Post by ©KAJAMANIA Board Team (Slim K) on Jun 9, 2004 23:34:03 GMT -5
hi Kajamaniac's 
PART II
here's a Brand-New Interview w. Nick Beggs by the REMEMBER THE EIGHTIES ...
Kajagoogoo 2004
YOU WORK WITH A HUGE NUMBER OF EIGHTIES ARTISTS TOO, MANY OF THEM THROUGH YOUR MUSICAL DIRECTOR WORK FOR THE 'HERE & NOW' TOURS... IS THE 'HERE & NOW' TYPE CIRCUIT SOMETHING YOU'D LIKE TO DO WITH KAJAGOOGOO THIS TIME AROUND?
No, I don't think we'll be doing any 'Here & Now' type stuff, the reason being that I don't know whether there's enough interest in the UK - in America there is which is ironic, but I think in the UK without Limahl there's not enough interest. if we had Limahl on board I think we would get some interest for things like that...
I MIGHT BE PROJECTING HERE, BUT I IMAGINE THAT SITUATION COULD BE QUITE REFRESHING IN THAT IT ALLOWS YOU, THE NEW KAJAGOOGOO, TO BE WHATEVER YOU WANT TO BE?
Yes, I think it does actually free us up to be more contemporary in our thinking because in a lot of respects we can experiment a lot more with the things that Steve, Stu and I are passionate about, whereas if we went out with the original five-piece as an 'eighties' act I think it would have to be more retrospective... going out as we are we will be playing the hits but when we make the next record we will be able to be more experimental and take some risks...
WHICH I IMAGINE WILL BE MORE EXCITING...
Personally it is, but there's less money in it!
HOW IMPORTANT IS THE MONEY?
I think money is very important to everybody, I try to live my life as though it doesn't matter but I'm a very careful person with money. I make sure that we live well within our means and I don't let my wife have a credit card! (loud laughter) We've all been in debt and we all understand the burden of debt, but I'm afraid society is spiraling towards a place where it untenable to continue the way we are. Environmentally and financially we cannot live in a world where we have to better last year's figures from an industrial level on a global scale to a personal home economic level you just can't live like that...
Having said all that there are times when I will turn work down because I don't want to work with that person, or because I just don't feel I should be doing it...
AFTER KAJAGOOGOO ORIGINALLY SPLIT YOU WORKED IN THE MUSIC INDUSTRY AS AN A&R MAN FOR A WHILE DIDN'T YOU? I DON'T SUPPOSE YOU MISS THOSE DAYS...
I'd do it all again in a heartbeat, I really would... I loved it - it was really great and I pissed a lot of people off, but I really enjoyed it... not the pissing people off but genuinely making records from an artistic point of view rather from the headspace of commerce, and coming across people who genuinely had a lot of ability but the record company just couldn't see it and could only see them in terms of a potential sales-sheet. Then seeing what's happened to a lot of people since, people like Skunk Anansie who in those early days weren't ready to be signed and it took another good year, more than that, and even Oasis who sent me stuff and was talking to them and then I got made redundant!
ALTHOUGH I SUPPOSE ALL THOSE GOOD THINGS ARE STILL A BIG PART OF YOUR LIFE IN THAT YOU CAN MAKE RECORDS FROM AN EMOTIONAL AND CREATIVE POINT OF VIEW RATHER THAN FROM A COMMERCIAL STANDPOINT...
Um, yes... although I am trying to apply both with Industrial Salt and I'm very much trying to be a business manager as well as a musician and writer. I heard Simon Cowell say something - and I don't very often listen to what he says - and he said something that I thought was very interesting, he said 'I Want to make records that I like, and I know that if I like it somebody else will', and I look back at some of the records I've made and I think 'no that's just too cringeworthy' or 'that's just daft, what was I thinking', but some of the later stuff I've just made from the solar plexus and it's just kind of got more... staying power, and I hope that will be the case with Industrial Salt.
WHAT EXACTLY IS THE 'INDUSTRIAL SALT' PROJECT?
It's two girls - they're very young, only seventeen, which I think is probably too old for the music industry in this day and age... they seem to like pre-pubescent's now don't they? But I'm going to go out on a limb here and stick with it because they're really great. The thing about them is that they're just really unassuming young kids who are very bright and have a lot of ideas and attitude about music and life, but also hate so much... I don't mean that they hate everything but there is so much in the music industry and the world that they just detest, and I identify with that I really do, because I get so angry about things. I think my wife despairs of me (in the background there is a muffled 'Yes' from Nick's wife Ann) and thinks I should go on 'Grumpy Old Men' because I can't watch television, and I can't go out, and I can't listen to the radio - apart from radio 4 - there are just SO many things that just make me seethe!
