracks live, we sampled many of Eno’s backing vocals into the Emu and Mark plays them from a keyboard. And he often sends me a click track or a little drum beat from the MMT8, which only I will hear, via headphones, to make sure that all the backing vocals that he’s firing from the sampler will be exactly in time with my drumming. Other than that, I don’t use any MIDI live. I try to keep live drumming simple.”

Finally, Baynton-Power reveals that James have taken so strongly to their new working methods that they’ve acquired a whole batch of recording gear which they’re planning to take on their forthcoming tours, starting with the legendary open-air Lollapalooza tour in the USA (their first public appearance with Adrian Oxaal, who will take care of Larry Gott’s guitar parts, including Gott’s trademark slide-guitar work). The new setup consists of a Soundscape version 2 system, with a laptop PC and Emagic Logic software, two Tascam DA38 machines, and an Allen & Heath mixing desk, and they intend to use it to work on new material, together with the Roland MC303 Groovebox, Clavia Nord Lead, Emu Morpheus, a Korg A/D rack and a few reverbs and other effects.

“We’re planning to write new material while touring,” he says; “either in hotel rooms, or using the jams that we usually play during soundchecks. The Soundscape hooks up straight to the PC, and it’s a really portable system that’s eminently compatible with the DA38 recorders. We can load material recorded on the DA38 into the Soundscape and edit it digitally. Or we can configure the Soundscape into any kind of mixer that we want. We’re planning to use Emagic Logic in the PC for MIDI sequencing and link it with Soundscape, and we’re thinking about getting Logic Audio for the PC, which is supported by Soundscape, so you can use the Soundscape hardware to do the audio — rather than the PC, which will inevitably crash! That would make a great combination. We think it’s a brilliant portable unit as it is. Working directly on audio material with Soundscape is a lot easier than sampling the section you want, naming and looping it and then triggering it from Cubase, which is what we previously did.”

Anyone who has toured knows how draining it can be, because there’s only an hour here or a couple of hours there to concentrate on something. It’s incredibly difficult to be creative in such circumstances, and so hats off to James if they indeed manage to do significant writing while on tour. But then, bearing Jim Glennie’s elegant summary of James’ motto in mind, they may well go where few have managed to go before them:

“We always try to push things to extremes. We don’t like to sit on our laurels and milk what we have done and never change. We’re always looking to change our sound and looking for different ways of working. What us kept us going for a long, long time is the fact that we still manage to find ways of working together that keep our music fresh.”

“I had no intention of being in a band at all. I got talked into it by a friend, because he’d bought this stolen guitar. An imitation Gibson SG, one of those really weird guitars out of a catalogue, which he’d got off a mate. We used to rehearse through my little 10 watt amp, singing through my dad’s hi-fi. It broke, of course.

“Finding people to be in your band can be pretty difficult. Especially drummers. And bass players. That’s why I became the bassist, actually – originally I was the guitarist – because no-one else wanted to do it. “The best thing to do is get a gig a couple of months away, when you haven’t even got a band or any songs together. That way you’ll get people interested and you won’t spend a year in your bedroom trying to perfect everything and get really pernickety and protective about it.

“You’ll need somewhere to practise, too. Somewhere you can make a real racket, somewhere a long way away from any houses. Failing that, the drummer’s kitchen will do!

“As for songs, if you want to do cover versions then go for your favourite bands’ early albums. Not only are they more credible but, more importantly, they won’t have too many chords in so you should be able to play them at least half decently. We used to do ‘Never Trust A Man With Egg On His Face’ from the first Adam & The Ants album and ‘She’s Lost Control’ by Joy Division.

“Transport’s essential. We went to all our first gigs on the bus; we’d stick all our equipment in the luggage hold, so we had to stand up all the way and hold on to it really tightly to stop it falling off.

“It was even more difficult, because back then we didn’t know how to tune our guitars and the Scoutmaster at the Scout hut we rehearsed at had an acoustic guitar -obviously -and he’d tune our guitars for us. Not that anyone noticed -it’s really not that important when you can’t play your instruments anyway. “You’ll need a good name. We chose James because it didn’t sound like a band name at all, but we had a few good ones before that. Venereal and The Diseases was the first one. Then Volume Distortion – sounds quite techno, that – and Model Team International. We were only called that because the guitarist’s girlfriend worked for a model agency called Model Team International and she had a T-shirt with the logo on. That’s a top tip; if you can’t afford merchandise then change your name to something that’s on a T-shirt already.”

With their new album already clocking up sales of 60,000, James are back with a vengeance. Nick Sorre visited co-producer and drummer David Baynton-Power at Foel Studios in Wales.

Sit down and I’ll tell you a story… James have been through a lot of changes in their fourteen year history. As a struggling four-piece, they made an impact on the trendy Manchester scene in the early eighties. They released two EPs on Factory Records between 1983 and 1985, before moving to Sire Records. They contacted Brian Eno in the hope that he would produce their debut album Stutter. Eno was busy, but it wouldn’t be the last he would hear from them.

James left Sire Records in 1988 and recruited drummer and producer David Baynton-Power, as well as a new keyboard player, violinist and trumpeter. The fuller line-up gave James credibility as a live act to be reckoned with. This led to a live album, and James’ signing to Phonogram and the release of Gold Mother which spawned the hits “Sit Down” and “Come Home”. Achieving better and better sales with each consecutive album, 1992’s Seven was a million seller.

An all acoustic tour ensued with Neil Young, which helped the James sound to become further refined. The band didn’t play an electric set for three months. On return from tour, James felt they were ready to re-approach Brian Eno. Having heard demo tapes of material the band were working on, he readily agreed to produce material with James.

The result of six weeks of writing and recording over forty songs was the acclaimed Laid album, released in 1993. At the same time, it earned James the Stateside recognition they had been yearning for.

Where did they go?

Until earlier this year, things had been rather quiet in the James camp. Singer Tim Booth embarked on a project entitled Booth And The Bad Angel with renowned Italian-American composer Angelo Badalamenti, putting him out of James’ composing equation for quite some time. Almost simultaneously, founding member of James, Larry Gott, decided he couldn’t go on touring. Coinciding with a realisation that they owed five years in back taxes, the band were on the verge of splitting. Baynton-Power recalls with posthumous humour that this time was referred to as “Black Thursday”.

Ever undetered, 1995 saw Baynton-Power set up a studio in his North Wales home. The band, with the absence of singer Booth, jammed and reflected, and emerged with a plethora of material, ripe for the renewed collaboration with Brian Eno. The main reasoning behind building the studio was financial. In David’s words…..

“It costs a lot of money to get a band as big as this into a studio, so I suggested that we could do a lot of the preparation in just one room. There’s all the equipment available, which doesn’t cost much to rent. So you can just sit in a house, which has the added benefit of allowing everyone to develop their sounds.”

This was evidently preferable to the standard rehearsal room experience which James have been well accustomed to in the past.

“When you’ve got a load of people banging away in a room there’s often not much interaction, and it just becomes a noise. It sounds great at the time, but then you listen back and can’t decipher what you were trying to achieve.”

To this end, James, and David Baynton-Power in particular became heavily involved in sequencing, initially employing a simple Atari with Cubase set-up, and then adding DA88s to the equation. This technology changed the working process for the band. The methodology of recording to digital multitrack and having the flexibility to edit the best takes into the finished product has been embraced wholeheartedly.

“We just stripped all the multitracks onto the DA88s” says David, “and set it up at home with a couple of samplers, Cubase, and a small mixing desk, and just sifted through the whole lot.”

He goes on to explain the additional advantages of recording every take.

“If someone’s just doodling on guitar or whatever, and you dash into the room saying ‘that’s great, play it again’, the response will be ‘I can’t’, so I guess my role on how the album occurred was to take the approach of getting absolutely everything on tape, and then having the job of piecing it all together to sound like a live recording. Which, essentially, it was.” Perhaps as a consequence, there are definite nods to the dance fraternity on Whiplash, but David maintains that this was not a conscious decision.

“All our albums have been a definite reaction to whatever we’ve done previously” he says. “We just felt comfortable with the ideas we were coming up with, which happened to be dance influenced. We didn’t know how it would turn out, but it just seemed to work.”

In with Eno

The recording of the album was a very natural process for the band. Having been afforded the luxury of spending an abundance of time thrashing out ideas before going into the studio with Eno and co producer Stephen Hague, the result is an album that is enticingly at ease with itself. The production process was equally re!axed; having collaborated with Eno before, Baynton-Power cites the partnership as “ideal, because he doesn’t turn it into an Eno production, he’s more of a guiding force without dominating.”

Eno also appears as main backing vocalist on Whiplash, to which he took a slightly unorthodox approach. Baynton-Power laughingly explains, “He’d just sit at the mixing desk, SM58 in hand, listen to the track and lay down some guide vocals. We ended up keeping a lot of them.”

David employed a similarly spartan approach for miking up his drum kit. His favoured 4-piece Tama kit was often miked with just a stereo pair.

“You just get a much livelier sound. Multiple miking can often sound a bit dead and clinical. You know, you listen back to classic old records with massive drum sounds, and they were recorded with just two mics. The only downside is that you don’t have the control at the mixing stage.”

This raw style of production appears to stem from the unpretentious approach Baynton-Power has to the task. On how he got into production, he simply explains, “I’ve always fucked around with mixers and studios; it’s really not a big deal.” So no top secret effects to get those huge industrial vocal sounds? “Nah,” says David, “That sound on ‘Go To The Bank is just a combination of Tim’s dynamic voice and one of those little Boss compressors.” Intriguing. On the question of which one, the nonchalant reply is “you know, the blue one.”

Top producer Stephen Hague was also involved, but according to Baynton-Power, he had little influence on the final product.

“Stephen was really keen to get involved with Whiplash, but he’s so busy that he didn’t have a whole lot of time to spend on it. And since so much of the groundwork had already been done, his input was limited. Anyway, he didn’t really want to babysit the whole album, he wanted to just pop in and see what was going on.”

David is in the rare position as a drummer to have production skills, and he finds this a major advantage in achieving the sounds he wants. “It’s about ideas really. When you’ve got a specific sound in your head, it’s certainly a bonus to be able to capture it. Instead of having to explain it to five other people, and convince them that it’s a good idea, and then get them to do it.”

Unusually, David records the live drum tracks after much of the other instrumentation has been committed to tape. “On a lot of the tracks, we’d have virtually everything on tape, and I’d just bash away until I get that groove. If you’re recording a guide track live, you might get a good feel, but you won’t be able to recreate it, so I prefer to do it after.”

There are dangers of working in this way, though, which David is fully aware of. Manipulating, sampling, and lots of overdubbing can be detrimental to the live feel which is so vital in James’ music.

“It doesn’t detract from the live feel at all”, he explains, “because what we do is write and rehearse loads of songs together. We all learn our parts, and play it as a band.”

Mastenng the whip

Recording at Foel studios was also an essential element in the mastering stage of Whiplash, as David enthuses. ..

“This is a great place to work, the atmosphere is superb, and the studio has one of the few Trident B desks in the country.” The culled equipment of the band members is installed at the studio, too, and includes some surprisingly modern kit for essentially a guitar based rock band.

Units such as E-mu’s Orbit and the Nord Lead feature heavily on Whiplash, along with the omnipresent samplers, including Akai SlOO0′ s and the E-mu 6400, yet David is a tad sceptical about editing sounds just for the sake of it. “You can fall into the trap of limiting your options. I just find that if you start fiddling around, you can lose the original ideas. It’s far better to stick with the sound you thought was great in the first place. Keep it spontaneous, that’s the key.

“We’ve always used stacks of synths, and we use them on stage, too,” David explains, “and I don’t think the audience realise that there’s a lot of pre- recorded stuff going on too.”

On the subject of tours, James’ recent tour of north America was cut short due to Tim Booth injuring his neck. There were rumours of substitute vocalist Michael Kulas filling the position, which were misconstrued by the press as Booth having left the band to continue his collaboration with Angelo Badalamenti. Patently untrue, of course, but it prompted the cancellations. Booth has fully recovered now and is on top form, if his country and western rendition of ‘Star’ is anything to go by. David has few qualms about the situation though.

“They were only club gigs really. Not many people knew about the tour anyway, and since we’re doing the Lolapalooza gig, and some festivals, people will have a chance to see us at some point.” Also on the bill for Lolapalooza are acts such as the Chemical Brothers, Orbital and the Orb, but David is confident that with the dance inspired meanderings of the Whiplash material, there won’t be a disparity with their show. James are versatile live, too, which stems from their willingness to tryout new material live. This has a number of benefits according to Baynton-Power.

“The thing is, you have the opportunity to hone songs you’re working on in a live environment. You can see the audience’s reaction, you can develop the song even further, and also, hearing the stuff in alive context rather than a rehearsal room is an added bonus. Because you’re playing at high levels and you’ve got huge monitors, the kick drum, for example, is just…” (punches his hand -very hard).

The live arena is of particular importance to James. Their shows are eclectic and highly acclaimed, and the band view touring as essential part of their progression. As David enthuses, “Getting up on stage is just so inspiring. You really lose yourself in it. Then you take the experience back to the studio.”

What’s next?

Keeping himself ever busy, Baynton-Power’s latest project is a female fronted dance-oriented band called Money. Collaborating with some of the members of James, David sardonically describes the project as “making music that we’re probably totally unqualified to make.”

But surely this at odds with the band’s foray into everything dancey? ”

Although we had some dance leanings on Whiplash it wasn’t really deliberate. This latest project is out-and-out dance. Half the band are involved in the project as writers and producers, and it just kind of stemmed from going to parties around here in Wales.”

The Money project were just heading off to Canada for their first clutch of gigs, and David is excited at the prospect:

“It’s really a kind of experiment, with the upcoming gigs we’ll have live guitars and everything, but within a dance act. And we’re funding it all ourselves as well, and we just want see where it goes. If it goes anywhere. It’s quite crossover, and the upcoming gig in Toronto will be mainly a rock audience, so it’ll be interesting to see what happens. Money is a completely external project to James, but I guess people will use that as a marker.” And some marker that may prove to be…

James’ Tim Booth has revealed how a Tibetan healer is helping him recover from a neck injury which has been plaguing him for months.

Booth hurt his neck onstage in Vancouver in April last year, at the beginning of a six-week US tour. The band called off the rest of the dates while doctors told Booth to remain horizontal for seven days. He was then ordered to rest for at least six weeks.

The injury had not healed at the end of the six weeks, but Booth carried on as James played the Lollapalooza tour and Reading Festival, where he surprised fans by appearing in a neck brace. The pain got no better as the weeks went by, and it was only last week that Booth was well enough to attempt physiotherapy for the first time.

Nevertheless, James are coming back with a full schedule, and they launched their latest projects with an acoustic gig last week in a London studio. Bernard Butler, Zoe Ball, Orbital, Jo Whiley, Texas, Dubstar, and Chris the mechanic from “Coronation Street” were among the audience watching the band run through a selection of favourites and a couple of new songs.

“Destiny Calling”, one of the new tracks, will be released as a single on March 2. Along with “Run Aground”, another new song, it will be included on a greatest hits album, “The Best of James”, which follows on March 23, and a UK tour will follow.

Dates are Manchester Apollo (April 11), Glasgow Barrowlands (13), Doncaster Dome (14) and London Brixton Academy (17).

The band will be playing electric instruments on the tour, although they may separately set up a few acoustic gigs – which the specially enjoy, being multi-instrumentalists. They plan one for Radio 1 and another in Manchester, possibly on a barge. Acoustic gigs are also less of a threat to Booth’s neck injury, which is more serious than anyone realised at the time.

“At one point, I was looking at being crippled,” he said. “I only started doing any exercise, physio, in the last week. Before that, every time I tried to do physio, I’d be on my back for two days. It just wasn’t healing. I couldn’t lift a paper bag.”

The Maker suggested that playing the Lollapalooza tour probably hadn’t helped his recovery.

“It probably would have been quicker if I hadn’t done those dates,” he agreed. “We couldn’t get out of them because of insurance. It was very interesting, I was one of the main survivors of Lollapalooza. A lot of bands split after that, or got seriously damaged. I think I did quite well.”

“I was being moved around all the time in the bus and I had to withdraw and be quite quiet, and I had a nurse with me virtually the whole time.”

“I’ll still have to be more careful for a while but I can’t not react to the music. I’m a dancer, and dancing’s the thing I love. I adore it. I can’t stay still. When I had the neck brace on at Reading, I was still moving more than most people. So we’ll see how it goes. I’ll be a bit tentative on this tour, and the band will be shouting at me if I forget.”

Asked if he intends to do what the doctors tell him, he said: “I’ve never really gone with established medicine, ever since I nearly died of a liver disease. I’ve had a number of injuries, but they’ve also been life-saving.”

“Illness is an amazing teacher. I’m happy with the end result, and I’ve gone through hell in some periods, but it teaches you a hell of a lot. I will get better from this one.”

“As I said, I feel it [the healing] has really started now. If you’d asked me two months ago, I’d say it hadn’t started.”

“I’ve been having some really good treatment from a lunatic. I know enough shamens and healers around. I’m seeing a Tibetan doctor.”

“I had two ruptured discs in my lower neck – the spongy discs between the vertebrae. Two of them burst. Eventually, the bones fuse together naturally. That’s what traditional medicine says, but I don’t necessarily think that’s what we’ll be doing.”

“You can heal anything, that’s my attitude. I’ve done that before.”

James, meanwhile, have been working on new material – “the best we’ve ever done” – with a view to an album release in the autumn.

When vocalist Tim Booth was searching for new members to help return Manchester band James to the forefront of the British music scene there was only one person, outside the band, he knew he could rely on — his clairvoyant.

His trusted Manchester-based confidante and adviser – Avril – offered him two names and addresses and, sure enough, her explicit detail was spot on and the last two pieces of the James jigsaw were set in place.

The more cynical among us may write this off as lucky or the height of coincidence but Tim, a man whose success speaks for itself, is nobody’s fool — and he knows something extraordinary when he sees it.

He says: “Avril, a clairvoyant in Manchester, has been guiding my business decisions for the past 10 years and I see her a lot. You have to put your own spin on what she tells you but she has been a wonderful help to me for a long time now.

“It’s not something that I talk about a great deal, possibly because many people wouldn’t understand, but I know and see a lot of clairvoyants. I suppose it suits my particular brand of lunacy.”

It’s both ironic and well-timed then that, following Tim’s crystal ball confessions, James’ new single is titled Destiny Calling. It’s out next Monday and is followed by the band’s Best Of compilation and two live home-town shows at the Apollo Theatre on April 10 and 11.

And Tim’s just grateful to be around to take part in the return of the hugely popular band, who’ve been touring their unique brand of inspiring pop longer than any of their Manchester contemporaries.

The singer feared he might have to hang up his microphone and dancing shoes for good last year after a pain in the neck developed into a spinal problem which was close to leaving him paralyzed. Incredibly, it was the alternative medicine of a Tibetan healer which saved him from life in a wheelchair.

He said: “I hurt my neck on stage in April last year at the beginning of an American tour. We called off the rest of the dates and I was told to lie down for seven days and then rest for at least six weeks.” The injury hadn’t healed at the end of his recuperation period and Booth stunned fans by appearing on sage at the Reading Festival in a neck brace. It wasn’t until November that the freak injury — two ruptured discs in his neck — began to feel like it was healing after help from a Tibetan doctor who practised alternative medicine.

Tim says: “I could have been disabled for the rest of my life by this injury. I’ve never really been one for conventional medicine. I got into alternative medicine when I almost died from what was supposed to be an inherited and incurable rare liver disease when I was 22 and it was controlled by alternative medicine. It’s obviously not for everyone, but it seems to work for me.”

Tim is pleased to have come through it, for obvious reasons, but also wants to repay the loyal fans who stuck by the band during their seven-year wilderness.

He says: “There are not many bands who can go seven years without success and still have a huge fan base. We have been incredibly fortunate in that respect.”

“Until last year it was four years since we had played a live show in the UK. The reception we received, especially in Manchester, was just amazing. We could feel the great wave of relief, not just within the band, but among our fans, when we finally had another hit again.”

Tim is promising the fans’ faith will be repaid 10-fold with the Best Of compilation, a handful of heart-stopping live shows, the new single and, later in the year, an album of brand new songs.

In the meantime he is to appear on stage in Bolton, without his band and microphone, when he takes the lead role in a new play, soon to be announced, which he described as “pretty intens.” His faith and neck restored, Tim believes 1998 will be James’ best year ever. Why? Well, because Avril says so.

A weak liver and a bad neck didn’t keep James’s lead singer Tim Booth sitting down.

“I hurt my neck when I was on stage in Vancouver last year. I was ordered to rest for six weeks but the injury didn’t heal. At one point I was looking at being crippled. I’ve never really gone with established medicine – my healing started after really good treatment from a Tibetan doctor. You can heal anything if you find the right curer.

As a child I was called ‘Chinky’ because my skin was yellow. It went that colour because I couldn’t break down fats. By 22, I was desperately ill and had to be hospitalised. The doctors told me that I had an inherited liver disease and there was nothing they could do. I discharged myself and sought alternative advice. I tried acupuncture, which was enormously healing because the liver affects the mind – jaundice is just a mental condition. The Chinese understand these things much better than us – they’ve realised that liver conditions can be explained entirely in terms of anger and confusion. My body was full of toxins so I progressed to colonic irrigation. It was the most dramatic treatment. I felt fantastic as soon as I started. I also tried the gall bladder flush which is rather slower. You drink a small dose of olive oil and lemon juice every morning for a year, then suddenly down a litre and a half in one go. I flushed out a jam-jar-full of gallstones. It was pretty uncomfortable for two nights but better than an operation.

Music can be very healing. I know that some of my songs are therapeutic by the letters I get. Our best-known number, Sit Down, touched a lot of hearts. I have been approached to perform in hospitals and psychiatric institutions. I’m very wary of group meditation because of all the gurus involved. When people think they have the power to help people transcend to a higher being, they usually turn out to be creeps. Alternative medicine is all about realising your full human potential – you have to find the right life-system. I’ve tried all sorts – vegetarianism, teetotalism, celibacy – but in the end you just have to find peace with yourself.”

Manchester-born Tim Booth, 38, is lead singer with James, who release their Best Of album today and will tour the UK in April.

We have no way of assessing and understanding our own lives in a greater sense, so the day that changed my life was probably some seemingly uneventful day, on which I blew my nose and triggered off a quantum reaction that sent my world on a different spin. However, here is a list of esoteric incidents in chaotic order, that left a deep impression on my software.

Mother nearly miscarrying me left a sense of being unwanted and a fear of walking on sidewalk grills.

Being born and son being born.

The horror of boarding school. The need to please, to fit in.

Loneliness and dealing with bullies.

Having a near-death experience in hospital.

Living with an undiagnosed, inherited liver disease for 22 years.

My son nearly dying of croup at six months in Portugal and driving 120 miles through the night to the nearest hospital.

Discovering that dancing and singing take me closer to the spirit.

Discovering that spirit is alive and well, despite the attempts of organised religions to kill her.

Rupturing discs in my neck; illness has been a great teacher, but I wish he’d piss off now.

Working with inspiring people: Brian Eno, Angelo Badlementi, Gabrielle Roth.

Love affairs and break-ups.

A couple of incredibly vivid dreams that warned me about the self-destructive direction my life was taking. They were about the dire consequences of the tortured artist myth I was trying to live up to at the time.

Meeting, loving and proposing to my beloved.

Today.

Details

James have recovered after a serious incident of whiplash for frontman Tim Booth that almost left him paralysed, and to prove it they’re back with a new single Destiny Calling and a Greatest Hits album as well.

Saul : When bands release a Greatest Hits or Best Of or whatever, it can quite easily be perceived as a weak cowing down to the business in many ways. But for me, it’s quite an aggressive thing for us to do. It’s a very deliberate statement of intent about the future of James. It says “Here are our 16 Top 40 records” This is about stating our case. This is a great band.

Tim : Well, Sit Down was actually written years before it was released. We wrote it and we wrote it in about twenty minutes and then fell about laughing, we couldn’t play it anymore because we were laughing so much. The first time we knew it was really special was Liverpool Royal Court. We took the song down quiet and the audience started singing the song back to us and so we took it down quieter and then we stopped and they sang to us for about five minutes and I mean we were in tears. We were very shocked.

Saul : The power of ten thousand, twelve thousand shouting this back at you was quite something.

I saw a really good interview the other day, I think on this show with Richard Ashcroft of the Verve and he said that when he split the band up in 95, he reformed the band two years later because he knew they had something to say. What he was really saying was regardless of what’s happening around you, you are doing this for a very good, the only valid reason, the only really strong reason, that you feel that you’ve got something to say.

