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  RR: Your parents were quite strict, weren’t they? Religious.

  ZC: They were. We used to have to go to church in our best clothes every Sunday morning, and we tried to live our lives according to the teachings of Jesus. We must have looked like something else with our tatty shirts and hair slicked down with water, all waiting at the bus stop at 7.00am.

  RR: I was talking with Naomi earlier, and she says you eventually found your own way, your own spiritual path.

  ZC: I’ve been all over the world, I’ve talked to many people and seen a great many things. There’s a lot of power out there, a lot of different ways of seeing things. I don’t believe that there’s any one right way to live your life.

  RR: You and Naomi, The Crystal Twins, performed covers and your own, original material right up until ninety-four, ninety-five, when you decided to go solo. You were, what, twenty by then?

  ZC: That’s right. Naomi and I had performed together since we were twelve. Eight years is a long time.

  RR: And that’s when things really changed for Zach Crystal. You began to write solo material.

  ZC: Right, right. I released my debut album Yearn in ninety-five. I had no idea – no idea – how huge it would become.

  RR: To date, Yearn has sold over fifty million copies worldwide, so it didn’t do badly.

  ZC: [laughs] It’s a blessing, such a blessing. I remember I was on a break from my Asia tour in ninety-nine. I’d been to Kuala Lumpur, Seoul, Taipei and I just … These were places on a map, pictures in a textbook, you know? I just lay down and cried. I cried for that little boy, that shy little boy delivering newspapers in the rain, you know? I wish I could have told him.

  RR: How big was music to you when you were growing up in Barlheath?

  ZC: My father was always listening to music, all the time, all these jazz records. Music was always on in our house, but I’d never really listened before, you know? Then, when I was about six or seven, my father, I don’t know, he just sort of decided to start playing his records to me. Really playing them.

  RS: Never would I have imagined that this was the childhood of Zach Crystal. It just sounds so beautiful.

  ZC: It was. It was a beautiful time, really. On Sunday afternoons, when my mother was ironing the school uniforms and making sandwiches for packed lunch, my father and I would listen to music in the living room. That hour or so was what I looked forward to all week. I had no idea what was ‘cool’ at the time. My parents didn’t approve of modern music. A lot of the themes in the pop songs upset them and we were forbidden to watch things like Top of the Pops. Naomi would sometimes watch them at her friend’s house and tell me about them like they were this big secret.

  RR: But not you?

  ZC: No. I was the well-behaved twin.

  [Laughter]

  RR: Zach, I just … This is so surreal. You’re coming off as just so normal…

  [Laughter]

  RR: I don’t mean that in a bad way, I promise. I was just worried – after all your years of hiding behind a mask, of being so shy, this interview might have been sort of … difficult, but here we are, just having a conversation.

  ZC: Maybe it’s time for me to grow up?

  RR: I have to be honest with you, Zach, I wondered if you’d even answer my questions.

  ZC: Oh Ruby, of course. It’s an honour, it really is, and now we’re talking about music … I mean, it is my favourite subject after all.

  [Laughter and cheering]

  RR: Please, keep going, this is music to my ears.

  ZC: The only music played in our house when I was a kid was my father’s records. He liked jazz piano and that’s what he played me on those Sunday afternoons. It was in those hours that I discovered Dave Grusin and John Lewis but perhaps my favourite of all, Mary Lou Williams. My father told me all about her, how she had taught herself to play the piano in the 1920s and became a mentor to greats like Thelonious Monk and Dizzy Gillespie. He told me about Art Tatum too; he learned to play piano by touch. ‘He was blessed,’ my father always said, ‘with perfect pitch.’ And that look on his face, that pride stirred something in me. It made me want to see that look in my father’s eyes when he saw me drinking in that sound, those chords. ‘Night and Day’ was my favourite; the way the music danced up and down the scale, the flourish of it, gave me such a tingle in my soul.

  I think my father treasured those afternoons too.

  RR: You can certainly hear that in your own music, that early influence. But you and Naomi, you brought a distinct pop element to your own music, right?

