Music Interview: Bernard Butler

When you’re not working, how do you prefer to listen to music?

If you want to talk hi-fi, I live by my Bowers & Wilkins 702s. They’re in my living room and they’re my go-to speaker. Whenever I’m mixing, I then go downstairs [from the studio] and listen to it at a reasonable level on the Bowers & Wilkins speakers – they’re the gods for me and they tell me what to do. I sit and make notes and then I make changes based on that.

I listen to everything – streaming and vinyl. I tend to listen to certain things on vinyl, like Coltrane or Joni Mitchell, and I have piles of CDs. I’m really happy that people can access music in whichever way is possible.

When I’m making a record, and mixing it, there’s a side of me that wants a hi-fi person to love it and think it sounds beautiful, but, if I’m honest, the bulk of me still wants a piece of music to scream out of a car stereo and make you want to turn it up – that raw energy and excitement. That’s what I always look for.

So, finally, thanks to the new version, are you now happy with People Move On?

I’m really pleased. I listened to it the other day when I got the master of it on CD and I enjoyed it. I’m not uncomfortable with it – I like how my voice is and that’s how it will be from now on. I’m cool with the fact that there was one version made by a 27-year-old who didn’t know what he was doing, and now I’m a 51-year-old man. Shit happens.

Bernard Butler’s People Move On four-CD box set is out now on Demon Music. There is also a two-LP version of the 2021 rerecorded album, featuring new vocals.

bernardbutler.com

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