Interviews
Jimme O'Neill from The Silencers talks to Britsound
Interview by Rob Quicke, May 4, 2006.
RQ: It’s been over 25 years now since you first started life in the music business with Fingerprintz, do you still enjoy working in the music industry?
JIMME: I love the music! [laughs] I don’t know about the industry. But I love the art of writing songs and playing music, I still play. And the great thing about music is you never know enough and you continue to learn. I continue to learn, I continue to sing. I’m probably a better singer now than I was when I started. So yeah, I love it and I can’t say any more than that.
RQ: With Fingerprintz you released three albums that were received quite well in America. You also played in America didn’t you, in the early days with the Fingerprintz?
JIMME: Yes, we played all over with it. We’ve done something like five or six tours of America. All the clubs. The first album was really well known in the States because it went in what they call number 1 add-on. Which means it was played on more radio stations than any other album. And it was ironic because we were probably one of the first new wave bands from Britain and the States at the same time as The Police were breaking in the States. So it was really an exciting time and we played lots of clubs there at that time. It was great.
RQ: So then you formed The Silencers. Now, the first album A Letter From St. Paul had some success in America as well didn’t it?
JIMME: Yes, the single Painted Moon was a hit. It went something like 50 in the charts or something like that. And the album did really well. And once again we toured the States extensively. We toured on our own all the clubs and then we did a tour with Squeeze. I remember we were in the States at that time for five months. So when you spend five months touring the States what they usually say is that it either makes or breaks a band. But it made The Silencers, it was good.
RQ: So after A Letter from St. Paul you also toured in 1988 with The Alarm didn’t you?
JIMME: Yeah, that was in Europe, not in the States. In fact I was very, very disappointed. It was kind of political problems between the management and the record company and so we never, ever, toured the States again after that. But we spent years touring Europe.
RQ: One of the most important people in the music industry in America is Bob Lefsetz. He writes a column that’s syndicated across America. He wrote a column last month where said he liked hearing The Silencers song Answer Me on satellite radio. Obviously many people in the UK and Europe know about The Silencers, but do you think many people know about you in America?
JIMME: It’s a strange one because I in fact received an e-mail from Bob that was very interesting because he talked about the album that Answer Me was from. It was an album called Blues for Buddha that was released in 1989. And like a lot of people here, Blues for Buddha was probably the best-received album because it had a kind of mystical quality to it and Answer Me was a song that I wrote with that kind of timeless thing in mind because it was like a folk song so you had all the Celtic influences in there from folk music. But also it was a rock song and also it was a kind of, dare I say it, philosophical type of song! So yeah, there were lots of things in it. It was poetry also which I’ve always tried to do.
RQ: I want to pick up on the word you just used: ‘timeless’. You once said of Blood and Rain your ‘Best of’ album, that your songs are “meant to stand the test of time.” Was that always the idea? Were you always looking for chart success or were you thinking it’s important to write the music that stands the test of time regardless of whether it’s commercially successful?
JIMME: That’s a good question because in the 80s when we were signed initially, the ‘brief’ we were given, and it was I suppose very much thanks to U2, because although the music was commercial, it was also well done, it was also poetic, and it was also passionate. And you had to believe in something, these songs were about things. They perhaps had a political edge or something. We were writing about things that happened. Subjects that we were passionate about. So, in the early days I wasn’t really caring very much about being commercial. In fact, I was trying not to be commercial. But of course it happened to be an era, an epoch, that you could do that. Then, quite soon after that… I didn’t really change my way of thinking, but I could always write things that were melodic. And if you write with melody you could say that you’re never far away from commerciality. But basically my heroes did the same thing. My heroes like Dylan, Leonard Cohen, The Beatles, The Stones, The Velvet Underground - all these people did the same sort of thing. There’s a great sense of melody. And I’ve never thought that ‘commercial’ means lacking in art or lacking in quality. I think that the two go together, but at the same time you don’t think about how commercial a work is, you just think how good it is. And that’s my philosophy on that.
RQ: But did you have pressure with The Silencers to deliver the goods commercially, particularly when you were signed to BMG/RCA?
JIMME: Yes there was a time with the fourth album. I didn’t really change the music, what I did was I got a friend of mine who had sung, who was a really good backing singer, and he was actually in the band. His name was Jinky Gilmour. And I got him to sing a few songs because he was quite a good-looking guy, you know [laughs]. And that helped us on that album, but really I didn’t really change the music because I couldn’t really, you know. When I write a Silencers song it has to come from inside. It has to come from somewhere inside me, and the most important thing is that it has to say something. It has to say something to me, it has to say something about what I believe in and it’s always going to be that.
