Brian Higgins appears on episode 2 of the BBC series Secrets of the Pop Song, which explores the process of songwriting, following from pen and paper to first public performance. In this episode, Brian Higgins talks about how the chart single has changed over the last 50 years and reveals the process of writing Sugababes' "Round Round", the first number 1 single produced by Xenomania.
You can view all the Xenomania-related bits in the video above. If you're in the UK, you can watch the entire show on BBC iPlayer - it also includes appearances from Guy Chambers, Mark Ronson, Boy George, Neil Tennant, Lamont Dozier and Rich Harrison.
In antecipation for tonight's £20 Music Prize, Popjustice has provided a download of the 2004 Twenty Quid Music Prize programme, which features interviews with Brian Higgins, Cheryl Tweedy, Richard X and many others. Click here to download it.
You might learn that Richard X and Hannah Robinson actually wrote "Some Girls" with Girls Aloud in mind, instead of Rachel Stevens. Since they knew that Brian Higgins was doing the whole of What Will The Neighbours Say?, they didn't even send the song to Girls Aloud. In her interview, Cheryl Tweedy says that Brian Higgins should be on the back of the £20 note, as well as Miranda Cooper, who is "an unsung hero of Girls Aloud". She is also left wondering if "The Show" is indeed a song about anal sex.
Here is Brian Higgins' interview:
Popjustice: Is Ricki Lake often 'on play' down at Xenomania towers?
Brian Higgins: Only when Sugababes are in attendance. They tend to watch a lot of the American shows like that when they're not singing.
If 'Hole In The Head' wins the Twenty Quid Music Prize, who gets the money - your lot, or the band?
The band.
Which shortlisted singles are your favourites?
'Leave Right Now', 'Sweet Dreams My LA Ex', 'Some Girls' and 'Superstar'. Having discussed it with the team, we think for overall sincerity and delivery, Will's record wins.
Is there anything that the shortlisted singles all have in common?
The majority sound like British records - they're not attempting to ape the huge volume of American product we're being served. And the majority are sincerely trying to give the artist a definite individual identity, which is what it's all about.
Why did 'Hole In The Head' get to Number One and 'The Show' Number Two? Was 'Hole in The Head' better?
There are two contributing factors: firstly Sugababes have the full support of all UK pop radio and Girls Aloud do not. Secondly, 'The Show' is a quirkier record and less easy to get your head around.
Why was 'Hole In The Head' eventually a Sugababes song rather than, say, a Girls Aloud song?
The music was pretty much there before the song was written. We'd gone away to write for three days just to focus on Sugababes - I brought all of the backing tracks we'd made over the last six months and as soon as the 'Hole in The Head' track came on I instantly knew it was the single. Writing the melody and lyrics was easy, so sure were we about the music. Those moments of clarity are the best bit about the music business. We try to find perfect matches unique to the artist we are working with. It doesn't always work, but that's the aim.
The word 'shit' stayed in 'Hole In The Head', but was removed from 'No Good Advice'. Why?
I'm sure that when Girls Aloud sell as many records as Sugababes have, their work won't be so readily edited. Sugababes definitely have a lot of adult buyers, which is a credit to them - and hopefully Girls Aloud will get those same people over time. The record company would have made the decision to delete the word.
You've told us in the past that, currently, pop groups aren't getting a big second chance in terms of making a big impact. You worked with V on their second single. Was that their second chance?
The story started last year when Island asked us to work with V. We were right in the middle of Mania's album so we were unable to do it. In April they asked me again, as they still felt that they didn't have an ideal second single, and we agreed to meet the band. We thought they were great. Bright and motivated, with a lot of charisma. We've done four tracks with them and we're very happy with all of them. I think V have the potential to be very big. When we decide to work with an artist it is normally a decision based on personality and the challenge we feel it holds for us. I think V's first chart entry of Number Six wasn't bad.
How much cash do labels spend marketing duff track into the charts, blind to the fact that a decent song does a lot of the legwork itself?
Marketing is a murky word - one in which music, great or poor, definitely takes a back seat, and money spent seems to start at six figures, although I think the general public is more discerning than it was three years ago. And don't forget that good pop records are as hard to come by as good records by traditional bands.
You wrote Cher's 'Believe'. What's Xenomania's next global hit?
I have genuinely no idea. We're working with some very big international artists at the moment so I would say the chance to do well internationally over the next 12 months is definitely there - we just have to be as good as we can possibly be, and make sure we stay fresh and don't get too tired. I am not sure at all if we would ever do something on the sheer scale of "Believe", but I would love to have another big hit in the States.
Is the pop single ever likely to die out completely?
In the case of hard copy CDs, I suppose the answer is yes. Over time, methods of delivery will become easier and everyone will have downloadable music at their fingertips. In terms of the pop single as a piece of music disappear, I think not. Pop music just goes through phases. At the moment, it has become very trendy to slag it off as a genre and the word 'manufactured' is pulled out at every opportunity. But over time a new set of producers and writers will emerge - these people will be influenced for a high quality modern sound. Bands had it all going on in the mid 90s and then, a couple of years later with Spice Girls, modern pop dominated. In the last couple of years we've seen the resurgence of those bands, which is the legacy of Britpop. The same will happen with pop music over the next few years as the bands start to fade creatively. I think it's inevitable.
What role have the Sugababes played in Xenomania's road to success?
A crucial role. We first met them in October 2001 and we'd spent the previous twelve months working on our own musical direction. We were getting quite desperate as we were struggling to connect with the predominantly R&B artists we'd get sent. Our ideas seemed a bit out of place, and for that reason we connected with the Sugababes as I felt they too were a little out on a limb from the pop mainstream at the time. To me they represented something superior to what was out there. As a result, the Sugababes undoubtedly brought the best out of us as we always felt under pressure to produce results that would do justice to their voices and overall talent. As it happens it was the pressure to match 'Round Round' that led directly to 'Sound of the Underground'.
What role have Xenomania played in the Sugababes' road to success?
We found a way to make their songs more accessible without removing too much from their characters. This crossed them over to a larger audience which helped them sell loads of albums. 'overload', 'Freak...' and 'Stronger' have also been crucial songs too - we're just very, very happy to have played a role.
The webzine PonyStep has published an extensive interview with Xenomania's Brian Higgins, conducted by Andreas Soteriou. Read it here. A few highlights from the interview:
The current state of pop and the need to reinvent «The world is pop mad now. (...) The ease for us to stand out is a lot harder now, so we have to re-appraise where we go sonically, which is fine. (...) In 2001, when we emerged, pop music was on its backside and indie music was about to rise, through The Strokes and everything else. We were an independent company and we were as indie as the other bands around us. (...) The difference was that we didn't sing our own songs and loved female vocals. It was easy for us to stand out (...), to dominate and dictate. All we had to do was make sure that every time we worked with either of the two girl groups that we had [Sugababes and Girls Aloud], that we didn't ruin it or cock it up. We took it so seriously, it was life or death because we knew that if we let it go with either Sugababes or Girls Aloud, there wasn't an obvious replacement because we were surrounded by a sea of bands.»
