1
00:01:06,375 --> 00:01:08,729
I don't think he wanted to
be a star, but...
2
00:01:08,730 --> 00:01:12,243
I think he'd got this feeling
that he'd got something to say...
3
00:01:12,244 --> 00:01:16,458
to the people of his own generation, a
feeling that he could make them happier.
4
00:01:16,459 --> 00:01:19,019
And he didn't feel that he did that.
5
00:01:50,141 --> 00:01:52,316
It's great that people have
been discovering Nick.
6
00:01:52,351 --> 00:01:55,408
Once you discover Nick,
you're going to tell other people.
7
00:01:56,836 --> 00:01:59,692
If you met a girl and you took
her back to her room...
8
00:01:59,693 --> 00:02:02,709
and if there were some Nick Drake
records there...
9
00:02:02,710 --> 00:02:05,037
you would probably want to marry her.
10
00:02:08,762 --> 00:02:12,185
I feel a bit of affinity with him.
I think if...
11
00:02:12,186 --> 00:02:15,300
if like Nick makes you think of home.
12
00:02:18,985 --> 00:02:21,258
I think that one of his
great tragedies...
13
00:02:21,259 --> 00:02:24,592
I think he said to someone:
"I've got no more songs. "
14
00:02:27,925 --> 00:02:32,376
There were moments when it was
very... sad working with him;
15
00:02:32,677 --> 00:02:34,480
later on.
16
00:02:51,157 --> 00:02:53,437
Well, I came to Nick Drake's
music very late.
17
00:02:53,438 --> 00:02:56,407
And he's got some sort of...
18
00:02:56,408 --> 00:02:58,866
magical quality, you know...
19
00:02:58,867 --> 00:03:02,049
There's a lot of mysticism,
no, mystique...
20
00:03:02,050 --> 00:03:04,300
attached to Nick Drake, because
he only made three records.
21
00:03:04,301 --> 00:03:06,403
And not much is known about him,
22
00:03:06,404 --> 00:03:08,646
there's no film of him.
23
00:03:08,647 --> 00:03:10,985
Very little recorded words.
24
00:03:11,286 --> 00:03:14,437
But there's still a kind of magic
about his music, I think.
25
00:03:16,543 --> 00:03:18,051
A kind of fragility...
26
00:03:18,052 --> 00:03:20,492
which a lot of people indentify with.
27
00:03:32,343 --> 00:03:34,218
My parents were both wonderful.
28
00:03:34,219 --> 00:03:38,749
They had an idyllic early
marriage out in Burma.
29
00:03:38,750 --> 00:03:42,416
Because life was wonderful
for colonials at that time.
30
00:03:42,417 --> 00:03:46,664
We were very typical, I suppose,
of a certain class.
31
00:03:46,765 --> 00:03:49,283
Of a middle class.
32
00:03:49,684 --> 00:03:52,692
My father as a young man
had gone out east,
33
00:03:52,693 --> 00:03:54,719
and was an engineer.
34
00:03:55,668 --> 00:03:58,329
My mother was very much Nick's mother.
35
00:03:59,294 --> 00:04:02,354
She was very beautiful and
she was very creative.
36
00:04:02,899 --> 00:04:07,455
And I think... really, would
have been a troubled soul...
37
00:04:07,456 --> 00:04:10,280
if it hadn't been for having
married my father.
38
00:04:11,449 --> 00:04:16,148
My father made living
possible for my mother.
39
00:04:17,026 --> 00:04:20,329
But he did not destroy her
creative ability either.
40
00:04:20,330 --> 00:04:22,993
She flourished as a songwriter.
41
00:04:25,884 --> 00:04:28,360
We came back to England.
Nicky was four.
42
00:04:29,021 --> 00:04:33,217
And our very earliest
school was together.
43
00:04:34,404 --> 00:04:38,933
And I always remember... I remember
Nick's first day at school.
44
00:04:38,934 --> 00:04:41,293
And I was by that time
head girl of this school.
45
00:04:41,294 --> 00:04:44,139
And I remember being
absolutely beastly to him...
46
00:04:44,140 --> 00:04:47,893
him running into my class
for a bit of... comfort...
47
00:04:47,894 --> 00:04:51,583
I almost denied the fact that
he was my brother.
48
00:04:52,584 --> 00:04:55,875
It was something I felt so deeply
ashamed of afterwards...
49
00:04:55,876 --> 00:04:59,309
I put it him and he'd completely
forgotten about it in later years.
50
00:04:59,310 --> 00:05:00,898
But I never forgot it.
51
00:05:13,925 --> 00:05:17,195
He was captain of various games and
things when at his first school...
52
00:05:17,196 --> 00:05:20,552
and when he went to the next school he
became the head boy of his first house.
