Speaker 1: Pushkin. James Blake has managed to distill his music down
Speaker 1: to pure emotion. His voice is transcendent, define genre and
Speaker 1: gender and the best of the R and B tradition.
Speaker 1: Contrasted with the unsettled, off kilter nature of his college
Speaker 1: style production, his sound is deeply stirring. In a word,
Speaker 1: James Blake's music is sublime. After releasing his self titled
Speaker 1: debut album in two and eleven, the British born James
Speaker 1: Blake went on to win Grammys and England's top music honor,
Speaker 1: the Mercury Prize. He's also produced and collaborated with a
Speaker 1: ton of musicians, including Jay Z, Beyonce, Billie Eilish and
Speaker 1: Travis Scott. James flew from England to work with Rick
Speaker 1: Rubin at Shangrela and Malibu in twenty sixteen. They worked
Speaker 1: together on a third album, The Color and Anything, and
Speaker 1: as you'll hear in this conversation with Rick Today, James
Speaker 1: Blake had a life changing experience while working and living
Speaker 1: at Shango Law with Jamila Jamil, but the time was
Speaker 1: his new girlfriend. James also recalls an embarrassing experience that
Speaker 1: left him making music in secret for years and tells
Speaker 1: Rick that recording his new EP of covers solidified his
Speaker 1: love of perfect pop songs. This is broken record liner
Speaker 1: notes for the digital age. I'm justin Richmond. Just a
Speaker 1: quick note here. You can listen to all of the
Speaker 1: music mentioned in this episode on our playlist, which you
Speaker 1: can find a link to in the show notes for
Speaker 1: licensing reasons, each time a song is referenced in this episode,
Speaker 1: you'll hear this sound effect all right. Enjoy the episode.
Speaker 1: Here's Rick, Rubin and James live from Shangola talk about
Speaker 1: from from the first album, like from making things. How
Speaker 1: did it start and what was your process because I
Speaker 1: imagine it's evolved over time. Yeah, first album, let's start
Speaker 1: with the well, the first album, I think everything started from.
Speaker 1: In fact, very often I would just sing into the
Speaker 1: mic and then I would remix the vocal essentially so
Speaker 1: like my brother. Yeah, So that one was just I
Speaker 1: sang it into the mic as a free floating vocal,
Speaker 1: no music behind it, and and then I built the
Speaker 1: entire production around that one vocal and if I remember correctly,
Speaker 1: it doesn't change all one. I was gonna say, it's
Speaker 1: all one vocal phrase that just gets stacked and just
Speaker 1: harmonized the different ways. Pretty sure. It's one vocal phrase.
Speaker 1: We listen to that. Let's let's incredible, it's incredible, it's ridiculous.
Speaker 1: I would just thinking as I was listening to that,
Speaker 1: since your first album came out, I've not been introduced
Speaker 1: to any artists since that. I've liked more than you
Speaker 1: since that time. That's Sae, It's it's the truth. Nobody
Speaker 1: close like it's my favorite music. Thank you music. That's
Speaker 1: an unbelievable accolade and compliment. Thank you. It's unlike anything.
Speaker 1: It's so original and so musical, and so seemingly awkward
Speaker 1: yet so musical. It doesn't make sense, doesn't make sense
Speaker 1: for it to be as groovy as it is for
Speaker 1: the pieces to come together. That that really seemed like
Speaker 1: they don't fit together. Yeah, they really didn't seem really
Speaker 1: don't seem like fether. It felt like, I mean, I
Speaker 1: haven't heard that in six or seven years, and it
Speaker 1: felt really strange. Yeah, but in the best way, like
Speaker 1: like you're surprised by the changes, Yeah, because no one
Speaker 1: other than you would have made those changes. I wouldn't
Speaker 1: even have made those changes, now, you know. And that's
Speaker 1: that's the thing. Is that my you know, the things
Speaker 1: that surprise me now are different. Yeah, so obviously the
Speaker 1: sound of my music change. But but I and I
Speaker 1: know I could never go back and do the same thing. Yes,
Speaker 1: but once you've kind of bottled something, there's no need
Speaker 1: to to do it again. But but I when I
Speaker 1: listened to it, I'm like, it makes me think of
Speaker 1: what I was and who I was then. I almost look,
Speaker 1: it's almost like I took that vocal and I flew
Speaker 1: it to like fifty different countries and put a different
Speaker 1: backdrop on it. Yes, and it's drilling and it's really fun.
Speaker 1: It's thrilling. Like I'm listening back to it, I'm like,
Speaker 1: oh that's you know, Yeah, it's really I got it.
Speaker 1: I got something right. I really felt, because it's actually
Speaker 1: unusual to listen back to something you did before and
Speaker 1: go and and feel like it's still kind of weirdly perfect,
Speaker 1: even though it's kind of crazy. Yes, and if you
Speaker 1: said you you wouldn't make the same choices today. But
Speaker 1: hearing it, it's super cool. I'm glad at it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's glad that it's in the world. Yeah, I'm really
Speaker 1: glad I did. It's actually really kind of sweet to
Speaker 1: listen to this stuff because there wouldn't be another time
Speaker 1: I would do this, and it's and it's kind of
Speaker 1: re engaging, almost like revisiting, like a cellular structure that
Speaker 1: I had before. Yes, so tell me about how how
Speaker 1: did you make that? What do you remember about it?
Speaker 1: And what do you remember about yourself? Then I would
Speaker 1: have been in my university housing and what school did
Speaker 1: you go to? It was Goldsmith's College. And I was
Speaker 1: incredibly I would say reclusive. I would say I was
Speaker 1: very angry, I think, and very lonely, and I didn't
Speaker 1: have I wasn't in a relationship. I'd never been in one.
Speaker 1: I was super sort of there was no reason for
Speaker 1: me really to go out anywhere, so I just stayed
Speaker 1: in my in my house. I remember being dreamily, highly
Speaker 1: emotional at that time. I was listening to Blue by
Speaker 1: Joni Mitchell every night before I went to sleep, and
Speaker 1: I listened to Bonivair for Emma Forever Ago every night,
Speaker 1: and I would just sleep to that music, and then
Speaker 1: i'd wake up and I'd feel creative and i'd just
Speaker 1: make things. I'd make music well into the night. And
Speaker 1: what I was normally doing is singing a vocal, and
Speaker 1: I had this cad mic and it was cheap and
Speaker 1: had a little Firefox sound card and a MacBook and
Speaker 1: a Midi control and that was it. And I just
Speaker 1: sang a couple of vocals and then what I would
Speaker 1: do is get the massive plug in and I would
Speaker 1: just I'd initialize the patch so it was just as
Speaker 1: all wave and I would make it a sign wave
Speaker 1: and I would just play it like an organ. And
Speaker 1: what keyboard were you driving it? I was using a
Speaker 1: just a little Midi keyboard like a am Audio thing
Speaker 1: or like a n Ovation I think. And it was
Speaker 1: literally something that any student would have. I mean, you know,
Speaker 1: if they were yet, if they if they wanted him,
Speaker 1: if they wanted to do that, then there was that
Speaker 1: the barrier of entry was very low. Yes, So what
Speaker 1: you would do, yes in terms of like in terms
Speaker 1: of within the context of you know, because I was
Speaker 1: lucky to even be able to afford that at the time.
Speaker 1: My parents brought me a MacBook for college and I
Speaker 1: just that was what I went with, and so I
Speaker 1: was lucky to have that. But and I would find
Speaker 1: different ways to harmonize the vocal. So what ended up
Speaker 1: becoming sort of my trademark or even my biggest tool
Speaker 1: was what I ended up kind of developing out of necessity,
Speaker 1: which was to take a melody and to almost in
Speaker 1: a sort of bark or you know, kind of in
Speaker 1: a classical type sense, it's just take a melody and
Speaker 1: reharmonize until I find the thing that feels good. By
Speaker 1: that point, i'd I've been playing piano since I was
Speaker 1: six years old, so that this came naturally to me
Speaker 1: to try. And but it was more about placing an
Speaker 1: emotion within the vocal with a chord, so each each
Speaker 1: each emotional moment had its own chord, you know. So
Speaker 1: you didn't you didn't learn that though you you I
Speaker 1: mean you learned that yourself. Yeah. I figured it out
Speaker 1: over I figured it out over time. Yeah, I sort of.
