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Two of Britain’s best known synthpop geniuses turn out to be ambienteers in disguise! What is this? Martyn Ware of Heaven 17 spills the beans about his and Vince Clarke’s shady operations. Using the latest technology- You really can't hear it? Martyn Ware sounds genuinely worried over the line from England. It's not the quality of the phone lines he's worried about, though. His and Vince Clarke's experimental album "Pretentious" was recorded using the latest technology in surround sound. The sounds are supposed to attack you from different points around you if you use headphones. I've tried, but I just seem to get the usual stereo effects. Sorry. - Everybody else hears it, Martyn Ware pleads. He should know. The Heaven 17 front man was involved in developing the software for the program used in making the album. The National Centre for Popular Music in Sheffield has a special auditorium for futuristic sound experiments, and commissioned Martyn to write a piece for them. Weird synthesizer man- I asked Vince to help. We're great friends, and I produced a record for Erasure in 1993. Also, Vince has the greatest collection of weird synthesizers I know. He never gets the chance to use all of them on the Erasure records, so I thought for once he'd get to squeeze out every strange sound he could. Originally we just made the track for the auditorium. Then people started asking where they could buy it, so we decided to make an entire album to go with it. Fans of Ware and Clarke may be surprised to hear the cinematic, instrumental sounds of "Pretentious". In fact, Ware made an album of ambient music called "Music for Stowaways" in the late seventies. Stowaways was what they called Walkmans back then. Vince Clarke, on the other hand, has recently written music for two movies and plans on doing more. - I'm convinced that Vince will be picking up an Academy Award for best soundtrack within five to ten years. He's a genius when it comes to creating moods and atmospheres. New Heaven 17 albumMartyn Ware has also been busy recently. He is producing soul and r'n'b artist Mario Vasquez and Heaven 17 are two thirds through writing a new record. - It's quite an important album for us. We really need to prove that we're not a retro act. We do retro performances sometimes, basically because it pays. But now we really want to have a modern sound, unlike the last album, where we deliberately used retro techniques. I don't want it to be just a pop record. We'll just wait 'til were happy with it. On the other hand, we don't want to wait too long either, because it could get dated. It's hard to sound modern these days, with what's happening in the dance movement. You know, everytime a new synthesizer gets out, it's all over those records like the next day. Ware recently met Philip OakeySo Heaven 17 is struggling to keep up with the times, as are Martyn's original band, The Human League. - I actually met Phil (Philip Oakey) recently for the first time in about eight or nine years. We had a chat at the Sheffield centre and it was good to see him. We did a documentary on The Human League and drove around Sheffield reliving old memories. Both of our bands are actually in the same kind of situation. We both have our own production units (labels) now, and none of us have a long term record deal. I like their stuff, but the songwriting can be both brilliant and so-so, I think that's their problem. If the new material of Heaven 17 is free of problems remains to be seen. In the meantime, they will have toured Britain with Culture Club and played a millennium gig in Sheffield where, by the way, Martyn recommends you to go if you happen to be in England. - The Centre for popular music is really great, it's a fantastic building. And of course my and Vince's music comes more to it's right there. But are you sure you really can't hear the 3D sound? It's so obvious! Please give it a few more listens, will you? The Clarke and Ware Project Mute Records page National Centre for Popular Music Heaven 17 official site Erasure Mute Records page |
