Speaker 1: There's a turd in Saturday. You can't go there.
Speaker 2: Hey all, you cool cats and kittens. Welcome to Midnight
Speaker 2: Chats and episode ninety two, here with James Acaster as
Speaker 2: tonight's guest. This is an episode that I recorded a
Speaker 2: few weeks ago. Actually actually maybe more than that, because
Speaker 2: it was before quarantine. It was before the lockdown and
Speaker 2: coronavirus had really taken a hold, So yeah, it was
Speaker 2: of a freer time when I met James and we
Speaker 2: originally we met up to discuss a new podcast we
Speaker 2: would have launched by now. It's been a little bit delayed,
Speaker 2: but it is coming now on the twenty fourth of April,
Speaker 2: James Acaster's Perfect Sounds. It is a podcast version of
Speaker 2: his book that you might be aware of, which was
Speaker 2: called Perfect Sound Whatever, and that was a book of
Speaker 2: his favorite albums from the year twenty sixteen. There's a
Speaker 2: whole story about why twenty six which we get into
Speaker 2: a little bit in this podcast to fill you in
Speaker 2: on that. James had a really terrible twenty seventeen, which
Speaker 2: happened from the very beginning of the year when in
Speaker 2: January he was dumped by his girlfriend. So to get
Speaker 2: over this heartbreak and there were some other things going
Speaker 2: on in his career. I believe he went and listened
Speaker 2: to all the new music that he could find on
Speaker 2: those end of year lists that were still floating around
Speaker 2: from twenty sixteen, and he became completely obsessed by the
Speaker 2: music on these lists. He has bought now to day,
Speaker 2: at this point in time, he has bought over six
Speaker 2: hundred albums from the year twenty sixteen, and he's written
Speaker 2: the book about it, and now he's making this podcast
Speaker 2: about it, which, as I say, starts on the twenty
Speaker 2: fourth of April on the BBC Sounds app. I'm sure
Speaker 2: you know loads of James's work. He's got incredible Netflix special.
Speaker 2: If you've not seen that, I'd really recommend it Parter.
Speaker 2: It's incredible. It's very clever, very smart stand up comedy.
Speaker 2: And he has his own podcast as well as this
Speaker 2: new one which he hosts with Ed Gamble, the comedian
Speaker 2: Ed Gamble, which is where we start the conversation. I
Speaker 2: put a load of links in the description of this
Speaker 2: podcast because there's a hell of a lot of music
Speaker 2: that he talks about, loads of stuff, loads of obscure things,
Speaker 2: and just include a few of those that's all you
Speaker 2: need to know. Thank you for downloading, Thank you for
Speaker 2: sticking with Midnight Chats during these strange times. Hopefully it's
Speaker 2: keeping you company. There's plenty there if you've not listened
Speaker 2: to all of them. Some of them are better than others,
Speaker 2: that's for sure. I feel like we've got better as
Speaker 2: time goes on. There'll be another one next week and
Speaker 2: then we'll see how it goes. Hopefully we'll get some
Speaker 2: more together soon. But in the meantime, if you do
Speaker 2: want to support us in any way, the best way
Speaker 2: to do that is to just give a donation at
Speaker 2: loudon quiet dot com forward slash subscribe. It can be
Speaker 2: for any amount. If that is. If now is a
Speaker 2: bad time for that, that's completely fine. Just to ignore
Speaker 2: that enjoy this podcast. But that is the way that
Speaker 2: you can support us if you would like to. In
Speaker 2: the meantime. This is James Acaster on Midnight Chat number
Speaker 2: ninety two. You would have been told this fact today,
Speaker 2: I'm sure, but we're currently in the we're in the
Speaker 2: basement of a restaurant. But this used to be the
Speaker 2: live lounge.
Speaker 1: Yes, for radio, so it pretty mad to think about it, actually,
Speaker 1: But yeah, it's a restaurant now and called Caravan, and
Speaker 1: downstairs he this was the live lounge and then sold
Speaker 1: it to Caravan, and then they still let us come
Speaker 1: in here and record if we want to. So that's
Speaker 1: pretty good.
Speaker 2: We're here to talk about a new podcast. But your
Speaker 2: podcast you do with edes off menu, what's the setup
Speaker 2: like that? I'm guessing you don't record that in the
Speaker 2: basement of Caravan.
Speaker 1: We don't go to the live lounge to do that. No, No,
Speaker 1: we just record it wherever we can sometimes wherever that
Speaker 1: it is best for the guests, and the setting is
Speaker 1: always the same, which is the dream restaurant. So wherever
Speaker 1: we are, we just set it in the guests dream
Speaker 1: setting for a meal.
Speaker 2: You've done like fifty odd of those now.
Speaker 1: It's done a lot, yeah, coaching fifty Yeah, definitely.
Speaker 2: It seems to be going very well.
Speaker 1: It's been really fun. I'm really glad that. I mean, yeah,
Speaker 1: you start off a podcast at because it's a conversation
Speaker 1: that you have with your mate all the time, and
Speaker 1: so you're like, well, let's do a podcast about it now.
Speaker 1: Because we're always talking about what our favorite dishes are
Speaker 1: that we've ever had anywhere, So when it was If
Speaker 1: we're having that conversation, may as well continue to have
Speaker 1: it and record it, and you don't expect anyone else
Speaker 1: to listen to it, and it's really nice when they do.
Speaker 2: Everyone seems to get into it. Yeah, that you've had
Speaker 2: from the ones I've listened to, everyone's yeah, like up
Speaker 2: for it. If you had anyone who's like, maybe not
Speaker 2: not been as keen, there's to go with it.
Speaker 1: One episode that hasn't come out yet. There is coming out,
Speaker 1: I don't think in this series, but maybe in the
Speaker 1: next series where I clash with the guests in a
Speaker 1: way that is unanticipated and so apparent and obvious. That
Speaker 1: that's why I'm fine saying it, because people will when
Speaker 1: you get to the episode, you'll know which one it is.
Speaker 1: And it's not that they don't go with the episode.
Speaker 1: Actually more than happy to talk about food, but they're
Speaker 1: not happy to go with me.
Speaker 2: Right, Okay. He was just someone that you.
Speaker 1: I've never met him before, you're not met him before.