Speaker 1: It was my way of creating something new out of
Speaker 1: something that was that felt mundane, because ultimately, you know,
Speaker 1: like a vocal unaccompanied if it's not a great melody,
Speaker 1: and I wasn't an inspired melody writer, So I just
Speaker 1: kind of tried to make you know, because I know,
Speaker 1: I know people who have the gift of just being
Speaker 1: melodically supreme, and when people can do that as fantastic.
Speaker 1: But I wasn't able to do that, So what I
Speaker 1: did was try and find it in other ways by
Speaker 1: harmonizing it differently so that it seemed like an incredible
Speaker 1: melody to me. Yes, um, I think the most I'm
Speaker 1: going to request that we get, could we ask for
Speaker 1: a little keyboard to be sent down just so that
Speaker 1: you could demonstrate Yeah. Yeah, One thing I realized pretty
Speaker 1: early on was a melody that you know, the more
Speaker 1: I listened to it, the less special it became to me.
Speaker 1: But if I reharmonized it, then it was exciting again.
Speaker 1: So so to re harmonize a melody and also to
Speaker 1: work within you know that a lot of the chord
Speaker 1: clusters would happen because I was working with usually quite
Speaker 1: a small MIDI controller, so I wasn't working with the
Speaker 1: whole range. So actually, you know, how to get the
Speaker 1: most out of I don't know, you know, two octaves
Speaker 1: was important too. There's multiple parts in that in that
Speaker 1: I'd never learned to share, but none of them are
Speaker 1: all like that that like you know, hands stretched, it's
Speaker 1: all um, you know, like just within this range. And
Speaker 1: then I'd placed that part and then you'd have another
Speaker 1: part there's a base and another part that's at the top,
Speaker 1: which would all be the same keyboard. Just change you
Speaker 1: just change your time. I'm just plus yeah, just active
Speaker 1: down and so but you know, it was a bit
Speaker 1: but I think it was a three active. But if
Speaker 1: I was feeling particularly uninspired, and it was just you know,
Speaker 1: there's so many ways of arriving and leaving and so
Speaker 1: specific order for a song, or would you record doing
Speaker 1: a lot of that and then chop it up. I'd
Speaker 1: record a lot of that, and then I'd sample myself basically,
Speaker 1: And that's what happened with as soon as you hear it,
Speaker 1: you're like that, and I remember you being like that.
Speaker 1: So that's where, that's where we want. It's amazing. It's
Speaker 1: just amazing to see you do that. And and I'm
Speaker 1: glad that you've come to recognize that what you do
Speaker 1: as a that work, it's not what other people do,
Speaker 1: so that you can continue to do it. You know,
Speaker 1: I feel like the more you try to do what
Speaker 1: anyone else does, the less interesting I've done. I've been there, man,
Speaker 1: I've been there. I've I've you know, for the years
Speaker 1: after the color and anything I was trying to chase
Speaker 1: the the genius of other people, you know, people I've
Speaker 1: worked with, people who've influenced me, people who have seemed
Speaker 1: to be you know, just based on my own down
Speaker 1: opinion on myself, were just so much high, you know,
Speaker 1: at a higher level of something that I couldn't do
Speaker 1: or whatever. I think I just had to get over
Speaker 1: that and get through it. And I think, you know,
Speaker 1: by the time i'd done assume form, i'd kind of
Speaker 1: assume form. The reason I decided to make that record
Speaker 1: wasn't because I needed to make a record. It was
Speaker 1: because I needed to get away from the idea that
Speaker 1: I had to write music in a way other than
Speaker 1: under my own. And I finally got sick of waiting
Speaker 1: for other people, sick of I was working on other
Speaker 1: projects and other things, and people were wasting my time.
Speaker 1: And I realized they had a moment of realization. I'm me,
Speaker 1: I can do whatever the fuck I want. Why am
Speaker 1: I waiting? Why am I idolizing other people? Why I
Speaker 1: can already do the thing, you know, do the thing
Speaker 1: that I love, like, why torture myself like that? And
Speaker 1: because you know, working with other artists is amazing, but
Speaker 1: some you know, I think at a formative time in
Speaker 1: my career, put too much weight on what some other
Speaker 1: people thought and too much kind of involvement in them.
Speaker 1: And I don't know why I expected from them. Maybe
Speaker 1: I expected too much or whatever, but I think it
Speaker 1: was a reflection on where I was at the time,
Speaker 1: but it ended up throwing me really severely off course musically,
Speaker 1: and I feel like I'm finding assumed form and where
Speaker 1: I'm at now has been me finding my feet and
Speaker 1: kind of going, fuck everyone else. I'm sure about this,
Speaker 1: and I'm sure of myself and I I'm comfortable in
Speaker 1: my skin musically, and the amount of voices that are
Speaker 1: going on in the back of my head when I'm
Speaker 1: making music now, I could have not been able to
Speaker 1: count them before. I mean, it was, it was intense,
Speaker 1: and it ruined my process for a while, but now
Speaker 1: is it feels relatively quiet in there. And I think
Speaker 1: it's a big part of why I made this before EP,
Speaker 1: because I wasn't thinking about, oh am I going to
Speaker 1: be judged if I sing over dance music or you know,
Speaker 1: if I combine those two worlds, and I'm not going
Speaker 1: to be you know, in my thinking part of it
Speaker 1: as well. There could be some people who think this
Speaker 1: is a bastardization of dance music, or it's a bastardization
Speaker 1: of songwriting, or it's it's you know, are the songs
Speaker 1: truck is perfect? But I don't know. The point is
Speaker 1: songs like I keep calling on this EP are kind
Speaker 1: of like the modern in a way. That's my modern
Speaker 1: dance music. Never lend share. It's a it's a weird structure,
Speaker 1: but it hits my it hits a part of me,
Speaker 1: and it it seems somehow solid, even though it seems
Speaker 1: like it's just about being held together. Honestly, Breck has
Speaker 1: been such an fucking journey to that feeling, and it's
Speaker 1: nice to be able to say that to you. Yes,
Speaker 1: I appreciate it. Let's listen to that song. We'll be
Speaker 1: back with more of James Blake's conversation with Rick Rubin
Speaker 1: after a quick break. We're back with Rick Rubin and
Speaker 1: James Blake. Was the household you grew up in musical Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean my dad is a musician and he was
Speaker 1: always playing music, and you know, my mum and him,
Speaker 1: it was, you know, singing in the car and doing
Speaker 1: three part harmonies in the car. Are on the way
Speaker 1: to like going on holiday and stuff like that. So
Speaker 1: because we would drive to holiday, I mean we'd go
Speaker 1: on holiday too, you know, Wales or the beach, and
Speaker 1: I want to say the beach. It's really just a
Speaker 1: kind of a gallery of rocks in England, but that's
Speaker 1: what we call the beach. So we're on the way down,
Speaker 1: we'd go camping in Pembrokeshire or something. I actually saw
Speaker 1: a bunch of like UFOs. There's the thing called the
Speaker 1: Pembrokeshire Triangle, which is a bit like the Bermuda Triangle
Speaker 1: except a lot less cool. And we went there quite
Speaker 1: a bit and we'd go camping and I sort of
Speaker 1: learned how to sing really in a way through doing that,
Speaker 1: I learned how to harmonize, especially how to slot in
Speaker 1: between two other notes, or how to you know, how
Speaker 1: to follow a top line or how you know. Those
Speaker 1: things really came from my parents. What would be the
Speaker 1: songs that he would sing in the car? God, I can't,
Speaker 1: I can't remember. Isn't she loved? I can't really, I
Speaker 1: can't remember it. Maybe Stevie Wonder songs or singing on
Speaker 1: the dock of the bay, or some Crosby stills, and
Speaker 1: Nash songs. I remember that our house was one that
Speaker 1: we used to sing a lot. And would those be
Speaker 1: the songs that would be playing in your house like
Speaker 1: that your parents? Yea, and so they'd sing it in
Speaker 1: the car on the way down or maybe it would
Speaker 1: be but happy Birthday that every year to this day,
Speaker 1: my parents will call me and sing a Happy birthday
Speaker 1: in harmony beautiful like It's just what they do. And
Speaker 1: the only drawback is that they can't have a third
Speaker 1: because otherwise I'd be singing happy birthdays myself. But that
Speaker 1: is a very cute thing that they do. And you
Speaker 1: said you started playing piano when you were six? Did
Speaker 1: you did you take formal lessons? I did lessons from Yeah.
