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Picture the poet, greet the griot – the Benjamin Zephaniah interview

Posted on March 19, 2015 by writewyattuk

Poetic Licence: Benjamin Zephaniah (Photo: http://benjaminzephaniah.com/)

When I spoke to Benjamin Zephaniah earlier this week, he was between a BBC radio interview and two days lecturing at West London’s Brunel University.

The Lincolnshire-based dub poet, author and activist was then heading back for another radio broadcast in Birmingham, catching up with his Mum in the West Midlands before a trek up to Preston, my excuse for speaking to him.

Benjamin was set to headline the city’s Harris Museum & Art Gallery’s Picture the Poet Live event, one of six touring dates for this National Portrait Gallery exhibition.

While the Preston event is fully booked, the exhibition runs at the Harris until April 11, featuring around 50 living poets captured in high-quality photographs.

The live event, with backing from the National Literacy Trust and Apples and Snakes, also included performances by youngsters who have written work inspired by the exhibition, with musical interludes from slowcore folk outfit Horsedreamers.

Sharing the bill with Benjamin were ‘charismatic Mancunian motormouth’ Mike Garry, who previously impressed at Preston’s 53 Degrees with John Cooper Clarke and Luke Wright.

Then there’s fellow acclaimed performance poet Ali Gadema, described as a ‘hip-hop theatre practitioner and workshop facilitator’.

It’s not the first time Benjamin has been involved in a National Portrait Gallery project, having previously curated an exhibition with celebratory tie-ins to UK multi-culturalism.

But he told me: “This is a bit unusual because I’m not doing any poetry gigs at the moment. It’s more about TV and radio programmes and my students. This is a real one-off.”

Does he tend to flow straight back into the performance poetry though?

Think On: Benjamin Zephaniah during his last visit to Preston, Lancashire (Photo: Denis Oates Photography)

“If I try and think about what I’m going to do, I can’t do it. I have to step on a stage. It’s really weird, I don’t know what it is.

“Everyone’s got their own style, and half an hour is a very strange time for me. I usually do an hour or more.”

So will it be more like a greatest hits package at the Harris?

“I don’t know. I don’t really have any greatest hits!”

After more than 30 years on the road as a dub poet, author and activist, I put it to Benjamin that he must know the motorways and back roads of the UK pretty well.

“Yeah, every time I find myself in a city or town I don’t know, I’m really shocked – I thought I’d know everywhere by now. I’ve been on the road since I was around 22, driving around the country.”

Now and again, he turns up on our TVs too, last time as half-time and pre-match entertainment at the all-West Midlands FA Cup quarter-final between his beloved Aston Villa and rivals West Bromwich Albion on March 7th.

His Ode to Aston Villa and West Brom brought the hosts luck too in a 2-0 win. So is he on a high about Villa’s current run of form under new boss Tim Sherwood?

“I’m not sure if I’d call it a high, there are some tough games coming up, but it’s nice to see a new manager come in.

“I never believed managers could make much of a difference, but after Martin O’Neill I was really sad when he left, which was very sudden before the start of the season after some argument in the boardroom.

True Villan: Benjamin Zephaniah is a committed Aston Villa fan (Photo: http://www.avfc.co.uk/)

“It’s never quite been the same. But at the moment, it’s really good.

“There was an amazing atmosphere that night, and I think with the people running on to the pitch after it was more a relief of tension rather than anything else.

“I couldn’t leave the ground for ages, with people saying, ‘You brought us good luck with your poem. Come and do it again. We want a poem every game!’”

It may not be such a frenzy in Preston, but Benjamin certainly proved a big hit during a talk and book-signing session at the nearby County Hall in late September.

I’ve a photo of my youngest daughter and myself with Benjamin from that night, the launch of Black History Month and his most recent children’s novel, Terror Kid, one of many such signing sessions across the country.

What was the public reaction to Terror Kid from that tour?

“Every event was different, some concentrating on the terrorism aspect, some on the riots and why young people riot, some people talking about multi-culturalism, and the idea that you’ve got a Romany lead character – as Brummie as everyone else – and a Moslem girl who is a kick-boxer.

“I would sit there and talk about what I thought the book was about, but others found other things in there.”

On his official website, Benjamin is described as a ‘poet, writer, lyricist, musician and trouble-maker’, while various other labels over the years range from dub poet and playwright to political activist, animal rights campaigner and even ‘rasta folkie’. So which sits best with him?

Question Time: Radio Lancashire’s John Gillmore with Benjamin Zephaniah at County Hall, Preston (Photo: Denis Oates Photography)

“One that’s never used, actually, a West African word – griot. The traditional African griot is someone who goes from village to village performing or reading poetry or playing music, like an alternative newscaster as well as a political agitator.

“They may be making people aware of a bad ruler or an illness spreading, going to villages completely off the electricity grid.

“I see myself as that too, because griots express themselves through poems or songs, but no one in the audience has to ask whether they’re a poet or a musician. They just see them as someone creative.

“Whatever they want to express, they’ll find their meaning. The word bard doesn’t say it completely, and a troubadour is not quite the same, but griot … yeah, we’ll add that to the English language!”

In a sense, I get the feeling that Benjamin is a poet and writer for those who don’t seem to think they do poetry or books.

“The majority of people that listen to my poetry will say to me, ‘I don’t really like poetry’, because of the relevance and subject matter.

“One guy came up to me at a university in Manchester and said he didn’t even like my poetry, but said, ‘I love what you say, and I love the content’. And I like that too.

“I can’t expect people to take everything I say in, but they remember little bits, and when I mention people like Marcus Garvey, they might remember that and find out who they were.

“One of my favourite intellectuals of all time is the American, Noam Chomsky, one of the most quoted too. But no one knows when they’re quoting him.

“When they look him up, they realise he’s done so much, in politics, linguistics and much more.

Rasta Folkie: Benjamin Zephaniah gets serious

“If he books to do a talk in London or wherever, it sells out within half an hour, like a big rock concert. And that’s for a professor!”

That coming from someone classed as a professor himself these days, the Handsworth-born 56-year-old a key part of the creative writing course at Brunel University, and back in 2008 included in The Times’ list of Britain’s top 50 post-war writers.

Yet this is a man unlikely to wallow in academic circles, and he’s just as quick to quote comic genius Spike Milligan as an influence as Chomsky.

It seems fitting too, as Spike probably introduced many of us to poetry without us realising it.

“He was a lovely man, so genuine. I get emotional just thinking about him. When he wrote his children’s poetry, he didn’t really write it to get it published, he just wanted to impress his daughter. I liked that about him.

“Also, his war poems were anti-war poems, about what it was doing to him and to other people.

“I met him once, while making this really weird, independent film by a girl straight out of film school.

“He came along and came over just like one of the crew, and when he spoke to me he spoke as if he’d known me for years.”

That’s good, I tell him, because it’s not always a positive thing to meet your heroes.

“No, sometimes I’ve been really been let down by that experience.”

So how come this West Midlands lad who made his name in London, travelled in Palestine and recorded with Bob Marley’s backing band The Wailers in Jamaica, ended up living between rural Lincolnshire and Beijing?

“I don’t think you should really be surprised. I’ve always gone on about multi-culturalism, and multi-cultural Britain means I shouldn’t just have to live in areas that are seen as multi-cultural.

“I have the right to live in a small village, even if I made a few jokes at first, saying I was the only Black in the village.

“I was watching a TV programme about Smethwick in the 1964 election (Channel 4’s Britain’s Most Racist Election), following the story of how immigrants moved into that area and local people tried to get them out.

“Go there now and everyone gets on with one another, but someone had to do it first.

“I’ve been in this small village just outside Spalding for some time, and often meet people who say – if they’re relaxed enough around me – I’m the first Black person I’ve met.

“There are people there who have never been out of the area. I have a close friend who does my handiwork who’s never been out of that area.

“He’s a hard bloke and you’d want him on your side in a fight. But if you suggest going to London to him he’d get so nervous.

“The other thing being there has taught me is that people tend to think those that live in the countryside are all rich and privileged. But rural poverty is brutal, probably even more so that inner city poverty.

“If the lights go out, you can meet on the corner in an inner city. In the countryside it really goes dark, and places really close. If you miss a bus, you’ve had it!

“There are lots of suicides too, lots of quiet drug problems, and real issues.

“As for Beijing, I believe we should have a multi-cultural world, so I can go and live there too.”

Benjamin’s folks were among the earliest to arrive in the UK after the initial post-war MV Empire Windrush sailings, but with Smethwick in the ‘60s in mind, I put it to him that – for all the race relations problems in the decades that followed – his parents arrived in a very different Britain to the one we know now.

History Maker: Benjamin Zephaniah at County Hall, Preston in September 2014 (Photo: Denis Oates Photography)

“I remember my Mum jumping out of her seat one day and celebrating, and I asked why, and she explained who Enoch Powell was and how that night a woman had thrown a drink over him.

“I didn’t quite get it at the time. When people tried to explain to me how some people hated you because of your colour, I didn’t get it.

“I could understand someone hating you if you’d stolen all their biscuits, but surely not because of the colour of your skin.

“And these were adults, supposedly responsible people. Weird!”

Benjamin’s Mum still lives in Birmingham, but he doesn’t seem to mention his Dad so much. So was he around to see his success and how he turned around his life after troubled early adult days before he headed to London?

“My Dad passed away a few years ago in Barbados, having been separated from my Mum. But he just didn’t care about my work at all.

“I was so proud when I took my first book to him, but he just said, ‘What’s that?’ as if it was a piece of trash. It was really embarrassing as well, because I’d gone with my girlfriend, and he just felt it was worthless.

“I went to visit him in Barbados not long before he died, and it was probably the best time I ever had with him. He had a new lease of life and I wanted to make my peace with him.

“Even then he just didn’t get it. But then he started this business driving tourists around in beach buggies around the island, and during a break he realised two people were reading my books.

“An adult was reading a poem and a younger one was reading a novel. He said, a little surprised, ‘That’s my son!’

“I heard from him and someone else who was there that these people told him what I meant to them and to the country, and it was the first time he went, ‘Damn, I didn’t realise’. That was just before he died.”

Does the 56-year-old Rastafarian think he’s more or less political now he’s reached such a relatively grand age?

“Not only am I more political, I’m more militant! I was told I’d get more mellow as I grew older, but I’m not.

“God knows what I’d be doing now if I didn’t have my poetry as an outlet and that platform to express myself on TV, radio and so on.

“And I am angry! We’ve come so far but still have racist groups and elections where we’re still talking about immigration and race.

“We’ve got governments of various colours and banks that have messed up and we’ve got to pay for it, and all of them are privatising the National Health Service slowly.

“Sometimes I just look at young people and think, come on – get angry! The angrier they are in their poetry, the better it will be.

“I have to teach my students to put something in their poetry. They all have some fine words but isn’t there something they really feel passionately about?

“It’s all kind of love stuff. That’s alright, but what about the love of humanity, a real love of your country and your people?

“Sometimes it takes a bit of time, as they think I’m their university tutor while the protest stuff I do is outside university.

”And with performance poetry you have to have something to say and have to be passionate about it, otherwise you may as well just be up there reading a book.”

Is Benjamin quite rigid in the way he writes? I can’t imagine him having too structured a day.

“I’m useless! I’ll say I’m going to write from nine until one and then decide I’m going to play football.

“I wish I had the discipline of some writers, but quite frankly a lot of people I know who write like they’re in a factory really don’t understand the realities of life, because that’s all they do.

“If they want to write about someone living in poverty, they’ll do some research, while I’ve got friends that live in poverty, so I’ll just go and talk to them.

“I think it’s really good for a poet to have other interests, like me in football and classic cars and clubbing. I can’t just write like I’m in a factory.

“When I got the deal for Terror Kid, I was offered a multi-book deal and said no. Everybody, including my agent, said, ‘What? This is what people dream of!’

“But I don’t want to be forced to write a book, I want to be able to feel like it, when I feel the political and cultural need to do it, I’ll do it, but not just because of some contract.”

Some of the issues raised in Terror Kid seem to have been replicated lately in the real-life stories of the Londoners making their way to Syria via Turkey.

When Benjamin last visited Preston, he talked about a teenage friend in London who headed to Syria, initially to fight Assad, but was quickly disillusioned by the reality of the conflict. Any word from the family since?

“I haven’t spoken to the parents for a while, but last time there was no news. I’m just hoping the feeling in the press about terrorism and people’s reasons for going out there is changing again.

“Some are just misguided and misled, and this lad went out there thinking he was going to be part of a liberation movement but then got in with people far removed from that, and wanted out.

“But he was scared of coming back because he thought he may be treated as a terrorist.

“It’s quite surprising just how many people have gone out there from this country, but – and this is the thing about the propaganda here – quite a lot go out to fight ISIS, and the guy who got killed the other day was seen as some kind of hero.

“I think that’s something that would just inflame the situation. They tell people in this country not to take sides, but if someone takes sides against ISIS we don’t seem to have a problem with it.”

Benjamin dedicated Terror Kid to the late, great left-wing stalwart MP Tony Benn. Why was he such an influence?

“He was a bit of a mentor to me, and sometimes if I had problems thinking something true I’d ask for his opinion.

“When Terror Kid was just an idea, I talked to him about it, asking about the use of computers in Government and how realistic that was.

Signing On: Benjamin Zephaniah poses with the blogger and his youngest daughter (Photo: Malcolm Wyatt)

“It was a slightly different story then, but he never lived to see it published. Yet he was the one who said I should write it, a long time before my editor.”

So what’s Benjamin working on at the moment?

“There’s a musical album that’s almost finished, although I’m not sure of the release date. And the new book’s in my head. I haven’t yet started committing it to paper.

“And I’m also off to China soon to do some kung fu.”

That’s another great passion for you, isn’t it?

“I’ve been a kung fu lover all my life, and can’t start the day without that. I’ve always been into kung fu, yoga, tai chi …

“I’ve never done drugs. I get high on learning how to breathe, I get high on pushing my body to the limit, I get high on learning how to be strong without using my muscles.”

Are you a family man as well?

“No. I’m tempted to say that one of the next things I want to do is … well, my Mum keeps saying it’s time for me to get married, and I think it’s about time. But who knows.”

Form an orderly queue, everyone.

“Oh, I don’t know about that!”

For the very latest from Benjamin Zephaniah, head to his official website here.

And for a writewyattuk feature covering Benjamin’s last visit to Preston in late September, 2014, head here.

Posted in Books Films, TV & Radio, Comedy & Theatre, Music | Tagged Ali Gadema, Aston Villa, Beijing, Benjamin Zephaniah, Birmingham, Black History Month, Griot, Handsworth, Harris Museum & Art Gallery, Lincolnshire, Marcus Garvey, Mike Garry, Noam Chomsky, Preston, Spike Milligan, Terror Kid, The Wailers | 2 Comments

March on with The Stranglers – the Baz Warne interview

Posted on March 13, 2015 by writewyattuk

Marching On: JJ Burnel and Baz Warne up front for the Stranglers (Photo: Warren Meadows)

It’s not often a front-man is still regularly held up to scrutiny after 15 years with a band, but that’s how it often goes with Baz Warne.

To put it mildly, The Stranglers’ founder member Hugh Cornwell was a hard act to follow, even though he left 25 years ago.

Hugh’s legacy was certainly a difficult one to live up to for replacement Paul Roberts, but he stuck around nearly 16 years – more or less the same period as Hugh.

And when Paul departed, the band had a ready-made successor in the ranks, Sunderland-born and bred Baz having replaced guitarist John Ellis six years earlier.

By next year, Baz should have eclipsed Hugh and Paul’s time with the band, yet he’s still asked by prying journalists like me what it’s like to be the new kid with his head on the block.

He had a colourful enough background with other bands, but this is The Stranglers after all. Does he still have to pinch himself that this is all really happening?

“Well yeah, but I have been with the band 15 years.”

True, but there must be times when you look around the stage and spot iconic bass player Jean-Jacques Burnel, keyboard wiz Dave Greenfield and drumming legend Jet Black, wondering how this all came about.