Speaker 2: It's an old boy.
Speaker 1: He did not like, he did not really get why
Speaker 1: I was pretending to be a genie and pretending to
Speaker 1: be a waiter, and he did not understand what my
Speaker 1: sense of humor was and so very much. He bodied
Speaker 1: up with had on that and they were friends, and
Speaker 1: I was My confidence evaporates almost instantly, and then even
Speaker 1: more so as the episode goes on. So it will
Speaker 1: be very obvious which one that is okay?
Speaker 2: And that's that's coming up soon?
Speaker 1: Is it ex Well, it's coming out in I think
Speaker 1: maybe the fourth series. Okay one, the third series as
Speaker 1: we speak now, I don't think it's in this series.
Speaker 1: I think it's going to be in the next You've
Speaker 1: recorded a lot in advance.
Speaker 2: I don't even want I'm not even going to ask
Speaker 2: you who it is. I'm gonna no.
Speaker 1: I think it's more fun.
Speaker 2: It's more fun to just yeah, find it, Yeah, and absolutely.
Speaker 1: No, yeah, because it will be it's so obvious. Don't
Speaker 1: if if you isn't a one in your unsure, I think, oh,
Speaker 1: maybe it's that one. It's not that one. That one
Speaker 1: was fine, and it's just you thinking that I had
Speaker 1: more of an awkward time than I did. But it's
Speaker 1: very obvious which one it is.
Speaker 2: There's that podcast, but you're about to launch this new podcast,
Speaker 2: which is essentially why we're here. Yes, it's like the
Speaker 2: podcast version of your book which was called perfect Perfect
Speaker 2: Sounds whatever. Yes, podcast has dropped or whatever, isn't it?
Speaker 2: It's just Perfect Sounds.
Speaker 1: Is that? Yeah? So that the book's called Perfect Sound whatever,
Speaker 1: and the podcast is called Perfect Sounds James Acaster's Perfect Sounds.
Speaker 1: And it's all about me deciding that twenty sixteen is
Speaker 1: the greatest year for music of all time. And I
Speaker 1: decide that because I've become obsessed with it, because in
Speaker 1: twenty seventeen, I have a bad personal year, and I
Speaker 1: deal with that by obsessively buying music from the previous
Speaker 1: year twenty sixteen, And I now own over six hundred
Speaker 1: albums that came out that year, and so I can't
Speaker 1: deny it's the greatest year.
Speaker 2: It's hard to be.
Speaker 1: Well, I just found the most amount of albums that
Speaker 1: I like, for you know, there's no other year in
Speaker 1: history where I have that many albums that I love. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And like you know, there's like all the albums I've bought,
Speaker 1: I like them, but then there's you know, hundreds that
Speaker 1: I love within that, and so you can't then go, now,
Speaker 1: that's not that Nah, I'm going to say that nineteen
Speaker 1: seventy one is because everyone else says that, and so
Speaker 1: I don't want to look stupid, so I'm going to
Speaker 1: agree with everyone and say, no, yeah, it's not in
Speaker 1: seventy one, because all those albums come out when really
Speaker 1: I don't listen to those albums. The albums that I
Speaker 1: love and that I'm most obsessed with that all came
Speaker 1: out in one year are the twenty sixteen Once. So
Speaker 1: I think that the big message to all music fans,
Speaker 1: I would say, is stop worrying about other music fans
Speaker 1: thinking you're cool, because those are not the people who
Speaker 1: really love music. They don't matter. Ignore those people. They're
Speaker 1: being on the message boards, they're having a great time
Speaker 1: on there. Meanwhile, none of them are connecting to anything
Speaker 1: proper and actually enjoying themselves and getting what you're meant
Speaker 1: to get out of music, which is a strong personal
Speaker 1: connection to it. And there's the social connection as well
Speaker 1: to music, which is great. Being in a room full
Speaker 1: of people who all like the same band, watching that
Speaker 1: band live and singing along together feels like church. It's great,
Speaker 1: and I appreciate that as well. But the dream is
Speaker 1: the crossover the two you've listened to an album, you've
Speaker 1: connected with it, you've obsessed over it. You go and
Speaker 1: see that band. Everyone's like minded and the same wen
Speaker 1: you all sing along, not academically, just going around the
Speaker 1: internet going on what's the best year of music? Okay? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Is that one actually saying that with each other? No? No, no,
Speaker 1: you got the best? Is subjective?
Speaker 2: I should say favorite really Okay, but yeah, I think
Speaker 2: you're right. I think not enough people discover new stuff
Speaker 2: as well.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so.
Speaker 2: You started to listen to just contextualize this that for
Speaker 2: people that maybe haven't read the book or don't know
Speaker 2: about this podcast. As you say, twenty seventeen was.
Speaker 1: A bad year. Yeah, just for me personally, and and it.
Speaker 2: Was bad at the beginning, right because this is where
Speaker 2: this is why, this is why twenty sixteen happens, because
Speaker 2: a lot of end of year lists were still around
Speaker 2: for like the best of twenty sixteen.
Speaker 1: And they're still there now and they never get raised
Speaker 1: off the internet. That's the beauty of a project like this.
Speaker 1: They'll always have the resources there. But yeah, they'd all
Speaker 1: gone up at the end of the end of twenty sixteen,
Speaker 1: and you know, in twenty sixteen, I'd started to pay
Speaker 1: attention to come a music again, for like over a
Speaker 1: decade bothered. No, for about a decade, I'd mainly just
Speaker 1: you know, got into I'd get into new albums, but
Speaker 1: there were albums from way back when people were recommending me,
Speaker 1: going oh, yeah, have you heard you know whatever this
Speaker 1: album from the seventies or some really obscure, weird album.
Speaker 1: I'll buy those and get into that. But I wrote
Speaker 1: off modern music. I thought nothing goods getting made now,
Speaker 1: and every now and again, i'd you know, buy something
Speaker 1: that was current, but it'd have to be really heavily
Speaker 1: recommended to me. And in twenty sixteen, you know, the
Speaker 1: year kicked off in January with David Bowie dying Black
Speaker 1: Star coming out, and suddenly everyone paid attention to that
Speaker 1: album and was like, oh my god, this is album's amazing.
