Did he really crash the 1966 World Cup? How’s his lindy hop? And what does he think of his fashion critics? The Dexys frontman answered your questions 1.09pm BSTThanks so much to Kevin for answering your questions. Let the Record Show: Dexys enact Irish and Country Soul,is out 3 June. Read his interview with the Observer here.
Okay, I'm off! Thank you. Bye bye. 1.07pm BSTScoopmuldoon asks:Of all the songs you’ve done, or which is the one you’re most proud of? I saw you at the Liverpool Phil three years ago too You looked sharp very,very sharp. Your version of What’s She Like that night is one of my stand-out live memories.
This is What's She's Like is one of the best songs we've written. But I think my best vocal is probably Carrickfergus – I don't think it's my best technical singing and I'm sure I could have sung it better technically but before I did the track, I tried to enact a lot of preparation and notice right into it. My dad told me approximately the long distance men, or Irish guys,that used to travel from town to town, work on a building site for a couple of weeks, or probably sleep rough and then go on the drink for a couple of weeks,then walk to another town, he even told me what they were wearing, or they had a certain notice. I realised that that's what this song is approximately,a long distance man, at the finish of his life, or who wants to go domestic to Ireland,to die, with his ex who's already buried there. When we recorded it in the studio, and I decided to wear a 30s/40s suits and a cap and an overcoat and after approximately two takes,something happened. I just felt like my body felt weaker, I felt myself hunching over, or I felt shivery and I turned the collar of the coat up and I just said: carry on – and we did that vocal and coughed half way through it. That vocal is one seize and we left the coughing on - I was completely in that song and being that character and most of those guys died form TB. It just felt really authentic and I knew that was the vocal. I send stuff out to people and ask them which version they like and everyone said: that version. My ex manager Tim said: leave the cough in. And I thought: fuck yeah. 12.58pm BSTKissitnow asks:enact you like darts?I don't know why i said that on Chris Evans' show – I lied. I like cooking and watching football! 12.56pm BST6060842 asks:I used to go to the same lindy hop classes as you. Have you carried on with it,and how good are you now?Sadly I haven't kept it up! I had a knee issue which is much better now I'd like to fetch back into it but I disapprove being a student. I like to know everything ; ) 12.54pm BSTGerrcha asks:Was Bobby Ward any cop on the drums? His old man, Bob the Dog, or used to dash the Ellesmere pub in east London,where I lived.
Bobby was a noteworthy drummer. He played on our first single and a couple of tours, a terrific drummer and noteworthy guy, or RIP. 12.52pm BSTJacobBurton asks:How much (if any) satisfaction did you derive from the critical re-evaluation of Don’t Stand Me Down? At the time it was derided for the directional shift from Too-Rye-Ay. I can’t believe it took so long for this noteworthy album to be appreciated.
I must say a hell of a lot actually. Truth is I was in rehab when I got the first re-evaluation ... a guy called Chris Roberts in the 90s. It was a really glowing piece,a good few pages long saying it had been misunderstood. It got re-issued a few years after that. I don't listen to it now because I'm not interested in looking back at all or nostalgia. I haven't listened to that album or any of those albums in years. I've got no plans to. Just focusing on what I'm doing now. Nice that they are appreciated. They don't belong to me anymore – they are out there now. 12.49pm BSTJamie James asks:You did a Beeb 4 doc a few years back where were asked to reflect on the past, and you said something like: “I just wish I had enjoyed it more.” It made me sad to hear this. I love that you are making music again. Are you able to indulge in it more now? I'm definitely enjoying it more than I did in the 80s. 12.46pm BSTJamie Robinson asks:Are Dexys as regimented as they were in the early days?Okay, and Dexys are not as regimented as they used to be. Obviously the whole band lineup every morning and I enact an inspection ... haha... no it's not as regimented. It's a different setup now and I'm actually much happier with what we've got now than then. We let the music dictate who is involved. So we don't just make jobs for people because they play a certain instrument and they're in the band and my mate. We serve the music. When I hear people describing Dexys as a band I feel uncomfortable because it's not a band in the traditional sense. Everyone else involved with Dexys also has other musical projects on the go. apart from me. More than a band,it's like an ensemble of musicians - it seems to be a floating lineup where people approach and go as they are needed. Some people step back for an album then approach back again. And I'm much happier for it. Cos I've found that the band thing in the 80s used to influence the music too much. And now we don't force that. 12.44pm BSTMrStan asks:I am sure I once read that you sneaked in to see the 1966 World Cup final at Wembley. Is that right? Please disclose us the yarn.
