To the best of my knowledge, the extensive UA promotional campaign launched for the 'Nosferatu' album was not accompanied by significant column inches in the press. Of the established UK music weeklies only the New Musical Express carried a feature on the album (or at least that is the only one that I have - happy to be corrected).
In late October 1979 shortly prior to the album hitting the record shop racks journalist Nick Kent interviewed Hugh about his collaboration with Robert Williams. In an increasingly spikey conversation something can be gleaned as to how this album came into being. Being one of the few contemporary pieces on the album it is valuable, but it could have been better if Cornwell and Kent hadn't spent much of the time sparring with each other.
Fair enough, Hugh wanted to talk about their new album and not The Stranglers whilst Nick Kent continued to bring his other band into he discussion. Hugh for his part kept up The Stranglers versus the press front and an opportunity was lost. Sadly towards the end of the piece Ken got personal and the whole thing turned into a tirade against The Stranglers.
Nevertheless it is what it is as they say.... so read on.
LAST TRAIN TO TRANSYLVANIA
Hugh ‘Crypt-ic’ Cornwell gets fangs in
perspective viv-a vis the latest solo Stranglers concept album, ‘Nosferatu’.
Nick Kent jams as Van Helsing the vampire hunter.
It’s not far from the trashy confines of
Carnaby Street to the desolation of James Street, the seedy side of Covent
Garden which houses the offices of Alan Edwards, PR to The Stranglers, Blondie,
Squeeze, Motorhead, Generation X and many others.
At literally ten minutes notice, I am to be
found heading for this locale on Wednesday lunchtime to interview Mr Edwards’
oldest and newest client, Hugh Cornwell, who has come up to London from
Portsmouth expressly to talk to NME. (The reason for my sudden enlistment into
the job? The scribe initially detailed has been detained for the day in
hospital, where his infanticipating wife is due to let nature and the stork
take their course. So…).
I arrive to find that Cornwell is absent.
It transpires that he is out having his rough-hewn mid-30’s
rugby-teacher-gone-to-seed visual photographed by the incomparable Pennie Smith
– an absence which gives me an opportunity to grab a quick listen to today’s
item of discussion, ‘Nosferatu’ Cornwell’s new album which hitherto I have only
heard by chance one night at a mutual friend’s house.
It’s a tricky aural extravaganza to gauge
the full strength of when using a mere portable cassette player. The mix gives
a disorienating slant to the albums dynamics, depth and texture, the
instruments often appear to float in some odd limbo. Certainly, it’s a fair old
departure from Cornwell’s more orthodox heathen thrust when he harnesses his
resources to The Stranglers.
One vital reason for this is that, where
the latter are propelled by Jet Black’s meat and potatoes drumming, here
Cornwell has collaborated with Captain Beefheart’s Magic Band percussionist
Robert Williams, not merely usurping his idiosyncratic trap-trouncing, but also
placing his talents right in the centre of ‘Nosferatu’s’ creative processes.
Indeed, although ‘Nosferatu’ will probably
be branded by the media as Cornwell’s solo album, the outer cover declares the
album strictly a dual creation, in no uncertain terms. The pair stand together,
both names in bold – “Hugh Cornwell and Robert Williams in ‘Nosferatu’.”
As Cornwell later explains, they met whilst
Beefheart’s current band was playing three nights in San Francisco. The
Strangler, a fervent Beefheart admirer (he nominates ‘Clear Spot’ as his
favourite B.Fart album, explaining that ‘Trout Mask Replica’ “has so much going
for it that I’m still discovering new things”), went backstage and “found
Robert to be the most forceful personality, the one with the strongest sense of
direction. Also we quickly found that we were into many of the same things.”
Among other appealingly morbid perversities
that proliferate on the album, Cornwell and Williams chose primarily to use the
character Nosferatu, a gnarled old vampire type doomed to a living death: an
evil, macabre blood-sucking existence, so pathetic that one feels genuinely
sorry for the poor old ghoul.
The character dates back to Egyptian
mythology – his doomy four syllable moniker translated as “spirit of
darkness/evil” or “cloak of death” or some such suitably grim handle. Indeed
one could go into an intoxicatingly lengthy description of the original vampire
himself, but literature is abundantly available for those wishing to sample the
full force of this monstrous apparition.
More to the point, two films have been made
using the old bloke’s name, a 1920’s Expressionist masterpiece directed by
Murnau and made in suitably gothic black and white with no sound, that grabbed
Cornwell who, when he viewed it early last year, “visualised it as an amazing
vehicle for emotional music”.
Williams evidently felt the same, and the
two set to work last summer, writing and recording together as a basic unit
with “friends” who were around who, according to Cornwell, “could add things,
say, or fill in the odd hole with their interpretation”.