“To be honest, I used to think like that, but probably just for the first three or four months. They made me feel welcome and a part of it right from the word go.

“As far as they’re concerned, this is The Stranglers, and this line-up’s now been on the go nine years and we’ve done more than we’ve ever done before.

“The last two albums were very well-received, JJ maintaining Giants is probably one of the best.”

I agree, having listened to Giants a fair bit on the build-up to last July’s Preston gig.

“Thank you very much. Was that for the 53 Degrees show? Was that a good one? I can’t really recall.”

It certainly was, and Baz was on fine form, as were all his band-mates, as chronicled on this very blog in my review here.

So when did the 50-year-old – who was just 10 when The Stranglers first joined forces in my home town of Guildford – become aware of the Men in Black?

“As a very early teenager up in Sunderland, one of the ways I got money to buy a good guitar was by delivering papers, and a guy on my route ordered Sounds.

“I think it was about 40p or something. I thought that was quite a lot, but then I started buying it and remember seeing The Stranglers on the cover.

“They looked very different. And when I heard them …”

Either the line from the West Country breaks up there or Baz is still genuinely lost for words, but I plough on and ask what era he’s talking about.

“That would have been 1976 or 1977, and once I’d heard them and caught them on Top of the Pops I put two and two together and realised it was that bunch of guys I’d seen on the front of Sounds.

“I just loved them, although I was always more of a guitar man, really. They were never really a guitar-heavy group, so it took a while to realise.

“They had a keyboard player, so I thought they were going to sound like Yes or Pink Floyd. Of course, nothing could have been further from the truth.

“So I’ve been aware of The Stranglers a very long time, then the band I was with in Sunderland, the Smalltown Heroes, supported them in 1995 and 1997.”

Had he already seen them live by then?

“I saw them in Sunderland in 1980 at the back end of The Raven tour. The place they played is a Tesco’s now.

“I only saw the Hugh line-up once, and was with all my mates from school, having drunk a bottle of cider before we’d gone along. I know I was there though!

“I also saw them at Gateshead (International Stadium) with Paul (Roberts), the very first gig or major tour they did with him in 1991.”

Do the founder members – JJ, Dave and Jet – tend to talk about those old times a lot when you’re on the road?

“Not very often, they don’t dwell on that. It’s 25 years ago after all. People often look back through rose-tinted spectacles, but they were exciting times and they were all so young.

“Somehow, by total happenstance, they managed to chance upon a sound that is totally and utterly unique and hasn’t been replicated before or since.

“They’ve never rested on their laurels though, and we always seek to move on.

“Every now and again someone will talk about Hugh, but because I’m on the inside and have been a very long time now, I’ve heard the bad stories and crap that went on.

“For what he achieved Hugh was unbelievable. He has such an instantly-recognisable, quintessentially English and timeless pop voice.

“I’ve studied guitar playing and although it makes me sound arrogant I think I’m a far better guitar player. But I can’t sing like him, and don’t think anybody could.”

Maybe the beauty of it is that you don’t try to – this isn’t a Karaoke Stranglers.

“I’m pleased you’ve said that, and I’ve said that when we’ve listened back to live recordings these last few weeks during rehearsals.

“Funnily enough though, we put a version of Down in the Sewer on and we all thought it was Hugh … but it was me!

Live Pedigree: JJ Burnel and Baz lead from the front for The Stranglers (Photo: Warren Meadows)

“JJ said, ‘You remind me of him sometimes, with your voice’. But I can assure you it’s not a conscious effort, and there are only traces and little glimpses.

“Besides, I couldn’t do that. I couldn’t live with myself. I’d just be a clone.”

Soon, you’ll have put in the same amount of service as both Hugh and Paul.

“Yes, coming up, having joined in April 2000. And there’s not one thing I’d change.”

Baz was speaking to me close to the band’s rehearsal rooms, ‘in the countryside, about 10 miles from Bath’, where they were also based when writing Giants.

It was their last weekend off before their March On tour, although Baz – his Makem tones as defined as ever – was already a fair distance from his Sunderland home.

“I flew down this time, but I’m pretty sure my car knows the way now. I’ve lived back in Sunderland seven or eight years now, after a few years away.

“The world’s a shrinking place, and you don’t need to be in the hub of it all anymore.

I prefer not to be. All it takes is a phone call and I can be wherever they want me to be a day later.”

Baz recently underwent a second bout of knee surgery, two years after the first was operated on, but insisted he was ‘on the mend and won’t need crutches or a bloody stick anymore.’

Guitar Man: Baz Warne in action at Cardiff on the March On tour (Photo: Warren Meadows)

So he won’t have to be wheeled on stage by anyone?

“I’m hopeful those days are way, way in front of me!”

Was that injury brought on from all the touring over the years?

“I honestly don’t know, but used to play a lot of football, and also have this bizarre stamping movement with my left foot, a bit like Joe Strummer, slamming it down.”

So it’s wear and tear, maybe?

“I think that’s exactly what it is. I’ve been doing that for 25 years.”

The tour started with dates in Brighton and their initial base Guildford, with 17 more following over a wide area and dates in Liverpool, Glasgow and London quickly selling out.

They also play Manchester Academy on March 21, with support from post-punk Blackpool band The Membranes and Scottish art-punk legends The Rezillos.

In fact, Membranes and Goldblade frontman John Robb, now perhaps best known for his Louder than War website, said of the band: “In 1976,The Stranglers were at the first peak of their powers and 40 years later the band is still on fire, with that powerful menacing sound. They are still one of the best live bands.”

As for the other tour guests, Baz added: “I’ve never seen them live before, but was a fan as a kid, and Can’t Stand The Rezillos, the first album, is still an absolute classic.

Destination UK: The Rezillos in live action

“We don’t know them, but they’ve still got Fay and Eugene and to my delight Angel Patterson, the original drummer. I’m looking forward to meeting them. It’ll be fun.”

As we discussed the tour schedule, Baz was interrupted by another call, quickly getting rid – and quite abruptly – a certain Jean-Jacques Burnel.

I point out that he’s playing a dangerous game, not least as JJ has a considerably larger understanding of martial arts than me.

Baz is dismissive. “Nah. Are you a karate man as well?

Not at all … in fact, I’ve never so much as a yellow belt, not even in the days when the New Romantic bands broke through.

I briefly explained at that point about my shared Guildford links with the band, and pointed him towards a previous interview with JJ involving lots of Surrey reminiscing (with a link here), while stressing that the legendary Stranglers bass player had a few years on me.

“Well, he’s older than you think he is, you know.”

It turns out that while Baz is happy with the schedule of the March On tour, he feels he’s missing out on a return to Ireland this time around.

“We don’t seem to do it as much as we used to. We’ve a lot of Irish fans and did a great festival there towards the end of last year, the last before my knee surgery, playing at The Electric Picnic.”

I read about that in a piece Baz did for the band website, talking about a bout of colourful language in a TV interview.

Ruby Quartet: From the left, Dave Greenfield, Jet Black, Baz Warne, JJ Burnel (Photo: The Stranglers)

“They were asking me to relate a story, and I warned them that it involved swearing, but they said that was alright as they’d edit it out later.

“But they didn’t, and when it was broadcast there it was in all its glory, with all the effing and blinding.”

So have your family on Wearside disowned you as a result?

“No! They know I like to relax with a little more profane language from time to time.”

The Stranglers were set to play Moscow this April too, but – understandably amid the current political circumstances – cancelled.

“They’ve made it very difficult for musicians, artists and entertainers in light of the political situation.

“But it’s not completely cancelled and the opportunity thrown away. As and when we can we’ll go. I’ve never been before, and the band has only been once, in the ‘90s.”

Are there European dates in the offing beyond the UK tour and a few summer festival dates?

“As we speak there are some being put together later in the year, probably around November, and quite an extensive tour so I’ve been told, but it’s still very much in the planning stage.”

As well as his time with Smalltown Heroes and then Sun Devils, Baz was previously with cult punks The Toy Dolls, best remembered for one-off hit Nellie the Elephant.

Makem Past: Baz’s old band The Toy Dolls seem to be managing without him

Baz laughs, then exclaims a blasphemic mutter.

“That’s a very long time ago! They were looking to expand to a four-piece with a guitar player. I auditioned, got the gig, then they decided they didn’t want to do that, so I was the bass player for two years.

“But that gave me the platform – it was when I first realised I could make a career out of all this.

“I toured the United States with them in the early ‘80s. You can imagine my mother and father thinking, ‘What’s he doing with this punk band? He must be mad!’

“But we played to up to 12,000 people. It was a real learning curve, tremendous fun …”

All part of growing up and being British?

“Aye, it was, and we had youth and exuberance on our side. And again that was a totally unique band – no one sounds like them. What more could you ask for?

“They’re still going to this day, and I still speak to (lead singer Michael) Algar every once in a while.”

Weren’t they a three-piece on Top of the Pops with Nellie the Elephant?

“Well, I’m actually on the record, but left before it was released. At the time I was horribly put out and very envious, but now I look back and think, ‘Thank Christ!”

Last year saw The Stranglers’ 40^th anniversary Ruby tour, a major celebration which proved to be their best-selling tour in more than 30 years.

But it was also a tour slightly tempered by health problems for drummer Jet Black, punk’s first septuagenarian.

Luckily, Jim Macaulay was on hand, although Jet joined for the odd cameo. Is that how it will be this time too?

Lining Up: Baz, Jet, JJ and Dave ask us outside (Photo: The Stranglers)

“In the last couple of years we’ve been bringing him on for a little session in the middle, and will do on this tour, when his health is up to the travelling and everything.

“But it’s going to be mostly Jim, and that kid inspires us all. He’s so powerful, such a good drummer and a very nice kid with lots of enthusiasm.

“The fans are very much starting to fall in love with him too, chanting his name at gigs as well as Jet’s. He’s thrilled at that.

“But Jet is very well, and I saw him yesterday for his weekly rehearsal and catch-up. He was in fine fettle and played very well.”

Baz and Jim, 30, certainly bring down the average age, with Jet now 76, Dave aged 65 and JJ aged 63.

“Aye, we do – which is much needed! We’re only 80 between us, not far off Dave … of course, I’m only joking.”

With no disrespect intended towards Baz and Jim, my abiding memory of the 53 Degrees show was JJ prowling menacingly at the front with that trademark bass growl, and Dave’s ear-to-ear grinning between sips of his pint from his keyboard tower at the back amid a fantastic wall of synthesised noise– two punk legends, even with Jet missing.

“Yeah, and I think we’re all happy to still be here. As Jet says, he wouldn’t have thought it would last for 40 minutes, never mind 40 years.”

How do they all get on behind the scenes? Baz’s bandmates can’t be the easiest bed-fellows.

“They’re not, and we have our moments, but you need a certain amount of friction to keep things fresh.

“To quote a really old cliché, it’s a family … and you never get on with your family all the time.”

Striking Chords: Baz Warne giving his best with The Stranglers at Cardiff University on the March On tour (Photo: Warren Meadows)

Is work due to start on the follow-up to Giants soon?

“All I’ll say is that there are rumblings. We’ve been tossing some very sketchy sort of skeletons of ideas around.

“Things are starting to come up in rehearsals, always a good sign, moments when someone will play something and you’ll say, ‘Play that again’.”

I seem to remember that worked quite well in Casablanca once. Sorry .. carry on, Baz.

“Yeah, so it’s not entirely beyond the realms of possibility, but we’ve another solid, busy year of gigging ahead.

“JJ and I have lots of ideas, and we’re looking in Spring to go to his place in the South of France, spend time down there and write, as with Giants. So yeah, it’s all positive and upbeat.”

Finally, there’s a real love between The Stranglers and their audience. It’s a love crowd, as Otis Redding would say.

“It is. The fans have always been very much behind the band. The Family in Black, we call it. We see a lot of familiar faces and know a lot by name.

“They’ve always been loyal, but in the earlier days when there was still a lot of friction, tension and anger, some of the older fans said they would go along as much as anything to see if they’d start fighting each other!

“Now of course we’re more mellow, although there’s still the unexpected and we’re still unpredictable. I think people like that as well.”

For all the latest from The Stranglers and full details of their forthcoming live dates, head to http://www.thestranglers.net/

Meanwhile, for a Hugh Cornwell feature on this blog from July, 2013, including a few more Stranglers reminscences, head here.

Posted in Music | Tagged Baz Warne, Dave Greenfield, guildford, Hugh Cornwell, Jean-Jacques Burnel, Jet Black, Jim Macaulay, Joe Strummer, Manchester, Rezillos, Smalltown Heroes, Sunderland, The Membranes, The Stranglers, Toy Dolls | 5 Comments

Feeding fiction to the 5,000 – my World Book Day 2015 encounter

Posted on March 9, 2015 by writewyattuk

Late Nerves: The authors get ready for kick-off at Deepdale. From the left, World Book Day’s Kirsten Grant, Jonny Duddle, Cathy Cassidy’s back (!), Frank Cottrell Boyce, Cressida Cowell, Danny Wallace (Photo: Malcolm Wyatt)

As I turned down Lowthorpe Road on my approach to Preston North End FC, a ‘cattlepiddler’ of high-vis jackets from a nearby school heading the same way suggested I was definitely in the right place.

Close by, coaches belched out their own human beans, their titchy little snapperwhippers all set for a day to remember, celebrating the beauty of books and children’s lit.

I should apologise for the BFG wordsmithery there, but who better to plagiarise in a World Book Day feature than Roald Dahl, one of this global event’s main inspirations? After all, that appreciation of past and present children’s fiction makes this annual happening a winner – rather than the ‘off the peg’ costume money-market harassed parents are conned into.

I was lucky enough to join the VIP contingent in the Invincibles Pavilion Stand for this ambitious event, the flagship of the ten WBD 2015 happenings across the UK. Okay, so there wasn’t much evidence of national media interest – at least on the TV bulletins I saw – but those who were there seemed to have the time of their lives.

As I sat, pitch-side, I wondered what late, great England and Preston legend Sir Tom Finney – his visage picked out on the seats opposite – would have made of this spectacle. I like to think he would have been up for it though, as he was with anything helping spread the word about his beloved club.

Praise too for all at Deepdale for their involvement in this project. Yes, there were headaches on the day, but overall it went surprisingly well considering the huge scale of this undertaking.

Even before I left our ‘green room’ – the PNE players lounge – I was aware of the sheer numbers of eight to 13-year-olds out there. A staggering 5,000 of them from 100 schools across the region were represented, and capable of a mighty racket.

Lining Up: Steve Butler, Deepdale Duck, PNE’s Rachel Brennan and Jonny Duddle form an orderly queue, without a burger concession in sight (Pic: Malcolm Wyatt).

Treasured PNE mascot Deepdale Duck did the hard work with club colleague Rachel Brennan in the warm-up, keeping the crowd whooped up as the stand filled up, while our six performing guest authors built up the courage to get out there and face them.

It was interesting from an independent view experiencing the different approaches to stage-fright, from co-organiser Jake Hope through to the writers themselves – all displaying plenty of PMT (that’s pre-match tension for the non-footie fans among you).

First-time children’s author but seasoned performer and writer Danny Wallace seemed quiet and somewhat pensive, Cathy Cassidy carried a nervous smile, and Frank Cottrell Boyce was perhaps wondering if he should have worn a little more protection from the elements than his best suit.

Meanwhile, Jonny Duddle – in full pirate garb, complete with cutlass – looked like he might be searching forlornly for land ahoy, and when I finally spotted Cressida Cowell she seemed to be jumping up and down on the spot in her own particular warm-up.

Perhaps the coolest head – at least outwardly – was that of Steven Butler, and that was handy seeing as our top-hatted resident ringmaster just happened to be the master of ceremonies.

Even his pencil ‘tache pointed skywards on the day, providing a note of positivity to help encourage his fellow guests. And pretty soon – with the Alan Kelly Town End now full – he was ready for the off.

