The Eternal Alternative: An Interview with Harry Stafford

1)    Please introduce us to your latest album 'We Are the Perilous Men' that you released with Marco Butcher? What is your philosophy or approach to the music you create and play live?

 What’s exciting about this album is that because we now know how to work together we have a much better idea of collaboration. This album has a very much more coherent ‘house style’ which means that there is a common thread running through the album.

We discovered that this could be like all those albums you love which are all done in the same session and the songs seem to run into each other in an effortless and seamless manner. That’s what we wanted on the album. A production that flowed giving the listener a time and a place for reference. Think: ‘Pink Flag’ Wire, ‘Unknown Pleasures’ Joy Division, ‘Entertainment’ - Gang of Four, ‘Loveless’- My Bloody Valentine. On these records the production was very much a character that knitted the songs together and created a common thread to the artistic quality of the album.

‘Bone Architecture’ was a collection of songs that we had written separately and then worked on to make a whole. This time on ‘Perilous Men’, the songs were fashioned from the same endeavour and communication, written from the same knowledge and musical sensibility to create an album that spoke to the both of us from the music to the lyrics and all the instrumentation along the way.

There’s a certain trust in each other’s ability that is unwritten but at the same time, because we have the same taste in music there is s definite belief that we will like and share the power of the individual contributions we both come up with. It doesn’t always work but generally we see a seed or a spark in every idea we make which can go on to be nurtured into an interesting song. 

2)    Given such distance between your respective homes of Manchester and North Carolina, how did you two come to work together?

I was aware of Marco on Facebook, and he shared a few of my posts. In 2019 he was the one who actually contacted me and asked me if I would like to hear some of his work. I of course said yes but at the same time being a little bit competitive and a natural show off, I sent him some of my solo work to share and maybe swap ideas and set up some kind of ideas meeting. I have loads of ideas that are not fully formulated so it was an excellent opportunity to hear what someone else could add or subtract to them without completely stripping the basic DNA of the song. The first song we worked on was a song I had written called ‘Horror film House’, the second was ‘There’s someone trying to get in’ which he had written, and which are both on ‘Bone architecture’.

I think it was at this stage that we thought were onto something, and the files have never stopped flying back and forth from Manchester UK to N. Carolina USA.

 

3)    Is it quite different or similar to your first collaborative album 'Bone Architecture'?

‘Bone Architecture’ was a collection of ideas that we stuck our bits onto to make a whole. ‘Perilous Men’ is an album which allowed the ingredients to properly cook. The  sense of a true collective effort where every part of the song was apparat. In Perilous men we had a better idea of how the mood and the ambience should be. The style and the presence of music and lyrics on a song had to be in beautiful synchronicity, or we wouldn’t put the track on the album.

 

4)    Would you say that the reason you began making music is still the reason that you are still making music today? Please explain.

 In essence when I began playing in a band in 1979, the sole ambition and my ‘raison d’etre’ was to play gigs, the performing was everything. I didn’t have any thoughts beyond the show biz of being on a stage. One thing that is increasingly evident, certainly in Manchester, is that there are so many gigs on every night that you can usually be playing but the audience is slowly dwindling.

I released my first record in 1983 which was the big game changer because it was picked up by BBC Radio 1 and we became better known and a record label wanted to sign us. We had five years of touring and four albums before we were no longer fashionable and took a break. But it’s that time you are on a break that you realise that you absolutely crave to be back in music, performing writing and recording. I actually took a break from the inca babies for 19 years doing other projects, but there was always this nagging sense of ennui that I couldn’t fill until I formed the band again. I, or for me at least, think once you’ve started it is very hard to walk away. I know people who grew sick of it and quit, but I just couldn't.

So, forming a musical partnership with Marco was just part of my ever-curious path of musical discovery, which has proven to be most rewarding.

5)    How have the artists you've interacted with or the music you love influenced the way you create, release or consume music today?

I think growing up in the late 70s and 80s, musically has been an incredible privilege. We have witnessed so many musical revolutions, Rock n Roll led to Psychedelia, which led to our era which was punk Rock, which led to Acid House, Hip Hop and rave. After this time there’s hasn’t really been a musical revolution quite as important. Sure, past styles are refreshed and momentarily made vital, but they still somehow sound ultimately familiar.