The (uncertain) future of the Girls Aloud/Xenomania partnership «Obviously that the rise of Cheryl Cole as a superstar is a phenomenon in itself, which is great for her. I think that everyone's got to wait and see where that takes Cheryl because it is obviously profoundly altering her life and how she sees her life. If she goes to America and does X-Factor and everything, then that is going to create a situation. They are all creating solo records, therefore they're all working with lots of other producers and stuff. It would be foolish for me to sit here and say that in a year's time, they'll definitely come back to us. (...) I guess there's three options, really; They will come back, they won't full stop or they'll be back and work with other people. I have a completely open mind to the way that is. I certainly don't think that we have any ownership over them or anything like that. (...) If the band continues it will be a small miracle, but then, every album was for me anyway. That's why we put so much into it, because we couldn't believe that they'd come back to us. We never assumed they would, ever.»
The early years of Girls Aloud «We initially only did two songs on the original Girls Aloud album; Sound of the Underground and No Good Advice, then I heard the other ten tracks and said, "This is a disaster". (...) They'd sent them off to these other Swedish guys and different people in the UK who were about to be rubbed out by what was coming - the rise of indie and our sort of pop. I heard this stuff coming back and I said, "There are two completely separate groups on this record. We need to get rid of six tracks and I'll replace them". We did that and allowed the album to stand up as a body of work. (...) When the second album came round, the label said, 'Listen, we're not going to do this group any more if you don't do it". I think my initial reaction was to do a few tracks and he said, "No, you have to do this because I think you're the only person who understands exactly what it is". So, that's how we took it on.»
Girls Aloud weren't accepted but gave two fingers up to everybody «'Sexy! No, No, No' sounded ridiculously challenging because we thought that radio wasn't going to play them anyway. It was like two fingers up to everybody. You're not going to play them on the radio, anyway, so we'll give you something that you couldn't play. (...) [Girls Aloud] loved the hostility that was in all their records because they realised that they weren't accepted. At TV studios, always treated really badly, unmanaged for years, having to do it all themselves. There is a great book in the Girls Aloud story, really. There is so much that people just don't know, about how much they were shunned at the start. We loved working with them, loved them as girls and their voices. They met a group of people that wanted to make a statement musically more than they wanted to make money. If we made the right statement and it was melodically as good as possible, then something good would come from that. (...) We’re lucky in the sense that we met a group that had various voices within it that could really inspire excellent records, and they met people that were obsessed about wanting to have an expression through pop music that was as avant-garde as it was commercial, looking to combine those two things.»
The Xenomania set-up «We're a fairly small group of people here. If ever we feel that there is a lot of thinking to be done, we contract people. In 2006, Xenomania was four people. Writing Sweet About Me, Call the Shots, Something Kinda Ooooh, there were just four of us. Then we sold a load of records and expanded, signed some acts and expanded again. It is a bit like a squeezebox, really. It opens and contracts accordingly, it doesn't show off by its size. There are eight people and some specialists that come in every now and again. I think we need to be that size.»
Between rural Kent and industrial Shoreditch «I‘ve never lived in London and never wanted to live in London. Although, I‘m probably closer to feeling more comfortable living there than I have ever done before because of the place we have in Shoreditch. There is a big studio there and a big flat so I‘m going to probably live there maybe a few days a week and then live here for the rest of the time. Split myself between Shoreditch and the countryside. I like Shoreditch because it is like a Northern town, very industrial. It is like a town, so I don’t feel like I am in a city and I like that, because I don’t like cities very much.»
Building an online presence for new acts «It’s no surprise that Ellie Goulding has got off to the quickest start this year, because she did the most work online last year, all the pre-label work, if you like. (...) I think she is a very good example of what needs to happen before you go on, you have to build it properly. The artist needs to be hands-on in doing that. (...) If I’d known then what I know now, I would have added a full online presence with Alex [Gardner], any number of different releases out into the marketplace prior to going anywhere near a label, so that there was a very healthy underground aspect and online presence for that artist and I didn’t do that, because I didn’t believe I needed to. (...) If you service a record to Radio 1, the minute you go in with it, they’re on Google, looking to see what the online presence is. They are now using that as a determination of how hip or cool something is. Regardless of the quality of the record or the act, if that presence isn’t there, they will not play the record. It is basically making it clear that if you haven’t built up the online work through the blogs and with Facebook fans, Twitter fans, then you can forget about it, unfortunately.»
Florrie Arnold «Florrie is interesting. I took her out of our group. She is not signed to a major label. She has got the majors trying to sign her, but I think that we have to build her world online. We're not signing her to a label, which I think is really important. Because the minute she is signed, someone on high will say, "Right, ready or not, let's get her on a schedule", and that isn't working. I think she is amazing, she has got a great story. She is only twenty, was a fantastic session drummer for us and then there was her emergence as a singer. She has got amazing things going on in her life.»
Stepping outside of the "Xenomania sound" «I guess whenever we have stepped outside of whatever people consider to be our sound, which is uptempo, electronic, exciting, imaginative and enthusiastic (...) lyrically interesting, original, with a shock in it somewhere, you won't know what it's going to sound like before you put it on... If ever we have stepped outside of that, it hasn't worked. 'Sweet About Me' wasn't your typical Xenomania record, and that was a huge worldwide hit, but I think that if you take the Rexola sound away from it, then it isn't successful. It needed that sort of thing to allow it to sink in to people's psyche and then they were able to judge it as a record as opposed to a Xenomania record first. I think that Vagabond was way outside what we would normally do because the guy's voice lead me into that particular area. I think that the truth of it is that it's probably a lesson in everybody sticking to what they're really good at, as opposed to doing things competently, because competently isn't going to get you anywhere. We're lucky in that we've found an area of music that we cen excel in, or call our own and I guess that's where we should stay. Naturally, sometimes we go outside of that, but it doesn't seem to work very often.»
What went wrong with Vagabond «If you look at Vagabond in the context of the single 'Don't Wanna Run No More', it's a good song, a very good song and a decent record and everything else, but it's not brilliant. It's not vital or unique or standalone. When we were actually looking at the record and seeing that it was going to struggle, it didn't sound remotely like anything else around it at that time, but it certainly wasn't leading anything else. As a result of that, it was a record that didn't make a connection with anybody. We have to accept that part of our job here is to connect with people. And if we're not doing that, it doesn't matter how good the record is, then we're not doing it right. Our other choice is to blame everyone else that the records aren't connecting and I think that 's a waste of time.»
Collaborating and creatively debating with the Pet Shop Boys «I thought that they would be hard work. I won't compromise on what I'm doing. I won't water it down and I won't dilute it, because that defeats the object of working with me in the first place, really. I don't like collaborating unless I am in charge of the collaboration. (...) Neil told me that they very wilfully checked their egos in every morning they came into the studio because they decided that they were going to trust me to do it. I would say that 98 per cent of the time that worked and the two per cent that it didn't were natural creative debates, really, between me and Neil, with Chris acting as mediator, "Break it up, lads. Break it up!" (Laughs). That was fine. Neil is ever so bright and visionary and all those things. We sort of worked out the rules of engagement before we made the record and then were able to make it well. And they came in with a lot of really good material that I liked, as well.»
