WEBVTT - Corinne Bailey Rae 0:00:15.476 --> 0:00:22.996 Pushkin crim Bailey Ray's an English singer songwriter whose career 0:00:23.116 --> 0:00:26.076 started with a bang. In two thousand and six, her 0:00:26.116 --> 0:00:29.116 debut album Talked to UK charts and was certified triple 0:00:29.156 --> 0:00:31.676 platinum with the help of her first hit single, put 0:00:31.756 --> 0:00:34.756 Your Records On. A slew of awards and other best 0:00:34.796 --> 0:00:38.716 New Artists distinctions followed. As she put out subsequent albums, 0:00:38.836 --> 0:00:41.676 Krin aspired to stretch herself as an artist beyond neo 0:00:41.756 --> 0:00:46.436 soul pop music's success. In September, krim Bailey Ray released 0:00:46.436 --> 0:00:49.956 her fourth album, Black Rainbows. It's an album inspired by 0:00:49.956 --> 0:00:53.396 her time spent exploring Chicago's historic Stony Island Arts Bank, 0:00:53.916 --> 0:00:57.676 a vast collection of black cultural relics and writing. Krin's 0:00:57.716 --> 0:00:59.876 new album is in many ways a reaction to the 0:00:59.996 --> 0:01:03.596 art she consumed in that archive. It's performed in a 0:01:03.636 --> 0:01:07.876 mix of jazz, rock and the avant garde. On today's episode, 0:01:07.916 --> 0:01:10.036 I talked to krim Bailey Rays about the years she 0:01:10.116 --> 0:01:12.796 spent in the Arts Bank archives and the stories that 0:01:12.916 --> 0:01:16.076 inspired her new work. She also talked about her record 0:01:16.156 --> 0:01:19.236 label's exhaustive efforts to push her to recreate the success 0:01:19.396 --> 0:01:22.276 of her first album, and how a Skateboarding magazine helped 0:01:22.356 --> 0:01:28.436 clarify the look of her new record. This is broken 0:01:28.476 --> 0:01:30.716 record liner notes for the Digital Age. 0:01:30.916 --> 0:01:31.836 I'm justin Mitchman. 0:01:32.636 --> 0:01:37.516 Here's my conversation with Corinne Bailey Ray your record. I 0:01:37.596 --> 0:01:39.276 listened to it, I guess went for a walk to 0:01:39.316 --> 0:01:41.996 go get some coffee and listen to it again. Like, 0:01:42.036 --> 0:01:46.796 it is really surprising how many different sounds are on here. 0:01:46.836 --> 0:01:49.316 Like I loved that. I never settled into like a 0:01:49.356 --> 0:01:50.436 groove listening to it. 0:01:50.836 --> 0:01:51.036 Yeah. 0:01:51.196 --> 0:01:54.036 Yeah, it's like each with each song, it's like it's 0:01:54.116 --> 0:01:55.636 kind of growing, evolving, changing. 0:01:55.716 --> 0:01:56.556 It's it's awesome. 0:01:56.556 --> 0:01:58.236 It's incredible, Thanks very much. 0:01:58.476 --> 0:02:00.436 Yeah, I wanted to have all these different styles, but 0:02:00.556 --> 0:02:04.236 it really came about naturally from responding to the objects, 0:02:04.276 --> 0:02:07.676 responding to the events. The idea that came seemed to 0:02:07.716 --> 0:02:10.076 be in a particular style, whether it was, you know, 0:02:10.116 --> 0:02:12.556 a punk song, or whether it's more aggressive guitars, or 0:02:12.556 --> 0:02:15.276 whether it's more like a ballad or something more psychedelic. 0:02:15.396 --> 0:02:18.476 Like it all it all just kind of presenting itself 0:02:18.516 --> 0:02:22.676 to me like that. But yeah, it is. It bounces 0:02:22.716 --> 0:02:24.156 you around a lot. 0:02:24.516 --> 0:02:27.436 What were the first handful of songs that you came 0:02:27.516 --> 0:02:30.356 up with for the record. I'm just curious how, you know, 0:02:30.596 --> 0:02:33.076 like how it started and how it evolved sonically. 0:02:33.836 --> 0:02:37.796 I think the first handful of songs were I wrote 0:02:37.796 --> 0:02:40.876 some and the residency. I went to the Arts Bank 0:02:40.916 --> 0:02:44.116 winside encountered the Arts Bank building, you know, Stoney Island 0:02:44.236 --> 0:02:47.836 Arts Bank in Chicago. You can see pictures of it online. 