Seven years ago Laura Marling came on episode 19 of the podcast at a very different time in her life. As she prepares to release her 8th album, Patterns in Repeat, this month (25 Oct), she does so as a new mother, who's trained to become a yoga teacher, who's gained a masters in psychoanalysis, who's formed a band called LUMP, who's quite touring, who's communicating directly with fans via a quite brilliant Substack newsletter about the craft of songwriting.
All of the above is covered in this week's episode of Midnight Chats, as well as discussion about death, T.V., secretly cooking for Damon Albarn and John Paul Jones with not great results, and the beauty of a new, sparse album recorded with a baby daughter literally by your side in your living room.
You can watch clips of the podcast online now, just give us a follow on Instagram @midnightchatspod.
Further reading/listening/viewing
Listen to our new Beat the Algorithm Spotify playlist
Laura Marling's Patterns in Repeat Substack
Credits:
Editing by Stuart Stubbs
Mixing and mastering by Flo Lines
Artwork by Kate Prior
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Good evening, I'm Greg Cochrane, Good evening, I'm Stuart Stubbs.
We are a couple of journalists who've been working in
independent music since the days of MySpace.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
One night a week, we become your guides through the
week in music, because, let's face it, the algorithms have
stop working for most of us.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
So we're here to share the best new underground music
and the news that you might have missed, as well
as discussing the week's biggest headlines and bringing you interviews
with some of our favorite alternative artists.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
The show is called Midnight Chats. Good evening, Stuart, good
to see you. Your mustache is looking particularly strong tonight,
as if you've just put in some product in it
or eaten a very saucy sausage. There is a little
bit of oil in it today, is there? Your lip
is glistening?
Speaker 1 (00:49):
It's yeah. I think I've put too much in. It's
only day two of putting something in it to stop
it right.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
It feels soft.
Speaker 1 (00:55):
It's turned into more more work than I wanted it
to be. I think you should grow one of those
beards that's not got the mustache. You should grow the
inversion of what I've got right, you know, like a
chin strap beard.
Speaker 3 (01:09):
I do know.
Speaker 2 (01:10):
If I did that, there's two reasons why that won't happen. One,
I can't really grow a beard, and two I think
I would look like a wrestler from the eighties.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
That's why I want you to do it.
Speaker 2 (01:20):
Oh, okay, fair enough, how are you doing.
Speaker 1 (01:23):
I'm good, Yes, I'm very good. I'm excited about tonight's guest.
We have Laura Marling on the show. But I know
for a fact that you've just been watching something that
I have recently watched as well, which is this madness
of Coldplay on the QVC channel.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
Yeah. So for people who haven't seen this, Coldplay have
got your album out, make that what you will. It's
called Moon Music. Last week they basically did loads of
press for this, so they you know, this is Coldplay,
the world's biggest band. They can just like pick and
choose the media that they do when they released and
want to promote new music, and they did. They did
all the big ticket stuff, you know, they did tonight
(02:00):
with Jimmy Founon, etc. But they also showed up very
randomly on the QVC, the shopping channel. They're in America,
and if you haven't seen this, they're there with the
presenter Jen who on link is quite iconic in the
shopping world. And they basically hung out on QVC for
half an hour trying to flog copies of their new
album and they're playing some songs. They had a Coldplay
(02:23):
toaster and a tea set that they were talking about.
It was a bit of chat. They took calls from listeners.
Should we have a little listen to this right now?
Speaker 3 (02:29):
At QVC. We have an exclusive offer that you can
only find.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
Here Moon Music in its own collector's edition packaging.
Speaker 3 (02:37):
It's called the Notebook Edition.
Speaker 2 (02:38):
Your choice of the LP or the CD. Hello Barbara,
Oh my gosh, I can't believe it.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
Hello, we can't believe it either. The phones.
Speaker 2 (02:49):
You love your band, that's one.
Speaker 3 (02:51):
I am totally blind. And the musician so music means
so much to me.
Speaker 2 (02:57):
That's amazing. And I've been to many many of your
answered And what I love about you, Chris, is you
seeing completely on tea most of the time for a
band to do that, but you do it.
Speaker 3 (03:11):
These are the Moon goggles.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
Now hopefully you'll be able to see on your screen
a simulation of what I'm seeing everything's colors and rainbows
and in my case it's hearts.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
To I just watching this on YouTube. It's very silly,
but very I just love it. It's completely like just
to see them show up in that place, very unlikely.
And I guess when you've been doing this thing for
as long as Coldplay, get an opportunity to do something
a bit different and not just do the same rounds
(03:43):
every time, it must have been.
Speaker 1 (03:44):
Quite a lie. They shifted some units, obviously. There's a
great line in it though, where the presenter she says,
now you can't get this anywhere else other then here
on QVC and the band's website.
Speaker 2 (03:58):
What I liked is they did they were like this,
five thousand copies, we're down to three thousand copies, et cetera,
et cetera. And at the end they was like, and
the we still got some copies of the CD if
anybody's he just couldn't flog all the coffees in the
time they were there. Brilliant.
Speaker 1 (04:13):
Did you think this was a marketing move as genius
as James Blunt's current bid to get to number one?
Do you know what this is?
Speaker 2 (04:25):
I also I also like this I've heard about this.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
This is James Blunt has said he's re releasing his
debut album, Back to Bedlam this Friday. Everyone watch out.
It's the one with your Beautiful on it. It's the
one we've all been waiting for. And he has said
if it gets to number one, he will let fans
or just the general public choose a new name for
(04:50):
him and change his new name to whatever anybody.
Speaker 2 (04:52):
Wants that he will change his name.
Speaker 1 (04:54):
That's what he said. He said this on the Chris
Moyles Breakfast Show on Radio X and his direct quote
from it was, this is not just an act of desperation.
It's a genuine thing. I swear on my life and
the life of my one fan, Brian from Glasgow, I
will change my name should it hit number one. James
Blunt is great at this stuff, and he's very very
(05:16):
good at like his social media is hilarious. He's not
I think he's probably safe. I looked at the big
releases coming this week and it's basically him versus Charlie
XCX for the Remix record, which I imagine is going
to be the number one. I don't think there's much
else in the running though, and Blunt could get it.
(05:36):
I will be buying Blunt's record again because I want
to see that happen, and you know it might have
special stuff.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
Yeah. This has got botimk boat face written all over it,
isn't it? And I want I want James Blunt to
change his name to Brian from Glasgow's. That's what I
think it should be.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
Right, let's get into this interview that I did with
Laura Marling maybe two or three weeks ago. Now, Laura's
been on the show before, seven years ago, when we
were right at the beginning of making midnight chats and
to this day. And I'm not just saying this because
she's back again now. One of my favorite interviews. I
(06:14):
don't know what. I think. It's her like, I just
really like her. It never could be you.
Speaker 2 (06:18):
I'm particularly good.
Speaker 1 (06:20):
You know what I mean is I don't know why.
It's not even as if it was an out of
the ordinary interview. I think it was just she made
it so good, you know, expecting a very maybe tough
interview back then of somebody who's very shy and quiet,
but she wasn't. So you can scroll all the way
back through the feed if you like this one and
want to hear what we spoke about back then, because
(06:42):
Laura was in a very different stage of her life.
She is about to release her her eighth album, Patterns
in Repeat, comes out in a few weeks October twenty fifth,
and it's a record that she has made since the
birth of her daughter. Let's not give too much weight
about everything. Come back at the end of this. Laura
Mining on episode one hundred and fifty two of Midnight Chats.
(07:14):
The last time we met was it was seven years ago.
Here are some things. Here are some things that I
picked up yesterday when listening back to that episode. It
was episode nineteen of the podcast. It was February twenty seventeen,
and you were making cheese.
Speaker 3 (07:29):
Yes, it does ring a bell. She do still making cheese,
not making cheese anymore?
Speaker 1 (07:34):
It is it a short lived I probably was.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
Quite a lot of my interests are short lived. I
was really into making Halloomy.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
Well.
Speaker 1 (07:43):
One thing I do need to thank you for from
that meeting was at the end of that at the
end of that podcast, I just got into reading I
hadn't I know right? And you put me on too,
Joan Didion. You suggested Joe at that point. Amazing.
Speaker 3 (08:00):
Great, she's pretty unheard of.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
Yeah, so thank you for that, because she's like one
of my favorite writers.
Speaker 3 (08:07):
Now, fantastic.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
I'm guessing you've read everything she's done.
Speaker 3 (08:11):
No, not by a long way, but some have you.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
Read a year of magical thinking? Yes, how are you
at death?
Speaker 3 (08:20):
Listen? I try not think about it, especially since I've
had a baby, gets way more intensive.
Speaker 2 (08:27):
Do you have a baby?
Speaker 3 (08:30):
But before then I was kind of well, actually no,
in tandem, in the last year, I've become like absolutely
fascinated with near death experiences as a sort of crutch
to cling onto for like a hopefulness about death.
Speaker 2 (08:46):
Right, Okay, so I like.
Speaker 3 (08:50):
Prepare it. Like it's also like I've been reading about
the menopause since I was like eighteen, because I just
I want to be absolutely prepared for ready for it
to be ready.
Speaker 1 (08:59):
So the in terms of like the near death experience,
what are you reading about people like accounts of people
who have had near death experiences?
Speaker 3 (09:07):
Yeah, I say reading, I'm like watching it on whatever. Yeah,
I read it in a book. I mean you twoe comment. Yeah,
like people who.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
They talk about they what they experienced.
Speaker 3 (09:20):
Yeah, and there is a universal experience that emerges from
like thousands and thousands of accounts of it, which is
that you get a sense of an immediate sense of
I'm not me, I'm not my brain or my body
as your as sort of I guess the death is happening.
And then you get a sense of, oh, that's my
body over there, and I'm above it or around it
(09:41):
or whatever. And then you have a sense of like
complete connectedness with everything, and.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
Well that sounds pretty good.
Speaker 3 (09:48):
Yeah, it sounds really good. And then you get a
kind of a walk through of your life and and
you see how how you have been in the world
has affected the world, and how the world is a
did you. So quite often people come back who have
near death experiences, and like, I'm going to try really
really carefully not to cause anyone any emotional harmble distress,
(10:10):
because I've seen the impact that I can have on
people's lives. I find that really lovely.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
That that is comforting. So how did you find A
Year of Magical Thinking? Which is a book? Because this
is the reason why I'm putting off reading that one,
I think because it's so squarely about yeah, grief and death,
which is something I tend.
Speaker 2 (10:30):
To run Away from Yes, yeah, did.
Speaker 1 (10:32):
You find it like a Was it a tough read?
Speaker 3 (10:37):
It was a long time ago. I think it's a
very beautifully meditative, thoughtful take on hitting the absolute like
maximum distress. So in that way, maybe like near death experiences,
it's probably quite a good thing to read. My favorite
stuff of hers was more than like political commentary. Okay,
(11:00):
I loved her take on hippies. I can't remember, but
it must be in the White Album.
Speaker 1 (11:04):
Yeah, I've read the White Album and I've read Slouch.
The first one I read was Slouch.
Speaker 3 (11:09):
Yeah. I loved Yeah. Yeah, maybe it's that one. We're
not talking about the kids, the hippies giving acid to kids.
I loved that. I mean, I love that as practice.
I just loved her take on it.
Speaker 1 (11:20):
I think the reason you mentioned her was because I
think we got to that via talking about your hobby
at the time of being obsessed with nineteen sixty nine.
Speaker 2 (11:33):
Yes, yeah, is that still a hobby that's gone?
Speaker 3 (11:36):
That's gone?
Speaker 1 (11:36):
Yeah, that was something that you were just you were
fascinated by that year and you.
