Speaker 1: Loud and Quiet Presents Midnight Chats.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I had such a common by midnight chat.
Speaker 1: Thank you for the introduction, John Grant. And here we
Speaker 1: go again Thursday night. It's late and we're back with
Speaker 1: another one of those midnight chats. Greg from Loud and
Speaker 1: Quiet here and if your interests fall into the very
Speaker 1: niche Venn diagram that displays the overlapping interests of Tracy Thorn,
Speaker 1: high speed roller coasters and the grammatical intricacies of the
Speaker 1: Icelandic language, then welcome to what's most definitely your dream podcast.
Speaker 1: For everyone else, well, there's a bit in what you're
Speaker 1: about to hear where I basically fall of my chair
Speaker 1: when John Grant showed me a very funny photo of
Speaker 1: himself on an amusement park ride on his fiftieth birthday.
Speaker 1: I've already banged on in recent episodes about how the
Speaker 1: best way to support this podcast is to subscribe, rate,
Speaker 1: and comment wherever you're listening to us. But even better
Speaker 1: still is that you just tell your friends and family.
Speaker 1: Maybe next time there's an awkward silence in the conversation,
Speaker 1: just blurt it out and just tell people that you
Speaker 1: like midnight Chats. But I'm not going to labor that
Speaker 1: point tonight, and I'm just going to get straight onto
Speaker 1: tonight's guest. And fact is, when we're researching these podcasts,
Speaker 1: which we do research, we tend to try and rummage
Speaker 1: around in the small footnotes of an artist's story to
Speaker 1: try and find some gold nuggets to ask them about.
Speaker 1: And John Grant is a gift in that respect because
Speaker 1: he's done so many and I don't really like using
Speaker 1: this word, but quirky things. During his career. He's had
Speaker 1: an extraordinary journey from his very strict religious upbringing in
Speaker 1: the US through to his time in the old rock
Speaker 1: band The Czars, and then following that battling personal addictions
Speaker 1: and later launching a very successful solo career and even
Speaker 1: gone on to write songs for the likes of Robbie Williams.
Speaker 1: Basically too much to fit into a relatively short podcast,
Speaker 1: but I do ask him about being nominated for a
Speaker 1: brit and writing the Icelandic entry for Eurovision.
Speaker 2: So don't worry.
Speaker 1: He has a new album coming out in October and
Speaker 1: it's called Love Is Magic, and it's about the beauty
Speaker 1: and absurdity of life. John was off to an award
Speaker 1: ceremony that night that we caught up to present one
Speaker 1: of his great influences with a prize. That's where we
Speaker 1: pick up and things end with him telling me about
Speaker 1: a song on this new album which features a swear
Speaker 1: word that we've never heard on the podcast before. So
Speaker 1: that's just a warning in case you have any small
Speaker 1: children listening nearby. Anyway, until next Thursday when we'll be back.
Speaker 1: This is Midnight Chats episode fifty five, with John Grant
Speaker 1: lying on a painful looking sofa but staying committed to
Speaker 1: his decision for a full forty minutes. Perfect sounding good John,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna lay down, John, Welcome to Midnight Chats.
Speaker 2: Thank you, good to be here, Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1: You look nice and relaxed.
Speaker 2: Now, thank you.
Speaker 1: We're doing this. We're recording this for people listening. We
Speaker 1: are in a little studio in East London and we've
Speaker 1: got like a small sofa which looks like actually it
Speaker 1: looks very similar to the one that was in my
Speaker 1: grandmother's house for many years.
Speaker 2: But hers was comfortable.
Speaker 1: It's uncomfortable. Can you feel the frame through those those
Speaker 1: very old looking cushions?
Speaker 2: Yes, and it's not comfortable at all.
Speaker 1: Actually, yeah, when you stand up, you're going to be
Speaker 1: feeling it.
Speaker 2: I think it would be too painful for me to
Speaker 2: try and change positions. At this point.
Speaker 1: I've committed. I mean, how are you doing?
Speaker 2: I'm fine. Like I told you before, it's a stressful day.
Speaker 2: But you know who's not having a stressful day.
Speaker 1: You're after an awards ceremony tonight.
Speaker 2: I am. I'm presenting Tracy Thorn with an award tonight,
Speaker 2: some sort of icon type.
Speaker 1: Thing, the Aim Awards, which, if people haven't come across,
Speaker 1: that is an awards that celebrates independent music. Yes, well,
Speaker 1: you've worked with Tracy before, but that's exciting to be
Speaker 1: able to reward her genius basically.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yes, I've decided that tonight I shall compare her
Speaker 2: to the Mississippi River in my speech, or whatever body
Speaker 2: of water made the Grand Canyon steady consistent, creating landscapes
Speaker 2: of incredible sonic beauty.
Speaker 1: That's perfect. I think we've got that written down right.
Speaker 2: I do. Okay, good, don't you think that's good?
Speaker 1: That's brilliant. She's got a book coming out next year.
Speaker 1: He landed on my desk the other day.
Speaker 2: Really another one?
Speaker 1: Yeah? Yeah, yeah, so not too like February.
Speaker 2: She's so smart and clever and her command of the
Speaker 2: English language fills me with shame. She's quite amazing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, what are award ceremonies like? Are they things like that?
Speaker 1: Are they like terrifying? Are they exciting? Are they There's nothing.
