Us Against The World

SOME TAKE longer than others, but in the end the bastards always sell-out. Just look at The Charlatans. There they were, the Stones to Oasis Beatles, when Tim Burgess, all airs and big pouty lips, decided to sod off to Los Angeles.
Before the stamp on his passport had had time to dry, he was down The Viper Room with the lowest of Hollywood s celebrity pond life. Worse still, he became so enamoured of the place that he s now living there full-time with his American girlfriend.
Fears that he s turned into a bit of a David Lee Roth were confirmed last month when he was spotted with blonde streaks in that once heroic barnet of his. Something he doubtlessly got done in Los Angles.
No, Didsbury, Burgess says in an accent that d sound right at home in the Rover s Return. I was round my mate s house when, well, a Jack Daniel s-related incident occurred. Every time I drink Jack I end up making a twat of myself, which is why I gave it up. Unsuccessfully. I was back to my old ways the other night, which is why I m on the pineapple juice.
It s all to do with my latent desire to be Keith Richards. I m sure if he d had a bottle of Tizer on stage with him in the 70s, I d be drinking that now. Y know, if Keith did it around the time of Sticky Fingers, it s rock n roll. My hair, though, has nothing to do with being in L.A. or auditioning for Motley Crue. Shit, that s let the cat out of the bag!
Next he ll be telling us he doesn t even like The Viper Room.
Not particularly, he lies. I used to think that Los Angles was full of wankers, but the last couple of times I ve been there I ve met some really cool people. Y know, underground types who haven t got their heads stuck up their arses.
It s easy to get the wrong impression about a place when all you ever do there is play gigs, and go to the after-shows. I m not saying that everybody in the L.A. music business is like that, but there are far more hangers-on and here, have some coke merchants than there are anywhere else in the world. There are people there normally not very talented ones who are obsessed with celebrity. You meet em at parties and it s, Hi, hello, how many records have you sold? I swear to God, you could be a child murderer, but as long as you were in the Top 20 they d want to hang out with you.
Burgess makes a pretty pathetic Britrock exile, having neither turned out for Rod Stewart s Exiles footie team, or jumped up on stage with The Neurotic Outsiders.
A mad thing happened a while ago, he continues. I went to this place called The Whiskey Bar, and who was on the door but fuckin Steve Jones from the Sex Pistols. Not as a greeter, but as a bouncer. It was a couple of weeks before Sporty Spice did Anarchy In The UK with them (The Neurotic Outsiders) at the Viper.
I dunno if it s me or the city that s changed, but walking round L.A., it s totally different to what it was like five years ago. Sure, there are neighbourhoods that you don t even go into at 11 o clock in the morning, but generally it s pretty laid back. I love the melting pot aspect of living alongside Chinese, Mexicans, Filipinos, Romanians . . . you name the nationality, they re there. With their restaurants. I don t know how I haven t turned into a fat bastard with the amount of food I ve been eating.
Before our female readers start throwing themselves into the Liffey/Lee/Shannon/Suir/Boyne/Corrib/Lagan (delete where applicable), let me assure you that the Burgess physique is as finely-honed as ever, with nary a hint of beer gut or wobbliness to be detected. In fact, the pounds have been disappearing of late.
Yeah, bloody thousands of them, he grimaces. Since I started pretending to be a DJ in 1995, I ve become an obsessive collector of records, and one of the best places in the world to pick up obscure soul stuff is L.A. I paid a hundred quid recently for a copy of Magic Corner by Belita Woods, which was a bargain compared to the original which will set you back a minimum of #4,000. I can say now, I ll never pay that much for a piece of vinyl , but if I saw it in a shop and had my credit card with me, I dunno. The Wigan Casino thing was before my time, but a mate of mine, Martin Kelly, taught me that there are certain records you just buy. It s the Northern Soul, shit, I might never see that again mentality.
Prior to getting his paws on Ms Woods, Burgess most prized acquisition was a mint copy of the Small Faces Ogden s Nut Flake, which is not only cherished for the quality of its tunes, but the roundness of its sleeve.
What really matters is what s in the grooves, he says philosophically. I ve never gone, this is a great tune, let s copy it , but there have been records I ve passed on to the others because there s a certain vibe I d like us to capture.
Has it ever crossed his mind that rather than splitting things five ways, he could become a full-time DJ and hang on to all the loot himself?
