Steve Anderson's most recognisable work is as Kylie Minogue's collaborator on her tours and previous albums. He was a record producer and co-writer of many of the songs on Impossible Princess as well as some of her earlier and later albums. His first work with Kylie was in 1992 when Brothers in Rhythm remixed Minogue's "Finer Feelings" - which was her final single release from a studio album with Stock Aitken Waterman for PWL Records.
Here's a very fresh Steve Anderson interview for you, Lovers. He talks Kylie and other artists he's working with, but I took out Kylie-related parts for you, so read carefully for some very interesting news and confirmations ;)
Sit back and enjoy! :)
Steve! Its been ages since we last did an interview! Since last appearing on DSTP, Kylies toured twice and released an album. Busy couple of years! What was your highlight of the last 18 months.
Hi - lovely to be asked back to the fabulous Don’t Stop The Pop. So much has happened since we last spoke including the fabulous Aphrodite Les Folies Tour, The Hurly Burly Show, Westlife Proms In The Park, Leona’s Live Lounge, Christophe Willem’s album and producing Kylie at Abbey Road which was a real dream come true.
The music in your shows your involved in are incredibly central to the framing of the concert or musical. In all of Kylie’s tours, Elouise’s Little Belter tour and Polly’s shows, the soundtrack you create, vitalizes songs we’ve long loved even if they’re contemporary classics....
I believe its about what we call the arc of the show. Its easy to put together a bunch of songs you know people will like but you want them to go with you on an emotional journey without realising thats whats happening. William works a lot with lyrics as a base for his ideas which I think is really important. For me its a case of making the music work with everything else that is going on on stage, sometimes the visuals inspire the music and sometimes its the other way around. Ultimately with Kylie just having her as a muse is often enough to inspire greatness.
Finer Feelings 25.01.2012
The same applies with Kylie’s classic hits. From your epic re-working of Step Back In Time in X Live to the beautiful ballad version of White Diamond. Does William give the direction to rework it? Or is it generally a constant debate and discussion in the run up to Kylie’s tours between you, Kylie and William.
With Kylie tours its usually a dialogue between Will, Kylie and myself about the style of the songs then I present versions which then get tweaked until they are right. Sometimes it can be instant, other times they need a few revisions but its usually only a few minor things. We’ve tuned ourselves to each other over the years so its often second nature. “White Diamond” was arranged for the film and just happened to fit perfectly into the Hollywood section of the North America Tour - its still one of my favourite things we’ve ever done and her vocal is beautiful.
It is another project you’ve work closely together with William Baker who you started collaborating on Minogue’s 1998 Intimate and Live tour. From Kylie, Rent, to Polly to Westlife do you feel the collaborative process with Baker stems from the real love of performance, music and presentation of a show? Will and I have been working together for over 15 years now so are very tuned into each other. He is a true creative visionary and so inspiring it can often just be a quick conversation and I’ve got the whole picture in my head of how something should sound. Its so important for someone like me to have people like him with a vision as I can pretty much make any kind of music work but there is nothing better than being inspired by an idea especially ones that are totally out of the box like turning Its A Sin into Edith Piaf meets The Stripper! I think essentially we have similar taste and are both a little bit nuts which really helps!
With Polly, I suppose there is that tremendous cabaret and burlesque tradition underpinning the arrangements but how do you start with Kylie and Elouise and soundtracking their corresponding shows?
With Kylie she obviously has the most amazing back catalogue to choose from so that is relatively easy. With Elouise we had to pick songs that she sounded superb on, could make her own, were true showstopping classics to fit in with the show and also that would punctuate the storytelling aspect of “Little Belter”.
The thrilling strings of Love Takes Over Me by Kylie (one of my Kylie songs) and the immense string section of Tainted Love (Elouise) could both be James Bond songs. Is there a John Barry James Bond anthem in your veins just waiting to be written and recorded?
I love both John Barry and David Arnold so yes there is always an influence especially in the brass sections, how could there not be with Elouise singing at the front!
On A Night Like This Abbey Road
Not really - everything we do is only right when we are all happy with it. That process takes a long time and our quality control level is so high that nothing but the absolute best gets through. I pretty much fondly look back at everything we’ve done and go ‘aww’.
So how do you initiate the first song for a monumental Kylie tour like Les Follies. I mean where does one start to piece together an overture for a show that sees Kylie perform on Pegasus, a chariot, on an angel and so forth?
Exactly that - I get a visual brief from William describing what he sees happening on stage and work from there. For Les Folies the show starts and ends with water from the Birth Of Aphrodite from water into Greek mythology going through Heavenly Hosts, Chariots and ending as a Million Dollar Mermaid in amongst fountains. Thats really all it takes for me, then I’m off!
So how many versions overtures did you compose before you realized you had the start befitting Aphrodite?
There were two quite different ideas for the intro and various versions of both but Will is very reactionary so once he hears something it immediately inspires him to know what he wants more or less of. This is great for me as we bat things back and forth to each other and send something to Kylie when we think we have the right one. It usually comes back and forth again for a bit until its signed off by everyone.
Kylie has rarely, if ever, had a fifth single but if there was one song from Aphrodite what track would you have liked to see given single privilege?
I adore “Can't Beat The Feeling” - it just makes me smile and for me is classic Kylie. Sometimes people are shocked that I tend to pick pop songs of hers as my favourites but I am still a massive fan and I love what I call the ‘Kylie moment’ and that song has a bunch of them all going on at the same time! I adore what Stuart did with that album.
Right after Christophe’s pop album, you jumped into putting together a new album by Kylie. What was that like?
It has always been a dream of mine to produce a Kylie album with acoustic instruments and also to produce an album at Abbey Road so when the two came together I could not have been happier. I worked with the lovely Colin Elliot on the production who has been responsible for the Richard Hawley albums which all have a beautiful darkness and warmth to them which we wanted to incorporate in this project. Also I knew the back catalogue like the back of my hand but he didn’t so much which was good as he came from a different angle on some of the songs. We recorded a whole bunch of songs , some with orchestra and band, some just band and some just piano or guitar. It was Kylie’s amazing Aphrodite band with a beautiful BV section and we spent the happiest 3 weeks in Abbey Road Studio 2 where the Beatles famously recorded throughout their career.
All The Lovers Abbey Road
I can’t tell you what an honour it was to go to work there every day only to be eclipsed by how truly great Kylie’s performance is on this record. Its true, honest vocal takes recorded on a beautiful valve mic and left very upfront in the mix as if she’s there right with you in the room. I could not be more proud of what we achieved there and I’m so incredibly thankful of the opportunity to do it, its an experience none of us will ever forget. There will be an YouTube video from the sessions uploaded on the 25th of every month to celebrate Kylie’s 25th Anniversary this year.
Abbey Road Studios is of course steeped in history. Did you happen to squeeze any time popping into the room where Yoko & John lived for months while recording his album?
We were recording in that very room - Studio 2 at Abbey Road is where the Beatles recorded the majority of their material and apparently John and Yoko set up home in the corner. We put the table with the kettle and biscuits over there.
Huge thanks to Don'tStopThePop Blog and you can find a full interview here: http://dontstopthepop.blogspot.com/2012/02/steve-anderson-interview-part-one.html
xo K
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