Good Neighbour – interview with Andy Chester (previously of My Computer)

In 2002, I fell in love with a band called My Computer. I heard one song somewhere, and searched the internet to find more info about this band, but all I got was geeky-forum messages about computer-stuff. I did a lot of research, and finally I managed to get a copy of the album “Vulneralbilia” and it was worth it. The Manchester duo Andy Chester and David Luke created beautiful and very original electronic music with elements of rock, soul, prog, hiphop, psychedelia and lots of other styles, – and they did it good. Both of their albums received great reviews in the press, they were called “the next Radiohead”, they collaborated with legend-producer John Leckie, they created musical masterpieces… but they did not sell much at all. After their 2005-release “No CV”, the band became even more invisible than they already were. In 2007 Andy Chester is back again with not one but TWO new albums and projects. He has left his musical partner and the break up was not a good one. In this honest and open interview, Chester tells us about his new life and his new projects, and he tells us about two problematic years, drugs, loss and break-ups.

First, let’s listen to Andy Chester’s new project The Good neighbour with a song called “There was a time” (stream).
[audio:http://eardrumsmusic.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/06/the-good-neighbour-there-was-a-time.mp3]

- It’s been some years since you released My Computer’s debut “Vulnerabilia” from 2002, an album I still have great feelings for. After the release of the follow-up “No CV”, you seemed to disappear. What happened to you and what have you done since then?

 Andy Chester : Well, what to say? I think I will just be honest and tell you this. The process of getting No CV made took a very long and painful 3 years and was not worth the consequences, which were in this order,

1. I smoked so much weed to block out the misery of making the thing with somebody who had turned in to what I can only describe as The Wicker Man. Then, I had a full on cannabis psychosis breakdown and lost the single most important person in my life who was the girl who had stood by me through 3 record deals and fed me every night for 6 and a half years. I then had the misery of touring NO CV with The Wicker Man. The label that put it out had no clue whatsoever about breaking an act like My Computer and we were duly left to rot by them after a truly shit attempt at stardom.

2. I then had to get my first job in 20 years to pay my mortgage after buying my ex girlfriend out of my house thinking NO CV would sell because a legend like John Leckie had produced it. The job was cleaning which payed me £70 a week. I then progressed to meat packing, door canvassing, tele-canvassing, telesales, stacking shelves and well, let’s just say I’ve not had a very good couple of years.

3. I sold my guitar and gave up music.

- In 2007, you are definitely back again, with a new album as as My Computer + you have recorded an album with your new project called Good Neighbour, and I hear you have been writing on a book too – how do you manage to be so productive after several years of silence?

 Andy Chester:  Luckily, just before I sold my guitar, I met a guy called Pete King who lived over the road from me who had a studio in his cellar. this was shortly after I had decide to split from the Wicker Man late in 2005. I had written 15 songs that Christmas in a caravan in Snowdonia, alone. Pete recorded them for me and I gave them to my label and my publisher and was ignored by both. A friend of Pete’s, Big Al, then told me about an online record store called CD Baby. After getting sick of no response from my industry contacts, I decided to get my shit together and upload them. I came up with the album title, compiled the album from the 15 songs I had written and CD Baby took me through the rest. When I left the local library where I use the internet, I felt truly independent. I had bought my first barcode.

Then in late 2006, I got a job stacking shelves and met a Hip Hop producer called Lee Doyle who worked with me. We talked about music whilst stacking pet food and clicked on Soul. I gave him the rest of my acoustic songs and we got to work. We started recording in February 2007 and had the record finished by May.
I started writing my book of memoirs in spring 2006 in an attempt to stop smoking weed. It worked. It is called ‘Don’t Go Where I’ve Been’ and is the best thing I have ever written. Writing without the restriction of melody or meter is MINT. I am a quarter of the way through it. The only thing that is holding up it’s completion is the fact that I am working 6 days a week at the moment due to the debt that the music business and my past lifestyle has left me in.
I have managed to be so productive because I have been so poor. When your back is against the wall financially, it is good to write because it doesn’t cost you anything, it passes time well and it satisfies your soul.

