So how did you become the head of a multinational corporation?
I invented it. And I was immediately the head of it, the moment I invented it. I was lucky, I made the first single myself, getting white labels pressed up. A 'Sounds' reviewer happened to be in the Rough Trade shop when they were playing it, and she really loved it and gave it a fantastic review.
Why the name Mute?
At the time I was working as a film editor. There's a technical term which is called 'Mute', it was written all over the place, and so I decided on using that.
What would you say you musical influences were?
At that time my favourite groups were Kraftwerk and Can and Neu. Because of my age, other things like the Kinks, Beatles and Stones were very influential as well.
Do you have a favourite musical period?
It's hard to say my favourite musical period because I don't think music really breaks down into periods. There might be music that I hated when it first came out in the sixties which I quite like now. It's your own relationship to the music that's important, the time is almost irrelevant.
Can you remember when you first heard 'I Should Be So Lucky' by Kylie Minogue? Did you think you would ever put out a single with her singing on it?
I thought it was really well-produced teeny bop pop track. I didn't think Mute would ever put out a record by her, because I thought she was under contract!
Do you keep a deliberately low profile?
I'm not a naturally outgoing person. I'm not deliberately trying to be reclusive - I just get on with what I do.
Do you have any plans to any more recording?
The odd remix, maybe. Producing is a full-time job. I stopped doing it because it became very stressful - it's very hard to produce a record with a group in the studio and have anything else on your mind apart from that. I felt it was compromising the production and the office work so I took the easy option and did this!
What are your ultimate goals for Mute?
It's fairly simple - being able to find and put out records that I think are good and to be able to survive commercially doing it. I don't want to be like Polygram or a huge company, that's not of any interest to me.
I want to be able to be in a position where I can sign groups that I like and give them the best shot possible to develop a career.
Are there any groups not on Mute that you would have liked to have signed?
The Prodigy, definitely. I think they're great. But we do work The Prodigy in America.
And how do you see Mute developing in the future?
In line with my ambitions, but Mute has to be sensitive to the market to a certain extent. It's tricky, because think Mute is going through a bigger change now than for a while - a number of bands have left which gives us the opportunity to look at some new groups in a more pro-active way. How Mute develops is entirely down to the music. There's no corporate plan like 'you will have this turnover by 1997, therefore we need to sell this many records therefore we need to sign these kind of bands'.
Is there any particular kind of band you're looking for?
Good! It's really that simple. If you look at Nick Cave and Erasure, the only thing they have in common is their quality. They're very different but both are exceptionally good. We've never been a genre-based company.
Erasure are often compared to the Pet Shop Boys. If they came out of contract, would you sign them up?
When Depeche started and were successful we used to get millions of demo tapes that just sounded like dodgy versions of them - we might have even got a demo tape from the Pet Shop Boys, I haven't a clue. But the thing about Mute is, we don't have lots of similar-sounding groups. I do like the Pet Shop Boys but frankly the challenge for me is to break new artists.
How did you first find out about Depeche Mode?
At the time we were distributed by Rough Trade and I happened to wander into the office one day and there were these horrible scruffy-looking New Romantics in there. The promotions person who was working there at the time said I might be interested in listening to a tape they'd done, but I was in the middle of something at the time - and looking at them, I thought 'F**k that' - so I asked them to come back later, but they never did.
Then a few weeks later I was at the Bridgehouse in Canning Town to see a concert by Fad Gadget, who were on Mute, and there was this group supporting them called Depeche Mode. I didn't even recognise them from the Rough Trade shop, though they have reminded me about it since!
And what was it you liked about them?
They were everything I was looking for in a group at the time. They were completely electronic, they were young and they had great pop songs. The thing about electronic pop at that time was that there were groups like the Human League who were very art school, using kitsch imagery; but Depeche were totally fresh, there was no cynicism, they just seemed to be totally uncalculated.
