Have you ever wondered how the dreams of teenage songwriters can evolve into timeless music? Join host Buzz Knight on this captivating episode of takin' a walk as he engages in a heartfelt conversation with Glenn Tilbrook, the legendary lead vocalist and guitarist of the iconic British band Squeeze. Together, they explore the band's rich history, diving deep into the creative process behind their new album, Trixies, which features songs penned by Tilbrook and his songwriting partner Chris Difford during their teenage years.
Glenn Tilbrook reflects on the optimism and dreams that fueled their early work, sharing the emotional journey of rediscovering these long-forgotten tracks after 50 years. This episode of takin' a walk is not just about music; it's about the stories behind albums that shaped a generation. Buzz Knight expertly guides the conversation, uncovering the unique dynamic of Tilbrook and Difford's songwriting partnership and how their creative evolution has led to exciting new projects, including their upcoming tour.
Listeners will gain insights into the production of Trixies and the influence of bassist Owen Biddle, highlighting how revisiting their roots has sparked a new wave of creativity for the band. Glenn Tilbrook shares his admiration for Paul McCartney, emphasizing the joy of making music and the enduring connection he feels to his craft. This episode is a treasure trove of music history insights, filled with inspiring artist interviews that resonate with anyone passionate about music and community.
As you tune in to this Squeeze interview, prepare to be transported through classic rock history and indie music journeys that celebrate the power of songwriting. Whether you're a fan of rock music, jazz music, or country music, this episode of takin' a walk promises to deliver inspiring music stories that will leave you reflecting on the cultural impact of music. Don’t miss out on this opportunity to walk alongside Buzz Knight and Glenn Tilbrook as they share musician storytelling that highlights the emotional healing through music and the legacy of iconic songs of the band Squeeze.
Join us on this weekly exploration of music history and the stories behind songs that have defined our lives. With every step, Buzz Knight takes you deeper into the heart of music, making this episode a must-listen for anyone curious about the creative journeys of legendary musicians. Tune in now and walk with us through the vibrant landscape of music history podcasts that inspire and uplift!
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Take a walk. There are bands that make great records,
and then there are bands that make records that feel
like they were written just for you, Songs that capture
a moment, a place of feeling so precisely that you
swear the writer must to be looking through your window.
Squeeze has always been that kind of band for me
(00:20):
and maybe for you as well. Up the junction to
tempted to cool for cats Glenn Tilbrook and Chris Difford
that built one of the most celebrated songwriting partnerships in
rock history, a partnership that has a catalog that has
stood the test of time like very few others. But
here's the twist. The story of Squeeze has a new chapter,
(00:44):
and it actually begins at the very beginning. The band's
extraordinary new album, Trixies, is out now on BMG, and
it's unlike anything you've heard from them before, because in
a sense, it's unlike anything they had heard from themselves before.
These are songs that Glenn and Chris wrote as teenagers
Glenn was just sixteen years old, set in a fictional
(01:07):
nightclub called Trixies. The songs were written before the hits,
before the world tours, before the legend. They were too young,
too inexperience to record them properly at the time, so
they waited fifty years, and now finally Trixies has had
its moment. The New York Times says, Tilbrook comes them
(01:28):
full of life, the buoyant hooks and confident, soulful vocal lines,
classic rock calls at a record imagined the youth realized
in maturity on Buzznight. And today I'm taking a walk.
We're gonna sit down with the man himself, the voice,
the guitar, the melodic genius behind one of Britain's greatest bands.
(01:50):
Next we'll talk to Glenn Tilbrook Squeeze on taking a walk.
Taking a Walk. Then take me back to nineteen seventy four.
You're sixteen years old. You and Chris Differd are just
beginning your songwriting partnership, and you're already writing songs about
(02:12):
a fictional nightclub called Trixies. What was the world you
were living in that inspired that?
Speaker 2 (02:19):
Well, a world of limited horizons, I would say, but
a lot of hopes and dreams and optimism about what
the future could hold for us. And I think that's
strangely enough, that optimism is reflected in the writing of Trixies.
It sounds optimistic to me. I don't know if I'm
(02:42):
just imbuing it with my memory, but it does sound optimistic.
And we have our whole future ahead of us, so
low wouldn't we be optimistic?
Speaker 1 (02:52):
And Lord, do we need optimism these days? Don't we?
Speaker 2 (02:56):
We all do?