Speaker 1: Around that age. My dad asked me if I wanted
Speaker 1: to play a guitar or piano or anything, and I said,
Speaker 1: I'll playing guitar and he was like, well I can
Speaker 1: get I can teach you that, So pick something else.
Speaker 1: And I started piano lessons and I never really look back.
Speaker 1: And also I don't think me and my dad were
Speaker 1: compatible as a student teacher relationship. I think we were
Speaker 1: better as just you know, father son. So and did
Speaker 1: you learn classical music. Yeah, I did all the grade
Speaker 1: you know, I did grade eight or whatever, and I
Speaker 1: could have carried on and done my diploma and etc.
Speaker 1: But I didn't. I just sort of ended with that
Speaker 1: and said said goodbye to the academic side of music
Speaker 1: because I just wasn't that interested. But it did give
Speaker 1: me a great backbone. But you know, and I wasn't
Speaker 1: very good sight reader. So if you don't develop sit
Speaker 1: reading very well, then it's hard to want to approach
Speaker 1: a new piece of classical music with sheet music because
Speaker 1: the journey to getting to just playing some fucking notes
Speaker 1: is so hard if you're not good at that that
Speaker 1: I gave up and I just wanted to improvise. And
Speaker 1: the whole time I'd just been learning to improvise myself.
Speaker 1: So it would go, James, do your practice, I go
Speaker 1: downstair play for you know, I try and learn this
Speaker 1: piece for I don't know, fifteen minutes and I give up,
Speaker 1: and then I just improvise for forty five minutes. And
Speaker 1: so they could see that I was just way more
Speaker 1: inclined and way more excited about improvising. And that's kind
Speaker 1: of what I've based my career on, really, is improvising
Speaker 1: I've always just improvised and then edited. Would you always
Speaker 1: improvise solo? Or might you put on a piece of
Speaker 1: music and play along and improvise? There was this funny,
Speaker 1: embarrassing moment I was always I was playing with these
Speaker 1: kids up the street. We were playing tennis regularly, and
Speaker 1: I became friends with one of them, and we lived
Speaker 1: four doors down from them, and so I could see
Speaker 1: their garden because we live in these like semi detached
Speaker 1: whatever houses and terraced houses in England. So from my
Speaker 1: bedroom I could see over the fences and he was
Speaker 1: in his garden. I remember I was playing. I would
Speaker 1: play records every night, so I'd come home from school
Speaker 1: and I just set up, I put a CD on
Speaker 1: and I just played piano and sing to the records
Speaker 1: with a mic. This was by the time I was
Speaker 1: like fourteen fifteen, and I think I was playing like
Speaker 1: I was playing records that kids my age thought were
Speaker 1: really sad, that as in, were really on completely. Uncle.
Speaker 1: What's the songs? Amazing song, Whitney Houston song, children a
Speaker 1: Future two some. We let them do that song. Unbelievable song.
Speaker 1: But anyway, so I'm just I'm belting this song at
Speaker 1: the top of my voice, playing like an electronic like
Speaker 1: eighties roads type sound like MIDI roads, and then I
Speaker 1: hear a bunch of kids laughing and they're going I
Speaker 1: can't remember what they were saying, but they were basically
Speaker 1: heckling me from four like houses away. And it was
Speaker 1: honestly one of the most embarrassing moments of my whole
Speaker 1: like one of the more embarrassing moments, because I remember
Speaker 1: that was my whole friend one of my whole friendship
Speaker 1: groups were there, and I was like crippled after that
Speaker 1: because I was just like this other people see this
Speaker 1: as a as a really effeminate and you know, like
Speaker 1: effeminate and a sad, lonely thing to do. They look
Speaker 1: at me as in some way kind of a weird,
Speaker 1: weirdough for like just wanting to do this, and also
Speaker 1: potentially there were homophobic undertones to like their abuse the heckling.
Speaker 1: I was just like, this is this is crazy, this
Speaker 1: is the thing I love doing. How can I be
Speaker 1: firstly a man and also like them? That doesn't make sense,
Speaker 1: you know, I can't be I can't be myself and
Speaker 1: like them, so I must be must be different and
Speaker 1: I and this I need to I need to keep
Speaker 1: away from other people. I need to make sure that
Speaker 1: no one sees me or hears me doing this. So
Speaker 1: it was kind of funny in a way, like when
Speaker 1: I look back on it, it's kind of a funny story.
Speaker 1: But at the same time, at the time it didn't
Speaker 1: feel funny. It felt like really shameful because at the time,
Speaker 1: like I said, there was so much toxic masculinity. You know,
Speaker 1: it was all about like being sporty and being you know,
Speaker 1: and I was just this kind of kid. He wanted
Speaker 1: to sing to Whitney Houston songs in my bedroom and
Speaker 1: like Mariah Carey, I was like obsessed with music box,
Speaker 1: you know, all these singers. It was super expressive. And
Speaker 1: there's me you know, with the I mean, you know,
Speaker 1: super like Ross Geller, like with my little keyboard and
Speaker 1: my mic and like trying to and so I just,
Speaker 1: you know, I think it started off that weird moment.
Speaker 1: Weirdly probably stopped me from wanting to show my musical
Speaker 1: ability to anyone, and so I didn't really play. I
Speaker 1: remember being you know, I'd go into practice rooms and
Speaker 1: I'm just not I'd not let anyone come and hear me.
Speaker 1: I would just go in and I'd make sure no
Speaker 1: one was around, and I'd go in on my own
Speaker 1: after school, and I'd make sure no one could hear
Speaker 1: me in, and I would just express I'll just play
Speaker 1: your parents. No, not a lot. I mean I did
Speaker 1: a bit, but not a lot. I would play with
Speaker 1: them in the other room, and they would be only
Speaker 1: ones that were sort of allowed to hear me, even
Speaker 1: from the other room. But I was very ashamed, I
Speaker 1: think looking back, I mean, I've not really ever talked
Speaker 1: about this, but I'm very ashamed of playing because I
Speaker 1: felt that it undermined my sort of ability to interface
Speaker 1: with other kids. Really weird to think that it should
Speaker 1: be something I would have felt ashamed of when I
Speaker 1: would imagine you'd have thought that it would have been
Speaker 1: something that people thought was cool, right, singing and playing.
Speaker 1: I don't know I would think that, but that's just
Speaker 1: not how people. People reacted. Yeah, I mean, anything that
Speaker 1: makes you different is any excuse too, To be honest,
Speaker 1: they probably thought I was just annoying, which I was,
Speaker 1: and the you know, the the way of actually articulating
Speaker 1: that was sad for playing the songs. But actually, yeah,
Speaker 1: I think it was a why and so maybe that
Speaker 1: even followed me into not feeling fully confident to put
Speaker 1: my music, put my voice in my music. I don't know.
Speaker 1: I mean there's lots of embarrassing moments like that that
Speaker 1: would have led to that. So it wasn't just that.
Speaker 1: But you know, if you ever, if you ever turbulent childhood,
Speaker 1: you can really spend at least up until other a's
Speaker 1: to to unpack what happened and why you feel shame
Speaker 1: around certain things and why you know, And it was
Speaker 1: definitely this whole, you know, these four albums have been
Speaker 1: me unpacking everything in real time and showing my workings. Really,
Speaker 1: do you remember the first time you sang in front
Speaker 1: of people on purpose? Yeah? I was terrified, but I
Speaker 1: remember that this girl really liked it and said and
Speaker 1: told her friend that she fancied me. How old were
Speaker 1: you at the time, I was about fourteen. Yeah, that
Speaker 1: was the first time I thought this is this is okay? Now,
Speaker 1: yeah this is cool. When did you know that you
Speaker 1: were going to do this for your life, like this
Speaker 1: was going to be the focus of your life. I
Speaker 1: think I always thought it would be pretty much. I
Speaker 1: didn't ever think I would get a different job. I mean,
Speaker 1: even when you were ashamed of it and doing it
Speaker 1: in your boy yourself. Yeah, you felt like this is
Speaker 1: what I'm going because I thought, well, they're not ashamed.
