God has been quiet since the release of his last, critically divisive project, "The Universe". Always a shy deity, he's so far refused all invitations to discuss the album or his future plans. But last week we found him back in the studio, chiselling out ideas for a new band and LP, and in a surprisingly talkative mood.

We grabbed the chance to chat to him about the techniques involved.

How long have you been playing life?

"Hard to say, really. I suppose it was something I picked up from my Dad, or 'Me', as I usually call him. I used to watch myself slowly forming out of the totally blank and incredibly empty, nothingy void and I guess it started from there."

Do you ever practice?

"Nope, never. I'm strictly a first-take being, just get in there, in front of the mike, with a handful of atomic nuclei and go for it. That first performance, the raw one, is always the best, always the most inspired."

Can you think of an example where that worked?

"Umm... 'Curry', that would be a perfect case. I just played the first thing that came into my omnipotence and wham, that was it, in the can. Raw. Aggressive. And you really go away from curry with the whole thing still ringing in your system.

"Y'see, if I'd kept messing around trying to perfect it, what would I have got? Logically, a toilet roll with a soft centre, but that leaves you with no room for improvisation.

"Actually, there were some outtakes from 'Curry' featuring red stripes that come when you whistle, but I thought I'd save those for the B-side."

In "The Universe", you make great use of death. It seems to be one of your favourite techniques, some critics claiming it was overused in the last set of recordings. Do you think you're in danger of repeating yourself?

"Really... (sigh)... what can I say? I've had this argument about death so many times. It's just an effect. What happens is, like, you take life, anybody's life, and you gate it really heavily, full off. It's a sort of psycho-acoustic trick to grab the attention because there's life going on perfectly normally and then suddenly it stops, dead, and you think, hey, what happened to that?? Otherwise lives would just sustain and fade off into the distance. I just like the sound of death. I can't help it. It's not a conscious thing. Completely unconscious, actually, for those involved."

Don't you think that's a very predictable use of studio effects?

"Oh come on, the one thing you can't accuse me of is predictability. Just my experiments with rhythm, Catholic that they are, would be enough to put me in the history books. It was me who first told the drummer just to use his limbs and leave his brain in the back of the Transit. Everyone copied that. Everyone who could get the drummer to stand up again, anyway. Suppose I did have an advantage there. Good lungs."

Were you pleased with "The Universe"?

"Well it's always difficult while you're creating something, to step back and take an unbiased view. There were a lot of critics who said, after 'The Universe' came out, that I could have done with a producer. I just had the Holy Ghost as engineer which was really good, actually, because being so sort of wispy, he could fix broken gear by materialising through the sockets.

"But on the whole, yeah, pleased. 'The Dark Ages' went on a bit too long, and I would have cut the dinosaur solo, maybe remixed 'Scotland', but for a first try at my own production, you could say I'm proud. You could also say I'm saggbanysh... oh... sorry, course, you haven't heard the new stuff yet, so you wouldn't know that one.

"Anyhow, you have to remember, I was working WITHOUT A MANUAL, like, they always turn up too late. I'd already wiped the guide vocal by the time the Bible appeared, and with no MIDI spec, as usual. MIDI? It means Made In Divine Image. It's a way of communicating, replaces the old CV — Church/Vicar — system so you get direct contact instead of praying. Trouble is, none of the churches was ever built to the same spec. Only some were constructed to the one-vault-per-octave standard.

"I'm thinking of having 'The Universe' retrofitted, but it would be a bit of a messy job, all that wire and dirt."

You used a lot of session players on "The Universe". Did they have a fairly free hand or were you strict?

"At the start I let a few of my sidemen just cool out and do their own thing, but they usually ended up getting stoned.

"If you know what you want, you have to keep a tight hold of the reins. The best session men are the ones who turn up, get on with the job, take the fee and blow... Abraham, Moses, Ronald McDonald."

What's your favourite device?

"A Prophet, though in the beginning, there was a Fairlight."

Do you tend to stay with the presets or do you get into programming?

"Well it's a bit like the weather, you know? I wake up each morning and think great! Let's get into some new shit — perhaps a hurricane in Ecuador, a downpour in New Delhi, a hot summer's day in Britain, you know, something really unusual that'll make people aware that I'm actually pretty good at what I do. Then I look at the great bank of knobs on me weather synthesiser, and the message on the screen says something like, 'Hi God, now would you like a slap-back real time dry signal in sync with the repeated output level on cloudbank 17?' So course, I just think sod it, and hit a preset. Favourite presets? Well, I suppose that The Average Sort of Day With One Surprise At Half Past Five is always safe, and I always enjoy using A Day So Tediously Average That Even Old Ladies In Hats Don't Talk About The Weather. So I'm pretty much a preset sort of supreme entity."

How do you build up a song?

"What, you mean track by track... light, darkness, water, overdub the fowl and bounce it down?"

No, where do you get the original inspiration?

"I know."

Yes, so where?

"Like I said, I know. Could be anywhere. Beats me. No idea. Where do you get yours from?"

Me? God kno...

"My point. And I don't, by the way."

How about the new material. You haven't been in the studio for long, only about four million years, yet you're planning to release a follow up while "The Universe" is still in the charts. Wouldn't it have been wiser to have waited a while?

"The record company said it was best to make a big bang with the first album, and I suppose they were right. But you can't listen to marketing angels every day of the eon.

"There's a whole side of me that didn't come out in 'The Universe', because it was all instrumentals. Y'know, instrumental in bringing about religion, instrumental in defeating the Roman Empire.

"Why should the devil have all the best songs? I'll tell you why. Because hell is like one great, bloody bathroom — natural reverb, all those caverns and things. Sing one line and your voice comes back like a male voice choir. What have I got? Shovels of empty space with a few scuddy little clouds banging around — anechoic, or what?

"Get Bono up here, get Elvis up here... come to think of it, I did didn't I... anyhow, let them try it. You sound like a fart in a fairy cake. Not on.

"But now 'The Universe' itself has finally come up with something I can use — a few decent plate echos, a Quantec, SSL desks... "

Solid State?

"No, Steady State; means you don't have to go back to the original all the time. But the point is, I want to sing. Every time I opened my mouth on 'The Universe' some insignificant shrub burst into flames or a dozy bint goes sodium chloride on me. It's taken a while, but I've finally got some songs together.

"I've done some demos. 'Skateboards' and 'Quadraphonic Sound' didn't pan out to well, but I like the way 'Microchip Technology' is turning out, and there are two new ones, 'The Colour Troom' and 'Everybody's Right Ear Turning Into A Kebab At The Age Of 46'. They're promising."

Will you carry on alone, or are you thinking of keeping the band?

"The original trio was OK, but this is more of a solo project. The Holy Ghost is getting further into production these days, and The Son is trying acting and sinking ships. But we're still all good friends. We have a laugh and a decent supper whenever we get together. I expect we'll work as a three-piece again one day.

"This is really something I have to get out of my system, on my own, though I might get a couple of friends in, to help out."

Gabriel?

"No. He takes longer to finish albums than I do."