Few artists have worked in such a wide variety of projects as Chris Connelly. Starting out on the predominantly electronic Fini Tribe, Connelly met up with Al Jourganson when he was helping the band get a deal with Wax Trax. He went on to work in Ministry and The Revolting Cocks as he also embarked on a solo career with Wax Trax. Among other things, Connelly has also been part of Pigface and teamed up with several Killing Joke members to form Murder Inc. The singer now has a new solo album, "Shipwreck," out on Wax Trax/TVT, and will be touring in early 1995.

The following is an interview from October 1994.

Like your last album, "Shipwreck" is musically pretty varied, while "Whiplash Boychild" had a more consistent sound throughout. Is there any particular reason for this?

That comes down to a few things, who played on the record and what the instrumentation was. I think on the first LP, apart for a couple of songs, it was pretty standard. But I think the more important thing is that when I get older I get more confused. Not confused in a bad way, but more varied in what I want to hear and how I feel I want the songs to be represented. All the songs are written on guitar or piano and then when it comes to arranging, one has to think about how you want the track to be perceived emotionally or otherwise and set about trying to create the sound.

Have all the other projects influenced your own music?

Certainly. I hope that for all I've done I've learned a lot. There are things that stick with you, techniques or whatever, and it's all a learning process I like to think

Do the musicians you work with take part in the song writing process at all?

Three of the songs I didn't write the music for, the first song and the last two songs. "Meridian Afterburn" and "Shipwreck" were written by Chris Bruce and I wrote the lyrics, and "Candyman Collapse" was written by William Tucker. Everything else I pretty much wrote myself, and when in came to recording or rehearsing there wasn't a whole lot of work to do other than on "Swimming," which the band made a lot more radical. It was a very poppy song that I wanted to be more dirgy. But everything else, I pretty much played the songs and we rehearsed them. I send out tapes, I just record them in my room. It's very low-tech, I have a Radio Shack $29 tape recorder and I just send them out to the band members and then when we get together to rehearse it's very straightforward and easy.

Did you take an albums worth of material in to the band, or did you try out more songs to see what worked?

I had an albums worth of material before I went in. I wrote this album over a period of one and a half to two years, and there were many more songs than actually ended up on tape. The amount of material we rehearsed was eleven songs, the album, and we didn't rehearse or records any other songs at all.

What was the reason for the Swinging Junkies tour you and William did earlier this year?

There were many reasons. The Swinging Junkies is actually something William and I have been doing for three or four years, on and off, and it was a really naive way first and foremost to present the new material in a rather more intimate atmosphere. We went on tour straight after we recorded the album and it was a chance for me to take that material out live and try to get a feel for the dynamics of the songs, for my voice in particular. Another reason was we just wanted to tour. I hadn't been out for a long time, and neither had William, and felt it time just to go out and travel the country and do something a little bit different. There wasn't a lot of overhead, it was just the three of us in a car driving around and it was really laid back. We didn't lose much money. It was just really pleasant to do. Traveling is just a wonderful source of inspiration for me. We just did it for the hell of it, really.

One of your shows was at an airport lounge in Connecticut. Can you describe some of the other unusual venues you played at?

We played a really great venue called Sudsy Malones in Cincinnati, which is a laudromat and bar. The best show in the tour I think was in New Orleans where we played in a house. It was a really large, beautiful, New Orleans house run by this really sweet couple. A friend of ours down there organized the gig and we got there and it was in this huge house with a bar and an indoor courtyard, and then there was this big room that was almost churchlike where we played. It was completely silent through the entire set and it was fantastic. People lived in the house, so afterwards we just went up to someones bedroom and hung around and talked. It was really special and nice.

In general, what was the audience reaction to the tour?

Really well, the ticket prices were quite low so people would show up for the hell of it. The reaction was fantastic. We were playing in quite diverse places

You've been involved with a pretty diverse array of projects. Did you have any particular plan when you first started?

No, I can only never plan things. There are certain aspects of what I was doing with Fini Tribe that I though were right and that I've carried over. Certainly Fini Tribe was an amazing learning forum for all of use involved at the time, and they've carried that forward into what they're doing these days.

Is there anything else that you'd like to try in the future?

I'd be real interested in doing a whole soundtrack. I'd like to do some more challenging things. One of the thing's I'd really like to do is collaborate with another vocalist. I don't know who that vocalist might be, but it's very rare that I've collaborated with other vocalists. I'd like to meet another kindred spirit and may write with him or her and sing together

Have you done any more with your spoken word work lately?

No. I have a mail box address that's on the new album and I'm toying with the idea of recording a cassette of spoken word and just selling it at cost through mail order for people who are interested. Either that, or making a little book of poetry and selling that. I enjoy doing spoken word performance, but I will do them very few and far between. I'm not happy to do a tour like that, for example, I' just don't think I have the confidence.

Do you have think you'll be including any more spoken word as bonus tracks on singles?

I haven't got anything. I may do a couple of more mixes, but I kind of doubt it. I am kind of old school in that respect. When I go into the studio I'm very cost-conscious, I like to record exactly what we're wanting to do so as not to waste time or money so I record an album's worth of material and that's about it.

A few years ago you mentioned that you would be moving to England. Why are you back?

I went out with Ministry and we were in England for a week and it was really miserable. I'd been there the summer before and it was really cool and a great vibe. I was all ready to move and everything. I'd moved out of my house. I was over there in November and it was just like all my friends were completely broke, and I was thinking I don't want that. London is an incredibly expensive place to live so I came back to Chicago.