Tag Archives: 1992
Le Pays Interview (French)
Rock Over London: Lose Control #92/11
Summary
Session version of Lose Control on syndicated US radio show
Track List
Lose Control (acoustic)
Details
Release Name: | Rock Over London #92/11 |
Artist Name: | |
Release Date: | 1st March 1992 |
Format: | Promo Album |
Catalogue: | #92/11 |
Session version of Lose Control on syndicated US radio show
- Lose Control :1990
Rock Over London: Promised Land #92/13
Summary
Session version of Promised Land on syndicated US radio show
Track List
Promised Land (acoustic)
Details
Release Name: | Rock Over London #92/13 |
Artist Name: | |
Release Date: | 1st March 1992 |
Format: | Promo Album |
Catalogue: | #92/13 |
Session version of Promised Land on syndicated US radio show
- Promised Land :1989
February 1992
Seven album and Live Video released. James return and play their first US gig – an outdoor rain-soaked free show in San Francisco’s Union Square.
Seven
Summary
Seven was a difficult fourth studio album for the band to produce. It was originally scheduled to be released to coincide with the September 1991 tour, but eventually emerged the following year. Even though it was initially panned by critics, it has remained a fan favourite for 32 years.
Track List
Original Release:
Born Of Frustration / Ring The Bells / Sound / Bring A Gun / Mother / Don’t Wait That Long / Live A Love Of Life / Next Lover (not on vinyl) / Heavens / Protect Me / Seven
2001 Reissue:
Born Of Frustration / Ring The Bells / Sound / Bring A Gun / Mother / Don’t Wait That Long / Live A Love Of Life / Next Lover / Heavens / Protect Me / Seven / Protect Me (live acoustic) / Sound (live) / Heavens (live) / Don’t Wait That Long (live)
2017 Vinyl Reissue:
Born Of Frustration / Ring The Bells / Sound / Bring A Gun / Mother / Don’t Wait That Long / Live A Love Of Life / Next Lover / Heavens / Protect Me / Seven
Details
Release Name: | Seven |
Artist Name: | James |
Release Date: | 17th February 1992 |
Format: | Studio Album |
Catalogue: | LP – 510 932-1, CAS 510 932-4, CD 510 932-2; CD 548 786-2 (re-issue) |
Most of the tracks that would form the Seven album were written in 1990, several were debuted on the World Cup tour and others on the December tour, with Ring The Bells, Bring A Gun and Next Lover featuring on the Come Home live video. A secret gig at Paris La Locomotive club in March 1991 saw the band start with ten new unreleased tracks from the demos they had just completed for Seven (Pressure’s On did not see the light of day until Wah Wah and Somebody Help Me remains unreleased).
The recording process for Seven did not go at all to plan. The extended success of Sit Down and the associated promotion delayed recording. The album was scheduled for the autumn originally and a massive 30-date UK tour had been announced to coincide.
Recording with Youth was a strange experience for the band. Shunning conventional methods he set the studios up with no artificial light but used candles to light the studio. The band were not happy with the sound of the initial recordings and when the studio time they had booked was completed, the album was only half-finished. Phonogram’s suggestions for producers to complete the job were rejected by the band, the job in the end going to the band themselves with the assistance of Steve Chase.
The delays meant that the album went ahead with no new product to promote, the single Sound coming out only at the very end of the tour. Audiences expecting a set full of Sit Downs were met by a peppering of the new album and some wilfully difficult selections from the band’s earlier material. Just before Christmas, the band organised a fan club show at Warrington Parr Hall where the whole album was previewed, this show being recorded for release as Seven The Live Video.
With the album finally finished, another single, Born of Frustration, was released in January followed by the album in February just as the band had set off on their first tour of America, thus being unable to put in the traditional promotional activities to coincide with the release.
The album was generally panned by the critics with lazy accusations of stadium rock being thrown at the band. The band still spring to the album’s defence – Tim said in Q in 1993 “I stand by Seven. It’s a good record. And if people have a problem with that they can fuck off”. The general consensus within band circles was that a backlash was inevitable after Sit Down whatever the band had released.
Lyrically, the band makes very strong references to the fallout of Tim’s relationship with the band’s manager Martine. The depth of feeling in some of the tracks was self-evident in Tim’s emotional reaction to some of the songs as he had been singing them live on the autumn tour.
Disappointingly the album only reached Number 2 being held off top spot by Simply Red’s Stars although it was Number 1 in the less significant Network chart.
The band toured the album around Europe in April and May which coincided with Ring The Bells as the third single which struggled to reach the Top 40, again partly down to the lack of promotion and live appearances.
The summer saw James biggest headlining live performance of their own at Alton Towers fun park on July 4, broadcast live on Radio 1. A fourth single from the album, a remix of the title track with the three new tracks added to make the EP at the band’s assistance was released the following Monday and failed to reach the Top 40, peaking at number 46.