Speaker 1 (02:57):
That's true when you rediscovered that original cassette after fifty years,
Take our audience back to what that moment was actually like.
Was it a shock? Was it extremely emotional? Of what
came flooding back at that moment?
Speaker 2 (03:15):
Well, at the risk of I want to dispel a
myth that is growing up around this. We knew about
the songs all the time, We hadn't forgotten them, and
I think, you know, some Chris found a tape and
he brought it in and it was good to hear
it because we hadn't heard it for a long time.
(03:36):
But we knew, we knew what we had for The
real moment I think was when we thought about doing
the songs and I learned how to play them because
I haven't played them for a long time, and we
sat down in here where I am now, this studio
control room, on this piano here and played the songs
(03:57):
to Owing middlind to Chris, and by the end of
that we did think, oh my god, this is better
than we thought it was. You know, it's a really
strong collection of songs, considering well, considering everything to do
with where they were made and the time they were made,
that stand up and didn't really need a lot of
(04:19):
help from us, except in the areas where we could
do with the most help. At that time in nineteen
seventy four, we couldn't play our sing particularly well, and
we can do it a lot better now.
Speaker 1 (04:32):
You've said the act of revisiting those songs had you
in tears, and that you're aware of all the stuff
you've still yet to hear and write when you're hearing it.
That's a profound thing to say about your own work.
Can you talk about that a bit more.
Speaker 2 (04:52):
Yeah, I'm glad I said it. I'm glad I put
it like that, because that's really meanful. What it means
to me is my musical palette in nineteen seventy four
consisted mostly of current stuff that I'd heard in the
last three years, but also was wider informed by the sixties.
(05:13):
That's why I taught myself how to play. And I
used to play a lot of songs in record songbooks
and teach myself how to play them. So all that
stuff is inside. I mean, also from my parents' record collection,
you know, and Fitzgerald and all sorts of different jazz
had found its way into my consciousness. So there was
(05:36):
that there. But rock music, well, that was twenty years old,
you know, and you of course there was R and
B and rock and roll before that, black music. But
there's so much more now, so much more, you know,
what I write now, I'm occupying all the decades that
I've had since then with information and influences. And at
(06:01):
that point it really wasn't that much stuff clunking around,
so it's more targeted, more precise.
Speaker 1 (06:08):
You mentioned Owen Biddle earlier. He produced Tricksies, a man
you know very well as Squeezes bassist. Talk about what
he brought to the recordings that, you know, maybe someone
outside of the band couldn't have.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
He bought. He brought a lot of the recordings. He bought.
His talent is here, his innate musicianship and also bought
He has such an appreciation for Chris and I think
he's the first sort of I'll be one of mind
I saying, his first Squeeze fan to join Squeeze, So
(06:45):
you know, that's sort of lovely. It's it's really lovely
to have someone like that in the band. On what
he brought to the table in terms of helping get
the songs ready is immense.
Speaker 1 (06:59):
It's got to be a dream for him too to
be part of that. I mean, boy, what a beautiful,
beautiful story. The album has this incredible arc. It's it's
set in the nightclub. It has crime scene vignette characters
on the margins. Was there always this narrative structure to
trick caese or did that reveal itself over time?
Speaker 2 (07:23):
You know, I think it. One of the things that
fascinates me about it lyrically is that there is a
story there, but it does involve lots of different characters,
but it's just not specific enough to say, oh, this
led to that, and then this happened, and then and then,
and the conclusion is it's not like that. It's something
(07:48):
that is really tantalizing to me is that it manages
to paint a picture of a place without ever revealing
everything about it or the people and so there are
all sorts of characters in now who we maybe come
across or just dreamt of. You know, certainly Chris had
more worldly experience than I did at that point.
Speaker 1 (08:10):
You and Chris have one of the great songwriting partnerships
in rock history, often compared to Lennon and McCartney. What
is it about the way the two of you work
together that has endured over these fifty years.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
I think the fact that we're very different people and
we don't we don't socialize, We have very little to
do with each other outside squeeze, and in a way,
in a strange way, the fact that we've found out,
probably in nineteen seventy six or something, has a great
bearing on our ability to maintain our relationship. Because if
(08:51):
our relationship isn't going anywhere except professionally, and we have
the utmost respect for each other, I think.
Speaker 1 (08:58):
I think that's a fascinating way to look at it,
because it's it takes out a lot of the messy
things that can happen in relationships and keeps you on
a very constant track to this day. You know exactly
what I'm talking about.