0:02:47.876 --> 0:02:51.356 It's the foundation that runs it. It's called the Rebuild Foundation. 0:02:51.916 --> 0:02:54.756 It's on the South Side of Chicago, which I don't 0:02:54.756 --> 0:02:56.316 know how much you know about the South Side, but 0:02:56.356 --> 0:03:00.116 it was a very vibrant, middle class black area in 0:03:00.196 --> 0:03:03.876 the sixties and then it's just had so much decline 0:03:03.956 --> 0:03:08.036 and unfunding and now it's really and there's a lot 0:03:08.036 --> 0:03:13.156 of difficult issues there with housing, mental health, drugs, violence. 0:03:14.356 --> 0:03:17.156 But there's this one building there on Stoney Island that 0:03:17.196 --> 0:03:19.596 hasn't been pulled down by the city. This city wanted 0:03:19.596 --> 0:03:21.956 to pull it down, and Theasta Gates saved it. 0:03:21.996 --> 0:03:24.516 He bought it for a dollar and saved. 0:03:24.276 --> 0:03:27.156 And raised four million dollars by selling his own art 0:03:27.516 --> 0:03:29.516 to make this a building again. 0:03:29.596 --> 0:03:31.876 So instead of being full of money, it's full of art. 0:03:31.996 --> 0:03:34.556 It's full of art artifacts, it's full of twenty six 0:03:34.636 --> 0:03:39.196 thousand books that were submitted to the Johnson Foundation, who 0:03:39.196 --> 0:03:43.356 did Ebony magazine and Jet Magazine, So all the books exactly, 0:03:43.436 --> 0:03:45.396 so all the books that were submitted to them over 0:03:45.396 --> 0:03:47.636 the years for review, as well as the books that 0:03:48.156 --> 0:03:53.036 John Johnson and the Johnson's collected. And then it has 0:03:53.156 --> 0:03:56.516 all the Frankie Knuckles records. So it's got this big 0:03:56.556 --> 0:04:00.156 slice of you know, Chicago house music. And it has 0:04:00.196 --> 0:04:03.436 all the glass slides from the University of Chicago. So 0:04:03.476 --> 0:04:07.236 when they digitized their archive, they just gave all this 0:04:07.316 --> 0:04:07.956 a bank they. 0:04:07.836 --> 0:04:09.236 Had nowhere to store it all. 0:04:09.836 --> 0:04:12.476 And it also has all these difficult objects that were 0:04:12.556 --> 0:04:15.796 pulled out of circulation by a black and Chinese banker 0:04:15.836 --> 0:04:20.156 called Ed Williams, problematic objects from America's past, you know, 0:04:20.236 --> 0:04:26.476 the trinkets and the mammy jars and newspaper articles, photographs, cartoons, 0:04:26.956 --> 0:04:28.996 all of these things that he would find in flea 0:04:29.276 --> 0:04:32.676 markets and yard sales that he wanted to just buy 0:04:32.716 --> 0:04:35.076 and putting a box in his house. So nobody else 0:04:35.156 --> 0:04:37.636 was buying them and putting them in their house and 0:04:37.716 --> 0:04:40.076 keeping it all going. So he had these boxes and 0:04:40.076 --> 0:04:42.916 boxes and things, and they became too much even for 0:04:43.036 --> 0:04:47.596 him to be around sixteen thousand objects, so they are 0:04:47.636 --> 0:04:50.036 also all in the bank as well. So I went 0:04:50.116 --> 0:04:53.556 looking around just as a tourist, as someone who's interested 0:04:53.556 --> 0:04:57.956 in history and black histories and stories and hidden stories 0:04:57.996 --> 0:05:02.236 and raised stories. And when I left, I just couldn't help. 0:05:02.276 --> 0:05:04.236 But you know, I was just scribbling a poem here 0:05:04.356 --> 0:05:06.956 or starting to write a song here, and I spoke 0:05:06.996 --> 0:05:08.556 to the asktra about it, and he said, you know, 0:05:08.596 --> 0:05:10.796 you should come be an artist in residence. 0:05:10.916 --> 0:05:13.236 You know, they have buildings nearby. 