Q&A with Andy Wright

Exclusive Interview by Karen Beishuizen
Photo Credit by Danny Clifford

Andy is an English musician, producer and songwriter who has been working with Simply Red for 30 years and Simple Minds for almost 15 years. He worked with Jeff Beck on two of his albums and received a Grammy for the song “Dirty Mind”. Currently Andy is working with Simply Red, Simple Minds, Chrissie Hynde and The Christians on new material.

KB: Did you always want to be a musician growing up?

Pretty much. But the desire grew through my teenage years. I pretty much taught myself to play the piano as a teenager (I had a year’s worth of lessons when I was 7). A guy at our church noticed me playing and was impressed and told my mother I needed to go for lessons. So I did from the age of 16-18. This set me in good stead and at the first opportunity I joined a college band and started gigging.

KB: You have a long working relationship with Simply Red: How did you meet and what is so special about working with Mick Hucknall?

Yes, it’s 30 years now! A twist of fate to be honest. At that time (1994) I was working as a programmer for a few producers including Nellie Hooper, Alan Moulder and Spike Stent so I guess my name was out there. I had a studio in Kilburn (West London) which was adjacent to a music equipment company. Mick’s then engineer, Roland Herrington, was taking a piece of equipment back to them and was out there looking for someone to replace Gota Yashiki (drummer and programmer on “Stars”) on the next Simply Red album. He asked the rental company, they recommended me, he popped in to see me and liked my ‘resume’ especially Spike Stent and looked no further. It was another 3 years before I got the producing gig and I’m still in the chair!

The obvious thing to say about Mick is that he is a phenomenal singer. But he also has a great sensibility towards music. He also is very sure of his opinion which means that we always know where we stand.

KB: You worked with Jeff Beck on the albums “You Had it Coming” and “Jeff”: How was it working with Jeff and what is your fondest memory?

Jeff had a wonderful boyish humor not unlike my own. So we laughed a lot! He played sublimely of course, and my vision was to move him away from the ‘muso’ camp and make his records more of the moment. Jeff, being innovative in every moment, embraced this and we made ‘You Had it Coming’ in under 2 months whilst composing most of the material in that time too. As most of our work was in some way experimental it was a while before I really appreciated first hand just how beautifully he played. It bought me to tears on more than one occasion.

KB: If you had to choose between producing an album or playing on an album: What would you pick and why?

I’m lucky enough to be doing both most of the time. I find it impossible to be a player in a band recording context whilst producing as I can’t focus on either role. But if I’m piecing together an arrangement I love taking part in the playing. I think my favorite sessions however are when I’m recording musicians that are sublimely good and steering the ship from the control room.

KB: Are there any current artists out there you would love to collaborate with and why?

Too many tbh…try Coldplay, Harry Styles, Bruno Mars, Fontaines D.C. etc. I guess it’s easy in my position to be labelled as the guy that does heritage acts and I’m really happy with that as ‘my’ bands are out there filling arenas all around the world so there’s nothing ‘heritage’ about them at all. But I feel I could do something with any of the above artists.

KB: If you could make an album with 7 of your most favorite songs: what would you pick?

Very difficult to answer that question! I made a record with Mick Hucknall called ‘American Soul’ which was a collection of covers mainly chosen by Mick. The most enjoyable aspect of this record was having a whole album of great songs sung by a great singer. So my job was to bring something new to the songs without having to strain to make either the song good or the singer sound good as they were already great! I still love early Elton, Simon and Garfunkel, Cat Stevens, Neil Young (I’m 63 so they were my first loves).

KB: What are you currently up to?

More of the same… Simply Red, Simple Minds (we’re almost 15 years into a working relationship), some Chrissie Hynde, a new record with The Christians, Toby Lee (up and coming guitar legend).

Check out Andy’s website: HERE

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