I don't know if you recall, but in early 1993 you sent a message to our readers who chose you as Best Male Singer in the Second CONNECT Reader's Poll.

Oh yes, I remember that. I was very thrilled because, obviously, I had not been to India and I was very surprised to know I had fans there.

So can we expect you here soon?

At the moment I am doing a brief South East Asian tour visiting Singapore, Hong Kong, Seoul and Bangkok. I would love to come to India and, to be honest with you, my record company has never organised a promo tour there though I have been in the region. Hopefully, they'll get their act together one of these days.

We are carrying your interview in a special Collector's Issue of our magazine which examines the current direction of entertainment in general. In your opinion, in what direction is music heading?

Well you know, my friend, I have no idea. I try and keep up with current music really via the radio and not through MTV. To be honest, I'm burnt out on videos, I'm burnt out on music having to be so visual. I kinda miss the days of radio when every song was open to interpretation. Now it seems everybody wants to have an easy answer and therefore every song needs to be visualized. So I try and still maintain my exposure to new music through buying a CD or listening to the radio.

For the most part, I don't hear that much music out there currently that I get off on. I think the current music scene, at least here in America, is not to accent musicality or good singing or songwriting but it's really more about fashion and a sort of posing, to have some sort of an attitude, whether you're rebellious or anti-establishment or angst-ridden, it doesn't really matter. It seems that record companies create these attitudes for performers instead of finding performers who can actually play.

For me, I still love Billy Joel, Elton John, Sting, Rod Stewart - these guys are really great musicians and songwriters. I watched the American Music Awards last night and I thought that Tom Jones was the best thing on the show - that kinda tells you where I'm at.

Well, I found the entire Prince package quite an eye opener.

Prince is a lot of hit and miss with his fans but he is capable of really terrific music. He's certainly done a lot of stuff that I wouldn't care for but he's also done a lot of stuff that I really love. Everybody knows how genuinely talented he is. What I am really amazed at year after year, especially the last three years watching the Grammies and the AMAs, is that I watch these performers who really can't sing. When they have to sing live, it's atrocious.

What impact did Kurt Cobain's death have on you?

Well, I think it was a jolt to Nirvana fans obviously. I really don't want to sound cold because I feel bad for his parents and the people who knew and loved him, but my point about Kurt Cobain is that here's a guy who basically had more reasons to go on, in terms of having a child. I think he took the coward's way out. I don't have any respect for a guy like that. I mean, if he's living in pain, then go deal with your pain, but to sort of chicken out and leave your child fatherless...

And here's another thing - knowing what you know about drug addiction for the last 25 years, I don't really have any sympathy for a guy like that. I have sympathy for the people who are really up against hard times, who fight to survive and succeed. And when a guy like Kurt Cobain, who's a multi-millionaire and has a lot of emotional problems decides to blow his head off, I'm not going to bat an eyelash. I'm not going to waste one ounce of sympathy on a guy like that. I know there are millions of people who disagree with me, but I'm not of the opinion that Kurt Cobain was a genius.

As hackneyed as it sounds, what do you think of the whole Seattle/grunge scene?

Well, I think it has very little to do with music and what's funny for me is that (among) probably eighty per cent of the bands classified as grunge, some could have the same singer. I don't really see a lot of difference from band to band. Some of the guitar playing is different but God, most of the singing is the same - it sounds like the same guy is camping out on everybody's band. Obviously, in the last year alone Pearl Jam has topped the charts and Stone Temple Pilots and those guys are really raking in the fans.

I just think that these young guys are really taking themselves so seriously, like they're curing cancer or something. I choose to really enjoy what I do and I'm aware that what I do is entertainment and it's not going to change anyone's life. If I can entertain somebody and make them feel good while they're listening to my music, then that's great but I don't take myself seriously.

You say that most of the new bands sound alike but the same could be said about your music which seems to stick to a formula.

I think everybody is entitled to their own opinion. My greatest goal every album is to not make an album that's the same. Everything is very subjective. But I really think that the Rush Street album was the most rock n' roll, in-your-face record I ever did. I also think that Rush Street was versatile to the point of being schizrophenic because on one side I had this song "Streets Of Pain" which has Tommy Lee of Mštley Crue playing drums and on the other side I had "Keep Coming Back" which is like an R&B tune. And I had "Hazard" which is kind of unclassifiable because it has its own style.

Much as I love most of the Rush Street album, I think the Paid Vacation album is a lot more consistent. Certainly, there's nothing on Rush Street that's anything like "Now And Forever" or "The Way She Loves Me" or the majority of the songs. So I really hear a vast difference from album to album in all four of my records. But you know, like I said, it is very subjective and your point of view is just as valid.

