If you are new to my blog let me explain: I do this thing where I transcribe audio from Talk Talk interviews where no text is available for the purpose of providing non-English speakers accessibility to those interviews.
So, let me make this clear, I claim no rights to the interview and my transcript is solely for accessibility and educational purposes.
I must apologize now, I'm really sorry this is taking so long. I've not had a chance to sit down and get to the other two parts of the interview, so I humbly present this very rough draft of the first part of the interview above (the other two parts are linked below). - Update - It's now all done!
As always, Brits, if I've clearly messed up something they've said, please let me know in the comments below. If anyone notices some seriously strange typos and grammatical issues in the text, also, let me know. I'll will happily keep this up to date and corrected.
Historic Films - Talk Talk Interview (3 parts)
Some things to note: We [yup... this is a group effort!] are in the process of trying to pin down exactly where they were. We assumed it was possibly Atlanta, Georgia - September 1, 1982 but have since been corrected as the incident they refer to about the preacher in the news happened on September 3rd and wasn't widely reported in the media until September 6th. I'm tentatively amending this to Miami until someone can definitively correct it for me - show me some proof!) - on tour with Elvis Costello & the Attractions.
The notation (?) throughout the text indicates items where I was not clear on who was speaking or what was being said)
Interviewer: Okay, let’s do a mic check quick. Let me just have you tell me what your name is and where you’re from.
Mark: Mark. I’m from London, England.
Interviewer 1: Okay. And…
Paul Webb: Paul I’m from London, in England as well. One. Two.
Interviewer 2: Once again.
Mark: Which one? Me as well? I’m alright.
Paul: One, two. Testing. One. (whistling)
Second Interviewer(?): Is that (unintelligible) mic…
Mark: So do you just work this area?
Interviewer 1: Yeah. We work Florida and the south east, pretty much, yeah. There’s so many recording studios down here that we never really have to leave this area. There’s always someone either coming through on tour or coming down to live and record.
Mark: Sure, sure.
Interviewer 1: So we get a lot of stories out here. We got criteria…
Mark: So how bad is the violence ‘round here. ’Cos, I mean, when I was, like, up in London, like, this cop he was telling me down here is the worst place in the whole of the States.
Interviewer 1: That’s what the image would lead everybody to believe. I dunno. I mean personally -
Mark: But it’s lies, is it?
Interviewer 1: Yeah. It’s nice down here I don’t…
Interviewer 2: Yeah it’s like any place, it depends where you go.
Interviewer 1: Yeah.
Mark: And what you look like.
Interviewer 2: There’s places in London that are terrific and there’s places you just don’t hang out at.
Mark: Oh yeah. That’s right.
Interviewer 1: Yeah, I mean it’s not really a (totally (?)) violent place.
Mark: That’s right. I live at one of them.
Interviewer 1: It’s not that chaotic. I mean, I just read a story in the paper in San Francisco. A street preacher was preaching and someone, a bunch of teenagers taunted him, so he jumped in a Mustang, a ‘65 Mustang, and ran right in to a crowd on the street and killed… I mean, total chaos you know, people… They jumped on this guy and beat him senseless. But anyway, let’s not talk about violence. Talk Talk’s playing tonight. Tell me, give me a little detail on how you’ve hooked up with Elvis Costello.
Mark: Well, a couple of months ago I came over to New York with Keith, our manager. We spent about three days in New York and three days over on the west coast which was primarily just to meet record company people. At the same time, when we were in New York, we were visiting agencies about, sort of, possibilities of what tours to do, you know. Elvis was one of the ones suggested and I mean the reason that we thought it would be a good idea to do the tour with him is just basically, I mean, he is a song writer and he’s gonna appeal to a listening audience, you know. And we wanted to play to an audience who were actually prepared to listen.
Interviewer 1: As opposed to an AC/DC crowd.
Paul: Yeah.
Mark: Sure, and wanting to bang their heads, you know. I mean I got nothing against it, but you know.
Interviewer 1: What can you tell me about, Paul, have you met Elvis personally or?
