A MASTER OF ALL TRADES

Fiona Russell Powell - Time Out - December 1983

What do you do when you’re a brilliantly talented songwriter and musician but have no locks, pretty frocks or ‘weird’ image, an uncooperative record company and look like a ‘Blue Peter’ presenter? How do you react when you produce three of the most enchanting singles of the year (‘Uncertain Smile’, ‘Perfect’, ‘This Is The Day’) which get very little airplay and are squashed under by rubbish? Sit back, starve and get virtually ignored by the media while others Copiously plagiarise and stolen notes Echo back at you in mono on the John Peel show.

One tends to become depressed, which is what happened to Matt Johnson, aka The The. But what was a long time ago – he refused to compromise either himself or his music, it paid off and he is one of the few non-pop prostitutes on offer in the record shops today.

A friendly, cheeky 22 year old born and bred in East London, Johnson lived in Stratford for most of his life where his parents run a pub called The Two Puddings. He is also so talented it’s untrue – under the pseudonym The The ( ‘I don’t want to use my real name, I’d hate to become public property’), Matt has been responsible for some of the best pop songs to have been written over the last four years. A jack – and it seems – a master of all trades, he writes the music and lyrics to all of his songs, plays every instrument, and produces and mixes the records, while his brother Andy ‘Dog’ Johnson provides some inspired artwork for the sleeves. When forced to play live, which he dislikes, he uses friends to fill in on the background instruments, friends like Marc Almond, Thomas Leer, Peter Ashworth (the photographer) and cartoonist Tom Johnston.

In 1980, when Johnson was just 19, 4AD released his first album ‘Burning Blue Soul’, described by the NME as ‘… the most psychedelic album to come out in years’. Way ahead of its time, Johnson’s LP had an enormous influence on Echo & The Bunnymen and The Teardrop Explodes (apparently The Teardrop’s Cope has since admitted that ‘Burning Blue Soul’ is one of his all time favourite records). Inexplicably, the record was almost completely passed over by the music press … Johnson couldn’t understand it: ‘That album… with people like the editors of the NME, I don’t exist as far as they’re concerned because I’m not fashionable or part of any contrived movement. They don’t give a fuck about how good someone is. That’s unfair as I’ve got where I am through sheer hard work and a gift I was born with. I didn’t take any acid to come up with that album – Salvador Dali said he never needed drugs to do those paintings, he said: ‘I am the drug’. And that’s how I feel.’

Stevo, the eccentric manager of Soft Cell and supreme at Johnson’s label Some Bizzare, spotted him, put a track of his on a compilation album, and decided to help him clinch a record deal. He arranged the now famous meeting with a CBS executive where business was discussed sitting astride one of the lions at Trafalgar Square. It worked and Stevo got The The a £70,000 contract. Three singles followed and Johnson recently released his second LP ‘Soul Mining’, voted record of the month recently in The Times. Journalists who’d previously ignored his efforts are now proclaiming him the musical genius of the ‘80’s, but Johnson hasn’t forgotten the earlier, crueller reviews: ‘I’m afraid I do bear grudges – I know I shouldn’t, but I just keep quiet and laugh while they’re having to eat their words now.’

Johnson has the big label ‘Depressing’ hanging over his head like a mushroom cloud. His lyrics are soul searching, emotional and personal, often asking the big ones: What is the meaning of life? Why are we here? But he doesn’t wallow, he deals with reality in the most uplifting and positive manner possible. If you ever feel depressed, just put ‘Soul Mining’ on the turntable and it’ll cheer you up instantly: ‘It really irritates me when people say I’m depressing. They’re just trying to label me but I’m an individual, I’m speaking to people rather that at people. And I just want to strangle people who call me a Lou Reed copy – they’re talking from ignorance, because of the big meal the press made over my meetings with Leonard Cohen (who turned out to be one of Matt’s biggest fans) They’re the kind of people who support this new pop sensibility, you know, it’s good to be fun, whacky, all dressed up and prancing about being superficial, ‘cos that’s fun and that’s ‘80s – well, that’s just bullshit as far as I’m concerned. I’m just very passionate and sincere about what I do.’

The The are putting the final touches to their 1984 masterplan – a world tour, a re-release of ‘Burning Blue Soul’ and the release of a special LP for fans called ‘The Pornography Of Despair’. Take that title with a pinch of salt. Matt Johnson writes great and classic songs – he is, and probably will remain, the most important pop artist to emerge this decade.