Speaker 2: Good about it? No, except that moment when you get
Speaker 2: to present them with that award on that stage, But
Speaker 2: everything else around it is an absolute nightmare. The dinner.
Speaker 2: I mean, I'll be sitting there with Ben and Tracy,
Speaker 2: so it'll be great. There'll be so waiter that looks
Speaker 2: like a young fucking treat Williams or something, you know,
Speaker 2: serving and I'll be mistaking his professionalism and hospitality for
Speaker 2: you know, interest and a lot a life lived together,
Speaker 2: and you know it'll all wind and crocodile tears.
Speaker 1: Other ones you've been to before? Did you do when
Speaker 1: you were nominated for a brit Award here a few
Speaker 1: years ago? Did you go to the Brads?
Speaker 2: I did?
Speaker 1: What was that like? Because that's a whole never that
Speaker 1: was tortuous, Okay.
Speaker 2: Yeah, because it just goes on and on and on
Speaker 2: and on and on. And I lost Bruno Mars, which
Speaker 2: is fine because he's he's very good. I think he's
Speaker 2: very good at what he does. Great voice, great personality.
Speaker 2: But yeah, and I also met boy George that night,
Speaker 2: which was lovely, and he was really sweet and kind
Speaker 2: and so it was really good for me to meet him.
Speaker 2: And and yeah, but I had this suit on and
Speaker 2: I don't know, I just I don't feel terribly comfortable
Speaker 2: with those things. That's not my bag. Baby.
Speaker 1: You mentioned language and command of language before. Now you
Speaker 1: speak five languages?
Speaker 2: Yeah, probably four or five.
Speaker 1: Okay, we've got listeners all over the world for Midnight Chats,
Speaker 1: but we've never been able to or I'm too I'm
Speaker 1: linguistically incompetent. So for people like living in Germany or Spain,
Speaker 1: we know that we've got listeners there, we've never had
Speaker 1: somebody on the podcast like before that's been able to
Speaker 1: speak so many languages. So if we were to say, like,
Speaker 1: welcome to Midnight Chats to people listening in Germany, what
Speaker 1: would I have to say?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I had such a common by midnight Chat. That
Speaker 2: sounds better, doesn't it, Yatala.
Speaker 1: What was the additional show?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: You always see like a fan of language in general,
Speaker 1: and when did you know that you had an aptitude
Speaker 1: for learning new languages.
Speaker 2: I guess that was my senior year in high school
Speaker 2: in the States, which is your last year before you
Speaker 2: go into college. That was the first year that German
Speaker 2: was offered at my high school, and I was a
Speaker 2: big Nina Hagen fan, and for that reason, I signed
Speaker 2: up for German, because I wanted to translate those Nina
Speaker 2: Hagen lyrics and be able to understand what she was
Speaker 2: talking about. And then I happened to have a great
Speaker 2: teacher as well, who sort of took me under wing.
Speaker 2: She saw that I was struggling that year, and that
Speaker 2: was the one thing that I latched onto that year
Speaker 2: that I really I really excelled at it. And I
Speaker 2: got an easy A in the class, or maybe I
Speaker 2: had a B, because I even though I was really
Speaker 2: good at it, I just didn't like to still I
Speaker 2: was still always a bad student, but still sort of
Speaker 2: effortlessly got a B or whatever it was that I got.
Speaker 2: And she, you know, she was somebody who sort of
Speaker 2: like she would go to a cafe with me on
Speaker 2: the weekend and speak German to me or talk to
Speaker 2: me about German, and she was wonderful. Her name was
Speaker 2: p Snider, and I've lost touch with her, unfortunately, but
Speaker 2: she was lovely. She moved back to Pennsylvania or something
Speaker 2: and back in the eighties and unfortunately lost touch.
Speaker 1: Do you subscribe the idea that some people have a
Speaker 1: natural talent for learning ot the languages? Who do you
Speaker 1: think that everybody can be able that has the ability
Speaker 1: to do that.
Speaker 2: There's so many different aspects about learning the language. I mean, pronunciation,
Speaker 2: like the ability to hear and phonetics is one thing.
Speaker 2: Everybody wants to be able to speak like a native
Speaker 2: and not have an accent. That's something that I've always
Speaker 2: been particularly good at, but it gets harder as your
Speaker 2: age and your mouth gets lazy. And then there's also
Speaker 2: you know, grammar, There's also you know, listening comprehension, there's
Speaker 2: I think I really feel like it's important to understand
Speaker 2: the grammar inside and out if you truly want to
Speaker 2: master a language, because then you can have total control
Speaker 2: over the language, if you know all the rules, and
Speaker 2: then you can really express your personality and your sense
Speaker 2: of humor and all these important things in that language.
Speaker 2: If you have that type of knowledge of it, just
Speaker 2: talking to people and immersing yourself in the language is
Speaker 2: a great way to go, but I think you need both.
Speaker 2: So I think you should be out there talking with people,
Speaker 2: just interacting, immersed in the society living there. If you
Speaker 2: can't do that, these days, there's all sorts of things
Speaker 2: you can do. You can read out loud in the language,
Speaker 2: you can look up things on YouTube, you can watch
Speaker 2: the news in that language, you can watch television shows
Speaker 2: in that language. Everything's on YouTube. So you can immerse
Speaker 2: yourself in that language to a great extent if you create.