Paul: Yeah. Well we… Yeah, we’ve met him. But I mean it’s just one of those things where you keep your distance from people.
Mark: Yeah. We’ve met him but we’re never admitting it. You know.
Paul: Yeah.
Mark: It’s one of them things.
Interviewer 1: What makes him, you think, so un-accessible to even the people that tour with him, you’d think that wouldn’t be the case. You’d be more open to talk music with his peers, you know.
Mark: Are we talking about Elvis?
Interviewer 1: Well, I want to talk about you too, but I wanna first …
Mark: Sure. Sure. I hoped you’d say that.
Interviewer 1: I mean nothing special that makes him hard to work with? I mean.. as a tour? Like the fans, for example, think that when bands tour together they’re partying together and they’re hanging around together. That’s not the case all the time, is it?
Mark: No. Like, obviously not. I mean, from a time schedule point of view, I mean, as we’re sort of heading out of the gig he’s heading in to the gig, stuff like that. I mean -
Paul: I mean he’s got the same attitude as we have. We just get on with the job, you know. And I mean we think it’s a bit silly, just all mixing and having… I mean we’re here for a purpose after all, you know. I mean, we’re here to play the States. I mean, he’s here to … whatever..
Interviewer 1: This is your first tour of the states?
Mark: That’s right, yeah.
Interviewer 1: Tell me how it’s been going and describe if you can briefly, your activities over the last six (?)
Mark: Well I mean in terms of an actual tour it’s been quite an easy one because we’ve been having, sort of, one day off out of every four. So it’s been pretty easy going. This thing with Elvis, we actually picked up his tour half way through, so we just essentially doing the east coast. We’ve got about another four more gigs to do with him which ends on the 6th of September. Then we’re going up to New York to do club dates then out to the West Coast to do some of the clubs out there.
Interviewer 1: A lot of your work is very accessible to clubs around…
Mark: Sure. Well, you see that whole club scene is really important in England as much as it is over here. And I mean that’s true of like, the advent of videos. Well, I mean, in England the use of videos in clubs has really been coming on strong recently. I mean, even to the extent where in England now they’ve actually started putting video jukeboxes in the pubs, so that like, you know, for your equivalent of like say about half a dollar, rather than just having the record come up on the machine you can actually watch whatever video you want. I mean-
Paul: In a lot of ways in England video has ‘come more important. Which isn’t a good thing really but there’s a lot of bands that are on the charts in England at the moment who just do videos and just do the records and never play live at all.
Interviewer 1: Why do you think it’s not a good thing from your point of view.
Paul: I think a band should play live, you know. I think they owe it to the people.
Interviewer 1: How does Talk Talk approach the club, do you do video / half live or how do you mix that up? Or you, do you just, I mean…
Mark: We… we see, the way video’s work in Britain is only as like a promotional thing. I mean you’d never use them to actually substitute for a live performance. It’s like, this whole thing with sort of, like synthesizer work and everything like that in general has become an increasingly strong trend in Britain is there are like a couple of drawbacks to it which are… It’s like they’re content on being reliant on sort of using tape, using drum machines and things so that with sort of certain groups they’re not actually capable of delivering live what they can deliver on record. So from that point of view it is a bad thing, you know. It’s sort of almost going to that sort of set up of it being like studio bands rather than performing bands.
Paul: Yeah there’s a few bands in England that are actually lip-syncing live.
Mark: Yeah.
Paul: They’re not actually doing anything. They’re just making nice videos. I mean we’re really into videos and we do ‘em to the best of our ability.
Interviewer 1: How many have you done?
Mark: We’ve done three.
Paul: We’ve done three now.
