Fran Healy

Fran Healy fronts Travis. He's a fascinating guy, you'll be interested in what he has to say whether you know the band's music or not.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:08):
Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bob Left Set podcast.
My guest today is Frand Dealing of Travage brand. We
were setting this up. We normally use the software Riverside,
which works in Chrome. You refuse to download a Google product,
tell me about that.

Speaker 2 (00:29):
I'm not a big fan of downloading anything onto my
onto my computer. I don't really. I generally use the
fary just because it's it's uh, it's more secure as
a as a bit of software. There's more, you get
more privacy with it. Google, Google will It's like an
anal probe. They just want to get right up inside

(00:51):
you and they're into all your bits and piece And
I'm not I just find them very intrusive. I'm not.
I'm I'm not keen on on when that. I think
Apple are a little bit more kind of privacy oriented.
Or maybe that's just what I be led to believe.

Speaker 1 (01:08):
But anyway, so have you had a problem downloading stuff
on your computer.

Speaker 2 (01:16):
When today?

Speaker 1 (01:17):
No, I'm talking about in general, since you're anxious about
downloading stuff.

Speaker 2 (01:22):
No. No, I I just don't like Google. I don't
like the company. I'm not a big fan of Google.
I'm not I think I'm not that my key on it,
but I'm anyway, it's just, you know.

Speaker 1 (01:39):
Well, the question is, if you have a problem with Google,
what other companies and what other products don't you use?

Speaker 2 (01:47):
I'm I don't. I don't really. I don't use Instagram,
I don't use Facebook, I don't use what's that? Don't use?
I actually do use Twitter, but that's now gone all

(02:09):
a bit wobbly. I don't really, I'm not. I think
their business models are interesting, you know, Facebook and or
sorry Alphabet. I think their business models are how could
you put it, very inventive. You know, you think you've
got four hundred thousand followers or five hundred thousand followers,

(02:32):
but in order to access those followers, you have to
pay the company to open up the gate to allow
you to reach all your lip you know, all your followers.
So it's like an illusion. You know, you've got forty
thousand or one hundred thousand, or a million or twenty
five million followers, but in order to reach them you
have to pay, you know. So it's it's not really

(02:54):
it's all a bit of a like smoking mirrors thing.
And again it's this feeling of being anally probed by
by someone in Silicon Valley, the Silicon Valley finger.

Speaker 1 (03:08):
So did you used to use these programs and stop
where you never used.

Speaker 2 (03:13):
Them at the beginning? And I never liked Facebook really
very much. I did I have a Facebook account? I
think it did, and I just kind of went away
from it. So something kind of like, I don't know,
you know, some some people just give you a vibe,
and some apps just give you a vibe and you're

(03:35):
like nah nah. And so Facebook was like that. And
then I got a little bit kind of like weary
because then they Facebook bought Instagram and they bought WhatsApp,
and it's all about I guess having the it's I
don't know. And of course there's TikTok. We were talking
about TikTok today being banned in the US or possibly

(03:58):
as a Supreme Court over the the their decision. But
that's another I don't know, you know, that's a that's
a whole other that's like crack cocaine. That's like social
media on crack.

Speaker 1 (04:12):
Okay, so you're not on TikTok.

Speaker 2 (04:14):
Fuck that well, I'm my band is on TikTok, but
and personally not on TikTok. I mean that I feel
it's again it's like I feel social media is do
you know, like have you ever I mean, have you
read like much German history? No, Like if you go

(04:35):
back to like when what's his name Martin Luther delivered
the Bible to the people, like you know, like he
printed it. That it was the printing press was invented.
And then suddenly you had this mass dissemination of information.
And when the normal people of Germany, you know, all

(04:55):
of the sort of normal people of Germany were able
to have the Bible for the first time, they suddenly
had the word do you know, they had the information
at their fingertips. Interestingly, the modern German language as you
know it today comes from that Bible. It was. It
was written in a sort of like a sort of

(05:16):
street the way there was there was a few different
types of German when before that, and Martin Luther went
around all of these different places. And when he wrote
the Bible or the Old Testament, I think, yeah, he
he wrote it in a sort of almost like street talk,
like a sort of street version of German. And that

(05:38):
that took the high German and the low German and
put them together to get the German that we sort
of know today. And so when all these people began
to read this book, the Bible, they had it for
like four hundred years after that it was the only
printed book available to people for for a long time.

(05:59):
But when they first got it, there was a thirty
year war like because people were like, you know, the
Church didn't control the world of God anymore. The people did.
So we're in this moment right now where I think
we're having another mass dissemination of information and it's kind
of it causes chaos. And I believe that the guys

(06:22):
in Silicon Valley they're very I'm not sure if it's
left or right brained, but they're not artistically minded. They
have no they're all very math you know, they're all
very sort of zeros and ones, and they think in
a certain way. They don't they never, i'm sure, ever

(06:42):
considered the consequences of what the impact of social media
would have on the planet. So I'm kind of I'm
getting to a point and I think a lot of
people are where you're like, I just want to live
in a cave. Would just give me a cave and
just don't like I want to throw my computer out

(07:03):
the window. I definitely did after trying to get onto
this to this today.

Speaker 1 (07:07):
Okay, outside the US, the world runs on WhatsApp, So
you're on tour outside of the US. How do you communicate?

Speaker 2 (07:18):
I use them messages on iPhone and that works for you. Yeah, yeah, absolutely, Oh.

Speaker 1 (07:26):
Okay, okay, just you're very well educated on these issues.
What do you think about Elon Musk and his power
in the American government?

Speaker 2 (07:36):
Well, that's that's a whole different question. That's about that
talks about power. I don't know if you've read any
of Robert Carrow's writing, and you know, the power broker,
I know who we're talking about.

Speaker 1 (07:48):
I have not read these books.