The project was completed six months ago
and is currently on the vinyl release starting blocks.
But again we begin to get ahead of
ourselves. As his quotes are starting to appear, so one should at least
acknowledge that yea, exactly after 40 minutes have elapsed Hugh Cornwell
arrives.
Expecting a somewhat more outwardly more
aggressive character, I’m pleasantly surprised to receive an instant impression
of the man as a fairly civil chap. That relentless bullyboy vocal he adopts for
singing is absent from his speaking voice, which suggest previous associations
with colleges of further education. Certainly he in no respect resembles a rock
star, what with his second hand demob suit and open necked white shirt, topped
off by features that rarely ease up from their naturally taut bone structure.
The final embellishment – a small goatee as
thick as a paint-brush but greased to stand at a point – is typically
Beefheartian …
At first hand-shake, he is amenable
courteous enough and comparatively soft-spoken, thus temporarily undermining
all prior visions I had of The Stranglers – or at least Cornwell – treating
journalists with total disdain.
This cosiness is however almost
instantaneously destroyed, when Cornwell leaves the PR office to walk next door
to his management office. Wondering if he intends to do the interview in there,
I follow. Cornwell, seeing me sauntering into the room, turns distinctly
chilly.
“The journalists’ room is in there” he
states curtly, as though he were telling a dog where his kennel is.
The incident, minor enough at the time, in
retrospect ties in perfectly with Cornwell’s view on the media. Journalists, in
The Stranglers’ terms, are basically inferior lags to the superior warrior-like
self-acclaimed artists the band so obviously consider themselves to be. We journalists are at best useful, at worst intolerable –
and if we are intolerable, then a bloated egomaniac thug like JJ Burnel sees no
moral issue in brazenly using his black belt karate training to beat up a
critic like Jon Savage of Sounds, who dared put his name to a criticism of
whatever The Stranglers’ latest product was at the time.
No, The Stranglers are a law unto
themselves, and in that respect they remind me a lot of Led Zeppelin.
Call one ‘new wave’, call the other ‘heavy
metal’, but both groups are out on their own, armed for combat in a ‘dog eat
dog’ business. Both groups have a reputation for being ‘heavy’ outfits who
despise outside criticism, because they foolhardily believe themselves to be
the best judges of their work and other opinions, unless virtually sycophantic,
are redundant.
Now, just as Jimmy Page still troops out
every so often to give the odd interview – purely for promotional reasons
usually – so Hugh Cornwell has chosen to talk to yours truly or anyone else
from the music papers... but strictly about the ‘Nosferatu’ album.
And nothing else. He’ll talk about how “when
we started recording, it was really terrifying music we were making. I mean we
were really frightening ourselves with the music that was coming out. Then it
was levelled out into becoming almost a soundtrack... a soundtrack for a film
that could never be made.”
And he’ll tell me that the whole album was
recorded in 22 days - “10 days at one
stretch, then 12 at another,” in LA.
But that’s yer lot. Despite the proximity
of ‘Raven’ to the top of the album charts, not a word will he vouchsafe on the
subject of his day job – The Stranglers.
So OK, let’s do the business on ‘Nosferatu’.
This bit’s for Hugh’s scrapbook.
The songs were written by
Cornwell/Williams, apart from Cream’s ‘White Room’ – given a radically
claustrophobic arrangement (it fits into the album concept by dint of the white
room representing Nosferatu’s hide-out from the daylight) and one number
involving a composer’s contribution from Devo’s Mothersbaugh brothers. Two
songs feature one ‘Duncan Poundcake’ : ‘Puppets’ and ‘Wrong Way Round’, for my tastes
the albums strangest cut, with Dury delivering a chillingly raucous ‘Little
Egypt’ freak-show owner’s harangue.
Although a final view-point has yet to be
reached, ‘Nosferatu’ strikes me as an intriguing, ambitious equal-parts success
and failure. It strives for diversity and wholeness at the same instant. But
whilst Cornwell and Williams’ experiments often call for unorthodox
arrangements that capture the alienation and claustrophobia of being trapped in
a form at once repellent and almost comically pathetic, Cornwell’s voice – a drone
that is neither effectively disembodied nor catatonic – often can’t carry it
off. Certainly Dury’s cameo whacks the point home with a vengeance.
Meanwhile Cornwell, obviously pleased with
the creation, talks about how one song – ‘Losers in a Lost Land’ – was written
with Williams “by post”, the two potentially diverse sections (Cornwell’s bass
patterns and Willams’ percussive effects) created 2,000 miles apart but in
perfect synch with each other.
