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INSIDE THE MIND'S
EYE OF RAY WILSON
~ An Exclusive Interview ~
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Its May 29, 2001,
and Ray Wilson is preparing to embark on a string of club dates in Europe. Not
as a member of Genesis, Cut or even Stiltskin, but as a solo artist establishing a new
band for a new audience. In one of his most personal and revealing interviews,
the vocalist/songwriter speaks candidly with World of Genesis.Com's Dave
Negrin about his club tour, his up-coming debut solo album, the last days of Genesis,
and much more.
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WOG:
I interviewed Mike Rutherford back in 1995 when he was promoting a
Mechanics project. He mentioned in the interview that the reason they the Mechanics
didn’t tour the US on their previous album (Word of Mouth) was because album sales were
poor, and he didn’t believe it was wise to tour to help promote an
album. At least at the time, he commented that he believed a tour was done
really only done if an album was successful.
That comment struck me as being odd, since
Genesis toured extensively in the 70s before they were a huge commercial
success, and all of the touring they did played a big part in what made
Genesis as successful as they eventually became.
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World of Genesis:
Can you tell me about your up-coming plans for your tour and if any dates
have been set past August?
Ray
Wilson: I haven’t really got a tour planned at the moment, but my
intension is to try out a new kind of band. A new idea, really, because
I’m working as a three-piece now. Myself and a couple of guys. I’m
trying to work on just really basing the music on an acoustic sound and
working very hard on just the basic dynamics. Basic song qualities. Making
sure the voice is really the focus. The voice and the song with less focus
on the music that’s behind it.
WOG:
Will you be doing predominantly new material at your shows?
RW: I’m doing some new stuff I’ve written, yes. I’m also playing
some music from the past. I was in a band called Stiltskin. So, I’ll be
playing some music from Stiltskin, some music from Genesis from the Calling
All Stations album and also some older music from Genesis that I did
when I toured with them; songs done by Phil Collins and (Peter) Gabriel.
So, it will be a mixture really of songs from Genesis and from the past,
acoustic arrangements of them – no keyboard at all.
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RW:
It tells you something doesn’t it, really? (laughs)
WOG:
When the band cancelled the tour dates in the US for Calling All
Stations, I noticed that discussion went from playing large venues
like Madison Square Garden in New York to smaller theater tours to
eventually canceling the whole US leg.
RW: I think the problem was taking the production over there. It was such
a big production that when you go over to America it’s obviously quite a
considerable cost. They have to make that add up, and it wasn’t going to
add up.
With regard to the first part of your question, the reality is
that in the 70s when Genesis was playing they played absolutely and 150
percent because of the music. Because of the love of what they did. There
is no doubt about it, because they sold no bloody records, but had a great
touring band in the very early years.
I think what we’re dealing with
now is a situation where by Mike and Tony, Peter Gabriel, Phil, the whole
lot of them, are all multi-millionaires. I think it is now as much about
money as it is about music. Obviously, you have to take these things into
account.
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WOG:
I know you did some acoustic material when Genesis was touring for Calling
All Stations. Will those songs be among the Genesis songs you will be
playing?
RW: It was because of that, that I started thinking about it. About
doing acoustic arrangements of Genesis songs on guitar. It was basically
because of the tour, and because of the launch we did in Berlin and also
at Cape Canaveral that got me thinking about it. It got such a strong
response from people, the whole acoustic idea. Also, Genesis never did an
Unplugged gig, you know, the MTV Unplugged. Genesis never did one. They
were one of the first bands to be asked to do one, and they didn’t want
to. I really like the idea now, whether it’s the music I wrote with them
or the music from the past with Phil Collins and Peter Gabriel, of doing
these songs in an acoustic style. Or even just without keyboard. Rather
than doing the keyboard arrangements that already exist, and they
(Genesis) do them better than anybody can do them, to actually do it from
a different angle. I’ve found it really good fun.
I’ve
been doing things like “Carpet Crawlers” on acoustic guitar, which is
fascinating. I think when you do acoustic arrangements of songs, you
really have to have a very strong voice behind it to make it work, because
obviously there is not as much going on in the music. So, the voice and
the melody have to be particularly strong. So, it’s quite an interesting
approach for me, and it allows me to keep on playing some Genesis music as
well as I do a version of “In The Air Tonight” (by Phil Collins) and
also a version of “Biko” by Peter Gabriel. But to do these songs as
well as do the music I’m writing myself, and the Stiltskin material, it
just gives the set a lot more depth. It’s good fun. I’m enjoying it.