Mark: What we did, we did two videos with-for Talk Talk. We did one with Russell Mulcahy, which was to sort of use the thing of using extras, stuff like that I mean, we actually made that video first for Talk Talk, which is the one you were showing. What actually happened was in England, they actually, there were a lot of shows which refused to play it because they sort of like, you know the fact that we had people sort of without mouths and we had people in it with dark glasses who were like maybe blind people and things. It was sort of considered to be in possibly in bad taste. So what we actually had to do was with Talk Talk was to do an alternative video which would, you know, get shown on certain shows. I mean, we’ve actually now got a new single out in England and we’ve just done a video for that with another director again. What we’ve actually done with that is, with rather than it being a thing where the band is the central subject of the video we’ve got an 8-year-old kid who is sort of like the star of the video you know, in the same way like with our first Talk Talk one the monkey is the obvious star. You know what I mean?
Interviewer 1: You’re seen in the video, but not that much?
Mark: Yeah, I mean we’re in sort of fantasy sequences that this kid has, sorta like, you know, E.T. It’s like, you know, the British version of of E.T.
Interviewer 1: So you like the idea of the different ways videos can be done instead of the band up there playing their instruments?
Mark: Yeah, yeah. I mean it’s really important. I always like in videos if the band are actually in it to see them doing it rather than sort of faking it, you know, doing it as if it were for real. At the same time it’s like with anything if you want it to get repeatedly played it must have things in it aside from just specifically the band performing.
Interviewer 1: That’s what we spoke about earlier, the repeatability factor of that.
Mark: Yeah. Sure, sure.
Paul: Yeah.
Interviewer 1: The club dates that you’ve got scheduled in the States will they include your promotional video clips? In other words, will you maybe show those while you’re backstage and then come out on stage and do it live or do you think they won’t even being showing that?
Mark: I would think they wouldn’t even be showing that. No. I don’t -
Paul: Yeah. I mean we don’t like to cross the two. I mean a video should be a video and a performance should be a performance. And at the moment we don’t think we’re at the stage where we… If you integrate the two it’s gotta be done properly. And we don’t think we’re at that stage yet.
Interviewer 1: There are some bands that have managed to combine the live medium and the video …
Mark: Oh sure, sure.
Interviewer 1: You know (unintelligible) it’s quite successful. It’s like a band warm up instead of having an opening band or something. Show your videos prior to your coming on stage. It gets them all excited about actually seeing you.
Mark: Sure, you see the only problem with doing that with Talk Talk is that they’re gonna wanna know where the monkey is, you know?
Paul: Yeah.
Interviewer 1: You’ll have to bring him on the road with you.
Mark: Yeah.
Interviewer 2: It’s like Devo with Booji Boy. You know those characters.
Interviewer 1: Tell me how you - Mark, you’ve been around the music business for a while. I know your brother Ed Hollis was involved with Eddie and the Hot Rods for a bit?
Mark: That’s right. Sure.
Interviewer 1: And how did that - How do you see your involvement in that? Were you anxious to get started on your own career?
Mark: Well I - It’s like with anything, I mean, with any sort of big brother, you always sort of, look towards what they’re doing. It certainly, sort of made the whole music business that much more apparent to me than otherwise it wouldn’t have done. At the same time, you know, right from sort of, when I was like say 12, and that, he was making me up tapes of music that otherwise I would never have even got to hear. I mean in terms of the actual formation of this band he was important because it actually started around me going in to do some publishing. Like a sort of publishing contract, right. Just purely for songwriting. At the same point my brother Ed was working in another studio, and Lee and Paul who are the rhythm section, were actually working on that session and he suggested to them maybe they come up and sort of try working with me. And it was just something that was really happening so we just sort of took it from there.
Interviewer 1: So the idea of forming a band to perform your music was the best way to go rather than just publish it and let other artists do it.
Mark: Yeah, I mean, obviously, I always would rather have played it than just sort of write it for someone else to do because the actual performance of it is one of the most important things about, sort of, doing music. It was just like, sort of, good fortune, the way it all sort of fell in to place. I mean, right down to - it was like, we had one week in the studio to go in and do some demos for the publishing deal. Within that first week it was obvious things were happening really sort of strongly. So we did the publishing deal, we used the money from the publishing deal to sort of finance us in rehearsal for a six month period. After like five months of being in rehearsal we got hold of Jimmy Miller, you know, he sort of produced things like Jumping Jack Flash, Spencer Davis, Traffic, stuff like that and he came in and did some demos with us. We put those out to the record companies. We then did five, like, London nightclub dates. After the third one of those we got a session on, like, Radio One which is the major radio network in England and after that like the deals really sort of started coming in. It has been very fast. I mean I think we’ve been really lucky [and] fortunate in the timing.
