The First Time With... Series 28 - 4. William Orbit

THE FIRST TIME WITH... SERIES 28 - 4. WILLIAM ORBIT (320kbs-m4a/130mb/57mins)
BBC Radio 6 Music broadcast: 26th February 2023

Artist, producer, songwriter, Grammy award winner, maverick. William Orbit shares some of his seminal First Times from his life and career.

Considering that his career spans six decades, and accounts for over 200m record sales, nothing should surprise you when it comes to William Orbit. But this might: not so long ago the Grammy Award-winning producer behind multi-platinum records for U2, Blur, Madonna, All Saints and countless others, signed up for an online tutorial in how to produce music. 'Pro Tools For Beginners', he laughs. "Now, I'm an ace on Pro Tools, but a few things puzzled me about the new version, so I signed up for a course. Episode one was basically: what is Pro Tools? What is sound? What is a computer? I was finding out for the first time what some of these 'mystery buttons' did. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry."

After a period of inactivity we'll come to later, William Orbit was ready to make new music: "I felt as on fire as I last did in about 1996." The result is 'The Painter', an album that's unmistakably the work of one of pop's most distinctive musicians, but one that turns exciting new corners too. Accordingly, it features old collaborators like Beth Orton and Katie Melua, as well as new friends like Georgia, Polly Scattergood and Lido Pimienta. "I'm so incredibly happy with it," he beams. "The last year has been the most creative time I can think of. New toys, new collaborators, new relationships; there are tracks on this album that are up there with my best."

The bigger picture begins in 1971 when, aged 14, William discovered his uncle's tape recorder. "It seemed like the most incredible thing in the whole world," he remembers, "that you could take a sound... and retain it." This was the start of a lifelong obsession with sound. Leaving school at 16 he took on numerous and varied jobs – from night shift at the Heineken Brewery in Amsterdam to the civil service. But one thought never left him. "What I knew is that I wanted to be creative," he remembers. "I just didn't know how. It burned me up."

By the late 70s Orbit was the rent-free resident of a caretaker's cottage in an abandoned Victorian school whose gas and electric had been left on. ("I was quite a seasoned squatter when it came to changing locks and putting in toilets.") The second hand shop next door, run by two chaps called Giuseppe and Raymondo, was piled high with musical equipment. The rest writes itself: Orbit formed a band (Torch Song), made music, and got rejected by labels until, one day, he didn't: There was a call from Miles Copeland of IRS Records. "It felt like a turning point. I thought: 'If I'm smart about it, I'm never going to have to leave this wonderful place of being paid to make music.'" One pivotal moment was witnessing Rusty Egan play a Torch Song single in a DJ set. "'We've arrived', I thought. We hadn't actually arrived, but it was a start."

Specifically, it was the start of a career in which Orbit became one of the world's most successful producers, for the likes of Blur, Madonna, All Saints, P!nk, Beth Orton, U2 and Robbie Williams. A career that also includes the launch of legendary dance label Guerilla, numerous solo releases such as the 'Strange Cargo' series and the landmark new-classical album 'Pieces In A Modern Style', and the journey from underground electronica to primetime Top Of The Pops, through projects like 90s band Bass-o-Matic and before that as the producer of comedian, Harry Enfield's single 'Loadsamoney (Doin' Up The House)' which rather improbably became Orbit's first hit record. (Both TOTP appearances are on YouTube, each quite extraordinary for rather different reasons.)

William's latest album 'The Painter' is out now.

Blur - Tender [Food]
Ferdinand Lang & Berlin Symphonic Orchestra - Spring from The Four Seasons - Violin Concerto In E Major [Classical Masters]
Cream - Badge [Polydor]
Simon & Garfunkel - A Hazy Shade Of Winter [Columbia]
Focus - Hocus Pocus [Polydor]
Tonto's Expanding Head Band - Cybernaut [Late Night Tales]
Jean Martinon & The London Symphony Orchestra - Capriccio Espagnol, Op. 34 [Decca]
Torch Song - Prepare To Energize [I.R.S.]
Marcia Henderson - Peter Pan: Build My House [The Magic Of Music]
The Jimi Hendrix Experience - Purple Haze [MCA]
Bass-O-Matic - Fascinating Rhythm [Now]
William Orbit - Barber's Adagio For Strings [WEA]
Madonna - Frozen [Maverick]
Blur - No Distance Left To Run [Food]
William Orbit & Polly Scattergood - Colours Colliding [Rhino]
Frank Zappa - Peaches En Regalia [Rykodisc]