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I
suppose if Mike and Tony and Tony Smith are looking at it and saying we
could tour, but we could lose five million quid, then it’s easy for me
to say “Oh, just do it anyway, guys. It’s only five million quid.” I
mean, they are all worth in excess of 80 million quid at least, you know.
So, its all very well for me to say just go ahead and do it.
I think if it
were the 70s, they would have gone ahead and done it. But now, because
it’s such a big money issue, they got cold feet. I can look at it from
both perspectives. I can understand that you’ve got the good name of
Genesis. You’ve developed this monster over the years and you’re very
proud of it and you’ve sold a lot of records, and you’ve created some
wonderful music, and you don’t want to tarnish that. I can understand
that and even the fear of almost having to go back to the beginning again.
When you’ve been up there doing stadium tours around the world and then
all of the sudden you’re back in small theaters, I can understand that
almost being quite frightening to them.
To
me, I look at it and say when I was with Stiltskin, I was playing in
clubs, I was doing festivals, but the clubs were like five hundred people,
one thousand people, maybe a couple of thousand people. That was the kind
of gig I was used to. So, then I start working with Genesis, and all of
the sudden I’m playing in arenas of 15,000, 18,000, 20,000 people, or
sometimes 10,000 people and the occasional stadium thing. So, for me, it
was very much upward. I was looking up the way. For them, it was looking
down the way.
So, it’s easy for me to sit here and say you should have carried on guys,
because that’s what you said you were going to do. How they feel inside, at
their stage in life as well….
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WOG: Earlier (in a previous
conversation) you mentioned to me that you did some demos of some new songs,
but that you haven’t recorded any polished studio tracks yet for a new solo
album. Any idea when your solo album might be released?
RW:
I’ve got no idea, actually. I worked for about seven or eight months
writing and just trying to produce various ideas. I got a lot more
“poppy” with the style I was doing. I think in all honesty, now that
I’ve had time to reflect on it, I don’t like that style at all,
really. It’s not really what I want to do.
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I mean, they’re 50-odd years old, they’ve got enough money to retire fifty
times over, and they’re probably looking at it from a different perspective
from me. I kind of look at it and think, “Shit! I wish you would spend some of
the money that you’ve earned over the years and give this a go for the
fans that love Genesis!”
Because they are great writers. Mike and Tony
are both brilliant writers and Phil is a great writer as well, but I
don’t really like what Phil does, to be honest. I’m not a fan of that
kind of “poppy” brassy stuff. It’s not me at all, but he’s still
got a good ear for a tune.
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I’m
not in a hurry to launch a solo career. I think it’s one of those things
that the only important criteria is that when I do launch a solo career,
that I have the complete game plan. And I haven’t got the complete game
plan yet. I think as things stand, I’m more interested in playing some
live shows and doing stuff in a more stripped down fashion, a more
acoustic fashion. A little bit like David Gray has done. I don’t know
if you know David Gray? He’s been very successful in the UK and I
know he’s been moderately successful in America. He’s kind of like Van
Morrison or Bob Dylan in a kind of modern day style. I like what he does.
There are some quite good jungley dance rhythms in his music, but its
acoustic stuff. I like what he’s doing. I’m kind of keen to just
experiment and do some live shows. Actually, just play in front of
people.
I’m so fucking tired of the music business. It bores me to death… to
tears (laughs)! Because it’s so shallow now. I’m more interested now
in just playing to an audience, and getting that feeling back again. Once
I’ve done that for a while, then I’ll think about exactly how I’m
going to record this music. At the moment, I’ve just got a whole bunch
of songs produced in various different styles, but I haven’t got a very
definitive idea of exactly how I’m going to do it. Until I’ve got
that, I don’t see any point in releasing an album. |
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I
like the idea of them doing another album and saying, “Let’s be really
selfish and do it for the sake of Genesis and do it the way we do music.
Very progressive, very not commercial, and let’s just do it for the love
of what we do.” But as I said, it’s easy for me to say, I don’t have
to spend the money.
