Over four songs and four instrumentals on her impressive debut album ‘Polarlichter’, ALICE HUBBLE makes the perfect synth earth mother.
Behind ALICE HUBBLE is London-based musician Alice Hubley, previously best known for fronting cult favourites like ARTHUR & MARTHA and COSINES. Despite her roles as a lead vocalist, this is the first time she has ventured out musically on her own.
With her forlorn vocal presence and endearing instrumental charm, courtesy of her array of vintage keyboards, ‘Polarlichter’ is an impressive solo debut that is a soundscape of pastoral solace.
Released on Happy Robots Records, home of RODNEY CROMWELL and TINY MAGNETIC PETS, the first single ‘Goddess’ has already been declared one of the singles of 2019 by BBC 6 Music’s Steve Lamacq, while the sub-OMD of ‘We Are Still Alone’ with its the lilting bass and elegiac transistorised melody is wonderfully glorious.
Alice Hubley chatted about the genesis of ‘Polarlichter’ and much more…
‘Polarlichter’ as a title is perfect for the album, but what inspired you to use that particular word, as opposed to other variants and languages?
The title track initially came from the artwork from the LP which I bought in a flea market in Berlin a few years ago. I like the way it sounds and rolls off the tongue, I probably don’t do the best job of pronouncing it though!
Some would say this is the album people have been waiting for from you since ARTHUR & MARTHA? Who were your key influences for this record?
That’s very nice of you to say. I do think this LP is very self-indulgent and it’s been the most fun I’ve ever had recording and putting out a record. The tracks were generally influenced by places and people / personal interactions. I don’t necessarily set out to borrow from other artists, I enjoy seeing what people pick up on when reviewing the record. There are definitely some surprises and Googling I’ve had to do, but I know I do wear my heart on my sleeve.
Was it the intention to make a half song / half instrumental album? What do you get as a musician from one form that you can’t get from the other?
I didn’t set out for that initially. When I first started the project, I was really looking to do more instrumental tracks and attack the writing process in a different way to how I have approached song writing in the past. I got a lot out of changing round my processes.
The song tracks developed along the way, mainly ‘cause they just come out of me. I think my instrumental tracks are representative of what I’m trying to get across when writing them, but it’s definitely easier to tell as a story with a song.
You began the compositional process on an iPad before bringing in analogue synths, which particular instruments did you use?
The main apps I’ve used are Tabletop and the Moog Model 15 synth app along with Garage Band and a few effects.
Where do you sit on that hardware versus software debate?
Ha, it is a contentious debate, I created a hushed silence in a room with a band (I won’t divulge who!) once when I said I liked the Moog iPad app! The thing I like about some apps is that they encourage a different way of thinking to playing a keyboard, recording can be quite immediate and you can come up with different ideas when things are more off cuff.
I personally feel if the sound fits the track and is good enough quality then why not use an app sound. I think I re-recorded the majority of the Model 15 tracks ‘cause they sounded better on the Prodigy, but the Tabletop sounds are very prominent on the LP.
‘Ruby Falls’ is a lively opening statement that paints pictures in the listener’s mind. When you go travelling, what sort of places do you like to visit and how does it stimulate your music?
I like to visit places of natural beauty and those more off the beaten path; this year, for contrast this year I’ve visited the Alhambra in Granada and a nuclear bunker in Prague. It’s nice to be taken out of the familiar, I’ve found travelling is inspiring and also triggers creativity for me.
The single ‘Goddess’ has had a very positive response, what was its genesis?
‘Goddess’ was one of the first tracks I wrote for the LP. I’d always liked the idea of writing a song called ‘Goddess’, it’s a word that is bold, beautiful and distinctly female. Through thinking about Goddesses and goddess worship came the idea of the destructive nature of the male gaze when taken to extremes, which the song explores lyrically.
I think the bass riff came in first before the song, it was written over such a long time. I then wanted to go for this chorused / filtering synth sound, which I remember worrying after it was done that it was too intense to listen to on headphones. I’m really delighted by the response it has got though, so I guess I was wrong!
The choral laden ‘Atlantis Palm’ is rather gorgeous…
Thank you!
The key track on the album is ‘We Are Still Alone’, it’s a bit like OMD meeting ASHRA?
That’s very kind, both bands are big touch points for me.
The main melodic theme of ‘We Are Still Alone’ reoccurs on ‘The Golden Age’ and ‘Still Polarlichter’, is this all part of a bigger story?
Ha, well spotted. The solo from ‘We Are Still Alone’ was at one point quite prominent in ‘The Golden Age’. It wasn’t intentional but it does help to pull the record together.
‘Kick The Habit’ goes all electro-glam, like a synthy Suzi Quatro?
Totally! I wrote the track after coming off tour supporting the psychedelic rock band BLACK MOUNTAIN, they have a lot of songs with big guitar riffs in them and this was my attempt at writing a big riff song.
Other touch points for me were second / third LP GOLDFRAPP and LADYTRON.
There’s a lot of flute sounds on the album, are they real ones?
I wouldn’t be adverse to a real flute on a record, but it’s all the beautiful sound of the Mellotron.
Which tracks on ‘Polarlichter’ are your own favourites and why?
I like them all for different reasons, though I’m particularly fond of ‘Still Polarlichter’ and ‘Atlantis Palm’. ‘Still Polarlichter’ because we went on such a journey in the studio with that song, it’s so sinister and also I love playing it live. With ‘Atlantis Palm’, it just feels so different from anything I’ve done in the past, it’s so simple but a big statement.
You are undertaking a headlining tour having opened for DAMO SUZUKI and TINY MAGNETIC PETS earlier in the year. How were those experiences and how will your approach change as you move into the role of headliner?
Both shows were a lot of fun, it was such a great experience playing with Damo and TINY MAGNETIC PETS and they were both very sweet to me.
It is a bit daunting but I am looking forward to the headline shows, I’m not planning on bringing anyone into the band as of yet, but I am looking to expand the set in some ways. Come along and see for yourself!
