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| Pam Sheyne |
Where are you from, and how did you get
into writing music?
I was born in Auckland, New Zealand and relocated to the UK when I
was seventeen years old. I started out singing and playing guitar in a hotel
band in London then eventually moved into doing session work and touring. I
toured as a backup singer for the Pet Shop Boys in 1991
which was an amazing experience but a real cross roads for me as I didn’t want
to continue being on the road. In 1992 I decided to concentrate on writing
songs full-time and got my first publishing deal. (My husband Nigel Rush was my
first publisher which is how we met). I wanted to be an artist but I started
having success with songwriting first and realised that it was more suited to
me. I am most definitely at home being in the studio writing and producing.
What were some things you worked on before Pokémon
2000?
I love
collaborating and particularly enjoy working with a producer and artist in the
room. In the mid-90’s I teamed up with Eliot Kennedy (Spice
Girls/Bryan Adams/Take That) and we co-wrote/produced for Rebbie Jackson
(Michael’s big sister). She came to London to work with us after we recorded
“Yours Faithfully” for her in LA. My first big success in the UK was with an
artist called Billie Piper
and a song called “She Wants You” which went to No. 3 in the charts and from
there I went on to work with a bunch of acts like Louise who was in girl band Eternal, Norwegian girl
duo M2M and Haley Westenra from my
home country New Zealand. I started doing more regular writing trips to LA, New
York, Nashville and Stockholm to broaden my network and eventually moved to LA
in 2008.
How did you get involved with writing songs
for the movie?
It was on a
writing trip to LA that I had a meeting with Darren Higman at Atlantic Records
for the first time. Darren mentioned he was looking for songs for the upcoming
movie soundtrack and he asked me if I wanted to write something for it. When I
went back to London I called writer/producer Matt Rowe as we had been working
together on a few projects. Darren sent us the visuals to write for one spot in
the movie.
What was your experience with Pokémon prior
to this?
I had never
watched Pokémon before and had only seen the huge impact it had on kids and how
popular it was all over the world.
What was the writing process like?
Matt and I
wrote “Wonderland” and “One” specifically for the film and soundtrack. I
remember us sitting in the studio with a blank page and watching the film
without music for the first time with these cute little characters all falling
down these tunnels and thinking, “I love working to picture, this is going to
be a blast!”
How did “The Extra Mile” get written?
“The Extra
Mile” was written with Tina Arena and Andrew Frampton originally for the Sydney
Olympic Games as Tina was asked to sing a song at the opening ceremony. She
didn't end up singing the song at the games but Laura recorded it for her
Italian and Spanish albums and then it additionally made the Pokémon Soundtrack
album.
Were the songs intended to be used in the
movie, or just inspired by it?
“Wonderland”
was written for a specific scene in the movie and “One” was just written for
the soundtrack. “Wonderland” was not
used in the film itself however because there were publishing clearance issues.
Two of the songs (“Wonderland” and “One”)
have Spanish versions. Were you involved in either of those?
My husband
and I flew to New York to produce the vocal with Angela Via at the Sony
Studios (it was actually originally intended for Dream Street, but was changed
at the last minute). We then flew down to LA to produce the Spanish version
with the translator Jorge Piloto, and then flew back to New York to mix full
length versions of English and Spanish versions. Vocals for “One” were produced
by David Foster-he added to Matt’s production and produced the Spanish vocals (translated
by Claudia Brandt) with Denisse Lara at 143 Studios near LA.
Was an Italian version of “The Extra Mile” ever
considered? Also, what was recording that song like?
There was
talk about doing an Italian version but they wanted it to be only English
language songs on the record for some reason. Nigel, Ben Robbins and I flew to
Milan to produce Laura Pausini’s vocals. It was such a pleasure to work with
her and she was very detail-oriented and such a trooper- we spent hours getting
the pronunciation right. The mix was done at RG Jones in Wimbledon in the UK.
What else have you written?
I co-wrote
“Genie in a Bottle” for Christina Aguilera,
“He Loves You Not” for Dream,
“Irresistible” for Jessica
Simpson, “When It Happens To You” for Corinne Bailey Rae,
“You Get Me” for Seal,
“Old Blue Jeans” for Miley
Cyrus (as Hannah Montana) and “For Love Alone” for Cece Winans. Others
include songs by Demi
Lovato, the Backstreet
Boys, and Lindsay
Lohan.
You recently spent some time in Europe
teaching music composition. What was that like?
I was asked
to mentor at a songwriting retreat with and for my friend Martin Sutton (The
Songwriting Academy which is based in London) at the end of May this year. Martin
has been doing this for a few years now and on this occasion we were four
mentors and 32 songwriters. We didn’t teach composition as such but did
masterclasses on the craft of songwriting and lent our experience on the
business side of it. It was a week-long camp in co-writing sessions with the
songwriters each day and because we were all staying in the same place we also
got to socialise and hang out so it was a lot of fun. I have also been
mentoring a lot of artists from South Africa and some have travelled to LA to
work with me over the past couple of years. I am looking at doing more of this
in the future as I enjoy working with young artists and teaching them some
tricks in writing songs. Watch this space!
Where can folks find your web site, and do
you have any social media that you post on?
Special thanks go to Pam’s husband Nigel Rush
for helping verify information for this article.
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