If you d heard me in action, you d know that I ll never be anything more than an enthusiastic amateur. It s just really good fun, and keeps you receptive to new ideas. I don t know if you ve met em yourself, but the thing that hits you straight away about Fatboy Slim, and The Chemical Brothers, is that they re mad music fans. Actually, the best fun I ve had as a DJ was doing warm-up for Tom and Ed.
You know that stuff I was saying earlier about Tim Burgess selling-out, and going all L.A. on us? Strike it from the record. Five minutes in his company, and it s obvious that he s still a Northwich lad, through and through.
Apart from getting a bit more mellow which you do in your thirties he s exactly the same as he was 10 years ago, confirms drummer Jon Brookes. What was my reaction to Tim saying he was moving to Los Angeles? I was pleased for him, and the band, cos he s in such good form.
While other groups are happy to live their personal lives out in the pages of the NME, The Charlatans have always been selective about opening up to the press. Indeed, their edited highlights approach to interviews has lead to accusations that they re a touch dull. Fair comment?
I can understand people wanting to know what goes on behind the scenes, but the rows and falling-outs, that do happen from time to time, never go further than the five of us, Brookes continues. Grudges in The Charlatans last half an hour, and then we go down the pub. If that constitutes being dull, fine, guilty as charged.
You mightn t see em plastered all over the tabloids, but that doesn t mean The Charlatans are adverse to a spot of celebrity schmoozing. Indeed, the recording of their latest opus, Us & Us Only, had to be put on hold after Jon Brookes came a cropper at Noel Gallagher s gaff.
I fell down his marble staircase and broke two bones in my foot, he explains. It didn t really hurt at the time cos I was pissed, but the next morning, fuck me, I was in agony. Leaving aside the fact that I nearly killed myself, it was a great party. He mightn t be too hot on the old interior design only joking, Noel! but he s a great host.
I was dead chuffed cos Robert Carlyle was there, says Burgess, whose list of other people he wants to meet includes Dylan, David Lynch and the Rolling Stones.
Even though it was totally the right decision, I still get freaked over us turning down the chance to tour with the Stones. Keith s great, but the coolest fucker on the planet has to be Ron Wood. It was pre-ordained that one day he d be a member of that band.
The Charlatans reason for politely saying no to Richmond s finest was that they had an album to complete. Other groups might find being shacked up in the studio tedious, but to Tim Burgess this is the very essence of his craft.
Obviously gigs are important, but what you ll be judged on in 20 or 30 years time is your records, he reasons. Getting it right in the studio s so important to us that we ve built our own. It s lead to a few indulgences like spending three days on the drum sound for I Don t Care Where You Live but the main difference is that we ve been able to phone each other up and go, Get down the studio quick, I ve had this great idea. The engineer who did Us & Us Only was pretty much living there while we were recording, so if we wanted to try something pissed out of our heads at four o clock in the morning, we could. The thing you don t normally do in a studio, cos it costs too much, is socialise, but when you ve got your own place it doesn t matter if you sit around all night drinking and smoking.
An ethos which I ve tried, but failed, to impress upon the Hot Press management.
While not quite the radical departure that s been mooted in some circles, Us & Us Only is without doubt the most adventurous Charlatans album yet the band finally learning how to assimilate their influences, rather than being overpowered by them.
It s got a good start, a good middle and an even better end! Burgess beams. We certainly knew what we didn t want, which was huge string-laden things, or half-arsed big beat. We took a risk producing it ourselves, but we knew that was the only way we were going to be able to make the record we wanted.
It s a not cool rock n roll thing to say, but I really think we grew up making it.
As well as being a string-free zone, there s nothing on Us & Us Only that can be described as epic , anthemic or wide screen . Not what Ocean Colour Scene fans want to hear, but a blessed relief for the rest of us.
Adding a string-section or an orchestra to a bog standard song doesn t make it any less bog standard. One of the most abused words in the English language is soul . Marvin Gaye had it, but unless I ve missed something, Travis don t. Every time I see those pained facial expressions of theirs, I think fake.
A mild admonishment compared to the battering Burgess gives Ian Brown.
He came out with some bollocks about me copying him. Or rather that his family thought I was copying him, which was really weak. I don t want to go on about it, but I think he s better off keeping his mouth shut. Prison does funny things to people, though.
