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Part 2 - Elektro
Kinetik
During the Autumn of 1992,
Shirleyann and I were hard at work putting together a set of
Kraftwerk material. The organiser of the 1992 UK Kraftwerk
Convention, Paul Wilkinson had expressed a keen desire for a
band to play at the next event - to be held in early 1993. We’d
been in close contact with Paul ever since we’d met at a
Kraftwerk concert in the Summer (see Part 1) and we were now
busy planning an ‘audition’ concert in Wales for Paul to attend
and approve of our efforts as soon as we were ready. Work
progressed well. We’d typically arrange the material at the rate
of one track or song a week. This involved firstly listening to
the original version umpteen times, plotting out all of the
various elements and components of each song using a sort of
graphic musical notation that we devised for the purpose. Our
next task was to then attempt to approximate Kraftwerk’s unique
sounds as best as we could by using our own electronic
equipment. Looking back, I now realise that this gave us a good
working discipline that has served us well ever since.
By November we’d finished arranging our set and at last Paul came down to West Wales to attend our first premier performance. Shirleyann decided to call our band Elektro Kinetik - a title borrowed from a Kraftwerk compilation album that she possessed. The gig was held in a small venue just down the road from our studio called The Miracle Inn. It was a quiet venue at the best of times. I used to remark that it was a miracle that anyone ever went in there ! This actually suited us just fine since if things should go disastrously, there would be no long queues of punters demanding their money back! The performance went well enough without any major hitches, though the audience must have barely reached double figures. I can remember one couple who listened intently throughout our set. They came up for a chat after we’d finished and remarked how nice it had been for them to “listen to something different for a change”. They particularly liked the Kraftwerk song that we’d included in our set. I hadn’t the heart to tell them that we’d done nothing but Kraftwerk material throughout the whole evening ! Paul was pleased enough with what he’d heard to now book us for the 1993 convention. He insisted on taking back to Blackpool with him a rough copy of the live recording of the gig which we’d made using Shirleyann’s ghetto blaster. Sadly, not too long after we played there, the Miracle Inn finally closed it doors for good and has been a boarded up derelict shell ever since. I can’t help but wonder if Elektro Kinetik’s debut performance there was the final nail in their coffin!!! One thing that became very
apparent that evening was the fact that we needed some kind of
proper stands for our equipment. For our first gig we’d raided
the venue of nearly every table they’d had. I soon roughly
designed some custom stands for our gear that David England’s
father-in-law, Don Williams, kindly built for us out of
lightweight wood. I specified that all of the stands should fold
up as small as possible and should fit into a Mini car ! Don
actually did an excellent job for us. In fact Kinetik still used
many of his stands until fairly recently.
Although Shirleyann and I had
performed the first gig as a duo, I was keen to bring in a third
person to the line-up for performing at the Convention.
Remembering his participation in the old days of the Tenby Music
Club (see Part 1), I asked David England who readily agreed to
join us on electronic percussion. We all piled into a hired
transit van and drove up to Blackpool picking up Dave on the
way. Once we had arrived in the wee small hours of the morning,
we had all had a restless night due to the excitement of Paul
and all of his various friends who were staying the night with
him prior to the convention. My throat had felt very raw all
that evening. I felt was coming down with some bug or other.
This did not bode well…..