53
00:05:20,553 --> 00:05:24,810
But, it didn't really seem to mean
very much to him.
54
00:05:24,811 --> 00:05:29,805
The Headmaster gave him a very
good report, but said at the end...
55
00:05:29,806 --> 00:05:32,978
"None of us seem to
know him very well. "
56
00:05:32,979 --> 00:05:36,644
And I think that was it all the
way through with Nick.
57
00:05:37,897 --> 00:05:40,132
People didn't know him very much.
58
00:07:44,583 --> 00:07:46,796
Music was very much
a part of my life...
59
00:07:46,797 --> 00:07:49,082
As I said my mother and
my father were both...
60
00:07:49,083 --> 00:07:52,430
composing songs from
my earliest youth...
61
00:07:52,431 --> 00:07:55,303
I remember it happening;
particularly my mother,
62
00:07:55,619 --> 00:07:58,286
who wrote songs about both of us.
63
00:07:59,156 --> 00:08:01,799
From my earliest childhood.
64
00:08:06,156 --> 00:08:11,232
I think that Nick was unconsciously
very influenced by her...
65
00:08:11,733 --> 00:08:14,608
He may be horrified at the
time to have heard this.
66
00:08:14,609 --> 00:08:18,642
But I'm quite certain he was influenced
by her whole chord structure...
67
00:08:18,643 --> 00:08:20,108
and by her way of composing.
68
00:08:20,109 --> 00:08:24,165
Perhaps the best way of showing this
is to actually play one of her songs.
69
00:08:24,166 --> 00:08:28,825
And you can see, somewhere,
the similarity and the influence.
70
00:10:10,824 --> 00:10:14,119
I met Nick Drake when I was
here in Cambridge...
71
00:10:14,120 --> 00:10:17,088
and he was up in Fitzwilliam College
reading English.
72
00:10:18,851 --> 00:10:23,332
There was an element of us
feeling slightly superior...
73
00:10:23,333 --> 00:10:26,967
to other students who were cycling
to lectures on their bicycles...
74
00:10:26,968 --> 00:10:29,452
We would get up late,
we would smoke dope...
75
00:10:29,453 --> 00:10:32,457
we would... not go to lectures...
76
00:10:32,458 --> 00:10:36,139
I think we felt we were
sort of superior...
77
00:10:37,079 --> 00:10:40,336
I was the guy who smoked
more dope than anybody else...
78
00:10:40,337 --> 00:10:43,510
and I'm the guy who went on
to have drug problems... later on.
79
00:10:44,415 --> 00:10:47,345
But there was this... it was really
a three-year holiday...
80
00:10:47,346 --> 00:10:50,082
and Nick would go off
and just play his guitar...
81
00:10:50,083 --> 00:10:52,112
I'd sometimes go and see him
up in Fitzwilliam.
82
00:10:52,113 --> 00:10:55,187
And he'd be just playing the
same riff over and over again.
83
00:10:55,563 --> 00:10:59,751
He always made it look effortless. I was
always struck by his guitar playing...
84
00:10:59,752 --> 00:11:02,465
because I would sort of strum
Beatles songs or something.
85
00:11:02,466 --> 00:11:06,481
He was playing this...
folky, bluesy style...
86
00:11:06,482 --> 00:11:10,163
It was always very clean and
with great precision...
87
00:11:10,164 --> 00:11:11,947
and he could repeat it
over and over again.
88
00:11:11,982 --> 00:11:14,757
And just go on and on for hours
playing this amazing riff.
89
00:11:14,758 --> 00:11:16,828
With interesting finger picking
and stuff.
90
00:11:16,829 --> 00:11:18,337
It just amazed me.
91
00:11:18,338 --> 00:11:21,118
We never actually did a whole lot.
92
00:11:22,747 --> 00:11:24,983
I can read you a bit...
93
00:11:37,723 --> 00:11:39,912
I have to say that I'm afraid
that this letter...
94
00:11:40,873 --> 00:11:42,835
got eaten by mice.
95
00:11:44,036 --> 00:11:46,758
In the drawer where it was kept.
96
00:11:46,759 --> 00:11:51,281
So, there are bits that are missing,
but not... not too badly.
97
00:11:51,282 --> 00:11:52,868
Yes, here we are.
98
00:11:54,648 --> 00:11:57,999
"It may surprise you to hear
that during the last few weeks...
99
00:11:58,000 --> 00:12:00,169
"I've been extraordinarily
happy with life.
100
00:12:00,170 --> 00:12:02,042
"And I haven't a clue why.
101
00:12:02,667 --> 00:12:06,952
"It seems that Cambridge can in fact do
nice things to one, if one lets it.