Speaker 2: You can create that for yourself at home these days
Speaker 2: quite easily. I think it's better to speak correctly and
Speaker 2: idiomatically and colloquially than to speak, you know, perfect with
Speaker 2: a perfect accent. I think anybody would agree with that.
Speaker 2: But of course, you know, we want to. One wants to,
Speaker 2: I mean, one falls in love with the language because
Speaker 2: one likes the way that sounds, and one would also
Speaker 2: like to sound that way right when speaking it. But
Speaker 2: if you can't overcome your accent, don't worry about that.
Speaker 2: Just do the work, do the drills, do the leg work,
Speaker 2: and it will happen for you eventually. Just put in
Speaker 2: the work and you will make progress in the language,
Speaker 2: and you'll make fast progress. In the language. There's and
Speaker 2: then there's there's times there's these key moments when you
Speaker 2: feel like you feel like you're actually going backwards and
Speaker 2: that you know less when you did that than you
Speaker 2: did when you started. And that's I find, at least
Speaker 2: I wonder to myself and think that it's probably the
Speaker 2: brain absorbing a huge amount of information and putting it
Speaker 2: in order and making sense of it, so that those
Speaker 2: times when you feel like you're actually going backwards, you're
Speaker 2: actually your brain's just doing a lot of work and
Speaker 2: you need to just relax and maybe take a break,
Speaker 2: and you'll find that when you come back to it,
Speaker 2: you will have made progress, and lots of progress, a
Speaker 2: lot more than you think. You're always further along than
Speaker 2: you think you are. But don't ever allow yourself to
Speaker 2: get frustrated and think I'm never going to be able
Speaker 2: to do this, because you can. You definitely can do it.
Speaker 2: There's a lot of people say they have no talent
Speaker 2: for learning the language. I'm not sure I believe that.
Speaker 2: I mean, certainly we have app we all have, you know,
Speaker 2: aptitudes or talents for different things. But I feel like
Speaker 2: if you put the work in, you can get to
Speaker 2: a very comfortable level in any language.
Speaker 1: Is Icelandic the most recent language that you've learnt, Yeah.
Speaker 2: That's the most recent one for me. And that's the
Speaker 2: hardest thing I've ever done.
Speaker 1: Really. Why is that? Why has that been so much
Speaker 1: more difficult? It is because it doesn't follow it as
Speaker 1: similar formula to some of other languages that you've learned.
Speaker 2: Structurally, well, it's very similar to German actually, but it's
Speaker 2: still much more complicated. For example, in German, you know,
Speaker 2: you don't you don't have very many forms for each word.
Speaker 2: Let's see you would have you know, for German, you're
Speaker 2: going to have like five forms for a word maybe
Speaker 2: you know in the different cases like de mann dan
Speaker 2: mann desmanus that has to do with the article, So
Speaker 2: you have and then you have a plural form d
Speaker 2: mena dane menoun, which is the plural, the dative plural
Speaker 2: where you just add an end to the plural or
Speaker 2: an e end to the plural, depending on what the
Speaker 2: word is. And in Icelandic you have sixteen forms for
Speaker 2: every word, so that's eleven more forms at least. And
Speaker 2: then for example, you also have masculine, feminine, and neutral
Speaker 2: nouns in Icelandic, you have a very complex verb system
Speaker 2: like French and German and Spanish and Italian and Portuguese,
Speaker 2: all the Romance languages with the subjunctive and compound tenses
Speaker 2: and conditional and Russian, for example, the verb forms the
Speaker 2: verb system is also quite difficult because they deal with
Speaker 2: something called aspect in the verb. It's quite complicated. But
Speaker 2: the verb forms themselves aren't as varied, and they just
Speaker 2: have one little particle Bui wait for the conditional tense,
Speaker 2: which you just add to the past tense of the verb.
Speaker 2: You had that particle and that becomes the conditional or
Speaker 2: the subjunctive. Yeah, so Icelandic it's just. And then the
Speaker 2: pronunciation is the hardest I've ever dealt with, much harder
Speaker 2: than German Russian. And that has to do with well
Speaker 2: they say that that for English speakers the pronunciation is
Speaker 2: particularly difficult for people for native speakers of English. I
Speaker 2: don't know why that is. I certainly do believe it,
Speaker 2: because I've never struggled with pronunciation like I do in Icelandic.
Speaker 2: I have to say things. I mean, I always had
Speaker 2: to read things out loud over and over and over
Speaker 2: to get them, and at the beginning, you sort of
Speaker 2: exaggerate sounds because you're getting your mouth to move, start
Speaker 2: to move in that way, because you need to retrain
Speaker 2: your mouth for each language. It's important to remember that
Speaker 2: your mouth doesn't move the same in those languages. And
Speaker 2: we don't move our mouths when we speak our language
Speaker 2: because we've learned to speak our language as easily as possible,
Speaker 2: you know, and so we're very lazy with it. That's
Speaker 2: what other people do too, and they're very lazy with things,
Speaker 2: and that's what turns into dialects and different accents because
Speaker 2: we're just trying to figure out a way to say
Speaker 2: things as quickly as possible.
Speaker 1: Do you spend the majority of your time? You know,
Speaker 1: it's still in Iceland now because obviously you move around
Speaker 1: plenty when you're on tour and things like that. But
Speaker 1: is that the main base?
Speaker 2: That's where I'm based, But I'm not there very much
Speaker 2: at all.
