Interview with A.E. April Issue of PLAYBOY Brazil
Posted: 11 Aug 2012, 05:49
This interview has recently appeared on FB where it was found by PD member conraculix,
who then asked the uploader Ma Theus to translate it into English, which he did ...
Here's also the link to the original source in Portuguese - confirm url in browser if site won't open ...
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Lovely! ...
... Thanks to both of you... 
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who then asked the uploader Ma Theus to translate it into English, which he did ...
Here's also the link to the original source in Portuguese - confirm url in browser if site won't open ...
...Lovely! ...
... Thanks to both of you... ...Not a lot of news, but quite enjoyable ...1. You performed in Brazil for the first time in 1990, and everyone who was there is a poignant reminder of those shows. Do you have a poignant reminder of those shows?
I never remember the shows. My memories are always of the city, persons, dinner, the weather. I like Brazil, but I confess that I do not remember the shows. When I'm onstage, there's always plenty of light and lots of smoke in my face, and every stage in every place looks the same from where I am. I can understand if people are having fun or not, but we have a relationship half blind, they see me, but I can not see them.
2. You do not release new album since 1990, and everyone asks when they will launch a new work, since a batch of songs done in the meantime you play live. Have no desire to record this stuff for yourself and your most loyal audience?
If I could do this to be released tomorrow effortlessly without having to negotiate with any label, neither Apple nor Amazon, I would. But it takes work and it takes time to make a good album, and my kids are too busy. The fact is that since we stopped releasing albums, things started to go very well for us [laughs]. So if we do not have a problem, we have no reason to want to solve it. Now, we're fine. I had an accident with my leg that got me out of shows for a year, and thought about doing something useful with my time then, which was to record every day for one year. But I could not, was very annoying.
3. Why keep the name Sisters of Mercy and not start a new project with new perspectives and a new name?
This is a great question. I do not know, I never thought about it. I think if we were to start today with a new name, unless we were nice to get a record company to establish ourselves, we would have difficulty in setting it back. What we do is very peculiar, and I think people look and think, ah, are the Sisters, ok. I do not think people would have the same understanding if we had another name. And on the other hand, the name Sisters of Mercy lets me do what I want in terms of music, perhaps with the exceptions of dub and reggae. So, I never felt the need, but honestly it's a great question because I'd never heard before.
4. My question was just about music: people already know what to expect of the Sisters of Mercy you never felt the need to create things that would not fit the band's sound?
I honestly do not. Sometimes we do things that seem a little out of the band of the spectrum, in which case we use as an introduction to our shows, or give to someone to use as a movie track. We know that this song is still one of the Sisters, but if we do not feel it has potential to be a hit from the band, a song from the tip, find a place for her. Previously, when we did vinyl records, there was always the possibility of putting a song on the strangest B. Today, there are still many possibilities for things that are a little different. So do not feel tied down.
5. The band's name comes from the music of Leonard Cohen?
No, no. Formerly all Leeds bands used to go to a pub, and there was a competition band names, all names in a hat would stop, and we lost. We wanted to call ourselves the Gang of Four, but others took that name. I like Cohen, he's a great guy, but I just interviewed him for Rolling Stone because I spoke the German language. I like him as like many people, like Led Zeppelin and Neil Young. I am a big fan of Motorhead. I like a lot of people.
6. The technology in music has changed considerably since 1981 when the Sisters came. This evolution has changed the way you make music?
It made no difference, because in 1981 I was very good in the art of editing tapes. Today this work is much simpler with computers, but I was already doing it then, I was using echo units to work as samplers, before samplers were invented. So the technology facilitated but did not change my ways, honestly. What made a difference was Photoshop, because I do a lot of graphic art, and my life is now much easier with Photoshop and Illustrator. I do lot of work with web servers, just because I like to understand how these things work, I have many computers and spend a lot of time playing with digital codes. But I spend more time with computers and watching movies than actually making music.
7. It is true that you're a big football fan?
I'm a fan of the FC St. Pauli, who is a football team that plays badly, it's a political event. It's more like a punk show than a game of football itself. We call "São Paulo". I do not see a game at St. Pauli for a year or so. The last time I saw a game a team you will know it was Barcelona, they are amazing, I love to watch them play. And I've never seen a soccer game in Brazil, there was no time or no time was I do not know, but would love to see a game there.
8. We have an image you created of a person dressed in dark clothes, who never smiles, and you repeated in interviews how this image is fanciful. I was wondering ...
(Interrupting) ... so you can judge after this interview, no? If you find me friendly and funny or if I felt depressed. It's not really something I should say, but if you look on the internet, some thousands of pages about the people, and gave me a lot of work, to write them, to make them light and fun. But this question of the image I do not think it is a problem for people who come to our shows, but a problem for people who do not go to our shows.
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knackered his leg and took a year out.
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