"Hazard" was very mysterious with its two videos. What's the story on that?

I think it was fairly self-explanatory. It's just a fictional short story set to music. I wouldn't even call it a murder mystery because the ending was never resolved - whether the girl was murdered or if she died mysteriously. It was just a piece of my imagination from reading books and watching a lot of mystery movies. I had never written a song at that point that was fictional. All my songs were either autobiographical or about people that I knew. This was just something that was fun to write; it was just an exercise that paid off. I certainly was very surprised that anybody responded to that because I didn't hear it as a hit song. I mean, I don't really hear any of my stuff as hits but I really didn't think that "Hazard" would even be a single.

I can tell you that the video is something that I'm very proud of because it doesn't ruin anybody's imagination. It dramatises the lyrics and we didn't resolve the ending - believe me the record company begged me to do Part III and reveal the identity of Mary's killer but I just refused because it's not part of the song so it couldn't be part of the video.

The other thing about the video is how it deconstructs your otherwise perfect rock star image when you are shown cutting your hair.

(Laughs) I don't know. Sure there were some people who thought that way but I was playing a character in that video and when the director suggested that the character would be sitting there sort of mysteriously cutting off his hair as if to try and change himself dramatically, I certainly didn't think it was symbolic of me, Richard Marx, the person. What's funny is that what we cut off is a wig and I really debated cutting off my hair which were really long. I was afraid of how I would look with short hair and oddly enough, now they're shorter even than in the video.

Coming to the future, when we listen to the music of the 90s, say ten years from now, what do you think it will say about this decade?

(Sighs) Good question. You journalists come up with good questions, I tell you. I have three kids, aged four, two and one. And I think when my oldest son is 14, he's gonna look back and say, What did these people think they were? Did they think they were politicians or Nobel Prize winners or people that would come up with the answers to life? I think, ten years from now, people are gonna look at the music being made by the younger bands and laugh at how self-serving and self serious it all is. I think that everybody should have a point of view, certainly, and I think that artists that want to (get across) their point of view to people are entitled to do so but I also think that I don't know that our generation is going to learn anything from a Kurt Cobain. People have held him up as a role model, but I can tell you for sure, I will give anything if my kid never looked at a guy like that as a role model. What is there to admire? I think that there is a lack of great songwriting and a tremendous lack of melodies. I try and fill that gap as much as I can. But in ten years, there'll be something else going on and you and I will be standing there in amazement.

Is that the same opinion you have about the so-called rock dinosaurs like the Rolling Stones and Pink Floyd who are still stomping around? Do you ask what did Mick Jagger think he was in the 60s?

No, I think that the difference to me is that Mick Jagger, then and now, is probably playing a game and he's loving every second of it. I have never ever known anybody who thought that Mick Jagger has ever wanted people to take him seriously. He's having fun and so was Freddie Mercury and so is Elton John - I know Elton a little bit and believe me, he's having fun and he's as successful as he was 15 years ago. He is not trying to be a spokesman for a generation. I think the reason they have longevity is that they think of themselves as entertainers and not people who were trying to change the world.

But in the Sixties, some of them were trying to do just that.

I don't think so. I don't think Mick Jagger wanted to change the world - he was always having fun. I think maybe people misinterpreted and took it all seriously.

Which brings us to a band that was trying to make a difference back then - the Beatles. This year should see their "comeback" album complete with Lennon's vocals sampled in electronically. What do you think of that?

Well, it certainly will make my record company a lot of money, I'm sure. I don't know how musically inventive that is but technologically, it is an amazement. What's next is we're going to have new Elvis Presley records because somebody is going to dig up scratch (recordings) he did and surround that with the Stone Temple Pilots playing. I mean, it's all marketing. Unfortunately, guys like Lennon and Elvis are not here to object to that. I am just grateful for the Beatles records that the Beatles made together. I'm not interested in a Beatles record that a record company makes.

How would you like your music to be remembered?

I hope that the music that's remembered is from an emotional point of view. And that's what's happening. I am not trying to reach out to anybody from a political or social level. If you and I went out to lunch together, I would tell you my social and political views in general conversation, as a person. But as a performer, I am definitely holding on to the idea of entertaining people and the best way I can do that is emotionally.

If I do some songs that have been tremendously personal and emotional to me and they have affected other people's lives, that's a great legacy but it's also an accident. I never sat down winning attention to try and touch the heart strings of millions. That's something that happened by accident a couple of times.

So when can we expect a new album?

I just finished writing it and am ready to start recording by March and it should be out by the fall. So far, based upon the writing, I think it's going to be the best album I've made. As for its title, I never come up with an album title until just about the last minute.

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