The end of the decade and the future of Xenomania «It was an amazing ten years, an incredible period, but I think it is over. And I think the fact that we were able to end the decade with a hit that was very like us in “I Left My Heart in Tokyo” is fine, a really good thing. (...) It feels like we've come back to how we started in a way. Putting remixes out and watching them go up the charts. It feels like I'm back there again in a funny sort of way. I've been working with Kylie, Alesha... Nadine's been coming in, so its not like I'm not active in the world of trying to create mainstream hits. It's just that I feel like I need challenges and I find them in tough situations. Looking for adversity, in a way. (...) I think that everything needs to be thirty per cent better now if you want to even consider having a similar level of success. I think for myself and Miranda, that our average songwriting has to increase by thirty per cent within the next 5 years. We have to get back to audacity within our records and making statements and all the things that we are used to doing, I suppose. Challenging things.»
A new interview with Brian Higgins and new Xenomania protégé Alex Gardner was published on the latest Scotland on Sunday. You can now read the article online. This is one of those rare and insightful interviews with Brian Higgins.
Important things that you might learn: Brian's work ethic comes from his father, who was so committed to being a GP that he barely saw him; he stopped composing at the piano a long time ago; «pop music is maths»; he's been listening to New Order, Kate Bush and Lady Gaga; Franz Ferdinand's "Take Me Out" is «the best pop song of the past 15 years». Highlights:
Brian Higgins says that melody is life-sustaining. "Water is the more precious resource – but only just," he chuckles. He is currently listening to: "Classic New Order as always, Kate Bush's Cloudbursting and Poker Face by the fantastic Lady Gaga."
Higgins on Franz Ferdinand: "Given they'd worked on new songs for three years, I expected them to have more urgency. But I still love them. Take Me Out is the best pop song of the past 15 years."
Xenomania had started above a pine furniture shop but Higgins always believed that songwriting required blissful surroundings. "My fantasy had been to write songs in Paris. I got there eventually and out of that experience came All I Wanna Do for Dannii Minogue – my first top five.". [Another notable song written in Paris was Girls Aloud's "Call The Shots".]
Alex Gardner thought he'd entered a fairytale world even before he knew of the Alice In Wonderland connotations with the Xenomania mansion. "The house is incredible. In every cubbyhole, people are making music – and in the summer they take their guitars into this beautiful, three-tiered garden. I guess that must have been a massive inspiration for Alice – it's the most amazing, peaceful, creative place."
Higgins was impressed by Gardner's work ethic. "I know I'm demanding, but we're not here to make up the numbers. My work ethic comes from my father who was so committed to being a GP that I barely saw him. Most people, when they're writing songs, trust their first instincts; I'm always suspicious of that. And I stopped composing at the piano a long, long time ago."
Alex gives away Brian's secrets: "He'd sing into a dictaphone in one corner and in another I'd do the same. At first I found him intimidating but he quickly became giggly and excited."
Alex first auditioned to be the singer in Xenomania's house band JFK. Higgins: "I'd heard him sing some songs by a couple of the guys who work here and, to be honest, Alex didn't do it for me until I was persuaded to listen to one of his own compositions. It was terrific. Then he came in to Xenomania and, after hardly any time in the house, I told him: 'I'm not going to let you leave until we've made a great pop record.'" Higgins says that "working with Alex was inspirational" and that he is an "extremely personable lad".
Alex Gardner can't decide which is his favourite pop moment at Xenomania HQ: bumping into Alesha Dixon and Girls Aloud, Kylie Minogue saying "hi" or Sarah Harding asking him where she could get some meatballs (oh dear).
With two weeks to go before ABBA World - the world's first officially endorsed ABBA exhibition - opens, The Times has published an article about the Swedish group.
Brian Higgins of Xenomania was interviewed for the occasion. He says that ABBA's "SOS" was «the benchmark song I chose to indicate the direction I wanted us to aim for. That was the standard we aspired to reach melodically».
He also says: «They were great, great records: great chords, beautifully played, clever arrangements and often an incredible musical motif that often matched the main vocal melody in quality. That’s incredibly difficult to do well and yet that’s what they delivered time and time again. Finally, the girls could really sing. They made beautiful sounds, which made every lyric totally believable.»
ABBA World, a 25-room touring exhibition featuring interactive and audiovisual activities, will be open at Earl's Court Exhibition Centre in London, England, from January 27th to March 28th.
The Guardian has published an article about Mini Viva, featuring interviews with Britt & Frankee, as well as Xenomania headmaster Brian Higgins, their manager Simon Fuller and Colin Barlow, president of Geffen UK.
NME magazine has published a special "End of Decade" issue, celebrating the changing shape of music over the last ten years. One of the key features on this souvenir issue is about Girls Aloud and Xenomania. You can read an excerpt of the article below (the rest of it focuses primarily on Timbaland and The Neptunes):
Published: NME (End Of Decade souvenir issue) Written by: Emily MacKay
Pop music since the turn of the century has been more exciting, more subversive, more forward-thinking and more downright danceable than ever.
When they predicted back in the '80s that pop would eat itself, they weren't wrong. What they didn't realise was that by feeding on its own internal organs, pop would only make itself stronger.
In 2002, when Girls Aloud won Popstars: The Rivals, reality TV was still in its fairly early days. Big Brother was only in its third series and the country was already well over the hysteria and subsequent undignified demise of original Popstars winner Hear'Say, but we hadn't quite reached the relentless conveyor belt of moon-faced idiots and exploitative freakery the genre ultimately descended to. It could still surprise you. That said, nothing could have prepared us for the Girls' "Sound of the Underground".
Wisely avoiding either the generic kiddy-pop route or the slough of sugary balladry that many subsequent reality TV stars have taken, it instead raced down the path the Sugababes had beat out with "Round Round" - sharp, danceable, relentlessly modern pop. The hard drum'n'bass rhythms, the ridiculous rockabilly guitar sample, the tense, abstract lyrics. Rather than trying to tack on an edge of credibility, it was made by people who knew exactly what they were doing. As a result we had the only decent Christmas Number One of the decade. It was smart, sexy, witty and it was... popular. It was a bit of a shock.
In the US, the influence of hip-hop and r&b had been pushing pop to new heights via the likes of Destiny's Child, Aaliyah and Kelis. British pop, however, had failed to meet the challenge of dance music, drum'n'bass and garage, remaining stuck in the novelty rut carved by the Spice Girls (you can bleat on about girl power all you want, but the plain fact is the majority of the Spice Girls' songs were naff as hell), Boyzone and B*Witched. "Sound of the Underground" (and "Round Round" before it) was a whole new kind of pop. It didn't glory in its own cheesiness. It wasn't wholesome Royal Variety Show family entertainment. It was shiny and sexy and perfect. While Kimberley, Nadine, Sarah, Cheryl and Nicola deserve their own credit (if you think you can give a song like that to just anyone, imagine the twins from this year's X Factor singing it), it made us start to think about chart its in a different way.
Growing accustomed as we now were to looking behind the scenes, peeling back pop's perfect skin to prod at the mechanical workings underneath, the producers of the track, Xenomania, became stars of a sort themselves. Seven years later we're excited about Mini Viva because they're produced by Xenomania. We're not excited by Xenomania because of Mini Viva. Xenomania leader Brian Higgins' previous biggest credits had been working with Dannii Minogue and Saint Etienne and writing and producing Cher's "Believe" (whose bizarre use of Auto-Tune is arguably still an influence in hip-hop today). Following "Sound of the Underground" and "Round Round", though, Xeno have sprinkled their magic dust over Kylie, Annie and the Pet Shop Boys, becoming a byword for wickedly clever, saucy, superficial, heartbroken pop. If you take all their writing and production credits together, they've had more UK top 10 hits than Madonna, Christina Aguilera and Britney Spears put together.