Interviewer 1: The demos that you had done were done at Island Studios right?
Mark: Yeah, that’s right.
Interviewer 1: How did you get from Island to EMI America? How come Island didn’t pick you up, ‘cos- ?
Mark: I don’t know. I mean you know they were just like - it’s easier to tell you why we signed with EMI and that was just, you know, like really apparent with a lot of their artists that actually seen developing their careers properly. So that was actually why we signed with EMI in England. And then from there EMI America wanted to take us.
Interviewer 1: Being on the Duran Duran tour probably a great way to break the States too, or that association will help, [do] you think, in this country.
Mark: I don’t think it will help in this country. It certainly helped in England, because when we actually did that tour we were sort of, you know, we were playing to capacity audiences, that we knew, there was, like, a very good probability they were going to like the sort of thing we were doing. So it was certainly good from that point of view. I mean, to me, I think Costello’s a good person to do a tour with over here. I mean, that’s why we chose him.
Interviewer 1: Right, maybe it is, because there… you know, the guitar-less bands, this new trend seems to be a softer, more listenable, rhythmic, you know, thing to be involved in and if you’re exposed to that type of an audience it can only do good things for expanding …
Mark: Sure. Mm. Well you see the whole sort of idea when around this band was actually formed in terms of not using a guitar and everything was sort of not that much in line with a lot of the other sort of contemporary English bands that we’re sort of working with since. Cos like I say there’s like a heavy reliance on drum box and things. I mean the actual thing that I was listening to at that time was.. were people like sort of John Coltrane, you know and it was much more of that idea of, when we formed this band we’ll have… we’ll form it around a small jazz line-up, you know, which is like, keyboards, bass and drums and we sort of substitute the vocal for what the saxophone would be. So it was much more that sort of thing so that as far as like a rhythm section it wouldn’t have to be that sort of, you know, heavily weighed down, sort of, burden really. It could still have the movement, that things need when you’re live, you know and it could have that movement in terms of development. I mean, it’s like this thing with not using guitar or I see, as much as anything, the reason we used it was just to work in that style. It’s like, although guitars seem to be redundant at the moment in England I’m sure it is purely a phase. And I’m sure, like, when we actually start working on our next album there will be ways we will bring guitar in and I mean not to the extent we’re gonna be, sort of, Foreigner or anything.
Interviewer 1: Right. No reliance on amplification as you (move forward?)
Mark: Sure. Sure.
Paul: Yeah. Right.
Interviewer: What.. uh. you are using the producer of Talk Talk, is also the guy who did some work with Bowie and who else did he produce? Colin? Is it Colin Thurston.
Mark: Yeah. Sure. I mean who we’re actually gonna use for our next stuff is, uh, Chris Thomas, you know, more recently has worked with the Pretenders, and sort of earlier with Sex Pistols, you know, Anarchy in the UK, and I mean, the main reason for that is, sort of, this comes back to the same point again is, I just think there’s a very strong danger with a lot of this, sort of, synthesizer music that it can get too laid back in its feel, too soft in its feel. And the reason I think Chris Thomas is, like, a really good choice of producer to use in the future is because take in sort of, Anarchy in the UK as an example, he’s actually transferred that power onto vinyl and at the same time take in the Pretenders as an example, he, sort of, really goes for a strong vocal sound.
Interviewer: Mm hmm. That’s interesting. The, uh, how… what… I’m always curious to know how the band names themselves. Tell me how Talk Talk originated then.