Seven did however cement James position as one of the UK’s leading alternative bands despite the press mauling it received. It also had some consequences that would alter the course of the band – it prompted the invitation to support Neil Young on his acoustic US tour that autumn and Brian Eno to want to work with the band.
The album was reissued in 2001 and again on double heavy 180g vinyl in 2017. Read about the 2017 reissue on EvenTheStars.
- Born Of Frustration :1992
- Bring A Gun :1992
- Don’t Wait That Long :1992
- Heavens :1992
- Live A Love Of Life :1992
- Mother :1992
- Next Lover :1992
- Protect Me :1992
- Ring The Bells / Ring Those Bells :1992
- Seven :1992
- Sound :1991
- London Town And Country Club – 16th December 1992
- Neil Young Support Slot – Press Release
- Super Channel Interview
- First We Take Manhattan – Vox
- Stately Homeboys – Select
- Alton Towers – 4th July 1992
- O-Zone Interview BBC1
- Glastonbury Festival – 26th June 1992
- Seven Single – Press Release
- Lentil As Anything – Sky Magazine
- Seven Single – NME News
- World Entertainment Tonight Feature on James
- Rock Et Folk Interview (French)
- BBC Radio 1 Interview
- Sit Down And Shoot Up The Charts – Mean St Magazine
- LA Chimes – Melody Maker
- Starclub Article (French)
- James Peel 45 From Seven – NME News
- Phosphore Article (French)
- Nord Matin Article (French)
- Multitop Article (French)
- Les Irrockuptibles Interview (French)
- Guitare Et Claviers Interview (French)
- Blah Blah Interview (French)
- Best Interview (French)
- Minneapolis First Avenue – 14th March 1992
- Chicago Cabaret Metro – 13th March 1992
- Seven US Press Release and Biography
- Ring The Bells – Press Release
- New York Times Article
- Lime Lizard Interview
- Vox Tim New York Picture
- The Band That Wanted First-Name Terms – The Independent
- Oxygen Interview (French)
- L’Etudiant Article (French)
- Le Pays Interview (French)
- Seven Album USA Release – Press Release
- MTV San Francisco Interview
- Key 103 Special
- Rock Over London Interview
- Music View Interviews
- James On A Rock And Roller Ride – Manchester Evening News
- Alton Towers – Press Release
- Seven UK – Press Release
- Seven UK Press Release And Biography
- James To The Tower – NME
- Holier Than Thou – Select
- Q Article And Interview
- Live 105 Biography
- Feels Like Seven – NME
- Today Article
- Born Of Frustration – BBC1 Top Of The Pops – 30th January 1992
- Seventh Heaven – Exit Magazine
- Born Of Frustration Press Release
- LA Gun Ordeal Shatters Star – Manchester Evening News
- MTV Interview
- The Magnificent Seven – NME
- Born Again James – NME News
- Warrington Parr Hall (evening) – 20th December 1991
- Warrington Parr Hall (afternoon) – 20th December 1991
- Gang Get Gott – NME News
- Material World – NME
- Standing Room Only – Vox
- Sound – BBC1 Top Of The Pops – 25th November 1991
- Sound – Channel 4 The Word – November 1991
- Sound Single Release – Press Release
- Going Live Interview – BBC1
- Sound – Press Release
- Norwich Gig Cancellation News – NME
- Sound Release News – NME
- Putting The Booth In – Melody Maker
- James Single – Melody Maker News
- Programme: Seven Autumn Tour (1991)
- Granada What’s New – August 1991
- London Tufnell Park Dome – 12th June 1991
- 1990 – 1992: Success At Last!
