This week, Reflex Malta Promotions once again welcomes the living legend that is Marc Almond, as its special guest at the 10th anniversary Reflex party.

In the hearts and minds of most people whose youth was soundtracked by the music of the 1980s, he will forever be linked to Soft Cell. It was, after all, thanks to that duo and its runaway success that turned him into an icon, a hero for all those who felt they didn’t fit into whatever it is that society required them to be. There is, however, much more to Almond than Tainted Love.

Now in his fifties, Almond has – aside from Soft Cell’s five albums – released 18 other albums to date, with another pencilled in for next year.

What is perhaps more remarkable is the variety of music that Almond has explored throughout his career. From Russian folk and French chanson to pop noir, Gypsy music, electronica, and of course, classic pop. Almond displays a remarkable passion for whatever project he undertakes, immerses himself fully and completely in such a way as to embody the old adage that variety is the spice of life.

He speaks here of his recent activity on stage and in the studio, as well as the challenges ahead.

2007’s Stardom Road album seems like a lifetime away given all that you have been up to since then.

I’m still passionate about music and always feel I can make a better record. As I get older I have more experience to bring to the recording process and therefore it’s more fun.

There are always new challenges. After my last album Varieté, which featured all-new original songs, I didn’t expect I would record such an album again, but this past year I’ve been more inspired than ever to write new songs.

I got the opportunity to work with legendary producer Tony Visconti on a mini-album, The Dancing Marquis, off which the Tasmanian Tiger EP, which also features songs written by Jarvis Cocker and Carl Barat (The Libertines, Dirty Pretty Things), and was recently released.

I’ve also recorded an album of original songs with producer Chris Braide to be released next year, as well as a semi-classical project with award-winning composer John Harle called The Tyburn Tree. I’m more productive and creative than ever.

Your albums Jacques, Heart on Snow, Orpheus in Exile and Stardom Road feature your reinterpretations of other artists’ songs. What do you find so fulfilling in performing other people’s work?

I love to acknowledge great songwriters and recognise that there are better songwriters than me. I like to pick songs that fit into my world and can sometimes express things better than I can; they say things in a better way. I take songs and make them mine. Sometimes, I feel I can be weighed down by baggage in my own songs.

Your 2011 album Feasting with Panthers with Michael Cashmore is essentially a covers album with a twist, but based on poetry instead. How challenging was that album to make?

None of those poems had been in song form before. I picked the poems and lyrics that I loved but Michael did all the hard work, putting them to music and arranging them.

I recorded the vocal tracks in London and e-mailed the files to him in Berlin. We weren’t in the studio together once, thanks to the wonders of modern technology.

The poems are quite decadent themes, and the music reflects that; sometimes it’s folk or classical and sometimes rock, but always quite exotic. It’s a beautiful record and one that inspired composer John Harle to approach me to vocal The Tyburn Tree.

This past year I’ve been more inspired than ever to write new songs

What was it like performing Torment and Toreros and playing after all these years with some of the Mambas again for the 2012 Meltdown festival?

It was a wonderful experience; along with the Twelve Years of Tears show at the Albert Hall in 1992, it was probably one of my favourite shows ever.

It was hugely difficult to re-create and involve 25 people on stage at one point with a choir and string section, but it was great to work with some of the original musicians.

If it hadn’t been for Antony Hegarty (of Antony and The Johnsons) asking me to perform it at his London Meltdown festival, I could never have afforded to do it myself, it was too expensive and complicated.

Since we’re talking of the past, further to 2001’s Soft Cell reunion and album release, will there ever be a similar get-together, perhaps the occasional live performance, or was that a final goodbye?

I’m always reticent to say never, but I’m pretty sure that the last time we got together to do the Cruelty Without Beauty album and tour was the last.

It started off great, but in the end I was reminded why Soft Cell split in the first place. It went from fun to miserable, and life is too short to do anything that isn’t fun these days.

Back to the here and now, what’s the story behind the Jarvis Cocker and Carl Barat songs on the Tasmanian Tiger EP, and what inspired the vinyl release?

Initially the intention was to record a double A-sided single, Burn Bright/The Dancing Marquis, which became a mini-album once I got into the studio as I became inspired to write and record more songs.

Tony (Visconti) wrote brilliant string arrangements and mixes for two songs (Tasmanian Tiger and Death of a Dandy) and coincidentally, I had been given new songs by Jarvis and Carl, which they’d written especially for me.

All the songs seem to relate in a way to this Dancing Marquis character, who in real life was the flamboyant aristocrat Henry Paget, 5th Earl of Anglesey.

I wanted to release it on vinyl as a tribute to the pop singles I bought as a teenager, many of them produced by Tony.

The songs are shot through with a glam rock edge. At the moment, the mini-album is released in two halves but will be available as a complete CD with bonus tracks in May.

Recorded music aside, you also appeared at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 2011 and in Paris in 2012 performing in Poppea…

In 2011 and 2013 I performed in an opera song cycle called Ten Plagues, about one man’s survival through the great plague of London in 1666. The opera was written especially for me and I won an award for my performance at the Edinburgh Festival in 2011.

The following year in Paris, I performed in an experimental rock opera Poppea, based on Monteverdi’s opera The Coronation of Poppea.

I played the philosopher Seneca who was teacher to the Emperor Nero (played by Carl Barat). I had a fabulous suicide scene in a bath of blood. Both pieces were a wonderful learning curve for me; they were very challenging and were much more complex than my usual music, and I developed my vocal style.

I felt if I could do this kind of project I could do anything. I had started in the theatre before pop, and I’d like to return to it more.

You’re also working on a new album, The Velvet Trail…

The Velvet Trail will be released next year, as I have too many commitments this year and I want to clear everything away to concentrate on it.

It’s very much a pop album and even returns to what some might call a Soft Cell style on some songs.

The album is a very high production and was produced by and co-written with Braide, who has written and produced Lana Del Rey and Britney Spears, among others.

What are you looking forward to on your second visit to Malta?

I had a wonderful time on my last visit. Malta is very beautiful and it was great to see that I had fans there who gave me such a warm reception.

Marc Almond will be performing on Tuesday (eve of a public holiday) at Gianpula, limits of Rabat.

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