Brian Eno is MORE DARK THAN SHARK

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Beat Instrumental DECEMBER 1977 - by Peter Douglas

MANZANERA AND THE LUCKY 801

In a world so dominated by brash extroverts, it comes as a pleasant surprise to meet someone like Phil Manzanera. Tall, bearded, quietly spoken, he carries with him an air of authority and purpose that demands respect, and makes you feel that he is the sort of bloke who will still be around when most of the dynamic one-hit wonders have chucked it in and taken up accountancy.

He also doesn't give interviews all that often, so we were glad of the chance to talk to him during a one-day break in London in the middle of 801's October tour.

Like it or not, the excellent new 801 album Listen Now is very much the kosmic koncept. It attempts to sketch in the loose idea of an oppressive future world in the same mould as 1984, but with the emphasis on the form that everyday life might take, rather than on any particular political system.

It's been done before, of course. But past efforts have always sounded too hysterical, too obsessed with dressing up in space suits and talking like Daleks. Phil is more interested in what would happen to human relationships in a society where constant government surveillance and the supremacy of machines has rendered communication between people impossible. One of the shorter songs on the album - Postcard Love - sums up this feeling very poignantly. "You'd be expecting lots of synthesizers all over the place and very electronic-type music. But it's the humane element I'm interested in... and I was quite pleased with the overall unity, on a vocal and lyrical level as well as instrumental."

Indeed. There's none of your screaming nuclear holocaust fall-out shock horror - more a sense of bleakness and despair - the same sort of glazed-eyed zomboid state that Bowie has been into on his last couple of albums. And somehow, though it's hard to say exactly how, 801 contrive to play music that is both melodic and exciting, whilst preserving that eerie undercurrent.

A lot of it has to do with the voice of vocalist Simon Ainley, a young "unknown" Phil has brought into the band to great effect. Simon's voice has the dry, unemotional quality of, say, Roger Waters when singing about pigs, dogs and rabbits but in fact thinking gloomily about how to spend that royalty cheque for yet another half-million spondoolies. Also in the touring band are Paul Thompson (ex-Roxy) on drums, Bill McCormick on bass and Dave Skinner on keyboards, another excellent singer. "It's a band now - that's the thing. It's not like a collection of individual names. Everybody on stage plays a very important part, which is great."

It's certainly different from the line-up on the album. Get a load of this list of session players: Dave Mattacks, Mel Collins, Simon Phillips, Kevin Godley, Lol Creme, Eddie Jobson, Eno... you probably get the picture. Surprisingly enough, it isn't a boring-old-fart superstar jam, as the cynical might expect. Phil retained a tight control over both arrangements and production to ensure that it sounded like 801, not Phil Manzanera on guitar, Bill McCormick on bass, Eno on... .etc. In short, a unit.

Inevitably the comparison with Roxy Music came up. To what extent is 801 a logical aftermath, I wondered? The demise of Roxy was, after all, a fair while back. Or was it?

"It's only eighteen months since we finished the last tour, in fact, which, if you go by The Who's standards isn't that long. They once spent about two years not playing together. We never officially split up, we never actually sat round and said, right, that's it, we'll issue a statement we're all splitting up. We've kept our options open. I'm sure we could record some great music together. But the actual practical side of things isn't right, and whether they'll ever be right is another matter. But we're all with the same record company and the same management, and that makes it very easy, if we wanted to, just to do it. But at the moment there are no plans to do anything."

Phil took another large bite out of his salad sandwich, swigged at the lager, tongued a wodge of food into his cheek, and stared thoughtfully into the middle distance. I rifled through my notes, wondering how to phrase the next question...

"If we could descend to the level of gear now," I began. He nodded approvingly and made a bread-filled sound. "I've got a whole new set-up now - it's fantastic. I decided this summer, when I was on holiday" (more gulping and swallowing, hands sketching in the air what words could not, at present, say) "thinking about my ultimate stage set-up. After spending five years with Roxy, going through all different types of systems, and I've had so many different things - guitar synthesizers and this and that, you name it - I decided to work out some system that was as simple as possible, but which had as many effects as possible. So I had this flight case built which has a front and a back which come off and has a rack inside it. And inside I have an MXR digital delay, a strobotuner, an Echoplex, a Yamaha 200 top, which has got lots of variables on it, and a Hiwatt. It's all in this unit, on wheels, and everything's plugged in, so all the roadie does is put one plug in the mains. And it's easy to service just by taking the front and back off."