After about two hours sleep (a pattern which was to become depressingly familiar in future Kinetik live projects) we set off with our gear to the ‘venue’ (a grand hotel on the Blackpool seafront) and set up our equipment in about 3 - 4 hours, finishing just before the convention officially started. As the time drew near for our performance to begin, the ballroom began to fill with our audience. I noticed that many seemed to have audio and video recording equipment - obviously intending to make recordings while we played. We began to feel a little daunted - I wondered just what we were getting ourselves into… Looking back in perspective and comparing the band’s early sound to the way we work today, I can’t believe how primitive and crude our set-up was and how we had the nerve to carry it off! The vast majority of the equipment we used was vintage pre-MIDI and all of the sequencing was done by the old laborious CV and Gate method. At the time, we simply couldn’t afford the latest state-of-the-art gear. Instead, we simply had to use what equipment we possessed as best as we could. Our drum patterns were supplied by a ‘Spec-Drum’ module bolted on the back of an old 48k Sinclair Spectrum computer (really!) while Dave overlaid his own fill-ins and breaks using a set of cheap drum pads. Our sampling was also the crudest possible - we used a pair of cheap SK5 Casio sampling keyboards (toys really, costing around £35 each - I bought the last two models they had left in Toys-R-Us!). Each one could only hold four low-fidelity samples. Our set was divided into two halves and I can’t help but smile when I remember Shirleyann and I crouched at the bottom of some stairs during the interval, re-sampling some sounds for the second half by speaking into these keyboard’s tiny microphones.
During the performance, my throat finally gave out and I ended up croaking towards the end of the set. It didn’t seem to matter much - many in the crowd were appreciative of our sound and seemed to realise the amount of sheer hard work we’d put into our performance. One person in particular stands out very vividly in my memory as being especially supportive - Andrew Slegt. Knowing that he dabbled himself in electronic music, I suggested that he provided the ‘cabaret’ for the following year’s convention. He modestly declined!
On the strength of our show,
Paul invited us to participate at the following year’s
convention to be held in 1994. Although we’d generally been well received,
(one review in Kraftwerk fanzine ‘Aktivitat’ I remember being
positive, though it ended with the comment “the long hair will
have to go !” - we had all sported ponytails !!!!!) I welcomed
the chance to improve on our set for next year as I personally
felt that we could do even better given the chance.
Work started almost immediately
‘refining’ our set for our next booking at the forthcoming 1994
Kraftwerk Convention. I finally decided to make the long overdue
jump into the realms of MIDI equipment after discovering a type
of sequencer (the Roland MSQ700) which I could synchronise
perfectly with our existing equipment. At the same time I also
invested in a ‘proper’ MIDI sampler which of course improved the
quality of our samples no end. Using the new equipment,
Shirleyann and I recorded a cassette release entitled ‘Four Trax
Live’ - a live recording consisting of some of the Kraftwerk
material which we hoped to perform in 1994 - a preview of the
type of sound we hoped to achieve next time.
Throughout the remainder of 1993, I began to think about enhancing our live set with accompanying images on video. For 1993, a co-organiser of the convention - John Shilcock had kindly provided computer images for us on video tape which we’d shown on small domestic TV sets while we played. These images had not been in sync with the music as we’d played however, and I wondered if my computer programming skills might be useful in putting together something for displaying via a computer while we played. After devising a way of making this work (the computer would constantly read the ‘clock pulse’ of our sequencer while we played and therefore know exactly where we were in a song no matter how fast/slow we played), I began the laborious task of designing and animating computer images for every song in our new set.
By November, we’d almost finished
structuring our new set and we decided to give our forthcoming
Blackpool performance a dry run by playing another local gig in
Pembroke, this time at a venue by the name of ‘The Tanyard’. In
order to bring the numbers of the band up to three, we asked
Allen Hardy, a colleague of Shirleyann’s at college to join us.
Allen also had a keen interest in electronic music and was
trying to put together his own recording studio. He’d followed
with interest what Shirleyann and I had been doing for some
time, and was glad to join us. Paul Wilkinson again came down
from Blackpool for moral support and to practise operating the
computer that was to generate our computer graphics.
