Stereophonics interview part 2
Charles: I have another question from a listener, I think her e-mail address is Clairbear. Would you prefer
to reduce someone to tears through a song or have a standing ovation?
Kelly: I'd like them to stand and cry.
Berny: Stand and cry with little lighters.
Kelly: Well they can leave the lighters, the lighters annoy me a bit but there you go.
Charles: This next question is from Berny. Did the success of your duet with Tom Jones surprise you?
Kelly: Yes and no really. It's one of those things that some people say you shouldn't do because it's not
cool to be singing with Tom Jones and we thought, well fuck it, the guys a legend. He sang with Elvis
and Sinatra and had dinner with Mohammed Ali and I couldn't care less what people think because I
know I can get better stories off him than some spotty little fucker in London. I think Randy Newman
writes great songs and people can see that. And to do a Randy Newman with Tom Jones and go on
tour with him for two weeks and listen to his jokes and have the experience of playing with lots of
black backing singers. It's just an experience and a bit of fun really. The album was finished we
brought it out and it went to number four or something. And for our cred in Wales it was amazing.
Charles: The second part of the question, do you find a lot of older women attending you shows now and
throwing their knickers on stage?
Kelly: Since Tom? I did a few Christmas shows with Tom. I had December off and joined him on stage at
Wembley and stuff and took some knickers on for him as we sang Otis Redding songs. I haven't yet
had a pair of big knickers thrown at me.
Charles and Berny: We'll tell all the fans that's what you want.
Kelly: I've had a bra thrown at me. They came up and at the end of the night asked for it back as well. But
our road crew Swamps, he used to collect bras.
Berny: Just bras, no men's underwear?
Kelly: No.
Charles: What bands were your greatest influence?
Kelly: A lot of things like I said I bought the soul stuff. Otis Redding, Stevie Wonder, Creedence, Kinks,
Beatles, Neil Young, Bob Dylan. When I was a kid, AC/DC. And stuff today as well. Everything
influences, all the modern bands as well.
Charles: Do you find that you are a fan now just as much as you were before?
Kelly: More so for early Stevie Wonder cause I think the guy was so ahead of his time. Like '68 to '74
Stevie Wonder records are unbelievable. To get that atmosphere on record now, you probably can't
even get it. You have all this technology today and it just doesn't sound like that anymore, they played
so well and had such a vibe about them. I suppose when you make records they become more of an
influence.
Charles: Do you find it hard to be a fan of your contemporaries?
Kelly: You tend to be a bit critical of everybody, about yourself as well. Videos or radio. If someone is
getting more radio play than you ask why are they getting more radio play than you? But you do respect
artists for being good. I think that Fran's a really good writer, Coldplay is good and I think what Noel
Gallagher has done, and Damon Albarn and Graham Coxon and all those types of people. I think
they're all really good musicians and really good at what they do. You respect that. Respect Oasis
mostly for opening a lot of doors for British bands even though people don't really rate them much
now. They changed a lot for the British music scene just by being arrogant. It was needed again.
Charles: Any bands that are coming up now that you see as promising?
Kelly: We took a guy called Davy Crockett on tour with us, and he's in a bands called the Crocketts,
obviously. He's a really good writer, and he writes books and stuff as well. He's a really clever guy.
There's a band called Turin Brakes who are gonna open up for us on the British tour as well. They've
got sort of a Crosby Stills Nash & Young vibe. Really good vocal stuff. I've never met any of Turin
Brakes. We just heard the cd and it sounded good.
Charles: What do you see as the future of music in ten years?
Kelly: Everyone keeps saying that rock music or guitar music is gonna die and it's all gonna be dance
music or whatever. I think there's room for all of it. Dance music needs rock music and rock music
needs dance music. It's all kinda combining anyway. Than you can choose which way you wanna
deliver it or produce it. We've made a quite authentic sounding recording using old Wurlitzers and
pianos and stuff. In a way that stands out just as much as anything else does. Not many people are
doing that as well at the particular time. We just wanted to that this time. Not to say that the next
record won't be very modern sounding next time. We're only on our third record. You don't get much
chance to develop much these days. If you don't make a great record every record you get dropped.
David Bowie and Neil Young made many shit records but they still had the time to develop.
Unfortunately peoples attention spans are much smaller now.
Charles: A lot of people who have heard this new album said that there's a strong Neil Young influence.
Any chance of working with him?
Kelly: There is actually. Not personally, but we're on a lot of the same festival bills in Europe which we
found out this week. I think we do a festival in Italy and Germany the same day as him. It would be
great to meet him. Harvest moon and stuff like that, records my brothers were always playing
around the house. He's a big influence lyrically. He's the type of voice you either hate or love. Most
girls can't stand him but most blokes like him because he sounds so sincere. He sounds so fuckin' bad
that he sounds good because he's all over the place really.
Charles: That must be one of the strangest things about getting to your level, suddenly you're the
contemporary with all the people you grew up with
Kelly: Yeah, it's strange meeting people on the way up like Paul McCartney or Neil Young is always
weird. And there's not many bands that kinda scare you (???). Watching Aerosmith on the side of the
stage scared me, and watching Black Crowes and Macy Grey and people like that. Mostly American
people because they put on much more of a show. You watch Macy Grey and she's kinda like the old
Ready Steady Go footage or Otis Redding and stuff. It's a proper show. You watch a British band and
it's kinda like going through the motions and it's fuckin' really boring. It's good if you're good at it
but if you're a boring front man and you don't have the best voice in the world it's a bit shit really. I
think Liam Gallagher is one of the few people that can stand on the stage and people look at him and
he doesn't do fuck-all. He's got that thing about him. That's an art as well I think.