Speaker 1: He's talking about death and about being dead, but also
Speaker 1: musically he really was pushing himself right to the end.
Speaker 1: It's a really avn't gard jazz rock album, and it
Speaker 1: wasn't like stuff he had done in the past, So
Speaker 1: this is incredible. And like so I remember, like people
Speaker 1: talking about that, I think, okay, that sounds cool, but
Speaker 1: in my cynical brain going like, just because he died Star, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's the only reason you guys are saying it, so
Speaker 1: I could have ignored it. And then Lemonade came out
Speaker 1: later on in the year, and it wasn't just hardcore
Speaker 1: Beyonce fans that were loving that. It was like music
Speaker 1: snobs were going, no, actually, this is this is a
Speaker 1: really properly good album. She's not just done a few singles.
Speaker 1: The whole album's great, and there's a visual album to
Speaker 1: go with it, and she's really thought about thematically. The
Speaker 1: whole thing ties together, and like, you know, all my
Speaker 1: social media was are washed with people going nuts for it,
Speaker 1: and I was like, I haven't seen this happen in
Speaker 1: a while, with like a really mainstream pop artist and
Speaker 1: everyone going crazy about an album they've done. And then
Speaker 1: Frank Coshan released Blonde in August, and you know, I
Speaker 1: remember this. I was hearing that nish Kuma, a friend
Speaker 1: of mine and comedian, was playing it around the flat
Speaker 1: we were living in at the time, and I assumed,
Speaker 1: you know that it was playing Ivy, the second track
Speaker 1: on the album. As for what an amazing song, and
Speaker 1: surely this has just passed me by. It's probably a
Speaker 1: song from way back when, and I'm old and I'm
Speaker 1: out of touch and whatever. And I said to Nisch,
Speaker 1: what's this? He said, it was released today. It's by
Speaker 1: Frank Oshin. It's his new album, and the album's amazing.
Speaker 1: And then seeing everyone evangelizing about that album online, I
Speaker 1: was like, maybe I've been wrong about current music and
Speaker 1: I should engage with it a bit more. So I
Speaker 1: started to read those ends of year lists when you know,
Speaker 1: November on woulds they start kind of like slowly December,
Speaker 1: there's loads of them. And then in January twenty seventeen,
Speaker 1: where my relationship broke up, I instantly retreated to the
Speaker 1: most recent thing that had brought me comfort, which was
Speaker 1: listening to these albums, which is reading those lists, buy
Speaker 1: a new music and listening to those albums. And so
Speaker 1: I continue to do that until I you know, the
Speaker 1: plan was just like just every time you feel sad,
Speaker 1: just do that. Pretty much all that year I felt sad,
Speaker 1: So every single night it was obsessively by an albums,
Speaker 1: six or seven albums a night sometimes, and you know,
Speaker 1: finding the time to listen to them, going back to
Speaker 1: some more than others, and that kind of you know,
Speaker 1: it's gradually got less and less as time has gone
Speaker 1: on and the reason for doing it has become different.
Speaker 1: I'm not going on it every time I feel sad. Now.
Speaker 1: If I do do it, i'm doing it out of
Speaker 1: curiosity because someone's recommended me something. But it just kind
Speaker 1: of continued even past twenty seventeen.
Speaker 2: So are you still doing it now?
Speaker 1: I found an album last night that I really like,
Speaker 1: so it was when I have to look at this
Speaker 1: on my phone because I don't know how to pronounce
Speaker 1: the name. It's a really weird like electronic, kind of
Speaker 1: noisy electronic album. We spoken word over the top of it.
Speaker 1: It's by mplex E Double M P l E k Z.
Speaker 1: It's called rook to t N thirty four and it's
Speaker 1: this Guy.
Speaker 2: That's a good title.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it is a good title. And it's this weird
Speaker 1: electronic like little soundscapes in the background, I think, but
Speaker 1: like horrible grumpy noises and this guy over the top
Speaker 1: going there's a turd in Saturday. You can't go there,
Speaker 1: but it an identified arm in the bagging area and
Speaker 1: saying stuff like that over the top of it. I
Speaker 1: was absolutely on board for this.
Speaker 2: I'm on board for this.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's great, and it is also a lot of time,
Speaker 1: it becomes stuff where you go, If I'm buying this
Speaker 1: much music from one year and an album like that,
Speaker 1: I can't just ignore that. An album that is like that,
Speaker 1: and that is a man to talking like that over me.
Speaker 1: I can't go, Well, I'm meant to be the foremost,
Speaker 1: you know, the main number one scholar on twenty sixteen music,
Speaker 1: but I'll ignore the album. We're a guy saying there's
Speaker 1: no turd in Saturday over the top of a weird
Speaker 1: electronic you know, little horrible keyboard noise. So yeah, I
Speaker 1: had to buy it.
Speaker 2: I mean, and what's your been your policy? I feel
Speaker 2: I have to ask this post twenty sixteen.
Speaker 1: Uh huh?
Speaker 2: Any interesting twenty seventeen to now.
Speaker 1: Absolutely I've bought more music from twenty seventeen, twenty eighteen,
Speaker 1: twenty nineteen than I have in any year before twenty sixteen.
Speaker 2: Okay, how's it stacking up?
Speaker 1: Six? Not as many?
Speaker 2: Doing quality?
Speaker 1: Oh? Quality wise? Well, I guess it's all relative, because
Speaker 1: like I've bought less albums from each year. Yeah, so
Speaker 1: you know, I've not I've definitely not exceeded one hundred
Speaker 1: mark in any of those years since, probably not even
Speaker 1: exceeded the fifty mark. But maybe I've been nudging fifty
Speaker 1: on each year that I've bought. But I'd say that
Speaker 1: each year, I've ended up with between you know, two
Speaker 1: or five albums that are gonna stay with me for
Speaker 1: a very long time and some of them will become
Speaker 1: my favorites of all time. And uh yeah, twenty sixteen,
Speaker 1: there's like hundreds of those. But like, I still think
Speaker 1: that's that's more than I was finding each year before.
Speaker 1: You know, But before I did this project, at the
Speaker 1: end of every year, it wasn't like I've got a
Speaker 1: new album that came out this year that is now
Speaker 1: gonna stay with me for hrases and become one of
Speaker 1: my favorite albums. That wasn't happening. So I wasn't looking
Speaker 1: for anything. And now that I am engaged more, you know.
