here and there. It’s like trying to recall what someone on the bus was talking about. It is quite scary, though, to start with. It’s a knack, like swimming. When you relax, there’s nothing to it. You can do it all day.
Images
Being in a band embraces a lot of things. There are your thoughts, which you are constantly expressing in your music, and being probed about by journalists and presenters. There are your clothes, which have to say who you are, too. Hair is cheap but hard to get right. You have to be able to think of things to say that are worth repeating, or at least repeat things that are worth repeating. You’ve got to be able to play an instrument, or sing, if you want to get any satisfaction out of it. You need to enjoy travelling, because there’s a lot of it. Stage design, record sleeve design, videos, photo shoots . . . There is always an expert to hand, but you need to know what you want or it all just looks like everyone else’s.
It takes a while to get the hang of everything. None of the early photo shoots were that spectacular. We didn’t look like a band. We still weren’t really, yet. We had written some songs and hung around together, but we hadn’t played more than a couple of dozen shows. Some touring was planned around the first single.
We went to meet with a design company in a mews in Paddington. It was the sort of place at which everyone who did art at school would have dreamed about working. They’d designed the covers of all the greatest records ever made, by the looks of things, and there were gold discs all over the walls in reception. The offices were bright and sunny, and hip-looking people were ‘just working on ideas’ at big draughtsman’s boards. The idea they’d had for ‘She’s So High’ was a naked bubblegum queen astride a hippopotamus. It was a painting by a San Franciscan artist called Mel Ramos. We all agreed it was brilliant, even Balfe, who said it was important to break minor taboos. It was just a good picture, I thought.
Andy Ross thought it would be a good idea for Damon and me to go and be nice to everyone at the EMI annual sales conference, which was taking place in a hotel near Gatwick airport.
It was the start of the nineties. It was a glittering affair and things got interesting after dinner. It was the tail end of the good old days in the record business. Record companies were still expanding and setting up film divisions. They’d made a fortune from rereleasing everything on CD. Record sales were higher than ever. British artists outsold American stars and it was a good time to be in the music business. It must have been quite an expensive event. There were hundreds of people there, including some proper pop stars. The boss of the company, Rupert Perry, made a speech on a little stage and said he wanted to introduce some special guests. Iron Maiden drove on to the stage in a bubble car and started swearing at everybody. Damon had a funny turn and ran outside. I was having an excellent time. There was a party in every room in the hotel. Nigel Kennedy, a strange kind of violin-playing arch-yobbo and the biggest-selling artist in the world at the time, was trying to throw a television out of the window of the first room I went into. A lot of men in suits were laughing. He fell in a heap on top of the telly before he got to the window. It was good in that room. I sat on the bed sharing a bottle of Scotch with a guy with a silvery beard who seemed quite interested in everything I had to say. We shot the breeze for ages. He knew all kinds of things. I liked that guy. We drank all the whisky. Eventually I said I’d better go and find Damon, who had last been spotted in a field trying to talk to some horses. Andy Ross said, ‘What the hell were you talking to Andrew Prior about for an hour?’ I said, ‘Who the hell is Andrew Prior? I’ve been drinking whisky with my mate over there!’ He said, ‘That’s Andrew Prior, you berk. He’s the head of
Images
Being in a band embraces a lot of things. There are your thoughts, which you are constantly expressing in your music, and being probed about by journalists and presenters. There are your clothes, which have to say who you are, too. Hair is cheap but hard to get right. You have to be able to think of things to say that are worth repeating, or at least repeat things that are worth repeating. You’ve got to be able to play an instrument, or sing, if you want to get any satisfaction out of it. You need to enjoy travelling, because there’s a lot of it. Stage design, record sleeve design, videos, photo shoots . . . There is always an expert to hand, but you need to know what you want or it all just looks like everyone else’s.
It takes a while to get the hang of everything. None of the early photo shoots were that spectacular. We didn’t look like a band. We still weren’t really, yet. We had written some songs and hung around together, but we hadn’t played more than a couple of dozen shows. Some touring was planned around the first single.
We went to meet with a design company in a mews in Paddington. It was the sort of place at which everyone who did art at school would have dreamed about working. They’d designed the covers of all the greatest records ever made, by the looks of things, and there were gold discs all over the walls in reception. The offices were bright and sunny, and hip-looking people were ‘just working on ideas’ at big draughtsman’s boards. The idea they’d had for ‘She’s So High’ was a naked bubblegum queen astride a hippopotamus. It was a painting by a San Franciscan artist called Mel Ramos. We all agreed it was brilliant, even Balfe, who said it was important to break minor taboos. It was just a good picture, I thought.
Andy Ross thought it would be a good idea for Damon and me to go and be nice to everyone at the EMI annual sales conference, which was taking place in a hotel near Gatwick airport.
It was the start of the nineties. It was a glittering affair and things got interesting after dinner. It was the tail end of the good old days in the record business. Record companies were still expanding and setting up film divisions. They’d made a fortune from rereleasing everything on CD. Record sales were higher than ever. British artists outsold American stars and it was a good time to be in the music business. It must have been quite an expensive event. There were hundreds of people there, including some proper pop stars. The boss of the company, Rupert Perry, made a speech on a little stage and said he wanted to introduce some special guests. Iron Maiden drove on to the stage in a bubble car and started swearing at everybody. Damon had a funny turn and ran outside. I was having an excellent time. There was a party in every room in the hotel. Nigel Kennedy, a strange kind of violin-playing arch-yobbo and the biggest-selling artist in the world at the time, was trying to throw a television out of the window of the first room I went into. A lot of men in suits were laughing. He fell in a heap on top of the telly before he got to the window. It was good in that room. I sat on the bed sharing a bottle of Scotch with a guy with a silvery beard who seemed quite interested in everything I had to say. We shot the breeze for ages. He knew all kinds of things. I liked that guy. We drank all the whisky. Eventually I said I’d better go and find Damon, who had last been spotted in a field trying to talk to some horses. Andy Ross said, ‘What the hell were you talking to Andrew Prior about for an hour?’ I said, ‘Who the hell is Andrew Prior? I’ve been drinking whisky with my mate over there!’ He said, ‘That’s Andrew Prior, you berk. He’s the head of
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