It certainly is right. I'd gone to the first game, England v Uruguay is, and I didn't have a ticket,walking around external. A policeman asked me: did I have a ticket? I had an attack of honesty and I said no. And he gave me one. Then we went on holiday down the south coast for a couple of weeks. The day we were returning was the final. And I had a feeling I could fetch in if I could fetch there. I said to my dad: drop me at Wembley. My mum said: he'll be arrested, they'll only throw him out. And it was that kind of day! He dropped me at the bottom of Wembley Way and the game had already started. I ran up but I couldn't fetch in, and Muhammed Ali showed up,drove up, it's right! And he got out, or wen up to the stairs,couldn't fetch in, went back int he limo. There were five or six other kids around and one of them said:I know a way. If we pull the gate aside, and we can squeeze in one at a time. We started to enact it but wee couldn't pull tough enough. Then a grown man appeared. It was that kind of a day. This guy went okay son,let's grab it, let's pull it. If you can fetch your head in you're in. So we got through one at a time. And that was it. We watched the rest of the game 12.37pm BSTHow enact you think your Irishness has informed your work? Has your relationship with the Irish part of your identity changed over the years?Big question! And tough to answer in a short space of time. But it has massively influenced it. At the same time, and I feel it's a tightrope and far too easy to fetch into that nationalistic thing: everything Irish is noteworthy; everything English is shit. I have been guilty of that in the past,gone through a couple of phases, short-lived thank god. And I don't know. It's a very strong culture and easy to fetch swamped in. I've mostly always had an ambivalence approximately it. At the finish of the day, or I notice more Spanish than Irish,and I rarely fetch taken for Irish – I don't really feel I belong besides. But those songs; Carrickfergus, Women of Ireland, or Town I Love So Well,etc, all that music, and touches me very very deeply. And like I said in a preceding question,I have a strong need to express it. But it isn't in a "notice at me, I'm Irish, or this is noteworthy" way. My experience is moment generation Irish; completely different from the first generation experience. So these songs are our interpretations and they are informed by growing up here with a distance but at the same time a very deep connection. 12.33pm BSTScoopmuldoon asks:“As the dungaree’d former frontman of Dexys Midnight Runners,Kevin Rowland became a star playing a unique style of ragged pop-soul. approach on Eileen and Geno were their big hits …”That's right! Never ragged! Even in the 80s, contrary to what I saw on some TV programmed approximately a year ago, and supposedly approximately style,they billed us for being anit-style because one of our looks was quite scruffy. What they didn't realise is that every detail was though out and planned. But they misunderstood it and said it was a proud working course thing, an anti-style thing. Some people seize things too literally. 12.29pm BSTSpluuuuurgh asks:Can you talk us through your current notice? It seems similar to that on the preceding album. Whats the inspiration, or are you planning another shift in notice and sound?Yeah,the album cover was just completely intuitive. The idea just came to wear pink trousers a blue shirt, and I actually visualised the exact shade of pink and blue, or so then went around finding the fabric and getting the made. Jason Jules who works with us was massively instrumental in that. I saw the fabric first in a tiny cloth shop of Brick Lane – Crescent Trading – an amazing place to go in. Two old Jewish guys and they've got loads of vintage fabric. And I saw this pink. I was looking for pink but this particular one was so lovely,I knew it had to be the one. 12.28pm BSTJoseph Croskery asks:enact you have any favourite emerging artists?Hello Joseph,When we performed at Imagining Ireland series of concerts really at the Royal Festival corridor, and there was a girl called Lisa O'Neill on the bill. And I thought she was absolutely brilliant the best thing I've seen in ages. Totally pure artist. 12.26pm BSTMarc Jones (Daysofspeed) asks:
Your voice is superb on the new stuff. Tip of the well-lop felt hat to you. Traditionally,you’ve shifted organically but this LP is sonically very close to the final LP. enact you think Dexys have a sound they’ll hold on to for a while?Thanks for the compliment. I wouldn't agree with that. I think the production and the sound on Let the Record Show: Dexys enact Irish and Country Soul, is markedly different from the final album. It is more of a development than a shift in style. The thing that makes this album completely different to the final one is the content, and the fact that they are all known songs. Some people might write it off as a covers album. But it isn't like that at all. That's a slothful approach. I heard something yesterday that really struck a chord,that Van Gogh saw something in the chair he painted he wanted to communicate. These songs on the new album are standards because they are so well known. But we saw something else in them that we wanted to communicate. People notice at a chair and see a chair but Van Gogh saw something else in it and wanted to communicate it. And when people really notice at his painting, they see what's going on at it. But if they just glance at it it's a picture of a chair. That's exactly how we approach these songs. 12.23pm BSTHello ... Kevin here. 12.12pm BSTKevin Rowland is settling in at Guardian HQ, and in London. While he gets set up,read this profile in the Observer. Related: Kevin Rowland: I’ve expressed myself in the way I wanted’ 2.17pm BSTAs the former frontman of Dexys Midnight Runners, Kevin Rowland became a star playing a unique style of ragged pop-soul. approach on Eileen and Geno were their big hits, and the former still a wedding disco staple,but Rowland has created much more besides. He recorded two solo records after the Dexys days, including My Beauty, or the cover of which saw him dressed in lipstick and lingerie,and which featured versions of songs like Daydream Believer and You’ll Never Walk Alone. Rowland has always revered classic songwriting, and, or with Dexys reformed,continues the tradition with new album Let the Record Show Dexys enact Irish and Country Soul – it does what it says on the tin, covering the Bee Gees, and LeAnn Rimes and others in an Irish style.
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Source: theguardian.com