If ever there was a band that encapsulated the idea or notion of ‘progression’ in music then surely it’s Wire. An ever-shifting musical presence, they are a band that has refused to stand still since 1976. Perhaps the reason for this is because they are not simply a band, and they don’t simply make music. Wire is an art project, a collective vision, a series of conceptual sonic sculptures; these have meaning, significance and shape. Founding member Bruce Gilbert was an abstract painter before the band, and always viewed Wire as a ‘living sculpture’. Likewise, Graham Lewis studied textiles and fashion and Colin Newman was also at art school (his teachers included Brian Eno and Peter Smichdt). And along with Robert Gotobed they shared a unique vision for a group that would soon act as the antithesis of the punk scene, although inadvertently revolutionising it along the way. Ironically, for such a relatively abstract idea, they made an intoxicatingly catchy and accessible first album: the magnificent Pink Flag. It was a cornerstone in the history of modern music, instantly iconic from the conceptual artwork by Bruce and Graham (a picture of flagless pole with a pink flag painted on) to the almost rousing sing-along qualities of tracks like ‘Mannequin’, to the short frenzied assaults in ‘Field Day For The Sundays’ and ‘Brazil’, to the rudimentary genius of ‘Three Girl Rhumba’. Everything about the record asked questions, I mean... 23 songs in 39 minutes? However, never one to stick to the script they soon made Chairs Missing (slang for mental illness) and when their fans were screaming for ‘12XU’, the band would respond with the weird and wonderful ‘Another The Letter’. Refreshingly (and no doubt frustratingly for some), Wire were a band that moved at such a speed, audiences struggled to keep up with them. If fans were tripping over themselves trying to catch up with and absorb Chairs Missing when Pink Flag was still hot on their turntable, then 154 would send them over the edge. 154 got weirder. It was a dark and brooding sonic manifestation, once again proving to be frighteningly ahead of the curve. “You gained respect as we passed. Not a wave, a gestured wink. I’ve redefined the meaning of vendetta. I should have known better,” sang Graham on the opening ‘I Should Have Known Better’. During the 1980s, Wire even pushed their artistic experiments onto their support acts; in order to both satisfy the needs of (and no doubt lift a surreptitious middle finger to) their audience, they hired a Wire cover band to support them and play the hits, so they could be free to experiment and display their most recent material. Still an amazingly fresh concept even today. Between December 1977 and September 1979 Wire released these three albums; it’s difficult to think of a band that had such a lasting impact in such a short space of time from that period.
2011 has been a significant year for Wire; they have toured more than any other year since 1978. They released Red Barked Tree arguably one of their finest albums to date and they appear to have come full circle, acquiring fans and admirers that are coming to Wire as a new band and entity, not ones simply approaching the band live with a back catalogue in their head. I spoke to founding members Colin Newman and Graham Lewis on the final night of their 2011 tour.
“We’ve had a very interesting year and we’ve had a lot of attention, which we’re now transforming into the next thing we do. In true Wire fashion,” states Colin of the band’s success this year. “We’ve been using this tour to prepare ourselves for our activities next year,” adds Graham, “because we’ve done so much work this year, it’s allowed us to embed Matt (Simms, the touring guitar player who replaced Bruce Gilbert when he left in 2004)” So, is Matt to be integrated into the next recording process? “Exactly,” they both nod in unison. Will this happen next year? “We are having a break now,” states Colin, “we’re all going to go home and get our heads out of Wire for a while and do other things. We do have some things planned for next year which I can’t really discuss, but next year will not be a touring year, it will be a figuring out year.”
Colin and Graham then begin to discuss their changing crowd as they continue to develop and age, “In some territories, we have an extremely young audience whose first introduction to Wire is Red Barked Tree. It’s fantastic,” enthuses Graham, before Colin adds, “I saw some band, I can’t remember who they were, they were a bit like Franz Ferdinand and were named after some part of European History like them, and anyway I didn’t like them. At the end of the gig, the entire audience was on stage with them and the entire audience looked like the band. There was no difference between the band and the audience and for a lot of younger bands that is how it works, because the audience can identify with the band. But you get people coming along to Wire shows and you think, ‘thank god there’s fucking hope’. We don’t have to go to the retirement home and listen to Vera Lynn,” before Graham adds, “Now it’s a different picture altogether, in America for instance were we playing to three generations of people. From over-sixties to sixteen.” The cycle of Wire continues to spin, so it seems, with Colin ending on the defining statement, “I think we’re generational terrorists really, I don’t really feel like I belong with people of my generation.”
