Emmer creates complex sugar cakes
"I want a new, adventurous color palette. I create complex sugar cakes. I stack. Phil Spector's 'The Wall of Sound,' too, was more than just many layers. The sound possessed detail. You hear that too little these days."
Musician/composer Stephen Emmer has a new album. With the collaboration of guest vocalists and star producer Tony Visconti, he pays tribute to pop crooners. Stephen Emmer (56) has been active in the music world for a long time. He does not often step into the spotlight. Yet, for years, you have probably been confronted with his work on a daily basis.
TV Tunes
He composes for films, documentaries, commercials, and theme songs for programs such as RTL Boulevard and RTL Nieuws. In the nineties, he did this for many NOS programs, including the news. His surname reveals that he is indeed the son of former news anchor Fred Emmer, but his mother, Roekie Aronds, a dancer with the Scapino Ballet, played a larger role in his musical life. “My parents divorced when I was four years old. Through my mother, I ended up in India, Aruba, and Suriname, and she introduced me to a lot of exotic music. She had a ‘weird’ record collection for her dance lessons. In 1959, Donald Jones sang a famous song for my mother when she had a guest role in Annie M.G. Schmidt’s TV series Pension Hommeles: ‘I would most like to put you in a little box.’”
Minny Pops
After a classical education, Stephen Emmer began playing a mix of pop and free jazz in the mid-seventies, together with Mathilde Santing, among others. His work as guitarist for the cult band Minny Pops from 1979 is better known. “We were experimenting with electronics and drum machines very early on and flirting with England. We received an invitation to come and record there with producer Martin Hannett, known for his productions with Joy Division. My song Dolphin’s Spurt was included in that. At the time, we supported Joy Division a few times, in England, but also at De Effenaar in Eindhoven.” Stephen Emmer then became a journalist for a while. He was a co-founder of the magazine Vinyl and had a radio program on VPRO. By now, he has been involved in applied music for many years. Every now and then, however, he releases special music of his own.
This was the case for the first time in 1982 with Vogue Estate, an album featuring cinematic music and vocal contributions from Billy Mackenzie (The Associates) and Martha Ladly (Martha & The Muffins). Recitement, an album of spoken word, followed in 2007. There are contributions from literary works and historical sound recordings, originating from or recited by writers, actors, and artists such as Lou Reed, Richard Burton, Remco Campert, Hugo Claus, and Sylvia Kristel.
Tony Visconti
His third album, International Blue, was released in July 2014. Emmer once again wrote, played, and arranged all the music; production was handled by producer Tony Visconti. The latter has an enormous track record. He has worked with The Moody Blues, T. Rex, and Morrissey, among others, but his most important work consists of accompanying and producing David Bowie, from 1969 to the present day. Emmer: “When I was working on Recitement, I received an email from America: ‘My client thinks you are on a special track.’ I asked who that client was. It turned out to be Tony Visconti. I replied that, unfortunately, I could not afford him. The response to that was that Mr. Visconti had long since left this business because of the money. He wanted to do it for free; that is how special he found my project.” For International Blue, Emmer contacted him himself to make use of his knowledge of pop history.
“You can just ask him how he played those bass lines on Bowie’s Heroes or that mellotron on The Moody Blues. Visconti was happy to collaborate again, because by now he considers me part of his family. Production was done at his place in New York and at Abbey Road Studios in London, where the album’s press presentation also took place on June 10 in Studio 2, which became so famous thanks to The Beatles.”
International Blue
On International Blue, the crooners are Glenn Gregory (Heaven 17), Midge Ure (Ultravox), Neil Crossley (Furlined), and Liam McKahey (Cousteau). “Before the age of computers and voice modifiers, singers had to do it all themselves. That produced a lot of beautiful things. My album is a tribute to the epic pop music of Burt Bacharach, Scott Walker, David Bowie, and a few others. With contemporary singers who were allowed to write their own lyrics, because that makes the experience greater. At most, they would occasionally ask what images I had in mind for the music. Sometimes I would give them a few keywords. The singers all sound amazing, without that muffled braying you often hear these days; that is a kind of vocal acrobatics in which one sings alternately with the normal voice and the head voice. In mainstream pop, that has become a format. Coldplay started it, and everyone imitates it.”
Emmer’s music evokes the atmosphere of yesteryear, yet the album was created using the most modern studio techniques, sounds, and beats. “I have made a contemporary interpretation of that music, mainly from the sixties. The Last Shadow Puppets did that on their debut as well; they indulged in pure nostalgia. With them, it was exactly like back then. I never want to copy something word for word, because then it has no added value for me. That is why I am not such a fan of The Dap-Kings. Very good musicians, but it sounds exactly like Otis Redding, because they want to capture it with that same old tape recorder. I want a new, adventurous color palette. I create complex sugar cakes. I stack. Phil Spector’s The Wall of Sound was also more than just many layers. The sound possessed detail. You hear that too little these days. A lot of music on the radio is bland; where has that expression ‘It’s in the details’ actually gone? It did indeed take me a long time to make this album. I didn’t mind spending an hour more or less. As a reaction to the straitjacket imposed by clients and the frantic rush of deadlines.”
[Soundz - Willem Jongeneelen]