0:05:13.356 --> 0:05:16.276 So we stayed there for two weeks and just really 0:05:16.356 --> 0:05:19.716 dug into the archives, read loads of books, sol loads 0:05:19.716 --> 0:05:23.076 of objects, attended loads of events, and then I've just 0:05:23.116 --> 0:05:26.756 been going back there very regularly all through these years, 0:05:26.796 --> 0:05:29.876 you know, since twenty seventeen. So I mean the first 0:05:29.916 --> 0:05:32.156 song I ever wrote about the bank was called you 0:05:32.156 --> 0:05:34.916 who Walk These Floors in Fear because I had seen 0:05:34.956 --> 0:05:38.036 a sculpture that was made from the abandoned floorboards from 0:05:38.036 --> 0:05:42.116 a police station, and the police station have been left 0:05:42.236 --> 0:05:45.596 for many decades, and these floorboards are from there. 0:05:46.036 --> 0:05:48.316 And I thought about what they had been witnessed to. 0:05:48.556 --> 0:05:52.636 You know how often in history it's the witnesses are silent, 0:05:52.756 --> 0:05:56.196 you know, they're the buildings, they're the windows, they're the trees, 0:05:56.436 --> 0:05:59.556 the soil, the slave cabin that, you know, the things 0:05:59.596 --> 0:06:02.556 that can't talk, but they you know, they've seen a truth. 0:06:02.716 --> 0:06:04.436 Yeah, that's the first thing I wrote. 0:06:04.556 --> 0:06:06.876 That's kind of on I guess a part two of 0:06:06.916 --> 0:06:08.476 the record, which I haven't finished. 0:06:09.156 --> 0:06:11.676 Then I wrote he will follow with his Eyes. 0:06:11.636 --> 0:06:14.996 And erasure, and then maybe before the Throne of the 0:06:14.996 --> 0:06:15.636 Invisible God. 0:06:15.716 --> 0:06:18.196 It just kind of you started from there. 0:06:18.516 --> 0:06:20.436 He will follow you with his eyes? Is it certainly 0:06:20.436 --> 0:06:22.596 like a dance element to it, So maybe that's the 0:06:22.636 --> 0:06:25.956 Frankie Knuckles Chicago house of it all. Well, how did 0:06:25.996 --> 0:06:27.956 you write that song? Like start off with words? When 0:06:27.956 --> 0:06:28.996 we had a piano. 0:06:28.756 --> 0:06:31.396 Guitar with he will follow You with his Eyes? 0:06:31.716 --> 0:06:35.876 I had seen all this advertising and I'd found a tin. 0:06:36.516 --> 0:06:40.236 Of a beauty product when I was in Chicago. 0:06:40.356 --> 0:06:43.076 I'd opened the drawers of the stone in the Ed 0:06:43.116 --> 0:06:45.036 Williams collection and seen this tin and it had this 0:06:45.076 --> 0:06:47.956 beautiful illustration on and it was this company called Valmore. 0:06:48.556 --> 0:06:49.996 So then when I was home, I was doing all 0:06:49.996 --> 0:06:53.156 this research about Valmore and finding out they were kind 0:06:53.156 --> 0:06:56.076 of like the Avon of their day. So they would 0:06:56.076 --> 0:06:58.516 sell these beauty products door to door. The guy who 0:06:58.516 --> 0:07:01.596 did the art for them, they all had these amazing 0:07:01.596 --> 0:07:04.996 illustrations online drawings, and it was this black artist called 0:07:05.076 --> 0:07:05.956 Charles Dawson. 0:07:06.516 --> 0:07:08.716 So they had very sympathetic drawings. 0:07:08.756 --> 0:07:10.956 You know that the line was targeted at black men 0:07:10.996 --> 0:07:14.636 and women, and it was targeted in this really romantic way. 0:07:14.916 --> 0:07:17.676 Whoever did the marketing was really good. So the perfumes 0:07:17.676 --> 0:07:21.036 would be called things like follow me boy or look 0:07:21.156 --> 0:07:24.396 me Over. And then when you'd read something in you know, 0:07:24.476 --> 0:07:27.636 Ebony or another publication about Valmore, and it would have 0:07:27.716 --> 0:07:30.836 all the products listed, it would say in a big 0:07:30.836 --> 0:07:32.396 banner across the top, you