This is an interview with Sharleen on MCM (Jan '97). The interviewer was Christian David. They were sat outside round a table. Sharleen, surprisingly, was wearing a black shirt. Some bits are missing (shown by asterisks), but it doesn't matter too much. Does it?
FIN
Sharleen: Yeah... No, not two and a half years off. Two and a half years
working very hard (grin).
MCM: You never take some time off? you're always working?
Sharleen: Um... There was a lot of different things. I mean I was in Paris for a
while...
MCM: ...Good Idea...
Sharleen: ...It was very good. I enjoyed it very very much. It was good for writing,
you know... *** in a new city.
MCM: France seems to be your second home since the beginning of the band.
Sharleen: I probably spend more time in France, I spend more time in Paris than I do
in Scotland. I like it very very much. I'm living a big romance (grin).
MCM: Ah...Ah, on va tout savoir...(=we're gonna know everything) So let's talk a
little bit of the story of Texas, to remind a little bit. So the band started
quite a few years ago.
Sharleen: 86, the band was formed. First album in '89 and this is number four.
MCM: So it starts to be a *** big story of four albums for the five of you.
Sharleen: Yeah, it's weird. I mean it's always strange *** When you think of the
bands at the time we released our first album, a lot doesn't exist anymore.
So we feel very happy that we've got to number four.
MCM: So how do you feel with the evolution of the band since the first album,
since the formation of it, until these days? ***
Sharleen: I think when we were going to make this album "White On Blonde", we said
we won't go into the studio and plug in the guitars and start playing as
a band...
MCM: like every band in the world...
Sharleen: we've done it before, you know. It wouldn't be a good idea. We toured so
much. It would have been typical Texas again. We really wanted it to change.
We wanted to make a different sound. We wanted to... just basically make it
exciting for ourselves again to make music. So we have to do something very
very different and approach it in a very different way to have a different
sound.
MCM: Ok. So now you are going to see a little sort program of a minute and a
half about Texas. the story of Texas.
Sharleen: ...Ooh...
MCM: ...we call it retrospective in French. So maintenant c'est la retrospective
de Texas.
Sharleen: You're gonna see my haircut? (grin)
MCM: Of course.
MCM: So this album (white on blonde) is very different from the one before and
the one before prepare this album in the sound, to me. Yo see what I mean.
Sharleen: Yeah, I know... I wonder what this dog is doing (a little dog walked in
the background)...Definitely when we finished Ricks Road, we started writing
songs on tour. But I think when we recorded Tired of Being alone, like five
years ago, I found a place where I thought my voice really fits a lot. I love
this kind of soul feel, very high to set my voice and you know I really
thought of Marvin Gaye. He had a really big influence on this record. It has
a very much soul feel to it but using very 90s sound like *** samplers
instruments. Hip hop is a very big influence on it also and the music is a
*mix-up* of Hip hop and, you know, rock steady music. People from the
"wu tang clan" *** we listen to. We mixed the two together. So it was good,
it has a different sound. It was interesting because in no time we played
together as a band when we made this record. Everything was really thought
out perfectly. And I watched a lot of Marvin Gaye documentaries, who
drove everybody insane. It was amazing. We watched documentaries
on Motown and stuff. And Marvin Gaye said in one interview : "I always laid
down when I said my vocals". So from that point, I used to lay down to sing
all the time and everybody said what is she doing? I was like
(pretends to be singing laid down)
MCM: And there's a lot of strings on this album.
Sharleen: Yes.
MCM: That's very new.
Sharleen: Well, we always used strings...
MCM: In this one, it's very present.
Sharleen: ...The thing is the way the record was, everything has a perfect place,
you know. We just normal played before and if it was good, it was a take
and done. Every piece of music that is on every song was thought and placed.
Also while the recording as well, we used a lot the computer, the Apple Macs.
You can move things about. You do whatever you want to do. We defined
something and move it. Then you read it back and you wouldn't normally play
it in that place. So it was like listening to someone else. You can distance
yourself from the music. You're like scientists or something, experiment all
the time. It was good. It was very good.
MCM: now we are going to see you on stage. It was one month ago or two months
ago and you played a kind of showcase.
[clips showing ]
MCM: we're still talking about "white on blonde". As you said you experimented
on computers with this album. Aren't you afraid that the fans of Texas could
be desappointed by the changing of the music?
