Andrew Weatherall – From Primal Scream to Warp Records and beyond, the Guv’nor of British dance music

Talk ’90s to me

This episode of Talk 90s to Me features a deep dive into the life and musical legacy of the late Andrew Weatherall. Guests Jono Burgess and Jim Butler

Key takeaways

• Andrew Weatherall's remix of Primal Scream's 'Loaded' is credited with helping kickstart the 90s indie-dance era.
• Weatherall used his 'confidence of ignorance' to innovate in the studio, often working without formal production training.

Main topics

• Andrew Weatherall's career arc
• The influence of 90s fanzines

Notable quotes

He is survived by about seven million children of the acid house revolution.

Conclusion

A poignant tribute to a DJ whose curation and character defined an era

Transcript preview

Speaker 3 (0:04) Hello and welcome to Talk 90s to Me, where we delight in indie music, but immerse ourselves in acid house, set up the boys' own crew and DJ at Shoom, kick off the actual 90s by remixing a primal scream ballad, then remix everyone else from Björk to Saint Etienne, move from upbeat Balearic sounds into panel beaters from Prague techno, create sabres of paradise. and Bocca Juniors, move to Yorkshire to learn dry stone walling, form two lone swordsmen and end the decade by creating Electro Clash through a compilation LP, all while sporting tattoos, brothel creepers and leather trousers. I'm Miranda Sawyer and this week on Talk 90s, I am delighted to be talking the late, great Andrew Retherall. with Jono Burgess and Jim Butler from the amazing publication Disco Pogo, who recently published a fantastic tribute to Weatherall that was so brilliant and so popular, it smashed into the Sunday Times top 10 bestseller list, which we will cheer. Hooray! Speaker 5 (1:09) Hi, Speaker 3 (1:10) Jono and Jim. Hello, Speaker 5 (1:11) everyone. Hi, Brenda. Thanks for having us. Thank you for having us, yes. Speaker 3 (1:13) Oh, well, look, we've got the book on display. It is a fabulous tribute. Before we begin talking about Andrew, who died aged 56, out of the blue really, in March 2020, just right before the COVID lockdown, I thought I would ask you both how you met him, how you knew him. I Speaker 4 (1:32) think I met him through Jockey Slut first, which is a fanzine that we started in Manchester. And funnily enough, the year Boyzone ended, I think we started Jockey Slut. And he agreed to be on the cover of the third issue. Joanne Wayne had this great idea about interviewing him about his tattoos, which was covered in tattoos. And the tagline, Weatherall gets his tats out, grace to cover. It kind of made the magazine, really, because we'd had a couple of issues out before that. But it was such a big deal in 1993. And for him to take his kit off as well, when I was going around, you know, little record shops. hawking bags around all over the country. Everyone was like, oh, we'll take that. That's Wetherell, but it's also funny. Speaker 3 (2:15) Yeah, and also interesting, not many DJs, I mean, not many DJs had that much of a personality and they wouldn't have done that, would they? Speaker 4 (2:21) No, but I think I remember him at the time saying, oh, I used to be involved in Boyzone and I understand fanzines and I want to help you guys, you know, on your way. So that would have probably been around the first time. And then he played for Bugged Out, I think, two years after that in 1995. So he was a regular at Bugged Out then. Speaker 3 (2:42) And what about you, Joe? Speaker 4 (2:43) First time I met him wasn't until it was Speaker 5 (2:44) right. I interviewed him for the last issue of what turned out to be the last issue of Jockey Slut in 2004. Yeah. There was a Two Lone Swordsman album coming out. Our Jockey Slut offices were opposite his studio in Shoreditch. So I used to see him about all the time. But I went to interview him for the... around his album and in between the interview happening and the magazine coming out, we died a death. Speaker 3 (3:09) So he basically opened Jockey Slut and Speaker 5 (3:11) finished it Speaker 4 (3:12) up. Is that what you're saying? He Speaker 3 (3:14) is interesting, as we'll kind of discover, but because he was very recognisable, I think his look was slightly intimidating. The first couple of times I met him, I was a bit scared because it was during the 90s and he had a kind of rockabilly quiff and he just looked quite... Not dark, because actually I kind of quite instantly discovered that he was really jolly. But he looked a little bit more scary than maybe a regular