Getting Under The Skin

THE CORRS' public image is one of unblemished beauty and soaraway success. But beneath the pop sheen lurk the darker lyrical themes of Andrea
Corr.
JOE JACKSON talks to her about the inspiration behind some of the Corrs' biggest hits, hears her anger at recent critical reaction and finds out what "Ireland's sexiest woman" really thinks about love, sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll and the whole damn thing.

PICTURE THIS. You're alone in a secluded trailer with Andrea Corr for at least an hour and a half. And, yes, of course, in that trailer there is an even moresecluded bedroom. It's a dream come true, right? Depends on the depth and nature of your dreams, Andrea Corr would argue.

Likewise when she sees herself described by one national newspaper as "the sexiest woman in Ireland" she has to wonder what exactly does this mean? Because, while happily acknowledging that looking "sexy" is an obvious plus in the fickle world of pop music, Andrea has also seen the physical attributes of herself, her sisters
Sharon, Caroline and brother Jim, dismissed as nothing more than a superficial sheen which deflects the eye from the fact that there is little substance in their music.

Tell that to the two million people who bought The Corrs' last album, Forgiven Not Forgotten, which was released in 1995 and sold 135,000 copies in Ireland alone. Their new album, Talk On Corners, seems set to follow the same sales pattern having already sold 60,000 copies in this country and gone gold in Spain, Australia and Japan - countries the band will be covering during their current world tour which will deliver them back to Dublin's Olympia Theatre for two gigs on December 8th and 9th.

But, right now, Andrea is sitting across from me on a seat in the groups trailer on the set of their latest video, which is being shot in Dublins' Iveagh Market. She's tucking into a plate of sprouts, chicken, carrots and mashed potatoes. So, Andrea, let's kick off with this question about you being "the sexiest woman in Ireland"?
As they say on the Leaving Cert: "Discuss."

"How can I discuss that? I don't think about it!" she says, laughing. "Of course I am flattered that people find me sexy because being sexual is that extra something special, meaning sex-appeal and sensuality and all that. It's not just the way you look it's the way you are. At least that's what I would say, if I was to use the word sexy about somebody else. And when I am described as "Irelands sexiest woman", or whatever, I would hope it's not just that people would want to sleep with me.

Can't she accept that teenagers , who are just discovering their sex-drive and don't quite understand the world of so-called adult emotions, might simply say, 'all I want is to make love with Andrea, nothing more, I don't need all the rest."

"They'd get all the rest, with me, whether they want it or not!" she responds, laughing. "And I honestly don't think my fans only see me in that way. I hope they don't. And as for my own attitude to stars, I must tell you that I look at something like the MTV awards and say "everybody I see up there is a clown!" I am a clown. All of us in the music business are clowns. The gear, the outfits, everybody dressing up as if they are part of a circus, craving attention. That's what I see when I look at Prince, with a lollipop in his hand! Or a band like Kiss. We're all clowns.

"When I look at people like that there definitely is a cringe factor. That's what I see when I look up at a poster of Prince. Yet I also see the vulnerability and know, from myself, the feelings of self-consciousness and doubt that are often hidden behind the clowns make-up. People can look at me and say, 'Andrea looks well' while at the same time, I am thinking, 'oh my God, I look like a caricature'. And then all I want to do is take the make-up off and get away from it all."

And when Andrea removes the make-up and the "sexy" dresses does she really feel self-conscious about her looks? Surely she accepts that she is absolutely irresistible to some people.

"Absolutely not," she says "I recognise my qualities, on a personal level and I know there is an attractiveness there, that shines through. But that attractiveness, to me, has more to do with my heart and soul, not body. I'm not exactly a Baywatch babe!" Others may disagree!
"There is no argument there! This is fact."

Okay, let's turn this around. In a recent FHM magazine poll it was claimed that women of Andreas' age, 23, are more likely than not to be sexual predators of a kind that "picks her male prey, tells him her sexual fantasies, dominates the liaison, then moves on to sleep with someone else." Is that a pattern Andrea recognises as
true?

