Spleen - The Allure of Improvisation

Best known for his long-standing collaboration with PJ Harvey and, more recently, with Italy's own Marlene Kuntz, Rob Ellis has an extensive body of production work and collaborations to his name (including Placebo, Mick Harvey and Marianne Faithfull), a couple of solo albums, and another couple with Spleen, his project devoted to the noisier, more rock-oriented side of improvisation. On the occasion of the release of "Nun Lover!" by the aforementioned Spleen, Onda Rock caught up with the многifaceted Rob in Senigallia to talk about it.

Hi, Magda!

Hi Rob!

Hi, how are you?

Pretty good, thanks. You?

I'm well, thank you.

(smiles) Actually, I'm here to produce a Roman artist, Giulia Villari. I think she's very talented, and she's definitely a name to keep an eye on.

You've been producing a lot of artists lately.

Yes, that's actually what I want to do (laughs). Seriously, I never want to play drums again!

Really?!

Yes, that's what I want to do, it's the part I love most about working on a record. Absolutely. Not playing, but listening. Listening and having ideas.

Mmmhhh… I find it so strange to hear you say something like that!

Strange? Why do you think it's strange?

I couldn't say exactly, but if recording can be boring, I imagine the adrenaline you feel getting up on a stage must be enjoyable.

(sighs) Yes, but it's not good for a man my age, my dear Magda (we burst out laughing). These days I can't really handle too much coffee, too much alcohol, or fickle women anymore, that's my current problem.

Getting back to playing live is out of the question!

I'm more or less joking. … More or less.

Let's talk about Spleen. The first album released under that name came out in 1996. What's happened since then?

In '96 two albums came out under the name "Spleen", and it was a project confined to a recording studio… Then I released some instrumental albums under my own name, and between then and now I've played and worked with other people: I've recorded, played live, produced, so I didn't have much time to devote to a new chapter of Spleen and, suddenly, I found myself ten years later.

The truth is we went into the studio meaning to record an album, and it was only at that point that I realized we were in the right atmosphere for Spleen, that this could be a Spleen album: it's basically instrumental improvisation.

You touched on a few things I'd been meaning to dig into.

Yes, but I've always kidded myself that it was a band and not just a project under the name Rob Ellis. This time, though, Spleen can finally be considered a real band, there are only four people involved. Before, there were a lot more people involved: there were 20 on the first album and 16 on the second. This time there were only four, all together, in the same room, improvising live, whereas on the previous albums I was alone in the room composing music for months and months.

I imagine asking Cristiano Godano and Josh Klinghoffer (guitarist, among others, for PJ Harvey , John Frusciante , Vincent Gallo) to play on this album was an easy choice, since you've known both of them for years. But how did you come to know Giorgio Vendola? I'd never heard of him, but he's an extraordinary bassist!

Giorgio is definitely one of the best musicians I've ever met in my entire career!

It was a genuine surprise, a genuine discovery: a couple of years ago I was in Senigallia to record the album and there was this music festival happening all over town. I was walking through the streets watching all these bands play and I saw this jazz group — whose name, I'm sorry to say, I just can't remember, which is really awful of me — this jazz group, as I was saying, had this extraordinary bass player with a style somewhere between Eastern European folk and experimental jazz. I immediately thought it was fantastic. I waited for the show to end, went backstage and — since he doesn't speak English and I speak very little Italian — I managed to explain with gestures that I'd be recording an album that week and asked him to take part in the sessions. That's basically what happened.

So I had the right feeling when I thought that this, rather than a carefully written and considered album, was more like the record of an evening of improvisations. But I didn't think there was also the awareness of wanting to release an album — I thought the album was a consequence.

I've always felt that a new Spleen album needed a band, rather than being the result of months of solitary work in a studio — I liked the idea of having ten people in the studio and recording whatever came out of an improvisation.

This album came out of an idea of Josh's: he was on tour in Europe and, having about ten days free, thought he'd spend a few days with me in Senigallia. Since he was here, I suggested we record something, but then I thought that whatever just Josh and I could put down in a single day wouldn't fully work, so I called Cristiano and met Giorgio, and we found ourselves being a band for just one day. We recorded everything in one evening: you know, Josh had to leave to finish the tour and there was no time to sit down and plan out what to play, the only thing we could do was improvise, and what you hear is the faithful result of that session.

I've rarely had the chance to improvise during my career, but whenever I have, I've always enjoyed it — I think I've always come away with really interesting results.

How did you go about adding the vocal lines and lyrics afterwards?

I was really happy with how the album sounded without a vocal line, I realized there were tracks with a lot of potential, that could become proper songs because they had a structure suited to an actual song, so it felt very natural to think about adding vocals. It took me about 6 months to write the lyrics, arrange the vocal lines and overdub everything.

The lyrics are about my unhealthy obsession with nuns (laughs) in films and literature.

Right, let's talk for a moment about the album title. My first impression was that it seemed like a kind of blasphemy...

Actually, it's an accusation leveled at me by Miss Polly Harvey: she sent me a text that said: "Nun Lover!". (smiling) I can assure you I'm not a pervert, I swear, it's just that I like films about nuns.

One of my favorite films is "Black Narcissus". It's set in a convent where all the resident nuns go mad, and one of them even tries to kill the Mother Superior. That's also what the track "Sister Ruth" is about. That film had a huge impact on a lot of people, including Coppola and Scorsese. In particular, the famous scene where Sister Ruth walks out of the chapel and there's that extreme close-up on her wild, possessed eyes. When, at the end of "Taxi Driver", the shot closes in tight on De Niro's eyes reflected in the mirror, well, that's a clear tribute to the scene I just described.

...I'm also very interested in the aesthetics and culture of nuns.

There's nothing deliberately perverse about the title (smiles), I swear.

Let's also say a few words about the packaging. I find it stunning.

I'm really happy with how it turned out. There are a couple of spelling mistakes that crept in during the transcription, because the person who worked on the artwork doesn't speak English and I don't speak Italian very well. It's funny that, as hard as we tried to make sure everything was written correctly, we still ended up with mistakes anyway.

These are still the first copies, but in later editions, the mistakes will be fixed.

No! Rob, you can't fix them, it's all so perfect! I was actually convinced they were intentional!

They weren't, but I'll confess that every Spleen record has typos in it, so by now it's become a bit of a running theme.

Rob, you'd already released several records under your own name.

Two have come out. The first in 2000 and the second in 2003. They're called "Music for the Home vol. 1 and vol. 2." They're instrumental avant-garde and electronic records.

Where does the need come from to have some records under your own name and others under the name "Spleen"?

I think the real reason is that, deep down, I'm quite shy (smiles) and very democratic, so I think it's right that, when several people work together, the record shouldn't be credited to just one person.

If it were simply my record, one I'd worked on alone, I'd find it fair for it to come out only under the name Rob Ellis, but if it's a band effort, it's right that it shouldn't come across as mine alone.

Will there be a video in rotation?

Hmm... (pulls the receiver away and shouts to the label) Will there be a video in rotation?

…

They're thinking about it, but I hope so.

And live shows?

We'd love that. The problem is getting everyone together: I'm busy with all my projects, Josh is always on tour with someone, Cristiano is in Cuneo recording the new Marlene Kuntz album, and Giorgio... God only knows where Giorgio is these days!

We're four people with very full schedules.

All four of us want to do it, and I hope we'll find a way to play live.

(January 26, 2006)

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