Interview with Chris Norman, August 2015
This interview was recorded in the days of Chris's gigs in Estonia, in the beginning of August. Chris was so kind to tell about his news, the main of which naturally concerned his new album.
— Hi Chris, what are your news? The main one is obviously about the new album?
— The news is that I’ve got a new album out in September and a single out three weeks before that. The single is called “Waiting”. I think it is out at the end of August everywhere except the UK where it’s to come out at the same time as the album. Because they got a different system in the UK with playlists. You can’t get into a BBC playlist before the record is out, so you have to build up to it, it’s weird.
— Will it be only a download?
— The single is just a download, nobody buys singles anymore, I mean hardly ever. It’s not worth to do it. The only if you’d be pressing some singles for promotion. There will be some, but only for giving to radio stations and stuff like that. But the actual thing is just to download. It’s just easy. I do it as well because people do that now, you know, get it on their iphones, mp3 players, computers, whatever. And when the video is released which will be about a week or two weeks before the single...
— A video on that single’s song, “Waiting”?
— Yes. And then, when you go on that, you’ll be able to just click and download it of iTunes or something and that’s it. Or I think when it first comes out you can preorder it and then get it.
— I saw pictures from the video shooting on your FB page. Some light airy room, you and Geoff are playing... Who else was taking part there?
— My son Paul on the drums, Geoff’s daughter Joanna playing acoustics and Andy Whelan playing bass.
— Yeah, the bass player looked much like him. But... Andy playing bass?
— Yes, but that was just for the video. Before that I knew Geoff was gonna do it, and I was thinking about bringing over some of my kids. But then Geoff said, Joanna will do it. Paul was over anyway, so I asked him and he said he’ll do the drums. And I rang up to Andy Whelan and said “Do you fancy playing bass?” Because he’s local, you know, and it was easy.
— Because you did it in England?
— Yeah, in Manchester.
— Ok. So how long in a whole did you work on the album?
— I started it doing demos, I think, in November of the last year, just before Christmas. I started finishing off song ideas that I got and then doing demos. And then I went right through after Christmas again, getting back to it. Then Geoff had a song over Christmas, he sent it to me and I just added some bits to it as well and then we demoed it. And then we took the demos that we’d done pretty much to the studio, and took some things off the demos and added extra things.
— So you have a Christmas song, right?
— Yes, it’s coming out in November. It’s not gonna be on the album because it’s too soon for a Christmas song to be on the album. It will come out separately. The first song to come out is “Waiting”, that’s on the album. And then in November we’re just putting out this single with a Christmas song called “That’s Christmas”.
— How many songs are on the album?
— Twelve songs plus one bonus track. And the bonus track is the song “Forty Years On”. That was just a song that was a part of the writing demo session I was doing. But then, because of the Smokie “40 years” thing, they heard that at Sony and decided they wanted to put it on this album. So I said OK. But now I’m gonna put it on my album, as a bonus track because it’s already has been released. But there’s 12 brand new songs, plus this bonus track, plus later on the Christmas song, so there’s 14 all together.
— Are all these 12 tracks written by you?
— Yeah.
— And who took part in the recordings, what musicians?
— Mostly that was me and Geoff. Rob Taggart played keyboards. I played bass. We used sample drums apart from one song Dorino played on (Christmas song). We had a couple of people in doing extra bits. We had a harmonica player coming in, a violin player, an accordion player on one track – I think his name is Simon Chandler. We had Harry Hamer, who was a drummer in Chumbawumba, playing washboard on the song called “Cat’s Eyes”, which is a bit like a skiffle song. And then he played congas and brushes on a couple of tracks.
— Did you work on the sound again with Neil Ferguson?
— Well, we recorded some of it in Neil’s studio, some of it in my little studio in Skipton, which isn’t really a studio but it has got a recording machine. I did the back vocals at Neil’s studio with Elli Luha and Teri Sullivan. Geoff did a lot of the stuff on his song at his house, on his recorder and then we took that to the studio, put that on and then added stuff to it. And same with all the songs. So we recorded in Neil’s at Chairworks studio.
— And was it all produced by you?
— Yeah.
— What kind of album it is, what kind of songs are on it?