Speaker 1: What is it about the character of Icelandic people that
Speaker 1: you like. I've been a couple of times, and as
Speaker 1: well as it being obviously a beautiful country and spectacular
Speaker 1: once you once you get out a record can travel
Speaker 1: around the island, it is stunning, But I found the
Speaker 1: Icelandic people fascinating because of their resilience and their sense
Speaker 1: of humor and their or just various characteristics. I just
Speaker 1: thought they were they were fascinating people. What what characteristics
Speaker 1: of Icelanders do you do you like?
Speaker 2: I like their humor, and they're they're they're quite cheery
Speaker 2: and friendly. I mean, you really got to learn the
Speaker 2: language if you want to crack that nut, you know,
Speaker 2: if you want to get into that society. Same thing
Speaker 2: with I mean any language, I suppose, or any If
Speaker 2: you really want to get to the know the people,
Speaker 2: you must know their language. But I love, you know,
Speaker 2: I love colloquial Icelandic. I love the way they they
Speaker 2: express themselves very in a very clever, funny way. But
Speaker 2: I don't know's it's that way with every single language.
Speaker 2: They're all very different, you know. And and Icelanders are
Speaker 2: pretty relaxed. They're sort of laid back. But that would,
Speaker 2: if anything, that would fill me with resentment because I
Speaker 2: should probably relax a little bit more. But they've got
Speaker 2: sort of a like a Spanish or Italian relaxedness to them,
Speaker 2: a relaxed attitude combined with the Scandinavian style and Scandinavian
Speaker 2: other Scandinavian traits, like it's a strange combination of reservedness
Speaker 2: and and.
Speaker 1: But also.
Speaker 2: Like they have a phrase that the rat dust, which
Speaker 2: is one of the first things that you learn when
Speaker 2: you go there, that the rat dust, which means that
Speaker 2: you know, it'll it'll work out, it'll work itself out,
Speaker 2: it'll it'll get taken care of, don't worry about it,
Speaker 2: you know. When applied to business, that's not too exciting
Speaker 2: for the for the consumer. But in as far as
Speaker 2: everyday lifestyle, I mean, they they have figured out a
Speaker 2: way to thrive in this sort of difficult to thrive
Speaker 2: in environment.
Speaker 1: Absolutely. If you've done and I sounded in winter.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I've done several of them now and they're hard,
Speaker 2: they're difficult.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So I mean again if anybody doesn't visited Iceland,
Speaker 1: but it gets dark approximately what time in the afternoon
Speaker 1: in deep winter?
Speaker 2: Yeah, in deep winter, I mean it's it's it's you're
Speaker 2: only going to have like an hour of light, you know,
Speaker 2: in December and then and that's just twilighty you know.
Speaker 2: So it's yeah, it gets very it's you really got
Speaker 2: to watch your vitamin d intake and make sure that
Speaker 2: you're getting vitamin D, get one of those lamps, take
Speaker 2: a supplement, go to the gym, make sure you're moving, exercise,
Speaker 2: you know, eat right. I mean a lot of people
Speaker 2: up there just go whole hog into the sugar. Seems
Speaker 2: like Scandinavians really struggle with sugar consumption. Well they don't
Speaker 2: seem to be struggling actually with it.
Speaker 1: But yeah, in those deep winters, we need to get
Speaker 1: some energy levels going.
Speaker 2: M h. Yeah, and sugar's Sugar's a killer when it
Speaker 2: comes to that. It's not doing anybody any favors. It's hard.
Speaker 1: A few years back, did you enjoy the experience of
Speaker 1: collaborating on the Icelandic entry for Eurovision?
Speaker 2: Oh? Yeah, that was weird. I was at first I
Speaker 2: wanted to hear what they were doing because I didn't
Speaker 2: really want to be involved in your vision because I
Speaker 2: don't I'm not I'm not really into that style and
Speaker 2: I don't really get crazy. I don't like to watch
Speaker 2: it either.
Speaker 1: I was gonna says you fullowed it up to that point.
Speaker 1: Was it something you were like a way?
Speaker 2: I mean when I was in Sweden, I watched it
Speaker 2: with everybody else, and you know, just sort of like
Speaker 2: a little bit horrified, but you know, Abba came from there,
Speaker 2: so you know it can't be it can't be that bad.
Speaker 2: But these guys that asked me to do this, to
Speaker 2: translate this song for them, I just really loved the
Speaker 2: song they were doing. I was surprised by what they
Speaker 2: were doing.
Speaker 1: It was like this.
Speaker 2: Punk pop, you know hit, and it was talking about children,
Speaker 2: like it was encouraging children to do away with prejudice
Speaker 2: and not judge other people. And and I really liked
Speaker 2: the message they were giving. And I really liked the
Speaker 2: people that wrote the song, and I liked the style
Speaker 2: of the song because it was quite different than other
Speaker 2: things that I'd heard. So I said, yes, so yes,
Speaker 2: I did enjoy.
Speaker 1: It on the night of the war. Did you go
Speaker 1: to it or did you watch it in Iceland with
Speaker 1: other people watching it kind of cheering them along sort
Speaker 1: of thing.
Speaker 2: I don't know if I saw it. I think I
Speaker 2: might have been busy, like out and about touring or
Speaker 2: something at the time. I don't remember seeing them perform it.