Tim : And then we went and did Lollapolooza which was a disaster in America. Not in terms of what it’s done for us. It was just so hard to get through. We’d go on and deal with heckling every night which we quite enjoyed. We found novel ways of dealing with it. We were playing with other bands such as Korn, who had songs like, can you beep stuff, songs like Kill Your Father, F**k Your Mother. After about 2 or 3 weeks I was walking off stage, I’d walk off stage to go and sing in the audience and I found that if I went up to the hecklers they couldn’t handle 10,000 people watching them, and the first time I did it, there was this huge guy, screaming abuse and I’d go up and sing to him and after 30 seconds he said “Will you give me a hug?”

Saul : We actually said beforehand to Mercury about the video that we’re not doing it if you put us in a great big freezing shed on the outskirts of London and we got in these big cars and we ended up in, let me see, this great big freezing shed on the outskirts of London. We started the video and the whole day went by like a flash.

Tim : I was really open to our ideas and said. I was naked. Did you suggest we be naked?

Saul : Yes

Tim : I think you did. Like and he said “Let’s all go naked”

Don’t panic, James fans… They are alive, well, still together – and working right here in Scotland!

Rumours that the boys were on the verge of a split were fuelled by the announcement that they’ll have a “Best Of…” package released this week.

But, no, they are NOT milking the cash cow before a final curtain call.

Singer Tim Booth says that work on a new album is in progress – at a SECRET Scottish location.

All very exciting.

“Split rumours have been going around since our Whiplash album and my solo project Booth and the Bad Angel,” says Tim.

“I can tell you they are just not true. We’ve no intention of splitting up. We’ve got too much still to do. We’ve already written about 20 or 30 new songs in a house somewhere near Dollar and they are the best things we’ve ever done.”

There will be a taste of the new material on the Best Of album and they already have enough songs for a completely new album later in the year.

“We’ve got that feeling again where you know you are writing a classic and it feels so right. I haven’t had that since writing Sit Down.

“All the band have enjoyed coming to Scotland. I holiday here quite a lot, especially near Inverness.

“Scottish people are a lot cooler. They leave us alone to get on with things.”

There was a time when James would never have been left alone. In the early ’90s, no self- respecting Indie kid would be seen dead without a James T-shirt and the band sold more shirts than copies of their 1990 album, Gold Mother.

On the front cover of every magazine and Features paper, they were hailed as the new U2 or Simple Minds, playing gigs to 30,000 people a night – and, amazingly, not very happy about it all.

Over the past few years, James have deliberately worked hard to under- sell themselves, to get out of the glare of the spotlight.

“We shut our fan club and said ‘no’ to a lot of media opportunities that would have probably sold us the next 100,000 albums,” says Tim.

“We were normal people who, all of a sudden, had this massive hit with Sit Down. It went out of control. We had people sitting on our lawn, following us to the toilet. A group of Japanese teenagers even flew to Manchester and stayed for six months until they eventually bumped into me.

“This time, if we have a runaway hit, I think we’ll be ready for it. We won’t spend any time trying to keep control of it. We’ll just let it go.

“Once we’ve picked the best of the 20 or 30 tunes we’ve got, we’ll have the best album from James yet and it should be out in September.”

James could have been forgiven if they HAD decided to call it a day in the last three years…

Guitarist Larry Gott quit to spend more time with his family and the band discovered they owed £250,000 to the tax man.

“And I should have been a bit more careful when it came to naming the last album,” grins Tim.

“No sooner had I called it Whiplash than I GET whiplash… I ruptured two discs in my neck and spent three months in a neck brace.

“It was agony. I was right in the middle of a tour and I had to keep going. “I managed okay, but the damage was too much and we had to cancel our next tour.”

“But we are doing a short tour next month, including the Barrowlands in Glasgow on April 13, and we’ll see how we hold out. I think I may have to cut out the erratic dancing and jumping about, but the show will still be good!

“I thought I was feeling better but, in the last couple of weeks, the neck is sore again and I may have to wear that brace.”

“It’s either that or quit, because if I do any serious damage, we may never be able to tour again. It’s literally a right pain in the neck,” says poor old Tim.

But don’t worry about the band bowing out. Dig out your old James shirt and remember that the best could be still to come.

Dominic Utton sits down with James to talk about the ‘Madchester’ fallout, a few humbling experiences and getting back on their feet in the UK…

Although having come to prominence as part of the “Madchester” scene at the end of the Eighties – alongside bands like the Charlatans, the Stone Roses and the Happy Mondays – the career of James has been less straightforward than that of most of their baggy contemporaries. Formed as early as 1982 after bassist Jim Glennie invited a dancer (then drama student Tim Booth) he spotted in a Manchester disco to sing for his band, they released a couple of EPs on the seminal independent label Factory, before eventually achieving a brief and sparkling success with singalong folk-pop singles such as “Sit Down” and “Come Home”.

Despite being revered in their home city (Morrissey: ” James are the best band in the world!”), and despite in “Sit Down” having the anthem of 1990, they never really emerged from the shadow of their fellow Mancunians. “We tried to side-step that Madchester thing really,” says Jim Glennie. “We were worried that if you come in on a wave you can get dragged back out by it. . . but, I mean, I loved that period. We took the Happy Mondays on tour, we played with the Stone Roses. . . we weren’t shunning that time or anything, we loved it. We were just a bit scared it would work against us in the long run.”

For a while it seemed it did. Several of James’ peers survived the Madchester fallout: the Charlatans came back with the superb Tellin’ Stories, Happy Monday’s Shaun Ryder formed Black Grape, John Squire of the Stone Roses achieved commercial (if not critical) success with the Seahorses, and the same band’s singer Ian Brown recently released a solo debut album Unfinished Monkey Business. In comparison, James looked to have gone the way of the many also-rans.

Until, that is, the end of last year, when they burst back into the pop consciousness with “She’s A Star”, an infectious, soaring blend of guitar pop and vocal harmonics that recalled the whirling optimism of their best Madchester songs. Now the success of that single is to be followed this month with another release “Destiny Calling” and a Best of CD.

Jim Glennie is cautious about how the public might react: “People tend to think it means the band is going to split up, which was something we didn’t even think about. But we’d spent four years slogging around America, and when we released “She’s A Star” we wondered if anyone over here would be interested – and then it entered the charts at Number 9 and it was like, bang, we’re right back in there. So we decided to get things moving a lot quicker, and the easiest way to do it was to get the Greatest Hits out.”

It’s a surprising album. Surprisingly chiefly for the number of hits they’ve had, for the number of songs you’d forgotten about, or forgotten where James songs. Songs that on reflection were actually all rather good. From the angular folkiness of the Factory released “Hymn For A Village” through the anthemic “Sit Down” and “How Was It For You?” to the lush confidence of “She’s A Star”, the CD is fascinating in the way that only a Best of CD can be – charting as it does the band’s musical evolution.

Jim agrees that the James sound has changed, but rather resents the folk label: “Folky? Do you mean adopting a mock muso-journo-whine spindly indie-folk-music?”

Erm. . .

He laughs. “Yeah, we have changed a lot. ‘Hymn From A Village’ sounds so, kind of, young and naive and scritchy-scratchy now. It sounds like we’re purposely trying to make it sound like a demo – although we weren’t at all. . . And then later we went through a phase of dragging loads of technology on board, samplers and drum machines and stuff. . . Now I think it’s almost kind of breaking it back down again, to the bare bones. We’re recording new things very quickly, keeping them fresh, keeping them a bit raw, not overcooking things. In a way it’s getting back to the principles of the early days.”

Does this mean there’s more new stuff to come?

“We’re hoping to get another album out for the end of the year. That was another reason for the Greatest Hits – it’s the easiest way to get back on course: get a greatest hits out, two singles off that and straight into the next album. . .”

With all this obvious enthusiasm for new material, one cannot help but wonder exactly where James have been for the past three years. Prior to “She’s A Star”, their last real hit was “Laid”, back in ’93.

Jim laughs again. “Funny you should say that – it was ‘Laid’ that kicked things off in America. It just took on a life of its own over there, it was completely played to death, so we thought right, let’s capitalise on this. We went over there supporting everybody, trying to gradually build up a support of our own – but the place is so bloody big it does literally take years. It was strange. It was humbling.

We left on the back of the success of ‘Sit Down’, doing laps of glory around Britain; and suddenly we were back in places where nobody knew who we were, or supporting Duran Duran. . .”

Duran Duran?

“Oh yeah, them and lots of other cool people too. People would ask us, do you like Duran Duran’s music and it would be like laughing I think they’re very good at what they do. . .”

The new CD is to be backed up with a small British tour in April – playing two dates in Manchester as well as one each at the Brixton Academy, Glasgow Barrowlands and Doncaster Dome. The band are excited at the prospect. “It’s going to be mad,” says Jim, “it’s going to be a huge big celebration from start to finish. James gigs tend to be celebrations anyway, but with this being wall-to-wall hits, it’ll be especially mad. It’ll be brilliant.”

James’ new single ‘Destiny Calling’ was released on March 2. ‘The Best of James’ CD is released on March 23.

He’s the man who inspired Noel Gallagher to start a band, yet the front man of veteran band James is no fan-punching, hotel room-trashing wild man of rock. No, definitely not cool, by any stretch. And yet…

“THEY’RE certainly not cool,” says the James publicist as we wait for Tim Booth, the band’s singer and lyricist, who’s gone out to feed his parking meter. “They’re not cool in any shape or form.”

They may not be cool, but they’ve certainly been around for a while. The Best Of James album, released this week, charts a career which has lasted 16 years, during which time they have had a few notable fans. Morrissey once called them “the best band in the world”, and Noel Gallagher is said to have decided to form a band after witnessing a James soundcheck. Brian Eno, who produced one of their most successful albums has said, “Their best songs rank among the very best of British pop music.”

“No, we’re not cool at all,” laughs Booth, when he returns to the somewhat uncool venue for this interview, which is his sister’s small terraced house in Hammersmith. Booth is currently homeless and looking for a house in Brighton, where his eight-year-old son lives. “You don’t mind if I eat while we’re talking, do you?” he asks, coming back from the kitchen with a bowl of cereal. This is no fan-punching, coke-snorting, hotel room- trashing Wild Man of Rock, but a quietly-spoken model of politeness. And intelligent with it. Definitely not cool at all.

“The whole rock world is based around the myth of sex and drugs and rock’n’roll,” Booth observes over his cereal bowl. “But I think it’s a load of crap. It’s fine for a while, but there’s a point where you have to grow up.”

Booth is 38 and has long been considered in music circles as something of an eccentric, if not a downright crank. In particular, the press have mocked his alternative lifestyle, which takes in a gamut of New Age concepts such as tantric sex (“it should be taught in schools”), primal scream therapy and “shamanistic dancing”, which he teaches to drama students in his time away from the band. He even once spent three years as a follower of a strange, semi-religious cult which enforced celibacy and 26 hours of meditation every week. “I’m into using any method I can to unlock human potential,” says Booth, whose journey along the alternative highway began when he was hospitalised at the age of 22 with an inherited liver disease. Doctors told him there was nothing they could do, so he looked elsewhere for a cure and found it in acupuncture and colonic irrigation. “Once you start investigating in that way, things just turn up,” he says. “‘New Age’ is usually a journalistic term of abuse, but it’s becoming more and more the norm. I mean, the Daily Mail runs articles every day on it.”

He hails from a middle-class background in Wakefield, where his father worked in the wool industry. At the age of 13, he was dispatched to a public school in Shrewsbury, which he “loathed” and he was eventually asked to leave. He worked for a while in a brewery in Tadcaster and then found his way to Manchester University to study drama. Ben Elton was a near-contemporary and directed Booth in a couple of plays. (Later this year, Booth will once again be treading the boards when he appears in Edward Bond’s Saved for two months in Bolton.)

It was at a Manchester disco in 1982 that the other three founder members of James first met him and invited him to join their band, which at that time was called Model Team International. The change of name came shortly afterwards, James being chosen simply for its singular lack of resonance. “We liked it because it gave nothing away,” says Booth. “The first time we did a gig under that name, the promoter put ‘not a poet’ in brackets underneath.”

In their early years, James established a cult following and eked out a living in Manchester on the dole, occasionally supplementing their meagre income with payments for undergoing drug experiments at a local hospital (with the exception of Booth, who was rejected on account of his dicky liver). Only in 1990 did they finally hit the big time, with the release of their fourth album, Gold Mother, which contained the irritatingly catchy hit single, “Sit Down”. At the time, the so-called “Madchester” scene was in full swing and James were right up there with Happy Mondays, Inspiral Carpets and The Stone Roses. They were certainly pretty cool at this point and, along with baggy jeans, the flowery James shirt was an essential fashion item, not to mention an important source of income for the band. Indeed, some cynics have suggested that they sold more T-shirts than they did records. Booth denies this, but he concedes that sales of the T-shirts “kept the organisation afloat”.

Their success was to be short-lived, however. If anything is predictable about James, it’s what Booth calls their “chaotic unpredictability” and their somewhat perverse desire to confound the expectations of their public. Hence, in 1992, their next album, Seven, heralded a new epic sound for the band and it was promptly panned by the critics as “stadium rock”.

The following year, they were back on track with the release of Laid, which broke them in the States, selling 600,000 copies. However, true to form, the follow-up, Wah Wah, a series of “ambient jams” from the Laid sessions, put them back to square one yet again. “Yes, we’ve managed to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory on several occasions,” says Booth laconically.

Things hit rock bottom in 1995, when the band discovered they owed £250,000 in back taxes. A temporary split followed, during which Booth released a solo album. Then last year James bounced back once more with their Whiplash album, which spawned the hit single, “She’s A Star”.

And for once the success appears to be continuing. Early reviews of the Best Of James have been good, while the band’s new single, “Destiny Calling”, entered the charts last week at number 16. The single takes a humorously cynical look at the way the music business treats artists like bubblegum and includes the lines “Cover us in chocolate, sell us to the neighbours, frame us in a video/Clone us in a test tube, sell is to the multitude, guess that’s the price of fame”. Booth considers it realistic rather than cynical, but that’s what all cynics say. “It’s a huge, multi-million-pound industry and I know I’m a commodity,” he says.

His record company’s marketing department recently presented him with a 20-page research document, but marketing isn’t really Booth’s bag. “I read half a page of it and then I conveniently lost it,” he says. “I’m not interested. I never know what chart position we’re at. I only really care in terms of whether it can assure I can make another record.”

With his latest re-emergence, Booth finds himself in the midst of the new Britpop pack, surrounded by callow young wannabes who were barely out of nappies when James were first being hailed as the Next Big Thing. But he isn’t fazed. “We’re a major influence on Britpop,” he says. “I know that because a lot of the bands have come to us and told us. But we aren’t cool enough for them to do it in public,” he adds with a grin.

THERE’S a general rule in pop that longevity sucks. Think about it: the Rolling Stones plodding theglobe like a mummified parody of a pop group; U2 flabbily reinventing themselves every couple of years, feverishly reading cyberpunk fiction, growing goatees and hiring happening DJs in the musical equivalent of monkey-gland injections, the Spice Girls outstaying their two-single welcome.

James somehow get away with it. They’ve been knocking around in one form or another for 16 years now, spending most of the Eighties languishing in obscurity in Manchester bedsit-land, beloved of the bleary-eyed obsessives who listened to John Peel, unknown to the rest of the world. When they had a hit, its hugeness was in proportion to the obscurity that had gone before. The humanist anthem ‘Sit Down’ swept the nation’s student common-rooms, encouraging the sort of smartass tertiary education ironists everyone wants to punch to occupy the dance-floors in a seated position.

Ho ho.

‘Sit Down’ was one of the first indie records to kick down the gates of the chart castle, and show the way for a spate of arch, small-label guitar-pop records to storm in and change the consensus of pop music in Britain.

Now indie is the new orthodoxy, James are elder statesmen of the predominant pop genre in this country.

Singer Tim Booth is beginning to come to terms with the group’s legacy. “We meet these people like Oasis and they tell us how important James were to them,” he says, “how they would all listen to us and come to the gigs in Manchester back in the Eighties.”

Booth has been remembering James’s history recently, coming up with a track selection for their new hits collection, Best of James. It was a chance to follow the group’s mutations, from the folky, surreal songs on the first two albums, through the harder sound that followed ‘Sit Down’, to the freeform experimentation of their recent work with Brian Eno. As often happens with these affairs, Booth found the early songs difficult to listen to.

“They didn’t sound right somehow,” he says. “They just weren’t recorded as we would have wanted.”

They were also a reminder of the decade of struggling that formed James’s beginnings, a time of uneasy relationships with record companies, low sales, occasional bouts of wilful obscurity. “We were artists, we were very weird, meditated a lot,” he says.

“We always knew we had a certain pacing to James. We knew it wasn’t going to be quick. Like when we were invited to America to support The Smiths, we thought ‘no’. It scared us. So we retreated. We were always on our own trajectory, that was just going to play itself out.”

Their fondness for the post-punk purity, their desire to be known purely for the music rather than for any image, made them seem almost self-defeating. They turned down the opportunity to be on the front of the NME, when it might have meant something, because they thought it entailed a certain selling out.

They embraced the artistic cliches of independence.

Ironically, given their mistrust of commercialism, they were kept afloat in the wilderness years by huge sales of their striking flower-motif T-shirts (still a must-have for certain cadres of environmentalist twentysomethings).

They remembered this need for independent development when they seemed in danger of mutating into a stadium-rock band.

‘Sit Down’ and the expansive, rockier Seven album garnered James a huge live following, and their shows became mass, communal celebrations. When their Laid album sold well in America, the temptation was to take the road for a couple of years and move into the rock dinosaur league.

Instead the group took a step back, took three years off to regroup and rethink.

They came back last year with the successful, if not ground-breaking, Whiplash, and a single, ‘She’s a Star’, that immediately became one of those songs destined to crop up on every film and TV soundtrack around.

James were still around without being embarrassing, or even noticeably that old (although Booth was sidelined for a while by a muscle injury that suggested all those years of yoga were catching up with him).

“We look around for people who’ve been around for as long as us, and I suppose there’s REM, the Cure even, but we feel we are still making music that people want to hear, that we still are relevant. When we came back last year we found we do still inspire each other musically. We still have that creative streak.”

Here’s an amusing tale about James. In 1992, Morrissey was asked to perform on an Amnesty International TV special. He agreed, but only on the understanding that his fellow Mancunians would be approached to play too. Since Moz was still pretty hot property back then, the promoters complied. It was only on the night of the concert itself that the singer’s ulterior motive became clear – he wanted them present at the unveiling of his forthcoming single, “We Hate It When Our Friends Become Successful” …

“We hadn’t seen him for about a year,” recalls James’ singer Tim Booth. “We’d had ‘Sit Down’ out and were starting to get big. I asked him after the show if the song was about us, and he led me to believe it was. We’re very good friends, though, and it was all good-humoured. It was a great boost for us at that time.”

The biggest irony, of course, was that James had taken so very long to become Moz’s “hated” rivals. Both artists had started out around the same time (1982) and in the same city (Manchester), but the Smiths’ mercurial career was over a good four years before James’ had even started to take off.

There was at least one good reason for this: James’ ill-fated tenure with Sire, whose lack of support for the band in the mid-80s has passed into legend. Before that, of course, James had established themselves as minor cult deities, via a trio of wonderfully original EPs on Factory, combining a folk-rock sensibility with a diffident, post-punk twist. However, Sire’s indifference to the chequered “Stutter” and “Strip Mine” albums (the latter was put on hold for a year) meant that any early momentum was lost.

Once the band were released from their Sire contract in 1988, things finally began to fall into place. Signing with Rough Trade, they recorded the two songs that would make their name, “Sit Down” and “Come Home”, though commercial success wasn’t to come until those two singles were reissued – in a different form -by their next paymasters, Fontana, at the turn of the 90s.

It’s at that point that the cult of James really took shape, and the era captured on “The Best Of James” begins. Fontana’s interest in the group was, in part, geographical – ‘Madchester’ was in the ascendant, and though James didn’t fit in with the prevailing mood of 60s revivalism and clubland hedonism, they were sufficiently entangled in the Manchester myth (Factory, the Smiths) to be seen as key players. However, it was abundantly clear that the group’s ability to write anthemic, idiosyncratic pop songs and, more importantly, to deliver the goods live, provided them with a definite advantage over their contemporaries.

“I thought a lot of that stuff – the Mondays and the Stone Roses – was incredibly overrated,” declares Booth. “We tried to avoid that whole scene, because if you go in with a movement you’ll burn out with it. But it was inevitable that we’d be roped into it by some people.”

When their “Gold Mother” album reached No.5, and the reissue of “Sit Down” hit No.2 (in March 1991), James were catapulted from the murky margins of indie-pop into stadium territory .There then followed four amazingly fruitful years, spawning a string of hit singles (“Sound”, “Born Of Frustration”, “Sound”) and a brace of magnificent albums, “Seven” and the Brian Eno-produced “Laid”. Their expansive sound seemed tailor made for large venues, and it made perfect sense when Neil Young invited them to support him on his 1992 U.S. tour.

In stark contrast to most of the arena acts of the ’80s, James always resisted the temptation to sing about ‘big’ issues, offering instead intensely private meditations on the subjects closest to their and most people’s hearts – relationships, love, destiny, personal insecurity. Though permeated with a community spirit, their folk-rock wasn’t cut out along nationalistic lines, nor did it celebrate anyone’s cultural heritage. Thankfully, flag-waving wasn’t their bag.

“If you get into that big, epic thing, and you write about wide open spaces and not your own experiences it gets vacuous,” argues Tim. “The good side of epic is Lawrence Of Arabia; the bad side is The English Patient. What we do can’t be used politically because there’s too much frailty in the lyrics.”

Occasionally, Booth’s personal visions have erred on the gauche side and, as a result, James’ have never been tagged as “cool”. Certainly, he’s been guilty of coming across ‘like a sex-obsessed freshman -“How was it for you?,” “she only comes when she’s on top”, “we messed around with gender roles”, etc. – but there has also been a wonderfully poetic turn to Booth’s finely-crafted words (“The waves are turning into something else/ Picking up fishing boats and spewing them on the shore”).

By mid-1994, the workload was beginning to take its toll, and James went to ground for a while. Booth recorded the solo album, “Booth And The Bad Angel” with Twin Peaks composer Angelo Badalementi, before learning that, not only was his longtime creative springboard, guitarist Larry Gott, quitting the band, but James owed five years of unpaid taxes.

“It was a bad time,” puffs Booth, “but we’d already been through so much that we had to go on. If we’d have split up, it would have been ten years earlier. We’d experienced everything before.”

Returning in 1997 with the dynamic “Whiplash” album, James scored three more hits with the U2-esque “She’s A Star”, “Tomorrow” and “Waltzing Along” (perhaps the only “waltz”-titled rock song not to be in 3/4 time). They also headlined Reading and consolidated their Stateside profile with a prestigious Lollapalooza slot. It was proof positive that James had secured themselves a reputation as a classic, timeless rock group.

Listening to “The Best Of’, its curious how a group with such an erratic, rambling biography have managed to produce such a consistently rich and satisfying canon of work. So much here sounds warm and familiar and striking, whether it’s the moody, stadium melodrama of “Born Of Frustration” or the tight, snare-roll powered pop of “Laid”. The album also includes two new songs – their celebration of manufactured pop acts, “Destiny Calling” (out now as a single), and “Runaground” – both of which sparkle with James’s magical, atmospheric stardust.

“We don’t usually write hits to order, but the record company wanted another two tracks,” laughs Booth. “They turned out really well.” With Booth set to appear in an Edward Bond play, Saved, being staged in Bolton this month, and “Destiny Calling” looking set to supply them with another hit, everything has turned out pretty well for James, too.

Details

Granada Reports interview with James at Castlefield Bowl barge show on March 25th 1998

Now they’ve been churning out the hits for fifteen years, they once got 10,000 people to sit down in the middle of a gig, and Morrissey, no other, called them “the best band in the world”. They are James.

And today, they returned to Manchester, the city where they started off, to launch an album of Greatest Hits. Trevor Ward was, of course, on the guest list.

TW : Now if you and me were pop stars, we could probably think of more exotic ways of celebrating fifteen years at the top and the release of our Greatest Hits album than spending a wet Wednesday afternoon on the banks of a Manchester canal.

Tim : I think this today should be a celebration of survival. And you know we wouldn’t have survived without the response we’ve had from the people in Manchester. We were supported in Manchester for seven years by our gigs here to people when we weren’t making any money anywhere else, noone else was listening to us and everyone else was telling us to give up.

