By Beate Nossum and Mette Moller - (Translation by Cindy Kandolf)
translator's note: that's a pun. in norwegian, an "a-ha experience" is
an experience of suddenly realizing that you've known something all
along, or of suddenly seeing pieces of a mental puzzle fall into place.
-cgk
"It's just crazy to sell three and a half million albums - and get
depressed by it," says Paul Waaktaar-Savoy. This week "Mountains of
Time" has sold 11,000 copies. That was a rush.
Mr. Waaktaar-Savoy is overall quite pleased with the fruits of this
year's harvest. First came his son, True August ("Auggie" [sic] to his
parents and friends), then came the standing ovations for the Savoy album
"Mountains of Time" from reviewers all over the country, topped by two 6
out of 6 scores in the major tabloids.
"When I started playing guitar, I'd dream that I opened all the
newspapers one by one and: 'Oi, we got a six there, too!'"
Paul giggles under a navy blue parasol on the deck at home in Vinderen
[in Oslo].
"I've taught myself that what the number says isn't supposed to be
important. A-ha wasn't exactly spoiled with good reviews. We only got
sixes for high sales figures, and cheek bones."
Usually Paul Waaktaar-Savoy doesn't like it when a member of the press
wants to reminisce about the eighties and a-ha when he wants to talk
about the nineties and Savoy. But today only a bit of sarcasm reveals
his deep-seated unwillingness to talk about old accomplishments. And new
ones.
"Will it be strange to stand in front of screaming fans again?"
"Yeah, that's the market we're aiming for now; getting back all those
twelve year olds who used to stand right smack in front of the stage."
Paul Waaktaar has never been known for being humorous. Now he can enjoy
a little irony.
"It's not even fourteen year olds who are doing the screaming these
days. Now the average pop star fan is a girl of seven. Give it some
time, and the record business will start focusing on the enormous market
among newborns."
HE WHO LAUGHS LAST, laughs the longest. Now that the bomb that is the
new Savoy album has exploded, a relieved songwriter from Manglerud can
guffaw all the way to the bank. Show the finger to those who laughed
derisively when one of pop history's most frustrated teen idols tried to
turn his supergroup into a serious orchestra. Without a great deal of
success.
"I was just sick of arguing with producers and record company people.
A-ha doesn't need a spin doctor to change our style of music. It was
depressing that sales figures were supposed to define our musical
development."
"And on top of all this, you and Morten Harket had a falling out?"
"Well, I got crabby."
"Why?"
"I got crabby because I wasn't told about Morten's solo album. Even if
we didn't agree within a-ha, I always thought we were going to continue.
So I wrote songs and kept on working - a whole year, for no reason.
After ten years of working together, I'd have thought it was sort of
expected that you mentioned these things," says Paul, who first found out
about Morten's upcoming debut as a solo artist by chance, from someone in
management with a case of verbal diarrhea.
"But afterwards I felt it was really all right. I started looking for a
new band - and, shit, you wouldn't believe how many terrible vocalists
are out there! But then Lauren started to play. I couldn't believe it.
It was like a gift. Now I've recorded more material with Savoy than with
a-ha, in one third the time."
PAUL WAAKTAAR has been sowing golden seeds since he was eleven years
old. Now the sixes are growing on trees. Not only on the branch
labelled "Savoy". Dagbladet's reviewer was also wild about the sensational
reunion performance during last year's Nobel Peace Concert. In January
a-ha will be launching their come-back with the album "Minor Earth/Major
Sky", to be released around the word - with meticulous German thoroughness.
Waaktaar is optimistic.
"If a-ha can play for 100,000 during the day, and Savoy in a little club
at night - hey, I'm happy."
"But if it flops?"
"If it flops, it's going to flop *big*."
Dagbladet, June 1986:
/*"a-ha is driven around London in a limousine with electrified handles.