Usually when a group plays, their first song is their best, but with them it was just one incredible song after another. they played at least half of their first album at that gig. I went back to see them again a couple of weeks later to make sure I wasn't dreaming and then, well, that was it.
A Slovakian fan has heard a rumour that when DM were recording "Speak and Spell" you locked them in the studio and wouldn't let them out until the album was finished.
Funnily enough, when they were recording "Speak and Spell", which was recorded really quickly by today's standards, Fletch and Martin still had day jobs in the city, in insurance and banking. So Vince did most of the legwork on that record, with Fletch and Martin coming in after work with Chinese takeaways to do their stuff. No, they weren't locked in!
Was it hard to maintain a working relationship with Vince after he left DM?
Although he officially left later, Vince announced he was leaving around the time the album came out, when they'd had three hit singles, so it was very weird, and I think Depeche felt let down that Vince had left them so soon. It all happened so fast, from first working with them until the time that Vince left was less than a year.
But no, I didn't have a problem at all.
Why do you think Vince has stayed with Mute all these years?
I think he trusts us and feels that we do a good job, and that we give him what he needs to have the kind of career he wants. You should ask him, really.
Do you think that Andy has influenced Vince at all?
Definitely, yes. I think Vince is a lot more open to certain things now than he used to be, and Andy's been quite influential in that. They're amazing! They're the most weird couple in terms of musicians, because they trust each other so completely. If one of them has a strong feeling about something, a song or an idea, then they always go with whoever's got the strongest feeling. They never really argue about anything. I think it's remarkable, to work like that for years and years.
How did the Assembly project come about and then eventually not come about?
Vince was working quite closely with Eric Radcliffe who had worked on the early Depeche records and produced Yazoo at the time - he had his own studio in part of the Blackwing complex - and after Yazoo finished he felt that he didn't really want to do a conventional group with a permanent singer, so he had this idea to produce a record of his songs, working with a number of different singers.
At the time it was a really weird idea, but it has now become quite common, particularly on the dance side. But what happened with The Assembly was that after he did the Feargal track, which was a hit and happened very fast, he found that he couldn't get the singers he wanted. They were either making their own records or on tour, so they couldn't do it for seven months, or they didn't want to do it. So he got disillusioned with the idea of it, as there were so many problems in getting the thing together, and so he decided not to pursue it.
And then there was a bit of gap, with Vince figuring out what he wanted to do. He did the single with Paul Quinn, which I thought sounded all right but which didn't do very well, and then he produced a few artists on his own label [Reset Records] to give him a bit of a breathing space. And then he decided he wanted to start a band again.
So when did you first meet Andy?
I was talking to Vince quite a lot around the time of the auditions. He just said, 'I've found some bloke and I'll bring him so you can say hello to him'. And then Andy came in, an extremely tired-looking young chap.
How did you feel when Erasure's first singles weren't successful?
I think after the third single wasn't successful everyone started to get a bit nervous. We started to question everything that we did, both from a band point of a view and a record company point of view - the promotion, everything. Everything Vince had done had been successful, so it was like, 'What's going on here? What's going wrong?'.
Personally it was really bad, because Vince had brought Mute so much success and I felt very frustrated because I couldn't put my finger on what was going wrong - was it us? Was it the records, or was it just the wrong time?
I think the time was a bit weird, American Rock was very popular,things like Bruce Springsteen, and Radio 1 wanted that kind of a sound. But Erasure got there in the end.
What was so good about that period was that instead of being downcast, Vince and Andy actually went out and played the colleges and really went for it when they played. Before, Vince had lived the life of luxury on the road because Depeche had jumped straight from the Moonlight Club to playing the Lyceum. They had never had to do the colleges and nor had Yazoo. But Vince was perfectly happy to go out in a van and and get on with it.
And then with "Sometimes" it exploded, which was extremely exciting for us. It was during a college tour that it came out. They were touring to try to get interest in the single, then as it started to get air play the gigs got fuller and fuller. By the time they were at the Mean Fiddler the single was Top Five and what was a originally going to be one night there became two nights, totally sold out.
