The Style Council: Two's Company
Neil Tennant, Smash Hits, 1 March 1984
ON A WINTRY Wednesday afternoon Paul Weller and Mick Talbot are lounging in a dressing-room at BBC Television Centre, waiting to record Top Of The Pops. Wondering whether or not to wear his new red pork-pie hat, muttering that Smash Hits is going "soft", wishing that more groups used their music to put over "an anti-Tory mentality" and regretting that he hasn't washed his hair, Paul is in fine fettle. Merton Mick meanwhile slips into his cycling gear, cheerful and friendly, a down-to-earth balance to Paul's questioning and cigarette-smoking tension.
"Pop music could fight back in a big way," Paul claims, "and I don't think there's many people doing it."
Are you then?
"As far as I'm concerned, yes."
After their first year together, the release of their debut LP imminent, and claims like these still being made, it was time to get to the bottom of this thing called The Style Council.
IS THE STYLE COUNCIL AN EQUAL PARTNERSHIP?
MICK: Yes and no because I'll never be able to churn out the songs and that's the big thing that makes the partnership unequal in one way. Aside from that, it's fairly equal. We talk over most things.
PAUL: It's true what he's saying. The worst thing is when you get into a band situation where people can't accept that which sometimes we used to get. It used to make people feel very awkward in The Jam.
MICK: Like with interviews, I'm well aware that a lot of people want to do the Paul Weller feature or interview and I accept that. There's always a focus on the front-man, for want of a better word, the lead singer and writer.
PAUL: It's only natural – whoever's written the lyrics, someone's going to ask them. And I'm quite stubborn – whenever I get an idea I like to go with it quickly.
MICK: I think Paul's got a more defined idea of what he wants than I have. He's a much better decision-maker. I hum and hah and I know it and if it was up to me we might end up only making one record a year. I think I influence the sound and the arrangements more.
DID YOU SEND ANY VALENTINE'S CARDS?
PAUL: No. When I was younger I did to a girl at school, probably primary school. She was the most popular girl in the playground – she had scratches on her knees!
MICK: Yeah, I sent one. I think they're a bit of a wind-up but they're nice as well. I'm not really a hearts-and-flowers sort of bloke, though.
WHAT DO YOU THINK OF NEIL KINNOCK?
MICK: He's better than Michael Foot in terms of getting votes. Brian Walden made the point on the radio that people who win elections are like TV personalities. He puts himself over quite well on TV and for a politician he's relatively young so he's a bit more in touch, I suppose.
PAUL: Yeah, well I think he's better than Michael Foot but that's not hard, is it? I still think that there's some quality he hasn't quite got. He's not quite strong enough, that's what frightens me, that he's not quite going to be able to do it. I think you've got to have a romantic, an idealist, someone who really speaks from the heart. I don't think there's enough romance in politics. If you had a romantic leader of the Labour Party or a socialist party, he'd win hands down. Kinnock's a good talker and everything but he hasn't quite got that romantic quality which I think he needs to be a great leader.
DO YOU ENJOY APPEARING ON TOP OF THE POPS?
PAUL: I don't know if it's just that I'm getting older, but I find it more and more ridiculous.
I don't think I'm very good at it – I look too self-conscious and inhibited.
HAS THE STYLE COUNCIL LIVED UP TO YOUR ORIGINAL AIMS?
MICK: I think we've done what we wanted to do which was to make good records. We've put out quite a variety of records and I think we've been quite fair with different b-sides and when the LP comes out it'll all be fresh stuff. I think we've made an effort with the presentation – we've done things a little bit different. And we've both avoided certain patterns in the industry that we've both been through before. A lot of people say Paul's softened up in his writing but he wrote his hardest song last year, 'Money Go Round'. I think we've been natural and honest.
PAUL: I think we try harder than most people to give quality down to the last details. We take pride and care in everything we do. We said we were going to do that in the beginning and I think we have; I don't think there are many groups who do that. With many it's all just product, ship it out and let the punters buy it and that's it. That's the end of their involvement. I think you've got to become totally immersed and involved in what you do, otherwise it has no weight or bearing. You can always sell a record if you have the right gimmicks. Hopefully what we do will cut through all that. We don't think about our "career", we just work from day to day. We don't have a formula.
ARE YOU GAY?