Will there be more from ALICE HUBBLE in the future, how has the solo experience been for you compared to being part of a band?
Yes, there is definitely more ALICE HUBBLE in the works, I’m actually in the middle of preparing to go back into the studio in September to start recording for the next release.
The whole ALICE HUBBLE process has been a dream, being solo means you can work at your own pace and can be quick at making decisions. It can get lonely at times, but I make a point of working with people I enjoy being around and try to have fun with it.
ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK gives its sincerest thanks to ALICE HUBBLE
Manchester Salford Eagle Inn (3rd October), Glasgow Nice N Sleazy (4th October), Sheffield Hatch (5th October), London Servants Jazz Quarters (5th November)
Celebrating their 40th Anniversary, OMD are one of the acts from the Synth Britannia era whose creative powers now are as strong as their chart heyday.
Setting a high standard of romantic retro-futurism with lyrical gists ranging from technology and war to deceased religious figures and long distance relationships, OMD released their debut single ‘Electricity’ in 1979, a statement about the environment that would have made today’s young campaigner Greta Thunberg proud.
Those who complain that OMD’s music is not dark enough often forget that within their highly melodic songs, subjects have included the suicide of a charismatic musician, the suicide of a woman who worked as a stripper because she had no other means of supporting herself, the racially motivated massacre of five innocent demonstrators by the Ku Klux Klan, the death of over 140,000 people by nuclear attack and most notably on two hit singles, the brutal execution of a teenage girl!
Founder members Andy McCluskey and Paul Humphreys began an impressive run of acclaimed albums and hit singles, starting with the Mike Howlett produced ‘Messages’ in 1980. The huge European popularity of the follow-up ‘Enola Gay’ captured the Cold War angst of the times under the spectre of Mutually Assured Destruction, while ‘Maid Of Orleans’ became the biggest selling single of 1982 in West Germany when Der Bundesrepublik was the biggest Western music market after the USA and Japan.
Long-time drummer Mal Holmes and live keyboardist Martin Cooper joined the fray as full band members for 1983’s ‘Dazzle Ships’ album, but things went creatively awry for OMD as McCluskey and Humphreys found themselves in an existential crisis, following journalistic criticism that songs about dead saints were not going to change the world. The more politically charged and experimental album failed to sell, but has since been re-evaluated in the 21st Century as a meisterwerk.
Bruised and under commercial pressure, OMD opted to pursue more conventional ambitions and traditions to stay in the black and scored the Top5 US hit ‘If You Leave’ from the John Hughes movie ‘Pretty In Pink’ in 1986. However a North American tour opening for DEPECHE MODE in 1988 failed to sustain momentum. In the backdrop of the resultant fallout and the inevitable musical differences, Humphreys, Holmes and Cooper departed, leaving McCluskey with the OMD brand name.
However, the split precipitated a number of interesting artistic and creative diversions for McCluskey and Humphreys which despite the triumphant reunion of the classic line-up in 2007 and the success of OMD’s most recent album ‘The Punishment Of Luxury’ in 2017, continue in varying degrees today in parallel with band activities. In his most recent interview with ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK, Paul Humphreys said: “I still find it utterly amazing and rather fantastic that after 40 years, OMD is still alive and well, selling out big tours and making what even our harshest critics consider to be relevant new records.”
By way of a Beginner’s Guide to showcase the diverse facets of OMD, a hefty 25 tracks of interest have been selected from their career, although largely eschewing those made famous by singular consumption.
But with so many tracks available and the list already being VERY long, links to the OMD family tree like THE ID, as well as work with MARSHEAUX and contributions to the soundtracks of ‘For The Greater Good’, ‘Eddie The Eagle’ and ‘The D-Train’ (which between them saw McCluskey working with notable names such as Danny Boyle, Gary Barlow, Hugh Jackman and Jack Antonoff) have been omitted.
With a restriction of one track per album project, they highlight how two lads from The Wirral have maintained their standing as a creative and cultural force four decades on, despite their numerous ups and downs.
OMD The Messerschmitt Twins (1980)
With their passion for military aircraft and German music, Andy McCluskey and Paul Humphreys were nicknamed ‘The Messerschmitt Twins’; this mournful Compurhythm driven synth ballad of the same name had mournful if cryptic lyrics which could be seen as the thoughts of aircrew during wartime missions, pondering whether they would return to home. The bleak fatalistic narrative was given further resonance by Andy McCluskey’s resigned vocalisation.
The ‘Organisation’ album saw OMD purchase their first polysynth, a Sequential Circuits Prophet 5 which allowed Paul Humphreys to explore more haunting gothic timbres away from the cheesier Vox Jaguar organ. Shaped by eerie choir textures and a repeating two note synthbass motif set to Mal Holmes’ simple marching snare pattern, the beauty of ‘2nd Thought’ echoed the third section of KRAFTWERK’s ‘Autobahn’ and displayed a maturity in OMD’s developing sound.
Available on the OMD album ‘Organisation’ via Virgin Records
Running at almost eight minutes, the nautical adventure of ‘Sealand’ demonstrated OMD’s mastery of the epic, mysteriously beginning with a ghostly collage of melodica and reed horns before sad synths and progressive sweeps made their presence felt. Featuring just a minute of vocals in the sparse middle section, the penultimate movement collapsed into a fit of industrial noise before a slow misty reprise of the main melodic theme, like a lost ship in the fog.
Like ‘Maid Of Orleans’, the harrowing ‘International’ was musically inspired by the skippy waltz of ‘Back In Judy’s Jungle’ by Brian Eno. The introductory news report about “a young girl from Nicaragua whose hands had been cut off at the wrists by the former Somoza guards…” acted as one of the fuels for Andy McCluskey to express his anger about economic corruption, political hypocrisy and torture in captivity, all topics which are still sadly relevant today.