TOP OF THE POP
Brian Higgins of Xenomania on how pop got hip again
«The decade started with Hear'Say - to many people as bad as we could get. The rise of very cool pop music ties in with the decline in television. TV was the vehicle of pop and up until 2001 the Internet hadn't taken hold, hadn't become ubiquitous within culture. As a result you were still able to market things very heavily through the TV screen. People had less access and less ability to check how good something was.
«Britpop went terribly wrong. It was about four or five groups that were fantastic and everything else was rubbish. The Spice Girls and All Saints came along, freshened that up and changed it. Then you had four or five years where everybody followed on from that, so the quality was diminishing and diminishing and diminishing and it ended up with an attempt to revitalise the genre.
«We were just desperate to make uptempo dance-friendly records. It was about risk-taking, about being unpredictable, sonically, but still being catchy as hell. I feel people are much more up for taking risks sonically, which is fantastic. But at the end of the day, the number of people who can produce a strong musical idea, deliver a melody that fulfils an idea, is low. The person who can nail a great melody is a rare commodity in the music business.
«The emergence of La Roux and things like that don't give the general public enough credit - if you give them something challenging they can accept it and digest it brilliantly. La Roux is an example of a record that on the surface sounds difficult but listen to it a few times and you can pick up on the magic within it.»
Written by: Johnny Davis Published: Q (October 2009)
In a Kent country house, Britain's pop factory cranks out hits for Girls Aloud, Kylie, and many, many more. Clock on at Xenomania - the "21st-century Motown"...
A Xenomania meeting in progress
Radio 1's Head of Music, George Ergatoudis, calls it "one of the most exciting pop records I've heard all year." Former Spice Girls manager and American idol impresario Simon Fuller was so taken with it he now manages the group. Even the Daily Star has declared it "nuts", in a good way. The general consensus is that Left My Heart In Tokyo is heading to Number 1 when it's released this month. For Mini Viva, the duo responsible for the striking disco-funk debut of pummelling strings, cheesy oriental synth motif, ridiculous rapping and indescribably great chorus, the journey from the North-west of England to the Radio 1 A-list has been a curious one.
Mini Viva rehearsing at Xenomania
"It was a bit weird," confirms 20-year-old Frankee Connolly, one half of Mini Viva. "They told us we were being taken to a studio, but when we got there it was just a big house". "We could", suggests her partner Britt Love, also 20, darkly, "have been going to anyone's house, really."
The pair met in 2007 at an audition held by a record label calling itself Select Music UK. Connolly had been targeted via her MySpace; Love showed up "after I'd seen a flyer". Soon they were driven to a house in Kent. "We came in and we were, like, Oh My God," recalls Connolly. "Seeing all the gold records on the wall!"
They spent the next two years training to be pop stars. This May they found themselves in the seventh-floor boardroom of Universal Music Group International's base in London. Their audience: Lucian Grainge, Universal's chairman and CEO, and arguably the most powerful executive in the British music industry. It was 11am and Grainge was eating muesli. But they stormed through Left My Heart In Tokyo and Mini Viva had a deal confirmed before Grainge had time to down his spoon.
Six weeks later Mini Viva are sitting in the garden of that same Kent house. It belongs to Brian Higgins, co-director of Xenomania, the most successful songwriting and production house Britain has produced in 20 years. From here Xenomania have written, recorded and produced 20 of Girls Aloud's record-breaking run of 21 singles. They have proved hitmakers for the Sugababes, Kylie, Pet Shop Boys and more, shifting some 25 million records in their 12-year history. Their songs are defined by a compulsion to corral pop music down ever more thrilling and creative avenues. Sugababes' Round Round or Girls Aloud's The Promise crossed dancefloor electronics with rock club guitars, classic '60s songwriting and sparkling '00s production.
Lyrically, too, Xenomania patented their own lines in winningly impenetrable silliness ("Something kinda ooh/Jumping on my tutu"), so much so that one journalist was compelled to ask Cheryl Cole whether 2004 hit The Show was about anal sex (it wasn't). Aided by five winning personalities, it was songcraft that escorted Girls Aloud from the nadir of credibility (winners of 2002 proto-X-Factor, Popstars: The Rivals) to somewhere near its zenith (two 2009 Brit Award nominations, Wembley Stadium gigs with Jay-Z and Coldplay).
Xenomania: Nick Coler, Miranda Cooper and Brian Higgins
Higgins acts as musical director, steering a seven-strong team that includes Xenomania co-director Miranda Cooper, best regarded for her lyric writing and now the most successful female songwriter ever (Madonna, Carole King and the Brill Building's Cynthia Well have trumped her elsewhere); Nick Coler, who programmed all The KLF's indelible hits; Tim Powell who started out in 1989 "doing hardcore rave stuff"; and Matt Gray, whose early platinum sellers include Pogo Stick Olympics and Space Station Oblivion - he wrote music for Commodore 64 video games.
Xenomania wall
Reliably dazzling yet never the same, Xenomania's services are understandably in demand. Their autumn schedule includes Cheryl Cole's solo album (co-produced with Will.i.am), Kylie's latest and the first material from Magistrates, the fashionably tipped Essex four-piece signed to The White Stripes' label XL. "At the moment there are 17 named artists we are being asked to consider," says the 42-year-old Higgins. "For us to accept any of them, it's really got to excite us a hell of a lot. We must not be caught putting out bad records."
The way Xenomania work is unusual. Based 45 minutes outside London "to avoid all the distractions", the team would never do anything as straightforward as sit down to write "a song". Instead they each work on backing tracks, chords or beats, Higgins choosing the best bits and building up songs like jigsaws. Xenomania believes that for a song to be "sincere", the artist must always be involved, so melodies and lyrics are always collaborative. Higgins: "The melodic side, which is about life, is the essence of songwriting. There's not many 17-year-olds who have Number 1 hits. If you're giving a melody to them to tell their life story through that melody, you've effectively given them the experience of the older person."
Higgins and Xenomania have already achieved success that would seem more than enough for most people. But it would be a terrible mistake to consider Higgins and Xenomania most people. "Presidents of labels go, Why haven't you retired yet?", he barks. "You think, is that what you're in it for? That's surely indicative of what they themselves are chasing. It's not someone who loves music. It's someone who wants overnight success. Well, I don't want to work with people like that. If you're searching fr overnight success, then get the fuck out of the business."
Xenomania are playing a long game, the next stage of which is to "bypass the nonsense" of the industry by launching their own record label. Aiming to become, as the team's head of A&R Sheila Burgel puts it, "a Motown of the 21st-century", Higgins's team have spent the last two years scouring the world for acts to develop. Turning the traditional pop producer's role on its head, Xenomania won't wait for record companies to bring them artists to work with. Instead, they'll sell record companies the artists they've discovered and developed.
That means presenting them "99 per cent complete", with a finished album with its first three singles earmarked, pre-style, rigorously drilled in performing live (50 shows for all new acts is now a ballpark figure) and, in Mini Viva's case, with their own brand of so-bad-it's-brilliant synchronised dancing. "I don't think record labels have the skill set to develop acts any more", says Higgins. "You need to be outside of it."