Actually displaying the graphics for this gig was somewhat of a problem. Ideally we’d have had a giant television screen or video projector but obtaining such equipment locally was virtually impossible or prohibitively expensive. In the end we decided to borrow the largest colour TV set we could find. Don Williams (who built our stands) kindly let us borrow a (relatively) huge, ancient set which seemed to weigh a ton! Despite being assured that we would be given enough time at the venue to set up all our gear, we arrived at the pre-arranged time only to find the doors firmly locked and no-one around! To try and save some time, we started to assemble our custom stands in the car park, much to the bemusement of several passers-by. Eventually someone turned up, opened up the doors and let us in. We now had something like 15 minutes to try and get everything connected properly - an impossible task! In the end it took us something approaching two hours without time to check everything properly. As we were now considerably behind schedule, our audience were becoming a little impatient. Once we actually started performing, things got off to a bad start. Several technical problems manifested themselves and the audience began to wonder what the hell we were trying to do. Our late start and technical difficulties had thankfully caused us to shorten our set. We were NOT enjoying ourselves! One of the last pieces we played was a version of “Pocket Calculator”, played using some customised hand-held devices. This we played (on purpose) at breakneck speed out towards the audience while they threateningly advanced on us and tried to disconnect our cables - Nice! We actually got paid quite well for this ‘performance’, but we were all dreadfully disappointed with the way things had gone after all the hard work we’d put into the project. We vowed never to play locally in this kind of venue again. In the end though, we’d learned several valuable lessons from this experience. We now ALWAYS take great pains to try and make sure that we have enough time to set everything up properly and soundcheck. To cap everything off, the next day I returned Don’s giant television set to him. As I struggled to carry this huge monstrosity up his garden path, I tripped on a paving stone and fell - crash! - right on top of the television while still holding it underneath. My right index finger was very badly crushed, split open at the knuckle. I was convinced I’d never be able to use it properly again. After stemming all the blood, Don drove me to hospital where my finger was stitched back together. Luckily, once I mentioned that I played keyboards, the hospital’s best surgeon was called in to try and piece it all back together. He did a fantastic job, though I was worried that it might not recover properly in time for the Kraftwerk Convention three months ahead. As it turned out, through intensive physiotherapy the use of my hand improved enough for me to stop worrying, though I reduced the amount of complicated keyboard parts that I had planned to do… At the time of writing, The Tanyard has also since closed down and has now become a derelict shell. Surely this can only be a coincidence ?????
Joining the line-up for 1994 was
my cousin Simon Darvell stepping into Dave England’s shoes. He
also played electronic percussion, this time with additional
synthesizer and electric guitar! I’d jammed along with Simon for
years (see Part 1) and felt we worked together well. He was
pleased (and somewhat bemused) to be joining us for the
Convention, though I think he didn’t quite know what he was
letting himself in for! Simon was studying music production at
Bangor University, and we stopped off there in our hired transit
van to collect him on the way up to Blackpool. As we drove along
the motorway, I played a cassette that Paul Wilkinson had sent
Shirleyann - his version of “Pocket Calculator”, done using a
cheap kiddies keyboard with various battery-operated key-rings
making assorted bleeps and whistles. It was absolutely
priceless. I decided that good use could be made of this. A plan
began to form in our minds…
The venue for the 1994 convention
was to be the same Blackpool seafront hotel as used for the
previous year. At Paul’s we met up again with a very
enthusiastic Andrew Slegt who insisted he was to help us set up
our gear on the big day and carry various heavy items around for
us. We gratefully accepted this kind offer of help.
