“We’re like a football team and I’m a
midfielder.”
and it should be quite interesting. Jupiter’s Carnival are also great. We always try to get some young psychedelic bands to play. I’ve read that musically speaking you’re not much into lyrics and I know you’ve worked with some lyricists like Michael Moorcock and Bob Calvert. How does that work, planning a track between you and a separate lyricist? Well Bob was a really good poet, and a lot of songs are like poems. I’m pretty good at writing music and Bob or Michael would just come up with the words. I find it quite easy. I listen to a lot of jazz and rock, and it goes in your head sometimes and catchy melodies and runs gets stuck in your head, so if you’ve got someone like Michael or Bob it’s quite easy. What we do now is I play stuff on the keyboard, play a bass line and stick it on a Mac and keep all the parts and then come up with some lyrics. Or sometimes it works vice versa. You’ve recorded quite a bit as a solo artist, including Brockworld last year. What are you able to do on your solo projects that you can’t with Hawkwind? Usually I use those tunes that Hawkwind don’t use! Tere are a couple on Brockworld which are actually from Te Machine Stops. Sometimes it takes so long to do things that I was like, oh, I’ll just stick them on my solo album. You’re not a natural attention-seeker, and don’t seem to crave that sort of attention on stage. How have you managed that through the years? I’d rather keep a low profile. It was probably a bit different in the early 70’s as we were getting quite a bit of publicity with Silver Machine doing so well and we were constantly doing interviews and publicity. It’s quite a weird old thing. I was verging on a nervous breakdown at some points so I just decided to take more of a backseat. We’re like a football team and I’m a midfielder. I know that with Hawkestra back in
18 / April 2016/
outlineonline.co.uk
2000 you staged a big reunion but it sounds like it didn’t go so well in the end. Is there any chance of something similar happening in the future? Nah, they’re all dying off now unfortunately, we’re getting old. It was a nightmare of organisation and I wouldn’t want to do it again anyway. Some of them have got grudges and squabble between each other as well so I don’t think it would ever happen. I feel that Hawkwind have never really got the respect or attention they deserved. Why do think that is? I dunno really, perhaps it’s our low profile! I’ve been given a couple of
awards, a Prog Rock award and a Lifetime Achievement award, so that’s not too bad. You never know, I might get another one before it’s too late!
Lizz Page INFORMATION
Hawkwind bring their epic Te Machine Stops show to the LCR on 23rd April.
Tickets are available from
ueaticketbookings.co.uk.
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