Tina Turner Remembered By Producer Martin Ware
Producer Martin Ware has paid tribute to Tina Turner, who died in May this year, in a new feature for The Guardian.
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The Heaven 17 man remembered how he came to work with Turner, “How I got involved was like an alignment of the stars. I’d been putting together an album of old songs reframed in new contexts and James Brown had just backed out at the last minute – or, rather, his lawyers had. So there I was in the Virgin Records office bemoaning my fate, wondering who on earth was going to sing The Temptations’ Ball of Confusion, and the head of A&R, who knew Tina’s new manager, Roger Davies, overheard me.
“The next minute, [Heaven 17’s] Glenn Gregory and I were flying out to LA to meet her, literally in her front room. The idea that these two naive lads from Sheffield, just busking, were going to meet this experienced, brilliant demigod was insane.”
Heaven 17 went on to produce Turner’s massive hit cover of Al Green’s Let’s Stay Together. Ware went on to remember recording with her, “Being in the studio with her was incredible from the start. The first time she walked in, she just walked to where the band was and got on with the job. We recorded Ball of Confusion and later, her [1983 comeback single] Let’s Stay Together, which I produced, both in one take. The only way I can describe those experiences is that it was like hearing a record you already knew well being made – she was that good. You just knew, oh, we’ve created something here that will live for ever. That’s never happened again in my life.”
“She asked us to write some songs for her next album, which is what became [the multimillion-selling] Private Dancer. We couldn’t because our heads were already really inside our next project, and we were pretty daunted by the idea of writing for her too. We suggested covers for her instead, like David Bowie’s 1984, which she did brilliantly. Do I regret not writing for her? No, but I do regret the royalties!”