Speaker 3 (11:39):
Collected yeah, record I collected records. I recently got read
of all my records.
Speaker 1 (11:43):
So did you Yeah, all of your records from that year,
all of your records for my.
Speaker 3 (11:47):
Records will stop? How come because I lost faith in
it as a concept, which I know is going to
be not helpful. Things stay because I bowing my records,
said CDs.
Speaker 1 (12:01):
You started buying CDs.
Speaker 3 (12:02):
Well, I started buying secondhand CDs. Yeah, and a really
good CD Wi Fi system. I just that's just my
preferred choice because I like listening to a whole album. Also,
I want my child to be able to do it,
you know, put the CD on and it was taking
up a lot of space which recently didn't have spare
(12:23):
And they are in the sort of I still own them,
they're just not here right. So I haven't given up
on it entirely. But yeah, and also I guess I
kind of felt like I'd reached my I'd achieved what
I wanted to achieve was just collecting records from ninety
sixty nine, and then I got bored with it.
Speaker 1 (12:43):
Yeah, yeah, okay, fair enough.
Speaker 3 (12:45):
I think it also just letting go of the stranglehold
that the idea of vinyl represents. You know that you're
hip and cool and interested things. I'm hip and cool
and interesting things. I just don't want vinyl taking up.
I don't want the stranglehold of vinyl in my life.
Speaker 1 (12:59):
That's so expensive A record now is thirty quid, which,
if not more forty quid for heavy vinyls.
Speaker 3 (13:08):
Yeah, I don't want to put people off buying viol
but you know, it is crazy how that's overlooked, the
cost and it becomes a kind of fetishized object, like
and I get it. I'm a music fan as well, obviously,
like in my in my soul, but yeah, there's a
lot of stuff that I don't agree with with vinyl
(13:29):
and what it symbolically means, you know, to have a
vinyl because that's not how people are listening to music.
It's simply not the case most of the time.
Speaker 1 (13:42):
So in the seven years since we last spoke, a
lot's happened for you since then, And here are a
few of the main ones that I've noted down. You
studied a Masters in psychoanalysis, I did, Yeah, released two
solo albums, with a third next month called Patterns in Repeat,
(14:03):
two more albums as Lump with Mike Lindsay love Lump Records.
I big fan. You've become a master of TikTok you've
decided to stop touring. Yes, and the biggest of all,
most life changing, you've started a substack.
Speaker 3 (14:19):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (14:20):
Oh YEA had a baby as well. Yeah, you've had
a baby.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (14:22):
We won't talk about all of those things because don't
think we're gonna have time. But there's a few things
that I definitely want to pick out. Obviously a huge
one as you've becoming a mother last year early last year,
and that's obviously a huge, huge influence on the new record.
But so is the psychoanalysis masters right. First of all,
(14:43):
what made you decide to study psychoanalysis.
Speaker 3 (14:46):
I had been in psychanalysis. I was a patient of
psychoanalysis for a few years in my twenties, and I
found it sort of profoundly beneficial, though prohibitively expensive.
Speaker 1 (14:59):
PSYCHOANALYSI this is the practice whey you're mainly talking to somebody.
Speaker 3 (15:04):
Yeah, you're just rambling on and on on on.
Speaker 1 (15:06):
And that mainly staying the therapist is mainly just letting
you get it, get it out right.
Speaker 3 (15:12):
Yeah. So it was interesting for me because up until
I went there, I felt very how do I say,
like stilted in my ability to speak. I was very
stumbling and preferred not to if I could, And so
like the having to go, and I went a couple
of times a week and talk for an hour without
(15:34):
anyone interrupting me. Otherwise you just sit in awkward silence.
And it was so unbearable that I had to fill it, right,
So I was forced to fill it. And like, the
amazing thing about psychanalysis is that what it makes what
the analyst is very good at, is that they are
finally attuned to what you're not saying. So they're looking
for all the space in between what you're saying and
pointing out conflicts in what your account of who you
(15:58):
are and how your life is. Yeah, And so it's
it's you know, it's brilliant in that way, and that's
why I was interested in it. But I don't think
it has the sort of ability to proceed as a
practice because it's so expensive. So I was interested in
how are the forms and to learn a bit more
(16:18):
about it so that I can understand where it can
be applied without that traditional practice of it.
Speaker 1 (16:23):
Yeah, as it's portrayed in the Sopranos.
Speaker 2 (16:26):
Yeah, was it is that close?
Speaker 1 (16:29):
Is that close?
Speaker 3 (16:29):
Yeah? Yeah? Or the sexual tension, yeah, the way Yeah,
I went to Freud and analys. I was like lying
on my back, you know, on a sofa, Okay, not
looking at them in.
Speaker 2 (16:42):
The face in a sense I would love to do that.
Speaker 1 (16:44):
Yeah, But did you ever find it frustrated that they
weren't because they won't tell you what to do? Were
they Like, that's not the point of it. And there's
part of me that will be crying up for like,
just tell me the answer that I can then go
and implement in my life.
Speaker 3 (17:02):
That's the problem. That's the problem with quick fixed therapy,
isn't it Like, yeah, doesn't give you the tools, doesn't
give you the fishing rod. Yeah, it's really frustrating. Also,
I had this thing where I kept turning up the
wrong time and I was like it was insane. I
kept knocking on their door at the wrong time while
they're in another session, and it was like this powerful
compulsion to embarrass myself in front of them. Do you know,
(17:24):
like these amazing things you start noticing like oh my god,
I'm doing this on purpose on some level, degrading myself,
and like it was amazing.
Speaker 2 (17:32):
It was it was, Yeah, did you talk about that
with them? Yeah?
Speaker 3 (17:35):
Then it all becomes a part of the therapy, part
of the process.
Speaker 1 (17:39):
That they're like, this is great, this is just another
thing we can we can add to the list and
get through. Have you found since doing your masters do
you find yourself psychoanalyzing everyone?
Speaker 3 (17:56):
They tell you that no, I did. At the beginning,
they they actually there's like a part of the course
which which is to discourage you from doing wild what
they call wild analysis, basically.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
Because obviously analysis.
Speaker 3 (18:08):
Wild analysis, and there's a great book called wild analysis
about that. But you know a little knowledge, as they say,
it's a dangerous thing.
Speaker 1 (18:19):
Yeah, yeah, because you could just go around judging everyone
you meet. I've just read the psychopath Test.
Speaker 3 (18:25):
Read, I listened. I would never pass up to listen
to read.
Speaker 1 (18:30):
Exactly what was it? Just called wild testing? Wild wild analysis,
wild I'm wild analysis everywhere right now for psychopaths, for
psychopaths and even watching you know, there's that concept at
the heart of that book, which is essentially psychopaths have.
Speaker 3 (18:46):
A biological reason.
Speaker 1 (18:48):
Yeah, you can't even you almost can't be mad at
them because it's just their makeup. Yeah, to have no
empathy and be a psychopath. And the statistic in it
one in a hundred has psychopathic de tendencies. I was
watching Zodiac the other night, classic film, not a new film,
(19:10):
but any stretch of imagination, but great, and I'm sort
of thinking, oh, it's not his fault, right, you.
Speaker 3 (19:18):
Know that, Like it's completely you have too much profound,
I've got too much.
Speaker 1 (19:23):
I'm certainly not not a psychopathe. But so I imagine
if I had studied something like that, Oh I'd be awful.
I'd be judging everyone. It would not be good for me. Yes,
But I think like the fact that you did that,
do you think something people would be surprised to hear
(19:45):
that successful musician is doing that in between their records.
It's studying, you know.
Speaker 3 (19:50):
It's a vanity, isn't it? To go to go and
do a postgraduate degree in something that isn't vocational is vanity?
I think, you know, like I'm very very proud of
that vanity Paraday achieved it. But you know quite most
of the people who were on that course were going
on it because they needed it as part of their
sort of vocational training, and I was just doing it
(20:11):
on a jolly. But I think I had a bit
of a chip on my shoulder about having left school
at sixteen and not having any qualifications, and I think
had I not done, I would have carried that chip
on my shoulder for a long time.
Speaker 1 (20:26):
You've done some other things between records as well, haven't you.
Speaker 3 (20:28):
Yeah, trained is the yoga instructor I did you? Yeah?
Maybe shortly after I spoke to you last time.
Speaker 1 (20:35):
There's one that somebody else that came on the podcast
mentioned to us. The person was Lucy Rose, right. Were
you working in a restaurant?
Speaker 2 (20:46):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (20:46):
Yeah, yeah. I served her yeah.
Speaker 1 (20:48):
And she jumped into you like what are you doing
and You're like, oh, I'm working yeah.
Speaker 3 (20:53):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (20:53):
But it was well, it was well into your career.
It wasn't like.
Speaker 3 (20:56):
It was while I was making Once. It was an Eagle, right,
and I was working at a restaurant in King's Cross,
and it happened to be I was again a van
you know, I like begged the chef. I got to
know the chef, and I was like, please, it's going
to come and work. I'd love to know how it works.
And so I was working there a couple of days
a week, and one evening it was the it happened
(21:17):
to be the after show or the catering restaurant for
Dame and all Barn's Africa Express.
Speaker 2 (21:24):
Okay, yeah, I think that's what it was called.
Speaker 3 (21:26):
It was sort of festival that was happening outside in
and so John Paul Jones and Damon Albarn both ordered
the Lamb one evening, which I was on the grill
doing and they both sent it back twice and then
didn't order it again as then like they just changed
their order. So that was sad.
Speaker 1 (21:42):
But yeah, you so you were.
Speaker 3 (21:47):
They didn't see me. I was at the grill, They
didn't know it was making. It wasn't a personal vendetin yeh.
Speaker 1 (21:53):
But did you think was that part of you? You're
you're working in the kitchen out of out of interest
of working there and debt. But when you go into
work that day and I say, well tonight is actually
a big music industry party going on. Are you thinking, oh,
for sake.
Speaker 3 (22:10):
I don't know in the music industry anyway, You're just like, yeah,
But funny enough, we were we were making as I
say once, I was an eagle, and Ethan John's my producer,
had been like, I think we need flugel horn, which
is a very rare thing for anybody to say, and
he was like, I only know one person who can
arrange flugelhorn, and it's John Paul Jones. And I was like,
(22:30):
if it's John Paul Jones, I'll take some flugelhorn. Fine.
So we were about to contact John Paul Jones anyway
because we needed him to arrange flugelhorn.
Speaker 1 (22:39):
For the album, and then you served him this terrible,
terrible lamb.
Speaker 3 (22:43):
Yeah, and I think maybe he just never returned. I
don't know what happened.
Speaker 1 (22:46):
He died after that after eating that? What was it
too pink? Too well done?
Speaker 3 (22:51):
I don't know. I can't remember. Maybe it was too
I imagine it.
Speaker 1 (22:53):
Was so sorry. There was there was the kitchen, there's
yoga teacher, anything else. I mean these this is already
more than I would imagine most professional musicians are doing
on the side of being musicians, no doing, it's much more.
And it just comes from like a natural inquisitive nature
that you've got.
Speaker 3 (23:14):
Yeah, I wonder sometimes, you know, my in my more
worried moments, I wonder whether it's like a condition or
something that I literally cannot sit still. But yeah, I'm
interested in lots of things.
Speaker 1 (23:28):
I guess I think that's a rare thing, especially for
people who work in creative industries. Maybe I'm just projecting
because I feel like this is me at the moment,
and I'm going through something right.
Speaker 3 (23:41):
Now about that.
Speaker 1 (23:44):
Whereas you know, music is sort of my identity. It's
my huge interest. It has been since I was a kid.
And there are other things that I like, Yeah, but
there's nothing that on that level, right And I think
when you're or when you're consumed by an interest in
the way that I have been, but also most musicians are,
(24:05):
I would say, then there's not really space for like
those other things to get in there.
