The work I did with Adrian Sherwood and Creation Rebel was pretty intense
too -- it was dark at times, there's no question about it, but we had a lot
of fun as well. Adrian Sherwood wasn't at the centre of the Gunther Grove
PIL scene, but he was certainly a part of it - me and John loved his
production sound. I was really keen to get involved with Creation Rebel,
African Head Charge, Style Scott and the others. I was so excited about it!
Those early ONU Sound albums are incredible, there's no doubting it. I tried
to get John Lydon involved with Creation Rebel and the other musicians too,
but he didn't. I don't know why. It was almost as if John was too shy -- So
we'd be there at Gunther Grove with the usual crowd, Don Letts, The Slits
and the others, and frequent guests like Dr Alimantado would be there too:
we'd be dancing to one of the Dr's latest dub plates, and it was around that
time me and Adrian Sherwood decided we were going to lay down some tunes
together with Creation Rebel. I really don't know to this day why John
didn't join us.
Around that time, everyone wanted to be around John, and John was just so
into roots music and dubwise. John liked Adrian too. As for me, I loved
Adrian when he was broke, when he made those early ONU Sound albums from
inspiration, purely for the love and joy of it. Whatever Adrian may have
done in his business deals sometimes, I could see he had a good heart. I
think Adrian really cared about me too: Sometimes when I was in trouble with
drugs, Adrian would come in to my room at Gunther Grove and we'd talk for a
long time. Adrian would say, 'Keith, don't do this to yourself '
Adrian was fundamentally a good person, and as for the music he made? Fuck,
some of the later ONU stuff has lost that intensity, but the early tunes!
You could name about ten of those early ONU releases which are just right up
there, right up there with the best, they are so intense. As for African
Head Charge, Adrian should have done so much more with them. They were so
incredible. There was nothing like their first three albums: Nothing like
them! I don't know, maybe Adrian loved them so much, what they were, that he
wanted to keep them for himself in some way, because there's no doubting,
they were extraordinary records. I remember the excitement of tunes like
'Elastic Dance' from My Life in a Hole in the Ground and Adrian saying to
me, "Keith , the talking drum! The talking drum! Just listen to the fucking
talking drum!"
| We had a lot of fun too -- there was a lot of mad humor and some funny
situations: I remember there was this rumour going round that Tappa Zukie
had just been shot down dead in cold blood in Kingston Jamaica. We were
discussing it, then we went down to DubVendor in Ladbroke Grove to pick up
some new 12"s, when who should stride right in, but Tapper Zukie himself!
Adrian looked like he'd seen a ghost. I wanted Adrian to get Tappa Zukie
down to the studio to voice some tunes, but Adrian was too taken aback -- we
were convinced Tappa was dead! |
Adrian ONU Sound Sherwood |
The truth is, I liked the way Adrian worked on the desk -- I really liked
it. Maybe Adrian doesn't realise just how much I liked his sound. And his
house musicians were brilliant: Style Scott (Roots Radics drummer and
founder of Dub Syndicate) with that heavy, militant one drop style, and
Eskimo Fox (Creation Rebel/African Head Charge drummer) with a far more
complex, spacious style which lent itself perfectly to dubwise dynamics and
echo. Carlton 'Bubblers' from Creation Rebel was a real professional. I
don't think he even smoked herb. Bim Sherman had such a beautiful, pure
tone, and was so good to work with -- he was very quiet and quite a reserved
man. As for Lee Perry? You have to pay the man ultimate, massive, highest
respect for what he did at The Black Ark in the late 70's. No one, I mean no
one, made tunes like Scratch's Upsetters at The Black Ark, but being honest,
he was really difficult to work with in his years at the ONU Sound Studios.
The man was a real pain in the neck sometimes. It was like having your dad
wandering around the recording studio, sternly ordering everyone around.
Still, he is Lee Perry, so what can you say?
It wasn't all good in those early ONU days though -- sometimes you could cut
the atmosphere with a knife the mood was just so bad. I remember some days
in the studio: guys in heavy coats with their backs against the wall --
really nasty moods, bad speed come downs and some resentful feelings amongst
people. Cold vibes, which are sometimes reflected in the sound of those
early ONU releases. You can hear the darkness, the coldness, the heaviness,
mirrored in the sounds. It has to be said, some of it was a result of bad
speed come downs too. Recording with Creation Rebel down at The Manor was
nothing short of surreal sometimes, pure madness. The credits on the sleeves
were often wrong as well -- quite a few of the tunes I played on and worked
on I wasn't credited for on the sleeve notes.