know, his. 0:07:32.396 --> 0:07:34.876 Eyes will follow you across the room. 0:07:35.156 --> 0:07:36.556 You know, and it would be then it'd be a 0:07:36.556 --> 0:07:38.756 series of wigs or something that they were selling. So 0:07:38.796 --> 0:07:43.236 they sold all kinds of things. And I thought about 0:07:43.356 --> 0:07:45.116 Valmore and just how. 0:07:45.116 --> 0:07:45.916 Enticing it was. You know. 0:07:45.956 --> 0:07:48.476 Sometimes I'd read about the hair products and think, I 0:07:48.476 --> 0:07:51.156 wonder if you could still get this, because it sounded 0:07:51.276 --> 0:07:51.916 like from the. 0:07:51.916 --> 0:07:53.556 Description that it did everything. 0:07:53.636 --> 0:07:56.556 You know, it's like it's nourishes but it's not greasy, 0:07:56.796 --> 0:07:59.516 and you know it it's a styling product and it's 0:07:59.716 --> 0:08:03.556 it's a premade and it's and I thought, gosh. 0:08:02.756 --> 0:08:03.916 They were so good. 0:08:04.076 --> 0:08:07.396 Their marketing was really good, and obviously it was it 0:08:07.476 --> 0:08:10.036 was the sympathetic view of black men and women, but 0:08:10.276 --> 0:08:14.196 it was very much aligned with white beauty. So the 0:08:14.276 --> 0:08:16.716 beauty they we're aiming at was, you know, lighter skin, 0:08:16.996 --> 0:08:19.836 straight a hair, all of these things. So I guess 0:08:19.836 --> 0:08:21.876 with a song, I wanted to present a kind of 0:08:22.516 --> 0:08:25.716 nineteen fifties dream world where you're really under the spell 0:08:25.876 --> 0:08:28.716 of this kind of advertising. You know, you can imagine 0:08:28.836 --> 0:08:31.236 them knocking at the door, and if you're a black woman, 0:08:31.316 --> 0:08:33.516 you know you're going to be taking the hair straightening 0:08:33.556 --> 0:08:36.396 cream and you're going to be taking the skin lightning 0:08:36.436 --> 0:08:37.276 cream and all. 0:08:37.156 --> 0:08:37.996 Of those things. 0:08:38.796 --> 0:08:41.436 But halfway through the song, the person who has been 0:08:41.516 --> 0:08:43.756 very much under the spell of our more, you know, 0:08:43.796 --> 0:08:47.236 there's this sonic disruption and then they end up saying, 0:08:47.236 --> 0:08:49.196 you know, I don't want to vanish into a girl 0:08:49.236 --> 0:08:50.556 that I don't recognize. 0:08:50.636 --> 0:08:51.676 You know, if you. 0:08:51.676 --> 0:08:54.076 Want to run to sweet sweet Georgia brown with another 0:08:54.116 --> 0:08:57.396 kind of skin lightning cream, you know, light light brown 0:08:57.476 --> 0:08:58.116 is the thing. 0:08:58.156 --> 0:08:58.796 Not dark. 0:08:59.316 --> 0:09:01.556 After that line, it's like a break in. It's like 0:09:01.596 --> 0:09:02.476 a break in the song. 0:09:02.796 --> 0:09:05.716 Yeah, it's a total break and the person everything just 0:09:05.756 --> 0:09:08.516 falls away and it gets much more contemporary, and it's just, 0:09:08.596 --> 0:09:11.036 you know, I'll be there with my plum red lipstick 0:09:11.116 --> 0:09:14.436 when Black Hair King came my Black Skin gleaming. I 0:09:14.476 --> 0:09:16.436 wanted it to be a sort of a shock and 0:09:16.676 --> 0:09:18.996 kind of you know, really assertive, and that the person 0:09:19.036 --> 0:09:21.396 would be sort of back in there, back in their 0:09:21.476 --> 0:09:25.716 self and away from this really enticing beauty which held 0:09:25.956 --> 0:09:28.556 many people under its way for a really long time. 0:09:28.996 --> 0:09:32.836 The repetition of those lines make it really feel like 0:09:32.836 --> 0:09:35.036 like a cold arm as much as like a refrain. 