Speaker 2: I just remember that I kept asking how did they do?
Speaker 2: How did they do? How did they do? And I
Speaker 2: think they came in like thirteenth or something.
Speaker 1: That's respectable, that's liked mid tables as such.
Speaker 2: But Iceland really wants to win it. They haven't won
Speaker 2: it before, right, right, And so I I wasn't sure.
Speaker 2: I really thought they I mean, I thought they should
Speaker 2: win with that song, but I think I was skeptical
Speaker 2: because it was just too good.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, that's the thing with your original it gets
Speaker 1: things that. Yeah, it doesn't matter if you've written a
Speaker 1: good songs, it's often about the other things that surround it,
Speaker 1: just the quirkiness of it, or the stage show or
Speaker 1: what eccentricity you put on your performance.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's so many different factors that you can't plan
Speaker 2: for it. And uh, yeah, you just never you don't
Speaker 2: know what's going to happen.
Speaker 1: Away from came about Iceland. Now has twenty eighteen been
Speaker 1: for you so far? Was the start of the year
Speaker 1: finishing Love's Magic, which is the new album. What's been
Speaker 1: happening in twenty eighteen so far?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I just was working on the record until finished
Speaker 2: it in March or April. Yeah, then I had some
Speaker 2: time off. I had a little bit of time off
Speaker 2: in Iceland, and then I have just started out on
Speaker 2: the promo thing. Now you know, the machine is getting
Speaker 2: going again, and soon we'll be, you know, rehearsing for
Speaker 2: the shows, and then at the end of October the
Speaker 2: first show will happen. And it's just all very quick,
Speaker 2: and it just goes very quick, and it's crazy. I
Speaker 2: can't believe it.
Speaker 1: I read that you celebrated your birthday earlier this year
Speaker 1: by going to a theme park and going on some
Speaker 1: roller coasters. I did.
Speaker 2: I went very jealous. Oh yeah, it was amazing. I
Speaker 2: went to Cedar Point, which I consider to be the
Speaker 2: best one of the if not the best theme park
Speaker 2: in the world or amusement park in the world, then
Speaker 2: one of the very best. There's another one in the
Speaker 2: States called Magic Mountain outside of Los Angeles, which also
Speaker 2: boths an impressive amount and quality of roller coaster. Okay,
Speaker 2: but Cedar Point was just in Crowit has a lot
Speaker 2: of the you know, they're all competing. It breaks the
Speaker 2: rules and then somebody else breaks them, and then it
Speaker 2: brings something back and breaks all the rules. They had
Speaker 2: a new one this year called Steel Vengeance.
Speaker 1: I saw a picture of this earlier and with people
Speaker 1: looking kind of terrified. On itself, it looked a bit rickety, like.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it does look like it sometimes when you're watching it,
Speaker 2: you can see the the structure moving back and forth. Yeah,
Speaker 2: but it was the most incredible thing I've ever been
Speaker 2: on in my life. It is truly the best roller
Speaker 2: coaster I've ever been on. I could not believe it.
Speaker 2: I went on it six times.
Speaker 1: Yeah, get off straight back in the queue. Yeah. What
Speaker 1: was so good about Steel Vengeance.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean it's quite fast. So it's going like
Speaker 2: seventy five miles an hour.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that is fast for Rodicas.
Speaker 2: It's very fast.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I mean there's ones there that go There's one there
Speaker 2: called Millennium Force that's one hundred feet higher than Steel
Speaker 2: Vengeance and it goes ninety five ninety three miles an
Speaker 2: hour the whole time. I mean it's it's just relentless.
Speaker 1: That was incredible.
Speaker 2: I went on that several times as well, like three times.
Speaker 2: And then there's another one called Top Thrill Dragster that
Speaker 2: goes from zero to one hundred and twenty miles an
Speaker 2: hour in four seconds. It's done with magnets, so you're
Speaker 2: just sitting there in the car and then it shoots
Speaker 2: you like a rocket.
Speaker 1: It like pollsat the sensation.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but it put from zero to one to twenty
Speaker 2: and four seconds and then it rockets you forty five
Speaker 2: stories into the sky. What's called top thrill Dragster, right,
Speaker 2: and then there's one called King Daka in New Jersey
Speaker 2: and I had actually ridden that one first, and that's
Speaker 2: a little bit bigger. They broke the record that Cedar
Speaker 2: Point held with this one before. That thing took my
Speaker 2: breath away, like literally sounds like it seriously. I mean
Speaker 2: I thought it was gonna that was almost too much,
Speaker 2: but it was incredible and we got right back in
Speaker 2: mind for that one and did it a second time
Speaker 2: right away.
Speaker 1: Have you been to any of the British theme parks
Speaker 1: like your Olton Towers and Chestint and World of Adventures.
Speaker 2: I haven't yet.
Speaker 1: It doesn't sound as exciting as seed a Point to
Speaker 1: be honest.
Speaker 2: Well, these are the biggest and fastest in the world. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: I mean that's why it had to be there for me,
Speaker 2: you know, And I think, I mean, Alton Towers has
Speaker 2: some impressive coasters as well. They have Him Oblivion, which
Speaker 2: is like I think, like Val Raven, but Val Raven
Speaker 2: is the you know, the biggest one of that type
Speaker 2: that the drop coasters where they sort of let you
Speaker 2: hover with your legs dangling over the edge that you
Speaker 2: can see the several hundred foot drop in front of you.
