Fairport Convention - Fansite - Review - Wood And The Wire

Interview:	with Simon Nicol - January 1998
By:	Phil " Widds" Widdows
COME all ye roving minstrels - and listen at the knee of a musician who has been doing the business for the last 30 years. Simon Nicol was a founding member of FAIRPORT CONVENTION, the band credited with creating English folk-rock in the late '60s. The band is named after the Nicol family home - Fairport - where friends gathered to make music. In the late '90s he's still part of the band, and will be coming to Preston for the first time in " at least 20 years" on Sunday as they start their annual winter tour of the UK. Fairport have been described as the UK's version of the Grateful Dead, so fanatical are their fans - although they substitute real ale for LSD... " It's an extraordinary business," admits Simon. " When we stared out playing none of us thought of it as anything more than a hobby or a phase. It was the thing to do at the time, to pick up a guitar and form a group, but we thought we'd get proper jobs one day - although this is what I would want to be doing in any case." " Fairport is a working band, and if we didn't play the rent wouldn't get played, but we are also outside the mainstream music business, running parallel to it. We release our own albums on our own label, recorded in our own studio. We organise our own tours and our own annual festival (in Cropredy in Oxfordshire). We don't have a record company worrying about our image!" That's probably a good thing for, despite creating a whole musical genre and being recognised as highly influencial in the history of British popular music, the band has never been the hight of fashion, although they attract fans of all ages." " I'm sure a lot of the youngsters full of fire and vigour look at us and think we're a complete bunch of old farts. Its not likely that traditionally influenced music - let's not call it folk-rock, eh? - is ever going to be immensely fashionable but because it contains such strong elements it'll always be there in the background." Simon may have helped start Fairport Convention, but even he left the band for some years at one point. Drummer Dave Mattacks - often found tub thumping for the likes of Paul McCartney, Chris Rea and Mark Knopfler - joined in 1969, as did bassman Dave Pegg, the man with the longest uninterupted run in the band. Fiddle maniac Ric Sanders has been there since 1985 while Chris Leslie (bouzouki, mandolin, bouzar, violin and vocals) joined at the end of 1996. Adds Simon: " People compare Fairport Convention to a sports team or a brass band or a choir, in that it's not about the actual people in it but what the name conveys. I think of it like a family. People are born and people die, but the family goes on. You never actually get to leave Fairport for good!" And after 30 years of making a living as a singer and guitarist, Simon is well placed to offer advice to anyone starting out down the same road. " Always be on time and when you are playing, play in time! It's about doing to others as you would be done by. Also, it's not a good idea for a member of the band to sleep with another member of the band - and no, that's not a temptation for any of us at the moment! - and it's not a good idea to form a band with your brother, although there are obvious exceptions to that rule. I think sometimes you can just know too much about another person." " Last year the band celebrated its 30th anniversary with the release of the excellent studio album Who Knows Where The Time Goes, featuring the song of the same title by the late Sandy Denny, singer with the group in the early '70s still remembered fondly by fans. Fairport had not performed the number since she left the band, but its hauntingly beautiful lyrics about the swift passage of time seemed to sum up their feelings about the last 30 years. Jokingly, these days it's often known as Who Knows Where The Hair Goes - and it's also Simon's favourite Fairport track. " I may give you another answer in a week or next year, but at the moment that's my favourite. I couldn't have sung it until now, when I've reached middle age."

Updated: 8 December 2003