Andy McCluskey: Kerry Katona had Marilyn Monroe syndrome
Andy McCluskey of Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark is Neil McCormick’s guest for the second episode of Needle Time, which broadcasts tonight at 10pm on Vintage TV (on Sky channel 369, Virgin 343 and Freesat 515).
One of pop’s most fascinating, articulate and entertaining theorists and raconteurs, McCluskey proves to be typically forthright on the subject of Atomic Kitten, the girl group he formed and wrote songs for in 1998 after OMD broke up.
“I love Kerry Katona!” he proclaims of their vivacious but erratic star, who went on to become a fixture of Britain’s tabloid culture and star of reality TV shows such as I’m A Celebrity … Get Me Out Of Here. “The first time I met her I told her, ‘You’re going to be a star, because you’ve got Marilyn Monroe syndrome. You’re gorgeous but you don’t know it.’”
McCluskey claims all his years as an electronic pop star did not prepare him for the viciousness and dishonesty of the manufactured pop business. After steering Atomic Kitten to a number one hit with his song Whole Again in 2001, McCluskey was effectively sacked because the record company told him, in no uncertain terms, “We’ve got a formula now and it works. We want Whole Again, Whole Again and more f-ing Whole Again.” To his horror, he found himself barred by lawyers from contacting the girls who he had discovered as wannabe teenagers in Liverpool and moulded into pop stars. Since the original trio of Katona, Liz McClarnon and Natasha Hamilton reunited last year, however, all have been reconciled.
“She was going to be a Page 3 model, but she couldn’t because she’d been in foster care and she was under eighteen,” McCluskey says of Katona. “So I said give me a year and let me see if I can make you into a pop star. Cause you’re just amazing. She couldn’t sing. But Liz and Natasha could sing, and Kerry was like the secret hand grenade, you’d throw her in the room and she’d just explode. Everybody loves her.”
In 2006, McLuskey reunited with Paul Humphreys, his partner in OMD, and the pair have released two acclaimed new albums, including this year’s English Electric, bringing their pulsing electro pop sound up to date. Once scorned as pretentious synth posers, OMD’s synthetic sound is perfectly in line with modern digital pop. Asked if he felt that electronic music had won, McCluskey guffaws with laughter. “Did it win? That’s a really good question. There was a time there when we were desperately trying to fight the rock and roll clichés. We were on a crusade to do something different. So there we were, hacking away at the monster’s head, and we thought we got it properly severed, and then grunge and Britpop came along. You can’t imagine how shocking it was to be told, no, your vision of the future is the past, and the future actually sounds like 1969!”
Neil McCormick’s Needle Time with Andy McCluskey of OMD will be shown on Vintage TV at 10pm, Tuesday 14th May and repeated on Saturday 11th at 7pm (Sky channel 369, Virgin 343 and Freesat 515)
