If the Stanislavsky Method acting technique could apply to the world of A&R, then Dave Bates would very probably be the world's first Method A&R man.

The 31-year-old head of Phonogram A&R doesn't just meet the band and producer at preproduction stage or listen to the rough mixes of the single: when Bates has signed a band he virtually moves in with them for the duration.

'Despite the fact it can be time consuming,' says Bates slipping into motormouth mode, 'it's the only way I can see to do it. After all if you sign a band, they have often signed to the label because of you — your personality has attracted them.

'You are the band's only link with the corporate mass that is the record company and you are personally responsible for their careers.'

In Bates' 11-year stint at Phonogram he has revolutionised his department and leads by his somewhat unusual example.

'When I took over as head of A&R,' he says, 'I changed the staff and completely stripped down the rosta to about seven or eight acts. We were carrying a lot of luggage so we sorted out their contracts and paid to have some of them finish quickly and said to them, "We can't possibly put all our energies into you if we don't think you are any good — so goodbye."

'So we were left with a rosta that we totally believed in but had to prove could be successful.'

The band that Bates allotted to work with were a young, talented twosome who were frequently referred to as a 'synth duo' regardless of the fact the neither of them played synthesisers. Starting as he meant to go on, Bates all but set up home with the band as they were recording their first single.

'Yeah,' he laughs,'I moved in but it was quite a strange existence because they were hopping around all over the place using all manner of studios, including the old Phonogram demo studio in Maddox Street which was pretty retarded in terms of equipment, but it had a superb vibe.

'The way I work with a band can lead to arguments and I can't deny that Roland, Curt and myself have had some blinding arguments.

'We've almost come to blows in some of the 'creative debates' we've had. We could hardly agree on anything. Even Mad World was meant to be a B-side at first until we had one of our famous 'discussions' and decided that we should release it.'

Fortunately the single was a success and money started coming in. Hopefully to preclude any further studio-hopping, the band decided to invest the capital in their own premises.

'The way they approached buying the studio was fantastic,' says Bates. 'They just decided that if they were to have their own studio then they would have the best ever and believe me it's fantastic. SSL, the Fairlight and Synclavier and all their keyboards are hardwired into the desk, Mitsubishi 32-track digital machine (X86) and two of every bit of outboard gear you could want.

'It's all set in this old wool hall which is fairly spacious so it's very well set out. The only problem with the place, and the band foresaw this some time ago, is that because The Wool Hall is a commercial studio and it is so good, they can't get into the place now. Everyone from Joni Mitchell to The Smiths have been using it because of the brilliant facilities, the ideal situation and the atmosphere.'

Even though Bates has worked with Tears For Fears since the band were teenagers ('because of that I still treat them like kids sometimes when in fact they've grown up now, but you can forget that') his relationship with Chris Hughes, the band's producer, goes back even further.

'We both worked in Branson's first mega-store. Chris worked down in the storeroom and I was the crazy DJ out the front of the shop playing the latest chart-bound sounds and some of the songs I thought would be hits. It was a good grounding for A&R really.

'But I truly believe Chris to be a genius. I mean every other A&R man is dying to get his acts to work with Trevor Horn but I'm not knocking myself out trying to get Trevor Horn because I've got Chris. You could see his talent developing from when we used two old Revoxes lashed together.

'When we moved up to eight-track to work with bands like Dalek I, Chris would want to take everything apart so he could suss out how it all worked and then he was happy.

'But my problem with Chris back then was that I was meant to be his partner and there he was playing drums, keyboards and guitars and I was doing nothing... dead weight. Our relationship is much more evenly balanced now.

'We lost touch when he went to drum with Adam and the Ants and I started working with the Tears and got Mike Howlett to do the first album. Half-way through I realised it wasn't working. Not being the most patient person, I scrapped the whole thing and got Chris.'

When the band began recording their second album, Songs From The Big Chair, in addition to the problem of not being able to get into their own studio, they encountered, much to Bates' chagrin, the nagging problem of lockouts.

'They're one thing that really piss me off,' he seethes. 'It's plain blackmail; some money-grabbing bastard at the studio saying, "If you don't pay the lockout rate we'll let someone into the studio the minute you're out of it to mess up all your settings on the desk and the outboard gear". It's a major pain in the arse.

'When you're dealing with bands like Tears For Fears or ABC or Big Country they just cannot work like that. They need to keep the settings so they can come back to the song after a break.'

While working on his latest project with Detroit-based duo Was Not Was, Bates encountered more problems with level settings, only this time the aggravation was of a more basic nature.

'The problem with Don and David is that they're too witty for their own good. We were mixing their new single Spy in the House of Love at a brilliant, and amazingly cheap, little studio called Take One in LA and Don decided that he wanted a kind of bluesy sitar sound.

'Quick as a flash David said, "Yeah, Blind Lemon Shankar", and we all fell about laughing. But Don actually fell on the desk and upset all the levels. It was very funny but it took us nearly two hours to set them all up again.'