RQ: Let’s talk about Seconds of Pleasure though. Is it true that you were going to be dropped by the record company but they saw you playing a gig just before the album was released, and from your performance and audience reaction they realized they couldn’t drop you. Is that true?
JIMME: Yes, what happened was that we had become sort of stars in Europe, especially France. We were big in France. And we were doing big tours and we were doing lots of gigs here. But unfortunately we never really took off on the radio in England. We were getting lots of play in Scotland because we were Scottish and modern, and had big concerts in Scotland. But we couldn’t seem to get on the radio in London. Sometimes people’s faces don’t fit, slightly, and you don’t get played because you’re not ‘hip’ enough, or we were kind of in between the British taste at that time. Because we weren’t pop enough like some really pop artists, and we weren’t sort of extreme enough to be independent rock. And we were with a big record company, which sometimes works for you in Britain, and sometimes it doesn’t. At that time we just couldn’t get on the radio, we couldn’t get a profile. But it was taking off in Europe, and the record company at that time did want to drop the band. It was the usual thing that happens as a new managing director takes over and he brings his own people with him and they say “well look at this band, what are we going to do with them?” They came to a concert, and the first half of the concert we played our new songs. The second half of the concert we played the classics. And after the first half of the concert they came backstage and they said: “that was really good, but obviously people know the songs”. And I said, “no they don’t know the songs, these are all new songs.” They said: “what? These are new songs?” I said, “yeah, these are all new songs.” So that was the way it was, you know. They didn’t really know much about the band but when they saw the band live they were knocked out. But The Silencers have always prided themselves in being a great live band, and we are still a great live band.
RQ: How difficult is it for people to hear your songs on the radio? Because mainstream radio isn’t really playing The Silencers any more. But with satellite radio in America there’s this new possibility that you could be reaching a whole new audience. How do you feel about that?
JIMME: Well, of course that would be fantastic. I’ve always believed anyway that what I tried to do with The Silencers was to create something that was well done. That was in the same image as my own musical heroes. And just make something that was well done. So you were getting a quality product. It wasn’t something built to last five minutes, it was built to last a long time. And I think the people who know our music, they know it’s not first listen, second listen, third listen…they know it’s something you can get right inside and after a while it starts to affect your life. I don’t say that with any sort of pretension, but I do believe that there is something in our music that has touched a lot of people. I know that by the letters I get over the years that it touches people. And we still have a lot of fans, and we still have people writing in to the website and things like that. So, I’m delighted if the music is finding a new life out there. I couldn’t be happier.
RQ: I once read a review where the reviewer wrote: “it’s a shame they weren’t massively, commercially successful but however, The Silencers were too good to be a ‘pop’ group”. What do you think they meant by that?
JIMME: [laughs] I think that there might be a bit of truth in that because there was a journalist in Switzerland who talked to me and he said, “your songs are too good, you realize that don’t you?” And I said, “I don’t know what you mean.” And he said, “they’re too good. Your songs are too good to be widely accepted.” And I didn’t understand that because at that time we were doing concerts. The concerts were full. The fans that came along to the concert were having a great time. And the band was having a great time. And I don’t think that’s necessarily true. I think what happened is that we never sold ourselves as stars or personalities. I usually let the music speak for itself and that is possibly something, because a lot of people know the music, even in France, a lot of people know the music here, but they don’t know the name of the band. We were never marketed as stars. We were never marketed in that way. When I compare us to, for example, a Scottish band that came after The Silencers, a band called Travis who became massive in Great Britain, I don’t know about North America, but with the right connections they sold a lot of records. We never managed that because we just missed out on that radio play which could have catapulted the band into the big time. But one advantage of not making it, if you like, is that I’ve never lost the urge or the ability to write new and better songs. And that’s something that I think is quite important because that’s what I do. I do that and I think perhaps if I had been massively successful I might have sat back on my laurels. Whereas I’m always looking for the next song, I consider that an art, and I’m just working to do the next thing better than what I’ve done before.
RQ: How do you feel though about being bigger in France for example than you are in the UK?
JIMME: France is such a wonderful country. I never found that a problem. The only problem I found, was that it would have made a lot of difference to the band if we would have cracked in the UK as well, even if we’d had a couple of hit singles there, it would have made it a lot easier if you like. But then again, if something’s easy it’s not really what you want, you know. Everybody else wants it. Record companies want it, managers want it, but as an artist I’m not sure because, as I say, after a while you don’t really want mega success, you want to be appreciated for the good music you make more than anything. And I think that’s still the case.
