Tony and Dave talk to Moby, who's not that mad or Christian or vegan really.

Moby has always been one of the music scene's most interesting and diverse characters, defying definition by veering between happy hardcore, ambient soundscapes and industrial metal with apparent ease; but at this years Reading Festival he still surprised many by delivering a straightforward punk rock set, totally abandoning the sequencer in favour of loud guitars from his new record "Animal Rights." Moby started out in guitar punk and new wave bands before being caught up in the dance scene in the mid-eighties; but is now growing bored with the dance scene just as the mainstream appears to be catching on. Why has he moved back in this direction exclusively?

"At first I tried to incorporate the two - punk rock music with the electronic sounds of the sequencer - but I ended up sounding like Billy Idol. Part of the joy of this is not being tied to a computer and improvising, it's emancipating. I guess that at the time I just didn't feel particularly eclectic! With "Everything Is Wrong" I was feeling a little more open and wanted to represent all these different things that I was interested in but lately, the only things I felt interested in are speed metal and classical music." Moby talks with some disenchantment about the contemporary dance scene: "I still like a lot of it - it's nice, but it doesn't make the hairs on the back of my neck stick up."

Is that because he thinks there's less good dance music coming out or just because he's been there, done that? "It's probably a combination of the two. There's a marked lack of passion and intensity in electronic dance music - it's more conservative and restrained on an emotional level. Now it's a virtue to see how stylized and restrained you can make a record, as opposed to 1991 when records were big huge booming fiascos. Today's dance music is nice when you're waiting for a table in a restaurant but..." So doesn't that make him want to come back and make that huge, uplifting record for today? "Well, I tried with "Feeling So Real", which was my statement of what I love about dance music, but the people who were interested weren't the dance people. The dance community said it's just cheesy happy hardcore - well, better emotional hardcore than cool, 'intelligent' techno."

Does this move away from technology partly reflect Moby's dislike for the effects of modern lifestyles? "Everything we do in the late twentieth century - in the context of the end of western civilisation, is going to be hypocritical. It's hard to be a purist; the only way to be a purist environmentalist is to kill yourself, really. At one level I love being alive in the modern world, as it's interesting and fascinating; I don't have a problem so much with technology as its applications. There are very few things which are fundamentally evil." Despite this, Moby's song titles ("Everything is Wrong"/"The End of Everything" etc.) seem to demonstrate a strong streak of pessimism with the world of today. "It's more overwhelming, not so much pessimistic as depressed at the effects of modern institutions on human beings, how they've separated us from each other and the possibility of leading productive satisfying lives... Sure, we can live fairly disease free, but the quality of life is compromised by values of our culture - just adhering to the status quo."

Moby is often caricatured as "that extremist vegan/Christian nutter" so we felt that it was time to delve beneath the common preconceptions to consider Moby's true feelings on the matter. After all, his appearance onstage at Reading with the slogan "FUCKER" daubed across his chest in paint seems somewhat at odds with the traditional image of Christian moderation. One description of his views we recently read dubbed him a "libertarian, unorthodox Christian" - "Well, unorthodox Christian, sure. I like Christ and I'm yet to find a better description of the human condition than that which Christ gives in the New Testament; but "libertarian"? There's a Libertarian Party in the United States and they're nuts. I'm not a civil libertarian but people should be able to do what they want as long as it doesn't impinge upon the rights of others - if you want to do heroin or blow your head off or if you want to have an abortion, fine, as long as it only affects you. The police's job shouldn't be preserving aesthetics." But surely most cases aren't clear - smoking is a personal choice but affects others just as suicide affects families in society. "Well, people always try to hide behind the smokescreen, no pun intended, of individual liberties when something they like is challenged but we've got to try to build a pragmatic consensus - smoking does hurt others, therefore in Moby's world smoking should be illegal, at least in the presence of other people. Your actions are compromising somebody else's ability to enjoy life - that's where the law should step in."

There are certainly very few high profile Christians in the music world, and while many Christians would be expected to oppose the high profile of drugs in the scene Moby doesn't see himself in opposition with these trends. "I don't really have a big problem with drugs or hedonism; I just have a problem with people hurting themselves. Its like the movie Trainspotting - the opening tirade makes a lot of sense to me, I do see drug use as a viable alternative to modern suburban living; not that I would advocate it for anyone, but I don't have a real problem with it. I have a much bigger problem with people doing work and living lives that are compromised - doing your job and feeling like an upstanding member of the society but they hate their job, they're unhealthy, not happy with their family and don't feel satisfied with anything. I see that as a lot more evil and widespread than hedonism and degeneracy. A lot of the hedonism of the dance scene is destructive, just placating people so that in the week they can go and do their mind-numbing jobs - the jobs are the problem, not the drugs! The drugs aspect of dance music was what made it so interesting in a lot of ways - especially MDMA which seemed to really liberate a lot of people. The whole drug issue is dealt with in black & white with no ambiguity: either pro or anti-drugs; pro-Christian or anti-Christian - there's no ambiguity but the world just isn't like that. Why not take each issue as it comes? MDMA is a good example; it was used by psychotherapists for years in benevolent ways but suddenly people start self-medicating with a seemingly benign drug and the government says 'No, its bad'. Well where's the empirical evidence? Its just so inconsistent."

Moby's album sleeves are always worth reading for their often scathing attacks on the excesses of society and promotion of an ethical way of life, but they have been dismissed by some as simply a hypertrophy of Christianity. Certainly, the love of Christ is an important aspect of Moby's work, but is the basis of Moby's viewpoint dependent on belief in God? "No, I think it relies on subjectivity. The essence of my ethical structure is the Golden Rule: if I don't want it done to me, I shouldn't do it to someone else. If I don't want a couple of pigs to put me in a stockade and kill me for my skin, I shouldn't do it to pigs. That's where my ethics come from - its really basic on that level." Of course, much established Christian thought (e.g. Catholicism) is contrary to this viewpoint - according to the Old Testament animals are placed under man's dominance due to our privileged relationship with God and are to be exploited for man's ends. The Church also bases its homophobia on Scriptural grounds. "Well, they should come and ask me 'cause I've figured it out! My belief is completely separate from the culture of Christianity. I see some flaws in it but I'm committed to Christ, not Christianity. But to me looking at the universe speaks of the existence of God; the existence of an architect at least and if you want to understand the character of the architect you've got to look at the character of the universe. If you want to learn about God, look at a forest." At this point the conversation moves into a discussion of the basis of faith, the success of Genesis chapters 1 and 2 as analogy, historical quirks of organised religion and rival theories for the origin of the universe. Fascinating as this was , its inclusion may be somewhat at odds with the typical content of the Baggage so it will have to be held back pending a decision to include a philosophical discussion page between the Live Reviews and the Elliott Interview.

Later that evening Moby played with Soundgarden at the Wolverhampton Civic Hall, and won over a crowd probably unfamiliar with his dance material with an entertaining half hour of hardcore punk rock and superb thrash metal versions of house classics "Everytime You Touch Me" and "Go". According to Moby: "For some reason the British mainstream press don't want to really talk to me - they're confused and waiting to see how everybody else will respond." And although I was disappointed by his move away from his superb electronic past I was quickly won over by his performance which proves not only that he is 'jack-of-all-trades' but also 'master of all'. But the truly frightening question remains - after the not-inconsiderable shift from uplifting house to speed metal; what on earth will he try his hand at next?

Moby was talking to Dave and Tony, in September 1996.