Mark: Well, Talk Talk was actually written at the time the band formed. It was written almost within a couple of days of the band forming. So we just went through all this, sort of, you know, like looking for the name, we went through all of the ridiculous alternatives you can think of, you know, and there was Talk Talk just sort of staring at us, you know. I mean, one of the main reasons I liked it is, I’ve got a hang up with people abbreviating names you know. I just think if you’re the Rolling Stones that’s who you are, you’re not the Stones, you know, and I just like the idea of having two words that were identical words but you couldn’t actually shorten it down into one, you had to just say it like it is.
Interviewer 1: Yeah, you heard someone out back stage just a few minutes ago said on the radio they’re calling you Talk Talk Talk.
Mark: Oi.
Paul: Making it longer now, innit yeah.
Mark: What d’ya say. What d’ya say.
Interviewer: There you go. They’re just uh… did you hear what they’re doing in the parking lot here at this show tonight?
Mark: No.
Interviewer: There’s some radio station that’s giving $50 bills out to people that are listening to that station K102.
Paul: Think I’ll get out there now and do, huh (?)
Interviewer 1: So I hope that people that people come inside. … Just sitting in your car, they’re going to be driving through and if you’re sitting in your car just listening to their radio station…
Interviewer 2: I’m going back out!
Interviewer 1: They’ll be giving $50 bills out so you’ll have to turn it up to draw these people in from throwing out some $50 bills.
Mark: That’s crazy, innit
Interview 1: You never know where their competition’s going to come from. So you’ve got how much longer on this tour and where can we expect to see you around the country?
Mark: We got about another four dates on this tour, then it’s up to New York to do some, like, a few clubs, out to the west coast just to do a few clubs down there and then we go back to England and we do, like, an English tour, European tour and then start on the next album.
Interviewer: Mm hmm. It’ll be a full tilt album this time, not just the EP, it’ll be…
Paul: Well, there’s an album out now.
Mark: Yeah.
Paul: … in England. It’s called ‘The Party’s Over’
Mark: Yeah, and I mean you’re….
Paul: and the EP is like extracts from that album.
Mark: Yeah, I mean, you’re actually getting the full British album will be coming out over here in October. The first week of October. The EP was just like, it was just more than anything like, sort of, a promotional thing. It’s just like let’s put four cuts on a 12” then we got like heavy duty sound and everything and it’s sort of, it’s sort of like an introductory offer, if you like, I mean, what they’re actually doing in addition to that is they’re putting ‘Talk Talk’ as a straight single out this week and they’re B-siding it with our first British single which was called ‘Mirror Man’ then the full British album will be available here the first week of October.
Interviewer 1: How do you think the radio constraints in this country… have you been exposed to the way FM radio here…
Mark: Yeah. I’ve been extremely surprised by the way radio works over here. What it actually seems like what is happening is this … its like because, sort of, it seems like because over everything is commercially orientated in terms of radio stations, they’re playing it extremely safe about what they’re actually gonna play and what they’re not gonna play to ensure ratings. I mean, when I went out to Los Angeles a couple of months ago I went down and visited K-ROCK and I was really sort of pleased to actually see, you know, the way they’re sort of experimenting in terms of what they’re playing.
Interviewer 1: The enthusiasm of the station, K-ROCK is doing
Mark: Oh, it’s superb. And from what I can gather it’s picking up a lot of ratings which is great. I mean, I just hope it will, sort of, influence others to follow the trend.
Paul: ‘Cos on the road, like, a lot of the clubs we’ve been to there seems there’s real underground thing for English music. Like, especially in places like Columbus and that there’s…. They don’t even, they don’t like Lynyrd Skynyrd and Led Zeppelin and they just, they wanna hear the records but they can’t hear it, so you know.
Interviewer 1: It’s a very… It’s American radio’s in that position right now they don’t know which way to go. There’s a backlash of new products, new bands that wanna be heard and (oh lets change tape) and they’re just not getting …
Interview Part 3
Mark: Yeah, that’s right.
Interviewer 1: How did you get from Island to EMI America? How come Island didn’t pick you up, ‘cos- ?