Speaker 1: In twenty seventeen, I found Hope by Shemir, amazing album.
Speaker 1: It's one of my favorite albums ever. In twenty eighteen,
Speaker 1: I was listening to Everything's Fine by Geene Gray and
Speaker 1: Kuile Cris. That's one of my favorite albums ever, you know,
Speaker 1: And like twenty nineteen, I'm trying to think about what
Speaker 1: the album was that I would have said was my
Speaker 1: favorite one of last year. I mean, I know there
Speaker 1: was a lot, so it's really, this is really gonna
Speaker 1: annoy me and I'm gonna cut and I come away
Speaker 1: from this and go, why didn't you just say that
Speaker 1: album which is clearly your favorite? But there was a
Speaker 1: lot last year. There was the Clipping album that came
Speaker 1: out last year was.
Speaker 2: Like, oh, the one, the Blood, the Blood one.
Speaker 1: There exist There existed an Addiction to Blood and it
Speaker 1: was like a horrorcore wrap album and that really blew
Speaker 1: my mind.
Speaker 2: And did you hear their record from twenty sixteen?
Speaker 1: I did. I Got a Splendor of Misery from twenty
Speaker 1: sixteen and their EP Wriggle that came out in twenty sixteen,
Speaker 1: So they released two projects, and yeah, really like those.
Speaker 1: I'd say I'd love that Existed to Blood even more
Speaker 1: because I think it's like more focused. But I love
Speaker 1: that they released a concept album in twenty sixteen set
Speaker 1: in the future about astronaut who's a slave who escapes
Speaker 1: the slave ship and flees across the vastest of space
Speaker 1: and falls in love with the ship that he hijacks
Speaker 1: and they have a relationship together. I think It's amazing
Speaker 1: that they released that album and incorporated like spirituals and
Speaker 1: stuff into the album as well. There's a lot of
Speaker 1: great hooks in it. Dabby Diggs was an amazing rapper,
Speaker 1: so that was what got me into that band. Was
Speaker 1: so through that got into a whole band and continue
Speaker 1: to follow their career, which is again something I wasn't
Speaker 1: doing before doing this project. I wasn't following bands careers
Speaker 1: as they happen and evolve. I was going back and
Speaker 1: finding dead bands and finding what they were up to.
Speaker 1: Now I can anticipate albums, which is a great feeling.
Speaker 2: What were you So, what were you when you grew up?
Speaker 2: What were you growing up listening to?
Speaker 1: Way back well when I was in primary school. So
Speaker 1: I got into music pretty early on for going to
Speaker 1: church and stuff. I'm not religious anymore, but I was
Speaker 1: raising a Christian family and going to church. There was
Speaker 1: a like a rock band church, one of those churches,
Speaker 1: like a hip call church, a hip called church, and
Speaker 1: people are kind of like you, pretty breezey Christians. And
Speaker 1: I loved watching the band and the drummer especially, and
Speaker 1: I started learning drums when I was seven. I remember
Speaker 1: like first into music was like, you know, all the
Speaker 1: big popular songs that everyone knows and that are funny
Speaker 1: as well, Like music had to be slightly funny. So
Speaker 1: like down Under, that down Under song by men at Work,
Speaker 1: I just found it hilarious and so I loved it.
Speaker 1: I loved rocking all over the world because the idea
Speaker 1: of rocking all over the world was mad, Like there's
Speaker 1: the thing, what that would be high host silver lining?
Speaker 1: I loved it, you know, and songs like that. Obviously,
Speaker 1: I loved in the Jungle, the Mighty Jungle. I'm not
Speaker 1: made of stone, so like, you know, stuff like that
Speaker 1: all the time. And then like kind of starting in
Speaker 1: primary school, I was loving this pop music. I really
Speaker 1: loved whatever was in the charts, you know. I was
Speaker 1: Aquard Dr Jones and Barbie Girl, who not many people
Speaker 1: would leave with Doctor Jones, but that was my favorite
Speaker 1: one of the two.
Speaker 2: That's a deep cut for the real Aqua fans.
Speaker 1: And then like heavily into Oasis for a while, heavily
Speaker 1: into the Spies Girls for their first album, and then
Speaker 1: heavily not into them immedia after that. Yeah, but like
Speaker 1: you know, still see that as a very what was at.
Speaker 2: The school you went to what was the thing. Because
Speaker 2: I grew up in Essex and the thing that we
Speaker 2: got really into Oasis was the Yeah, the whole school
Speaker 2: got into that. You had to like Oasis even if
Speaker 2: you didn't like Oasis, Yes, you know what was what
Speaker 2: was that? Were you in like? Were you in step
Speaker 2: with your friends and the rest of the school.
Speaker 1: Not so much? Oasis wasn't Yeah, not many people liked
Speaker 1: Oasis and stuff in my school that I remember. It
Speaker 1: was more East seventeen Spice girls, all those Peter Andre
Speaker 1: foot while everyone liked Peter Andre and you know, all
Speaker 1: the boys had to aspire to have six packs and
Speaker 1: all this kind of stuff. There's a touch shop called
Speaker 1: Flavor in our school, spelled the way Peter Andre spelled
Speaker 1: it f l a va. So it's like all that
Speaker 1: kind of you know, people were into that kintry.
Speaker 2: They really liked, they really liked on people.
Speaker 1: Love Peter Andre. For a while it was like really big,
Speaker 1: but like, yeah, outside of that, people weren't really into
Speaker 1: guitar bands as much. Okay, yeah and things. So I
Speaker 1: was into a bis a lot until that. I mean
Speaker 1: I basically was into the first two Oasist albums and
Speaker 1: then I thought be here now. On the day it
Speaker 1: came out, listened to it once, decided it's the best
Speaker 1: time I've ever heard, listened to it a second time
Speaker 1: and was really disappointed.
Speaker 2: Didn't come out the week that Princess Diana died, yes,
Speaker 2: or something like that, which then I think the band
Speaker 2: might blame for the reason it Yeah, I mean it's
Speaker 2: still sold loads.
