10cc head to the Sands Centre
10cc head to the Sands Centre
Legendary band 10cc, who have sold millions of albums, will take to the stage on October 1st at Carlisle’s Sands Centre.
I am not going to rattle on too much about the band, they need no introduction, we managed to get a few minutes on the phone with 10cc’s lead singer, Graham Gouldman, who is also a Hall of Fame songwriter and all round nice bloke and brilliant craic.
Congratulations, 50 Years of 10cc – What was the original plan when you got together back in 72?
Thank you, I can’t believe it actually, it’s very strange because the time seems to have gone very quickly.
There was no plan – that was the plan, we just had our studio where we wrote and recorded what we liked and we did something that we thought, Oh! that could be interesting to someone and it went on from there really. That is I think why it worked for us because we didn’t want to follow any trends. We basically wrote and recorded what we liked for ourselves and fortunately other people liked it as well.
These songs are timeless – what do you put that down to?
I don’t know, I suppose we never followed any trends so they are quite in their own niche, I think that’s why they seem to have stood the test of time – because they didn’t follow any trends.
It’s not like they were disco songs or whatever, they can stand the test of time if they are big hits I suppose, but there was some sort of quality about them that just seems to work and that’s why we can still tour them today and people want to hear those songs.
People do want to hear them and you’ll have three generations at your gigs.
Well we were already seeing the next generation and now we’re seeing the third, that’s so gratifying.
But it’s because of the internet, Spotify, streaming and downloading etc that these songs are so accessible, that’s the upside to that side of the business.
You’re a master songwriter, out of all of them tracks from 10cc, what’s your favourite, you’ve got to burn them all and can only save one, which one and why?
Laughing, – Well, can I answer like a politician and say the question you should be asking is what two songs do you think represents 10cc? Seriously though, no one song represents us, ‘I’m not in Love’ will be the most famous song, when we start playing that you can almost feel the rush in the crowd – but the most fun one is Dreadlock Holiday because everyone knows the chorus. But I love them all.
Do you get nervous at all about going on or not?
Yes I do a little bit and if I didn’t I would stop doing it. It would mean I don’t really care and I like the nerves. There are times when I’m at the side of the stage ready to go one and I’m thinking to myself, ‘I don’t need to do this – why are you doing this?’ and then I go on and I’m going, Oh Yeah, I know why I’m doing it and it happens every time at every gig.
It’s been well reported that two teams were writing, you and Eric and Godley and Creme, when you were actually choosing what to go on a record, was there a real tension and competitiveness?
No not really I have to say, very, very rarely there was the odd thing, but generally we agreed because whoever came up with a suggestion we’d try that out and if it didn’t work we would say OK, fair enough, that idea didn’t work. We all had the right to try whatever idea we wanted and that held us in very good stead. There was no one who was making the decisions for everybody. We agreed on everything together or disagreed.. Laughing ( Ed’s Note – I was referring to which song made it onto a record, but Graham was answering about the songwriting process – probably a question they get asked regularly)
Going back in time – your old fella Hymie was a poet – would you class yourself as a poet?
He was a poet – a playwright and he wrote stories and he was a massive help to me in the early days when I was writing for other artists in the 60s, he was very, very involved in that.
I wouldn’t say I’m a poet, I class myself as someone who writes music and writes lyrics.
Lyrics aren’t poetry as I don’t think the lyrics wouldn’t necessarily stand up without the music, there are people like Joni Mitchel and Paul Simon, who, when you read their lyrics do read like poetry.
But I don’t think any of our stuff does, it’s not being detrimental to it, it’s just that there has to be the marriage between the music and the lyric to make it work.
You wrote for lots of bands, such as The Hollies, Herman’s Hermits and The Yardbirds, who was the favourite?
I’ve got a soft spot for The Hollies I have to say, I thought they were a fantastic band.
As a songwriter, what advice would you give to someone who wants to get into songwriting?
Try and write something from the heart and from your own experience, it’ll feel more genuine when other people hear it, and also try and be original – don’t follow trends and just be yourself and if that works then you’re onto something. But to follow trends? I don’t think it’s a good idea, but that’s just my personal opinion and my advice.
