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The first edition of my band Earthworks evoked a certain British playfulness. Pigalle was the tourist area of Paris, known for it’s neon-lit red light district, that benefited from an immigrant population of Algerians, Senegalese and Moroccans. It had colour, vibrancy and excitement. The area has probably been ‘tidied up’ now, like Manhattan, NY. Django Bates’ (keyboards and horn) and saxophonist Iain Ballamy’s co-written melody has a whiff of the street-food you’d pass as you rolled down the street.

Electronic drums were still in their infancy in 1991, but already helping me to bring out a melodic aspect to any rhythm I chose to set up. Notwithstanding all the kit, I hear I opted for hand clapping for a fair bit of Iain’s soprano solo. After the abrupt change of tempo at about 3’43”, Django tears it up with a pretty traditional and very French accordion (squeeze-box) sound from the keyboards. His solo peaks with a cue at around 5’56”, and we’re on to the home stretch, a mad rush for the finish where the only instruction to the band for the end tune was ‘play as fast as possible’ till it hits the brick wall of the final note.

There’s a bit of Zawinul’s Weather Report here in the appropriation of other culture’s food, smells and beats as raw material for colourful collaboration, written or improvised. Pigalle has plenty of both – may have missed a bit of garlic, but hey, can’t have everything. It’s an idealised fantasia on the kind of music a Moroccan street band (albeit with a lot of kit!) would have been playing in Pigalle as we Earthworkers walked by in 1991, on the way to our own gig. Hope you enjoy listening to it as much as we enjoyed playing it.

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