DJ because of the way that he dressed. Yeah, yeah. And maybe because of the music that he played actually towards the end of the 90s. But when I met him, I thought I was a bit scared of him because he was so cool, which everybody thought in the 90s. But he was so kind and nice. I was slightly freaked out by how friendly he was, really. Yeah, yeah. You like talking about mad. History stuff is what he really liked. I Speaker 4 (4:03) think when he died, even quite a lot of people said they were always in awe of him. People who you were like, oh, wow, you were scared of him as well in a way. But obviously they then, you know, became really good friends with him because he was a very sort of kind, humble bloke, really. He's very Speaker 3 (4:19) jovial. He's much more jovial than you kind of imagine. He's Speaker 4 (4:22) very funny, Speaker 5 (4:22) yeah. Lots of people who we interview in the book and, you know, elsewhere as well just say that they were fanboys or fangirls, you know. starting off and then they ended up working with him you know people like Richard Fearless and Jack Skuna who was obviously in Sabres of Paradise with him you know they were absolutely in awe of him and like you said you know probably a little bit scared of him. Then it turned out he was a human Speaker 3 (4:41) being. Exactly Speaker 5 (4:42) and they worked with him and actually you know something that a lot of people will remark upon is his generosity of spirit. But there's that kind of facade. Not facade, but there was that. It's Speaker 3 (4:52) just a look, isn't it? Speaker 5 (4:53) Yeah, well, yeah. I think people were Speaker 4 (4:54) probably a little bit intimidated by him. But in the early years as well, he looked like Throb from Primal Scream, which probably helped with the Primal Scream connection. Speaker 3 (5:02) Very true, very true. Okay, so look. Weatherall comes from Windsor. He got into grammar school, but he flunked his A-levels. But he did get art and history, which I think is significant. An indication of his character, maybe. He's a soul boy, but he's also into indie music and he follows New Order around for quite a while, along with Simon Eccle, who's his great friend, and his brother Ian. This is what Simon Eccle says about him. They set up a boy's zone together later. Andrew was always a weird kid and they met because, and this bit reminds me of the Rolling Stones, because he spots Andrew walking up and down Windsor High Street. holding an album that he just wouldn't have seen before. And so they get talking this way. And then, this is also significant, they take acid and go to clubs together with their friend Phil Goss. This is like the formative years. Yeah, the teenage Speaker 4 (5:54) years. Speaker 3 (5:55) When he lived with Simon, they moved into a Speaker 2 (5:57) flat Speaker 3 (5:57) together. They moved into a place called Ward Royal and the only furniture in the living room was a backseat from a Citroen 2CV. That's so 90s, isn't it? That detail is in your book. I just thought that is so 90s. I just was really happy with it. Okay. So he starts DJing, doesn't he? He starts DJing around 1987? Speaker 4 (6:16) Yeah. I mean, it comes out of Boyzone. So Boyzone comes first, which is a fanzine from 1986. And it was Terry Farley had seen The End, which was the Farms fanzine in Liverpool, which is about trainers and football and music. He was like, if the Scousers can do it, then so can we. So I think Terry Farley was from Slough and a proper soul boy. And he meets Simon and Andrew, who are a few years younger than him, in clothes shops and record shops, that kind of thing. I think in a pub in Windsor as well, where there's a bit of a community. But yeah, the crucial thing is he's from the soul scene, as are a lot of the DJs at the time, like Nicky Holloway and Pete Tong. But Wetherill, crucially, is an indie kid. I think Terry Farley says... We read Blues and Soul, he reads the NME. But yeah, we first hear of Andrew Weatherill, not as his name, but as The Outsider, which is a brilliant pseudonym because he's like an outsider all his life after that, really. But he calls himself The Outsider in Boyzone. He writes Speaker 3 (7:17) kind of like little, it's almost like an editorial, isn't it? Yeah, Speaker 4 (7:19) he writes the editorial, he handwrites it. He also art directs it, so apparently he's always bringing in pictures to... run through the fanzine, and he brings an electroset. Simon says whenever they'd run out of a tea, he'd have to sort of make a tea out of two of the bits of