NEON NEON - Stainless Style
****1/2
TWO musicians – one Welsh, the other American – throw their heads back and
laugh in agreement.
They decide the DeLorean DMC-12 sports coupé is more like a kitchen appliance
with wheels than a car. “It looks like a giant aluminium toaster,” says one.
“It’s pretty stunning when you see one in the flesh,” says the other. “You
can’t take your eyes away. It’s like a slightly hideous spaceship.”
Gruff Rhys, lead singer with the Super Furry Animals, and Boom Bip, noted
producer and instrumentalist, are discussing the unlikely inspiration behind
their collaborative project. As I’m connected to their Los Angeles hotel,
Bip, otherwise known as Bryan Hollon, switches his mobile to speakerphone.
They imagine I’m there in the room with them.
“We’re sitting at a round table with three chairs and the phone is in the
empty one,” says Gruff. “We’re drinking coffee and we’ve got you a cup.”
They’re in LA to play a gig that night at the Viper Room on Sunset Strip,
remembered as the celeb hangout where River Phoenix died of an overdose.
Picturing the surreal scene at the hotel, I join them in my mind and together
we head back to the Eighties, the time of cheesy power-pop, trashy
synthesizers, big lacquered hair and the DeLorean.
Wealth
As Neon Neon, Gruff and Bryan have made a concept album entirely devoted to
Detroit-born engineer and entrepreneur John DeLorean and the “dream” car he
produced near Belfast primarily for the American market. The music sounds
exactly like everything the car stood for in the early Eighties —
ostentatious wealth built on the flimsiest of foundations.
Creator ... John DeLorean
Gruff says the album has “loads of influences from the past 30 years of shiny
pop music” but lyrically it tells an “impressionistic” story of one man and
his extraordinary machine.
“His life was a good excuse to make an interesting party record. It’s a life
mirrored by the 21st Century world obsessed with celebrity culture and
product placement.”
With its elaborate gull-wing doors and distinctive stainless steel panels, the
DMC-12 became the time machine of choice for Marty McFly and Dr Emmett Brown
in Back To The Future. The ultimate cult car? Quite probably.
Bryan adds: “Every major city still seems to have one. Even as a kid, I
remember seeing that one random DeLorean outside a barber’s shop in Dayton,
Ohio. I was just fascinated by them.” Only 9,000 were produced in the car’s
short lifetime between early 1981 and late 1982 but the legend carries on in
the shape of the 6,000 still in existence and this album, fittingly and
brilliantly called Stainless Style.
The 11 songs of pumping electro pop draw on the fact there was a lot more to
the John DeLorean story than the car:
The production line was in Northern Ireland in the midst of the
troubles involving the IRA and the British Government.
The rise of the 2,000-strong DeLorean workforce was followed by its
equally quick demise when the struggling plant went into receivership and
was closed by the powers that be in London.
Towards the end of the company’s existence, John found himself on
drug-trafficking charges as part of an FBI sting but was eventually
acquitted when the courts decided he was a victim of entrapment.
One song is actually called Belfast, and Gruff says: “A lot of bad sounds
about the troubles were written in the Eighties, often by people who had
never been to Belfast. This was a chance to try out something without
needing to police it.
“There’s a lot of mystery surrounding the DeLorean factory and its demise and
this song brings it closer to home.”
By the time the first Back To The Future film arrived in 1985, the DMC-12 had
long since ceased production but its starring role was a typical stunt by
flamboyant DeLorean.
“It’s no accident that the car was in Back To The Future,” says Gruff. “Songs
had been written about his previous cars (he forged his career at Pontiac
and Chevrolet). The DeLorean factory might have gone but he was still
getting his cars to become icons.”
To trace the Neon Neon story, we only have to go back as far as 2003 when Boom
Bip supported the Super Furries on their Rings Around The World tour. Bryan
says: “I was doing a laptop set and just took along a visual artist doing
projections.
“Because there were only two of us, we were able to travel with the Super
Furries on their tour bus. We could hang out every night after the show,
travel to different cities together and play each other music. We really got
to know all the guys.”
Famous appearance ... Back To The Future
Then the Super Furries employed the services of Boom Bip on Father Father for
their remix album Phantom Phorce (2004), before Gruff repaid the favour with
vocal contributions to Bip’s Blue Eyed In The Red Room.
Gruff takes up the story: “Eventually we discussed recording a whole record
together, and the idea was to make something completely different to
anything we’d ever done. I was so excited.
“The initial demos Bryan played me were very glossy and streamlined. Then we
were in this house in London belonging to Will from the Lex label to do some
recording. He had loads of books about shiny cars. They were pretty varied
but one had a picture of a DeLorean so we decided to write a song about it.
Then I started looking into John DeLorean’s life. It was so colourful.
“The lyrics started flowing because there were so many chapters to his life.
“I just couldn’t stop writing songs about John DeLorean. That confirmed the
musical direction.”
Bryan adds: “Once the lyrics started taking form and being laid over the
tracks, it took the music in a whole different direction and really gave us
focus. The lyrics became inspiring to the music.”
While Gruff believes the music isn’t specific to a particular era, he accepts
that “we were definitely listening to a lot of power pop from the Eighties,
from the dawn of the video age. Buggles and a lot of Prince.”
They also cite Cliff Richard’s Wired For Sound and teen pop starlets Debbie
Gibson and Tiffany.
And as Stainless Style developed, the pair invited all sorts of guests to make
contributions, from Strokes drummer Fabrizio Moretti, Har Mar Superstar and
The Magic Numbers to hip-hop’s Yo Majesty, Spank Rock and Fatlip. The single
I Lust U is a dancefloor banger featuring the sexy, honeyed vocals of Welsh
singer Cate Le Bon.
Excited
“Once we had that initial recording, there were great moments, perfect moments
for guests to be involved,” says Bryan.
“Everybody was really excited about the concept. We simply told them we were
doing the story of DeLorean.
“With the Yo Majesty collaboration, Gruff wanted to do a song about working
factory conditions — Sweat Shop. He came up with a hook, a kind of chant and
we had this real grimy beat. We sent it off to them and they conceptualised
the lyrics. We gave them a little nugget and they took it and ran with it in
their own direction.”
Gruff adds: “It was so exciting working with people making different
additions. Everything seemed to come from a slightly different musical
place. The result was unique.”
Listening to the album, it’s clear this cacophony of metallic synths and beats
and soaring melodies matched to inspired lyrics makes for one of the most
interesting albums of 2008.
“Obviously, we’ve got loads of other projects but this was a hell of a lot of
fun,” says Gruff. “We’ve set a precedent now.”
It’s such a shame John DeLorean died in 2005. If there’s one person who’d
approve of the glossy, tacky, brilliant Neon Neon, it’s him.
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