102
00:12:06,953 --> 00:12:09,480
"And I'm not sure that
I did let it before.
103
00:12:09,681 --> 00:12:14,365
"I think I've thrown off one or two
useless and restrictive complexes...
104
00:12:14,366 --> 00:12:16,067
"that I picked up before coming here.
105
00:12:17,605 --> 00:12:19,983
"The work isn't too bad at the moment.
106
00:12:19,984 --> 00:12:23,671
"I'm doing seventeenth and
eighteenth century poets.
107
00:12:23,672 --> 00:12:26,519
"People like Swift, Pope, Blake, etc.
108
00:12:26,520 --> 00:12:28,999
"Who have quite a lot
to offer in their way.
109
00:12:29,000 --> 00:12:31,648
"But they seem to be very difficult
to write about.
110
00:12:31,649 --> 00:12:34,382
"Must stop now and go to bed. "
111
00:14:45,105 --> 00:14:48,507
Both of us were very keen on
him staying at Cambridge.
112
00:14:48,508 --> 00:14:51,291
Whatever else you did in life,
if you managed to get a degree...
113
00:14:51,292 --> 00:14:53,452
at least you'd have something
to fall back on.
114
00:14:53,453 --> 00:14:58,459
His replies were that a safety net was
the one thing he did not want.
115
00:14:59,381 --> 00:15:01,856
So that rather cut the ground
from under my feet.
116
00:15:04,411 --> 00:15:08,908
He used to look back on Cambridge days
with a certain amount of nostalgia.
117
00:15:09,744 --> 00:15:12,677
Anyway, that's... another story.
118
00:15:20,409 --> 00:15:23,236
We were actually sharing
a flat together in London.
119
00:15:23,237 --> 00:15:26,108
Until one day, Nick came into my room...
120
00:15:27,329 --> 00:15:29,762
and... he was a man of
few words, my brother.
121
00:15:29,763 --> 00:15:33,902
And, said... "Here you are. "
122
00:15:33,908 --> 00:15:38,133
And he threw onto the bed the complete
record of "Five Leaves Left. "
123
00:15:38,134 --> 00:15:41,489
I was absolutely astonished...
I couldn't believe...
124
00:15:41,490 --> 00:15:44,042
This is my brother, my little brother...
125
00:15:44,043 --> 00:15:48,131
had produced a full long-playing record,
as it was then.
126
00:15:48,884 --> 00:15:50,087
It was amazing.
127
00:16:08,001 --> 00:16:09,787
He was great to work with.
128
00:16:09,788 --> 00:16:12,069
All you needed to worry about
was the other people.
129
00:16:12,070 --> 00:16:14,918
Because Nick's guitar would
always be right.
130
00:16:15,219 --> 00:16:18,015
Nick's voice would always be right.
131
00:16:18,684 --> 00:16:22,440
Nick was just there... and I think...
132
00:16:23,383 --> 00:16:26,620
When you listen back to the records,
one of the things that is most...
133
00:16:26,621 --> 00:16:29,177
extraordinary is the guitar, because...
134
00:16:33,585 --> 00:16:38,364
it's so clean and so strong, and all
the notes are equally balanced.
135
00:16:38,666 --> 00:16:40,883
It's very unusual to have
such complicated...
136
00:16:41,284 --> 00:16:46,637
finger picking parts played in
such a clear strong way.
137
00:16:46,638 --> 00:16:50,033
Every note... So that you really can...
138
00:16:51,319 --> 00:16:54,930
construct the whole recording
around the guitar.
139
00:16:58,093 --> 00:17:00,291
Nick and I were living in London then.
140
00:17:00,610 --> 00:17:02,978
And I think "At the Chime
of the City Clock"...
141
00:17:05,057 --> 00:17:07,716
I'm just going before the studio,
not how I worked on it.
142
00:17:07,717 --> 00:17:10,116
But very much tried to
capture the mood of it, and...
143
00:17:10,117 --> 00:17:12,803
it was bleak, lonely, wet.
144
00:17:13,816 --> 00:17:17,103
October evening, trotting around
some street in London.
145
00:17:17,104 --> 00:17:20,634
There's several songs like that, that
Nick does... "Parasite", on Pink Moon...
146
00:17:20,635 --> 00:17:22,099
I think it's a similar sort of mood.
147
00:17:22,824 --> 00:17:27,760
So we decided to put like
counter-melodies... but no chords.
148
00:17:28,422 --> 00:17:33,785
So most of it is another tune,
to make it lonely and bleak.
149
00:17:34,486 --> 00:17:37,337
And basically there's either the
fiddles an octave apart...
150
00:17:37,338 --> 00:17:39,615
or the cellos doing the low line.
