Ben
Harper : "If a French guy named JP Plunier hadn't
discovered me, I would probably still be playing for three
drunks in one of the coffee-shops in the desert south of
Los Angeles. Plunier listened to me and he decreed: The
whole world must hear this!
There's a coffee-house near where I live. That's where I
met him the first time. We were in line buying candies.
He asked me:
— Your parents are the people from the music shop,
right?
— Yeah.
— I go to the university, I met your father.
I was a kid, he was eighteen or nineteen years old, I was
eight or nine. I had nothing to say to guy his age. He often
went to the shop and I was often there. We liked the same
music. A few years after that, he was interested in the
music that I had written, he wanted to work with me and
I with him; he was the only person who understood the musical
direction that I wanted to take. It was a spiritual connection.
That's the way it had to be."
"[...] JP moved heaven and earth, he called everyone
in showbiz. He wasn't afraid of nything! He chatted them
up, went off on tangents, contacted all the records companies.
A bluesman who plays sitting down, what a concept! To get
some peace, a girl from Virgin finally said: Okay, okay,
give me a tape tomorrow at noon. The next day we went there,
my band and I, guitar-cases under arm, proud as gypsies.
We set up in front of her desk, took out our gear and played
her four songs. Virgin signed us straightaway. All started
like that, with an audacious act. Virgin had given us some
money to record demos. We wanted to produce the music ourselves,
JP and I. In three days, we had produced and mixed six songs
and they are all in the first album."
JP Plunier : "[...] I was
studying at a Polytechnical Institute in California. Later
I obtained another diploma in the town where Ben lived,
I went to Pomona College. I met his family there and their
shop (...). I knew him since he was a kid but I lost sight
him, he grew up, and so did. He did his thing and I did
mine. At first it wasn't the plan that I would manage him,
I made videos, stuff like that. He gave me a copy of his
very first album "Pleasure And Pain" (...) There
were three complete songs which he had written and the rest
were covers. I offered to take some pictures, and then he
saw what I did. I directed a little video of "Whipping
boy", without synchronization, without anything, everything
was done by hand. It was really, very, very basic. There
were some other guys who were interested in him but they
didn't get it. They'd say to him: "You have to take
singing lessons, you have to change this or that...".
I didn't have at all the same vision. I talked with Ben,
he played his songs, I made some suggestions and he agreed
with me. That's how we started to work together."
— Excerpted from the 'Roots' page part 2 |
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