- Manchester Free Trade Hall – 17th December 1992
- London Town And Country Club – 16th December 1992
- Bristol Colston Hall – 15th December 1992
- Leeds Town And Country Club – 14th December 1992
- Glasgow Royal Concert Hall – 13th December 1992
- Osaka Club Quattro – 6th December 1992
- Osaka Club Quattro – 5th December 1992
- Kawasaki Club Citta – 3rd December 1992
- Kawasaki Club Citta – 2nd December 1992
- Kawasaki Club Citta – 1st December 1992
- Redondo Beach The Strand, Los Angeles – 24th November 1992
- Los Angeles The Palace Theater – 23rd November 1992
- Fresno venue unknown – 21st November 1992
- San Francisco Civic Centre – 20th November 1992
- Chicago World Music Theatre – 19th November 1992
- Chicago World Music Theatre – 18th November 1992
- Milwaukee Riverside Theatre – 15th November 1992
- Milwaukee Riverside Theatre – 14th November 1992
- Austin The Backroom – 12th November 1992
- Dallas Bomb Factory – 11th November 1992
- Ybor City El Pasaje, Tampa – 8th November 1992
- Brevard County Fair – 7th November 1992
- Daytona Beach Emery Riddle University – 7th November 1992
- Fort Lauderdale The Edge – 6th November 1992
- Baltimore Hammerjacks – 4th November 1992
- Montclair College – 2nd November 1992
- New York The Ritz – 1st November 1992
- Boston Channel Club – 31st October 1992
- Oswego Laker Hall – 30th October 1992
- Allentown Zebras – 28th October 1992
- Lawrenceville Rider College – 27th October 1992
- New Britain, CT, The Sting – 25th October 1992
- Chicago Riviera – 13th October 1992
- Washington Smith Centre – 3rd October 1992
- Las Vegas Bally’s – 26th September 1992
- Pacific Amphitheatre, Costa Mesa, Los Angeles – 25th September 1992
- San Diego Summer Pops Bowl – 23rd September 1992
- Los Angeles Greek Theatre – 22nd September 1992
- Los Angeles Greek Theatre – 21st September 1992
- Salem LB Amphitheatre – 18th September 1992
- Park City Park West Amphitheatre – 16th September 1992
- Denver Red Rocks – 15th September 1992
- Paris Fete De L’Humanite – 11th September 1992
- Feile Festival, Thurles – 31st July 1992
- Morlaix Tamaris Festival – 18th July 1992
- Calais Fort Le Nieulay – 12th July 1992
- Leysin Festival – 10th July 1992
- Alton Towers – 4th July 1992
- Roskilde Festival – 28th June 1992
- Stockholm Moderna Museet – 27th June 1992
- Glastonbury Festival – 26th June 1992
- Torquay Riverside Centre – 23rd June 1992
- Exeter University – 22nd June 1992
- Porto Pavilhao Das Antas – 9th May 1992
- Lisbon Coliseu dos Recreios – 8th May 1992
- Milan City Square – 5th May 1992
- Bern Stufenbau – 4th May 1992
- Frankfurt Live Music Hall – 3rd May 1992
- Copenhagen Loppen – 1st May 1992
- Hamburg Grosse Freiheit 36 – 29th April 1992
- Berlin Quartier Latin – 28th April 1992
- Cologne Live Music Hall – 27th April 1992
- Mauberge La Luna – 25th April 1992
- Paris Bataclan – 23rd April 1992
- Amsterdam Paradiso – 22nd April 1992
- San Francisco Warfield Theatre – 26th March 1992
- Los Angeles Roxy – 24th March 1992
- San Diego Sound FX – 23rd March 1992
- Phoenix Mason Jar – 22nd March 1992
- Atlanta Masquerade – 18th March 1992
- Detroit St Andrews – 16th March 1992
- Minneapolis First Avenue – 14th March 1992
- Chicago Cabaret Metro – 13th March 1992
- Boston Paradise Rock Club – 11th March 1992
- New York The Ritz – 10th March 1992
- Toronto Opera House – 8th March 1992
- San Francisco Union Square – 15th February 1992
- Manchester Polytechnic – 8th February 1992
- Born Of Frustration – BBC1 Top Of The Pops – 30th January 1992
- Warrington Parr Hall (evening) – 20th December 1991
- Warrington Parr Hall (afternoon) – 20th December 1991
- Sound – BBC1 Top Of The Pops – 25th November 1991
- Sound – Channel 4 The Word – November 1991
- Granada What’s New – August 1991
- London Tufnell Park Dome – 12th June 1991
Seven (Japan)
Summary
Japanese version of Seven with OBI sleeve and fold out lyric sheet in Japanese and English.
Track List
Born Of Frustration / Ring The Bells / Sound / Bring A Gun / Mother / Don’t Wait That Long / Live A Love Of Life / Next Lover / All My Sons / Heavens / Protect Me / Seven
Details
Release Name: | Seven (Import, Japan) |
Artist Name: | |
Release Date: | 17th February 1992 |
Format: | Studio Album |
Catalogue: | PHCR-30 |
Japanese version of Seven with OBI sleeve and fold out lyric sheet in Japanese and English.
- All My Sons :1991
- Born Of Frustration :1992
- Bring A Gun :1992
- Don’t Wait That Long :1992
- Heavens :1992
- Live A Love Of Life :1992
- Mother :1992
- Next Lover :1992
- Protect Me :1992
- Ring The Bells / Ring Those Bells :1992
- Seven :1992
- Sound :1991
San Francisco Union Square – 15th February 1992
Setlist
Johnny Yen / How Was It For You? / Protect Me / Lose Control / What For / Heavens / Born of Frustration / Come HomeSupport
NoneMore Information & Reviews
James’ first ever US gig on a Saturday afternoon outdoors and filmed by MTV. The show was hampered by terrible weather causing a couple of delays in the show.
Manchester Polytechnic – 8th February 1992
Setlist
Don't Wait That Long / Born of Frustration / Come Home / Bring A Gun / Lose Control / Heavens / Live A Love Of Life / Sit Down / Walking The Ghost / Next Lover / Johnny Yen / Ring The Bells / Gold Mother / God Only Knows / Sound / How Was It For You?Support
n/aMore Information & Reviews
A secret warm-up show for the band’s upcoming US tour.
MTV San Francisco Interview
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”
Key 103 Special
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
Rock Over London Interview
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