Livewire 1997

by kelly barbieri

rgw:
I've worked with a lot of other people and usually I find that I'm the one that wants to push back the parameters. This does seem to be a formula that people tend to fall into place and again that's why Pig is in place.

kb:
That's quite a statement considering that Raymond G. Watts, aka Pig, was not only a founding member of KMFDM, but has also worked with such explosive industrial acts as einsturzende neubauten, Psychic TV, Coil and Jim (Foteus) Thirwell. Pig's current album Sinsation, on Nothing Records label pushes the parameters of what has come to be known as the industrial genre. Unlike his many collaborative projects. Raymond takes full responsibility with Pig, single-handedly controlling everything from songwriting and sampling to the production of the album. Pig is a one man show, and Raymond considers is nothing less than his baby.

rgw:
Exactly, With Pig it's mine, I can make as much as a mess of it as I want. I know that it might not be as successful as some other things because it's more experimental, but that's the name of the game. Pig is more personal. I get cheesed a lot...there are so many angst-ridden people people out there that is gets to a point where you have to be, Come On! Stick your tongue in your cheek!..

kb:
Seething with animosity, Sinsation takes the listener directly into the mind of Raymond Watts-which, by all accounts, is a most frightening place to be. Through the lunatic strains of the album one can hear the way Watts has influenced, and been influenced by, the bands that he has worked with. Sinsation is directly implicitive of a time when industrial was just that; banging on oil drums and howling at the moon-yet it also manages to integrate melodic aspects of different genres. The result is something that can only be described as Pig.

rgw:
I can get into any music genre, whether it's highbrow, lowbrow, whatever the fuck. I can appreciate it on some level. I don't try to take it apart, any old old crap and I can find something of interest in ti, even the howling of the dog next door.

kb:
So how's it going?

rgw:
Not very well at the moment; they're trying to find out what's wrong with me. They've been probing me all day. They keep asking me what drugs I've been doing. They're going to have to have me back in a couple of weeks and tell me how long I've got.

kb:
I hope it's long enough for you to get over here and play some gigs

rgw:
Oh, I don't know about that...I don't think that anyone would bloody well want me over there anyway!

kb:
I disagree, I enjoyed the CD very much

rgw:
You did! I'm not too sure, maybe it's because I spent so much time over here sitting in a fucking studio. It's like you do this thing and give birth to the little bastard and you have no idea what's going on with it.

kb:
Do you enjoy working on your own?

rgw:
I just seem a little cut off at the moment. I've been beavering away on different projects. You kind of start losing touch with what's going on, so I've been thinking of getting my hands dirty in something a little less isolationist. Pig is kind of a reaction against what I've done with other people, but then you miss feeding off of other people. but then you might be just catching me in a kind of melancholic state.

kb:
It seem to me that the album is either a step beyond or a step back. Either way, it has insight.

rgw:
But then, the other side of the coin is that your locked away in your studio for months, without seeing the light of day, or getting any other input from other people, and not speaking to the label, miles away from where the product is coming out, and you have no idea what's going on.

kb:
How did you like working with Karl Hyde from Underworld?

rgw:
Actually Karl from Underworld did the Pig album previous that wasn't released in the states called The Swining. He did a lot of the guitars on it

kb:
Is there a difference to your solo projects as opposed to your collaborative ones?

rgw:
I find working alone harder, actually. I got this guy Steve White now, so I'm not entirely alone any more. The programming side of things just started to suddenly grown. One computer turned into more computers, and hard drives, and discs, and more samples, and synths and so on- it just got to be for me to deal with. So I brought in Steve, and he takes care of a lot of the programming and that allows me to step back more. But working alone is like tearing my hair out, because I want to do something that hasn't been done before, or not lately. Last year I worked with some of the KMFDM guys on Nihil.

kb:
You also did a CD called KMFDM V. Pig.

rgw:
I was part of KMFDM in the beginning, when it was just Sascha, Nico, and myself, and we went our separate ways. The KMFDM V. Pig was a point when we were slowing coming back together. I would just walk in and Sascha would say, I got this great backing track here, write some words or put down some programming...While there were some specially defined roles, it was easier because it wasn't my baby, I had ideas and input but it wasn't mine.
kb:

Is it difficult getting a live band together that can adequately play your material?

rgw:
I find it difficult. I'm just in the process of getting the ball rolling. When I had the last live band I worked them quite hard and was fairly exacting. They like the fact that it's quite specifically defined, that seems to make it easier on them, although they say its challenging, it's different for them, and they all seem to get something form it...it's like when I work with other people, I guess.

kb:
The album cover art is rather interesting, whats the deal?

rgw:
That cover photo, we took it in the darks, so it looks all spooky. The inside, without being too pompous about it, was trying to tie in the elements that there was all these disjointed bits of body and pig to create a new body. It was supposed to reflect the musical aspect of taking different elements to create something different. That's what Pig was always about. Trying to find different things that maybe other people didn't pay attention to. I see sampling as building something, constructing something. A lot of people, not as much as before, but a lot of people still use sampling in a very sterile way. That lamp post has already been pissed on, that field has already been plowed, and I don't need to do that because it's already been done very well.