electroset, like an eye stuck on top of an eye. So it's proper cut-and-paste fanzine. Boyzone becomes a bit of a cultural phenomenon, I suppose. It was just cool, wasn't it? I remember Speaker 3 (7:46) seeing it and thinking, well, it's a cool thing. Yeah, yeah. Speaker 4 (7:49) Good Speaker 3 (7:50) humour and good music taste and stuff. Speaker 4 (7:52) Yeah, it's about music, trainers. Speaker 4 (7:56) crisps football yeah all these things that Speaker 3 (7:58) lead into loaded eventually Speaker 4 (7:59) yeah exactly yeah it really is and then they inevitably start throwing parties a couple of years later and he's the guy who has all the records obviously people like Terry Farley being a soul boy has got loads of records but Simon just said he's got way more records than anyone else and they're quite unusual as well as playing things like Lou Reed and Echo and the Bunnymen at the Boys' Own Parties, he'd play, he once got kicked off of playing the 6-3-3 squadron theme and just putting the fog on for like about five minutes, whole room full of fog in there. But yeah, he'd also play, you know, I think when Shum started later on, he was the only person with a psychic TV tattoo. So he was really into throbbing gristle. And he meets Speaker 3 (8:43) Genesis Peoria there, doesn't he? On the stairs, I think, Speaker 4 (8:45) isn't he? Yeah, Speaker 3 (8:46) yeah. Speaker 4 (8:46) Shows him the tattoo. So yeah, he starts DJing in that period. And I think he's just quite singular compared to the Soul Boys because he just plays different music. But it sounds like even from that beginning, he starts to get a bit of a rep. And so at the parties, everyone's sort of like, oh, what time is Andrew on? Because he just brings a point of difference. Speaker 3 (9:06) Yeah, he looks very different, doesn't he? Although I have to say there's a really brilliant... in the book, isn't there, Jim, that I was showing you before? Yeah, Speaker 2 (9:13) yeah, Speaker 3 (9:13) yeah. And it's him and Simon and another guy called Spike. And they're at, I know you meant to say Shum, but I'm going to say Shum. Speaker 4 (9:21) I say Shum. Speaker 3 (9:22) I can't help it. Shum. And they're dancing. Yeah. And he looks, to me, although he has, you know, I know that everyone says he has a different style, he just looks like a raver to me. That Speaker 5 (9:33) particular picture, yeah, yeah. He's another person on the dance floor, isn't he? Yeah. And I think that's... something that you know comes through when people talk about him is that obviously you know he's a very exalted figure within dance music electronic music music in general but the thing that a lot of people always want to remind us of is that he was so much fun yeah Speaker 3 (9:52) you Speaker 5 (9:53) know and i think that that those pictures you know those ones of shum and when he's they're going on away days to weekenders and stuff like that you know he's just one of the the crowd you know he's Speaker 3 (10:03) He's just having a laugh, isn't he? He's just Speaker 5 (10:04) funny, you know. And I think because of his intellect and his wit, you know, that probably did set him apart from a lot of them. I think Simon refers to him as the grammar school kid, you know. But yeah, I think that, and later on, you know, when talking to the people that work with him, they just say he was so much fun, you know. Because he was so funny. And Speaker 3 (10:22) also, like, he's very witty. I mean, I wrote down quite a few things that he says in the book that really made me laugh. There's a point where, this is later on, but basically him and Justin Robertson are in Belfast and there's a point where they get their ID checked with this kid, like, pointing a gun at them. And Justin Robertson's girlfriend gets all kind of, like, scared when they ask her name and she can't... Can't remember. She's so, so, so het up about it. And Weatherall just goes, look inside your coat, he says, Dorothy Perkins. Yeah, Speaker 4 (10:55) yeah. Diffuses the situation. Speaker 3 (10:57) He's so good. He's Speaker 4 (10:59) just Speaker 3 (10:59) really funny. Speaker 4 (10:59) Well, Simon also sort of says he was such a funny, engaging person as well that he knew that as soon as he'd start meeting people from the West End, they'd just love him. Speaker 3 (11:09) Yeah, yeah. So Speaker 4 (11:09) when Danny and Jenny Rampling met him, I think actually when he played Shum on the farm. Yeah, they run Shum. Yeah. When he played Shume on the Farm, Jenny said he never asked for money. It just didn't seem to, obviously