And how involved were you with the remastering?
I was there, but it was quite hard. If you hear that something sounds wrong it's quite hard to know what you need to do, technically. You just know it doesn't sound quite right. But what do you think of it overall? The remastering?
Well it sounds fine to me. It sounds a lot clearer
Yes, that's a good thing isn't it? It does sound a lot clearer
Rob, being the technical man, says that there appears to be a slight glitch at 2:56 on the title track with regards to a distorted keyboard note...
I think he's quite right because I think I actually wrote that down as well and I remember it was 2:56 too! ( laughs )So he's quite right and I mean that's frustrating. Things like that are frustrating.
Because obviously as far as the playing goes there's not much you can do about it unless you re-record it
No I mean I think what it is it's a distortion, some level is too high. So it's nothing played wrong, it's just a frequency thing, that's all. It's been pushed too much in the mix.
So it's slightly frustrating, little things like that, but I think at the end of the day nothing's ever perfect is it? So at least it does sound clearer and cleaner and all those things are all in its favour. Sometimes you increase some frequencies to get a brighter sound and then you're going to get those distortions because you're going into the same sibilant kind of frequencies and what you need to do is, at those points, pull it down so that doesn't happen.
I think probably too that it's on the first track because as time went on I got more kind of demanding! ( laughs )but probably the first track I was sitting in the back going "Ummm.." and not just going: "No! No!" ( laughs )
It must be quite strange listening to it again after so long. Does it still sound the way you originally intended it to? Were you quite happy with it again?
Yes, I mean I'm always never really happy with anything I've done. I always listen and find endless fault with it: "Oh that's out of tune, that's this, that's that" you know and I'm always like that with everything, so I would never be happy with anything. But I think it's just nice too because it doesn't sound old, it doesn't sound 80's does it really! ( laughs )do you know what I mean?
No, the good thing about the album is that it does actually sound timeless. So it will be very interesting to see how the album actually does when you've got almost a new audience
I think that that's true, that it is timeless and that's something that you never know that you've done at the time do you really? You can't imagine that and I think that that's nice really that that's the case.
I think that's a testament to how good the album is. So what's the story behind the missing sleeve artwork?
Well the original artwork was done by Martyn Atkins and I don't know where he is anymore. I don't know if anyone knows where he is. But Rough Trade could have just reproduced the original but Geoff said "Well what do you feel about it having new artwork?" and I thought well that's fine. I wasn't especially attached to the old artwork. It wasn't like I was totally personally involved in it or anything.
That's interesting. So Martyn Atkins actually did it off his own back as it were?
Well I wanted to have pressed flowers and I may have even pressed the flowers and given them to him, but I didn't painstakingly sit it out, whereas if I had I might have been more...
But did you supply the photographs that were used for that one as well?
Yeah, the photographs I did, because there's a little blossom and then there's a little old building. I can't think what else there is, but I remember the cherry blossom because that was out when we were recording it.
So at the end of the day I didn't mind it having new artwork, but I was pleased that they did that [ Virginia points out the pressed flower image on the CD itself - taken from the original sleeve artwork ].
It's a neat touch
Yeah and like I was saying to you before, I was pleased to have this kind of reference to the original as well.
I think that it does work very, very well. So regarding live concerts - You've only performed With My Eyes Wide Open, I'm Dreaming live at some of the early concerts. So have you got any plans to perform the album as a whole?
No because again it would be too difficult. I don't even know how I would go about it at all with it having so many different elements. I mean there would be a way of doing it, there would be a way of doing some of the tracks definitely. If you got the multi-track and you could lift off some of the backing tracks. But my feeling is that most of them would have been mixed out as we went along. So I don't even think you can do that.
You probably could get a backing track, so you could try and recreate the loops, which you could probably do quite easily, very easily these days. But even then, the backwards stuff and the random piano chords and backwards xylophone. I can't imagine how you would do it really.
It would be quite tricky?
It would be very, very tricky. It would be an awful lot of work. It would be really tricky and it wouldn't sound the same. It definitely wouldn't sound the same.
But I think live performances, by their nature, are never going to sound the same...
No but I don't even know how you could get it approaching it really.
So what do you think about live performances in general anyway? Would you like to do more live shows?
Yeah I would quite like to do live stuff. I quite miss it really. But I don't know really what call there would be or what demand there would be for me to do that. I mean it would be very nice to do something that was very unusual - possibly in some little old redundant church in the middle of nowhere.
I think that's a great idea. Something that was really low-key I'm sure would work quite well
Yeah
So what would be the motivation to do it? I'm saying this because I'm eager to see you live! I'm pushing the stick just a bit!
( laughs )
I guess the one thing that would be stopping you is the fact that you're outside of London which doesn't help, unless you performed something local
Financially it's difficult. It's really difficult to pay people to do stuff. That would be a whole new thing that would hold me back. Yeah, getting people down there to do it. So it's just a very practical thing really.
Well I guess it would be a good excuse to get Martin Stephenson down to perform
Yeah it's a drag that we live so far apart really because I can imagine that we could quite easily do some stuff together if Martin was around - or lived slightly nearer! ( laughs )
What about Anne Stephenson?
Yeah I've lost touch with Anne. Yes, I mean it would be great to do something with Anne again. But it is hard. It is hard not being particularly near anybody and it just feels quite insurmountable in a way. You know, I just think "Where would I start?" on something like that. But yes, Martin would be a great person to begin with because it's very easy to do things with him.
Finally, do you have a message for the people who visit the website and who will be buying copies of From Gardens Where We Feel Secure?
Well just I suppose thanks for going to the website really and also as well thank you to you too! That's what I would like to put as my message - thanks to Paul for doing a great job! ( laughs )