REPLACEMENTS INTERVIEW

Rip It Up, Issue 161, 1 December 1990, Page 14

REPLACEMENTS INTERVIEW

label to glossify things," he explains, "then Chris Lord-Alge, the engineer, put this sheen on everything. He put the moustache on the Mona Lisa for us. It got us a Top 50 hit but it crucified the effect of having one song that felt like this, one like that." This time around, Paul, who co-produced with Scott Litt, pledged to "strip it down and make it sound like the demos. You hear the songs and the voice; all that stuff in the background is the accompaniment, ratherthan featuring big, loud, hooky instruments. This record is a reaction to being on tour and playing extremely loud for six months. The last thing I wanted to do was pick up an electric guitar and make some loud music. That's partially the reason it's more acoustic based. I wrote

more instinctively this time; spending days writing pages of things. Then I'd come up with a song title, melody

and chord structure. I'd flip through pages of my prose and choose lines from here and there. Lyrically, four or five songs are literally on two pages in different orders." Spare, haunting songs like 'Sadly Beautiful', 'All Shook Down' and 'Bent Out Of Shape' (which sports the affecting lines "I smell your hair on the clothes I wear, I miss yourface") possess a melancholy, almost bleak ambience. "Whatyou hearthere is a guy having a break-down," confesses Paul, "Part of that is directly linked to why I'm not ready to tour just yet. In the past, I tended to live the songs out and feel I had to feel them as intensely as the day I wrote them. The idea of going out to perform this album is not a happy one. I have to find a way to distance myself from it; to convey the feeling without going back to the hotel room and slitting my wrists. But I'm better now than then." This soul-baring honesty is something Paul claims he's "always found necessary .My art comes first in my life but it's hard to balance that with how I relate to my family, friends and band. I don't want to lose any of them but I wantto be true to my songs. I've made that decision, and it's scary. 'Td love to write a happy song. That's my goal in life right now. I've always told myself before that I couldn't be creative when I'm happy butthat's something I could change. I could be a fairly happy, charming person but it's never reflected in the songs." The current uncertainty in the Replacements camp is something Paul finds exciting. "I thrive on the unknown. I'm addicted to danger," he says, "There'll probably be a Replacements tour but maybe not. The record company hates the uncertainty," he chuckles

mischievously, "but now I'm going to tell the truth, which is that things are dangerously exciting again. I've lied for 30 years. I've stopped drinking nowand hopefully I am changing a few things in my personal life so I'm in no position to lie again. "We've always been a band for rumours. 'ls Paul dying of cancer?'. 'ls he crazy?' No. Paul is just tired of doing what he's done but if you think I'm not going to tour you're crazy. In a perfect world, we'd have enough money to go out and do whatever we wanted creatively, then come back and be a band. But what's unfortunate is that financially the other members of the group can't support themselves through the band unless we tour. "I still don't know if I have the desire or courage to play a solo tour but I'd like the option of playing with either the Replacements or more soulful players." These are ominous words for the legions of diehard 'Mats fans who really believe they are "the only band that matters". "Each record, there's a new thing for the old fans to get mad about, but if I just listened to them I'd never create anything," Paul says, "A few of the band members concern themselves too much with the old fans but to me, the Replacements always represented daring risk-taking. It may be commercial suicide, but in a way it's heaven-sent that we've never really been commercially successful. It's not like I'm the goose killing the golden egg. Maybe the clay egg!" Westerberg openly admits that critical raves and obsessive fans haven't exactly had his band threatening to go platinum. Spying Jon Bon Jovi on the cover of ME he queries, "How many critical raves has he had? Yeah, I might trade bank accounts but I wouldn't want those pants." A wee feud seems to be simmering between the Jersey poodle and the Midwest rocker. "I saw the Replacements on the cover of. j Musician magazine with the headline 'The Last Great Band of the • 'Bos'. Yeah, right. I never heard of these guys," sneered Jon Bon Jovi, the embodiment of the phony rock n'roll the Replacements slagged on 'SeenYour Video'. Paul Westerberg attracts a different kind of admirer, that's for sure. "I hate to say it but we're getting more sensitive types now; people who are smart, who read, rather than just like a big noise," he says, "Four. years ago, the typical Replacements fan was a guy in college who drank too much and didn't have a girlfriend. We get more female fans now, but I could get into trouble talking about that! I'm willing to show a more female side, whereas most rockers who come on as macho seem false. All the women I've ever known are attracted to men who are man enough to be gentle. Hey, where's that waitress bitch?" The Replacements' reputation for drunken debauchery persists, however. "Some women have this image of the guy who swings from chandeliers. One journalist came to interview us just after covering a convention of 350,000 Hell's Angels. All her girlfriends phoned to see is she was all right, but they were more worried about us. I couldn't believe it. What the fuck have we created here?" His chandelier-swinging days are over now, Paul hopes. "I've been drinking since I was 13," he states. "It became my life, I could only function«. underthe influence of alcohol or chemicals. I've been a victim of the biggest rock n'roll cliche. You create this monster and have to live up it. Finally, it was 'Paul, you're not happy doing this. Who cares about rock n'roll? Stop drinking or you'll die.' Once you do that you realise you still have rock n'roll. So write some, play some! I've done everything not sober for so long that each time I do something sober it's like 'Hey, can dothat!" "I'd like to see it as a lifestyle change. Of course, it'll come out that