— It’s anything you think of. That’s why I called it “Crossover”. It’s like every crossing over from one style to another all the time. Because, you know, I didn’t stop myself from writing anything I liked pretty much. So if there was a song that was like a bit country and I liked it, I recorded it. And if I wrote a song that was a bit rock-n-roll and I liked it, I recorded it. So I didn’t think – oh, I can’t do that, it’s too country or it’s too rock-n-roll or it’s too whatever. I recorded everything that I had written and I liked, all the songs that I would like to listen to myself. I finished them off and recorded them. So it’s like a mixed mishmash of different styles. But it still sounds like me because it’s my voice, and still sounds like us because it’s our playing, you know.
The thing with album title is that you always get at that point and you think: what we are going to call the album? And then you’ve got like a list of things with “could I call it like...?”, “could I call it like...?” And then I’ve might asked, “what do you think of that?”, “what do you think of that?...” I did that with Geoff, I was saying “what do you think of this?”, you know. And then he sent me some. And at the end I went with that name.
— Do you have any favourites on the album or think it can be a hit?
— Well, I hope “Waiting” is a hit. Actually I’m not necessarily thinking of it. I don’t need to have a single hit because people like me don’t really have hit singles anymore, you know. I just talk about a hit – a radio hit, so that everybody heard it, knows it, then goes and buys the album. But it’d be nice if there was some kind of a hit as well, if it’s sold enough to be in the charts, that would help, of course, then to even more promote the album. So that’s the main thing really.
I like all the songs on the album actually. All the songs, more than I’ve done before really. Because usually always there is a couple of songs on album that you are not so sure about. But I like all these songs. The first song is “Waiting” and I like that. The second song is “Cat’s Eye” which is that skiffle one, I like that a lot. And then this “Highest Mountain”, I like that. “Fly Away”, that’s a good song. “Carry On”, that’s a good song. They are all in different styles, so I like them all, you know.
— But you will probably have to pick some of them when you’ll be doing your promo interviews for the new album?
— Yes, I’ll do them in September. And it’s always hard to pick a song anyway. When I do those interviews they say, what song would you like to pick of the album? I have to pick a song. And I don’t really know if I’ve picked the right one, I never know which song to pick. I don’t really know which song I like best out of an album till about a year or two after usually.
— Well, then you probably know this already regarding the previous album... :)
— What songs are my favourite on “There And Back”? “Nobody’s Fool”. It wasn’t a “star” track on the album when I did it, but it is now. I guess at that time the “star” track was probably gonna be “I’m Gone” or something, but now I’m not keen on “I’m Gone”. “Nobody’s Fool” has stood up, I like that a lot. Also “Gypsy Queen”, which stood the test of time.
So it’s difficult at the time when it’s new to know which one is... But I think this is a better album. (“This is your best work” – adds Geoff who's sitting beside).
— Ok, any other news?
— No, that’s the main thing – I’m doing an album and I’m doing the stuff I always do when get an album out, I’m doing a tour... I’m releasing the album via Internet – downloads everywhere, taking out some Google ads and stuff. I’m hoping it’s gonna get to more people because I’ve always relied before on radio and stuff. But radio don’t play me as much as it used to do, so I got to find a different way. So this is gonna be promoted on the Internet more.
And I’ve done this video which is gonna be on my YouTube channel. I like the video, by the way, it’s good. It’s not just a shot with a group, it starts off with close-ups of me all in white, a bit like the album is like that too. I think it’s a good kind of general theme, image going through it. So this is thing. And then there are bits with us playing there, but there are also bits on location with a little girl and a woman and a black guy doing stuff. It’s kind of to do with waiting for something, looking up at the sky and all that. So it’s good, I like the video, it’s well shot, it’s of a good quality and the people who did it were good, I was very pleased with them. And also I’m doing another one now, in September, for the Christmas song called “That’s Christmas”. The song is catchy, very catchy.
— But you had a Christmas song before...
— Oh, that was years and years ago. Me and Pete wrote that, but that was just a rip-off of “Ode to Joy” by Beethoven. We knew that when we did it. And we never released that. The only reason we did that was because of that Christmas thing, Riga thing. No, this is a purposely written thing.