First time I came here was, I actually organised a school trip to come and see Iggy Pop play at the Apollo and I got punched out by a bouncer and that was my first liaison with Manchester and it went downhill from there really.

The highlights have been mainly concerts, G-Mex, amazing concerts when we broke through with Sit Down and 10,000 people sat down.

Someone like the Stone Roses or the Mondays and Oasis and The Smiths, they somehow rode a really big wave. I don’t know how to explain this without sounding pretentious. And we never did that. We kind of would do stuff and then pull back. Do stuff and pull back. We paced ourselves in a way that was more for the long-haul, I think. They were more like explosive stars that would last a few years and burn out. You can’t keep that level going. It’s too much pressure, too much intensity and when you’re talking about young people, and there’s all the sex and drugs and rock n roll at your doorstep all the time, most of them can’t keep their heads together.

Interviewer: Tim and Saul, welcome to Videotech. Now, we’ve just seen Sit Down, which for me was about being at university and having a good time. That was the song that broke you into a different audience. How do you look back on that now, what kind of a song is it for you?

Saul: You shouldn’t have been having a good time at university, you should have been working.

Tim: And getting into huge amounts of debt. Um, it’s really hard, it was sucha rollercoaster that it’s quite hard to remember, it was just every day getting different news about the song. Not only did it go to No.2 and stay there for a long time, but we were hearing stories that they would play it in all the night clubs, and people in the nightclubs would sit down on the floor and dance on the floor, and for a number of years we’d hear this. We’d hear stories that this was happening in Turkey. A friend of mine went to the biggest nighclub in Europe, holds about 10,000, in Istanbul, and they played Sit Down and all these Turkish people sat down and danced to Sit Down. We’d hear these bizarre stories, and it was like, this song’s got a life of its own, it’s doing its own thing.

Audience reactions were amazing, they’d started sitting down at the concerts and singing it to us, or they’d get on the stage and sit down, or we’d get in the audience and they’d get on stage, and each time you didn’t quite know what as gonna happen at that moment. That was really thrilling, and it was totally spontaneous, it just was not planned.

Interviewer: Now, that song’s on the greatest hits album, but you guys have been around for a lot longer that that, so which way is the greatest hits going, is it from then to now or from then going backwards?

Saul: It covers the whole history of James really, back to 1985, the second single they did, I wasn’t in the band then, but Hymn From A Village, on Factory records, that’s there, and it and it charts all the way through to two very new songs, one of which you’re going to play later, Destiny Calling, and an even newer track, the latest thing we’ve done, a track called Runaground. So it covers basically the whole history of James. There’s no really early scratchy demos on it though.

Tim: There’s not much from the first eight years, there’s one song, mainly because some of then we couldn’t get permission for, and some of them we’d recorded so badly we didn’t want to use them.

Saul: Couldn’t dare listen to them.

Tim: We’d be embarrassed. So it seemed that we were gonna stick to the singles, and if we called it Greatest Hits we’d all be arguing over what was, or if we called it Best of, I mean it’s called Best Of but that’s rubbish really, it’s greatest hits, it’s singles.

Interviewer: Ok, well lets take a look at one of the new tracks we’ve mentioned, this is Destiny Calling. So, that’s the new single. Are we gonna be hearing it when you guys tour, when you hit the Brixton Academy in April?

Tim: Oh yes, we’re working on quite a few new songs at the moment, and we hope to have some of them ready for this tour.

Interviewer: Fantastic, we’ll look forward to that. What about the festivals, are we going to be seeing you at any of them this summer?

Saul: Three or four have come through yeah, so we’re gonna be doing a few of those.

Interviewer: Are you looking forward to getting out on the road again?

Saul: Totally, yeah, especially the festivals. We were meant to do them last year but we went off to America, so this summer it’ll be good to be in our own country and making some noise.

Tim: I think live is our strongest suit, anyone who’s seen us live, that’s what’s kept us going for fifteen, sixteen years, the fact that people trust that they’re gonna get something unusual live.

Interviewer: Thanks for that, and we’ll see you guys after the break when we’ve got the brand new Top Ten.

Details

Reporter : This is the big bit of the show, the one we’ve been crossing our fingers for. We’ve got a satellite hovering over the building and a satellite hovering over Los Angeles. We’re off now live, that was James ‘Sit Down’ hence standing up sitting down. Now we’re going live to LA to talk to two members of James. Hello James. Hello James.

Saul : Wish they’d hurry up, Jesus.

Reporter : James, James

Saul : Come in Moscow, come in Moscow

Tim : Hello

Saul : Hello

Reporter : Hello, you little swines, hello

Tim : We’re in LA.

Saul : We’re in LA

Reporter : I didn’t ask you a question

Saul : We’ve got this satellite gap

Reporter : Listen lads, we just heard that brilliant song Sit Down. Your biggest hit, frankly you’ll never get better than that in my eyes. What was it like having a hit like that?

Saul : Sit Down went in the charts at number 7 and I think all of us went “Hang on a minute, something’s happening here. Now we’ve got to focus”. And we never did.

Reporter : What’s the price of fame lads? During this answer, the one of you on the right just laugh

Tim : We’ve had an easy ride with fame. We’ve haven’t been….

Saul : (laughing) sorry

Tim : What are you laughing at?

Saul : He said “Divorce”

Tim : Is that what he said? Yeah, the costliest thing about fame is divorce.

Saul : That’s why I couldn’t help laughing, because it’s genuinely funny.

Tim : Very good Andy

Reporter : What in hell was that all about? Tim, you’ve had a neck injury

Tim : Speak up Grandad

Reporter : Tim, you penis, you’ve had a neck injury. You penis.

Tim : We had to do Lollapolooza which was a 36 date tour of America with me in a neckbrace and a kind of travelling nurse with me. Which was a really bizarre experience cos it was the tour from hell anyway. It actually meant that I got my own quieter bus which was quite nice. I actually had one of the best rides but it was quite bizarre.

Reporter : You ponce. Rumour has it, Tim, that you’ve been performing in bandages

Tim : I can’t dance like I used to dance with my neck at the moment. I’ll have to wait another year or so before I can do that.

Reporter : Does that mean we won’t be able to see your hilarious dance style Tim? That manic thing you do. Come on

Tim : We had this amazing festival in Switzerland, Hultsfred, where we had to stand in for Status Quo when we had to play to 15,000 Status Quo fans and we won them round which was a very weird and nervy experience.

Saul : I think if anyone, if this programme goes out anywhere in Sweden, we should say that Hultsfred is in Sweden.

Tim : Perhaps we should, it might help

Saul : You see this is what happens all summer. We get on less festivals than we should because we keep turning up to the wrong country.

Reporter : You’re crazy guys, I can tell that much. Last week, Liam was slapped for being a bad boy, what sort of fun and games do you get up to?

Saul : How about this? Dave, our drummer, on the roof of our bus in Auburn Hills wearing nothing but a pair of old Calvin Klein boxer shorts with a rolled cigarette in one hand and a pint of beer in the other with a pair of Wayfairer shades with a prostitute bent double in front of him wearing a bikini for example, and the whole Lollapolooza tour. We’re all there taking photos and it’s the best thing I’ve ever seen.

Reporter : What a bunch of rubbish that was. I bet you made that up. Right James, you’re releasing your Greatest Hits now, is that not selling out? I bet it is. Come on.

Saul : Why are we doing this?

Tim : Because somebody pointed out to us that we’d had something like 14 consecutive Top 40 singles and we were like “Have we really?” and “Yeah, do you want to put them out as a Greatest Hits record?”, “OK”

Reporter : Tim, give me a hippy nomad answer to where you’re living now

Saul : He doesn’t know. He’s going through what I went through for years.

Tim : I’ve lived in a suitcase for the last few years. I have a woman I’m marrying in New York,

Saul : One in Barbados

Tim : A son in Brighton, a house in Manchester and work in London.

Reporter : The satellite link is breaking up lads, thanks very much, you’ve been brilliant

Saul : I have this lovely house beside a mountain in Scotland

Reporter : Shut up

Saul : I’m having the time of my life up there when I get to see it, surrounded by forests and wonderful people, it’s a mad party house actually.

Reporter : I didn’t even ask you a question. Shut up. Goodbye. Off you go.

At the final date of the 1998 Best Of tour, Tim asked me to come back stage with a tape recorder. Below is a transcription of our conversation:

T: What it is is that I’d like to make a statement, if that’s alright with you.

D: Yes.

T: You can use it, and if you don’t mind letting the other fanzines use it…

D: Well, I don’t actually run a fanzine

T: I thought you did.

D: No, that’s John and Su.

T: Well, whatever. It was simply because I’ve been reading, in the latest one, A Sound Investment, the stuff about us not changing the set list anymore and seeing you there every night, it was just I thought what I’d better do is address it. It’s simply that we… that’s gone now .. you know, James has changed and we won’t be changing the set list very often again. There’s lots of reasons. I’m the only one that wants to change the set list and has wanted to for a year. And no one else does, and the reasons are quite sensible. It started out with the Adrian thing, and him learning a small set. And it was also that, like, if we’re playing to 4000, and maybe a few hundred people come both nights we’d be changing the set and maybe making the set not as good just for those 400.

D: I guess it’d mean messing around with the lights as well.

T: No, the lighting guy wants us to change it, that’s what he’s done for 10 years.

D: The lights last night were much better.

T: He loves the difficulty of not knowing what the hell we’re going to do next. And, it’s like we should make the set list for the 4000 rather than the hundred or two that are coming both nights. That was one of the reasons. And the other was that most of the others believe we play better when we’re playing the same songs. I actually disagree with that, but I’m outvoted. And that’s as it is. So I kinda wanted to say that, because I know people are coming with this expectation and it no longer applies. But, unfortunately, we just aren’t…

D: We’ve been coming watching you for years, quite a few of us…

T: I know. I know. I mean, I miss it, but it’s like… I also see why the others don’t want it, and obviously when we do the Christmas tour it’ll be all the new songs and it’ll be that kind of change, but…

D: Have you got anything specific planned for later on in the year?

T: Almost certainly something in December.

D: It’ll be even colder outside.

T: It’ll certainly be colder outside. You’ll have to come a bit later. Or you’ll have to bring your thermals.

D: How’s the album going?

T: Fantastic, it’s nearly platinum, by the fact that we get a platinum disc tonight, in advance.

D: On stage?

T: No, no… we haven’t gone that far.

D: It nearly stayed number 1 the week Pulp came out.

T: Yeah, even the second week we were only a few hundred copies away… and now we’re at number 3. It’s doing great. Oh, the other reason is that the last couple of years have been more about survival… like, my physical survival and other people’s kind of survival in different ways.

D: Yeah, we weren’t expecting you to come back last year, we thought it was all over.

T: Yeah. I think in a sense we probably did… or parts of us did. And changing the set list… the other reason why, which is, really sensible, is that it used to cause so many rows before we’d go on stage.

D: We’ve been outside venues sort of… when the doors have been open…

T: It could cause a lot of division, and it was like… well, you know, and in that sense “can’t be arsed” is fair enough… (refering to an article in A Change of Scenery Issue #7)

D: Well, that wasn’t the exact comment I made. The guy who wrote the article in the last fanzine (A Change of Scenery Issue #8)…

T: Well… No, I think there’s some… you see, I’m in two minds… cause I can hear those arguments and I agree… I can see the sense in a lot of them, but there’s something in my spirit that’s very upset by it not changing, and… “can’t be arsed” can be levelled as a criticism sometimes. But it’s more… it’s not so much “can’t be arsed”, it’s that we’re very chaotic… and getting us to rehearse songs… let’s say, two people don’t want to do the song, and you try to get people to rehearse it… it doesn’t work anymore…

D: Is that why some of the songs you’ve been doing, you’ve been doing with three or four members… the other guys not being involved?

T: On the stage you mean? Not really….

D: Ah, with the sessions…

T: Ah, the sessions… Partly, cause those sessions sometimes the room’s not big enough for bass and drums. It really varies. I mean, partly it’s been, you know, who wants to do that session. It’s kind of, shambolic…

D: Cause I guess it’s the first time in a long time that you’ve been doing that many sessions in such a short period of time…

T: Yes… They’ve been great. I thought the GLR was the best we’ve ever done…

D: Was the song you did at Radio 1 – the jam between playing into the show – was that actually…

T: I can’t remember it, actually. I don’t know what we were doing at the time.

D: I think Mike at the BBC was recording it.

T: No, that was just us messing around. Noone’s even listened back to it. Like, we made up a song today in soundcheck and one yesterday, but to be honest they get lost a lot. It’s like us just playing.

D: How much stuff have you got, like all this unreleased stuff that’s hidden away?

T: The new stuff?

D: Well

T: Over the years? Oh don’t, I don’t know

D: Well we’ve got a tape that we’re doing on the internet which we’re basically people are sending us a tape and stamps or whatever to post it and it’s basically just the songs from bootlegs from over the years and it’s all the live songs that you never actually got to the studio.

T: We never got to release …

D: There’s some really good songs on it.

T: I’d like to hear it one day.

D: I can send you a copy. Most of them are from the eighties.

T: And the other issue, the one about us releasing different formats for the singles, again it’s something I’m totally uncomfortable with, but has been a matter of us competing and surviving.

D: If you don’t get in the charts, you’re lost.

T: All I can say to people is discriminate and don’t buy them automatically. You know, look at them and see if you want them.

D: But I mean the multimedia one was a lot better.

T: Good

D: Because the remixes we thought weren’t that great. The mulitmedia was something different.

T: We’ve been stretched a few times and it’s been like … we haven’t got it so there’s been a few remixes and again it’s kind of a compromise with the survival basically.

D: Do you know what you’re putting on Runaground yet?

T: Saul, Dave and Mark with Ott did a remix. This really good one.

D: Of Runaground?

T: Yeah, it’s really odd though. It’s got like extra guitar and extra different things in. And I think we’re putting some of the GLR on one of the tapes, I actually wanted the whole of the GLR and I think there’s something else.

D: I guess it’s rarities, like on Destiny.

T: Yeah, yeah I think so, there might be, I don’t know.

D: Do you have a planned date for the album? Is there going to be a single with the festivals then the album?

T: I hope so. If we’re lucky, we’ll get a song out in the summer before the thing gets released, but I’m doing the play you see. So that’s gonna be a little bit ….

D: How that’s going?

T: We start next week

D: That’s sort of when the single’s coming out?

T: We start next week. I have a couple of promo things I can probably do and that’s it. It won’t give it as much push. (to press officer)Is that it?

D : I guess you need to go now.

What song describes you best?

“‘Leaving on a Jet Plane’, because I’m in love with someone very special and the sentiment fits”

What is heaven?

“A little house on a beach in California, with no fog, and people I love”

What is hell?

“Listening to my demons that talk to me in the dark, and being led by them.”

What’s your earliest memory?

“Setting fire to the Christmas tree, aged two. The tree was in my parents lounge, which I wasn’t allowed to go into because I was so young. I got in there and found some matches and burned everything. It was a highly-charged symbolic act.”

What’s your greatest fear?

“That God is an arsehole”

Who is your all-time hero?

“Anyone who lives their life with an understanding and appreciation for things beyond the material and who search for joy.”

What’s the worst trouble you’ve been in?

“Having a poisonous snake placed around my neck and dropped by its trainer”

Who was the first love of your life?

“A girl named Diana, aged 12, on an Italian island. I stalked her for days and finally got one kiss, just before she got on a ferry and went back to Milan.”

What’s your greatest talent?

“Searching for truth”

Upon whom would you most like to exact revenge, how and why?

“I wouldn’t exact revenge because I know from experience that it all comes back to you likea razor-edged boomerang.”

What’s your most treasured possession?

“My flat by the sea”

What have you most regretted doing while drunk?

“Twice, I got to the point of kissing a girl I really fancied, and threw up.”

What can you cook?

“Lots of things very well”

What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever received?

“First, ‘Love Is All You Need’, and second, a very wise woman once told me: ‘If you leave a back door open in your relationship, it might not just be you who uses it. That relationship will always have a hole in it.'”

Can you read music?

“No”

If you were invisible for a day, what would you do?

“Give flowers to people and make cats fly, just to remind people there’s magic in the world. And I’d probably also steal £1m from some massive corporation that wouldn’t miss it.”

What are your final three wishes?

“To have infinite wishes. To shift the whole energy of this planet so people have far more happiness. And to live with complete faith and trust in life.

Former peers of The Smiths, prime movers of the Madchester scene and rivals to Simple Minds/U2’s stadium crown, JAMES have been there, done that. Glyn Brown meets the band once described as ‘Manchester’s best kept secret.’

~”James’ music exists in past/future territory, somewhere between eccentric, romantic, tender, crazy and ecstatic. Their best songs rank among the very best of British pop music: it rings true” – Brian Eno, 1997~

JAMES: what happened there, then?

You could call them – they’ll stop reading at this – pop’s big-league nearly men, the ones who blew our minds on several occasions, through several eras, whether they were dressed in tatteed sweater and moccasins, or straitjackets, or billowing silk shirts.

Again and again they’ve sidestepped the top bracket with some very fancy footwork but, boy, did they get close. One or two slightly different moves, and the band who were once third men to U2 and Simple Minds wouldn’t be sitting in the crowded lobby of a north London Hotel utterly unnoticed. Not that they seem to mind this relative anonymity.

Tim Booth, one-time troubled eccentric and God freak with a history of psychic unrest, and multi-instrumentalist Saul Davies – representing a seven-strong assortment of contenders – are far from the disconsolate has-beens popular opinion might cast them as. With a ‘Best of’ retrospective (1988: The Year Of The Hits) and a new LP in the works, they are back for another shot at pop’s crown.

And after 15 years in the business of rock’n’roll, this turns out to be an opportune moment for them to look back on their tumultuous history – at what was, might have been and might still be in store for them…

So, here we are, in 1982, which is when bassist Jim Glennie, drummer Gavan Whelan and guitarist Paul Gilbertson spotted Tim dancing at Manchester University, where he was studying drama, and picked him to be Bez before Bez was out of nappies. These days, Tim teaches a system of therapeutic shamanistic dance. Back then, he was just whacko. And James were called Model Team International, because Paul was going out with a model and that was the name of her agency and logo on their free T-shirts. When the agency boss threatened to sue, Tim suggested something to honour his inspiration, James Joyce.

Their first release, on Factory Records in October, 1983, was the ‘JimOne’ EP, its guitar-pop frippery claimed as a successor to Orange Juice or The Fire Engines at their best, thought many thought it embodied the very weakest elements of indie. One track, “What’s The World,” was quickly covered by Morrissey, an early and ardent admirer. “To be honest,” says Tim now, “I think Morrissey fell in love with me. I may be wrong. I mean, he wasn’t out then. We used to go driving round Manchester Together. I didn’t really realise his feelings ’til quite a bit later.”

If The Smiths were influenced by James, “then we were influenced by The Fall and Joy Division – by their bloody-mindedness, their awkwardness, their refusal to play media games.”

Media games were no problem for Morrissey. James may have had a certain mystique, but, by now, long-time fans The Smiths were up and past them, touring the States, and James, although they’d co-toured here, turned down that support slot, as well as several music paper front covers. “We want to introduce the band by music, not by words,” they pompously disclaimed.

Nevertheless, when the second EP, ‘James II,’ appeared in 1985, the boys were minor-league legends in their home town. It wasn’t long before they were approached by a major label – the Warners off-shoot, Sire – to record their first full LP, ‘Stutter.’ Produced by Lenny Kaye, right-hand man to another Booth icon, Patti Smith, ‘Stutter’ appeared in 1986. A Luddite counter-blow to the futuristic technological indulgence surrounding them, it owed much of its success to new member Larry Gott’s nimble guitar picking, and mixed traditional folk with more powerful rock – the Iggy Pop tribute, “Johnny Yen,” introduced themes of exhibitionism, despair and violence, though arguably the sound that backed those ideas wasn’t always powerful enough to carry them. And James were still dressing like idiots or Smarties, in tartan scarves and primary colours.

1988’s ‘Strip Mine’ continued the melodic course, with off-kilter folk influences, a few simple singalong choruses that would lay a path for the future and Tim’s vocals a cross between Ian McCulloch and Operatic yodelling worthy of Heidi. Perhaps the most interesting track is “Riders,” in which Tim, slipping from Morrissey to Cave, howls of “sipping the juice that causes the pain all great singers need.” Here began a tumble toward dark and devastatingly depressive lyrics. “All my early songs were either paranoia about the business and how it destroys the soul, or about suicide, the myth of the tortured artist.” Some time later, Tim will tell me how wary he is of the words he writes, because they so often pre-figure future events.

Sire were not kind. Head man Seymour Stein, a “collector of artefacts,” was devilish. “It’s not romantic,” says Tim, “it’s exploitation. Stein didn’t really like our music – we were simply something to be collected.” “Sit Down” was written during this time, but never played to Sire. Eventually, James escaped on a legal loophole found by the band’s astute then-manager, Martine McDonagh.

A self-financed live LP, 1989’s ‘One Man Clapping,’ prompted a deal with Rough Trade. This, too, was not entirely fortunate. Rough Trade were not only on the point of bankruptcy, they also failed to see commercial prospects in James. “Geoff Travis said, ‘Look, this is minority music, it won’t sell to more than 20,000 people,'” remembers Tim. “So I asked him to let us go, and he did.”

James regrouped, adding enough members to bring them up to a seven-piece (Gavan Whelan left; Saul, Andy Diagram, Mark Hunter and Dave Baynton-Power joined), and took the record Travis had heard in embryonic stage to Phonogram/Fontana. The album was ‘Gold Mother.’ It sold 350,000 in the UK alone.

‘Gold Mother’ was a triumph – brainy, with a full, sometimes distorted, guitar sound, sparky brass and danceable rhythms, though Tim’s lyrics, if you cared to listen, were black as pitch. By the time it came out, in 1990, “Sit Down” had reached Number Two in the charts. The Madchester scene was revving up to full swing and James, along with Happy Mondays and The Stone Roses, were its champions. Every venue they played sold out. And Tim was on the verge of a nervous breakdown, his miserablism turned to full-scale depression.

There were a number of reasons. One was the band’s seemingly impregnable image as freakish vegan monks. Which, at one point, they had been. In the early Eighties, there had been a bit of lunacy and dope-smoking. Booth had suffered a serious liver complaint. “I nearly died,” he says. “I stopped breathing in hospital.”

As a result, Booth and Jim Glennie screened what they ate, joined a semi-religious cult and spent three-and-a-half years shunning the debilitating practice of sex (Tim is still bitter that his guru of the time slept with half the “disciples”).

But the band were hardly celibate now. In an effort to confirm that, newer T-shirts said COME, and there was talk of promoting the single, “How Was It For You?”, by stencilling its name down the side of condoms. Still, the holier-than-thou schtick had been compounded in 1989 when Tim shaved his head after seeing a documentary on Auschwitz, and remained such a problem that the band thought of changing their name.

Gradually, however, ‘Gold Mother’ turned Tim into a different sort of messiah, a leader for the lost, lonely and confused. His furious lyrics yelped about devious politicking (“Government Walls”), and, since he’d been victim of a sternly religious upbringing, about Christianity and TV evangelists. The pungent vitriol of “God Only Knows,” which stands alongside Flannery O’Connor’s novel, “Wise Blood,” in terms of religious disillusion, saw the band receive sacks of hate mail. An obsessive drive saw him take up most of a 1991 “Melody Maker” interview by talking about 40 “hidden” gospels – gospels according to Mary Magdalene, gospels showing Jesus to be a vegetarian nutcase who gave his disciples enemas – that he’d found in the Vatican library.

Crass as it may sound, what may have prompted this leap off the deep end was a split from his long-time partner and manager, Martine, who had just given birth to their son, Ben, and to whom ‘Gold Mother’ was dedicated. Live reviews showed Booth wild-eyed and manic, often in tears before a show, and he tells a story of climbing speakers mid-gig to walk along a 40ft-high balcony rail (“I didn’t give a shit, I was totally fucked up”), only getting down when he saw his minder crawling along on all fours behind him – “The guy was risking his neck for me. I thought, ‘Fuck, get off this.'”

There’s more than an element, of course, of glorious self-indulgence in it all; there was bound to be a fall. 1992’s ‘Seven’ was where the James sound really changed. The opening track, “Born of Frustration,” was accused of being cribbed from Simple Minds’ “Don’t You Forget About Me,” and the two bands’ sounds were not dissimilar – grungy, hypnotic, ululating and epic in proportion. Tim disagreed with the comparisons.

“I try really hard not to be Bono – we have to de-epic our sound now,” he said, though there was little sign of an attempt. And no reason for one: ‘Seven’ was windswept and often inspired. But the press were doubtful, petulantly slamming it as “bombastic stadium rock” – James by now were big enough to fill Alton Towers, where they played to 32,000.