Available on the OMD album ‘Dazzle Ships’ via Virgin Records
THE PARTNERSHIP was an unrealised project of Peter Saville cohort and ex-SPOONS member Brett Wickens with Roger Humphreys (no relation) who recorded as CERAMIC HELLO. Produced by William Orbit, the pulsatingly uptempo ‘Sampling The Blast Furnace’ featured vocals from Andy McCluskey alongside vocodered voices and chants by Martha Ladly. While this remains unreleased, the McCluskey-less demo was on the reissue of CERAMIC HELLO’s only album.
Not officially released, alternate version available on the CERAMIC HELLO album ‘The Absence Of A Canary V1.1’ via Vinyl On Demand
After the critical mauling ‘Dazzle Ships’ received, OMD were in debt to Virgin Records and had to sell more records to survive. The commercial pressure led to a trip to the sunnier climes of AIR Studios in Monserrat and the musically diverse ‘Junk Culture’. A song about McCluskey’s intimate liaison with a local girl, the bizarre mix of carnival whistles, soca, Mellotron choir, rhythm guitar and 808 driven electro came over a bit like AZTEC CAMERA produced by Arthur Baker.
Available on the OMD album ‘Junk Culture’ via Universal Music
1985’s ‘Crush’ was Stephen Hague’s first full album production and opened the doors for OMD’s ambitions in the US. ‘The Pacific Age’ continued the partnership and was intended to reinforce momentum. The opening song ‘Stay’ threw in the kitchen sink from Mal Holmes’ mighty drums to layers of synthetic strings plus the addition of soulful female backing singers, brass and heavy metal guitar. But the esoteric elements that made OMD so appealing were being wiped away.
The suave and sophisticated Etienne Daho was seen as France’s answer to George Michael. While OMD were in Paris recording ‘The Pacific Age’ at Studio de la Grande Armée, they took part in a ‘Les Enfants Du Rock’ French TV special also which also saw their French label mate interviewing his musical influences like Françoise Hardy and Serge Gainsbourg. The DAHOMD duet saw Daho and McCluskey’s low voices blend well over the original Stephen Hague produced single from ‘Crush’.
Available on the ETIENNE DAHO deluxe album ‘Pop Satori’ via Virgin Records
ARTHUR BAKER & THE BACKBEAT DISCIPLES Walkaway (1989)
Producer Arthur Baker gathered a studio collective to make a pop record tracing his love of soul, synthpop, disco, HI-NRG and Europop. His first recording since the fragmentation of OMD, Andy McCuskey contributed lyrics, keyboards and vocals to the electro-reggae of ‘Walkaway’ which threatened to turn into CULTURE CLUB’s ‘Do You Really Want To Hurt Me?’. The vocal cast of the ‘Merge’ album included Al Green, Martin Fry, Jimmy Somerville and Etienne Daho.
Available on the ARTHUR BAKER & THE BACKBEAT DISCIPLES album ‘Merge’ via A&M Records
Going it alone, Andy McCluskey became open to collaboration. Meeting Stuart Kershaw and Lloyd Massett from pop rap combo RAW UNLTD, they set about modernising the rhythmic elements of McCluskey’s new OMD songs. The ghostly ‘Walking On Air’ referenced ‘Statues’ while the bossa nova evoked the mellow moods of Bryan Ferry. Kershaw took over the drums from Mal Holmes who left OMD in 2014 for health reasons.
Available on the OMD album ‘Sugar Tax’ via Virgin Records
THE LISTENING POOL Where Do We Go From Here? (1993)
With bursts of sampled choir, electric piano and wah-wah guitar, ‘Where Do We Go From Here?’ came from THE LISTENING POOL’s only album ‘Still Life’ released in 1994. Driven by a gently percolating drum machine programmed by Mal Holmes, the understated air reminiscent of CHINA CRISIS was sweetened by Martin Cooper’s soprano sax with Paul Humphreys vocally pondering their creative situation with the threesome having now departed the OMD camp.
Available on the THE LISTENING POOL album ‘Still Life’ via Telegraph Records
Recorded for his ELEKTRIC MUSIC project after leaving KRAFTWERK, Karl Bartos’ collaboration with Andy McCluskey featured one of his best melodies synth melodies. Bartos told ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK: “We picked some cassettes and finally I found the opening notes of ‘Kissing The Machine’”. With fabulously surreal lyrics about a love affair with a sexy robot, the song was later resurrected with new backing from Paul Humphreys for ‘English Electric’.
Available on the ELEKTRIC MUSIC album ‘Esperanto’ via SPV Records
On a commercial roll and aiming for a younger pop market, ‘Liberator’ featured lots of busy modern dance effects but saw Andy McCluskey losing his way in the song department. Its confused schizophrenic nature was compounded by the pure genius of darker numbers like ‘King Of Stone’ and ‘Christine’. The symphonic string laden ‘Best Years Of Our Lives’ was another of the better tracks, borrowing its sad topline from ‘Spanish Harlem’, a song made famous by Ben E King.
Available on the OMD album ‘Liberator’ via Virgin Records
After the muted reception for 1993’s painfully poppy ‘Liberator’, Andy McCluskey brought in a conventional rock sound for 1996’s ‘Universal’ but the OASIS sounding ‘Walking On The Milky Way’ failed to get traction. One of its B-sides ‘The New Dark Age’ gave a haunting salute to ‘Statues’ using the auto-accompaniment on the Elgam Symphony organ and was the last great synth song of the solo era as the OMD vehicle was quietly retired…
When Andy McCluskey joined Stuart Kershaw to write songs for a girl group, most thought he had lost his marbles. When three girls from Liverpool were recruited to form ATOMIC KITTEN, it eventually led to a UK No1 ‘Whole Again’. However, the demo of the first single ‘Right Now’ sounded like disco evergreen ‘Never Can Say Goodbye’ arranged like ‘Sugar Tax’ era OMD, but with female vocals!