I have also been single for nearly 3 years which helped. Loneliness, if harnessed in the correct way, can be a powerful creative tool.

- Tell us more about Good Neighbour. In what way is it different from My Computer’s music?

 Andy Chester: Good Neighbour is my latest offering to the traditional routes to the people via the music business. I am not holding my breath on reaching destination household name though, despite it’s quality. It is me and Lee and it is different to My computer in these ways,

1. It has space, we let the songs breath through the principles of Hip Hop production values. The parts for the songs were instant, inspired and put down in 1 or 2 takes. The record has a cohesive quality to it and is not as eclectic as my Computers first 2 albums whilst retaining diversity and a freshness that you only get from new collaboration. Because of this, it is more accessible than My Computer. This was not a money chasing exercise or power trip and Lee asked me for no money to record although he could have.

2. I got on with Lee whilst making it.

3. It was a fast record. It took 3 months instead of 3 years

- What are your plans for the Good Neighbour- project? I know an album has been recorded, but do you have any releases scheduled yet?

 Andy Chester: I am currently, tentatively, dipping my toes back in to the shark infested waters of the music business. There is a little bit of interest. We shall see…

- My Computer and Good Neighbour: What is the story behind these names?

 Andy Chester: I came up with the name My Computer after the dole made me do an I.T course. I thought if we made it big, Bill Gates might sue me and it would be good exposure. We made it as big as my little toe so I fear no litigation.

Good Neighbour is the name of a job I recently went for living on a housing project. You got a rent free flat and a free telephone. I didn’t get the job but I kept the name.

- When you write and record as Good Neighbour, – do you work and think music differently than you would have done if you were to record something new for My Computer? Is it always obvious when you write a song that “this is a song for My Computer” and “this is for Good Neighbour”?

 Andy Chester: I am finished with My Computer and I am no longer a drug addict. I have stopped taking drugs, to make music, to take drugs to. I am typing this from the serene environment of a book publisher in leafy Cheshire who have given me a job I can make work. I am under no pressure. I can only do one band at a time and only ever have. The first Good Neighbour album is finished and ready and willing to go all the way with a label that knows what it is doing. If the record gets picked up, I hope to write more songs for Good Neighbour. My song-writing hasn’t changed much in 20 years apart from the fact that my lyrics get better and the song-writing process is faster.

- You’ve been in the music business for some time now. What is the most important thing you’ve learnt that you will use in your new projects?

 Andy Chester: You don’t need drugs to be creative.

- “No Computer”, the new My Computer-album you have made on your own, it sounds VERY different to the previous albums from My Computer. Tell us about the process of making “No computer” and the thoughts behind it.

 Andy Chester: No Computer saved my life at a time in my life when I was a suicidal heartbroken pothead. It was my first Christmas away from the absolute love of my life who left me for dust when I needed her more than ever before. I couldn’t stay in the house we had shared for 6 years and bought together. My sister lent me her Caravan and off I went with my acoustic guitar and my friend Carl who drove me there. In one final foolish attempt to get her back I had asked her to marry me before we set off. She turned me down. It was a sink or swim situation. I swam. Alone and drunk in the welsh moonlight the songs just poured out of me and healed the gaping flesh wounds she left me with. When I got home and started recording with Pete, I had truly had enough of technology and wanted to keep the same spirit that the songs were written in. As I say on cdbaby, if it is true that all great art stems from great misery, then these songs are positively picasso!

- Why acoustic?

Andy Chester: Apart from a few guitar lines and backing vocals it is simply pure song-writing. Something I needed to get back to after the excessive production of NO CV and a nice way to wrap up the failure of electronica that was My Computer

- All our interviews end with a TOP 5-list, a top5 of everything. What’s your top 5?

Andy Chester’s Good Life top 5
—————
1. Good Love
2. Good Music
3. Good Food
4. Good Sex
5. Good Sleep

Andy Chester’s  new album as My Computer “No Computer” can be bought from CdBaby or from iTunes.

About Knut

Knut started this blog in 2005. He loves music, writing, art, design, reading, movies, aquariums and coffee. Knut is from Norway.