It's all about belief
Steve Hogarth interview
MNN: What is the significance of the white strings on your fingers?
SH: Right. Well, the significance of the bandages, when I was about 21, (sings) 'it was a very good year,' I had a gig on an ocean liner. One night about three o'clock in the morning, on this ocean liner, the bass player decided to murder the drummer and attacked him with a broken glass with the intent to cut him into small pieces. The rest of the band tried to prevent the drummers demise. We didn't realize the bass player was a psychopath, turned out he was. One of the things you have to be careful about when you join a band. There's more to a band than just four of five guys that play music, you have to be a little cautious, in case one of them's an axe murdered! Anyway, it turned out that I got very badly cut up as a result. (Steve shows us his hand and scars). He cut my hands up and I very nearly bled to death. There wasn't a doctor on the ship, so I was stitched up by a Swedish sailor. He saved my life. The glass actually severed the tendon in my thumb. I lost the use of my right thumb and it took two years of surgery, physiotherapy and pain to get it going again. My hands were constantly bandaged. I kind of saw the funny side of it; I used to bandage my fingers on stage for nostalgia and from there it turned into a kind of good luck thing. If I don't wear them, terrible things happen. Of course, terrible things happen when I do wear them.
MNN: Well, you're very theatrical. Have you ever done any acting?
SH: I did drama at school, I did a bit of mime when I was younger. I haven't really had the opportunity to act in anything outside of our own videos, things that we've done.
MNN: You've got a strong voice, do you do any vocal warm-up before a performance? Have you had any formal vocal training.
SH: I don't do any exercises, but I should. I've never had any vocal or piano lessons. What I do and what I have are a combination of what I've worked out for myself, what goes on inside my brain and the experience having sung for so long and so hard. Every year goes by I know I'm singing a bit better than the year before. It's a really good feeling and that's happened every year of my life since I started singing. I mean, hopefully, if I get up to sing one day and I'm not singing as well as I did last year that would be terribly depressing. That hasn't happened yet; I get better each year. It's purely a combination of caring about it being good, not being careless, and doing it as often as I have to do it. Voice is like any other muscle, it gets fit through use and in my case it gets stronger through use, provided I'm not really stupid with it. The harder I hammer it, the more resillient. Of course, if you overdo it, you can damage something; so far so good.
MNN: Is there anyone you would really like to work with?
SH: I'd love to sing, just for five minutes, with Joni Mitchell because she's a genius. There are really not that many people. I'd like to sing with Peter Gabriel because I respect him as a singer, writer, and good bloke. I admire his honesty - there's not too much honesty in our profession. I've met him a couple of times. He played me 'Red Rain' just after he'd mixed it in his own studio. There was only me, the guy I was working with, and Peter and we all just sat together and listened to it. He didn't really know us but he had nonetheless invited us in to hear it. I admire him for that and I admire him because he seems to care. It's important for me to have fun when I'm working so I wouldn't be interested in anyone miserable or pretentious. I'd really like to do something orchestral. I'd like to work with people in different fields of music, really. I mean everybody says, 'Oh (Marillion's) a progressive band.' Progressive rock doesn't interested me one bit, not one iota. I find it all terribly naive and secondhand for the most part. I'd much rather work with people digging about out in the dark who don't know where they're going rather than people who are busy trying to recreate something retro. I think it's always much more interesting. I have massive respect for David Byrne and what he's always done. I share a birthday with David Byrne, actually. 'Once in a Lifetime' is the story of my life. He wrote the story of my life without even knowing it. (Singing) 'And you might find yourself... this is not my beautiful house...'
MNN: Do you feel flattered that people travel all over the country to see you?
SH: I'm amazed and moved by how far people are willing to travel to see us. I couldn't really conceive of travelling that far to see a band, myself. I've never done it. I'm a musician, so music is very dear to me and when I was younger, there were a lot of musicians I was crazy about, who I'd have crawled over glass to experience. But I never dreamt of travelling massive distances to see a band and I never, ever went up to anyone in my life who was famous and said, 'Hello. I'd just like to say I like your music.'
MNN: Was that a turning point for you? To see that show and think, 'This is something I have to do'?
SH: Yeah, it was a turning point. The first band I ever saw was Deep Purple at Sheffield City Hall. They had an album called Machine Head out. A friend of mine at school lent it to me. I really got into it. I love Ritchy Blackmore's guitar playing. I was never a massive fan of Ian Gillan's singing. I think Ian Gillan's got a lot to answer for, all this (sings) 'Waaaa' stuff which I really don't like and a lot of singers did that afterwards which is a shame. I loved Ian Paice's drumming and Roger Glover's bass playing and of course Jon Lord's Hammond playing. It was just inspirational. I went to see them and I'd never seen a real band before, a serious band. I mean I'd seen bands that are just crap in Doncaster where I lived or in Sheffield. I was just sitting there watching and going, 'Jesus. This is the most exciting thing I've ever seen going on in a room! This is what I should do! What's the point of doing anything else?' That was the point where I decided that I should be performing. I'd already been a singer. I was in a choir when I was a kid. I'd always love to sing, especially on my own in echo-y places. I'd stay behind after school sometimes and sing in the corridors of the empty school to myself for the sheer joy of hearing it. But I never imagined that I would do that until I saw Deep Purple. I just thought, 'Well I can't think of anything anyone could do that is more exciting than this, so I'd be a fool if I didn't do this.' So that is what started me off with this sort of idea of becoming a musician. I persuaded my parents to get me a piano. I started working on it the next day. They got me a piano and I taught myself to play. This is the essence of excellence because this is about belief. It's about commitment, about sensitivity. It's about power. You can't have power without sensitivity. Just as you can't have life without God. You can't have sensitivity without commitment because you have to believe in something to be sensitive. I think Pete Townsend had it. I don't know if he's still got it. He definately had it.
Music News Network
March 1996 supplement, Issue #35-Marillion
