Dubstar: IS THERE ANYWAY BACK FROM HERE? originally included on United States of Being album
This is the song that convinced me that Dubstar should reform, all the way back in 2003. It would take three years for this to happen of course, but I had this inescapable feeling that Is There Anyway Back from Here could put us right back on the map. It was the Not So Manic Now for the 2000s. How could we resist?
Is There Anyway Back From Here (ITABFH), much like Not So Manic Now, started life as a different song called ‘No Place To Go’ by a band from Leicester called Dizzy Valise. I’d been introduced to them by my manager Sharon Tapper (funny, as I’m writing this I’m discovering more and more similarities in the story of this song and the story behind Not So Manic Now). She’d been sent some music and thought we’d be a good fit. She was right, we got on well, I produced some of their songs (All These Things being a firm favourite) and remain in contact to this day.
One late summer afternoon in the early 00s I was driving on the A7 in Andalusia Spain with Dizzy Valise’s demos on the stereo. As we pulled into our turning for Puerto Banus ‘No Place To Go’ came on. Naim was on the vocals of course, John providing most of the arrangement…it was the standout song of a strong set and reminded me of Natalie Imbruglia’s Torn, in a good way.
‘This is a hit, I need to do something with this’
Steve Hillier
Friday 16th December 2022
I don’t remember why we didn’t make a version of this song for Dizzy Valise, I have a feeling that our paths were diverging at that point, I was spending most of my time in Spain and then songwriting across Scandinavia and the USA.
But I couldn’t forget this song, there really was something important going on in ‘No Place To Go’. So I rewrote the lyric, changed the structure around a fair bit (again, much like Graeme Robinson and Jon Kirby had done with Not So Manic Now) and we landed with Is There Anyway Back From Here. Next question…I had no band at this point, who was going to sing this? I’m not going to find anyone in Spain. Could this be a Dubstar song? Oh, hang on, yeah… there is no Dubstar…
I’d already worked with a fantastic singer from Bristol called Lily Fraser, I thought she’d be ideal. I’d put together a backing track, Chris had already played guitar, this could be great. Lily was up for it so came round to my apartment in Hove and sang the song perfectly. Couldn’t have been easier.
But…it didn’t work. Not Lily’s fault, it was mine. The arrangement wasn’t right, the feel was way too 1990s. In the cold winter sunlight of 2023 that’s not so much of a problem but back in 2003 it was exactly how you shouldn’t be sounding. In fact, the problems with the arrangement would persist for the next eight years. And a few years later, with Dubstar back together and with Sarah singing, ITABFH would go through incarnation to incarnation, each time getting bigger and more bombastic. The Dubstar version rolled along like Ace of Base on steroids, with all the bombast that implies, and yet never really took off. Tim Mason did a mix out in Malta, it didn’t quite work. Paul Tipler did a mix at his place in Peckham, didn’t quite work. There are three complete sets of vocals sitting here on my hard drive, a testament to the tortuous journey the song went on. My fault, sorry guys. You can’t mix a faulty arrangement into a hit.
And then…
As I was completing all the mixes for United States of Being in late 2011, I threw the dice one last time for ITABFH. What would it sound like if I rolled the song the other way, stripped it back, like on the alternative version of I Lost A Friend? I went back to the vocals and played along on my Yamaha CP-70B electric grand piano. Finally, and as if by magic there was the song again, removed from the layers and layers of production. This is the result, the definitive version of a song that had more makeovers than…er…I dunno, my metaphor ran away with me me there.
The real hero on this song is my trusty (and sadly no longer with us) Roland Juno-106. She provides all the bass and pad sounds…in fact apart from some Yamaha DX100 here and there, all the synthesiser arrangements on the USOB sessions were 100% analogue.
Thinking back now
It’s a sanguine experience listening to ITABFH today. In many ways the making of this song is the story of keeping faith, persisting with a tune that no matter how many mistakes simply wouldn’t die. I think the results speak for themselves.
On the other hand, sitting here listening to ITABFH gives me a sense of what the Portuguese call saudade. This is the sound of the past, there really is No Way Back to those times, there can be no more Dubstar. This lyric describes the last days of a relationship, and although I wasn’t thinking of this at the time, it also reflects the demise of Dubstar. There are multiple lines that chime with the end of that act, not just in 2000 but in 2008 and 2014.
I’m frozen fantasising of a lifetime next to you
And you hate romanticising but I thought we’d always win,
so tell me is there anyway back from here?
The answer was no, even though we were making the best music we’d ever made. There simply was No Way Back to the 90s and no place to go in the 2010s.
This article includes excerpts from DUBSTAR.COM. Want more? You can find the story behind every Dubstar song ever recorded including dozens of unreleased songs right here at Dubstar.com
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