Speaker 2 (07:50):
Well he I think he's on the fourth volume of
his of his biography of My Brain's Melting, Thank you,
Thank you, Lindon Johnson, and he's he talks in that.
I've watched a few interviews with Carol and he speaks

(08:12):
about power and he's sort of really his interest is
in that. And he said something really interesting in a
New York Times interview your podcast when he was asked
about the nature of power, and one of the things
he said that piqued my interest was that talks about

(08:36):
Lyndon Johnson for I think seventeen years, you know, being
very friendly and very he knew exactly who to talk
to to pull in power, to gather power, and never
once showed his hand about what he would do once
he had that power. So for all of us people

(08:59):
that don't have any power, I mean, it's kind of
like none of us do in this world today. You're
either something like Elon Musk he's got a lot of
money but and and influence. But our political leaders have
a lot of power. That's where the power really lies
in the country. But billionaires and political leaders. And so

(09:21):
I'm not sure what he's up to because a minute ago,
you know, he was like I was like, for instance,
I was saying, I'm like I was turning a corner
for my sins. I bought a Tesla a few years
ago because my kid was like, we got to get Tesla,
and I'm like, I'm happy with my nineteen eighty five.
We say these three hundred d I'm just let's not

(09:42):
get a Tesla. So I went, fuck it, I'll get
a Tesla. And we've got this this machine that drives
at this computer that drives now, and I was turning
into my street in Los Angeles, in Venice in it
and this guy I was beside me in the car,

(10:04):
beside me, he rolled down his window and my window
was down, my elbows on the window and this is
when was this a year and a half ago? And
he shouted, I mean we were maybe one foot apart
from each other, took a cigarette out of his mouth
and screened fuck Elon at me. And I was like,

(10:26):
I was like, what you kidding? Because it was it
was round about the time when Elon Musk was beginning
to go like change his political leanings. He's moved his
company to Texas. And I was like, I knew that
his the worm was turning for him, but this the

(10:48):
memo hadn't reached this guy yet that Elon was going
into his car. And and but it's interesting to me
how these people operate, Like for normal people like you
and I and most people that roam the lands, we
we're just normal people. And I have no idea what

(11:10):
someone like that is agenda is. I can only imagine
that he wants to get to Mars, so he's going
to probably do everything possible to make that as easy,
to make that as much the path of leisure resistance
as possible. So I don't think he's I think he's

(11:32):
definitely on the spectrum. So his his very is very
sort of know what to behavior, what would seem like
anti social behavior, like his op likes the way he talks,
the way he acts in a kind of different way.

(11:56):
I think that's definitely spectrumy. I mean, we're all on
the the my grainbow in some way, in some more
than others. But I think possibly with Elon Musk, he's
definitely he wants to go to Mars. He wants to
save the world, and he doesn't really give a damn
about like what people think. It seems. But I'm from

(12:22):
the outside where you and I are sitting, does it matter?
Do we have any power to change any of that?
Doesn't really seem so we're quite powerless. And I realized
that a long time ago. I realized that when when
we had the Iraq War with George W. Bush and
Tony Blair's wonderful war in Iraq that everyone marched against

(12:44):
because we all smelled something funny, fishy, and everyone said,
don't do it, and they did it anyway. That's when
I began to realize, Oh, God, this this idea of
democracy and this idea of the people have the power
is actually it's kind of not really, not really true.

Speaker 1 (13:10):
Okay, I'm gonna change the focus for a minute. Originally,
you're from Scotland. Yes, Scotland has talked off and on
about seceding from the UK. In addition, UK you've had Brexit.
What are your views on those things?

Speaker 2 (13:29):
I remember, I remember where I was when breakfast we
were in Amsterdam. I was sitting in a hotel lobby
when I when I saw the headlines and I was like,
this is not good. It's not good. For first of all,
it's it was you know, you watch the the the

(13:51):
way that what's the word? The campaign was ruled out
and it was very very persuasive to you if you
didn't maybe read enough or or look at the news enough,
or you didn't get your news from different sources. And
this was the birth of Cambridge Analytica as well. This
was their their little guinea pig almost Brexit was to

(14:17):
see if they could target people on Facebook, you know,
and get there exactly know exactly who would we who's
about to tip to the right or the left, and
they can send them exactly a tailored commercial to their
Facebook that will tip them in favor of Brexit. And
they did and they won, and I was like, oh

(14:38):
my god, this is going to be a disaster. And
it's been a disaster. Wow. We can't like even I mean,
it's it's gone into every walk of life. I think
it's going into I mean, speaking personally, the live business
where you could get in a tour bus and just
tour Europe and go around Europe as a band. Yeah,

(15:02):
and there's a lot of red tape now, I mean
a lot. And we talk about our fishing industry, we
talk about like the role of and also the breakup
of Europe. You're seeing it fragmenting, you're seeing Russia NATO again.
All of these things are way above my head and

(15:23):
I'm sure your head and everyone's head, because it's these
are the this is you go back to this idea
of power and that's where it lies and lies. And
I mean I had little tiny brushes with it here
and there down the line when I'm I've been to

(15:45):
Brussels and I've gone in to represent some of the
music business. You know, when we've been talking about Brexit
and we've been talking about like trying to sort of
make it easier for bands to make some money from recording.
So I've been there, but you get the feeling that

(16:05):
there's so much like you're talking a different language anyway,
bricks at Brexit was a really big fumble over there,
but we're living again where these this is like, you know, me,
you live in interesting times. We're living in such interesting times,

(16:26):
you know.

Speaker 1 (16:34):
Okay, just because a lot of people are Americans who
are really not familiar with world politics, explain why Scotland
wanted to s seed and what the status of that
is today?

Speaker 2 (16:47):
No idea what the status is today. It's it's Scotland
wanted independence. I can't honestly because I moved away like
twenty twenty odd years ago. So as a Scottish person
moving away, I don't want to be one of these
against Scottish people who are like blah blah blah when

(17:10):
I don't live there. You know, I live in the
United States and I'm I'm kind of I feel like
I'm in I'm neither in. I'm in neither country, but
I'm on a base level. The Scottish National Party ran
a very very good campaign to have Scotland become independent,

(17:36):
and at the time I wasn't sure because I wasn't
living there. You've got to be there, you've got to
be on you've got to have feet on the ground
and be in the bars and be in the street
and be in the supermarket and be talking because we
like to talk in Glasgow. And so a lot of
my friends were pro it. Some of my friends were

(17:58):
against it. Personally, I always feel like putting walls up
and dividing things is not great. But I think the
reasons for independence in Scotland stem from just long history
of England or sorry no England London and just kind

(18:21):
of fucking us are. Like you rewind back to the
nineteen late nineteen eighties nineties. We have a thing called
the poll tax and this was like a type of
tax that British government tried out in Scotland. First, you know,
where do all the where do all the nuclear submarines

(18:45):
say they live in Scotland. You know they don't live
in England. They keep all the nuclear arsenal of Britain
next to us. I mean, it's it's kind of like funny,
you know. So this is all of these reasons, like
they the nuclear thing, to the economic thing, to just
this historic thing of being kind of humped by London.

(19:07):
I think a lot of Scottish people, half of Scotland
almost wanted to secede, as you say, and it didn't happen.
They failed, And but now that then then Brexit happened
and now I don't know where anyone stands because the SNP,

(19:28):
the Scottish National Party, is in disarray. They've lost Alex Salmon,
the leader at the time of that. He's dead. He
died last year. Nicolas Sturgeon, who used to run the SNP,
she resigned. She's in a sus a weird scandal herself.
I don't know if that's been resolved. So it's Scottish

(19:52):
politics is in slight disarray.