HOW DID YOU GET INVOLVED WITH THEM IN THE FIRST PLACE?
Long story, but what happened was that one of my colleagues - Steve Askew from Kajagoogoo, who is virtually my neighbour and lives over the road - has a studio and has some students and one day about a year ago he said 'I've been teaching this girl since she was thirteen and now we're doing a piece of music for her music A-level and she's brought her mate in to sing it while she plays guitar, and what do you think of this song?' and I listened to it and I said that it was a hit record... so we started working on some other stuff over the past year and it's gone really well.
We've sent stuff off to various places and we've got Japanese investment and a couple of labels over here are showing some interest, and they keep on calling to see if the girls are ready to see live yet, and I keep saying not yet, not yet because I want it all to be right first. Stylistically I'd put it between Garbage and Shampoo...
SO WHAT EXACTLY IS YOUR ROLE IN ALL OF THIS?
Writer, musician, A&R man, producer manager and cat juggler! Along with my partner Steve Askew... but I think it will be at least another year because we're still embryonic and we have to put the right band together around them - at the moment Steve and I are playing for them, and I don't know if we will continue to play for them or get a younger band in - I don't want it to look like two girls with a couple of crusty old men in the background. But it's all coming together and we've got David Stopps Management coming in to help us, who look after Howard Jones...
SO, WHAT'S NEXT FOR YOU... THERE'S LOADS ON THE HORIZON FOR KAJAGOOGOO AND FOR ALL YOUR OTHER PROJECTS, HOW DO YOU SEE IT ALL UNFOLDING?
Well the first thing I need to do it to buy ant powder because the house has been overrun with ants! Then I have to practise the Kajagoogoo music and vocals, I have to rehearse with the band and tweak the live set, I've got to start production on the Industrial Salt album because the money has come through from japan, I have to set up contracts between my production company and Industrial Salt and the management company, I've also got a few gigs with other people... ABC have quite a lot of shows coming up, last week I did a couple of shows with Nick Heyward, Toyah and Ben from Curiosity... corporate shows, and I'm off to Nick's birthday party tonight... funnily enough Nik Kershaw came over last week and Ann said we should do a tour... 'The Three Nicks' so maybe we'll do that too!
Oh, and I'm going to interview Chris Squire - I'm going to one of the Yes concerts in Exeter and I'm going to interview him for my bass magazine and it's going to be a cover story as well...
But first I have to buy ant powder!
MAY 2004
thanks to www.remembertheeighties.com/
peace & love
SLIM K
PART II
here's a Brand-New Interview w. Nick Beggs by the REMEMBER THE EIGHTIES ...
Kajagoogoo 2004
YOU WORK WITH A HUGE NUMBER OF EIGHTIES ARTISTS TOO, MANY OF THEM THROUGH YOUR MUSICAL DIRECTOR WORK FOR THE 'HERE & NOW' TOURS... IS THE 'HERE & NOW' TYPE CIRCUIT SOMETHING YOU'D LIKE TO DO WITH KAJAGOOGOO THIS TIME AROUND?
No, I don't think we'll be doing any 'Here & Now' type stuff, the reason being that I don't know whether there's enough interest in the UK - in America there is which is ironic, but I think in the UK without Limahl there's not enough interest. if we had Limahl on board I think we would get some interest for things like that...
I MIGHT BE PROJECTING HERE, BUT I IMAGINE THAT SITUATION COULD BE QUITE REFRESHING IN THAT IT ALLOWS YOU, THE NEW KAJAGOOGOO, TO BE WHATEVER YOU WANT TO BE?
Yes, I think it does actually free us up to be more contemporary in our thinking because in a lot of respects we can experiment a lot more with the things that Steve, Stu and I are passionate about, whereas if we went out with the original five-piece as an 'eighties' act I think it would have to be more retrospective... going out as we are we will be playing the hits but when we make the next record we will be able to be more experimental and take some risks...
WHICH I IMAGINE WILL BE MORE EXCITING...
Personally it is, but there's less money in it!
HOW IMPORTANT IS THE MONEY?
I think money is very important to everybody, I try to live my life as though it doesn't matter but I'm a very careful person with money. I make sure that we live well within our means and I don't let my wife have a credit card! (loud laughter) We've all been in debt and we all understand the burden of debt, but I'm afraid society is spiraling towards a place where it untenable to continue the way we are. Environmentally and financially we cannot live in a world where we have to better last year's figures from an industrial level on a global scale to a personal home economic level you just can't live like that...
Having said all that there are times when I will turn work down because I don't want to work with that person, or because I just don't feel I should be doing it...
AFTER KAJAGOOGOO ORIGINALLY SPLIT YOU WORKED IN THE MUSIC INDUSTRY AS AN A&R MAN FOR A WHILE DIDN'T YOU? I DON'T SUPPOSE YOU MISS THOSE DAYS...