Available on the ATOMIC KITTEN single ‘Right Now’ via Innocent Records
Ousted from Team AK by a coup d’état, Andy McCluskey licked his wounds and formed another girl trio THE GENIE QUEEN. Featuring soon-to-be WAG / top model Abbey Clancy and future TV presenter Anna Ord, ‘What A Girl Goes Through’ was an appealing pop R ’n’ B number based around samples of ‘Souvenir’. The project disbanded without being signed, but a track called ‘Pulse’ on ‘History Of Modern’ featured the girls.
Paul Humphreys and Claudia Brücken released their only album as ONETWO in 2007 and from it was ‘Anonymous’, a song co-written with Andy McCluskey that began life as a demo from the aborted PROPAGANDA reunion. The pretty ringing melodies and elegiac atmospheres were very reminiscent of classic OMD. But the collaboration had been unusual as at the time of the song’s conception, as Humphreys had not yet committed to rejoining McCluskey in his old band.
BLANK & JONES featuring BERNARD SUMNER Miracle Cure – Paul Humphreys Onetwo remix (2008)
Having worked with THE CURE’s Robert Smith, trance duo Piet Blank and Jaspa Jones had Bernard Sumner of NEW ORDER high on their list of vocalists for their album ‘The Logic Of Pleasure’, which also featured Claudia Brücken. The German duo remixed ONETWO’s ‘Kein Anschluß’, so naturally the gesture was reciprocated when Paul Humphreys offered his smooth offbeat atmospheric rework of ‘Miracle Cure’.
Available on the BLANK & JONES single ‘Miracle Cure’ via Soulfood
Of this ‘History Of Modern’ highlight, Paul Humphreys said: “It was a song Andy did many, many years ago with Stuart and I think it was done in the 90s. He played it to me and it sounded a bit like a rock ballad. I said ‘I think the vocal tune’s great, but everything else has to go. Give me the vocal stem and I’ll do a whole new track for it’, so I came to my studio and completely reworked it.” – the result was mesmerising and even dropped in ROXY MUSIC’s ‘If There Is Something’ at the close.
Mal Holmes said “MIRRORS do OMD better than OMD do OMD!”… originally a ten minute epic split into three movements, ‘Secrets’ closed MIRRORS’ outstanding ‘Lights & Offerings’ long player, driven by an intense percussive tattoo and a shifting octave bass riff that was pure Klingklang. While pushing forward the synthetic claps, Andy McCluskey stripped down the backing and shortened proceedings, making it much less claustrophobic and militaristic than the original.
Originally on the MIRRORS deluxe album ‘Lights & Offerings’ via Undo Records, currently unavailable
PAUL HUMPHREYS & DOUGLAS COUPLAND Electric Ikebana (2012)
A collaboration between ‘Generation X’ author Douglas Coupland, and Paul Humphreys, ‘Electric Ikebana’ was an audio visual installation to act as the voice of the network for French telecoms company Alcatel-Lucent. The beautiful piece had conceptual hints of KRAFTWERK’s ‘The Voice Of Energy’ while there was also a charming mathematical formula recital “x = [-b +- √(b² -4ac)] / 2a” to the tune of the nursery rhyme ‘Pop Goes The Weasel’ which recalled ‘ABC Auto-Industry’.
Of ‘Helen Of Troy’, Andy McCluskey said to ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK: “George Geranios and Nick Bitzenis of FOTONOVELA were our label bosses in Greece via their Undo Records and they sent me this track…the demo had Nick going “Helen Of Troy – Helen Of Troy” so I took his vocal off as you do, chopped it all up and rearranged it… it’s gorgeous! I have used some of Nick’s backing vocals… I love it to bits! And ‘Helen Of Troy’ is much more of a metaphor than either of the ‘Joan Of Arcs’ were.”
Andy Bell’s debut solo album ‘Electric Blue’ was produced by ONETWO’s backing band THE MANHATTAN CLIQUE and featured two duets with Claudia Brücken. ‘The Violet Flame’ album saw ERASURE express an infectious zest for the future with songs beginning as pre-recorded dance grooves from Vince Clarke. But the best number from the sessions was ‘Be The One’ remixed by Paul Humphreys who added the beautiful Synthwerk magic that characterised ‘English Electric’.
The avant pop approach of VILE ELECTRODES is reminiscent of early OMD, with ‘Deep Red’ capturing Andy McCluskey’s interest enough to invite the duo to support the German leg of the ‘English Electric’ tour. With its bleak potent drama, ‘The Vanished Past’ came with a mighty drum climax like ‘Navigation’. “Not everything is as it seems” as a forlorn stranger joins in after five minutes. As the adventure unfolds like a lost OMD epic, that stranger reveals himself to be Mr McCluskey!
OMD began their recorded career with a KRAFTWERK homage and four decades on, came full circle. A great grandchild of Klingklang and cousin of ‘Metroland’ from ‘English Electric’ but refined for BBC Radio 2 airplay, ‘Don’t Go’ captures the essence of OMD’s enduring electronic appeal. With crystalline synth melodies from Humphreys and a spirited vocal delivery from McCluskey attached to a hypnotic Synthanorma backdrop, OMD continue to produce quality avant pop.
ALICE HUBBLE is the new solo project of Alice Hubley, previously best known for fronting ARTHUR & MARTHA and COSINES.
Taking in the influence of Delia Derbyshire, Daphne Oram and Sally Oldfield, the avant pop heart of Hubley is now set free on her debut long player ‘Polarlichter’, literally translated in Deutsch as “polar lights” or auroras.
Recorded with analogue synths at home before being mixed at Big Jelly Studios under the co-production supervision of Mikey Collins who also contributed drums and guitar, ‘Polarlichter’ is undeniably escapist.
In keeping with the aura of varying colour and complexity projected by the album’s title, the opening instrumental ‘Ruby Falls’ offers mysterious octave shifts and pagan flutes while picturing North Sea islands painted by hand played keys.
Laced in Korg and Juno, her forlorn vocal presence makes its first appearance on the wonderful ‘Goddess’, a song about male obsession which has already been declared one of the singles of 2019 by BBC 6 Music’s Steve Lamacq. With its moody vintage synths and primitive drum boxes, there are also hints of BOOK OF LOVE, THE CURE, SPARKS and OMD.