Those two concerts were fantastic in terms of excitement, because you knew that something was about to happen. It was a turning point. I mean, I remember when they played the Marquee shortly before that tour, where they were supported by Primal Scream. The only people there were guests. I think they only sold about four tickets! I remember the first time I heard "Sometimes". I'd gone to see Vince and Flood - who was producing Erasure at Worldwide Studios. They said, 'Oh, we think we've got quite a good song' and then they were so nervous they said, 'Oh just press 'Play'. We're going off to have a pint', and left me to listen to it. It wasn't finished, it was just a rough mix, but I thought it was fantastic, an incredible song. When it was actually finished I looked at Flood and said, 'If this isn't a hit, I don't know what's going wrong'.
The next really big single was "Crackers International"...
Well, from that moment they had big hits, really. "The Circus" was good, and "The Innocents" went to Number One, but the next major jump up was when we did "Crackers International".
At the time they were playing Hammersmith Odeons and stuff like that. They'd brought out three singles off the album and done a UK tour but we felt the momentum was still building, so we wanted to take another step forward. We decided to film a TV show at the NEC in Birmingham and make it into a real party. And that's really when I got a feeling things were going to go a lot further because the NEC sold out almost immediately - they'd never played anything that size before - and then they put another one on and that sold out and then there was a third and that sold out too! And we had only put it on to make this TV show! But at that time the momentum had gathered much more than I had realised, with the TV show and "Crackers International", and in January the album went back to Number One.
At this stage Erasure were bringing out albums every year. Was it difficult to maintain the level of interest?
I think with "Wild!" they did take a different approach. They wanted it to be less obviously poppy, a bit darker and I think they achieved that to a certain extent. But less poppy doesn't mean less successful, just less 'up', really.
And of course by that time they were playing arenas, which the band don't like playing that much, because they feel they're losing contact with the audience. And then the concert at the Milton Keynes Bowl, which was incredible - to play to 70,000 people so soon after having three flops. And you get a much broader audience who go to arena shows, couples in their 30's who you would never have thought liked Erasure, which to me is great, to have such a broad section of people watching.
"Abba-esque" was Erasure's, and Mute's, first Number One single. It was originally going to be an album?
It was going to be an album, but everybody thought it would be overkill to do a whole album of Abba songs.
It had been planned for a couple of years at least, it was a question of finding a moment to do it. "Chorus" hadn't done quite as well as "The Innocents" or "Wild!" - they didn't tour with "Chorus" at the time - so things had leveled off a bit. But that phase from "Abba-esque", the "Phantasmagorical tour", and then "Pop!", was a hugely successful period for the band.
Since then Erasure haven't toured...
Bastards!
So I take it you're in favour of them touring?
Absolutely. Partly because I think they're great live, and also because, at the level Erasure are at, touring is really important - not necessarily to sell more albums, but to maintain their relationship with the fans. If you don't tour it's like being married to somebody living on the other side of the world - you talk to them on telephone but there isn't any closeness, if you see what I mean. And people really do love Erasure live. There is something extra to the live shows that isn't on the record.
I can certainly sympathise with them, because touring is extremely weird and quite grueling, mentally. You work very hard for a very short period of time every day, and then the rest of the time it is really boring, waiting around, traveling or just sitting in a room watching TV. It's fantastic for the period you're actually on stage, with all the adulation from the fans, but the rest of it is a real comedown.
Vince has never been that keen on touring - he loves being with the audience but the actual act of touring is quite hard on him. He's a 'stay at home' kind of person by nature. And so after they did their last world tour he said he wanted a break for awhile.
The singles from "I Say I Say I Say" gradually did less well...
"Always" was one of their biggest singles internationally. It was huge in America and Germany for a long, long time, but it was by far the strongest single on the album. I don't think it was an album chock-full of singles - very good songs, but not necessarily great singles - the two don't always go hand in hand. "Always", though, was a classic Erasure single. People think of them as an up-tempo band but actually all their biggest records have been mid-tempo things like "Ship Of Fools". Not ballads exactly but not bouncy pop tracks either - tracks with a strong atmosphere to them.