Speaker 1 (19:54):
So how did you decide to leave Scotland in the UK?

Speaker 2 (20:00):
It's a great question. Well, I Travis. So Travis got
together in nineteen ninety one. That's when we started the band.
I was starting our school and I started the band
at the same time. And we chugged along for six years,
our five years or whatever, and it became and I

(20:23):
got a little bit better and a little bit better
at writing songwriting, and then it became clear to me
anyway that we needed to change the backdrop. We needed
to bring the the mountain was that they say the

(20:46):
mountain would come to Mohammad, take my Hammed to the mountain. Right.
I had to do that. We had to go down
to London to seek our fame and fortune Dick Whittington style,
and we arrived there in nine team nine to six
June the first or April the first, Oh no, yeah,

(21:07):
June the first, and we that's where we stayed for
twelve years. We went down for six months to try
and get a record deal. We were all on the
doll meaning one how met unemployment benefit right, which we
called the John Major mute John Major, who is the
UK Prime Minister. We called the unemployment benefit the John

(21:31):
Major Music Scholarship Scheme. And we we got lucky. We
got a deal very quickly. The day before my twenty
third birthday July twenty second, nineteen ninety six, this guy
came up to me in a bar and said, I
want to give your band a deal like and I

(21:52):
was like what, because we'd only just got there and
he'd managed to get a tape from someone and we
sang to this to this guy a few months later,
but that's another story. But yeah, that's why we went
down there. We we we couldn't get arrested in Scotland.
I think people come up there and they they they

(22:14):
check people out, they check bands out, and I think
we just had to go down And it was a
really interesting time in London. It was britt pop was booming,
the the art scene was amazing, and labor was just
about to get into power. Tony Blair was just about
to so everything was was was about to flip to

(22:38):
to something new. And we went down and we were
right in the midst of all this when when we arrived,
and so really and it was a really great time.
It was it was you have Oasis and pub britt
pop and all that stuff going on, and we weren't
really part of that. But that's why we need to.

Speaker 1 (22:57):
Live, okay. And how did you leave London?

Speaker 2 (23:03):
Ah? We left London. So we moved in ninety six
and in two thousand and six I had my kids,
my boy Clay, and and while we while my wife
was pregnant with Clay, someone through a brick through our
window and there was a series of events, like three

(23:25):
things happened we had a brick thrown through our window.
Someone stole like I'd lest stupidly left my laptop sitting
on a sort of with it opened, like glowing out
of the window. So I got my laptop stolen. They
smashed the window and I felt like, whoa, that's that's
that's a bit kind of aggressive. And then two people,

(23:51):
two of our neighbors, were mugged on our street, one
at knife point and then another one was at knife
point taking on a bus, driven away out into the
middle of nowhere and robbed. Neither of them were hurt,
but I was like, wow, that's it felt like it
didn't feel safe anymore. And we lived in a very

(24:11):
leafy suburb of London called crouch End where Nick Hornby,
the writer based High Fidelity, was based there. That's the
neighborhood from that book. So that's that. When we got there,
it was really nice and then it started to cool
a bit nasty, so I was like, let's just go,

(24:32):
and so we moved to Berlin. Meet my wife and
like two eighteen month old son. We moved to Berlin
and Berlin was I mean, for such a huge city
in Berlin's massive, it's quite provincial when we moved there.
You know, you've get kids here are like nine, ten

(24:52):
eleven walking hand in hand down the street. It's lovely.
And so we went there. We stayed there for ten
years and I had a lovely time, and then came
to came to Los Angeles.

Speaker 1 (25:07):
Okay, There're been a lot of legendary records made in Berlin.
We had David Bowie in the seventies, We ultimately had
you two. Could those records have been made anywhere or
is there a vibe that affects your creativity in Berlin?

Speaker 2 (25:23):
Well? Interestingly, I the both of those bands and Depeche
Mode made their seminal albums are arguably some of their
most seminal work in one studio called hansa Hands of
Tone Studio, and I had I had. My room was

(25:47):
in that complex. My room was the room where Depeche
Mode even when we were recording. When I was demoing,
I was a found video of Depeche Mode in my
room playing like showing a journalist how to sample the
sound of dropping like a scruise on the ground and

(26:11):
showing them that you could put it into keep order
and you can so could the question, Yeah, Berlin I
think now this is both of those bands. Actually, you
two came after the wall fell, so Bert Bowie did

(26:32):
a lot of great work with you know, in hans
A before the Way, before the wall fell. You two
came in after the wall fell. There is a vibe
there and I think, but the further you got away,
the further you got away from the vibe at the
further you got away from the wall falling in nineteen
eighty nine, that the more it Berlin has become a

(26:55):
little bit just smoother, you know, a little bit more
and your margindized, if you know what I mean. You know,
the high store streets are kind of like the high
store streets. They got a Uni Globe, they've got a Nike,
They've got you know, all these things. So it's but
there's definitely, you know, Berlin is a very interesting town.

Speaker 1 (27:17):
You know.

Speaker 2 (27:17):
If you want provincial, you got it in Spade Fields.
If you want Second World War horror like tours, you
got it. If you want to go and dance all
night in a nightclub, you got it. And Berlin's kind
of got it all. And there's a very liberal I

(27:39):
would say liberal. It's an interesting flavor because it's not
quite liberal. It's it's when people can put up with
other people. I don't know the words my Ward's family,
when people can like if you're gay, black, white, and
they don't care. It's just like you're just a human,

(28:02):
let's just go on with it. I think like in
all the years I lived in Berlin, and never once
I never once heard any and everyone saw someone getting
beaten up, and never once saw broken glass, and never
once saw anyone raised their voices to anyone. It's a

(28:26):
very and I think that has a lot to do
with their history, where there's almost zero tolerance over there
of any aggression of any kind. So you've got like
you could you can be arrested for calling someone a cunt,
which is if you're in Glasgow. I mean it's like
Glasgow's like you know, Iceland has got like a thousand

(28:50):
ways to say snows. In Glasgow, there's like a thousand
meanings of the word cunt. We use it in a
very different way than everyone else. So if you call
someone a seaward in Glasgow, sorry, in Berlin, you can
get arrested because they don't put up with any of it.