Mark: I don’t know. I mean you know they were just like - it’s easier to tell you why we signed with EMI and that was just, you know, like really apparent with a lot of their artists that actually seen developing their careers properly. So that was actually why we signed with EMI in England. And then from there EMI America wanted to take us.
Interviewer 1: Being on the Duran Duran tour probably a great way to break the States too, or that association will help, [do] you think, in this country.
Mark: I don’t think it will help in this country. It certainly helped in England, because when we actually did that tour we were sort of, you know, we were playing to capacity audiences, that we knew, there was, like, a very good probability they were going to like the sort of thing we were doing. So it was certainly good from that point of view. I mean, to me, I think Costello’s a good person to do a tour with over here. I mean, that’s why we chose him.
Interviewer 1: Right, maybe it is, because there… you know, the guitar-less bands, this new trend seems to be a softer, more listenable, rhythmic, you know, thing to be involved in and if you’re exposed to that type of an audience it can only do good things for expanding …
Mark: Sure. Mm. Well you see the whole sort of idea when around this band was actually formed in terms of not using a guitar and everything was sort of not that much in line with a lot of the other sort of contemporary English bands that we’re sort of working with since. Cos like I say there’s like a heavy reliance on drum box and things. I mean the actual thing that I was listening to at that time was.. were people like sort of John Coltrane, you know and it was much more of that idea of, when we formed this band we’ll have… we’ll form it around a small jazz line-up, you know, which is like, keyboards, bass and drums and we sort of substitute the vocal for what the saxophone would be. So it was much more that sort of thing so that as far as like a rhythm section it wouldn’t have to be that sort of, you know, heavily weighed down, sort of, burden really. It could still have the movement, that things need when you’re live, you know and it could have that movement in terms of development. I mean, it’s like this thing with not using guitar or I see, as much as anything, the reason we used it was just to work in that style. It’s like, although guitars seem to be redundant at the moment in England I’m sure it is purely a phase. And I’m sure, like, when we actually start working on our next album there will be ways we will bring guitar in and I mean not to the extent we’re gonna be, sort of, Foreigner or anything.
Interviewer 1: Right. No reliance on amplification as you (move forward?)
Mark: Sure. Sure.
Paul: Yeah. Right.
Interviewer: What.. uh. you are using the producer of Talk Talk, is also the guy who did some work with Bowie and who else did he produce? Colin? Is it Colin Thurston.
Mark: Yeah. Sure. I mean who we’re actually gonna use for our next stuff is, uh, Chris Thomas, you know, more recently has worked with the Pretenders, and sort of earlier with Sex Pistols, you know, Anarchy in the UK, and I mean, the main reason for that is, sort of, this comes back to the same point again is, I just think there’s a very strong danger with a lot of this, sort of, synthesizer music that it can get too laid back in its feel, too soft in its feel. And the reason I think Chris Thomas is, like, a really good choice of producer to use in the future is because take in sort of, Anarchy in the UK as an example, he’s actually transferred that power onto vinyl and at the same time take in the Pretenders as an example, he, sort of, really goes for a strong vocal sound.
Interviewer: Mm hmm. That’s interesting. The, uh, how… what… I’m always curious to know how the band names themselves. Tell me how Talk Talk originated then.
Mark: Well, Talk Talk was actually written at the time the band formed. It was written almost within a couple of days of the band forming. So we just went through all this, sort of, you know, like looking for the name, we went through all of the ridiculous alternatives you can think of, you know, and there was Talk Talk just sort of staring at us, you know. I mean, one of the main reasons I liked it is, I’ve got a hang up with people abbreviating names you know. I just think if you’re the Rolling Stones that’s who you are, you’re not the Stones, you know, and I just like the idea of having two words that were identical words but you couldn’t actually shorten it down into one, you had to just say it like it is.
Interviewer 1: Yeah, you heard someone out back stage just a few minutes ago said on the radio they’re calling you Talk Talk Talk.
Mark: Oi.
Paul: Making it longer now, innit yeah.