Speaker 1: All these artists are making all this music, so someone's
Speaker 1: not ashamed of it. Yes, I'm ashamed of it. Yes,
Speaker 1: And as soon as I'm out of this fucking shitthole,
Speaker 1: yes that I'm I was born in, and that all
Speaker 1: these people are judging me in, yes, I'm fucking out
Speaker 1: of here, and I'm going to show everyone that this
Speaker 1: isn't shameful and that this is worthwhile and that I
Speaker 1: was actually pretty good at it, and so fuck you all.
Speaker 1: You know, I'm going to go into this room here
Speaker 1: where no one is and work on that silently until
Speaker 1: I get the opportunity to get out of it. Amazing,
Speaker 1: beautiful story. Thanks. I definitely spent too long, though, because
Speaker 1: you know, after after you want to prove yourself, it's
Speaker 1: like that feeling doesn't doesn't go away naturally, So long
Speaker 1: after you need to prove yourself, you're still trying to
Speaker 1: prove yourself. Yeah, And I think that is that's what
Speaker 1: you're chipping at. That that's the thing I've been chipping
Speaker 1: away at is that that need to prove that I
Speaker 1: can do something. I mean, I've proven that, you know,
Speaker 1: I don't need to anymore, while you don't need to
Speaker 1: do that anymore. If it's driving you're making great music. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's a it's worth the price, yeah in a way,
Speaker 1: in a way. Yeah, I've debated that with myself over
Speaker 1: the years of you know, where it was was the
Speaker 1: music worth the pain? And there have been times when
Speaker 1: I said no, and I would have taken it all
Speaker 1: back fully, Yeah, yeah, because I think you know, until
Speaker 1: you develop who you are outside of music, and you
Speaker 1: develop your sort of raised on there for outside of it,
Speaker 1: then it can feel that when it's taken away, it
Speaker 1: removes your purpose as a human beings. So therefore you
Speaker 1: might as well not be here. And that's that's where
Speaker 1: I got to during the Color and Anything almost you know,
Speaker 1: before I came here, that's where I was because I thought, well,
Speaker 1: if I can't do this, then what can I do?
Speaker 1: What's the point in me being here? There's no point,
Speaker 1: which is obviously i'm very unhealthy thought, but it's but
Speaker 1: it was because I hadn't worked on any of my
Speaker 1: relationships or my friendships or or myself. I'd only worked
Speaker 1: on music at that point, so it's like, well, if
Speaker 1: this thing isn't working and I've got block on this,
Speaker 1: then I'm fucked. And I was fucked. And so from
Speaker 1: the point of being fucked, it was a long road
Speaker 1: to unfucking myself. As Russell Brown would put it, how
Speaker 1: do you describe the difference from the from the first
Speaker 1: album to the second album? From the first of the second, well,
Speaker 1: the second had more pressure on it by quite a
Speaker 1: long stretch. And I don't you know, I don't shy
Speaker 1: away from pressure, but the songs time you had to
Speaker 1: deal with it, though. Really that was the first so
Speaker 1: I kind of didn't really understand it in a way.
Speaker 1: I wasn't really I didn't really feel afraid because I
Speaker 1: was like, well, this has never happened to me before,
Speaker 1: so this is all brand new anyway, so I might
Speaker 1: as well just react to what's happening. I'm not. I
Speaker 1: wasn't consumed yet with what people thought of me, because
Speaker 1: I was already I was doing well and I thought, well,
Speaker 1: I'll just continue doing that right and people would like
Speaker 1: it again. So I did. And but you know that
Speaker 1: the song for that record, I Retrograde didn't really come
Speaker 1: to me until probably the second from last thing I
Speaker 1: wrote in a like three year period. It actually was
Speaker 1: touch and go really, because if that song hadn't been
Speaker 1: on the record, I don't think people did bore it.
Speaker 1: You know, it was it was by far and away
Speaker 1: the standout song in terms of people's I think people
Speaker 1: bought it because they liked the first album, but then
Speaker 1: Ritrograd was the one that they talked about, right, and
Speaker 1: had had that I'll been on there, I think it
Speaker 1: would have been harder to convince people that I'd evolved
Speaker 1: and though I was getting better at my craft, you know,
Speaker 1: because I think the rest of it is fairly I mean,
Speaker 1: it's more put together than the first one, but it's like,
Speaker 1: I think some of that album is caught in a
Speaker 1: middle ground between complete collage and song. So you know,
Speaker 1: it needed that song with a real backbone, even though
Speaker 1: it's not a conventional structure. It needed that song with
Speaker 1: a real backbone to pop out and grab people. So
Speaker 1: but yeah, I think, you know that's by that time,
Speaker 1: I'd been in my first relationship as well, which changed things,
Speaker 1: and I had more to write about. I wasn't just
Speaker 1: writing about being a lonely virgin anymore, and you know
Speaker 1: there was some level of account accountability from that as well,
Speaker 1: you know, like just starting to realize that I actually
Speaker 1: affect other people and they affect me. Yeah, I would
Speaker 1: say even even the songs rooted in collage are I
Speaker 1: think it's such a big part of what you do
Speaker 1: that a good collage from you is every bit as
Speaker 1: compelling as someone else's good song. Oh, that's nice to hear. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think it's it's it's it's really, I think that's
Speaker 1: your your mastery is of that. Well, I definitely I
Speaker 1: would I'd say I got into the habit of thinking
Speaker 1: of it as weaker and so it's nice to hear
Speaker 1: say that. I think it might be your superpower. Well,
Speaker 1: I think it's the superpower I didn't want. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: think it's you know, it's it's it's I think that
Speaker 1: if it is that, I think that's the kid for
Speaker 1: a lot of people. I think we're assigned. Yeah, it's like,
Speaker 1: give me invisibility. I don't want the ability to make
Speaker 1: a collage. But I'd say two years ago, if I
Speaker 1: could have chosen, I would have taken strong pop songwriting
Speaker 1: as as a power over what I have. Yes, and
Speaker 1: I'm so glad you didn't get that choice. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean too. And actually now i'd say I'm happy with
Speaker 1: what I have, you know, I'd say that I'm I'm
Speaker 1: excited to see what that yields in the future, because
Speaker 1: I think it's nice to think that you can do
Speaker 1: something after all these years, to look look at what
Speaker 1: you do and go, oh no, it's it's naturally evolved
Speaker 1: over all this time. And if I hadn't have been me,
Speaker 1: then it would have never got off the ground. Maybe
Speaker 1: none of it would have got off the ground. And
Speaker 1: it's like finding money down the back of the sofa.
Speaker 1: It's like, you know, oh, I still got that. You know,
Speaker 1: I've found this ability that I've got to do this
Speaker 1: thing that is actually kind of unusual. We'll be right
Speaker 1: back with more from James Blake. We're back with James
Speaker 1: Blake talking to Rick Rubin about moving to LA full
Speaker 1: time and also about putting his live show together with
Speaker 1: friends and bandmates Rab mccandrews and Ben Asset. Are you
Speaker 1: living out here full time now? I am? Yeah. You know,
Speaker 1: it's funny since I since I came to sharing with LA,
Speaker 1: I didn't leave really. I flew over here like I
Speaker 1: was in such a bad way, and I remember, you know,
Speaker 1: telling you about a lot of that stuff. And when
Speaker 1: I was in England, I think I just had this
Speaker 1: idea that I was just going to stay there, and
Speaker 1: you know, it's very English of me, but just to
Speaker 1: kind of you know, stay and suffer. Yeah, and I
Speaker 1: Jemina sort of put me on a plane basically, and
Speaker 1: because she was already going and I was like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I'll come with you. And but she'd been in La
Speaker 1: and I was staying in England and just getting stuck essentially,
Speaker 1: and then so and then she brought me over and
Speaker 1: the first thing I did was come here pretty much,
Speaker 1: and she came to stay with me, and we basically
Speaker 1: fell in love here. So that moment, those like four
Speaker 1: months were like, you know, for us, kind of like
Speaker 1: a summer holiday thing, and you know, it was it
Speaker 1: was up and down. But ultimately we may not have
Speaker 1: had that time again because you know, after I left Shangola,
Speaker 1: she ended up getting really busy and I got really busy,
Speaker 1: and so that it was really formative being here and
Speaker 1: I and I didn't pack much stuff. I just came
Speaker 1: here and then I was like, I'm never I realized
Speaker 1: I'm not going back. It was a very It was
Speaker 1: a moment of real clarity as I am, I don't
Speaker 1: know if I'm ever going to live there again. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's interesting. I want to just fly my stuff over,
Speaker 1: like I don't even want to go back to interesting.
