OMD - The Story of a Modernity

You can say anything you like about Andy McCluskey, the veteran frontman of one of British synth pop's most glorious bands, except that he isn't a talker. And come to think of it, there's no real difference between his stage persona – he's like a pinball forever bouncing around, albeit in a strangely choreographed way – and the elegant exuberance he brings to answering our questions. Andy, in short, is not one of those interviewees who coast along on autopilot or answer out of boredom; quite the opposite, he's an enthusiast who happily dishes out anecdotes, airing his passions and, why not, his pet peeves. We caught up with him in Cologne, right in the middle of the promotional campaign for the new OMD album, titled "History Of Modern". Here's what he told us.

Andy, let's start with the latest album. The fact that you've reunited with the original line-up 24 years after "Pacific Age" suggests we're looking at a major event. What's changed between you, and in your music, since then?

Obviously our situation has changed enormously. I think the biggest shift came from the fact that the original band split up towards the end of the '80s. I carried on alone with the OMD project for a few years, but then I stopped in 1996. It was obvious why: indie-rock was everywhere, along with Oasis and Britpop – '80s synth pop bands were completely out of fashion and out of time, and it really felt like the moment to stop. I was banging my head against a wall, but then things changed again...

And quite a lot, I'd say...

Right. People started asking us to play live again, to appear on TV, to produce records for other artists, because electro was becoming cool again, and so in the end we even did a TV show. Actually it was really just for fun, just to go out there and say "hey, hello everyone!" again – it was the first time in 17 years that all of us had been together in the same place and... well, we enjoyed it, we had a good time. We were offered some shows, so we thought: "Get back to doing gigs? Why not, let's do a few...". We put tickets on sale for nine shows and they sold out immediately. So by this year we'd played forty.

Have you and Paul stayed friends since the original line-up split up?

Yes, we never had any big fallouts. I can say we've always remained friends, so much so that Paul even worked with me on a couple of songs on the last album released as Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark, in 1996.

Today there are plenty of bands drawing on your classic sound and making synth pop. I'm thinking of Junior Boys or Hot Chip... Are you familiar with these bands?

Certainly.

So tell me: how do you react when you hear songs with a style similar to OMD's?

It's definitely interesting, but it shouldn't be surprising. If you think about it, pop music is old by now: there's nothing that hasn't already been done in the past. A few years ago every band had a '60s and '70s sound, now that's faded into the background and everyone wants that early-'80s sound...

Luckily...

You mean for me? Well, I really can't complain...

Yes, but for me too...

(at this point Andy bursts out laughing, ed.) I think the problem is, and always has been, the same. There are bands with a unique and special way of working, Hot Chip for instance are one of them. But now that electro is back in fashion there are people – exactly like thirty years ago – who have nothing to say, who are neither unique nor special, and who just want to be part of the industry, so they start making electro music. So, you see, there's some electro music we like, such as Hurts, Mirrors, and Robyn is fantastic too, but then there's other stuff that's worthless. It's always the same story, and from that point of view there's nothing new.

Do you think what you do is just a synth pop revival, or is there something new on the latest album?

In creating the sound of "History of Modern" we took a look back at our own history and realised that the best music we've ever made was on the first four records. Back then we had a unique, distinctive sound, we wrote songs, we had things to say and we said them in our own recognisable style. We've always tried to do something different, but different doesn't always mean better, so I'll be honest with you: in the late Eighties OMD weren't really up to much...

But "Sugar Tax" was a good record...

Yes, "Sugar Tax" was indeed a good record, but "Crush" and "Universal" weren't exactly the best.

Yes, I agree with you on that...

I'll tell you, even "The Pacific Age" and "Liberator" weren't up to much. "Sugar Tax" was a good record with good music, but if we really wanted to come back, the most important thing was to sound like ourselves and like nobody else, and the distinctive sound of Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark is the sound of the early records. But we had to make sure we weren't simply making some kind of retro, nostalgic record — instead making sure the production, style and musical quality sounded like... 2010. That was the tricky balance we had to strike: we had to use the traditional OMD sounds while also making the record sound current. That was the real challenge.

You've always been sonic explorers with synthesizers. Don't you think today's technology limits that kind of exploration a bit and tends to flatten the sound? I'm thinking especially of studio work: isn't there a risk of being seduced by the shortest route, so to speak? Because these days everything seems so much easier, don't you think?