Ring Master: Steven Butler has a moment of reflection amid the mayhem (Photo: Malcolm Wyatt)

Steven proved a natural too, The Diary of Dennis the Menace series author giving his young audience a rowdy glimpse into the Butler family home in his youth, his audience almost spellbound and his excitable delivery proving infectious.

It’s understandable I guess, when you factor in that this was Steven’s ninth of 10 such Biggest Book Show on Earth UK & Ireland events, having started out on February 23rd in Norwich, a run leading to a big finish the following day at Newcastle City Hall in an event organised by the wonderful Seven Stories.

Pretty soon, he was introducing Jonny Duddle and the good vibes continued, this former Prestonian – now based in North Wales – making as much a verbal impact as a visual one.

Our resident salty cove rearranged his tricorn hat and talked passionately about his picture books and local roots, and whenever he felt things might be flagging he’d ask his audience, ‘What do pirates say?’ and received a mighty ‘Aaarghhh!’ in response.

Jonny also shared a little of his expertise with us, an illustration of a JD parrot taking shape on the big screen at the Bill Shankly Kop end of the ground as he worked feverishly, before the kids suggested – at his prompting – a ‘squawk’ should be added.

Between the guest slots, our red-coated MC returned for more crowd-whipping fun and introductions, giving us three lesser-known facts about each author before they were invited to step on stage, the goal-posts moved on the day in more ways than one.

Introducing Hamish: Danny Wallace is picked out on the big screen on the Bill Shankly Kop (Photo: Malcolm Wyatt)

Next up was Danny Wallace, who also proved a natural with this crowd, introducing them to his book character Hamish and life in the less-than-glamorous fictional town of Starkley, with a little help from Jamie Littler’s artwork.

We were also treated to a few headlines from The Starkley Post, the children invited to give their verdict on how interesting each was. And it’s not often a live performer invites his audience to shout ‘Boring!’ for a large part of his set.

Of course, Danny was anything but dull, proving a big hit with the kids, not least when he introduced us to his own children on the big screen, showing pictures of cute monkeys.

Cathy Cassidy had a hard task following that, but coped superbly, one of the event’s biggest sellers overcoming slight technical hitches to deliver a clear, impassioned address.

She encouraged those present to make sure they enrolled at their local library, shared with us her love of the wonder of books from an early age, talked about her Chocolate Book series and her re-imagining of Alice in Wonderland, then got on to the subject of day-dreaming in class.

In Wonderland: Cathy Cassidy addresses the 5,000, as seen on the big screen (Photo: Malcolm Wyatt)

Cathy was soon on such a high that she even asked if anyone liked football. The resultant roar led to her apologetic admission that she wasn’t such a fan, but she looked relieved to get a bigger response when she asked who loved books and who loved day-dreaming.

By the time Frank Cottrell Boyce took to the stage, the PA system was definitely playing up a little, and you got the feeling a fair proportion of his audience couldn’t quite make out what he was telling us – feverish running about following from the University of Central Lancashire technical team.

Meanwhile, Frank soldiered on tremendously, snapping a picture of the crowd before a book-related take on Rowan Atkinson’s ‘taking the register’ skit, involving Gandalf and many others dotted around the ground.

If I missed some of his words, it’s not because I was taking advantage of the green room facilities (although I did dart off at one point for a restorative coffee as the cold took its toll), but because we too were struggling to hear.

But Frank quickly had the audience on his side, introducing his latest fictional hero, The Astounding Broccoli Boy, while relating his own experiences of turning a different colour in public.

It was also noticeable after Steven had re-taken the mic. that Frank was fully relaxed now, walking along the stand and beaming smiles and waves to his new roster of fans as if he’d just won the Sherpa Van Trophy.

Broccoli Boy: Frank Cottrell Boyce on the Bill Shankly Kop big screen, treating the crowd to a reading (Photo: Malcolm Wyatt)

That just left Cressida Cowell, and if the kids were starting to get a little cold by now through over-exposure to the elements on this early March morning, they were soon warmed up by her bubbly talk of dragons and much more.

She flashed up snapshots of her on a Scottish island hideaway as a child, the one where she first dared to dream of these wee beasties that would make her name. And if you’ve ever seen Cressida in action, you’ll know you can’t help but be inspired. Imagine Miranda Richardson’s Queenie in Blackadder II in playful mode and you’re not far off.

Cressida also treated us to a little live drawing, bringing Toothless to life on the big screen, keeping her young audience fully engaged when thoughts were turning to dinnertime.

Pretty soon, the young ‘uns were all filing out, the Preston Six taking a collective bow on stage after a farewell address from co-organiser Elaine Silverwood. We were soon back in the warm, and while the organisers were still not quite ready to relax, the authors were.

Danny and Jonny were in good form as we chatted over cuppas, Frank and Cressida were in deep conversation at the bar, and Steven seemed almost unrecognisable in his civvies, his circus redcoat now safely back on its hanger.

Candid Moment: Frank and Cressida compare notes in the PNE players lounge (Photo: Malcolm Wyatt)

I didn’t catch Cathy again, but later found out she’d been ‘ambushed’ by her adoring public, clearly having felt she’d missed out on her usual post-event meet, greet and sign, like that which kept her so busy in an event the previous year at Blackburn.

With the coffee running out and Jonny mentioning he was ready to change out of his pirate gear, I felt it was definitely time to leave, waving goodbye to Frank as he chatted on his mobile phone outside the stadium before heading back towards Leyland.

The sheer size of the event was still being brought home to me as I drove away, a vast convoy of coaches encountered en route heading back to their respective schools.

It might have taken the organisers a while to fully appreciate it, nut I should put in writing here that it was all a resounding success, and everyone could feel proud of their input.

You could argue that any one of these authors might have proved more personal and just as successful in front of two or three classes, but this ambitious event somehow worked a treat and should stay in the memories banks forever – for its authors, pupils and teachers alike.

Reading Matters: Danny Wallace casts a quizzical eye over his first children’s book (Photo: Malcolm Wyatt)

I was close enough to see just how much work went into the whole spectacle, from booking the guests and the venue to co-ordinating the school operation and ensuring pupils got their pre-signed books as a treasured memento of the day.

Last year’s King George’s Hall show was spectacular enough, yet this was five times the size, and just the sheer amount of St John Ambulance volunteers in the ground shed light on that.

To use the football vernacular, children’s lit and the love of books was the clear winner here. The boys and girls done good. Result.

For this blog’s WBD 2015 pre-event feature with Cathy Cassidy, head here, and for a Frank Cottrell Boyce feature head here.

To find out more about the World Book Day organisation, head here.

With thanks to regional co-organisers Jake Hope and SilverDell of Kirkham‘s Elaine Silverwood.

And for far better pics from the day than mine, head to Sara Cuff’s C Pictures site here when she’s got them online, and Michael Thorn’s own take on the day here.

Posted in Books Films, TV & Radio | Tagged Cathy Cassidy, Cressida Cowell, Danny Wallace, Deepdale Duck, Frank Cottrell Boyce, Jonny Duddle, lancashire, Preston, Preston North End, Steven Butler, World Book Day | Leave a comment

Cathy’s Adventures in Wonderland – the Cathy Cassidy interview

Posted on March 7, 2015 by writewyattuk

In my second feature centred around World Book Day 2015, I talked about Alice, libraries, music, the power of dreams and much more with best-selling children’s writer Cathy Cassidy, in an interview a few days before her WBD appearances at Preston North End FC and Newcastle City Hall.

Creative Wonderland: Cathy Cassidy has a big 2015 ahead of her (Photo: Louise Llewelyn)

It’s been a busy 2015 so far for Cathy Cassidy, and promises to remain so.

The Merseyside-based children’s author is set to publish two new books in the next couple of months, her Lewis Carroll-inspired Looking Glass Girl in April followed by the final book in the much-loved Chocolate Box series, Fortune Cookie, in June.

But before all that she had a major date with five other authors, facing 5,000 kids from 100 schools across the North West at Preston North End FC.

And Cathy, talking to me from home ahead of her big day, was feeling the pressure – not least as she reckoned her football skills weren’t up to scratch.

“It’s a bit scary! I never imagined I’d be doing a talk in a football ground! For me, the best thing is not to worry too much about the logistics, and just assume the people organising it – who are brilliant – will make it amazing.

“I’ve heard from a lot of people going along. There’s a lot of excitement out there. As long as they don’t give me a football, I should be alright!

”Back at primary school, I played football with the boys sometimes and they put me in goal, which I felt really proud about. Now of course I realise they were just shoving me out of the way!”

So is Cathy not like Liesel in Markus Zusak’s The Book Thief, who proved quite a handy player in her back-street games?

“Sadly not!”

I’ve since caught up with Cathy and can confirm she survived that ambitious, ultimately successful PNE World Book Day event and one the following day at Newcastle City Hall organised by the wonderful Seven Stories.

But while you’re have to wait for the writewyattuk take on the Preston event, here’s my full pre-event interview with the lovely-as-ever Cathy.

First, we talked about two of her fellow WBD authors at Preston, Cathy taking – to use the football cliche, which seems apt in the circumstances – each game as it comes and only thinking about her next 90 minutes on the pitch.

“I know Frank (Cottrell Boyce) a little and think he’s amazing, very inspirational and possibly one of the nicest, kindest people in children’s books.

“And I met Cressida (Cowell) a long time ago and really liked her. She’s lovely, very quirky, and cool.”

As it was, there was clearly a spark with the other ‘players’ on the day too, talented writers and illustrators Danny Wallace, Jonny Duddle and the day’s MC, Steven Butler, all making a big impression on Cathy that day. But I’m getting ahead of myself there.

I put it to Cathy, also involved with last year’s successful Biggest Bookshow on Earth on Tour event for World Book Day at King George’s Hall, Blackburn, that it must be odd playing to such a big crowd for someone whose normal working day tends to involve just a writing room and a laptop.

“I know! How amazing, You can’t think too much about the numbers, but talking to your reader or a child who might not be a reader yet – helping them see how magical books can be, opening all kinds of doors to them.

“This is way bigger than any live audience I’ve done. I’d say about 1,500’s the biggest before. But there’s no point in worrying about it. You’ve just got to do your thing.

“What I you think is important is to hope some of those kids are going to find something they can connect with.

“With that line-up and all those amazing authors, there will definitely be something for everybody.

“And what an amazing, incredible event to pull together, with kids coming from right across the North-West region.”

Library Love: Cathy at Bannockburn Library (Photo: Stirling Council Libraries and Archives via https://www.flickr.com)

It’s fair to say Cathy is a great believer in children’s lit, education and arts funding, and a fierce defender of our libraries, following recent national and local Government spending cuts.

And while it was inevitable that the subject would come up, the Coventry-born writer was quicker off the mark than I gave her credit for!

Asked what the first book she read that made her think a career in writing might be for her, she responded: “There were so many, it would be so hard to pick just one, but perhaps I could say it was down to libraries, because I was such a library addict.

“I would go to visit with my Dad and come out with armfuls of books. That was such an education to me, and libraries gave me all that for nothing. If you didn’t like a book you could just take it back the next week.

“I discovered so many things, unveiled by that ability to just go in and pick something randomly off a shelf.

“I could never have become the person I am today without libraries, yet they’re under threat right now – including three l regularly visited. That breaks my heart.

“They say kids don’t read these days, but we know different – not least through these bookshow events, experiencing just how much it means to these children.

“Only last night I had a sad email from a girl whose school library is being closed down, being turned into some kind of common room.

“They’ll be putting some books in the corner of a lobby and throwing everything else away – no school library, just a book corner.

“Along with her friends, she’s making banners, starting a petition, and asked me to write to her headteacher, which of course I will.

“Please, anyone who cares about our future should stand up for libraries and reading. Children are our fantastic, imaginative, creative potential, and we must look after them, protect them and nurture them.”

Big Break: Cathy Cassidy made the grade at her favourite teen mag Jackie

The 52-year-old wrote for Jackie and Shout magazines and was a primary school art teacher in Scotland before becoming a full-time writer.

She initially moved from Coventry to Liverpool as an art student, and after several years bringing up a family in Galloway, South West Scotland, is now back on Merseyside.

The mum-of-two has had more than 20 books published since her 2004 debut Dizzy, including three for younger readers about Daizy Star, which she also illustrated.

Cathy has sold more than two million books worldwide, and nominated three times over six years for the Queen of Teen accolade, winning once.

So tell me about The Looking Glass Girl, your modern-day re-imagining of Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland stories.

“This year is the 150th anniversary of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland being published, and last year Puffin were asking about different children’s classics and I said how much I really loved Alice.

“It’s one of those Marmite things when you’re talking about classics, but Alice is one I really loved when I read it fairly young, probably aged eight or nine, thinking of all those quirky, fantasy bits, funny and quite cool.

“Then you read it again later and get all sorts of totally different things from the experience, in what is a very surreal almost-nightmarish story really. And that’s the take I’ve carried with me all these years.

“It was a library book and one I didn’t own myself at first, but I’ve various different copies now, and it’s one of those books you go back to, keep re-reading.

“If you talk about it to children, they actually believe it’s a fairy-tale. I love that, and it’s so ingrained in our culture.

“It’s a magical story and means an awful lot to almost everybody. Very few people know little about it, maybe because of various films, but that’s the power of that story.

“I’m not re-telling the original story, but have written the tale of a group of girls who have an Alice-themed sleepover which goes wrong.

“One of the girls falls into a world of nightmare and confusion in what is quite a dark story compared to some I’ve done.

“I think kids are really going to like it and connect with it though, and I don’t think there’s anything unsuitable for my younger readers. It’s just that there’s a little more of an edge, showing the darker side of bullying and fear, although there’s nothing graphic.

“A lot of the story is told through flashbacks and imaginings and this dreamworld the main character finds herself in, in which a lot of Alice imagery appears.

“No one falls down a rabbit hole, but there are big parallels to the original. It wouldn’t really interest me to just re-tell someone else’s story though.”

Is the story sullied by modern thinking on what Lewis Carroll might have been like away from his books?

“The story is so powerful and strong that you don’t think too much about the person who wrote it. There’s nothing in the story itself that makes me feel uncomfortable, although I feel that‘s the product of someone who was quite disturbed probably.

“The Tate Liverpool about three years ago did the most amazing exhibition of Alice-inspired art, with photographs from Lewis Carroll’s private collection, his manuscripts and early drawings, plus masses of work inspired by the stories.

“It was quite amazing – from the surreal to more decorative responses to the imagery. It’s in our society and in many others now, quite multi-cultural.

“I might not have necessarily wanted to hang around with Lewis Carroll, but it’s the story that matters, not the person that writes it.”

It also seems a perfect book to plug on World Book Day, a celebration of children’s lit over the years.

“Yes … but sadly it won’t be out until the start of April!”

A lot of readers know Cathy first and foremost for her Chocolate Box series, and the last instalment follows next month. What’s more, it appears that she has even more books coming out in 2015.

“Fortune Cookie is going to be out at the start of June, and it’s a crazy year for me, with two other books coming out!”

The Chocolate Box series is largely set in the West Country, where I believe you saw out some of your student days.

“I worked one summer in Somerset when I was an art student, and deliberately went back to set the story in the village where I worked. I always like to have a strong sense of where a story is set.”

Is it sad to say goodbye to a few of your characters after so long?

“That’s going to be really weird. I’m still putting finishing touch edits to Fortune Cookie now, and it feels so weird that this is the last edit of the last book.

“The character telling the story in the final book hasn’t been in any of the previous books, only being alluded to or hinted at the end of Sweet Honey.

“In that way it’s exciting – I wanted to tie up the loose ends and finish the story and it was nice to do that from outside the perspective of the sisters.

“But leaving the story behind and having it released into the wild to see what people will make of it, knowing it’s the last, is quite hard. A lot of readers have really loved that world.”

That said, it’s rumoured there’s a TV series in the offing for the Chocolate Box series (which started with Cherry Crush, published in 2010).

“It’s still definitely a rumour, I’d say. There is a TV production company with the rights to do a treatment for a possible series, but it’s very early days and I don’t really know enough about how that works.

