Fair enough Peter, but
aren't you drawing more attention to your appearance than the group's music? PLAY MISTY FOR ME
The Iron fist in the velvet glove - that's Dead Or Alive's Pete Burns. The Liverpool singer might look like punk's answer to Danny La Rue but he's as tough as a Scouse docker.
You want proof? - Then look no further than Dead Or Alive's current single 'Misty Circles'.
"I think it'll take a lot
of people by surprise, 'cos it's going into the mainstream, where most people haven't
heard anything I've done. They'll probably expect me to be a real manly voice. It's not a
deliberate attempt at a contradiction, it's just the way I am.
"I'm not the boy next door. I can't pretend to be mild mannered and things that I'm
not. Though if I did it would make things easier for me. I'm bloody stubborn and difficult
to deal with.
"My temper's never got me in trouble 'cos it blows up to such an extent that there's
never any repercussion from it. It's just over. I'm not somebody who compromises with
record companies or anybody else around me. I'm very very headstrong.
"I'll explode about thigns - I'll throw tantrums to get my way. You're supposed to
grow out of things like that but I'm getting worse all the time. I'm getting much more
stubborn about what I want to do."
Fair enough Peter, but
aren't you drawing more attention to your appearance than the group's music?
"I really hope that my
career doesn't rely too much on my appearance. That could put a major strain on me. I
really don't want to rely on image. It's much more difficult to make a good image than a
good record. If you concentrate on the image and not on the music you're a tosspot. How
long can you go round sucking your cheeks in and make records that are rubbish? I wanna
make good records - and be remembered for my records not my image.
"I'll use my image to win attention for the group. When we get attention our music
will do the rest."
Aah, the music. DOA are mixing up a powerful electrophunk concoction far removed from the ethereal textures of their earlier work. Why the change?
"From the first record I
ever made - 'Black Leather' by Nightmares In Wax - this was the music I was hearing in my
head. What I was singing before wasn't really what I was hearing in my head, it was a
means to an end.
"I don't know anything about studio techniques - I was doing all those records 'cos I
didn't know how to do these.
"Now we're following the musical direction I've always wanted to go in. You can't
imagine how happy it makes me."
Dead Or Alive's ambitions are big. Pete constantly refers to the world market, to the marketing muscle of large record companies. This is Burns' big chance and he's taking it very seriously.
"Everybody, when it boils
down to it, is in this business for money, for a living. You can't treat it as a hobby
like pottery or something.
"There's no point just concentrating on Britain, if you've got the advantages of a
world-wide label. There's a whole world out there - why not capitalise on it? You've just
gotta take the situation you're in and use it. We went as far as we could on the Indie
level. Now we're on a major label we should use it."
Sound sense Pete, the sorta
thing your adversary Boy George would no doubt agree with. Is there any similarity between
you and the Boy?
"I think he's a bit more outgoing, a bit more chatty than I am. What he wants to do
he's doing very well, but it's not what I want to do. I don't wanna be someone who just
appeals to house-wives, that's just not me."
Now that should get the letters flooding in.
Jim REID (Record Mirror, 18.06.83)