And if Xenomania's USP has thus far largely been girl pop, the next six months will see them comprehensively edging out of whatever remaining comfort zone they have left. Following Mini Viva, there'll be Vagabond (lusty soul-rock band), Pageboy (Pink-esque pop), Alex Gardner (groove-based blue-eyed rock), Nite Visions (the sons of Duran Duran's Andy and Roger Taylor, and sounding like it) and Gerard O'Connell (who'll release his music, a sort of four-to-the-floor Coldplay, under the name of Goldmark). This comes at a time when pop is once again in the ascendant; the days of Dizzee Rascal's Holiday and Lady GaGa's Paparazzi.
"Pop was a dirty word", says Radio 1's George Ergatoudis, whose swap of indie Jo Whiley for poppy Fearne Cotton perhaps signals a subtle station repositioning." But quality, exciting pop music sounds fresh now. Xenomania are doing it."
The Xenomania house
Arriving at Xenomania HQ, you could be forgiven for thinking you had entered a cult. Or at least a commune. The sprawling 16th-century mansion edges onto a village green, complete with Tudor tea rooms and statue of Sir Winston Churchill. "Girls Aloud used to stay at the local pub," says Miranda Cooper, 34. "Brian got the guy from the gym, Nigel, to take them out on the green running at 7.30am. They weren't happy."
Alice Liddell, the inspiration for Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, used to live here. A team of gardeners are attending to the not-insubstantial garden. There's a stream, and ducks everywhere. "There only used to be two", notes Florrie Arnold, one of two impossibly beautiful girls who float to greet Q, "Now they're breeding like rabbits."
At 20, Arnold turns out to be one of the grizzled old hands - a member of Xenomania's house band. Elsewhere teenagers sit around a wooden hall table, playing back music on MacBooks, writing lyrics in notebooks, and generally being so good-looking you feel like running screaming out the back door.
The house is a hive of activity. An east wing is off-bounds - Higgins's living quarters, with long-term partner Sarah ("I've no idea why it says 'danger' on the door," notes Arnold.) "We're churning out ideas all the time," says Nick Coler, who is currently "trying to get some beats together" for an undetermined artist for the St Trinian's II: The Legend of Fritton's Gold soundtrack. "You're trying to sell someone a feeling, and that's the feeling you're trying to get," he says. "It's easy to make something catchy. To be able to listen to it a thousand times, and still have that feeling - that's hard."
Boys in the attic: Jason Resch & Kieran Jones
Elsewhere, house band members Jason Resch, 20, and Kieran Jones, 19, also known as JFK, are working on potential backing tracks for the same song, Tim Powell is tweaking mixes of Alex Gardner's music and Fred Falke, the noted Parisian remixer, is tackling a song by 2008 X-Factor winner Alexandra Burke. (Q stumbles across Burke at one point, before being shooed away by Higgins.) Falke divides his time between his own Toulouse studio and here. "The couch is very comfortable", he says admiringly. "Ikea."
Given all this, it's perhaps no coincidence one of Girls Aloud's albums was called What Will The Neighbours Say?." The villagers have generally got used to it," says Kieran Jones. "Though some do stand on the green and just stare at the house. That's a bit disconcerting."
Soon, housekeeper Pilar has lunch ready. Catering for 36, it's a feast comprising roast pork, cod mignon, hazelnut and vegetable salad, cabbage, beetroot and roast potatoes. There's a minor surge kitchen-wards. "Can you wait till Brian comes in first?" advises his PA Claire, in a tone that suggests it would be a good idea.
Lean and gym-fit, in his leather jacket Brian Higgins might bear physical resemblance to a Formula 1-era Damon Hill, but in temperament he's more Sir Alan Sugar: famously hard to please. A "work obsessive-compulsive" he's made no bones about packing pop stars he can't get along with on the train back to London, expects 12-hour days from his team and cheerfully admits to "binning 90 per cent" of Xenomania's work in his quest for the perfect pop song.
Franz Ferdinand excitedly proclaimed working with Xenomania on their recent Tonight: Franz Ferdinand album would be "a music marriage made in heaven" only to abandon the sessions three months later. "It didn't really work," said singer Alex Kapranos.
"I think Brian liked Franz Ferdinand... on a personal level," says Pet Shop Boys' Neil Tennant, whose 2009 collaborative Xenomania album Yes proved more successful. "But he works you very hard. He's very headmaster-ly. The first time I worked with, Miranda [Cooper] said, Right, now we'll try that with a different melody. And write some new words. I was like, What?"
"And you get marked," notes Tennant's partner, Chris Lowe. "He puts stars by your work, and comments. It's ruthless. It's fantastic!"
His self-belief is certainly impressive. In February, he had the first six acts signed to Xenomania perform for an audience of music business heavyweights that included six label presidents, two chairmen, 10 Radio 1 producers and key journalists. "One of the presidents said to me afterwards, If you'd fucked that up, you would have been fucked, Brian," he says. "But to me it was logical: the quality was there. And," he grins, "everyone left wanting to buy something."
Higgins was born in Whitehaven, Cumbria, the second eldest of five siblings. His father was a GP, his mother an actress. Aged 20, he co-wrote the song that would become Cher's Believe. At that stage he was a sales director at magazine publishers Reed. At night, he'd start his second job, writing and remixing pop songs into the small hours.
Along with Tim Powell and Matt Gray, he wrote All I Wanna Do, a Number 4 hit in 1997 for Dannii Minogue. "That was my entry fee," Higgins says. Executives at Warners asked if he had anything good for Cher, then hankering after a pop-dance direction. He'd spent eight years sitting on just the thing. Believe went to Number 1 in 23 countries, sold 10 million copies and ensured Higgins would never have to do a day's work again - an unlikely scenario.
Miranda Cooper & Brian Higgins
He set up Xenomania - the opposite of xenophobia, apparently - recruiting Cooper with what would become a trademark, a "talent in spotting winners" in the strangest places. Cooper, daughter of a former director of royal jewellers Asprey, was employed as a backing dancer for Eurovision hopeful Gina G. Later, Higgins would recruit A&R Burgel from US publication Bust ("the magazine for women with something to get off their chests") after bonding with her over the finer points of Simone Jackson and Anita Harris on the Here Come The Girls: British Girl Singers Of The '60s compilation. "We agreed that we're on a mission to destroy mediocrity," Burgel says. "Those 'alright' records. Throw them in the bad category. It has to be brilliant, or nothing."
Xenomania set about mastering pop. "As far as songwriting's concerned, we're fucking scientists", says Higgins. "I went through the whole of The Beatles songbook once, playing the chords on my left hand and working out all the melodies on my right. I just don't think there's that level of analysis of melody and chordal structure anywhere else."
«Wake Me Up was a fucking brilliant pop record» - Popjustice £20 music prize on Xenomania's wall
They struck gold with Girls Aloud. "I can still remember the girls' faces when we gave them [drum'n'bass/ surf guitar debut single]Sound Of The Underground," says Colin Barlow, now president of Geffen Records, then overseeing their label Polydor. "But coming from that TV show format, we wouldn't have got anywhere unless we'd taken a risk."
Over the last two years Higgins has "sunk hundreds of thousands of pounds" of his own money into the next stage - establishing Xenomania as a label.