RQ: Let me talk to you about the future of The Silencers. In the group you now have your daughter Aura who sings with you, and your also son, James. Have you been able to give them advice about the music industry from your own experiences?
JIMME: The best training is to play concerts. And they’ve both been in the band for years now. And that’s the only advice I can give them because all the joy that comes from playing live and all that positive experience, they’ve had that. They know and they love it. They also know that it’s a job, it’s not just the two hours on the stage that matters, it’s all the day getting ready for it, it’s preparation and training and all that sort of stuff, and rehearsing. They know all that now, and they go along with my idea that it’s the music that’s the most important thing. Everything else is just not really important but you have to do it. Sometimes you have to talk to the press, do interviews and everything like that, which honestly, we never have a problem with doing that. And you have to meet fans, you have to talk to fans. They know all of this by heart.
RQ: Your son, James, is in a band himself called Bwana Devil, how’s that going?
JIMME: Well James has been in the band for years, and they changed the name recently to Bwana Devil, and in fact it was me that gave them the title. It was the first 3-D movie. So that’s where I got the title. They’re great. They’ve been going for a while and they’re really, really good. They’re all really good-looking guys and they make great music. And last week I was in Scotland and I was helping them make a demo of their songs for a big record company who’s interested in them. The record company paid for their demo and they’re very interested in the band - Polydor in fact – and they do two styles of music. They play with the band which is British kind of pop music, I suppose you would call it, ‘rock pop’. And they also play acoustic. And the acoustic stuff is just James and Martin, two singer and two guitars. And that is fabulous in fact. So we spent a day recording their acoustic stuff and they recorded seven songs in one day. I’ve got the demo tape here, it’s magnificent.
RQ: Let me ask you though Jimme, why did you never record a solo album, or even an acoustic solo album? Songs like About the Sea and Unconscious from Seconds of Pleasure, are really intimate, moving songs, and they feature you prominently, and they’re acoustic based songs. So why did you never do that?
JIMME: Well, it’s funny you should say that because that’s one project that I want to do. But then I’ve got definite projects on at the moment but that is one project I would like to do in the next few months. I’ve got some friends with a recording studio and I want to do an acoustic album. That’s exactly what I want to do because the last couple of years in music has brought me back to the roots of what I do and I’ve actually been singing a lot acoustically and playing a lot. And that’s one thing I’m going to do. I’m going to do that soon. And, yes, I know that there are so many good songs The Silencers have done. Some things have been concerts where I just play acoustically and there’s no doubt about it, going back to, if you like, my folk roots where I started, I started in folk clubs playing blues and folk songs, and that’s different than playing with a band, it’s more intimate. Yeah I’m going to do that anyway.
RQ: So can we really look forward to that then?
JIMME: Oh yes, definitely. I’ll be doing that soon.
RQ: The Scottish influence clearly comes through your music. And there are other artists that also convey that Celtic influence too, artists like Ricky Ross, Deacon Blue and Runrig, to name a handful. How important is it to you that you retain that Scottish, Celtic identity in your music?
JIMME: Well, we never set out to sound like Celtic rock or necessarily be Celtic, but I wanted it to have identity in the same way that most pop music is based on R & B or the blues. So when I thought about it, what is my identity? I’m not American, I’m not black, I’m a Celt from Glasgow, and I’m Irish descent. So I basically kept the folk roots of where I come from, but then created a music that was also going to be played on big stages. I made it electric in the same way that U2 have got a kind of folk sound or The Byrds have got a very pop sound but it comes from folk music and it was electric. So that’s what I tried to do with The Silencers, and that was basically the formula. I didn’t try and disguise … I didn’t really search out, but I said okay we’re going to stay in this area. And that was it. I always tried to write what I would call ‘electric folk songs’.
RQ: What’s next for The Silencers? Are you releasing any new music shortly? I hear there’s a new live DVD in the works isn’t there?
JIMME: Yeah. We did a concert in Bretagne last year and it was filmed so we’re going to release that. I’m also working on recording that acoustic album. I’ve also started writing in French and I’ll be putting out an album with my first songs written in French. Which is quite funny, but it’s something that I’m quite interested in. Very different from The Silencers but it’s a challenge so I’m going to do that. But yeah, the acoustic thing is definitely going ahead. I’ll definitely be also writing towards a new Silencers album at some stage. So the next year I think it’ll be mainly recording and working away and hopefully getting things released as soon as possible.
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