“I imagine this is the kind of thing that won’t always come off. They’re working on it, really believe in it and think it’s amazing, but it then needs a broadcast company to put it out.

“The impulse would be to jump up and down and say, ’How awesome’, but until it actually appears on TV I won’t believe it!

“I think it would be awesome TV though, in the way it connects. The stories have such a big place in the hearts of the readers and TV would bring it to a much wider audience.

“It’s all about families and friendships, problems and overcoming them, lovely elements of that kind of Bohemian fantasy of the perfect life you’d love but that isn’t always so perfect under the surface.”

We talked about the fantasy aspects of Alice in Wonderland, but your books are more about real-life issues. Does part of that come from your past ‘agony aunt’ days with Jackie and Shout magazines?

“I don’t think it comes from that as much as it does from me, It’s a fair enough assumption, but it’s really the other way around.

“I’m fascinated by what makes people tick and how people react to things and manage to cope with the awful stuff life might sometimes throw at them.

“Then others look like they may have everything but inside are very damaged or messed up for no obvious reason.

All Set: The WBD 2014 team in Blackburn – (from the left) Cathy Cassidy, Jonathan Meres, Lauren St John, Laura Dockrill, Alex T Smith and Curtis Jobling

“It’s just the complexity of the human condition in some ways. That’s a very fancy way of putting it – but I’m so fascinated by feelings, emotions, friendships, families, and the way in which we fix ourselves, glue ourselves together and find a way of making our lives worthwhile and happy.”

You do seem to pride yourself on ‘connecting’ with your fans, as you put it.

“Yes, and I think that’s very important, and matters to me. Everyone who writes gets a proper, personal reply, although it might take me some time – I’m so snowed under now.

“And if you take the reader out of all this, there really is no point. I get so much back from my readers, and this lovely feeling they get something wonderful from a book.

“Some have come to me at a signing crying, because a book has meant so much to them or has helped them with something. To know you can actually impact on someone in that way, it’s quite a powerful feeling.

“That does far more for me than being an agony aunt or being a teacher had – being able to write a book that can help kids.”

In a recent video interview, a young girl asked about Daizy Star, and you revealed how your Dad was part of the inspiration for Daizy’s father, who builds a boat ready to travel the world. Do many real-life family experiences cross into your books? Only there’s a thin line sometimes between personal and public. Do you feel conscious about writing ‘too personal’?

“Yes, I don’t think I would. Family is family, and there are always people who will be sad or unhappy or who won’t remember something a certain way. For me, fiction is the way to go about that.

“Almost every one of my books is about me in a way, stepping into the shoes of a different character.

“With Daizy Star, my Dad had died just before I started that series, and I was carrying an awful lot of grief. He was probably my biggest inspiration, a big hero and a big supporter of me as an odd child who had big hopes and big dreams.

“He was definitely always in my corner, so it made me want to dig up some of the crazy things, because he was a very eccentric guy trapped in a little working-class place that didn’t give him many options for carrying out those dreams.”

What did he do for work?

“He repaired cars. He was a panel-basher. He was good, but it wasn’t really what he wanted to do. But there were so many things he wanted to do – it was a different thing every six months or so! Again, that’s something reflected in the Daizy Star series.

“My dad really did build a boat in our backyard, and it wasn’t even a boat like Daizy’s dad. It was a huge trimaran!

“I remember going with him to get the mast of the boat, choosing which tree we would have, carrying it back on the roof of the van with lots of rags on it. It stuck right out in our backyard towards whoever was behind us, who wasn’t very impressed!

“There was a garage next to our house that got deconstructed because it was so full of the hull. The whole house was ruined by it, my Mum hated it and couldn’t bear it. There was no way she was going to go sailing around the world in anything, let alone this.

“But I thought it was amazing and believed totally in it and that dream we would go sailing around the world. We never did, but it’s one of those things – that power of dreaming and power of belief that transmitted itself to me.

“Later in life, when he was around 55, Dad designed a 1930s-type racing car as a kit car. It never worked as a kit car, because it was so complicated to build and he was the only person who could build it!

“But in the end he built around 25, and they’re all around the world now, some in Australia, some in Europe. They’re the most amazing things.

“So there’s certainly no sell-by date on a dream. He finally got to do the thing he loved. He never made a penny, but he was happy.”

Did you inherit your love of folk music from your parents?

“I think it would be from my Dad. He loved American folk like Burl Ives and Woody Guthrie, while I discovered Bob Dylan later.

“He was also crazy about Hank Williams, and we had one of his songs at his funeral. All of these things you’re kind of brain-washed by as a child.

“I remember when Billy Bragg’s Mermaid Avenue (with Wilco) came out, we absolutely loved those songs and played those with our children around, who were then just toddlers.

“So they ended up being brainwashed by that! I think my Dad would so love the music my kids are making now. Unfortunately, he died at a point when they were still deep into deep emo/goth stuff.

“No one would ever have predicted they would turn out to be producing ballady folk. I love how things come round like that.”

Indeed, and I should plug at this point the work of Cathy’s son Calum Gilligan – previously with Subject to Change – and daughter Caitlin Gilligan, who both perform and record their own material.

In fact, Caitlin was featured on this very blog very recently, after her debut EP release with Finch and the Moon, with a link here.

Cathy and I have a lot of 1980s’ musical influences in common, from The Cure and Dexy’s Midnight Runners through to Echo and the Bunnymen and The Teardrop Explodes. Did those bands provide her art student soundtrack?

“Absolutely, and I hate to admit it, but the reason I went to Liverpool was because Echo and the Bunnymen and The Teardrop Explodes were there!

“I remember watching the Teardrops’ Reward video and thought I wanted to go there – as people would be walking around in air force jackets and hiring jeeps. So cool!”

Funny Cathy should say that (he adds, nonchalantly), with the tale of that very video told in a recent Julian Cope interview on this blog, with a link here.

Anyway, on with the story, Cathy …

”Liverpool was that place I wanted it to be. It felt like everybody was either in a band or designing dresses or painting things on walls. It was full of creativity.

“Those bands I loved and admired were there and that made you feel like you were part of something.

“You would see them when you were out and maybe talk to them. Some of The Bunnymen lived just down the road from me, while Julian Cope lived just across the back from one of my student flats.

Flying Days; Julian Cope in his air force jacket with The Teardrop Explodes

“It was lovely, and music is the backdrop to your life. It was such fantastic, emotional music too.”

At the risk of over-doing the plugs here, I’ll also add that if you press this link, you’ll find an interview with Echo and the Bunnymen’s Will Sergeant, touching on those days. I’ll stop now though (honest).

Wikipedia suggests you’ve written 23 books now. Are you still keeping count?

“I probably lost count when I got to around 10, and I’m very challenged in the numbers department anyway.

“The problem is I’ve written short books too, and there were four e-book shorts last year, then there are non-fiction books, the Daizy Star series, the stand-alones, even some tiny books given away on magazines way back at the beginning. Do any of those count?

“Anyway, some say 23, some say 27, and maybe we’re getting into fractions as well.”

Whatever the number, that’s not a bad turnout in barely 10 years, is it?

“I think it’s pretty good going.”

I believe you’re Puffin’s top-selling children’s author too.

“Ooh, I don’t know about that. I think I am for girls, but they publish the Wimpy Kid books in the UK, and I don’t out-sell Jeff Kinney.”

Then there’s the Queen of Teen label. Does that must make you feel pretty proud?

“I think that’s hilarious, for me to be a Queen of Teen! Such a weird thing.”

I’m guessing you were more the quiet one reading in the corner at school. Is that why that seems so strange getting that accolade?

Mood Board: Cathy Cassidy inspires at Blackburn’s King George’s Hall in 2014

“Exactly, that’s always where I was and it’s still where I prefer to be! I don’t actually feel comfortable in the middle of anything.

“I prefer to stand on the edge of things. That’s where you see everything. If you’re in the middle of everything for too long you begin to believe that’s where you ought to be, and I would hate to feel like that was my right.”

My girls talk about the ’popular girls’ at school, or the ‘plops’ as my youngest puts it!

“Ooh – I love that, and might steal that! Being popular doesn’t really mean anything. It’s only really when you’re a kid when you’re trying to work out where you are and how you fit into the world.

“School gives you this idea that the popular kids rule the school, but what you don’t understand when you’re that age is they don’t rule anything else.

“When you look back with the benefit of hindsight, those kids don’t actually come to anything after school, and that’s such a shame.

“You believe life’s always going to be that way and actually it isn’t. You have to adapt and change, and sometimes people on the edge of things are the ones that can use all that they’ve observed to move forward.

“Life is not a popularity contest, and that’s so hard to tell people now when kids are brought up and brainwashed to believe it’s the case with things like The X-Factor, Big Brother and every magazine that still exists which is full of gossip, Z-list celebrities and aspirations to be rich and famous.

“Instead, try and do the things that make you happy, because rich and famous won’t make you happy. I think it’s damaging to our kids to try and show them that’s the only way.

“So don’t aspire to be the person in the middle, aspire to be good at what you do and do the things that make you happy, and don’t worry if you’re the quiet one that likes to stand on the edge.

Teen Queen: But Cathy’s not strictly sure about that label

“Being quiet is just as good as being confident and noisy! It’s about being you and using the qualities and skills you have.”

Quite right too. But did Cathy ever really think all those daydreams of being a writer when she was a schoolgirl might come to something like this?

“Not at all. I mean, imagine! I wasn’t filled with confidence as a teenager. I knew I wanted to give it a really good try and was willing to work for it, but when things begin to go right don’t necessarily think they’ll keep going right either.

“Having a journalistic career was lovely for me and felt like I was writing for a living, and I was illustrating as well. Those two things meant a lot to me.

“But then being given a book deal blew the whole lid off my world!”

Might you have ever stuck with being an art teacher, or would you have felt unfulfilled?

“Being an art teacher, if you’re doing it properly – why would you be unfulfilled? I loved every minute of it. It was very fulfilling and a wonderful thing to do.

“I still miss it, as I miss being a journalist. Lots of things I’ve done were fantastic at the time for what I needed to be.

“But – and I hate to be political here – I just wish the Government would leave teachers alone, because they’re squeezing the life and the joy out of teachers.

“That is so dangerous for our kids, destroying that for those that go into teaching for the love of it – which is most of them. I loved teaching art. It was one of the best things I’ve ever done.”

Chocolate Heaven: A Cathy Cassidy display at Wycombe High School’s library (Photo: https://vle.whs.bucks.sch.uk)

You’ve been based back in Merseyside for a while now. Was it sad to leave Scotland, where your children grew up?

“I do miss that whole wild countryside feel of Galloway, that peaceful sense. It will always be number one in my heart.

“But it’s lovely where we are now, having the culture of a city right on your doorstep.”

Finally (wrapping up after around 40 minutes of our planned 15-minute chat!) I ask Cathy about her writing room, and whether she gets regular interruptions from her beloved lurchers, Kelpie, the senior, and young Finn.

“Kelpie does sometimes, and Finn, who is now three and much cheekier. The problem is that my writing room is now in the house and the dogs don’t usually go upstairs.

“They’re not encouraged to anyway. Kelpie will sometimes if she’s looking for me or looking for something to do. Finn will though. He’ll just stick his nose right on your knee as if to say, ‘What about me?’

“My writing room’s a little untidy, and always is. It’s full of my old books, all these things I collected that I didn’t have as a child. It’s kind of nostalgia all around me, like an extended version of the shed I had in Galloway really.”

You once wrote about your former shed that it was perfect because there was no internet connection. That seems to have changed now. I hate to sound like a stalker, but you do seem to be on social media sites a fair bit.

“Yes, I think I need to destroy the wi-fi connection. My output would probably go up 75 per cent! But when I’m writing I actually try to limit myself.

“I’ll look first thing in the morning and again maybe at lunchtime and later in the day, when I spend a lot of time updating my facebook fans’ page and Dreamcatcher blog.

Garden Idyll: Cathy Cassidy with her lurcher, Kelpie, outside her former writing hut in the Galloway Hills

“I kind of miss the shed on that basis. You really had to want to go off and check your emails back then!”

Actually, Cathy was one of those who inspired me to kit out my own writing shed, although I have to admit I’ve barely been out there all winter, as there’s no heating or power supply.

In fact, I was relieved recently when I learned just how little Dylan Thomas wrote in his famed boathouse in Laugharne, mid-Wales. Word has it that most of his creative output came in the room he had at his parents’ house before all that. This gets Cathy thinking.

“I’d love to know the actual output of these sheds, especially for those people who live in the North!

“I was great in summer, and spring and autumn were fine, but winter in Galloway was just Baltic!

“The people who helped us with my shed up there said how well insulated it was and how it would be fine. But there were icicles inside! There was no way I was sitting in there, not even with seven jumpers and scarves on!

“It’s probably my age, but it’s just fantastic to have an inside place now, where you still have all your lovely stuff around you so have that feel of the shed, but you’re inside!”

Looking Glass Girl by Cathy Cassidy is available in a Puffin hardback from April 2.

For all the latest from Cathy and various links, try her official website here.

Keep checking this blog for a feature on this year’s World Book Day event at Preston North End FC.

More Books about Chocolate and Girls, the first writewyattuk Cathy Cassidy feature, from July 2013, can be found here.

* With thanks to Carolyn McGlone at Puffin and World Book Day 2015 North West regional organisers Jake Hope and Elaine Silverwood.

Posted in Books Films, TV & Radio, Music | Tagged Alic ein Wonderland, Cathy Cassidy, Chocolate Box, Coventry, Cressida Cowell, Frank Cottrell Boyce, Galloway, Jackie, Lewis Carroll, Liverpool, looking Glass Girl, Shout, Somerset, World Book Day | 6 Comments

Finally catching up with Frank Cottrell Boyce

Posted on March 6, 2015 by writewyattuk

Tracked Down: Frank Cottrell Boyce (and some might call him elusive)

Tracked Down: Frank Cottrell Boyce (and some – like this blogger – might call him elusive)

I won’t hold back. Lots of people who know about my love for children’s lit will have heard me talk in glowing terms about the work of Frank Cottrell Boyce, the respected film scriptwriter who turned to fiction with such success.

Ask me about my favourite contemporary children’s books and I’ll no doubt mention his first three novels.

In 2004 there was Millions, adapted from his own screenplay on the advice of the film’s director (and Frank’s good friend) Danny Boyle, a touching and funny story of two brothers who find a bag of money and work out how best to dispose of it.

Then there was Framed the following year, the author’s tale of a dying North Welsh community brought to life through an appreciation of art.

Next up was Cosmic in 2008, following a gifted and talented teen’s journey into space, one that might just have seemed a little far-fetched on paper, but was worked to seemingly-effortless perfection in the hands of this talented Liverpool-based writer.

There are others works deserving of praise too, not least The Unforgotten Coat, a 2012 Guardian Children’s fiction prize-winner.

And we also had a trio of books that should inspire a great love of reading for younger readers – his modern re-imagining of Ian Fleming’s Chitty Chitty Bang Bang story.

It’s not just about a great way with words either. All three books provide great examples of darn good storytelling, engaging and believable characters, with plenty of warmth and pace.

I’ve been hoping to get an interview since I first fell for Framed (which I discovered before I read and saw Millions), but he’s become increasingly busy, a victim of his own success maybe.

The fact that the 55-year-old is a true family man with seven children and two grandchildren probably means his available time for interviews is limited in the first place.

Then you need to factor in that his public stock rose considerably when he was chosen to write the script for that memorable Danny Boyle-directed opening ceremony for the London 2012 Olympics.

Then there are all those films he’s helped pen since his formative days writing TV soap scripts for Brookside then Coronation Street.

I’ll mention here Welcome to Sarajevo, Hilary and Jackie, 24 Hour Party People, Grow Your Own, and last year’s The Railway Man. And there are plenty more. That’s some pedigree.

There was even a Dr Who last year, and you could argue that there’s a green-themed correlation between that episode – In the Forest of the Night – and his latest novel, The Astounding Broccoli Boy.

