Interview held in Sheffield on the 2nd November 2006 Interview conducted by Mark Kenyon.
Steve joins his brother (John) on stage (Photo Credit, Mark Kenyon - Editor)
TEJ: Will there be a follow up to the album?
JH: Yes you will see one.
TEJ: it is interesting that there are no lyrics on the album...
JH: It is an instrumental album.
MD: John hasn’t heard me sing yet. I do sing in my improv trio it’s a process. Its not going to happen over night I’m not going to say “Hey John lets write some lyrics I’ll sing and you play it”. But if its anything to do with me its not going to happen in a formulaic sense.
JH: One of the things I like about working with Moodi is that he isn’t a trained musician. It’s not like he went to Music College.
MD: I find music too overwhelming to be a discipline. I’ve trained in playing the tabla, the guitar and I get to a certain stage and it gets too overwhelming. I have a guitar, a drum kit, samplers, a clarinet, home made percussion. For me it’s sounds - sound is the key.
JH: I find that very exciting working with Moodi, Clive Williamson and Nick Clabburn. It’s because they’re not totally trained musicians, they don’t always do the expected next chord or progression.
MD: Intuition is as important as formal training. Ask any trained musician. Am I right?
JH: Yes.
MD: Intuitive music is important.
TEJ: It does seem there are artists out there who have become lazy within music and their use of lyrics. How do you keep your work original?
JH: Well that’s another area – lyrics. I work very closely with Nick Clabburn. I like working with the lyrics that he has written. It’s like working with Moodi. Working with someone with a different personality, a very different personality, I respond in a different way, completely different. If it was just me left to my own devices, I might just write endless love songs (laughs).
TEJ: Moving along, considering we are in Sheffield with its industrial heritage, I thought one of the songs from Red Planet Rhythm called “Life is a Ridiculous Solo” sounded like a production line...
MD: It’s actually an old heavy steam train.
JH: It is a train isn’t it?
MD: A beautiful old mechanical heavy train. Ask any steam enthusiast, it’s rhythmic. Do you know about Sheffield musical heritage from the 70’s,? Electronic music from the 70’s and 80’s?
TEJ: Sadly no.
MD: I’m talking about Cabaret Voltaire and the Human League. Its all stepped back to the industry and the electronic repetition and there’s a brilliant DVD out called Made in Sheffield about the music scene and what occurred in the 80’s. Why Sheffield became world famous. A lot of them could hear the steel forges and Thump Thump Thump of the forges as they lay in bed at night.
TEJ:I have tried reviewing SteveHackett’s album Wild Orchids and I found that I wasn’t able to write what I wanted to write about the album.
JH: Well Steve’s album is quite a mixture of different styles with the heavy rock stuff and then you have got some lovely orchestral stuff. It’s a very happy marriage and it’s very difficult to achieve that, him and Roger King.
TEJ: He has covered EGO and ID...
JH: Well of course he was an important part of Checking Out of London, those fantastic guitar solos. I was very pleased with the version he did and I was very flattered.
TEJ: How did the rehearsals and tour go for the John Hackett Rock band?
JH: well it was amazing to be on stage with the band. It was the dream of a life time. It was great to be in the driving seat. I get bored quite easily with music, whatever kind of music, and for me it was really great to mix the sound up a bit. It was great to be able to play Checking Out of London and then to mix it with Ace of Wands and Voyage of the Acolyte and then also with material from Nick Magnus and Tony Patterson. To be able to give that mixture of material I hope was very varied.
TEJ: I was at both performances in Sheffield and London and I came away each night wanting more.
JH: Good.
TEJ: I would have been happy to have seen the tour a few more venues.
JH: It really was just a toe in the water to see what the reaction was and how it all came together with the band. Until you actually get out there and you’re doing it you don’t know what it’s going to be like.
TEJ: The response you received from those performances, has it inspired you to go out there and to do it in the future?
JH: In principle yes, but there are a number of considerations. Firstly this up coming tour with the Steve Hackett Acoustic Trio in Japan and the follow up to Checking Out of London. It is almost completely written, just a couple of more songs left, but that’s going to take up quite a lot of time next year.
TEJ: Is that in collaboration with Nick Clabburn?
JH: It is yes.
TEJ: Is there a title for the new album yet?
JH: No, not yet.
TEJ: Is it going to be similar to Checking Out of London?
JH: It’s going to be similar and different (laughs). It’s very song based, the style is going to be slightly less progressive, but I would hesitate to pin it down by saying its exactly this or exactly that. So we will have to see how it works out. I think it will be slightly less of a progressive rock style, but that doesn’t necessarily mean there won’t be a Mellotron on it!
TEJ: Have you been working with the same people again on this?
JH: Yes, a lot of it I record myself. I did quite a bit of Checking out of London and putting the album together. I will do as much as I can myself.
TEJ: Do you think Moodi will be involved on this project?
JH: I think it’s quite possible. We haven’t really discussed this, but I like a lot of the stuff that Moodi does, the sounds and different textures. I think it would be good if he were willing...
MD: I’ll bring my guitar (laughs).
JH: I’m thinking more in sound textures to be honest.
MD: I really like Checking Out of London. I was brought up on rock music and I’ve got a critical ear. What I like about John’s work and his flute work is that it’s really harmonious and well produced and its really well balanced and as he (John) was saying earlier, Steve’s solo at the gigs was the highlight. I’ve never seen a guitar played like that before.