Well, I mean... some things are easier but others are more complicated. When we started out we didn't have that many instruments, and certainly not a computer full of synth samples. In some ways that made things easier, because you didn't have many alternatives: it went more or less like this: "Ok, bass drum!" "Boom boom boom", and then "Bass sound!" "Doo doo doo", "Ok, done!". Now instead it goes like this: "Bass drum!" "Umm, well there are three thousand different ones! My God, which sound do we use?!". And of course people still believe the same thing: "Oh, you do it all with the computer, you load in the samples, press a button and the computer writes the song". No it doesn't, come on! I wish it did...! Thirty years ago there were people who'd say (here his tone turns deep and serious): "The machine writes the music". No, we write the music: we use machines, but it's us who write the music. Unfortunately synthesizers don't have a button that says "hit singles" on it! (another laugh, ed.)

Both you and Paul have taken lead vocals on OMD's biggest hits, so I've always wondered how you decided who would sing the next song. Did that kind of dual arrangement ever cause problems for you?

Actually it was very simple: if we wrote a song together, or if I wrote it on my own, I'd sing it. If Paul wrote it on his own, he'd sing it. So on average, every album had most of the songs written together, one or two tracks written by me alone and maybe one by Paul. If he'd written it on his own, without any input from me, then he was the singer. That's why there are singles like "Souvenir" and "Forever Live And Die", which Paul wrote on his own, without me getting involved, and which he therefore sang. There was never a situation like "Ok, it's your turn now, I'll take the next one...".

...so it was all very clear-cut, then. On the new album, are you the only one singing?

Yes, exactly.

What did it mean to be pioneers of electronic pop in punk-era England? Tell me about that period...

Oh, it really was all very exciting. It's worth remembering that Paul and I created and discovered our own "alternative" music as far back as 1975, when we started listening to Kraftwerk. Even then we intended to write our own alternative electronic music, and that was before punk. But when that movement exploded we found ourselves with a great opportunity, partly because it was easy to find places to play, and partly because it encouraged people to make different kinds of music. So we got a wonderful chance in Liverpool, where there was a fantastic venue called "Eric's Club": we invented the band just to be able to play one night, and they accepted us. Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark was only meant to be a one-night project, but then we came back for another gig, then came the single for Factory ("Electricity", ed.), and right after that we signed to a major label, Virgin. I have to admit that for me and Paul all of this was really surprising. We never expected to have hits, we weren't interested in becoming pop stars. We'd simply play at his mother's house on Saturday afternoons, when she went out to work: we'd get together and play our weird music. Our friends thought our music was awful, so we never imagined it could be pop. It was strange, nobody liked it, we only made it for ourselves. So it really was a surprise when, three years after we'd started writing songs, we released "Electricity" as a single. Just think... we'd written "Electricity" at sixteen, and suddenly everyone started finding it amazing, and Tony Wilson, from Factory Records, said "This is the pop music of the future!".

Right, it really was an unrepeatable moment...

Truly. It was an amazing, incredible time. The only problem was that most journalists hated us. You know, they were journalists who judged rock by the old clichés, so they hated what we were doing, along with Human League and Depeche Mode. "This isn't music" — they'd say — "it's not manly, it's not sweaty, it's not honest". They didn't understand us, so they turned against us, and yet now you get people coming out with lines like "ah, the OMD 'classic' 'Enola Gay'", the 'classic' 'Architecture And Morality'". But if you look at the reviews from back then, they were terrible, and now they're 'classics' (and here Andy sniggers with satisfaction, ed.)

Don't get me started: I think back to all the arguments I used to have with fans of “blood, sweat and tears” rock, and all those distinctions between “real music” and “artificial music”. But I have to say that, over time, a lot of those people have changed their position, and today they see things from a different perspective. At the end of the day, it's a debate that's been somewhat overtaken by events…

Listen Andy, we were talking about Kraftwerk earlier: since there's a song dedicated to them on the new album, “Rfwk”, I'd like to know a bit about your history and theirs. As young men you were fans of theirs, and given all the references you've scattered here and there, you didn't do much to hide it. I know you worked with Karl Bartos, and I also know that they didn't part on the best of terms (especially with Wolfgang Flür, from what I've read). Are you still friends with Karl?

Absolutely, in fact I sent him an mp3 of “Rfwk” itself, and just a few weeks ago Wolfgang Flür wrote me an email to say he'd heard our new record on the radio, so yes, I know them well and we're friends. I haven't seen them in a long time, but we still email each other now and then, we talk on the phone, and I'm hoping they'll come see us on our tour in Germany next November. As for Ralf Hütter and Florian Schneider, I'm actually not in touch with either of them, and honestly, when you think of Kraftwerk, when you think of the great man of Kraftwerk, you think of Ralf…

What do you think of the new project he's carrying on solo as Kraftwerk?