But let’s just cut to the chase now and point out how – after much negotiation – I finally managed to track Frank down to his publisher’s office in London on the lead-up to this year’s World Book Day, albeit while he was pre-signing books.

What’s more, a proper in-person meet followed six days later at that memorable event at Preston North End FC, with Frank just one of several high-profile children’s authors speaking to 5,000 North West schoolkids.

More will follow on that Deepdale extravaganza on this very blog within a couple of days. But for now, here’s the result of that first chat (bearing in mind that the WBD event mentioned has now happened!) – and plenty of Frank speaking.

Are you looking forward to World Book Day in Preston?

“Yes, it’s going to be brilliant, although I can’t imagine doing something like this in front of 5,000 kids! It’s going to be very different from reading to a class, but it’s such a great line-up. ”

I’m guessing you know most of the authors involved.

“Yes, and I’ve just been with Danny Wallace this morning. He‘s kind of a stand-up comedian anyway, and has his radio show, so he’ll be fine.

“Cressida Cowell’s seen a lot of success through the How to Train Your Dragon so she’ll be okay, and Cathy Cassidy’s just a superstar.”

And that just covers two-thirds of the day’s writing stars. Putting yourself into the shoes of the children seeing you on the day, was there ever anything like this in your day – seeing a hero or a writer?

“You’re kidding me! I just assumed authors were dead, and I may well be by the fifth of March! I never met an author when I was a kid.

“I love the idea of going to a football stadium to hear stories. That’s fantastic! A brilliant notion.”

Would you have had a writing hero by the time you were crossing into your teen years (the event age range spanned from eight to 13-year-olds)?

“By year eight I was in love with Richmal Crompton, who wrote the Just William books and was from this region. I thought she was amazing. And although I knew she was dead, she was still making me laugh!”

Did you enjoy writing as a lad and your English lessons at school? And did you have inspirational teachers?

“Yes, I think it was around year six when I picked up the bug, doing that thing where you can make people laugh without being there.

“I had an amazing teacher, Sister Paul at my primary school in Rainhill (near St Helens), who if I wrote something funny, would read it out to the class.

“I would sit at the back, and even to this day if I’ve got a film out or a play or whatever, I’ll just sit at the back and think it’s just like being back in Sister Paul’s class.”

I know you’ve mentioned the humour of E Nesbit’s Treasure Seekers books as another major influence before now.

“I think Edith Nesbit is the funniest writer we’ve ever had, bar none. In fact, on the train down I was reading one of her books – and do that a lot. I was reading The Amulet, an amazing story.”

Any tips for budding authors or young readers about to discover The Astounding Broccoli Boy who might fancy a crack at this writing malarkey?

“Just read a lot – read, read, read! In fact, I’ve just been involved with the BBC’s 500 Words competition, offering writing tips, with the closing date yesterday.”

I know all about that, not least as my youngest daughter left it right until the last couple of hours before submitting her finished story.

In fact, I add, she made the schoolgirl error of going back and reading her offering after clicking the send button, spotting a slight mistake which made her think she wouldn’t win.

“That really doesn’t matter at all. It’s not about that at all. It’s so great that competition. And you can reassure her that it’s around 60 per cent of entries that come on the last day, leaving it until the last minute.”

So is that how you work too?

“Yeah, definitely … on the bus.”

You must be good at this pitching business by now, so …. The Astounding Broccoli Boy – explain in a nutshell. Is it an everyday tale of a boy who turns green?

“It’s about a boy called Rory who’s always being picked on at school. He gets pushed into a river, and when he comes out he’s turned bright green.

“Everyone’s worried it’s some kind of infectious virus, so he’s locked away in a hospital, but Rory has a very positive outlook on life and looks at history to see who else has turned green.

“He comes up with The Incredible Hulk, Swamp Thing, The Green Hornet, Green Lantern, and decides he’s got to be a superhero.

“He decides there’s nothing wrong with him and he’s just got super-powers, and this book is about him trying to find out what his super-power is.”

How long did The Astounding Broccoli Boy take to come together? Was it an idea nagging in the back of your head for a while?

“It took forever, and yeah, very much so. In fact, I have a blood disease and actually turn yellow if I get stressed, so I have had that experience of people looking at me.

“I’m not aware of the condition, but if I’m in a motorway café I‘ll suddenly be aware of people staring at me and know I’ve done that Incredible Hulk transformation and look like a daffodil.

“So it’s always been there, people watching me turn colour, and it’s taken me around four years to write this. And yes, it does takes me a while to write a book.”

What do you see yourself as first and foremost these days – children’s novelist or scriptwriter?

“Children’s novelist – first and last!”

Is scriptwriting just something you did in the past then?

“Yes, in quite a few cases it’s scripts I wrote a long time ago that have come to light, and sometimes someone offers you something that you feel you know exactly how to do, so you’ll do it.

“That’s fun too, and a nice thing to do … like Dr Who or whatever.”

Ah yes, Dr Who. I loved In The Forest of the Night on the last series. Any more Dr Who commissions in the pipeline?

“Not in this series, but I might in the series after.”

I see you recently succumbed to joining Twitter. Are you quite well structured with your writing days, or as easily distracted as most of us writers by social media?

“Well, there’s no internet in the house until the kids come home from school at around four o’clock.”

Are you an early morning or late-night writer?

“Definitely early morning.”

And do you write in long-hand or straight on to the computer?

“I’ve always written straight on to the computer, but the book I’m writing now I’m writing in a big notebook and I’m having such a great time.

“Maybe it takes you back to being at school, making you feel like a kid again. I’d recommend that.”

Did you have to fit it all around childcare for a few years?

“Well, the kids have been great, to be honest. It doesn’t really make any odds them being in the house, particularly with the last couple of books.”

How old are your children now (yes, you did read that right before – Frank has seven altogether!).

“My youngest is 10 now, and I have a girl who’s 14, and they’re really interested in what I’m doing and I read it out to them.

“They’re really good at remembering continuity things that you’ve changed, or telling you straight what works and what doesn’t work.”

How old is your eldest child now?

“The oldest is going to be 30 this year, which is shocking!”

Have you moved on to grandad status yet?

“I’ve two grandchildren, with one four and one …. new, around six months old.”

Any of your children following in your writing footsteps?

“I’m co-writing something with my eldest son at the moment, a TV series set in the 19^th century, based on a story he’s always loved.”

I was watching the adaptation of The Railway Man recently, and those scenes where Eric meets his wife-to-be on the train (played by Colin Firth and Nicole Kidman) are so clearly Frank Cottrell Boyce-scripted.

“Ha! Yes, they’re very North-West, aren’t they! I think my favourite line in the whole film is when he says, ”If you think Warrington is fascinating, wait ‘til you get to Preston!”

I loved the films and books of Millions and Framed. Are we finally going to see Cosmic on our screens soon?

“I’m working on the script for Cosmic at the moment, and it’s obviously a much bigger movie because it’s set in space.

“I’ve had great luck and have an American producer called Janet Zucker, who just happens to know loads of astronauts, and is also involved in the SpaceX program, so it certainly looks like it will happen, which is amazing. And it’s certainly been fun working on it.”

There were author cameos in the Millions and Framed films, so are we likely to see you pop up in space too? And if so, will you have to undertake zero-gravity training for the job?

“Gotta do it! Got to have a spacesuit, yeah! Otherwise, it would be like doing Dr Who and not getting in the Tardis.”

How about a Chitty Chitty Bang Bang remake?

“I was talking about this recently, because the Broccolis own the film rights for that … and that’s a weird thing after just writing The Astounding Broccoli Boy!

“I actually sent Barbara Broccoli a copy of the new book, and she was like, ‘Oh! Maybe we’ll make that!”

There was quite a bit of media excitement recently about the EastEnders’ anniversary shows. Ever been tempted to get back on the writing team at Coronation Street?

“I had such a great time doing that! It was wonderful … but it was like a full-time job.”

And seeing as soap stars often come back from the dead, there could be a Brookside revival maybe?

“Yeah!”

What was Proper Clever about, the play what you wrote (as Ernie Wise would say) for a Liverpool Playhouse show during the European Capital of Culture celebrations in 2008?

“I wanted to get a play for younger people into The Playhouse, and it was a comedy set in school, with some of it set in cyberspace, with characters talking to each other but not always seeing each other. That was fun.”

Franks’s Heroes: The Undertones

Then there was the 2013 City of Culture work in ‘Stroke City’ (Derry/Londonderry, Northern Ireland). I recently spoke to someone involved alongside you, my Undertones guitar hero Damian O’Neill, and he told me what a smashing fella you were.

“He’s a great guy! And the O’Neill brothers were just great for that. They did everything for their city at the drop of a hat. If you asked them to do something, they did.

“I rang them to ask about composing a special piece of music, and they were really apologetic, saying, ‘We won’t be able to do this until Monday’!”

So were you a big Undertones fan (he asks, already knowing the answer)?

“Yes! Huge! I chose the Undertones for one of my Desert Island Discs (My Perfect Cousin, incidentally, with Frank’s great 2010 selection still available on the BBC iPlayer here) and absolutely idolise them!

“For the Capital of Culture event they did a gig in the Bogside in Derry, and I had my two youngest with me. And they will never know how lucky they were for their first gig! Unbelievable.”

From the City of Culture work to the recent UK papal visit – co-presenting with Carol Vorderman – and the London 2012 opening ceremony, we seem to see you pop up in unlikely places. What’s the next big unexpected thing you’re likely to be involved with?

“Oh no, no, no! I’m just going to sit and write books from now on!”

On that fantastic London 2012 opening ceremony, it was a wonderful celebration of some of the best aspects of this multi-cultural nation, from nods to the NHS and Welfare State to a light shone on our industrial heritage, Shakespeare, children’s lit, and so on. It should have been a proud moment for you. Did you get chance to enjoy it at the time?

“I think I did, because as the person who’s been doing the writing I had very little to do on the night. I was the only member of that five-man team that had any relaxation.

“That said, just before the event, I was queuing for chips with Thomas Heatherwick, the designer who worked on the new London bus and the Olympic cauldron, and we both said we felt really relaxed.

“But then I added, ‘As long as the cauldron doesn’t jam, because then that’s all people will remember’.

With that, the colour just drained from his face. So when the cauldron did close up, I lost my voice instantly. I must have been so worried.”

You’ve often spoken out on social justice issues and clearly have a campaigning streak, like fellow World Book Day star-turn Cathy Cassidy. In fact, both of you have strong views regarding saving the nation’s libraries.

“Absolutely. We’re living in a time of almost zero mobile mobility. And the one thing we know about libraries is that they’re key for that mobility.

“I know people who have extraordinary lives and have taken extraordinary routes, and anyone who hasn’t taken the normal route, when you talk to them, there’s always a library in the story.”

There are lots of other roles and accolades that have kept Frank busy in recent years – like his Professor of Reading position at Liverpool Hope University, his honorary Doctor of Literature title from Edge Hill University, and his patron’s role with the Insight Film Festival in Manchester.

So how do you fit it all in? Do Mrs CB and your children recognise you when you show up at home?

“I make sure that’s never compromised. I spend a lot of time at home.”

(I was starting to run out of time by now, but cracked on with my next deliveries, while Frank batted everything straight back at me with typical honesty and humour).

I believe it was Danny Boyle who first inspired you to write a children’s book. Are you still in regular touch?

“We speak a lot. He’s shooting at the moment, making a film about Steve Jobs. But he’s back soon.”

Everyone knows about Danny, of course, but you also worked alongside Michael Winterbottom a fair amount, another Lancashire lad – from Blackburn. I’m guessing you hit it off from the start.

“We did, and we made a lot of stuff together.”

At what point did you realise it was time to throw yourself in at the deep end and write full-time?

“I’ve never had a job, and I’ve never done a day’s work in my life!”

Would you ever consider moving away from Liverpool?

“No … why would anyone?”

Did a new life in, for example, Hollywood never appeal to you?

“Not at all, and it’s give you an edge anyway, being here. “

At that point, Frank’s finally about to be whisked off and back to his huge pile of books to sign ahead of World Book Day, but I manage to ask him two more questions before he’s carried out by the ankles.

First, I have a big dilemma to address here. Should I file your books under C or B … or just go with F?

“Definitely C. Yeah!”

Finally, of all your big moments so far – from the first script commission to the Carnegie Medal (for Millions) and first public appearance, London 2012, and so on, is there a career moment that outstrips the rest?

“For me it’s always when you get the first copy of a book. There’s just something really amazing about that – bigger than any premiere or anything else, thinking, ‘There it is’.

“And it will be there forever, even if it’s just in a second-hand bookshop in 20 years’ time. Someone on a rainy day might think, ‘What’s this?’ It’s a wonderful, wonderful thing.’

The Astounding Broccoli Boy by Frank Cottrell Boyce is available from Pan Macmillan in paperback and hardback from March 26.

Keep checking this blog for a similarly in-depth Cathy Cassidy interview and a feature from this year’s mammoth World Book Day 2015 event at Preston North End FC.

* With thanks to Catherine Alport and Leanne Bennett at Macmillan Children’s Books, plus World Book Day 2015 North West regional organisers Jake Hope and Elaine Silverwood.

Posted in Books Films, TV & Radio, Comedy & Theatre, Music | Tagged Cathy Cassidy, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, Cosmic, danny boyle, Framed, Frank Cottrell Boyce, Liverpool, London 2012, Millions, The Astounding Broccoli Boy, The Railway Man, The Undertones, The Unforgotten Coat, World Book Day | 7 Comments

One-time Goodie remains a rebel without a clue – the Graeme Garden interview

Posted on March 6, 2015 by writewyattuk

Kazoo Kings: Old farts Graeme Garden and Barry Cryer on the set of BBC Radio 4’s I’m Sorry I Haven’t A Clue

If Graeme Garden had taken up his expected vocation and become a doctor, the 72-year-old might well have had his feet up by now.

The Aberdeen-born Prestonian pondered this down the telephone line from his home in Oxfordshire, in a somewhat-underplayed tone.

“Yes, I’d be a retired doctor … doing am-dram.”

I’m guessing no regrets on that front then?

“No. I might have been a reasonably good doctor, and competent, but I’m not sure I’d have been a very happy one.

“I didn’t fancy being around all those sick people, but then I entered showbusiness, where you just meet a different class of sick people.”

Instead, he chose comedy, and as a result (warning: cliche ahead) we could all enjoy a healthy dose of the best treatment of all – laughter.

Was his early TV scriptwriting on Doctor in the House the closest he got to be a practising medic?

“Apart from when I was student and they let me lay hands on patients, it probably was. Although I did slightly more serious stuff later, making an educational series with Dr Rob Buckman and John Cleese.

“We started with a funny little sketch about a particular illness or condition, then Rob did a run-down about it.

“It was really for the benefit of patients that had been diagnosed and hadn’t been able to take in exactly what the doctor had told them at the time.”

Script Cream: Graeme Garden

It does seem ironic that Graeme has been brought in for medically-related shows like Peak Practice and Holby City in recent years too. But we didn’t go into that.

He’s back in his hometown on Sunday (March 8), joining chairman Jack Dee, fellow old stagers Tim Brooke-Taylor (his fellow ex-Goodie) and Barry Cryer, plus newer kid on the block Jeremy Hardy, for a special edition of long-established BBC Radio show I’m Sorry I Haven’t A Clue, ‘the antidote to panel games’, at Preston Guild Hall.

So when did he move to Preston?

“I was about four, I think. I didn’t really see my Dad for a couple of years, he was abroad in the Medical Corps, picking up the pieces at the end of the war.

“But when he got back he moved to Preston and got a job there, we all moved down, and he and my Mum stayed for the rest of their lives.

“He was doing orthopaedic work and because of his war service was very interested in trauma surgery.

“One of the reasons he stayed was because of the Preston bypass, the first motorway (now part of the M6), thinking there would be quite a lot of challenging trauma work.

