From the Winter 1998 Korg Pro View Issue, by David Rogan.  

TEARING IT UP WITH PHIL COLLINS ~ This just in: Phil Collins writes hit
songs.  Lots of them.  18 hit albums with Genesis.  Six more hit albums on his
own.  Hit movie soundtracks.  Hit collaborations.  Hits, hits and more hits.
In the arena of popular music Phil has put a hit streak together that would
impress even DiMaggio.

So to what does he attribute his phenomenally successful, uncannily consistent
career?  Just what does Phil have that makes him, well...Phil?  Surely, Mr.
Collins himself could shed some light on what it takes to sit down at the
keyboard and write another chapter in one of the most prolific and successful
stories in the history of rock music.

My first interview question to Phil Collins, quite simply, was where does it
come from?  Where do you get your inspiration?

His answer, delivered with all the self-effacing charm I had been told to
expect from someone who has become a perennial fixture at the top of nearly
everybody~s rock and roll Nice Guy list, took me somewhat by surprise.

~Well, it~s luck really...I wouldn~t even call it inspiration.  It~s just
plain luck.  There~s such a big element of luck when you put your hands down
on a keyboard and you see what happens.  That~s why I like...and I~m not
bull-shitting here...why I like Korg instruments, particularly the old
Wavestation.  You hear a sound and you play a chord that sounds great on that
and then you go find the next chord....~

Korg:  So the inspiration is almost a by-product of the songwriting process?

PC:  Right...I have the one song ~Northern Lights~ where the entire song is
built just around the sound.  I~m an untrained, instinctive keyboard player,
so I just follow my nose.  You can be in the studio playing around all day and
it~s like ~I~ve heard it before, or I~ve played that before.~  And you go
away and come back fifteen minutes later and sometimes you just get lucky.

Korg:  With such a formidable background as a drummer, do you find yourself
writing drum parts along with a melody line as you go?

PC:  The groove on top of which I~m writing usually comes first.  I tend to
write like a drummer...I certainly play piano like a drummer...it~s very
rhythmic and not very independent.  To be honest, sometimes I usually just sort
of set things up with the drum machines and the drums will be atmospheric.
With a song like ~Sussudio,~ for example, the drums would be something that
you would replace because it was just straight ahead.  Most of the time I get
something like that going ahead of time before I sit down at a keyboard.

Korg:  So when you write what, in effect, becomes a ~throwaway~ drum pattern,
do you then take pains to put your stamp on the piano part?

PC:  That~s really a very difficult question to answer because every time is
so different.  I power the whole studio up and there is only me there.  I~ll
start playing the piano and find that I~ve left the MIDI things on and I get
whatever has come up on the other five keyboards.  Sometimes that will be quite
interesting, and that will make me play something and maybe within a half hour
if I have something that I like I~ll go program a drum pattern that will help
what I~m doing.  There~s no real method....

Korg:  I read somewhere that you explained your decision to leave Genesis by
saying that after 25 years, you just wanted the music to be ~just you.~  Can
we talk about that?

PC:  Well...you say things like that and you don~t realize that the answer will
be bandied around the world.  I would never choose to answer that question in
that manner again...I left because after 25 years I just figured I was
justified
in thinking maybe I should do something else.  In fact, the real reason for
leaving, and I'm sure Tony (Banks) and Mike (Rutherford) have felt the same
way...where one day you just wake up and say 'I wonder if I want to do this
tomorrow.'  Or 'Maybe this will be the last album'....That's why we've been
saying for the past 20 years in interviews, 'We'll just wait and see what
happens.'

When it happened for me was during the writing and recording of the album
'Both Sides'.  The entire album was done on demos in my bedroom where I have
my studio and it was a totally homemade, one-man effort, and I was halfway
through that and the album was very personal, suggesting even that I was having
problems in my personal life...so therefore it was the worst possible time
to do
something with the group.  And at that time Mike had asked Tony and me if we
would get together for a charity thing.  And we all got together that night and
did four or five Genesis songs...and it occurred to me during the first song
that I felt like I was almost acting.  It felt like it wasn~t my shoes I was
wearing.  And I thought ~hmmm, that~s interesting.~  I had never felt that
way before.

Korg:  [Segue whiplash alert:]  Speaking of shoes...I noticed on your Oprah
Winfrey appearance that you whipped out a pair of tap shoes...

PC: (Laughing)  Oh, year...Well I had just seen 'Lord of the Dance' in New
York and I was blown away!  The idea of having thirty people dancing like that,
to me, was like having 15 drummers on stage.  It~s incredible!  To me that~s
the same thing as what Chester (Thompson) and I used to do.  It~s just so
exciting...the accuracy!  I actually met Michael Flatley afterward, and we~re
going to do something together with drums and taps.  Anyway, I went to see it
again in Chicago and afterward went out and bought a pair, two pairs, actually,
of tap shoes!  A lot of drummers are actually great tap dancers and vice
versa...Fred Astaire was a great drummer...Buddy Rich was a great tap dancer.

Korg:  Is that why you occasionally drum along with, rather than instead of,
your regular tour drummer, be it Chester Thompson or Ricky Lawson?

PC:  On stage I have to have a connection with the audience...that~s why the
singer is up front.  I mean, I *can* sit behind the kit and sing and play, of
course, but it looks so terrible to the audience.  I have to find a drummer
that can translate my ideas and not make me say ~I wish I was doing this.~  I
was always lucky with Chester with Genesis and with my stuff because he was
always great at interpreting and taking something on stage farther than I ever
had.  It~s very difficult because really, I~d almost rather not be singing so
I could just go play the drums.  Of course, when you write songs and record
them and they become hits you have to go and sing them, right? (laughs)

Korg:  You just received your new SGproX.  Will you be using it on your next
tour?

PC:  Oh yeah!  We~re just winding the tour down now in Europe (in the end of
December) so I have to go home and get used to the feel of the thing and what
it can do, obviously.  The beauty of it for me will probably be in the studio,
actually.

Korg:  Can you tell us a bit more about your studio gear?

PC:  Well, apart from the Korg Wavestation, which I use quite a bit, my entire
last album was composed entirely on the 01/Wfd with many of the rhythmic things
being done on the Trinity.  So apart from the SGproX I~ve been a longtime Korg
user...which is why I agreed to do the interview!  I wouldn~t be doing it just
for the new keyboard...I have a long standing great relationship with Korg.

And I love the Trinity...of course as a drummer, consequently I~m almost
allergic to electronic instruments.  And the manuals (chuckling)...I almost
have
to hire an assistant to get through the manuals!  But, honestly, I think I~ve
just scratched the surface of what these instruments can do.  Obviously, I do
what I can do on them, but I can~t wait to really get into all these
instruments in depth...especially the SG.  I have all of them connected in my
studio, so just one touch of a button they~re all there.  Really I use the
Wavestation and especially the 01/W all the time.  I~m a big, big fan of the
Korg stuff.

Korg:  We, at Korg, might say the same about Phil.