The world shuddered on its axis when THE ART OF NOISE left ZTT to
become a ‘real band’. With jibes from Paul Morley still ringing in their
ears, JJ and ANNE DUDLEY tell Ted Mico about the art of deception.
Pictures by Peter Ashworth
AND first there was this. And then there was that. And then there was
only dross. And then, there was more dross. And soon we were all
neckhigh in the stuff. Vinyl dross that reaked of foeces. A tidal wave
of automated musak that drowned our enthusiasm and waterlogged the sense
of adrenalin, a sense, of importance.
Suddenly we were forced to find virtue in the mediocre — in Duran
Duran, in Animal Nightlife, Christ, even in Latin Quarter! Nothing
mattered. Everything was, merely a matter of routine.
And then quite unexpectedly the routine was disrupted. Disrupted by
the sound of change — a sound that combined and condensed our
aspirations.
And then there was The Art Of Noise.
“Into Battle With The Art Of Noise”. The trio of arts and noises
fought valiantly. We listened eagerly. Before our very ears, the dross
was dissolved in sweat, and excitement was restored with dance on a keen
edge — music with force and finesse.
And then we asked ourselves “Who’s Afraid Of The Art Of Noise”? And
right after that we asked “who the hell are the Art Of Noise”.
And that is what I’m here to tell you. What the hell is underneath their mask of anonymity, that shroud of secrecy.
The Art Of Noise are no spectre created by the fringe paranoia of Mr
Morley (the greengrocer) and Mr Horn (the TV repair man). JJ (short for
Jonathan Jeczalik) and Gary Langan (who is at present taking a short
leave of absence in Germany) both founded the band as a hobby. Both were
Trev’s right hand men (Mr Horn has two right hands) helping him to
produce the likes of ABC, Malcolm McLaren, and Frankie. And then Anne
Dudley, The TV man’s keyboard player/arranger joined the hobbying duo.
And then the hobby got out of hand. Within a digital moment, ZTT’s
guiding light became a choke chain. Like all smart people, AON didn’t
want to be strangled, and thus history, was made: The Art Of Noise
became the first (but probably not the last) band to leave the
mock-ivory towers of Basin Street, and head for the mock porcelain
sanctuary of China Records.
But why all the past anonymity? Their invisibility had reached the
point where no-one believed they really existed outside someone’s warped
fantasy. I have seen the Art Of Noise. I understand why. Anne and JJ
look like muesli-eating joggers who have lost their way through a
country ramble. They may be in touch musically, but wardrobe-wise
they’re very out of season. Original it is. Conventional pop it ain’t.
JJ explains.
“There was a certain amount of paronoia at ZTT about how they were
going to put across this act that didn’t compete with the likes of
Frankie in terms of visual presentation. Mainly because we’re none of us
gay and we didn’t think we could come across on the gay market “as
being terribly gay.”
Effete, possibly. Self-confident, certainly. But gay… never. JJ
cups his hand round his chin and ponders the meaning of stubble while
Anne, the only known fan of BBC2’s “Gardener’s World” (there’s always
one) expands on the blueprint for total Noise domination.
“You’ve got to remember that the anonymity was started with fairly
serious intent. The whole basis of the music business had been turned on
its head when people looked at fashion instead of music. They were
misled into believing that groups like Culture Club were extremely
avant-garde because of the look of the group, whereas in fact they are
incredibly conservative.”
Lord knows why ZTT thought to muzzle the Noises voices. They seem
more than capable of provoking a fight with pop fans. Anne continues
with some sartorial eloquence. “We thought we’d fool the public entirely
by not having an image at all, and that would make them concentrate on
the music…”
I assumed that video had already massacred the radio star. Why settle
for just music, when you could have music, style, and interesting
videos to sample? And then there was The Art Of Vision…
JJ: “At the moment videos are much more boring than records. That’s
why we intend to turn it all around. Our aim is that the video is going
to be our new leader. Our singer. Just because we are now talking to
certain members of the press doesn’t mean we want to be in the
limelight. The videos and photos you will see won’t be any more
revealing about ourselves as individuals.”
The three technocrats of the Fairlight empire seem very eager to avoid the price of fame — recognition.
JJ: “We don’t want to be mobbed in the newsagent in the morning.” JJ
looks up and smiles at Anne. He looks like a cross between Magnus Pyke
and Paddington Bear. Cute, but completely hair-brained.
”If you were mobbed every day, then one day one isn’t going to be mobbed and that would be completely intolerable.”
OVERALL this sounds somewhat fatalistic. Anne is more pragmatic: newsagent mobbing would simply be inconvenient.
Anne: “There you are going in to collect your copy of the Daily Splurge and you get attacked!!”
JJ: “We all want a simple life.”
“And the Guardian,” Anne interrupts. Listen carefully and you may
hear a faint note of sarcasm. Listen more carefully and you may note a
semi-quaver of truth.
JJ: “We may remain unseen, but we will replace what we used to have
with a closer visual linkup which will cut the crap and make our form of
entertainment more acceptable and more palpable.
More palpable than what?
JJ: “Than wading through mispelt, incorrectly punctuated
badly-phrased cribbings from German Existentialists which personally I
think is bleep, bleep, bleep.”
