Neneh Cherry's Soul Stew
Mucian MagazineDec.1992
Neneh Cherry left school at 14, joined a band at 16 and had her first child, Naima, at age 19. Now 28, she's performed and recorded three albums with the British avant-funksters Rip Rig & Oanic, lived in London, Sweden and New York, put together an international smash hit, "Buffalo Stance", thatdeftly fit rap's political brain into hip hop's dancing shoes, enjoyed critical and commericial kudos with herdebut album, "Raw Like Sushi," and brought into the world a second daughter, Tyson, whose father, Cameron McVey, a.k.a. Booga Bear, is Cherry's closest musical collaborator and the coproducer of her brand new record, Hmebrew.
So Neneh, do you ever ge the feeling you're moving at a faster pace than everyone else? "No, I feel a lot slower!" she laughs. "Cause I'm a Pisces and I really vague out. I don't always do the amount of things I should; sometimes I don't even read for onths. And I'm definately not the most serious person in the world.
"But I also feel I've got to get on with my stuff here, 'cause time is short. In this last period two dear friends of mine have died. Giving birth and losing people created a sense of calm, but also urgency. I think sometimes I'm in search, like I'm on a mission, but something must have happened in the corse of making this album -- all of a sudden I really deel grounded. Probably temporarily," she laughs again. "But I'm feeling like, "Letthings be."
Cherry is taking in the palmy afternoon air at a patio table near the ool at a West Hollywood Hotel; last night, having flown here from London, she was introdced to shooters, a drink from which she's mildly recovering. So if she's feeling less wired than usual today, she's got her reasons. Cherry's personality isn't all that different from her music; Both boast a wide range of expression, yet always seem to find thier natural pulse.
In that respect it's no accident that her new record arrived an unhurried three years after the stsrling success of Raw Like Sushi with a sond and with songs that feel as lived in as Cherry's home, where the music was recorded.
"That's why we called it Homebrew, she says. "It had all gone down at home. Behind closed doors, me banging my head trying to get lyrics out, asking people for words -- it;s been a real knitting session. Obviously there was pressure: "People are going to forget who ou are "! she exclaims, lightly mimicking an anxious marketing executive rfrain. "But we knew we couldn't rush it, and if we had it would have been blood, sweat and tears that wouldn't have been worth anybody's time. And if people are going to forget who we are thta quick, then we'll remind them --- later."
Most fans won't need a reminder, but they may be suurprised. "Uffalo Stance" came out like a bombshell, and the video provided ample evidence that Cherry ws one too, while "Homebrew" suggests a character who has gained more focus and depth. He latest albumw as the latest fresh tip in a hip-hop scene where frehshness was what really mattered. But "Homebrew" arrives at a moment when hip-hop and rap are taking greater stock of their cultural tradition, and Chrerry's new batch brings to mind the classic 70s sond of artists like Curtis Mayfield and Minnie Ripperton.
"Wow, what a compliment!" she repsonds to the comparison. "Well, those arer eocrds I will live and die by. I've been listening to Minnie Rpperton all summer, she was a fanstaic woman. Butt what I think it is, we've just expressed ourselves a bit better this time. And that's what made those records timeless, there was something about them that always made sense. That's why we didn't want to make just a dance album."
Cherry's frequent use of the word we when she describes her work isn't Englisg modesty; the album was deliatly conceived in a communal atmosphere, and fed off a depsarate collection of local and far-flung talents. The result is a record that includes collaborations with Michael Stipe ("Trout") and Guru from Gang Starr ("Say"). But also there are contributions from relatively untested taents like Geoff barrow and Twilight Firm, who helped constuct "Somedays" and "Twisted", respectively two of the album's more nuanced and sophiticated arrangements.
"I think we just traveled with it," she notes of the rcords mostly unplanned twists and turns. "We took the time we needed to soak up some inspiration, look around the world -- so there'd be something to say! Then we let time take its course. We didn't take months on every song taking it apart and changing it; wed get to a cerain point and then go off some place else, and come back with a fresher perspective. 'Cause it's easy to get fed up with that bassline, you know, and tehn you wa to change it, and then you lose it.
"I remember my daddy trying to teach me piano and I couldn't do it. Then I'd come back and it would all fall into place. This album was like that. It's more digested. I've grown the way anyone does, and so the record becomes a vehicle to move onto the next thing. You laugh and cry .... and now the record is done it's like sending your kid off to school!"