WOG: How and when did you first hear that you were out of Genesis?
RW: I’ve never really been out of the band as such. They didn’t phone
me up and say, “Ray, you’re fired!” They basically phoned me up and
said, “Ray, we’re not continuing.” I’ve never really felt that I
was out of the band as such; it’s just that the band doesn’t exist
anymore (laughs). When I heard that, it was just after the Cut tour, about
a year and a half ago. I’ve read some articles saying that I was fired
and stuff, but to be fair to them, they didn’t phone me up and say,
“Ray, you’re fired. We’re going to carry on and we’re going to get
somebody else to sing.” Or, “We’re going to carry on and get Phil
back.” There was never any of that. They just said, “We’ve decided
not to continue because the market doesn’t want us.”
I think they didn’t want to completely close the door to ever doing
anything again. |
"...
If I went to the record companies with a live album of me doing Genesis
songs, they wouldn’t give a shit."
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I mean, I think it would be wonderful if they could all reunite with
Steve Hackett and Peter Gabriel and Phil Collins and do a world tour like
that. That would be brilliant for the fans. I don’t think it’s something I
would be involved in. |
WOG: These concert dates that you’re
doing, are you considering recording them for a possible future release or
would that be a copyright nightmare since you’re doing a lot of other
people’s material as well as your own?
RW:
I think it might be quite interesting to record a few shows just to see
how it comes out. I suppose the beauty of it as well is if you record live
you can always do the occasional overdub. Maybe bring a keyboard sound in,
like a Wurlitzer, or something like that? You know, something quite cool
like an analog instrument. I don’t mean synthesizers and all that type
of stuff. Another alternative is that you can keep it exactly as it is
live, which is, I suppose, the better of the two options. |
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Guaranteed Pure
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WOG: Because you would choose not to be or because
you think they wouldn’t pursue you?
RW:
No, no. Not by choice. I just don’t think they would want me there.
I’ve been very isolated and left out of stuff since I’ve finished
touring with them. You know, they’ve done promotion for the Hits
album (Turn It On Again: The Hits) and they reunited every member
of the band. I don’t know if you saw it? They all reunited, but I
wasn’t invited.
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But I am keen to
record them, and if it sounds good then, yeah, I would make it available.
Whether a record company would want to release it or not is another
situation all together, but I would make it available through the website
or whatever.
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They
released “Carpet Crawlers” (the new version on the Hits album) and I was supposed to be singing that with Phil and
Peter, and then I was left out of that as well and nobody told me why.
There’s been a lot of isolation and being pushed out.
WOG: Really? You were originally going to sing on “Carpet Crawlers ‘99”? |
With
regard to copyright, it’s not a problem at all, because if I was doing
Genesis songs for example, all you have to do is pay the licensing fee for
the tracks that you record. That’s not a problem. Obviously, I’d do it
legitimately and fairly so nobody gets stitched up.
WOG: Assuming that you don't get major (record) label interest, some artists find that going independent offers them more artistic
freedom, and allows them to make more money than they would taking a small
percentage from a smaller label. That
seems especially true with artists who already have a following or tour
extensively and sell their CDs at shows.
RW:
I think so, and I don’t think people are really interested anyway. I
mean, if I went to the record companies with a live album of me doing
Genesis songs, they wouldn’t give a shit. They wouldn’t be remotely
interested in that. I think some fans would be interested in it, but
that’s not enough to start a buzz in the music business.
For me, you do these things for the love of music. You don’t do them
because you’re trying to make a fortune. It’s just quite simply
because you’ve done something you’re proud of, you like the sound of
it, and you feel that fans would enjoy listening to it as well. To be
honest, I’m not really bothered about making money off of something like
that; I’d rather just make it available.
WOG: Well, there was never a live Stiltskin or Genesis album with you on
it. So, there might be some novelty there...
RW:
I mean, yeah, maybe. Maybe it’s something that could be on a slightly
bigger scale. I really don’t know. I just know that as soon as you go to
record companies nowadays, its extremely difficult if you’re doing
something like that. That type of sound.