“When he was running the casualty department at the old PRI, they were the first to put radios in the ambulances and send messages out to medical staff.

“He did a lot of work at Wrightington Hospital too.”

Does Graeme have good memories of those days?

”I went away to boarding school when I was about eight, just coming back for holidays, but the family were there right until my Mum died two or three years ago.

“We lived just outside Broughton, and I went to the church school there. Funnily enough, I was watching some Morris dancers the other day in the Cotswolds and one came up to me wearing a cheese on his head and said, ‘Do you remember me?’

Cap That: The Goodies – from the left: Graeme Garden, Tim Brooke-Taylor, Bill Oddie (Photo: Andre Csillag/Rex Features)

“I said I didn’t think so, and he said we were at Broughton School together. It’s a small world.”

It wasn’t the fact that both of you were wearing giant Black Pudding Bertha flat caps at the time then?

“No, he was a naturalised Cotswoldian, I think.”

What takes up most of Graeme’s working days as of 2015?

“I have too many working days to be honest, and I’d rather take it easy more. However, if they didn’t pay me to do it, I’d do it as a hobby, so I can’t really grumble.

“Most of the time it’s radio and the stage, as we take – as we are doing in Preston this weekend – a version of the show to various venues around the country.”

Dearly Missed: Humphrey Lyttelton

It must have been a difficult call to carry on with the show after chairman Humphrey Lyttelton’s passing in 2008. Was there ever a question of whether you continued?

“There was quite a lot of soul-searching, and after he went we were all very sad and shocked, and didn’t do any shows for a year, taking time out to think about it.

“I think all of us were quite keen to carry on though, and then the BBC let us know that the vast majority of listeners had requested the show shouldn’t stop and please carry on.

“I think it was a joint decision between the BBC, the listeners and us, as it should be. And I think it’s worked very well too, and Jack (Dee) is fantastic.

“He still has the same distance as Humph did. Humph had this sort of aristocratic disdain for the show, while Jack has more contempt. He’s very grumpy, but very funny, excellent for us.”

I don’t think I could ever have dealt with Jack in his days as a waiter before he took to comedy.

“No, that would have been interesting!”

What’s the single-most repeated remark that gets hurled his way when Graeme’s spotted in public? Is it related to his 12 years from 1970 as part of The Goodies?

“Occasionally I get the theme tune shouted at me, and depending where I am, it’ll be, ‘You’ll have had your tea…”

The latter is from his pairing with Barry Cryer as Hamish and Dougal, also borne out of I’m Sorry I Haven’t A Clue.

“…or they ask about Mornington Crescent.”

Another ISIHAC reference of course, and one to which there’s no answer really, is there?

“Well, you say that. If you’ve got time …”

It’s now 50 and a bit years since Graeme became President of the Cambridge Footlights, around the time he first met future Monty Python star Eric Idle. Does that seem possible?

“It didn’t seem possible that I became President when it happened. It’s extraordinary. But Twitter’s a wonderful world, and someone tweeted the other day, ‘Have you ever been to Preston’ to Eric Idle, who tweeted back, “Yes, and my good friend Graeme Garden came from there.

“So I tweeted back, ‘And I’ll be back there this Sunday’. In fact, Eric did actually come up and stay with me up there a couple of times, for the odd New Year party and that.”

Graeme’s first real break came as a writer for I’m Sorry, I’ll Read That Again, and he still looks back on that with wonder.

“I was actually on the radio, and that had been my ambition since I was a tiny kid, because we didn’t have a television when I was little.

“Listening to a comedy programme on the radio was my cup of tea – shows like Jewel and Warriss and even catching the end of ITMA.

“It was very exciting for me, and the first time I got a cheque for writing silly stuff was great.”

So how long has he been working on I’m Sorry I Haven’t A Clue now?

“Well, I came up with the idea in late 1971 and we started recording it in 1972, so it’s had a fair old run – some 60-odd series.”

I can’t hear the show without thinking back to my Dad howling over it at lunchtimes (that’s with laughter by the way), not least the Late Arrivals at the Ball section of the show.

Old Gang: The Goodies

Do you get that kind of response a lot when people spot you?

“We still meet a lot of people who say, ‘I’m very grateful to my parents for making me listen to this’. Eventually the penny drops, and people get into it as they get older.

“It’s an old show and we’re old people, but it’s by no means an old audience – with plenty of students and people bringing their kids.”

How long do you reckon you’ve worked with Tim Brooke-Taylor now? And Barry Cryer for that matter?

“I knew Tim from Cambridge, but I got to know Barry pretty much as soon as I got to London and he was part of a comedy scene we were mixing in.

“I’ve known the old fella a long time, and I’m actually interviewing him on stage in Bristol on the 20th of this month as he’s getting a comedy legend award from Aardman at the Bristol Slapstick Festival.

“Of course, you’ll know Aardman from Nick Park – another Preston lad!”

Indeed. ‘Atta boy’, as Wallace would say!

So how do the relatively new guys on the block deal with it all, like Jeremy Hardy?

“Well, you mention the new kids on the block, and we’ve been trying to get more women to play the game. We’ve always tried, but a lot of female comics have said no.

“Victoria Wood turned us down a few times before she said yes, and she’s done it three times now I think.”

Was it Humphrey’s old friend Samantha that put them off, do you think?

“Erm … I think they might have done other panel games and not liked it. But you asked what it’s like for those coming in, and we’re actually terribly kind and supportive, aiding each other.

White Coat: Graeme Garden, complete with ’70s sideburns

“If someone’s bit short on gags, we share ours around. And we don’t try and make people feel uncomfortable. We’re not competitive in that way.

“That said, when we’re doing things like the Late Arrivals we have a bit of a go and don’t tell each other what we’re going to do, so sometimes you can hear furious pencil scrubbings out when something you’re about to say has already been said. So there’s competition there, but it’s very good-natured.

“We’ve had new folks recently though, and Omid Djalili was fantastic, and Susan Calman’s done a few …”

And Susan was a recent interviewee on this blog, I might add.

“A funny lady.”

Of all the work Graeme’s done in radio and TV over the years, is there something in particular he feels should have seen more success?

“Barry and I wish we could have gone on with Hamish and Dougal. We did three short series of 15-minute programmes, then pushed it to the BBC about doing possible half-hour programmes and were told they didn’t want any more at all.

“So that bit the dust, but it was lovely working with Baz, Jeremy Hardy and the great Alison Steadman. A real fun gig.”

At this point – clearly not checking my internet facts first – I mention that Graeme’s done Dr Who parodies in the past, asking if he’s been lined up for the real thing alongside Peter Capaldi. He sounds grumpy in his response.

“Well, they’re not parodies, they’re just audio versions. What do you mean by that?”

Sorry –parody wasn’t the right word, I add (trying to dig myself out of a hole, unconvincingly).

“Parallel universe, more like. But I’ve had no approach from Cardiff or wherever it is based now. “

Ever Alert: General Blight is no match for Eric, aka Bananaman

Maybe they’ll read this and think, ‘Hang on, let’s get a proper doctor in there …”

“Well, who knows. I do see they’re making a Bananaman feature film though. I’ve got my yellow onesie standing by. But I’ve not been approached yet.”

And are the TV scripts still coming in these days?

“Occasionally. And some of the young writers get in touch with an idea and ask for help developing an idea.

“There are lots of little bits and pieces, but I’m not quite so desperate to earn a living from it now. I’ve finished paying the mortgage, Although my kids still cost me money.”

Have any of Graeme’s three children followed him into comedy, or medicine for that matter?

“My daughter briefly went into medicine, becoming an ambulance paramedic in the East End, but she’s now a teacher and a vice-principal of a technical college.

“My eldest son is a musician and was with The Scissor Sisters. He’s been touring a lot with Alison Moyet lately on her European tour.

“And my youngest son is the lead concept artist on a huge video game.”

Has he won you over to computer games?

“I said I should really get an X-box and play this game when it comes out, but he said, ‘I’m not really sure about that, Dad.’ I think he feels I really need to start off with Super Mario or something.”

Maybe you could try Pong instead, that first computer game you could play on your telly in the 1970s.

“Yeah, that was about my level.”

Bright Side: Graeme’s old chum Eric Idle

When was the last time he watched a full episode of The Goodies?

“It would have been a couple of years ago. We watched a lot of them when we were doing a stage show. Tim and I did that at the Edinburgh Fringe and we did the same one and another with Bill (Oddie) in Australia, where there’s a very keen fan-base.”

Any chance of a reprise of that stage show?

“I don’t know. It went better over there than it did here.”

Was there always an element of rivalry and suspicion with your old friends the Monty Python team?

“A good-natured rivalry. We were all chums and all worked together on various things over the years. I think their great move was into movies.”

Those films stand the test of time as well, don’t they.

”The movies are great. The TV shows not quite so. But The Life of Brian has got to be one of the funniest ever.”

There were other questions I might have put to Graeme, not least – for a lad brought up on the banks of the River Tillingbourne in Surrey – an explanation of The Tillingbourne Folk and Madrigal Society from his I’m Sorry, I’ll Read That Again days.

Instead I asked him if he got twitchy around Christmas time, when this writer for one has his annual airings of The Goodies’ Father Christmas Do Not Touch Me. His response – give or take a slight titter – is typically deadpan (I blame his association with Jack Dee).

“Oh, I’m really pleased to hear it still exists.”

I’m not totally convinced he means that, but carry on, explaining how I like to think my girls are old enough to hear it now, yet still have my doubts.

It’s great song after all, but I guess these are difficult times for any TV personalities who had the misfortune of being around the less wholesome performers of the 1970s.

“Yeah, I don’t know. It’s all gets a bit Operation Yew Tree after all this time.”

Gee Up: Bill, Graeme and Tim monkey around

Fair point. And does he realise it’s exactly 40 years ago that Funky Gibbon was a top-five hit for The Goodies?

“Oh really?”

Only I was watching a Bay City Rollers’ TV show on YouTube recently (purely for research of course – I don’t tend to watch too much of the tartan-trousered ones – that would be like cheating on Hamish and Dougal, I fear), and felt Graeme was a little less convincing a performer as Bill and Tim on that occasion. Or at least he wasn’t quite as animated as they were. Perhaps he was just embarrassed by the whole thing.

“I was holding back. I didn’t want to show them up with my fancy dance moves.”

I’m Sorry I Haven’t A Clue visits Preston Guild Hall this Sunday, March 8 (7.30pm), with tickets priced £25.

For details of the rest of the dates on the tour, head here.

Posted in Books Films, TV & Radio, Comedy & Theatre, Music | Tagged Bananaman, Barry Cryer, Bill Oddie, Dr Who, Eric Idle, Funky Gibbon, Graeme Garden, Humphrey Lyttelton, I'm Sorry I Haven't A clue, Jack Dee, Jeremy Hardy, Monty Python, Preston, Tim Brooke-Taylor | 1 Comment

Dances with Wolves, Belfast and Wigan – Introducing The Nouvelles

Posted on February 27, 2015 by writewyattuk

Bright Future: : The Nouvelles, with Johnnie out front in his Shout to the Top t-shirt

It seems odd that a band that recently recorded a song for the Northern Ireland football team’s Euro 2016 campaign should be based in Wigan.

What’s more, this happening indie outfit are fronted by a singer who played a key role in his home nation’s peace process.

I’ll address that soon enough, but will mention first how The Nouvelles – recently touted as ‘the next big Northern band’ – have already enjoyed plenty of interest.

Formed in Manchester by Belfast’s Johnnie Jackson, their early achievements included appearances at several esteemed UK festivals and a major record deal.

But then came hiatus and time out, Johnnie taking to France to think things over before reassembling the band in Wigan, with input from producer John Kettle.

Having exorcised themselves from previous record and publishing deals, The Nouvelles set about putting their new DIY model to the test, self-releasing single Rising while deciding which offer on the table they should go with for debut album, This Modern Sound.

Meanwhile, there’s that football link, working with the Irish FA on a song for potential European Championships qualification.

That’s on hold for now, but it’s fair to say things are looking rosy at present – not only for Michael O’Neill’s national footie side, but The Nouvelles too.

Johnnie is joined in The Nouvelles by guitarist Tom Kinton, from Chester, bass player Rob Regan from Bolton, and drummer Steve Atkinson, from Merseyside, with regular guest appearances from notable deputies such as singer Robyn Xanthia.

I caught up with Johnnie during a tea break from his job as a trainee social worker, based around Greater Manchester.

Wigan Warriors: The Nouvelles

He’s not the only one in the band working either, but as he puts it, “We’re hoping we can take a little career break soon.”

Johnnie proved an entertaining interviewee, passionate about his band, his influences and his football, and prone to fits of laughter.

There’s already been plenty of hyperbole written about the band. Is that vindication for all his band has set out to achieve?

“We’re certainly looking to be the next big Northern indie band, and we’re pretty focused on that.

“But we really just want to be able to play to 200 people, and for the last few gigs we’ve been doing that. That’s our dream. Then we can take it from there.

“Our whole priority is just avoiding this whole X-Factor circus. All sorts of people seem to be sucked into this stardom idea.

“It’s not what we’re about at all. We’re a purist indie band. One venue recently said, ‘These guys are going to be playing arenas at £70 per head soon’, but that’s not us!”

There was an earlier sell-out at Manchester Academy, wasn’t there?

“Yeah, but that was with George Borowski – the ‘Guitar George’ of the Dire Straits song, Sultans of Swing – so he attracted a few people too that night.

“It nearly got a bit too much for us around then, leading to our hiatus. There were lots of labels there that night, and we weren’t sure the right people were there or if it was the right moment.

“So when we came back, we decided to launch ourselves in Greater Manchester rather than Central Manchester. And it’s been a master-stroke.”

I should have told Real Lancashire advocates to look away there, because when Johnnie says Greater Manchester, he means Wigan, his band’s adopted hometown, where they also rehearse at Urban Sound Studios.

“You get an element of peace in Wigan, you can focus on it all very easily and don’t get caught up in things.

“It was fantastic in Manchester, but the master-stroke was to get out, take our time and see if we really wanted this, away from the journalists and massive fan-base.

“I went to France for six months, on the coast near Bordeaux. While I was there I gave someone a CD in a surf shop and they told me I had to go back to Manchester and finish the job!

“That made the decision for me. I wasn’t learning to surf that well anyway. I nearly drowned a couple of times, with the waves so big.”

The Nouvelles’ rebirth was helped by BBC 6 Music’s Tom Robinson playing the single on his show.

“Rising was short-listed via his Fresh on the Net feature, and he follows us on Twitter now, which is great. You know you’re going in the right direction when things like that happen.

“The reaction’s been mind-blowing! It started with Tom, then we loaded it on to BBC Introducing nationally, which led to support from BBC Manchester too.”

Is the single indicative of the first album?

“I’d say we’re less commercial than that. There’s a little indie rave feel on the single, but it’s a natural extension of what we do.

“For example, there’s another tune on the album, Fade Away, which is piano-driven and a fantastic song to lead into Rising, but darker and less commercial.

Band Champion: Tom Robinson

“There’s an element of dance on Rising too, with Ben Hesketh playing piano, then Robyn (Xanthia) singing.

“But there’s a real cross-section across the album, and we remain keen to recreate that indie vibe The X-Factor almost killed off.

“The Smiths broke up in 1990, The Stone Roses looked like they were going to recreate the whole thing but then split up, while Oasis were more like a super-group.

“There was never really anyone who replaced that Smiths feel. Everyone’s sucked in by money, but we can avoid that.

“We’ve all got careers outside this, and range from 20-year-olds up to 40-year-olds – that brings security too.”

So where does Johnnie fit into that age range?

“Me? Gosh! I just say mid-30s now. But I’m looking well on it!

“The beauty of that 10 years’ experience – having spent five years in a rehearsal studio in Manchester and the last few getting it right – is we don’t need to worry about things a band solely in their early 20s would.

“Given the chance, a younger band might take anything offered. We’ve had loads of offers from indie labels and publishers, and have a publishing deal right now.