And then they went West. Looking back, Saul tells me, “It was a mistake to leave this country. We could’ve nailed it here, and it felt like we had, but we hadn’t. We weren’t quite big enough or strong enough to avoid backlash – and it came.”

They spent three yeares in America, during which time they toured an acoustic set with Neil Young, and Tim was quoted as saying he yearned to “get out beyond the treadmill into hyperspace.” Egotistical as this may sound, Booth was, in fact, beginning to sort himself out. He’d dabbled with analysis, though the therapist cut short treatment, saying, “I’m sure I could cure you, but I don’t know what that would do to your songs.” So he turned to less conventional methods and, though still capable of insisting “art” could only come through pain, had embarked on lessons in shamanistic dance, which helped release his demons.

Work had begun on another album, 1993’s ‘Laid.’ An impressed Peter Gabriel offered his Real World studios; the producer was Brian Eno. ‘Laid had a subtle, stripped-down sound, loose with slide guitar – but the working atmosphere with the cultured Mr. Eno wasn’t always as relaxed.

Says Saul: “Eno used to get annoyed because I play a lot of instruments and, when we were improvising, I’d flit between different things.

“I remember him once getting me against a wall during a jam – he goes, ‘Listen to this fucking guitar you’re playing, you little c***. It’s brilliant – and then it stops. Why does it stop?’ He had me by the collar, up against the wall. I thought he was gonna hit me. I wanted to beat him up.”

But you went back and played guitar the way he wanted? “Oh, yeah.”

‘Laid’ broke James in the States, where it sold 600,000 copies. The follow-up, ‘Wah Wah’ (1994), a series of ambient jams from the ‘Laid’ sessions, was less successful. Intended as a reinvention, its release was delayed for over six months – by which time U2’s Eno-produced and similar-sounding ‘Zooropa’ had appeared, stealing James’ thunder. Aware that, at home, Madchester was history and feelings had changed, the band remained in America. Contemporar reports featured six men on a debauched bender, snorting drugs in the tour van, watching porn and waving around willies upon which young groupies had inked their names, while Booth, closeted away, sounded tired and defensive: “I think,” he said, head in hands, in 1994, “we’ve failed to present a coherent myth.”

What followed was 1995’s ‘Black Thursday,’ so-called because on that day Larry Gott and manager Martine walked out. It was discovered that James owed 250,000 pounds in back tax, and the band very nearly imploded. A long break from each other led to Tim’s solo LP, 1996’s ‘Booth and the Bad Angel,’ with 50-year-old Twin Peaks composer Angelo Badalamenti.

Meanwhile, Jim, Saul and Dave were back in the studio. They corralled the band, and the outcome was last year’s ‘Whiplash.’ Headstrong and poptastic, it was regarded by many as James’ best album to date, entering the UK Top 10 and delivering one of their all-time best-selling singles in the Beatles-esque “She’s A Star.”

But how quickly they do forget. Despite all this, and only 12 months later, people ask, surprised, if James are “still going.” They seem to be doing more than that. ‘1988: The Year Of The Hits’ is a holding device, though it features two powerful new singles, one of which, “Destiny Calling,” again features those reliable Beatles-patented descending chords so popular with Oasis. Its sentiments regarding the music biz are cynical and, though Saul doesn’t agree with them, he understands the bitter chorus of “We’re freaks.”

“Every band’s a freakshow. People look at you through the glass – ‘Don’t feed the animals.’ I was reading ‘American Psycho’ the other day, the bit where he kills a child at the zoo, and he sees a sign on the glass: don’t throw coins at the penguins, because they might die, they’ll choke on them. And he says, inevitably, ‘I throw a quarter into the pen.'”

This is as may be, but Saul – and Tim, and the rest, if it comes to that – know full well they’re not penguins. They’re in a business more or less like any other, with exactly the same swings and round-abouts. Which is why there’s a fresh LP just about half- written on a DAT somewhere. And a tour lined up for April.

And why, according to Saul, “This is gonna be our year. I don’t expect we’ll be massive, but I’m hopeful we’ll gain some respect. I know we had success in the past and let it go. It’s our fault, we walked away from it. Now, though, well, we don’t have a choice.”

Do James have a thing to say to us, right here, right now, in 1998? They say they do.

Time to get back in the ring.

It’s been a turbulent 16 years for JAMES, but somehow they’ve survived, and now they’re releasing a greatest hits album. VOX asks ‘How was it for you?’ and hears tales of shamanic dancing, altered states and tour bus madness.

ONLY IN pop music is longevity imbued with such heroic glamour. When talking about bands who’ve managed to stick around for more than three hit singles and a patchy debut album, people use the word “survivors”, as if these musicians had endured major surgery or nuclear war, rather than the rigours of the tour bus and the television studio. You don’t hear people referring to long-standing bank managers or builders as “survivors”. Pop, if it hasn’t yet eaten itself, is renowned for eating its own.

James, 16 years into a career of remarkable transformations, from hippy dreamers to indie idealists to baggy superstars to stadium heroes to experimental weirdos to near oblivion, are certainly survivors, although, as they’ll tell you, it was touch and go for a while. It seems they’ve always known the score – right back in 1985 they released the song ‘Hymn From A Village’, where Tim Booth attacked pop music and its “songsmith crooks” for unforgiving vapidity – “Oh go and read a book/It’s so much more worthwhile” he spat, righteous with the knowledge that James were outsiders in the musical world. Thirteen years later, heralding a new ‘Best Of’ compilation, James are back with ‘Destiny Calling’, a single which takes a mellower look at the lot of a band, all with a self-referential nod and an arch smile.

“So we may be gorgeous/So we may be famous/Come back when we’re getting old…”

It seems James, having seen every inch of the rock machine, are feeling almost affectionate towards the old beast these days.

“I’m not naive enough to be disillusioned with pop music,” smiles Tim Booth. I understand the machine, and it’s very predictable. I can also accept and enjoy it as well. There’s a lot of luxuries in this job that I love, and the song isn’t condemning them, it’s right in the middle of it all, laughing.”

“She likes the black one/He likes the posh one/The cute ones are usually gay…”

The audience at James’ acoustic showcase in Whitfield Street studios, off Tottenham Court Road, are laughing too, at the dissection of the pop world. James’ entrenchment in early-80’s indiedom, living in poverty in Manchester, funding their band by offering themselves for drug experiments, is long past. Early albums ‘Stutter’ and ‘Strip Mine’, a string of Hieronymous Bosch metaphors, medieval imagery and sparse folk instrumentation, sound like they sprang from a tarot pack. Saul Davis, James’ present guitarist, who was recruited just prior to their breakthrough album, ‘Gold Mother’ in 1990, recalls their image in Manchester at the time.

“I though they were the weirdest bunch of fuckers I’d ever met in my life. James felt raw at that point, it was a strange little thing, very self-contained; a little family. It wasn’t obvious what the rules were, it felt different to anything I’d ever been in before, quite clean, quite pure. I bought “Strip Mine” and hated it – it sounded so light and skippy, urgh. I went home and told my flatmates that a band called James had asked me to join them, and they’d seen them at Glastonbury in 1985 and thought they were the best band in the world. Things started to sound better through those ears.”

He wasn’t the only one to have a change of heart. With the huge success of ‘Sit Down’, flowery James T-shirts became ubiquitous anywhere there was indie disco. They bought the design for 50 quid from local Manchester eccentric Edward Barton, and the merchandise soon became as much an icon of the ‘Madchester’ baggy era as Joe Boggs flares and pudding bowl hair cuts. Baggy was never their bandwagon, though – they might have come from Manchester and been friends of Happy Mondays and Inspiral Carpets, but they didn’t belong to the hedonistic, ecstasy-driven maelstrom that was rising up from the city’s clubs. Compared with the hooligan beats of the Mondays and the dance-tinged grooves of The Stone Roses, James were dependent on a more traditional folk-rock idiom for their songs.

Ironically, it was this tendency that was to undermine their victory. After seven years awaiting success, it seemed a very short honeymoon period before the country – at least, the press – decided they’d had enough of James, and ‘Seven’, the follow up to ‘Gold Mother’, was dubbed ‘stadium rock’ with the righteous horror people usually reserve for crimes against horses. Instead of triumphantly capitalising on their years of indie creed, they were kicked in the teeth and marked down as underground traitors who’d sold out their weird folk edge for global gain. Compare the angular rhythms and jerky passions of ‘Gold Mother’s ‘Come Home’ and ‘How Was It For You?’ with the dour grandeur of ‘Seven’s ‘Ring the Bells’ and ‘Sound’ and the difference is marked. “I heard you calling through the drumbeat,” sang Tim on ‘Hymn From A Village’, pleading for a “strong primal” music that would reach past rock’n’roll production and into people’s hearts. With these new songs, it seemed unlikely that even a crowd of 30,000 people would be able to make themselves heard through the epic sound. Unsurprisingly, that’s not how Tim sees it.

“What happened was we became famous during the making of that record”, says Tim. “We were going to produce it ourselves, but we couldn’t because we kept getting pulled out of the studio to do press. So we got Youth in, because he played us PM Dawn which he’d just done, and it was a fantastic-sounding record. The idea wasn’t to go rock at all, it was just the most exciting music. But journalists decided to see the songs a certain way – and do you know where that came from? One chorus – the “lalalalalas” on ‘Born of Frustration’.”

So it wasn’t an attempt to expand the sound in keeping with your expanding market?

“That’s a joke. We’d been playing those songs live for a year, and the band were becoming more confident. On ‘Seven’, everyone found their place – it’s one of my favourite records.”

All the same, the cool reception of ‘Seven’ was to have far-reaching effects on their career.

“There’s not a country in the world that’s as judgmental as this country. Me, Jimmy (Glennie, bassist) and Larry (Gott, guitarist) had a lot of ups and downs with the press and knew we were due that backlash, but the new guys – the ones who’d just had good press – they were freaked. Tabloid culture is the primary culture here and when we get interviews by European or American journalists, they say how do you deal with the crap. What happens is, you get quite paranoid and think, shit, they don’t like us any more, even though we’d just played to 35,000 people at Alton Towers. It’s ridiculous – and totally wrong. We had so many offers to tour America and we took them and didn’t come back for about four years.”

SO WHILE the Britpop explosion took hold and America became the new Evil Empire, James were AWOL in the States, out of sight, and as out of mind as you can be when you’re selling 600,000 copies of your fifth studio album ‘Laid’ across the USA.

“Our biggest problem was that we got off on America so much, and that was seen as a betrayal. In America, you can get what you want any time of the day, and we were blown away by that. Our mistake was that we didn’t come back for a few years, which was negligent of us,” shrugs Tim, as if they’d forgotten to cancel the milk. “The next thing you know, you’re accused of being anthemic, the indie police come around and you’re shot for crimes against indie.”

This might be said with Booth’s serpentine smile, but it can’t mask the sharp hint of bitterness. There’s a persistent sense of a band who feel that this far down the line they shouldn’t have anything to prove, but can’t help proving it anyway, who might loftily dismiss the machinations of press and industry, but still want their credibility back, still need the recognition for what they feel to be their massive influence on recent British music. Tim mentions James’ unlikely fans, the bands that owe them a creative debt. There’s a mention of how Tricky used to come and watch them every night from the side of state at Lollapalooza, how he’s expressed an interest in touring with them. A reference to a book about Oasis where Noel, then a roadie for The Inspiral Carpets, cites seeing James soundcheck as the reason he formed a band. The story about Neil Young asking them to support him in the US and their rapturous reception from his notoriously partisan audience. The way Brian Eno approached them to work on ‘Laid’ and the experimental dance set ‘Wah-Wah’ and not vice versa. The memory of Radiohead supporting them around the time of ‘Creep’ and how Tim “never saw them making such a great record, but it’s wonderful. I’m really happy for them to now have that success.”

There’s little perception of James being and influential band in Britain. They’ve left behind no clear legacy, unlike neon vapour-trails of The Stone Roses or Happy Mondays. They don’t appear in the lists of the greatest albums ever. But ask Tim if he sees the band as being influential and he nods with utter conviction.

“I know it. Major Britpop bands have shown us their signed James T-shirts.”

Why James have survived when most of their contemporaries have faltered is a mystery. Their early hero Ian Curtis is dead. The Smiths, who took the young band under their wing, long gone. All those baggy bands they were lumped in with have either mutated or been forgotten, Shaun Ryder becoming the Mr Creosote of pop excess, and the jury still being out on Ian Brown, while the Inspiral Carpets – who apparently lifted ‘This Is How It Feels’ from a James song with Tim’s approval – remain a footnote. But, as Saul says, last year survival was a subject tactfully avoided. After 1994’s Woodstock, they were near to splitting up, their exhaustion from touring providing the fertile ground for nascent personal emnities, while Larry, third original member along with Tim and Jim, left to be with his family.

“When we look back at it, we realise we were so close to breaking the whole thing open. We’d sold 600,000 copies of ‘Laid’, we were so close to really selling, but we couldn’t carry on. It’s like your wave doesn’t make it to the beach and you have to wait for your tide to go back out and come back in again.”

With new musicians Adrian Octal (guitars) and Mark Hunter (keyboards), they recorded last year’s ‘Whiplash’, and uneasy mix of their free-form, Eno-inspired experiments and – in singles ‘She’s A Star’ and ‘Waltzing Along’ – the wide rock panoramas of ‘Seven’. This time, they feel their return will be uncompromised by such disruptions.

There’s a belief that James never fell prey to all the excesses that eat bands from the inside out.

“I could tell you some stories,” says Tim, waggling his eyebrows, “but I won’t.” With Saul’s encouragement, they tell the tale of Lollapalooza where, due to serious injury, Tim was in a neck brace, while the band were just in trouble.

“It was the most horrible tour ever,” shudders Saul. “If any bands read this and they’re asked to do Lollapalooza, say no, because it will destroy them. It destroyed us.”

“We had two buses, a party bus and a peace bus for me,” says Tim. “I was fucked, I had a helper with me the whole time because I couldn’t walk properly. But I actually had a good time. I learnt how to use a computer and got through it. The party bus… [he pauses portentously] went into Happy Mondays cartoon mode and disappeared for a couple of months. It went out of control.”

“It’s difficult to know how to phrase it, ‘cos you get into trouble,” sighs Saul. “It’s not the enclosed space or the fact that it is all men on the bus. It was to do with wanting to get to the heart of it… wanting to fuck America up the arse and wanting to fuck each other up the arse, wanting to push each other into a situation where it was undeniable we had gone into madness. It was like Hunter S Thompson – let’s crack open the ether and see what happens,” he says, with melodramatic relish.

Tim grins. “We were playing like demons.”

Quite literally, according to the rock jocks who came to see Korn and were greeted with the sight of six fey Englishmen in dresses and mirrorball shirts. As Saul says: “A 40-minute set at Lollapalooza isn’t the best time to think: ‘Hmm, lets do some improvised jazz.” James had taken a bite out of America and suddenly, America was biting back.

“The third day in,” says Booth, “25,000 people started shouting ‘faggots’, so on the fifth day we got dressed up real faggy and we were ready for them. I used to work on lines to put them down and Saul would stand there in his little dress and go: ‘I want you to suck my cock’ a number of times and they just shut up. What I did, which I’d never do in England, was walk off stage and go sing to this huge guy who was heckling us and he was so embarrassed ‘cos all the people were watching him. After 20 seconds, he said: ‘Will you give me a hug?’ And I thought, ‘Wow, this is interesting.”

IT SAYS a lot about Tim Booth that he wouldn’t wander offstage in England, but in a land where people carry guns, he’s quite happy to make advances towards potentially dangerous thugs. He’s a curious mixture of charm and steely professionalism, with a pragmatic spirituality that’s far away from platitudinous new-age bleating. There are reminders, too, that this man was once a student of drama at Manchester University. At the video shoot for ‘Destiny Calling’, in a bizarre studio complex in London’s Mile End, Tim is required to remove all his clothes for a shot. VOX offers its sympathy – it’s cold enough for another remake of The Thing and anything other than head-to-toe fleece is and invitation to hypothermia. Tim, however, takes the comment as meaning ‘How embarrassing for you to be naked’, and is quick to assert that he has no problem with it at all. You can just imagine his student productions. He might come across as pretentious, were it not for his way of saying “that sounds really pretentious” after particularly elevated statements.

“Tim needs protecting, he gets a lot of flak,” says Saul. “He confuses people by being honest. No one’s ever really got the point of him.”

And that would be?

Saul pauses. “He’s and alien, a fucking alien. He’s on the fringes of life. He just doesn’t conform to any of the rules. That to me is rock’n’roll.” He laughs and shrugs. “OK, he drinks chamomile tea…”

Jim Glennie gleefully tells a different story.

“Everyone thinks Tim goes to bed at midnight and drinks weird herbal stuff, but he’s in league with the devil like the rest of us. He’s the bad boy of rock’n’roll. He’s the worst, honestly.”

Given the fact Tim is a pop star, Jim’s story is much easier to believe. There’s an obvious difficulty in reconciling his 16 years in a rock’n’roll band – a famously filthy profession – with the idea that Tim is an ethereal, otherworldly being. After all, this is the man who sang “don’t need a shrink but and exorcist” on ‘Born of Frustration’. Did the idea of self-destruction ever appeal to him?

“That’s what ‘Johnny Yen’ [from ‘Stutter’] is about. When I was younger, I swallowed the tortured artist myth hook, line and sinker. What I decided early on was that I wasn’t going to do it. I wanted to go to that level of pain, that level of madness and survive it, and do it consciously – not with drugs.”

Basically, Tim Booth gave God and ultimatum.

When I was 21 I gave myself a year to find out if God existed,” he says. “I decided that if I didn’t get any proof, I’d throw myself into the tortured artist role and burn myself out. I wanted proof and I found it in that year. Once you reach that point, there’s a point to living, so I was no longer going to become the suicidal dickhead.”

He’s cagey about the nature of this life-changing experience.

“You can’t explain meeting God. It’s not religious, but I believe in spirit. As much as I can say, I discovered it through meditation. It’s about going into altered states. I do that a lot through dancing and movement and love-making. Other people touch that stuff on drugs. But there’s a price to pay with that one and you can’t stay in those roles, you just stagger around like a drunkard till next time.”

Aware perhaps of the pervasive image of himself as the serious, high-minded singer slapping the wrists of his over-exuberant band, he adopts a more reasonable tone.

“But that’s just my way – because the band hates being presented as this sober, meditative thing. It isn’t. And I drink now and then, I even take drugs now and then. I don’t write it out of my experience. I don’t have any moral judgement on these things.”

The extremes Tim is drawn to are beyond the blaze-of-glory excesses that you would expect. At the acoustic show, Tim expresses his delight at letters he’s received from asylums saying how James are the patients’ favorite band, or from “a cassock of monks” from a progressive monastery, saying how much they enjoy the band’s music. The next day he talks about his work with “shamans and lunatics”, the classes he teaches in going into trance states through dance.

“You can have a lot of fun doing it. The teacher I work with has shown me that. I’ve worked with a lot of male Shamans and it’s all about pain endurance. This woman says that’s very much a macho idea of shamanism; her idea is it can involve great pleasure. We dance for days and get into amazing states, then she frees different areas of your psyche to get in touch with spirits. I think people get it through dancing anyway, they just don’t label it – it makes it less pretentious.”

There are those who see rock’n’roll as a continuation of shamanism. Does Booth find it easy to fit James in with that side of his life? Isn’t it hard to sustain some kind of spirituality in the world of a touring band?

“It’s become and overused word, especially in rock’n’roll, usually it’s an excuse to take drugs and justify it in cultural terms. Having said that, there is definitely a continuation. At a rave, with people dancing – that’s a shamanic thing to do. They’re using Ecstasy to help them, but they don’t need to.”

Did Booth ever succumb to those temptations?

“There’s a vortex in rock’n’roll which is very dangerous. Basically, if you achieve success, you can have anything you want. You can have unlimited drugs, unlimited alcohol, unlimited sex, and unless you learn discipline, you just become a big appetite. People think that’s heaven, but you have to be disciplined enough to be free. I only went into excess for about 2 years. Then I checked out of it.”

James, though, still show no sign of checking out. “Tell us when our time is up/Show us how to die well/Show us how to let it all go…” sings Tim on ‘Destiny Calling’. What would it take to split them up now?

“Either becoming uninspired, or a sense of, oh look, we’ve done it now. Which would take massive success. It’s almost like we’re sitting here waiting for the finishing post, and until we find it, it’s hard to know where to stop.”

Name : Saul Davies of James

Band : The Jimi Hendrix Experience

Venue : Isle of Wight Festival, 1970

“I had hippy parents who took me to the Isle of Wight when I was five, and bloody good it was too! I remember waking up in the middle of the night, my parents screaming at me “Shut up, it’s Hendrix” I think we were probably a long way away from him. I think everyone was. I don’t think they had PAs in those days, did they?

We went in a Land Rover, and I remember getting my finger stuck in the window. A little stopper had come out and I stuck my finger in the hole. Some hippies had to give us some cold chips, which my mother rubbed all over me to get my finger out of this hole. And I got my parents busted. They were passing pills to someone. The police saw this happen and went up to them and asked ‘Did you pass pills to that person?’ They were denying it and I said ‘He did’ and they got carted off!

What happened to me? I’m not telling you. But it was 1970 and we lived in a virtual commune at the time. There were lots of surrogate mothers and fathers around. Anyway, they didn’t get into serious shit. Not sure what it was they had, but it obviously wasn’t too offensive or appalling.

I hadn’t seen so many people in one place before, and not since. It was just overwhelming. I can remember bits of Hendrix, the bloke with the flute – Ian Anderson from Jethro Tull – and bits of The Who. It was an amazing line-up and great fun as a kid to be at something like that, getting covered in mud and doing all the things that I’ll be doing at festivals this summer.

I found out years later that our manager, Peter Rudge, was actually on stage standing behind Hendrix’s amps. He was up there as a young, svelte thing holding onto the back of Hendrix’s amps and stopping them falling over. He’d taken The Who there; he was their tour manager or something. He was almost a hero in his own right, even in those days.

I can remember what I was wearing, and I remember that it all became floor cloths afterwards. My salmon pink flares with satin stars that my mother had sewn into them. Bitch! She was determined to make hippies out of us! I think it worked for a bit, but by the time we got to 1973, we were all disillusioned.

We play a lot of festivals now, and it’s really easy to just become the ligger backstage, closeted in your little, relatively warm, safe, not-so-muddy environment. But we do enjoy playing the big festivals because we can get out there and do the simple things that punters do – just watch bands and not get hassled.”

With a Best Of compilation zooming upthe charts and a brand new album simmering on the stove, James guitarists Saul Davies and Adrian Oxaal are in ebuillent mood, “Our songwriting’s a fairly confused process,” they warn. “It does seem to reap results, though…..”

“Let’s drive the car into the hotel bar and do the interview in there!” James guitarist Saul Davies might be weary from preparing live renditions of James classics Sit Down and Laid for Jo Whiley’s Radio 1 lunchtime programme at the BBC’s Maida Vale studios all morning, but his eyes positively sparkle at the prospect of ram-raiding the band’s Swiss Cottage hotel to create the perfect ambience for a TGM chat. “Didn’t Keith Moon do that in a Rolls Royce?” ponders his six-string colleague, Adrian Oxaal. “Yeah,” affirms Davies, “He drove it straight into the hotel lobby.” “Mmmm” remembers Oxaal, “then he got out and ordered a drink, as if nothing strange had happened…” Davies shakes his head. “That’s cool,” he mutters, struck with admiration for the legendary Who skinsman.

Fortunately for TGM’s police record, the duo decide that a more law-abidingly pedestrian means of gaining access to their swish digs is the best option – and once safely ensconsed in the hotel’s bar, talk turns to their chart-topping singles album The Best Of. Liberally sprinkled with hits from all their previous studio albums – from indie-dance classics Sit Down and Come Home from the breakthrough 1990 album Gold Mother through the galactic slide-heavy refrains of She’s A Star from last year’s Whiplash, The Best Of showcases a band that have been afraid to paddle their own sonic canoe wherever they damn well please.

Given the loyalty of their fans and the consistent sniping of the music critics – ‘folkie vegan Buddhists who caught baggy before they developed messianic stadium rock tendencies’ is about as many of the inaccuracies hurled at James that you could cram into one sentence – Davies was expecting widely diverse opinions about the compilation album. “It shows how stupid we are, though,” he laughs. “Because everyone thinks that now we’ve put out a Best Of, this is the end of the band – but we just wanted to do a singles album. Noone forced us to do it.”