Channelling German trailblazers Manuel Göttsching and Harald Grosskopf, both in their solo guises and together as ASHRA, the pulsing cosmic overtones of ‘Atlantis Palm’ offer beautiful synthetic choirs and airy fluty textures for a superb seven minutes of melancholic ambience.
Hubley’s earthy demeanour returns on the sub-OMD of ‘We Are Still Alone’, where the lilting bass and elegiac transistorised melody are glorious.
But when the synth strings respond in that ASHRA style, it becomes perfect avant pop where Hubley sadly resigns to herself that she “couldn’t find the way to make me better”.
‘Kick The Habit’ takes a jump in tempo and schaffels with live percussion for a charmingly enjoyable slice of electro-glam. Meanwhile keeping things to waltz time, ‘Hunt For The Blood Red Moon’ is electronic folk, solemnly dancing around a maypole of Moog.
Filmic instrumental ‘The Golden Age’ has its synths set to toy town, but more haunting Mellotrons weave their way into the wicker lattice with brilliant vibrato swirls before progressing into mutant funk and a collage of album segments to create an uneasy schizophrenic feel.
The chimes of ‘Still Polarlichter’ sees Hubble still alone, again echoing OMD with the string machine playing a variation on the ‘We Are Still Alone’ theme, but with more of a psychedelic vibe. At over nearly seven minutes, the mighty bubbles of synth, drum breaks and Germanic demeanour concoct a recipe of feisty feminine prog.
With the language of melody in common, ‘Polarlichter’ makes a fine voice-assisted companion to OBLONG ‘The Sea At Night’, an instrumental album of rustic organically farmed electronica released earlier in this year.
Over four songs and four instrumentals, ALICE HUBBLE makes the perfect synth earth mother with her endearing array of vintage keyboards. This is an impressive solo debut that is a soundscape of pastoral solace.
Bristol Radio / ON (14th September), Manchester Salford Eagle Inn (3rd October), Glasgow Nice N Sleazy (4th October), Sheffield Hatch (5th October), London Servants Jazz Quarters (5th November)
Paul Humphreys and Andy McCluskey were two lads from The Wirral who creatively realised their passion for European electronic music following the purchase of a Korg M500 Micro-Preset synthesizer.
Having formed a more conventional outfit called THE ID, they grew frustrated with the band format and felt they could better pursue their more experimental leanings inspired by their love of KRAFTWERK, NEU! and LA DÜSSELDORF as a duo.
Backed by a TEAC tape recorder named Winston owned by Paul Collister who became their first producer and manager, Humphreys and McCluskey played their first gig as ORCHESTRAL MANOEUVRES IN THE DARK at Liverpool’s Eric’s in Autumn 1978. Roger Eagle who ran the club liked what he heard, leading to more gigs and visits to other cities.
Eventually the single ‘Electricity’ b/w ‘Almost’ was released in June 1979 on Manchester’s Factory Records, housed in a black-on-black thermographed sleeve designed by Peter Saville illustrating the two songs as avant garde music notation. Gary Numan heard the single at his label Beggars Banquet and the rest as they say is history…
With OMD currently on a huge world tour to celebrate their 40th Anniversary, Paul Humphreys took time out to speak from California about their past, present and future…
Who’d have thought when you were recording ‘Electricity’ in Paul Collister’s garage, you’d still be doing it after 40 years!?
I still find it utterly amazing and rather fantastic that after 40 years, OMD is still alive and well, selling out big tours and making what even our harshest critics consider to be relevant new records. We’ve said this many times but we really only planned to do one concert at Eric’s club in Liverpool in 1978, as kind of a dare to each other.
So it was the series of chance meetings of important people that followed that led to an incredible series of doors opening for us that led the way to our success, probably the most important of which was Tony Wilson at Factory Records. We considered ourselves an art project, Tony saw us as pop music. Time then proved that we could actually end up being both. I remember a confused executive at Virgin Records once saying, “What exactly are you trying to be, Stockhausen or Abba?” We said, “Can’t we be both?”
Photo by Robert Ellis
When was the moment you thought OMD might have legs, was it the Gary Numan tour, signing to Dindisc or was it much further in?
It took us a long while before we realised that OMD could actually have a future. We tried not to believe some of our friends on the Wirral who thought we were a bit crap and thought we made weird and mostly unnaccessible music, and in the back of our minds we always thought “hmmm… perhaps they are right…” to the point where after we signed a 7 album record deal, we still budgeted for failure by spending nearly all of our signing on advance money, building a modern studio in the centre of Liverpool. The deal we signed with them, gave them the right to terminate at any time, yet we couldn’t, so our rational was to at least have a recording studio as a viable business, if and when Dindisc / Virgin ripped up the contract.
I think it was when we stood on the stage at Top of the Pops for the first time, playing ‘Messages’, that we had a little inkling that maybe, just maybe, we are doing something good… but yes you mentioned Gary Numan. We love Gary and he did give us a massive opportunity to play on big stages, frighteningly big stages for 2 kids who weren’t even 20 years old!
At that time we couldn’t have dreamed that only a few years later, we would be playing the very same stages but this time as the headline act selling them out. I saw Gary only recently when he played a fantastic concert at the Royal Albert Hall, and after we had a little reminisce about what a fantastic tour that was, don’t forget that for Gary, that was his first major tour too, which went on to define him as a fantastic live artist.
It’s not like OMD has stood still. After a tentative recorded return, ‘English Electric’ in 2013 was perhaps stylistically the album that many had been waiting for since 1984, how do you look back on it all now?
It was a scary thing making a new OMD album after so much time had passed. We hit a point where we had had several years of touring since we all got back together. The touring was very successful, and it was wonderful to be touring with Andy, Martin and Mal again (and now of course with Stuart) and we really enjoyed taking picks from our career catalogue, and playing the whole of ‘Architecture & Morality’ live was so much fun.