151
00:17:41,098 --> 00:17:44,625
It's similar on "Fruit Tree", the way
the oboe and the cor anglais are...
152
00:17:44,626 --> 00:17:48,243
they're all just playing one long tune
and one takes off after the other.
153
00:17:48,244 --> 00:17:51,343
'Cause I didn't want to take over
from the guitar playing,
154
00:17:51,344 --> 00:17:54,724
which is really sort of... well, you'll
notice when you hear it, it's...
155
00:17:55,832 --> 00:18:00,274
It's like a machine, I don't want
to take the art out of it...
156
00:18:00,275 --> 00:18:02,531
'cause it's beautiful and
very spiritual, but...
157
00:18:04,267 --> 00:18:06,799
it's all demanding, you mustn't
go against the rhythm...
158
00:18:06,800 --> 00:18:09,003
'cause Nick's always going to
keep that rhythm perfectly.
159
00:18:10,204 --> 00:18:13,598
We were looking for a bleak,
lonely sound, and I think...
160
00:18:13,599 --> 00:18:17,274
John did it perfectly again.
There was the guitar, strings...
161
00:18:17,275 --> 00:18:19,722
and the woodwinds overdub, isn't it?
162
00:18:28,566 --> 00:18:31,127
So here in one track
you have the guitar.
163
00:18:34,938 --> 00:18:39,051
And that's the rock that
the whole thing's built on.
164
00:18:40,810 --> 00:18:43,963
That's his voice coming
down the guitar microphone.
165
00:18:47,721 --> 00:18:49,624
And there's the singing.
166
00:19:05,447 --> 00:19:06,505
That's Dave.
167
00:19:08,632 --> 00:19:11,050
That's probably Dave
playing the guitar.
168
00:19:11,751 --> 00:19:13,066
Bass guitar.
169
00:19:19,069 --> 00:19:20,663
And that's the drums
170
00:19:49,668 --> 00:19:53,313
What you're hearing now is just
the raw product put down.
171
00:19:54,956 --> 00:19:58,890
At the time, when we sat in
the control room, it sounded like this.
172
00:20:01,087 --> 00:20:06,058
But we would then...
put a perspective on the sound.
173
00:20:06,159 --> 00:20:08,503
For which we'd start using echo.
174
00:20:30,091 --> 00:20:32,502
And you can just hear the
playing again out there.
175
00:22:05,525 --> 00:22:09,272
I thought that it all would be fine.
We're gonna send Nick out on the road...
176
00:22:09,273 --> 00:22:10,736
and it's all gonna be great.
177
00:22:12,086 --> 00:22:17,709
And so we sent him out on a tour
of colleges and clubs... you know.
178
00:22:18,060 --> 00:22:20,937
And it didn't work at all, because...
179
00:22:21,238 --> 00:22:27,148
of the situation where you have a bar
or you have people drinking and talking.
180
00:22:29,117 --> 00:22:31,200
He couldn't get anybody to stop talking.
181
00:22:31,201 --> 00:22:34,649
He didn't know what to say to them,
he took a long time tuning his guitar...
182
00:22:34,650 --> 00:22:36,869
because every song
has a different tuning.
183
00:22:39,482 --> 00:22:43,590
And eventually he got so discouraged by
the fact that people wouldn't shut up...
184
00:22:44,809 --> 00:22:48,011
You know, he wasn't like Keith Jarret.
185
00:22:49,594 --> 00:22:53,327
He wouldn't stop and say "shut up, I'm
not gonna play until you be quiet. "
186
00:22:55,531 --> 00:22:58,132
And he just called up one day
and said: "I'm coming home. "
187
00:22:59,089 --> 00:23:01,213
And we cancelled the rest of the dates.
188
00:23:02,054 --> 00:23:04,416
And he never really did another show.
189
00:23:22,126 --> 00:23:24,844
A friend of mine went to see him
and he hammered on the door...
190
00:23:24,845 --> 00:23:26,967
and there was no reply.
So he went round...
191
00:23:26,968 --> 00:23:30,013
the back of the house and looked through
the window and there was Nick.
192
00:23:30,014 --> 00:23:33,393
Just looking at the wall.
He was just looking at the wall.
193
00:23:33,394 --> 00:23:36,384
He didn't want to tap on the window
and disturb him, but...
194
00:23:36,385 --> 00:23:38,596
He just left.
195
00:23:41,528 --> 00:23:43,999
He said: "you know, he's a really
strange guy, sometimes. "
196
00:23:45,204 --> 00:23:49,620
Nick just seemed to become more
isolated, you'd go and see him and...
197
00:23:49,621 --> 00:23:53,074
the conversation would become
uncomfortable, and I would leave.