I was on the Isle of Man for Christmas and we were talking on the phone with Geoff, just talking about Christmassy things, you know. What you are doing – I’m just chilling out, you know, and watching telly, presents and all that. And the next thing was that he sent me a text “I’ve written an idea for a Christmas song”. He said, I’ll do a demo and send you. (“The song was based on the conversation with us”, – adds Geoff). Then, about a couple of days later, I got an e-mail with this demo on Geoff singing this song. And I liked it straight away, so I said, yeah, we should record it. So when I got back to recording it, Geoff sent me the basic backing track with a different key to suit my voice because Geoff has a very low voice. I wrote some different words, some parts, some of them changed a bit but not much, basically the song is as he wrote it. I just changed a few bits, and sang it, demoed it. Then we took it in the studio, put vocals on it, and kids choir on it, and some jingle bells, and it sounds really great, I love it! :) So we get a Christmas song out and that meets a plan I had :)... Because, I was telling Geoff, I was watching the program about Christmas songs and there were people like Noddy Holder from Slade, they are making like half a million quid a year every year from these Christmas songs that they wrote in 1973 or somewhen! So I said to Geoff, if we’d have some of that, just a bit of that, then it would be a nice pension, you know, wouldn’t it? (laughs). So we thought, yeah, we should do a Christmas song then, but if nobody buys it, then that is a plan out the window, but you never know it.
— Ok, Chris, now what about changes of your image which many fans are probably still surpised for...
— You mean my beard? My Vandyke? :) (speaking to Geoff – “What do you call it? Goaty?”) :)) Well, I just got sick of seeing the same f**king face peering out on me every time I look at my mirror (laughs). And also on stage pictures and Youtube stuff, I got sick of seeing myself. This face is getting older every time I look at it, you know :). So then I just didn’t shave for a bit and I thought it looks all right. First I thought maybe I’ll change my image. Maybe I’ll do like a Paul Rodgers and I’ll have like a little goaty beard, cut my one shorter and that will be different. But then I thought, no, because I watched a program on TV called “The Three Musketeers”. You know this story, but it was a modern BBC production of it, it was on every week. I was watching it and I thought, I wouldn’t mind looking like that :). So I thought, I grow my hair longer and I have this and I’ll have a different image (laughs).
— So it has no connection with a new album or tour or whatever, just like, you know, film actors sometimes do it because of their roles, and then you might get back? Because through all your life you hadn’t this thing for long... :)
— No, it has nothing to do with the album. I’m getting older and I just thought I’m sick of seeing the same face, I want to change it a bit. If I keep in this business, I can’t look like that forever, you know. So I thought it’s about time to try to do a different look. So this is it (laughs). And I might keep this now. When I get even older I might just let it go grey too, you know, do a Tom Jones. And then I’ll have white hair and white beard, that’s maybe when I’ll cut the hair short, when it goes pretty white. I mean, it’s probably quite white now, I have it obviously dyed but one day I’ll probably stop that at all, but I don’t know when.
— Are there any news from your daughter Susan?
— As for Susan, we thought she was going to do “X Factor” but it didn’t happen at the end. She sang there and everybody was going crazy for it and the “X Factor” people said, you’re gonna be on the show, we‘ll let you know. And then it just fell through, I don’t know why. Anyway, maybe it’s a good thing because once you get on that, you sort of get tied, you know, you are painted with that brush. We were talking before, I said I’m trying to see if I can come with any songs. Because it’s a different generation, you know. But if I get an idea what kind of things she’s into, I can usually listen to that stuff, to different people and then trying filter through it and hopefully come out with something. Hopefully I can do something and then we can go and at least do some demos. She’s got a great voice.
— But what about that album that she has recorded with your other kids like five years ago?
— That album was for the kids, for Michael, Steven and Susan. And then they just didn’t want to do it anymore.
— I mean, wasn’t that a similar story when you wrote the songs for another generation?
— But that was a different style. The thing was that wasn’t really Susan’s thing. And it wasn’t really Michael and Steven’s thing, it was sort of in between. It was like a trying to get effects of a heavy rock thing with a commercial thing. And I don’t think anybody was perfectly satisfied with that really. Then Michael and Steven didn’t want to do it anyway. So Susan was then going out for singing in clubs and pubs and that. And her style that she likes is different from that, you know. It’s more in a kind of a soulful pop, if you like, in this area, whatever you call it – like Paloma Faith and those kind of people. So we are trying to see if we can do something along those lines, I mean in that direction. And if she’s happy with it, we can demo it, and hopefully she can write with me, at least the lyrics. And then we’ll see. But, you know, it’s hard these days. It really is, the music business changed so much.
— Yeah... But it’s a pity for those songs, because I heard them once in a car with you and they were sounding really great!
— Well, the songs are still there. One of these days, you never know, you can always revamp them and do them again for somebody else.
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