After lunch, there are rehearsals, in 72 hours, Xenomania will host a room at the iTunes Live London Festival '09 in Camden. Alex Gardner's album isn't out until at least January 2010, but it's all part of a long-lead build up to launching Xenomania's acts; and generating as much industry and media anticipation as possible while simultaneously honing their live performance. Backed by the Xenomania house band, Pageboy's singer Brooke X romps through Heartbreak and Red Wine - a sultry pop-rock tune that lodges itself in your head.
The next day Q return to find Danish pop types Alphabeat in the hallway. Later Gerard O'Connell, Mini Viva and Jason Resch perform. Cooper and Higgins look on, the former bouncing on her hands, while Higgins stares ahead inscrutably.
"With this job, it's your life more than your job," says 19-year-old Alex Gardner, who'd come to London from Edinburgh to model before being earmarked by Burgel. "Everyone wants to make it work as best as possible for each other. It's like a big family." He's recently signed to Duffy's label A&M, with whom he's already drawing similarly "potentially massive" comparisons.
Pageboy rehearsal
Brooke X, on the other hand, caught Burgel's eye performing in a New York all-female Led Zeppelin tribute band - Lez Zeppelin. "Sheila emailed and asked if I wanted to come over to England," she explains. "I was, like, What's this? Who are Girls Aloud? Cher? OK, cool. But it's made me see how creative pop can be."
Can Xenomania become a Motown for the 21st century? In attempting to do so, they're diverging from their success with girl pop - which has upset some of their faithful fanbase.
"The hardcore Xenomania fans have been, What the hell is going on?", says Vagabond's singer Alex Vargas. "What is this Vagabond?"
In fact Higgins has already spent three years steering Vargas from dreams of becoming Robert Plant, into a more soulful direction. "That was a blow, but good in the long run. I was 18; slightly arrogant. Brian showed me that melody is the key to everything. I'm glad he pointed that out".
"What Brian is attempting is a big task," says Colin Barlow. "But I can't think of anyone else who could create something like that. With that work ethic, talent and passion, he has every chance."
Two days later, Alex Gardner is onstage at the iTunes night. It's a compelling four-song performance. Cooper, Burgel and Higgins stand directly in front of the stage, two of them dancing, Higgins standing stock still and mouthing every lyric. Afterwards Fred Falke is effusive. "How can you not enjoy it?", he beams. "You have to be deaf, dead or drunk."
Higgins is more cautious. "I'm standing here thinking of all the things that can be done better," he says. "But it's only his 25th performance."
Twenty-five more to go? "Something like that," he says. "We'll get there." Don't doubt it.
The current edition of Literally magazine (#34, July 2009) features a 15-page interview with Xenomania's Brian Higgins. Literally is published three times a year and is only available to members of the Pet Shop Boys Club. The interview was conducted by Chris Heath, on May 13, 2009. Some selected quotes from the interview, organized by topics:
Brian Higgins' first steps in the music business
«I came to it late... I think most people in the music business probably have their first successes or get heavily involved with it in their early 20s - that never happened for me. I had a record deal when I was 19 and then got dropped, and so I had to work in business and write songs at night.
«By the time I got to 28, 29, we were starting to have hits in the daytime and I was still working - it was only when I had a number 1 hit in America ["Believe" by Cher] that I actually left work, full time employment. That was ten years ago, when I was 32. So to come to it at 32, I cherish every day. Because I'd got to the point at about 29 where I never believed I'd ever leave work. I'd started to have hits, but I thought this is the way it's going to be: I'm going to work in the day and I'm going to have a hit a year, and I'm going to have more money than anyone else I know, but generally speaking this is my life, and I'd accepted that that's what it was.
«And then suddenly it changed. And so as a result of that I cherish every moment and every single day, and that's the truth of it. This is my life. I don't have a life outside of it, I don't want a life outside of it. That's it. I'm obsessed to this degree. And very lucky to be able to be obsessed to this degree. But it has to be driven by success. If there's no success then there are no people - that's a fact. Otherwise it's just a weird guy in a house who buys in all these young friends - it has to be successful.»
Obsession with synthesizers and electronic music
«I was obsessed with synthesisers, and I guess my obsession with synthesisers had been based around Duran Duran and the way they utilised synths, which I thought was amazingly clever, and Japan, and Depeche Mode. They were my three groups that I probably obsessed about and aspired to be. But back then, especially where I was from in Cumbria, you'd never see a Jupiter 8 in the flesh, let alone be able to afford one. Because why would one of those ever find its way up there? It never would.
«I had a Casio MT-40 keyboard.
It was the most repulsive thing going»
«So I was just obsessed with electronic music, and its inaccessibility to me made me more obsessed. Particularly as I was a keyboard player. I had what they called a Casio MT-40 keyboard, which was a white tiny thing that introduced a range of home keyboards. It was the most repulsive thing going - it wasn't remotely analogue, it wasn't remotely like a synthesiser, so I used to get effects pedals and do anything I could to change it and make it swirl about with these pre-set sounds.
«For me the Pet Shop Boys were the first group that I felt pushed electronic music forward beyond where Japan, Depeche Mode and Duran Duran had taken it. And in many ways the songwriting was superior to those three groups. Undoubtedly - melodically, lyrically, in every single facet. And so I felt that they progressed a genre that I was obsessed with. So I admired them and wanted to know about them because of that.»
Xenomania: character, attitude and application determine things
«It's very difficult to get in. Everyone's hand-picked. Your talent just gets you an interview - it's character and attitude and application that determines things, it's not talent. Talent just gets you on the pitch. Nobody knows who or what they're joining when they come here but it's been thought through exactly how they'll get on with people, so as a result it's a house full of enormous ambition but with people who are very, very quietly determined as opposed to showy people. (...)
«I guess it's full of people who want to be coached, who want to know stuff. That sort of mirrors me and Miranda - we're obsessed by knowledge. We want to know more about ourselves, we want to know more about how to do things better, we want to know stuff. And so I guess that's the culture there, and so we look for people who are probably a bit like that. (...) "How can we improve, how can we get better, how can we make it more exciting? How can we not go stale? How can we stay exciting? How can we stay relevant?". It's all of those questions. Puzzles. Non-stop puzzles. So I suppose this house is full of people who are up for puzzling that out with me, but letting me be the person that actually fills the crossword in, because only one person can do it. »
What people want from Xenomania
«People are coming to me already with a quality idea in mind, because they've heard it. They want that. They want whatever it is they've heard applied to their project. But people need to understand that when they hear something that we've done on the radio, a process has been followed to achieve that. It isn't just something that I pull out of a hat. A very particular, precise procedure has been followed which is supposed by a philosophy which is supported by a mentality which is supported by a lifestyle - the whole thing goes back back back back back. It's a puzzle to me and I've puzzled it all my life (...)
«And we're just not interested in the way other people do things. And we're not interested in celebrating in the way other people celebrate. We're just not interested in anything other than the way we want to do things, I suppose. And it's a mentality that you can't break, because it makes us unhappy and then you won't get what you want anyway. (...) But obviously that sort of mentality, to be able to cope with information on that level, I've trained not just me but myself, Miranda, Tim, we've trained our minds to think that way for many many many many years. That's why you couldn't really copy our way of working - because you'd be overwhelmed with it.»