(29:10):
And I think that's got a lot to do with
their like the history people just they don't have any
time for any any like anger or aggression. But weirdly,
as I've been living in Los Angeles the last eight

(29:31):
years and looking over to Berlin and still talking to
friends over there, looking at the news every day, we're
beginning the pendulum is swinging to the to the other
side again. And it seems to be very like like
I say, it's a pendulum, the pendulum of politics or
the pendulum of pendulum of the populace with one way

(29:54):
and another. I think Angelo mercle was possibly one of
the most amazing and politicians in history. Like she managed
to hold on to power, keep everyone happy, most closely
stand on the world stage. And and she had she

(30:15):
had a very and and she had a very sort
of right on background. But I know it's and then
she's left, and pendulum is the petulum is swinging very
much in the opposite direction. Now, I guess ship like
that happens.

Speaker 1 (30:41):
So how did you end up leaving Berlin and getting
to Los Angeles again?

Speaker 2 (30:46):
It was never and it wasn't really a plan as such.
I we had a we had a We're fortunate enough
to have an apartment in New York and we got
that in two thousand and three and we sold it
in two thousand and fifteen or so, and I was like,

(31:12):
we we knew we had friends in Los Angeles, and
I was like, let's just get a place there, like
swap a brick for a brick. So we did that
and we went over to LA and when we were
over someone was like, oh, they're having open days for schools.
And Clay had been not really enjoying bilingual school, which

(31:34):
is like in Germany. In Berlin, he went to German
speaking an English speaking school together and they teach you
mathematics in German and they teach you history and English
and it's like it all kind of and he never
really liked it. So we saw a school over here

(31:55):
and then we thought, fuck it, let's just go. So
we all of our stuff in a big truck and
came to LA. And we've been here and I'm gett.
I think it's like it seems to be a pattern here,
like a ten or around about ten years. Every ten

(32:16):
years I moved to another place, and it's coming up
to that now.

Speaker 1 (32:20):
So if we were talking, we are talking, would you
be saying, yeah, I'm ready to move on from La.

Speaker 2 (32:26):
Oh yeah, absolutely absolutely, I've never you know, on like
La and Berlin are apparently his sister sister cities, and
there's there there couldn't be more different, Like I was saying,
in all my time in ten years in Berlin, I

(32:47):
didn't hear anyone raise their voice to anyone. I didn't
see any trouble. It's a very peaceful place. Like yeah
it was. It was super peaceful on the country. Come
into Los Angeles. It's like you're I was saying to
someone the other day, LA is like a pressure point

(33:10):
on like if you're getting a massage and someone you know,
presses that a little bit in your back where you're
like fucking know here where all the where, everything, all
the nerves come into one point. That's l A is
one of those places. And uh, it's it's it's downs
is it. Yeah, it's it's upstream from from other places.

(33:31):
If it happens here in La, then you can be
guaranteed it's probably going to happen somewhere else down the line. Culturally,
you know, they make Hollywood here and and but I
and all of the cities I've ever lived in, I mean,
Ela gets a really Eli gets. I don't know why

(33:53):
people think Ella is kind of like look and dizzy
or you know, you get New Yorkers early la and
can't San Franciscan say like la as if it's kind
of like nah, I've never lived in a more badass,
hard ass city than this. I mean this city at

(34:15):
the moment anyway. And maybe it's just the time, but
the it's like, you've got that this homeless crisis. You
got seventy thousand homeless people, which is you know, it's
like what in it? How can I how can people
let that happen in the richest country in the world.

(34:37):
You've got insane crime. I saw I've seen four people
dying in front of me on the street in Los Angeles. Well,
I've lived here. I've gotten into four different altercations, not
none of which had anything to do with be just
people like I got someone try to carjackbe like pull

(35:01):
me out of the window of my car. Someone When
we were away from our house for a little while
we came back, I'm talking like a week. We came
back to our house. There was a dudle in our house,
tooled up like he had but he was he'd just
taken drugs, so he was a little bit like, you know,

(35:22):
out of his head a little bit, and he was
a big guy and I had to like gingerly walk
him out of the house, you know. And I got
into this fight where a guy who smashed his hands
down on my car and ordered me to get out
of the car, which, being from Glasgow, I did. He

(35:45):
took his shoes off and it was like going to
like beat me up karate style, and I managed to
talk him off the ledge. We're very diplomatic Scottish people.
We top people off ledges. They should get us in for,
you know, like when people are on when people are
jumping off bridges. And oh yeah, I got bitten by

(36:09):
a dog and almost lost my finger, my finger. I
was a neighbor's dog escaped and I was just driving
down my hill and at at like another neighbor's dog
had been hit by a card a year earlier, and
I've seen I saw the dog and I'd stopped my
car and there was all the other cars on the

(36:30):
on the road and I was like, no on my watch,
And so I chased this sausage dog up my hill
and then picked it up and it just like chewed
my finger off. So it's been and then, yeah, I've
seen people like I've seen things. I feel like Rutger
Hower at the end of Plage Runner. I've seen things

(36:52):
you wouldn't believe. It's living in Los Angeles, and I'm
not to mention you're like, we're truly right in the
heart of global warming. It's like last year there was
massive floods. My house flooded and it was a nightmare.
This year, my friend's houses are gone, they burnt down.

(37:14):
Because it's just like what and we're right on the
San Andreas fault line ready to pop at any second.
Why anyone would come here? You know, you've got to
be crazy to come here, right, but in a weird way,
all of that kind of all of that kind of

(37:35):
makes it interesting. But I am absolutely ready to move
from Los Angeles. I think if you've lived here, if
you were born here and you grew up, it's like
boiling a frog, you'll have no idea that coming in
from the outside. I mean my album, there's a song
on the album, which is the title track of the album,

(37:56):
which is a massive event on Los Angeles and it's
a sort of spoken word. I'm not saying it's a rap,
but it's a spoken word of me just ranting about
the city. And I think the reason if if, if anything.

(38:17):
And again, and then there's the people of Los Angeles
who you see, it's been amazing actually to watch people
going out and helping other people in this time of
this disastrous time that everyone's certain neighborhoods are going through
the outpouring of of of charity and helping and it's like,

(38:40):
I've never seen anything like it. And I think because
in Los Angeles, you're not really you don't get a
chance to rehearse being a human being because you're everyone.
Come out of your house, you get in your car,
go to your work, get out your car, you walk
up the stairs, do your work, come down the stairs,

(39:02):
getting your car, go home, walk across your path, go
into your house. There's that sort of so everyone is
in there these like metal boxes in their pods, listening
to their podcasts. Hopefully they're listening to this one. And
and but there's not this. It's there's no metro system.

