Part 1

Name: Simon Fisher Turner
Nationality: European
Occupation: Artist / Composer / Man of the world
Current releases: Simon Fisher Turner’s live album Under the Arches is out now on A Colourful Storm Records. His latest studio album, Instability of the Signal, recorded with the Elysian Collective, David Padbury and Francine Perry, is out now on Mute Records. Simon also posts new music at Guerilla Audio on the 1st and 15th of every month. (Every recording is available for 14 days before being replaced by the next one.)

If you enjoyed this Simon Fisher Turner interview and would like to know more about his music, visit him on Bandcamp.

Thanks to Alasdair Dickson for conducting this interview.



When I listen to music, I see shapes, objects, and colours. What happens to you physically when you're listening? Do you listen with your eyes open or closed?

It’s such a difficult question to answer. You listen to music in different ways and different situations, y’know? It depends on where I am, to tell you the truth. When I’m concentrating I tend to listen with my eyes closed, or if I do have my eyes open I sort of look into the distance, trying to focus on listening. It's something I grew up with.

As a kid, music wasn’t actually just for fun, it was sort of educational. When a teacher put on a piece of classical music, you had to sit down quietly and listen to it and then talk about it afterwards. I don’t think people do these days  ...  well my kids don’t.

Even if you didn't know what to say about it after - when you're a little schoolboy - what I think it was doing overall was teaching you to listen and realise that listening is a valuable way to spend your time, which is what I did when I was growing up. When I’m making a record or trying to get something together, it's all about concentration. It’s not just sitting there and twiddling your thumbs, because obviously you do get that in a class of kids, who don’t know how to listen and you’re like, ‘Oh just stop that, Johnny!’ because they just haven’t been taught how to listen. It's a bit like being taught to relax.

I went to a ballet school and for an hour a week you'll be lying on the floor and you're taught to relax. It's like ‘Well, you just relax’ but no, you actually have to relax bits of your body first and then bring it up your legs and, even if you can't do it, really make your mind try to tell you to relax and then you kind of sink into a funk, like when before you go to sleep; you are in a kind of druggy sort of phase of ‘Am I awake? Am I asleep?’  ...  and that's sort of being super-relaxed.

If I’m listening to my music and making it, I’m unbelievably concentrated on it, so my eyes can be open and closed but I’m a real strict stickler for detail, so for that I tend to cup my ears forward and stare at the speakers. In a headphone situation I quite often close my eyes  ...  but I don’t really see colours or shapes at all.

Do you experience strong emotional responses towards certain sounds? If so, what kind are they and do you have an explanation for these?

With certain sounds yes. Crying. I think it's obviously because of being a father. Particularly children crying more than anything else. Screaming. People being hurt. I don't think I've ever heard animals being hurt.

People shouting. I remember years ago, in Brixton, a woman shouting at her child really publicly. I don't know what he'd done but she was really having a go at him. I'm sure if I wasn't a father I would still be affected by the sound of pain.

When did you start writing and producing music and what or who were your early passions and influences?

I don't write music, so what I do is I just try to make it somehow.

Although I was brought up classically, I was encouraged to abandon learning a more classical approach by my piano teacher, Miss Boase, who said “Well obviously you want to play stuff you make up”, so I used to make up bits of piano on my own when I was about 15. She realised that I didn't want to read music or carry on classically and she said “Well, you play all the time anyway because I hear you playing all around the school”, because I went to this ballet school and there were pianos everywhere.

Still, if I find a piano that’s empty, I'll always sit down and I’ll always play. She encouraged me to do that, so that's the first time, at the Arts Educational Trust - which is a Drama and Ballet school - when I was 14, 15 years old.

I don't compose, I play. What I tend to do is play, work out a piece, learn it and then I've learnt it - I don’t notate at all - but I haven't actually progressed; my piano playing is pretty similar to how it was then. I just kind of play for as long as I can and then I make a mistake and then I stop. But now I’m more than likely to do the old Brian Eno thing: Make a mistake, play it again, play it again-again, an octave up, an octave down and then it just becomes something. I haven’t played the piano since the last time I played the piano (five months ago) and I’ve got to play the piano this week.

As long as I feel comfortable, I can just start  ...  but that’s all you’re going to get from me. I can play the opening of ‘Bridge Over Troubled Waters’, I can play a little bit of Khachaturian, a tiny bit of ‘Für Elise’  ...  but only about ten seconds of each and then I’d just rather thump it.

