14-02-09 // The Story of Diamonds Fall

January 2008, Malta, Temple Studios. David Vella and me were having a Pizza somewhere at the other side of the old island... looking down to the sea... making plans, David reading his Q Magazine and me: talking to him until he is dizzy... a storm comes up... we did not plan to record a song, but, really... what else was there to do?

We drove back to Temple Studios. David showed me 2 new weird acoustic guitars called 'Dobro' and... well, that was his mistake, really: "Please, David, get a nice Microphone here, right here in the kitchen...". 30 minutes later, the fundament for the song "Valerian" was recorded. It was the only song that we ever wrote and preproduced without any Drums on it. "Any Rockdrummer would destroy the beauty"; well, "except someone like Jaki Liebezeit from Can", I joked. Well - a few months later my friend Thomas Simon from Rough Trade Germany would call Jaki and asked him to play on my album. Jaki agreed, straight away. But not as a sessiondrummer, he said: he insisted on playing on all songs. "Diamonds Fall" was born. Jan from the "Spiegel" gave it the verdict: the thing with Jaki and NOT typical Rockdrummer had worked.

© Bart E. Streefkerk

I had my doubts, here and there. Now I am 100% sure it was the right thing to do. Back to March 2008. One or 2 other songs were written in January... I forgot which ones. But I brought with me 3 rough scripts and recordings from 4 small clubshows in February 2008. "Sigh" ended up on the EP, but the other 2 rough ideas that we improvised with the band, ended up as "60's 70's 80' 90's 10" + "Fiat Topolino", now on the "Diamonds Fall" album. The first one is about the eternity and beauty of Songs, whenever they were released, they have the same roots... bla bla... the "Fiat"-one is surrealistic, weird and funny...

On the same 2 weeks-session in March suddenly a cat comes whining and crawling into the studio. The poor young cat had only one eye. Whenever she tried to get out, she would have been attacked by other cats... she needed help, was adopted by David and I called her "Minnie the 1-eyed cat". The next day I took the weird 'Dobro' acoustic guitar, strummed some nice little chords and sang "Lord have mercy with the 1-eyed". I had seen the picture, the parabel/allegory of it. Well - it's a love song - or is it not?

"Valerian", "Coppergirl", "Diamonds Fall" and "Lord..." were all from that magical January/March 2008 period. Are they Lovesongs? Or are they not? Are they written for or from the 1-Eyed? Well - whenever I try to explain the songs in an interview, I fail miserably. Those 4 songs for me are the heart of the album. They are melancholic, they ask questions in a warm, beautiful way.

Simultaniously I asked Toett, my live-Keyboarder, to pre-write songs for me; here and there I would come to Toett's studio "Der rote Salon" and listen to his composition, widen the sound with him, change the writing a bit and take it with me to find more ideas and lyrics for them. Thanks to Toett, those songs are different from the 4 above mentioned; the songs Toett and me co-wrote, are "The world has been unfaithful", the great soundtrack that "Jane Wyman" is, and the wonderful "Black Light".

Furthermore, there is a song called "The ballad of Pia and Toett", written by Pia and Toett in 2007, that I always liked but found it too commercial; that's why that's the only album track produced +mixed by Boa/Vella: I had to screw it up, make it sound a bit more warm and dirty (as you know - all the other 11 album-songs were produced +mixed by Tobi Siebert in Berlin). What else is there on the album? "The race is over" is a leftover from the days of "Boaphenia". I always loved that one, but it never seemed to "fit" on any album.

"DJ Baron Cabdriver" is about a crazy taxidriver that picked us up from Strongroom Studios, London, late 90's ; the guy had called himself DJ Baron and never wanted to bring us to our hotel in the westend. They took some weird drugs back in the late 90's...

Around June 2008, Malta, after 2 more sessions, David and me listened to the material we had recorded. We were surprised: we had 10 songs and they were all good. We felt impressed by it, went out and decided: let's ignore and fuck the business rules: we wanna write a couple of more songs and then release it as soon as possible. Without the "destruction" of the A&R-people. That was the time when Thomas called Jaki Liebezeit and I called Tobi in Berlin to ask him to produce and finish the album. Tobi and Jaki agreed for November and December 2008 sessions. Tobi and me got on very well. Jaki came and we had a week of talks between Barcelona with Chet Baker, CAN and his nowadays-obsession with african music/voodoo music etc... and of course some wonderful intense, peaceful drumsessions with Tobi, David, Jaki and me. Then Tobi added his "influences" and mixed it in a great way: 2009! Beautifully landscaped short stories....

Meanwhile I had decided to relaunch my old label "Constrictor", thought "back to where I came from" and asked Rough Trade Germany to help me realize and distribute it. This was it in short: the story of my album "Diamonds Fall".
It sees the light tomorrow. And I really hope you like it.

Bye from the cold, P.