Speaker 1: It's interesting when it hits you. Yeah, the reality of
Speaker 1: oh I'm not going back. Yeah. I can remember you
Speaker 1: talked about ups and downs, and I can remember there
Speaker 1: was one time when there was something going on relationship
Speaker 1: wise that was heavy, and we watched that video about
Speaker 1: non balant communication. I remember it really reached you. It
Speaker 1: was huge. That moment was huge, and I wanted to
Speaker 1: thank you actually in person because because I haven't really
Speaker 1: you know that things have gone in so many different
Speaker 1: directions for the both of us, but we haven't really
Speaker 1: seen each other since those sessions. But I wanted to
Speaker 1: thank you because that moment was instrumental in our relationship,
Speaker 1: but also just in general for me. It was the
Speaker 1: Marshall Rosenberg non violet communication thing and learning after a
Speaker 1: lifetime of basically just accusatory language, you know, of just
Speaker 1: saying well, if I feel this way, then it must
Speaker 1: be you know, you did this and you did that,
Speaker 1: and that's why I feel like this and actually to
Speaker 1: be able to do away with that kind of language
Speaker 1: and speak from a place of feeling and non accusatory language.
Speaker 1: I recommend that now to everyone I come across who
Speaker 1: was in a relationship or just even who wants to
Speaker 1: change the way they work with the world. It's it's massive.
Speaker 1: It like change the way I produce as well, like
Speaker 1: the way I am makes you more approachable. You can
Speaker 1: roll with the punch, is much easier, things tend not
Speaker 1: to go sour. Relationships that you know with people who
Speaker 1: are more like that are much more likely to work
Speaker 1: because you can come to a middle ground. And so
Speaker 1: I mean, yeah, not only did it fix that particular
Speaker 1: problem at the time in my ship, but also just
Speaker 1: had so many knock on effects. So thank you. I've
Speaker 1: done a lot of growing up, and I think actually,
Speaker 1: like the kind of in anything. The record we worked
Speaker 1: on together was so much a coming of age record. Really,
Speaker 1: I don't know if coming of age means a certain age,
Speaker 1: but for me that was, you know, I was twenty
Speaker 1: six or twenty five, and you know, coming into the
Speaker 1: what they call the Satin Was it The Satin Returns
Speaker 1: or whatever? And yeah it was. I mean that is
Speaker 1: that is a complex album. It's a it's a dense
Speaker 1: kind of forest in my mind when I when I
Speaker 1: look back at that music, I do a little bit
Speaker 1: feel sorry for you for having had to sit while
Speaker 1: I you know, I mean, if you ever watched The
Speaker 1: Crystal Maze. No, we had this game show in the
Speaker 1: UK where basically there's a team of people, like four
Speaker 1: of them or multiple of them are outside the maze,
Speaker 1: basically being able to communicate with the person that is
Speaker 1: in the maze. And so there's one person going through
Speaker 1: the maze, but they don't see everyone else sees it
Speaker 1: from the bird's eye view and they only see it
Speaker 1: from inside the maze. So they're like no, no no, no,
Speaker 1: go left, go left. I feel like that's what that
Speaker 1: record was. I feel like you were You were the
Speaker 1: people outside the maze, and I was in the maze
Speaker 1: trying to get the fuck out of it, making all
Speaker 1: the wrong turns. But I think, you know, I did
Speaker 1: get out of it in the end. But it's like,
Speaker 1: as a producer, how do you see that kind of situation?
Speaker 1: Is it a challenge? Is it a personal challenge. Is
Speaker 1: it a musical challenge or is it it's just it's
Speaker 1: just part and parcel of the job. It's part of
Speaker 1: the job. Is it's as much about having an instinct
Speaker 1: about the music as as an instinct of how to
Speaker 1: deal with the emotions going on in the room and
Speaker 1: people and where people are in their lives. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: it's so different, and you'd think it has something to
Speaker 1: do with each, but it really doesn't, right, And I've
Speaker 1: seen at both ends of the spectrum. I've seen very
Speaker 1: young artists who are attached to some ideas that are
Speaker 1: not helpful to them and are unwilling to let go
Speaker 1: of them because they because of in their limited view,
Speaker 1: they think that that thing that they're not willing to
Speaker 1: let go of is the reason they've gotten as far
Speaker 1: as they've gotten. That's one version. And then I've seen,
Speaker 1: you know, I've worked with you know, seventy year old
Speaker 1: greatest artists in the world, and they still seem lost.
Speaker 1: It's unbelieving, you know, it's unbelievable at both ends. But
Speaker 1: then there and then you you meet people who are
Speaker 1: just completely comfortable with themselves, comfortable with the process. There's
Speaker 1: no rules, you know, it really is different every everyone,
Speaker 1: and you must get it is. I mean you get
Speaker 1: to work with a lot of people and you see
Speaker 1: it's it's completely different every time. It is. And I
Speaker 1: noticed that when when as a producer, I think with
Speaker 1: my producer hats on, coming to work at shang Laren
Speaker 1: and working with you was huge for learning how to
Speaker 1: adapt to those situations because I'd put someone in that
Speaker 1: situation myself, you know, like I can look back on
Speaker 1: moments of coming into the studio and just not wanting
Speaker 1: to work. You know, we were here for months, so
Speaker 1: there were days when I just couldn't work. I was
Speaker 1: just catatonic, almost like I could barely even speak. Most
Speaker 1: people can hide that if they're only going to the
Speaker 1: studio for like a day or two, a few sessions
Speaker 1: in a week. But when you're going through something and
Speaker 1: you're just going in every day and you're staying at
Speaker 1: the studio, then you can't really hide it as well.
Speaker 1: It's like being in Big Brother or something like a
Speaker 1: reality TV shows, like you can hold it up for
Speaker 1: hold up the facade for a while, but at some
Speaker 1: point everybody's seeing you every day, like all the engineers,
Speaker 1: the assistant, the you know, you like at some point
Speaker 1: you break. I think what it showed me was how
Speaker 1: to accommodate somebody's their actual real life and the fact
Speaker 1: that their real life is what they're drawing from, and
Speaker 1: to not take that for granted. It's actually really heavy
Speaker 1: some of the ship people go through to actually what
Speaker 1: they put into this music, and so you can't always
Speaker 1: think about music basically, and then it can't always only
Speaker 1: be about the music, because ultimately, if you don't have
Speaker 1: any ability to listen to them about the other stuff,
Speaker 1: then why are you really as a producer. There's also
Speaker 1: the I imagine it's different for you as I think
Speaker 1: of you primarily as an artist who as a producer, right,
Speaker 1: But maybe that's just because that's the way I came
Speaker 1: in contact with you as an artist first. Now I
Speaker 1: think you're probably right. Yeah, I don't imagine that adds
Speaker 1: another layer of complexity to it, because you always would
Speaker 1: know what you would do as an artist, but what
Speaker 1: you would do as an artist might not always be
Speaker 1: what's best for them as an artist. So being the
Speaker 1: producer for them is different than being an artist collaborating
Speaker 1: with them as another Yeah, to be able to have
Speaker 1: some distance and to maintain that clarity and objectivity is
Speaker 1: much easier when you're not thinking about your you know
Speaker 1: this outpouring all the time. And and actually a little
Speaker 1: bit like you know when people say that once they're
Speaker 1: in a safe relationship, all of the all their stuff
Speaker 1: rises to the top. When you're starting like an album
Speaker 1: campaign or sorry, an album recording, and you don't know
Speaker 1: where it's going to go, and you're just you know,
Speaker 1: you're trying to find or at least I'm trying to
Speaker 1: find the real feelings and the and the you know
Speaker 1: what it is. I want to say, you're likely to
Speaker 1: stumble on some land mines emotionally because they're there, and
Speaker 1: it part of the process of trying to heal yourself
Speaker 1: for musicians in some way, at least temporary, really is
Speaker 1: to step on them. So you know, I think I
Speaker 1: stepped on a few while I was here. That's why
Speaker 1: it's so therapeutic. The process of making music is so healing,
Speaker 1: both for the person making the music and for the listener. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, there's some there's something inherent in it. Even
Speaker 1: when someone's singing about something terribly painful and there's no
Speaker 1: resolution in the song that has a healing feeling for
Speaker 1: someone who's also feeling that because you resonate on a
Speaker 1: human level, I'm not alone, you know, this is a
Speaker 1: real Yeah, we're in this together, even though we don't
Speaker 1: know each other. Yeah, that's right. I actually think that
Speaker 1: for me, the allure of producing probably grew greater after
Speaker 1: I worked with you, just because I saw that there
Speaker 1: was a way of stepping back, you know. I think
Speaker 1: being so in it all the time, just in the
Speaker 1: emotional trenches, it's just it's hard and and it takes
Speaker 1: its hell in a way, it's healing, but then also
Speaker 1: takes a toll, and the people around you are constantly
Speaker 1: subjected to it. You're not the same basically, and it
Speaker 1: is ultimately a fairly self absorbed thing. So I think
Speaker 1: my fear as someone who you know, got into music.