Two new songs were included on the Best Of. One of them – Destiny Calling – sees James rocking with tongue firmly in cheek as they catalogue the comic realities of life in the pop world; the other track Runaground is a deliciously melancholic beast with a tear-inducing signature riff that spirals to a psychedelic conclusion.

“We’ve got 28 songs written for the next album,” reveals Davies.

“Rest assured, though, that you’ll only hear the best ones of those,” chips in Oxaal.

Davies : “Runaground is a fuckin’ serious piece of music. It’s more representative of the stuff that we’re doing at the moment. For me, the sonic melange I’m creating on that track and the lead guitar playing at the end is the best I’ve ever done. It’s simple and a bit unsure of itself, beacuse I didn’t know what I was doing when I played it. It sounds like a cross between New Order and Neil Young.”

“I quite like what I did on Destiny Calling,” counters Oxaal, “particularly the main riff and the lead solo. We tried doing it a different way to the way we did the original version in the studio and I came up with something really good. It’s nice when that happens – when you don’t have to struggle for inspiration.”

Collectively James have written galaxies of songs – yet the duo themselves still find it quite hard to fathom out their own songwriting process. “From my perspective,” proffers Oxaal, “it either comes out of nowhere or it rises from us having a jam together.”

Davies nods. “Our songwriting is a fairly confused process from anyone on the outside, and even to ourselves a lot of the time,” he admits. “It does seem to reep results, though….”

“One thing I’ve noticed recently is that early James songs were based on two-chord progressions. Then it moved to three-chord progressions – Come Home, Sit Down, How Was It For You? Since Laid, there have been more four-chord progressions and these progressions tend to follow fairly obvious intervals.” “E, A and B basically” chuckles Oxaal. “Yeah,” Davies elaborates, “but because there’s a lot of us and we have a fairly instinctive and musical approach, it sounds quite complex.”

This simple-but-deep musical approach is lost on many, including vocalist Tim Booth. “He hasn’t got a clue!” proclaims Davies. “During a song we’ll often play inversions of the basic chords and he’ll think we’re playing totally different chords and so he comes up with different vocal melodies. During a rehearsal he’ll say things like ‘Go back to the bit where you changed chords,’ and we’ll just laugh and go ‘We didn’t change them, you tit!'”

Oxaal only joined James a couple of years ago during the recording of Whiplash when the commitment of original guitarist Larry Gott was coming under question. Before his elevation to the major league, Oxaal played with indie hopefuls Sharkboy; he nabbed himself the James job because he and Davies (who himself joined James prior to Gold Mother in 1990) were childhood friends and had played together as teenagers in a pubescent combo called King Cobra and the River Men (‘I can’t remember any of the songs we wrote, thankfully,’ Oxaal laughs.) In those days, mind, Davies played drums. He credits Oxaal with teaching him to play guitar. “We used to go busking together in our hometown Hull. The thing was, I could only play the things Adrian taught me how to play – I couldn’t play anything else.” He shakes his head in disbelief. “It took me years to make that connection. It did!”

Both Saul and Adrian still hold Larry Gott in very high esteem. “I was always in complete awe of Larry – I hated picking up a guitar in front of him,” opines Davies. “He was a very special guitar player with a great ear for sonic activity.”

“How he managed to create the guitar part at the beginning of Sound will always be a mystery to me,” enthuses Oxaal. “It was something very unique to him.”

“I don’t know how he did that either,” admits Davies. “I think it was a combination of his guitar, his fingers and where he positioned his e-bow…..”

At this point in the proceedings the scene in the hotel bar is swelled by Michael Kulas, the Canadian backing vocalist who joined James a year or so ago (just to add to the confusion, Michael also plays guitar on some of the new tracks). How do the three split the post-Gott guitar roles? It turns out that although both Davies and Oxaal have strong improvisational skills, only Oxaal is capable of remembering what he comes up with. “I’m great at coming up with stuff when we’re jamming, but I always end up having to ask these two what it was I actually did,” Davies smiles ruefully.

Kulas, who wrote the intro riff to Runaground, describes his own guitar style as “very modal. I like running riffs of open strings in a twangy style. I also try and adapt to these two, because they have their own very different slant on guitar playing.”

Davies: “Basically, Adrian’s riff man…”

Kulas: “He feels it through the bottom of his freakin’ toes man. He’s got guitar coming through him.”

“I’m kind of ‘Byrds sonic boy,’ continues Davies. “And Mike’s ‘atmospheric sonic boy’. Mike’s very intellectual about his playing. Adrian’s a complete idiot, til you put a guitar in his hands….” “Not true!” objects Kulas, but Davies is already launched on his punchline. “Me though – I’m a complete idiot regardless of whether I’ve got a guitar in my hands or not.”

Although not previously a lover of Gibson’s finest, Saul Davies cadged a Les Paul Goldtop from Larry Gott when he left the band, and life hasn’t been quite the same since. “That guitar became more relevant to what we were doing,” he explains. “We were a bit twangy when we first started, but we’ve got a bit more hunkier. When I see myself on telly, I think ‘Wow! Look at that guitar!’ I can’t take my eyes off it.”

For acoustic duties, Davies employs a couple of Godins and a Lowden; his other main electric is a G&L ASAT. “It sounds gorgeous,” he purrs. “It’s got more body than a normal Fender sound, somehow….”

The G&L and the Les Paul are put through a Fender Prosonic head, a Marshall cab and a considerable array of FX pedals. “I use all sorts: a Pearl Flanger, a Tube Screamer – both She’s A Star and Runaground have got Big Muff all over them,” he enlarges. “I also play violinm which I often put through my MXR Blue Box octave divider. I have to limit myself onstage to just a few pedals though – because I jump around so much, I have to know that whichever ones I jump on, it’ll basically sound alright.”

Adrian Oxaal has remained faithful to his Fender Jazzmaster for over ten years. “It’s the guitar I learnt to play on,” he coos. “I got it initially because I liked the shape, but now I still use it for nearly everything I do” Other instruments that Adrian calls upon include a cello, a Takamine acoustic and a Mosrite (‘for feedback and microphonic noises’). “Larry Gott used to play a lot of slide, so when I joined I bought a Blade Strat-style guitar and hiked the action up to cover those parts,” he adds. As for amps, Oxaal proudly boasts his Fender Blues DeVille can melt cheese at 50 yards. “It’s a great lead amp, cutting but not tinny. It’s really good for rock riffs where you don’t want clean or fuzzy, but something in the middle.”

Even when jamming, Oxaal likes to set out his full FX pedal armoury, including a wah-wah, a Big Muff fuzz, a delay and a flanger. “It’s a great combination for getting the right texture for a riff,” he beams, “and when you sweep the wah-wah in and out, you get all sorts of psychedelic progressive rock shite!”

The Manchester hideaway of James’ singer is a calming place, heavily influenced by natural E, pentacles, crucifixes and Native American animal spirits. But then, it’s easy to scoff

Although the other members of James are scattered throughout the world, Tim Booth still likes to retain a flat in Manchester. He divides his time between Brighton where his son lives, and New York, home town of fiancee, Kate, which doesn’t leave a lot of time for the city that so heartily embraced his band circa Sit Down.

A pleasant walking distance from the city’s ‘Curry Mile’ (more curry houses per square mile than anywhere else in the Western world) Tim lives in the kind of artsy community common to Douglas Copeland novels.

“This house is like a way-station for creative people,” says Tim nonchalantly. “Actors and directors and producers come and go every month or two. One of the tenants is about to become a director on Coronation Street.”

But despite the Parisian Left Bank atmosphere indoors, the surrounding area is not without its problems. It’s quite a rough area, warns Tim, with more than its share of burglaries. Only last week Tim’s car was broken into.

“I feel quite vulnerable letting you into my room,” Tum admits. “But I also feel quite open, because I make my house a place of calm, as my life is so intense. I try to make a room a place of magic and fill it with antidotes to life in a rock band.”

1 SNAKESKIN

“This is the skin from a corn snake owned by Saul Davies (James violinist). It’s non-venomous and actually very sweet. Snakes shedding, their skin is a great image – the Native Americans saw it as a symbol of transformation. In Morocco, a snake-charmer once put a poisonous snake around my neck and then dropped it. Everyone else fled in terror, but I just sat their calmly, and thought it smelt like chicken. Later on, after the snake had been removed, a bead of sweat dropped where the snake had been and I jumped and screamed “AARRGH!” If I’d reacted like that earlier, I’m sure I would’ve been bitten.”

2 TIBETAN OIL AND DRUM

“These were given to me by a Tibetan shaman. He was trained from the age of 3 to 27 as a healer, which is a hell of a burden to put on any three year old. His element is lightning and thunder, so he uses shock as part of his healing. Whether you believe this or not, part of his training was conducting lightning. The oil takes seven years to make, and he gave it me to rub on my back. I use the drum for ceremony purposes. I wouldn’t play it onstage, because it’s too precious.”

3 CROSS

“I’ve got a couple of crosses – they’re just gifts from different people. I’m not into Christianity on any level, though. If you look at the history of the Catholic Church, they may have well have been the Mafia. The way they killed each other to get power, the way they raped their sisters – it’s fucking atrocious. I think the story of Christ is an amazing story, and if he were alive today, I’d be the first knocking on his door, but I don’t think the Church has anything to do with Christ. They’ve hijacked an astonishing man, as most religions do.”

4 PENTACLE ENGAGEMENT RING

“How much of this can I tell you without sounding like a complete wanker? This ring is a pentacle, and it represents the relationship between the Sun and Venus, which is a symbol of love. I initially decided I was only going to buy it if there was some kind of sign, and the next song on the radio was ‘Take Five’. A week later I showed the ring to one of my fiancee’s best friends and she went white as a sheet. Two days before she’d had a dream that Kate and I were making love and a guy with top hat and tails was saying ‘Their love-making is so profound, they’re making the star break out of the circle’. She then drank ten cups of tea in the dream and at the bottom of the last cup was this symbol.”

5 NATURAL ECSTASY

“It’s not chemical. It’s made out of kava nuts. It’s a legal high that works as an amazing aphrodisiac – it came top of a Cosmopolitan review. I have tried Ecstasy but it didn’t do anything for me, and the person I was with had a terrible comedown the next day. I want to reach those states in life, and there’s many ways to do it – through breaths, through loving sex, through dancing. You can find those ways and they don’t damage you physically.”

6 BUDDHA STATUE

“I love the work of the potter who made this – his work comes alive, especially when you’re in an altered state. I got in touch with him two weeks after he’d decided to stop being a potter, and he’d smashed all his work up. He’d become a school teacher, and I went round to see him to try and talk him out of it. I like the Buddha because it has a touch of the extra-terrestrial about it.”

7 COLOURED ROCK

“This is an amethyst geode, and it was given to me as an engagement present by a wonderful clairvoyant who’s helped me for a number of years. Amethyst is actually for developing clairvoyant powers as well as having calming properties. You just have it around and treat it like a great flower – feed it and clean it when you can.”

8 CARD WITH A PICTURE OF A TURKEY

“This is a Native American animal card. They’re more gentle than tarot cards because they’re less specific. To a Native American, every animal carries an energy, and the animal can give you that gift of energy. So a fox is about invisibility, because they have to stay hidden, and an eagle is about truth because they have great vision. A turkey is about giving things away – Native Americans would often give all their possessions to people in the belief that things would come back to them.”

9 DAMIEN HIRST POSTCARD

“That was a gift from Brian Eno, I love Damien Hirst – I’d describe him as a three-dimensional philosopher rather than as an artist. Most of his ideas are about life and death and sex, and finds a 3D way of bringing these issues home. Socrates said that philosophy was about preparing you for death, and Hirst has the same kind of concerns.”

10 LEEDS VS MANCHESTER UNITED TICKETS

“I usually shy away from talking about football. I don’t like the partisan shit and I especially hate the violence between Leeds and Man United. It all dates back to the War of the Roses – we laugh at the Turks and Kurds hating each other over things that happened hundred of years agom but we don’t realise that exactly the same thing happens here. I’m a Leeds fan, but I’ve been to see United a few times, because my son is a United fan. They used to play ‘Sit Down’ before games, which was weird.”

11 BACK MACHINE

“You attach this machine to a door and hang upside down, like a bat. I’d been hunting for one for ages because I ruptured a disc while dancing. I tracked one down and I rang up and left a message on the phone. A friend of mine from San Diego rang me back and said that he was the person who made them! I’ve been hanging from door-frames ever since. It aligns the spine and alleviates the pain.”

12 TOP HAT

“Jesus, this gets worse. I bought this in LA for Halloween. It’s a seriously pagan festival in America, much more intense than here. I got a really weird fishnet stocking mask to put over my head, and together with the top hat, it put me into a dark and dangerous place. We went to a great gay area where there were lots of transsexuals and amazing parades, and everybody was embracing their dark sensuality. It was great fun.”

13 EDWARD BOND SCRIPT FOR SAVED

“This is the play I’m going to appear in for a four week run in Bolton. I carry it with me every day and I hope that by some process of osmosis I’ll learn the lines – it doesn’t work, unfortunately. Plays are the scariest things of all things to do, as you can’t do a reshoot if you fuck up. This is the first time I’ve acted in 13 years, I acted in plays when I was a student in Manchester, and I even played a small role in a play directed by Ben Elton. But I wasn’t very good in those days – I had no sense of confidence.”

Tim Booth of James tells us what makes him shake his body.

1 CORNERSHOP – Brimful of Asha (Wiija single) – Tjinder and co’s dancefloor smash

“I first heard this in America a while ago and really loved it. I thought it was really hip and ahead of its time. I love it because it seems so innocent and guileless. It’s brilliant how they’ve managed to resurrect the word ‘bosom’ and forced it into the national consciousness through so much radio play. I’m not sure how badly they want or need fame and success. I just hope they don’t make the same mistakes we made.”

2 NICK CAVE – Are You The One I’ve Been Waiting For? (from the Mute album “The Boatman’s Call”) – The Lord Of Gloom at his depressing best.

“I’ve been a fan of his for years. This song is a rather self-indulgent choice. It’s for the times you’re pining for your loved ones and you feel all mopey and sad without them. I first saw him live when he played with The Birthday Party who were supporting Bauhaus. He came on wearing a dog collar tearing pages out of a Bible. It made Bauhaus seem pretty pathetic in comparison.”

3 JAN GARBAREK – Officiarden (ECM) – ambient choral music for those monastic moments

“It’s these monks performing choral music with a lone saxophonist in the middle of the whole thing which sounds really peaceful and haunting. I like it because it’s extremely soothing and therapeutic. It works best when you’re having a Radox bath. It’s a wonderfully still and tranquil contrast to the rest of my life. I usually listen to it on tour when things get too hectic”

4 HILDER VON BINGHAM – Canticles of Ecstasy (Hyperion) – F**ked if we know, Ask Tim

“It’s 13th Century Christian music. I listen to this when my memories are frazzled. It’s an extremely calming influence. Best listened to when you’ve got the lights off and you’ve got nowhere else to go except your own bedroom. It’s the ultimate sound of loneliness. It’s an extremely good reminder of why you miss your loved one when she lives in America.”

5 THIS MORTAL COIL – Song To The Siren (from the 4AD album “It’ll End In Tears”) – Ethereal classic and 4AD in a nutshell

“It’s from their atrocious debut album, it’s the only decent song on it. It reminds me of a Tim Buckley song called ‘I Need To Cry.’ Liz Fraser’s (from the Cocteau Twins) voice is one of the best voices of the Eighties. And that’s what separates this song from the rest of the album. It reminds me of a lot of the stuff I did with Angelo Badalamenti, because it’s dreamy, sensual and dangerous. Apparently David Lynch wanted it for ‘Blue Velvet’ but he couldn’t afford it. If it had been used on ‘Blue Velvet’, it would have been the perfect soundtrack.”

6 ESTHER AND ABI OFARIM – Cinderella Rockafella (Philips Single) – Glam rock stomper from the age of the dinosaurs

“I just remember seeing them as a child in the Sixties. They were this old hippy couple who became this one-hit wonder. It’s a really stupid song, the sort of song you can have a laugh about. It reminds me of my relationships because of the absurdity of it and because you can turn songs like this into your own special little song. And it’s also a self-indulgent reminder of my youth and I’ve included it for purely nostalgic reasons.”

7 FLEETWOOD MAC – Rumours (Warner Brothers album) – Classic transatlantic MOR from the Seventies

“I didn’t like it at the time because I was a punk and it didn’t really tie in with that scene. It was the same with Blondie. They weren’t really heavy enough. But it works if you go back and rediscover it. It’s an incredible album because the pain involved is evoked so subtly and it’s translated so wittily, creatively and eloquently.”

8 NEIL YOUNG – After The Goldrush (Reprise album track) – Classic whiney-voiced ballad from the King Grumpy

“I’ve been a fan for 15 years and it still thrills even now. It just comes across as being so naïve with all those cackhanded solos. The lyrics are very focused and concentrated, although at times it seems like he’s had one joint too many. It requires a lot of effort to truly appreciate him, but once you’re in, then it’s definitely love. This is Neil Young at his authentic best. Touring with him was amazing. I defy anyone to not enjoy his acoustic shows.”

9 RADIOHEAD – OK Computer (Parlophone album) – Groundbreaking, mindblowing opus from Prince Grumpy and chums

“I like the randomness and awkwardness of it. It seems to have been made without any commercial concerns at all. You can’t understand the words, but that’s part of the appeal. They toured with us early on and I found them a little too tortured, too intense, but there’s more of a balance here. I like the campness of ‘Karma Police’ with that line ‘They think I’ve lost it completely.'”

10 JAMES – The Best Of (Mercury album) – Britain’s Number One album!

“New James compilation album. The most underrated band of all time from Manchester. Available for all occassions, including weddings and barmitzvahs. Priced £13.99 from all good record shops.”

After 15 remarkable years, numerous line-up changes and countless highs and lows, James are back. Pat Reid sits down to meet the survivors.

Tim Booth, singer with James, has got amazing eyes. Penetrating yet sympathetic, suggestive of both sharp intelligence and playful humour, they sum up the band far better than those best-selling “Ja” t-shirts you saw everywhere in the late 80s. With a new Best Of album to promote, Tim, along with guitarist/violinist Saul Davies, is on the interview treadmill in a London hotel. The pair’s personalities are contrasting, but oddly complementary. Tim is gentle, Saul is aggressive. Tim’s agenda is mystic and spiritual; shade-wearing Saul talks about “beer and tarts”. What they both have in common is a passion for James.

The band formed in Manchester in the late 80s, releasing weird indie-folk records and supporting The Smiths on tour. After years of struggle, they broke through in 1991 with the anthemic Sit Down single and the successful Gold Mother album. In 92 a critical backlash unfairly dismissed the fine Seven album as “pomp rock”, but the following year the Brian Eno-produced Laid made inroads for the band in America. After experimenting with electronic music, James returned last year with the strong Whiplash album, yielding the hits She’s A Star and Tomorrow.

Now, with the ‘Best Of’ album setting the seal on their past efforts, it seems an appropriate time to ask: how did all this get started? Tim’s EYES SPARKLE AS he thinks back to 1982: “Three 17 year-old scallies from Manchester saw me dancing in a nightclub while they were stealing my beer. When I went and confronted them they asked me to join.” The main thing Tim remembers from the band’s earliest performances is fear. James were petrified of playing live. And not only that, their own audience was distinctly heavy. “They had a fanbase of the 40 most aggressive people in Manchester,” Tim grins. “It was scary.”

The first few James gigs were supporting Orange Juice, then came the real test -Manchester’s Cyprus Tavern, by all accounts a bit of a hellhole. “About 40 people just sat there with their arms folded,” Tim recounts. “Giving me a real fucking stare. They were mates of Danny, the previous singer, who’d ended up in Strangeways for GBH, and they didn’t like some middle class student taking over his position…”

For Saul, the call to take up with James followed an eerily sirnilar pattern. “It was totally by mistake,” he insists. “I was in a club in Manchester on player’s night with these arses playing 12 minute guitar solos. Larry, the original guitar player in James, came up to me and said ‘Get up there, have a go’:’ It was another one of those portentous accidental encounters which so enliven musical history… “I don’t know why he did that,” Saul says, still bemused. “I’d never met him before and I didn’t know James at all.” In the event, Saul got up on stage and rattled off a one-note violin solo. A suitably entertained Larry invited him along to a rehearsal the next day. As the band improvised and Saul joined in, he had the distinct feeling that he was being auditioned: “I wasn’t taking it seriously,” he insists. “I thought they were pretty crap really.”

However, a week later when Saul was on stage with the band while an admiring Morrissey swooned in the wings, his impressions underwent a rapid re-evaluation. Not much of a fan of the music of the time, he had a crash course in the late ’80s Manchester scene. “James had taken the Stone Roses and The Happy Mondays on tour. When I joined, our support band was Inspiral Carpets. Suddenly I had a quick history lesson in what James was and what its place was.”

At this time, the band had been a cult attraction for five years, but had been unable to translate their popularity into commercial success. By 1989 they were so skint that they were reduced to testing drugs at a local hospital to pay for rehearsals. “We all went on the Enterprise Allowance scheme,” Saul says. “They gave you 40 quid a week to set up your own business, 17 quid more than if I was on the dole. But within a year we played at Free Trade Hall in Manchester, which holds about 1800, and it was sold out. It started to bubble up in Manchester, until by 1992 it became massive, and then we played Alton Towers to 35,000.”

CERTAINLY, WHEN SAUL JOINED in February 1989, James were about to enter a golden period. Hit singles and critical acclaim were their lot. That is, until the press turned against them. Today, Tim no longer reads their reviews. “1 know how the machine works too well,” he explains wearily. “and I just get tired of it. I decided four years ago not to read any more reviews of James. When Seven started getting very bad reviews it affected the new people a lot because all they’d had was real positivity. We became terrified of making anything that sounded ‘pompous’ -on some journalist’s definition of what that meant -so I found it a very negative influence on the band. You go back to Seven now, it’s a great record.”

It is indeed. But then, despite the detractors, James always have been touched with greatness. This is, after all, a band who won their first hardcore audience by resolutely upstaging an outfit as legendary as The Smiths on the Meat Is Murder tour.

“We’ve been an amazing live band,” Saul argues. “Which is why I hate it when we get slagged. Our Reading performance got slagged and we were brilliant. We were up against Cast and Suede and we were the only band that got everybody going. That’s what we do 30,000 people having a fucking good time.”

JAMES MAY HAVE CARVED a reputation as a near-definitive live band, but last year, Tim confesses, he lost the urge to perform. However, recording an acoustic set for joint release with the “Best Of’ compilation helped relight his fire. “We didn’t know what we were doing,” he recounts happily. “It was very improvised. I told stories in between songs, just like the old days.” James songs do tend to accumulate a certain anecdotal weight over the years.

Like the woman who ran a mental hospital telling Tim that Out To Get You (from Laid) was the inmates’ favourite song. Or the refugees from a weird cult in the states who had a soft spot for Seven… “These kids had been born into a religious cult,” Tim confides, “they broke out when they were about 14. Born Of Frustration was their breakout song. They felt it gave them the strength to do it.” Wow. Obviously Tim’s devotion to spiritual matters really works for some listeners. It’s this desire to truly touch people that makes James so cherishable. “Obviously Sit Down did it on a mass scale,” Tim continues. “We went into hospitals and sang that song to a kid in a coma. A lot of people who’d had bereavements wrote to us and told us that it was their favourite song.” Saul’s thoughts on the band’s most famous song are characteristically sharp: “Sit Down obviously is part of popular culture,” he says.

WHICH BRINGS US TO the 18-track “Best Of’ offering which should restore the band’s place in the hearts of the populace. If Crowded House hadn’t already used it, ‘you know more James songs than you think you do’ would be an appropriate tag. “There’s 14 top 40 hits on it,” Saul says “and two new songs which I think will be successful. The second single, Runaground, will probably be our biggest since Sit Down. Everyone who hears it goes ‘Fuck, it’s gorgeous’.” Of course, in the reference books, James sit resplendent in fine company, sandwiched between The Jam and blues hero Elmore James. So do they ever sneak into WH Smiths and proudly survey their page in the Guinness Book Of Hit Singles?

“No, I’ve never done that,” Saw replies. “But the other day we were looking up to see who’d sold the most records. Up to 1989 The Beatles had sold 1.2 billion records. Then we read that Paul McCartney has 39 gold discs and I thought, Wait a minute – I’ve got nine!” He cracks a cheeky grin: “That’s not bad.” Tim prides himself on the band’s consistency over the years: “Even when the albums have failed as wholes,” he says, “you can see the integrity.”

