The Other Two – Stephen Morris and Gillian Gilbert interview

Stephen Morris and Gillian Gilbert’s accidental pop career away from New Order as The Other Two has been an adventure they have never quite controlled… Here the husband-and-wife duo reflect on their side project’s debut album, The Other Two & You.

“It wasn’t so much that we came up with the name The Other Two, it’s that other people kept calling us that anyway.” So begins Stephen Morris’ explanation of the strange and subterranean history of New Order’s most mischievous side project.

When Bernard Sumner began Electronic and Peter Hook launched Revenge in the wake of their parent band’s rave-era classic Technique, New Order’s drummer and keyboardist Gillian Gilbert were initially left kicking their heels. With perfect timing, the pair were then suddenly reminded that they had work to do after all. Shortly before recording began on Technique in Ibiza, New Order had been approached to compose the soundtrack for BBC1 series Making Out, a Manchester-set factory drama that starred Keith Allen and Margi Clarke. “We agreed, and immediately forgot that we’d said yes,” admits Morris.

And just as Bernard and Hooky announced their solo plans, Making Out producer John Chapman appeared at the mixing sessions for Technique to ask how New Order were getting on with that soundtrack…

“I didn’t think four people doing a soundtrack at the same time would have worked anyway,” says Gilbert. “We didn’t know what we were doing, but it got me and Stephen writing a lot of music. We got professional about soundtracks later, learning how to write to a scene.”

Two’s Company

Rather than working at New Order’s increasingly sedate pace, the couple would have a week to score each of the series’ eight episodes. “That was fine,” breezes Stephen. “One of the hardest ideas in music is: ‘What do you write a song about?’ When someone sticks a video in front of you and says they want something to go with it, that’s half a song done straight away. We then ended up with loads of two-minute pieces of music.”

Two years later, in 1991, The Other Two released their debut single, Tasty Fish. By then, New Order had turned Morris and Gilbert’s theme for Janet Street-Porter’s documentary series Reportage into their only UK No.1 single, World In Motion, for England’s 1990 World Cup team.

Tony Wilson’s business partner, Alan Erasmus – “The man of mystery at Factory,” as Morris accurately summarises – suggested the pair turn their TV incidental music into a soundtrack album. “That’s what The Other Two was supposed to be: a soundtrack album,” says Gillian. “For some reason, we decided to then try turning it all into songs instead.”

Wilde Hearts

The fizzing instrumental for Tasty Fish, as raved-up as Technique and twice as poppy, was an obvious choice to become a proper song. Sharing a record label with Kim Wilde, the instrumental reached her dad, Marty Wilde. “Marty said Tasty Fish was a really good track, something Kim would sound great on,” explains Gilbert. “That got Tony Wilson interested. Kim came to our studio, did some great ‘Do-do-do’ melodies and… that was it. Kim was lovely, but we’d naively thought that, because she’s a singer, she’d have come in with lyrics ready and turn it into a song on the spot.”

Stephen takes over the story of the whereabouts of The Other Two’s missing third: “What happened with Kim happens a lot with us: we were too awkward to follow it up. We assumed someone would ring us and say: ‘We’ve booked this studio and Kim is coming in on that day.’ Kim probably thought the same: our people would call her people.” Gilbert: “The trouble is, we didn’t have any people.”

Fishing For Lyrics

Thus began Gilbert’s alternative career as a frontwoman. She’s got Chris Lowe levels of mystique behind her keyboards on stage but just like her Pet Shop Boys counterpart, Gillian is a total hoot when not being an international pop enigma. And Morris is one of life’s great eccentrics, reminiscent of Bob Mortimer as he rattles off surrealist insights.

Together, they’re absolute couples goals and their main interest seems to be to make each other laugh as frequently as possible. Telling the story of The Other Two is just an excuse for further mischief.

New Order producer Stephen Hague suggested Gilbert do the vocals herself: “He was so encouraging – I enjoyed singing. Lyrics, that was another matter.” Bernard Sumner was perhaps not the ideal role model, according to Gillian: “Watching Bernard write lyrics in the studio, you think: ‘God, that looks tortuous.’ We fell into thinking that you can’t write lyrics unless you’ve been tortured. I tried torturing myself for a bit, but that didn’t work. It wasn’t the easiest of processes.”

To highlight how un-tortured The Other Two were as artistes, Tasty Fish was named after a favourite chip shop in nearby Stockport. Stephen: “To this day, I don’t know why the hell we called it Tasty Fish. Good publicity for the chippy, I guess.” Gillian: “It was in the great tradition of New Order: give it a title that’s nothing to do with the song.”

Going Off

The single reached UK No.41. “We’ve got quite a few conspiracy theories about that,” laughs Gilbert. “My sister was living in London. She told me Tasty Fish was on Radio 1 all the time – but that you couldn’t buy the single anywhere. I’m not sure if that’s because Factory couldn’t afford to press more or, as we later found out, Tony Wilson just wasn’t into us that much. He was telling people: ‘It’s just too poppy, loves.’”

“Even Quincy Jones was intrigued,” remembers Morris. “He was the head of New Order’s record company in the States. He came over to take New Order out to dinner and asked us: ‘Do you know anything about this Tasty Fish song? It’s being played in all the roller discos, and apparently it’s not even signed!’ It was a brilliant week when it looked like it might be a hit.”

It led to The Other Two’s first promo video: “That was the worst part about that song being called Tasty Fish,” grimaces Stephen. “The director filled the set full of fish. The fish arrived at 9am, then weren’t used until 7pm. No fridge, hot studio lights… awful.”

