ALEX JAMES TALKS ABOUT CHEESE |
 Cheese is the new rock'n'roll. Well, everything else has been, and at least cheese has one big rock'n'roll connection: Alex James, the former Blur bassist, writer and all-round Renaissance man, has moved out of London to a Cotswold farm where he indulges his passion for making cheese. When he's not having his cheese and eating it, James is still an influential figure in the British music scene. So when the makers of Mobile Act Unsigned were looking for judges to help them choose the best unsigned band in the country, they looked no further than James and his fellow judges, DJ Jo Whiley and record mogul Simon Gavin. James talks about his rock'n'roll years, his favourite Mobile Act bands and, of course, cheese… What made you decide on the bucolic life on a Cotswold farm? I found the girl, and once you've got the girl you can go anywhere, really. It would've driven me mad six years ago, but now I think London would drive me mad. I think it was just the right time for me to move. So you don't miss the hectic lifestyle of London? I was talking to someone the other day who said they wanted to get out of London, because they were just too busy, but the countryside is actually massively absorbing. There are so many things you need to do in the country, there's always something that needs fixing or seeing to or is just about to break. I seem to be working harder than ever. It's brilliant, definitely the cleverest thing I ever did. We bought a farm on our honeymoon! A bit reckless at the time, perhaps. But I suppose it's quite a well-trodden path for ageing rock gentlemen. You said how busy you are. You've got music, journalism, writing, TV commitments, the farm and a young family. Do you ever worry that you've taken on too much? Yeah, but I suppose the more you do, the more you can do. It's funny, everything seems to help everything else. As long as everything complements everything else, it's okay. I don't have enough time or money, but then who does, I suppose? What would the Alex James of 15 years ago said of the new you? Would he have been quietly impressed, or would he have thought you'd sold out? Sold out? Sold out of cheese, maybe. I guess it's brilliant to be young when you're young, it's just the terrible tragedy of being in a big-ass rock'n'roll band is that it's very easy to become to grotesque as you get old, and I think it's been a bloody godsend that Blur's had a bit of a break, and we've all had to learn how to become civilised, upstanding members of society. We could so easily just have never stopped touring and boozing and s****ing, and we'd all be pretty ropey by now, I'd expect. My big gig this week is playing the guitar at my son's play group, doing Bob the Builder. They're f*****g mad, they are. They get really excited. My wife's going to play tambourine, so I've got a kind of Wings thing going on. On TV, you've done Have I Got News For You, and you were on University Challenge: The Professionals, representing The Idler. Which was more scary? I'm doing Question Time in January, and that's a f*** of a lot more scary than anything else. You get the call, you've got to step up to the plate, really. There's so many television programmes anyway, there's so much media. Does everybody work in the media now? Working with cheese is good. 'Cheese keeps me real, man!' Where did your passion for cheese come from? I have always liked cheese. They really did used to throw it at me in Japan, I didn't make that up. They found out that I loved cheese, and they went and bought it to throw at me. I think I got into it through my dad, really. My granddad was a chef, so my dad could have gone two ways. He went the way of never f*****g cooking anything in his life. But he did enjoy his food, and he introduced me to cheese. And I was a vegetarian for ages, so I ate a lot of cheese. It is the tastiest substance in the Universe, isn't it, cheese? All meat does taste a bit like chicken, but no two cheeses taste the same. In amongst all of this, how much of your life is dedicated to music? I've got a shed full of microphones and guitars, and I fiddle around. I've got a session in January. I did a good session with Florence and the Machine last month. She's great, she's going to do really well. Have you heard of her? No? She's brilliant. I've been working with Bernard Sumner a bit. It's great. Song-writing is brilliant. It's the best thing about being involved with music. Especially now I'm married! It is the most satisfying thing, actually. It's more satisfying than playing live, or s******g groupies. Writing a good piece of music is worth all the money in the bank. I don't want to sound pompous, but that's what's most precious. Why did you decide to become involved with Mobile Act Unsigned? It's just a format that really works. The X Factor format is great, the trouble with it is, the content's s***. But I thought this promised to be much better. And I like doing telly - lots of people running after you asking if you want a cappuccino and doing your hair. It's like being Louis XIV. And it is a good format, and I thought if the bands were good, it would be all right. And it's good fun. And the music business is struggling a little bit at the moment. It's tough for new bands out there, f*****g tough. What have you made of the standard of bands involved? They're really good. But then, you go along to Camden any night of the week, and there's half-a-dozen really good bands playing. I realised that when I was at the record label and I was trying to work out who to sign. There's actually very little difference between good bands and great bands. But it's quite easy to be reasonably good, and it's really, really hard to be really good. Do you think any of the bands qualify as being really good? I think Mancini could be. I still think they could win the competition, actually. I think they could come back in on a wild card. It's frustrating, because I think I know what to do with them. It would be unethical of me to whisk them off to a studio and sort all their problems out, and then vote for them to win. So I won't be doing that, but it's really frustrating. I'm pretty sure they're not very far off of having a couple of big hits. Revenue have got a lot of charm, and they've got the ability to break rules. Bad Robots are okay, but they're not good enough to be able to break rules, I don't think. Hijack Oscar are brilliant musicians. Do you worry about hurting people's feelings when you have to pass judgement on them? Yeah. I don't hate the Bad Robots, but it seems to be my job to tell them they're not very good. But lots of people like the Bad Robots. My gardener yesterday asked me if I could get a signed CD of theirs for her son. You can't pick what other people like, though, or what you think they'll like. You've got to go with what you like. That's the only way you can judge music, really. One of the judges, Simon Gavin [Head of A&M Records], has to sign the winning band to his label after the final… The frustrating thing for Simon is that he can see Mancini have got loads of potential, but the music is too generic. But that's so easy to sort out. He's thinking 'The band that I sign, I'm going to have to release their single, on the back of the final show, and they've got to be ready, ready, ready!' At least the beautiful Iraina Mancini is marketable, isn't she? She could sell soap. She could sell tea towels. That's a big head start. I'm a sucker for girly bubblegum pop anyway. The less the music's about, the better, really. The more whimsical it is, the more I tend to like it. Has watching these guys struggling to make a start in the business made you nostalgic for when Blur was starting out? It's nice to see their enthusiasm. But my advice to struggling musicians is 'Don't struggle'. You need to make it look easy, otherwise no-one is going to be interested. Just enjoy it.
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