0:09:35.156 --> 0:09:36.716 You know, it's just it's beautiful, and like the way 0:09:36.756 --> 0:09:39.596 it just repeats, repeats, repeats, and the production evolves over 0:09:39.676 --> 0:09:42.476 that second half of the song, it's like it feels 0:09:42.556 --> 0:09:43.716 it feels subversive in. 0:09:43.716 --> 0:09:46.676 A very cool way. Thank you as you're. 0:09:46.516 --> 0:09:50.036 Writing out the words, you know, at that point the 0:09:50.076 --> 0:09:51.676 song should move into something else. 0:09:51.836 --> 0:09:55.156 Yeah, I wanted it to be a shift away from 0:09:55.276 --> 0:09:58.236 you know, in the beginning, we had vibraphones and guitars 0:09:58.316 --> 0:10:01.236 and we had strings, and it was all very dreamy 0:10:01.556 --> 0:10:06.396 as imagining. Like you know, there's probably Californian movies that 0:10:06.436 --> 0:10:08.116 were shot, you know, where a car would be sort 0:10:08.156 --> 0:10:13.156 of winding round the roads, wrapping a mountainside and the sunshining. 0:10:13.196 --> 0:10:15.316 You know, that kind of fifties. 0:10:14.876 --> 0:10:18.636 Dream world, and you can live in it, but at 0:10:18.676 --> 0:10:20.636 some point you have to when you break out of it, 0:10:20.676 --> 0:10:24.276 you realize how all consuming it was. And so yeah, 0:10:24.316 --> 0:10:26.396 I really wanted to have that repetition back, but I 0:10:26.396 --> 0:10:28.196 wrote it on guitars, so that would always just be 0:10:28.276 --> 0:10:29.636 like pulling one string. 0:10:29.876 --> 0:10:33.956 Plum red lipstick man Blake hit. 0:10:34.076 --> 0:10:35.996 And then I guess when we did it in the studio, 0:10:36.236 --> 0:10:39.756 we just you know, we wanted wanted it to evolve, like, 0:10:39.836 --> 0:10:41.836 didn't don't bring the base straight away and have this 0:10:41.956 --> 0:10:46.756 more like cosmic sort of weird jazz moments is like 0:10:46.876 --> 0:10:49.236 is it futuristic? Is it seventies? It's you know what 0:10:49.316 --> 0:10:51.996 we wanted it to be. We want to be different 0:10:51.996 --> 0:10:52.916 to what had gone before. 0:10:53.516 --> 0:10:55.716 Yeah, it's it's incredible. It's really cool. 0:10:56.076 --> 0:10:58.916 And the tone of the beginning does sort of remind 0:10:58.916 --> 0:11:01.276 me of like, well, like the late fifties, like early 0:11:01.356 --> 0:11:04.476 sixties almost like a it's akin to like a Frankie 0:11:04.596 --> 0:11:06.596 Valley production or something. But then yet again, just like 0:11:06.596 --> 0:11:09.036 everything else on the record, it's like halfway through it's like, 0:11:09.116 --> 0:11:10.596 oh shit, we're under something else now. 0:11:10.676 --> 0:11:10.916 You know. 0:11:11.236 --> 0:11:12.916 I really liked it, and I thought, you know, some 0:11:12.956 --> 0:11:16.316 people were saying it's close to what your sound has 0:11:16.396 --> 0:11:18.916 been historically. So I really liked the idea that you 0:11:18.996 --> 0:11:20.996 might put it on and be like, oh, finally I 0:11:20.996 --> 0:11:22.436 can just kind of relax. 0:11:22.116 --> 0:11:22.796 In this, you know. 0:11:22.836 --> 0:11:24.796 But then you listen to words. What is she saying? 0:11:24.876 --> 0:11:27.156 She's saying lighter and bright? Why is she's saying longer 0:11:27.196 --> 0:11:29.516 and straighter? And you know it's kind of you know, 0:11:29.716 --> 0:11:31.316 I feel like the eye in that song is not 0:11:31.396 --> 0:11:34.796 really me. It's kind of this I don't know, Shirley 0:11:34.876 --> 0:11:38.796 Bassie type Earth Kit, you know, delivery everything, you know, everything, 0:11:39.076 --> 0:11:40.756 you know, I want to when I was being more 0:11:40.836 --> 0:11:42.916 dramatic than I would normalss sing it, you know, it's 0:11:42.916 --> 0:11:44.236 trying to sort of be in that world. 