What happens on tour usually stays on tour, as they say. With 2014 album Paradise Filter, Caravan updated the concept in the interests of caring about loved ones – and at the same time updated their approach to songwriting and the music industry, as Pye Hastings told Prog at the time.
Caravan have never had a problem with misleading their loved ones while they’re on the road. “If you’re touring and you call home, the last thing you want to do is give your wife or girlfriend the impression that you’re having a great time while they’re stuck in the usual humdrum existence,” explains multi-instrumentalist Geoffrey Richardson.
“So we came up with something called a ‘paradise filter.’ You’d attach it to your mobile, or in the old days to the hotel room phone; and when you called, it cut out all the sounds of the party happening around you, and substituted the noise of building works or similar. That way, people back home wouldn’t realise you were enjoying yourself!”
In the world without such a device, however, guitarist/vocalist Pye Hastings regrets the things that can go wrong. “I once went to Rio for a show. My wife told me to see the local sights, and she wanted to hear all about them when I called. So I dutifully phoned and told her I’d just been for a helicopter ride around the Christ The Redeemer statue, and I was now sitting on gorgeous white sand in the blazing sunshine.
“She hung up on me! It turns out she’d had a bad day at the office – my wife’s a criminal solicitor – and wasn’t amused by my honesty. Sometimes you can’t win!”
Paradise Filter is the title of the latest Caravan album. It’s their first all-new studio release in a decade, and the exposition of the title’s meaning isn’t the only surprise here. It’s an unusual record for the band, because not only is every track rather short by their own standards, but the lyrics have an edge of reality too.
In the past, Caravan have been known for a rather whimsical approach. They were reminiscent of the eccentric Englishness in 1950s Ealing Studios movies, and their capacity for satire was often overlooked. But the songs on the new album suggest a shift in approach. “It might be due to the fact that a couple of years ago, I moved back to the north of Scotland, and that affected the way I thought of my lyrics,” says Hastings, who was born in Tamnavulin in Banffshire. “I wanted to introduce a sense of realism in what I was writing about.”
This is clear on Fingers In The Till, which is a barely disguised dig at the way the music industry has always treated musicians. “The business people take their percentages and what’s left goes to the artist, who usually get the smallest cut. But without the musicians and songwriters, there would be no record industry. It’s always annoyed me, so I decided it was time to put into words the way I feel about it.”
It would be logical to assume that Farewell My Old Friend was written about late drummer Richard Coughlan, who died in December 2013, but that isn’t the case. “Because I live in a small Scottish village, I experience interesting things,” Hastings explains.
Funerals there are social occasions… the wakes tend to be very boozy
“For instance, everyone goes to every funeral in the area, and there was one week where I went to three of them. The third was for a friend of mine, and I was amazed to see a few hundred people gathering for her funeral. Of course, funerals there are social occasions, and the wakes tend to be very boozy!”
Coughlan’s lengthy illness contributed to the decade-long gap between The Unauthorised Breakfast Item in 2003 and Paradise Filter. “Richard started to have health problems just after we finished the last album,” says Hastings. “But he was so determined to carry on, and we thought taking a brief break would help him recover.
“The hiatus got longer and longer, until it was obvious to everyone that he just couldn’t carry on. That’s when we brought in Mark Walker on drums. Richard still played percussion with us, until even that proved impossible.”
There’s no doubt that Caravan – completed by bassist Jim Leverton and keyboardist Jan Schelhaas – miss co-founder Coughlan, but they refuse to live in the past. They proved that by embracing the concept of PledgeMusic to finance the new album. “When it was suggested to us that we raise the money for the new album through Pledge, I was very dubious,” Hastings admits.
The fans will back us to the hilt, no matter what… I can’t tell you how fortunate we are to inspire such loyalty
“In the end we were convinced to give it a try. And it astonished me when we got to 50 per cent of our target in just five days! But then the guy who runs our website told me he wasn’t at all surprised, and that Caravan fans are so committed to the band that they will back us to the hilt, no matter what. And he’s right. I can’t tell you how fortunate we are to inspire such loyalty.”
When the dust settled, 149 per cent of the money needed had been raised; and the extra funds haven’t been squandered: “We found the costs involved with making the album were greater than expected,” reveals Hastings.
The band were also under something of a time constraint, despite having no label to apply deadline pressure on them for the album to be finished. “We were due in the studio [Canterbury Sound] in September,” says Walker, “but had to delay it because they were already booked up. And the way Pledge works, you have to commit to getting copies of the finished album to people by a certain date, so we had to get it completed in a hurry.”
Various packages were on offer, one of which was an edition of Paradise Filter with a bonus CD called The Back Catalogue Songs.“We thought it would be a good thing to re-record a few songs with the current line-up,” says Hastings. “That way we could offer some fans the opportunity of hearing some of their favourite tracks being reinterpreted. It was fun to do, and we did it in just one day, recording live in the studio.”
We’ve talked to Universal about getting the rights back, but the money they want is just silly
However, don’t expect lots of older tracks to be revisited. “As far as I’m concerned, it was a one-off, just to offer something special to diehard fans,” insists Hastings.
He’s also rather ambivalent about celebrating the band’s 50th anniversary, which is now just four years away. “Do you have to remind me how old we are? Ha! To be honest, something like that doesn’t really take up much of my time. I’m not one for living in the past and looking backwards. I’d rather see this band as having a future and get excited about all we want to do.
“We now have our own label – Caravan Records – and not only have we put out Paradise Filter through the company, but we’ve also got back the rights for The Unauthorised Breakfast Item.” They’d like to own the rest of their catalogue too, but there’s a problem.
“A lot of our albums are owned by Universal,” explains Hastings. “These are Caravan albums in that all the music and performances on them are from us; you could say we have a moral right to own them. But legally they’re under the Universal umbrella. We’ve talked to them about getting the rights back, but the money they want is just silly – way beyond what we can afford.”
The last thing we want to be are business-heads… I leave all of that to my wife
They’re pressing on regardless with plans to make the most of their new-found freedom. “We’ve had meetings with various distributors,” sighs Hastings, “but the deals they have offered us are totally unacceptable. If we signed with any of them, we’d be earning hardly anything. So for the time being we’re going it alone. We’ll sell albums at our gigs and online.”
All of which suggests Caravan have now become corporate-minded – but Hastings disputes the claim. “We’re now more aware than ever of our potential earnings – but the last thing any of us want to be are business-heads. I leave all of that side of things to my wife. She’s better at it than me!”
“She gets to stay at home and count the money while we swan off around the world,” laughs Richardson. “It’s a tough life being a musician!”