198
00:25:24,691 --> 00:25:28,052
And then he wound up going back
to his parents' place where...
199
00:25:28,053 --> 00:25:31,926
I think he felt quite embarrassed
about that, quite ashamed that...
200
00:25:31,927 --> 00:25:34,801
he hadn't been able to cope in
London and pay the rent and...
201
00:25:34,802 --> 00:25:37,145
do all the stuff that we
all have to do and...
202
00:25:37,146 --> 00:25:39,820
wound up in his parents' place.
And he did go into hospital...
203
00:25:39,821 --> 00:25:44,112
while he was there and he was treated
with anti-depressant drugs.
204
00:25:44,113 --> 00:25:46,890
I don't think the psychiatrist
could have done anything else.
205
00:25:46,891 --> 00:25:50,422
If you're presented with somebody like
this, from a privileged background...
206
00:25:50,423 --> 00:25:54,338
done well at school, got to Cambridge,
what else are you going to diagnose?
207
00:25:54,339 --> 00:25:57,304
Doctors think in terms of diagnosis...
208
00:25:59,066 --> 00:26:03,261
I see it more as an existential thing,
that the world was becoming...
209
00:26:03,262 --> 00:26:06,378
a rather heartless and
a rather futile place.
210
00:26:07,121 --> 00:26:09,163
Home Again
211
00:26:37,535 --> 00:26:42,450
He said once: "I don't like it at home,
but I can't bear it anywhere else. "
212
00:26:42,451 --> 00:26:46,803
I think he felt it was a kind of refuge.
He had to come back here.
213
00:26:47,004 --> 00:26:49,869
He tried many times to go away.
214
00:26:49,870 --> 00:26:54,259
Often. He used to stay away for several
nights. We never knew where he was.
215
00:26:54,260 --> 00:26:58,696
We used to ring up his friends and
wonder if they'd seen Nick.
216
00:26:58,697 --> 00:27:00,649
In case he was in trouble, you know.
217
00:27:02,717 --> 00:27:06,286
I think he had rejected the world.
218
00:27:06,287 --> 00:27:08,491
Nothing made him happy.
219
00:27:14,322 --> 00:27:17,221
Well, I never really did begin
to see a change...
220
00:27:17,222 --> 00:27:21,660
none of us did. It was something
that sort of crept up... on Nick.
221
00:27:21,661 --> 00:27:24,020
And the great difficulty
for my parents...
222
00:27:24,021 --> 00:27:26,371
who were extraordinarily...
223
00:27:27,217 --> 00:27:31,204
tried so hard, you know...
As understanding as they could be.
224
00:27:33,011 --> 00:27:36,308
They tried to get to grips with his
illness and tried to understand it,
225
00:27:36,309 --> 00:27:40,247
but it was very difficult, because they
felt that everything they did was wrong.
226
00:27:40,248 --> 00:27:43,061
And in a funny way, everything
everybody did was wrong.
227
00:27:43,062 --> 00:27:44,554
But they were much more
there and present.
228
00:27:44,555 --> 00:27:50,246
He sort of retreated into
his home environment.
229
00:27:50,983 --> 00:27:53,010
But he so wanted to
break away from it, and...
230
00:27:53,011 --> 00:27:54,956
felt separate from it, I think.
231
00:27:58,207 --> 00:28:03,856
I don't believe that he really felt
a part of his home background.
232
00:28:04,821 --> 00:28:07,681
But he couldn't escape from it,
towards the end.
233
00:28:09,403 --> 00:28:11,491
He saw more.
234
00:28:13,224 --> 00:28:16,481
And that is expressed in his songs
and almost nowhere else.
235
00:28:17,925 --> 00:28:22,256
I think he became more silent...
as he saw more.
236
00:28:27,479 --> 00:28:32,667
He said to me once: "I have failed
in everything I have tried to do. "
237
00:28:33,358 --> 00:28:36,105
I said: "Oh, Nick, how can you? "
And then I...
238
00:28:36,106 --> 00:28:40,031
I elaborated all the things
he had so patently done.
239
00:28:40,032 --> 00:28:43,658
That didn't make any difference.
He felt that he had failed...
240
00:28:43,659 --> 00:28:46,820
to get through to the people
he wanted to talk to.
241
00:28:52,267 --> 00:28:57,694
His mother called me, and she said they
wanted him to see a psychiatrist.
242
00:28:58,502 --> 00:29:02,978
And that he... felt people
would judge him.
243
00:29:04,302 --> 00:29:06,817
But that was a kind of
a sign of weakness.
244
00:29:08,226 --> 00:29:10,157
Typical English point of view about it.
245
00:29:12,979 --> 00:29:15,189
And... would I speak to him?
