Neneh Cherry & The Making Of Buffalo Stance
When I first heard Buffalo Stance on the radio for the first time I sighed a breath of relief and relaxed, it sounded different from most other songs on the radio at the time, it was totally alive, vibrant, exciting, funky and fun. Neneh’s fantastic vocals leapt out of the speakers and made you take notice from the opening ‘Stop the f-beep)-ing scratching and give me a beat!’
The reason for the sigh of relief was that up to that point I kept thinking the track wasn’t finished yet. It had all seemed a bit too quick and a bit too easy. Let’s back track….
1988
I’d been a freelance engineer for two years and had been introduced to Rhythm King records just as Tim Simenon’s (Bomb The Bass) ‘Into The Dragon’ album was taking off in a big way. I ended up doing a couple of the single mixes for songs from that album…..Megablast (feat MC Merlin) and ‘Say A Little Prayer (feat Maureen)’.
Not long after, Tim asked me if I’d work with him on a track for new artist that he’d met by the name of Neneh Cherry. On a Monday shortly afterwards we showed up at a cool little studio called Hot Nights in Fulham, London to get started. The record label, Circa, gave us a budget for 5 days to record and 2 days to mix. I was to co-produce the track with Tim. I think it was my first ever production gig. I had a proper record label contract which involved royalties and everything!
Monday
The first day it was just Tim, myself and the studio assistant engineer. It was the first time I would ever program drums, samples etc on a song. I showed up with my ‘rig’ which consisted of a little Casio CZ101 synth, an Akai S900 sampler and Atari ST computer running Cubase. Not a very extensive equipment list I’ll grant you. The studio handily had some cool synths of its own though.
Tim surprised me. He showed up with a very modest amount of vinyl records and DJ deck….I was expecting that he would come with crate fulls of records. I set up and started programming a basic drum beat to get us up and running. He asked the studio assistant to give him two channels on the mixing desk to monitor his deck. So, as I was programming the drums Tim would be scratching vinyl at the same time and I swear that everything that he scratched up sounded great. I would stop programming and sample what he was doing into the S900, therefore I could then place it wherever it worked in the song as the structure was figured out. There was no tedious listening to endless amounts of samples trying to find something that worked. Tim had obviously done his homework before coming to the studio and figured out what worked along with the demo that we had of the song.
By the end of the day we had what I thought was a basic track that could be finessed over the next few days after we had some vocals from Neneh to work with. My favourite part of that first day was coming up with the sound for the synth that rises up into the chorus’s. It was one of the presets in a Roland JX-10 synth that belonged to the studio. It was a blisteringly good sound to kick off a chorus I have to say. Meanwhile all the parts that Tim came up with were sounding fantastic, ‘Gigolo’, ‘Are you ready!?’, that funky sax riff that comes in about half way through - all brilliant and they really worked.
Neneh was coming in the next day. I was expecting that she would come in, sing a rough/guide vocal for us to work with, then Tim and I would slave over the track over the next couple of days followed by Neneh returning on the Friday to do the ‘proper’ vocals. However…..
Tuesday
Neneh and Cameron McVey her boyfriend/manager arrived at the studio. I hadn’t met them prior to this. Neneh was, as we all know, strikingly beautiful and cool - as well as warm and friendly. They both liked the track - so it was vocal time.
Witnessing Neneh on the mic for the first time was unforgettable. From the get go, Tim and I were looking at each other in awe. Neneh didn’t just sing the song with incredible attitude and sass up the wazoo, she spontaneously threw in all those superb ad libs throughout the track that we all know and love. She did about three or four takes and we had more brilliant stuff than we could use. Her vocals were just full of her awesome personality and character.
The most difficult part was deciding which parts we didn’t have room for. My favourite parts are her ‘Yeah Timmy, tell it like is’ and the ‘What is he like?!’ Followed by the ‘Ya know wot I mean’ and the fabulous grunt she delivers right after it. Without a doubt it was the most spirited and uninhibited vocal session I’ve ever experienced.
When Neneh was done singing she came in to the control room to listen back - and then if I remember correctly, some of her crew like Judy Blame, her great friend and stylist, came to the studio to hear it too. I took a break from the control room where the song was blasting and went into the relative calm of the vocal booth to give my ears a rest. I could still hear the track playing out of Neneh’s headphones though.
There was an acoustic guitar in the booth and I picked it up and started doodling along to the song. I hit upon a riff that I really liked, but I was way too scared to mention it to Tim, Neneh or Cameron. The idea of a guitar riff, I thought, would be shot down in flames - too alternative guitar band style for these hip people!
Before Tim left that evening, I said ‘So tomorrow we can work on the track and finesse the parts right?’ He said ‘Why? I think it’s done, it sounds great!’. I said ‘But, for a start, the drums and bass were just thrown down to get us started!’ He wasn’t buying it but agreed to come back the next day and listen.