Speaker 2 (09:15):
I know exactly what you're talking about, right you're right.
It's sorry right. It's like an unintended superpower that we have.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
I'd love that the press release mentions that revisiting Trixies
has sparked a new wave of songwriting, which is so
exciting to hear it that a brand new album of
Squeeze songs has already finished. What did going back to
the beginning unlock for you guys creatively?
Speaker 2 (09:45):
I thought it was really important when we were talking
about doing this, about doing Trixies, that we didn't just
do that, because I thought there was a danger that
we trap ourselves in the past, and the way to
combat that is to do two things at the same time,
and that's a new an old album, and to give
(10:06):
them both the amount of attention that they deserve. And
what happened throughout that process is that Trixies really informed
our songwriting. But it's not it's not where it was
in nineteen seventy four. It's where we are now and
we have many more influences coming into play. And I think,
(10:29):
as anyone who loves music or the test, your taste
never remains static. It's a constant, ongoing digestion of whatever
is really floating your boat at the moment than Bine
with all the other stuff that you've heard. So we're
very different writer as to how we were then. But
I think the great thing is that we're capable of
(10:53):
writing something that is at the very least the equal
of Trixies. And that's a really big thing because we
knew that. We knew that Trixies would be a big thing,
but we knew that the thing after that I had
better be something good and it's necessary be the end
of our legacy, you know, it could be that, it
(11:13):
might be that, who knows, we're getting another bit.
Speaker 1 (11:18):
Well, Squeeze is about to headline arenas in the UK
for the first time, including a hometown show at the
Big Arena, three miles from where the band began.
Speaker 2 (11:31):
Yeah, one mile.
Speaker 1 (11:35):
Wow, All right, what is that that? That's the Two Arena?
Speaker 2 (11:38):
Is that right? It's the two The Two Area is
just down the right.
Speaker 1 (11:41):
Yeah. So talk about what that means to you personally.
Speaker 2 (11:46):
Well, you know, when I reflect on my career, I
go back to meeting Chris and having Squeezes a band
for three years before we made a record, and then
the early success and the mid period of hanging about
a bit, and then in a way. One of the
things that's the strongest influence on me is what happened
(12:09):
when our career. You know, when we split up in
ninety seven, it was a sort of tough time. I
was so low and I was playing clubs and sometimes
people will come at other times, not necessarily that many.
At that point, I really discovered something that maybe I'd forgotten,
which is that I love doing this and whatever it is.
(12:31):
If I'm playing in a lawn direct to six people,
that's what I'll do, and I'm happy doing that and
never to think, oh, you know, I could have been,
I should have been. You know, that's I don't see
anything productive in thinking like that. I see a great
deal of productivity in enjoying the moment and wherever the
(12:52):
moment is, make sure you're there, present, and in it.
And that has been the biggest gift to go forward
back into Squeeze and bring that to where we are now,
where I think we're the best we've ever been, and
I think that the new album contains some of the
best songs we've ever written, and that's such a fantastic
(13:14):
place to be in.
Speaker 1 (13:14):
Now. Do you have a recollection of the first moment
in your life that you knew you would be deeply
connected with music for the rest of your life.
Speaker 2 (13:29):
I think that in the first half of my life.
I'm sixty eight now, I'm going to say probably for
the first half of it, I wasn't at all sure
my career in music would last, and I wonder what
that was about. There was a fear of losing the
foothold that we've got again. I mentioned the time when
(13:52):
my career was at its lowest. Became like a superpower
for me because I realized that to do this and
that it's not going to stop. I'd already reached the
point where if I was going to stop or to
stop then, if I had been depressed, it would have
been then. But it's not what happened. I enjoyed that time,
and I enjoy this time.
Speaker 1 (14:14):
We talk often on this podcast about when folks have
that first Beatles moment. Many times it's the first Beatles moment,
and it's a reference to the Ed Sullivan Show appearance.
What was your first Beatles moment that impacted you?
Speaker 2 (14:33):
Do you know? I have a very vivid memory of
walking to my school when I was six or seven
and hearing the intro called to Hard Day's Night when
it was a new song come out of an upstairs
window and I stood and listened to it from the
(14:55):
street and it just elect tied me. And I don't
know if I was I was aware of the Beatles before,
but that sound absolutely captivated me.