It’s
(the music industry) so image conscious that it becomes everything other
than music. That’s what I don’t like about it, that’s why I’m
disillusioned by it. Although, I’m not down heartened at all. I’m
disillusioned by the whole industry really, because it’s just getting it
so wrong now. The focus is on the wrong stuff.
WOG:
On your site you mention that the members of Cut are spread out all over
the globe, and I know Nir Z is on tour with Billy Squier, Styx, and Bad
Company this summer. Do you foresee yourself recording with them as Cut
again in the future? |
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RW: Yeah. They told me I was singing and dropped it and didn’t tell
me why (laughs). There’s been a few shitty things, but I didn’t blame Mike
and Tony for that. It’s just the industry. I think Tony Smith (Genesis’
manager) is a bit to blame, I have to say. The manager could have dealt with
things a bit nicer. I went through a very, very difficult time for a couple
of years. I lost my home, stuff like that, because of their decisions and
their in ability to tell me of their decisions until a little bit too late
in the day. I suppose from my own point of view, I suffered a great deal
emotionally. I felt very rejected and very upset. I was never invited to
lunch in London to have a discussion and to explain it. It was a phone call
from Tony Smith and that was it.
WOG: But since you had a contract for
a couple of albums, how was that settled?
RW: They just paid me; they agreed a reviewed amount. They picked up the
option of a second album and then didn’t do it. I mean, I can’t go
into the details of that for legal reasons, but they basically paid me for
a period of time. A basic wage and then stopped, because that was their
obligation.
From
my point of view, if I had done a second album, it would have meant a lot
more to me financially than the first one did, because I had a higher
percentage in the second album than I did the first, contractually. So, it
would have made a big difference to me. As I say, I made some decisions in
life. My home and stuff like that. I spent a lot of money on a house
understanding that I was doing another album. Of course, then they
didn’t, so I lost the house. But, fuck it; it’s only bricks (laughs)!
It doesn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things.
WOG: After the success of the Stiltskin album in Europe, the fact that
you didn’t do a follow-up album, says that tensions in the band must
have been terrible. Were the relationships within the band completely
unsalvageable by the time Stiltskin had completed the tour for The
Mind’s Eye?
RW:
Yeah. I think so. It was really two of the band members had a falling out
with Peter (Lawlor) who started the band and he was the main guy really.
Him and me. Me being the lead singer and him being the writer… of the
first album anyway. The bass player and the drummer had a terrible
relationship with Peter. And to be fair, Peter Lawlor, who was also the
guitar player, was extremely an extremely difficult character to get on
with. The bass player and the drummer left, and it was just Peter and me.
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Stiltskin in the '90s with
Ray Wilson (front)
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RW: I don’t think that there is a demand for it to be honest. I loved
what I did with Cut. It was my favorite music I’ve ever done. As well as
the music I did with Stiltskin. I have a great passion for that kind of
music.
I
think the key element is the melancholy mood to a lot of it. I also like a
bit of aggression in music. I like that kind of thing. Genesis did it in |
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"Any band would suffer when you replace
someone as prolific as Bono
or Phil Collins
or Mick Jagger or a real household name like that..."
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a
slightly…
I
think the key element is the melancholy mood to a lot of it. I also like a
bit of aggression in music. I like that kind of thing. Genesis did it in a
slightly… There was still melancholy on the Calling All Stations
album, but it didn’t have that kind of aggression that bands like Pearl
Jam or Soundgarden would have had in the early 90s and stuff. I like that
kind of aggression in music, and Genesis obviously didn’t do that. They
did do the melancholy (element), so I kind of enjoyed that side of it.
WOG: At what point of the Genesis tour did you ask Nir Z if he
would be interested in doing an outside project (the Cut album)?
RW: To be honest, it didn’t work like that. My own thing on the side
(Cut) had a drummer already.
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I just felt I’d rather just continue this kind of thing on my own,
rather than deal with the politics of a person who really isn’t very
pleasant. I didn’t want that. I’ve never ever had a falling out with
any of the guys I have to say within Stiltskin. I have a reasonable
relationship with all of them, but sadly, it was a problem between Peter
and the other two that caused the end of the band. I just thought,
“Well, what can you do?” It was such a waste!
WOG: You made reference to a second Stiltskin album. Was there a second
one?