Speaker 1: Interesting reason to blame, yeah, because I understand if it
Speaker 1: didn't sell much, you would blame it on that. But
Speaker 1: it makes no sense with the biggest band in the
Speaker 1: world and we made no money, I guess because we
Speaker 1: have a car crashed into a swimming pool in the
Speaker 1: front of our album. People thought that was bad days
Speaker 1: because Princess Anna has just died, that'd be fair enough.
Speaker 1: But you sold loads and people said it was so
Speaker 1: that's not that's not because I thought that they were
Speaker 1: listening to it and there was a cloud hanging over
Speaker 1: us because of the death of Princess Diana, and then
Speaker 1: we couldn't enjoy We couldn't enjoy it, you know, do
Speaker 1: you know what I mean? So like it was, it
Speaker 1: was more that it was just wasn't as musically dense
Speaker 1: and rich, and the melodies weren't as memorable as the
Speaker 1: first Those first two albums, God, it's like everything about
Speaker 1: them is. Yeah, it is great that there's the rawness
Speaker 1: of the first album, and the second album, which is
Speaker 1: the one that I connected to the most at that age,
Speaker 1: has just got so many memorable songs and hooks on
Speaker 1: there and it's executed perfectly, and that third one is
Speaker 1: just not as much to it. You could of get
Speaker 1: the it's all surface layer, and then the next listening
Speaker 1: has nothing really more to it than the initial hook
Speaker 1: that was on there. Okay, so you know that was it?
Speaker 1: That was it, guys. It wasn't die, It wasn't business.
Speaker 2: So when did you start, because you you're a drummer,
Speaker 2: you've drummed in bands. When did you what? What type
Speaker 2: of what style of band was that? Like an was
Speaker 2: your first band? Like an OACC band?
Speaker 1: No, it's by the time was in bands I liked,
Speaker 1: Like I was listening, I was reading krang and stuff
Speaker 1: like that and really liked metal and punk grunge especially,
Speaker 1: and I wanted to be in those kind of bands. So,
Speaker 1: like I was a third teen fourteen, I started playing
Speaker 1: in bands with the people in school and they were
Speaker 1: all into the same stuff. So we were just covering
Speaker 1: smells like teen Spirit, bored by the Deaftones, the songs
Speaker 1: that walk by Pantera, who were doing all those kind
Speaker 1: of songs. By the time I started writing music in
Speaker 1: the band, we were doing like new metal for our
Speaker 1: sins and it was like all kind of But we
Speaker 1: had two guitarists who were very good guitarists, one of
Speaker 1: which was like a you know, a child prodigy who
Speaker 1: should have gone somewhere, but you know, no one ever
Speaker 1: really nurtured his talent when they should have. But this
Speaker 1: kid was like, amazing.
Speaker 2: What's he doing? Do you know what he's doing now?
Speaker 1: No idea what Matthew Butler's doing now? I hope he's
Speaker 1: doing well. He I bet he's still an amazing guitarist.
Speaker 1: Like he'll still be shredding probably in a pub in
Speaker 1: like a pub rock band and everyone's like, I'm sorry,
Speaker 1: who the fuck is that? Because why is he here?
Speaker 1: Like it was just so good and like there was.
Speaker 2: Always one kid in the school that's was his kids
Speaker 2: at your school.
Speaker 1: At my school. Yeah, just you know, he won't mind
Speaker 1: me saying this bottom set for everything. Yeah, and just
Speaker 1: in the incredible guitarist, and it's the failings of the
Speaker 1: teachers to not go, Okay, he needs to do that
Speaker 1: for a living, because otherwise he's not gonna you know,
Speaker 1: you know, like these other things aren't for him. And
Speaker 1: that's fine. You don't have to be good at maths.
Speaker 1: You don't have to be like that doesn't have to
Speaker 1: be a life. He's he's better at the guitar than
Speaker 1: anyone else is at any subject in his year. So
Speaker 1: we need to nurture that, not just write off music
Speaker 1: and go no, well, that's not a proper thing. It
Speaker 1: is a proper thing. People do it for a living,
Speaker 1: so like you can easily make it his job and
Speaker 1: you're not bothering because at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: you're not actually very good at your jobs. So awful stuff,
Speaker 1: you know. I really hope he has found a way
Speaker 1: of making that work, but I haven't heard from him.
Speaker 1: But he was just like, we do new metal songs
Speaker 1: and then suddenly there's this Joe Saturani style solo just
Speaker 1: midway through and everyone will be like, wow, that's different,
Speaker 1: and that was like.
Speaker 2: You know, what was your singer?
Speaker 1: Like we never settled on a singer, okay.
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, we had, did you all take turns in that?
Speaker 1: Because are you just no? We had different singers. We
Speaker 1: had a couple of gigs with nice singer and about
Speaker 1: four gigs with different singers, and the longest serving there
Speaker 1: was this guy who just he would sing really nice
Speaker 1: in the band practices and then scream on stage and
Speaker 1: we were like, can you please just sing nicely like
Speaker 1: we've asked you to and he was like, yeah, yeah, yah,
Speaker 1: I'll do it next time, and then he would scream again.
Speaker 2: What was that just a nerves thing like you'd get up.
Speaker 1: I guess it must have been a adrenaline. May there
Speaker 1: must have been a nerves thing that he was like
Speaker 1: or that in the moment of doing the gig. It's
Speaker 1: what made sense to him was he would also like
Speaker 1: he would always like he'd always put a dress on
Speaker 1: as well. He had a floral dress and he would
Speaker 1: put that on, which he hadn't run that bias either,
Speaker 1: but we didn't care as much because who cares, But
Speaker 1: like it was like, okay, that's cool, Like you know,
Speaker 1: enjoyed a bit of a performance there and you've got
Speaker 1: a stage outfit, but then just screaming, and it's like,
Speaker 1: I love screaming as much as the next person in music,
Speaker 1: as long as it suits the songs. Really didn't, It
Speaker 1: really didn't at all.
Speaker 2: So when did you When was the last time you drumed?
Speaker 1: You?
Speaker 2: Do you still? Do you have a kit?