Speaker 1 (15:08):
Wow, what a visual. Yeah, that's incredible. You guys are
going to be at the Hollywood Ball in September. That
must be really incredibly exciting thinking about that, you know, Lucky, Yeah,
it's amazing alongside adam Ant in the English Beat a
remarkable British invasion bill talk about that, the energy like
(15:34):
when Squeeze plays a room of that magnitude, you.
Speaker 2 (15:38):
Know, Squeeze. Since for Lockdown and all that stuff, we
did a lot of housekeeping and we've got better and better.
We're now a nine piece band that seems unimaginable to
paper are used to a five piece Squeeze. But we
(16:00):
have a lot of different things that we can do
now that we could never do. One of them being vocals.
We have six people in the band that can sing,
so we use that to its full extent. We have
Bv's Harmony vocals. Well, we have so broadened our palette
of what we can do and how we can deliver
it live. It's just I'm so excited for when we
(16:20):
turn because we just knocked people over. Now it's you know,
I'm not the change in us. And then the audinance
reaction is really palpable and it's incredible and we deserve
every bit of it.
Speaker 1 (16:36):
I would say so. And I'm incredibly looking forward to
seeing you guys again. I've seen you guys many times
through the New York City trips that you would make.
It's always been a special place. I'm imagining to play
New York City.
Speaker 2 (16:52):
Absolutely, yeah. Completely. I was told to someone earlier on
and saying about the first few of Manhattan and you
drive in from JFK. Frost, which is in nineteen seventy eight.
You come as that little bit of a hill you
go over and then you see Manhattan glinting in the distance,
and that was that thrill has never left me. I
(17:13):
still get that buzz without right, you know, I'm riding
into town and see that view. It was everything and
more than I ever could have imagined.
Speaker 1 (17:22):
Oh, I have chills with that description. That's so fantastic.
And from all those performances and being able to be
part of a radio station where you guys were instrumental,
which was WNWFO Wow New York City. Yeah, I got
to work weekends there played many Squeeze records during my time,
(17:43):
for sure, and we'll never forget that. So finally, Glenn, Yeah,
the signature taking a walk question, if you could take
a walk with anybody living or dead, who would it
be and what would you want to talk about? And
where would you take that walk?
Speaker 2 (18:00):
Glenn, it will be, uh, it will be with Paul McCartney. Actually,
and this could never happen because we are not equals.
We happen to have done the same thing. But his
influence has been so immense on me. You know, he is,
he is fantastic. I would love to get to know
(18:22):
him in a way I know I never will.
Speaker 1 (18:27):
Beautiful having you on. It's amazing talking to you, Glenn,
And congratulations on Trixy's on the upcoming tour, the next album,
and thank you for all the joy that you continue
to give us. Thanks for being untaken a Walk.
Speaker 2 (18:44):
Oh, thank you, boss, It's been really lovely. Thank you.
Speaker 1 (18:49):
I'm buzz night and thanks for listening to the Taking
a Walk podcast. Now please check out our companion podcasts
produced by Buzznight Media Productions with your host Lin Haff
Music Save Me, showcasing the healing power of music, and
comedy Save Me shining a light on how laughter is
the best medicine. All shows are available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify,
(19:14):
and are part of the iHeart podcast network.
Take a walk. There are bands that make great records,
and then there are bands that make records that feel
like they were written just for you, Songs that capture
a moment, a place of feeling so precisely that you
swear the writer must to be looking through your window.
Squeeze has always been that kind of band for me
(00:20):
and maybe for you as well. Up the junction to
tempted to cool for cats Glenn Tilbrook and Chris Difford
that built one of the most celebrated songwriting partnerships in
rock history, a partnership that has a catalog that has
stood the test of time like very few others. But
here's the twist. The story of Squeeze has a new chapter,
(00:44):
and it actually begins at the very beginning. The band's
extraordinary new album, Trixies, is out now on BMG, and
it's unlike anything you've heard from them before, because in
a sense, it's unlike anything they had heard from themselves before.
These are songs that Glenn and Chris wrote as teenagers
Glenn was just sixteen years old, set in a fictional
(01:07):
nightclub called Trixies. The songs were written before the hits,
before the world tours, before the legend. They were too young,
too inexperience to record them properly at the time, so
they waited fifty years, and now finally Trixies has had
its moment. The New York Times says, Tilbrook comes them
(01:28):
full of life, the buoyant hooks and confident, soulful vocal lines,
classic rock calls at a record imagined the youth realized
in maturity on Buzznight. And today I'm taking a walk.
