The Icicle Works and Go West are just two of many British bands that have found success the American way. Here's how...

No matter how well prepared you are for it, it's guaranteed that your first experience of the United States will be a surprise, but not necessarily a pleasant one. The culture shock isn't the obvious thing: it's not the fact that they call it a store, but the fact that it has no windows. It's not that people talk to you in the street, but that they may be squaring up for a fight. To look after yourself in an American city, you've got to remain alert. If you're white you don't get out of the subway in the black quarter of a city. If you're a man you don't dance on your own in a club unless you want some redneck trying to pick a fight with you because he thinks you're gay.

Basically it's a whole different way of existing, and just because they speak the same language doesn't mean they think the same. But music is often said to be a universal language, so does British music fare any better in the US than British travellers? Recent history would suggest yes as the answer, and the British traveller might walk tall thinking that the Beatles, The Stones, Led Zeppelin, Bowie and Boy George more than make up for The Boston Tea Party. He'd soon be brought down to earth though. If you talked to an average American kid, the chances are that you couldn't name one British band in 20 that he would know about. The fact is, British claims to world musical domination look puny from the other side of the Atlantic.

So what is it about the British acts which do become well known in the States? Why does one British band make it where a thousand others flounder? These were some of the questions I put to Ian McNab of The Icicle Works, and to Cox and Drummie, better known as Go West, since both of these bands are reputedly continuing the subjugation of the American musical empire. Well, we shall see.

The Icicle Works

Last year The Icicle Works managed to sell 100,000 copies of their debut album in the states. For a band whose music is psychedelic, textural and uncompromising, such success was somewhat unexpected, a fact that becomes obvious as you talk to Ian McNab, writer, singer and guitarist with the band. A down to earth Liverpudlian whose conversation is filled with cautionary comments about the state of the States, and with impersonations of dumb Americans, he is the first to admit that their success was due to good fortune rather than any planned strategy.

"Really it's all governed by the radio. Obviously it's got something to do with the quality of the single, but mainly it's just got to have certain qualities of sound that the radio stations think people want to hear. They always tell you it's got to be anthemic, meaning that everyone's got to be able to sit in an arena and, like, wave their arms to it."

Many British bands sell 30-40,000 records in America, but can't rise above cult status because their music is not right for what is known as Contemporary Hit Radio; Top 40 radio in other words. When you consider that recreation for, say, a Texan panel beater is to buy a six pack, drive to the park and then sit in the car listening to the radio and drinking the beers, you begin to realise how important radio is to what music in the US is all about.

"Last year REM sold 250,000 records without getting on the radio, and I just can't express how amazing that is. We were very fortunate that off our first album that was released in America we had one song which got on to Top 40 radio, which sort of sold the whole band. The same goes for the Simple Minds who've been trying to make it for ages in America. Then they come out with Don't You, which a lot of Simple Minds fans think is the worst thing they've ever done, but because it fitted in with the CHR format it was added to all the playlists and subsequently has become a massive hit for them."

Last year the Icicle Works had a hit in Britain with Love Is A Wonderful Colour, but because the sound wasn't right for Top 40 radio, the single wasn't even released in America. Narrow minded or what, you might ask, but worse is yet to come.

"The whole format of music in America is so homogenised. It's got even worse this year."

"We had one song that got onto Top 40 radio, which sort of sold the whole band"

Indeed, Arista, the band's American record company, want to remix some of the tracks on the new LP in order to get them played on top 40 radio.

"We've got a contract saying we can veto it if we don't like it, but it's 99% certain that we won't like it because I know exactly what they're gonna do to it. They want that big, pure Rock sound that is not raw at all. Lots of bass on the bass drum so it sounds really nice through the reverb, but not raw. It must sound precise, like Bryan Adams or Don Henley."

Obviously, Ian admits, a compromise will have to be reached, and it's a thing that the band have grown used to. When in Rome do as the Romans do, as the saying goes, and it would appear that the old adage can apply to music as well. Last year the band did two support tours of the US, with The Pretenders, then with Dave Gilmour. Finally as the single climbed the charts, the band were able to do a headline tour, playing 1,500 to 2,000 seater halls across the country. Their first concert, supporting The Pretenders in front of 6000 people, quickly made them realise that pride would inevitably presage a fall. Some compromises were unavoidable.