As you well know, Ralf always wanted Kraftwerk to be the perfect machine. I, on the other hand, always felt there was something very human about Kraftwerk. Everyone in the Seventies thought they were a machine, and indeed, compared to the rest of the music of that decade, they really did look and sound like one. But if you listened closely you could hear people in the band, beautiful melodies, and a way of playing that wasn't entirely perfect. You could hear melancholy and romanticism in there too, even if people never fully grasped that side of them. There was a beautiful, poignant humanity in Kraftwerk: “Trans Europe Express” and “Neon Lights” are, to me, absolutely gorgeous, romantic songs.

I couldn't agree with you more…

Whereas now – that is, since Karl, Wolfgang and, more recently, Florian have left – if you listen to something like “Aerodynamik” or “Vitamin”, or if you catch a live show, there's almost no humanity left at all, he really is just like a perfect machine and, personally, I'm not that keen on it…

Are you friends with Ralf too?

I've met him three times, and that's it. You know, for me it was very difficult, it was like meeting God, and I think he's perhaps a bit of a strange man, talking to him can be quite complicated…

Florian must be a strange character too, though…

Yes, although actually I think Florian does have something of a sense of humor…

Do you really mean that?

Yes, I think so. They keep themselves shut away in their own world, and it must be really hard to get into it, but let me tell you: they're also the most important thing I've ever heard in my life.

I could say the same…

When I first heard “Autobahn” I thought: “Wow!”. They came to play in Liverpool on 11 September 1975, at the Liverpool Empire, I was sitting in seat 246 (and here Andy recites the number almost solemnly, ed.): for me, that day marked the start of a whole new life.

Over the course of your career you've worked with some great producers. I'm thinking of Mick Howlett, Rhett Davies, Stephen Hague - which of these do you think was the real wizard of the recording studio?

The funny thing is that we actually had problems with producers because we had a very, very particular and individual way of writing and putting songs together. Rhett Davies, for example, didn't understand us at all - that was a big mistake. We'd asked for Rhett because we loved the sound of Roxy Music on their early-80s albums. We brought him in for "Dazzle Ships", but we asked him to work on a record that just wasn't his thing, so it was very difficult. The best producer we ever had was probably Mick Howlett, because he let us do whatever we wanted. He was patient but also smart - he never changed anything. He'd say: "OK, is this how you want to do it? Then do it! It's not how records are normally made, but it's your way of doing it, it's your style. I'll just help make sure it sounds like a professional record, but I won't tell you what you should or shouldn't do."

He wasn't trying to bend your music to his own taste...

No, he didn't change it, he simply helped us get the best possible recording of our ideas. Of the three, personally I'd say Mick Howlett was the best: Stephen Hague and I argued all the time - he was a nice guy, but I hated working with him...

Then you also had a run-in with Martin Hannett early in your career, and that didn't go too well either, did it?

It didn't work out for "Electricity" - his vision for that song just didn't work, you know, all those gothic effects and that echo? But then he took our song "Almost", which was a bouncy little pop tune, and gave us back a beautiful song, echoey and romantic. So let's say he got one right and one wrong.

He must have been an odd character, I've read some bizarre stories about him...

Very strange, but we had an interesting time working with him. Factory Records had no money, so we had to mix in these horrendous studios, at night, when there was nobody around, and by about three in the morning Martin would be so out of it that he'd crawl under the mixing desk and fall asleep. Paul and I would say to each other, "So what do we do now? Do we wake him up or not?" "Ah, no, I'm not waking him up!" The only thing we could do was wait for him to wake up (his tone turns understandably amused, ed.).

Perhaps not everyone knows the more experimental side of OMD. I'm thinking of certain things on "Organisation", or your extraordinary b-sides, the ones collected on "Navigation". Why haven't you recorded anything like that in more recent times? After all, nobody associates you with an industrial sound, and yet you did plenty of things in that vein...

When we were writing the b-sides, it was an extraordinary opportunity, because we'd spent the previous six months surrounded by new instruments and new music. The singles were ready, the album was finished too, but we needed extra tracks, and from that point on we had complete freedom, a blank slate - we could do whatever we wanted with all the new gear, and on top of that we were still full of energy. So we'd write our most interesting material, and "Navigation" shows just how good and strong our b-sides were. We stopped doing them that way after "Dazzle Ships", which nearly killed our commercial career - we went from three million copies sold to three hundred thousand, losing ninety per cent of our audience.

I've always found that very strange, because after all "Dazzle Ships" has both catchy songs and the "difficult" kind of songs from your earlier records...

I don't know what to tell you, maybe "Genetic Engineering" wasn't the right choice for a single...

Maybe, but "Telegraph" was really catchy, it worked brilliantly...