0:11:44.996 --> 0:11:47.956 I'm so happy to hear Shirley Bassie reference like she's 0:11:47.996 --> 0:11:51.516 incredible and no one talks about her anymore. She's and say, 0:11:51.556 --> 0:11:53.676 with the earth of Kit, I can just uniquely bizarre 0:11:53.756 --> 0:11:54.596 but beautiful voice. 0:11:54.676 --> 0:11:56.316 Yeah yeah, I love that. 0:11:56.876 --> 0:11:58.876 But you know, I didn't want to say that, but 0:11:58.916 --> 0:12:00.276 that's what was my response. 0:12:00.396 --> 0:12:02.676 Listening to the albums, when it got to that song, 0:12:02.716 --> 0:12:05.036 I was like, oh, okay, something that not you know, 0:12:05.076 --> 0:12:06.636 it's not that like I pigeonhole you in my mind. 0:12:06.676 --> 0:12:08.196 But by the time I got that song, I was like, oh, 0:12:08.196 --> 0:12:10.636 this feels like for MEI terrain. 0:12:11.716 --> 0:12:12.516 Yeah, and it was. 0:12:12.556 --> 0:12:14.636 And that's you know, writing it in this sort of 0:12:14.676 --> 0:12:17.156 buzz and over a guitar style. It's like, you know, 0:12:17.316 --> 0:12:21.716 I write a lot of songs from there, so yeah. 0:12:21.196 --> 0:12:21.716 I love that. 0:12:21.756 --> 0:12:23.956 There's like it's not like you rap on it, but 0:12:23.956 --> 0:12:26.916 there's some tracks like New York Transit Queen really where 0:12:26.956 --> 0:12:30.796 it sounds almost like similar to the way ESG like 0:12:30.876 --> 0:12:32.836 kind of like it was like they weren't rapping, but 0:12:32.836 --> 0:12:36.076 they were like aggressively talking on the track, but also rhythmically. 0:12:36.196 --> 0:12:38.196 It was like, that's very cool. 0:12:38.276 --> 0:12:40.476 It's a really cool reference because I did find. 0:12:40.276 --> 0:12:43.916 That the ESG record amongst Frankie Knichols stuff as well, 0:12:43.996 --> 0:12:45.596 you know, Frankie Nickles archive. Wow. 0:12:45.676 --> 0:12:46.436 Yeah, yeah, it's like. 0:12:46.516 --> 0:12:49.316 This band is so cool. I don't know enough about them, 0:12:49.396 --> 0:12:51.916 you know, I don't know enough about them, but yeah, 0:12:52.236 --> 0:12:54.076 I really want to use my voice in all these 0:12:54.076 --> 0:12:56.036 different ways on the record. I mean, I think all 0:12:56.076 --> 0:12:58.916 it was a side project, so I didn't feel any 0:12:59.076 --> 0:13:01.676 sort of beholding to the music that I've done before, 0:13:01.716 --> 0:13:04.836 and I thought, it doesn't matter if it's really different 0:13:04.876 --> 0:13:07.956 to what I've done. In fact, it should be really 0:13:07.956 --> 0:13:09.356 different to what I've done, because it's it's. 0:13:09.236 --> 0:13:10.476 A side project. It's not me. 0:13:10.676 --> 0:13:12.396 It's like you know, I was calling it for it 0:13:12.436 --> 0:13:14.676 was like the Chicago Project was for ages. It was 0:13:14.756 --> 0:13:16.716 just that, and firstly it was going to be an 0:13:16.716 --> 0:13:20.476 EP and then it turned into more but it Yeah, 0:13:20.476 --> 0:13:22.276 it was only really towards the end of it that 0:13:22.276 --> 0:13:24.636 I thought, oh, I really should claim this as my own. 0:13:24.756 --> 0:13:27.276 It has been my obsession for the last seven years 0:13:27.276 --> 0:13:29.636 and I want it to beat my record now. 0:13:29.676 --> 0:13:31.396 It's only really when I saw my name on it. 0:13:31.516 --> 0:13:33.556 You know, we worked in this brilliant graph artist called 0:13:34.116 --> 0:13:38.156 Manu Shribley, his art designer, and I'd seen his writing 0:13:38.196 --> 0:13:40.516 on a skateboard magazine. 