246
00:29:15,940 --> 00:29:19,038
So I talked to him and just said:
nobody's going to think any...
247
00:29:20,001 --> 00:29:23,575
worse of you for getting
help if you need help.
248
00:29:24,241 --> 00:29:25,830
It's normal.
249
00:29:26,277 --> 00:29:28,040
But he did sound bad.
250
00:30:17,936 --> 00:30:23,780
He came to see me, looking very bad...
very dirty, etc, etc.
251
00:30:25,997 --> 00:30:29,520
In a way, what he said to me there,
he had this outburst...
252
00:30:29,521 --> 00:30:32,652
of anger about everything.
253
00:30:34,164 --> 00:30:36,708
"Everybody tells me I'm great
but I'm broke. "
254
00:30:37,609 --> 00:30:38,767
"Why? "
255
00:30:40,770 --> 00:30:44,934
In a way it was a manifestation
in the conversation...
256
00:30:44,935 --> 00:30:47,208
of the lyrics of "Hanging on a Star".
257
00:30:48,913 --> 00:30:51,612
"If you deem me so high,
why am I so low? "
258
00:30:51,613 --> 00:30:54,745
"What is the story?
Why don't I understand it? "
259
00:30:54,746 --> 00:30:56,669
"Everybody says I'm a genius. "
260
00:30:56,670 --> 00:31:00,929
"And I don't have any money,
I don't have a career...
261
00:31:00,930 --> 00:31:02,276
"It's all a mess. "
262
00:31:09,656 --> 00:31:13,315
You have to remember that although
I saw Nick occasionally socially...
263
00:31:13,316 --> 00:31:15,334
mainly I saw him when he had
an album to work, so...
264
00:31:15,335 --> 00:31:18,815
by the time the last album came out,
the last one of the three...
265
00:31:20,751 --> 00:31:22,482
Then he was seriously withdrawn.
266
00:31:22,483 --> 00:31:27,326
It was quite dramatic,
everyone will tell you this.
267
00:31:27,327 --> 00:31:29,986
Everyone that saw him then will
tell you it was a dramatic departure...
268
00:31:29,987 --> 00:31:31,475
of the Nick that we knew.
269
00:31:31,476 --> 00:31:34,382
He didn't speak much,
the odd muttered word.
270
00:31:35,712 --> 00:31:38,486
He had quite a down appearance.
271
00:31:40,730 --> 00:31:43,456
His sister once said that the pictures
down on the house in Heath...
272
00:31:43,457 --> 00:31:45,836
which was this particular album,
where the most honest she'd seen.
273
00:31:45,837 --> 00:31:48,476
I'm not sure I buy that entirely
but I know what she means.
274
00:31:49,577 --> 00:31:51,579
It did reflect what he
was like at that time.
275
00:31:52,280 --> 00:31:56,053
You will meet people that tell you
he was depressed at other times...
276
00:31:57,231 --> 00:32:00,136
I was there at the times,
the session times and...
277
00:32:00,137 --> 00:32:02,578
nothing was quite like
that final session.
278
00:32:03,462 --> 00:32:06,826
Whereas before you bounced ideas
and you talked and made things work...
279
00:32:06,827 --> 00:32:10,747
there he just basically sat or stood
and I ran around and eventually...
280
00:32:10,748 --> 00:32:13,852
I ran out of things to say. I just
clicked. It was like doing a still life.
281
00:32:42,331 --> 00:32:45,382
I always say that Nick was born
with a skin too few.
282
00:32:45,603 --> 00:32:50,487
But I think it's better summed up by
a poem that my mother wrote.
283
00:32:51,396 --> 00:32:53,781
And it's a poem that's
called "The Shell".
284
00:32:55,723 --> 00:32:57,494
Which goes...
285
00:32:58,294 --> 00:33:02,274
"Living grows round us like a skin.
286
00:33:02,275 --> 00:33:04,859
"To shut away the outer desolation.
287
00:33:05,499 --> 00:33:08,390
"For if we clearly mark
the furthest deep.
288
00:33:08,391 --> 00:33:11,769
"We should be dead long years
before the grave.
289
00:33:12,505 --> 00:33:15,684
"But turning around within
the homely shell...
290
00:33:15,685 --> 00:33:19,590
of worry, discontent, and narrow joy...
291
00:33:19,591 --> 00:33:23,858
we grow and flourish and rarely see...
292
00:33:23,859 --> 00:33:27,188
"the outside dark that
would confound our eyes.
293
00:33:29,050 --> 00:33:31,011
"Some break the shell;
294
00:33:31,012 --> 00:33:35,328
"I think that there are those who push
their fingers through the brittle walls
295
00:33:35,329 --> 00:33:39,297
"And make a hole,
and through this cruel slit...
