I wanted to ask you about "Le Matin Des Noire." It seems to be very loop-based.

Barry: Yes it is. I took a loop from an Archie Shepp tune. [Laughs] It's funny. I took a loop from an Archie Shepp record and I got very heavily spanked by Archie Shepp for it. Which is why it is called "Le Matin Des Noire" and he's got a record called Le Matin Des Noire. The track was called "J'aime Paris" before. I took this loop because I wanted to hypnotize the listener as you arrive after "Twisted Smile" on Nothing Hill. I wanted to run away from there quickly and go to Paris -- to go further into Nothing Hill if you like. So I took this loop and ran it over and over and did all this stuff around it. The thing about Paris -- for someone in Britian -- is this whole other world of glamour that you just don't experience here in sort of oppressed England. I probably understand the way of the French more than some of the people that I walk past on the street there, and so I became this weird sort of existential voyeur, this invisible man. This has happened to me a few times in Paris and I wanted to document that.

Archie turns around to me and says, "Hey, what the fuck? Don't fuck with my music. I want everything. I want all the money and you've got to call it by my song title." I thought, "Wow. That's amazing." I was shocked. But it's also brilliant because everything has been taken away from me and I'm invisible as the writer with barely any creative input at all. That's a mind-blower because it was exactly the kind of emotion I was trying to create.

So, yeah, to answer the question simply: it is loop-based. But I feel that story is important.

You also recently did a collaboration with Pan Sonic. Is there an interest in more electronic based stuff?

Barry: Well, I've always sort of liked it. I've always had an ear out for that sort of thing. I guess because the computer is such a part of the world now -- for me -- that is where I got my start in it. Pan Sonic is one of those bands that come along and I think, "This is amazing." It is so different, so far away from what I would do that the idea of combining what I've done and what they do was something that I couldnt' really resist.

Are you looking to do more of this sort of thing?

Barry: I don't know. If they come up. I was looking for a B-side for the next single and I found this piece that I did one afternoon that was totally electronic. And it really stirred me again to hear that sort of thing. It is a part of who I am. Moss Side Story was written on an electronic keyboard. That was all I had. I made a kind of soul connection with that instrument. I kind of like that there is a weird disassociation/connection thing that goes on with electronic instruments -- which I can't for the life of me fathom out and maybe it has something to do with the way that I see things -- people can relate to electronic music. It does something; it takes you off on this trip.

It seems to be more mathematically-based. I read more and more about people who are doing laptop-based work who have no experience or background in musical theory. And I wonder, "But how?"

Barry: Yeah, they're operating from someplace else altogether. I've picked up some CDs from kids who are like 19 and are totally untrained, and they are using this equipment and are coming up with this strange stuff. It's an expression of... Well, it's the same thing I'm doing really. They're untrained -- well, I'm untrained, too -- but the fact that you can just turn on some machine and start creating is really exciting.

Is music then just another form of expression that doesn't require language?

Barry: That's deep. Ah, I think we put a language to it to understand it. To communicate. I think that is why a cello has a different color than, say, a violin. Which is different from the bass or the viola. Completely different. I guess they become a language then. To bring back my orientation, that's why it is picturesque. The ideas of cinema, if you like, are easy to express in music because they're about emotion. For me, that's where the communication is. The soul.

So, here's the kicker. You've now added vocals to your work. Does that detract or...well, that's a silly statement...

Barry: [Laughs] Both.

Okay, okay. [Laughs]

Barry: No, I know what you're saying. I can violate the expectation by saying something. And I can have a direct communication as well, obviously by the spoken word. I'm just introducing it to do both really, to both offset and be direct.

It was very strange the way things came about. Unlike the usual way in which a melody would come to me, a line would jump into my head. I'd write that line down, thinking that it was going to be for some book or something. It started with, I think, "Through myself, I don't see me." I couldn't resist it. Through myself, something is telling me to open my mouth. [Laughs] It was a bit like that.

On the cover of my edition of Moss Side Story, there is a quote which reads: "In a black and white world, murder adds a little bit of color." That seems to still be percolating through your work.