0:13:40.556 --> 0:13:43.676 And then just kept calling him like please, please, can 0:13:43.716 --> 0:13:45.396 you do that? It just has to be you? 0:13:45.596 --> 0:13:48.156 And but I realized I hadn't told him, don't put 0:13:48.156 --> 0:13:49.996 my name on, so I told him, you know his 0:13:50.276 --> 0:13:54.196 photos and it's called Black Rainbows. But I hadn't quite explained, Oh, 0:13:54.236 --> 0:13:56.796 it's not really my project, it's a side. So when 0:13:56.796 --> 0:13:59.716 I saw my name written down, forgot to tell him 0:13:59.756 --> 0:14:01.236 not to put it on. But then when I saw 0:14:01.276 --> 0:14:03.076 it in the way, just even the way he'd written, 0:14:03.116 --> 0:14:07.796 it made me reimagine myself. It was really weird, but 0:14:08.076 --> 0:14:10.876 just something about the waste and that script just been 0:14:10.956 --> 0:14:15.116 free from all the different fonts that I feel like 0:14:15.156 --> 0:14:17.636 I've tried as sort of logos of my own name, 0:14:17.716 --> 0:14:20.116 and then suddenly there was just this free writing, and 0:14:20.116 --> 0:14:22.596 I thought, yeah, I really like I like how that looks. 0:14:22.636 --> 0:14:23.436 I like how that is. 0:14:23.996 --> 0:14:26.316 Do you typically look through skate magazines or is that? 0:14:27.236 --> 0:14:29.236 It was just it was a real fluke. It was 0:14:29.316 --> 0:14:30.676 just the way they had it presented. 0:14:30.796 --> 0:14:32.396 I think I've probably got it here that when I 0:14:32.436 --> 0:14:36.956 saw so, it's like, who's this elegant sort of black 0:14:36.996 --> 0:14:39.516 teenager on the front and then this writing. I mean, 0:14:40.636 --> 0:14:42.756 so I couldn't even work out when it was cool 0:14:42.956 --> 0:14:48.276 at the time. I think that's renaissance issue. But the 0:14:48.316 --> 0:14:53.756 magazine's called Numbered, But I really really like magazine shopping, 0:14:54.036 --> 0:14:57.676 and there's this there's a shop called Colours May Fay 0:14:57.756 --> 0:14:58.676 and leads that I go to. 0:14:59.236 --> 0:15:00.276 But there's also this. 0:15:00.396 --> 0:15:04.036 Store that's it has like a car heart downstairs and 0:15:04.036 --> 0:15:06.636 loads of skating, but it's got magazines upstairs, and it's 0:15:06.636 --> 0:15:13.356 everything from punk z means, you know, like rad you know, 0:15:13.516 --> 0:15:18.356 trans by, Queer publications, and and then. 0:15:18.356 --> 0:15:20.956 Just art house stuff and fashion stuff, and. 0:15:20.916 --> 0:15:23.836 So I always think magazines are really special. I mean, 0:15:23.876 --> 0:15:25.756 I know you can get loads of loads online now, 0:15:25.796 --> 0:15:28.356 but just seeing how someone's put all the work into 0:15:28.396 --> 0:15:30.196 it and putting it together, and you know, it costs 0:15:30.236 --> 0:15:31.996 money to make all these shoots, so I think like 0:15:32.476 --> 0:15:34.876 you can pay your seven pounds or twelve pounds or 0:15:34.876 --> 0:15:37.636 whatever it is. And I'm still really analogued. I love 0:15:37.676 --> 0:15:41.596 coming home from town. There's just like ten magazines and 0:15:41.596 --> 0:15:43.116 then you get to see like, oh who was the 0:15:43.236 --> 0:15:45.796 art director, who was the you know, so I really 0:15:45.836 --> 0:15:47.436 like to do that, and I like to read in 0:15:47.436 --> 0:15:49.556 the bath, you know. So it's just you can't really 0:15:49.556 --> 0:15:51.836 do that with your phone, just you end up destroying 0:15:51.836 --> 0:15:52.196 your phone. 