JH: Well that was fantastic when Steve came on and he joined us for the Tower Struck Down and Ego & ID. The was pretty wild when he came on with us. I like that when he really lets go and he improvises and gets all of these amazing sounds out of the guitar.
TEJ: It was nice to see Nick Magnus on stage with you...
JH: Yeah, I haven’t been on stage with Nick for goodness knows how many years and it was fantastic working live with his stage personality, which came over really well - along with the other guys from Regenesis, and of course Neil Marshall who, by sheer coincidence, teaches drums at Charterhouse. I thought Tony brought a lot with his stage experience and his voice having that rock edge to it.
TEJ: I wish we had the chance to hear more from the rock band...
JH: Well there is a chance. We did record some of the rehearsals. We had a weekend before the gigs and Clive Williamson and Dave Robinson came over. They set the mics up and they left their machines running all weekend. It’s on tapes, recorded onto ADAT, and I have those in the can. They require mixing. It’s quite a big job, there are a lot of takes to listen to but there is a record of the band.
John Playing the guitar (Photo Credit, Mark Kenyon - Editor)
TEJ: Sort of like a Rehearsal Archive?
JH: Yeah.
TEJ: You have just returned from the Northern European leg of the Acoustic Trio tour - any memories from it?
JH: It was a terrific tour it went really well. It was great and mostly full, certainly in Germany. We went into the former East Germany. In Reichenbach a guy turned up with some Genesis albums he had bought before the wall came down and the albums cost him over a week’s wage at the time. Steve gladly signed them for him.
JH: We went to Berlin. Roger is always taking the mickey out of me because I am not good with technology, anything with buttons or computer software - I’m not very knowledgeable. I was having trouble getting into my hotel room with those credit card style keys and I glanced up the corridor and I had a little smile to myself because Roger King was having trouble getting into his hotel room also. I couldn’t figure out how to do it and we were in the same boat. In the end we got a guy from the hotel desk to come and show us (laughs).
TEJ: How did you get to the first gig in Norway?
JH: We flew. In the run up to the flight there were, of course, worries as to whether you were permitted to take musical instruments on board due to the recent security issues. I always travel with my flute and I wanted to take it on the plane. You hear these horror stories of cellos having to be put into the hold and coming out the other side looking like a jigsaw puzzle. Fortunately a few days before we flew, they relaxed those restrictions.
TEJ: I recall the 2005 Acoustic trio tour. How do you feel the North European 2006 tour went?
John with Steve on the 2005 acoustic trio tour (Photo Credit, Mark Kenyon- Editor)
JH: I feel as though we played the best we have ever played as a trio and we have worked together for a few years as a unit. I think we used more improvisation. Steve was very keen to stress that, so when we were rehearsing we did some extended improvised passages. I think I’m loosening up in that aspect and certainly I think we all felt that it was the best that we had performed as a trio. There is always a feeling before you go on stage - there’s Steve with just a nylon guitar and Roger and me with my flute and you think “my goodness, where are the drums and bass?” It’s true there are times when you feel you have to work a bit harder in that respect. But I think the rewards are tremendous, both musically and the audiences reaction, when it is just the three of you like that you have to dig deep to make it work.
TEJ: I really liked the performance of Hands of the Priestess, and I found the live performance was longer than the studio version.
JH: Hands of the Priestess is a classic. It’s got to be one of the best flute pieces ever written. It’s a gorgeous piece, I always enjoy playing that.
TEJ: The Acoustic Trio played in a cave in Cornwall in 2005. Were there any surprising venues on the 2006 acoustic trio tour?
JH: I think we are doing our round of venues having done the cave. In Luxembourg we played a place that until 30 years before had been a prison. Later on in the tour we played the Karstadt Café which is a department store by day. We went up in this lift past rows of suitcases and jumpers and there were these grey haired old ladies sipping their coffee at five o’clock and then by evening they’re all out, and then these Steve Hackett fans come in and it turns into a nightclub. So I think we have done our round of venues.
TEJ: I remember the cave in Cornwall because it was so cold.
JH: It looked beautiful though didn’t it?
TEJ: Yeah it was very nice especially the outside.
JH: The acoustics were very good in there, certainly for the flute.
TEJ: Yeah the whole gig was fully of clarity.
TEJ: The gigs in Japan are next on the horizon. Have you and Steve played Japan before?
JH: Yeah we played in a club called A Tribute to the Love Generation and the gigs went really well.
TEJ: Have you and Moodi worked together since you recorded the album?
JH: Yeah, just this morning Moodi and I were working on a book I wrote a few years ago with Nick Magnus doing some playing which is a scales book, mostly aimed at children to get them to practise their scales. We will be putting it up on the www.hacktrax.co.ukwebsite so that you can just download it and get the sheet music and the audio files straight off the internet.
TEJ: The internet has enabled people to cut out the hassle of finding a publisher and trying to gain their interest in publishing work that might be a niche market.
JH: Well, yeah it cuts out a lot of the hassles that you have got. It’s really exciting to be able to do that.
TEJ: Technology such as the Internet has given people the freedom to release books or songs.
JH: Yeah that’s why I set up Hacktrax as an outlet for my own creativity and with people like Moodi coming in it’s brilliant. Camino have been really helpful and I am really grateful to the people who buy the albums and who support us. For more information please check out John’s official website hacktrax.co.uk
Thanks to John and Moodi for giving there time on a cold Sheffield lunchtime.
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