296
00:33:39,298 --> 00:33:43,482
"stare out across the cinders
of the world with naked eyes.
297
00:33:44,344 --> 00:33:46,689
"They look both out and in.
298
00:33:46,690 --> 00:33:50,931
"Knowing themselves,
and too much else beside. "
299
00:33:57,728 --> 00:34:00,930
John Wood and I did the final
recording session.
300
00:34:02,345 --> 00:34:04,248
He was in such a state...
301
00:34:04,283 --> 00:34:07,205
that he couldn't sing and play
the guitar at the same time.
302
00:34:07,206 --> 00:34:09,905
Those last four tracks...
303
00:34:10,624 --> 00:34:12,532
"Black-eyed Dog" and all those...
304
00:34:12,533 --> 00:34:17,481
are recorded with the guitar and
then voice singing over the guitar.
305
00:34:17,482 --> 00:34:20,409
Because he was just too...
306
00:34:20,410 --> 00:34:25,695
nervous... I don't know how
to describe the way he was...
307
00:34:25,696 --> 00:34:31,051
but it was very agonizing seeing him
trying to do those recordings...
308
00:34:31,144 --> 00:34:34,887
They were extraordinary recordings,
but they were the combination...
309
00:34:37,047 --> 00:34:41,481
the lyric and the music and the
state of Nick at the time of doing it...
310
00:34:41,482 --> 00:34:45,924
was a very... distressing experience.
311
00:35:46,735 --> 00:35:48,582
He went up to bed rather early.
312
00:35:48,583 --> 00:35:52,967
I remember him standing by that door,
and I said: "You off to bed, Nick? "
313
00:35:53,468 --> 00:35:55,041
I can just see him now.
314
00:35:58,182 --> 00:36:02,834
Apparently he'd been down, he'd been
downstairs during the night.
315
00:36:04,093 --> 00:36:07,064
I heard some corn flakes
or something like that.
316
00:36:07,365 --> 00:36:12,202
And he often did that...
when he couldn't sleep.
317
00:36:12,703 --> 00:36:16,025
More often than not,
Molly would hear him.
318
00:36:16,026 --> 00:36:18,260
Goodness knows how many
nights this happened.
319
00:36:18,261 --> 00:36:20,750
She would hear him passing
our bedroom door...
320
00:36:20,751 --> 00:36:23,960
and she'd get up, put her dressing
gown on, go down and talk to him.
321
00:36:23,961 --> 00:36:25,673
This occasion she didn't hear him.
322
00:36:25,674 --> 00:36:28,099
But he'd obviously had been down.
323
00:36:28,850 --> 00:36:32,403
Then he went back and he took
this extra strong dose of these...
324
00:36:33,844 --> 00:36:38,929
pills that had been prescribed
for him called Tryptizol...
325
00:36:38,930 --> 00:36:41,438
which he thought were anti-depressants.
326
00:36:41,439 --> 00:36:46,050
He told us he was supposed to be
taking three a day or something.
327
00:36:46,976 --> 00:36:50,300
- They were prescribed...
- You were always worried about Nick...
328
00:36:50,301 --> 00:36:52,133
being so depressed, and when
he used to hide away...
329
00:36:52,134 --> 00:36:55,094
the aspirin and the sleeping pills
and things like that.
330
00:36:55,095 --> 00:36:57,716
These particular things we didn't...
331
00:36:57,717 --> 00:37:02,553
think were... in anyway dangerous.
332
00:37:18,071 --> 00:37:22,687
And... that was it. The next morning...
333
00:37:23,435 --> 00:37:25,924
He often didn't get up at all early.
334
00:37:25,925 --> 00:37:28,332
He sometimes had very bad nights.
335
00:37:28,333 --> 00:37:32,214
And I never used to disturb him
at all, but it was about...
336
00:37:33,902 --> 00:37:36,429
It was about twelve o'clock
and I went in...
337
00:37:37,051 --> 00:37:40,055
Because it seemed it was
time he'd got up...
338
00:37:40,056 --> 00:37:42,065
and he was lying across the bed.
339
00:37:44,070 --> 00:37:47,128
The first thing I saw was
his long, long, legs.
340
00:37:54,733 --> 00:37:57,919
I was playing in a comedy at the time,
at the Bristol Old Vic.
341
00:37:58,673 --> 00:38:01,146
It was my opening night.
342
00:38:02,947 --> 00:38:05,795
I rang my parents after the show...
343
00:38:05,796 --> 00:38:09,007
which I always did after the first
night, to tell them how it had gone.
344
00:38:09,008 --> 00:38:11,296
And I remember the phone was engaged.