RW: The
second album, we had been writing some stuff and it just kind of lost
momentum. |
The
problem I had was that when I came in to record it, the Cut
album (Millionairhead), Nir wasn’t in the band. It
was another guy named John Allison. Obviously, I had just been
working with Nir on an album and a tour, and I came to record
my own stuff, the Cut stuff, and the drummer just wasn’t up
to it. I just suddenly realized, “Jesus, I’ve got a
drummer who isn’t good enough!” And that is why Nir was
brought in. I brought Nir in because I panicked (laughs)! I
thought, “Well, who do I get?” And, Nir is the best
drummer I’ve ever worked with by a mile.
Nir’s
brilliant for rock music, because he hits it (the drum skins) so hard.
He’s a very intelligent musician and a very talented guy. I worked with
Nir, because I knew him and I just know that he’s stunning. He’s an
amazing drummer. |
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As
I said, I wrote the album (Cut’s Millionairhead), had the record
deal in place, and then Genesis came along and kind of spoiled it in all
honesty.
If I look at it from that point of view, I wish I never joined
Genesis, because it kind of blew my whole game plan. I let it happen. It
was my own fault. Because it was such a big opportunity and I suppose in
the end I thought, “Christ, you can’t say no to this!”
When I
look back at it from a purely musical point of view, I wish I had said no
to it, because it fucked my life up. It really did fuck my life up. I
enjoyed the touring (for Calling All Stations), and I thought the
touring went extremely well. I never had any bad vibes at the concerts.
Every gig I did, people stood up at the end, as they do at gigs, and chanted
for |
WOG: I recall you
mentioning in another interview that when you were doing the promotion for
the Cut album that so much of the questions really focused around the wrong
band. Do you think that being in Genesis or having just completed a tour
with them hindered the success of the Cut project? |
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more. That’s it! They didn’t hold up cards saying “Phil
Collins.” Apparently, Marillion had all that stuff going on when they
toured after Fish left. I had none of that. I had a really strong response
from people. So, I enjoyed that side of it. I enjoyed the recording of it
to a degree, but I wasn’t as involved as I would have liked to have
been. But I wish I had never done it musically. I really do. I wish I’d
never done it!
WOG: In another interview you mentioned that the song
“Millionairhead” was about someone from Stiltskin. Was that aimed at Peter Lawlor? |
RW: Yeah, I think I timed it wrong. My timing was completely wrong.
The problem with the Cut project was that it was only released in Germany.
It wasn’t released anywhere else in the world, except Germany. A lot of
people don’t know that, but that’s the reality of it.
The
reason I signed the deal in Germany, was because Stiltskin was signed in
Germany also. We released in the UK independently.
In
America, we released it through East West, who bought it for a lot of
money, and did nothing with it which defied belief, to be honest. It was
never released in the UK, the Cut thing. |
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RW: Yeah.
The problem was… when I joined Stiltskin, I
was unemployed, so I didn’t have a great deal of money. Neither did the
other guys in the band. The bass player had done quite well, because he
worked with a band called Hue and Cry and they had been quite
successful in the 80s. But myself and the drummer, we didn’t have any
money. We were getting paid 150 pounds a week in the early stages of
Stiltskin. We have a term, which is “airhead,” I don’t know if you use
it in the U.S. I just made the word “Millionairhead” out of the two
words “millionaire” and “airhead” and came up with a song,
basically, about the rise and fall of it. And the reason it failed was
through somebody’s greed. That’s what its about. |
I
think, when I look at it now, the timing was wrong. It was too soon after
the Genesis album.
The Genesis album, by the record company, was regarded as a failure in the
UK and obviously it didn’t work in America either. It worked ok in the
UK as it happens, but it didn’t work in America at all.
So, I basically had a lot of cynicism before I even started (the Cut
album). I singed to the German label, and thought “Well, fuck the UK,
I’ll just do it through Germany.” The downside to that was that the
German record label wasn’t best set up to help me properly. I wanted to
work with a producer on that album (Millionairhead), rather than
produce it myself, because I’m not a producer. I’ve written the music
and arranged the music, but I really wanted someone else who I could use just
to put that little bit of dressing on it to make it very now or very
modern sounding. I didn’t have that.
I look at it now and think that
there are some good songs in amongst it, but wasn’t produced in as
modern a fashion as it perhaps should have been. That’s why it didn’t
do as well as it might have done.