Lionel Bart was a good friend. He was a terrible musician: he could knock out a tune, badly, but he sang most things. ‘If you can’t hum it, then forget it.’

I love Wagner more than any other classical composer. I heard Flamenco music when I was a kid in Spain. My father had his submarines - actually, maybe it had gone to frigates by then - in Gibraltar, so we used to holiday in Algeciras, the town opposite Gibraltar and I heard - ‘Drrrrrrrrrrrrrrm!’ - Flamenco music and that was fabulous.

Then, while we still lived in Cornwall, in Plymouth, a guitarist called Manitas de Plata came and played at the ABC Cinema. My mum and I went. It was just mind blowing. Still is! Hey, that’s why I’ve got Tito Heredia playing at my next gig. He’s a Flamenco guitarist and he’s a gypsy from Algeciras.

I hated the Stones; hated everybody apart from The Beatles and classical music. Rubber Soul was the first album I bought. The Sound of Music was huge in my life. West Side Story I never understood ’til later. We lived in Cornwall until I was 14, so I didn't really get exposed to anything but Radio Luxembourg; I heard pop music but it didn't really mean anything. Well, it did: ‘Lazy Sunday Afternoon’.

Various songs stuck out in the ‘60s  ...  (sings) ’Let's Go to San Francisco’  ... various songs stuck in your brain: Tom Jones. I remember my father chopping logs in the back garden to ‘What's New Pussycat’. Incredible. I can remember it really, really detailed; my dad in an Airtex shirt.

Despite being a solo artist for most of your musical career, you have also been in bands including the fledgling The The and the duos Deux Filles and Jeremy’s Secret. What does being a member of a band give you that being a solo artist doesn't?

Nightmares. Just makes your life hell. Being in a band I wouldn't recommend. (laughs)

Always at the beginning it’s really nice and then it doesn't take long for it to ... I mean, with The The, I knew Colin Lloyd-Tucker who introduced me to Matt Johnson. Matt's songs were great so Matt said “Join”, Colin played and the three of us just did some gigs; no drummer, just the three of us playing Matt’s songs was really great; all off Burning Blue Soul, which is the 4AD album. Just three guys, two guitars, one bass. I played bass and guitar and we’d swap around. Matt’s a lovely guitar player; great singer.



Then I was allowed to do one song, Colin was allowed to do one song. We then got this residency at the Marquee and it all just fell to pieces because Matt started getting in his other mates - Marc Almond, Thomas Leer and Jim Thirlwell - and the band became bigger. For me they just sort of lost what was fab about being three guys turning up with guitars in plastic bags and just playing, so Colin and I went off and formed Jeremy’s Secret and then that all went wrong because Colin got a solo deal, so that fucked me up.

[Read our JG Thirlwell interview]

Deux Filles was really great because they don't really exist, so they're not really a band. They're just ghosts, really. Old friends.

The Beatles were only together 10 years. The idea of travelling around, I can't do it very often. We've got four (Jarman) ‘Blue Now’ gigs coming up but there's three weeks off in between each gig, because I can't play the same thing twice. I can barely remember my name let alone what I'm supposed to be doing, so the repetition of being in a band is just not for me.

By being a solo artist - which is silly of course, because I’m a collaborator - at the moment I'm bored as heck because I haven't got anything to work on; I mean I have got things to work on but unfortunately I'm the person who has to sort of start them. I haven't got a foil at the moment. I really like to work harder than I am. I'm not being given any work really and I’m not having much fun really on my own. You’ve gotta inspire yourself; that’s why I record so much, I think; I trawl through these tapes. I like playing with people.

That’s what’s great about the Elysian Strings. We go into the studio when somebody gives me a budget ... and you go, “Great! We’ve got a budget to make a record." Nobody even does that these days.

I get commissioned to do something which means I get the money, which means I can go into the studio and take the string players in and then we make stuff up.

There's no composition, it's just making it up. That's what I do. I'm just a guy who just makes stuff up, constantly. If you do something at home and you like it - whether it's on a Revox, a reel-to-reel to recorder, or computer, or in your head, or on a guitar - you've got an idea. So I start with an idea, which then turns into two ideas and maybe just stops at two ideas because that's enough. On the other hand you can think, ‘Ooh, it would be nice if only ... ’. So yeah, I just make it up as I go along.

As a collaborator, Dean Brodrick was a genius. Dean’s arrangements, on The King of Luxembourg’s Sir particularly, they’re mind-boggling. When he said we're gonna do it with an English consort I had no idea what he was talking about. I said “What do you mean?” He said “Y’know ... bassoons, bass bassoon, crumhorn, clarinets, no bass ... ” I thought, 'Okay, we really are going out on one here’ but ... incredible sound. Incredible sound.