What have been his highlights so far? “When we did the live video at G-Mex 1 remember thinking it was actually perfect. It summed up everything I wanted us to sum up. Laid was an amazing thing, just to work with Brian (Eno). And to tour with Neil Young in America. To have Neil Young’s respect at the same time as Brian Eno… We felt that was our kind of peer.” Tim tells a touching tale from the Laid sessions. While recording Sometimes, Eno had never heard the completed chorus. When Tim reached that part of the song the producer was clearly moved… “We get to the chorus and I sing ‘Sometimes when I look deep in your eyes I can see your soul’. I was looking at him when I sang it and he nearly fell over. He slumped into a chair and sat there with his eyes closed. At the end he said, ‘That was one of the musical highlights of my life’:’ Now that’s a compliment.

So, if Tim could go back and meet himself 16 years ago as the ride was just beginning, what advice would he give himself? “Relax,” Tim says simply. “Enjoy it.” By his own admission, the singer has often felt “too responsible” to simply have a good time in the band. Additionally, James have always been perceived as rather moral – and not at all hedonistic – figures. Tim argues that this is more a reflection of his lyrics thanan accurate view of his fellow James-ers. “They would much prefer to be seen as a hedonist band. James are like The Happy Mondays a lot of the time, and I’ve toured with The Happy Mondays, I’m not exaggerating.”

So how come we don’t know about it?

“We don’t tell the press,” Tim says, twinkling again.

The early James had three rules: not to have any lessons (“because you end up learning to play like everyone else”); to ditch any song that sounded like anyone else, and to be unpredictable on stage at all times. Tim elaborates: “That meant changing the set list or improvising new songs, or singing a song in German. We used to make up songs a lot on stage in those days”

This whole approach arose from one gig when the band arrived at a venue to find themselves billed by a helpful promoter as “James (Not a poet)”. Tim decided to unleash some wilful confusion by going on and reciting a poem as a joke. He strode up to the microphone , but the lights failed to come on, so he stood there in total darkness, savoring an ominous silence from the expectant audience. When he finally read the poem, the applause was thunderous, “It was really powerful because of the tension,” he explains. “The band came on and we played the best gig of our lives.”

From then onwards they decided to always take risks.

“There’s a theory about pop music,” says Tim. “That it’s 90% predictable, 10% unpredictable – and the 10% is the crucial part. If it’s too predictable, the audience goes into automatic pilot. When you do something where you and the audience don’t know what’s going to happen, everyone is in a higher state of concentration. Most bands play three songs and the gig’s just a variation on those three songs.”

So how can bands avoid getting stuck in a rut?

“Strip down!” Tim urges. “Do a poem! Sing a song on your own, then go really big! Do a dance song. Fuck people’s heads…..”

JAMES have been here before – on the verge of world-slaying success and then – doh! – their credibility-lovin’ frontman goes and spoils it all. So, can they make it a second time around with their new ‘Best Of…’ riding high? Read on…

Silently, without a stir to harm the karmic solemnity, we enter the meditation chamber. We step over a prone drummer, slumpled against the wall, deep in spiritual communion with his inner child. Beyond him lie a bassist and his girlfriend locked motionless in an ancient configuration that the druids called ‘spoons’. Further into the darkness we can make out the figure of a guitarist balanced torturously across two plastic chairs as if, through the enlightening quality of extreme discomfort, he may levitate at any moment.

In ten minutes’ time they will be called upon to offer up three songs in sacrifice to the Dali Jools Holland as part of his eternal televised quest to bore Britain into some kind of jazz-based righteousness. But first, they must be fully prepared in body, mind and spirit.

Yes, after getting heartily ripped to the tits on champagne and jazz fags the night before, James are having a kip. Bless.

But they are not complete. In his own separate dressing room deep in the bowels of BBC Television Centre, Tim Booth readies himself in isolation, far from the soul-polluting forces of cigarette smoke and decent conversation. Perhaps he’s reciting a mantra for one of the group, wire-framed guitarist Saul Davies, who cannot rest. He paces the corridors, seeking more booze, driven and twisted by the terrible secret that haunts his every waking moment. For Saul, unbeknownst to his slumbering band mates, has today revealed James as evil, manipulative fakers of Milli Vanilli proportions.

“When I wrote ‘Destiny Calling’,” he admits furtively, “I just stuck a capo on the guitar and played ‘She’s a Star’ twice as fast. When Tim started coming up with his ideas for the lyrics having a go at the music business I started pissing myself. He doesn’t know this, but that song is actually a very clinical piece of marketing. It’s recycling.”

He sighs and swigs, eyes skyward.

“If Linda were still with us, she’s be proud.”

EXPOSED! EX-BAGGIES in hit swap cash con! So James’ cocky, self-defacing satire anthem aimed at the cynicism of production line pop is actually less original than ‘Theme From Cleopatra’! Triple bluff! Game, set and match to the elf-faced cocktail god!

But then, nothing is what is seems in Jamestown. NME arrived at BBC HQ ready to toast the valadiction of some of Britain’s most dogged survivors and underrated triumphalists. A band who sniffed the big shorts of stadium USA, cracked under the pressure of terminal uncool, almost bickered themselves out of existence and then clawed their way back to Number One thanks to a startlingly fresh comeback album (last years ‘Whiplash’) and enough ‘Greatest Hits’ to stun a rabid buffalo. A band who have just completed a sold-out Big Sheds tour to the rapturous acclaim of mobile phone salesmen across the nation. A band only a few feet short of being on top of the world again. And climbing.

Instead we find ourselves chairing an internal debate that makes the Northern Ireland peace talks look like the Jo Whiley TV show. Just when James should be at their most ambitious, assured and elated we find them riven with insecurity and indecision, awash with the same frictions that forced them to spend the four years after the 1993 ‘Laid’ tour as far from each other’s armpits as possible. And it’s all Perry Farrell’s fault.

“Lollapalooza fucked us bad,” Saul recalls of last year’s US festi-jaunt. “The lid came off the things we’d been keeping the lid on for an easy life. Fundamentally, it’s avery difficult band to keep together. A lot of our problems come down to Tim. He’s a fucking alien. He can be such an arse sometimes when there’s no need and only an alien would do that. But he’s not always at fault and when he applies himself he’s got a good voice.”

Jim Glennie, sly-smiling bassist and one-man eyebrow crop, touches his arm.

“Steady on…”

“We’re seen as these yogic flyers,” Saul continues, “but I’m not, Jim’s not, Tim is. And Tim is James, publicly. I can’t stand it sometimes. The way he represents us is so one-dimensional.”

It’s a fame thing, a dream thing, an ambition thing, a fear thing and – in one particular case – a large dose of New Age hippy bullocks thing. And it has built barriers, driven stakes and opened chasms withing James in the past few months. And so, adopting our most slimy Tony Blair smile, we split the People’s Republic Of James into its various camps and hit the peace-keeping trail. First stop, Camp Michael…

I WENT TO THIS GROOP Dogdrill party,” Saul grins, plunging his filter coffee, “and they had bucking bronco women with their arses in the air. You get on them and you like you’re fucking this thing. I lasted for what seemed like an eternity, but I was told later that it was a second. So par for the course, really. Then they had an ice torse and they were pouring vodka into it so you had to wrap your gums around this ice cock. It was great!”

Camp Michael gathers around a hotel breakfast table in Swiss Cottage and proceeds to celebrate itself. The generals-in-chief are Saul and Jim, but they speak largely for the rest of the ground troops (brooding keyboardist Mark Hunter, affable drummer David Baynton-Power, balloon haired guitarist Adrian Oxaal and fresh-faced new boy guitarist Michael Kulas). These are men of extravagance and excess, men who are proud of their peccadilloes “but only the unmentionable ones”. They plot to bag as many free World Cup tickets as possible, shudder with the previous night’s hangovers and consider George Michael as the patron saint of their wild-living cause.

“It just reflects people’s narrow-mindedness, ” says Jim. “If it goes against society’s judgements and society’s rules then you go to a public toilet and get a buzz out of doing something like that. It’s seedy and scummy but that’s sex! It’s fucking great! It’s a reflection of society, not him.”

The polarities in James, however, reach far deeper than their stances on public Jodrells. For the first time since the early-’90s they’re faced with their fundamental crisis point again. The point where Madam Unit Shifter lifts her skirts to reveal a world of unlimited fame and possibility, of magastardom beyond their admittedly pretty wild dreams. And, frankly, it scares James shitless.

Last time, after the Simple Mindish bluster of ’92’s ‘Seven’ blasted them to within howling distance of the mega-league and ‘Laid’ became a bona fide stonk-on hit Stateside, they almost purposely bullocksed it up for themselves. They headlined Reading with an acoustic version of ‘Sit Down’ and a handful of songs they’d written the week before. They argued and fractured, the opposing ambitions in the group brought to the fore by thir fear of failure and success, the risk of losing credibility if they made the big push or sliding back into car mechanics if they didn’t.

A five-year stint in the wilderness later and Fame rears its ugly yet strangely alluring head once more. A Number One ‘Best Of…’ compilation. A fan-base moshing like your mam on trucker speed to all their fave stude classisc. The distant call of Wembley. An abyss, but the bunjee rope looks firm. Fancy a plunge James?

“I was trying to have a conversation with some of the band about how we’re gonna approach the next album,” Saul muses, “but they couldn’t take the idea that we just go for it, that we could really do something on this album that we haven’t been in the position to do since ‘Seven’. Instead of fourth on the festivals next year, we could be headlining, won’t have to share a dressing room with Space. We could probably make a record with 12 singles on it. Personally, I think it’s time to hammer it home.”

“We’ve always shied away from situations like this,” Jim continues, “turned inward and done something weird. We’ve done that sidestep too many times. Doing the bleedin’ obvious for us is so different. It’s like, ‘Do ‘Sit Down’ last? Can’t we do two really quiet ones after it?’ ‘WHY? Give them what they want! They’re gonna go out the door buzzing like bastards! That’s unusual for us.”

“It’s gonna cause conflict on the next tour,” says Saul with trepidation. “A lot of people are gonna drag mates along to Wembley going, ‘They were AMAZING last time!’ and they’re gonna hear a new album that may be quite weird.”

And here we reach the crux. To shit cash or not to shit cash? To get caught soggy and satisfied with your metaphorical pants down in public, giggling like an extremely rich hedonistic rock pig, or to live a worthy and limited career and gain belated respect when you inevitably pass away having achieved arse all. James, you see, are caught in the wide and hazy gap between George Michael and the lovely Lady Linda.

Jim drops his head and considers this ridiculous and ill-conceived concept for a second.

“Basically, yeah,” he decides eventually. “You’re spot on.”

“THAT WAS REALLY SAD actually,” Tim Booth whispers in his delicate half-lisp, crouched praying mantis-like on his chair. “It really caught my breath. She’s one of the people, like Diana, who tried to use the position they were in to actually do something, and that has to be commended. I was really upset. That sweet woman was here.”

In Camp McCartney, all is serene. Tim Booth carries his own atmosphere of calm around him, talks like a hypnotist in full swing and has the solid gaze of someone who has brushed past The Other Side (he died for a few seconds from a liver disease aged 22) and come out smelling of tofu. You are the closest to a Linda McCartney figure we have left, aren’t you?

For nearly a minute he laughs. Then pauses. Weighs up the correct response for a clear conscience.

“Arsehole.”

Oh, come on, pal. You champion vegetarianism, don’t do drink or drugs, dabble in arts beyong your immediate shere (to wit: his forthcoming appearance in controversial slapstick child abuse caper Saved in Bolton) and, publicly, at least, you come across as a bit of a characterless hippy-dippy space cadet.

“I commend your bravery,” Tim glistens. “Hmm… Hmm… I don’t care to answer that. I don’t need to defend myself. I don’t fit and I don’t intend to fit. To me it isn’t just about success, it’s about how you carry it and how you live it. In most people’s cases it’s a cancer not a cure, it’s a nightmare not a dream. Most people cannot deal with it. That’s the challenge. Can you carry that energy? There’s a vortex to it. It’s litterally a twister and you have to respect it and have discipline. You have to be disiplined enough to be free.”

And he’s off, spiralling unprompted into internal discussions of Glenn Hoddle’s faith healer, his teachings of ‘ecstatic dance’ in Manchester, his former lives as Roman gladiators and humble beasts of the field blah blah oooohhmmm. It’s a little like being stopped by an Oxford Street monk who doesn’t want to sell you his guru’s book for 50p and wouldn’t much like you in his cult, to be honest. But, in describing his torturous inductions into Shamanism, he does eventually attain a mild state of pertinence.

“You have to really face your dark side,” he hisses, “your disowned self. You have to go onstage in front of a hundred people and act our your darkest secrets. It’s a good way of blasting anything you’re ashamed of. People can no longer kill you with those statements. ‘You’re a fake, you’re full of shit’. Yeah? Well I remember sitting on a stage in San Fransisco with a bag full of shit, bringing it out and covering it on my body going, ‘I’m full of shit’. How can you hurt me more than that?”

And thus NME’s sarky piss-taking slides from his back like water from the immortal mongoose of enlightenment. The twat. Still, such techniques can’t help relations within James, can they? Doesn’t your method of attacking your inner demons face on increase the tension?

“I like to plunge in and confront and that isn’t always the right thing to do,” Tim admits. “We’ve had some tense fucking times and it’s been the worst we’ve ever had in the past couple months. Survival is the key. I have quite a wild fury and my spiritual path is not about being a nice Christian person who turns the other cheek. Uh-oh, no fucking way. I’m not into revenge because revenge is no good for me.”

Saul says you’re an alien. Do you ever feel like that?

“Yes.”

Why?

“Because I’m an alien.”

Oh. Right.

“I think the others blame me partly for holding them back before,” he continues, “and that invented a lot of anger. Saul has a really conscious awareness of marketing and I have a real fear of losing integrity. Those are two polarities. For now, I’m in the minority. They aren’t incompatible. Part of the excitement is the contradiction.”

Trouble is, Tim is the contradiction in James. As his band mates are slavering to capitalise on the glory of being the New Beautiful South, to race into the first class cabin of life and drown themselves in top booze, to live out their days as credibility-free but extremely rich and happy rock sluts for ever, Tim steps back, respects “the vortex”, measures his strength and worthiness to tackle it and then pisses off to Lancashire for two months to be an actor.

Meanwhile, the back-stepping has already begun. James’ new single ‘Runaground’ – the second of the two songs specially written for the ‘Best Of…’ LP – is a slow-burning alienation epic that is simultaneously their boldest and least commercial single since ‘Hymn From A Village’. And it was almost the new ‘Candle in the Wind’.

“I wrote most of that lyric on the day that Diana died,” Tim confides. “I thought of it that way, but God knows how the others would have reacted to that! But really it’s about the fact that I used to have relationships and leave a door open.”

And it is with an exit clearly signposted that we leave James hanging in the balance of their own contradictions once more. We may next see them through a flash of firework smoke from the far side of Shea Stadium or through the flames of an overcooked cheesburger across a fast food counter in Barnsley. But rest assured, we will see them again.

“We’ll carry on,” Jim states from the nerve centre of Camp Michael. “As long as people keep listening to it we’ll keep doing it. One day we’ll get up and it won’t be there any more. I don’t know what won’t be there, but we’ll just go ‘It’s gone, hasn’t it? Yeah it has. See ya’. It’s therapy being in this band, it really is.”

“Yeah,” Saul interrupts, “but a really dodgy type of therapy. You get charged loads to do it and it doesn’t really work but you think it’s doing you good. And everyone still tells you you’re a prick.”

Thus saying, Saul has not the slightest inclination to prick himself with hundreds of pins in front of an audience of baying Buddhists. Vive la difference…

Paul Flynn talks to Tim Booth about a new stage in his career .

The short trip from Bolton to Manchester in the modest Saab (rear windscreen missing, tapes everywhere) of erstwhile James frontman Tim Booth is enough to persuade you that the man himself is of a slightly more actorly disposition than he is of a true, blue-collar, rock’n’roll one. Not to dismiss his self-evident services to muslc with the pop group that are currently, to quote music biz parlance, ‘doing a Beautiful South’ with their formidable Greatest Hits package, just that it’s odd to sit in the passenger seat of a pop star’s motor having a cerebral discussion on the nature of argument. Here, though, is a man that began his musical life with the scholarly invitation to “go and read a book, it’s so much more worthwhile”.

Argument, then: Tim doesn’t have them. The character that he is to play in his first professional theatrical engagement, Len in The Octagon’s revival of Edward Bond’s maladjusted ’60s gang drama Saved, can’t stop. To his desired end of character consumption he’s begun to have them and only this morning argued with a flatmate over breakfast in the cockney accent that he’s getting to grips with. Impressively, when he files off into his newly learnt tongue he doesn’t take the usual shortcut of punctuating every sentence with ‘Innit.’ “I want him to take over me,” he says. Meet the real Methodman.

Tim Booth’s acting history is erratic but committed. His contemporaries as a drama student at Manchester University number impressive alumni: Bhaji On The Beach brains Mera Sayal, playwright Charlotte Keatley and, most famously (fill in the occupation at your own leisure) Ben Elton. He acted under Elton’s direction, then “James came along and I was happy to do it.” He’s been offered parts before, including Tommy on Broadway (“I went to see it and turned it down.” Wise man) and is a discerning spectator, describing both Theatre de Complicite and Sam Shepherd as “inspired.” More relevantly, away from the glare of publicity, he teaches Five Rhythms Movement work at the Metropolitan University’s drama campus in Didsbury and is a watchful student himself. In anticipation of a move into acting -“If I just did James I’d go crazy. This is a risk, but that’s how I live my life” – he spent three months last year at Acting For Life in Los Angeles studying under Jean Bour.

The Octagon connection came about after artistic director, also Saved director, Lawrence Till approached a mutual friend with an eye on Tim for providing a score for the show. They met and Tim was promptly offered the role of Len. For Till, only a week and a half into rehearsal, Booth has a clear reverence. When asked if there was any sense of’ aye-aye, there’s a pop star in the room’ with the other actors he’s quick to deflect the suggestion. “Not here. Not with Lawrence. Which is really reassuring. He is really reassuring. So detailed, so calm, so clear. And extremely good fun. He has a magical way of keeping the focus away from tensions outside of the script.”

Saved is at Bolton Octagon from 14 May to 6 June.

Details

Jayne Middlemiss : From the baggy brilliance of Sit Down to the subtle sophistication of Destiny Calling, James are celebrating 17 years in the business with a Best Of album that resolutely refuses to leave the Top Ten.

(to Tim) You’ve got the Best Of album out and a lot of times when a Best Of album comes out it’s often when bands are just about to split up.

Tim : You want us to split up do you?

JM : Of course not

Tim : No, this came about almost by chance. Someone in the record company pointed out to us that we’d had something like 15 Top 30 hits and would we like to put them on a record. We said “Yeah, great, that’s fine. Do it”

It’s obviously done very well. We didn’t expect it to go to Number one. That was a great thrill. But the other thing was it allowed us to take stock of the whole kind of career. I think we’ve been taken for granted in this country for four years. And it suddenly made people go “God, wow, they’ve had a lot of records, haven’t they? A lot of good records.”

JM : Your last single Destiny Calling seemed to take a critical look at the way the music industry treats artists. Was this a personal thing that you lot have experienced?

Tim : Destiny Calling was playfully critical. It was also acknowledging that we’re part of it. You become a product to a certain group of people who are making money out of you. And you have to accept that. I mean, that used to be terrifying to me. And the fear of success kind of blanding you out as an artist or a musician. It was always a great fear of mine.

When we first did Sit Down I was quite freaked out by it. We were getting amazing letters from people, people playing it at funerals and weddings and all kinds of things. We were asked to play it at hospitals to children on life support machines. People in comas and things like that. It had a very strong impact and at one point we tried stopping playing it and I wanted to keep it, like if we played it, we would do it acoustic one week and heavy metal the next week. You know change it. I’ve come much more to terms with it now in the past few years that it’s its own thing and it’s not much more to do with me anymore. It’s like a gift, like something you have to let go of.

JM : I want to talk to you now about Laid. I saw one of the best pieces of music television. Unplugged, it was you and the guitarist. Just singing that song. There was so much emotion. What goes through your mind when you’re doing a song like that?

Tim : When I’m doing songs we’ve had for a while, a song like Laid, for me the really important thing to make it fresh and get vulnerable with it. Cos you can just act it or you forget why you wrote it, the initial impulse that sparked you. And so the way to keep present and fresh and not become a stale dinosaur. You have to keep getting vulnerable.

JM : It was so sexy that. I was in the gym and it was on the thing…

Tim : We figured everyone would think we were gay after that. We’d turned it into almost a gay love song.

JM : It was just so…. It really moved me. I was on the step machine and I had to stop.

Tim : Lovely

Details

Snap, Cackle And Pop popped round to James frontman Tim Booth’s house for a bit of chat with him and guitarist Saul Davies.

After coming to prominence as part of the Madchester scene in the late eighties, James outlived their baggy contemporaries and have now put 16 years behind them.

Tim : I don’t know how we’ve kept together this long. The first seven years we made no money and it didn’t matter to us. We were doing things that we loved passionately so we’d carry on doing them and then we had success and it’s almost much harder from then to deal with success and balance all those things out.

And with Sit Down the anthem of 1990, their gigs packed out with a sea of those famous flowery t-shirts, the band decided it was time to try and crack America.

Saul : We just think we had a lot of critical success and it was married to sales, big sales in the early nineties and going off to America, which was a wonderful experience for us, you know we went on tour with Neil Young and did all sorts of amazing things, went to places I never thought I would go to, never mind playing.

Abandoning big stadium gigs in Britain for the smaller crowds of the States gave bands like U2 and Oasis the chance to take the megastardom tag that seemed destined for James.

Tim : You see, I don’t see James as having made any mistakes, I see James as having been James which is having their own path and I don’t see any problem in not being as huge and famous as Oasis. I wouldn’t trade places with Noel or Liam for any amount of money. Because that’s not what it’s about for me.

But with Noel reportedly inspired to form a band after seeing a James soundcheck and Morrissey calling them the “greatest band in the world”, the boys are aware of the influence they’ve had on the music of the last decade.

Tim : It’s great when your peers, when Neil Young takes you on tour or when Noel Gallagher says what he says and Morrissey. You know lots of bands have the signed t-shirts from the Dominion concert and you know really sweet things we get and that’s really gratifying as a musician.

And with their recent Best Of album already platinum, there are more fave James tunes than you might expect.

Saul : I think that’s probably a process that people have bought the album, have listened to it and were vaguely familiar with Sit Down or whatever and suddenly kind of thought “Oh my God, I remember what I was doing when this came out” and it would send some shockwaves through people’s lives as well that process, which is a really good one.

And their new single Runaground looks set to follow the fate of the other 17 singles on the album.

Tim : We didn’t get to ride any of the horses. But we got to sit in the beautiful Irish pubs and see the Irish culture.

What was the first football match you attended?

“Liverpool vs Barcelona 1977/8”

Which team do you support?

“Barcelona”

Which footballer would you like to go out with?

“Luis Enrique, Barcelona”

Have you ever had trials with a football team?

“Yes, the Central Schools under 16 team”

What football position do you play? How good are you?

“I just run after the ball. 7/10”

Who’s your favourite player?

“Stoichkov”

Compare James to a football team&ldots;..

“Man City”

What would you call your World Cup song?

“You’re Wasting Your Time”

Predict the score of the Scotland vs Brazil game

“3-1 to Brazil”

Which World Cup side do you rate the highest?

“Spain”

Who will be the highest goalscorer in the tournament?

“Ronaldo or Batistuta”

Mike : Baby, baby, baby

Saul : Baby, baby, baby

Mike : Hello. We’re talking about rocking and rolling and folking

Saul : Yeah, that’s right, we’re going to folk all the way

Mike : That’s right. Let’s folk.

Saul : Simple Minds were supposed to play here yeah, but they’re sick. They needed to replace one old pompous has-been rock band with another and we were the next thing available. We’ve done it before though. We did some mad festival in Sweden, Status Quo were the headlining act in front of 25,000 people in a forest and we came out, hapless idiots with borrowed equipment because we’d played our gig two days before and got put in this slot. We came out on stage and there were these 2000 pissed-up Swedish nutters at the front going “Status Quo, Status Quo” and we were like “Doh, what are we going to do?”

By the end of this summer, the Best Of will have done well enough for people to have sat up and taken note. I think that has happened already but after the performances at the festivals that we know we can do. If we do what we know we can do, then people, it will be kind of undeniable, I suppose people will begrudgingly like us, accept us. Not many bands get five stars out of five, do they in Q for a live performance so we feel like we’re doing OK.