they probably paid him, but he just didn't even think or just didn't even cross his mind to get paid for playing records, which sort of says a lot. Speaker 3 (11:31) Hello, hello, it's Miranda here and I have some news. Talk 90s is going live. We're very excited to announce we are throwing open the doors of perception and welcoming our lovely listeners to join us on the 15th of October at the Institute of Contemporary Music and Performance in Queen's Park in London. We are recording a live episode with... The fabulous Yassi Salek of Bansplain returning to Talk90s to discuss Courtney Love in the 1990s. You won't want to miss this. Yassi is a longtime fan of Courtney and also knows her. She has several anecdotes and you will enjoy it. Tickets are priced at £17, but if you're a patron, they're just £13, which is also a great excuse to become a patron-er. We only have a capacity of 100 tickets, so once they are gone, they are gone. To get yours, search Talk90sICMP or visit podmasters.co.uk forward slash live for more information. Talk90s, live at the ICMP on October the 15th. With Yassi Selick. Hooray! Get your tickets today. Speaker 3 (12:51) Around this time, he meets Jeff Barrett. So Jeff Barrett eventually sets up Heavenly. But he at the time is just somebody on the scene. He's doing press for various people, including the Happy Mondays and Primal Screen, people like that. Speaker 2 (13:05) And Speaker 3 (13:05) they really click, don't they? They actually look quite similar. Jeff had kind of curly hair, like long curly hair like Andrew. But Jeff is kind of like gingery fair, basically. And Andrew is like dark. He looks a bit like a kind of Three Musketeer, doesn't he, Andrew? That's Speaker 4 (13:23) exactly what Justin says in the book, that they come into Eastern Block in Manchester looking like waistcoats, long curly hair, looking like the Three Musketeers. And he's like, how on earth did you get up the street without being beaten up? Speaker 3 (13:35) It's because they've got big boots on. Yeah, Speaker 4 (13:37) exactly. Speaker 3 (13:38) Okay, so look, we're coming out of the 80s, we're going into the early 90s. There's one thing I did want to mention, which isn't really... passed over in the book, but I just want to say it anyway. His mum dies in 1990, actually, when she's 45, and she was a young mum. She had MS, so it, you know, obviously a very difficult thing. But in the early 90s, he starts doing remixes, doesn't he? Okay, Jim, who is he doing remixes for? Speaker 5 (14:06) Well, the first one he did was Happy Mondays, which would have, I mean, he did it with Paul Eichenwald. who obviously they were all, you know, moving in the similar circles. They spelt his Speaker 4 (14:16) name wrong on the sleeve. Speaker 5 (14:17) Yeah, they spelt his name wrong on the sleeve, yeah. Speaker 3 (14:19) And also in your book, Sean Ryder can't remember a thing. Speaker 5 (14:21) I mean, to be fair to him, the PR did say he can't remember ever Speaker 4 (14:26) meeting him. He says Speaker 5 (14:27) he can remember meeting him once. And he also said he couldn't remember that he was actually, he had done the remix. He remembers Oakenfold, because I suppose at that point, Oakenfold, who then obviously went on to produce Pills and Thrills, was the bigger name, I suppose. But yes, he does the Happy Mondays Hallelujah Club mix, which... Speaker 3 (14:46) Jeremy Deller's all-time favourite record. Speaker 5 (14:48) I mean, Hallelujah in and of itself is a fantastic track, but Weatherall stroke Eichenfolz mix is, to me, the best version. And then obviously from there, he goes on to do, you know, well, I'm sure we'll come on to Loaded, but he does, you know, a few more heavenly things to help Jeff, I suppose. And then obviously, yeah, Loaded is the one that really... makes his name. Speaker 3 (15:11) I've interviewed Bobby Gillespie here and you know you could argue that Screamadelicus starts the 90s you know I mean there's lots of different arguments obviously partly I'm doing it because he was in the studio with me but I can make that argument Speaker 1 (15:23) but Speaker 3 (15:23) Loaded that story is basically that is only Andrew Retherall's only second time in the studio second Speaker 1 (15:33) or third yeah I mean which Speaker 3 (15:34) is kind of amazing and I think that that's there's an assumption that if you can put records you Speaker 2 (15:40) know Speaker 3 (15:41) as Speaker 2 (15:42) a Speaker 3 (15:42) dj you know oh you can choose those records maybe even mix them that you'll be a good