Speaker 3 (24:12):
Well, you and I were talking before the microphones went
on about you taking up painting, so there is well
what happened because this happened to your lockdown, But what
happened in lockdown as people stopped feeling the outside pressure
of the world and all of these things rose up
that they were interested, like everybody making banana bread and
sour dough and stuff. But it's interesting, it's in everyone.
(24:36):
And I obviously have and have had for a long time,
the luxury of not having to structure my working day
in any particular way. So I have a lot of
luxury associated with that to follow interests, but it's what
people experience in lockdown.
Speaker 1 (24:51):
Do you ever worry about that luxury.
Speaker 3 (24:54):
Going and what having to get a real job?
Speaker 1 (24:58):
Yeah, but at least if that were to happen, it
feels like you're equipped to like want to do other
things because working in the kitchen it's hard work. I
mean it's hard. It's not like you've chosen some some
sort of very bougie, relaxed thing to like do on
(25:19):
a whim, like that's like a real job.
Speaker 3 (25:22):
Yeah. I mean I wasn't working as hard as like
people who are actually chefs. I want that to be
absolutely Okay. All of my dalliances are vanity dallass. Okay,
my partner is a chef and has you know, he
works like a dog. It's crazy. So people who actually
(25:42):
work these jobs actually work really really hard. But so
it might, you know, I take a sort of I
like to I'm not shy of hard work, I guess,
but I also just I like taking little flavors of everything,
and I find that expresses itself very much in what
books I like to read, like and what media I
(26:03):
like to take in. It's like there is no algorithm
that can contain me. Okay, they're not onto me because
my interests are so bizarre and what not bizarre is
an interesting me kind of way. But like I can
jump from one topic to another topic, I forget the
other topic. Just be like that topics over to me.
Now I'm on this topic. Now, that's what That's what
(26:23):
my brain is like.
Speaker 1 (26:28):
As we say, last year, you gave birth at the
beginning of the year.
Speaker 2 (26:34):
On my birthday.
Speaker 1 (26:35):
That's a good birthday, although it means you can never
celebrate your own birthday, doesn't it's great.
Speaker 3 (26:44):
They kind of get worse off to.
Speaker 1 (26:47):
Ye fair enough, I've read that like shortly after that
time or you know, as soon as soon as you
had your daughter, you were really high, like sort of
a manic high. How long did that last?
Speaker 2 (27:00):
For?
Speaker 3 (27:03):
Crucially not a manne high, but I was high on hormones.
I think it lasted for I mean, it's only just
ended as far as it hasn't ended, but that that
level of high where I was, like, I'm judging it
by the kind of voice notes that I left friends
whatever they call, yeah, voice notes, voice messages. I think
(27:24):
that probably went off three months where it's like just buzzing,
just buzzing, just prof prophesizing about this, that and the
other whatever came into my mind, and it was amazing.
Speaker 1 (27:35):
Was it received well?
Speaker 3 (27:37):
People aoud it funny?
Speaker 2 (27:37):
I think, yeahah, yeah, yeah, okay, good.
Speaker 1 (27:40):
It didn't get to.
Speaker 3 (27:41):
Get in the way tired quickly imagine it probably did
gets hired, But it was a wonderful way to be
out in the world.
Speaker 1 (27:48):
You wrote one song that's on the new record within
in that period, right, which is the opening track on
the album, and then you decided, Okay, I'm not going
to write anymore and I'm just going to like relax
into being a mum. Yeah, and then I'll write again.
Speaker 3 (28:06):
I think I was just thought I was so surprised
that I was writing because I hadn't anticipated being in
that headspace because I couldn't for instance, I couldn't read
a book or have a notebook, which and they were
the two things that because I was like constantly occupied
with my hands or whatever, even when they were sleeping,
and I thought those were the two vital parts of
(28:31):
my songwriting. Like I read read a book, I underline
a bunch of phrases in it, write down some notes,
and end up thinking about lyrics and then I write
a song that's how I thought it had been done
my whole life, And it turns out that I didn't
need any of those things. So it was a real surprise.
And then, yeah, I just wasn't Sometimes when I'm writing
(28:52):
an album, I think I'm in writing mode. Make sure
I play the guitar every day, you know, I make
sure I'm ready and open to the muse or whatever.
And I didn't think that this time, because I was like,
I don't have I just didn't literally didn't have the
mental capacities thing like that, and and lo and behold,
things just sort of slipped through the net into the
(29:13):
into the beings and and I carried on writing. So
it was Yeah, it was great.
Speaker 1 (29:19):
It's such a beautiful record. It's I love how sparse
it is, no drums, and the fact that you went
for like the original recordings on it, right you didn't?
Was it recorded here?
Speaker 3 (29:34):
Yeah? It was recorded there?
Speaker 1 (29:35):
Yeah, in this room, in this room.
Speaker 3 (29:37):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (29:38):
Yeah, I mean it suits you. I think, like, like
you know your because your voice is your voice, and
I think to an extent, you wouldn't really notice that
it's these sort of skeletal sketches that you've done, Like,
I think it still sounds like one of your records,
you know. I don't think anyone's going to miss a
high fi quality recording in a studio, Yeah, you know
(30:02):
what I mean.
Speaker 3 (30:02):
And that was a big That was a concern because
also because I worked with Don Monks, who has engineered
a lot of my albums, who's a like extraordinary technical wizard.
So too for him to be okay with putting you know,
putting together something that's based on not hi fi, you know,
(30:25):
deeply low fi the way I recorded it at the
base of it. It was hard work for him, but
he did an extraordinary job.
Speaker 1 (30:33):
And your daughter was in the room with you at
so how old would she have been when these recordings are?
Speaker 3 (30:39):
She was I started recording where did those demos? When
she was six months? So with the demos that then
became that actually the actual sort of tracks on the album.
So I had I brought up because I have a
studio in the basement where I did a lot song
for our daughter. But I didn't want to be in
the basement psychologically for some reason, I didn't want her
to be in the basement. So I bought my stuff
(31:01):
up here, sacrificing massively on sound because my basement is
sound treated, and she was next to me on the floor,
you know, on a wriggle matal whatever, or asleep, and
so a lot of it was done very very quietly,
sort of the game cranked up as far as it
(31:22):
could go so that I could get it over the
line kind of thing, and it gave it a kind
of quality that was hard to replace in the studio,
so we just kept everything.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
There's a song on there that your dad wrote, yes,
called Looking Back. When was the first time you found
that song? Because he wrote that song when he was
in his twenties.
Speaker 3 (31:39):
Yeah, yeah, when he was younger than me.
Speaker 1 (31:41):
So when did you come across this? Was it a
recording of it or did you have the lyrics of
it or the court or what did you have? How
much of it did you have?
Speaker 3 (31:50):
He he used to play it all the time, like
it was his sort of thing that I have, as
I always play the same thing when I pick up
a guitar, and he always used to play that, So
we were familiar with it. And I think when I
was sort of it must have been sixteen or seventeen
when I had started writing songs, putting music out he
(32:14):
as we often do. We played together quite long time,
quite a lot when we are together, and he shows
me runs of chords that he thinks are nice, and
I steal them and meant me basically, something I've actually
repeated with my partner who's also a musician, who I
steal all of his cor progressions as well, paging doctor Freud.
But I had used the chords for that for another song,
(32:38):
and I still thought, oh, I'll take those chords. I
don't really care much about the lyrics, so I'll just
take the chords and write another song. And then of
course I hit my thirties or whatever. And he played
it here when he was visiting when my daughter was born.
There was a guitar and he just picked it up
and started playing it, and it was like devastating to
hear for some reason, you know, some whatever point in
(33:02):
my astrological.
Speaker 1 (33:02):
Journey, song, isn't it.
Speaker 3 (33:05):
It's a sad Yeah, it's a sad song.
Speaker 1 (33:07):
Like it's so. It's written bio dad when he was
in his twenties, but from the perspective of an old
man looking back on his life. Yeah, and now that
your dad is an older man, Yeah, how does he feel?
Speaker 2 (33:18):
Like?
Speaker 1 (33:18):
I mean, I was going to say how does he
feel about the song? But he obviously still feels proud
of it and connected to it, because if he's coming
around and playing that song, still amazing that he's had
this one song that he's you know, constantly goes back
to his whole life. That's incredible. Does he what's do
you know what his relationship with that song is now
having like now being at the age that the person
(33:39):
in the song is imagined to be.
Speaker 3 (33:40):
Or maybe this is an English thing maybe rather than
a universal thing. But wouldn't you love to know the
inner passions of your parents? Like, yeah, I'm never going
to know. And actually, now I am myself a parent,
I'm like, oh yeah, probably see why Actually you keep
them quiet to yourself whatever your life becomes devoted to
someone else's passions. But you know, I have no idea,
(34:06):
no idea what he thinks. He hasn't heard it, so
I don't know he hasn't heard version purposefully, He's like
I told him that it's and he was, you know,
he's excited to hear it, but I didn't want in
case he didn't like it or in case. Yeah, I
just wanted to save it until it was like definitely
out in the world, and I think it'd be changed. Yeah,
(34:28):
I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I
mean that has an extra level of obviously profundity to
me because of that question.
Speaker 1 (34:35):
Do you find I mean, I know you're not gonna
you're done with touring, you can do any.
Speaker 3 (34:40):
Shows, like I'm not done with touring forever. I'm done
with touring for you know, for are parents. Yeah, well
I've got young children.
Speaker 1 (34:47):
Yea. How do you think performing that live is going
to be? Are you planning? Yeah, you're planning on doing
that one live? Where you will that?
Speaker 3 (34:56):
Will I get through it? Yeah? Yeah, I don't know.
There's a lot lots of things from the staff. I'm
worried about not getting through really, but then you know,
actually something does strike you when you hit stage where
you don't it doesn't. I did a little show the
other day, very on somebody Else's It was a podcast actually,
but it was a live one, and I played a
(35:19):
couple of songs hadn't played for live for nearly two years,
and I was quite nervous. And then I got up
there and I was like, oh so good, I just
love it.
Speaker 1 (35:29):
Let's quickly talk about you becoming a TikToker.
Speaker 3 (35:32):
Yeah, sure, top topic.
Speaker 1 (35:35):
What made you choose TikTok.
Speaker 3 (35:36):
I mean, I find I've always found Instagram, it's all.
I'm only on any of it obviously for a means
to an end.
Speaker 1 (35:44):
I mean, yeah, and I don't it wouldn't it be
nice to get rid of it.
Speaker 3 (35:48):
It'd be lovely to get rid of it. But I
also find it boring when people say, oh, go back
to age report, idiot. I'd rather be just silently part
of it than trying to pretend like it's not necessary
for everything else. So that's why where I landed on that.
I find Instagram like mostly annoying. Like what I see
on there, I find it mostly annoying, irritating and MV inducing,
(36:10):
and I just think it's literally only there to produce
envy kind of thing. But I get it. Yeah, I
can do that too if we need to, if I
need to participate, I can produce some MV if I
need to generate some, and Twitter abviously have nothing to
do with But TikTok I was like, TikTok felt like
I started using TikTok when I was a new parent
(36:33):
because somebody had recommended it to Actually, I started using
it when I was pregnant because I was going down
a home birth route and somebody had recommended, like there's
a lot of good home birth community stuff on there,
and somebody recommended it as a really good source of
like very very different opinions, and you get kind of
every opinion and every from every walk of life about
(36:54):
various things. And I was like, well, that sounds like
hell on one level, but for this particular thing that
I was trying to deduce, it was really unbelievably useful,
like incredible, and it was all obviously generated. That those
things that I was interested were all generated by people
(37:15):
who had no agenda other than just sharing that information.