We're gonna sit down with the man himself, the voice,
the guitar, the melodic genius behind one of Britain's greatest bands.
(01:50):
Next we'll talk to Glenn Tilbrook Squeeze on taking a walk.
Taking a Walk. Then take me back to nineteen seventy four.
You're sixteen years old. You and Chris Differd are just
beginning your songwriting partnership, and you're already writing songs about
(02:12):
a fictional nightclub called Trixies. What was the world you
were living in that inspired that?
Speaker 2 (02:19):
Well, a world of limited horizons, I would say, but
a lot of hopes and dreams and optimism about what
the future could hold for us. And I think that's
strangely enough, that optimism is reflected in the writing of Trixies.
It sounds optimistic to me. I don't know if I'm
(02:42):
just imbuing it with my memory, but it does sound optimistic.
And we have our whole future ahead of us, so
low wouldn't we be optimistic?
Speaker 1 (02:52):
And Lord, do we need optimism these days? Don't we?
Speaker 2 (02:56):
We all do?
Speaker 1 (02:57):
That's true when you rediscovered that original cassette after fifty years,
Take our audience back to what that moment was actually like.
Was it a shock? Was it extremely emotional? Of what
came flooding back at that moment?
Speaker 2 (03:15):
Well, at the risk of I want to dispel a
myth that is growing up around this. We knew about
the songs all the time, We hadn't forgotten them, and
I think, you know, some Chris found a tape and
he brought it in and it was good to hear
it because we hadn't heard it for a long time.
(03:36):
But we knew, we knew what we had for The
real moment I think was when we thought about doing
the songs and I learned how to play them because
I haven't played them for a long time, and we
sat down in here where I am now, this studio
control room, on this piano here and played the songs
(03:57):
to Owing middlind to Chris, and by the end of
that we did think, oh my god, this is better
than we thought it was. You know, it's a really
strong collection of songs, considering well, considering everything to do
with where they were made and the time they were made,
that stand up and didn't really need a lot of
(04:19):
help from us, except in the areas where we could
do with the most help. At that time in nineteen
seventy four, we couldn't play our sing particularly well, and
we can do it a lot better now.
Speaker 1 (04:32):
You've said the act of revisiting those songs had you
in tears, and that you're aware of all the stuff
you've still yet to hear and write when you're hearing it.
That's a profound thing to say about your own work.
Can you talk about that a bit more.
Speaker 2 (04:52):
Yeah, I'm glad I said it. I'm glad I put
it like that, because that's really meanful. What it means
to me is my musical palette in nineteen seventy four
consisted mostly of current stuff that I'd heard in the
last three years, but also was wider informed by the sixties.
(05:13):
That's why I taught myself how to play. And I
used to play a lot of songs in record songbooks
and teach myself how to play them. So all that
stuff is inside. I mean, also from my parents' record collection,
you know, and Fitzgerald and all sorts of different jazz
had found its way into my consciousness. So there was
(05:36):
that there. But rock music, well, that was twenty years old,
you know, and you of course there was R and
B and rock and roll before that, black music. But
there's so much more now, so much more, you know,
what I write now, I'm occupying all the decades that
I've had since then with information and influences. And at
(06:01):
that point it really wasn't that much stuff clunking around,
so it's more targeted, more precise.
Speaker 1 (06:08):
You mentioned Owen Biddle earlier. He produced Tricksies, a man
you know very well as Squeezes bassist. Talk about what
he brought to the recordings that, you know, maybe someone
outside of the band couldn't have.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
He bought. He brought a lot of the recordings. He bought.
His talent is here, his innate musicianship and also bought
He has such an appreciation for Chris and I think
he's the first sort of I'll be one of mind
I saying, his first Squeeze fan to join Squeeze, So
(06:45):
you know, that's sort of lovely. It's it's really lovely
to have someone like that in the band. On what
he brought to the table in terms of helping get
the songs ready is immense.
Speaker 1 (06:59):
It's got to be a dream for him too to
be part of that. I mean, boy, what a beautiful,
beautiful story. The album has this incredible arc. It's it's
set in the nightclub. It has crime scene vignette characters
on the margins. Was there always this narrative structure to
trick caese or did that reveal itself over time?