Barry: Exactly. It's funny. It's interesting to find something like that at the very beginning because I think that is so metaphoric of the whole body of work. I would put that on a Greatest Hits Ever record. [Laughs] It pretty much runs concurrent with the whole work.

Is it emblematic of a discussion about moving away from the rigidity of a black and white world? That sin and salvation come from the extremes? Are we -- as listeners, as a society -- are we ready for a world of color?

Barry: Those are the sort of moments to go for. I'm subverting the idea that it is murder, that it will bring that about. It's not. It's the sweetness as well. We have to find something -- everyday -- that is going to give us hope for the next day. If you find that by escaping with one of my albums for an hour, that's fine. If you go away and think, "Yeah, I'll sit down and do that novel I've been dreaming about," or, "I've been distracted from the harsher realities of the world and I think I'll go play soccer with the kids," then fine. I think I actually play a part in that by examining myself, by putting myself in there. I think that someone could get something from that; they could get some cold comfort, if you like, from that.

I was watching that show Six Feet Under last night and there was this part where the girl in the family was talking about where she was going to head in her life. All these really bleak options came up, and I was thinking, "God, when you look at it that way, that's the truth." Where do you find the reason to exist? Where is the sweetness? I think it is great that the character that they've chosen is the Hope of Youth squashed. I'm interested to see where that goes because then maybe we can find something in our own lives -- "Oh, it's not all that bad" -- and carry on.

Are you familiar with Colin Wilson's work? The Outsider specifically.

Barry: Yes. Yes, I am.

I had a huge quote that I wanted to share with you, but with this connection, most of it would probably get lost. You may know it already.

Barry: I've probably forgotten all of it. I have on it my book shelf. I read it when I was 16 or something.

Yeah, it's been out for a while. He purports the idea that it is a dark world and the writer -- the artist -- is the one who stands outside and says, "Your options are to be devoured by the darkness, or to find the light."

Barry: That is the exact truth. I caught myself in a mood yesterday, thinking, "Have I chosen this mood or has this mood chosen me?" Because if it has chosen me, then I am fucked. If I'm choosing it, then maybe I can make another choice. It is exactly that thing. That's what I'm talking about. That's Nothing Hill. Right there. Boom. It's okay. It's where life begins.

The sleeve notes on the record are sort of a manifesto from the King and I say, "Don't weep about this because this is where the light begins."

Is that what "Cold Comfort" [the last track on the record] is then?

Barry: Oh, yeah. It will devour you. But it's alright. We've got direction. We've got stuff going on. The end is a really strange sort of ascension, ah, decension. [Laughs] It's weird. I feel like it is a downward uplift. It'll be interesting to see where it goes in the next tale, the next "Adventures of..."

Is this record part two of a trilogy of records?

Barry: Well, it is interesting because it could be. People say that to me and I have become very offended. "No, it's just a trilogy because of Moss Side and Soul Murder and Oedipus. There's no trilogy! What are you talking about?"

And then I started thinking about it and realized, fuck, it just might be. With As Above, So Below, I really drove the car into the wall and this album walks away from the wreckage. So, I don't know what the next one is going to be like. Maybe it is.

Things seem to fall comfortably into that type of triptych.

Barry: What is that about? Have you any idea?

It seems like it begins with this sense of discovery. You've ripped the veils from the world and seen it the way it truly is. And then there is that sense of, "Okay, now I'm in it." And the final sense of you and it going forward. Together. It's William Blake, actually. "Songs of Innocence and Experience."

Barry: Wow. That's really quite poignant and personal. I can see that. Quite clearly actually. To be honest with you, I've started writing the new record -- this one has been in the dock for awhile -- and I've about half of the new album and it is so full of light. Still quite me. [Laughs] But it is so filled with light in the coolest, most celebratory way that I've ever been. Not in a sort of flowers and hearts way, you know what I mean? The tempo is just the right tempo that really gets me moving. It is like finding something finally. Maybe there is something in that.

On the web:
Barry Adamson (official site)