I'd do it all again in a heartbeat, I really would... I loved it - it was really great and I pissed a lot of people off, but I really enjoyed it... not the pissing people off but genuinely making records from an artistic point of view rather from the headspace of commerce, and coming across people who genuinely had a lot of ability but the record company just couldn't see it and could only see them in terms of a potential sales-sheet. Then seeing what's happened to a lot of people since, people like Skunk Anansie who in those early days weren't ready to be signed and it took another good year, more than that, and even Oasis who sent me stuff and was talking to them and then I got made redundant!
ALTHOUGH I SUPPOSE ALL THOSE GOOD THINGS ARE STILL A BIG PART OF YOUR LIFE IN THAT YOU CAN MAKE RECORDS FROM AN EMOTIONAL AND CREATIVE POINT OF VIEW RATHER THAN FROM A COMMERCIAL STANDPOINT...
Um, yes... although I am trying to apply both with Industrial Salt and I'm very much trying to be a business manager as well as a musician and writer. I heard Simon Cowell say something - and I don't very often listen to what he says - and he said something that I thought was very interesting, he said 'I Want to make records that I like, and I know that if I like it somebody else will', and I look back at some of the records I've made and I think 'no that's just too cringeworthy' or 'that's just daft, what was I thinking', but some of the later stuff I've just made from the solar plexus and it's just kind of got more... staying power, and I hope that will be the case with Industrial Salt.
WHAT EXACTLY IS THE 'INDUSTRIAL SALT' PROJECT?
It's two girls - they're very young, only seventeen, which I think is probably too old for the music industry in this day and age... they seem to like pre-pubescent's now don't they? But I'm going to go out on a limb here and stick with it because they're really great. The thing about them is that they're just really unassuming young kids who are very bright and have a lot of ideas and attitude about music and life, but also hate so much... I don't mean that they hate everything but there is so much in the music industry and the world that they just detest, and I identify with that I really do, because I get so angry about things. I think my wife despairs of me (in the background there is a muffled 'Yes' from Nick's wife Ann) and thinks I should go on 'Grumpy Old Men' because I can't watch television, and I can't go out, and I can't listen to the radio - apart from radio 4 - there are just SO many things that just make me seethe!
HOW DID YOU GET INVOLVED WITH THEM IN THE FIRST PLACE?
Long story, but what happened was that one of my colleagues - Steve Askew from Kajagoogoo, who is virtually my neighbour and lives over the road - has a studio and has some students and one day about a year ago he said 'I've been teaching this girl since she was thirteen and now we're doing a piece of music for her music A-level and she's brought her mate in to sing it while she plays guitar, and what do you think of this song?' and I listened to it and I said that it was a hit record... so we started working on some other stuff over the past year and it's gone really well.
We've sent stuff off to various places and we've got Japanese investment and a couple of labels over here are showing some interest, and they keep on calling to see if the girls are ready to see live yet, and I keep saying not yet, not yet because I want it all to be right first. Stylistically I'd put it between Garbage and Shampoo...
SO WHAT EXACTLY IS YOUR ROLE IN ALL OF THIS?
Writer, musician, A&R man, producer manager and cat juggler! Along with my partner Steve Askew... but I think it will be at least another year because we're still embryonic and we have to put the right band together around them - at the moment Steve and I are playing for them, and I don't know if we will continue to play for them or get a younger band in - I don't want it to look like two girls with a couple of crusty old men in the background. But it's all coming together and we've got David Stopps Management coming in to help us, who look after Howard Jones...
SO, WHAT'S NEXT FOR YOU... THERE'S LOADS ON THE HORIZON FOR KAJAGOOGOO AND FOR ALL YOUR OTHER PROJECTS, HOW DO YOU SEE IT ALL UNFOLDING?
Well the first thing I need to do it to buy ant powder because the house has been overrun with ants! Then I have to practise the Kajagoogoo music and vocals, I have to rehearse with the band and tweak the live set, I've got to start production on the Industrial Salt album because the money has come through from japan, I have to set up contracts between my production company and Industrial Salt and the management company, I've also got a few gigs with other people... ABC have quite a lot of shows coming up, last week I did a couple of shows with Nick Heyward, Toyah and Ben from Curiosity... corporate shows, and I'm off to Nick's birthday party tonight... funnily enough Nik Kershaw came over last week and Ann said we should do a tour... 'The Three Nicks' so maybe we'll do that too!
Oh, and I'm going to interview Chris Squire - I'm going to one of the Yes concerts in Exeter and I'm going to interview him for my bass magazine and it's going to be a cover story as well...
But first I have to buy ant powder!
MAY 2004
thanks to www.remembertheeighties.com/
peace & love
SLIM K
