Questions With Answers
Trevor Boyd Interviews Marty Willson-Piper for the Church fanzine NSEW, Ladbroke Grove, West London 27.2.00

Trevor Boyd: Marty, a new solo record; first solo tour in ten years; All About Eve acoustic gigs and possible electric gigs and album; new Church album and gigs .... It's exhausting just talking about it  .... Marty Willson-Piper 'This is your life'.... discuss

Marty Willson Piper: You should be me

Is it like waiting for a bus, one doesn't turn up for ages and then four come at once?

Well that's living in London isn't it?

Are you feeling pretty 'up' just now with all this happening?

I'm feeling absolutely totally like, the fact that there's only 24 hours in a day, is a huge problem, because there's so much going on, and I'm not knocking it because I actually thrive on all that kind of energy.  When I'm really super busy I really enjoy it.  I love being super busy, but there really is not quite enough time in the day for me.  I honestly can't quite keep up with it.  I'm just managing.  And also. Remember it's also to do with personalities as well, because being in All About Eve is one whole trip on its own.  Being in The Church is such another planet, it's such a different trip; the personalities and the creative process, everything is really different and then focusing in on the solo thing as well, where I've got my own power to tap into; it's all very, very different.

The solo record is five years old, most of the tracks are about five years old now.  How does it sound when you listen to it now, given that you recorded it so long ago?  Does it sound like a new album or a bit of history?  It sounds fresh to me, but then I haven't lived with it for five years.

Everybody who hears it, they haven't got the history of the record.  A lot of people who are going to get the record are aware of its existence, and aware that it's been an ongoing process for quite a long-time.  For me it's very frustrating for it to have taken that long to get to the stage where its ready to be released, and when I hear it now, there are things about it that I would have changed like a shot.

The lyrics are really personal aren't they?  They relate to relationships that no longer exist.

OK I have no problem with that - absolutely no problem at all, because the songs, if they are about situations that happened under circumstances, well that's OK.  Every song has its moment that it's based upon and that's just fine.  I've got no problem with what the subject matter is or how I felt at the time, because what's important in music is emotion and the emotional context of the record is relevant to when the songs are written.  If the record had come out five years ago and those songs were relevant to the situation that I'm in is totally different to how I feel right now it's still fine because songs for me mark a point in time and the songs for me are results of experiences.  What's going on in my life is irrelevant to the public as to what particular month it happened.  So I don't have any worries about that, even though I've moved way on from that emotional context of the record.

First Hanging Out In Heaven.  Then it was going to be mechanical Ballerina and that it went back to Hanging Out In Heaven.  I was trying to think what's the link here?  The only thing I could think, listening to the lyrics, was "Heaven is upstairs, first door on the right", is the line in one of the songs.  Is that any bearing on the title at all?  Does the title mean anything?

Yes it does, yes.  Basically, although it's terribly unhip, it's a love record and because I had the opportunity to do some more recording since the love died, it's a love and love record and Hanging Out In Heaven is basically .... the title is what I said to the person I was with when I was with her.  I said to her,  "Being with you is like hanging out in heaven."

Just going through the tracks, Forget The Radio was written more recently wasn't it?  It has that trademark jingle jangle and, I dare I say it, the irony maybe is that it could be seen as 'radio-friendly'.  What I guess you're getting at on this track is forget the radio; you've got the records.  Listen to them.

Well you know, I can never understand how music enters people through their groin, it doesn't do that with me, it enters trough my brain and seeps down slowly to my groin.  I don't relate to music on a sexual level immediately.  Sly Stone is quite sexual and I love that stuff.  It's very sexual music but the thing about records that Sly Stone makes is that they are sort of braining as well, they interesting musically as well.  So Forget The Radio ... What I like to with a record is sit down and listen to it.  You know Suzanne and I have done that.  We've put the Muses record on for example, and when we put that record on we sat down together arm in arm and we didn't speak until the end of the record.  We just sat and listened to the whole record from beginning to end.  I think that is actually a lost art, actually sitting down and listening to a record without moving.

The sleeve says "for the listeners, Croscombe/Somerset"  Who are the listeners?"

Anybody who's listening.  Listening seems to be out of fashion.  This si the interesting thing about these All About Eve shows.  We get into this thing at some shows that we play and people just listen and I love them for that.  I don't know whether you can love an audience, but when you have an audience that is listening to everything that you do then that's fantastic.  But when you get an audience that is kind of like distracted like last night in Peterborough, then actually what it is, is the atmosphere that is setup by the venue.  The venue sets the atmosphere.  You kind of like have the situation where a place is setup for listening and you have a place that is setup for talking.  That's why it is great to play in seated venues, because as soon as someone sits down then it suddenly, psychologically, has an effect and they get themselves into a position where they listen.

Your singing on this album is much stronger than your other records.

Yeah a lot of people have said that.  I'm not sure why.

It sounds very rich and full and relaxed maybe?

Its funny because Swan, when I was in the recording studio recording Swan, I just couldn't get it and Tracey, the wife of Shep the engineer, I just said to her I can't do it.  She said to me "Have a rum and coke" or something like that and I decided to go along with that and I got pissed singing it.  And by the time I got to actually singing the lead vocal I was actually drunk, I was really loose.  I sang it drunk.

I want to ask you some questions about All About Eve.  I caught four of your shows, and apart from last night [Peterborough], they've been fairly relaxed affairs with attentive and appreciative audiences.

There are going to be more acoustic shows more electric shows.  There is hopefully going to be an acoustic live album [Fairy Light Nights is out now!].  There is hopefully going to be an electric album of original songs.

Julianne was really resistant to playing any All About Eve songs before.

Yeah, well that's just a phase she went through isn't it.  She's really quite keen about it now.  She's got a job you know.  She has a strange sort of schizophrenic existence where she sings like an angel and works in a marketing company, in a boring building in London.  She has to get up at 7.00 in the morning to get to work.  Then she goes and sings like an aesthetic princess and its really strange but there are a lot of musicians who aren't making it ... we are making it 'cos we're selling out all our shows and whether that continues or not I don't know.

There's a bedrock of interest in the UK certainly isn't there? .... You know, when The Church play the UK it's London, when All About Eve play the UK it could be anywhere.

Yeah that's right.  I think its good what we do

... and who doesn't?  This interview is taken by kind permission from the fantastic Church fanzine NSEW.  For the full interview and all things Church subscribe to NSEW here.