So I found that like very interesting. And then I
was also finishing my masters, then there was a lot
of like stuff about psychanalysis that was really interesting generated
kind of thought I would not not have had otherwise.
So I was like genuinely just like maybe I'm actually
(37:35):
pro TikTok, and then I'm not. Is a sure sciences story,
short story, but I did like what I prefer about
it is how it's like another dimension to information or
even comedy or like, you know, it's a new language
(37:57):
that you have to use of visual. I don't know.
Speaker 2 (38:01):
I just.
Speaker 3 (38:03):
I got a lot out of it at the beginning,
and it's taken a massive nose dive since then.
Speaker 1 (38:09):
Like my painting, like all great things, you know, yeah,
exactly burns bright, yeah, burns bright.
Speaker 3 (38:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (38:17):
But it's good that. I think it's good that you're
open to those things, because so many people, like you say,
would just reject TikTok as being low culture or just
not being you know, being like, oh, it's not I
can't be bothered with that.
Speaker 3 (38:35):
I find that so boring. Yeah, I find all strongly
held opinions really boring, and I hold my opinions really
likely and try never to be pinned down to a
single one. But strongly held opinions not my bag.
Speaker 1 (38:49):
I've always found it weird when people don't do this
so much anymore. But there was a phase in my
twenties I'd say when some of my friends or people
I would meet would be really proudly say that they
don't own a tea TV.
Speaker 3 (39:01):
Sull you're watching it on your laptop, don't try and
make out you're better than me. I know what you do.
Speaker 1 (39:05):
And also, why don't you want a TV?
Speaker 2 (39:08):
Brilliant?
Speaker 1 (39:09):
TV is brilliant, isn't it.
Speaker 2 (39:11):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (39:11):
I mean if I'm going to watch TV, I want
it on a proper TV. I don't want to watch
it on a laptop.
Speaker 2 (39:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (39:15):
I mean there's loads of great things on TV.
Speaker 3 (39:18):
But they are watching TV. Can we just yeah?
Speaker 2 (39:21):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (39:21):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, they're just watching. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (39:23):
Even if you're watching reels on Instagram, it's TV, still
watching TV. Just don't have a TV.
Speaker 1 (39:28):
Do you watch live TV?
Speaker 3 (39:31):
This is yes, I do sometimes.
Speaker 1 (39:32):
Yeah, okay, I was going to say that in the morning. Yeah,
I watch live TV all the time. I think it's
maybe my age or are lots of people I know
my age don't. But I will watch things on streaming.
But I like just seeing whatsong. I don't like too
much choice.
Speaker 3 (39:50):
Yeah, it was a simple a time.
Speaker 1 (39:52):
Yeah, here we are. I just like to know. Okay,
these are the things to choose from. I'll just choose
one of those. Yeah. I think there's something in that.
You don't look convinced by that.
Speaker 3 (40:04):
I'm not convinced by that, but I guess I I
live a different version of that because I find the
adverts so depressing. I try to avoid it if I
can stick to the beab if I if I need to,
I only watch five TV shows which I own the
entire box set of in digital form.
Speaker 2 (40:23):
Okay, you know I don't.
Speaker 1 (40:24):
What are those?
Speaker 3 (40:27):
Start to finish the Sopranos.
Speaker 1 (40:29):
I've just finished the Sopranos. I think that's why I
mentioned it earlier in my mind.
Speaker 3 (40:33):
Yes, yeah, well phrase and sopranos obviously have psycho analysis.
Speaker 2 (40:38):
Of course, of course that might be why.
Speaker 1 (40:42):
So you've got those two? What are your other ones?
Speaker 3 (40:45):
Uh? Cab your enthusiasm?
Speaker 1 (40:48):
Okay?
Speaker 3 (40:49):
Deep? And then what's what else is there? The old
Alan Partridges own all those obviously the special TV specials
just genius and that's it.
Speaker 1 (41:05):
Really.
Speaker 3 (41:05):
Yeah, it's pretty much all I watched.
Speaker 1 (41:07):
Okay, I think I think I'm done. But before I go,
what should I read next? Who should who should I
be reading? Who's my next? Joan Didion?
Speaker 3 (41:16):
Let's have a look here at what's on myself today? Well,
I'm just reading. I don't know.
Speaker 1 (41:27):
There's a lot of taro over there.
Speaker 3 (41:29):
There's a lot of taro. I was doing a lot
of taro research for my substack.
Speaker 1 (41:34):
That's I was going to say, we've not spoken about
the substack, but I've noticed the taro on the substack.
Speaker 2 (41:39):
Yes, it's taro.
Speaker 1 (41:40):
A new thing you.
Speaker 3 (41:41):
Tara has been a long standing thing. Pick picked it
up in la as as people do, and took it
very seriously for a number of years, and now I
take it with a huge pinch of salt. I'm just
using taro as a jumping off point for topics. Yes,
substacts really handy. As we discuss about face the blank page,
you don't want to face the black page straight on.
(42:04):
But book wise, at the moment, I'm reading round A
July's new book, All Fours, and it is I'm howling
with laughter in the night reading it.
Speaker 1 (42:11):
All Fours, All Fours.
Speaker 3 (42:13):
It's so funny.
Speaker 1 (42:14):
What's it about.
Speaker 3 (42:16):
I'm only halfway through, but it's it's basically, I mean,
the the top line is that this woman who's been
who's married and has got a kid, who takes a
road trip by herself to figure some stuff out. But
the brilliant bit is is that it sort of discusses
the ways in which people in a marriage can internally
(42:39):
drift apart while remaining together and the ways in which
women drift away from a woman's perspective. It's amazed she's
isolated some extraordinary truth. It's written like as was her
last book, written like a It's like you're watching a
film reading it. The pace of it is so brilliant.
(43:02):
She's brilliant at pace.
Speaker 2 (43:03):
What's the author name again, Miranda July, Miranda.
Speaker 1 (43:06):
July all fours. Okay, I'm going to get I'm going
to tear it up. Ingratuations on the new record lovely,
thanks so much. I'll see you in seven years years.
Speaker 3 (43:18):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (43:22):
I loved hearing from Laura and Marlin there, Stu. I
can't believe it only met her once before, because that
chat just sounded so warm and like maybe that's just
how hospitable and personable Laura Marlin is. And you got
to go to her house and it was like so
it all sounded very just really really intimate. It was brilliant.
(43:42):
And I also like that one minute in this is
this is I think this is a sign of how
well you two got on. One minute into the conversation,
you're already talking about death. Wow, stud you're going there man.
Speaker 1 (43:57):
Straight with a death chat. Yeah. I suppose that could
have gone either way, couldn't it? And if it had
gone badly, you would never have heard it. That's the
vacular podcast, isn't it. So I mean, just to comment
on that, thank you for those kind words, but also
the answer is it is Laura. Laura is like you know,
it's all her. She is very personable, very easy to
(44:19):
talk to. That's what I found last time I spoke
to her. But you know, yeah, it's been seven years
in between, you know, Like a couple of weeks ago
on our one hundred and fiftieth episodes, somebody asked us
the question does going to an artist's house make it
more relaxed? And I was a big advocate, saying, yeah,
I love it. I love going to the house. And
partly that is to be nosey, but it is part
(44:41):
of making it. Them they feel relaxed, you feel more. Therefore,
I feel more relaxed, And I think this was a
good example of that. She's a good talker and she's
very funny.
Speaker 2 (44:50):
This is really funny. It reminded me that when you
and I first started writing about music, like it was
this is quite a while ago now, right, Laura Mark
was like just emerging as a new artist, and this
is around the time of like Munthdon Sons. She's part
of that scene, considered part of that scene, wasn't she
the sort of like new folk explosion. And the thing
(45:14):
that you would often hear about Laura and Marlin away
from her music was that she was very timid and
she didn't particularly like speaking or doing interviews or she
preferred to focus on the music. And she's now such
a lucid speaker. And also it made sense when she
when you both got into talking about psychoanalysis, which I
thought was fascinating, it made sense that maybe that was
(45:34):
something that she's done that's just completely changed that part
of well she.
Speaker 1 (45:39):
Said that, yeah, yeah, there's a bit where she said
the reason she went she had trouble speaking, like fucking
over her words, didn't really like to talk. And it's
a great advert for it because she I remember she
won that. So Laura's still only thirty four, which makes
me feel a bit sick, but it's because she's because
she started when she was so young.
Speaker 2 (45:59):
She was like, yeah.
Speaker 1 (46:01):
She's been nominated for five Britain Awards so far, all
for Best British Solo Female Artist. She won one of them.
She won the first nomination in twenty eleven, so she
would only have been twenty one then. And I remember
watching that live and seeing her pick up her order
and being being like thrilled that it was that type
of artist winning an award. But I do remember how
(46:22):
weirded out she was, and I remember her speech and
her getting wherever it was El's call back then or
wherever this huge arena, and her just wanting to get
off that stage as quickly as possible.
Speaker 2 (46:33):
I love the fact that you went to the room,
you went to her home, and you went to the
room where this album was recorded. So this podcast was
recorded in the same room that that album was recorded in, which.
Speaker 1 (46:41):
Is yes, and I would say they are both as
beautiful as each other. The record and this podcast, Oh absolutely,
man iridescent. Now, before we go, I think we've got
time quickly for a beat. The algorithm yes, and you
(47:03):
can go first. What do you think? What would you
tip people to listen to this week?
Speaker 2 (47:09):
I want to recommend a song called four Am by
Big Pig.
Speaker 1 (47:13):
Big Pig.
Speaker 2 (47:41):
Previous guests on the podcast Big Pig Jess Smith a
Big Pig aka j Smith or other way around Jess
Smith aka Big Pig came on the podcast episode ninety
nine and Midnight Chats if you want to scroll back
and give that a listen. She was an amazing guest.
By the way, Big Pig. I'm a huge fan of
Big Pig, the Irish artist, and she's just released this
a new single, four Am. It's the first song that's
(48:02):
going to be coming from her debut album because she's
released like bodies of work projects before and I love
this song. I love Big Pig. I think she's got
this incredible knack for writing seemingly very simple melodies. But
if it was simple, everybody would be doing it. I
feel like Big Pig is like one Internet moment away
from being the next Charlie Xx. That's what I hope.
(48:24):
That's what I hope. I would love for Jess Smith
to be have an even bigger platform than she does
right now. But Stu, what are you listening to at
the moment?
Speaker 1 (48:33):
It's animal themed you've got for Big Pig, I'm going
for Dog Unit, Oh, different type of animal. Dog Units
are a band from London and they're an instrumental band,
normally playing a post rock fully plugged in sound. They
had a debut album out earlier this year called at
(48:55):
Home on a label called Brace Yourself, and Brace Yourself
have now released an EP that is all acoustic version
of a few of the songs from that album called
at Home Still. So that track is brilliantly titled when
(49:45):
Do We Start Fighting? And but like this podcast, I
like it. I like the acoustic vibe. There's lots of
strings on this. They've obviously put a lot of They've
got a lot of extra bodies in the room to
record everything acoustically. The final track is its lovely string track,
Dog Unit at Home Still. We will put those two,
(50:07):
along with everything else that has ever been mentioned on
Beat the Algorithm, onto our playlist that's on Spotify. There'd
be a link in the show notes. You can also
find it just search Beat the Algorithm on Spotify. That's
where we're adding the songs every week.
Speaker 2 (50:22):
Yeah, so we've got Dog Unit and Big listen to
you tonight. It's been a lot of fun. Laura and
Marlin absolute ten out of ten guests loved hearing from her.