Shoot Busby!! I believe we have arrived have arrived at the home of
Mr “Bleep” Morley — the erstwhile moving finger, and now but a staid
executive ink blot. The AON and Paul never really saw eye to eye, and
certainly never danced cheek to cheek. Paul never liked Mahler’s third
album.
JJ: “Morley and I would talk about David Gower’s cricketing strokes,
but I’m afraid after that there wasn’t much meeting ground between us.”
How much more meeting ground does any man require?
“I suppose JJ’s alcohol consumption just wasn’t up to it,” Anne
mutters to evade the microphone. Is this the AON venting spleen? Of
course not! They are far too well-mannered, well-heeled, and concerned
for other’s well-being. Especially that of the Buggle-eyed wizard Mr
Horn.
JJ: “Basically Trevor is solely responsible for our intervention into
pop in the first place. In fact, Trevor is probably responsible for the
entire history of the western world.”
After their initial intervention, the AON hi-jacked bric-a-brac from
the past 300 years of music and non-music, refurbished it, reshaped it,
refined it, and finally called it an album. No one is sure how much
Messrs Horley and Morn were responsible for “Who’s Afraid…”. Estimates
appear to vary.
JJ: “It’s difficult to tell. We say approximately 1.73 per cent (he
strokes his non-existent, non-existentialist beard), but it could even
be as high as two per cent. You see, all that has happened is that Gary
and I started something, it was taken away, and we have taken steps to
get it back. Anne hated the last LP. She thought it was a load of old
drivel.”
Anne eventually rises to JJ’s bait: “No I didn’t. I liked bits of it.
I just thought a lot of bits were (she pauses) dodgy. The next album
won’t have any dodgy bits.”
And then without any badly punctuated fanfare, without ‘warning, but
with some surprise the Art Of Noise climbed to No 1 in the American
Dance Charts without any publicity at all. In fact, so little is known
about the triumvirate in the States that they were voted best new black
act in several recent polls.
JJ: “We naively believe that’s how it should be. The music should
speak for itself. All we did was come up with an easily recognisable set
of noises that sounded great on a ghetto blaster and was great to bop
to.”
The new single, “Legs”, uses the same “recognisable” beatbox barrage.
The AOR are inspired by movement and energy, despite Mr Morley’s
sideswipe press release announcing that they were now capable of
becoming a conventional rock band.
Who’s afraid of being reactionary?
JJ: “If one could find a way through the appalling style and
illiterate writings of Paul, you would see that all he says is erroneous
and untrue. We laughed at it. We’re so used to his bungling attempts at
punctuation by now. We thought he did a rather poor hatchet job.”
Mispelt names never harm you. Very little can harm the Art Of Noise.
They are too composed, too truly English. They must iron their upper
lips. As is now the norm, “Legs” contains a myriad of volatile
influences: ideas collide like torsos at a blind-date disco. Toilets
flush, drains are cleaned, engines rev and horses legs gallop.
JJ: “It follows a similar formula. When we make our tracks we try to
always convey some real emotion, be it ridicule or heart-felt pain. We
won’t always make life so easy. We intend to stretch ourselves, and
therefore stretch the listener well past the bounds of endurance.”
“Moments In Love”, the celestial love song of 1984, has already been
used for a variety of more down to earth purposes. Madonna walked up the
aisle to it, and now Brylcreem are using it for their new ad campaign.
“It’s quite flattering having so many different people using our
material. I mean, our presentation may be original, but we’re certainly
not. Nothing really is. We just juxtapose odd and wondrous things in
different ways. If a sound excites us, we are reasonably sure we can put
that excitement across. For instance, there’s a truly wondrous moment
when someone hits something in a sport and the ball does exactly what
it’s supposed to do. It’s that sort of perfection we try to convey.”
And yet their music, they confess, is largely founded upon mistakes. A
band willing to three weeks working on a song and then flush it down
the tubes. A band that find character in imperfection. A band who,
despite their image of fingers soldered to transistors, spend as little
time in the studio as possible.
JJ: “We have always tried to produce something that causes a
reaction. I can’t stand being mediocre,” Anne nods in accordance,
“That’s the worst crime of all.”
NEVERTHELESS, JJ finds no conflict in challenging convention with AON
one moment and producing the vacuous likes of Stephen Duffy the next.
The Art of Noise is built out of conflict — JJ hates “Gardener’s World”.
He hates all television. He does like Mahler.
“People hove got used to
regarding telly as the truth which it simply isn’t. People should be
more discerning about what they see and how they react to it. The Art Of
Noise videos are partially designed to attack and dismantle these
prejudicial points of view. Henry Polemic will be the singer we never
had.”
To aid Herr Polemic, two young, innovative, and completely untested
video directors, George and George, have been working close to the edit
with the Noises, who were attracted to them mainly because the duo had
the same christian name.
So this is the Art Of Noise. Or perhaps the art of deception?
Anne: “We’ll never clarify our position. The Art Of Noise will always
be filled with inconsistencies, hyperbole, non-sequiteur, and
conflicting themes.”
And then there was…
JJ: “…Everything. We will always produce music that comes from
somewhere and goes to somewhere else. Movement. There are far too many
pop myths to explode before we finish. It’s all part of the perverse
delicacy we call our way of life.”