An Interview With Ringo (1975)

 

Ringo at the Tommy premiere

An Interview With Ringo

New Musical Express

April 12, 1975

    Ringo was wearing a full-length fur coat. His hair distinguished by greying at the temples. He sits down with brandy and bitter lemon. The matter in hand is the new David Hentschel album from Ring O Records. Startling music turns out to be a freeish representation of Ringo's own Ringo album, from individual tracks to cover.

     "I was thinking of starting a label, and we thought it would be good if he did something for the label, and we thought it would be good if he copied the Ringo album. I mean, he really wanted to do a symphony, but I forced him into it. 

    "Oh yeah, it's gonna be a good company. We're talking to several people at the moment. I mean, lots of people have sent in tapes. Now, George has these really crazy freaks coming in for his label. 'Hey, man, I've just written this new mantra,' but we just get the rock-and-roll people.

     "I don't know whether I'll put myself on the label right now. I can't cause I'm with EMI, but that finishes next year. After that, we'll see if it's a good idea."

 But what of Apple?

     "Well, we still have a couple of buildings. We don't have any artists or anything, cause we are trying to split ourselves up. Apple can't end as such because it will have all the Beatle product. 

    "It's very hard. You sign a piece of paper in two minutes, and it takes you seven years to get out of it. We've got 27 lawyers in L.A. at the moment trying to dissolve our partnership. I'd like the world to be on a shake of the hand.

     "Certainly, if any artists get pissed off, they'll be able to leave my company. With Brian, it was fine. I'd have signed a toilet roll for him."

     Ringo's career is remarkably buoyant at the moment. He admits that after the initial dissolution of the Beatles, he spent a year sitting in his garden wondering what to do.

    But now he has a number one in the U.S. with the "No No Song", which may not be released over here. "We don't think they'll play it over here. I asked at Capital, and they said 'no', and I don't think the BBC would play it. I've never heard it on the radio, and it's on the album, so they could have played it if they wanted to. It's interesting because last year in America we checked out all the stations, and they said they wouldn't play it there either. So we put out "Snookeroo" as the A side, but everyone played the "No No song", which freaked us all out. I mean, there's been no problem at all. Anyway, it's an anti-drug song. You know me. I'm so nice."

     Which is absolutely correct. Meanwhile, his next project is putting together his next album, which he'll regard as his third. (on the basis that Ringo was his first, and both Sentimental Journey and Beaucoups of  Blues were special assignments, effectively prenatal as far as his solo career is concerned.)

     "I don't know whether the third album will be with Richard Perry. Maybe he's busy. Maybe I'm busy. We haven't talked about it. I'm just going back to L.A. next week to try to get some things together for it. Also, Bobby Keyes-he's an old friend of everybody's-and I are going into the studio when I get back to see if we can get anything from it. If it comes off, he'll be on my label. I keep promising myself to do another country album, but I don't seem to have the time.  By the time I've done a pop album, it's the end of the year and time to start again. I'm supposed to be doing a TV show. Graham Chapman has just written me a script. Originally, it was intended to push the Goodnight Vienna album, but it's a bit late for that, so it will now be a different show based on the cover of the album and featuring tracks from it. It's a Python-ish type thing, and go and see Holy Grail. It's really great."

     Ringo also confirms that there are plans for him to make a film with Burt Reynolds, although a shooting schedule has not yet been arranged. He will play the part of Reynolds' dumb servant, and he's still designing furniture with Robin Cruikshank. "We do mirrors as well, and we have the franchise on the Disney characters. That all goes tumbling along. It goes on without me. We design things together, and then Robin runs all the business side."

     "Then Keith Moon and I are trying to get a movie together. Have you heard Moon's album? Some of it's very good, especially the bits I'm on. That never looks very good in print. Anyway, it was a disaster at first, and he knows it, and I know it. But then he got it together. There's a couple of really good tracks. "Solid Gold" should be the single, and he does that old one of ours. "There are places I remember.." 'In My Life." That's it. He's like the new Rex Harrison on that because he semi-talks it."

     Mention of Moon leads to inevitable discussion about Ringo's most recent public appearance, which was at the premiere of Tommy. Me, I'm just waiting for a member of the public to summon Ken Russell for audio/visual assault and battery. But what did our Ringo think of it? "I thought it was amazing. I was stunned, shattered. It was so good. It just blew my brains out. What little I have left. The only thing is, it's ironic because you see it and then you go to a party and get pissed. My reading of the film is that it's about getting yourself together, and lying on the floor in some hotel isn't getting yourself together. The point is that cinema's only just catching up on sound, and it's through rock movies. They had quadraphonic, and now we've got fumfaphonic or whatever. I keep trying to find the fifth speaker. Is it in the ceiling? (In fact, it's placed behind the screen.) It really heightens the movie if you have great sound. But of course, when it gets to Bradford, they're still going to show it just the same. But they'll put it through a teeny speaker."

