Mat Interview From MTV Chinese
HE IS IN FASHION
An exclusive interview with Suede’s bassist, Mat Osman in Beijing
(Sept. 15, 1999)
I’ve been looking for this performance of Suede
for a long time. On 19June, they played for almost two hours with songs mainly from their
last two albums, songs from “Coming Up” are especially loved by the audience.
Two weeks later, from the Denmark’s Roskilde Festival set list, I saw the name Suede
again. At the Backstage, I found Suede’s dressing room, to my
surprise, they are exceptionally friendly(maybe cos they heard that I’m a DJ from
Mainland China), especially bassist Mat Osman. At first I almost thought that he is the
manager of the band since there’s nothing of the arrogance of a superstar and
he’s even taller than I’ve thought. He told me not to go away ‘til
they’ve finished their performance. So, I had my place at the side as
“Band’s Guest” and watched Suede for the second time in my life. Later the
manager of the band asked me to talk to Mat since he was preparing to go to Beijing with
his girlfriend after Roskilde.
Due to the fact that I had to join a few other festivals before returning to Beijing, I
would be arriving a day later than Mat, so we decided to meet at Shangri-La Hotel in
Beijing as there are Shangri-La. On the day before Mat went back to the UK, we did the
following interview in the garden of Re Tang Fan Zhuang(a restaurant) in Beijing.
Mat: Ni Hao(means Hello - this is the phrase Mat just learnt), I’m Mat from the band
Suede, I’m sitting in a Si Chuan(a province of China) restaurant at the moment. I
just had a Si Chuan Da Pei(a Chinese dish) There is a small pond in front of me.
DJ(Y): What makes you come to Beijing?
M: A month ago, my girlfriend and me were planning to go to somewhere I’ve never been
to before. I’ve been to a lot of Asian cities like Bangkok, Hong Kong etc., which I
like very much, so we thought of Beijing. And I met you at Roskilde. You’re the first
Beijing man I’ve ever met, that’s why we’re sitting here.
M: Basically, British bands “steal” from lots of other kind of music, we’ve
“stolen” Indian music, American music, and lately we started to
“steal” from French music again. I think the best thing of playing in Asia is
that even though the audiences do not understand our lyrics(we do – Ed), they still
understand our music. For a musician, the most exciting thin is when one sees the audience
understanding the music he plays. I think the truly great music would be accepted by
anyone anywhere in the world. I remember hear Bob Marley’s music on a taxi here in
Beijing. I can hear Bob Marley’s music anywhere on the earth, in Finland, America,
Beijing, Bangkok, even on a small island. Because his emotions, his feelings are in the
music, which could be understood by people around the globe. This is what we called great
music.
Y: This is the last day being in Beijing and this is your first trip here, what’s
your impression of Beijing? How would you tell your friends about your trip here when
you’re back?
M: I think most British and Americans still think that China is a closed Communist state.
Actually, someone even go like, “It’s hard for foreigners to go to Mainland
China, when you are there, you can’t go around freely, they’ve got no rock
music, no news there, everything is controlled,” before my trip. But everything is
just opposite, I feel like in Tokyo when I’m in Beijing, a modern Asian city. Many
cities in Asia have got lovely buildings, on my ride into Beijing, it was all office
buildings on the side of a long, straight road. I was thinking, “Where am I? Have I
got to a wrong place?” When I arrived at the central
of the city, it is so beautiful, and the people are friendly.
Y: Did you remember when I proposed to bring you to see gigs by some Chinese rock bands in
Roskilde, you thought it doesn’t worth the troubles. What do you know about the
rock’n’roll scene in China after seeing Ai Se(a
Chinese rock band)?
M: It was quite good! Not much difference from what I’ve seen in other places.
Shamefully, I couldn’t understand the lyrics cos everyone was laughing, but I still
enjoyed very much. They are brilliant musicians, I admire them very much. And we
didn’t leave, we watch it from beginning to the end. This is an excellent experience,
because someone told me that there
is no rock music in China, in fact, this is not the case. Recently, we canfind Chinese
films in the UK. This is wonderful.
Y: Can you tell me the story of Suede?
M: This is Suede story…(at this time, someone whistled at us, Mat joked that it must
be a Blur fans) Brett and me went to the same secondary school in the eighties, in the
South of London. We started playing music in his room, and that’s the birth of our
band. Later, we moved to London together for university, where we met our guitarist
Bernard and drummer Simon. We
jammed together for another two or three years, at first people did not like us, because
we were very much “anti-trend”, what we played was totally different from what
people listened to at that time. Gradually, some people started to accept and like our
music and coming to see us play, then we became successful in a short time. It was no more
than six month from being hated by everyone and getting our first number one album. After
that, we released three albums, lost a guitarist, acquired a new one who was just
seventeen, never been in a band, and had not even leave his hometown. We just finished our
fourth album and we are having our world tour at the moment, up to this day.