When the boys are seated in the car, the electricity is turned on - and
wild fans who try to open the doors are really in for a shock.*/
Paul Waaktaar-Savoy shakes his head and searches further through a pile
of old news clippings. A *telex* from Nork Telegrambyr† [a.k.a. NTB,
something like the Norwegian version of the Associated Press] stating
that "Take On Me" has fallen from first to third place on the American
singles charts. Their debut album, "Hunting High and Low", has sold
seven million copies. Morten, Mags, and P†l are doing up to eighteen
interviews a day. Before the balloon runs out of air, they've had eight
hits on the impossible British Top Ten chart. A-ha is much bigger than
Madonna. Almost bigger than Dire Straits. The papers are writing about
conditions they haven't seen since the Beatles were in their heyday.
Morten Harket flexes his biceps, Magne Furuholmen pulls his stunts, and
Paul is playing softly. Even when a-ha played for 200,000 fans - that's
two hundred thousand - in Rio, young Waaktaar was taking things pianissimo.
"It was only a game. During the concerts, we had a system. Morten took
care of the front rows, Magne dragged along the masses, and I tried to
communicate with the handful of introverts standing at the back of the
room."
"But what were you thinking about?"
"I had that feeling where you sort of wish you were Mick Jagger."
"??"
"You get immune to it. Everything that happened was just a job - pure
hype. Way too shallow and transparent to use any time on. The only
times we really enjoyed ourselves were when things were totally out of
control."
"Do you think it will be like that again?"
"Don't think so. I don't know. You need to have a certain age group for
things like that to happen. The slightly older people - the ones who are
interested in the music - can't be bothered to stand at an airport for
ten hours just to wait for you to land."
"The papers wrote that you three earned 50 million in 1985 alone?"
"It's interesting to read what the papers wrote," Paul says diplomatically.
He thinks that pop stars earn more now. And he's shockingly correct.
His colleague Lene from Aqua earned 70 million last year. Those kind of
numbers give us ordinary wage-slaves pause.
"I HAVE NO IDEA what we earned. But we were tricked sometimes. For
instance we had nothing to do with all the books and posters, and
probably missed out on a hundred million or so right there. The Spice
Girls surely earn more from bubble gum than from music."
"How did your family react to everything that was happening?"
"The worst part was before things started to happen. They were worried
about us when we went to England on good luck and warm wishes. Afterwards
things have gone well."
Dagbladet, October 1985:
/*"Isn't it a bit frightening that your son is at the top of the
entertainment world?"
"Oh, yes. P†l has told us some stories from Hollywood. It's a nasty
business. (....) Their manager has told us that most pop groups come from
unstable family backgrounds, you know, the slums of Liverpool and so on.
He thinks it's a real advantage that all three boys come from secure,
middle-class families." */
"Whoops! There I was, trying to cultivate an image as a working class
hero, and one comment sets me back years - and it's from my own mother!"
Now Paul has become a father. "Auggie" is going to follow the twin
circuses of Savoy and a-ha, through thick and thin. Everything's
beautiful. No clouds in a clear starry sky. Or...?
"The problem in a-ha is that everybody wants to be everybody else.
There's fighting for position. I want to sing. Morten wants to write
songs. Magne... We've worked it out and seen what we could have done
differently. The only thing that is going to keep a-ha functioning, is
to release albums more often. [Yes... yes.... YES!!!!] Towards the end
we were using so much time on promotion that we were only releasing an
album every third year. This time I want to let things happen more
spontaneously. Release the stranglehold on the whole thing. I know I
was running the show too much when we were in the studio, and I'm sure
that drove Morten and Magne mad at times..."
Paul thinks.
"Sometimes I think - hey, I have enough money, why not just *live*? Why
fight and struggle with new songs? But my relationship with music is
something like parents who only live through their children. And the
first time you get a song down - and you get chills down your spine -
well, you get hooked."
So the refrain junkie Paul Waaktaar-Savoy plans to double his dose for a
long time to come.
"What Savoy did in the clubs in New York was a kind of self-torture, but
I did it to grow on. With a-ha, we had so many hits. If things slowed
down during a concert, we could just switch over and play a couple old
favorites. It was a kind of parachute. Now people come to us after
concerts and ask about what they've heard, and if Savoy's music is
available on any albums. To play with a-ha in Rio is another game
entirely. A *completely* different game."