these cause cancer," he says, eyeing his fake beer suspiciously. Paul confesses he's reticentto commit to a Replacements tour "until I have a few more months under my belt. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't afraid of the pressure touring entails." He's not about to get moralistic, though, and he's tolerant of continuing drinkers. "If Tommy asks if he can have a drink I'll say 'lf you don't, I'll punch you out. Get shitfaced so I can see what it looks like!"' But Paul does acknowledge feeling "slightly responsible" for influencing fans to get under the influence. "I've seen horror shows at our gigs where we tended to attract a crowd that would use us as examples for their own problems—'lf he can get as far as he is being so fucked up, there's hope for me'. Anyone thinking that is in fora depressing, ugly, scary lesson." Westerberg remains suspicious of celebs using theirstatus to preach. "If they want to do good in their minds, OK, but to me it's laughable. Fine, if you're politically orientated, but I'd rather hearyou write a catchier song. Make up your mind, buddy." To Paul, a catchy song is one of life's lasting joys. "I love melody and the feeling words convey. I don't like rhythm and groove-orientated music and that seems to be the music of the day." The Replacements still see themselves as mavericks in the music biz. "We've never really been part of anything," he says, "We were too young to be punks and way too young to be in a classic rock band and now we're too old to be in the Pixies. We have a mixture of classic things but with an attitude that wouldn't have survived in the '6os. We'd have been the garage band that played the dance shut down by the police. We were seen as a punk band because basically we drank too much, had a good time and were a bit obnoxious. We're dreamers who lucked out and somehow got a little skill along the way. Now, we'll never be the young new hope and we're glad we're past that. Paranoia sets in when you're the critics' next big thing. "The Replacements could have been very successful if we'd been a little smarter or a little dumber but we were always in the middle. We'd never want anyone to tell us what to do but we didn't know what to do on our own. The door has been open but we've been climbing up the building to get through the window because we don't trust who is waiting behind the door." The Replacements have definitely been one of the most influential bands of the 'Bos, inspiring a whole generation of guitar-bashing rockers. "Snot nosed garage bands will go out of their way to write songs about us, or me in particular," Paul maintains, "They cop our attitude, they've got the drinking, they do silly covers, they switch instruments, but they don't have the songs." Not that Westerberg considers helping out younger bands to be beneath him. He gets positively animated when discussing the Leatherwoods, a Minneapolis group he's begun producing. "They have great elements they just need to bring together," he says. In turn Paul remains a fan of some of his early rock n'role models. "We played a gig in New York with Keith Richards on ourlasttour," he recalls, "They didn't want us hanging around backstage but I snuck in and got a Polaroid of me and Keith. Course he's looking at me like I'm the guy who sweeps up! Hey, we've always worshipped the dinosaurs we were supposed to hate. We loved Rod Stewart, the Stones, Led Zeppelin." And just as those rockers keep rolling on, so will Paul Westerberg. "I really don't know what's in the near future forthe Replacements but I can see us with snow white hair, our guts hanging overourtrousers, playing 'Bastards of Young' in a lounge somewhere in 2006." Can we buy tickets now?

KERRY DOOLE