Speaker 1: Do you play well? I'm weirdly so in like I
Speaker 1: think five days time or like six days time. I'm
Speaker 1: going home to Ketherin. I'm getting my old drum kit,
Speaker 1: which I haven't played in. It's been in its drum
Speaker 1: cases for twelve years. Just gathern dustin. Nothing has happened
Speaker 1: to it. I'm going to load it in the car,
Speaker 1: go back to London, unpack it in the studio, not
Speaker 1: tune it, and after having not practiced drums in twelve years,
Speaker 1: I'm going to record drums all day for two days,
Speaker 1: and with an out of tune drum kit with absolutely
Speaker 1: the rustiest I've ever been.
Speaker 2: Is this for a particular reason?
Speaker 1: Yes?
Speaker 2: Is it a reason you can tell me about?
Speaker 1: Yeah? I think so. It's it's a project I wanted
Speaker 1: to I just kind of I played drums like so,
Speaker 1: I actually myself at least album in twenty sixteen. Well,
Speaker 1: oh hang, so it's the only bit of drumming that
Speaker 1: I have done since being in bands. But where there's
Speaker 1: a load of bands that I used to know from school,
Speaker 1: and I was a fan of theirs and bought their
Speaker 1: demos they would sell at gigs, and they've each got
Speaker 1: at least one song that I thought, I still think
Speaker 1: today is an amazing song. I was like, oh, no, ie'
Speaker 1: I never hear these songs. All these bands are broken
Speaker 1: up now. So in twenty sixteen, I got everyone kind
Speaker 1: of back together almost into the studio. I played drums,
Speaker 1: but I only got things like I got each song
Speaker 1: right once, you know, like everything else was so rusty.
Speaker 1: I can't even play standard drum beats anymore. But we
Speaker 1: recorded them all again as like indie grunge songs and
Speaker 1: released this album. So that's the last bit of drumming
Speaker 1: i've done.
Speaker 2: What's that album called.
Speaker 1: It's called Lunar Dot Raids the Bee Litty. It's called
Speaker 1: Lunar Dot Raids the Bee Pidgin And it's because it's
Speaker 1: made up of all the different band names, right, okay,
Speaker 1: so that I couldn't be bothered to come out with
Speaker 1: a new band name. So I took one word from
Speaker 1: each of the old bands and put them together. It's
Speaker 1: best I could to make a sentence, and.
Speaker 2: Can I hear this? Can people listen to this? Band camp?
Speaker 1: Band camp? And all the money goes to the youth
Speaker 1: centers where we used to practice as teenagers. So we're
Speaker 1: getting no money from it. If you it's it's a
Speaker 1: paywe you want album, but any money that you do
Speaker 1: donate to it goes to these youth centers.
Speaker 2: Has it got the threading guitarist?
Speaker 1: It hasn't, because it's songs that were written by bands.
Speaker 1: I wasn't in bands that I was a fan of
Speaker 1: right locally, and he's not on it. I've lost contact
Speaker 1: with him, and he didn't plan on it, and it
Speaker 1: would have been inappropriate to suddenly have a shredding guitar
Speaker 1: solo on any of these songs. The guitar was mainly
Speaker 1: done by a comedian friend of mine called Rob Dearan,
Speaker 1: who is a genius guitarist, and I knew I could
Speaker 1: play many songs and he could figure out how to
Speaker 1: do it in a grunge style, and I enjoyed that
Speaker 1: so much. I really loved making that album to a
Speaker 1: point where I didn't think I was I was. I
Speaker 1: was surprised at how much. I thought I was doing
Speaker 1: it to get it out my system. I'm the kind
Speaker 1: of person who, once I've got an idea to do something,
Speaker 1: if I don't do it, it's going to really bug me.
Speaker 1: So I was just doing it to get it out
Speaker 1: my system. It and I really loved being in the
Speaker 1: studio with my friends and recorded music and it being
Speaker 1: a fun thing that, you know, had no basis in
Speaker 1: my career. There wasn't any kind of like, you know,
Speaker 1: path to be taken off and any goal with it.
Speaker 1: It was just doing it for the love of it
Speaker 1: and doing it with my friends. And so I went
Speaker 1: to do something else like that, but I was like, well,
Speaker 1: I don't know, you know, anything else that I do musically,
Speaker 1: I'd have to start from square one, you know, I'd
Speaker 1: have to start like writing original songs, and I'm not
Speaker 1: good enough to do that. I haven't played drums in ages.
Speaker 1: My drum is going to be absolutely shit. I can't
Speaker 1: do that. And so I thought, well, I'll make that
Speaker 1: the basis of the album then, and I'll I'll make
Speaker 1: the facts that I'm completely out of practice and completely
Speaker 1: I've neglected my I used to, you know, teach the drums.
Speaker 1: I was properly. I played for hours a day, and
Speaker 1: I taught kids the drums as a job, you know,
Speaker 1: So like I'm and now in comparison, I'm awful. You know,
Speaker 1: I've neglected this talent completely, and I want to do
Speaker 1: an album that's essentially about that, so that contrasts what
Speaker 1: happens when you completely neglect something and when you nurture it.
Speaker 1: So I'm doing, you know, two days of awful, well
Speaker 1: of my best. I'm gonna try my best. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: try and do it for a joke sounding shit, but
Speaker 1: I'm going to deliberately do it on an out of
Speaker 1: tune drum kit, trying to play the best that I
Speaker 1: possibly can just drums, just drums. Cut that into tracks,
Speaker 1: and then the next week we're getting a professional drummer
Speaker 1: in who is one of my heroes, who's going to
Speaker 1: come in and he's going to tune the drum kit,
Speaker 1: same drum kit, and then play over the stuff that
Speaker 1: I've played and do either accompaniment to what I've done
Speaker 1: or better versions of what I've done, like proper versions
Speaker 1: of it, and then we're going to mix it in
Speaker 1: a way that that kind of showcases both of them
Speaker 1: and contrast them both, and then there's some other musicians
Speaker 1: have got lined up who are gonna do stuff over
Speaker 1: the top of that afterwards. But the imediate stuff that's
Speaker 1: happening next week is me and this other drummer.
Speaker 2: Is the Okay, you'd had to say, who the other
Speaker 2: drummer is?
