Changing face of Mann, continued.

Hold on a minute. Mustn't let him wriggle out of it. But surely you've seen yourself change?

"I've seen it, but it doesn't mean that I have the capacity to draw the right conclusions from it. I don't know what conclusions are to be drawn that paved the way for what's happening now. I suppose it must have done if it came before this, but I'm not sure I could answer your question as if I knew the answer. I think about what tape we are going to use on stage, when the lights are going to flash, that's the sort of thing I'm concerned with all the time."

My God, he did get out of it. Right, let's try it another way round. Supposing you found yourself a top pop group again with singles in the charts and the image of the band becoming as important as the music you were playing?

"It could only happen if we made it happen. I don't think it could happen without our active co-operation."

But you might start selling an awful lot of records without doing anything about it.

"We could start selling records but we need not for example keep putting out commercial accessible singles following it."

Pause. I'm going to try keeping quiet and see if he explains himself further. Ah, he's shifting in his seat.

"I would seek to have the band be very successful. If you make music then you want it to reach a great many people but it really depends what the music is that's reaching all those people. That's the key. Hopefully if it's an album then there's no big problem but if it simply revolves around the fact that all people remember you for is the single then I wouldn't like that."

Ha, it worked. Now we're getting somewhere. Quick, on with it. You're just about to go out on tour and presumably the fact that you have a single in the charts will draw more people to your gigs.

"I'm a bit worried about that actually. I'm worried that some of the audience won't be into the band; they'll just be aware of one song rather than us as a group." "But it's not really that kind of single is it", says Chris who has been taking a quiet but intelligent interest in the proceedings so far.

"No, but you'd be surprised," says Manfred. "Around the time 'Joybringer' was in the charts in '73 we suddenly found kids screaming at us again. It only happened at a few gigs but it was enough to make my blood run cold. It was like hearing a wolf cry in the middle of the night and not having a fire."

By which we can take it that we are unlikely to see Manfred guesting on stage with the bay City Rollers. But if you don't want people to come and see you purely on the strength of the single, how are you going to break through to new people?

"You can get a wider audience by producing an album, a single and a new album. people like the single so they buy the album to give it a listen. That's how you get a wider audience."

But that's a longer process isn't it?

"I think it's actually a quicker process because you can't be everywhere at once but the album can be."

Pause. Let's see if the same trick works again.

Manfred turns to Chris: "Chris, what you're watching is a journalistic pause. If the journalist pauses carefully enough, the guy he is interviewing always goes on and in those moments he finally gives himself away. That's right isn't it?" he says turning back to me.

Rumbled. Gasp. That'll teach me to try the same trick twice. Better see if we can salvage anything from this. Er… Why, is there something you don't want to give away then?

"Ah. e have the intellectual journalist here do we?" he laughs. Collapse of stout journalist. "It's just that I was pointing out to Chris what you tend to do. Of course there is nothing to give away."

And even if there was I'm not going to find it out now. Game to intelligent rock star who was doing interviews when I was still trying to puzzle out why cycling home after necking parties used to hurt so much. Oh well, better scratch around and see if there's any consolation crumbs lying around. Um, er, you tend to keep a fairly low profile Manfred, don't you?

"I keep a low profile because it's only intelligent for me to do so. I'd look ludicrous dropping my Y-fronts on stage. If it didn't I probably would. I'm not going to be the person I'm not but if I see someone else doing it and they carry it off with style I'm not really averse to them doing that. I don't take the view that it's not music. I mean, we try to use lights and tapes intelligently. I've no animosity towards people who use theatrics. Even the people who stand brooding in a corner are using a kind of reverse theatrics. The moment you come onto the stage you are in showbusiness."

So where do you draw the line?

"What's comfortable to you and what you really do well. The idea is to be good on stage. We aren't playing the album, we are trying to do a set that will get through and present it so that people will sit up and take notice."

Attendant publicist is now looking at his watch and shuffling his feet. Time for just one more question. Might as well go out with a bang. Manfred, you don't like looking back do you?

"No, I don't. I don't think the audience is interested in looking back. I'm certainly not interested in looking back. I'm just interested in what we are doing now. It's not really a principle. It's just that I get fed up with people who just come up and start talking about the mid-Sixties. Asking me why Paul Jones left the band and so forth. I don't mind some valid comparisons being made between then and now but some people want to talk about nothing else. At least we've chatted about what we are doing and the album."

Thanks you Manfred. handshakes all round and I'm ushered out by the publicist. It was an enjoyable interview but a bit harder than I'd envisaged.

Publicist tries to steer out the back way. No chance. We go out the front way and there is an eminent scribe from a rival paper waiting his turn.

We exchange pleasantries. He asks me how it went. Fine I answer. As he gets up to retrace my steps to the conference room I say: "For Christ's sake don't start talking about the past. he'll clam up. Just be on your guard, that's all."

He smiles.

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