Burgess tone mellows as he says that last sentence a reference, one assumes, to the detrimental effect that eight months in nick had on Rob Collins. Unable to come to terms with the sentence he d received for his part in an armed robbery, the Charlatans keyboard-player went on a mad bender that eventually lead to his death in a car crash.
While not wanting to get into all that today, guitarist Steve Harrison summed it up succinctly when he said recently that, Rob was such an ordinary bloke. If you went to the pub with him in Walsall, he d probably be talking about fishing, what lead weights and floats he was using. Really normal, almost dull sometimes. The whole prison thing really worried him, not being able to look after his kid, missing her growing up and everything.
And he certainly got more involved in drugs as a result of going to prison, and that made him more confident, so he started doing more manic things. I think prison had an incredibly negative effect on Rob. It didn t do him any good at all and it seemed so pointless he wasn t a big enough personality to make an example of like that.
Completed after his death, it s no surprise that The Charlatans cite their last album, Tellin Stories, as the one they had the most difficulty making.
It took nine months, but felt like nine fucking years, Jon Brookes says acidly. Even before Rob s accident, it had been bloody hard work. People started buggering off on the flimsiest of pretexts cos they didn t want to be in the studio, and there was loads of other stuff going down that wasn t pleasant.
As completely knocked sideways as they were, The Charlatans made it clear that they had no intention of throwing in the towel.
The decision has been made to carry on because we have to continue in his memory it s what he would have wanted, read the official band statement. He lived it like he loved it and he ran out of time. There will be no change. We are fuckin rock. We ve lost our mate.
Eighteen months on, Burgess quietly professes to being as happy as I ve been in a long time. How much of that contentment is down to the fact that having been dismissed as the runt of the baggy litter, The Charlatans have now outlived all of their Madchester counterparts?
None, really. At the start, yeah, maybe we did sound the same, but then everyone went off on their own missions. I m not going to say Ha Ha, we ve lasted longer than the Inspiral Carpets , cos they got to where they wanted to go and then called it a day. This has nothing to do with what Ian Brown s said recently, but I did feel let down by the Roses. A band that good should ve made more than two albums which isn t to say that I want them to do a Happy Mondays and reform. If they did, it d purely be for the money which, y know, is the worst reason there is.
Having already conquered Britain and Japan, The Charlatans are planning to tour the arse off Us & Us Only in Europe and the States, where despite repeated visits they re still very much a cult act. And an appendaged one legal niceties forcing them to trade on the other side of the Atlantic as The Charlatans UK.
I wish I could say we have some sort of masterplan in relation to America, but we don t, the singer admits. Just when I think I ve got the market there sussed, along comes a band like Coal Chamber! All you can do is get on a bus and play in every fucking venue that ll have you. That or sleep with someone at MTV so that they put your video on fast rotation!
Those bastard VJs get all the perks. n
The first single he ever bought was Automatic Lover by Beezer Homes League punks The Vibrators.
Another record that he s unnaturally fond of is UK Subs Stranglehold .
After leaving school at 16 with one O Level, he got a job scrubbing asbestos-coated ceilings and the inside of chemical tanks.
He was meant to audition for the Inspiral Carpets, but went to see Manchester City instead.
When Ian McCulloch quit Echo & The Bunnymen in 1988, he was on the shortlist of replacements.
His least favourite gig was in 1989 when The Charlatans played support to Cactus World News at the Manchester Boardwalk. 250 people paid in. Only 25 were left by the time the headliners came on.
In 1993 he thought it would be a wizard wheeze to record I Was Born On Christmas Day with Sarah Cracknell. It wasn t. Despite a Top Of The Pops appearance, the single stalled at number 37.
His daily bath, shave and coiffing routine never takes more than an hour. Honest.
The record he s currently boring the rest of The Charlatans to death with is Chaka Khan & Rufus Tell Me Something Good .
He hasn t tried Absinthe yet, but would be very grateful if Universal could get him a bottle the next time he s in Dublin.
1. Forever
At seven minutes-plus, this is the band s first epic since One To Another and, with the trademark churchy Hammond dissolving into a loping bassline and
lackadaisical dub/dance beat, a prime candidate
for a live set-opener (not to mention flagship
single, albeit in edited form).