I think watching a lot of those punk bands in the late 70s was an extraordinary time, and with the bands that came soon after it was even more so. They had fine tuned the rawness of punk onto an amazing time of musical experimentation that was Post Punk. I think in 1979 many of my favourite albums that initially shaped my musical tastes were released. When we started making albums in the 80s, we were influenced by further post punk acts like The Cramps, The Birthday Party and The Gun Club, I guess it was called death rock or the beginnings of Goth Rock.

I think when we release an album it invariably gets aimed at an audience who liked or might like the above acts. It’s often the way you keep your audience, and while they say never preach to the converted, some people most definitely do not want to be converted, but then that’s the nature of the diversity and polarisation of music.

6)    If you could perform with any artist, living or dead, who would it be and why? If you could collaborate with another artist, living or dead, who would it be?

I’d like to be on a bill with The Cramps, Motorhead, The Clash, and Lightning Hopkins. If only for the sheer joy of listening to their fabulous back catalogue. It’s also quite a diverse bill and would satisfy much of my musical needs.

I love to write some songs and ask Tom Waits to sing them, his essential sometimes desperate howl can say so much in a song that sometimes mean instrumentation can be sparse and even economical.

 

7)    What is your favourite thing about performing for people in a live environment? Do you prefer festivals or venue-based gigs?

I’m happy playing on most stages and in many different sized arenas. I think our solo music perhaps demands a more intermate setting whereas the inca babies could do with a bigger arena. But I am often just delighted to perform.

Someone once said that Rock and Roll should be played with a roof on, which is true but as I haven’t played any really big open-air festivals I couldn’t really compare.

My experiences of watching bands at festivals on a big stage with thousands of others used to be amazing  (Reading Rock in 1979, Glastonbury 1986), now it is actually pretty rubbish.

With all the chat, phones, and ‘sharing’ the event while having a total indifference to the music, sometime I wonder why people go to Rock/pop music events, wouldn’t they be better off just going to Ibiza.

 

8)    Harry, your band Inca Babies emerged on the same scene at the same time as bands like Echo & The Bunnymen, Joy Division and The Fall - did you ever play or tour with any famous folks from that era (or perhaps you otherwise met / hung out)? 

I absolutely love those three bands and was lucky enough to see them when they all started off in the late 70s. I have never shared a stage with any of them though which is a shame. We did however play with Nick Cave a couple of times, The Gun Club, Wire, The Jesus and Mary Chain, Wedding Present, Red Lorry: Yellow Lorry, Sex Gang Children, and many others. It was always absolutely essential to find out how everyone else was getting on. No one was very competitive in those days as we all shared the same audience and were happy to play on the same stage as we know there would always be people seeing us for the first time.

Jeffrey Lee Pierce was a real rock star, we were in awe of him, he exuded charisma and made it all look so effortless, where as Nick Cave was a bit more of a gawky kid who sometimes tried too hard to be an outlaw and often resorted to being monstrously wasted, but we loved him the most.

 

9)    Are you also involved with other music groups / projects apart from this collaboration?

A year and a half ago Rob - the incas Drummer - and I had a really great project lined up with Keith Levene of PiL. We were to record  a vinyl album of his and our ideas, we were in the rehearsal stage when he became ill and sadly he wasn’t able to release his material which sounded really good. He had a lot of great ideas and it’s such a shame we couldn’t have realised them.

10) Can you share anything about your plans for the next year or so that fans can look forward to?

There will be another album which we have been working on. We actually have a lot of really great tracks which could be made into a fabulous Record. Marco and I have been trying out loads of different approaches to how we put songs together. One of the most interesting areas of music is to try and introduce instruments we are unfamiliar with and see if it can lead us somewhere unexpected. This has also lead us to explore elements of electronic music and strange brass and woodwind pieces. It’s not as bad as it sounds you will have to wait and se in a year’s time to see what we come up with, you won’t be disappointed it’ll be awesome!!

Marco and I have still never met in the flesh, so we are hoping to play a gig at some stage. Probably in America, maybe even next year? But we will have to see, I’m naturally raring to go, and I know Marco is too.

Thanks for reading, all the best Harry Stafford.

Listen to the Full album here :

Check out the 'Rules of the House' video  :

You can see the 'Walk Among The Spectres' video here :