Speaker 1: I've been on Oblivion and we actually had to stop
Speaker 1: because the ride. This is the worst thing that you
Speaker 1: want to hear when you're at a theme park, when
Speaker 1: you get the message from somebody going was a member
Speaker 1: of staff coming over the pa and saying, we're just
Speaker 1: temporarily going to have to just holt the ride because
Speaker 1: of a technical problem. And you and you're sat there
Speaker 1: and your legs are just dangling, and you're, you know,
Speaker 1: you kind of.
Speaker 2: You were dangling off the edge.
Speaker 1: At that point. We were in the you know where
Speaker 1: you get onto the ride and you're you're already in
Speaker 1: the harness, you're ready to go. That's the point where
Speaker 1: we were. So somebody was out there on the on
Speaker 1: the track, so to speak, dangling in mid air. It
Speaker 1: wasn't us, but we heard the announcement and we were
Speaker 1: there for twenty five minutes.
Speaker 2: So yeah, HORRIFYE. Well this one val Raven, that suitor point,
Speaker 2: which the drop coaster, it was long. I couldn't believe
Speaker 2: how long it was. Okay, I mean it was incredible.
Speaker 2: That was one of my favorite ones as well. I
Speaker 2: have to say I couldn't believe the the sheer number
Speaker 2: of impressive coasters they have there.
Speaker 1: It does sound good Olwen Towers. When I was going up,
Speaker 1: they had this one called Nemesis that was announced. Yes,
Speaker 1: there was a big deal made about that when that
Speaker 1: came around.
Speaker 2: I've heard of Nemesis.
Speaker 1: Nemesis is good. Oblivion was better.
Speaker 2: I think, what's Nemesis? Is it lupin?
Speaker 1: Yeah? Yeah, yeah, yeah. It wasn't as fun as Oblivion
Speaker 1: because that is the one where you go in and
Speaker 1: you pulled the harness and your legs dangling and you
Speaker 1: kind of your yeah, you know, you're flying around your
Speaker 1: legs above your head and everything else, and you're seeing
Speaker 1: the sky in there just your shoes, which is quite exciting.
Speaker 2: But that first drop is incredible. I don't know how
Speaker 2: much higher val Raven is than Nemesis. I mean they
Speaker 2: you know, it's usually a few feet. I went to
Speaker 2: one in Germany just a few weeks ago. They have
Speaker 2: one called the Kraku, which is the Kraken the cracking
Speaker 2: like it and it's a it's a drop coaster like
Speaker 2: this and it drops you into the mouth of the Kraken,
Speaker 2: which is just the circle of teeth. I mean, it's amazing,
Speaker 2: but it was. It was over in like two seconds.
Speaker 2: It was completely okay. It was like a half or
Speaker 2: the third of the time of val Raven, which just
Speaker 2: seemed to go on forever, which is good for a coaster.
Speaker 2: But then at this German park they had one called
Speaker 2: the Flight of the Demon, which was one of the
Speaker 2: ones where you dangle on either side of the track.
Speaker 2: And I have to say that one is obviously made
Speaker 2: by the same company that made the Gatekeeper in Cedar Point, Ohio,
Speaker 2: which was just it was fun, but it was just
Speaker 2: like a riding in a really smooth, nice car. It
Speaker 2: wasn't particularly scary or anything.
Speaker 1: It was beautiful.
Speaker 2: You're on the edge of the lake erie and so
Speaker 2: you're just looking out over the what looks like the
Speaker 2: ocean because they're so huge, those lakes. And it was
Speaker 2: fun but just very chill. But there was that company
Speaker 2: built one for this part called, like I said, Flight
Speaker 2: of the Demon, same coaster, you're with the harness with
Speaker 2: your legs dangling on either side of the track, and wow,
Speaker 2: that was more impressive than the one at Cedar Point.
Speaker 2: It was really very cool.
Speaker 1: What was your entry point into your love of theme parks?
Speaker 1: Was it like a Disneyland thing?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think Disneyland might have been the first one.
Speaker 1: Space Mountain, yeah, I think thunder Mountain was my first one.
Speaker 1: Was that Paris or Paris Disneyland Paris, Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I went to the one in you know,
Speaker 2: the the one in California anyway, Disneyland is in California
Speaker 2: and disney World is in Orlando, Florida. Yeah, those are
Speaker 2: the two biggies out, you know. So we went to
Speaker 2: the one in Disneyland in California and then and then
Speaker 2: I think it was Cedar Point after that because we
Speaker 2: I grew up like three four hours from Cedar Point, right,
Speaker 2: So we had friends in Toledo, Ohio. Sometimes we would
Speaker 2: drive over from Michigan and then we'd stay at their
Speaker 2: house and then go to Cedar Point the next day.
Speaker 2: And those were like some of the greatest memories I've
Speaker 2: ever had. And they still have three, like three of
Speaker 2: the coasters there that were there when I went there
Speaker 2: in the seventies, so I hadn't been there since the seventies.
Speaker 2: When I went this this, you know, a month ago.
Speaker 1: And that was a bit of a nostalgia trip as well.