“We’ve also been offered a new three-year publishing and promotional deal from the fella who discovered Stereolab, one of my favourite bands.

“But we haven’t signed that yet. We want to get the album finished by Easter, and we’re talking about that to the producer, John Kettle.”

John Kettle is perhaps best-known outside the studio for work with Wigan folk-rock outfit Merry Hell and, previously, The Tansads. Was he a factor in their relocation?

“We heard about John through a mutual friend, the guitarist I wrote Shine with, Trevor Standish. He brought us down to his studio, and there the decision was made.

“We’ve been working very closely since. I’ve learned a lot from John, like how to structure songs rather than just knock out a catchy indie tune.”

Molineux Link: Johnnie’s passion for Wolves inspired This Is Our Love

Johnnie uses the example of a new song, This is Our Love, inspired by his beloved Wolverhampton Wanderers FC, explaining how John Kettle’s methods changed the way the song developed.

“That turned out very much like a Stone Roses sound, and lots of our new songs have taken that direction, if you can imagine how the Roses’ third album might have sounded.”

That’s not to say The Nouvelles are copyist, despite a love for several bands from that era, including two with Wigan links – Starsailor and The Verve.

“No, we’ve definitely got our own wee sound. I call us post-Oasis, but you don’t want to make too much of that.”

If anything, I’d say Johnnie’s voice and accent suggest homegrown influences such as Ash’s Tim Wheeler instead.

“Aye!”

Then perhaps their more commercial songs bring to mind someone like Embrace.

“Absolutely – both influences. I couldn’t agree more!”

So is it fair to say we’re talking about a 1990s indie sound?

“True, and I think we’d have done all this when I was in my 20s, but I was working in the peace process over in Northern Ireland.

Belfast Link: Ash sprang from the same city

“Meanwhile, Tim Wheeler was busy with his band, but we were in the same bars, like Laverys in Belfast.”

So tell me more about that peace work back in Northern Ireland. What was your role in the talks with Mo Mowlam’s Government team?

“Conflict management, working on the fringes of the peace process, a junior advisor to senior players.

“I was never a leader and never wanted to be a leader. I was more a junior academic advisor.”

Understandably, Johnnie is careful of his wording, stressing independence from any political party.

He was however part of a team helping bring the likes of Loyalist politicians Frankie Gallagher and brothers David and Brian Ervine to the talks, helping pave the way towards peace.

“One of my big breakthroughs was with the Drumcree parade in the 1990s, when I was just coming out of my teens.

“Next thing I knew I was being driven around in armoured cars, mediating between the Republicans and the Government.

“I’d get out of a car at the end of a day in somewhere like Portadown, and bump into old schoolmates serving as police officers by then.

“I’m glad they did see me though – or they wouldn’t have believed me! Aye, I lost my 20s to all that.”

Talk of Northern Ireland and The Troubles inevitably got me on to the music scene there and my love of The Undertones (I say inevitable to anyone who’s read more than a few of the features on this site), leading to Johnnie mentioning how he knows Terri Hooley, the record shop and label boss who helped break the Derry five-piece.

Of course, Terri was later immortalised in the film Good Vibrations and was a character who famously cut through the sectarian divide, long before that peace process.

“I liked that film. It was very well balanced. It didn’t go over the top about the sectarian stuff, and didn’t make out Terri to have had a terrible life.

“Because he didn’t. He had a couple of run-ins, as we all did with the paramilitaries, but that’s just the nature of a society like that.”

Does Johnnie plan to take his band over to Belfast in the near future?

“I’d like to do a ticketed gig over at The Limelight soon. There are so many new venues over there now, but that would be our choice.

“When we were kids in the ‘90s, that’s where we went. So 200 people at a tenner a ticket – let’s get them in! But we’re going to wait for the album, then do it.”

Could he not have made it back in his home city with his first band, The Thirty Ones (who took their name from a notion for better racial diversity)?

“We had a cracking wee band, and were doing really well. With the peace process going well, we were starting to do live gigs.

“But I just thought there was a glass ceiling, and wanted more. It was a great crowd, but very dance-focused. Belfast is an eclectic crowd rather than a punk crowd.

“You had to work really hard to find the indie pubs. It’s changed over the last few years though.”

And is there a thriving indie scene in the band’s adopted hometown Wigan at present?

“I’d say it’s in crisis at the minute. We were set for a couple of nights at the Cube, but since then it’s closed down for some bizarre reason.

“That said, the Greater Manchester music scene is very strong, and competitive.”

Johnnie clearly continues to retain links with his homeland. So how did it come about that he got asked to do a song for the national football team?

Rising Sons: The Nouvelles

“There’s a funny story behind that. I went back to Belfast for a visit a couple of years ago, and my friend, now a director of football development at the IFA, said off the cuff, ‘Go and write a song for the Northern Ireland football team.’

“He probably thought nothing of it, but I thought that was a brilliant idea, went away and did it. And now everybody loves it.

“Were not sure if it’s the right time for that just yet – but it’s coming, preferably on a proper label. We’re talking to Cherry Red Records. They put out football songs, so that would be perfect!”

If Northern Ireland reach the Euro 2016 finals in France, will the band recruit team manager Michael O’Neill, captain Steven Davis and the rest of the squad for a remix?

“Well … at the minute the song’s been done, and it’s up there on soundcloud …”

The team have got to do their bit on the pitch first though.

“They’re doing it! They’re doing really well, and that would just be fantastic.

“I heard Billy Hamilton wants to be involved in the video too. He likes his Stone Roses and his indie scene. Besides, my Mum and him are pretty friendly.”

Some of that may not be true, but I ask if Johnnie remembers Northern Ireland’s last great international campaigns – those World Cup finals in 1982 and 1986, when Billy Hamilton was among the stars?

“I was only a kid at the time, but that’s when I started watching football. I vaguely remember watching the 1986 World Cup with my Dad.

“Actually, Norman Whiteside getting injured was my first real conscious memory of football.”

So why does he support Wolves? Does it go back to their Northern Ireland legend, the late Derek Dougan?

“My mum said she was one of those who actually did go out with Derek Dougan. But I think every woman in Belfast says that!

“The Dougan family lived across the road from us, while my Dad was George Best’s dad Dickie’s gardener.

“He did it for free though – he didn’t take a penny off him. I think he just did it to show off!

“And although the story’s only really broken recently, we knew for years before that George Best was a Wolves fan before he signed for Manchester United.”

Back to the music, what about another Northern Irish band that made it big on this side of the Irish Sea – Snow Patrol. Has Johnnie watched their progress with interest?

“Absolutely. Again, they were on the rise the same time as Ash and our band. We were bigger than Snow Patrol in Belfast at the time.

Snow Business: Gary Lightbody and the Snow Patrol line-up

“But we always knew Gary Lightbody would do well. He’s from just down the road in Bangor. And Snow Patrol had the continuity. They didn’t just up sticks and go.”

Are The Nouvelles confident of an Easter 2016 release for This Modern Sound?

“I’d say 100 per cent. Everything’s on course, and we’ll be done by Good Friday.”

I warn him that could be a shoe-in for lazy journalists everywhere, with mentions of Good Friday plus talk of Easter and the single Rising. This comment inspires fits of laughter.

“I never thought about that! I’m not so sure that would go down so well though … being from a liberal loyalist community!”

It appears that the band are already on the way to a follow-up release too.

“We’ve already got the second album written! I was only thinking this morning about some of the great songs that are not going on this first album.

“I’ve always said how sad it is when these great musicians spend so much money and time on guitars and equipment, whereas we just dander in!

“And when you’re listening to bands like The Smiths, The Stone Roses, Oasis and Doves, you’re going to be writing good songs.”

For more information about the band and forthcoming dates, head to www.thenouvelles.com.

This is a revised and expanded version of a Malcolm Wyatt feature for the Lancashire Evening Post, with the original’s online version found here.

Posted in Music | Tagged Ash, Belfast, Embrace, John Kettle, Manchester, Northern Ireland, Peace Process, Snow Patrol, The Nouvelles, Wigan, Wolverhampton Wanderers | 1 Comment

The Race for Space by Public Service Broadcasting – a writewyattuk review

Posted on February 20, 2015 by writewyattuk

It was supposedly a happy accident that Public Service Broadcasting stumbled upon correlations between the sublime Everest on their debut LP and a mention of George Mallory’s historic Peak XV explorations while working on their second.

Either way, it was clearly meant to be, that link via John F. Kennedy’s inspirational Rice University speech in 1962 a perfect starting point for The Race for Space, a truly stunning follow-up to the mighty Inform – Educate – Entertain.

I should warn you now I’m likely to use words like ‘stirring’ and ‘poignant’ a fair bit in this review, with that introductory track no exception, its celestial choir providing the first of many hairs-on-the-back-of-the-neck moments on an assured long player.

If the whole notion of Public Service Broadcasting suggests a love of the retro, there’s nostalgia aplenty on Sputnik, and not just for the period when the CCCP paved a way for all those later space missions, but also the less-celebrated Balaeric Beat dancehall days, Willgoose’s backing track hinting at MARRS’ Pump up the Volume.

But it’s the overlay of the audio documentary matter that proves the catalyst, the growing synth-symphony perfectly capturing the spirit of this exciting time in our relatively-recent history. And as it reaches its climax, Wrigglesworth’s percussive mettle takes us beyond the bleep of the satellite as PSB transport us to the heavens.

Then comes the pre-emptive single, Gagarin, its brass-infused funk seemingly far removed from the subject yet somehow working perfectly with this tale of ‘60s world icon Major Yuri, conveying at least something of the love felt for this folk hero.

There’s also a perception of that feeling of just what we could achieve in this momentous period. Yet PSB stress they’re not here to give us a history lesson, and the sheer joy in this unlikely tribute also shows the band’s sense of fun and play.

There were dramatic lows in this historic race of course, and there’s a respectful nod to the three Apollo 1 crew members that died in a 1967 Cape Canaveral flight test in Fire in the Cockpit, its static-fused soundtrack suitably solemn, somewhat reminiscent of Johnny Marr’s soundtrack to The Smiths’ Meat is Murder.

EVA takes us into another area, the concept of weightlessness and all the vagaries of these out-of-this-world explorations, the wonder of that first space walk beautifully replicated in sonic form.

Similarly, Apollo 8’s journey to the dark side of the moon is perfectly re-imagined in The Other Side. A sense of the mighty task of that crew and the expectation is brilliantly nailed, and while you know the outcome, there’s no less a feeling of triumph as you relive that moment with the rest of the Houston control room.

Dream-folk duo Smoke Fairies provide apposite accompaniment to the proceedings on Valentina, adding a Sigur Ros feel to the band’s acknowledgement of Vostok 6 cosmonaut and first woman in space Valentina Tereshkova’s part in the tale.

And from that 1963 landmark we reach perhaps the pinnacle, six years later, with the truly inspired Go! – the album’s second single covering the feted Apollo 11 mission.

This being Pubic Service Broadcasting, there’s no ambition to take the obvious path, with just a brief mention of the Eagle’s touchdown, the band instead opting for the crew running through their moon landing speed trial procedure, another sublime touch brilliantly dealt with. Again, it gives us a real sense of the spirit of celebration and proves a perfect album high-point.

That epochal moment is then followed by the more-pensive final program mission end-point of Tomorrow, the Apollo 17 team neatly summing up all that had been achieved ‘for all mankind’ in the years up to 1972, complemented by a stirring soundtrack that carefully builds from Tubular Bells type beginnings.

The whole concept of this album was always going to be a hard ask for Messrs Willgoose and Wrigglesworth, with a mighty fall from the heights possible after such orbits of expectation. But from lift-off to landing, they come through unscathed and have produced a mighty work to be proud of.

For a recent writewyattuk interview with J.Willgoose Esq., head here. And for this blog’s lowdown on PSB’s first album, head here.

The Race for Space by Public Service Broadcasting (Test Card Recordings) is released on February 23^rd, 2015, with forthcoming tour dates and more from the band on their official website.

Posted in Books Films, TV & Radio, Music | Tagged Apollo, Everest, Gagarin, NASA, Public Service Broadcasting, Sputnik, The Race for Space, Valentina Tereshkova, Vostok, Willgoose, Wrigglesworth | 4 Comments

When you comin’ back? The Gretchen Peters interview

Posted on February 20, 2015 by writewyattuk

Comin’ Back: Gretchen Peters live at the RCC Letterkenny, Donegal, October 2013 (Photo: John Soffe) (www.johnsoffe.com)

Gretchen Peters is on the crest of a wave, and loving it. After all those years perfecting her songwriting craft, getting on for 20 of those as a solo artist, it seems like the critics have finally sat up and taken notice.

The 57-year-old’s last long player, Hello Cruel World, was hailed as her ‘career best’ by NPR in America, but it seems to me that her new album has even bettered that.

Last week, Gretchen was in London, doing a little promo before returning to these shores in mid-March, and that coincided nicely with critical acclaim on both sides of the pond for her wonderful new country noir opus Blackbirds.

From the dark matter of the title track and single When All You Got Is A Hammer to the beguiling Pretty Things and Everything Falls Away, there’s certainly plenty of depth.

And it’s an album that flits around the US with its locations and themes, from the leafy New York suburbia where she grew up to her adopted country capital hometown.

She doesn’t pull any punches, her subjects ranging from domestic abuse and self-loathing to a war vet re-adapting to civilian life and a grieving widower coping with the aftermath of the BP oil spill.

Those familiar with the alt-country, folk-rock and Americana of Steve Earle, Emmylou Harris, Lucinda Williams and Neil Young should love Blackbirds. So what did she make of the early reaction?

“It’s just been fantastic on both sides of the Atlantic. I’m so thrilled. It makes me think maybe I’m a late bloomer, which is fine with me. This whole past year has been really remarkable and eye-opening for me.”

Mortal Instruments: Gretchen Peters (Photo: http://www.gretchenpeters.com/)

That included the momentous night last October when she was inducted into the Nashville songwriters’ Hall of Fame, quite an accolade for a New York-born ‘carpet-bagger’ who only moved to Tennessee and the home of country after a spell in Colorado.

But while that honour seems to suggest this outsider has been accepted by her peers, she continues to plough her own furrow on the folk side of Americana meets country.

“I think what’s really hit home. It’s such a wonderful position to be in, getting that kind of validation at a point in your life where you feel you’re still doing your strongest work.

“It would have been very easy to feel – if I hadn’t had this new album to work on and look forward to – really happy and honoured but also worry ‘now what?’

“Instead I felt I had so much forward motion and was so focused on this coming out and I’m just so happy to be in that position.”

Blackbirds is already a hit in the UK download country charts, with her Circus Girl compilation also selling well again. But is this the album that will see her cross-over into the mainstream charts here?

“It does seem to be going that way. We’ll see. It’s certainly far ahead of where Hello Cruel World ever was.”

For many of us – myself included I might add – who have only caught up with her catalogue more recently, should we go from the start or head backwards across those seven studio albums and two live LPs?

“I think you go backwards. And one of the albums I’m still very proud of yet probably didn’t get heard as much was Burnt Toast and Offerings, which I jokingly but not so jokingly refer to as my divorce album.

“To me that was a turning point, paving the way for these last two albums.”

The Secret of Life from 1996 was the first album under Gretchen’s own name. So what led to that decision to go it on her own then?

“I was always my own entity. I had bands when I was coming up in Colorado in my 20s, but always under my own name.

“I always knew I was too head-strong to work in a democracy! I was so directed as a songwriter, and knew I wanted to sing my own songs and that was the path for me.”

She’d already been in Nashville a few years by 1996. Did she know her pianist (and now husband) Barry Walsh, an acclaimed artist in his own right, by then?

“Yes, and he played on that first album. He’d been playing on my demos a few years at that point, including my second set of demos. I never called another piano player after that – he had such an affinity for my songs.”

After all the album tours over the years, has she got to properly know the UK now?

“Oh yes – considering my sense of geography is terrible, I know the UK better than some people who live here!”

That’s included some memorable appearances at the Glastonbury, Isle of Wight and Cambridge Folk festivals.