     Ringo explains that he lives seven months in England, during which time he can see his kids, and five months in L.A. where most of the friends are, as well as the people he likes working and recording with. Yes, he says he is getting divorced, "Just like everyone else, but because it's me, it's some big scene."

     What sort of music is Ringo himself listening to? "Well, there's Harry Nilsson's new album, of course, and Eric's new album has a few fine tracks on it. I listen to a lot of country music and a lot of rock/ pop music. I like Mud. I think they're really a tight little band. Rock and Roll, I think, is a great album, but I'm prejudiced with John anyway, 'cause I like most things he does. The only one I didn't like was Sometime in New York City. I really do think that Walls and Bridges is the finest album in the last five years by anyone.

     Ask what he feels about the contemporary pop scene, Ringo replies that "It's waffling, with no sense of direction. Who knows what could be next? It might be an Italian tenor or something."

Interview with Ringo

Sounds Magazine

April 12, 1975

     "It's not called Ringo Records. It's called Ring O'Records. I thought we'd get a bit Irish, you see, but we had the Dubliners do an ad, and none of them sounded Irish. Five drunken Irishmen, and none of them sounded Irish. I was going to say "It's Ringo Records, and they were going to say, 'Oh no, sorry, 'tis Ring O'Records', and they just sound like they're from Cornwall, so we couldn't use it. It's so silly.

     Someone tells him that the "O" part means "son of", a fact of which he is apparently unaware. "Oh well, I didn't know that. Well, this is son of Ringo. You learn something every day. Did you know that it takes a man two and a half minutes to jump off the Eiffel Tower?" This last is a very accurate Michael Caine impersonation, which is entirely missed by the fact-finding reporter, who knows what "O" means. 'Have you tried it?' She asked. Ah well, try again, Ringo.

     A determined lady from a German pop magazine who wants to know where the record was made. "In my studio." "Yes, but where?" "It's in Ascot." "I know, but whereabouts?" She seemed to be expecting a route map of the district. "It's next to the kitchen," Ringo offers. Eventually, she gives up.

     "And Apple lives?"  "Oh yeah, the four of us. It's still ours. We're all directors of certain companies: I'm Apple Films, George's Apple Records, John is publishing. Paul resigned because he didn't agree at that time with what we were doing."

     You might also be wondering how Ringo, who's played everything from a Mexican gardener to a vicious rapist, everyone from Frank Zappa to Ringo Starr, came to be the Pope. "I finished that last week. It was only a week's work, but it was worth it to work with Ken Russell. I was dressed up, but I had no makeup, and he says, 'Well, you may be playing the Pope, but you look more like Rasputin.' I had this big mitre hat and this cloak and things, and I waxed me mustache. The Loony Pope. Pope Looney."

     Ringo clearly has eyes for Russell's job. "I produced a couple of films, and I don't want to do that again, but in the end, I'd like to direct, which everybody says, but it is the greatest gig. I was mainly in charge of the film about Mark Bolan, and that's why I loved it. But I was in it as well, and at the same time, I was doing Son of Dracula with Harry, which I was producing and was in. That was one of the heaviest years of my life. I'm very lucky because I'm allowed to do a lot of things. I've tried producing movies. I don't want to do that again."

     His recent lack of success seems to surprise Ringo less than it does me. Maybe he could have been a smash if he's done. 'I Can Help,' but I don't know how 'Only You' could miss with nostalgia, a lovely arrangement and a good choice of song, all going for it. I was surprised. "I thought it was such a good track. With the other one, it didn't sell because they wouldn't play it on the radio because it mentions naughty substances. But here, I couldn't sell newspapers. "Back off", and "It Don't Come Easy" did better, but I mean, America is my market. Really, it seems more open in America. It's anybody's game there. Here, they're stuck in their way with five or six groups that can do anything. Right now, it's young Scottish groups or soud music. That's the market. British loyalty lasts for as long as it lasts, there's no discrimination between a good track and a bad track, really."

     Despite its comparative failure here and success in the U.S. of late, Ringo seems determined to keep living here in the house at Ascot, where he was a Lennon's house guest for 18 months before buying it, even though he says he has to keep working to live in this country.