I was the last one in the studio that night so I thought ‘I’ll just put this guitar part down before I forget it - just in case’. I quickly dialled up a twangy guitar sound in an E-mu Emulator sampling keyboard which sounded very fake - but I thought it would do for the purpose of remembering the part. More about this later….
Wednesday
Tim still didn’t think I should change the drums and bass so I just did a couple of tweaks - like add the backward reverb on Neneh’s vocal ‘Wind on my face’. I was still too scared to mention the ‘guitar’ part so I just keep that fader down.
The great thing about Tim was that although he’d made his own album, he wasn’t a seasoned studio warrior - he was more of a DJ guy. He didn’t have preconceived ideas about having to work all night in studios, he had better things to do. So, he wanted to cancel the rest of the time in the studio and wait for the mix session on the Saturday in Roundhouse Studios, Camden. Reluctantly I agreed, thinking ‘this doesn’t seem right - cancelling studio time - it can’t be finished yet!’.
Saturday
Remember, in the budget we had two days booked to mix. By midday Tim’s saying ‘I think we’re done…I should call Cameron and get them down to listen.’ I think about the guitar part that no-one else has heard yet and say to myself, ‘come on, it’s now or never!’ So the next time I played the mix through, I very, very slowly raise the guitar fader up in the mix until Tim says ‘what’s that?’. I’m prepared to rapidly pull the fader back down and bury it and I say ‘oh…just something I….’ But Tim interrupted, ‘I like it, what is it? Turn it up!’. And then there it was - proudly in the mix! “At least until Cameron and Neneh hear it” I thought. But Cameron and Neneh were equally as enthusiastic about it as Tim was. I was very happy because I thought it was a pretty good hooky element.
Hindsight
It wasn’t until years later that I was listening to it and I thought ‘how did we get away with the unedited version being that long - 5’42”?! That’s almost 12” remix length! I believe Tim and I were pretty healthily naive at this production lark and just went with the flow. The song doesn’t follow a ‘normal’ tradition song structure. I can’t find a ‘radio/7in version on Spotify - was there one? There’s a 4’ 10” video version where even on that, no music plays until the bass kicks in at about half a minute. There are two middle eights/bridges too - the ’Smokin’ part over the funky sax part and then later, the more chilled out ‘Wind on my face’ part. But, it is so bursting with Neneh’s energy that I don’t think it feels long at all. There’s not a dull moment anywhere.
I really appreciated Tim’s confidence in putting the brakes on the recording side and the song having this fresh, not-worked-to-death excitement about it. In future projects though, while trying to continue that discipline of keeping things fresh, it became quickly apparent that it helps if you have an almightily charismatic, brilliant singer like Neneh to carry it off.
If I’d had my way, one thing I would have definitely done would be to fatten up the kick and snare. But like I said before, when I heard it on the radio, it sounded very fresh and different compared to what else was around at the time. And it was on the radio a lot - thankfully.
Raw Like Sushi
After delivering Buffalo Stance to the Circa, the go ahead was given to start work on the rest of the album. Tim and I were to be involved. Thinking about it though, I’m not sure why Tim was only involved in the production of one song, ‘Heart’ with me (and actually he was never credited with co-production which he definitely should have been). On other songs, I was working mainly with Phil Chill, a great drum programmer, and various other musicians. Neneh, who had been pregnant but barely showing during the making of Buffalo Stance, was now very visibly pregnant. She was still producing fabulously energetic vocal tracks for the songs though and never complained once about being tired.
Buffalo was released in the UK on 1st November 1989 and it took off in a big way. It was a great atmosphere to be working on an album where the first single was already out and becoming a hit. The video was pretty low budget but a heavily pregnant Neneh pulled it off in an amazing way - and caused quite a stir - pregnant woman dancing around in a music video - how shocking!?
One day Neneh had to fly off to two different music tv shows in two different parts of the UK to perform Buffalo Stance but she still came to the studio by late afternoon to sing vocals. Thinking back on it - we shouldn’t have been doing that, she should have been resting. At one point, it was getting late and we were close to finishing a song, I said, ‘Are you ok, are you sure you want to keep going? She stood leaning back a bit, hands on her lower back, counteracting the weight of the baby out front and said, ‘yeah, you just tell me when we’ve got it all’. Neneh was amazing. And when we finished at around 10:30pm, she said, ‘Do you want to come back to our house, I’m cooking’! She was like superwoman!
Not long after, she gave birth to her second daughter Tyson. I went to her house a couple of days afterwards and she was up and about and looked ready to get back to work!
I was with Neneh when she was asked for her first autograph. We were driving off to a studio but we stopped to buy some food on Kensington High Street. We were heading back to my car in a side street when a guy in a Fedex truck squealed to a stop beside us and the driver jumped out and said ‘Hey you’re Neneh Cherry right?! Can I get your autograph?’ She graciously obliged while he told her how much he loved Buffalo. It was a lovely moment to witness and a great way to start a work day in the studio.