(39:26):
You know, like if you were to take what we
were in Paris in September and I was thinking, wow,
if you if you took the Metro out of Paris.
It would be like, how could you possibly have Paris
without the metro? How could you have New York without
the subway and the and the and the bus system.
Or London with its tubes and its public transport, where

(39:50):
no matter if you're rich or poor and everything in between, black, white,
every religion and creed, they all get on it. You
all sit next to each other. You might meet someone
who talks to you. You might you might be and
you might have a revelation, you might have nothing, but
you're all in it together, whereas in La we're all

(40:13):
in our own separate little pods and the We do
have a public transport system here, but that's generally for
like poor people who can't afford a cup. So I think,
like watching how the city and the people of the
city have reacted to this disaster just now, it's been
really interesting because I think folk are dying to be human,

(40:36):
you know, they're like they just they want that there's
a there's an absence, there's like her They talk about
the drought and the hills. There's been like a drought
of humanity or something here. You know, there's people aren't
allowed to talk to one another because they're all in there,
they're all in their cars. Anyway I am. I mean,
I could talk all day about it, but I think

(40:57):
it's time to move on.

Speaker 1 (40:59):
Oh okay, just to stay on this LA point for
one second. You're talking about New Yorkers in San Francisco,
people putting down Los Angeles. Yeah, what are the positives
that you seem to be alluding to?

Speaker 2 (41:15):
I think there's there's there's It's like if you concrete
everything over, you know, nature has a habit of just
like popping through you. You see the little bit of
green grass popping through the crack on the pavement, on
the sidewalk, And I think underneath all of this there's
a there's a big heart. Ellie's got a big heart.

(41:36):
But it's too dangerous, you know. I mean, I've got
to say it's a dangerous place. And I'm like, I
feel like I'm reached. I'm reaching my third strike and
I don't know you are My inner my inner alarm
bell alerts, it's is it red? Now it's like get out,
you know my I mean for five years ago was

(41:59):
like get ready, and now it's like get out. So
I'm not alluding to it. I don't think. I think
you meet in your life. There's loads of people you
meet along the way, and you learn a little bit
from every single person you meet, and then there's all

(42:20):
like the other people that you don't get to meet.
I think this is a I think I came to
Los Angeles to live at a really, for want of
a better word, interesting time, and it's not being great.

(42:41):
It's been frustrating at times. I am and I'm ready
to I'm ready to get out. I mean, my friend
left the other day. He's he's moved to Alabama and
of all places, to Birmingham, and I was like, you're leaving,
Like it's like the guy running from the the warehouse

(43:03):
is the warehouse explodes into you know in the movies,
and he's driving his car and on the background there's
like fire, and you know, it's like Lord of the
Rings in the background. It's it's a it's a it's
a it's an intense place, and I've really kind of
enjoyed and not enjoyed living here. I don't think I've

(43:26):
ever been more stressed out than I've than than to
be in in LA than any other city I've ever
lived in. So I'm quite ready to move on to
I mean, I think about maybe moving back to New
York because my kid is going to art school there
next next year. Like New York, I mean, when we

(43:48):
moved out of New York, it was like, fuck, man,
this place is that it's just too crazy. But it's
there's you know, it has it has. There is more
chance to bump into people on the streets in New
York and less so here.

Speaker 1 (44:04):
Okay, how do you keep a band together when you're
living in Berlin and then you're living in la.

Speaker 2 (44:14):
We met in various different ways, and we became a
band eventually, And hmmm, what drew is to one another
as friends is the thing that's at the core of
the band, This friendship between the four of us, and

(44:37):
each relationship, my relationship to Kneel and the drummer, to Dougie,
to Andy the guitarist, and Andy's relationship to me and
the two other guys, and you know, everyone's relationships I've
woven in such a way as it's it's a very
manageable relationship. You know, some bands get together in the

(45:01):
last two weeks and you know, the front man falls
out with a guitarist because the guitars wants to be
the singer or I don't know, or the front of
mine wants to be the drummer. I don't know. And
some bands last, you know, like us twenty years as
a band, thirty four years as friends. And I think

(45:22):
there's a lot that's a lot to do with making
each other laugh. There's a lot of laughter in our relationship.
It's funny like each year that goes on, when we
do interviews, we we're asked this more and more, like
what keeps you together? Because it's like I feel like sometimes,

(45:47):
like you know, you get these couples that be married
for like fifty sixty years and it's like, oh my god,
And I guess it's like you just we make each
other laugh. We really expect each other space, the personal space.
We also we're friends, but you're in a band together,

(46:09):
your business partners as well, but you're also married. It's
a weird quasi place between all of those three that
trifecta of things and the relationship of our by this
somewhere in the middle of it. And you know, you'd

(46:29):
take a bullet for them, but you could shoot them sometimes,
you know what I mean, Like like any marriage that
seems to work is there's a sort of duality there.
And I mean, I love the guys in my band
and we love each other, and I think that's the
bottom line.

Speaker 1 (46:49):
Yeah, but if you're all that in the same location,
how does it work?

Speaker 2 (46:54):
All? Right? Well, thankfully we can. We get together and
play shows in the same location and uh, and we
go into the studio in the same location. And when
we're not on the road or in the studio, we're
in our different places. And and we don't need to
be together all the time, because when you're on the road,

(47:14):
you are together all the time. I think we've spent
more time together than we spent with anyone in our lives,
probably maybe even our own children. So yeah, we we
almost like that the bat phone goes and we're like, Okay,
we'll be right there, and we all we all turn

(47:35):
up to the show and and and then you go
on tour, like we're about to go on a tour
in America and we're going to turn up in Raley,
North Carolina on Monday and get on bus and off
we go, and like we've been to get there for

(48:00):
like a long time. And I think like it just
I mean I mean, god, we've there's some I mean,
I don't know I should say this, but there's there's
some like big shows we've done where we've maybe not
played for like two years, like we've had a blong
break and h we've gone, fuck it, let's just do

(48:25):
the show and see if we can just do it
without raharsing, just just for the hell of it. And
its fine because it's like fallen off a bike. So
it is to me all the bands that I love,
they've always kept there the sanctity of the band. You
know that the four members have remained the same until

(48:46):
the band had broken up. So yeah, it's it's it's
pretty easy to.

Speaker 1 (48:52):
Okay, so you're going to go on the road, you're
not going to rehearse at all.

Speaker 2 (48:56):
Oh No, we've we've we've basically come we've basically come
off a UK tour, so we don't wear weird. We're
so rehearsed. We've only had like three weeks off, so
we're we're in peak match fitness right now. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (49:22):
Okay, you talked earlier about being in Brussels talking about
remuneration for recordings. Can you tell us more about your
viewpoint on that.

Speaker 2 (49:33):
Yeah, I don't know where I stand on that anymore.
I'm still getting everything's changing so quickly right now, and
it's just they don't know where I stand on it.
I was talking. I was saying, in.

Speaker 3 (49:53):
A car park, we are driving out of a concrete
car park the other day and there was a guy
with his window down playing music, dance music, really.