345
00:38:11,297 --> 00:38:13,867
It was continually engaged,
and I thought...
346
00:38:13,868 --> 00:38:16,494
that it must be out of
order or something.
347
00:38:16,495 --> 00:38:20,294
Of course they'd taken the phone off the
hook, that was the day Nick had died.
348
00:38:20,911 --> 00:38:24,536
And they didn't want to
tell me over the phone...
349
00:38:24,537 --> 00:38:26,465
at that precise moment.
350
00:38:26,652 --> 00:38:31,318
But what happened was that they drove
down to Bristol the next day.
351
00:38:31,702 --> 00:38:33,710
But they sent a telegram
to say they were coming.
352
00:38:34,655 --> 00:38:37,434
And for some extraordinary reason,
I thought it must be...
353
00:38:38,339 --> 00:38:40,998
that they were on their way
to visit my grandmother.
354
00:38:42,418 --> 00:38:45,748
I had no idea why they were coming.
None at all.
355
00:38:46,600 --> 00:38:49,507
And then they turned up,
and they told me.
356
00:38:50,313 --> 00:38:52,875
And although I had no idea
why they were coming...
357
00:38:53,176 --> 00:38:55,717
I remember putting my head
in my hands and saying...
358
00:38:55,954 --> 00:38:57,964
I knew.
359
00:38:57,965 --> 00:39:03,112
And of course they thought that Nick
had sent me a card or something...
360
00:39:03,113 --> 00:39:04,812
It was nothing to do with that.
361
00:39:04,813 --> 00:39:07,406
On one level I didn't know at all.
362
00:39:07,407 --> 00:39:10,064
But on a deep level...
363
00:39:10,065 --> 00:39:12,697
I... knew.
364
00:40:29,851 --> 00:40:33,856
I don't really know for sure whether
Nick wanted to take his life.
365
00:40:34,157 --> 00:40:36,329
My feeling is that what happened was...
366
00:40:37,159 --> 00:40:41,027
that he had all these pills...
it certainly wasn't premeditated.
367
00:40:42,586 --> 00:40:47,806
That he just tipped them out to into his
hand and threw them into his mouth...
368
00:40:47,807 --> 00:40:49,616
and swallowed them and thought:
"What the hell! "
369
00:40:49,851 --> 00:40:53,735
"Either I die or I live and things
will be changed. "
370
00:40:53,936 --> 00:40:55,938
"Something different will happen. "
371
00:41:38,314 --> 00:41:43,083
When you have the very
great good fortune...
372
00:41:43,084 --> 00:41:47,165
to come from a very loving family.
373
00:41:48,436 --> 00:41:50,957
the price you have to pay
for that good fortune...
374
00:41:50,958 --> 00:41:53,873
is the death of the people
in that family.
375
00:41:53,874 --> 00:41:56,978
That's the tragedy which
is always there...
376
00:41:56,979 --> 00:41:59,071
It changes your life forever.
377
00:42:00,372 --> 00:42:03,263
But you grow around it.
378
00:42:23,963 --> 00:42:25,708
I was quite shocked, actually.
379
00:42:27,450 --> 00:42:29,562
People say we must have
seen it coming, but...
380
00:42:29,563 --> 00:42:33,276
as I said, Nick had always
had those... spells.
381
00:42:35,199 --> 00:42:39,362
But it was a shock. I hadn't heard
from him for two or three months.
382
00:42:43,632 --> 00:42:45,575
I was just terribly sad.
383
00:42:47,575 --> 00:42:49,595
I suppose I wasn't surprised.
384
00:42:58,491 --> 00:43:02,453
But it was... it seemed a great loss.
385
00:43:03,766 --> 00:43:07,575
For somebody I'd enjoyed
working with so much.
386
00:43:21,556 --> 00:43:27,371
"I'm afraid that at this stage my voice
began to fail me rather badly. "
387
00:43:28,159 --> 00:43:30,235
"I'll just do one more song. "
388
00:45:14,782 --> 00:45:17,727
Of course the only thing that makes
sense of his death...
389
00:45:17,728 --> 00:45:22,594
is his fame that is now...
coming about.
390
00:45:22,595 --> 00:45:24,228
I think above all it's not his fame...
391
00:45:24,229 --> 00:45:27,221
it's more the fact that
a lot of young people...
392
00:45:27,222 --> 00:45:30,158
have found his music such a help.
393
00:45:30,484 --> 00:45:35,774
That I thing would have pleased
him so very, very much.
394
00:45:35,775 --> 00:45:37,727
He once said to my mother:
395
00:45:37,728 --> 00:45:43,025
"If only I could feel my music had done
anything to help one single person. "
396
00:45:43,026 --> 00:45:44,737
"It would have made it worth it. "
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