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| Interviewer: |
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Ute, you have a certain style. Why this new direction?
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Ute Lemper: |
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Well, I was always interested in exploiting new and different areas. While I love singing
the repertoire from the Weimar Republic, I'm a contemporary person in all senses and spirit, in
political awareness and awakeness. So it's obviously one of my wishes also to perform something
contemporary. This is not the first experiment though. I've done a few various marginal pop
experiences in the French area and a beautiful collaboration with Roscoe. But this is something
wonderful.
David Sefton put together this project of having various contemporary composers and artists write songs for me. Most of them reacted really positively and immediately sent over a few. There are three songs from The Divine Comedy, a contemporary cabaret group, which really puts the cabaret universe in a pop concept. And the wonderful Neil Hannon, I love his voice and his interpretations. Then we have Elvis Costello who, even though he's a cult pop figure, is very much a crossover artist too. It was a great honour that he wrote three songs for this album. Then we have Tom Waits. He's the icon; I love everything he's done. The wicked and wild stuff, and the completely out of reality stuff. There's also the end-of-the-world cabaret stuff, where it all falls apart. It's just beautiful, and very theatrical. The Nick Cave song, Little
Water Song, is one of the most beautiful, and it's so incredible.
We recorded it with the whole string section. This woman is drowned by
her lover, and her head is put under the water and she sees him up there
full of anger, drowning her. These are the last thoughts and images going
through her mind. She observes the situation, but full of sensefulness,
beauty and serenity. It's really a most incredible surrealistic song.
I love it. And I love Nick Cave. He does what he wants and does not compromise.
There's a big personality and spirit behind all that work. |
| Int: | |
And Philip Glass?
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| Ute: | |
The Philip Glass
song Streets Of Berlin is actually not really directly written for
me. He had written it for the movie Bent and Mick Jagger sang it as a cover
A song, with only a piano. We've made a beautiful arrangement out of it.
It's very neo-classic, it's like Bladerunner - a very scary atmosphere,
a drum and a loop going on. And it's like say, Berlin in 2030 or maybe in
1946 immediately after the destruction of everything. Or maybe 1919 when
it was destroyed by the First World War. It has this really lost, anonymous
spirit. I love that he wrote the song. I mean, Berlin is a very special
place for me; it is my favourite city in Germany, maybe in all of Europe,
or even the world, because it's been so marked by history. It's a nice thing
to have a song written by Philip Glass on Berlin.
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| Int: | |
Can you talk about the duet you sing with Neil Hannon?
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| Ute: | |
Well, we have
two duets on this album. One is written by Joby Talbot of The Divine Comedy,
and sung by Neil Hannon. It's called Split and is about two people
fighting, breaking up. The text for this song is not very deep but it's
a great, groovy song. It was just so much fun recording and singing it.
The other song is one by Kurt Weill. We chose it from The Threepenny
Opera, called the Tango Ballad. It is a duet, and it is most
beautiful. We put it in a very contemporary musical concept. Like a lot
of the other songs of the album, it's a very "Bladerunner" universe, you
know a little bit out of time, out of concept. It's fun to sing a Kurt Weill
song in a completely different context. I've never done this; I've stayed
so faithful to the material and its authenticity. Either I do it in a completely
theatrical way with piano, just in recitals, or with the original arrangements.
So this is the first time I'm going out of this concept, and it seems very
natural to me.
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| Int: | |
Can you talk about Punishing Kiss?
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| Ute: | |
Well Punishing
Kiss is a very interesting song. There's basically two parts, there
are two songs in one. It's a very ironic song. It's sung by the woman watching
the television, and she's completely helpless, doing the channel hopping.
She's engrossed in the whole artificial, decadent world with neurotic and
sick values. And she's having strange ideas about this, and these perceptions.
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| Int: | |
Scott Walker?
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| Ute: | |
Well, Scott Walker
wrote one called Scope J. It's like a mini-opera. It's very hard
to speak about because it's such a conceptual piece of work. It includes
everything – noises, silence and a storyline. It's very surrealistic,
the poetry is very fragmented so you have to take it in and make your own
impression out of it. He's such a completely non-compromised artist, who
really only does what he wants to do, and has this very dense perception
of whatever message he wants to put out, and whatever story he wants to
tell.
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| Int: | |
What is it like working with Jon Jacobs?
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| Ute: | |
Jon Jacobs is producing the album. He's usually the producer of all The
Divine Comedy albums, at least the last four, I think. So he's very used
to working with this team. He's really super-cool and it's a great change
for him, and for the band also to do something different. We've all had
enormous fun, and I love the musicians. |
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