Paul’s parents kindly let us rehearse in his front room the day before the convention - once we’d carefully moved all of his furniture out of the way first! While we rehearsing, Dave England turned up with his camcorder. Dave had actually enjoyed himself so much last time, that he’d decided to come along again and meet various friends he’d made the previous year. Dave insisted that he video some of our rehearsal '(some of this footage was actually projected onto the giant screen during Kinetik’s 1997 EMMA performance) in Paul’s front room. Today, this excellent footage always makes me smile when I see Paul’s standard lamp knocked askew and all his furniture carefully stacked up in the hallway! Bearing in mind the previous year’s late night before the convention, I suggested that Elektro Kinetik sleep in Dave’s camper van parked in the road outside Paul’s house. This proved to be a mistake however. Roaring traffic kept us awake for most of the night. Yet another instance of a sleepless night before a concert!!! Just as we were dropping off to sleep at 5am, it was time for us to set off. Simon wasn’t that keen - being used to rising late. His comment of “Oh no, it’s the middle of the NIGHT !!!” aptly summed up how we all felt. By 9am, with Andrew’s help we
were all set up and sound-checked, much to the annoyance of some
of the hotel’s guests I suspect. The actual performance went
well with no major hitches and I felt a lot more satisfied with
the result compared to the previous year. Paul had hired a giant
TV screen which was used to display our computer graphics. Paul
had also operated our computer and video tapes. I was very
pleased that these had worked splendidly, perfectly
synchronising to our music as we played.
Once the Elektro Kinetik performance was concluded, it was now a good time to make use of Paul’s cassette tape. Various convention organisers (including Paul) were engaged in a “question and answer” session. Members of the audience asked ‘the panel’ questions regarding various Kraftwerk matters. During the course of time, Andrew Slegt (who was in on my plan) produced a cassette tape claiming that it was possibly an ultra-rare Kraftwerk recording. Would the panel care to comment on this ? A cassette player was produced and the whole audience waited on tenterhooks to listen to this long-lost masterpiece, only to hear… Paul’s dulcet tones echoing around the ballroom accompanied by his kiddies keyboard! The whole ballroom erupted with laughter and applause (much more than we’d had !) and it was judged by many people to be the highlight of the day. To this day, I don’t think Paul’s ever completely forgiven me! I keep threatening to turn his tape into a proper Kinetik studio remix. We’ll probably get around to it sometime. A few months later, a feature on the Kraftwerk Convention appeared in Sound On Sound magazine (Vol 9 issue 7 - May 1994) which as well as detailing the convention itself also had a detailed feature on Elektro Kinetik, praising our set highly and including photographs taken during our performance. This issue is well worth tracking down if you’re a keen follower of Kinetik.
Throughout the remainder of 1994,
Shirleyann and I had to decide which musical direction the band
should now take. One thing we were sure of - it was now the time
to leave behind the idea of performing cover-versions. We wanted
to steer the band in a new direction and start writing original
material. I knew that unless we did this, it would be difficult
for us ever to be judged as a band on our own merits. It can be
difficult and frustrating sometimes, injecting original ideas
into music that you have had no input into writing in the first
place!
Towards the end of 1994, I worked hard in London for a couple of months raising the necessary cash to buy some new musical equipment for the studio. I felt that we desperately needed a ‘proper’ drum machine and a high quality multi-track tape recorder so that we could start making more professional sounding recordings. We ended up purchasing an Alesis SR16 and a Tascam 488 8 track machine which was to be our studio workhorse for the next four years. To test the new technology, we recorded a couple of unreleased test tracks - a version of “Man Made” by Man Parish and a version of Jarre’s “Revolutions”. This was the last work ever done under the name of Elektro Kinetik.
Just after New Year’s Day in 1995,
Shirleyann and I started work on what was to be the first track
destined for our new REFINED project - “Kinetik Energy”. The
initial idea behind REFINED was to produce music inspired the
Welsh industrial landscape near our studio. As I stated in a
press release at the time “a sort of Welsh culture, but with a
difference”. The title REFINED also had an extra meaning - we
felt it was now the time to ‘refine’ the band’s sound. To mark
the new direction that the band was now taking, I decided to
shorten the band’s name to simply Kinetik, as I felt the new
name was more ‘punchy’ and didn’t sound quite so pretentious. Of
course it also made our past links with the conventions less
obvious!