But, after several years of this, we thought, is this it? Do we really want to just be considered a retro band just trading on our former glories? Don’t get me wrong, for some bands that’s absolutely fine and in no way am I criticising them for doing it because songs are like little time capsules and when you play them people are transported back to the time they were released and remember the people they were at that time and they people they were with, and associated feelings, events and emotions of the time. That is essentially the power of music, and we recognise this, and we really really love playing and picking songs from our big catalogue.
So why not just give new songs a try, after all moving forward and looking to the future was the band’s original remit? So, without announcement we went back into the studio to just see if we still had something relevant to say, in the voice of OMD. ‘History Of Modern’ was the album that we look back on as getting the OMD engine running again, and I think it has some really great tracks on it. It certainly was very well received by fans and critics alike.
For me, despite the fact that I think it’s a great first offering after many years, it doesn’t quite have the sonic and stylistic cohesion that ‘English Electric’ or ‘‘The Punishment of Luxury’ has, I think largely to do with the fact that the songs were selected from the ideas we’d both had collected over several years independently and we worked them up together. We did try being very modern sending ideas to each other via the internet and working independently as I live in London and Andy lives on the Wirral.
But you had a bit of a re-think?
When we realised that it really didn’t work to our satisfaction, we changed the way we worked for the following 2 albums, kind of going back to how we used to write and create in the very beginning, being in the same room at the same time throwing ideas into it and seeing what happened…
There is no replacement for that, it sounds bloody obvious really as its most creative way to interact, so now we mainly write up in Andy’s house and finish, overdub and mix in my studio in London.
‘The Punishment Of Luxury’ album maintained the standard, audiences didn’t think you could get any more electronic but you did!
Yes, ‘The Punishment Of Luxury’ was a definite return to our original roots. In deciding to play some of ‘Dazzle Ships’ at the Museum of Liverpool and the whole of ‘Dazzle Ships’ at the Royal Albert Hall, we found the preparation for them utterly fascinating.
We needed access to, and to be able to deconstruct our original recordings to retrieve all the mad radio samples and FX that were so randomly generated at the time as they couldn’t possibly be recreated, and, in listening to these old recordings in their multi-track form, we realised just how simple and how very electronic they were. It was a real ‘eye opener’ to be honest, and therefor made the remit for ‘POL’, to try to go back to a “less is more” philosophy, the discipline to be as simple and as electronic as we could make it yet also trying to sound ‘modern’…
You made good use of the Omnisphere VST on ‘Isotype’, what are your preferred creative tools these days?
We made almost the entire last 2 albums completely in the box so to speak, inside the computer with Protools using a lot of modelled analogue synths from the early days such as the Jupiter 8, Prophet 5, Virus, ARP etc, but also using new synths that have never previously existed in the physical world that provided colours and sounds that we found new and inspirational, namely the Omnisphere (great for melody sounds such as the one in ‘Isotype’) and also Waves have a great synth / sequencer called Element which we used extensively.
The problem these days is that there are so many sound possibilities that unless you’re really careful, you can get so completely lost in your choices and exhaust yourself exploring all those possibilities, you can forget the initial goal which is to write a good song! We call this ‘the tyranny of choice’. These days we find it important to reduce the choices by deciding on a sound palate, in the same way a painter decides his colour palate for a particular painting.
For ‘POL’ for instance, we decided that we should only use small electronic sounding drums and percussion, and only drew from that palate… between us Andy and I literally have a library of thousands of kick drums and thousands of snare drums, unless you reduce that into small categories, you’re completely lost.
The live set-up has changed from Roland Fantoms X8s to Native Instruments Komplete Kontrol S88s, how have those been to use on tour?
Yeah, when we first got back together in 2006, Roland had a great synth / sampler out called a Fantom X8, so I sampled all of our sounds into that machine for myself and Martin to play, it took me months and months, I had to sample Mellotrons, Fairlights, organs, and sounds from all of our analogue synths we used to use.
Some of those early synths we had to find a re-buy from Ebay as we’d either lost them or they were broken beyond repair. There was a night when Andy and I were both bidding against each other on Ebay for the same synth, a Korg Micro Preset. Idiots! We could have got it for so much cheaper if we’d spoken on the phone first… DOH!
Anyway, the Fantoms got old, they started to develop problems, and Roland stopped making new ones. One day Roland called to say they had a new version of Fantom called a G8 about to come out and asked if we wanted to try it out, I said great, can you talk me through how to export all my sounds into the new machine from the old? To which they replied, oh you can’t do that, you’ll have to resample everything… yeah sure, another 3 months’ work… NOOO!
Not an option, so we kept buying Fantom X8s on Ebay to replace broken ones until THEY started to fail and finally decided to switch to a system that has built-in redundancy, the world of laptops and Native Instruments Kontakt running in MainStage. It still meant that we had to spend months importing all the sounds them into the new system, but for the last time!!! I have to confess something, we employed a tech geek to do it for us, I couldn’t face doing it again myself!! *laughs*
Have you any thoughts on these hardware synth reissues like the Korg ARP Odyssey and Korg MS20 Mini, the new Prophets or those Behringer clones? Are they something that would interest you?
I think it’s great that they are made available again, but they are not all exactly the same as the originals, most of the core engines and oscillators are different and are digitally controlled. I’m actually more interested in new hardware synths that I’ve never used. I’m gonna buy an Arturia MatrixBrute when the tour is over, it has a fascinating and versatile modulation matrix with a brilliant sequencer. I have a friend who owns one and is total love with it. I also want to buy a Moog, the Moog One Poly looks amazing but it’s like £6k I think… ouch! Amazingly, we’ve never owned a Moog. Not sure why really, we were more drawn to Roland, Korg and Sequential Circuits synths as they seemed more suited to our needs.
While there were classic styled OMD songs like the title track, ‘One More Time’ and ‘What Have We Done?’, there were more harder rigid numbers like ‘Robot Man’ and ‘Art Eats Art’?