"Do I believe that to be true? she asks, rhetorically. "I really don't know what it's like to be normal and out there. I haven't dated or gone out with someone in along
time." Months, years?
"Years." So Andrea Corr hasn't had a serious relationship in years?

"Yeah," she says. "And d'ya know what I think, in general, in relation to that article you quote? I think everybody is trying to fight what they are. Instead, everyone should accept what they are. Take this whole feminist issue. I don't need to get in a suit and become a man in order to succeed! The feminist thing too often is the
idea that we must become the male. What is wrong with being feminine beautiful and powerful? That's what I'd read into the article that you quote. 'Aren't these women great because they are behaving like men?' There is so much confusion for women these days, but that kind of behaviour is not going to work for them.

"I, personally, don't believe that a woman who can say, 'it's the '90s, I can be like a guy, sleep with whoever and move on without giving a damn and it' can be really satisfied by that. I would love to meet someone who actually means that, from the heart. I'm sure people will disagree with me. Fine. But, ultimately, to me, sex,lovemaking is too sacred to be flippant about it. And I think most women, in their hearts, feel that way. I really do believe that."

Moving in social circles that take her far from her hometown of Dundalk, is there ever any danger that Andrea Corr will lose this value system which clearly is central to her psyche? For example, when The Corrs tour, or when she flies to Budapest to appear in Evita, with Madonna and Antonio Banderas. At times like that doesn't she ever think "Good God, look at that opportunities that are there for me, now!"

"Sexual opportunities? No," she says, categorically. "And there is no chance that I would go wild and let go of a value system that definitely is, as you say, central to what, and who I am."
Does Andrea drink?
"Yes."
Does she get drunk?
"Absolutely, yeah."

So when she's drunk and maybe is longing for intimacy, doesn't she ever say "to hell with it, I'll go for this guy, even if it is only for one night."

No, I'm not like that. And I never feel that insecure," she replies. "And I would never do anything like that unless there is a serious attraction between two people. I've never even kissed somebody I didn't want to kiss! That's just not how I am. And anytime I've gone out with anybody it's been a long term relationship,
friendship, chemistry. I could never separate the physical from that, because the physical comes from the conversation, all those other aspects of a relationship."
Why has it been so long since Andrea was involved in a relationship?

"Because I only ever want a relationship when I am seriously attracted to someone. And that doesn't happen often."
Doesn't she ever feel temporary attraction, try a relationship, for, say a day, a week, then maybe decide: 'Okay, no potential for anything serious. I m out of here'.

"That just hasn't happened.. Honestly. As I say, I am a romantic and I fantasise a hell of a lot. So, in my head, I could probably make more of a situation than is actually there. But when I am attracted to somebody I get all romantic about tragedy, hard times, even domestic aspects of the relationship. I even look forward to it, see this as part of the romance."
Is this why Andrea recently claimed she would one day like to have children in the context of marriage?

"I never said only in the context of marriage" she responds.
So can she see herself having children outside of marriage?

"Absolutely. I believe marriage is sacred and would prefer to get married but I do think people can make steady, committed relationships and not sign those papers.
Daddy will be very upset to hear me say that! Sorry, daddy! But, plan-wise, I am getting married and having babies. Yet I don't condemn any other way, once there is love."
But does Andrea Corr really like men?
"Of course I do! I love men."
Not necessarily, "of course", surely? After all, doesn't the shag-them-shag-them-out-because-they've-been-doing-that-to-us-for-centuries attitude evident among
many women these days, suggest that they may even secretly despise men.

"But that is such a ridiculous attitude because we're all so dependent upon each other. And they can't pretend that they don't want men, because they do."

And yet a growing detestation of the male of the species also burns it's way through many of the songs of the more angry female singer songwriters these days, the dominant tone less one of cliched romantic love between men and women than one of rage, a sense of a woman saying, "it's about time you guys were put in your place".

