feeling blue

-- Record Mirror, 4 June 1988

Scritti Politti are back with their single 'Oh Patti' and Green Gartside is so busy that the poor boy hasn't even got any time to do his washing. Nancy Culp lends a sympathetic ear

Reproduced with kind permission from Record Mirror.
© 1997 Miller Freeman Entertainment. All rights reserved.

Outside in the streets of Soho, it's a fine summer afternoon. Inside the management offices of Scritti Politti hovers a little black raincloud in the bronzed healthy-looking form of mainman Green Gartside.

Just back from the Montreux pop festival and slotting in this interview before video meetings and a trip to Holland to promote the new single 'Oh Patti', he's feeling more than a bit sorry for himself.

Loudly bemoaning the fact that he has no clean clothes to take with him and no time to do the washing (yes, he does his own!(, he mentions that "the Gaultier is at the bottom of the wardrobe covered in make-up" (that's a suit to you and me) and that all he has to wear is what he stands up in. What's more, his house is falling to pieces, he hasn't got the time to wait in for the workmen to fix it, his phone isn't working and he's plum tuckered out.

After spending two and a half years working on 'Provision', the follow-up to the occasionally brilliant, occasionally flawed 'Cupid And Psyche '85' album, Green is once again back on the promotional treadmill.

Although the single and the album are no great radical departure from their predecessor, they're a fine, well-constructed, classy continuation of the theme. Suitably 'up' and soulful, 'Provision' is just the sort of thing fine summer days are enhanced by.

However, on this fine summer day, the charming Mr. Gartside is sipping black coffee and looking a mite tired. For once though, he isn't intellectualising himself out of existence as he's sometimes prone to doing, and it's a very much the lighter side of Green on show.

Rumour has it you were being a bit rock 'n' roll in Montreux.
Oh shite! What did you hear? What was I doing? Tell me, tell me!

Oh, just that you were seen clutching your head one morning saying "My God, I'm turning into a rock 'n' roll animal"!
Oh yeah...I did have a bit of a...

So you like your booze then, do you?
YES!! I like a drink. Nothing really happened...

Do you find yourself getting sucked into that rock 'n' roll circus part of it easily?
I don't get sucked into it because I disappear for so long to make records. It's not my kind of thing anyway...He lied! No, I'm not a very rock 'n' roll person.

Do you feel that you think too much for all that?
It's not true actually. It's a story that they ell...I mean, I read interviews with me and I wouldn't recognise myself in them at all. In fact, if I didn't know me and I read any of the interviews with me, I'd think "What a dick!". Occasionally you read things and you get quite hurt, but I deal with that by mainly not reading things. I'm old enough now for it to be like 'This is stupid'.

Do you think that some journalists see you as some sort of intellectual challenge?
Definitely. It's become a convenient thing to label me with. And to some extent, I wouldn't deny it. I'm not an intellectual though. I'm a pop musician and I have read books and I'm not going to lie about that. I don't read all day and every day by any means and I make no apology for the fact that I like reading books occasionally...

Do you ever slob out in front of the telly?
God! Are you kidding? A lot of the time! When I was in the studio in America, I was really bad at just picking up a six pack at the corner on the way back from the studio and a huge bag of pretzels and stuff and I'd sit and watch garbage television for hours and hours...And I do the same here, given the opportunity! The best nights are 'Coronation Street' followed by 'Brookside'...bag of crisps! I love it! Absolutely love it! I'm a big 'Brookside fan. What's happened with Sheila and Bobby? When she went clubbing and came back and the two men had followed them home, I was on the edge of my seat! I had a lot of sympathy for Bobby.

Why?
I don't know, I just do. I feel bad for Sheila too...Why are we talking about this?

Because I don't want to start talking about the history of art or anything like that. Because I'm bored of reading interviews with you where you're spouting great long eulogies.
Me too!

Let's have the lighter side of Green, because there must be one. It sounds, though, on your records, like every single word and note is really worked on. Is that true?
To some extent...In terms of working the stuff out, that doesn't take very long at all. The writing of it is the most fun and there's actually very little hair-pulling goes on about that.

Why did it take you three years to make this album then?
It's partly because we don't play live and these songs have never been performed before you get into the studio. You go and sing and you think "Jesus, how the hell am I going to do this?". It's difficult for me because I'm not really a singer anyway and the only time I ever sing is for a couple of months every three years...And a lot of it is to do with battling technology. You can spend weeks fighting with a Synclavier (very sophisticated synthesiser).

Don't you ever wish you could just go in and make an album in three weeks?
Yes. I do now and I think that this new album and 'Cupid And Psyche' were two albums of a type that took a lot of time and money to make, and concern themselves with a certain way of making a record and writing songs. It took two albums to develop that ground and consolidate it and now I'll quite happily go and make a completely different kind of record which needn't take that long.

Do you feel that you've opened up the floodgates for all these white boys singing souly stuff?
No! I don't sing with a white soul voice.

I was thinking about people who could be influenced by you. Bros maybe?
They like us...Scritti are a group that other musicians like. More than the public do probably but that's fine...That's cool. I like Bros. I do! I think they're groovy; the guy can sing...

If you were 19 again, would you like to be in a group like that?
If I were to start now and I were 19 I'd probably just want to make the wickedest, deftest sort of white hip hop or something like that. If you pointed me out as I am now to the me that signed to Rough Trade, I would've hated me. Looking back on the very first records we did, a lot of it just sucked. It was really immature and stupid. But then if you pointed me out now to the me that was then, I would've thought what I'm doing now sucked.

Are you very moody?
I can think back five or six years when I'd just go off at the wildest things. Now I say "Good grief, did I really do that?". I'd violently lose my temper which I don't do any more.

Perhaps you've calmed down.
That's what it is...Just age! It's also learning from experience. When you've smashed a TV set up once you think twice about it.

Don't tell me you've done that!
No, no! Well...I did, yeah, actually, yes, I did it once. But that was a long time ago!

What happened to Green as a sex symbol/male model?
Never was. Never happened.

What about those Vogue photos in al the Gaultier gear?
Someone asked me to do some photos. Actually, I hate all that. I hate having to be the front man. I never did like it very much, it always scared me which is why we didn't play live.

Were you joking when you mentioned the Gaultier in the bottom of the wardrobe earlier?
Oh no, I do have one, like everybody else...

Everybody else? Hang on a minute! It's a bit expensive...
Well, erm, I like some of that stuff, then some days I don't want to go near it.

You're obviously not used to being teased, are you?
No, well I told you, journalists very often come along and take me much too seriously. It's not difficult really, is it?

What's next for you then?
Months and months of schlepping around the world doing promotion for this album which I'm simply thrilled about?! After that I don't know. Possibly go and write for other people or maybe go to Jamaica and make a record of my own. It's pointless thinking about it now, this record may completely stiff and I'll continue to be broke like I am now...

So you're no loaded then?
You're kidding me! I spend every penny I ever earn. It goes back into making records and the money's run out...

So it's the broken biscuit counter of Woolworths for you?
It won't be the first time? Are we done? Have you finished beating me up then?