  ZC: That’s right. You see, even though modern music was mostly forbidden in our house, my sister loved it. She had a Walkman and headphones and she listened to Wham!, Duran Duran, Frankie Goes to Hollywood, the Thompson Twins. She played them to me too and, you know, as much as I loved Dad’s jazz piano music, I loved these bands too. Those pop hooks and the catchy lyrics stirred something else in me, just like the piano. I didn’t know I needed it until I began to listen to them too. I listened to how the music was created, why it appealed to so many people.

  RR: That’s when you started writing songs?

  ZC: It was after a month or so of listening to music on a Sunday afternoon that my father came home from a car boot sale with a battered Casio keyboard. The day my fingers first floated over those keys and I began to learn that I could dictate sound, could control the rhythm and the flow of the music, was the day that everything changed. I used to sit in that living room with these great big headphones on, plugged into that keyboard, tapping away at the keys, teaching myself how to play. I never read one single note of music. I still can’t today. I learned it all by ear. I began to make little tunes, little songs, learned how harmonies and rhythms worked. I must have looked a real sight, this little kid sat there, humming and muttering away to himself, hunched over the keys. My father said I was a regular Sugar Chile Robinson.

  RR: You still have that keyboard, don’t you?

  ZC: I do, I do. I write all my songs on it, still.

  RR: That’s amazing. Zach Crystal, with your five-hundred acre property in the Highlands, recording studio, treehouse – still writing songs on that thing.

  ZC: [laughs] I don’t forget my roots, Ruby.

  RR: Can we talk about your house for a moment? It’s truly a wonder, isn’t it? Up in the Scottish wilderness, miles from anything.

  ZC: It’s my place of refuge, Ruby. It’s where I go to learn, to create. Up in the forests, away from everything and everyone. It’s where I wrote all of Damage, my second record, which came out in 2007.

  RR: Damage really is close to being a perfect record, I think. I mean, every song on it, every single one is a work of art. Now you’re telling me about your influences, it really starts to make sense, the place that album came from.

  ZC: Damage was the record I always wanted to make, you know? Just me, without the – you know – the label people telling me what to do. I was thirty-three when I wrote that album. I’d matured, as a person, as a song-writer. Writing that album reminded me of being a kid again, you see. Making other people happy with music.

  RR: What are your earliest memories of entertaining?

  ZC: Before I knew it, I was playing that keyboard for the whole family, putting those tinny drum tracks behind the songs. Our whole house was singing along to ‘Numbers Boogie’ or ‘The Donkey Song’.

  I never forgot that feeling. Making people happy with music. That’s what brought us together back then; our family, sitting in the living room, with the smell of cooking in the air mixed with washing powder from the clothes hung up in the kitchen, everyone smiling and singing. When I’m sat there under the spotlight at a sold-out arena in Tokyo or London, Stockholm or Las Vegas, I still remember those old days in our house on the Hopesprings Estate. I think it’s important never to forget where you came from, and never to forget the people who helped you on your way.

  RR: We’re going to play a video from Damage in a moment, but am I right in thinking you h
ave some exciting music news for everyone tonight?

  ZC: Exclusive news, Ruby. No one knows this until now, right now.

  RR: I’m so excited and I don’t even know what this news is…

  ZC: I wonder what you’d say if I told you a new record was coming, Ruby, and a world tour?

  RR: Oh my God, really?

  ZC: Where do you think I was for the year I ‘disappeared’? What did you think I was doing? Like I’ve told you, I never stop. I never stop working.

  [Cheering, getting louder]

  RR: Really? Really?

  ZC: You heard it here first.

  [Cheering]

  RR: We’re going to go to a short break, ladies and gentlemen. Enjoy the video of ‘Starfall’ by Zach Crystal, and we’ll be right back.

  Episode One: Monster-Busters

  Extract from: BBC News at Ten (22/03/2018)

  —Concern is growing for the pop superstar, Zach Crystal, who has now been missing from his home for more than a week. The star’s twin sister, Naomi Crystal, reported her sibling missing to Police Scotland earlier this month just after she and her daughter Bonnie, thirteen, moved into the five-hundred-acre property, Crystal Forest, which is situated in the remote Colliecrith National Park, west of the Cairngorm Mountains.