Speaker 2 (50:07):
That's kind of music. And I had never heard this
song ever. I don't know. It was like, no idea
what this song was. This guy was. This guy was
loving this. He was really getting into it, and it
made me think, like I was. I just had this
thought to myself that maybe in the next ten years,

(50:29):
we'll see with all of the artificial intelligence and deep
learnings of AI sort of things happening, you'll have so
you'll have all the music that you like that you

(50:52):
listen to you know it. So iTunes will know or
Spotify will know what your favorite songs are because they
push you in songs, they know what you like. You'll
discover new songs, and so that's what's happening at the moment.
And when I heard this guy's music that I didn't know,
and he was like as if it was like he

(51:13):
was listening to I don't know like something. Everyone was like,
he just loved this music that I had no idea of.
It made me think maybe in the next ten years
or even sooner, there'll come a time when those companies Apple, Spotify,
the streamers will have their own way of so you

(51:35):
use a user, well, you'll be able to generate your
own music that is so well done that it's almost
it might even get to number one of the charts,
and it will just be based on what you like.

(51:57):
It's getting there. I mean, I was thinking the other day,
like I was actually talking to chat GPT about it.
Have you ever talked to chat GPT? No, you should
try it. It's it's it's a it's a it's a
it's a it's a trip. So you can actually talk

(52:17):
to it now, and it talked back to you really
like a like when you're talking. And I was saying
to it because I had this thought that we'd we
started this is a quite interesting bookend because we started
talking about Google and my feelings of the finger of

(52:38):
the silicon finger being like being anally anally inserted into
your data. I think that I was thinking, in the future,
wouldn't it be a nice thing. If every person you me,
every person like these these these companies were able to

(53:02):
mine every email that you've ever written, every phone call
you've ever made, every like I'm sure they maybe do
a little bit of it just now because they know
what to push you for adverts and whatnot. But imagine like,
because when I look at my emails, I have a
certain tone and I'm sure you do too, right, And

(53:23):
so if they got all of that information on a
on on a language sort of level, and and and
crunched it all together, and then they used your actual
voice as well, like they could take now they can
take my voice. I've done it myself. They've got the
technology even now where you can say a sentence that

(53:47):
they give you and then you can write anything and
it will say in your voice. It's pretty amazing and
it's very early days yet. But if you could crunch
all the information from all your emails and canmmunications and
somehow get your personality or close ish to your personality

(54:08):
out of that, Like how would you answer a question
about Brexit, or how would you answer a question Fran
about or Bob about your mum or you know or
your family or whatever imagine, like I've lost a lot
of people. I just lost my friend, a really really

(54:29):
good friend of mine, just before Christmas, and we were
texting to each other a couple of days before it,
and I was looking through the texts and it's like
he's pretty much there, and the textion was his personality's
definitely there. But imagine you could if your dad died,

(54:52):
or your mom died, or your brother or sister died,
or your best friend died, and you could call them up,
you know, you could just like speak to them and
they would speak back and at the close ish to them,
and it was based on all their millions and billions
of emails that they've written in, all of their phone
calls and all of whatever is I think that would

(55:14):
be a nice thing to do with everyone's information rather
than pushing you know by this Alapisia cream threw your hair,
you know what I mean?

Speaker 1 (55:25):
Well, I mean there are a couple of things there.
On some level, we're on the continuum because it used
to be and I grew up on the East Coast,
I moved to the West coast. You kind of lost
touch with people. Your kid, who's what nineteen or whatever,
he's never going to lose touch with anybody. Everybody's going
to be completely reachable. I mean, you talk about the fires,

(55:48):
somebody tracked me down for somebody's phone number, who's in
a hotel. In the old days, if you would change
your number all the time, Today people have a number
that's their number. They don't want to change it because
everybody knows it, et cetera. But I think when it
comes to creativity, there's a human I mean, it's like

(56:08):
you were talking, You're talking about you know, this is
one of these algorithmic things people tell. You know, I
got a big bug up my ass because statistically active
users don't listen to playlists they pick and choose. But
what if I'm listening to Jackson Brown and Joni Mitchell.
It's never going to predict that I buy the First

(56:31):
Wire album one four three. But I bought it and
I listened to it and I kind of liked it.
You know, same thing. You know, It's like research. Steve
Jobs legend a difficult person, but leaving that alone, never
did any market research. Market reasters tell you where you've been.

(56:53):
I won't tell you where you're going. It's like people
send you AI songs that sound like legendary acts and
you go, oh, well that's kind of cool, but you
don't continue to listen. And it's like whenever you listen,
you know, we listen to the old favorites, but what
we're hungry for is the new and different. So listen.

(57:14):
There will definitely be evolution. But moving on from this point,
you're going on the road. Do you have to go
on the road for the money or you're going on
the road because you're a band and that's what you do.

Speaker 2 (57:29):
You're asking some very good questions. It's great, great question.
So it's a it's a balance. We when Travis started, like,
first of all, all of the bands that made me
once to get into a band, we're American. I just

(57:52):
I mean it's being maybe it's a Scottish thing. We
look over to America and we just love we all
loved your accent, you know, I love the American accident
and all the movies and the TV shows and it
was just like couldn't get enough of it, and your
culture was really it was just this the shining White
House on the hell kind of it was to us

(58:13):
and all the ball the music that come out of America.
I mean I've got you sort of take your own
for granted, the Beatles and all that thing, but Irm
for instance, was a huge influence on me, not musically,
but more like, this is what a band should feel
like their career should be, not just this rocket to

(58:36):
the moon and then remain in orbit for it. It's like
it should go up and down, you should go left
and right, and the band should stay together. And then
Bill Barry sort of had his aneurysm and stepped aside,
and they went on for a little bit longer. But
when they were a four piece, they were my template
as well as the band Robbie Robertson, Leave On Hell,

(58:58):
et cetera. They were, if you could sort of Travis
Are somewhere in It's like a cocktail of those two bands.
So when we first came out to America, we toured
with Ben Folds five, and we kept coming touring and
touring and touring, never making a penny. We never ever

(59:19):
ever have made money in America ever, We've never We've
maybe lost money once at the very early days when
we were starting out, but we generally we have all
through our history just broken even in America. So we
come to America when you see Travis in America, we're

(59:40):
coming to see you. We're not there to make any
money or anything, because we've never made money in America,
and our manager didn't really like that, so he stopped.
He stopped, he stopped bringing us over here fourteen years ago,
and eventually we we we changed their manag sure after

(01:00:01):
twenty twenty odd years and and now that we're a
little bit more in control of our of the controls
of our of our spaceship, we're coming back. And we
might not make any money in America, but it's not
about money. Like you ask any any songwriter or a
musician or artists worth their salt, or journalist or anyone

(01:00:25):
who makes something from nothing, they you probably find that
most of them are kind of like like, wow, we
we we're still getting away with this. You know, we're
still able to do this. So I would say, coming
to America, we Travis Priky, we go and do like festivals.