«(...) It's really difficult because we're so awkward - we only know what we know, and we know it better than anybody else. So as long as that continues to be successful then we'll continue to be awkward with it. And not wanting to dilute things or play a game or do a project so that you can wear a badge saying "we did that". Because that doesn't mean anything. We're Xenomania, so fuck you! Seriously. That's how we generally view it. Is that arrogant? I don't know. I think all successful music entities have their own very strong thing.»
Bad experiences with big artists
«Everything about us is about enormous enthusiasm for something. And therefore big artists can come in and they think "they're the flavour of the whatever, let's take their thing and then we'll do what we want with it..." Well, no, that's not acceptable anyway. I've had that experience happen where the big artists were fine until they got into the mix room and then they basically pulled the record to pieces. So I took my name off the record and the writing credits off the record. Because they're assholes. And they sold about 20.000 copies, and they've never been seen since. So big artists are often jerks of the biggest order. And often people say don't meet your heroes because you'll be let down, and I sort of understand why people would say that.»
The Xenomania system
Melody is the raw material
«Through understanding and watching other people write, and observing how they write, I tried to come up with a way that ensured that people didn't get stuck in melodic cul-de-sacs, where they would spend time polishing ideas that basically weren't any good. Melody is the raw material of all songs. It's not lyric, it's a melody. It's a tune. That's what people latch into first (...)»
«Don't back your first idea because it might be the third one that's the winner. But songwriters generally are arrogant, and I would include myself in that - the first thing you do that you like, you think that's the one and you follow it. And I've seen us write too many bad songs, or average songs, that followed that. So our system defuses songwriter arrogance and puts a much more labour intensive melodic aspect to it. You work for the melody a bit harder.» (...)
The taste test
«I encourage true melodic expression whereby you're confident enough in the surroundings that you're in to basically pour into a Dictaphone every melodic idea your brain can give that piece of music within a six, seven or nine minute period of time. I then comp those melodies down and then select the ones that I really like. And then I'll make a gut decision as to whether or not I think there's enough melodic content with which to make up a song. And then once that's decided that yes there is, therefore you go about the process of lyricing all of those things. You lyric everything, you sing everything, and then it's based upon the best vocal performances. (...)
«It's all based on the taste test, I suppose. The vocal has then got to deliver the whole thing, so basically you line up the top six, seven, eight vocal performances and then you have the intellectual challenge of knitting it together, which I love, and which is fascinating. And very challenging. (...)»
«I wanted to do things that are original and different but still very very commercial»
Knitting things together
«The challenge built within it is overwhelming sometimes. It's very hard. And we've trained our minds to work this way over many many many many many years. (...)
«But let's talk of a track that clearly uses that system. "Under Pressure", David Bowie and Queen, there's virtually no repetitive parts in that song. Now, I didn't listen to that as a young guy and think, "oh, that's the way to write songs". It's just the way I fell into it, wanting to do things that are original and different but still very very commercial. I found that I was becoming obsessive about knitting things together. A chorus is obviously constant, but I didn't understand why everything around the chorus had to be constant too. (...)»
Where pop and avant garde collide
«I want people to be listening to things hundreds of times and finding nuance that they didn't hear previously. (...) That's how I hear music - looking for the originality and the rememberbility. It's the hardest thing, to get the balance between those two things. I'm interested in where avant garde and pop collide. But the "pop" word is critical within that. (...)
«I think the path to true originality is that at some stage the originators must be confused. They have to be. If you are to achieve something with true originality. And I know people could read this and say, "well he did that, and that's not particularly original". I can only say I aspire to it. Whilst, at the same time, I'm obsessed with hit records. I don't want anything that isn't a hit. So you have to understand how the things merge together (...)
«A cool record that's not known by anyone, it's a waste of time. It's about trying to get your music played to as wide an audience as you possibly can and trying to fulfil as much of an original aspect within that as you possibly can. So it's a very challenging burden that you place on yourself. But I think it's at the core of why we've had such a long, long run of hits, and why so many of those hits have got really particular highlights within them that don't necessarily relate specifically to anything else around them at the time they're released. And I think that's a good body of working.»
The (new) sound of Girls Aloud
«"The Promise" was the sound of a big group, a group about to be huge»
«I'm a very aggressive person and I like music to attack. To shoot you in the arm a bit. I want that from it. There's a driving aspect to the music we've made over the years. Girls Aloud are different because Girls Aloud have become such a big group that it's up to us to deliver what they need to fuel the Big Group-ness. So Girls Aloud's records were more driving and pumping and innovative then than they are now because that's not what's required. They need to be fulfilled as the big stars they've become, so "The Promise" was the sound of a big group, a group about to be huge. They needed the theme tune to that. They didn't need "The Show". They didn't need "Biology". They needed the theme tune to the biggest girl group on the planet, and that's what we felt "The Promise" said to us. That's where I'm doing the right job for the girls. But generally speaking my own default position in music is to have something aggressive.»
Pet Shop Boys - Chris Lowe & Neil Tennant
«Chris Lowe is an electronic pioneer. He's one of the greatest.»
«They're fantastic people. It makes total sense why they've had their career. (...) It's very difficult to survive in the music business for however many years. (...) And I think to do it there needs to be some sort of outstanding qualities in the people, and it was nice to be able to identify outstanding qualities in Neil and Chris. (...)
«Chris lives his life in a euphoric state of mind or a doomsday state of mind - it's one or the other. I don't think it's anything like bipolar, he's just like that. He's capable of enormous euphoria, and that's what comes out in his music, and he's exceptionally bright, and he's got a very good heart, Chris Lowe. And he's an electronic pioneer. He's one of the greatest. So you're working with one of the greatest modern musicians of all time with Chris Lowe.
«And so to have such a personality that's capable of reaching such scales of happiness sort of makes sense. That it would have to be a person like that that could have done some of the musical things he's pulled off over the years. That's how I sort of summed up Chris Lowe. A real lover of life. But also this doomsday aspect as well, which is hilarious. He really makes me laugh when he's like that. (...) But seeing how happy he is in music, and seeing music come together, he has incredible enthusiasm - a super-human level of enthusiasm. And that's great to see. I love it.
«Neil's an intellectual - very, very, very clever, incredibly charming, very bright, very quick-witted, but probably believes everything he says is right. Everything. So therefore he probably needs someone to catch him a little, but just to make him question himself a little bit, because he's fearsomely clever, but he's not always right. But what a fascinating guy. He's amazing.»
«I was struck by how they looked completely different from anything else that was around. I thought "West End girls" was just an incredible record. Incredible record. (...) [Neil Tennant] wasn't an obvious front man, I suppose, in the way that people have been projected for years and years and years before then. I think he was more enigmatic. But the music was the thing that I was blown away by. (...)
«I thought the second album was amazing. I was making the album that got me my first record deal when that album came out. And the music I was making was incredibly hip - the house music thing was just exploding in this country on an underground level and I was doing those sort of records and was starting to get a lot of interest because of that. I can't remember what we eventually called the record, to be honest - it didn't do anything. But I remember coming back from the studio and listening to their new album on a cassette in the car and feeling very relevant because everything I was doing was very electronically based. It was a continuation of what they'd done on the first album. They've always been so strong, chordally, the Pet Shop Boys, as well as melodically.»
Where the Pet Shop Boys went wrong
«I felt - and Neil knows this - that they became less and less broad, lyrically, and they ceased to speak to me. And I just felt that what I was getting, rightly or wrongly, was Neil's personal life. And I wasn't interested in Neil's personal life. I was interested when I felt they were talking to me, and when I felt they were talking about broad subjects, and the amazing soundscapes that Neil and Chris would paint. It was a world in which I felt a part of, and welcomed into by them. (...)»