Speaker 1: I mean, I was touring by the time I was
Speaker 1: twenty one, you know, and like I was starting to DJ,
Speaker 1: starting to play live, and everything became about me. And
Speaker 1: I'm the solo artist. I'm the front man, I'm the
Speaker 1: you know, the person who does the interviews. I'm what
Speaker 1: people are trying to get answers out of. I think
Speaker 1: at a certain point when I realized that that was
Speaker 1: having a negative effect on people around me. I almost
Speaker 1: became allergic to the idea of going to that place
Speaker 1: where everything's about me again. And so the idea of
Speaker 1: going to a studio and having everybody, like, you know,
Speaker 1: having people getting the food, getting the you know, going
Speaker 1: to like even just turning knobs for me, but on
Speaker 1: the desk, you know, or people asking me, you know,
Speaker 1: what are your thoughts on how this is good? You know,
Speaker 1: this album being about my emotions in some way felt selfish,
Speaker 1: self indulgent. Self indulgent, yeah, and selfish because ultimately, you know,
Speaker 1: people around me lives would change if I went and
Speaker 1: just stayed and I stayed in the sorry a studio
Speaker 1: for a month or maybe let some of my responsibilities
Speaker 1: go a little bit, because I was so absorbed in
Speaker 1: the music. And so I think I'm becoming a bit
Speaker 1: afraid of that. And I think producing was a way
Speaker 1: to transition out of that thing and ultimately be able
Speaker 1: to just go home, clock out. And I noticed that
Speaker 1: when I was here. One of the things that always
Speaker 1: struck me as Initially it struck me as odd, but
Speaker 1: then I realized was fucking great is that you would
Speaker 1: always clock out at like seven o'clock, so we'd work
Speaker 1: from twelve to seven, and then you'd be out and
Speaker 1: you'd be having dinner with your wife. I always thought,
Speaker 1: but what if something amazing happens after seven o'clock, you know?
Speaker 1: And but that's me being so absorbed in it that
Speaker 1: I think that that's more amazing than having dinner. It's not,
Speaker 1: you know. And now I realize that it's not more amazing. Firstly,
Speaker 1: it's not more amazing than having dinner. Secondly, it's important
Speaker 1: to have your boundaries, and it's just so much hard
Speaker 1: to have your boundaries when it's your music. Let me
Speaker 1: let me say two things about that, or things to
Speaker 1: think about about that. The first one is it's different
Speaker 1: for an artist who does a deep dive into a
Speaker 1: window of time making an album. Let's say it's several
Speaker 1: months of total dedication to nothing else. So you've done
Speaker 1: that four times over the course of your life. I
Speaker 1: do that every day, all the time, for the last
Speaker 1: thirty something years, you know, hundreds of times. So for me,
Speaker 1: it's different because if there's no breaks on a day basis,
Speaker 1: and there's no breaks in my life ever at all,
Speaker 1: and I do feel like and I learned this the
Speaker 1: hard way is that I probably spent twenty five years
Speaker 1: of my life in dark rooms with no windows, often
Speaker 1: past the point of productivity. Yes, out of some other
Speaker 1: other thought of thinking I was going to miss something,
Speaker 1: which I don't believe I did considering the fact that
Speaker 1: if work is still going on and something good happens,
Speaker 1: I get to hear it the next day when I
Speaker 1: come in. Either way. Yeah, the other part of it
Speaker 1: is that that's in terms of the personal balance side,
Speaker 1: then in terms of the having perspective, being able to
Speaker 1: step away or even better, getting to work on something
Speaker 1: else and then coming back really changes your relationship to it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you're hearing it closer to the way other people are
Speaker 1: going to hear it. Other people don't get to hear
Speaker 1: it a million times in a row before they even
Speaker 1: decide if it's done or if they like it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's another thing I've learned to stop. I don't take
Speaker 1: any mixes out of the studio with me. I never
Speaker 1: listen to a work in progress unless unless there's a
Speaker 1: specific reason to, you know, if there's a decision to
Speaker 1: be made, I'll listen, but I don't want to listen
Speaker 1: to something over and over and over again and get
Speaker 1: used to it, because then I'll think that's how it goes,
Speaker 1: when in reality, if I don't listen to it and
Speaker 1: come back fresh and hear it, I may realize, oh,
Speaker 1: this part that sounded the right length yesterday is too long.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't have known that if I kept drilling it
Speaker 1: into my head in the way that I liked on
Speaker 1: that one day. So there's a real benefit in stepping
Speaker 1: away and coming back and seeing it fresh. There's a
Speaker 1: balance to be struck, for sure, if you can maintain
Speaker 1: some sense of normalcy at the same time as in
Speaker 1: your private sort of way being this absolutely not really
Speaker 1: for this thing that you're this little kind of sculpture
Speaker 1: you're building in your in your back room. That's kind
Speaker 1: of what it feels like. But I but I do
Speaker 1: feel that wherever I am, it always feels like I
Speaker 1: have this secret, you know. I feel like, you know,
Speaker 1: I could just be at a party, or like I
Speaker 1: could be at the beach or whatever, but in the
Speaker 1: back of my mind, I'm building this this thing at home.
Speaker 1: And in some ways that's a cool feeling, and in
Speaker 1: other ways that's an incredibly kind of isolating feeling because
Speaker 1: no one could see it. Yeah, but it's like when
Speaker 1: I first came here, I was like, oh this is
Speaker 1: this is like life rehab, like people come here to
Speaker 1: get better whatever it is. You know, everything's white and
Speaker 1: green like the grass, and you know there's like more,
Speaker 1: there's like exotic wildlife just coming and perching outside just
Speaker 1: as you're writing lyrics of the other things you've got
Speaker 1: to produce and collaborate on. What's been the most fun
Speaker 1: for you outside of you as an artist? M Well,
Speaker 1: Andre three thousand spins to mind, and some of my
Speaker 1: work with Stara has been really fun. The most fun
Speaker 1: I mean it was I mean working on four or
Speaker 1: four is incredibly gratifying, even though I didn't actually do
Speaker 1: that much. I mean in terms of, you know, musical
Speaker 1: input there really wasn't a huge amount. But it was
Speaker 1: being in the room and being a part of a
Speaker 1: record being created and being an opinion that was driving
Speaker 1: where that record went, one of many, and helping Jay
Speaker 1: formulate whatever. Even to just play a small part in
Speaker 1: that was just so fucking fun. And just his process
Speaker 1: showed me that there was a different process. You know,
Speaker 1: I could have loads of people being a committee and
Speaker 1: and and and take every opinion. What's that quote? Megan
Speaker 1: Markles said it in an interview recently. Let let compliments
Speaker 1: and criticisms flow down the same drain. You know, amazing
Speaker 1: ability to do that presence of mind over himself. And
Speaker 1: I imagine your voice was probably different than many of
Speaker 1: the voices in the room, which is interesting. Yeah, although
Speaker 1: probably the biggest, like the person I learned the most
Speaker 1: from aside from Jay was No Idea. He probably is
Speaker 1: the most truth telling, one of the most truth telling
Speaker 1: people I've ever met, just in terms of you know,
Speaker 1: he doesn't care what the reaction is to what he's saying.
Speaker 1: He will just deliver the absolute, whole truth. And that
Speaker 1: I think is part of the essence of fourth or
Speaker 1: four I think is No Ideas. Next to Jay, the
Speaker 1: biggest influence on that record is No Idea. It's so
Speaker 1: helpful when someone will really reflect reality back. Yeah, at
Speaker 1: the cost of potentially of upsetting the person. Absolutely, it's
Speaker 1: a difficult road to walk, Yeah, but it's really what's necessary.
