Ivo: If Peter did go to Northampton, that was another thing that he didnt tell me! I first met Bauhaus in the Earls Court shop where Peter had intercepted the tape they were intending to deliver to Beggars Banquet. Peter came to find me in the restaurant over the road and insisted I come back immediately to listen to it and meet the band.
According to Bauhaus singer Peter Murphy, Peter said, Im having you lot. Ivo didnt want us. Thats what Peter said at the time. Ivos a mardy bugger! And really sarcastic [laughs]. But when we walked into the Beggars office, Ivy [Murphys affectionate nickname for Ivo] was working there, and he looked at us after hearing the music and said yes!
Via a Skype connection to Turkeys capital Istanbul, where Murphy has lived since marrying his Turkish wife and following the Islamic belief of Sufism, the former Bauhaus singer still looks sleek and gaunt, his celebrated dark lord persona intact. Traffic whirs away in the background, but it cuts out when Murphy puts on Re-Make Re-Model from Roxy Musics epochal 1972 album debut, presumably to set the scene for our conversation, by showcasing Bauhaus roots in both glam and art rock.
I was fifteen, Murphy begins, and I didnt know if it was male or female, but I saw this pair of testicles peaking out under a Kabuki outfit, and it was the most
erotic moment. It felt angelic. The photographic object of his affection was David Bowie, in his Ziggy Stardust leotard. Roxy Musics synthesiser magus Brian Eno, says Murphy, was maybe even more magical, awesome in that raw, lo-fi way, the drums on his solo records so flat and thick and stocky, with none of that fucking reverb bollocks that Ivo would swamp things in!
The Bauhaus siblings, David and Kevin Haskins, both now live in California David J, as the bassist calls himself, is in Encinitas, 95 miles from Kevin Haskins Dompe (hes since bolted on his wifes maiden name) in Los Angeles. Both willingly testify to a similarly shared epiphany July 1972, when Bowie in the guise of Ziggy sang Starman on Top of the Pops. I was hooked, and I knew I had to do this myself.
Theres one missing voice guitarist Daniel Ash. Though he lives in California as well, he hasnt communicated with any of his former bandmates since the bands 2008 album Go Away White. Ash, the others say, prefers tinkering with his beloved motorbikes over any remembrance of the past.2
Playing guitar, David J had graduated from his first band, Grab a Shadow, and having encouraged Kevin still just thirteen to learn the drums, theyd joined Jam, a hard rock covers band. And then punk happened, says Haskins Dompe. David took me to The 100 Club to see the Sex Pistols, The Clash and the Banshees. The next day I cut off my hair and wore my paint-splashed polyester pyjamas to art school.
After the demise of the pairs short-lived punk band The Submerged Tenth, David J had bumped into fellow art school student Ash, who hed known since kindergarten. We clearly had a connection, says David. We both loved dub reggae, and Bowie. Haskins and Ash subsequently formed The Craze, which, Haskins Dompe says, played new wave power-pop, which Daniel didnt like, so that ended. Ash asked Haskins Dompe to join a new band fronted by Ashs old school friend Peter Murphy, but excluding David J. Daniel felt Davids ideas were too strong, but he relented, says Haskins Dompe. I could see the chemistry between them.
David J had watched the others rehearse. They were so streamlined and stark, and Peter had such charisma, and looked amazing. They had a bassist, but his looks and personality didnt fit, so I joined.
Peter Murphy: David was sensitive, smart, self-interested, a dark horse. Kevin could be narky and uppity, but he was our sweet angel. I was very overpowering but we were respectful of each other, though there was a lot of unspoken, repressed tension.
The battle of wills that marked Bauhaus to the end produced the necessary sparks at the start. Written only weeks after David J joined, the bands debut single Bela Lugosis Dead was a cavernous, dub-enhanced nine-minute drama with the epic mantra, undead, undead, undead, in honour of Bela Lugosi, the Hungarian actor most famous for his 1931 portrait of Dracula. We surprised ourselves, because it was ambitious and didnt follow anyone else, says David J. Every major label (and Stiff) declined to release it, before the fledgling London independent label Small Wonder stepped in. Theirs was the only response that didnt think the track was too long.
Thirty-four years on, Bela Lugosis Dead remains Bauhaus signature classic; it hung around the new UK independent singles chart (launched two weeks after Axis) for two years. It also helped spawn a genre that proved to be as contentious for the band as it was for the future 4AD. Its said that the term gothic was used by Factory MD Tony Wilson to describe his own band Joy Division, but it was also applied to the ice queen drama of Siouxsie and the Banshees. Soon enough it would be shortened to goth, and wielded as a pejorative term, to describe an affected version of doom and angst.