You were very good too. Your must Slash was excellent,
and we look forward to being with all of you
listeners this time next week. Thanks for tuning in. This
(50:43):
has been Midnight Chats. Midnight Chats is a joint production
between Loud and Quiet and Atomized Studios for iHeartRadio. It's
hosted by Stuart Stubbs and Greg Cochran, mixed and mastered
by Flow Lines, and editor by Stuart Stubbs. Find us
on Instagram and TikTok to watch clips from our recordings
(51:05):
and much much more. We are Midnight Chats Pod.
Speaker 1 (51:07):
For more information, visit loudan Quiet dot com
Good evening, I'm Greg Cochrane, Good evening, I'm Stuart Stubbs.
We are a couple of journalists who've been working in
independent music since the days of MySpace.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
One night a week, we become your guides through the
week in music, because, let's face it, the algorithms have
stop working for most of us.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
So we're here to share the best new underground music
and the news that you might have missed, as well
as discussing the week's biggest headlines and bringing you interviews
with some of our favorite alternative artists.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
The show is called Midnight Chats. Good evening, Stuart, good
to see you. Your mustache is looking particularly strong tonight,
as if you've just put in some product in it
or eaten a very saucy sausage. There is a little
bit of oil in it today, is there? Your lip
is glistening?
Speaker 1 (00:49):
It's yeah. I think I've put too much in. It's
only day two of putting something in it to stop
it right.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
It feels soft.
Speaker 1 (00:55):
It's turned into more more work than I wanted it
to be. I think you should grow one of those
beards that's not got the mustache. You should grow the
inversion of what I've got right, you know, like a
chin strap beard.
Speaker 3 (01:09):
I do know.
Speaker 2 (01:10):
If I did that, there's two reasons why that won't happen. One,
I can't really grow a beard, and two I think
I would look like a wrestler from the eighties.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
That's why I want you to do it.
Speaker 2 (01:20):
Oh, okay, fair enough, how are you doing.
Speaker 1 (01:23):
I'm good, Yes, I'm very good. I'm excited about tonight's guest.
We have Laura Marling on the show. But I know
for a fact that you've just been watching something that
I have recently watched as well, which is this madness
of Coldplay on the QVC channel.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
Yeah. So for people who haven't seen this, Coldplay have
got your album out, make that what you will. It's
called Moon Music. Last week they basically did loads of
press for this, so they you know, this is Coldplay,
the world's biggest band. They can just like pick and
choose the media that they do when they released and
want to promote new music, and they did. They did
all the big ticket stuff, you know, they did tonight
(02:00):
with Jimmy Founon, etc. But they also showed up very
randomly on the QVC, the shopping channel. They're in America,
and if you haven't seen this, they're there with the
presenter Jen who on link is quite iconic in the
shopping world. And they basically hung out on QVC for
half an hour trying to flog copies of their new
album and they're playing some songs. They had a Coldplay
(02:23):
toaster and a tea set that they were talking about.
It was a bit of chat. They took calls from listeners.
Should we have a little listen to this right now?
Speaker 3 (02:29):
At QVC. We have an exclusive offer that you can
only find.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
Here Moon Music in its own collector's edition packaging.
Speaker 3 (02:37):
It's called the Notebook Edition.
Speaker 2 (02:38):
Your choice of the LP or the CD. Hello Barbara,
Oh my gosh, I can't believe it.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
Hello, we can't believe it either. The phones.
Speaker 2 (02:49):
You love your band, that's one.
Speaker 3 (02:51):
I am totally blind. And the musician so music means
so much to me.
Speaker 2 (02:57):
That's amazing. And I've been to many many of your
answered And what I love about you, Chris, is you
seeing completely on tea most of the time for a
band to do that, but you do it.
Speaker 3 (03:11):
These are the Moon goggles.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
Now hopefully you'll be able to see on your screen
a simulation of what I'm seeing everything's colors and rainbows
and in my case it's hearts.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
To I just watching this on YouTube. It's very silly,
but very I just love it. It's completely like just
to see them show up in that place, very unlikely.
And I guess when you've been doing this thing for
as long as Coldplay, get an opportunity to do something
a bit different and not just do the same rounds
(03:43):
every time, it must have been.
Speaker 1 (03:44):
Quite a lie. They shifted some units, obviously. There's a
great line in it though, where the presenter she says,
now you can't get this anywhere else other then here
on QVC and the band's website.
Speaker 2 (03:58):
What I liked is they did they were like this,
five thousand copies, we're down to three thousand copies, et cetera,
et cetera. And at the end they was like, and
the we still got some copies of the CD if
anybody's he just couldn't flog all the coffees in the
time they were there. Brilliant.
Speaker 1 (04:13):
Did you think this was a marketing move as genius
as James Blunt's current bid to get to number one?
Do you know what this is?
Speaker 2 (04:25):
I also I also like this I've heard about this.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
This is James Blunt has said he's re releasing his
debut album, Back to Bedlam this Friday. Everyone watch out.
It's the one with your Beautiful on it. It's the
one we've all been waiting for. And he has said
if it gets to number one, he will let fans
or just the general public choose a new name for
(04:50):
him and change his new name to whatever anybody.
Speaker 2 (04:52):
Wants that he will change his name.
Speaker 1 (04:54):
That's what he said. He said this on the Chris
Moyles Breakfast Show on Radio X and his direct quote
from it was, this is not just an act of desperation.
It's a genuine thing. I swear on my life and
the life of my one fan, Brian from Glasgow, I
will change my name should it hit number one. James
Blunt is great at this stuff, and he's very very
(05:16):
good at like his social media is hilarious. He's not
I think he's probably safe. I looked at the big
releases coming this week and it's basically him versus Charlie
XCX for the Remix record, which I imagine is going
to be the number one. I don't think there's much
else in the running though, and Blunt could get it.
(05:36):
I will be buying Blunt's record again because I want
to see that happen, and you know it might have
special stuff.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
Yeah. This has got botimk boat face written all over it,
isn't it? And I want I want James Blunt to
change his name to Brian from Glasgow's. That's what I
think it should be.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
Right, let's get into this interview that I did with
Laura Marling maybe two or three weeks ago. Now, Laura's
been on the show before, seven years ago, when we
were right at the beginning of making midnight chats and
to this day. And I'm not just saying this because
she's back again now. One of my favorite interviews. I
(06:14):
don't know what. I think. It's her like, I just
really like her. It never could be you.
Speaker 2 (06:18):
I'm particularly good.
Speaker 1 (06:20):
You know what I mean is I don't know why.
It's not even as if it was an out of
the ordinary interview. I think it was just she made
it so good, you know, expecting a very maybe tough
interview back then of somebody who's very shy and quiet,
but she wasn't. So you can scroll all the way
back through the feed if you like this one and
want to hear what we spoke about back then, because
(06:42):
Laura was in a very different stage of her life.
She is about to release her her eighth album, Patterns
in Repeat, comes out in a few weeks October twenty fifth,
and it's a record that she has made since the
birth of her daughter. Let's not give too much weight
about everything. Come back at the end of this. Laura
Mining on episode one hundred and fifty two of Midnight Chats.
(07:14):
The last time we met was it was seven years ago.
Here are some things. Here are some things that I
picked up yesterday when listening back to that episode. It
was episode nineteen of the podcast. It was February twenty seventeen,
and you were making cheese.
Speaker 3 (07:29):
Yes, it does ring a bell. She do still making cheese,
not making cheese anymore?
Speaker 1 (07:34):
It is it a short lived I probably was.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
Quite a lot of my interests are short lived. I
was really into making Halloomy.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
Well.
Speaker 1 (07:43):
One thing I do need to thank you for from
that meeting was at the end of that at the
end of that podcast, I just got into reading I
hadn't I know right? And you put me on too,
Joan Didion. You suggested Joe at that point. Amazing.
Speaker 3 (08:00):
Great, she's pretty unheard of.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
Yeah, so thank you for that, because she's like one
of my favorite writers.
Speaker 3 (08:07):
Now, fantastic.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
I'm guessing you've read everything she's done.
Speaker 3 (08:11):
No, not by a long way, but some have you.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
Read a year of magical thinking? Yes, how are you
at death?
Speaker 3 (08:20):
Listen? I try not think about it, especially since I've
had a baby, gets way more intensive.
Speaker 2 (08:27):
Do you have a baby?
Speaker 3 (08:30):
But before then I was kind of well, actually no,
in tandem, in the last year, I've become like absolutely
fascinated with near death experiences as a sort of crutch
to cling onto for like a hopefulness about death.
Speaker 2 (08:46):
Right, Okay, so I like.
Speaker 3 (08:50):
Prepare it. Like it's also like I've been reading about
the menopause since I was like eighteen, because I just
I want to be absolutely prepared for ready for it
to be ready.
Speaker 1 (08:59):
So the in terms of like the near death experience,
what are you reading about people like accounts of people
who have had near death experiences?
Speaker 3 (09:07):
Yeah, I say reading, I'm like watching it on whatever. Yeah,
I read it in a book. I mean you twoe comment. Yeah,
like people who.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
They talk about they what they experienced.
Speaker 3 (09:20):
Yeah, and there is a universal experience that emerges from
like thousands and thousands of accounts of it, which is
that you get a sense of an immediate sense of
I'm not me, I'm not my brain or my body
as your as sort of I guess the death is happening.
And then you get a sense of, oh, that's my
body over there, and I'm above it or around it
(09:41):
or whatever. And then you have a sense of like
complete connectedness with everything, and.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
Well that sounds pretty good.
Speaker 3 (09:48):
Yeah, it sounds really good. And then you get a
kind of a walk through of your life and and
you see how how you have been in the world
has affected the world, and how the world is a
did you. So quite often people come back who have
near death experiences, and like, I'm going to try really
really carefully not to cause anyone any emotional harmble distress,
(10:10):
because I've seen the impact that I can have on
people's lives. I find that really lovely.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
That that is comforting. So how did you find A
Year of Magical Thinking? Which is a book? Because this
is the reason why I'm putting off reading that one,
I think because it's so squarely about yeah, grief and death,
which is something I tend.
Speaker 2 (10:30):
To run Away from Yes, yeah, did.
Speaker 1 (10:32):
You find it like a Was it a tough read?
Speaker 3 (10:37):
It was a long time ago. I think it's a
very beautifully meditative, thoughtful take on hitting the absolute like
maximum distress. So in that way, maybe like near death experiences,
it's probably quite a good thing to read. My favorite
stuff of hers was more than like political commentary. Okay,
(11:00):
I loved her take on hippies. I can't remember, but
it must be in the White Album.
Speaker 1 (11:04):
Yeah, I've read the White Album and I've read Slouch.
The first one I read was Slouch.
Speaker 3 (11:09):
Yeah. I loved Yeah. Yeah, maybe it's that one. We're
not talking about the kids, the hippies giving acid to kids.
I loved that. I mean, I love that as practice.
I just loved her take on it.
Speaker 1 (11:20):
I think the reason you mentioned her was because I
think we got to that via talking about your hobby
at the time of being obsessed with nineteen sixty nine.
Speaker 2 (11:33):
Yes, yeah, is that still a hobby that's gone?
Speaker 3 (11:36):
That's gone?
Speaker 1 (11:36):
Yeah, that was something that you were just you were
fascinated by that year and you.
Speaker 3 (11:39):
Collected yeah, record I collected records. I recently got read
of all my records.
Speaker 1 (11:43):
So did you Yeah, all of your records from that year,
all of your records for my.
Speaker 3 (11:47):
Records will stop? How come because I lost faith in
it as a concept, which I know is going to
be not helpful. Things stay because I bowing my records,
said CDs.
Speaker 1 (12:01):
You started buying CDs.