What I love about Sir is it’s just guitars, keyboards, drums and old English instruments, which is fantastic. I’d love to try and get all that together but, again, can you imagine the money it would take to ... I’m always talking about money!

What are the most important tools and instruments that you're currently using?

Computer ... and my recorder, which is a Roland Edirol.

I always had a recorder on the phone but I’d always forget it and would say to my daughter, when she was younger, “Oh I wish I had the Edirol with me” and she’d go “DAaAAD! Use your phone!!!”...and I’d go “Ohhh, of course.” But I could never get the recordings off, so for gigs I could play those things by leaning the phone up to the microphone.

I started off with cassette recorders and then MiniDisc. DAT’s beautiful still, but I don't use it, so Edirols are just great. I’ve had the same make since I-don't-know-when and they don't make them anymore. That’s my beauty ...

But instruments? Piano. But I don't play unless there's one in the room. I was going to play the guitar at my next concert, then I've decided not to because it's just too complicated. Maybe I'll change my mind.

Which albums or artists do you love specifically for their sound?

Well I love them all for their sound! The first one I can think of is the Beaver and Krause album called ‘Gandharva’ and the reason I love it is the sound-specificus: some of it was recorded in Grace Cathedral in San Francisco. So that’s an album that made a big impression on me.

The Beatles’ Magical Mystery Tour ... You could take any of them. The album I listen to more than any album in the world ever is Abbey Road. It’s avant-garde! It’s not rock music remotely, apart from a couple of bits. It’s just avant-garde sounds, singing. How anybody could say that Oasis are anything remotely like The Beatles is an insult. The Beatles never plodded to start with!



There’s still nothing remotely like Station to Station, sound-wise. It’s just in a world.



Then of course the early Eno albums were very distinct. Exposure by Robert Fripp is just a fabulous record. He’s great; I love Fripp.There’s a guitarist like no other. So you could take any of the Bowie ones, the early ones. I lost interest after Scary Monsters.

The beautiful album that Sakamoto made before he died. Incredible. It’s just piano and stuff, just so simple.



It’s interesting because two things come to mind: You hear Sakamoto breathing kind of quite heavily on the last album and also you hear Bowie on his last album, also going “Hhhhhhhh” and it’s like, ‘Wow’. I loved the sound of Mr. Hendrix as a kid. It’s funny listening back. I love the ‘Band of Gypsies’ live album.

I do listen to new albums. Beyonce’s sister, Solange, I just love her. I’m a huge fan of FKA Twigs. I love the last two albums. I sample her; I steal from her; I do all sorts of things. I’m still nicking stuff, constantly.



The new Jamie XX album is fantastic. There’s some bits of it and I will have nicked those already. I take a bit and just loop it ... and I can either play with it or not. I looped it and played along to it live because it’s just so good.

Old favourites: Al Green, Tamla Motown, Stevie Wonder … but new bands? I suppose I like the Idles but I seem to have been a bit ‘bandless’ lately. I used to go (to gigs) all the time but now I can’t even remember the last time I saw a band.

Then you’ve got William Eggleston, who’s a photographer; his albums are great. I live round the corner from Rough Trade, so I buy albums a lot. It’s a great thing. I’ll go “What’s that?” I buy them and I don’t necessarily play them, which is a weird thing.

There can be sounds that feel highly irritating to us, and then there are others we could gladly listen to for hours. Do you have examples for either one or both of these?

Sounds that irritate me ... Oh, a horrible one ... I’ll show you ...

(Simon walks over to his computer keyboard and starts tapping at the keys with both hands.)

Also, if you’re talking to your children over the phone and hear people doing that through the phone, that is the most horrible sound in the world.

Sounds I’d gladly listen to for hours? Probably things I’ve never heard before. I’m very happy listening to frogs. Wildlife.

Are there everyday places, spaces, or devices which intrigue you by the way they sound? Which are these?

Well the thing is, you get familiar with sound. I’ve always quite liked being underneath a motorway. I love that ‘WRRRGHHHHHHhhhh!’

Flagpoles in the wind. I love cars on cobblestones. Just gorgeous. Berlin’s full of cobblestones. New York, staying on the West Side by the Hudson River; lots of cobblestones and you get that ‘PhrrrrrrRrrrrrRrrrrrrrr’. It’s the up-and-down of the stones.