«I think they ceased to be relevant to a wide audience. (...) I think Neil and Chris became more introverted in the way they were looking at it, and that's probably where they lost it slightly. I think their problem is that they didn't work with enough producers that were songwriters in their own right, because I think, had they done that, more pressure would have been put on the songs. I think as they got older they tended to work with people who were getting older as well. (...) I think the Pet Shop Boys became about a wry eyebrow. That there had to be something witty in it. Had to be. (...) I think they became more about how clever they could be.»
Working with the Pet Shop Boys: first meeting
«I didn't want to do it. Because I'd just had a difficult experience with another big group, in Franz Ferdinand, and I thought, "Well, these lot will be worse". But I respected them so much, and respected the request so much, that I felt it was better to let them know that face to face, as opposed to a dismissive "No, we're not doing it" through their manager. (...)
«I told them about why I felt I would be bad for them, because I know what I like and I don't understand what I don't like, therefore I dismiss what I don't like. I don't dilute, I don't have a committee. I have no interest in what I don't like. End of story. (...) I said that and they said, well, we really want to work with you now, because we think you'll push our standards far higher. And I thought, well, that's good. That made me more interested. Because I wasn't trying to put them off, I was telling them the truth. I felt that they would be very difficult because they have a clear vision, and so do I... and so what happens in that situation? (...) If you get involved with this I really am involved with it and you have to be prepared to go through that with me, and it's not always an incredibly pleasant experience. (...)»
[The Pet Shop Boys had no idea that Brian Higgins had originally planned to say no to them on their first visit. «It's funny,» Neil said, when told, «Because when we went down there I thought we wouldn't want to work with him, I think». Chris said: «I didn't think for a moment he wouldn't want to work with us. It didn't occur to me».]
How Pet Shop Boys work together
«I'm obsessed by long term relationships in music -
it's the key motivating factor that bonds us together here»
«They dovetail perfectly, because Neil is an extrovert in some ways, and I think Chris is, but he's more reserved with it. You only see Chris when he wants you to see it, whereas Neil's a natural performer, I suppose. And that to me is where it's at - there's so much power in Chris, but it sort of comes out through Neil to a certain degree.
«You can see the fact that they both still really admire each other. I see that very clearly - I love it. I love things like that. I love longevity in relationships, because it requires flexibility and a lot of love and a lot of care for the other person, and altering yourself to fit. And I'm obsessed by long term relationships in music - it's the key motivating factor that bonds us together here. I've been with Miranda every working day for 13 years, and it's more fun today than it was a year ago, and than it was two years ago. I'm obsessed with that. It's the binding force that keeps us altogether here.»
"Love etc."
«It's very difficult to release a record these days and be successful with it if it doesn't sound like anything else around it»
«I didn't want to give it to them. (...) Chris kept on about it, and he could see that I didn't want to play it. I don't think Neil got it initially. Chris got it. I think Chris got Neil onto it. (...) Then I was lying in bed one night, and thinking "for fuck's sake...", and then sort of thought, "No, I can see it. This is a move that they could and probably should make". So I sort of relented. (...) It was very different for them. It was much more aggressive, which is not a word you would apply to the Pet Shop Boys particularly. It was aggressive which I really liked.» (...)
«I said this to Neil last Thursday: "The fact you released 'Love etc.' to me stands you in incredible stead for the next three to four years". Because it's very difficult to release a record these days and put it out and be successful with it if it doesn't sound like anything else around it. Because obviously everyone's worried about the recession, independent radio's worried about advertising revenue, all those different things, and so therefore it makes it far easier for media in general to be more herd-like than they normally would be anyway.» (...)
The disagreement over "Love etc.":
«It was hilarious. (...) Obviously Neil's a very very very intelligent man, and he's self-confident in his own ideas and that sort of stuff. And I think he told me how something was going to be before I'd finished my own experimentation process of it, and I just... I won't be told in that sense. You can ask. Or whatever. But generally speaking it was that. I need to cross all the "t"s and dot every "i", particularly in a system that's as strange as ours. (...) I think his convictions were generated by his own excitement of how things were going. (...) I have great moments with all of the records that we make but they're very small and very quick. And after that I start looking at the problem and faults. (...)
«The debate was whether it was better to repeat something that worked or change to something that didn't work - the change on paper looked good, but didn't sound good. So it's better to repeat something that sounds great as opposed to change something and sonically lose that standard. It ticks an artistic box, it doesn't tick the listener's box, and I will always be on the side of the listener, not the artists, whether I'm the artist, Miranda is, Neil, or whoever. (...) And this went on for weeks - not the argument but the need to find better-sounding words. Eventually we got it. It was a completely valid discussion. At the end of it Neil said something like, "The South Bank Show should have filmed that".»
Working with the Pet Shop Boys again
«I really love spending time with them. (...) I'd love to get Chris down here to do some music, and for me, Neil and Miranda to sit and write against it because I think that would be good for everybody. I think we can continue on in that perspective. If they wanted to make another record with us and stuff like that then... yeah. (...)
«I don't do too much of that sort of thing - I have to really believe that there's going to be an enormous commercial point to it. Only because of what we're prepared to invest in it, emotionally and time-wise and at the expense of other things we'll let go because of it. But I would probably make an exception for them, because I do think that they're fantastic people. (...) I think our lives are better here and more enriched because of our work with the Pet Shop Boys. I totally believe that.»
[Neil Tennant:«I think it would be a shame if we didn't work together. Because I think there's a thing there that he does that we probably wouldn't do with someone else, and also I think at its best we do something with them that doesn't sound like their records. I think a unique thing happens that is almost separate from the rest of their ouevre.»]
What Xenomania learned from the Pet Shop Boys
«I thought it was fantastic how they are with each other. We're about longevity now at Xenomania. You can't get away from it - we've been around a long time. Because we have such a youth development policy here and are very very very free and open with our experiences, so therefore you're merging very experienced people with very young people and it's all meeting and colliding in the middle together [the youngest person at Xenomania is 15 and the oldest is 55], that in itself gives us the fuel. Because we're only going to win if we write better songs than everybody else and our records sound more interesting and more original than everybody else, and the only way that's going to happen is for us to have a very open mind as we go forward.
«And so seeing how they are and how flexible they were able to be with me, that explains their 25 year career. (...) And I think it was fantastic to see how considerate they were to each other, because that holds the key to our own longevity, that the key people within the organisation here, the chief writers, look after each other and take care of each other and then willingly pass that knowledge on to younger people who give us their fearlessness and allow the whole thing to collide. So Pet Shop Boys and Xenomania was a bit like Xenomania within itself. The age gap between the Pet Shop Boys and the key Xenomania people they worked with, myself, Miranda and Tim - is mirrored identically internally within Xenomania. It's a generational thing. It was confirmation of lots of things.»
Xenomania is a songwriting and production house based in Kent, England. It was founded by songwriter and producer Brian Higgins.
Since 1996, Xenomania have written, produced and remixed tracks for a string of successful artists including Girls Aloud, Pet Shop Boys, Sugababes, Dannii and Kylie Minogue, Saint Etienne, Cher, Gabriella Cilmi and many others.