Speaker 1: And the reason so many successful artists work over time
Speaker 1: tend to diminish is because the voices around them just
Speaker 1: start so true. Nodding, Yes, we know examples of that
Speaker 1: happen right now that it's tough to it's tough to
Speaker 1: watch when you know you love someone's music, but that
Speaker 1: is the way it is. Takes an immense strength of
Speaker 1: character to allow dissident voices into your session, and mine
Speaker 1: happens to be in my relationship, which is very useful.
Speaker 1: You know, someone will just be like, no, I can't,
Speaker 1: that's not not hitting, or you know, keeps you grounded, well, yeah,
Speaker 1: and or just the encouragement of your authentic self, you know,
Speaker 1: tell me about the coverage you're working on. Well, I've
Speaker 1: done this DANCEFPP and the next thing is that I'm
Speaker 1: going to be releasing kind of studio versions of some
Speaker 1: of the covers I released over the year. When I
Speaker 1: say released, I mean I just played them on a
Speaker 1: whim on ig live streams and then they became and
Speaker 1: then I looked back and go, oh, no, that actually,
Speaker 1: you know, I made sort of slightly made that on
Speaker 1: my own, so I'm going to put that on this EP. Nice.
Speaker 1: It started as just an opportunity to play music live
Speaker 1: because I didn't have enough songs that I wanted to
Speaker 1: play at the piano because you know, a lot of
Speaker 1: my music stems from production exercises in a lot of ways,
Speaker 1: so taking some of those back to the back to
Speaker 1: the keyboard doesn't always work as a piano song. So
Speaker 1: I was like, well, you know, then I put out
Speaker 1: a request to fans saying like, you know, what do
Speaker 1: you want me to hear? So we what do you
Speaker 1: want me to cover? And got overwhelmed with responses, read
Speaker 1: through literally all of them and it was thousands and
Speaker 1: genre wise, what were the things that were sent to you? Like,
Speaker 1: what was the spectrum? I mean every literally everything, No,
Speaker 1: there wasn't. There wasn't you know, in terms of recorded songs,
Speaker 1: there was, There was every genre. But the ones I
Speaker 1: ended up picking out were just Nirvana, Stevie one. I
Speaker 1: mean they were like the heavy hitters really of songwriting,
Speaker 1: because really I was listening for the DNA of the
Speaker 1: songs and could I actually perform them. I think I'm
Speaker 1: attracted to the just the same. You know. When I
Speaker 1: say same, I mean I'm attracted to pop music. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's what my natural disposition is to listen to the
Speaker 1: best pop music. And I think the best pop music
Speaker 1: ever written, the Beatles, Nirvana, Billie Eilish, some of those songs,
Speaker 1: you know, Stevie Wonder, Frank Ocean, Radiohead Bill with us.
Speaker 1: I mean that's like eighteen minute. So talk about how
Speaker 1: the live show came together. It's some of the best
Speaker 1: live performances I've ever seen I've been thanks to you. Yeah,
Speaker 1: thanks for coming to our shows. Yeah, tell me how
Speaker 1: did it come? Coming from a DJ background, I would
Speaker 1: not guess that the show that you do would be
Speaker 1: the show that you do, right, because it's not got
Speaker 1: any backing tracks or any sinking or anything like that.
Speaker 1: A lot of reasons, A lot of reasons. Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: very specific what you're what what I've seen is a
Speaker 1: very specific thing. I don't know anyone else who does
Speaker 1: what you and your group do. Yeah, we started noticing those,
Speaker 1: you know, those little SPD pads after we It's like
Speaker 1: a little Roland pad that you can hit that you
Speaker 1: can put samples on it. Basically like a like an
Speaker 1: MPC but for drummers. And I remember we started using
Speaker 1: that and then like a couple of years later, I
Speaker 1: started seeing all these other bands with this little drum thing,
Speaker 1: which is a small thing, but that's what that's how
Speaker 1: we got away from the computer, is how we got
Speaker 1: away from ableton, from from sinking from midi clicks, from
Speaker 1: having to be dependent on the pulse of a computer,
Speaker 1: basically because as soon as that happened, we tried it.
Speaker 1: But as soon as it happened, Ben just feel the same,
Speaker 1: and like none of our music stunded the same, even
Speaker 1: though it was different to the records. Like probably what
Speaker 1: would have been most faithful, most faithful to records was
Speaker 1: playing to a midi click with Ben with the headphones,
Speaker 1: and but it didn't feel you know, I'd done a
Speaker 1: lot of jamming in bands before. I played in a
Speaker 1: lot of different bands before I started making music, just
Speaker 1: like in pubs or at school or cover bands, like
Speaker 1: just stuff, you know, like circuit stuff, just learning to
Speaker 1: blend in with other musicians, you know, like how to
Speaker 1: not always be sloing, how to sometimes hold it down
Speaker 1: keyboard wise, It's like learning lead or rhythm guitar. And
Speaker 1: I knew I wanted to play like a band, and
Speaker 1: actually me, Ben and Rob had been in a band
Speaker 1: at school, so I knew what it felt like to
Speaker 1: play with Ben and Rob where we weren't tied to anything.
Speaker 1: So suddenly it just felt like being in strait jackets,
Speaker 1: so we just got away. I was militant about anything
Speaker 1: with if there were other apps on this thing, it
Speaker 1: wasn't allowed on stage. Like if you could email on it,
Speaker 1: you're not having it on stage. So it became about okay,
Speaker 1: so how do we So we've got the drum pad,
Speaker 1: We've got these synths. They're the ones I used on
Speaker 1: the record. Rob has this magical ability to fill in
Speaker 1: any gap on a record, so like if we needed
Speaker 1: a guitar, that he had it. But if we needed
Speaker 1: a chair, if we needed like a sample that had
Speaker 1: to come in at a certain point, he could. He's
Speaker 1: just very good at multitasking, so he could do it all.
Speaker 1: If we needed a baseline. He was playing the Moog
Speaker 1: Taurus like the Taurus three is amazing. I used that
Speaker 1: as the base for Retrograde. So I just brought it
Speaker 1: from home and we used it on tour. So I'll
Speaker 1: say it was expensive. You know, I've probably bought six
Speaker 1: profits six of every keyboard to have three different rigs
Speaker 1: over course of time and replacements. So every piece of
Speaker 1: gear we've got on stage, I've got three or four
Speaker 1: or five copies of So took a while to make money,
Speaker 1: but you know, once you get going, you know, you're
Speaker 1: a self sufficient live act that can't go wrong unless
Speaker 1: one of these bits of gear blows up. And even
Speaker 1: then I can just transition something else. It can't just
Speaker 1: stop because of a laptop broke. That's the other thing
Speaker 1: is that we would proof like we were completely watertight
Speaker 1: when it came to we can react to anything that
Speaker 1: goes wrong, but a computer can't. Yes, and there's nothing worse.
Speaker 1: And I've been on stage when a laptop fails, and
Speaker 1: there's nothing worse than just three nerds standing over a
Speaker 1: laptop screen wondering why the music it's not coming out
Speaker 1: like it. It's just the worst image. So I just,
Speaker 1: you know, just just went for that. So but yeah,
Speaker 1: like in terms of how we developed the show, it
Speaker 1: was like divvying out part. Really it was like, okay,
Speaker 1: so who can play what? And we've got three of us,
Speaker 1: and if we can't play everything, and then we just
Speaker 1: won't play everything, and maybe the sound guy can do
Speaker 1: a couple of delays, but that's about it. So we
Speaker 1: kind of treated it like a dub and in a
Speaker 1: way like you know, you've got sort of our sound
Speaker 1: guy had to be scientist or King Tubby and we
Speaker 1: were the band. Yeah, having seen you live and so
Speaker 1: loving the albums. Once I saw you live, it sounded
Speaker 1: like the albums were the demos for the live show.
