Having only known Warren Ellis through his music I had no idea what to expect talking to him. On record the Dirty Three's sound is equal parts beauty, melancholy and chaos. On stage Ellis is a wild man possessed - a lightning rod for illicit forces. One time I watched him closely as he lurched from side to side, mangling his violin before throwing up in a bucket. In photos the heavy brow gives him an intense, brooding quality. But, it's a surprise how verbose he is.

The Dirty Three have been relentlessly instrumental since forming in 1993. But that's changed with the release of the band's latest record Cinder. A few years back Ellis said, "The obvious thing people had been telling us ever since we started was that we should have a singer. We never really felt the need for lyrics, because we've always felt that what we did was lyrical enough."

But Cinder sees the Mekons' Sally Timms and Cat Power's Chan Marshall add vocals. A revolution?

These days Ellis resides in France with his family. It's here that we find him.

Hello Warren, where are you ringing in from?
I'm in Paris, its getting cold. We're on the heels on winter. Even when the sun's out the air's still cool. It's hard to get the kids up for school I tell you.

You've been in France for a while now - do you still feel like an Australian visiting or are you part of the culture now?
I've been here eight years and I still don't get it. I don't pretend to get half of it. My French is better and I understand some things but everyday I realise what's happening around me is very different to what I know. But I've never pretended to think that one day I might be French. I'm Australian and it's clear as the nose on my face.

How does French sound mixed with dulcet Australian tones?
No one can really pick where I'm from. They're like 'where are you from? You've got an odd accent' sort of thing. I sound more like I'm from the south of France or something. I've got a courser accent.

Have you ever met your name sake - the graphic novel writer Warren Ellis writer of things like Wolverine and Transmetropolitan?
No, I haven't actually. I realise there's a writer by the same name. I've never read any of his stuff. He's seems to be pretty well known though.

Ever wondered what another Warren Ellis's life has been like?
Ah, no. I find it funny though that there's someone out there with the same name. Maybe I should get onto the internet and write to him. I don't even know what that would serve but it's definitely odd to think of someone walking around out there with the same name.

I think it could tumble you or anyone in the same boat, into an existential crisis. You realise that someone might've had the same nicknames, might've been teased for the same reasons that you were.
That's true, I hadn't thought about that - maybe he's got the same problems. Maybe if we met we'd have a massive nervous breakdown.

Have you ever met anyone that looked like you?
Well, there's a painting of Napoleon Bonaparte that hangs in the Louvre and there's a copy of it in a hotel in Glasgow. It's at the Malmaison Hotel behind the desk and it bears an uncanny resemblance to me. Nose, everything, you know. A strong nose, same hair. He's standing there with a sword up in the air and he's looking kinda menacing. Anyway, it's Napoleon Bonaparte in his 20's. And quite a few people, more than 20, have commented on how similar it is. And when I checked into the hotel all the staff did a double take.

Is that the pull you felt to France - the fact you might be Napoleon re-incarnated?
Well, you know what actually, people also said that I also looked like Vincent Gallo and I recently played a concert in Britain that he was at and a couple of people in the Bad Seeds they wanted to see me and him in the same area so they could see that we weren't the same people. I guess that's another person that people say I look like. I think he stole my dress sense.

Is it impossible to play violin and not feel some connection to Eastern Europe?
I'm sure it's possible because people seem to do it, not everybody seems to have that style of playing. I'm not sure that I play in that style but it's certainly I style that I really like. It has a tone of the instrument that is very recognisable and it brings a mood.

What's the strangest place you've heard your music being played back to you?
I'm not really sure - I have heard our music from time to time. It's always really surprising when you hear it in a film or something. To hear it in the context of being in a cinema - that someone has actually has stuck it in somewhere - I find that odd.

Do you still have a bucket at the side of stage when you play?
What to vomit in? I haven't had one for a while. It's been a few years since I've needed a bucket (laughing). Did you see that did you? It's sort of one of the hazards of the job really. You never know when you're going to be taken ill do you?

On Cinder there's been a revolution for the Dirty Three - there's lyrics, there's singing…
It's just what it is, it's someone singing on it. I think the bagpipes is more of a revolution for me than the vocals.

But why vocals now? After resisting for so many years…
Why not? We were looking to really open up the band and the songs and I've been playing mandolin and bazouki for eighteen months and brought them in and we really wanted to try and give every song what it needed and not think about how we might do it later on. The idea to have Sally on was as if her vocals were another instrument because I kept hearing a woman's voice on that particular track {'Feral'}. She was in town and Casey Rice, who was recording the album, called her and she came in. Then a little while later I saw Chan in Australia and she said she had time to sing on a track or something and she did it {'Great Waves'} in one or two takes and it seemed to fit in with the rest of the songs. There was no more thought beyond that. I guess what is quite different for us is that it does place the instruments in a different spot which has always been the distinct characteristic of the Dirty Three sound - that the instruments are always right in your face. Once the vocals get in there they seem to be given a lot of space. They're put up front and the instruments sit back and play a secondry role. But I think it adds to the album's breadth and depth. It seems a very rich album to me.

Is Chan Marshall the nutbagger that the music press leads us to believe?
I wouldn't call anyone a 'nutbag'. She's lovely. She's a lovely person and I think everybody gets a little precious. I don't know what everyone's problem is actually. She's certainly got an idiosyncratic way of doing things. But so what? She's not asking to be loved.

Or, is it a cry for love?
I've got no idea. I guess you're talking about some of the idiosyncratic nature of her performances - she's seems to have a reputation that precedes her. But it certainly seems to be consistent, I'll give you that. Generally it's about people's expectations of what they think they're going to get. And if they don't get it they get upset about it. It certainly has enamoured people to her as well. I guess most people know what to expect now and that's how it is.

Do you try and consciously avoid similar song structures - as in setting up a song, building to crescendo, then fading away…?
Yeah, that was an obvious thing that we had to have a look at after a while because it seemed we had fallen into that. Sometimes you do it, sometimes you don't. There doesn't seem to be any fixed rules because if you look at it that closely then you can knock out some of the intuitive responses that you have or it can stop you doing a song. There's also something that you have to accept as being a part of the way that you work together. That's what you actually might like about it - or that people might like about it. It was certainly something that we became aware of - that we're just doing this or that. It was like, 'okay, let's try and watch that at least'.

The first series of Dirty Three records tried to capture the live sound of the band as best you could - it seems Cinder is different to that.
Absolutely. I guess it's the closest we've come to producing the Dirty Three's sound. In the past it's always been about a few overdubs but mainly trying to capture what we're capable of doing live. But this time around we wanted to shorten the songs and be disciplined about that. At the heart of it it's still live because that's what we did - played it all together but then we've fleshed it out after that. Not worrying about how we were going to pull the results off live.

Listening to 'Flutter' off the record I can hear Alice Coltrane - is that far off the mark as an inspiration?
You'd be totally right there, I love Alice Coltrane. She's one of my heroes. I'm listening to her right now and I saw her two weeks ago in Paris do a concert. She's one of the greatest string arrangers and just so fantastic, beautiful, great organist and was really able to put that music and wildness into almost into a pop format. They were like pop songs. I think she's great, I think I've got everything she ever recorded. Probably half the notes I've ever played in my life are dedicated to her.

What's your favourite track off Cinder?
'Doris' - it's just a ball tearer. It's great and the pay off is like no other pay off - it's just fantastic when that change jumps in. It constantly makes me laugh.

©2005 Christopher Hollow

¡Tarantula!
the Sand Pebbles' fanzine
'another ghost transmission...'
sandpebbles@brella.org
©2005 Christopher Hollow