Speaker 2: Then, yeah, it was a nostalgia trip because I was
Speaker 2: there with my you know, I went there with my
Speaker 2: mother in the seventies and so I've met at great
Speaker 2: memories of her from that and my sister and our friends,
Speaker 2: and oh it was amazing. But they didn't have anything
Speaker 2: like what they have now. I mean, it was just
Speaker 2: a different world. The corkscrew was the biggest thing they had.
Speaker 2: And looking at the hill now it looks like it
Speaker 2: looks like a tiny little child.
Speaker 1: It was that what we thought was the most exciting thing.
Speaker 2: That was the biggest thing, and the adults thought it
Speaker 2: was scary too. But now they have these monster things.
Speaker 2: I mean, have you seen a picture of top thrill dragster?
Speaker 1: No?
Speaker 2: I mean it's forty five stories high.
Speaker 1: That's like half of the shard in London or something,
Speaker 1: isn't it. That's ridiculous. Yes, do you get the photos?
Speaker 1: You know, when you come out on the other side
Speaker 1: and then they say do you want to buy this
Speaker 1: photo of you looking petrified? Do you have you got
Speaker 1: a collection of them? Amazing expensive?
Speaker 2: If you give me that phone, if there's a phone charging,
Speaker 2: get on I can show you one right now that
Speaker 2: will that will surely delight you of me on Flight
Speaker 2: of the Demon.
Speaker 1: And then I'm just getting John's phone so that you
Speaker 1: and showed me a photo with him on the Flight
Speaker 1: of the Demon.
Speaker 2: I mean, people say I look like a demon from
Speaker 2: hell on it. Where's the thing?
Speaker 1: That is absolutely fantastic. That's what I did when I
Speaker 1: said one word gravity, like are you.
Speaker 2: But people said I look like a demon from hell?
Speaker 2: And that photo?
Speaker 1: Is this your friend next to you?
Speaker 2: I just think it looks like a like a groan
Speaker 2: of horror coming out of it.
Speaker 1: It looks like you might be in pain. But yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean it's enjoyment pain. That is so good.
Speaker 2: That girl next to me, she was the one interviewing
Speaker 2: me that day. They'd heard that they heard in Germany
Speaker 2: that I like roller coasters and tak me to the
Speaker 2: roller coaster park and then interviewed me afterwards.
Speaker 1: That is that is brilliant. Her hair is exactly, Hey,
Speaker 1: what are we doing here? This here for we should
Speaker 1: be doing this? And what about Thorpe thought Park? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't they have a big woody I think the
Speaker 1: last thing I heard, Yeah.
Speaker 2: You see the skinny puppy t shirt here in this
Speaker 2: photo as well.
Speaker 1: Ah, wonderful. Yeah, that is good.
Speaker 2: I just love this photo and I like her. She
Speaker 2: looks like she's just floated in from yoga class, right.
Speaker 1: Yeah, hair is like vertical. It's absolutely brilliant.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's amazing.
Speaker 1: That's the highlight of my day so far. That's brilliant.
Speaker 1: Speaking of brilliant pictures, the front cover artwork of your
Speaker 1: new album, Love's Magic is truly fantastic.
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 1: Definitely the best piece of artwork. Oh yeah. If you're
Speaker 1: listening to this and you haven't seen it, just immediately
Speaker 1: going have a look. It features yourself with a bird
Speaker 1: cage on your head. Tell me about the day that
Speaker 1: you put together that artwork.
Speaker 2: Well, I was really annoyed that day because you know,
Speaker 2: I was arriving in Paris and at the hotel they
Speaker 2: were like, oh, we don't turn on the AC until June,
Speaker 2: and it was April and it was, you know, sizzling already.
Speaker 2: So as you know, as the spoiled American, you're really
Speaker 2: irritated by that. There's not a fan in sight, you know. Yeah, anyway,
Speaker 2: and yeah, so there's that, and then and then the
Speaker 2: the shoot was like ten hours long, so it was,
Speaker 2: it was. It was a grueling day of you know,
Speaker 2: just went wandering around in front of you know, good
Speaker 2: looking men in my pants, you know, with them all
Speaker 2: fully clothed, and I just felt, you know, fat and
Speaker 2: disgusting and you know, you're in your fucking pants, and
Speaker 2: I just I didn't really enjoy that. But I you know,
Speaker 2: I always, I always want to commit to the vision
Speaker 2: of the artist and the photographers. So you know, it's like,
Speaker 2: I don't give a shit if I'm miserable. I'm going
Speaker 2: to do it because I want it to be right.
Speaker 2: And it is right.
Speaker 1: It's it's very right, you know.
Speaker 2: Scott King, you know, designed that whole thing, and Johann
Speaker 2: It's I keep forgetting the photographer's name because it's it's
Speaker 2: not even that difficult, but it's sort of a much
Speaker 2: trickier name than Scott King, you know. But the photographer
Speaker 2: was great too. He had he understood what we were
Speaker 2: doing and he you know, he got some great shots.
Speaker 1: I'm not going to see a better album cover this year.
Speaker 1: That absolutely not. I've made my mind up already.
Speaker 2: Well, thank you.
Speaker 1: I should ask you some questions about this album because
Speaker 1: we've you know, we've not already talked about it yet.
Speaker 1: We've been too busy talking about want to tell is
Speaker 1: love is Magic? How was the process of making this
Speaker 1: because you traveled to two places that are almost certainly
Speaker 1: not like each other, Cornwall and Texas.