2. Good Witch,
Bad Witch 1
Brief electric piano and stand-up bass piece which sounds like something cooked up by John McLoughlin and Angelo Badalamenti in a spare moment (the band were using the latter s Pink Room as an intro tape on the last tour).

3. Impossible
You re A Big Girl Now / Cindy Incidentally -style slice of old-school quasi-misogyny, replete with shuffling beat and chord changes as comfortable and weatherbeaten as a trusty pair of trainers and moth-eaten hoodie.

4. The Blond Waltz
The scally wags stray even further into Girl From The North Country (as opposed to North Country Girl ) territory with this bitter 3/4 sway, in which Tim drawls I guess I m your man with just the right amount of ambivalence.
5. A House Is Not A Home
Pure Faces/Band-like vintage swagger, and about as down-south as these northerners get. Over a guitar lick borrowed from Robbie Robertson, Burgess pours salt on his domestic blisters, and Tony Rodgers sends organ figures shooting off in all directions, stopping just short of putting clavinets through a wah-wah unit, a la Up On Cripple Creek .

6. Senses
Slow, stoned piano ballad with meandering harp intro plus long-limbed and languorous mood. Again, Tim quotes liberally from one of his favourite sources, The Stones ( You re my sweet black angel ).

7. My Beautiful Friend
In which a picked dobro figure gets pinned to the wall by an uncharacteristically strict rhythm figure and edgy vocal. A whiff of pedal steel suggests The Verve s country-rock experiments, but otherwise, this is the least rootsy song on board.

8. I Don t Care Where You Live
Another waltz, jerry-built around the Takamine, the Tele and the old johanna. I Don t Care . . . gives us a brief glimpse of what The Charlatans might sound like as old farts lazing on their porches, skulling cheap wine and crawling around on all fours looking for the smoke they dropped between the floorboards.

9. The Blind Stagger
More Rain Song -style melodrama, coloured with cello and tempered by a tired wide-boy turn from Tim. Again, the rhythm section hold their fire for a full two minutes, before a coruscating guitar lick triggers them into life and the group entire manfully set about transcending their many influences.

10. Good Witch, Bad Witch 2
A backwards organ loop gives way to Chick Corea-like plugged-in piano and plucked bull-fiddle as Burgess sneers I m goin where the good wind blows through an overdriven speaker cabinet. This is the one tune which suggests future fertile departures for The Charlatans, a kind of delta blues/swamp jazz/Gris-Gris/Tricky-trippin -in-N Awlins vibe. Cool.

11. Watching You
The only tune not to stick after a couple of spins, with the multi-tracked harmonies representing the only elements left over from the halcyon days of 89. A li l fuzzy, a li l unfocused, but hey, 10 out of 11 ain t bad.
Peter Murphy