"Our attitude before going to America was just to try to be ourselves, which is possible in this country, but the audiences there want you to be preening Rock stars. They want you to think you're great. If you just stand there enjoying it the audience won't get into it, so you have to sort of be leaping about all over the stage saying 'Come on I wanna hear you.' We started off on first gig just sort of enjoying it, but we realised that unless we did something it was just gonna die, so we quickly accepted that."

With the success of From A Whisper To A Scream, the band had a lot of pressure to stay and do promotion in America, even when Love Is A Beautiful Colour became a hit in England. The band didn't want to go the way of The Fixx and other British bands who never managed to make it in their own country, and Ian regrets to a certain extent the amount of time they actually did spend in the States. The tours which they undertook were somewhat heavier than they had first imagined, and they also did radio promotion in every city they played in.

"Doing promotion can be very depressing. You have to explain yourself much deeper and go through the same things over and over. You get this sort of thing all the time; "Hey, we've got I-cycle Wurrks all the way from Mayan-chester, England. Say you guys are pretty big over here, an er, hey, where did you get the name..."

Traditionally the way to break America has been to do tours, and to a large extent that remains true. The Americans have a very different attitude to bands playing live, and the idea of a studio band is still a remote concept to them.

"They want that big, pure Rock sound that is not raw at all"

"Rock and Roll is still seen as a form of rebellion over there. They still think it's cool to get in your car and turn the radio up loud, and stare at people when you stop at traffic lights, but like over 'ere that's really corny. Therefore in America, going to a gig to see band play live is a really big thing, so it's really important that you can play live."

After the radio, the most potent medium in the Stateside music biz is MTV, the all music, virtually all videos, cable channel. The Icicle Works were lucky enough to get 'heavy rotation' which was a surprise since the video, done at the behest of the record company, was nothing more than the band miming in a white room trying to "look as unpretentious as possible."

"Because it was so simple it stuck out like a sore thumb, because most of the other videos, especially the Heavy Metal ones, are so sexist. They are still actually making videos with women actually leering out of cages and ripping clothes off. I believe if things carry on the way they are going now, kids won't be able to sit down and just listen to a record; they'll have to have a video as well. But that's not my problem, that's America's problem."

Or more specifically, the video companies' problem. You see, the competition is quite tough. A quick flick of the button on your control unit takes you onto channel 74, the Playboy channel — or as it's more commonly known, the dirt channel — so that the all-American male can sit in his armchair with a six pack enjoying a world of wine, women and song, in which only the wine is not vicariously experienced. What a state to get into. When the videos get boring, flick the switch. When there are no bare asses, it's back to boring videos again. What can a character like McNab have in common with a country of such ludicrously impotent excess? Certainly the tensions manifest themselves in the band's dealings with Arista.

"We have very bad relationships with our American record company, which I don't think is a personal thing between us and them. It's just that you're arguing with the whole state of the nation!"

Go West

Go West? I did about this time last year. One steamy morning about 4am, whilst I was doing the final layout for the Boston business weekly I was working on, a redneck staggered into the office. When he found out I was English he insisted I smoked some of his reefer, and proceeded to extol the virtues of Boy George. But after he realised he was unwelcome his conversation changed; "Of course the guy's a maggot." I tried to get him to explain the remark, but he didn't seem able. What he meant, of course, was that George was a fag, but was too scared to say it. Nevertheless his resentment of the invasion of American taste by a British libertine was obvious enough. Things are about to change, I predicted.

Go West are to my mind an indication that I was right. Four years ago Peter Cox and Richard Drummie paired up to write and to form their 'dream band', but found themselves right up the creek basically; an English band who sounded American at a time when America wanted British bands that sounded English, and England didn't want anything that sounded American. But with their single We Close Our Eyes going top five in Britain, and Top 40 in the US it's obvious that things have changed.

Signed up by an American A&R man, and originally intended for the American Chrysalis label, the success that Go West have had in Britain has come as something of a surprise. Nevertheless it hasn't stopped them selling a lot of records in the US.

Whilst not being exactly anthemic, the band's songs have a recognisably American feel, and the accomplished production of Gary Stevenson is perhaps exactly what Ian McNab was describing as the 'CHR format'. Various publications have accused them of pandering to the American market, but the band deny it, and I can believe them. Very down to earth are Cox and Drummie and it's not hard to see that even if some people do call it bland, they are a hundred percent into it; it's their language.