As with all our albums, we like to remove ourselves from our comfort zone and explore new ways of writing songs, experimentation is our remit, and stylistic repetition can become boring, it’s very easy to fall into “Verse, Bridge, Chorus, repeat, then Middle 8, then Chorus to fade” arrangements of songs… sometimes that works fine, but I think we fell into that trap a little too much in the mid-80s. ‘Art Eats Art’, is basically a list of our favourite artists, designers etc. played over a tough electro track that’s bonkers and follows no standard arrangement format, as many of the songs on ‘‘The Punishment of Luxury’ and ‘English Electric’ do.
The 40th Anniversary ‘Souvenir’ tour is coming up, have you got a large pool of songs ready to perform depending on which territory OMD visits?
Yeah, there will be some surprises on the tour, it’s hard with so much to choose from, but we’re also limited by the amount of available time for all of us to programme and rehearse things that we’ve hardly ever or even never played before. There will be a few lovely surprises though! Can’t say anything else ?
And yes we do play a different show in other territories and that makes things a little more complicated for us. America didn’t properly accept OMD until ‘Junk Culture’ times and songs like ‘If You Leave’, ‘Dreaming’, ‘So in Love’, ‘Secret’ are really huge in the USA and there would be a riot if we didn’t play any of these, not so in Europe though.
The 2017 tour saw you bring in a pre-show online poll for fans to decide one song to perform out of a shortlisted three? How practical was that to implement as a band and will the system return?
We have no plans to do that on the next tour, it was kinda fun though and kept us on our toes every night, the crew didn’t like it much though as all the computers for stage and screen images, had to all be reordered at the very last minute!!
Photo by Brian Griffin
You personally got involved in the Abbey Road remasters of the first four OMD albums released in 2018, how did you find that experience? Did it prompt any interesting memories for you?
It was an amazing experience to work in Abbey Road doing the mastering, and it did bring back a lot of memories. It was a bit stressful though, as there have been so many different versions / mixes and edits of all the songs, choosing the right ones wasn’t an easy exercise!
What was more interesting to me was for the ‘Souvenir’ box set extras, I found 22 unreleased songs / ideas which I mixed and compiled into one album. It started by me going to the EMI archive near Heathrow, it’s a temperature controlled vault, with a giant foot thick steel door with an enormous wheel that you spin to open it, like you see in movies. All THE BEATLES tapes are in there, Bowie, Stones etc. It’s absolutely massive!
Everything OMD ever recorded is in there and I pulled out all the tapes I could find that I didn’t recognise the title for. It was difficult though as many times, we used working titles for songs that we’ve used that were changed at the last minute. I spent several days there taking tapes out and sending pictures of tape boxes to Andy for ideas and to jog each other’s memories. I ended up taking out tapes from around 1980 to 1990 period.
The problem I also had is that tapes from that era degenerate and actually you can’t actually play them now. The glue they used to put the oxide on the tapes starts to lose its stick so you have to bake the tapes in a special kiln oven to re-glue the oxide back on to the plastic tape, sounds completely mad I know, but it works!
So, I found 22 tracks, some of which are full songs and some are just experiments that were never developed, but I had great fun mixing them. I mixed them only using FX and E’s that we would have used at the period, spring reverbs, crappy delays and Eventide Harmonisers. I had so much fun doing them and there are a couple of absolute gems in there! The big take away for me in this whole exercise was to see how we used to work, pre-computers.
We basically used to lay down 5 minutes of one idea, then when we wanted a change of chord, we’d drop in the new section on different tracks, so on the desk we’d have to hand mute the first idea so they wouldn’t play together.
But of course I can’t remember where to mute things now as I barely even remember the songs themselves, never mind what our vision was at the time, so I was left with a giant puzzle working out what tracks have to be on or off at certain points of the song… it was great fun, I hope you enjoy it…
In 2015, OMD did series of gigs featuring ‘Dazzle Ships’ and ‘Architecture & Moraility’. As 2020 is the actual 40th Anniversary of the ‘Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark’ and ‘Organisation’ albums, are there any plans to do a similar type of special showcase?
I’m not so sure if we’ll play those albums in their entirely again, but we do have some future ‘specials’ planned and one is actually booked… That’s all I can say at this stage…
Would you consider trying to write a new song around the limited functions of the Korg Micro-Preset as a kind of “four decades on” experiment?
That would be an interesting experiment. Although the Micro-Preset was a totally limited synth and actually sounded pretty shit until you put the original signal through a long chain of FX processors, then it became an interesting synth. I think we may have already exhausted every possible sound that synth can ever make though!
ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK gives its warmest thanks to Paul Humphreys
The ‘Souvenir’ 5CD + 2DVD deluxe boxed set is released on 4th October 2019 by Universal Music
OMD Souvenir 40th Anniversary 2019 – 2020 European + UK Tour, dates include:
Lisbon Aula Magna (15th October), Porto Casa da Musica (16th October), Madrid Riviera (19th October), Barcelona Apolo (21st October), Belfast Ulster Hall (23rd October), Dublin Olympia (24th October), Nottingham Royal Concert Hall (26th October), York Barbican (27th October), Hull Arena (28th October), Gateshead Sage (30th October), Glasgow Royal Concert Hall (31st October), Manchester Apollo (1st November), Sheffield City Hall (3rd November), Liverpool Empire (4th November), Birmingham Symphony Hall (5th November), Leicester De Montford Hall (7th November), Bath Pavilion (8th November), Oxford New Theatre (9th November), Guildford G Live (11th November), Portsmouth Guildhall (12th November), Watford Colosseum (13th November), Cambridge Corn Exchange (15th November), Ipswich Regent (16th November), Bexhill De La Warr Pavilion (17th November), Bournemouth Pavilion (19th November), London Hammersmith Apollo (20th November), Rostock Stadthalle (25th November), Dresden Kulturpalast (26th November), Leipzig Haus Auensee (28th November), Berlin Tempodrom (29th November), Hamburg Grosse Freiheit 36 (30th November), Berlin Tempodrom (2nd December), Stuttgart Leiderhalle (3rd December), Düsseldorf Mitsubishi Electric-Halle (5th December), Frankfurt Jahrhunderthalle (6th December), Krakow Studio (3rd February), Warsaw Progresja (4th February), Oslo Rockefeller Musichall (7th February), Stockholm Berns (9th February), Malmo KB (10th February), Copenhagen Vega (12th February), Brussels Ancienne Belgique (14th February), Utrecht Tivoli (15th February), Paris La Cigale (16th February)
After first breaking cover in 2013, Shanghai synthpop trio QUIETER THAN SPIDERS mysteriously disappeared despite having previewed numerous tracks on YouTube and Soundcloud.
