Fully Furnished

"SOME PEOPLE ask why I damn well bother with love songs, but it's what really churns me up — I still think there's some definitive stuff to be said along those lines."

Some, yes. Not as much as there used to be, but always some. And definitive is definitive, after all. Furniture say they do make them like that anymore. The songs boast wonderful lyrics — a rarity in the current Cuyahoga (a dying river, chucks) of pop groups with enticing veneers and shallow substance. That Furniture are a pop group will have to be taken as a basic premise for now. What surprised them was how their last single 'Love Your Shoes' sounded…

"When we heard it on the radio it was peculiar," says Tim. "Whoever they were they were good, but they weren't us. It was supposed to be deadpan, understated. It ended up a bit soft."

"There was a patch not too long ago when we suddenly blossomed," adds Sally. "We came out of ourselves."

A new toughness? The new single 'I Can't Crack' should be bringing some palatable bedsit melodrama into your grins even as we speak… Jim Irvin and Tim Whelan talk most, 'cos they're nearest. They formed the group with drummer Hamilton Lee, and at the end of '83 released a six-track mini-album, 'When The Boom Was On', utilising (among other musicians) Larry N'Azone (sax), Maya Gilder (keyboards) and Sally Still (bass), all of whom are now fully-fledged Furniturists.

"To get a full picture of us you have to… wait," explains main lyricist and really rather tall vocalist Jim. "There's no way to get an instant idea from one song or gig. That's always been a problem for us; we know there's more in us than we can hope to get out. It's logistics. There's thousands of ideas bubbling to the surface all the time."

The phenomenal (well, I think so) 'Dancing The Hard Bargain' single revealed about 700 of these.

"Somewhere between Cabaret Voltaire and Joni Mitchell… we want Furniture to have that range of emotional possibilities. We have all these ups and downs, and we want them reflected. It seems pointless to be in a group that's stuck in one slot. How frustrating. It's horrible when you hear records which have no reason for coming out. We'd like to always be interesting, with variety, honesty, straightforwardness."

This certainly comes across in the (deceptively funky) live performances.

"By wandering onstage 'naked' as it were, not preening ourselves for hours, we're in fact making a hell of an effort. We're not hiding behind anything; it's close to the bone."

Furniture lay claim to no "grand scheme". As Tim says, "Intention is almost an irrelevance. We are successful. Whether lots of people buy the records or not is another matter. The records exist."

The material is the manifesto, and it's some party — one of those where you discover things about yourself, just when you thought you knew it all…

"I'm just playing music," says Larry The Sax. "I don't really listen to the lyrics. I suppose that's terrible?"

In the case of the graphic and cutting (!) 'She Gets Out The Scrapbook', or the airily intense 'Robert Nightman's Story', it's sinful! Furniture continue to shift around; be moved willingly.

What keeps you going? Without hesitation, Tim answers, "It's an obsession."

It is this kind of spirit that makes bishops kick holes in stained glass windows for the love of wicked women. Long may it flourish.

BAND PHOTO (derived-images/band-photo-from-interview-fully-furnished.jpg)

Large black-and-white press photo occupying the right half of the feature. Five figures arranged around a vertical pillar or door-frame:

- LEFT of the pillar: three figures crowded into a darkened doorway — a young man with dark hair brushed back (likely Jim Irvin), a woman with short dark hair looking straight at the lens, and a third figure partially obscured behind them.
- RIGHT of the pillar: two figures framed against a lighter wall — a man in a light-coloured fedora/trilby with his hand raised to his chin (likely Tim Whelan, frequently pictured in hats), and a woman with curly/frizzy dark hair (likely Maya Gilder).

Photo credit: P K Edgely (visible in the corner of the print).