"A song, as an individual piece of self-expression, often relates to just one experience," responds Andrea. "Take Alanis Morisette. I don't think her anger is aimed at men, in general. She's had a bad relationship and she's shouting that out, just like the song we're making the video for today, 'I Never Loved You Anyway', though our song obviously is more tongue and cheek. It's not rage, it's more of a send-up. But that is just an expressive moment, on my behalf. It's certainly not one more woman saying 'to hell with all men'."

Actually at this point Andrea Corr didn't say "to hell with" she used a four letter word but then quickly asked, "please don't print that swear word" explaining that she sees the use of such words, in print, as 'sensationalist and shocking." While we're on the subject, Andrea also criticises my 1995 HOT PRESS interview with a "please don't name him" male singer suggesting it was "too sexually explicit, by far." She is not convinced by the argument that the relatively closeted singer himself later revealed that he felt "liberated" by the fact that this particular interview he was able to publicly present himself as he really is, for the first time.

"Maybe. But I m not into sensationalist interviews," she retorts. "I've read them and decided I don't want to know about another person's sexual behaviour. As John Hughes, our manager often says, 'Sex, politics, religion, they're all private'. And I, personally, get no stimulation from reading about what somebody is doing with, or to, somebody else, sexually."

Fair enough, but if Andrea and the rest of the Corrs were more open about their private lives, sexual or otherwise, mightn't that go some way towards undoing the notion that there is no blood behind the loveliness, that they have led a charmed life and this consideration, when they do articles is a fact that we are a family and
there is only so much that can be revealed, publicly, without running the risk of hurting someone, "Andrea responds. "You are a journalist, you have a private life, there are things you don't want your brothers and sisters or mammy and daddy to know. The same applies to all journalists, but they seem to forget that when they come in asking questions. Everybody has that restraint. But when I say something publicly I am very aware of all this, very self conscious about what I can, and can't
reveal." When Andrea says that revealing too much can lead to someone being hurt does this mean that her parents, for example, may have read something that caused them unnecessary pain?

"No. And the thing is that I could say anything and not much would-be a surprise, say, to my daddy because there is a total honesty between us," she replies. "But there are five of us involved in this band, taking into account our manager. And you have to think of them too when you do an interview." So Does Andrea Corr feel personally restricted by such considerations?

"I don't I, personally have anything to hide so I'm actually okay, but it definitely does effect what I say in public," she concedes. "Then again, another reason I think about what I say, before I say it, is that there are many people out there who are reading this article and could be swayed by what I say. You do have that responsibility. I have a different life than our fans, and a different perspective on all this, so someone woo is very vulnerable, could be swayed by my opinions, rather than come to their own conclusions."

That said, what is Andrea Corr's response to recent reports that Ireland has the highest level of dope-smokers among young people in Europe.

"Everybody can do what they want, I don't condemn anyone who feels they have to do that. But there are much better ways to escape," she says. "And there is no doubt that dope slows up your brain. Years go by and you see people who had ambitions but they're wasting away. You ask 'where did that dream go?' and they might as well admit, 'I smoked it away'. So I don't think the whole tendency towards dope smoking is healthy at all."
Andrea has worked in a pub and, in this interview, admitted she herself likes to get drunk - so couldn't dope-users retort that the same brain-eroding effects result from the extensive use of alcohol?

"Of course," she says. "And there are people who can smoke dope once in a while and that's fine. It's the same with drink. Everything in moderation is fine. But in terms of Ireland having the highest level of young people that smoke dope, do 'E', whatever, that is scary. Of course could say having a joint and having a drink is
much the same thing. But in terms of 'E' I would say to anybody never to take it. There is something about drugs that has always given me nightmares. From when I was very young, I'd have this nightmare about being out of control, drugged and pathetic. And abused, by myself. Thus letting others abuse me."