A Matter Of Mime

The experience was even worse for Gillian. “New Order had a ‘No miming’ policy,” she says. “I was terrible at miming in that video and just hated it. More than anything, that’s what made me think: ‘Oh God, can I just go back to being in the background?’ Of course, New Order mime all the time on TV shows now.”

When it looked like Tasty Fish might go into the Top 40, possibly resulting in a Top Of The Pops appearance, Gilbert and Morris began contemplating how to make The Other Two work live. A Certain Ratio’s Jez Kerr, who sang backing vocals on the single, would play bass. A female drummer was hired, and rehearsals began on Tasty Fish for potential TV performances.

“I do regret The Other Two never played live,” confesses Stephen. “I think if we had actually gone on Top Of The Pops and done that first live performance, we would have considered it more seriously.” Gillian nods in agreement, adding: “It wasn’t me thinking: ‘I’m not doing it,’ it was about building up our nerves to doing something new. With videos: it was awful, but I’m glad I did it. Playing live, we never quite took that next step.”

Starting Something

The band’s debut album, The Other Two & You, was soon completed – but remained unreleased for two years. With Factory going under, New Order needed to get back together, and quickly, to try to save the label. As Morris notes: “I’ve got a theory: if you want New Order to do anything, tell them that The Other Two are about to release an album.”

Somewhat to the duo’s surprise, The Other Two & You has just been reissued by Warner. The album had previously been re-released by Factory associate James Nice’s labels, LTM and Factory Benelux, in 2010 and 2020. Stephen cautions: “It was allegedly remastered then, but I honestly didn’t do it, as I didn’t have time. Warner said they’d get it remastered properly this time. Then they asked us if we had the masters and, well…”

Jazzed Up

When The Other Two & You was first due out on Factory in 1991, Morris took the album to “the one cutting plant that Factory wasn’t blacklisted by.” It was a swish facility, with two adjacent studios. “When I collected The Other Two record, I took it home, put the needle down and it was all…” He starts doing an impression of parping bebop jazz. “I was going: ‘They’ve put sax all over it! What’s going on?’ The pressing plant was working on Courtney Pine’s album in the next studio. They’d sent us his, and ours had gone to Courtney Pine. Good job I checked, or else New Order fans would’ve been going: ‘That’s nothing like Tasty Fish, those two really have changed direction.’”

Once Factory had been taken over by London Records, New Order’s new home suggested The Other Two & You should wait until New Order’s new album was out. Eventually, the pair’s debut emerged five months after Republic, in October 1993.

“Listening to it again, The Other Two & You isn’t as bad as I’d expected it would be,” deadpans Stephen. “Some of it is ‘What the bloody hell were we thinking!?’, but some of it is actually really good.” Gilbert adds: “Bernard said we were very catchy once. I don’t know if he meant that in a good way or not. And Hooky had told us about one of the songs: ‘That’s a very complicated bass riff. It’s got too many notes in it.’”

Dark Drama

Once second single Selfish stalled at No.46, London’s interest waned. A dark drama, Selfish is most similar lyrically to New Order, though Gillian deflects any interest in who “Someone I hate, she thinks she’s great” is written about. “Our daughter asked that!” she grins. “I told her: ‘You don’t want to know.’ When I started writing lyrics, it became quite personal. Listening now, those lyrics are a bit creepy. I’ll just say that it’s about someone from the past.”

The new reissue includes a previously unreleased mix by Love To Infinity of Innocence, which would have been the third single from the record. The album could also have featured a different hit. After Moby was hired to remix Movin’ On, at Morris’ suggestion he made it sound like: “Kraftwerk, if they were a country and western band.”

The result was so catchy that London thought it a smash. “You could see the pound signs in their eyes,” says Stephen. “Then a certain person, sat next to me now, told them: ‘If you think I’m getting dressed up in denim and a cowboy hat, with a pig under my arm, you’ve got another thing coming.” A highly amused Gilbert admits: “Maybe I should have done it. It sounded like Cotton Eyed Joe, only years before Rednex did it.”

Super Highways

Six years on, the duo’s second album Super Highways arrived – after Making Out producer John Chapman reappeared, asking The Other Two to soundtrack his latest BBC1 series, Edward Woodward and Kathy Burke’s refuse collection drama Common As Muck.

Sub Sub singer Melanie Williams helped with lyrics on album two. “When Melanie started incorporating my ideas into her lyrics, that was great for my confidence,” Gilbert emphasises. “The more I went on, the more confidence I had. The songs are better on Super Highways.” Morris: “I prefer it, too. The only thing that’s a pain – and it’s my fault – is I was obsessed with drum and bass, so the production is a bit dated. That album will be getting reissued soon, too.”

Although The Other Two’s name has since been on occasional remixes for Nine Inch Nails and Tim Burgess, there’s yet to be a third album. New Order’s return has stymied that. But Gillian hints: “There could be something. Around 2010, we started a new album. Since we began these reissues, Stephen has been digitising the tapes of those unreleased songs. I’ve come in and gone: ‘What’s that? It’s really good!’ It turns out it’s us. There’s probably enough there for an EP.” Why didn’t they finish making it? “New Order started making Music Complete. Like Stephen said, if you want New Order to start something…”

Order the The Other Two & You (Exclusive 1LP Vinyl) reissue here

Read More: New Order Album By Album Guide