Nous vous livrons ci-dessous une interview promo de Ringo Starr et mark Hudson, relative à la publication du nouvel album de Ringo Starr, « Choose Love », le 7 Juin prochain :
ADING IN, FADING OUT:
RINGO: You feel like if you die, the world will end. And actually, it won’t. Throughout the album, there’s a lot of peace, love and spirituality. So I wrote a line that says, « When I disappear, I hope I’ve left enough love. » That’s all that you can really leave and all you really do need. You can leave your money if you want to, and leave the house. But if you’ve left enough love that’s more important I feel. »
MARK: At one point Ringo wanted to call the album just Love and have every song deal with that concept. But once we got going, things changed.
RINGO: It’s like with Sgt Pepper – that was going to be « the opera. » Then after three tracks, it was like, « Sod it, let’s just play. » This time we had several possible album titles including One Leg at a Time and Fading In, Fading Out. Ultimately we thought the thing to say to the world is Choose Love. « No matter what you choose/choose love. » I think that says it all.
GIVE ME BACK THE BEAT:
MARK: That started with an idea Ringo had to do a drum song using multiple drummers, including Charlie Watts, his son Zak, Jim Keltner and himself.
RINGO: They always have guitarists coming on together on record, so I thought why not one for the drummers? That didn’t work out for this record, but then « Give Me Back The Beat » became a love song about beat of the heart. And for all the drummers out there, this is the first time I’ve ever done two complete drum tracks of myself on one song. And for guitarist, check out Steve Dudas’ solo.
OH MY LORD:
RINGO: When I wrote « Photograph » and « Back off Boogaloo » I had George to produce me and George was always trying to get into them the words « God » and « Krishna » and I fought it. And now just with the growth within myself, I have no problem with that now. For Oh My Lord, » we begin with my demo with me and my little crazy organ. George, bless him, has his « Sweet Lord » – this is mine. I did play the song for Olivia when it was a demo because I feel that George would have loved it. I always say « God » or « Lord » in a spiritual sense, not a religious way. But I’m big enough to say the word now.
HARD TO BE TRUE:
RINGO: We always three guys sitting around and they’re the saddest mother-bunch in the world because inside of all of us there’s « The dog’s dead, the wife’s left and the jukebox is broken. Inside, we’re all a country song and half of our battle is to pick it up and write a song where we’re not sad, where she hasn’t left and the dog’s fine.
MARK: Ringo is playing this old Wurlitzer all over this record. To me, playing the middle eight of « Hard To Be True » there’s something that brings to mind « Photograph. » This song gives me that same great feeling.
SOME PEOPLE:
RINGO: That’s Barbara and I, speaking of love. The songs come out of the atmosphere.
MARK: It’s a great song about the ying and the yang of relationships. If I may mention your old band, we were talking about the song « You Won’t See Me » and playing acoustic guitars. Richie sat down at the drums and started playing the beat for « Some People » and it was that moment the song was really born. Ringo said, « There’s got to be a twelve-string on this » and Dudas played another great solo.
RINGO: Every album someone gets the Man of The Record badge for being the most valuable player – Steve Dudas is getting it for « Choose Love. »
WHY AM I ALWAYS WRONG?:
RINGO: I was just having a bad two days with Barbara. You’re married for 25 years and you’re going to have a few bad days. I just came into the studio one of those days and said, « Why am I always wrong? Let’s have a cup of tea. » When I came back and Gary had the start of the melody of that song just from that one line. Around us, you have to be careful who says what because suddenly it becomes a song.
DON’T HANG UP:
RINGO: We were in England doing « Don’t Hang Up » which is a real story song about two people and a guy in a rock & roll band and we wanted a woman with . . .
MARK: Balls.
RINGO: Balls, Chrissie, if you’ll use the expression. My daughter knew Chrissie better than I did. I asked her for Chrissie’s number and we invited her to spend the day and see if she’d liked to do it. She was great because she made her part her own. She changed it and made it better. We were very open to her ideas –we’re not in the Army here.
MARK: I love Ringo’s drumming on that. I’ve produced a lot of people but I’ve never known the right hand of a drummer to be any greater. Listen to the way he plays the bell and the cymbals. Usually cymbals are considered just a violent instrument just to crash at the top of the chorus. There’s finesse to how Richie plays that a lot of those darn kids should listen to and learn from.
ME AND YOU:
RINGO: Our songs happen when they happen. There are no set patterns. It’s organic . . . like the food that I eat.
MARK: Steve Dudas had the chord changes there and a lyric for a verse. I played it for Ringo and somehow we ended up sitting in a car writing the song from there. Just two romantic guys together in a car pouring their hearts out.
SATISFIED:
RINGO: Gary Nicholson had the first verse for that one. It was all about « I won’t be satisfied » and yet again I’m always trying to take a turn to the positive. So the last verse is mine where I will be satisfied. That’s a great example of going from being the teenager who’s never satisfied to a place where you can feel grown up and satisfied. But you have go through a lot of life to get there.
MARK: This is also the one when Ringo pulled out some very special guitars and let us play them.
RINGO: Three of my great friends gave me guitars and I brought them out for this song and let the three boys play with them.
MARK: We switched guitars on every verse so we all got to play them. And Rose Stone – who’s been on all our albums – came in with her girls and gave us that great Wall of Sound ending.
CHOOSE LOVE:
RINGO: Love rocks, and that song rocks too. Love doesn’t have to be a dirge. Love is up and so is this song. That’s the theme of the record and we mention some songs that I love in it. This is our love album. Why not choose love? Name a better choice. And yes, I do sing, « You’ve got to pay your dues/If you want to sing the blues. » If you listen to my albums they all have some illusion to either « It Don’t Come Easy » or « Back off Boogaloo. » It’s somewhere in every one.
THE TURNAROUND:
RINGO: That’s telling people when you’re down, turn it around. You can get back up again.
MARK: « The Turnaround » was built on a jam. We were in the studio after lunch and Steve Dudas had his guitar plugged into Ringo’s odd amp.
RINGO: I get more odd things than (even) things these days.
MARK: Ringo doesn’t want the Marshall Amp – he wants the Meatball Amp. On the spot, this groove appeared and this song emerged. Ringo was talking about back in really old days with Rory Storm, the one song he got to sing was « Alley Oop. » So at the end of « The Turnaround, » Ringo doesn’t sing that song, but he lets you know that he has sang it.
RINGO: You have to be careful. The last record we borrowed that bit from « Let ‘Em In. » So I called Paul and said, « I’m doing this, okay? » He said, « Well, call the publishers » I said, « No, I’m calling you. »
FREE DRINKS:
RINGO: That’s us boys who are over 21 trying to write a disco Ibiza record and it turned into this surf spaghetti western. Because I live in the south of France half the time, I was mentioning places over there. It became one of our traditional travelogue songs. Then Steve Dudas did this « Fistful of Dollars » guitar line and we all cheered.
MARK: When I heard that disco beat, I was nervous for a moment. I was like, how are we going to pull this one off?
RINGO: « Free Drinks » started with a loop I made in Monoco on an old synth I have there, and it only got loopier, like the song.