As such, does Andrea agree with the spokesman for the Dublin Drugs squad who recently suggested that pop stars who glamorise the use of drugs are as guilty as drug dealers? As in, dance acts who suggest that the best way to enjoy a rave or access a trip-hop album is to drop 'E'.

I think they are as guilty and that is totally wrong," she says. "One of the saddest things is to see young people - who, as I say, are vulnerable to this kind of thing - being led astray by pop stars, which is what I was talking about earlier. I'm so happy I grew up in an age where it was 'let's go and drink' before eighteen. That was
the bad thing to do. If I grew up in an age where E was prevalent I probably would have taken it. And maybe one of my friends would be dead, or I would be.
Because it's so dangerous. I have seen it turn people's lives' around. Their lives go to complete shit, from taking E. And I mean young people who start off taking it because it's seen as a soft drug, so accessible, and, yes, popularised by rock stars."

Does Andrea ever suspect that it is her relatively conservative attitude rather than the music that is being reviewed and rejected when certain rock critics dismiss The Corrs as "bland"?

"Sometimes, definitely," she claims. "And I also get a sense of certain reviewers saying, 'shit, I wish I didn't like this album, I wish I could totally resent it, but I can't', probably because rock critics do see us as so uncool. And as I said to you before, rock critics are terrible snobs when it comes to pop music. They're all trying so
hard to be alternative, to take a stand against whatever is popular with the majority of people. They're all very conservative themselves, in that sense. So I'm not really surprised when such critics attack us. But, yes, a lot of our critics are probably just rejecting us because we are presented in the media as so clean, so straight.
Well, we are, so what?"

But how clean is Andrea?

"Well we are all born with original sin, so I don't need to start making up some more sins just for HOT PRESS!" she says, laughing. "I have my own sins, as everybody does in the family, but we don't need to read about them! Yet if people dislike you because you are clean or straight, that definitely has nothing to do with music. Some reviewers dismiss me simply because I don't spit on stage, or carry on like Liam Gallagher. None of us do that. Why should we? Other reviewers attack us just for the sake of their own career, as in that person recently, in The Sunday Tribune. He was on his own stage there, it had nothing to do with us"
The piece to which she was referring was penned by Michael Ross who claimed that session musicians did most of the work on the new album, that drummer Caroline features on none of the tracks and that the band wrote only five of the songs themselves.

"I don't want to give him the stage he made for himself in writing that article, because that is exactly what he would want," she responds. "But I will be honest and say that was the first thing ever written about us that I felt was totally unjust. I believe in Karma, try to live that way. I get what I give. I'm not nasty to you so you won't be nasty to me, I believe. That's how my family lives, too. So we, The Corrs, are honest about what we are and everything we do. None of us have really done anything that was that wrong. So that article was so undeserved, unjust and incorrect that it hurt me because I hated things like that being said about my family,
about my mother and my father.

"I look at that picture they used of us in the article and I see my sisters and my brother and do you know what I see? I see the work they do just as they see me and the work we go through every day to try and be a successful band, and as human beings. And when I look at us I see that we are honest and we are not shitheads and we don't deserve to be attacked like that. And in that article I also saw not only something incorrect, unjust and uninformed, but lies."
What 'lies': the claim about Caroline, the session musicians or who did, and didn't actually write the songs?

"By defending I put myself in a position that is unnecessary. I don't need to defend our music," Andrea counters. "If you read the credits on the album you will see there is one song, 'Intimacy' that was written by other people. All the lyrics, the music on that album, if they weren't written just by ourselves, they were co-written with somebody else. I don't feel I should have to defend that! I went out there and I never worked so bloody hard in my life, then to come back here and read that response. And as for the suggestion that it's all session musicians on the album, that is just ridiculous. But for me to pick on bits in his article and go 'that was wrong, this was wrong' is making part of what he said right and, as I say, giving Michael Ross the kind of stage he obviously craves."