Yes, I know. Look, I honestly couldn't tell you what happened. We could talk about it all day and still never really know exactly how it went. But after that record Paul got married, we'd both settled down, we had responsibilities, and this was our job, so we had to make sure we could actually make money from it: that's where all the problems with the band's sound started. That's why we stopped experimenting, stopped just doing whatever we wanted. So especially with the b-sides, we really stopped experimenting. Still, the interesting thing is that on our most recent record we went back to experimenting with the b-sides - except now they're not called b-sides anymore, they're bonus tracks. There's this really interesting song called "Ideal One", and then there's "Alone", which is a great track, a genuinely good b-side. Another curious thing is that on "History of Modern" there's a track called "New Holy Ground" that was originally meant to be a bonus track: we were so excited about it that once we'd finished the record, we decided to put it on there.

I'd like to talk for a moment about the charts. You had great success across Europe as well as, obviously, in the UK, but perhaps somewhat below expectations, overall, in the US. It's strange, because you were arguably among the first to help trigger the great British Invasion of 1983/84. How do you explain that? You had a few hits, but you never achieved the success of Human League...

It's interesting because right when our music became a bit more conservative and traditional, American audiences started loving it more. We used to joke about it among ourselves: since we were actually among the first English bands to land in America, between 1980 and 1982, we always said it was a bit like D-Day. When the Allied ships landed on the coast, the first soldiers to come ashore were shot dead, while those who landed afterwards managed to reach the beach by walking over the corpses of the first wave. Well, we were the first to land on American shores, but we got killed by the American press, while Human League and Culture Club, walking over our corpses, marched on and found success (he has a hearty laugh, ed.).

I read somewhere that, among your classic body of work, you consider "Architecture And Morality" your best album. I find it a very beautiful record, but perhaps less daring than the previous "Organisation" and especially the following "Dazzle Ships". Do you agree?

Well, if you really think about "Architecture and Morality", you'll realize it's just as distinctive as "Organisation" and "Dazzle Ships", in its own way, but it has these wonderful, choral sounds. There's "Souvenir", "Maid of Orleans" and "Joan of Arc". It might seem less experimental, but "Sealand" is a very unusual track, and "Architecture And Morality" is essentially musique concrète. Anyway, I don't want to get into a debate about which record is the most experimental, I just think our first four albums are the best thing we've ever done.

What does Andy McCluskey listen to these days?

What am I listening to right now? Let's see... my favorite record from last year is "Body Talk Part One" by Robyn, if you don't know it, get hold of it, and actually this week "Body Talk Part Two" is coming out too. Then there's a band, Au Revoir Simone, I really like their record. But I still listen to old albums too, sometimes I love putting on "A Walk Across The Rooftops" by Blue Nile, I adore it, it's a fantastic record. And then I always listen to my all-time favorite record, one that nobody has ever really understood, by two Canadian folk singers, Kate and Anna McGarrigle. One of them, Kate, was the mother of Rufus Wainwright, and she sadly passed away recently. It's a wonderful record, it's not the style of music I make, but those harmonies are so melancholic and moving, and sad... So, those are some of the things I listen to.

And what about Paul? Does he listen to different music? Because at the start you used to listen to the same stuff, right?

You see, actually at the start we listened to the same music because I bought the records and he owned a stereo. The simple reason Omd came into being is that I used to bring my German records over to Paul's place. I had a mono turntable that sounded terrible, whereas he'd built himself a stereo system because he was into electronics. He'd built a stereo, and I'd go round to his house: it was simply a wonderful symbiotic relationship.

Listen Andy, what can we do to see you on stage in Italy? I saw you've got a load of dates lined up in Germany, and not a single one here. You've always kind of snubbed us, how come?

I'd love to come to Italy, we asked if it was possible but there's no agent or promoter willing to pay us enough to put on a good show. Sure, we could come and do a s#!t show, with terrible sound and no lights, but who'd want to see that? If you know anyone who could bring us to Italy with a proper show, we'd really love to come to Milan or Rome, because we haven't played in Italy since 1982...

I know all too well, unfortunately I couldn't come and see you and it was a shame, since there hasn't been another chance here since...

Listen, if you know anyone, ask them. I'd really like to come, we don't hate Italy, quite the opposite, we love it, it's just that nobody calls us. Anyway, I hope you'll like the new record. It's doing really well here in Germany, in Holland and in England. I was very nervous because journalists only had a few weeks to listen to it and I didn't know what they'd make of it. But it's really good and it's doing very well.

Thanks to Laura Lucia Rossi for her patient and precise help in putting this together.

Ride the wave of great music

Add OndaRock to your favorite sources on Google Discover. Don't miss our reviews, milestones and latest news straight in your feed.

Follow on Google