BETH ORTON - ORTON: 'RAVE MUSIC HORRIFIED ME'

Singer/songwriter BETH ORTON was convinced the British rave scene in the 1990s was a "government ploy" to pump young people full of drugs to distract them from the grim reality of everyday life. The SHE CRIES YOUR NAME star became popular with revellers who labelled her "the comedown queen", listening to her gentle tunes after a wild night out. But far from feeling part of the ecstasy-addled scene, she just wanted to inject positive thoughts into people's minds while they were recovering from a pill-popping spree. She says, "I thought it was a government ploy to just numb everyone's brains, carpet-bomb them with ecstasy, and make them loving when really it's a massive holocaust. "And then I met (producer) WILLIAM ORBIT, so that's how I started to become a bit intrigued; I went to a rave and it was shirts-off sweaty geezers and it really scared me. "It was like the modern age and what's it coming to? This is the beginning of the end and the apocalypse. "(I thought my music) could be subterfuge, get in there when the people are wide open and put some beautiful thoughts in their heads."