(01:00:49):
This is where bands generally make their their their like
paydays and and festivals are very different from their own shows.
And we're we haven't really toured in America for fourteen years,
so this is like this tours. I feel like we're
can have. It's like starting over again. It feels I

(01:01:13):
think there's a lot of a lot of work to
do in America, and then I don't know if there's
enough years left in my life to do it. But
we have a good following here and people come and
see us, so I guess that's good.

Speaker 1 (01:01:34):
Okay, underneath that, you're gonna go on the road. Let's
just assume you break even. You're gonna play venues where
everybody's gonna know all the songs, great personal experience. In
the back of your mind, are you saying, well, if
this is really great, maybe next time they'll bring their friends,

(01:01:54):
will be larger venues, or maybe there'll be some spark.
Is that part of it?

Speaker 2 (01:02:02):
Yeah, there's definitely a part of it. Every band wants
to break America, every band, because it's like there's there's
a there's there's different aspects of of what it is
that we do. One of them is try and write
a melody that you've not heard before, try and speak
your heart. Don't write a song, don't don't ever ever
write a song to fit with the current wallpaper. Just

(01:02:25):
like Steve job Right, I write songs. I'm a big
believer in that. Just if it comes out like it's you,
don't don't kill it because it doesn't look like all
the other ones. You know, like like that that because
it doesn't look the other ones, then that's something to celebrate.
So all the songs that come out has to mean something.

(01:02:46):
But there's also another aspect of it, which is wow.
You know, like songs are like a cure. Songs are
like medicine. They're like magic spells. And you can see
it when you when you play a show. The challenge
is break America and and but don't don't lose that

(01:03:10):
core value. Don't don't don't do it against your core values.
Don't burn your core value used to break America. If
you break America, it'll probably be the backs. And we
broke Europe and the United Kingdom in nineteen ninety nine,
about two thousand and three, and then it was but

(01:03:32):
it was real, it was it's not It wasn't really
that enjoyable because you suddenly you're famous, and then everyone
treats you differently, and then suddenly you're it's a weird thing.
I can't imagine what it's like to break America. But
the challenge is to hold on to your core values

(01:03:55):
and be and play bigger venues because these songs, they
they work, they're they're a cure. They make people feel better.
They and you and I both know when you hear
a song you talked about Jackson Brown, I was listening to,
Oh God, it's that song. It's in Taxi Driver, remember

(01:04:23):
the name for this late for this guy. So that
when I heard that song, and I didn't really know
Jackson Brown. I know what it looks like and a
few friends had records by albums and then I heard
that song and I was like, who the fuck is this?
And it like it went into me. I was sorry

(01:04:45):
for digressing, jumping and popping and even but my brain
jumps around a little bit. Last night, I was lying
in bed with my mother half and it was like
one o'clock in the morning and we're sort of trying
to fall asleep, and the end song on a TV

(01:05:07):
show we were watching was Wichita Lineman, which I mean,
I could tear you just thinking about that song. What
is it about that song that makes me like like
well up? And there's a line in it and I
was saying to say, like, what, what an amazing thing?

(01:05:30):
There's a line in that song that goes and I
need you more than want you, and I want you
for all the time. Isn't it great that you can
hear a song and that one line can last you
your whole life. I can, I can eat that line
forever because it never ever it's like a riddle or something,

(01:05:51):
and you sit with it and you're like, oh it
even now just saying I'm like, oh, such a gorgeous
use the words, the melody and the emotion and the
strings sound on top of it. It's music is like
a So if you're a musician who writes from the heart,
it goes out and you we're not we're not, we're

(01:06:13):
never just we're not doing it for money. Right, You're
out and you're you're you're carrying the cure. You're you're
taking it to people to make people feel better, and
I'm if you doing that, then I want to take
it to a bigger audience. You might never your audience
might never get bigger because you're not in control of

(01:06:34):
that at all. But but the temptation to take it bigger,
to cure more people, to make hearts feel better, Like
people come up to me all the time and tell
me all this song really helped me, or this song
got me back in touch with my dad, or because
we both liked it, and you know, it's like wow,

(01:06:56):
it's a powerful thing, is music. And I'm I'm deeply
kind of humbled and everything to be able to do it.
And I definitely I think I think we've been singing
longer than we've been speaking. And I think that's why
music's maybe goes deeper than all of the arts.

Speaker 1 (01:07:26):
Okay, you talk about not selling out and you got
to speak from the heart. To what degree didn't you
dissociate yourself from the audience. Let's use the reverse paradigm.
There are all these people in writing sessions as we
speak in Nashville trying to write a hit. Okay, yeah,

(01:07:48):
is there ever in your mind going, well, you know
if I do that, I want to write my own
Wichita Lineman, let me see how I can put the
pieces together.

Speaker 2 (01:07:57):
Of course you do that every time you sit down song.
But you don't write Richita Iman. You write Richard ta Wineman. Right,
You're you're just you're trying to all everything. You're like
a You're like a tea bag in every single song
you've ever listened to and every experience you've ever had,

(01:08:19):
and every time your heart's being broken or you've been
let down, or every time you've been lightened up, it's
a tea leaf in that tea bag and then the
hot water pours in and then a cup of tea
comes out, and it's a different flavor every time. You
don't know what you're going to get. When you sit
down to write a song, you don't know what it's
going to be. It's fucking amazing. It's a miracle. It's
like like we're talking to Dougie, our best player when

(01:08:42):
we were on tour and U can. He's like, yes,
our shows kind of we have the song and we
have a talk a lot on stage, and I don't
have anything in my head before I go on stage.
I just talk. So some nights it's just nonsense and
it's and some nights I say some quite cool stuff.