Speaker 2 (07:23):
You know, I think it. One of the things that
fascinates me about it lyrically is that there is a
story there, but it does involve lots of different characters,
but it's just not specific enough to say, oh, this
led to that, and then this happened, and then and then,
and the conclusion is it's not like that. It's something
(07:48):
that is really tantalizing to me is that it manages
to paint a picture of a place without ever revealing
everything about it or the people and so there are
all sorts of characters in now who we maybe come
across or just dreamt of. You know, certainly Chris had
more worldly experience than I did at that point.
Speaker 1 (08:10):
You and Chris have one of the great songwriting partnerships
in rock history, often compared to Lennon and McCartney. What
is it about the way the two of you work
together that has endured over these fifty years.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
I think the fact that we're very different people and
we don't we don't socialize, We have very little to
do with each other outside squeeze, and in a way,
in a strange way, the fact that we've found out,
probably in nineteen seventy six or something, has a great
bearing on our ability to maintain our relationship. Because if
(08:51):
our relationship isn't going anywhere except professionally, and we have
the utmost respect for each other, I think.
Speaker 1 (08:58):
I think that's a fascinating way to look at it,
because it's it takes out a lot of the messy
things that can happen in relationships and keeps you on
a very constant track to this day. You know exactly
what I'm talking about.
Speaker 2 (09:15):
I know exactly what you're talking about, right you're right.
It's sorry right. It's like an unintended superpower that we have.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
I'd love that the press release mentions that revisiting Trixies
has sparked a new wave of songwriting, which is so
exciting to hear it that a brand new album of
Squeeze songs has already finished. What did going back to
the beginning unlock for you guys creatively?
Speaker 2 (09:45):
I thought it was really important when we were talking
about doing this, about doing Trixies, that we didn't just
do that, because I thought there was a danger that
we trap ourselves in the past, and the way to
combat that is to do two things at the same time,
and that's a new an old album, and to give
(10:06):
them both the amount of attention that they deserve. And
what happened throughout that process is that Trixies really informed
our songwriting. But it's not it's not where it was
in nineteen seventy four. It's where we are now and
we have many more influences coming into play. And I think,
(10:29):
as anyone who loves music or the test, your taste
never remains static. It's a constant, ongoing digestion of whatever
is really floating your boat at the moment than Bine
with all the other stuff that you've heard. So we're
very different writer as to how we were then. But
I think the great thing is that we're capable of
(10:53):
writing something that is at the very least the equal
of Trixies. And that's a really big thing because we
knew that. We knew that Trixies would be a big thing,
but we knew that the thing after that I had
better be something good and it's necessary be the end
of our legacy, you know, it could be that, it
(11:13):
might be that, who knows, we're getting another bit.
Speaker 1 (11:18):
Well, Squeeze is about to headline arenas in the UK
for the first time, including a hometown show at the
Big Arena, three miles from where the band began.
Speaker 2 (11:31):
Yeah, one mile.
Speaker 1 (11:35):
Wow, All right, what is that that? That's the Two Arena?
Speaker 2 (11:38):
Is that right? It's the two The Two Area is
just down the right.
Speaker 1 (11:41):
Yeah. So talk about what that means to you personally.
Speaker 2 (11:46):
Well, you know, when I reflect on my career, I
go back to meeting Chris and having Squeezes a band
for three years before we made a record, and then
the early success and the mid period of hanging about
a bit, and then in a way. One of the
things that's the strongest influence on me is what happened
(12:09):
when our career. You know, when we split up in
ninety seven, it was a sort of tough time. I
was so low and I was playing clubs and sometimes
people will come at other times, not necessarily that many.
At that point, I really discovered something that maybe I'd forgotten,
which is that I love doing this and whatever it is.
(12:31):
If I'm playing in a lawn direct to six people,
that's what I'll do, and I'm happy doing that and
never to think, oh, you know, I could have been,
I should have been. You know, that's I don't see
anything productive in thinking like that. I see a great
deal of productivity in enjoying the moment and wherever the
(12:52):
moment is, make sure you're there, present, and in it.
And that has been the biggest gift to go forward
back into Squeeze and bring that to where we are now,
where I think we're the best we've ever been, and
I think that the new album contains some of the
best songs we've ever written, and that's such a fantastic
(13:14):
place to be in.
Speaker 1 (13:14):
Now. Do you have a recollection of the first moment
in your life that you knew you would be deeply
connected with music for the rest of your life.
