David Picking contributed various electronics, the mournful trumpet solo on the title track and “All The Blue Changes,” and drumming to No-Man’s 2003 album Together We’re Stranger.
How did you first hear about No-Man and where did your involvement with Together We’re Stranger come from?
I first became aware of No-Man in 1993 when a friend suggested I should check out their debut album, as he thought it had similarities to musical projects that I had been involved in. I bought the album on cassette and enjoyed it, but didn’t monitor the band closely after that.
My proper connection to No-Man came about in 2001. My friend and Gramophone bandmate Jon Cotton had become friends with Stephen Bennett through an online users’ group for Logic (audio software). I sent Stephen some of the instrumental music that I had recorded under the name Rhinoceros. The next thing I knew, I had a message on my answering machine from Tim, saying that he had heard the music and wondered if I would be interested in releasing it via Burning Shed, which was just getting started. He also mentioned that he had spontaneously written lyrics and recorded a vocal for one of the pieces, which was a surprise! (“Made See-Through,” which was later included on My Hotel Year.) An album of my Rhinoceros work, Tea Chest, was released through Burning Shed in 2001, then Tim asked if I wanted to contribute to Together We’re Stranger.
Was it unusual to be sending files back and forth without meeting face to face with Tim and Steven at all?
It seemed like an unusual way of working at the time, although of course it has since become very common. I am a fairly shy and socially anxious person (and I was much more so at that time), so it worked very well for me, as it meant that I could work on my contributions at my own pace without too much pressure. Steven sent me rough mixes of the songs, which were substantially complete. I then spent several weeks experimenting with different sounds and parts and sent back what I thought were the best ones. I had no idea what would actually be used until I heard the final album several months later. Tim has mentioned in interviews that, despite collaborating on a number of different recordings, he and I have never met in person or spoken on the phone, which is true. That was never really a deliberate plan on my part, but it became a sort of running joke and I was curious to see how far we could carry our working relationship on that basis. Pretty far, as it turned out!
How did you get that mournful trumpet sound on the first two tracks of the album?
Through not being able to play the instrument very well! I didn’t get much direction from Tim and Steven, but one specific exception was that Tim asked me to record some of what he called my ‘asthmatic trumpet’. I am not a trumpet player by any stretch of the imagination, but I had learned the basics on the instrument and managed to get some sort of breathy, quasi-Jon Hassell-like tones out of it which I had used in my own music. I recorded a short section in the transition between the first two songs, as that seemed to be the only place that it could fit, and thought, ‘They won’t use that,’ but… they did. The wisdom of that decision is still questionable in my opinion, but hopefully it works in context.
How much of the spacey electronics and mellotron we hear on the first four tracks is you and how much is Steven’s?
My electronic additions were all subtle, textural sounds; any chordal or melodic parts are Steven’s. The sounds that I added are most noticeable in the transition between “All the Blue Changes” and “The City in a Hundred Ways,” and at the end of “Things I Want to Tell You.“
The reissue of Together We’re Stranger included an alternate “drum-mix” of “The Break-Up for Real.” Do you remember anything on why Tim and Steven decided to go with the other, drum-less, version?
Tim indicated at the outset that because the album was going to be quite ambient and minimalistic, it probably wouldn’t call for full-on drum kit parts, but I recorded a simple part for “The Break-Up For Real” (used for the alternate mix) and also a snare drum part for “Photographs in Black and White.” I think that both were rejected because having no drums brought a certain cohesiveness to the overall flow of the album, and it would have been too jarring to break with that on only one or two songs.
Have you remained in contact with Tim and Steven in the years following the release of the album?
I never had much close contact with Steven, although he asked me to remix a Bass Communion track which was included on the Reconstructions and Recycling album; we had no great reason to remain in touch after that. Tim and I remained in more active contact and we worked together on my second Rhinoceros album and of course My Hotel Year. In more recent years, we lost touch, partly because I no longer live in the UK, and also because I have stopped making music in a professional capacity.
Reflect on your involvement with Tim’s 2004 album “My Hotel Year”
In all honesty, I look back on that album with a certain ambivalence, as I know Tim does himself. I think that it was misrepresented as a Tim solo album, which may have led people to expect something very unified in approach, whereas in reality it was a collection of diverse collaborations with several different people, without a strong connecting thread. In mixing the album, I think I did a decent job in trying to bring a cohesive sound to the material, but it ultimately betrayed its fragmented origins, and maybe that’s why some people found it unsatisfying. Still, over the years I’ve heard people praise certain songs, and it’s gratifying to know that it did have a positive impact on some listeners, even if it remains, as Tim called it, his ‘least loved album’.
Special Thanks to Neil Spragg.
All The Blue Changes 