Q Magazine
Neil Jones

November 1997

In 1984 music was trundling down a sorry path of bland beats, synthesised progressions and piss poor lyrics. One of the few lights in a new dark age was Kalle Ryan's second album Was?. His first album Footsteps in Chalkdust was something of a college cult hit. A record so precious to those who knew it, that it was spoken about only in hushed tones for fear that the secret may spread too far. This second (highly experimental) album proved to be such a distinct departure that it alienated him from many of those early fans, and in addition served to shape Kalle's musical future as we would come to know it. It is hardly surprising that such an odd record developed out of singular obsessions and a happy stroke of luck. This is the story of that album as told by those who made it.

Matt Collins (Producer) I remember coming into the studio on the first day and Kalle was wearing only red shorts and a cowboy hat. I knew there and then that I was in for either the worst or best experience of my life.

Jud (guitarist) Essentially we were working within new looser guidelines. The first album had gotten such a good buzz that the record company was willing to pump money into whatever Kalle wanted to do.

Matt Collins For the first week Kalle refused to allow any traditional instruments into the studio at all. He wanted to make a clean break from his first album and was determined to go for broke and make something unlike anything that had come before. The band were roaring through loudhailers, banging bin lids, thowing food at the microphone, setting themselves on fire. It was fucking mayhem.

Rob McConnell (former manager) The record execs were calling me, asking me how it was going. I had to try and convince them that this was the going to be the next Sergeant Peppers without letting them hear a second of tape, you know what I mean? Not an easy thing to do I can tell you.

Kalle Ryan (singer/composer) At that time I was very interested in seeking out some kind of pure expression. A true voice or original language. In the title track there's a line that goes : "Like a new language, hard to master." And that really embodied the essence of the project and became the mantra for the whole recording of the LP.

Jud Nobody other than Kalle really knew what direction the whole thing was heading. The problem was that he was ridiculously paranoid and became really secretive. We had massive rows for the first few days, which basically ended up on the record.

Relly (drummer) Myself and Jud had the hardest time of everyone I think, because we knew Kalle the longest and still we were clueless. He had this really thick pad, like a sketchbook, and it was full of like, notes and drawings and all this other stuff for all the songs. But he was keeping it real vague. He was really bad at bringing it across.

Rob McConnell I think Kalle had a fair idea what he wanted out of the whole experience, both musically and mentally, you know what I mean? He was joshing with everyone in a really measured way just to get different ideas out of them. His take on it was that he was in a position to do what he wanted and he would use it to his advantage. I mean, things got fairly out of hand at times, but I think the album is the better for it. All those emotions are real, you know what I mean?

Jud Things were not going well. I'm sure even Kalle will admit to that now. He was giving us more and more detailed outlines of what he was looking for. We were starting to get to grips with the whole philosophy of language And it really helped when he took us to see [Werner] Herzog's Jeder fuer sich und eins gegen alle, but we were still struggling with the whole thing. It was all too abstract still.

Matt Collins So, for the first two or three months I had basically been recording mad tea parties. That was all well and good, but nothing really useable was being layed down. And pretty much everyone was getting pissed off. It was obvious that the session was going to fucking fizzle out unless something fresh came about.

Relly We were well depressed leaving the studio on the Thursday night. We all headed down to the pub and proceeded to get legless. Nobody wanted to talk about it, but it was hanging in the air. It had to come up eventually and sure enough it did. There was a lot of shouting and threats. And right in the middle of it all we had one of those really hopeful moments and Kalle said he had an idea for the following morning.

Kulti Lappinen (joik singer) I arrive at 10.30am on Friday. Kalle and me drink one bottle of vodka each. He showed me the picture of the many people with many languages and I sing then until my voice finishes at 6pm Saturday.

Jud As far as I'm concerned, the record is as good as it is, because Kulti's unique singing gave us such a great foundation to build the wall of sound on. It was the touch of magic we needed.

Kalle Ryan Hearing Kulti sing was one of the greatest moments in my life. The joik singing became so much more than we ever could have hoped. We took a real chance and it became the soul of the record. Kulti's singing is as honest as anything you'll ever hear.

Rob McConnell Needless to say, it was the turning point for everything. It all fell into place from there. A real buzz started happening in the studio. And the band ended up recording and mixing all the material in less than a month. That includes all the b-sides and everything. It was truly phenomenal.

Matt Collins Once they got on that roll, they were able to bring back a lot of the early material and rework it into the mix. Like any great album, it started to take on a life of its own. I mean hindsight is twenty-twenty isn't it, but I remember thinking that there was something more to it. Like they were on the verge of something.

Relly It was a tiring album to make, but in a good way. We knew we had something to say and that was always going to carry it. It didn't matter if it sold well, because we felt that it was bound to be misunderstood. It's great to see this huge revival now. In fairness, it was well unusual for its time. It still is.

Kalle Ryan It's a record I'm very proud of. We always liked to say that it was one of the first albums of the future.