Mark: What d’ya say. What d’ya say.
Interviewer: There you go. They’re just uh… did you hear what they’re doing in the parking lot here at this show tonight?
Mark: No.
Interviewer: There’s some radio station that’s giving $50 bills out to people that are listening to that station K102.
Paul: Think I’ll get out there now and do, huh (?)
Interviewer 1: So I hope that people that people come inside. … Just sitting in your car, they’re going to be driving through and if you’re sitting in your car just listening to their radio station…
Interviewer 2: I’m going back out!
Interviewer 1: They’ll be giving $50 bills out so you’ll have to turn it up to draw these people in from throwing out some $50 bills.
Mark: That’s crazy, innit
Interview 1: You never know where their competition’s going to come from. So you’ve got how much longer on this tour and where can we expect to see you around the country?
Mark: We got about another four dates on this tour, then it’s up to New York to do some, like, a few clubs, out to the west coast just to do a few clubs down there and then we go back to England and we do, like, an English tour, European tour and then start on the next album.
Interviewer: Mm hmm. It’ll be a full tilt album this time, not just the EP, it’ll be…
Paul: Well, there’s an album out now.
Mark: Yeah.
Paul: … in England. It’s called ‘The Party’s Over’
Mark: Yeah, and I mean you’re….
Paul: and the EP is like extracts from that album.
Mark: Yeah, I mean, you’re actually getting the full British album will be coming out over here in October. The first week of October. The EP was just like, it was just more than anything like, sort of, a promotional thing. It’s just like let’s put four cuts on a 12” then we got like heavy duty sound and everything and it’s sort of, it’s sort of like an introductory offer, if you like, I mean, what they’re actually doing in addition to that is they’re putting ‘Talk Talk’ as a straight single out this week and they’re B-siding it with our first British single which was called ‘Mirror Man’ then the full British album will be available here the first week of October.
Interviewer 1: How do you think the radio constraints in this country… have you been exposed to the way FM radio here…
Mark: Yeah. I’ve been extremely surprised by the way radio works over here. What it actually seems like what is happening is this … its like because, sort of, it seems like because over everything is commercially orientated in terms of radio stations, they’re playing it extremely safe about what they’re actually gonna play and what they’re not gonna play to ensure ratings. I mean, when I went out to Los Angeles a couple of months ago I went down and visited K-ROCK and I was really sort of pleased to actually see, you know, the way they’re sort of experimenting in terms of what they’re playing.
Interviewer 1: The enthusiasm of the station, K-ROCK is doing
Mark: Oh, it’s superb. And from what I can gather it’s picking up a lot of ratings which is great. I mean, I just hope it will, sort of, influence others to follow the trend.
Paul: ‘Cos on the road, like, a lot of the clubs we’ve been to there seems there’s real underground thing for English music. Like, especially in places like Columbus and that there’s…. They don’t even, they don’t like Lynyrd Skynyrd and Led Zeppelin and they just, they wanna hear the records but they can’t hear it, so you know.
Interviewer 1: It’s a very… It’s American radio’s in that position right now they don’t know which way to go. There’s a backlash of new products, new bands that wanna be heard and (oh lets change tape) and they’re just not getting …
Mark: That’s what someone was saying to me. They’re saying, like, maybe there’s five new spots open in any one week for new records. It’s sort of Foreigner, REO [Speedwagon] and Lynard Skynyrd. The three of those bands; there are only really two spots left open, you know.
Interviewer1: Right. It’s distressing you’re right.
Mark: I mean, you see, that is something that you don’t actually get in England because, because, sort of, the main radio station in England isn’t a commercial station. There are no restraints on that station like that. I mean the only restraint you got in any ways is just like obviously if you’re in the top forty you’ve got more chance of your record being played than if you’re not in it. But in terms of, like, diversity, it’s extremely diverse.
Interviewer1: The disc jockeys will play new music just for the sake of playing (new music?)
Mark: Yeah, I mean, you know it’s…
Paul: Yeah. They won’t stick with ‘Stairway to Heaven’ for the rest of their life, you know.