“Yes, I’ve done Glastonbury twice, and sometimes almost consider the UK my home territory, having been touring here longer than I have the States.”

Furthermore, BBC Radio 2 veteran broadcasters Bob Harris and Terry Wogan are clearly big fans – something else that has probably helped open a few doors this side of the pond.

“It’s helped immensely. They’ve both been very supportive and helpful. You’re so lucky here to have people like that who champion music they personally love.

“It’s not everywhere you go that presenters can share what really moves them musically.”

It seems that us Brits manage to focus less on sticking to one genre.

“Yes, and I think that’s one of the reasons why coming over here and touring I’ve founds an audience so willing to embrace me, because I’m a bit of a hybrid.

“I’m a bit of a mutt, coming from a lot of different musical places – and that didn’t seem to work for me as well in the States in 1996 as it did here.

“I came over here and found all the qualities that ensured I wasn’t a mainstream country artist there worked for me in the UK.”

Gretchen also featured on Jools Holland’s radio show during her promo visit.

“We had a blast! That will be out in March.”

So is it just you and Barry doing the rounds over here this time?

“It is, but we’re bringing a band back for the tour. We’re working with (Canadian multi-instrumentalist) Christine Bougie, who’s toured with us a couple of times. She plays electric guitar, lap steel and drums.

“Then we’re adding a gentleman called Conor McCreanor (from Belfast) on bass, so it’s really the biggest band I’ve brought over here, and I’m excited about that.”

I’m guessing it will be a set based around Blackbirds, a few cuts from Hello Cruel World, and a few other past crowd favourites.

“That’s pretty much the size of it. When we toured Hello Cruel World we played that whole album in sequence, which was real fun and I enjoyed that, but I don’t want to repeat that.

“There will be a healthy amount of songs from the new album and a lot of other ones. I’m in a mood to revisit some of the older songs and definitely some from Hello Cruel World that people will want to hear.”

How does your Songwriters Hall of Fame accolade compare to a few of the other awards you’ve bagged over the years? You’re among pretty hallowed company.

“I think it’s at the very top, really. It’s an acknowledgement of a lifetime of work rather than any particular work, which is remarkable.

True Grit: Gretchen Peters (Photo: http://www.gretchenpeters.com/)

“The list of who’s in that Hall of Fame is mind-boggling really. It was such an acknowledgement for me from my peers for work I did primarily all by myself in a room.

“I didn’t have a lot of co-writers, and wasn’t the typical Nashville writer. To be voted in was from what I could see strictly a way of saying ‘well done’, and that means so much to me.”

You mentioned in a recent radio interview how you‘d got to know kindred spirits like Nancy Griffiths and Steve Earle along the way, and I can certainly hear the latter in your more recent work. And I like that label ‘country noir’.

“I like that too!”

Gretchen has revealed how during the summer of 2013 when writing songs for Blackbirds, she went to three memorial services and a wedding, something that inspired an awareness of the inevitability of mortality that has since coloured her work.

I guess it happens to us all, with ageing parents and so on – a realisation that getting old can be a crock of shit sometimes. She puts it better though, with a more optimistic spin, when she says, ‘You understand the fragility of life, and the beauty of two people promising to weather it together.’

She certainly wears her influences on her sleeves en route, and I’m definitely getting Emmylou Harris on a few songs. Is she a big influence on you?

“She’s a beacon! I don’t know if Americana music would exist without her. I came to her like a lot of people via Gram Parsons, through their collaborations then her records.

Gretchen’s Beacon: Emmylou Harris has been a mighty influence throughout Gretchen’s career

“They deeply, deeply affected me. When I started playing in clubs aged 18 and 19 years old I was singing her songs, and when I started to write I started to write like the people I admired and those writing on her albums, like Rodney Crowell. It’s a big continuum and she’s definitely the centre-piece.”

I admit to Gretchen that I was only a late convert to Emmylou, turned on by her work with Daniel Lanois and co on 1995’s fantastic Wrecking Ball.

“That’s just a great example of her evolution as an artist. And great artists do evolve. They move on and find other sounds and other things interesting.

“That was a turning point album for her and for a lot of us to see what the possibilities were. While being perhaps primarily an acoustic, country-based artist, she certainly kicked at the stalls.”

And I think that’s what Gretchen’s doing with Blackbirds, isn’t it?

“I think it definitely is.”

Gretchen worked on an album with Tom Russell in 2008, wrote alongside Ben Glover on this album and fashioned a duet with Jimmy La Fave, while Rodney Crowell was on the last. She’s also worked with John Prine. So is there any chance of a future duets album with a few compadres?

“I would love that! Duet singing is one of my absolute favourite things in the world, again going back to Gram and Emmylou – where I got my appetite for it.

“And because of the songs they sang, I went back to The Delmore Brothers, The Louvin Brothers, The Everly Brothers, and all that great duet singing. You may have just planted a seed. I love that idea!”

Winning Duet: Jimmy LaFave, who joins Gretchen on When You Comin’ Home (Photo: http://moneypennymusic.co.uk/)

The song you do with Jimmy LaFave, When You Comin’ Home, is certainly a fine one.

“I love duet and harmony singing better than singing lead really. It’s a deep joy to me to do that … so what a great idea!”

Watch this space then.

What’s your current favourite of all the songs she’s written that have been recorded by others? And I do realise that’s like asking who her favourite child is, but sometimes artists take things in a different direction to how we might have envisaged them.

“Oh definitely. That has happened, but then in other cases an artist will stick very closely to my version – which is a compliment.

“It’s hard to pick a favourite, but one that meant the most to me was Etta James recording Love’s Been Rough On Me, because she has one of the great voices of our time, and to hear my words and melody in her voice was just tremendous.”

Is there anyone else out there you haven’t had the guile to send a song to yet?

“Well, if I had a so-called bucket list, I would love to have a song recorded by Emmylou Harris … speaking of icons.”

I mentioned that gritty quality to some of the songs on the new album, and Johnny Cash, Leonard Cohen and even Nick Cave spring to mind for me in places. Is that a departure for you?

“It is, and I embrace that darker musical direction, concurrently with the darker lyrical direction, and felt that the music should reflect that.

“I learned a lot and picked up a lot from one of my co-producers, Doug Lancio, who has a very natural propensity towards that grit.

“I knew I wanted that and felt I needed some of that, and drew on him for a lot.”

Then alongside that more earthy quality there’s the sumptuous Pretty Things and beautifully evocative The House on Auburn Street. It seems like Gretchen’s really stretched out on this album.

“We did, and what I was thinking and listening to was partially responsible for that. I thought of this album as an American folk-rock album, in the sense of Neil Young plus Crosby, Stills and Nash, Simon and Garfunkel.

“I would consider all that as the bedrock. I heard so much music in my house – jazz and rock and everything – but if there was a bedrock for me it would be that American folk-rock.

“It was hugely influential and in my DNA, so I was very consciously channeling a lot of that sound.”

It’s good to see the younger generations coming through too, although I did mention how I’d read that she’d toppled Taylor Swift from the top of the UK country charts with Blackbirds.

“I can’t even believe that’s true!”

It seems to be, but I must say it’s a breath of fresh air to see someone like her doing so well in the big market – an artist who writes her own material can only be a good role model.

“Well, I’m always rooting for the singer-songwriters. That’s the music I came up on, and means the most to me.

“I think there’s a place for everything, but especially the young women in the mainstream country world like Brandy Clark and Kacey Musgraves. I’m excited to see them do well.

“Although I don’t really intersect with that world much anymore, I did at one point, and really love to see these women kicking down some walls and writing more lyrically-pointed songs.”

Gretchen recently said she was drawn to artists courageous enough to face ageing and mortality in their work, citing Leonard Cohen, Paul Simon, Bruce Springsteen and Nick Lowe. That seems to be a male domain in large part though. So does this album prove women can write hard-hitting songs too?

“Yes, and I think they’re writing some of the most interesting music going on in country at the moment. The men seem to be writing about beer and pick-up trucks. That’s fine, but there’s a whole lot more to life.”

In that sense, I mention how Martina McBride’s recording of her 1996 song Independence Day made a real impact.

“It did, in a huge way. It was one of those songs you only realise with hindsight what an impact it had. And 20 years later it still has, and I still play it. But you also realise those sort of songs don’t come along often.”

Gretchen’s always been big on story songs, full of real characters, like On A Bus To St. Cloud. Was that the first great song she thought you wrote, suggesting she was heading in the right direction?

“I do feel On A Bus To St. Cloud was a real personal milestone. There were others here and there, like Souvenirs, where I felt I’d found who I was, but On A Bus to St Cloud was the first I wrote where I really felt I wouldn’t change anything.

“I still love singing it, and still find new things in it, which is very rare in a song.”

I’m guessing after your results on Blackbirds, there’s more songs to come from Gretchen and Ben Glover together.

“Absolutely. I love Ben and what he’s about as an artist. For someone like me who’s not particularly comfortable with co-writing, writing with Ben was just dreamy, and I think the world of him.

“He’s working on his own album, doing his own thing right now, becoming a headliner, as he should be.”

Incidentally, the only song on the album she wasn’t involved in writing was Nashville. It’s clearly a great song, but why did you choose that?

“That song has been in my life for 10 years, and brought me to David Mead, who wrote it. And we ended up writing a singing a song together on my Burnt Toast and Offerings album.

“I’ve wanted to sing that song since I first heard it, but David’s version is so beautiful that I was put off recording it, wondering how I could ever improve on it. But eventually I just thought I wanted to sing that song, and felt it belonged on this album.”

And I suppose now you’ve been accepted as part of Nashville, it could be seen as an acknowledgment of love for your adopted home city?

“Maybe there’s a little of that, because Nashville really is my home and I’ve been accepted there in every possible way. This is perhaps a wonderful way to express that.”

Gretchen’s back in the UK in mid-March for 16 dates, including two shows in the North-West. Has she any particular memories of past Liverpool and Manchester visits?

“With Manchester I go back to maybe 1996 or 1997 playing there, with lots of good memories.

“With Liverpool, I think it was only since 2013, but we’re playing the same venue this time, the Epstein Theatre, and I fell in love with that venue.

“Of course, Liverpool looms large in musical mythology for us Americans. It’s like making a pilgrimage.

“And on this tour I believe we have a day off there, and have been invited for a little tour of John Lennon’s home. I’m pretty excited about that.”

For the writewyattuk verdict on Gretchen Peters’ new album Blackbirds, head to our review here.

Gretchen Peters plays Liverpool’s Epstein Theatre on March 29 (0844 888 4411 / http://www.epsteinliverpool.co.uk/) and Manchester’s Royal Northern College of Music on April 2 (0161 907 5200 / http://www.rncm.ac.uk/).

And for details of the other shows on Gretchen’s UK tour, her past releases and much more, head to her official website here.

This is a revised and expanded version of a Malcolm Wyatt feature for the Lancashire Evening Post, first published on February 19th, 2014.

Posted in Music | Tagged alt country, Americana, Barry Walsh, Blackbirds, Burnt Toast and Offerings, Emmylou Harris, folk, Gretchen Peters, Hello Cruel World, Jimmy LaFave, Liverpool, Manchester, Nashville, Rodney Crowell | 3 Comments

Blackbirds by Gretchen Peters (Scarlet Letter Records) – a writewyattuk review

Posted on February 20, 2015 by writewyattuk

From the moment the electric guitar chops signal the lead-off title track on Blackbirds, we’re in no doubt as to the underlying grit of Gretchen Peters’ latest 10-track opus.

We certainly have a contender for a career-best outing here, the introductory number every bit as compelling as co-writer Ben Glover’s version, a musical out-rider showcasing a harder ‘country noir’ sound found throughout this master-piece of redefined Americana.

This is an artist clearly not content to sit back on her laurels after recent acceptance from her Nashville peers, and I could see Nick Cave tackling this murder ballad, its dark matter suitably chilling and a fine example of Gretchen’s rich story-craft.

This is no one-dimensional songwriter either, and Pretty Things stretches the canvas somewhat to show another side, with shades of Alice Cooper’s Only Women Bleed beneath it all.

It’s the chorus that sets it apart, dynamic piano touches from husband Barry Walsh suggesting a Ben Folds song in places, while the lyrical content is sharp and thought-provoking, battles with personal self-confidence brought to the microscope.

On the surface of it, we’re back into more conventional country territory with latest single When All You Got Is A Hammer, but again this is cutting-edge content. Amid the guitars and superior band feel, there’s a Steve Earle feel to this tale of a war vet’s less than triumphant hometown return, Gretchen unconcerned about upsetting any apple-carts.

Everything Falls Away brings to mind Chris Isaak’s Wicked Game tackled by Maria McKee, our accomplished songbird showing us her Emmylou Harris pedigree.

The House on Auburn Street is another vivid cinematic tale, the artist transporting us back to her New York suburban youth with a song that wouldn’t be out of place on Emmylou’s landmark Wrecking Ball album. And this is no cutesy sentimental journey.

Cinematic Tales: Gretchen Peters (Photo: http://www.gretchenpeters.com/)

There’s a real band feel on the Jimmy LaFave-assisted When You Comin’ Home, and it’s perfectly placed, perhaps reminiscent of a cut from Mark Knopfler’s 2006 All This Road Running collaboration with the afore-mentioned Ms Harris.

There’s an Hallelujah meets Londonderry Air under-current to Jubilee, and it seems fitting to mention both the Leonard Cohen influence and Irish pioneering heritage for someone who fits right in with that Transatlantic Sessions set.

As it is, the artists involved across this album suggest a who’s who of modern American roots music. But that’s not the full story, for it’s Gretchen’s songwriting craft – the lyrical and musical – that brings everything together.

We’re into country territory again with Black Ribbons, but this is no flippant take on the genre – rather another characterful portrait, the tale of a fisherman coming to terms with his wife’s death and aftermath of the BP oil spill on Gulf of Mexico waters.

It’s a strong enough premise from that alone, but when you factor in the band ethic and acknowledge we have a stonking song, you get the bigger picture.

While the song subjects see Gretchen flit around her home nation, this is an album that should appeal on this side of the Atlantic too, and conversely that comes through on her interpretation of David Mead’s Nashville, the only cover here.

I could see Cerys Matthews attempt this pensive yet emotionally-charged song, and there’s something of the songcraft of Boo Hewerdine there too. But for all that it’s a love song to Gretchen’s adopted hometown, and one that certainly sells Tennessee’s state capital to this wordsmith.

That might have been the perfect conclusion, but Gretchen’s not finished yet, a stripped-down The Cure for the Pain bringing us back to that over-riding theme of our inevitable fight against mortality, with all the skill of Bruce Springsteen’s best work.

While Gretchen highlights the darker side of life, this hospital bed-tale suggests a little light among the shadows, accepting the ultimate outcome while celebrating the good throughout life’s journey.

And that leaves us with a return to Louisiana for her semi-acoustic take on Blackbirds rounding things off, every bit as strong as the electric version.

Darker Side: Gretchen Peters (Photo: http://www.gretchenpeters.com/)

Early sales, critical acclaim and attention suggest Gretchen’s reached a new album high with Blackbirds, and if 2012’s Hello Cruel World was her ‘career best’, I feel she’s topped that here.

Clearly, Gretchen and her hubby work well together, and with Ben Glover’s co-writing and Doug Lancio’s co-production she’s moulded a long player that deserves its place among the defining albums of not just alt-country but Americana too.

Furthermore, on the back of her recent Nashville Hall of Fame honour, we have here an album boldly showcasing an artist not afraid to revel in her own creativity and cross that country line.

For a writewyattuk interview with Gretchen Peters, complete with tour date details and links to the artist’s website, head here.

Posted in Music | Tagged alt country, Americana, Barry Walsh, Blackbirds, Bruce Springsteen, David Mead, Doug Lancio, Emmylou Harris, Gretchen Peters, Hello Cruel World, Jimmy LaFave, Leonard Cohen, Nashville, Nick Cave, Steve Earle | 1 Comment

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