Part Three

Pat: It seems to me that the record companies have now gotten themselves backed into a corner, where the way everything works now is that it is so expensive to promote anything the way it's got to be done and to play the game, that they can't afford to take chances on new artists and roll the dice anymore.

You get maybe one or two shots and then they've spent a million dollars on you for one bloody single!

Pete: I can't even fathom where that goes.

Pat: Well, I guess there's all kinds of, not payola, but there are now these "fly aways", right, where they go to the radio stations and say ok, you're going to play this artist. This artist is doing a tour, and if your station is in LA, we're going to give you five trips to give away to see the artist in New York, IF you play the record.

And the record company pays for all these flights, they pay for hotels, and this is the modern way you "grease the machine".

Pete: I am aware of that, but Avex doesn't do that, which makes them suffer in media exposure for their artists. And I realise from our days with Sony, who make everything that's electric, that Sony bands are on the cover of everything, they're on every TV show, because everybody who writes about them goes away with a MIniDisc or some fucking kind of TV.

It's not like that with our record label. They give away a copy of your record, a ticket to your gig, and that's it. That might have affected the progress of Fragile a little bit.

Pat: Yes, but that's the way it's SUPPOSED to be, and that's the tragedy of it.

Pete: Yeah, it's more honest, but it's a little bit frustrating, as well.

Pat: But it's just a shame that it's so difficult to do things the way they're supposed to be done. You have to play all these games or you don't get anywhere.

Pete: Yeah, it's just a changing climate. It's like complaining about the ozone layer disintegrating: whatever we do, we're not going to be able to put it back the way it was. So me, personally, I'm keeping on using hairspray.

Pat: (laughs) You know, you touched on Fan the Flame a few minutes ago, and to me, that's always been one of my favourite albums, but it's also the closest to the Pete Burns "piano bar" persona that we get glimpses of from time to time.

When I listen to that record, and I know what you mean when you say sometimes that maybe it sounded slightly old fashioned or middle-aged, BUT to me, whenever I listen to that record, like on "Perfect Stranger", I have this vision of like a big club in Miami or in Havana (before Castro), with all these showgirls with big headdresses in big lavish productions.

And then you come out on some big white piano, sitting on top of it, singing "Perfect Stranger". And it's like this great opulence and decadence.

Pete: It killed us with Sony, though, Pat, it absolutely killed us with the record company. I suppose because I look on the glorious days of the past, of how things were, and I think "Fuck, that album did it for me, it murdered me with the record company". Because they just had this terror I was turning into Frank Sinatra.

And they completely lost interest. It was like, "No, we don't want you to be like this." I was adament and stubborn and thought I had to do it. So I feel a bit ambivalent about that album when I talk about it as a body of work.

I did like the songs on it, and I can see what people saw in it. But I can also see what the record company got panicked about, because I suppose if that had been a successful album I might have turned into Dina Carroll.

Pat: Yeah, but you know what, Pete, I think the job of a record company is to take an artist and to nurture that creativity. You know, you give them this, and they should not say, "Oh, we're nervous, because this is different than you were last time."

Pete: They shit themselves (laughs).

Pat: They should say, "OK, great, how can we maximise this, so that as many people as possible a) hear it, and b) like it?" That's their fuckin' job! And if that's too scary for them, what are they doing in the record business?

Pete: Yeah, but it's recessions, isn't it, and...I don't know how I really feel about it. I haven't sat thinking too hard about it. It's almost as if I've become very Zen about it, what will happen will happen. And I really haven't got any fear about it.

I'm not going along like a robot. There are certain things that aren't suitable for me. There have been certain things I have been asked to do that are not suitable that I don't do. But if it's pretty stress-free and it's OK and it's going to work and the record company are willing to put their money up front for it, I'll go along and do it, and see what happens.

Because it can only get so far, and I don't know if this actually happens, but if your record company fucks up, there's got to be a certain amount of honour, where they go, "Oh, well, we tried it our way first and we really fucked up so maybe you should try it your way and we'll see what happens."

Pat: Yeah. One of the other things along the lines of what we were talking about there, I think that if they had promoted Fan the Flame and got behind it 100%, I don't think you would have turned into Dina Carroll. Because I think like any other artist who has creativity inside him, you would then have wanted to do something else. Maybe not the next month, but at some point, the pendulum would have shifted.

I mean, if you look at Nukleopatra, that was a very hard sound on there. And I think that you would have arrived at that anyway, in your natural...you get bored with things, and you want to move on. You don't like doing the same thing over and over.

Pete: No, but it's my sentence in life isn't it? I've got Spin Me Round coming out of my backside (laughs)...

Pat: (laughs)

Pete: I've been sentenced to do the same thing over and over again. I don't know, I don't have a black and white answer for those things, really. But I know that the hardcore kids...you know, I should never have looked at that message board!

Pat: (laughs)

Pete: I never will again!

Pat: No, I don't recommend it, Pete. Because it even makes me nervous reading it. And I'm not trying to put down the fans at all.

Pete: Neither am I, because they're entitled to their opinions.

Pat: Of course.

Pete: But I don't want to read people's minds.

Pat: I don't either. And I don't like...if I talk to you...you know, these discussions are like between us and then we share them because we know people are interested.

But I don't really like to hear other people's comments about what you're saying or what I'm saying because then...

Pete: Well, they've got to be in my shoes for awhile. Sometimes some things are hurtful. They misconstrue a lot of things. But then again I'm not what I am, and how I look, and what I do, FOR them or anyone else. I am that for ME. And if they happen to take interest in it and like it, well, great! And if they don't like it, fuck off.

Pat: Yeah.

Pete: But somewhere along the way, and I've seen what's been written on other people's message boards, and it's like some kids are acting like they're industry moguls, saying what the artist should do and how the artist should look, "the artist did this wrong" and blah blah blah.

And it's like, who the fuck are you to have an opinion?

Pat: It's almost like role-playing, I think. People get their chance to put themselves in the position of a radio mogul and act like that.

Pete: Yeah, but how quick they are to take up that opportunity! It just amazes me. I don't really get to meet that many kids who like what I do, and I call them kids but they're probably not kids anymore...But people who like what I do, I don't really meet them, and I think it's quite good that way. I really think it's much healthier that way.

But their opinions...God, some of the stuff I read! I know that even discussing it will fire them up to put even more of that crap up there!

Pat: (laughs) Well, you won't know, because you're not going to look at it!

Pete: No! You know, one night, I don't know how I did it, but I went on the Right Stuff website and I just clicked, and then I had this whole catalogue of a million websites. And I think I started off at 9:00 at night and I was there till 5:00 the next morning. And I was suffering rage syndrome, I wanted to start replying to them.

But you should never know those things, you should never pay attention to what people are saying. But it's just the fact that if they like someone like me who does what I do, how can they possibly think they can express those opinions as though they naturally assume I am going to read them.

Because it's the way things are worded, and the way they are written. They naturally assume I am going to see those things, and cut my cloth to suit their order.

Pat: Yeah, it's a bit presumptuous at times, I suppose. Pete, it's a two edged sword, I think, the relationship between the performer...you already know all this, obviously. But it just brings it to my attention, that people want to know you better, but at the same time I think a certain distance between the "star" (in inverted commas) and the audience is a good thing.

Pete: It's got to happen.

Pat: Otherwise we'll wind up with Big Brother. You'll be the person they're looking at in the morning, scratching his ass and, you know, brushing his teeth. And that's not what a star is all about.

TO BE CONTINUED...

(c) Copyright 2001 Pat Geary. Not to be reproduced in whole or in part without written permission.