Speaker 2: I was in Cornwall, in Saint Bruard at Benge's studio
Speaker 2: and which is this idyllic, beautiful place, you know, at
Speaker 2: the foot of Bodmin Moore sold in the hillside there,
Speaker 2: and it's just absolutely incredible, incredible natural beauty there. And
Speaker 2: he has a beautiful house there, and he has this basement,
Speaker 2: you know, with all these wonderful scents and modular sense
Speaker 2: and it's truly a fairy land like playground, like fairy
Speaker 2: tale like surroundings. And you're never far from the coast
Speaker 2: down there. So there's you know, beautiful little day trips
Speaker 2: to be had when you can't stand being in the studio.
Speaker 2: But we had, we just had so much fun. It
Speaker 2: was just criminal the whole time. You know, it was
Speaker 2: super super fun, and he's so incredible to work with,
Speaker 2: you know, and I really wanted to get the sounds right,
Speaker 2: so it was great to work with somebody that's a
Speaker 2: master of sound design like he is, to help me
Speaker 2: get where I was going, and then I just sat
Speaker 2: there and composed. And then he was the engineer as
Speaker 2: well as well as you know, constantly showing me what
Speaker 2: to do or he was always doing all the poking
Speaker 2: around with the with the modulars because I wanted to learn,
Speaker 2: but I wasn't down there to learn. I was down
Speaker 2: there to make music, so you know, it would have
Speaker 2: taken you know, ten years. So he's you know, looks
Speaker 2: like a you know, operator at a switchboard, you know,
Speaker 2: the whole time, and just very very fast and knows
Speaker 2: what to do and knows those instruments inside and out
Speaker 2: and has all the great classics, you know. He has
Speaker 2: an original three C Moog modular and a Bukla and
Speaker 2: the CVS, the Putney here from England, a museum of
Speaker 2: since yeah, and the Art twenty five hundred, which is
Speaker 2: the most gorgeous thing you'll ever see. C S eighty
Speaker 2: from Yamaha, which is not a modular synth but probably
Speaker 2: the mother of all analog synse I mean, it's just incredible,
Speaker 2: you know, and things like Blade Runner were done on
Speaker 2: that synth with Vangelis Ervan Golis, however the hell one
Speaker 2: pronounces his name never know, and let's see what else.
Speaker 2: He also had an EMU modular and a Surge modular.
Speaker 2: Just shocking. And I really fell in love with the
Speaker 2: Prophet The Prophet MVS from nineteen eighty five, which is
Speaker 2: an incredible, incredibly beautiful instrument with incredible pad sounds, the
Speaker 2: most delicious pad sounds you're ever gonna hear.
Speaker 1: There's a song on the album called smug Cunt Yes,
Speaker 1: which is a word I've not said on this podcast
Speaker 1: before but I have now. And is that about anybody
Speaker 1: in particular?
Speaker 2: Originally I was going to write it about Vladimir Putin,
Speaker 2: but he I think he's It became a much broader thing.
Speaker 2: It became, you know, it became just like a term
Speaker 2: for a term of exasperation when faced with these you know,
Speaker 2: money hungry, greedy, power hungry narcissists of the world who
Speaker 2: who will do anything, and you know, the destruction of
Speaker 2: any person or anything or anything in nature is second.
Speaker 2: You know, it's just totally uninteresting to them. It simply
Speaker 2: doesn't matter. I think I've I've just expressed myself very poorly.
Speaker 2: But it's about you know, extreme narcissism and people who
Speaker 2: go out into the world totally self absorbed, without any
Speaker 2: self awareness, looking to destroy calculating. I don't know. So
Speaker 2: Donald Trump, I don't know. He barely fits in there
Speaker 2: because I don't know if he's capable of being calculating.
Speaker 1: You know, exactly.
Speaker 2: But I you know, I don't know the guy. But
Speaker 2: I hate this type of person. I don't like that.
Speaker 2: And you know, it's it's I think you have to
Speaker 2: be careful, you know, judging other people because you unless
Speaker 2: you've walked in their shoes. But there's also a time
Speaker 2: for just raw reaction to what you perceive as absolutely
Speaker 2: disgusting in art, you know, and so you know, the
Speaker 2: feelings of the moment are totally valid and smug cant
Speaker 2: is the only way I know how.
Speaker 1: To describe it. It's an album that sort of reflects
Speaker 1: on both the absurd and the beautiful. To my mind,
Speaker 1: at least, like to find the absurd in everyday life
Speaker 1: feels very easy these days. You only have to just
Speaker 1: turn on the TV or I have to just get
Speaker 1: out of bed, exactly, have to open Twitter. Actually, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's true. Yeah, you don't have to get out of
Speaker 1: bed to open the window to an absurd world? Is
Speaker 1: that in a weird way? Can you find any positives
Speaker 1: in that? As in, like, is it an inspiring thing
Speaker 1: that it can be so absurd in the same way
Speaker 1: that you know, like comedy can be inspired by that.
Speaker 1: Can you be inspired to write a song about that?
Speaker 2: Absolutely? Absolutely, I think that's exactly what I do. I
Speaker 2: think I find it. You know, it's like you don't
Speaker 2: know where they'll laugh or cry? You know, I mean
Speaker 2: if you don't laugh, you will.
Speaker 1: Cry, you know, so you might as well laugh.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, you know, if you don't laugh, you would
Speaker 2: cry if you were capable of it still.
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