During an active time in terms of OMD releases, Andy McCluskey reflects on OMD's past, present and future including the forthcoming unreleased material album and The Id EP...
Looking back with a sense of perspective, what are your feelings about OMD now?
I’m very proud of what we did. I think it will never be possible for
me to be in any way objective about it really, even with the passage of time.
I see it differently, but it’s still me and I was still doing it so I just
see it from a different perspective. I’ll never be able to be objective about
it. But I’m happy with the whole course of the thing. There’s always
things you wish you’d done differently. I suppose I wished, in hindsight,
that whilst I think Dazzle Ships
Photo: Neil Taylor
But yeah, basically I’m very happy with it. Some of the things that I would do differently definitely would be to pay more attention to who was looking after the finances and the legal side of things. But these are the consequences of doing deals when you’re young and naïve. We wanted to make records, write songs and play gigs and were enjoying that very much and you assume that someone else is taking care of your business for you and, unfortunately, very often they’re not really taking care of the business in a way that’s totally to your benefit. So in that respect I wish I’d had the accountant I’ve got now, if I’d had him in the 80’s that would have been great.
It’s not just about the money, it’s just about the frustration of a lot of the things that informed choices that were made in later OMD life were because of the lack of money. I think if we’d had several million in the bank, I’m sure we would have had more confidence to do things that weren’t trying to pursue an obvious commercial route. But being aware that we were skint and if we made an album that really died a death, we were going to be in big trouble, which both consciously and unconsciously informed the way we thought about what we were doing. So I could go on answering this question for the rest of the interview really. How long was it? 18/20 years? I mean there’s so many facets of things. The basic is yes I’m happy and I’m proud.
One of the regular queries voiced by fans is the fact that there was no farewell tour. Looking back, do you think a final tour would have been a good idea?
I think that the only way you do a farewell tour is you go when you’re
at sort of the peak of your game. The reason why the band finished and I didn’t
tour, it just seemed to me that there wasn’t the audience anymore, either
for the records and possibly even for the concerts. The reason why there was no
tour with the Universal
Part of the reason for not touring was how hard it is to get a tour together. I think this is something people that don’t understand. I wasn’t working with Nigel Ipinson or Phil Coxon anymore. Nigel Ipinson had left and taken with him all of the live samples I had for all the lead synth parts. I didn’t have them anymore so I’d have to recreate them. So before the band even rehearsed, there would be 2 or 3 months work and I’d have to find 2 keyboard players and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I mean there was so much stuff would have to be done, it wasn’t an undertaking that just seemed to be merited really by my willingness to do it or my perception of how many people would actually go to a concert. I know there are a few people who visit the website regularly who wish the band would have done a farewell tour. But, even if they got a petition together, I don’t think they’d have enough names on it for it to actually justify all the hard work that would have to go into putting together just one concert. I’m sorry.
Photo: Neil Taylor
But do you miss live performances in general anyway?
Yeah. I miss the travelling, I miss the camaraderie of the band and the crew backstage. I miss going to all the different countries and certainly miss the incredible feeling of standing on a stage in front of sometimes many thousands of people who absolutely adore what you do - yeah, who wouldn’t miss that ego massage! (laughs). But I don’t miss all the hassle of getting prepared for a tour, I don’t miss the nerves, I don’t miss the days when my voice is battered and I wonder if I’m going to be able to sing and I’m in a foul mood all day long before I go on stage! (laughs). So there were downsides to touring as well! But I think to be honest that some of my most incredible memories are actually from tours. In many ways they were the reality-check. You know, millions of people can buy a record but you’re not in the shop when they buy it. But, at a gig, when you sing the song and people applaud you then that’s real. You’re all there at the same time, in the same building and that makes the whole thing much more tangible and therefore in many ways more rewarding.