But in 2018 there were ‘Signs Of Life’ as QUIETER THAN SPIDERS officially released their first track ‘Shanghai Metro’ on a compilation via Amour Records. And now, the anonymous family group of Leon, Yi Fan and Yao finally release their long awaited debut album on Anna Logue Records, promising “Electric sound-waves that pulse through our sleep… and our dreams”,
It is a body of work that has a timeless quality which manages to be simultaneously futuristic and classic, just like the electronic pop of yore. ‘Signs Of Life’ begins with the bubbling chiptune inspired ‘Arcade Eighty – Five’; both rigidly rhythmic and richly melodic, it is exactly what KRAFTWERK would be sounding like today if they could be bothered to make new records. With a harsher robotic tone, ‘No Illusion’ keeps up the standard with its sharp hooks and recalls the endearing homemade indie electro of WHITETOWN.
As well as ten actual compositions, ‘Signs of Life’ also features eight conceptual interludes, the first of which being the self-explanatory ‘Disorientation’ which in 2019 falls into that ‘Stranger Things’ territory. Also accidently falling into current music trends, ‘Night Drive’ would probably be considered Synthwave although the chipmunk voice samples and sectional structure keep it firmly within the classic synthpop template.
The very short ‘2139’ looks ahead courtesy of Jean-Michel Jarre derived arpeggios and string machines to act as a intro to the simply wonderful ‘The Land Of The Lost Content’. Inspired by an AE Housman poem, it glides with a glacial beauty that not only is appealing to the ear, but can be danced to as well.
The soothing piano on ‘Distant’ provides respite from all the beats before ‘Shanghai Metro’, a whirring tune that would be exactly what OMD would sound like if they formed in the 21st Century.
But while the strong melodic elements recall Paul Humphreys and Andy McCluskey’s more recent work, particularly 2013’s ‘English Electric’, there is a fresh dynamic slant with the train station announcements and robot voices acting as catchy hooks.
The music box sequence of ‘Chang’e’ has a European arthouse air about it, which is appropriate as the following ‘Fessenden Grove’ is a solemn piano piece that incorporates ‘Scenes From Childhood’ by German composer Robert Schumann. But its eerie voice samples stating “this young man’s dead” prepare the listener for the loss and despair expressed in ‘Hibakusha’.
A beautifully haunting song about the aftermath of Hiroshima, it is a thoughtful merging of SOLVENT and Michael Rother which as far as subject matter and melody goes, is up there with ‘Enola Gay’. Fittingly in that unsettling ‘Stranger Things’ vein, the horror of ‘Silent Centre’ comes afterwards.
That fatalistic air continues with ‘Komarov’, an instrumental eulogy to the cosmonaut of Soyuz 1 who was the first man to die on a space mission; capturing the tragedy in music, it is a hairs on the back of the neck moment, swathed in chilling but melodic sadness; OMD would be rather proud if this was one of their own…
And as the album becomes much more downbeat, ‘Brave New World’ does as title suggests, dressed in dense Vangelis sweeps. More personal and introverted, ‘The Signs Of Life’ stares mortality in the face and reflects on the difficult emotions that come when the end is nearer than the beginning, “when the light begins to fade”.
The longest track on the record, the slow expansive drama of ‘The Statues’ could not be more different from ‘Shanghai Metro’, the mournful choir boy melancholy standing alone in the cinematic synthesized atmosphere. The funereal instrumental ‘Zara In The Stars’ closes ‘Signs Of Life’ with a glorious heavenly ambience perhaps not heard since MOBY closed ‘Hotel’ with ‘Homeward Angel’.
In common with records such as ‘Low’, ‘Closer’ or ‘Play’, ‘Signs Of Life’ begins in an upbeat fashion but then gets increasingly slower, stranger and sadder. And with its conceptual interludes and emotive avant pop in various tempos, it is a direct descendent musically of OMD’s ‘Dazzle Ships’ and ‘English Electric’.
A document of melancholy and uncertainty through its difficult gestation over the last six years, ‘Signs Of Life’ is one of the best electronic pop albums of 2019. Its understated artistic perseverance has been well worth the wait.
‘Signs Of Life’ is released by Anna Logue Records on 4th October 2019 in double CD, double vinyl LP and download formats featuring a bonus album of 10 remixes by artists including Kevin Komoda from RATIONAL YOUTH, VILE ELECTRODES and THE SILICON SCIENTIST – to pre-order, please email [email protected]
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ALICE HUBBLE 2019 live dates include:
in 2017, continue in varying degrees today in parallel with band activities. In his most recent interview with ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK, 
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but the OASIS sounding ‘Walking On The Milky Way’ failed to get traction. One of its B-sides ‘The New Dark Age’ gave a haunting salute to ‘Statues’ using the auto-accompaniment on the Elgam Symphony organ and was the last great synth song of the solo era as the OMD vehicle was quietly retired…
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came with a mighty drum climax like ‘Navigation’. “Not everything is as it seems” as a forlorn stranger joins in after five minutes. As the adventure unfolds like a lost OMD epic, that stranger reveals himself to be Mr McCluskey!
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5CD + 2DVD deluxe boxed set is released on 4th October 2019 by Universal Music
live was so much fun.
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