On the eve of their Fleadh headline spot, Tim Booth tells ALLY ROSS why the big brothers of britpop are bigger then ever

Blimmin’ Chesney Hawkes. February 1991 and James were all set to spend a few months at No.1 with the classic student sing-a-long anthem Sit Down. Then along skips ****ing Chesney with The One and Only.

And what a prophetic title that was. For apart from a couple of ‘where are they now’ features, Ches had the good grace to slope off into the showbiz ether.

James still haven’t got that No.1 single, but there are no hard feelings says singer Tim Booth.

“Some time later Chesney contacted me to apologise” chuckles Tim. “He kept going on about how much better our single was and how guilty he felt “Poor kid, I felt sorry for him, it was unfair to have all that fame thrust upon him so young.”

Things also went a bit dingly-dangly for James after Sit Down. A follow-up album was mauled in the press and it’s been feast or famine ever since. The soaring high was the 1993 album Laid which was followed by a crippling blow of a #250,000 bill from the tax-man.

Summer 1998 marks a new pinnacle. The band headline tomorrow’s Fleadh at Finsbury Park and their ‘Best Of’ album illustrates why Morrissey called them his favourite band and Noel Gallagher formed Oasis.

“Noel’s been very generous in his praise,” smiles Tim. “I have vivid memories of him as a roadie for Inspiral Carpets.

“Friends saw Oasis when they were great but I saw them in New York six months ago and it wasn’t healthy, they looked bored. As for Liam – Jesus, that poor kid is adrift. I wish him luck, he needs it.”

Has to be said though, Tim can come across as a trifle odd too. He has been through the whole sex, drugs and blah blah blah and is now immersed in the whole ‘new age’ malarkey.

However, none of it seems risible when he gently explains he got into alternative medicine to treat a liver diesease. “I don’t fit into rock circles as I look at alternative methods of getting high – dancing drumming,” he says earnestly. “People are narrow minded, it all gets dismissed as ‘new age’.”

The one vaguely annoying aspect to all this is that Tim echoes the old rock star refrain: “I don’t consider myself cool.”

It’s all self-deluding nosense of course.

For a start, if Tim Booth wasn’t cool he would’ve spotted the most glorious double entendre when asked if he was looking forward to the Fleadh.

“I intend to go out there and completely expose myself,” he said, without a smidgen of irony.

“I love exposing myself and taking alot of risks.”

Well, it should help sell a few more tickets.

I confidently predict that unless Chesney turns up, Tim Booth exposing himself will be the talking point of the day … musically speaking, of course.

– James will be joined at The Fleadh by The Corrs, Sinead O’Conner, Billy Bragg and Shane MacGowan.

JW – Jo Whiley

TB – Tim Booth

JW: Special guest today is Tim Booth from James, hello.

TB: Hello

JW: It’s been far too long you’ve been absent from this show. We’ve missed you.

TB: Well I came minus my brain, I left that in New York. We’ll have an interesting interview, but you’ll have to excuse my dumbness.

JW: So a serial experience?

TB: Yes.

JW: You’re doing Glastonbury, tomorrow night. Is this story, this myth true that you were due to play when the game was going on, and you said no I don’t think so.

TB: Yeah, it was definitely, certainly I think, in the last 15 minutes of the England game (laughs). We said, you’re joking, and THEN, (still laughing) they lied to us and promised that there were no screens at Glastonbury, and that people would be glued to us, and it’s a lie, there’s huge screens there for the football. So I think, but no we’re about 15 minutes after the game finishes we’re going to have 2 set lists, one very up and positive, and one completely, grief stricken, mourning.

JW: Oh God, which one do you reckon you’ll going be playing?

TB: (laughing) Hopefully, the up one! Please God!!

JW: Yeah. Have you been to any of the matches? Did you manage to blag any tickets?

TB: No! I watched the games in America, I’ve just been to America. Um, cos’ my fiance lives there. And, er, it was amazing watching it on American TV with American commentary, very different to England.

JW: Really. You say you’ve been over to New York to see your fiance. Do you get to see each other very much?

TB: She’s moving back here in September. So we are rectifying that. We’ve had about a year and a half of plane.

JW: It must be very difficult?

TB: It’s very weird, having that amount of water between us.

JW: Is there going to be a wedding?

TB: There will be a wedding. I don’t know when, and there’ll be one in America and one in this country.

JW: Ah, to please all friend and relatives.

TB: And because we’re schizophrenic.

JW: Yeah, of course. There is that. Have you enjoyed the whole Best Of James, that album coming out, the attention you got from that?

TB: YEEESSS!! I did enjoy it. We were really, flattered to be received so well. Um, it was like really touching. We didn’t expect number 1, and we didn’t expect the fans at the concerts to be so celebratory. Those gigs were amazing!

JW: Did it suprise you how many hits you’d had when it came to putting the album together?

TB: Yeah. I mean we were told about a year ago, and it was like, you’re joking?!

JW: Yeah. You said that you are an Aquarian, and you like to try different things. You just don’t do music, you studied drama at University, and you’ve just finished on stage at the moment. Can you tell us about the play you’ve just done?

TB: I’ve just finished a play in Bolton called Saved, by Edward Bond. Which was a play in this country that changed the censorship laws in the 60’s. There’s one scene in it, that’s particularly harrowing, that people objected to.

JW: What’s that?

TB: Well it’s a murder of a baby. Er, that takes place in detail, in so far as, it really shows you why people get to a point of doing something so atrocious. And that, obviously, is a totally disturbing thing. On the opening night of the play, 30 people walked out, in that scene. But we got great reviews, and after a couple of weeks audiences came from afar to see the play, and then it was going down thantastically, it was an amazing experience.

JW: Will you be doing more acting then?

TB: Yes.

JW: Is this the beginning?

TB: Definitely. I loved it.

JW: So are you actually talking about certain things? Do you know what you’re next project is going to be?

TB: I’m getting a lot of offers. We got great reviews in the Guardian, and in different papers. So I’m getting good offers.

JW: How exciting! Must be brilliant!

TB: It is brilliant. I’m made up actually. I couldn’t believe how well it went.

JW: Ok, we’ll play the single. This has been out before, I’m not going mad am I?

TB: It has been out before. You’re not going mad. This is one of my favourite songs I’ve ever written. I wanted to write the most romantic love song I could. With a lot of vulnerability in it, so when people fall in love, they all go, I love you, and really, often what they want, is the other person to say, I love YOU. So I made the chorus, please fall in love with me, so it’s straight forward vulnerable.

(‘Fall In Love With Me’ is played)

JW: Have you got a pet?

TB: Have I got a PET?! No not at the moment.

JW: Have you ever had a pet?

TB: Oh! Basset Hounds! Basset Hounds are special, they are untrainable. You take them to a dog trainer, and they say, we train every dog except the Basset Hound. Fred Basset is the perfect psychology. I mean this thing used to steal food from everyone, it used to eat frozen raspberries from the deep freeze, and butter, packs of butter, anything that fell on the floor.

JW: What was it’s name?

TB: Samantha. I think I loved it for it’s rebellious outlook.

JW: What would the band say was your worst habit?

TB: My worst habit? The band would say, tenacity, that I just don’t give up on things, to the point you know where it’s hard to win an argument, if I’m really set on something.

JW: You’re in a newsagents, you’ve got 3 Pound 50p, what would you buy?

TB: 3 Pound 50. It used to be a magazine called Ethics, that came out for about 4 months, and then folded. It was the first magazine I’ve subscribed to! And they were so ethical, that they sent me my cheque back!! Which I was really impressed with. But that’s gone, Vanity Fair’s gone crap in the last few years. Scientific America I’m quite into at the moment, with Quonton Physics theories, which I find fascinating.

JW: So not a packet of fags, and Walker’s Crisps?

TB: OH! I’m saying completely the wrong rock ‘n’ roll stuff aren’t I!! I’d say, the Daily Mail, The Independent and a bottle of water.

JW: Who’s you’re favourite character in Star Wars?

TB: In Star Wars? I’m a Star Trek fan. And Captain Picard is my hero.

JW: Have you met him?

TB: No I haven’t. I saw him do a one man show in America. That’s how much of a fan I am. And one of the first things I said to my acting agent, was I want to be on Star Trek. Get me on Star Trek. In my dreams!

JW: What would you like to have on your epitaph?

TB: Huh!! (laughing) ‘He did his best!’ Or, ‘I’m not coming back!’

JW: And your most drunken moment?

TB: 16 throwing up in a friends back garden.

JW: That long ago?

TB: I’ve had a few other drunken moments, but I haven’t been drunk for a long time.

JW: The light don’t come on in your kitchen, what do you do?

TB: Curse. Call an electrician, (laughs) no, I’d change the BULB!!(Laughing)

JW: And if you could hear just one last tune, as you’re on the Titanic, and it’s going down, what would you hear?

TB: That’s cruel! ‘Please Fall In Love With Me’. I’m sorry, at the moment that would be the genuine answer.

James: Saul Davies (guitar)

“The first time I played at Glastonbury after joining James was in 1991, I think, and I remember Del Amitri arguing that they should go on after us because they’d had a hit and we hadn’t. It fired us up so much that we did a really amazing show. You could see people sticking their heads out their tents, like ‘who’s that?’ By the time we’d finished the crowd stretched way, way up past the mixing desk and up the hill. It was really something.

“I’m going to enjoy watching Robbie Williams, seeing him work the Glastonbury crowd is going to be hilarious. I think he’ll be the hit of the festival.”

James play the main stage on Friday night.

Tim Booth – James

What was your first Glastonbury experience?

“James first played in 1985, the mud year. Saul (Davies, guitarist) wasn’t in the band then, but watched while covered in mud!”

What was your best Glasto moment?

“The whole band having a collective out-of-body experience in the ambient crystal tent.”

And the worst?

“The worst thing about Glastonbury is turning up on site in a huge double-decker bus with all the luxuries: clean sheets, flushable toilets, champagne, caviar, the works; and looking out over all those dirty people in tents. That makes you feel really bad.”

Tim : We’ve played it for many years. It’s one of the best festivals easily. Just don’t put us on at the same time as England.

Int : And if they’d said, we can’t do that

Tim : We wouldn’t have played

Int : You wouldn’t have played?

Tim : No. It’s a waste of time.

Int : Really? People are here for the music aren’t they?

Tim : They are here for the music. But… we wouldn’t have played.

EIGHTIES ICONS as remembered by TIM BOOTH of JAMES

MARAGRET THATCHER: “She summed up the Eighties, she certainly dominated how things were seen in this country, ambition without caring who you tread on. She was like some weird twin of Madonna, with the emergence of the power woman, working in a male world and beating them at their own game.”

MORRISSEY: “It was very weird with Morrissey because I knew him and I watched him become an icon. When you see behind the scenes, you realise what an illusion it is. It was just so bizarre the way that he was worshipped. What was good about Morrissey was the sensitive male aspect. I think it allowed people like Jarvis Cocker to come through now.”

NELSON MANDELA: “Nelson Mandela’s inaugural speech is one of the most inspiring pieces of writing I’ve ever read. He goes to prison for what he believes in and then maintains his dignity and integrity , even in an incredibly vicious regime. Gorbachev and Mandela are the two most amazing men of that time, incredible icon archetypes.”

LOADSAMONEY: “He was an absolutely brilliant character, I found him hilarious. Harry Enfield really got it spot on with him. He sent up the worst aspects of the Thatcher era which was basically making lots of money. It stated the whole philosophy of capitalism in a nutshell. I don’t think the character would make the same sense today.”

ALSO REMEMBERED: Sam Fox, Ronald Reagan, Marilyn, Bob Geldof, Prince, Madonna, Roland Rat.

Tim Booth’s in love and he’s got it bad. The lead singer with top indie band James has just returned after visiting his fiancee Kate, who works in fashion photography in America, and the couple are hoping to fix a wedding date soon.

“We’re going to have one wedding on the beach at Big Sur – one of my favourite spots in the world – and another here in England” he reveals. “I met Kate a couple of years ago in Los Angeles and we got engaged six months later. I’ve met the woman I love and if I’m meant to be with anyone, it’s her”

Things are looking good for Tim, 38, and the Manchester band. They’ve had 14 hit singles – Sit Down and Come Home the most memorable – over the last 16 years.

With their recent Best Of album having just spent a month in the Top 10 and a new single and album on the way, now’s no time to call it a day.

“If we split up, I’d probably last for about a year. James has some big overheads and a lot of the money I earned got ploughed back into the band,” says Tim, who admits to being financially naive in the early years.

“I didn’t fritter it away on fast cars as such, more like fast women. When you’re young, you don’t know how to save and think it’s going to last forever. But I’m wiser now and over the last few years have been careful to save and invest.”

He’s also keen to move into other areas, particularly acting. He reveals that having trod the boards in the controversial ’60s play Saved in Bolton recently – for which he earned £250 a week – he’s been offered a series of TV films and has even considered a number of Hollywood scripts.

“I’ve really got the bug from doing Saved,” he says. “And now I’ve done Bolton, it’s ‘tomorrow, the world.’ James will come first but I’ll make space for any decent roles.”

It’s not his first contact with acting – he studied drama at Manchester University with Ben Elton and Rik Mayall (he met the band James in his final year there). But his renewed interest began by chance when he was offered the part of Tommy on Broadway three years ago. He turned it down but later decided to get an acting coach and moved to Los Angeles where he met his fiancee.

After a chance meeting with a Hollywood film mogul, a series of scripts came his way and he auditioned for the part of Nicholas Cage’s brother in the hit film Face/Off.

“I was at a record company party when I was taken aside and told ‘Tim Booth, I want you to meet Tim Robbins’ and all I could say was ‘Hey, you’re huge’ because he’s 6ft 4in”

Tim recalls “I started talking to this guy next to Tim Robbins and he asked me what I did. So like a lunatice I sang out our latest record to him. I don’t know why I did it. It’s so unlike me to do that. But we got on really well and when I told him I was interested in acting, he gave me his card – he was head of Polygram Films.

“If I had the choice, I’d love to act in the X Files or go into space with Star Trek. The Jean-Luc Picard character was the best.”

One place the Leeds-born singer’s going back to on a more permanent basis is Brighton where he’s just bought a house. This will allow him more time with his nine year old son Ben from his first marriage to Martine McDonagh, the band’s former manager.

“He’s going to live with me occasionally, which is great,” he says. “I also get on well with Martine still. She’s going through my new flat advising me on what kind of paint to use.”

But the move spells the end of an era for a man who’s live in Manchester for two decades.

“It’s sad, but I’ve hardly been there in the last four years,” he says. “The thing that strikes me these days is the violence – all these gangland shootings.

“My Saab 900’s been broken into four times in the last two years and that’s just ridiculous.”

Band Name: James

Chat with Tim Booth from James, Sunday 23 August.

Question: Hi Tim, thanks for braving the rain to chat to us!

Answer: Hello.

Question: Tim, are you looking forward to the gig in Manchester? I am going.

Answer: It’s too long away to look forward to but the Manchester gigs are all amazing celebrations. If I held my breath that long, serious damage would ensue.

Question: How has V98 been? Who are you looking forward to seeing again?

Answer: I saw Robbie Williams yesterday and his big charisma and I think he’s a very well hung performer.

Question: What’s next from James?

Answer: We are working with Brian Eno on a new masterpiece that the critics will hate. Have I got a chip on my shoulder or what? Sarky northern git.

Question: Why did you do that free gig in Manchester down by the canal?

Answer: Sounded like a good idea at the time.

Question: Which of your albums do you think is your greatest?

Answer: Laid. That’s why we are working with Brian Eno again.

Question: I just want to say you have total stage presence. You really got everyone pumped up.

Answer: Gee thanks.

Question: Do you ever get sick of all the attention you get?

Answer: Seldom, I’m very greedy.

Question: As, ahem, “Elder Statesmen”, what do you think of the younger bands today? Not saying you are Status Quo like!

Answer: They’re all too young. I like Nick Cave – he’s my favourite, that famous Aussie octogenarian.

Question: Frank Sidebottom! Is he a top bloke or an arse in a papier mache head?

Answer: Arse in a papier mache head.

Question: Who are your favourite band ever?

Answer: The Doors or the Beatles, sorry to be so predictable.

Question: To continue a theme: Pet Sounds or Revolver best album ever?

Answer: I hate Pet Sounds. It’s a musicians album, not for me.

Question: Ok, since we’re on the subject of down under rockers. Do you like Kylie?

Answer: What do you mean by like? She’s very sweet. I ended up in a corridor at Top of the Pops telling dirty jokes with her.

Question: Are you sick of Sit Down?

Answer: Sometimes, but the song has a life of its own and I’m grateful to have co-written a song that touches so many people.

Question: What is the scandal that would get you on the front of the News of the World; girls, booze, drugs… dodgy politics?

Answer: Well, the rest of James are more akin to the Happy Mondays and any day would provide enough scandal for the News of the World.

Question: Do you ever find yourself ridiculous and why?

Answer: Of course. Human life is often ridiculous and I’m not immune.

Question: Who are your greatest influences?

Answer: Patti Smith and Iggy Pop.

Question: Have you had a chance to see Iggy Pop at this festival?

Answer: Not this time but I’ve seen him maybe fifteen times when I was an impressionable youngster and he impressioned me.

Question: Where will you be in ten years?

Answer: In a rocking chair wearing Val Doonican pullovers in Hawaii. Very high.

Question: If you could spend thirty minutes with anyone on earth ever, who would you pick?

Answer: God. He’s got a few questions to answer. Sorry, she.

Question: Were you ever into Northern Soul? Ever followed a youth cult?

Answer: Punk. I was a teenage punk.

Question: Thanks a million Tim! Nice one.

Answer: Goodbye good people. May your gods be with you.

Interview with Jayne Middlemiss

JM : I was wondering “Have you seen Madonna?”

Tim : Have we seen her? Do you mean in the biblical sense? Yes

JM : Have you?

Tim : You mean Mary Magdalene

JM : No. The Madonna

Tim : She’s The The Madonna

JM : Madonna. Like A Virgin. Material Girl

Tim : Yeah, that’s Mary Magdalene. Mother of Jesus

JM : Lord is as man. You know Lord is as man.

Tim : Lord is as man. Has she got some sort of speech impediment? Where’s she from? From Newcastle

JM : I don’t think I’m getting any luck there

second part of interview

JM : How are you two getting on?

Tim : With each other? Really badly, we had a punch up this morning.

JM : Did you have a punchup? Who ended up winning?

Tim : It was a draw.

Saul : In true James style it was democratic end to a dour three-each.

Tim : A couple of broken ribs

JM : Well you still managed to perform on the stage over the way. Fabulous.

Tim : Well you see we’re very technically gifted. I bit one of his fingers off and he still managed to play guitar. I was impressed

Saul : I’m going to take one of my toes off and put it back on here. You can do that apparently you know.

JM : You could start a trend

Saul : All the musicians hobbling around in Austin and Texas have all had their toes chopped off. They go to the hospital and they put your toe in a jar for a week and then they stick it back on and give you $10,000. And all these poor musicians who can’t get gigs and stuff. Somebody told me, I was either being wound up or….

Tim : No, it’s true. It’s a toe-sewing program that they have for surgeons practising sewing back organs on

JM : So, that’s absolutely horrible

Saul : These aren’t really our heads. We’re actually members of the Happy Mondays.

JM : You’ve got Sit Down out and number 7 in the charts. 98 version. Why did you release it in a 98 stylee?

Tim : In a 98 stylee. Money

JM : Oh well. Fair enough

Saul : No, we wanted a mixer in for having it as an extra format on a release or something like that and Apollo 440 wanted to do it and it was really hard to know whether it was actually any good or not but everyone around us was telling us it was fantastic, you’ve got to stick it out. They hardly got any money for it because it wasn’t meant to be a release. We didn’t give them very much.

JM : Did you rip them off?

Saul : No, no, we haven’t. No

JM : Number seven’s very good

Tim : Number seven’s very good at Christmas, yeah. Very good. The reason we did the dance version is that I can’t sing any more and we’ve bitten off so many fingers of the piano player he can’t play it very well either.

JM : Play with your feet

Tim : That is my feet. On my hands.

Suddenly James are back from the indie graveyard. Nigel Williamson talks to singer and former wild man Tim Booth.

This time last year James were so out of fashion they seemed on the point of disintegrating. Yet the end of 1998 finds the former indie champions in the middle of a huge stadium tour after a renaissance year which gave them their first No 1 album in a 15-year career.

There have also been hit singles with Destiny Calling and Runaground, while a remix of 1989’s Sit Down scored all over again, and saw them cavorting on Top of the Pops with Robbie Williams. Their eagerly awaited new album is scheduled for April release and it promises to be as strong as anything they have ever done.

Lead singer Tim Booth is discussing this unexpected turn of fortune over a late breakfast at a converted studio in a former farmhouse in the heart of the Sussex countryside, where the band have spent two weeks rehearsing for the tour. He freely admits that the stories of James’s near break-up are all true and has no problem with the suggestion that they are in line for “Comeback of the Year.” Most artists offered such an accolade would insist that they never really went away.

“We did disappear. We went to America and we didn’t play here for three years so people had a right to be pissed off with us,” he admits.

“We had some very black days but we put out the ‘best of’ album and we turned a corner. It produced a wave of euphoria and it lifted us and the audience. We suddenly got a new lease of appreciation, which definitely fired us up.”

It certainly did. The lacklustre James that made an unpropitious return to Britain at the Reading Festival in August 1997 and the one that gave a performance of quite awesome energy at the Brixton Academy in April this year immediately after they had gone to No 1 might have been two different bands.

Somehow the reminder of their glorious past which the ‘best of’ album provided captured the imagination all over again. “We are one of those bands that gets overlooked because as a frontman I haven’t taken the big rock’n’roll loudmouth role,” Booth says. “We’ve always crept up on people. A couple of the old songs sound dated but, in the main, people were surprised how fresh they sounded. We write songs like German cars – built to last.”

Once revered as leaders of the “Madchester” scene, along with the Happy Mondays and the Stone Roses, they quite Britain in the early 1990s after the critics savaged their album Seven as pompous and overblown.

“We were steeped in the NME indie myth and then the indie police came looking for our blood,” Booth recalls. “We took it very personally. We were stung by it. That’s why we just buggered off.”

At the time they were one of the most successful bands in Britain, headlining huge venues such as Alton Towers. “We bought all that indie myth that playing stadiums meant you had sold out. So we went to America and the first gigs there were for 200 people. We needed that challenge because we didn’t want to be like Simple Minds and U2. When we finally came back here, we had to prove ourselves again. We are at our best when our backs are against the wall.”

Now the scene has changed, he says, and bands such as Oasis and Pulp have made it cool to play stadiums again. But there have been other more personal changes too. In earlier years Booth’s erratic behaviour was legendary. Wild-eyed and manic on stage, he became a leader for the lost and confused, a turbulent and troubled figure prone to depression and breakdown, at one point joining a religious cult which espoused celibacy. Today he lives contentedly in Brighton with his new wife and his son Ben from a previous relationship.

So has the famously tortured artist found true peace at last?

“I don’t know if I’d go that far,” he says. “I have found a contentment in a relationship I’ve never experienced before. It’s really new for me, believing that it will last or that I am allowed such happiness. I’ll always be a neurotic person but I have never swallowed the idea of the tortured artist. The rock’n’roll myth is based on it and it is voracious. There is something fascinating about a person living their life on the edge in the public gaze. As a performer you feel this energy pulling you that way and it’s dangerous. You have to be very strong to find your own centre.”

Booth, who went to drama college with Ben Elton, has also branched out this year into acting with a role in Edward Bond’s Saved at the Bolton Octagon. He is thrilled because he has been nominated as best newcomer in the Manchester Evening News drama awards.

“In my student career I was in a few plays with Ben but I was no good because I had no confidence. I wanted to prove that I could do it, so I went to LA and retrained,” he explains.

Alongside his thespian tendencies, I can’t help noticing that reading matter for the tour includes Simon Heffer’s biography of Enoch Powell and the new Tom Wolfe. So is this a new mature James we are now witnessing? “This is still a very wild band, believe me,” he says. “As night creeps in, a transformation takes place.” Faith restored in their rock’n’roll credentials, it seemed like a good time to take my leave.

Blagging free tickets is one thing, but when you’re asked to go on tour with one of the UK’s best bands, you’re not going to say no are you? Well we bloody weren’t.

When the house lights go down and nearly 16,000 people from your hometown roar their approval, the noise at the front of the auditorium is simply unbelievable. Then, in the glare of a single spotlight, you walk out on stage, and that noise moves from the realms of the unbeliveable to the downright terrifying. For a moment, before the opening bars of the first track kick in , you stand there gazing across an ocean of heads and hands stretching as far as your squinting eyes can see.