And so this last album, "Erasure"...
This last album didn't really do as well as we'd hoped. We took a big risk with the first single, "Stay With Me", which unfortunately didn't connect with people. Obviously now I think it was the wrong decision, but that's with hindsight. It did okay, because it was the first single from an Erasure album and inevitably that's going to do quite well, but we knew it was going to be very tricky because it was a ballad. A mistake.
And "Fingers & Thumbs"?
I think maybe the interest had gone from that project by the time that came out and although it's in theory a classic Erasure song, it didn't really perform in the way that we'd hoped.
Was it your decision to call the album Erasure?
No, it wasn't actually. They were talking about various names, but then they saw a sketch of some artwork which had just Erasure written on it, there wasn't a title, and they said, 'Oh, that's good. Let's call it that'.
Who chooses which songs are taken as singles from an album?
It's a long process. Erasure are very focused on the quality of the songs where I have to be focused on not just that, but whether it's a good single or not. I mean, sometimes we agree on what should be a single, in which case it's very simple, but usually whenever I first listen to a new album, or just the demos, it's a case of 'Now that one we're going to have an argument about' and so on. And if you ask too many people for advice you tend to get a different answer from everybody you ask, which is just going to confuse you. With the first single, nobody has heard the album, but once the album's out everyone has an opinion and says, 'Oh, why didn't you release that as the first single instead?' You just have to follow your heart and decide, really.
Who chooses which artists remix the singles?
Well, Vince hates remixes. But Andy quite likes them. And the fans quite like them. well, some of them do! There's two types of remixes - there's the remix where you choose somebody because you think they could do a great version of the song, the more artistic approach - and then there's the remixes to be played in the clubs, because they have got a big club following, and so you choose somebody who can do a good club remix.
And the choice of producer?
Very much a joint effort. Sometimes it happens almost by chance and sometimes it's a real slog to find somebody. Gareth's worked on quite a few records because he works with Andy on the vocals, but Vince tends to like to work with a different person each time. It doesn't mean anything negative about the people he's worked with in the past, he just wants a bit of a fresh approach. I mean, he could produce himself, but he prefers to have somebody to bounce ideas off and to give encouragement.
Why do some singles get released in some countries and not others?
Because each country is so different in the way that it works. For instance, the British market is very fast, so you have a single out and within three or four weeks it's over in terms of charts and radio, so you want go on with the next one pretty quickly. But in America and France, and to a certain extent Germany too, you can have a single around for six months or so. "Always" is a great example of that. It was in the German Top Fifteen and the American Top Five for months. And because it is getting so much airplay, the radio stations aren't interested if you come in with a new single - they're getting a fantastic response through their market research to the old one and don't want to take it off the radio - and so because all the countries work at different speeds, sometimes you have to miss out a single.
And then sometimes at the end of a project you may have put out three singles in the UK and feel that a fourth would be pushing it a bit, but Germany might want to put out another one. By that time it doesn't matter so much because everybody can buy the album anyway. I'm sure it's frustrating for the fans to have to buy imports - Europe has had roughly the same singles released but America is always a bit of a problem like that.
In a interview with Vince he mentioned that you had rejected a couple of songs from "Crackers International".
Yeah. But I don't reject a lot of songs. It was just because it was an EP - a very important one - and I thought the songs weren't as good as they were capable of. They may still exist on a tape somewhere, or in Vince's head, but I can assure you they weren't anywhere near as good as the ones they ended up with.
Why does it take so long from when an album is finished to when it gets released?
From the day the record's finished there are a number of things that have to be done - you have to get the artwork together, you have to decide what the first single will be and you need to get the various mixes done of that single, which can take a while waiting for the people you want. But the main reason is that we've got people all around the world who put the record out, so they all need time to listen to it and to come up with ideas on how they're going to market it. It's called 'set-up'. You want the big magazines to have reviews out at the same time the album comes out and some of these magazines have lead times of 3 months, so you want to give them time to listen to it property.