Richard: "Well if it's the case that we've produced the 'ultimate American consumer single' then we're in the money! But it wasn't a contrived thing, I don't think we're that good that we can do that. People just have to write what comes naturally."

"Audiences there want you to be preening Rock stars"

The review which occasioned the above remark appeared in the NME, and it's interesting that when, three years ago, Martin Fry sold them the idea of 'perfect Pop' in concept form, the NME practically wet their pants for it. But now, when it happens naturally, innocently you might say, it's condemned as consumer Pop. There's an example of English eccentricity for you.

The band admit that in the years spent struggling to get a record deal they were susceptible to the demands of the A&R depts.

Richard: "However much you deny it there is a tendency to compromise your material when you're trying to get a deal, whether you realise it or not. All the way through the three years of trying to get a deal people were saying that we were very close, that we almost had a single. So you think you could just compromise on one song which would get you the deal and then you're in."

But in the end, the compromises the band made in their music were in favour of the British rather than the American market.

Richard: "In the past people have always said we were American orientated, so I suppose we weren't surprised by the American response. America's got this aura of it being a tough nut to crack, but I always thought England would be more of a problem, and even when We Close Our Eyes came out everyone, including the British record company, thought it would be America only."

Peter: "We actually went to LA prior to making the album because they were concerned that we had no knowledge of top 40 radio. We didn't have any solos on our songs, because at the time we were writing them England just wasn't interested in solos — these were the sort of compromises we made. But in America they were still using guitarvsolos, so because we thought that England wasn't going to like us, and because we wanted to use guitar solos anyway, we'd get them back in. The one big difference that trip made was that there was more guitar on the album. We came back thinking — great, because it meant less compromises; if England didn't like it we'd just have to put up with America, but as it happens American music is starting to take off over here."

"In America, going to a gig to see a band is a really big thing, so it's really important that you can play live"

So, if the music of Go West is perfect for the American market where does its perfection lie, and have those qualities become important for selling records in this country as well?

First and foremost, and a greater asset to a band than any Fairlight, must be Peter Cox's voice.

Peter: "The kind of singers that I like (Paul Rodgers, Robert Palmer, Marvin Gaye...) tend to be more successful in America than in England, and since my voice is an integral part of the sound of Go West, naturally that made us think that America would be more receptive."

Secondly, the band decided that they wanted to make the 'best' album they could, and you know what best means when you put speech marks around it. Tangible virtuosity is something greatly appreciated by American audiences: if you sit in a bar in Boston and you see two rednecks about to brain each other you can be sure of one thing; if they're old men they'll be arguing about the greatest team ever fielded by the Boston Celtics; if they're young guys they are arguing about who is the best lead guitarist in the world.

As Peter says, "Somehow the technical standards of the players in American have always struck me as being higher. That's not to say the ideas are better, they do one thing but they do it very well."

It's quite conceivable that things are moving in circles. Whatever it was that made millions of Americans fall for Boy George — latent homosexuality, anglophilia — it looks like they're over it now. They want guitar solos and they are not ashamed to ask for them.

Go West's luckiest break on the American front was the support that MTV gave them. Not only did they give the band's videos heavy rotation, they also screened some specially filmed interviews with Cox and Drummie as well. As far as videos go, they were lucky enough to start with the best; Godley and Creme, so really MTV could not have had much excuse not to play the video. These and other marketing strategies by Chrysalis, the company that brought you the 'spectacularly high profile' of Spandau Ballet, are all things that Peter and Richard have been subjected to, hiding any reservations they may have for the time being at least.

"Richard: "We're a new band, and you feel a certain responsibility towards your record company, well I do anyway. I know they're in it to make money, but up till now at least they haven't treated us like a can of beans."

Peter: "You have to plan promotion weeks ahead of the actual release of the single, and the first single was just intended to get us known a bit. So when the single did a bit better than we expected we got a bit more exposure than we had expected too, and maybe came across as a bit more commercial than we would have liked."

Finally, Go West openly aspire to being a Rock band, a term that would have brought contempt from all sides until recently. But tastes are definitely changing; when both Phil Collins and George Michael can make singles which go to number one both sides of the Atlantic. But don't be deceived by the fact that Collins and Michael are British. Self confessed Rock bands like Go West no longer have to apologise to the British public, but that is not because they have gone out and vanquished the States. Far from it. We are being invaded by the sight and sound of MOR; the taste of Top 40 radio is in the air!