Speaker 3 (12:02):
Well, I started buying secondhand CDs. Yeah, and a really
good CD Wi Fi system. I just that's just my
preferred choice because I like listening to a whole album. Also,
I want my child to be able to do it,
you know, put the CD on and it was taking
up a lot of space which recently didn't have spare
(12:23):
And they are in the sort of I still own them,
they're just not here right. So I haven't given up
on it entirely. But yeah, and also I guess I
kind of felt like I'd reached my I'd achieved what
I wanted to achieve was just collecting records from ninety
sixty nine, and then I got bored with it.
Speaker 1 (12:43):
Yeah, yeah, okay, fair enough.
Speaker 3 (12:45):
I think it also just letting go of the stranglehold
that the idea of vinyl represents. You know that you're
hip and cool and interested things. I'm hip and cool
and interesting things. I just don't want vinyl taking up.
I don't want the stranglehold of vinyl in my life.
Speaker 1 (12:59):
That's so expensive A record now is thirty quid, which,
if not more forty quid for heavy vinyls.
Speaker 3 (13:08):
Yeah, I don't want to put people off buying viol
but you know, it is crazy how that's overlooked, the
cost and it becomes a kind of fetishized object, like
and I get it. I'm a music fan as well, obviously,
like in my in my soul, but yeah, there's a
lot of stuff that I don't agree with with vinyl
(13:29):
and what it symbolically means, you know, to have a
vinyl because that's not how people are listening to music.
It's simply not the case most of the time.
Speaker 1 (13:42):
So in the seven years since we last spoke, a
lot's happened for you since then, And here are a
few of the main ones that I've noted down. You
studied a Masters in psychoanalysis, I did, Yeah, released two
solo albums, with a third next month called Patterns in Repeat,
(14:03):
two more albums as Lump with Mike Lindsay love Lump Records.
I big fan. You've become a master of TikTok you've
decided to stop touring. Yes, and the biggest of all,
most life changing, you've started a substack.
Speaker 3 (14:19):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (14:20):
Oh YEA had a baby as well. Yeah, you've had
a baby.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (14:22):
We won't talk about all of those things because don't
think we're gonna have time. But there's a few things
that I definitely want to pick out. Obviously a huge
one as you've becoming a mother last year early last year,
and that's obviously a huge, huge influence on the new record.
But so is the psychoanalysis masters right. First of all,
(14:43):
what made you decide to study psychoanalysis.
Speaker 3 (14:46):
I had been in psychanalysis. I was a patient of
psychoanalysis for a few years in my twenties, and I
found it sort of profoundly beneficial, though prohibitively expensive.
Speaker 1 (14:59):
PSYCHOANALYSI this is the practice whey you're mainly talking to somebody.
Speaker 3 (15:04):
Yeah, you're just rambling on and on on on.
Speaker 1 (15:06):
And that mainly staying the therapist is mainly just letting
you get it, get it out right.
Speaker 3 (15:12):
Yeah. So it was interesting for me because up until
I went there, I felt very how do I say,
like stilted in my ability to speak. I was very
stumbling and preferred not to if I could, And so
like the having to go, and I went a couple
of times a week and talk for an hour without
(15:34):
anyone interrupting me. Otherwise you just sit in awkward silence.
And it was so unbearable that I had to fill it, right,
So I was forced to fill it. And like, the
amazing thing about psychanalysis is that what it makes what
the analyst is very good at, is that they are
finally attuned to what you're not saying. So they're looking
for all the space in between what you're saying and
pointing out conflicts in what your account of who you
(15:58):
are and how your life is. Yeah, And so it's
it's you know, it's brilliant in that way, and that's
why I was interested in it. But I don't think
it has the sort of ability to proceed as a
practice because it's so expensive. So I was interested in
how are the forms and to learn a bit more
(16:18):
about it so that I can understand where it can
be applied without that traditional practice of it.
Speaker 1 (16:23):
Yeah, as it's portrayed in the Sopranos.
Speaker 2 (16:26):
Yeah, was it is that close?
Speaker 1 (16:29):
Is that close?
Speaker 3 (16:29):
Yeah? Yeah? Or the sexual tension, yeah, the way Yeah,
I went to Freud and analys. I was like lying
on my back, you know, on a sofa, Okay, not
looking at them in.
Speaker 2 (16:42):
The face in a sense I would love to do that.
Speaker 1 (16:44):
Yeah, But did you ever find it frustrated that they
weren't because they won't tell you what to do? Were
they Like, that's not the point of it. And there's
part of me that will be crying up for like,
just tell me the answer that I can then go
and implement in my life.
Speaker 3 (17:02):
That's the problem. That's the problem with quick fixed therapy,
isn't it Like, yeah, doesn't give you the tools, doesn't
give you the fishing rod. Yeah, it's really frustrating. Also,
I had this thing where I kept turning up the
wrong time and I was like it was insane. I
kept knocking on their door at the wrong time while
they're in another session, and it was like this powerful
compulsion to embarrass myself in front of them. Do you know,
(17:24):
like these amazing things you start noticing like oh my god,
I'm doing this on purpose on some level, degrading myself,
and like it was amazing.
Speaker 2 (17:32):
It was it was, Yeah, did you talk about that
with them? Yeah?
Speaker 3 (17:35):
Then it all becomes a part of the therapy, part
of the process.
Speaker 1 (17:39):
That they're like, this is great, this is just another
thing we can we can add to the list and
get through. Have you found since doing your masters do
you find yourself psychoanalyzing everyone?
Speaker 3 (17:56):
They tell you that no, I did. At the beginning,
they they actually there's like a part of the course
which which is to discourage you from doing wild what
they call wild analysis, basically.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
Because obviously analysis.
Speaker 3 (18:08):
Wild analysis, and there's a great book called wild analysis
about that. But you know a little knowledge, as they say,
it's a dangerous thing.
Speaker 1 (18:19):
Yeah, yeah, because you could just go around judging everyone
you meet. I've just read the psychopath Test.
Speaker 3 (18:25):
Read, I listened. I would never pass up to listen
to read.
Speaker 1 (18:30):
Exactly what was it? Just called wild testing? Wild wild analysis,
wild I'm wild analysis everywhere right now for psychopaths, for
psychopaths and even watching you know, there's that concept at
the heart of that book, which is essentially psychopaths have.
Speaker 3 (18:46):
A biological reason.
Speaker 1 (18:48):
Yeah, you can't even you almost can't be mad at
them because it's just their makeup. Yeah, to have no
empathy and be a psychopath. And the statistic in it
one in a hundred has psychopathic de tendencies. I was
watching Zodiac the other night, classic film, not a new film,
(19:10):
but any stretch of imagination, but great, and I'm sort
of thinking, oh, it's not his fault, right, you.
Speaker 3 (19:18):
Know that, Like it's completely you have too much profound,
I've got too much.
Speaker 1 (19:23):
I'm certainly not not a psychopathe. But so I imagine
if I had studied something like that, Oh I'd be awful.
I'd be judging everyone. It would not be good for me. Yes,
But I think like the fact that you did that,
do you think something people would be surprised to hear
(19:45):
that successful musician is doing that in between their records.
It's studying, you know.
Speaker 3 (19:50):
It's a vanity, isn't it? To go to go and
do a postgraduate degree in something that isn't vocational is vanity?
I think, you know, like I'm very very proud of
that vanity Paraday achieved it. But you know quite most
of the people who were on that course were going
on it because they needed it as part of their
sort of vocational training, and I was just doing it
(20:11):
on a jolly. But I think I had a bit
of a chip on my shoulder about having left school
at sixteen and not having any qualifications, and I think
had I not done, I would have carried that chip
on my shoulder for a long time.
Speaker 1 (20:26):
You've done some other things between records as well, haven't you.
Speaker 3 (20:28):
Yeah, trained is the yoga instructor I did you? Yeah?
Maybe shortly after I spoke to you last time.
Speaker 1 (20:35):
There's one that somebody else that came on the podcast
mentioned to us. The person was Lucy Rose, right. Were
you working in a restaurant?
Speaker 2 (20:46):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (20:46):
Yeah, yeah. I served her yeah.
Speaker 1 (20:48):
And she jumped into you like what are you doing
and You're like, oh, I'm working yeah.
Speaker 3 (20:53):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (20:53):
But it was well, it was well into your career.
It wasn't like.
Speaker 3 (20:56):
It was while I was making Once. It was an Eagle, right,
and I was working at a restaurant in King's Cross,
and it happened to be I was again a van
you know, I like begged the chef. I got to
know the chef, and I was like, please, it's going
to come and work. I'd love to know how it works.
And so I was working there a couple of days
a week, and one evening it was the it happened
(21:17):
to be the after show or the catering restaurant for
Dame and all Barn's Africa Express.
Speaker 2 (21:24):
Okay, yeah, I think that's what it was called.
Speaker 3 (21:26):
It was sort of festival that was happening outside in
and so John Paul Jones and Damon Albarn both ordered
the Lamb one evening, which I was on the grill
doing and they both sent it back twice and then
didn't order it again as then like they just changed
their order. So that was sad.
Speaker 1 (21:42):
But yeah, you so you were.
Speaker 3 (21:47):
They didn't see me. I was at the grill, They
didn't know it was making. It wasn't a personal vendetin yeh.
Speaker 1 (21:53):
But did you think was that part of you? You're
you're working in the kitchen out of out of interest
of working there and debt. But when you go into
work that day and I say, well tonight is actually
a big music industry party going on. Are you thinking, oh,
for sake.
Speaker 3 (22:10):
I don't know in the music industry anyway, You're just like, yeah,
But funny enough, we were we were making as I
say once, I was an eagle, and Ethan John's my producer,
had been like, I think we need flugel horn, which
is a very rare thing for anybody to say, and
he was like, I only know one person who can
arrange flugelhorn, and it's John Paul Jones. And I was like,
(22:30):
if it's John Paul Jones, I'll take some flugelhorn. Fine.
So we were about to contact John Paul Jones anyway
because we needed him to arrange flugelhorn.
Speaker 1 (22:39):
For the album, and then you served him this terrible,
terrible lamb.
Speaker 3 (22:43):
Yeah, and I think maybe he just never returned. I
don't know what happened.
Speaker 1 (22:46):
He died after that after eating that? What was it
too pink? Too well done?
Speaker 3 (22:51):
I don't know. I can't remember. Maybe it was too
I imagine it.
Speaker 1 (22:53):
Was so sorry. There was there was the kitchen, there's
yoga teacher, anything else. I mean these this is already
more than I would imagine most professional musicians are doing
on the side of being musicians, no doing, it's much more.
And it just comes from like a natural inquisitive nature
that you've got.
Speaker 3 (23:14):
Yeah, I wonder sometimes, you know, my in my more
worried moments, I wonder whether it's like a condition or
something that I literally cannot sit still. But yeah, I'm
interested in lots of things.
Speaker 1 (23:28):
I guess I think that's a rare thing, especially for
people who work in creative industries. Maybe I'm just projecting
because I feel like this is me at the moment,
and I'm going through something right.
Speaker 3 (23:41):
Now about that.
Speaker 1 (23:44):
Whereas you know, music is sort of my identity. It's
my huge interest. It has been since I was a kid.
And there are other things that I like, Yeah, but
there's nothing that on that level, right And I think
when you're or when you're consumed by an interest in
the way that I have been, but also most musicians are,
(24:05):
I would say, then there's not really space for like
those other things to get in there.
Speaker 3 (24:12):
Well, you and I were talking before the microphones went
on about you taking up painting, so there is well
what happened because this happened to your lockdown, But what
happened in lockdown as people stopped feeling the outside pressure
of the world and all of these things rose up
that they were interested, like everybody making banana bread and
sour dough and stuff. But it's interesting, it's in everyone.