Speaker 1: Is that seb Rockford who is from Polar Bear and
Speaker 1: all those. He's a jazz drummer. He's a proper yeah,
Speaker 1: one of my heroes. Can you play jazz drums with
Speaker 1: that sort of thing that you would play used to
Speaker 1: be able to play a bit jazz drums. But he's
Speaker 1: a very versatile drummer. He's been in loads of bands
Speaker 1: that have fused jazz with all manner of genres. He
Speaker 1: I actually met him through doing this BBC podcast. We
Speaker 1: did an episode about the John bapp album where now
Speaker 1: when the drum drumming on that is incredible and the
Speaker 1: whole album started off with drums and then everything was
Speaker 1: built around it. So I wanted to get drummers in
Speaker 1: to talk about it. I've got Adam Betts, who's an
Speaker 1: amazing drummer with square pusher and acts like that, to
Speaker 1: come in a solo artist in his own rights and
Speaker 1: an entirely drum solo album that came out in twenty sixteen,
Speaker 1: which is incredible called Colossal Squid. And Seib Rockford came
Speaker 1: in and did that episode as well, and there was
Speaker 1: like two drum kits set up with those two, and
Speaker 1: I talked to him about the drumming on this album
Speaker 1: and how much we love it. It's like a bonus
Speaker 1: episode for the podcast. It's like a longer deep dive
Speaker 1: into We've got these bonus episodes that are longer and
Speaker 1: investigate albums a lot more. And I met him through that.
Speaker 1: You know, he did the episode of the podcast and
Speaker 1: just played those different styles of drumming on it. I
Speaker 1: tried to show him one of my drug meats that
Speaker 1: I used to put. The production team forced me to
Speaker 1: show him a thing I had done, and to my surprise,
Speaker 1: he really liked it and sent me a very nice
Speaker 1: email about about it because I've been thinking about that
Speaker 1: drum beat you did a lot, and I just then
Speaker 1: confessed to him in the moment, I wrote that drum
Speaker 1: beat when I was in a band and obsessed with
Speaker 1: his drumming, and it's the beat is me copying him.
Speaker 1: The probably way you like it, because it's me just
Speaker 1: trying to sound like you when I was seventeen. And then,
Speaker 1: you know, I just seized it. I already had the
Speaker 1: idea for this album in my head, and I thought,
Speaker 1: I'll just I'll ask him if he wants to do it.
Speaker 1: And I was astounded that he would have been my
Speaker 1: first choice anyway. I never thought I would have got him.
Speaker 1: And yeah, I can't believe he's gonna do it.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 1: You know, it's just a bit of fun for me.
Speaker 1: But that's why I'm talking about it so enthusiastically. It
Speaker 1: is so much fun.
Speaker 2: So the new podcast is you're going to go through
Speaker 2: fifty of your six hundred records, Yeah, with different different
Speaker 2: comedians going to join you. Yes, you're playing. You're gonna
Speaker 2: have twenty five guests, right, and they're all gonna listen
Speaker 2: to two each.
Speaker 1: Yes, So I've got there's fifty episodes, twenty five guests,
Speaker 1: two episodes each, and each episode I've sent them an
Speaker 1: album in advance, which is one of my favorite albums,
Speaker 1: not just from twenty sixteen but from all time. And
Speaker 1: they are going to come on the podcast and they're
Speaker 1: going to tell me what they think of it, and
Speaker 1: I'm going to tell them what I think of it
Speaker 1: and why I love it, and by the end of
Speaker 1: each episode, I'm going to see if they will admit
Speaker 1: that twenty sixteen is the great year for music of
Speaker 1: all time. And so you know that gives the you know,
Speaker 1: the listener, if it's an obscure album you've never heard before,
Speaker 1: you don't need to worry about not knowing what on
Speaker 1: about because the other person I've got on as a guest,
Speaker 1: they've only just heard. So we're it's it's someone who
Speaker 1: loves something told us someone who is a novice to it,
Speaker 1: new to it.
Speaker 2: Sure, and do you most of them? Most of the
Speaker 2: fifty I know you've got. I know you've got some
Speaker 2: big ones like Lemonade's going to be in there, and
Speaker 2: Blonde is going to be.
Speaker 1: Black Star, Run the Jewels Free.
Speaker 2: Some of the big stuff is going to be in there,
Speaker 2: but there's also some really obscure stuff. I've assume what
Speaker 2: is there in there that the album that you like
Speaker 2: that is from a Ned Flanders tribute band that.
Speaker 1: Is not in there?
Speaker 2: Can you just explain what that record? Because I read
Speaker 2: about that being in because it's in the book yes,
Speaker 2: and I listened to them today. I listen to a
Speaker 2: song by them called White Wine Spirit Step. They are.
Speaker 2: To describe them, they're like a metalcore band, yes, called
Speaker 2: what are they called?
Speaker 1: They're called Oakley Docally, Okay Docally. The album is called
Speaker 1: Howdy Doody and it and.
Speaker 2: They dress as Ned Flanders from The Simpsons yep, And
Speaker 2: all of the songs are based on him.
Speaker 1: And Flanders, so they're singing in Ned Flanders quotes and
Speaker 1: stuff like that. Yeah.
Speaker 2: It's like it's well done, isn't it. Yeah, it's not
Speaker 2: like they are com clearly all play.
Speaker 1: Yeah. The reason why it's like an album that I
Speaker 1: mentioned in the book and that I've talked about a lot,
Speaker 1: is because it was definitely the tipping point where I realized,
Speaker 1: okay this, I don't have any control over this project anymore.
Speaker 1: Like I don't have any control over what I buy
Speaker 1: because I have to own this album because I can't.
Speaker 1: It's like I was saying earlier about that album we
Speaker 1: talked about, I can't say I know everything about I'm
Speaker 1: like I know more about the musical twenty sixteen than
Speaker 1: anyone else, and yet I didn't buy the Ned Flanders
Speaker 1: metal out like you kind of have to own it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so like there was album's not that was like, well
Speaker 1: just without even listening to it, I have to own
Speaker 1: this album. And it's a really interesting experience that album
Speaker 1: because sometimes it comes on on shuffle and I'm like
Speaker 1: this is good, Well who's this and then I go
Speaker 1: over like oh no it locally docally, I mean join
Speaker 1: them at face value, like it's a weird one because
Speaker 1: it's like the kind of the very concept of it
Speaker 1: stops you've engaging with it on the normal level.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but it is actually but they can play because
Speaker 2: have you heard that band Harry and the Potters. No,
Speaker 2: Harry and the Potters.