When it comes to the question of the musical base to which Andrea Corr believes she is "totally true" she explains that it takes in her parents favourites, such as the Carpenters- who obviously directly influenced the sound of the Corrs - and any music that has "good melodic lines, well sung and with strong lyrics." Andrea believes that the new album, Talk On Corners, is more "mature and expressive, along these lines" than the first.

"To go back to your earlier question , there definitely is more sexuality and sensuality," she says, her mood lightening again. "All of that is a consequence of us being together all this time and writing as a family. This too, goes back to what you and I were talking about earlier, in terms of what you do and don't reveal about yourself
during interviews, or while writing a song. When I write a song with the family, the fact is that I am the 'little sister' and my mammy is there and when it gets to something like sex, you start thinking, 'oh, I m not supposed to have these thoughts about sex!'. I remember when I first wrote 'Runaway' with that silly line, 'make
love to me through the night'; when I first sang it I was turning my face away, knowing my mother was going to say, 'My God, where did you learn that?' And then I'd say, 'from T.V. mammy!'.

"So our first album is restricted, in this sense. While writing songs I certainly felt we were restricting our own passions. And even on stage it was the same. you'd never completely let go because if you do really break free, physically, and do something you're kind of thinking, 'Oh! sister, brother, mammy, daddy!'. But then you
work together and you realise you are only human and that none of these feelings are anything anyone should be embarrassed about. So, playing together, touring the world, on stage every night, I started to more fully express myself. At every level. So did Sharon, Caroline, Jim. And slowly we let go those inhibitions so when we
got to writing these songs, I think there is an awful lot more passion here than before. Read the lyrics to 'Only When I Sleep'! They're not coming from someone who is shy and they are definitely sexual, sensual, and it is basically about a woman who meets a lover in her sleep."

But how assertive is that, Andrea?
"Well. Someone did say to me the other day, 'will you stop writing in the third person all the time?' It is 'she' does this, 'she' does that, it's the safe girl over there and I just write about it!" Andrea laughs.

Yet is this really a diversionary tactic on Andreas behalf, so daddy doesn't say, 'is this a song all about you and your late-night sexual fantasies?'.

"I have done that, yeah! But these lyrics, though they are based on life and on facts, are embellishments as well!" she says, somewhat mischievously.

Nevertheless, there is a lot of longing in Andrea's songs on the new album.

"You think I'm longing? Longing for love?" she responds, feigning tears. "Actually, I m longing for more sprouts!"

Not in the middle of the night, you're not, according to 'When He s Not Around' where you sing: "I find I can't breathe and I can't sleep/When he's not around."

"Okay, the thing is, this brings us back to the subject of privacy and there are things about me that I don't want my family to know," Andrea responds. "So I always say songs like this and 'No Good For Me' are fantasy, a dream. I don't want people knowing these things about me, even though such songs, yes, are based on
reality."

Is there a married man Andrea craves and can't have, a man who is with somebody else, to paraphrase a lyric in 'No Good For Me'?

"No, but I can imagine being in that situation. Then to write the song, I get deeper into the story and end up really believing it. And it hurts. I wrote the first half of this song, about falling for someone who is no good for me, then the story developed into "you have a home and quiet place. And someone else in you're strong
embrace". And I did feel the whole thing, as in she's protected, I need that sense of protection. So these are authentic feelings at the centre of the songs, though the facts aren't necessarily true. That's how I write. Though, no, I'm not in love with a married man. But I can fantasise about that, because I have spent a lot of time with
a man who is married, and fantasised about it being bigger than it was."

Would Andrea sleep with a married man?
"No way."
Why?
"Because I don't sleep with men, anyway!" she says, self-consciously.

Was Andrea eve involved with a man who committed suicide, an act that then left the narrator of the song contemplating the same fate - which is, as she once admitted, the subtext of Forgiven Not Forgotten? And if that really is the subject of the song, why didn't she make it a little more obvious?