PAUL: Am I gay? No, I don't think I am, not in the conventional sense, but I can appreciate people of my own sex as well. Some people I see I sort of feel an attraction for them but whether it's a sexual one I don't know. I don't know that you can always pinpoint emotions, can you?
MICK: No, but you can love people in a lot of different ways whatever their sex.
PAUL: People should be able to think or do whatever they want as long as it doesn't harm anyone else and a lot of the fan letters after we did the 'Long Hot Summer' video said that. And I think to get a lot of letters and that kind of reaction has got to be a good thing. I don't know about actually having gay sex but sometimes I think... well, I wonder what it's like. I'm actually open-minded on the subject.
DO YOU DRINK?
PAUL: No, I don't.
MICK: Yes but I haven't had a drink for about three weeks. I do but not to excess. I'd say I was a mood drinker: I drink when the mood takes me.
PAUL: I used to enjoy drinking but I got fed up with it so I gave it up.
WHEN ARE YOU GOING TO GIVE UP SMOKING?
PAUL: When I stop enjoying it, although I smoke too much. I should cut down.
WHAT RECORD WOULD YOU LIKE TO BAN?
MICK: The Trainspotters' – I think it's Mike Read's record! It's been re-released. That whole thing with the Frankie Goes To Hollywood record makes me laugh 'cause I've listened to Mike Read the last couple of mornings and he's reading letters and making jokes with sexual innuendoes. So I think he's two-faced.
PAUL: That Cyndi Lauper record's obscene to me just because it's so stereotyped and the actual sound of the record is a bit obnoxious as well. You can't talk about morals any more – authority's morality is just bullshit. You've only got to look at the nuclear arms race to see there's no morality.
WHAT'S THIS RECORDING STUDIO YOU'VE BOUGHT?
PAUL: It's one that I've worked in in the past and I really like the atmosphere there. It went up for sale and it just really made sense to get it 'cause we do a lot of recording and it saves money.
HOW MUCH DID IT COST?
PAUL: About £200,000. It's a lot of money – we got a loan for it as well. I don't really know much about finance and I don't like to get involved in all that. I find it a bit dreary. My old man handles all that. I don't think I'm intelligent enough anyway.
PAUL, IS IT TRUE YOU DON'T SING ON MANY TRACKS ON THE STYLE COUNCIL LP?
PAUL: I sing on six and there's 13 tracks. There's quite a few instrumentals; Tracey Thorn's on a new version of 'Paris Match' and there's a rap and five instrumentals. We wanted to make something different. The first side is supposed to be almost like a live sound, like a combo playing in a club with minimal backing and production. And then there's a lot of different styles – it's an LP of extremes.
MICK: Maybe people are conditioned to hearing ten structured pop songs on an LP and it's not that. We've bravely gone maybe some places where we shouldn't but it isn't self-indulgent.
PAUL: Malcolm McLaren called his LP a "musical adventure" and if he hadn't I'd have put that on our LP because it's quite adventurous and hopefully it'll be quite an adventure to listen to it. You won't know what's coming next.
WHO WOULD YOU MOST LIKE TO JOIN THE STYLE COUNCIL? A) MARILYN; B) JOHN TAYLOR; C) HOLLY JOHNSON (F.G.T.H.); D) TORVILL & DEAN.
MICK: Torville & Dean.
PAUL: Yeah. The Style Council On Ice! We were thinking of getting a live act to support us anyway. John Taylor? I dunno. Which one's he? The one with the floppy hair? No, I don't think he'd qualify.
WHAT MESSAGE WOULD YOU LIKE TO SEND TO THE NEW RUSSIAN LEADER?
MICK: Any message I've got for any Russian leader is: let's be mates! That's really naive and stupid but it's a basic philosophy.
PAUL: He's so old, how long is he going to be in power, anyway? I've no message for him. I feel sorry for him in some ways.
DO YOU THINK YOU'RE LESS POPULAR THAN YOU WERE?
PAUL: Yeah, I'm bound to be. It would be totally pointless for me to get out of The Jam with their popularity and go straight back into another group with the same popularity. I wouldn't have changed situations or made any progress. And I don't like the assumption that, just because someone liked what I did in The Jam, they're going to like what I do now. Maybe I'm quite content with the way it is.
© Neil Tennant, 1984