Zero Worship
March 15th, 2002 by freddie96
Zero Worship: Henry and Sam from Zero 7 reflect on a remarkable year, while Ally Fogg listens in awe.
A warm Saturday night in July 2001, and Zero 7 are headlining the Big Chill’s Enchanted Garden festival in Wiltshire. Four songs into their set and the crowd are already enthralled, hanging on every nuance of every note, when the band are joined on stage by Australian chanteuse Sia Furler. They strike up the intro to ‘Distractions’, Sia begins to sing, and a spontaneous, audible gasp ripples through the crowd – it is the sound of four thousand jaws dropping in unison.
No-one was quite prepared for the intensity of Sia’s performance that night, how she could take the quiet beauty of Zero 7′s music and inject it with so much raw power and passion, pouring her soul into the song, her vowels twisting with heartache, pain and desire. Many of us who were lucky enough to see Zero 7 that night would later admit to every clichZ in the book – tingles, goosebumps, shivering spines, tearful eyes. It was a remarkable set, and they knew it.
?It was a genuinely special occasion for us,? says Sam Hardaker, one half of Zero 7. ?I went the year before and really loved the atmosphere, and thought if we were ever going to play live, that would be the place to do it. And to be back only twelve months later playing the Saturday night was just amazing. It was the first time we played to people that were familiar with the music, to see people singing along to a record that they did know and obviously cared for was just awesome. I still don’t think either of us have quite come to terms with that, really.? His musical partner Henry Binns agrees.
?We’d done a couple of little tours, and everything was going well,? he recalls, ?but we didn’t really feel it directly. And then that night was a really big response. I think that was when we first realised that this thing had moved onto another level.?
It has been an astonishing year for the two childhood friends. As it began they were unknown producers, with a CV that ran to a tiny handful of remixes and a couple of EPs. They had just put the finishing touches to their debut album ‘Simple Things’, scheduled for release on the tiny Ultimate Dilemma label. A sumptuous feast of downtempo soul and cinematic ambience, it became a word-of-mouth sensation before it was even released.
The beauty of the album is its richness. While many of the current wave of downtempo acts have clear musical origins in the minimalist electronica of Brian Eno and Kraftwerk, Zero 7′s sound is much closer to theme-tune composers like Lalo Schifrin, Tom Scott and, especially, John Barry.
?I think [Barry] has influenced a lot of music – Radiohead, Portishead, anything ending in ‘head’ really,? Henry enthuses with a chuckle. ?In some way, in some form, he is at the crux of British music. He’s brilliant and you can’t help but be influenced by him.?
By the time of the release of ‘Simple Things’, Zero 7 were clubbing magazine cover stars. By July they were headlining a festival. By August they’d picked up a top twenty single and a Mercury Prize nomination. On September 11, the day the world stood still, they were one of the dazed groups at the Mercury awards ceremony, playing music amidst the horror.
?When we walked in there we just thought, this should not be happening,? Henry says. ?There was a dark cloud over the whole night. But just being there and playing, and sitting down to watch the other bands, it was actually quite nice. Despite everything, I thought all the bands played really well.?
It may or may not be coincidental, but Zero 7′s summer of success was accompanied by the phenomenon of identikit TV-advertised ‘Chill Out’ mixes. According to the marketing execs and the features pages, chilling out was the new going out, and Zero 7 were the spearhead of a new social movement. It is not a theory that goes down too well with Sam Hardaker.
?I don’t think that scene exists,? he says firmly. ?I wouldn’t imagine any of the people who turn up on those compilations really feel part of any sort of movement. I’ve got quite a cynical view of that stuff – hypocritically so, I admit, because we are on a lot of them ourselves. But it’s just manufactured. The name has just been knocked up by the record companies because Café Del Mar abums seemed to be landing on quite a few coffee tables. Somebody could obviously see there was money in that. We never thought about making chill-out music at all. We just made the record we liked at the time.?
If Zero 7 feel little affinity with their co-accused on Now That’s What I Call Chilling Out, they are nonetheless proud to appear on the programme for the Futuresonic Festival in Manchester this week, representing the highbrow of the dance music spectrum alongside names like 4Hero and Coldcut. Sam talks of them with an endearing touch of reverence.
?I’m actually in awe of quite a lot of people like that. I’ve been a fan of Coldcut for years, I used to buy their old bootlegs. And 4Hero I’ve loved since their early underground breakbeat stuff. I don’t know if we’re coming from the same place musically, but I can appreciate what they do.
?People talk as if we were part of a scene – they mention us alongside Bent, Lemon Jelly, Blue States, people like that, but to be honest I don’t know any of those bands. I’ve never even heard some of them. But when I listen to the new 4Hero album I am in awe of how they do that, how they make those sounds.?
Sam and Henry make unlikely stars and they know it. They admit to being less than totally comfortable with press work, and they have yet to lose the air of wide-eyed naivetZ that has accompanied their rapid rise. They are full of self-deprecating humour and are very poor at telling people how good they are. Asked if he would rather be thought of as a producer, songwriter or performer, Henry chuckles and says, ?I guess we must be producers really. I don’t consider myself a bona fide songwriter. Likewise I don’t really see myself as a bona fide producer, and I’m certainly not a bona fide performer. We just dabble in all three somehow.?
Touring is still a particular novelty. ?Every time I’m on stage I think, fucking hell, what am I doing here? It’s like a school trip for us – singing songs at the back of the bus. A couple of 30-year-old dads re-living our youth.?
Now that’s what I call chilling out.
Ally Fogg, November 2001
A version of this interview was first published in The Big Issue in the North. Reproduced with permission. © Ally Fogg 2001.