Cherry has a warm, down-to-earth manner. Dressed in red overalls and with littlemakeu, she has a casul yet dignified bearing, although as fashion spreads and videos indicate, she's not averse to playing the galmorpuss, either. "I come as I am -- I can'y play the game really," she says. "But I can be in a situation and make the best of it, even if it's to get out of here wuicker. That's when I'm working -- it's a job, right?" She smiles at the thought. "It's not always easy. But everyone has that problem."
Certainly herry'smusical choices have been anything but slick. After "Buffalo Stance" she resisted crafting another dance tune -- even another dance tune with a message -- and felt relieed when the brooding Manchild" was released in Engalnd as a follow up single: "Buffalo Stance" was a cgood calling card, but we wanted it known that the album wasn't ging to be like that." Cherry's inventive mi of raps with straight on singing, which seemed radical t the time, has since become part of the mainsteam, a development she terms a "relief". But "Hmebrew" still has its share ofmusical quircks. Songs and raps end abruptly, or segue fro one to the other without a pause for breath. Odd sonic clinks jar the atmosphere of carefully constructed musical moods. It's all part of what Cherry calls her search for natrealness and doing something that's from the heart."
"I think there are a lot of poeple hungry for thatsimplicity," she says. "I thinkg things get over manufactured and by the time they reach you there's nothig left that really relates to you. I mean, we can enjoy the campness of something that doesn't take itself seriously, that ABBA-esque kind of drama. But at the end of the day there's something that strikes a chord where you can't help but be moved by it.
"I saw Bruce Springsteen at the Amnesyt International show in London. And having lived in New York, it was like all the white kids were into the Boss, you know? she laughs. "That bandanna posse thing. But he got up on stage and he was really pumpin and his veins were busting out and ou know -- I liked it! I wouldn't buy the record but I liked it. And that's the power of real communication. If you're opn enough to takeit in, itll get through to you, not what it is.
"I thinkPrince was one of th first people to break into the pop world with a twist. He wasn't just soul, there was a bitof Jimi and Sly Stalone, and the rock thing ... now you see hip-hop relating to jazz, and that's great. Because iIthink a lot of people have felt rootless. There's a wicked thing in America, which is you have to deny who you are to be completely American. I see it in Sweden now too, people are coming there from all over and there's this pressure to be Swedish. Ans when people ask me where I'm from, I'm never really sure what to answer," she says
drily. "I go, Well ... that's really complicated."
Cherry is half-Swedish, on her mother's side. Her father is an African percuussionist, but the couple separated when Neneh was young. Mostly she was raised by her mom and step dad, the well-known jazz composer and trumpeter Don Cherry, with whom she retains an emotionally close if geographically distat relationship. The odd thing, she obseeves, is that growing up, "I had to trip where I didin't see myself as musical. My dad wouldl try to teach me stuff and I would say no, I can't. I tried playing the bass for a while and didn't have the concentration ... I was tryin g to get into it but I just didn't know what I was gonna end up doing. And then,I kind of found my way into it, and all the different ingredients that were handed down came into my life later."
On one of Cherry's fingers, almost unseen among a gaggle of eaborate snake rings, is oneof those little things, a wedding ring signifying her recent marraige to Cameron McVey. "We really were married before," she says. "We jus wanted to celebrate it. We'd come out from the album and this work- heavy year and we were still there. Wedo just about everything together, though work is a separate thing -- well, it's harda nd it isn't," she admits. "If we're working and Cameron touches me accidently or not, I always get king of embarrassed, like, 'Don't do that, 'cause I'll melt.' Ot I'll get sh if I'm showing him ideas, playing
tapes -- I feel like a little girl or something."
On wisted" perhaps the key song on Homebrew, Cherry sings about the tentativeness of a romanti situation, and by extension the kind of wary optimism with which she tends to view the world. "That song is about him," she says. "Cause when I met him it was like he knew me, it was the weirdest thing. He went, I can help yo, you know. And I'd felt something I'd never fetlbefore but at the same time I was trying to brush off. It's that line in the song: "You pushed your way through my attitude.' My friends were all saying you really need some time on your own, don't be falling into a relationship, and so here I was going against my grain for some weird principle. And a the end of the day it was like, I don't care. If we make it throught we make it, and if we don't it'll still be worth it for whatit was."
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