Interview_Louis Theroux

VINYL RULES
MUSIC,
VINYL
AND ME:
LOUIS
THEROUX
1

You’ll know all about his fantastic documentaries and his way of
finding the humanity in whatever subject he confronts. But what
about his taste in music and records? We try to find out…
Louis, what type of record collector
are you?
The lapsed kind. Since having kids my
vinyl-buying has become sporadic,
verging on non-existent.
And what do you like about vinyl?
I love almost everything about it – the
physicality of the object, its weight and smell,
the information it contains in the form of
inserts and sleeve notes; I like putting on a
record; I also enjoy the grit and richness of
the sound. The only issue is how much space
it takes up. Also, I suppose, having to get up
and take records off and on and put them
back in the sleeve - I’m a terrible one for
having multiple records lying around outside
their sleeves and in disarray.
Do you remember the first record
you owned?
If memory serves, the first vinyl I owned –
not counting singles – was a copy of Twice
As Kool, a double album of the best of Kool
and the Gang. My parents gave it to me as a
birthday present. I think the first album I
went out and bought was Dig the New
Breed, a Jam live album. I got it at WH
Smith in Putney.
Are there any records you feel smug to own
a copy of?
I proudly own a Roy Ayers album – called
Mystic Voyage – which I bought in 1990 at
a second-hand shop in rural Vermont for
Louis Theroux
one dollar. A few years later, I saw a copy
in New York going for a hundred dollars.
Woot-woot!!
Are there any records you’d love to own?
Well, there are
many, but one is
Here My Dear by
Marvin Gaye. His
divorce album. I
saw a copy of it
once – a friend had
it and, seeing how
impressed I was,
he tried to give it
to me. He wasn’t a
collector, and I’m
not sure why he
owned it. I couldn’t
take it from him,
though. I wasn’t
sure he knew what
“
I LIKE
PUTTING
ON A
RECORD;
I ALSO
ENJOY THE
GRIT AND
RICHNESS
OF THE
SOUND.
”
he was giving away. I’d also love to own any
of Nick Drake’s albums. But I wouldn’t want
2

VINYL RULES
to pay top dollar for them. For me, most of the
pleasure is finding treasures in unlikely places
– car-boot sales and yard sales.
On your travels, have you come across any
vinyl freaks? Or avid collectors of anything else?
Most of the vinyl-hunters I know of have been
peers in the TV industry. A friend who worked
with Mark Lamar, years ago, told me he is an
obsessive – or maybe I should say “dedicated”
– vinyl collector. Apparently, when he is in
a new town or city in America, he seeks
out out-of-the-way thrift shops and secondhand
stores to comb them for records. I
also understand Stewart Lee has a big vinyl
collection. I suspect Dave Gorman probably
does too – that’s based on nothing other than
instinct. Vinyl and a certain kind of comedian
seem to go together.
As for other collectors – I did a story called
America’s Most Dangerous Pets and met a
man called Joe Exotic. He had something like
two hundred tigers, but he didn’t really collect
them. They were a by-product of his attempts
to make money by offering photos with tiger
cubs. At the other end of the extreme, Chris
Eubank’s wife (now ex-wife) used to collect
antique biscuit tins.
Is there any music that takes you back?
Supergrass’ I Should Coco is a big album
for us…
I Should Coco was a big album for me, too! It
takes me back to my first place in New York; a
studio apartment on West 21st Street. The first
party I went to – which felt something like an
initiation into a different life stage (involving
girls and possibly alcohol) – was in 1982
Joe Exotic AKA Tiger King
3

and I was 12 years old. Grand Master Flash’s
The Message was playing on repeat. I’d never
heard anything like it.
Also, the first time I listened to a Walkman,
which belonged to a friend, it played Heart
of Glass by Blondie, and I’ll never forget the
majestic power of the song and the weirdness
of knowing the other people in the room
couldn’t hear it. Certain hip hop songs take
me back to when I was leaving school – Paid
in Full by Eric B and Rakim, especially. At my
wedding, we did our first dance to In Dreams
by Roy Orbison.
Nearly done: tell us your all-time
top-five albums
Marvin Gaye, After the Dance; Beck,
Mutations; Joni Mitchell, Blue; Neutral Milk
Hotel, In an Airplane Over the Sea. Arctic
Monkeys, AM. That’s today; it could be a
different five records tomorrow.
Finally, what have you got planned for the
rest of 2017?
I’ve got a three-part series about crime in
America coming up on BBC2. I’m also
starting to think about what my next
documentary feature might be. But that’s
a longer-term project…
THOUGHTS ON
JOHNNY CASH…
On the man in black, himself
I enjoy him as someone who self-consciously
projected qualities of darkness and menace:
his image as the man in black, and his
identification with criminals and prison
inmates. In the early nineties, when gangsta
rap was being lambasted by Charlton Heston
and others for its violent lyrics (Ice-T’s Cop
Killer was exhibit A for the prosecution), my
recollection is that Johnny Cash spoke up in
its defence. Mindful, presumably, of his own
famous lyric “I shot a man in Reno just to
watch him die”.
At the same time, he did novelty records
and was a born again Christian. So, there
are interesting contradictions there. At the
same time, I confess, I don’t know his music
that well. However, I’ve been more taken
with his very late work, than anything else.
American IV: The Man Comes Around is an
amazing record. Also, I really like his cover
of a (believe it or not) Sting track, I Hung My
Head. And, we used God’ll Cut You Down in
the doc The Most Hated Family in America.
4