(24:36):
And I obviously have and have had for a long time,
the luxury of not having to structure my working day
in any particular way. So I have a lot of
luxury associated with that to follow interests, but it's what
people experience in lockdown.
Speaker 1 (24:51):
Do you ever worry about that luxury.
Speaker 3 (24:54):
Going and what having to get a real job?
Speaker 1 (24:58):
Yeah, but at least if that were to happen, it
feels like you're equipped to like want to do other
things because working in the kitchen it's hard work. I
mean it's hard. It's not like you've chosen some some
sort of very bougie, relaxed thing to like do on
(25:19):
a whim, like that's like a real job.
Speaker 3 (25:22):
Yeah. I mean I wasn't working as hard as like
people who are actually chefs. I want that to be
absolutely Okay. All of my dalliances are vanity dallass. Okay,
my partner is a chef and has you know, he
works like a dog. It's crazy. So people who actually
(25:42):
work these jobs actually work really really hard. But so
it might, you know, I take a sort of I
like to I'm not shy of hard work, I guess,
but I also just I like taking little flavors of everything,
and I find that expresses itself very much in what
books I like to read, like and what media I
(26:03):
like to take in. It's like there is no algorithm
that can contain me. Okay, they're not onto me because
my interests are so bizarre and what not bizarre is
an interesting me kind of way. But like I can
jump from one topic to another topic, I forget the
other topic. Just be like that topics over to me.
Now I'm on this topic. Now, that's what That's what
(26:23):
my brain is like.
Speaker 1 (26:28):
As we say, last year, you gave birth at the
beginning of the year.
Speaker 2 (26:34):
On my birthday.
Speaker 1 (26:35):
That's a good birthday, although it means you can never
celebrate your own birthday, doesn't it's great.
Speaker 3 (26:44):
They kind of get worse off to.
Speaker 1 (26:47):
Ye fair enough, I've read that like shortly after that
time or you know, as soon as soon as you
had your daughter, you were really high, like sort of
a manic high. How long did that last?
Speaker 2 (27:00):
For?
Speaker 3 (27:03):
Crucially not a manne high, but I was high on hormones.
I think it lasted for I mean, it's only just
ended as far as it hasn't ended, but that that
level of high where I was, like, I'm judging it
by the kind of voice notes that I left friends
whatever they call, yeah, voice notes, voice messages. I think
(27:24):
that probably went off three months where it's like just buzzing,
just buzzing, just prof prophesizing about this, that and the
other whatever came into my mind, and it was amazing.
Speaker 1 (27:35):
Was it received well?
Speaker 3 (27:37):
People aoud it funny?
Speaker 2 (27:37):
I think, yeahah, yeah, yeah, okay, good.
Speaker 1 (27:40):
It didn't get to.
Speaker 3 (27:41):
Get in the way tired quickly imagine it probably did
gets hired, But it was a wonderful way to be
out in the world.
Speaker 1 (27:48):
You wrote one song that's on the new record within
in that period, right, which is the opening track on
the album, and then you decided, Okay, I'm not going
to write anymore and I'm just going to like relax
into being a mum. Yeah, and then I'll write again.
Speaker 3 (28:06):
I think I was just thought I was so surprised
that I was writing because I hadn't anticipated being in
that headspace because I couldn't for instance, I couldn't read
a book or have a notebook, which and they were
the two things that because I was like constantly occupied
with my hands or whatever, even when they were sleeping,
and I thought those were the two vital parts of
(28:31):
my songwriting. Like I read read a book, I underline
a bunch of phrases in it, write down some notes,
and end up thinking about lyrics and then I write
a song that's how I thought it had been done
my whole life, And it turns out that I didn't
need any of those things. So it was a real surprise.
And then, yeah, I just wasn't Sometimes when I'm writing
(28:52):
an album, I think I'm in writing mode. Make sure
I play the guitar every day, you know, I make
sure I'm ready and open to the muse or whatever.
And I didn't think that this time, because I was like,
I don't have I just didn't literally didn't have the
mental capacities thing like that, and and lo and behold,
things just sort of slipped through the net into the
(29:13):
into the beings and and I carried on writing. So
it was Yeah, it was great.
Speaker 1 (29:19):
It's such a beautiful record. It's I love how sparse
it is, no drums, and the fact that you went
for like the original recordings on it, right you didn't?
Was it recorded here?
Speaker 3 (29:34):
Yeah? It was recorded there?
Speaker 1 (29:35):
Yeah, in this room, in this room.
Speaker 3 (29:37):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (29:38):
Yeah, I mean it suits you. I think, like, like
you know your because your voice is your voice, and
I think to an extent, you wouldn't really notice that
it's these sort of skeletal sketches that you've done, Like,
I think it still sounds like one of your records,
you know. I don't think anyone's going to miss a
high fi quality recording in a studio, Yeah, you know
(30:02):
what I mean.
Speaker 3 (30:02):
And that was a big That was a concern because
also because I worked with Don Monks, who has engineered
a lot of my albums, who's a like extraordinary technical wizard.
So too for him to be okay with putting you know,
putting together something that's based on not hi fi, you know,
(30:25):
deeply low fi the way I recorded it at the
base of it. It was hard work for him, but
he did an extraordinary job.
Speaker 1 (30:33):
And your daughter was in the room with you at
so how old would she have been when these recordings are?
Speaker 3 (30:39):
She was I started recording where did those demos? When
she was six months? So with the demos that then
became that actually the actual sort of tracks on the album.
So I had I brought up because I have a
studio in the basement where I did a lot song
for our daughter. But I didn't want to be in
the basement psychologically for some reason, I didn't want her
to be in the basement. So I bought my stuff
(31:01):
up here, sacrificing massively on sound because my basement is
sound treated, and she was next to me on the floor,
you know, on a wriggle matal whatever, or asleep, and
so a lot of it was done very very quietly,
sort of the game cranked up as far as it
(31:22):
could go so that I could get it over the
line kind of thing, and it gave it a kind
of quality that was hard to replace in the studio,
so we just kept everything.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
There's a song on there that your dad wrote, yes,
called Looking Back. When was the first time you found
that song? Because he wrote that song when he was
in his twenties.
Speaker 3 (31:39):
Yeah, yeah, when he was younger than me.
Speaker 1 (31:41):
So when did you come across this? Was it a
recording of it or did you have the lyrics of
it or the court or what did you have? How
much of it did you have?
Speaker 3 (31:50):
He he used to play it all the time, like
it was his sort of thing that I have, as
I always play the same thing when I pick up
a guitar, and he always used to play that, So
we were familiar with it. And I think when I
was sort of it must have been sixteen or seventeen
when I had started writing songs, putting music out he
(32:14):
as we often do. We played together quite long time,
quite a lot when we are together, and he shows
me runs of chords that he thinks are nice, and
I steal them and meant me basically, something I've actually
repeated with my partner who's also a musician, who I
steal all of his cor progressions as well, paging doctor Freud.
But I had used the chords for that for another song,
(32:38):
and I still thought, oh, I'll take those chords. I
don't really care much about the lyrics, so I'll just
take the chords and write another song. And then of
course I hit my thirties or whatever. And he played
it here when he was visiting when my daughter was born.
There was a guitar and he just picked it up
and started playing it, and it was like devastating to
hear for some reason, you know, some whatever point in
(33:02):
my astrological.
Speaker 1 (33:02):
Journey, song, isn't it.
Speaker 3 (33:05):
It's a sad Yeah, it's a sad song.
Speaker 1 (33:07):
Like it's so. It's written bio dad when he was
in his twenties, but from the perspective of an old
man looking back on his life. Yeah, and now that
your dad is an older man, Yeah, how does he feel?
Speaker 2 (33:18):
Like?
Speaker 1 (33:18):
I mean, I was going to say how does he
feel about the song? But he obviously still feels proud
of it and connected to it, because if he's coming
around and playing that song, still amazing that he's had
this one song that he's you know, constantly goes back
to his whole life. That's incredible. Does he what's do
you know what his relationship with that song is now
having like now being at the age that the person
(33:39):
in the song is imagined to be.
Speaker 3 (33:40):
Or maybe this is an English thing maybe rather than
a universal thing. But wouldn't you love to know the
inner passions of your parents? Like, yeah, I'm never going
to know. And actually, now I am myself a parent,
I'm like, oh yeah, probably see why Actually you keep
them quiet to yourself whatever your life becomes devoted to
someone else's passions. But you know, I have no idea,
(34:06):
no idea what he thinks. He hasn't heard it, so
I don't know he hasn't heard version purposefully, He's like
I told him that it's and he was, you know,
he's excited to hear it, but I didn't want in
case he didn't like it or in case. Yeah, I
just wanted to save it until it was like definitely
out in the world, and I think it'd be changed. Yeah,
(34:28):
I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I
mean that has an extra level of obviously profundity to
me because of that question.
Speaker 1 (34:35):
Do you find I mean, I know you're not gonna
you're done with touring, you can do any.
Speaker 3 (34:40):
Shows, like I'm not done with touring forever. I'm done
with touring for you know, for are parents. Yeah, well
I've got young children.
Speaker 1 (34:47):
Yea. How do you think performing that live is going
to be? Are you planning? Yeah, you're planning on doing
that one live? Where you will that?
Speaker 3 (34:56):
Will I get through it? Yeah? Yeah, I don't know.
There's a lot lots of things from the staff. I'm
worried about not getting through really, but then you know,
actually something does strike you when you hit stage where
you don't it doesn't. I did a little show the
other day, very on somebody Else's It was a podcast actually,
but it was a live one, and I played a
(35:19):
couple of songs hadn't played for live for nearly two years,
and I was quite nervous. And then I got up
there and I was like, oh so good, I just
love it.
Speaker 1 (35:29):
Let's quickly talk about you becoming a TikToker.
Speaker 3 (35:32):
Yeah, sure, top topic.
Speaker 1 (35:35):
What made you choose TikTok.
Speaker 3 (35:36):
I mean, I find I've always found Instagram, it's all.
I'm only on any of it obviously for a means
to an end.
Speaker 1 (35:44):
I mean, yeah, and I don't it wouldn't it be
nice to get rid of it.
Speaker 3 (35:48):
It'd be lovely to get rid of it. But I
also find it boring when people say, oh, go back
to age report, idiot. I'd rather be just silently part
of it than trying to pretend like it's not necessary
for everything else. So that's why where I landed on that.
I find Instagram like mostly annoying. Like what I see
on there, I find it mostly annoying, irritating and MV inducing,
(36:10):
and I just think it's literally only there to produce
envy kind of thing. But I get it. Yeah, I
can do that too if we need to, if I
need to participate, I can produce some MV if I
need to generate some, and Twitter abviously have nothing to
do with But TikTok I was like, TikTok felt like
I started using TikTok when I was a new parent
(36:33):
because somebody had recommended it to Actually, I started using
it when I was pregnant because I was going down
a home birth route and somebody had recommended, like there's
a lot of good home birth community stuff on there,
and somebody recommended it as a really good source of
like very very different opinions, and you get kind of
every opinion and every from every walk of life about
(36:54):
various things. And I was like, well, that sounds like
hell on one level, but for this particular thing that
I was trying to deduce, it was really unbelievably useful,
like incredible, and it was all obviously generated. That those
things that I was interested were all generated by people
(37:15):
who had no agenda other than just sharing that information.
So I found that like very interesting. And then I
was also finishing my masters, then there was a lot
of like stuff about psychanalysis that was really interesting generated
kind of thought I would not not have had otherwise.
So I was like genuinely just like maybe I'm actually
(37:35):
pro TikTok, and then I'm not. Is a sure sciences story,
short story, but I did like what I prefer about
it is how it's like another dimension to information or
even comedy or like, you know, it's a new language
(37:57):
that you have to use of visual. I don't know.