It's been suggested that Erasure could record some duets, with Alison Moyet, for instance.
If it's the right song, at the right time, with the right person. I'm not against the idea - as an artistic thing it could be nice. But I don't think it would be a good thing to do as a career move at this stage.
Are there any plans to release a b-sides compilation?
That sort of thing is always on the back burner - b-sides, or remixes, or a box set of singles. We may do something one day.
What about the sessions they did for the BBC, in particular "Heart Of Glass"?
We never did anything with that, did we? It might end up as an extra track on a CD or something along those lines.
Is there any chance of an acoustic album?
I don't think the band would be up for that. They see it more as just a nice thing to do for the fans rather than as a serious career move. They might do something, but it's not on the cards.
What do you think Erasure will be remembered for?
Obviously the songs, and their shows, and their consistency. And Andy was the first overtly gay artist to cross over into pop. I think the acceptance he got across the board was so incredible. That was a major achievement. People were saying, 'Oh, you should tone it down a bit' and he just stuck by it and said, 'No, f**k it, that's what I'm going to do.'
So, what is the current Erasure situation?
They're recording a new album, which should be out early next year. And they're thinking about touring, possibly before the album is released and hopefully afterwards as well - that's the immediate future.
Have you heard anything of the new album?
I have. It's somewhere between Nirvana and Diamanda Galas! No. I think it's sounding really good. The songs are more pop-structured. Rhythmically it's very strong, because Neil McLellan - who's worked with The Prodigy - is working on the record with Vince, and he's very good at programming rhythms. Vince has pretty much handed that side of it over to him. But that's as much as can I say about it, really.
Do you have any favourite Erasure songs?
Yeah. There's a lot, because they change all the time. The album version of "Rock Me Gently" was one of my favourites. I thought it was fantastic, one of the best things they've ever done.
What about favourite Erasure concerts?
There's so many, it's difficult to say. There's one I remember which was in Prague in 1989, about two days before the Berlin Wall came down. It was over-sold by about 2 to 1 and the security guards just let everybody in - it was jammed, people were sitting on each other's shoulders. It was a fantastic Erasure show, and the audience really responded to that, but you just felt there was something in the air at the time.
How do you feel that they've changed over the 10 years that you've known them?
I think that over that period Andy's changed a lot more than Vince. Obviously Vince had already been through the mill, so to speak, a couple of times and he'd already had the fame and so forth. He seems a lot more open to ideas, more relaxed - I think he is very at ease with himself now, which is a good thing.
But Andy has gone from being a 21 year old to a 30-whatever-he-is year old, and everybody goes through huge changes in that period. When he started out, he was a struggling singer, just like a million other kids who want to get into the recording industry. He's always been very quiet and shy in his personal life, as opposed to on stage, where he is very 'out there', which is typical of a lot of artists. But he hasn't turned into an impossible pop star - he was impossible before he was a pop star! He still gets up late the same as he did before. I think they're still really warm and friendly and care about what they do - you find that some bands get cynical about their fans, but they haven't at all.
What about musically?
I think the songs have got a lot more sophisticated, more complex and a lot more adventurous in their structure, not just because of the long versions on the last record, but in general. Their sound maybe hasn't developed that much, but it's more refined. Andy, as a live performer, has come on in leaps and bounds with every tour and I can't wait to see what he's going to do on the next one. They both still work very hard. When they do it they do it properly, which has never really changed from day one.
Daniel Miller, thank you.
Questions suggested by: Mike Depaz, Sarah Barlow, Gary Fottis, Johan Grant, David Power, Marek Sasura, Scott Muetter, Stephen Hendrie, Paul Tupaczewski, David Levin, Gabe Nowak, Farhan M Kazmi, Mark Drackford and Pierre Zarokian.