I think “Another Day” was a great opportunity as a single, but it's
life. It’s one of those things. It’s all about timing and image and
all that stuff nowadays. I don’t know, I can’t get too wrapped up in
all of that, because you forget that you’re actually in this for music
and not for image and timing. |
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WOG: Do you think that the Guaranteed Pure albums will ever be
reissued at some point? I’ve been looking for them for years.
RW: (laughs) I have some here in a cupboard, actually (laughs)… CDs.
That’s the only copies of them that there are. It was never commercially
released other than in Edinburgh and the east of Scotland. It wasn’t a
big deal. I didn’t have a record deal.
Ray
Reflects on Genesis:
"When I
look back at it from a purely musical
point of view, I wish I had said no
to it,
because it fucked my life up."
WOG:
Are there extras that you would consider selling?
RW: Yeah, I’ve got a whole bunch of them… a few hundred of them in
storage in a cupboard. I just listen to them and cringe (laughs)! I think
that there are one or two good songs on them. We did a song called
“Swing Your Bag” which was just a kind of stupid song.
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WOG: Did you have any reservations
about stepping into the shoes of Phil Collins by becoming the new lead
singer for Genesis? I would think that many people would fear that even with
a successful album, you would never escape the shadow of what Genesis was
with Phil.
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WOG: The one for the Outpatients ’93 compilation?
RW: Yeah. The Outpatients thing…
WOG: How did you get hooked up with Fish for that project? |
RW:
When I was first informed of the desire for me to audition, my first
instinct was not to do it. The reason my first instinct was not to do it
was, because I was so wrapped up in doing my own thing. The continuation
of Stiltskin, which was what Cut was. It was a continuation of
Stiltskin.
I
was so far down the line with that when Genesis came along, I thought,
“Wow! That’s a really impressive offer, but it’s not really where my
heart is.”
When I went to meet the guys (Mike Rutherford and Tony Banks), audition
and have a chat with them, their intention was to… They realized that
Genesis almost had to start again musically if I joined it. Because, they
were replacing one of the most famous singers in the world, and it
wasn’t going to be easy. Regardless of how good a singer I am, it’s
irrelevant. It’s just going to be bloody difficult. Not only that, they
had lost a key song writer as well in Phil.
Especially, the way that the sound of Genesis had developed. It was
becoming more and more Phil and less and less Genesis, and when you took
him out of that the band went very retro.
I
was involved in writing, but only a little bit at the end. So, my input
really wasn’t great. So, you lost something. So, it became a bit more
retro, which I liked, personally. But the downside to it, of course, was
that they were going to have to come to terms with the fact that album
buying public wasn’t going to be 50 million like it was the album
before. It was going to change.
WOG: Do you think Mike and Tony’s expectations were still somewhat
unrealistic at that point?
RW: Yes, but I think to be fair to them, they really didn’t know what to
expect. Had the American market bought the album with the same attitude
with the European market did, then everything would have been fine. But
they didn’t, as it happens.
It’s
not to blame anyone in America for that, it’s just the way
it goes. It’s life. A lot of the good die-hard fans bought
it. I’ve had lots of e-mails from America who love it, and
Canada, and so on and so forth. But, it didn’t work the same
way it did in Europe and that… I suppose for them — it
scared the shit out of them.
In the first place, when I first spoke to them it was like,
“We’re going to start again.” I did a contract with them
for a couple of albums, I was a band member- I wasn’t a
session singer and
they were doing a couple of albums to see how it went. I thought,
“That’s fair enough. If you’re going to commit to a couple of
albums, then at least this is going to be something that we can work on
over the next five years.”
What
the end result was, was that the American market didn’t take to it, the
European market was good but not great, and they were afraid that if they
released another album after Calling All Stations that no one would
buy it at all because of the trend.
If you look at Invisible Touch
and We Can’t Dance, if you look at the album sales for these
albums, and then Calling All Stations, it was quite a considerable
drop. They were concerned that if they released another album that nobody
would buy it at all and that they would ruin the good name of Genesis.
That was their reason.
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RW: Well, I recorded all the songs in his studio. He lives just along the
road from me. Fish put a lot of money into a studio, a beautiful studio,
and we went along there and recorded it.