Keen to expand the Kinetik line-up once again to a three-piece, we asked Allen Hardy to join the band on a more permanent basis. Allen keenly agreed and had soon written an audition piece of music for Kinetik - a track which eventually became “Pipeline” once we’d all ‘refined’ his ideas. We were all very pleased with the result. Allen also attended the recording session for the next track in production, '>“Refined”, but it soon became clear that Allen found working with us a little difficult. I personally think that the way we worked intimidated him a little - he was also always asking to bring electric guitar and bass into the Kinetik sound, but Shirleyann and I didn't see our music progressing that way at all. Allen lived about 30 miles from our studio and found attending studio sessions difficult with no transport of his own and the almost non-existent public services available in our area. About this time, the three of us took Allen’s camcorder on a night-time drive to the oil refineries near the studio. We had hoped to capture some sound and images that we could use for the REFINED project. Unfortunately Allen hadn’t charged his camcorder batteries and we spent a lot of time rushing around trying to capture images before his power ran out! To cap it all, we were stopped by the police on the way home. The refineries had become suspicious of our activities and had thought we might be terrorists!!! REFINED recording sessions resumed in March with “Net Working”, a track promoting the idea of working from home via the internet. Local job opportunities were very bleak at the time, with no hope of work unless you were able to grab a job at one of the refineries. Little did I realise when this track was written that this would be exactly the way that I would be working in a year’s time! The minimal lyrics I made up as a joke when we played back the first rough mix. They seemed to fit, so we kept them. Some people have commented that the lyrics seem a little dry and trite, but they’re missing the point - the whole thing was meant as a light-hearted joke! We heavily filtered my vocals to try and make them sound as if they had came a long distance down a telephone cable. With four completed tracks now in the can, we released a promotional cassette and CD release containing these and a remix titled “Kinetik Energy”. We sent this off to all the people we could think of who might be interested in what we were doing. The feedback we had was generally positive and we found this very encouraging. At Easter, Andrew Slegt came to stay with us. We’d kept in touch since the Kraftwerk Conventions and had by now become very firm friends. He’d also been very positive about the first Kinetik tracks he’d heard and was very interested in seeing our studio and our working methods. He was keen to jam along with us as well, and we spent many hours happily making up musical bleeps and tunes. He also kindly let us borrow some of his own equipment to take some samples from. In the Summer, we returned his visit and brought along with us a very rough early mix of “Dance Machine” for him to listen to. The track had actually been indirectly inspired by a track of Andrew’s with the same title! (he’d sent us a cassette with it on a few months before). During this visit I actually asked Andrew to consider joining Kinetik. After a moment’s thought he modestly declined. I think he was very flattered that I’d asked him to join, but he later told me that he felt that it didn’t seem right for him to join the band when he’d had no musical involvement with the tracks we’d already written.
During the Summer and Autumn, we
became aware of the plans of Pembroke Power Station (situated
right on our doorstep and partly the inspiration for REFINED) to
burn a controversial and allegedly polluting fuel, Orimulsion.
Much of the local population was dismayed at the prospect of
Orimulsion burning and very quickly an action group, the
Orimulsion Action Coalition was formed by a friend of mine, Max
Fairbrother. Max and I talked about various ways of bringing the
‘burning issue’ to local public awareness. One idea Max came up
with was to organise a ‘Burning Issue’ concert where local bands
could contribute to the proceedings. Realising that the theme
behind the concert fitted perfectly with our REFINED themes and
ideas (and the issue was also something we cared deeply about),
I offered Max the services of Kinetik for the event. He readily
accepted our offer with much enthusiasm.
With about two months before we were due to perform our material for the very first time, we now had to think about constructing a live set based around our existing material. Allen however was very unhappy about the prospect of performing live with Kinetik and with regret, decided to quit the group. We parted ways amicably and he left us on good terms. As far as we were concerned, Allen was still a part of the Kinetik Family if not now an actual member of Kinetik itself. This however, left us with
somewhat of a problem. We now had only a few weeks to prepare
for Kinetik’s first ever live performance and we were down to
just two people. Somehow, somewhere we had to find a third band
member and quickly…. |
