Bobby Conn

I need to challenge myself and the listener.

“I basically wanted to kill myself on record, you know,” explains Conn, on the eve of the release of his career defining work to date. ‘A King For A Day’ is Conn’s first real accessible record, taking all the great elements of his legacy and integrating them into what sounds like an opus unauthorised anthology. At 40, Conn is very much at the top of his game; here he takes time to talk to Clash about the issues which inform this mini epic.

During the late 80s and early 90s the ideology of Bobby Conn was born; heralding from Chicago, his vision was simple: take a beat, a bass line and take on the world. His music today is much more complex and faceted, there are so many layers to it. It’s dense as it is banal, it’s nihilistic as it is impassioned and more importantly it’s got soul. For Conn the mission on this record was the annihilation of his ego, the death of the self and the transcendence of the spirit through music. Historically we can use this record as a pointer, a bookmark to which Conn self imploded and was reborn. Conn describes his music as resembling the qualities of Plutonium: “It’s incredibly dense and poisonous,” so in its very nature it’s destructive as it is redemptive.

The opening track ‘Vanitas’ reworks the notion that the achievements of man are insignificant in comparison to the creations of God, in a literal sense; Conn is highlighting the irony of life and the downright stupidity of celebrity-obsessed culture. “If the belief exists that none of our works stand in line with those of God, you can assume that nothing will be remembered from the past or the future.” So why then, you would ask, does he bother? What’s the point if nothing will be remembered? “Because people like me are always trying to figure out what individuals are thinking and why they are thinking it.” We have to try and understand our surroundings and make best use of them, is Conn’s rationale.

“To me I find it fascinating to watch the likes of Donald Trump; I am both intrigued and horrified. His puffy face radiates corruption and disease, but he is upheld as this avatar of success and wealth, how can you trust a man like that? Just as Donald Trump is a symbol of success, Paris Hilton is a great symbol of decadence. One Night In Paris is really hard to watch; she’s not a very sexual person, you can objectify her body but it’s far from the reality.” There are a great many people who celebrate these falsehoods and it’s this that leads Conn to challenge the ideals and demi-gods of today through his music. He still however has a great deal of respect for their drive and belief system.

“Paris Hilton has the quality which is required to be a star; she has incredible balls, she’s fearless and aggressive, she puts herself in these positions which 99% of the population would consider humiliating and do it with such confidence, she becomes notorious and a star. That’s a rare quality and that’s why she’s successful. Anyone can take their clothes off and fuck in public, not everyone can do it and position themselves so that it is going to reward them. The same applies to Britney Spears; some people claim she should not be a star but not everyone can stand in front of 80,000 people and look like they are suppose to be there. The fact of whether she can sing or not is irrelevant, star quality has nothing to do with talent.”

Bobby’s a rare breed of person, a real sonic crusader with a social conscience. No way is he a hippy; age and children have grounded his belief system. He’s much more focused than he was in his early days and this shines through in the music. The most important discovery he’s made is that you can lead two alternative realities no matter how surreal they seem. “Having children has really given me a lot more perspective. Life is not all about me anymore; ‘King For A Day’ is about how on Saturday night I can be in Manchester getting my toes sucked by over zealous fans and on Monday morning I am back at my day job of making my family work, but it just seems absurd that the two realities can exist; I can’t even believe it myself.”

It’s hard for me to sustain one idea for 3 minutes. I need to challenge myself and the listener.

As much as this is the most accessible album he has produced in his career it’s also his most musically diverse. The ambivalent nature of the record is part requirement of the cultural shift of recent times, spurred on by the arrival of MP3 players, YouTube and MySpace, then gradually nobody wants to listen to one genre of music. He explains: “I have moved way from the simplicity of the beat and the bassline. It’s hard for me to sustain one idea for 3 minutes. I need to challenge myself and the listener; if they can’t handle an 8-minute assault at the beginning of the record they should turn it off right away. In the future I am going to move further away from where I started musically; my vision is to make a bunch of disco records, then make a record conceived like a symphony, where there is a harmonic progression throughout the whole piece, like a symphony with 3 movements. I want to see how far away from the traditional song format I can get without making a boring prog record.”

The album’s heart and soul lies when Bobby connects the fantasy with what keeps him motivated in life. “‘Love Won’t Let Me Down’ is about how I deal with the audience. When I perform I take my glasses off so the audience appears as a series of shapes, colours and blurs. It is also about being away from home and there actually being a sense that there is a life waiting for me at the end of the road, so even though we are on a journey I already know the ultimate destination. We are on tour getting in these obscure situations with strangers but knowing that there is this grounding entity at the end makes it all the more rewarding. Before a comfort zone existed I was not very focused on getting things done, I would let the fantasy take over and drift. Having children has made me come back down to earth and realise that not having a vision is sometimes better than having one.”

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