Sharleen: No I think they would be desappointed if Texas has given them
another album. Why would you like an album that sounds like the one before.
Time's changing, music's changing, culture's changing, everything's changing and you've
got to move on. I never will be the same. Never.
MCM: ...No, it's not interesting to do it. When you find just a way to do an
album and the next are all the same, it's boring.
Sharleen: Yeah, it's too safe. You need risks always and in everything you do
in life.
MCM: When you are an artist you have to do that. You're not a kind of worker
doing the same thing all the time. You know.
Sharleen: Yeah. As I said it had to be special for the band to make it. It was very
difficult. It was very hard to make this record in this way because it would
is very easy for us to just take the intruments and play the music.
It's very very easy. But we had to make it hard, we had to think about everything
all the time, we played the guitar and read the manual to work the machine,
tried things, sampled the guitar. It was tiring.
MCM: Is it not a little restrictive and frustating sometimes to work with the
machines when you like to play with real guitars, with a real band.
Sharleen: No, we had real guitars to make the samples. Then what you do is...
you sample the section of the guitar and then you cut it and then
loop it together and then you play back the guitar. Because you sample it
goes like "teeteet shht teeteet shht". You can compress it and it sound
different from playing it with amp. And then you play over your part again.
You get a different placing.
MCM: You have to keep it fresh...
Sharleen: Yeah you have to keep it fresh. At some point it was scary but it was
really good because it was hard for us.
MCM: So the title. Why did you choose white on blonde?
Sharleen: I'm not blond (grin)
MCM: Can you prove it? (grin)
Sharleen: here we go ...(pretends to rip off a wig). No it was a Texas's sense of
contracdiction. White on blonde. I have black hair and I wear black.
No basically white on blonde means 90's *** new - fresh - simple:
White On Blonde. That is what the album is all about.
MCM: so we're gonna see you again on stage the same day.
[Clip of Sharleen playing the piano (Tired of Being Alone)]
MCM: So it's going to be a tour, of course. When you put out an album you have
to do a tour.
Sharleen: Yes. It's a challenge. It's gonna be good because we really look forward
to do it. We have rehearsed a bit, playing the songs. The new songs, it's a
challenge to play but to reinvent the old stuff and bring up to the new
sound : The new generation Texas (grin).
MCM: How do you work the sound? You have to change it because the songs are
very sophisticated on this album. On stage they have to be more stripped.
Sharleen: Wait and see. It will be a big surprise.
MCM: How is it gonna be some strings on stage, why not?
Sharleen: God I can imagine how it would be. I love strings, you know. May be if we
do a big showcase, we bring a lot of strings.
MCM: So you're gonna play in March in Paris of course.
Sharleen: we'll play in Olympia.
MCM: Of course. You tried it once and you come back.
Sharleen: We'll do it again. Yeah, I'm looking forward to do it a lot.
MCM: So you like to be in France
Sharleen: Yeah.
MCM: But how do you feel when you have to come to work here?
Sharleen: I don't mind to come here to work if I'm coming to play a concert but for
the last two days, I've been in a hotel doing press interviews every minute.
I don't have any minute to even visit the hotel. I could be anywhere and I
love Paris so much. So I feel very frustated. I'd rather...go shopping.
MCM: Eh, you can go around, it's the shopping place.
Sharleen: I don't have time.
MCM: Ask the chief up there (points behind the camera). So the
French audience has been very kind with you even if they don't understand
every word you just say...
Sharleen: ...They do understand...
MCM: ...So when you speak to them, they become crazy. Remember that.
Sharleen: No, you know, the French people... we always have good relationships with
fans. I don't know why, I don't know the answer why. But it's good. I love
it. It's a good feeling. It's great to be able to love someone so much, to
play your music, to have success. Especially the music from a different
language. So I feel very ... honored.
MCM: We feel too. It's good to see you back home. It's kinda home.
Sharleen: Yeah.
MCM: We're gonna see you again, for the last time on stage in the program.
[Clip - Say What You Want]
MCM: Bravo. It's the end of the show. Thank you for coming. So the next project
is, of course, the tour. The album is here...
Sharleen: ...World domination (grin)...
MCM: Texas is back (grin). The Return (grin). Good luck for this album. I hope
to see you again.
Sharleen: You will.
MCM: You come to see me or I'll come to see you. Merci Beaucoup. Bye.