0:15:52.196 --> 0:15:54.476 I've done it before, I have, I have I do. 0:15:54.676 --> 0:15:56.916 Why did I do that? Yeah? 0:15:56.916 --> 0:15:57.596 Way less fun? 0:15:57.756 --> 0:15:58.036 Yeah? 0:15:58.156 --> 0:15:59.876 Yeah, I mean I feel like at some point people 0:15:59.876 --> 0:16:01.956 will realize, just like with Vinyl, you know, it's that 0:16:02.036 --> 0:16:04.836 it's like it's much more fun. You could scroll Instagram 0:16:05.196 --> 0:16:08.716 or TikTok or Twitter or whatever, but it's way less fun. 0:16:08.796 --> 0:16:11.716 It's fun, but also there's a limit to it, which 0:16:11.796 --> 0:16:13.756 is good, where you know, you never get to the 0:16:13.796 --> 0:16:16.236 back page of the Internet, and so your brain is 0:16:16.636 --> 0:16:19.516 I've got this completest thing sometimes when I'm on Instagram 0:16:19.556 --> 0:16:22.156 and then I'll look up and hours have gone past, 0:16:22.196 --> 0:16:24.836 and i think I'm trying to just get to the end, 0:16:24.916 --> 0:16:27.236 and the rule will be no end, whereas with a magazine, 0:16:27.276 --> 0:16:29.716 you know, when you've done the whole thing, you. 0:16:29.676 --> 0:16:32.196 Know, you know, yeah, it's kind of it's nice. It's 0:16:32.316 --> 0:16:33.756 kind of like a sad thing because you've got to 0:16:33.796 --> 0:16:35.676 wait for the get healthy. 0:16:35.756 --> 0:16:37.236 It's healthy. 0:16:37.276 --> 0:16:39.596 Now go and eat some food or like go outside 0:16:39.676 --> 0:16:43.636 for a work. You know, that's dead eyed scrolling thing 0:16:43.676 --> 0:16:45.396 that you can get to it like just before you 0:16:45.436 --> 0:16:45.796 go to bed. 0:16:45.876 --> 0:16:49.476 It's so bad, you know, really try not to do it. Now. 0:16:50.596 --> 0:16:52.196 We're going to pause for a quick break and then 0:16:52.196 --> 0:16:55.436 come back with more of my conversation with Krein Bailey Ray. 0:17:00.116 --> 0:17:03.596 We're back with Karin Bailey Ray. So you really you 0:17:03.716 --> 0:17:05.916 weren't thinking of it as a side project. Just as 0:17:05.956 --> 0:17:10.676 a way to trick yourself into being a bit more 0:17:10.876 --> 0:17:12.916 outside of your comfort zone and music making. You were 0:17:13.036 --> 0:17:16.556 legitimately thinking about this as something that would not have 0:17:16.636 --> 0:17:17.236 your name on it. 0:17:17.236 --> 0:17:19.116 It wouldn't have my name on it, and then I thought, oh, 0:17:19.116 --> 0:17:22.036 I'd like, you know, people could be pleasantly surprised if 0:17:22.076 --> 0:17:23.876 they found out that it was me. But I was 0:17:23.916 --> 0:17:26.676 really I think because as soon as I thought of 0:17:26.716 --> 0:17:29.636 it as a side project, then I just felt completely free. 0:17:30.316 --> 0:17:33.196 I'm not doing it for a label, and it doesn't 0:17:33.236 --> 0:17:35.556 have to have radio songs. It doesn't have to have 0:17:35.596 --> 0:17:37.796 three minute songs. They don't have to be catchy, they 0:17:37.796 --> 0:17:40.236 don't have a tradition, have to have a traditional form, 0:17:40.676 --> 0:17:43.196 you know, like some of them don't have a second verse, 0:17:43.276 --> 0:17:45.316 or some of them have no choruses, or some of 0:17:45.316 --> 0:17:48.076 them have eight verses, or whatever it is. 0:17:48.676 --> 0:17:50.676 I just wanted to make and I wanted it to be. 0:17:50.676 --> 0:17:53.756 Kind of messy, and I felt all the time really 0:17:53.796 --> 0:17:54.636 excited that. 0:17:55.676 --> 0:17:55.876 You know. 0:17:56.196 --> 0:17:59.036 I think before I would have had a song like 0:17:59.156 --> 0:18:02.876 before the Throne of the Invisible God. And then thought, Okay, 0:18:02.916 --> 0:18:05.316 what else can it do? Maybe I should put in 0:18:05.316 --> 0:18:06.876 a middle eight, or maybe I should now have got 0:18:06.876 --> 0:18:08.116 to get it smaller, and I've got. 0:18:07.956 --> 0:18:10.676 To get it shorter. Could the beat did it? You know? 0:18:10.716 --> 0:18:12.476 And I just where does that come from? 0:18:12.516 --> 0:18:12.716 In you? 0:18:12.876 --> 0:18:15.276 I think it's just for years of being a label, 0:18:15.516 --> 0:18:18.036 you know, where you're interacting with people. I mean, when 0:18:18.076 --> 0:18:21.676