“We produced each other. Robert would be behind
the console whilst I was laying down my tracks and vice versa when he was
laying down his percussion, snatches of synthesiser, and other bits.
“He even wrote the lyrics to ‘Nosferatu’
itself. That was to be an instrumental.”
Elsewhere the Mothersbaugh brothers appear
on one track, the collaborative work entitled ‘Rhythmic Itch’, whilst Ian
Underwood, best known for his multi-talented instrumental expertise showcased
most strongly on Frank Zappa’s ‘Uncle Meat’ and ‘Hot Rats’, appears on one or
two cuts.
“It’s reached a point where I feel this
record is sounding like another crummy solo album with ‘starstudded’ guests”,
mutters Cornwell, disgruntled.
I disagree, and he seems mildly appeased at
my contention that names like Robert Williams and Ian Underwood aren’t exactly
in the same mould as yer super session stars like Ronnie Wood and Ringo Starr,
for which we can all be thankful. Still, Cornwell’s paranoia about
star-spotting leads him to deny quite adamantly that any such personage as Ian
Dury appears on the record. “Duncan Poundcake is on the album. Not Ian Dury.
Get that right.”
Cornwell looks back on the album’s making.
“It was almost like Robert and I being
schoolboys again and going in and experimenting. Very quickly we ended living a
sort of quasi-vampiric existence. Sleeping all day, recording all night and
making sure we got home just before dawn.”
In the midst of what can only be described
as blithe reminiscences on Cornwell’s part about his work with Robert Williams
in Los Angeles, I am suddenly reminded that this is the same man who on ‘raven’
wrote a song entitled ‘Dead Loss Angeles’.
“Yeah well, when you check the inside of
the sleeve of ‘Nosferatu’ you’ll see I’ve written ‘Recorded in Undead Los
Angeles’. I wrote those lyrics as an indictment against the fact that that on
one level Los Angeles stands for everything crass and dumb and sick in American
society. It’s the very epitome of all that crap.”
Hugh joins the queue for the bloodbank. Pic: Pennie Smith
He expounds on his own particular vision of
Nosferatu, based primarily on the ‘20s film as opposed to the recent re-make of
Nosferatu by German wunderkind Werner Herzog.
“He’s a desperate man – very, very
desperate. But he’s got something a lot of people crave and that’s immortality.
But the irony is that he doesn’t want it. He’s very pathetic really. No-one
realised that in fact he’s a very, very sad man.
“All the songs on side one are portions or
episodes, say, of an imaginary film Robert and I made about him. The first
track has him hurrying, desperate to get home because it’s close to daylight.
Then with ‘Losers’ (Cornwell’s favourite cut) he’s back in the crypt, pondering
his miserable existence. Then in ‘White Room’ he recalls his past and how he
got into this state in the first place. The fourth track, ‘Irate Caterpillar’
is him confronting technology – this immortal ghoul in this industrial complex
where he sees a crane and thinks that it’s giant caterpillar out to destroy
him. Then the side ends with the Mothersbaugh’s ‘Rhythmic Itch’ which is just a
totally objective viewpoint on the basic theme right.”
The second side consists primarily of
Cornwell’s studies in aspects of perversity.
“It fascinates me. Perversity is a part of
everyone, because all humans are imperfect and those imperfections create
perversities, right. It’s so logical to me. Everything I do is logical. It
comes from studying science – chemistry - at college, see. I don't like going off at tangents. There's never any point to tangents."
The latter remark harks back to a reference I'd made to The Stranglers' work. To him, that's a "tangent" as far as this conversation is concerned.
At first though, Cornwell consents to answer a few perfunctory questions on the subject of the band he still adamantly declares to be the main source point of his creative output. The dreadful live album! ‘X Certs', he states with blunt candor, "would've been much much better, if we'd mixed it. Instead, (Martin) Rushent mixed it. That's why it's so bad.
"We're never going to use a producer again. What the fuck for? Producers are just shitty little parasites. Period. All they're good for is telling jokes. And we know better jokes than any of 'em!"
I ask Cornwell if the six-month delay of 'Nosferatu' was irksome and whether it was dictated by a need for new Stranglers product. Cornwell feigns mild indifference but declares firmly: "Not at all. In fact, the six-month break has helped Robert and I to really come to terms with the project, to sharpen a few things up, get it in perspective."
OK then, let's go for some serious issues, Mr Cornwell. I mean, here you are recalling with great affection the making of an album with Robert Williams, a musician most unlike any of The Stranglers. And, God knows, the album sounds very different from anything The Stranglers have done, particularly 'Raven' . ..
"So? ... " Cornwell is getting peeved.