Speaker 2 (38:01):
I just.
Speaker 3 (38:03):
I got a lot out of it at the beginning,
and it's taken a massive nose dive since then.
Speaker 1 (38:09):
Like my painting, like all great things, you know, yeah,
exactly burns bright, yeah, burns bright.
Speaker 3 (38:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (38:17):
But it's good that. I think it's good that you're
open to those things, because so many people, like you say,
would just reject TikTok as being low culture or just
not being you know, being like, oh, it's not I
can't be bothered with that.
Speaker 3 (38:35):
I find that so boring. Yeah, I find all strongly
held opinions really boring, and I hold my opinions really
likely and try never to be pinned down to a
single one. But strongly held opinions not my bag.
Speaker 1 (38:49):
I've always found it weird when people don't do this
so much anymore. But there was a phase in my
twenties I'd say when some of my friends or people
I would meet would be really proudly say that they
don't own a tea TV.
Speaker 3 (39:01):
Sull you're watching it on your laptop, don't try and
make out you're better than me. I know what you do.
Speaker 1 (39:05):
And also, why don't you want a TV?
Speaker 2 (39:08):
Brilliant?
Speaker 1 (39:09):
TV is brilliant, isn't it.
Speaker 2 (39:11):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (39:11):
I mean if I'm going to watch TV, I want
it on a proper TV. I don't want to watch
it on a laptop.
Speaker 2 (39:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (39:15):
I mean there's loads of great things on TV.
Speaker 3 (39:18):
But they are watching TV. Can we just yeah?
Speaker 2 (39:21):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (39:21):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, they're just watching. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (39:23):
Even if you're watching reels on Instagram, it's TV, still
watching TV. Just don't have a TV.
Speaker 1 (39:28):
Do you watch live TV?
Speaker 3 (39:31):
This is yes, I do sometimes.
Speaker 1 (39:32):
Yeah, okay, I was going to say that in the morning. Yeah,
I watch live TV all the time. I think it's
maybe my age or are lots of people I know
my age don't. But I will watch things on streaming.
But I like just seeing whatsong. I don't like too
much choice.
Speaker 3 (39:50):
Yeah, it was a simple a time.
Speaker 1 (39:52):
Yeah, here we are. I just like to know. Okay,
these are the things to choose from. I'll just choose
one of those. Yeah. I think there's something in that.
You don't look convinced by that.
Speaker 3 (40:04):
I'm not convinced by that, but I guess I I
live a different version of that because I find the
adverts so depressing. I try to avoid it if I
can stick to the beab if I if I need to,
I only watch five TV shows which I own the
entire box set of in digital form.
Speaker 2 (40:23):
Okay, you know I don't.
Speaker 1 (40:24):
What are those?
Speaker 3 (40:27):
Start to finish the Sopranos.
Speaker 1 (40:29):
I've just finished the Sopranos. I think that's why I
mentioned it earlier in my mind.
Speaker 3 (40:33):
Yes, yeah, well phrase and sopranos obviously have psycho analysis.
Speaker 2 (40:38):
Of course, of course that might be why.
Speaker 1 (40:42):
So you've got those two? What are your other ones?
Speaker 3 (40:45):
Uh? Cab your enthusiasm?
Speaker 1 (40:48):
Okay?
Speaker 3 (40:49):
Deep? And then what's what else is there? The old
Alan Partridges own all those obviously the special TV specials
just genius and that's it.
Speaker 1 (41:05):
Really.
Speaker 3 (41:05):
Yeah, it's pretty much all I watched.
Speaker 1 (41:07):
Okay, I think I think I'm done. But before I go,
what should I read next? Who should who should I
be reading? Who's my next? Joan Didion?
Speaker 3 (41:16):
Let's have a look here at what's on myself today? Well,
I'm just reading. I don't know.
Speaker 1 (41:27):
There's a lot of taro over there.
Speaker 3 (41:29):
There's a lot of taro. I was doing a lot
of taro research for my substack.
Speaker 1 (41:34):
That's I was going to say, we've not spoken about
the substack, but I've noticed the taro on the substack.
Speaker 2 (41:39):
Yes, it's taro.
Speaker 1 (41:40):
A new thing you.
Speaker 3 (41:41):
Tara has been a long standing thing. Pick picked it
up in la as as people do, and took it
very seriously for a number of years, and now I
take it with a huge pinch of salt. I'm just
using taro as a jumping off point for topics. Yes,
substacts really handy. As we discuss about face the blank page,
you don't want to face the black page straight on.
(42:04):
But book wise, at the moment, I'm reading round A
July's new book, All Fours, and it is I'm howling
with laughter in the night reading it.
Speaker 1 (42:11):
All Fours, All Fours.
Speaker 3 (42:13):
It's so funny.
Speaker 1 (42:14):
What's it about.
Speaker 3 (42:16):
I'm only halfway through, but it's it's basically, I mean,
the the top line is that this woman who's been
who's married and has got a kid, who takes a
road trip by herself to figure some stuff out. But
the brilliant bit is is that it sort of discusses
the ways in which people in a marriage can internally
(42:39):
drift apart while remaining together and the ways in which
women drift away from a woman's perspective. It's amazed she's
isolated some extraordinary truth. It's written like as was her
last book, written like a It's like you're watching a
film reading it. The pace of it is so brilliant.
(43:02):
She's brilliant at pace.
Speaker 2 (43:03):
What's the author name again, Miranda July, Miranda.
Speaker 1 (43:06):
July all fours. Okay, I'm going to get I'm going
to tear it up. Ingratuations on the new record lovely,
thanks so much. I'll see you in seven years years.
Speaker 3 (43:18):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (43:22):
I loved hearing from Laura and Marlin there, Stu. I
can't believe it only met her once before, because that
chat just sounded so warm and like maybe that's just
how hospitable and personable Laura Marlin is. And you got
to go to her house and it was like so
it all sounded very just really really intimate. It was brilliant.
(43:42):
And I also like that one minute in this is
this is I think this is a sign of how
well you two got on. One minute into the conversation,
you're already talking about death. Wow, stud you're going there man.
Speaker 1 (43:57):
Straight with a death chat. Yeah. I suppose that could
have gone either way, couldn't it? And if it had
gone badly, you would never have heard it. That's the
vacular podcast, isn't it. So I mean, just to comment
on that, thank you for those kind words, but also
the answer is it is Laura. Laura is like you know,
it's all her. She is very personable, very easy to
(44:19):
talk to. That's what I found last time I spoke
to her. But you know, yeah, it's been seven years
in between, you know, Like a couple of weeks ago
on our one hundred and fiftieth episodes, somebody asked us
the question does going to an artist's house make it
more relaxed? And I was a big advocate, saying, yeah,
I love it. I love going to the house. And
partly that is to be nosey, but it is part
(44:41):
of making it. Them they feel relaxed, you feel more. Therefore,
I feel more relaxed, And I think this was a
good example of that. She's a good talker and she's
very funny.
Speaker 2 (44:50):
This is really funny. It reminded me that when you
and I first started writing about music, like it was
this is quite a while ago now, right, Laura Mark
was like just emerging as a new artist, and this
is around the time of like Munthdon Sons. She's part
of that scene, considered part of that scene, wasn't she
the sort of like new folk explosion. And the thing
(45:14):
that you would often hear about Laura and Marlin away
from her music was that she was very timid and
she didn't particularly like speaking or doing interviews or she
preferred to focus on the music. And she's now such
a lucid speaker. And also it made sense when she
when you both got into talking about psychoanalysis, which I
thought was fascinating, it made sense that maybe that was
(45:34):
something that she's done that's just completely changed that part
of well she.
Speaker 1 (45:39):
Said that, yeah, yeah, there's a bit where she said
the reason she went she had trouble speaking, like fucking
over her words, didn't really like to talk. And it's
a great advert for it because she I remember she
won that. So Laura's still only thirty four, which makes
me feel a bit sick, but it's because she's because
she started when she was so young.
Speaker 2 (45:59):
She was like, yeah.
Speaker 1 (46:01):
She's been nominated for five Britain Awards so far, all
for Best British Solo Female Artist. She won one of them.
She won the first nomination in twenty eleven, so she
would only have been twenty one then. And I remember
watching that live and seeing her pick up her order
and being being like thrilled that it was that type
of artist winning an award. But I do remember how
(46:22):
weirded out she was, and I remember her speech and
her getting wherever it was El's call back then or
wherever this huge arena, and her just wanting to get
off that stage as quickly as possible.
Speaker 2 (46:33):
I love the fact that you went to the room,
you went to her home, and you went to the
room where this album was recorded. So this podcast was
recorded in the same room that that album was recorded in, which.
Speaker 1 (46:41):
Is yes, and I would say they are both as
beautiful as each other. The record and this podcast, Oh absolutely,
man iridescent. Now, before we go, I think we've got
time quickly for a beat. The algorithm yes, and you
(47:03):
can go first. What do you think? What would you
tip people to listen to this week?
Speaker 2 (47:09):
I want to recommend a song called four Am by
Big Pig.
Speaker 1 (47:13):
Big Pig.
Speaker 2 (47:41):
Previous guests on the podcast Big Pig Jess Smith a
Big Pig aka j Smith or other way around Jess
Smith aka Big Pig came on the podcast episode ninety
nine and Midnight Chats if you want to scroll back
and give that a listen. She was an amazing guest.
By the way, Big Pig. I'm a huge fan of
Big Pig, the Irish artist, and she's just released this
a new single, four Am. It's the first song that's
(48:02):
going to be coming from her debut album because she's
released like bodies of work projects before and I love
this song. I love Big Pig. I think she's got
this incredible knack for writing seemingly very simple melodies. But
if it was simple, everybody would be doing it. I
feel like Big Pig is like one Internet moment away
from being the next Charlie Xx. That's what I hope.
(48:24):
That's what I hope. I would love for Jess Smith
to be have an even bigger platform than she does
right now. But Stu, what are you listening to at
the moment?
Speaker 1 (48:33):
It's animal themed you've got for Big Pig, I'm going
for Dog Unit, Oh, different type of animal. Dog Units
are a band from London and they're an instrumental band,
normally playing a post rock fully plugged in sound. They
had a debut album out earlier this year called at
(48:55):
Home on a label called Brace Yourself, and Brace Yourself
have now released an EP that is all acoustic version
of a few of the songs from that album called
at Home Still. So that track is brilliantly titled when
(49:45):
Do We Start Fighting? And but like this podcast, I
like it. I like the acoustic vibe. There's lots of
strings on this. They've obviously put a lot of They've
got a lot of extra bodies in the room to
record everything acoustically. The final track is its lovely string track,
Dog Unit at Home Still. We will put those two,
(50:07):
along with everything else that has ever been mentioned on
Beat the Algorithm, onto our playlist that's on Spotify. There'd
be a link in the show notes. You can also
find it just search Beat the Algorithm on Spotify. That's
where we're adding the songs every week.
Speaker 2 (50:22):
Yeah, so we've got Dog Unit and Big listen to
you tonight. It's been a lot of fun. Laura and
Marlin absolute ten out of ten guests loved hearing from her.
You were very good too. Your must Slash was excellent,
and we look forward to being with all of you
listeners this time next week. Thanks for tuning in. This
(50:43):
has been Midnight Chats. Midnight Chats is a joint production
between Loud and Quiet and Atomized Studios for iHeartRadio. It's
hosted by Stuart Stubbs and Greg Cochran, mixed and mastered
by Flow Lines, and editor by Stuart Stubbs. Find us
on Instagram and TikTok to watch clips from our recordings
(51:05):
and much much more. We are Midnight Chats Pod.
Speaker 1 (51:07):
For more information, visit loudan Quiet dot com
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