But ultimately, what a strong collection of music!
Post PIL, post ONU Sound, LA years and now.
After I left PIL, I stayed in USA and carried on making music: I linked up
with the Captain Beefheart drummer Robert Williams, Flea and Hillel from the
Red Hot Chilli Peppers and the Fishbone singer. I cut an album called
Violent Opposition -- I recorded 'Looking for Something' and the Hendrix
track 'If 6 was 9' with those guys. It was great -- musically bonding with
Flea! I met them and I said it straight to Flea and Hillel -- "You, me,
studio, tomorrow" and that was it. Flea auditioned for PIL, did you know
that? Of course we wanted him, but at the end of the audition, he just said,
"I'm sorry, I'm already in a band, but I just really wanted to jam with you
guys."
The tune we did together, 'Looking for Something' that is a true story --
just listen to it. The lyrics reflect a real longing; true events that
happened to us at that time , what we were living through and what we were
thinking about -- ("Woke up in an alley I'm searching for something, I don't
know what it is. Driving through the desert, I didn't find it there. I'm
looking for something and I don't know what it is. I've read all the books,
but they're just the same as me man, they don't know where it's at. It aint
in no Bible, it ain't in no church, and it aint in no steeple. Jesus was on
a search, but he didn't find it. I don't think he found it. I'm searching
for something, but I don't know what it is. I've looked in the mountains;
I've looked in the deserts; I looked in the garage once, I didn't even find
it there. I don't know what it is.")
Another strange thing happened when I was in LA: I went to a meeting of
physicists, artists and scientists out in the desert somewhere -- when I was
there, one of these professors came over to me and said, "Keith, I've got
some people here who really need to speak with you" and he introduced me to
these Hopi Indians. These guys could really relate to some of the tunes I
was making -- I had made a track with this deep drone tone weaving through
the whole structure of the song, which tied in with their natural world
philosophy and some of their shaman ceremonies. That was fulfilling,
speaking with those Indians tribesmen and elders.
I hung out with Robert De Niro a little too, and we went out to some clubs.
I remember reading that when Don Letts met Martin Scorsese he couldn't think
of anything to say to him. I can relate to that! De Niro's films like 'Mean
Streets' were what I was brought up with. Those early De Niro films spoke a
language I really understood.
I met Jon Hasell in LA too, and that is one serious guy. I like his music a
lot -- I really relate to what he has been doing with sound, and sound
treatments. He is someone I'd love to work with. I'd like to work with Jonas
Helborg of Bardo records as well. I really, really like his bass playing
style. Mos Def is another artist I rate very, very highly. I play his music
all the time.
Right now I'm working with a number of musicians in London under the Murder
Global umbrella -- Murder Global is my current recording project, and I work
with a number of artists within that structure --I've been making tunes with
Hip Hop artists in London and other sounds too, like ragga/drum and bass/
noise artist, The Bug. I recently took part in a Sound System Clash, playing
live with The Bug versus Asian Dub Foundation and Adrian ONU Sound. Besides
that, I'm also in the process of working on some tunes with some dub artists
here in London and USA. The results we have are good, so we are working on
securing the right deal.
The point is, I don't like being put in a category or labelled: if I want to
make hardcore, I will. If I want to play in a Sound System style, I will. If
I want to make ambience or work on sound track, then I will. My output since
the late 70's has explored diversity without ever being slavishly derivative
or labelled as any specific form, and thank God for that! I've always
avoided all that! Imitating is not, not ever, what it's all about. As I've
said time and time again, I respect my influences far too much to ever
imitate them -- categories and labels are just so limiting to an artist, so
with Murder Global, I'm trying to go beyond all that.
Generally though, I think a lot of the people I meet these days are too much
in their own heads -- they read too much, and don't work out their own
opinions from what life itself teaches them. I believe that concepts and
ideas already exist in a perfect form outside of us. It's up to us then, to
access them, to realize them through our own inspiration -- to make them a
reality in our own life, to give form to them."
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ABOUT THE INTERVIEWER
Greg Whitfield writes about music and art, and has produced work for the BBC
and a number of art journals. He also writes promotional press releases and
publicity copy for various London-based record companies. |
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