Mark: That’s right. And you can have Anarchy in the UK at number ten and Kenny Rogers at number eleven. It really don’t matter.
Paul: Yeah.
Interviewer1: There’s so much concern about the quote unquote aging hippy music, you know that they’ll continue to play the Lynard Skynyrds, the Led Zeppelins to death because what they think is the bulk of their audience the 18 - 34 year olds are now you now you know 28 to 45 or something and they’re still locked into that whole 70’s late 60’s rock and roll and there’s a whole new thing of music that’s around now and I think, the reason, that, you know, the purpose of radio is expose it and let the listeners ultimately decide. Which is different in England because , in this country, they just don’t do that, it’s run too much like a business. How do you find your self handling the business of music. I mean, that it’s been said music being an art form trapped in an industry. I mean you’re all obviously very interested and into your music as an art form and your know, expressing your music on stage. Does the business get in the way of that? Do you find that?
Paul: We just leave that to management really.
Mark: Yeah.
Paul. I mean, we’re aware of what’s going on, but that’s it.
Mark: Yeah. I mean, it’s like anything. Obviously there is a need to be commercial right, at the same time, sort of, if we are in any way commercial, that’s sort of as much through luck as it is through judgement. I mean you know it’s not… we definitely don’t at any time sort of try to compromise what we’re doing in order to make it commercial. You know, but at the same time we do see the importance of being commercial.
Interviewer1: Sure. it’s not premeditated. It just so happens that you write in that vein
Mark: Sure. Sure.
Interviewer: It’s interesting to note that video could possibly be the ingredient that breaks open radio. Uh, as you know videos are selling records. If people see Talk Talk video and like what they see they’re more apt to go and buy that record whether the radio station in their town is playing it or not.
Paul: Mm hmm.
Mark: That’s right. That’s like I say I think the importance of video is getting stronger and stronger all the time. I mean, you know, just from the think of being in England it is extremely strong over there now
Interviewer1: Right. For some bands. It’s interesting also like bands like your self
Mark: Yeah, yeah, obviously.
Interviewer1: I mean you guys visually attractive to the listeners. Your music would express that to them the two go together. Some bands aren’t going to make that transition
Mark: Sure. Sure.
Paul: Yeah. Right.
Interviewer1: You know. What feedback have you gotten from your video? Girls coming round more and uh?
Paul: Oh, of course, you know. Yeah.
Interviewer1: Right. It helps the groupie factor. But, uh. Alright, anything else, John, do you wanna add to this before…
Interviewer2: No. I think that uh…
Interviewer1: I think we got what we need.
Interviewer2: That wraps it up.
Interviewer1: Anything you want to leave the MTV audience saying?
Interviewer2: Any videos?
Interviewer1: Any warning.
Paul: I’ll leave the last word with you, Mark. That’s fine, yeah.
Interviewer1: Okay.
Paul: I think I’ve got a sound check, a sound check.
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Partially published on May 17, 2020. Completed October 28th, 2020. Please feel free to contact me and let me know where I effed up above in terms of spelling or words or punctuation (which I know is terrible).
Thanks to all the great fans I've met and interacted with online for all the support and patience with me, and for providing corrections where necessary.
Special thanks to the Penny, Queen, Curmudgeon and Precious for their moral support.
Of course, thank you Mark Hollis, Lee Harris, Paul Webb (Rustin Man) and Simon Brenner (Angel River) for making Talk Talk every bit of awesome it was. Also: Sir Phill Brown, Tim Friese-Green (Heligoland), Rupert Black, Ian Curnow, Mark Feltham, Jeep Hook, Phil Reis, and James Marsh for all the pretty pictures.
If there is any interview where there is audio that hasn't been transcribed that you would love to read, let me know. I'll happily look for text online for you and if none exists I will certainly do my best to provide a transcription to the best of my ability. If you have requested something from me and I haven't delivered yet, absolutely bug me again. My brain ain't what it used to be.