You’re 64 plus vat and about to embark on a 24-date tour, does that fill you with dread?
(Laughing) – I like that and no, I’m looking forward to it.
If you think about what it’s going to be like you might say, ‘Well that’s a lot of travelling’ The easy part is the playing, the travelling can be a bit tiring but you get an energy from being with musicians, some who I’ve worked with since the 70s.
We really enjoy each other’s company, we’re very good friends, there’s always a lot of banter and a lot of funny things happen.
And then there’s the actual doing the gigs which I love doing and you get an energy from that as well, that’s where the audience is of course.
So it’s not as daunting as you think and also, if it was daunting I don’t think I would do it to be honest.
I was listening to the track you have just released with Brian May ‘Floating in Heaven’ and vocally it reminded me of George Harrison.
Really? That is a real compliment I have to say, funny you should say that because someone said it sounded like McCartney and someone said it sounded like a John Lennon song, so I’m going to take all those three compliments and put them together and say ‘Thank you very much’ (laughing)
It does have a Beatley sound and towards the end you have them floating keys like you find in ‘I’m not in Love’ just delicately floating in the background, was that intentional?
I did use that idea as I thought it would be a good production idea for that track.
I asked people to come forward with questions to ask you, Tom Caton from Egremont asks
‘How did that combo come about with Brian May?
Ok, so when the telescope James Webb Space Telescope was launched last Christmas, I started following it on the NASA website – and became, well, enchanted by the whole thing.
I thought it was fantastic and was moved to write a song about it from the point of view of being the telescope.
I played it to Andrew Campbell from my record company ‘Lojinx’ – they put out my last solo album, Modesty Forbids – and I sent him the song and he said ‘I absolutely love this song, it’s fantastic, but why don’t you get someone like Brian May to play on it’
It made sense because not only is he a brilliant guitarist but he’s also an astronomer and an astrophysicist.
So anyway I did and Brian said ‘I absolutely love this track – I want to be involved and want to play on it’ So he played on it, he did some backing vocals and he came up with production ideas as well, he’s been very, very involved in it and it’s opened up loads of stuff, such as NASA have used it in one of their videos and it’s been absolutely fantastic and that’s how it came about.
Neil Cambell from Kirkdale Liverpool, who’s now in Australia asks ‘Citeh or Utd’?
Utd! ( Eds Note – I did reassure Graham that there are tablets for that )
GPick asks ‘Do you ever keep in touch with the lads’?
The only one I speak to regularly is Kevin Godley, on tour we have our own videos and Kevin has produced and directed three for us, recently we did one where he is singing and we are backing him on a song called ‘Somewhere in Hollywood’.
Are there any more Solo Albums in the pipeline?
Well, I’m thinking about doing another Solo Album but it’s just time with the upcoming gigs and promoting the ‘Floating in Heaven’ record as well. But I will do another album and have slowly started to compile the songs I’m going to record, then I’ll pick out the best ones for the record.
Finally, where was your very first gig that you played to an audience?
At primary school in a talent show that was sort of in the Skiffle era.
We had a bloke who had a guitar, I didn’t say he could play the guitar, but he had a guitar – and I was playing some sort of weird drum thing and someone else was playing a pole with a bit of string on it tied onto a box to make a kind of bass sound, god knows how it sounded like?
Did it have a name?
I don’t think we did, I know one of the early bands was the High Spots and The Cravats, can you think of a worse name for a band, it’s terrible.
So that band with awful guitar, bad drums and terrible stringy-thing, how did it not make it?
I don’t know, I think EMI – Decca and all the majors such as Warner Bros – Universal all missed a trick there, their loss!
Thankfully, Graham won’t be bringing that band to the Sands but will however be bringing 10cc’s Greatest Hits for you to enjoy. So grab your tickets and prepare to be blown away.
Buy 10cc tickets for Carlisle Sands Centre on Saturday, 1st October 2022 | Ticketline
Picture credit Reinout Bos
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