  Crystal, who is forty-four, and whose last album Damage, was released eleven years ago, has been the focus of recent controversy, after the body of his longest-serving aide and close personal friend, James Cryer, was found in the vast forest that surrounds the property by special constables working on wildlife crime in the area. Zach Crystal has not been questioned with regards to the discovery and Cryer’s death appears to have been an accident. Naomi Crystal has made a brief statement, explaining that the recent media focus on the death of Cryer caused the singer significant sadness and distress. She urges him to get in touch and asks that anyone who has sighted the star contacts the police. A tearful Bonnie Crystal also urged her uncle to please get in touch with his family.’

  Extract From: ITV News at Ten. (04/05/2019) 10:00pm

  —Tonight: enigmatic superstar, Zach Crystal, missing for over a year, is finally home.

  Zach Crystal fans around the globe have tonight been in raptures at the return of their idol. The singer, who seemingly vanished without trace in March 2018, is thought to be safe and well, and recovering at his property in Colliecrith National Park, Scotland. It is not known, as yet, where Crystal has spent the past year, but that doesn’t seem to matter to the thousands of fans who have taken to the streets of Aviemore to welcome home their idol.

  This news comes alongside accusations about Zach Crystal’s personal life. Police Scotland have refused to comment on these claims. What is clear, however, is that the controversy that has been raging for some time now on the internet and social media has soured what should have been a day of celebration for Crystal’s legions of loyal fans.

  Extract from Sky News (13/09/2019) 11:44pm

  —Sorry, yes, we’re just getting word that … yes … a fire has broken out at Crystal Forest, the home of reclusive musician, Zach Crystal. We can confirm that fire crews from Aviemore, Kingussie, Ballater and Newtonmore are currently battling a blaze in Colliecrith National Park, west of the Cairngorms. Right now it has not been confirmed if Crystal himself is present at the property, which is said to be engulfed in a hundred-metre-high blaze.

  More as we get it…

  Extract from: BBC Radio Five Live – the Gordon Cantwell Show (14/09/2019) 3.30am

  —One story that has opened up overnight is that the home of controversial musician, Zach Crystal, has been destroyed by fire. Crystal Forest, as it’s better known, was reported ablaze a few hours ago, and due to its remote location in the middle of the Colliecrith National Park, was more or less destroyed before fire services could reach it and tackle the blaze.

  Oh, my word, what a story. We’ll be taking your texts and calls throughout the night on what appears to be a real tragedy. It’s not confirmed, but what I’m hearing is that Zach Crystal himself has perished in the blaze. That’s what’s coming through right now.

  Oh, my God. Oh, my word.

  Zach Crystal had just announced the release of a brand new album, and tickets for his Forever tour were already selling out across the world.

  This is a real tragedy. A tragedy for the world of music.

  Extract from: TalkSport – the Boswell and Murphy Breakfast Show (14/09/2019) 7.26am

  —We’re taking your calls, this morning, on Zach Crystal. Yes, that’s right, the Zach Crystal, who, I’m sad to say, was confirmed dead at 5.00am this morning. Fire-scene investigators up at Colliecrith National Park in the Scottish Highlands have confirmed the remains of the superstar were found among the ruins of his five-hundred-acre property. What a tragedy.

  —Well I don’t think it’s a tragedy, Morris.

  —Here we go, we’ve got Martha on the line. Not a tragedy, you say, Martha.

  —Not at all, the bloke was a bloody weirdo, wasn’t he? There were all sorts of rumours … those two poor girls what were found in his forest. Awful business wasn’t it?

  —Martha, these are unsubstantiated rumours. None of it was proved.

  —Lived in a tree house, didn’t he, with a load of teenage girls. That’s true, innit? Good bloody riddance, I say.

  —Thanks Martha. What do you think, Neil?

  —I mean, the guy was a musical legend wasn’t he? You can’t be a legend without being a bit odd. He lived in a haunted wood, didn’t he?