Well, did you feel that you needed to make 'Nosferatu' due, perhaps, to The Stranglers going through a lean period? You know, going through the motions?
"What do you mean by 'going through the motions'? Do you mean 'crapping'? We crap all the time. Every day, in fact (laughs)."
Cornwell is peeved. This journalist is going above his station. Doesn't he know that he, Cornwell, only wants to talk about his album? But tell me, Hugh, can you explain the human chemistry involved in the four members of The Stranglers?
"No!"
But you talk in great depth about how you worked with Robert Williams. OK, so how do you work-with someone like Jean Jacques Burnel?
Cornwell has to stop this here and now. ''I'm not going to answer that. Like, how would you feel if some journalist asked you about your emotional relationship with your girlfriend?"
Well, it would depend on the context. A more realistic parallel would be someone asking me how I get on with fellow writers on the paper I work for: I'd certainly answer that.
"I don't see the parallel," mutters Cornwell.
"And I'm not going to talk to the press about emotional relationships I experience! The Stranglers are alive and very well and they are still the group that I commit most of my energies towards. OK? Now I came here to talk about this" (points to 'Nosferatu' cassette)
"and nothing else."
Get the picture? Cornwell wants a nice slice of publicity for his collaborative off-shoot record - nothing more. I'm just the stooge who's around to ask nice bland questions and pass on the relevant platitudes.
Yet again however I return to The Stranglers/'Nosferatu' dichotomy, and Cornwell at least attempts to make a distinction between the two.
"The band is my professional career. It's a very vital part of my life, a very good way of getting across certain things. 'Nosferatu' - which I'm very, very proud of - is like, almost a hobby, what I did on my holidays."
But earlier you were talking almost ecstatically about how you and Robert Williams worked so well together OK, so right now you're tied to different bands, you've got commitments - but if Williams phoned up and said: "Listen, I'm leaving Beefheart, let's work together full-time," would you take his
offer?
" No (pause). No, because however great it was working with Robert, there was a concept there, there was a kind of spontaneity we shared for one great period of time that in 22 days created 'Nosferatu'. That doesn't mean it'll gel like that automatically a second time. Maybe it might, maybe not."
In the six months since 'Nosferatu', have you thought up any new ideas with theme that could take off like that did?
"I've had ideas, yeah. I get ideas for songs, write them down in five minutes and then lose the piece of paper I wrote them on. There's always something up there. It's more a case of actually getting into the studio, getting in with the right chemistry and doing it. Otherwise all those ideas are nothing more than scraps of paper. Which I lose more often than not." He laughs to himself.
Two final culminative verbal exchanges occur, leaving me half-bemused and half-amused by Cornwell.
A stray remark from Cornwell about how, unlike the artistic maverick of a rock composer that he is, I as a writer am always prey to all kinds of censorship and hob-goblin sub-editors out to twist the meaning of what I've written, gets me well pissed-off. Taking the statement to be tantamount to calling me a hack, l enlighten Cornwell on certain facts – in particular that I am a freelance writer and my primary concern is that my pieces, give or take the odd verbose sentence, remain in the state in which they were first conceived and penned.
"You're lucky then," mutters Cornwell. " 'Cos almost everyone else gets their articles cut to shit." .
No more, I counter, than people like yourselves. Bands have producers and big record-companies calling the shots on them. You're evidently successful so your company lets you go on with what you want to do. But if you weren't successful, your bollocks would probably be in hock. God knows, I've seen more bands totally compromised than journalists.
Cornwell mutters words of disbelief. The Stranglers, after all, are warriors. Journalists are just voyeurs to him.
The hilarious thing is that many of The Stranglers' song lyrics are just fifth-rate puerile sneering attempts at some kind of journalistic overview on 'current issues', weighed down by a rock-slide of splenetic bilge and tossed out with a sneer, a boot-boy swagger and a total absence of humanity.
A simple question about The Stranglers' future plans makes Cornwell turn downright rude. "I'm not telling you! I Want to keep you guessing," he retorts in what I presume he considers to be a mischievous tone of voice.
You want to keep me guessing? Listen, mate, do you think I really give a toss what you do next? Two years ago, you were doing a Roundhouse concert against Mick Jagger, because he said you were "dreadful" or some such belittling adjective. Now you're sounding just like him!
“Well, I just want to keep you on your toes!"
Hugh, old son, I'm afraid to tell you but I frankly don't give a fart in a tunnel about your future projects, because, give or take a couple of new riffs, it'll be the same-old-same-old in a new wrapping; music for people who're trying to learn how to sneer with sincerity.
Back to the crypt, old son. Dawn's coming up and the light's too fierce for your transparent superciliousness.