Speaker 2 (13:29):
I think that in the first half of my life.
I'm sixty eight now, I'm going to say probably for
the first half of it, I wasn't at all sure
my career in music would last, and I wonder what
that was about. There was a fear of losing the
foothold that we've got again. I mentioned the time when
(13:52):
my career was at its lowest. Became like a superpower
for me because I realized that to do this and
that it's not going to stop. I'd already reached the
point where if I was going to stop or to
stop then, if I had been depressed, it would have
been then. But it's not what happened. I enjoyed that time,
and I enjoy this time.
Speaker 1 (14:14):
We talk often on this podcast about when folks have
that first Beatles moment. Many times it's the first Beatles moment,
and it's a reference to the Ed Sullivan Show appearance.
What was your first Beatles moment that impacted you?
Speaker 2 (14:33):
Do you know? I have a very vivid memory of
walking to my school when I was six or seven
and hearing the intro called to Hard Day's Night when
it was a new song come out of an upstairs
window and I stood and listened to it from the
(14:55):
street and it just elect tied me. And I don't
know if I was I was aware of the Beatles before,
but that sound absolutely captivated me.
Speaker 1 (15:08):
Wow, what a visual. Yeah, that's incredible. You guys are
going to be at the Hollywood Ball in September. That
must be really incredibly exciting thinking about that, you know, Lucky, Yeah,
it's amazing alongside adam Ant in the English Beat a
remarkable British invasion bill talk about that, the energy like
(15:34):
when Squeeze plays a room of that magnitude, you.
Speaker 2 (15:38):
Know, Squeeze. Since for Lockdown and all that stuff, we
did a lot of housekeeping and we've got better and better.
We're now a nine piece band that seems unimaginable to
paper are used to a five piece Squeeze. But we
(16:00):
have a lot of different things that we can do
now that we could never do. One of them being vocals.
We have six people in the band that can sing,
so we use that to its full extent. We have
Bv's Harmony vocals. Well, we have so broadened our palette
of what we can do and how we can deliver
it live. It's just I'm so excited for when we
(16:20):
turn because we just knocked people over. Now it's you know,
I'm not the change in us. And then the audinance
reaction is really palpable and it's incredible and we deserve
every bit of it.
Speaker 1 (16:36):
I would say so. And I'm incredibly looking forward to
seeing you guys again. I've seen you guys many times
through the New York City trips that you would make.
It's always been a special place. I'm imagining to play
New York City.
Speaker 2 (16:52):
Absolutely, yeah. Completely. I was told to someone earlier on
and saying about the first few of Manhattan and you
drive in from JFK. Frost, which is in nineteen seventy eight.
You come as that little bit of a hill you
go over and then you see Manhattan glinting in the distance,
and that was that thrill has never left me. I
(17:13):
still get that buzz without right, you know, I'm riding
into town and see that view. It was everything and
more than I ever could have imagined.
Speaker 1 (17:22):
Oh, I have chills with that description. That's so fantastic.
And from all those performances and being able to be
part of a radio station where you guys were instrumental,
which was WNWFO Wow New York City. Yeah, I got
to work weekends there played many Squeeze records during my time,
(17:43):
for sure, and we'll never forget that. So finally, Glenn, Yeah,
the signature taking a walk question, if you could take
a walk with anybody living or dead, who would it
be and what would you want to talk about? And
where would you take that walk?
Speaker 2 (18:00):
Glenn, it will be, uh, it will be with Paul McCartney. Actually,
and this could never happen because we are not equals.
We happen to have done the same thing. But his
influence has been so immense on me. You know, he is,
he is fantastic. I would love to get to know
(18:22):
him in a way I know I never will.
Speaker 1 (18:27):
Beautiful having you on. It's amazing talking to you, Glenn,
And congratulations on Trixy's on the upcoming tour, the next album,
and thank you for all the joy that you continue
to give us. Thanks for being untaken a Walk.
Speaker 2 (18:44):
Oh, thank you, boss, It's been really lovely. Thank you.
Speaker 1 (18:49):
I'm buzz night and thanks for listening to the Taking
a Walk podcast. Now please check out our companion podcasts
produced by Buzznight Media Productions with your host Lin Haff
Music Save Me, showcasing the healing power of music, and
comedy Save Me shining a light on how laughter is
the best medicine. All shows are available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify,
(19:14):
and are part of the iHeart podcast network.
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