He heard one of the songs and he
put it on the Outpatients album. He said, “I like this! It
reminds me of the David Lee Roth ‘Just A Gigolo’ thing.” You know,
the recording that David Lee Roth of Van Halen did of “Just a Gigolo”
as a solo artist? He just said, “I like this!” and put it on the
album, and that’s how it happened. I didn’t get any money from it. I
just put it on it.
WOG:
Were both Guaranteed Pure albums on CD?
RW: There’s only the one really. The other one is just on DAT. It’s
just a cassette, a four track recording.
WOG: Can you tell me how you came to join Guaranteed
Pure and why you left the band?
RW:
I met a piano player named Paul Holmes who was also in Cut. I met him
in a piano bar in Edinburgh. He was playing like Billy Joel, or whoever.
You know, that piano bar type thing covering other people’s songs. When
I was about 20 years old, I used to go to this bar, because my girlfriend
at the time used to sing. She did a spot, and whoever the piano player was
backed her.
I met Paul in the piano bar while she was getting up and doing
her thing. We got talking and he said, “Did you want to get up and do a
song?” And I got up and sang with him, and I sang “desperado” by The
Eagles. I remember it very well (laughs). He thought, “Christ, you’re
a good singer.” So, I said, “Would you fancy writing some stuff
together? I’ve been doing some bits of writing. I play guitar; I’m not
all that good, but I’m really a singer-which is my main thing.” And we
started writing together and Guaranteed Pure basically evolved from that.
Then I brought my brother, Steve, who had worked with me in my bands at
school. We used to write stuff in the bands we were in at school. He
played guitar, and he also was a singer at one stage. We brought him to
Edinburgh from Dumfries, which is where I was born.
Steve got
involved and then we were a trio, and then we got a bass player and then a
drummer… and that’s how it worked out.
The
band split up, because Paul, the piano player…. It got tough financially,
as it always does in any band trying to make ends meet. He decided that he
wanted to go back and do piano bars, because he made a good living out of
it and he was very good at it. So, he went away and did that, and the
whole band kind of fell apart because of it, since he was a very key part
of the band and a good friend. So, he left, and that’s how it ended. I
didn’t leave Guaranteed Pure; it just kind of ended.
SELECTED
ALBUMS FEATURING
RAY WILSON
Click on the album art below to buy them or to hear audio clips |
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"...I look at it and say,
'"Well, that’s not what your
intention was in the beginning, guys. You can’t just say that because it
didn’t take off in America, all right that’s it. We give in. We go
home. If you told me that in the first place, I would never have joined
the band!"
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Stiltskin
- She
The 2006 return of Stiltskin, featuring the new line-up with Ray Wilson and
Nir Z of Genesis fame! Includes "Fly High", "Sick and Tired", "Constantly
Reminded", "Fame" and much more! A fantastic album, and perhaps one of the
best albums of the year! Highly recommended!
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From
my point of view, I look at it and say, “Well, that’s not what your
intention was in the beginning, guys. You can’t just say that because it
didn’t take off in America, all right that’s it. We give in. We go
home. If you told me that in the first place, I would never have joined
the band.”
So, there is a little bit of resentment there, because I feel
that they didn’t have the courage to continue when I think they should
of, because I think Calling All Stations was a good album, a lot of
people really enjoyed it, sure it wasn’t as commercially massive as the
albums before it but it was never going to be. You can imagine replacing
Mick Jagger in the Rolling Stones. I mean, Christ, they would suffer as
well. Any band would suffer when you replace someone as prolific as Bono
or Phil Collins or Mick Jagger or a real household name like that. I feel
a little resentment, because they went in with one attitude and they came
out with another.
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Ray Wilson
-
Ray Wilson Live
Double live album featuring music from Ray's solo career, Genesis, Stiltskin,
Cut and more! Recommended!
Ray Wilson -
Change
Ray's studio solo debut! Includes the title track, "The Beach",
"Goodbye Baby Blue", "Along The Way", "Cry If You Want To" and much
more. Highly recommended! |
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Special thanks to Ray Wilson for granting this
interview. This
interview is © 2001-2007 David Negrin and may not be reproduced in whole or in
part without permission. |
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