Do people still come along with the hope or expectation of you doing Pink Flag etc? “What people come expecting is not really our concern,” Graham firmly replies, “we decided to make a fundamental change on this tour, as things have been changing and developing. This is our second tour of the UK this year, so it seemed pretty absurd to come back and do the same thing. So we’ve been working in some different material.” Graham states, “We took about seven songs from the shelf that hadn’t been used or played since 1978-79 and had only played a few times live before we dispersed.” The intensity, passion and foresight that Graham and Colin talk with is invigorating - two men in their fifties who consider playing the same material twice in one year to be “absurd” is testament to their constant sense of reinvention and creativity, as well as placing some younger bands under the spotlight and highlighting their rigidness in comparison. I wonder if they consider any other younger bands to be doing what Wire are doing, conceptually? “I don’t think anyone is doing what Wire are doing,” states Colin with some assertion, and his comments ring clear with authority. Colin then adds further, “It’s never straight forward, it can never be straight forward. Because you’re talking about art. If people keep doing the same thing over and over again, you get a diminishing return. You’ve got to figure out new ways to approach it.” So, what are the band's thoughts on all the bands from their generation - essentially considered their peers - reforming and playing shows? “I think Magazine have probably learnt one of our lessons because they have produced, or I’m told they’ve produced, a really great record. I think they are the only band from our generation besides Wire who have actually done that. I mean, all the others that did the comeback shows, they didn’t play anything new, and if they tried to do a new record it was a dismal failure. But they haven’t worked together! You can’t just not work together for 25 years and then come back and make a stonking record, it doesn’t work like that,” fires Colin, as Graham adds, “We know, we’ve been there.” So, the nostalgia trips with bands playing their classic album is not something you subscribe to? “It’s shit!” declares Colin, “I’m sick to death of it, this don’t look back thing. I mean, just stop and think about what you’re doing and how you’re devaluing your art. Just remember how you got there in the first place, by playing new songs! It’s kind of depressing.” Graham then goes on to tell of how Wire played with a reformed Sex Pistols, “We played with them at a free festival in Turin a few years ago, there was like 50,000 people there. The Pistols played and it was one of those situations were there was just no escape; ‘Anarchy…’ and ‘God Save The Queen’ are still exceedingly good songs, but the rest… one couldn’t help but think it’s all a bit Chuck Berry,” before Colin adds, "They’re playing the same set from 1976! It’s pub rock.” Graham then jokes, “But now they can play it, but in 1976 they couldn’t, and it was fucking hilarious! They were taking the piss, but now they can play the thing, it’s just...” Graham shrugs with disappointment. Colin states, “It’s just depressing really. You know they’re doing it for the pay cheque and that none of them are really talking to each other." "Let’s move on," interjects Graham, before Colin finalises "I think if we stand for anything it’s hoping that people perceive we have a bit of integrity. That isn’t to say we’re in the business of clearing rooms or in the business of taking a rabidly anti-commercial stance, we do what is necessary for the art and to make it grow, and if we’re not making it grow then we can’t do the art.”
We continue to talk about all manner of things for some time, a conversation that spills over into the pub and stretches for another couple of hours. The overwhelming arc and feeling that I extracted from this conversation was one of change, invention and constant thought. While the mechanics of Wire’s contemporary art concept may be complex, multi-layered and ever expanding, one thing remains a constant in their lives and musical career, and that constant is change. I found it both frightening and refreshing just how focused and relentless they were when it came to talking about their art, perhaps because I interview bands half their age on a weekly basis who seem to exist solely in the shadows of other bands, their roots coated in gloopy nostalgia. Or perhaps it’s due to the fact that nearly every other band their age is out and about slowly crushing their integrity and musical heritage through tacky reunion shows and suspect ‘new’ material. Even listening to the records of Wire (which I have done steadily since I was 19) didn’t prepare me for Wire in person, a band that, 35 years after their inception, are still moving, developing and creating at a pace that consistently outruns those who consume it. I should have known better.