It’s in the lonely moment of exhilaration that you realise you’re a star. ” A one, a two, a one, two three four….”

Let’s go back in time 3 days before this momentous night in Manchester. It’s half seven on the evening of December 10 at the Marriot Hotel in North London. Six out of seven members of James are hanging around in the foyer waiting for the “Front” people carrier to take them for a night out on the town, courtesy of the mag. “Don’t forget the lads are playing Wembley Arena tomorrow night” says their press woman, “so take it easy tonight, alright?”

Exactly 14 hours of “taking it easy” later, it’s 9am on the day of one of James’ most important gigs ever and not one member of the gang has had a wink of slumber. Everyone has piled into Dean’s (the chief of security) hotel room and the procession of orders from room service has been as endless as the queue for the bogs.

“Courshe we can bloody drink”, slurs Saul Davies, violinist, guitarist and smallest, most shaven headed member of the band. “Shonly the media that like to make ush out as vegan folk rockers”. And with that Saul finally keels over and quietly auditions for next months ‘Mate in a state’. Meanwhile, Jim, (bassist) and founder member, is arguing with Dave ( drummer and Wales’ only contribution to the band ) about the merits of sheep shagging. On the bed, Adrian (lead guitar) and Mike Kulas (guitar and vocals) the newest additions to the band, are talking some of the most purest bollocks known to man.

Ten thirty is fast approaching as Mike waltzes in the room wearing the shirt he has selected for tonight’s show. Rightly he receives a general barracking for a garment that resembles a 1970’s Hawaiian dishcloth. “You can’t go on stage wearing that rubbish!” I shout, jabbing a very wobbly finger in his direction, “Let ‘Front’ buy you something decent”

“Alright” says Mike, “You’re on”

“I’m coming with you” mumbles Saul, raising himself from the dead .

And with that me, Piers (the ed), Saul and Mike weave our way down to reception and jump in a cab.

“Make sure you get them to soundcheck by four!” barks a worried looking Peter Rudge (James’ manager). Ten shops, two pubs and one Burger King later it’s four o’clock alright, but we’re still in Piccadilly trying to find a taxi – along with 100,000 Christmas shoppers. We eventually arrive at Wembley Arena just after five to a withering ‘you two keep out of the way’ look from a less-than-happy manager.

We slink off to the dressing room and tuck into the bands’ nosebag : one bottle of vodka, one of gin, four of wine, six of champagne, a huge icebox filled with Fosters and, oh yeah, a couple of sarnies.

Sound check over, the arena slowly fills with fans. Tim Booth enters wearing a coat covered in mirrored sequins. “We’ve got something special planned for “tonight” he explains. “For the encore when the crowd are waiting for me to walk on stage, I suddenly appear in the middle of the crowd at the back of the arena wearing this.”

The support act the Stereophonics, leave the stage and in James’ dressing room anxious, pale men pace up and down, chewing fingernails and smoking heavily- it’s like being in a hospital waiting room full of expectant fathers.

The sound of Tim and Mike singing scales and warming up their vocal chords drifts eerily through the walls….Mr Rudge checks his watch :8.56. “Right you lot, let’s go” he yells and the band queue up with shaking limbs and rolling heads -like they’re in the tunnel at Wembley. Piers and I leg it to the photographers pit between the bouncers and the stage, and as the lights go down the noise is well on the way to frightening. Saul strides on stage with adrenaline blood and murder in his eyes. “Come on then, are you fookin’ up for it?” he screams. And as the band launch into Laid, and Tim does a convincing impression of a rag doll at a rave, it seems that everyone is.

A dazzling array of foot stomping, hands-in-the-air classics follow ( She’s a star, Destiny Calling, Confusion, Come Home, Born of Frustration, Say Something etc) along with 3 new tracks from the forthcoming album, provisionally entitled “Millionaires”. One and a half hours later, the set ends with a simply storming rendition of the perennial crowd pleaser Sit Down. As the band troop off no one could guess that six-sevenths of James had less sleep last night than your average barn owl.

The encore begins with Top of the World and all eyes are on the crowd where Mike, bless him, is wearing the Front sweatshirt we presented him before the gig. Meanwhile Tim, ten security blokes and two guys from Front are sprinting through the labyrinth of passages and corridors under Wembley Arena. Under cover of darkness and unnoticed within the waiting crowd. Then two spotlights split the night, tracking slowly across the crowd until they converge on Mr Booth in his technicolour dreamcoat. “The view from here’s breathtaking,” he sings, grinning .The look on the faces of the punters as they realise who they’re standing next to is a treat.

Two songs later the show’s over and one buzzing band are slapping backs, guzzling ale and swapping stage stories. After a quick shower, ‘band tartmeister’ Saul ushers us to the after-show party with promises that there will be “Birds aplenty”.

This surely is what being in a band is all about.

The previous night, in various watering holes around London, the band were furiously dishing out tickets and aftershow passes to any female that didn’t closely resemble Jo Brand. Throughout the show security chief Dean has been busily doing the same. We open the doors to the after-show partyand- surprise, surprise!- the place is wall-to-wall fan…. erm, fans of a high quality and definitely female nature. “They’ve got to be young, eager, tasty and there’s got to be enough so there’s a few left over for the likes of us,” Dean explains.

The rest of the night involves booze, birds and hotel rooms, and at ten the next morning, after a luxurious 3 hour kip, ten bleary eyed bastards shamble onto the tour bus. Destination :Manchester the gig that will finally see the band Come Home .

“Saul”, I ask, as he clambers wearily into his bunk. “What does this gig mean to you?”

“This gig”, he sighs, “is gonna be in front of nearly 16,000 fans in our home town. It’s the biggest indoor gig James have ever played in Britain, so it means a lot to all of us. Now would you kindly piss off and let me get some sleep”.

It’s a relatively reasonable request from six stone of knackered sex machine, so we do.

In Manchester the pre-show build up follows a similar pattern to the previous night– except for one dressing room bombshell, an hour before the gig Tim announces he may have to pull the gig because his voice is “totally fucked”.

By the time the house lights go up, it has all proved to be a powder puff of precious balderdash. The band tuck into some well earned dressing room booze and then its Groundhog day behaviour as Saul ushers us off to the after show party where he once again assures us that there’ll be “birds aplenty”. Once again he’s right and, over breakfast the next morning, I promise not to tell a soul about his night time athletics. This, of course, precludes me from mentioning room 459 and the two nurses from Manchester Royal Infirmary, but hey! As he sits there rebuilding his strength with a large plate of bacon and eggs, the dirty bastard has only one thing to say “You know Mark” he grins “It’s only rock ‘n’ rolll but I like it.”

The Guildford Festival is very different to the hedonistic Glastonbury experience isn’t it?

We did – as you call it – the hedonistic festivals last year, so we felt we’d OD’ed on that. This year’s detox, and then next year we’re going back into the frying pan again.

Would you like to share a favourite festival moment?

At Lollapalooza we played before bands like Korn so the audience kept shouting “faggots” at us. We went out and got these glitter tops and skirts. I was in a neckbrace, wearing a cowboy hat and glitter outfit, and when they’d scream abuse, I’d walk out into this audience. I had a really good time playing up this “cabaret transvestite” we all have inside of us.

Why are James seen as a big festival band?

We know how to reach out to large numbers of people. I think a lot of bands keep their eyes down and don’t really see who they’re communicating with. And other bands hide behind technology and lights.

Have you ever taken too many drugs and lost it?

I used to go to those really small harvest festivals, they were really wild. I remember my first acid trip at one of those. I saw an American sweat lodge with all these naked people. I thought it was a hallucination but these people were naked and were dancing around a fire and going into a steam tent.

If you had to expire at a festival, which time-honoured method would you choose: on-stage electrocution, drug overdose or hypothermia?

Struck by lightning! Last year at V-ninety-whatever-it-was there was rain and there was lightning, and we started with “Sometimes”, a song about a boy wanting to be struck by lightning. A puff of smoke, then. I’d like there to be no remains except my boots.

Ten years ago, there were three bands that really mattered – all from Manchester. The Stone Roses had brought an optimism and Sixties-influenced harmony back to the charts, the Happy Mondays had reintroduced swagger and danger, and James had … well James just busied themselves with crafting a succession of finely-tuned, beautifully weighted pop songs.

“We didn’t really feel part of Madchester,” claims singer Tim Booth, “we weren’t taking the same narcotics really…”

As their contemporaries imploded – victims of egos, substance abuse or their own success – James quietly got on with it, even, with 1993’s Laid breaking America. Through the Nineties they became a kind of pop fixture – a top 40 single here and there, an album now and then – one of those bands that always seemed to be around but never spectacularly so.

Then came last year’s Best Of compilation. Suddenly, it seemed James were cashing in their chips, saying look, here’s the result of 15 years in the charts, here’s 18 songs you know and love and probably didn’t even realise were all by us. Sit down. Enjoy. The album promptly hit Number One and sold more than a million.

“I think it really brought home to people that we are a big band in this country,” Booth says. There’s no trace of arrogance – he simply feels that after a decade and a half, James deserve to be recognised not just a “credible” band but as one that sells a lot of records.

“We’re artistically very ambitious and we’re ambitious in terms of getting through to a lot of people.” He pauses. “I think it’s an old-fashioned point of view now. I think the attitude behind a lot of modern music is that fame justifies everything. The quest for fame in most bands seems totally at the expense of creativity.”

But that’s why it’s called the music business. He laughs: “Well, it suits the record companies – certainly more than bands who have artistic goals.”

When the Best Of came out, it was viewed by many critics as a sign that James were calling it a day. In much the same way that a Lifetime Achievement award can imply there’s no more left to achieve, a Best Of can imply that there’s nothing of quality still to come.

Booth shrugs. The time was just right for that record, he feels, there was nothing further to it.

“By the time the Best Of was out, we already had some more songs written,” he says. “We’re perfectionists, our standards are really high, so we just keep working on the songs and going further and further over budget and trying out different ideas until we get it right.”

The result is the new single I Know What I’m Here For – resonant with the kind of funked up keyboard riff and clear vocals which defined so much of what was good about their Madchester period – and the forthcoming album Millionaires.

“We’ve ended up with a record that’s got five singles on it. It’s very unusual for us.”

Perhaps James have got a taste for million-selling records. Perhaps it’s time Tim became a proper rock star?

“You mean a traditional rock star?” he laughs. “I’ve been given quite a hard time for not being that. Part of my position is reacting to the rock world.

“I mean, it’s an adolescent fantasy. You can have whatever you want – as much sex, as much drugs, as much booze.

“You’re treated like a god and what you don’t realise is that you’ll end up being sacrificed. What I did was learn to develop my own values, otherwise it would have eaten me alive.” There have been changes to the way James work. The traditional creative process – get all of them in a room and jam until something interesting emerges – has been replaced by a more disciplined approach. “This is the first record we’ve ever made where we’ve turned up with chord structures,” says Tim, completely straight-faced. “To us, it’s totally new and original. I suppose to everyone else it’s how things normally work….”

Maybe they will learn how to be a million-selling act.

Indie Gods, survivors and thoroughly nice blokes, James are back with a new single, album and tons of great stories about trying to be gay and going with hookers. Tim Booth and Saul Davies talk to Eric James

So, there are seven of you in the group, any benders?

Tim : We wanted to make sure you knew beforehand that there weren’t. We’re honoured that you want us in your magazine, but I thought we should make sure you know there isn’t anyone.

Have you ever tried it?

Tim : I’ve tried it a couple of times, but it wasn’t my thing. I had two men who I was very close to and I thought I must see if I can sleep with them, and it just wasn’t the thing. We had a bath together and got into bed and it was like ‘Sorry’

Were they gay and you weren’t?

Tim : One of them was gay and the other was pan

That’s the best one to be.

Tim : It’s weird, but when we called one of our records ‘Laid’ our libidos went up a lot. Then we called the next record ‘Whiplash’ and I ruptured two discs in my neck so we thought this time let’s be very careful what we call this record. I wanted to call it ‘Millionaires’ cause I wanted us all to make a lot of money.

You should have called it Laid Again

Tim : We know what your agenda is

Saul : I’ve slept with Jimmy, the bass player, now I come to think of it.

Any good?

Saul : He was amazing actually

Are you for real? I can’t tell because you’ve got shades on.

Saul : You don’t want to see these eyes

Tim : They’re very beautiful eyes actually

You’re having a homoerotic moment right here and now

Saul : No, he was great, we did it a couple of times.

Who did who?

Saul : There were no givers and takers, it was just a shared experience. We’re really good mates but sometimes it spills over into this really weird area and it’s great.

Shall we talk about how the band got together and all that?

Tim : No, let’s give you some more homo stories.

OK, Have you ever snogged each other or anything?

Tim : I’ve only ever done it in plays. I was Jean Genet in a play. It was partly to test myself out, to see what it was like.

And what was it like?

Tim : He had a moustache. With bits of food in it. It didn’t taste very good as far as I was concerned.

So, what sort of girls do you go for?

Tim : Oh, this is fantastic. I love it. Personally, I’ve met the love of my life so I’ve been faithful for the last three years. A woman called Kate. We have a blast.

What about you? Hooked up?

Saul : I find it very difficult to have a relationship with anybody

So, a girl in every port

Saul : There have been times when it’s been like that, but recently I’ve cleared the decks. I’m trying to get rid of all extraneous things from my life.

Shags are never extraneous

Saul : I’d rather fuck myself, do you know what I mean? It’s quicker.

Do you get good girls being in a band?

Saul : Naaaasty girls. Erm, I suppose the answer to that is that being in a band you’re in a situation where you’re more likely to get whatever you want, whether that’s drugs, money, women, whatever you want. But you know what’s it’s like. You can get so wrapped up in someone sometimes, you begin to miss your own faults, cause you’re in this person, not in your own head.

So you just phone up for hookers now?

Saul : I have done. Just to see what would happen

And what did happen?

Saul : A hooker arrived…. Hello room service. I was more intrigued about what you would get for your money, how it would work, was it fun or frightening….

And was it fun or frightening?

Saul : It was really frightening. I tried to cancel the reservation, but she was already knocking on the door of the bloody hotel room.

She was probably out there waiting. She was probably some groupie.

Saul : No, I specifically asked for a six-foot black woman and that’s what was standing there, and I was like ‘Oh no, this is madness, I don’t want this.’

So you sent her back

Saul : No, I sat her down and said ‘Do you want a drink?’ And she was thinking ‘Oh no, a talker’

So you did fuck her?

Saul : No, she fucked me, completely actually. It was great

What do you mean?

Saul : I encouraged her to do really weird things, and she was totally obliging. And the next night we went to a late-night movie together and then she went home. She was really cool.

Tim : I had a friend once who was on the streets in New York, a woman, for a couple of years and she was getting so many men that just needed to talk she gave it up and became a therapist. She’s a healer now. That’s what most people want.

Saul : Sexual therapy

Yeah, a shag

Tim : I’m not sure about the shag thing. In the end, it’s better if it’s connected with your heart.

Yadda, yadda, yadda

Tim : It’s not all yadda, yadda, yadda. In the end, you just think ‘Oh no, I’ve just been shagging around. THIS is what I’ve been looking for’

But say you stay with Kate for the next 25 years, it’s bound to fall off a bit….

Tim : Check back in 25 years

Don’t straight people think that to be in a long-term relationship you have to be monogamous?

Tim : In straight relationships, there’s a lot more dishonesty about the nature of the male, about what a man needs. When there’s two men in a relationship, it’s easier for them to be honest, because they both have a direct experience. I see people and want to shag them and me and Kate talk about that and laugh about it and play with it, but I know that’s a short-term thrill that would damage something long-term for us.

Why?

Tim : Because, sex, to me, is not just a physical act. Something goes on in sex that is much more profound whether you like it or not. When you have an orgasm, I personally believe on some psychic level you become entwined, you become connected to that person. What is an orgasm? What is that?

It’s nature’s way of making you want to shag

Tim : I believe in a more mystical aspect. You’re energetically connected.

Did you connect with your hooker?

Saul : Well, we ended up going to the movies together, doing something normal after extreme and odd circumstances. There’s a nice confusion there.

JW: How are you both ?

TB: Good

JW: Saul the shades aren’t coming off at all ?

SD: No they are glued.

JW: Are we gonna get any details about last night’s activities at all ?

SD: No not on air

JW: Tim do you know anything ?

TB: I’m sorry he’s only just arrived but the shades are tattoed on they are 3 dimensional virtual shades

SD: I’ve become a cliche of myself haven’t I ?

JW: You do look the rock star part it has to be said, swagger and attitude.

TB: It’s fantastic – We have to have someone in the band who takes care of that department – he was voted it for 1999.

SD: Which bit do you do then ? you do the the juggling.

TB: I do the fire-eating

JW: You both look very well ’cause Tim everytime I have done something you have been on there’s been some kind of ailment that’s stricken you down

TB: Yeah I’m Woody Allen – I can’t help it – the people in Scotland think I’m really pathetic and we cancelled T in the Park 2 years running cause of my health. It was Eddie Izzard’s fault last time you remember.

JW: Yeah you went over to New York was it ?

TB: Yeah I caught some germs from him – sitting too close to the stage.

JW: But you are good now.

TB: I’m fit and feisty.

JW: Now the video we were talking about earlier is very glossy, dynamic, where did the idea come from ? It looks a bit Pet Shop Boys to me.

TB: It wasn’t ours – I haven’t got a clue how videos work – it doesn’t work on the basis of making a movie – you get a script it looks fantastic, you make the video and you look like an idiot and then you get another script and it looks like nothing and you kinda think well I trust the Director and he makes it and its being played all over MTV – personally I think it’s cause we’ve got women around us.

JW: But it’s not you see – I didn’t notice there were women in that video.

SD: We feel guilty about this you see

TB: Do we feel guilty?

SD: I do

JW: You are too liberal you.

JW:But the cowboy look has gone, the boots and the hat in the video, cause you are in camouflage today.

TB: I couldn’t ride my horse down Oxford St

JW: We got a space for you outside.

TB: You have ? Shoot If I’d have known I would have brought it with me.

JW: We’re gonna play an exclusive track off the album and you are going to announce some tour dates.

TB: Aye

JW: Do you want to get that over and done with?

TB: Defintely said the dentist – we are going to do another of our brief tours

SD: (Announces dates) the big arenas, the big horrible sheds where we look like tiny little people in the distance – I wish we weren’t doing them.

JW: So why are you ?

SD: ’cause we are lazy.

TB: we will have cameras that will make us look bigger and we’ll find a way of making it intimate.

SD: It’s cause we are really ugly you are probably best to see us from afar actually.

JW: Never go and see them at an intimate venue cause it will be harrowing.

JW: How was T in the Park, a lot of people were saying it was one of the outstanding performances of the whole festival.

TB: Yeah from 100 yards

JW: What’s your most memorable bit ?

TB: I did this speech in rehearsal and said that I’d really like this year if we don’t play Sit Down as much and Saul kind of went look we haven’t played Scotland for 2 years running cause you cancelled it and if we don’t play it there’s gonna be a riot and so he talked us into playing it so we played it at the end and 40,000 people were dancing and I can’t argue with that it was fantastic.

JW: Saul do you feel vindicated ?

SD: It was a bit of a no brainer though – stick 40,000 scotsman in a field, give them a load of cooking lager, stick them in front of a band called James playing a song called Sit Down – can’t lose.

JW: How do you manage to put so much raw emotion and soul into your lyrics ?

TB: I’m a highly unstable person and basically I write from that point of view – it’s very easy – I’m a raw human being. At the moment my life is quite stabilised so I wait for other band members to have a wild night and come crashing down the next day and then I follow them round with a pen and photogrpahs.

JW: I can imagine Saul’s giving you and awful lot of material at the moment

TB: Masses all the songs on the album are about Saul.

JW: Is there a theme to the album ?

TB: There’s not. There’s a few out and out glorious love songs cause I’m madly in love.

JW: Still, that’s pretty good.

TB: It’s not bad is it 3 years. I think this one’s the real thing.

SD: We’re very happy

JW: Are you ? I’m very pleased for you both.

TB: He’s cute isn’t he

JW: He’s very cute

TB: But those sun glasses have got to go Em and then there’s some songs about revenge.

JW: Where do they come from ?

TB: She’s getting so excited, look how excited she is – she’s a vulture this woman. You think she’s a nice cute easy going…..

JW: No none of that – so the revenge comes from where ?

TB: A number of people in the last few years who would wish us harm – in fact the song you are going to play from the album which sounds like a really lovely perky chorus “Here’s a mirror with your name on, singing we’re gonna miss you when you’re gone” It’s not a song at all its a spell of protection, it’s like a mirror around myself that anybody wishing me harm will have this mirror reflect back at them their energy.

JW: We’ll play it then

(Plays If Anybody Hurts You)

JW: That sounds very powerful.

TB: It’s fun, we’re happy with that.

JW: Its not fun though is it ?

TB: No its a devious dark song with a chirpy chorus.

JW: And that’s not gonna be a single.

TB: It might be if we get round to a 4th or 5th

JW: At the end of the Rough Trade version of Sit Down someone sings the words Lester Piggot over and ever again – then 5 years later on the Laid album his name is in brackets after Sometimes.

TB: It was a very strange sound engineer in Bath – forgotten his name looked like a hippy and he used to check the sound by saying Lester Piggot and we taped him one day and stuck him on the record. He was quite happy with that.

JW: Are there any plans to do another enhanced CD Single like the Destiny Calling CD’s ?

SD: I didn’t know we’d done one,

JW: Did the people from the X-Files talk to you personally about using the Ring the Bells ?

TB: I completely forgotten about it and I bought the X-Files box set and was going through them on a boring day and I heard this song on the jukebox and I thought that sounds like the Eagles – I know this song and then we came on and they used us for about 2 minutes – a very cool moment.

JW: How do you feel about the eclipse ?

TB: Saul lives in a permanent eclipse.

SD: I have to say. Its not even a total eclipse – Its getting blown out of proportion – the idea of 4 million withering hippies looking at something which happens every few years anyway all around the planet – connecting this with the end of the century – I hate it all – I’d like to get in an aeroplane and go up there and put smoke out and obscure their view – that would be fantastic – take the moment away from them.

TB: I love it

JW: When was your last big row ?

TB: That was it just there. We don’t have big rows – of course we do

SD: We can find a really good way of working with each other – we have different lifestyles but are complimentary to each other – I don’t understand it I think we quite like each other don’t we ?

TB: Yeah I think so – yeah definitely.

JW: If you disagree how do you deal with that ?

TB: Liam and Noel – sometimes we call in Jimmy to arbitrate. We put him both sides cause he’s quite balanced.

SD: And if his balance goes he threatens you – well he threatens me cause I’m much smaller than him.

TB: We have big disagreements and we take it in turns to back down – we’re both very emotional and every so often…. Saul chokes on his coffee.

JW: Are you gonna play Booth and the Bad Angel live again or make another ?

TB: Probably not – I’d like to make another with Angelo cause I love the man and I had such fun making it – the record company didn’t like the record and it seemed to conflict with their big investment in James – so at the moment no.

JW: Saul, Money – does that mean anything to you ?

SD: We’ve done all these mad big, in-your-face house tunes and this is taking up a lot of time and we wanna get it out. Its big euro house – big cheesy stuff we can’t do in James – we’re gonna send some of it to Orbital and ask them to if they will do little bits.

(Plays I Know What I’m Here For)

JW: Sounds a bit like the Pet Shop Boys – What were you saying about Dave the drummer?

SD: He’s doing a track with the drummer from Catatonia and the drummer from the Stereophonics – they’ll get confused the three of them – it’s a Cozy Powell track Dance with the Devil – Dave if you are out there wake up.

JW: The single’s out on Monday “I Know What I’m Here For” could you not have chose something a bit snappier – its difficult to remember ?

TB: It sounds like a Manics title doesn’t it.

JW: It does actually.

TB: We nicked it from one of Bevan’s speaches in 1952.

JW: The new album’s called Millionaires – the last album was called Whiplash and you suffered at the hands of that.

SD: The one before it was called Laid though remember.

JW: Didn’t suffer quite so much then. Why Millionaires ?

TB: Well we need some money quite simply. And also playing with the idea that everyone thinks we’re loaded – we’re sick of buying rounds in pubs – here comes a rich pop star he can buy a round. Have a look at my bank statement – not true.

JW: Well something’s gone with your record company then surely.

TB: Definitley – we’ve been ripped off for £325 Million as Mr Elton John said today.

JW: How do you feel at the moment you do seem very enthusiastic, energised, not surprised that you are still here but that people are so receptive to you.

TB: Its drugs.