  —True, true. He did spend a lot of time with teenage girls as well though, didn’t he? The guy was in his forties for God’s sake!

  —I know, I know, but this is Zach Crystal we’re talking about. Think of all the work he did for charity. It wasn’t his fault that some silly teenagers got themselves lost in the Scottish Highlands, was it? They knew the dangers going in. There’s wild cats and all sorts of things in there aren’t there?

  —We’d love to hear what you think here on Boswell and Murphy in the morning, so text or tweet us. Better still, give us a call. Zach Crystal – what legacy will his death leave behind?

  Extract from: BBC News (15/09/2019)

  —The crowds of mourners paying tribute to their fallen idol have not been deterred by the rain here on the Chelsea Embankment. Piles of flowers have been laid outside the gates to Chelsea Physic Garden. Yesterday, it was confirmed that pop superstar, Zach Crystal, was found dead at the age of forty-five at his home in Colliecrith National Park, Scotland. Crystal is thought to have died of smoke inhalation during a fire that broke out at his remote, five-hundred-acre property known as Crystal Forest. The secluded mansion, which also contained guest suites and a recording studio, as well as Crystal’s personal chambers in a vast, luxury tree house overlooking the property, is said to have been completely destroyed by fire.

  This once little-known botanical garden in London was reportedly one of Crystal’s favourite places to visit when in the capital. Huge crowds, not unlike those here now, would wait outside the garden when Crystal would spend upward of four hours here, alone.

  There are tears and spontaneous outbursts of song from Zach Crystal fans the world over, who are gathering in towns and cities to mark the passing of a musical legend.

  —I can’t believe he’s gone. I can’t believe it. He was everything to me … he meant everything.

  —I’ve been here since I heard. I’ve not slept. It’s not sunk in. It’s just … I can’t believe it’s happened, he can’t just be gone … not like that…

  Extract from: LBC – the Verity Moss Show (17/09/2019)

  —It’s being reported all over the world, the ‘tragic’ death of Zach Crystal. I’m sorry but what? Zach Crystal? The guy’s dodgy.

  —Of course he isn’t dodgy. How can you even say that?

  —Look, you’ve got this forty-year-old bloke inviting twelve-year-old girls up into his tree house. He had them running round the woods in the middle of the night. Those two young women
, Lulu and Jessica, found dead, then his closest advisor has a fatal accident in the very same woods and now this. Surely you can’t come on here and defend Zach Crystal, can you?

  —Verity, it’s all lies. All of it. It’s all a media conspiracy against Zach. It always has been. Did they ever find any evidence that any of those girls had been abused? No. Did Zach Crystal ever get arrested for murder? No. I tell you what, if this was anyone else—

  —If it was anyone other than a middle-aged bloke inviting young girls to come and stay with him, he wouldn’t get away with it!

  —You don’t get it, you lot in the media. Just because he wasn’t at your beck and call.

  —That’s right, actually. He wasn’t. The biggest pop superstar in the world decided to hide away in a remote wood, spouting rubbish about evil spirits, while young, vulnerable girls were disappearing.

  —Honestly, Zach Crystal was the one helping young, vulnerable girls, he was actually the one doing some good in the world. You people will never understand. Now he’s gone, now he can’t defend himself, all you can do is peddle the same old lies. It’s pathetic!

  Welcome to Six Stories.

  I’m Scott King.

  Over the next six weeks, we’ll be looking back at one of the most polarising scandals of recent times, one that should have opened up the floodgates, made a giant crack in the zeitgeist, made us question ourselves and each other and perhaps galvanised us into questioning how we look at things.

  Yet somehow it didn’t.

  This was the biggest thing that never happened.

  For those of you who are new to the podcast, this series is a glitch in the matrix, an anomaly; one unlike all the others. We’re still doing what we always do here – listening to six different sides of the same story. Raking over old graves.

  Six episodes, six interviews, six stories about one case. In this series we look back at a crime through six different pairs of eyes. We’re looking six ways at one man.