Speaker 1: I can guess where this is going, but no, I've
Speaker 1: not heard them.
Speaker 2: They I mean they've been around a long time since
Speaker 2: since maybe the first film came out, Yeah so what
Speaker 2: twenty years maybe?
Speaker 1: Yeah? Yeah, and.
Speaker 2: It's two guys. I think they're from Boston and they
Speaker 2: dress as Harry Potter and all of the songs about
Speaker 2: Harry Potter. But they are really the io really stripped down,
Speaker 2: like sound like beat happening or something. But it kind
Speaker 2: of makes they they're not brilliant now it's brilliant. And
Speaker 2: it's for what it is, but not like Oakley Oakley,
Speaker 2: who as you say, it comes on shuffle and you're like,
Speaker 2: this is a good band.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, it was actually a good band. I mean
Speaker 1: they've changed members so many times, and all of them
Speaker 1: have nicknames like you know, head Ned, dread Ned, and
Speaker 1: they every time they change a member, they have to
Speaker 1: think of a different word. It's like one syllable and
Speaker 1: rhymes with ned. But yeah, it's it's mad how like
Speaker 1: it comes up and I think it will never be
Speaker 1: one of my favorites just because I can't get past
Speaker 1: the Flanders things. Yeah, but but I'm delighted that it
Speaker 1: came out that year and that it was something. You know, ultimately,
Speaker 1: when you're talking to people about the albums that came
Speaker 1: out in one year without playing, you know, there's some
Speaker 1: albums that are like really great indie albums that had
Speaker 1: to grow on me for a bit. And now I've
Speaker 1: got some of my favorites and I love them. But
Speaker 1: it's hard to like sell that to people. Yeah and go, oh,
Speaker 1: there's this band and it's just really good guitar songs,
Speaker 1: but so like but it's much easy to go Okay,
Speaker 1: there's this one album, and throughout the whole album is
Speaker 1: a sound of an active bee hive for the whole thing,
Speaker 1: and it's this constant droning noise of all the bees.
Speaker 1: And over the top of it, a cellist has figured
Speaker 1: out that the bees are humming in the key of C,
Speaker 1: so they're playing in the key of C the cello
Speaker 1: over the top of it. And then there's like, by
Speaker 1: the way, I'm talking about the album b by one
Speaker 1: right now, which was originally an art installation, and it's
Speaker 1: the guys from Spiritualized did it, and like it's there's
Speaker 1: more to talk about. Yeah, well you got go on
Speaker 1: about those albums, and not necessarily your favorite ones, but
Speaker 1: they're really interesting albums that are worth listening to, and
Speaker 1: again emphasizes the fact that you know, we can casting
Speaker 1: aside to the kind of just fun little convincing people.
Speaker 1: Twenty six SEMs the Greatest year of for musical time,
Speaker 1: which is just a bit of a laugh really like
Speaker 1: trying to convince people that it's a fun little game.
Speaker 1: But really the whole point is there is so much
Speaker 1: great music being made today, and so much interesting music
Speaker 1: and inventive music, and you know, for example, people are
Speaker 1: doing this stuff. People are harmonizing with Bees, you know,
Speaker 1: There's like a lot of stuff going on. People are
Speaker 1: still pushing things and being weird. It's not just all
Speaker 1: throw away, disposable stuff.
Speaker 2: Because I mean, you can't really listen. You can't really
Speaker 2: buy six hundred albums at any point and for them
Speaker 2: to all be of the same thing. It's really eclectic.
Speaker 2: You're mix from Bees to ned Flanders, covering all the bases.
Speaker 2: Is there anything just musically generally not necessarily in this
Speaker 2: project that you just won't touch a strand of folk music?
Speaker 1: I don't think I could say that, because it all
Speaker 1: depends on how it's done and what I've really what
Speaker 1: I've been identify more through this project is what I
Speaker 1: don't like within certain genres that turns me off. So
Speaker 1: like I'm more able to listen to songs now and
Speaker 1: say why I don't like them and what could be
Speaker 1: changed what I mean, I would love it, you know.
Speaker 1: So it's like, for the most part, I don't like
Speaker 1: just big, chuggy rock music that is like very straightforward
Speaker 1: rock music, and I find it boring. But a lot
Speaker 1: of the time it's not because of the music itself.
Speaker 1: It's because the production is always pretty predictable and just
Speaker 1: straightforward and inspired production, and the vocalists are often you know,
Speaker 1: just sound. You can't pick them out of a lineup,
Speaker 1: just classic vocalists. And whereas actually if the production was
Speaker 1: a bit more interesting and the vocalist was a bit
Speaker 1: more you know, unique, then I'd probably love it, you know.
Speaker 1: So it's not the genre, it's the way that people
Speaker 1: do them. And for so much of it as well,
Speaker 1: it's just the production. Like so much, I didn't care
Speaker 1: about production before this, and now I realized that actually
Speaker 1: there are certain styles of music, like rock music or
Speaker 1: folk music, where the more clean and glossy the production is,
Speaker 1: the more I don't like it. Yeah, and actually I
Speaker 1: really like to just hear. I'd hear people properly creating
Speaker 1: and performing something. And although you know, I like loads
Speaker 1: of electronic music as well, samples and stuff, but you
Speaker 1: can still it comes through. Yeah, even if I hear
Speaker 1: someone playing something live, it comes through how much they
Speaker 1: genuinely exploring a genre and care about him.
Speaker 2: You should listen to Harry and the Potters. I think
Speaker 2: they're the band for you.
Speaker 1: I think they're my favorite band as of now.
Speaker 2: They've got loads of albums as well.
Speaker 1: I bet.
Speaker 2: Harry Potter, but yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1: I've been drinking a lot during this podcast because I've
Speaker 1: got a bad throats. I've got to keep it lubricated.
Speaker 1: So I've gone through a glass of like what I
Speaker 1: think was carrot juice and a cup of lemon tea.
Speaker 1: I'm now dying for a piss and also quit pretty concern.
Speaker 1: I've been gulping into the mic the whole thing, so
Speaker 1: enjoy anyway, good Night,