Jackie Leven Interview

Interview by the German Van Morrison fan Ulrich Begemeier for the British Van Morrison newsletter, conducted on 22.09.1997 at the Sinkkasten in Frankfurt am Main (Morrison once played there as “Storyville” with the Monarchs). Leven talks about the reissue of Control (LSD imagery), the pseudonym John St. Field (trouble with the police in a northern English town), years in Madrid, Berlin, South America and Dorset, Doll by Doll falling between two stools (like The Yachts, The Original Mirrors, The Only Ones), unreleased Virgin recordings, the attack, heroin and the CORE Trust, which he said he had handed over to his friend Jason Wright but remains a “father-figure”. He reports on the Doll by Doll concert in Brussels with Jo Shaw and David McIntosh (Shaw is currently building a studio for George Martin), on a song not used for the film Sid & Nancy, and on having received the German critics' annual prize in Bonn the day before (after a journey from Bautzen via Hannover, Hamburg and Düsseldorf), where he sang “The Bonnie Earl O' Moray” unaccompanied. A large part concerns Van Morrison: “Slim Slow Slider” on For Peace Comes Dropping Slow, “Hungry For Your Love”, Hillman's term “pathos”, Veedon Fleece as favourite album, being neighbours in Notting Hill, the 1995 Q Awards. Plans: Doll by Doll CDs, Charisma/Virgin material, Argyll Cycle Vol. II, Injured Women, an album setting Russian poetry to music (Mandelstam, Akhmatova). At the end he explains the Artaud photo on the covers.