Charles: Do you find it odd that your new album is already all over the internet?
Kelly: No, not really. I think everyone's album gets all over the internet. It's on Napster now, innit? It took
a while to get on it really as it was finished in September. Kids are gonna download it and they like it
they're going to buy it anyway. It's the same as when we used to tape cassette copies. I don't have a
really big argument for it, I just think that the art work and proper quality of it is part and parcel of it. I
like to get the whole package 'cause I think, you kinda see colors when you get albums, I do when I
listen to my old records. The album cover kinda gives you a color. I think all that's part of it. I don't
think you can get all that from an internet copy. The qualities not good enough and I don't think you
get all the atmosphere of it.
Charles: Do you think that it damages the album at all, the fact that's it's already all over the net and it
doesn't come out for another two months?
Kelly: In a way it kinda creates a vibe. If they like what they listen to than they tell other people and there's
still people hearing your music. Money wise you lose a lot of money, but you do so anyway. I think
you get about one pound thirty a record and the record company gets the rest. That's why they're so
worried about it. The record companies and Napster should get together and work it our really and
they'd be much better off for everybody. It's like a listening post in a record shop. It's a complicated
thing and I'm sure it will get really fucked up before it gets right. I think record companies should get
involved and try to sort it out.
Charles: Did you ever consider releasing a fake album, hiding the real one in a vault until you release it.
Kelly: No, I never considered that. I think Radiohead did that. I didn't buy all that Radiohead stuff because
make a record all fucked up. They know that conflict is gonna work but they keep another one ready in
case it doesn't work. In that sense I don't really believe that. It's so hard to market a record as it is, to
market two would be a nightmare. So many people are doing it and it takes two years to get around the
world because there are so many magazines to talk to, tv stations. Whereas years ago there would
be one magazine and one radio station in the country and you could tour the world and people
would release a record a year, maybe two a year. Now you can't do that because you have to talk to
everybody and you end up talking about music more than you make it, so it's a bit weird.
Charles: If it all ended today, what would you do to keep yourself happy?
Kelly: The world?
Charles: Your music career.
Kelly: I'd do something else. I'd probably write something. I'm always writing ideas down. I'd like to end
up writing a script. I'm always doing stuff like that, so. When I get bored of doing what I'm doing on
stage, or get too fat and bloated and don't look so good on stage than I'll do something else. There's
nothing worse than a fat ugly old rock star. So I'll do something else than. There are plenty of things
to do. I've got my fingers in a lot of pies and I'm not scared of this being taken away from me because
at the moment I'm on top of our game particularly and I know where were going and I hope it
stays that way for as long as…..I think we're in control of it to a point and if you don't get lazy you'll
always be able to do it.
Charles: Is it liberating to feel that way, to feel you have something else if this all ends?
Kelly: Yeah. If you've got ideas it's fine. I get involved with the art work and videos and stuff. I probably
get involved too much really as I don't have much time. In a way bands can get dropped or the record
label can go bust. Our labels got shares everywhere and they can fall through. If you're good at what
you do or are determined to achieve something than another label will sign you. But you're only as
good as your last record, your last song, or your last gig, so if you don't keep moving forward or keep
criticizing what you've done than…that's where most people fall. They get all their money and fuckin'
spend it all and forget they have to write a song for the next record and it all falls through. You've got
to split yourself up a little bit.
Berny: I was just expecting and answer like I'm gonna start a sheep farm in Wales. I was right outside of
Newport and there were sheep everywhere.
Kelly: Nah, fuck sheep. Well, I don't fuck sheep. My family does that. Just gotta get lots of Wellies.
Charles: In this country we have the South, North East and West Coast. Lots of people don't realize that
there are strong divisions in the UK as well. Most people don't realize that being from Wales is quite
different from England proper or Scotland.
Kelly: Yeah, England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales are four countries and they make up Great Britain. And
you got Northern Ireland as well. It isn't that complete of a different culture to be honest. North
England, Scotland and Wales are kinda all an island. Dublin and Southern Ireland are kinda similar in
enthusiasm at gigs. Than South England like London is a bit more, there are lots of different types of
people there. Not like New York, but there are a lot of different cultures there. You don't get that
much in Wales really. There's no black kids in my school or stuff like that. It's very much all of your
own kind until you go a city like Cardiff where there's a lot more of that stuff. It's not like New York
and LA where it's quite different.
Charles: Do you feel an affinity with any of the other Welsh bands?
Kelly: Pride that we've done something for the people of Wales because for many years they didn't have
anything to talk about. Apart from Tom Jones or Shirley Bassey or Anthony Hopkins or Richard
Burton, which are four or five people. I seen Anthony Hopkins eat somebody's brain last night which
was great. Catatonia, Manics, ourselves. I think we all got really successful albums at the same time. It
was really funny actually to see all of us on the covers of the NME, the Melody Maker, Select
magazine, Q, it was all Welsh bands. Kids never had that before in Wales, so for them they had a
sense of fuck off, you've been laughing at us for years and now we got that. As a band I don't want to
make it a national thing because it gets really boring and everyone says you're from Wales, you're
from Wales. If your songs are good it doesn't matter where you come from. You could come from
fuckin' Germany, it doesn't matter. The Scorpions.
Charles: I want to thank you for taking a few minutes out.
Kelly: No problem.