"Because I'd rather have those undercurrents in a song," she says. "To state it blatantly is far less interesting, as far as I'm concerned. And it could be dangerous. I think Romeo And Juliet is a beautiful story but I don't want anyone to think that suicide is romantic. It's not. It's horrendous. But tragic fantasies are romantic. Yet, no it's not about an ex-boyfriend and I never seriously contemplated committing suicide. Of course I have thought about suicide but I immediately go 'how can anyone do that to their family?' It's so selfish, to leave them there, questioning, trying to work out what went wrong. But then you have to be in a not-right frame of mind to commit suicide because everything in your body is telling you to live. Yet even though I love life too much to actually do it, I'm drawn to exploring the subject of suicide, the fact of our own mortality. Then again, there are times when I d stand at the top of a building, look out a window and say, 'Hey Andrea, you could just step out there and end it all'. And I have to look deep into that feeling. It's like riding a roller coaster."
Has she been scarred by romance?

"Yes. But that is part of it all, isn't it? Where there is love, there is pain. Where there is immense happiness there is bound to be sadness following that. And even though I don't think love has to end in tragedy, I think it can get all domestic and mundane, which is probably worse and why, as I said earlier, I try to find the romance even in that aspect of relationships! And I do dream a lot. For example, I get very emotional watching movies. I'm lost, in there! Like when I saw Leaving Las Vegas I walked down that road and was so hurt and affected by it, I couldn't stop crying. Same with The Piano and Midnight Cowboy. That's the wonderful thing about movies. I don't want to have to directly have to experience what Joe Buck or Ratso experienced in Midnight Cowboy, but watching a movie or, for that matter, writing a song about something like that, is the next best thing. It's a powerful experience, in itself, without having to go through all the pain and tragedy, first hand."

But doesn't this make Andrea Corr something of an emotional coward, a woman discharging her all her deeper potential through writing songs, immersing herself in movies and fantasies simply because she is afraid to embrace the real thing?

"Oh God, maybe I am! That's tragic," she reflects. "Maybe you are reading a lot more into me than I can read into myself, because you're objective. And this is provocative stuff, that will make me go off and wonder is that what I am? An emotional coward? I honestly can't answer that question, though I do often think that I am tragically romantic and maybe that means I do choose to live life through things like songs and movies, rather than first hand, lest I be broken by it all. There are so many terrible experiences to be had in life but I don't want to have them. And, no matter what you say, Doctor Joe, I still think it is great that movies are made so we can fee lit all, from the outside."

Does Andrea Corr ever get annoyed at the fact that more critics seem to comment on the superficial surfaces of her music than the serious underlying themes?
Alternatively, is she ever afraid that the relatively light-weight nature of the music itself will neutralise the dark undercurrents in the lyrics?

"Well, the point I that on the new album there are more undercurrents that there ever were before in our music," she responds, smiling "And though I don't get annoyed that people miss this aspect of our music, I am really pleased when maybe one-out-of-ten people notice it. Especially our fans. But we just make the music. If people want to listen, at a surface level, or if they want to look under the surface for what's really being said in a song like 'Queen Of Hollywood', that's their right to choose. It's the same with people who don't want to listen to us at all. That's fine, go listen to something else! Either way, we're not setting out to make people listen to the words, or the undercurrents. That's up to the listeners themselves.

"And, let's address another criticism of The Corrs and Talk On Corners before you go! As in, the suggestion that we don't have control over our albums. We do. No one else dictated terms on this album. The music went the way it should go. We all know music is a case of where business meets art but no one came along from the business side of things and told the Corrs 'this is the way the song should be'. If we allowed that to happen there is no way anyone on earth would be
moved by the music we are creating. this album is a true expression of The Corrs, as we are now, in 1997. There is nothing on Talk On Corners that is dishonest. Every emotion was indulged!"

The Corrs play the Olympia Theatre on Mon 8 and Tues 9 December. Talk On Corners is out now.