Speaker 1: That's what it sounds like, because I remember you saying,
Speaker 1: why don't you just record the next album? Because it
Speaker 1: takes on this whole other thing that's incredible when it's
Speaker 1: played live, just like the added human element, well, it's
Speaker 1: all the elements are human rather than just one yes,
Speaker 1: but human element of the interaction of rhythm. Yeah, do
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. It's like a conversation rather
Speaker 1: than yes, completely yes, because yeah, and it has a
Speaker 1: different life to it that it's thrilling. Now, I don't
Speaker 1: know if that's only because I know the computer version
Speaker 1: that hearing it released from the straight jacket, it's so thrilling. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm not sure, but I know that because I've I've
Speaker 1: never heard I don't think I've ever heard any of
Speaker 1: the music live before hearing the record, So I don't know,
Speaker 1: but I will say knowing the record seeing it live,
Speaker 1: it's only better. It's funny because a lot of things,
Speaker 1: you know, there are some songs that i'd feel don't
Speaker 1: get better and there are, and we just choose the
Speaker 1: ones that do. Yeah, And you know a lot of
Speaker 1: bands just have to play the songs that don't translate
Speaker 1: that well live or because they're the big songs, you know,
Speaker 1: or that we've been lucky and also we've just sometimes
Speaker 1: we just play the ones that don't translate that well,
Speaker 1: and which you know, we've not always made the right
Speaker 1: choices with songs. But I think I feel quite lucky
Speaker 1: in a way. I would like to record an album
Speaker 1: where it's just me, Ben and Roll playing the songs
Speaker 1: I've written. Obviously, that would be a much longer process
Speaker 1: because you've got to write the song, write the album,
Speaker 1: then learn it, then play it, and then produce that. Yes,
Speaker 1: And at the time when we were doing Current Anything,
Speaker 1: I remember you suggesting it, I was just like, I
Speaker 1: don't actually have time. I don't think I've got the
Speaker 1: headspace to be able to do that. I don't have
Speaker 1: the time, potentially the money because you know it's not cheap.
Speaker 1: And then also I don't have the I don't have
Speaker 1: any life force left. Like I just was like drained,
Speaker 1: I was dying. I felt like I was dying. Someday,
Speaker 1: I hope we get to do that, Yeah, And the
Speaker 1: way to do it is to essentially finish the album. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you would do exactly the same thing. What you do,
Speaker 1: know is you finish an album and then you decide
Speaker 1: how you're going to play it live, and then you
Speaker 1: play it live. Right. The only difference will be when
Speaker 1: the record comes out exactly but the process will be
Speaker 1: exactly the same. Everything will be exactly the same. And
Speaker 1: to have that presence of mind to be like that's
Speaker 1: going to be the way it goes, then yes, But
Speaker 1: I think the time when you're becoming attached to all
Speaker 1: these demos, all these all these songs, yes, and the
Speaker 1: way they're produced and the way they sound and the
Speaker 1: where they hit, and it's like I was just becoming
Speaker 1: so attached to the production of these things I couldn't allow.
Speaker 1: But then the other thing is that I quite enjoyed
Speaker 1: the fresh lease of life it gets when it becomes
Speaker 1: a live adaptation. Absolutely. I quite enjoyed having this thing
Speaker 1: at home that sounds like that, and then being able
Speaker 1: to take this very organic thing on the road and
Speaker 1: its feeling different and it being a surprise to people
Speaker 1: rather than it just sounding note for note the same
Speaker 1: thing as they've just heard at home. Do you ever
Speaker 1: learn anything about the songs when you play them live?
Speaker 1: Does your relationship to the music change? And I sing
Speaker 1: them differently? And actually I sing the melodies slightly differently live.
Speaker 1: But it's funny how we adapt like sometimes and even
Speaker 1: be an improvisation one night that you get used to
Speaker 1: and then you just start doing it that way and
Speaker 1: then you just think that's how it goes. Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: like a lie that I started to believe. And that's great.
Speaker 1: That's kind of fine as well, because ultimately, you know,
Speaker 1: sometimes when you hear a musician sing a song, like
Speaker 1: a Tommy York or whatever, and you're like, I know
Speaker 1: this record inside out, so when he sings it, it's
Speaker 1: it's going to have to chime in with the exact
Speaker 1: thing that I've got in my mind. And when they
Speaker 1: sing it differently, could be just because they've almost Chinese
Speaker 1: whispered themselves over the course of two tours and now
Speaker 1: it sounds like this. And it's nice to see the
Speaker 1: iterations of these songs over the years and how how
Speaker 1: musicians reidentify with the songs, and you know, it's like
Speaker 1: Joni Mitchell, she actually came to see us at the Troubadour,
Speaker 1: which I probably told you about before, but it was
Speaker 1: an unbelievable moment. I remember her telling me that when
Speaker 1: she originally wrote Case Review, she didn't know how to
Speaker 1: tell the story, even though she had told the story
Speaker 1: in the lyrics and the on the record. But she
Speaker 1: told me that she as she got older, she became
Speaker 1: a better storyteller in her delivery, and she now knew
Speaker 1: the correct emotion behind the things she'd written, almost like
Speaker 1: it would It was disembodied of that in the first inclination,
Speaker 1: but as she got older, it was imbued with real
Speaker 1: depth and you know, just emotion. And I think that's
Speaker 1: happened in some ways to some of the songs I've written,
Speaker 1: where I've realized their meaning way after I wrote them,
Speaker 1: maybe because when you're writing them, it's coming more from
Speaker 1: the subconscious, so it's almost like a dream that you
Speaker 1: can reflect on later, Like the time you wake up
Speaker 1: from a dream, it just seems like surreal, but if
Speaker 1: you look back years later, it's like, oh, that meant
Speaker 1: I know exactly what that meant exactly. Yeah, there's that.
Speaker 1: And also I think maybe that it's an intellectualization in
Speaker 1: the moment, unless you were just freestyling lyrics straight from
Speaker 1: the subconscious, it would be difficult to not premeditate these lyrics.
Speaker 1: I mean it is they are by definition premeditated. So
Speaker 1: you know, there's a sense that you've intellectualized what you feel,
Speaker 1: and therefore there is a natural dis embodiment from the
Speaker 1: feeling to the lyric in your explanation of it. It
Speaker 1: may not always be perfect, and that is our job,
Speaker 1: in a way, is to articulate. But then later on,
Speaker 1: once you know the lyrics, once you they're in you
Speaker 1: and you'll never forget them their muscle memory, then the
Speaker 1: feeling can come through them much easier. So the first
Speaker 1: time I ever sing songs, I'm not reagod at singing them.
Speaker 1: They don't come out feeling integral or authentic. It's when
Speaker 1: I've sung them for a couple of years or even
Speaker 1: ten years, that's when you're like, oh, he's now a conduit.
Speaker 1: Those those lyrics are a conjuit the for what's going on, beautiful,
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for doing this. Yeah, I mean,
Speaker 1: it's absolutely my pleasure I've made. I honestly seeing you
Speaker 1: again and actually in the place where we recorded, covering
Speaker 1: anything I have been having almost I mean, honestly, it's
Speaker 1: so pivotal for me to come back here again, and
Speaker 1: you know where my relationship started, where my album was made,
Speaker 1: where I went through all those changes, and in front
Speaker 1: of you and with in some ways, with your guidance
Speaker 1: and with what's happened. Since it's so big for me
Speaker 1: to come back here, and it feels so good, and
Speaker 1: I think it's almost felt like therapy. It's just unlocked
Speaker 1: a couple a little like oh yeah, and then and
Speaker 1: then that and then you know, and then I've been
Speaker 1: talking about but this because I've been almost piecing together
Speaker 1: memories and and going, oh, this is really important, beautiful.
Speaker 1: You know, I'm so happy to be on the journey
Speaker 1: with you. Thanks having me on. Yeah, thanks to James
Speaker 1: Blake for sharing so much of his journey and creative
Speaker 1: process with Rick. You can hear all of our favorite
Speaker 1: James Blake songs and I playlist at Broken record podcast
Speaker 1: dot com, along with the original songs that he covered
Speaker 1: on his new ep and be sure to subscribe to
Speaker 1: our YouTube channel at YouTube dot com slash Broken Record Podcasts,
Speaker 1: where we can find extended cuts of our new and
Speaker 1: old episodes Broken Record is produced with help from Lea Rose,
Speaker 1: Jason Gambrel, Martin Gonzalez, Eric Sandler and his executive produced
Speaker 1: by me a Little Bell. Broken Record is a production
Speaker 1: of Pushkin Industries and if you like Broken Record, please
Speaker 1: remember to share, rate, and review our show on your podcast.
Speaker 1: Aff Our theme musics by Kenny Beats. I'm justin Richmond
Speaker 1: Pace