Y: I like you music is because my favourite musicians are David Bowie and Roxy Music, how
does their music influence you
M: Bowie influences a whole lot, all of us like his music very much. I’ve seen him
many times, I’ll say “Hi” to him for you. If he comes to China, I’ll
introduce you to him. You’ll like him. When these two bands made their greatest
albums I was still very young. I started to learn about Bowie’s music at the end of
the eighties. As the albums he released at that time were very inexpensive and I
didn’t have much money. I remember when I bought “Heros”, I was unable to
describe it. You know at that time the music is the like of The Jam, The Clash, and
Bowie’s music is so utterly different. The greatest thing about Bowie is that almost
all my favourite records are known to be cos of him. Because when I bought David
Bowie’s records, people told me I should listen to the album “Transformer”
he produced for Lou Reed. Then I bought it, and I loved it to bits. After that, I went on
buying a lot of Lou Reed and Velvet Underground records. Later on, I found out that David
Bowie was working with Iggy Pop, I started to listen to Iggy Pop too. I like him also.
Through Iggy Pop, I learnt about Patti Smith, so if you like David Bowie, you’ll know
more than a hundred bands just because of him. Sometimes I like this too, many a time some
sixteen, seventeen year old youngster tell me that like Suede very much, then I’ll
tell them that I like Roxy Music, and Kate Bush. Afterwards, they’ll listen and buy
those records. You know youngsters today haven’t even heard of Sex Pistols and The
Clash, that’s the reason why we play some of their music in our gig, they will learn
about those musicians after that. So that is quite good. Bowie’s music covers a wide
range of music, and he always find some interesting musicians to work with, I like many of
his records very much. Like knowing Roxy Music through David Bowie, Talking Heads through
Brian
Eno, etc.
Y: Then, do you agree people saying that Suede is a glam rock band?
M: To be honest, I don’t like Glam Rock, even though I like David Bowie and Roxy
Music very much. Most Glam Rock music like Gary Glitter’s etc. is not about real
life, that’s why I don’t particularly like them. Most of the music I like and
those I grew up with are very real, they are about common people, and that is why I
don’t like Glam Rock. I cannot admit David Bowie being a Glam Rocker because he is
much stronger than that. I think his best record isn’t “Ziggy Stardust”, I
like “Low” and “Heros” much more. In my opinion, “Scary
Monsters” is his best album, and there’re miles between that and Glam Rock.
Y: Suede is an important British band in the nineties, what is your opinion on Brit Pop?
M: To me, it is actually a meaningless word, because you cannot use a geographical term to
describe a music phenomenon. Also, I don’t think that our music is related to Oasis
or Blur in any way. The thing that is common between us is that we’re about the same
age, we’ve the same skin colour, we’re from the same country. That is the only
common thing. Maybe you could invent a “China Pop”, what I mean is that in such
a densely populated country, there are thousands kinds of music. It is a meaningless word.
So, I think “Brit Pop” doesn’t really exist, it was just five or six
British bands released their quality albums at the same time, but I don’t think
they’re the same.
Y: What do you think when looking back your debut album?
M: On one hand, I feel so proud, on the other, I think we could do even better. It feels
like when you are home, your Mum takes out the photos your took when you’re small and
show them to your friends. You know that feeling? When I listen to our first album now,
that’s the feeling I have. Not thinking about the producing, the performance, I still
feel very proud of that, though it’s not my favourite album.
Y: You changed a new producer for the latest album, does that mean you are hoping to add
some new elements to your music?
M: Yes, because producing a record now is not the same thing as we did ten years ago, like
the digital technology, demo technology, recurring drum machine etc., you have to use
these technologies. We make a record every two years, promising that it wouldn’t like
the last one, especially to those who listen to the music. Using ways we haven’t used
to be to work is very exciting, and you need constant pressure to keep yourself improving.
I think when you listen to the new album of Oasis and you found it so much alike as the
last one you’d be very disappointed. You’ve got only twenty years time
to make music, so you should try to change.
Y: Your third album “Coming Up” is my favourite one, because there is this
exciting youthfulness about it.
M: That is because of the joining of guitarist Richard. He indeed is a young man, at that
time, he had never been in a studio, I think that is a very good alliance. The rest of us
had been doing this recording thing for years, we know what we should do, but Richard had
never done that, so you could hear this excitement and the desire of getting all the
feelings out through
this album. This is surely an album with youthfulness.
Y: Who is the greatest bassist in your heart?
M: I think it should be Paul McCartney. When you now listen to his recordings twenty years
ago, it still has its freshness, its melody, its power. I think he is the greatest. And
this one called James Jameson, no one knows about him because his name is never on the
records. He recorded for Motown singers and involved in a lot of famous songs like,
“I’ll be There”, “Baby Love” etc., he plays very well, it’s
an enjoyment. When I started play bass, there wasn’t any cool bass players. Almost
all of them are the most preserved one in the band. Whom I really like is the bassist from
Stone Roses, Mani. I remember they played their number one song “Fools Gold”,
that’s the first time for the band’s best bassist. He is a very wonderful
bassist, he gets very involved in the performance, you’ll be very moved by his
performance.
Y: What is your personal favourite record?
M: My most favourite record should be the one which I never get bored of, that is, David
Bowie’s “Golden Years”. That is a very optimistic record, I would play it
whenever I move into a new house, that’s that first thing I’d do. Maybe I’m
a bit superstitious, because this record has a feeling of going forward and being very
positive. Although the title of the record is “Golden Years” which sounds very
nostalgic, in fact, it’s looking into the future.
Translated by Gigi (the Oakes
Playground) from the interview by You Dye in MTV Chinese
For original Chinese version please check out the MTV Chinese site (Big-5 coding only) http://www.mtvchinese.com/big5/Highmusic/Interview/International/Suede/Index.html