"And presumably," I interjected, "you switch everything in and out from a pedalboard?"

"And then I had a pedalboard built," he continued, not to be deterred from his flow, "a very comprehensive pedalboard, built by Peter Cornish, and that gives me everything at the push of a button. I can have ADT with the digital delay, echo... I've got a compressor, I've got a lead and rhythm button. For the lead I use a small 25 watt Yamaha amp, which is on top of a Yamaha Leslie-type cabinet, which I use for rhythm. And I have it right by the side of me on stage, pointed in towards the band rather than at the back, and I have a monitor, for if I want to hear the little amp louder or something. And I have one guitar."

"Which is?"

"Which is one I borrowed off Lol, actually. It's Lol's Les Paul, that he bought off Dicky Betts. I'd never used a Les Paul on stage before.By having the digital, you can make it sound like a 12-string with the flanging effect. And it's got a great rhythm sound - and obviously Les Pauls have a great lead sound. So I've rationalized everything. The actual pedalboard I've got him to build quite small - it's not an enormous great thing that you have to tap-dance all over. So I'm really very pleased. I've never been so pleased with a set-up."

Traditionally Phil has been associated with an original red Gibson Firebird wit hgold-plated pick ups. He also has a Firebird whose shape is the reverse of that one, with three humbuckers. Then there's a '51 Telecaster. But what is it about this Les Paul that cuts the mustard in such admirable fashion?

"It's a '57. And Lol's kept it in immaculate condition. It's got the original case, and it's got all the original little pieces of paper that came with it, which I was amazed to see when I opened the box. Y'know, this is your new Les Paul."

So it seems that the older faithful standbys will be stashed away in a cupboard for some while as the newcomer is put through its paces. It doesn't actually sound much like a Les Paul, but then I suppose with all those effects that's hardly surprising. On the album, Phil's guitar is well down in the mix. It is not, in fact, the kind of album at all that we have come to expect from guitarists. He is only interested in guitars to the extent that they provide a section of the total sound. So a lot of it is that quiet multitracked sustained stuff that provides a nice backcloth for the other instruments.

"When you're producing something as well as playing, you try to think of the whole. I try to integrate my guitar parts. If there's a track which has got very important lyrics on it, I want those to be heard, I don't want the guitar to obliterate it all. But I want there to be a nice guitar line adding something to it. So if I work out something melodic, and also something that will blend in with the vocal line, and soundwise will blend in, I find that a smooth distorted tone will always cut through more than a very loud piercing tone on record. Wherever you put this fuzzy, sort of smooth tone in the mix, you'll always hear it."

By this time he was well into the third or fourth sandwich, and the gesticulating hands came into play once again as he told me how exactly to achieve the sound he was talking about.

"Well (glump glump) - (Who is this Glump? - Ed.) I put the guitar onto the bass pick up and I put the tone on full bass. Then I get the fuzz box, this one that Eno's got,(it's a very old WEM one) put a new battery in and put it on to absolute maximum. And then you have to play it without taking your fingers off the fretboard, otherwise it goes sort of graunch.(Graunch must be one of Glump's friends - Ed.) So you work out these lines that are fairly smooth, that run into each other, so you don't have to take your fingers off. And then you double-track them slightly out of tune. And that's it. And it always cuts through, the reason being that slight out-of-tuneness thing. You don't really notice it's out, but there's enough in the track to make it stick out. That's just one of the sounds. There are so many different sounds that I've spent time getting."

Most of them are to be found nestling between the grooves of Listen Now - an album which I wholeheartedly recommend, as much for its delicately tasteful production as for its fine songs. Manzanera is a craftsman in sound and atmosphere. He's also a a nice bloke. But at this point, with Phil's trip to Plymouth in the offing, it was time to press the STOP button on my trusty cassette recorder and head off down the Kings Road in search of a sandwich of my own.