(01:09:02):
But there's definitely two different bits of the gig. And
he says there's the talking bit, and it gets the
audience is listening to that, and then he says the song.
Then the song begins and he says songs like a
magic spell, and everyone sort of go into this strange
sort of reverie for about four minutes and then you

(01:09:24):
sort of come out of it. And the only people
who are not under the spell are the other roadies
and the guys who are having a like hold the
spelling place because they can't and if they do, and
sometimes they do, go into the spell zone. So yeah,

(01:09:44):
the Nashville thing is an interesting thing because you've got
ten guys sitting around deliberately trying to write a hit,
deliberately thinking. I mean, it's the way the music business
has done its thing. I mean, ninety eight percent of

(01:10:04):
the music business is that, and that's song designing. I'm
more interested in song divining. And that's where the two schools.
That's where AI comes in. That AI will replace that
the thing that I'm doing, the thing that you're doing.
AI can't replace it because you need to you need

(01:10:27):
you need to get your hand bitten by a dog.
You need to get you need to get carjacked, you
need to see someone dying in front of you, You
need to look into like kiss your granda's forehead and
his coffin right that. AI can't fucking do that. And
that's where songwriting or No, I didn't even want to

(01:10:52):
call it that magic. Spell making really comes in handy
and that's why you'll all but always need it, because
we all need that touch human touch thing that makes
us human humans. That makes sense.

Speaker 1 (01:11:08):
So let's just say you had to stop today. Let's
not talk about why do you have enough money? And
there's enough money coming in from your history of Travis
to get to you to the end. Yeah, okay, so
you're not doing this primarily for money, and.

Speaker 2 (01:11:30):
What's my job? So you get paid for it, right,
for for doing like the festivals and things and that
that sort of. But I'm lucky enough to have written
some evergreen songs that that the residuals are like good. Yeah,
it's it's not it's not it's not great, but it's
it's not like I grew up poor. And that's another thing,

(01:11:51):
you know, like if you're poor, you're all of this,
all these wonderful things like music and art, culture and
journalists and all those things are not on your menu.
You're you're going to go to school, You're you're going
to not enjoy it. You're going to leave and get

(01:12:14):
a job, have a have a family, and die and
life's going to be hard. It's going to be cool
and nice and there's going to be all the ups
and downs, and but I, like I said, it wasn't
one of the menu for me. And my mum moved
us from this very like where we lived was the
Heroin capital of Europe in nineteen eighty three or eighty two,

(01:12:39):
place called Possel Park like if you's it's like fossil
but with a p and we lived there and she
moved us over to the south side of Glasgow and
to one of the best normal just schools, but it
was one of the best schools in the whole city.

(01:13:00):
And at this school, I there was a couple of
teachers that saw something in me and even polished it
a little bit and gave me confidence and got me
and went look at this. Look here's the impressionists. You
can draw. I mean that's what I did. I was
a drawer. I never like like I think, I only

(01:13:23):
started singing like when I was like much older and
being in bands was much more down the line. But
art and drawing and visual art was much more my things.
Kind of still isn't a way, So yeah, I didn't.
That wasn't on the menu and for me and so

(01:13:44):
I to think that I have residuals or you from
get played on the radio from these songs is partly
kind of like wow again, Like I say, like musicians
are a little bit like can you believe we're getting

(01:14:06):
away with this? You can actually make a living out of.

Speaker 1 (01:14:10):
So have you ever decided to go straight? You didn't decide,
If you didn't do it, you ever thought about it? Though,
I just can't do this anymore. For whatever reason. I
got to do something else.

Speaker 2 (01:14:21):
Sure, sure, yeah, yeah, I do it. Every time I
sit down to write a song. I fucking hate writing songs.
It's the most humiliating tooth pulling process in my life.
And there's because it's like everyone talks about it like

(01:14:42):
it's some kind of artistic thing I have. It's just
pure digging dig dig dicks. Like uh. The the scene
at the beginning of There Won't Be Blood, Daniel day
lewis down the hole like with a little with his
leg broken, and he's digging and digging and digging looking

(01:15:05):
for that little bit of gold that he's going to
take up and crawl across the desert to the to
the guy. He's going to crush it down and make
it into the ring or whatever. It feels like. Songwriting
to me is very man you And there's a lot
of like, you know, the sort of classic scrunched up

(01:15:28):
bits of paper get thrown at the waste paper by
his kid. You know, that's a piece of ship. That's
a piece of ship. And you sort of you've slowly
drinned your ego down until it's dust and you can't
and you think you're the worst song writer in the
entire world. And what I've learned is just beyond the

(01:15:49):
crest of that hill of self hate and humiliation lies
the song. The ego can't. I've learned in my many
years writing that the ego has to be out of
the way, it has to be gone for you to
for the thing to come through you. And when it does,

(01:16:12):
it's like it's kind of mad and special. And that's
the thing you get addicted to. You get addicted to
that feeling when when a song comes through and you
let oh my good, when nothing compares to it, there's
nothing that compares to it. I can only imagine what
Jimmy Webb thought when when he wrote and I need
you more than want you, and I want you for

(01:16:34):
all time. I mean probably I mean, he's he probably
punched the air and he was just like yes. But
to get to that line, who knows if it took
like months of digging and digging or if it just
like happened with that. But so yeah, when I'm in that,

(01:16:56):
I'm like, fuck this. I do not have fucking hate
this job. I'm rubbish. I can't do this, But I
do it because at the back of your head, you
want that. You want you want to you know that
the there's a certain arrangement of notes and a rhythm
that constitute a new melody, and finding a new melody

(01:17:17):
and a new song or feeling to put around that
melody is more overpowering than the humiliation and that I
want to stop doing this, but I do have those
feelings like I can't go on.

Speaker 1 (01:17:34):
Oh okay. But in terms of your process, are you
always writing songs or you're saying, oh, it's time to
do an album. I got to sit down and write songs.

Speaker 2 (01:17:49):
It's like going to the bathroom. It's like flushing a toilet.
Like no, it's not like litt let's let's keep scatology
out of it. It's like flushing a toilet. Will stay
hold we'll stay in the bathroom. But your cistern where
all the water is kept, it fills up. And in
this filling up of the cistern is an It is

(01:18:13):
what you do between the finishing the last song for
the last record and beginning writing the next and the
next song, not the next record, because it's just song
best and and and right now it's filling up. And
I know, I know songwriters who have gone in and

(01:18:35):
they flush the toilet, and now comes the album, and
then they go for for the next twenty years and
they get little little gyps if there's nothing. Really you
gotta wait for it. You gotta let let let it.
Let your live a bit go out. You have experiences,
live your life a little bit. Let the let the

(01:18:56):
cistern fill up. I used to feel like shit, I
don't want to write writer's block. And then I realized
sort of got wise to it, and I was like, no,
this is this is part of the process, This is
part of this is a complete This is like possibly
the sort of the biggest bit of it, which is

(01:19:16):
the the inaction. You know, you're the harvest is only
a week long. You know, for the rest of the year,
the field is being tell the seats are being planted,
then watered, then then grown and then but like I say,
the harvest is very quick. So right now I'm in

(01:19:40):
the follow that I'm quite happy to not be writing.

Speaker 1 (01:19:46):
Okay, I understand the analogy to the system, Yes, but
how much of this is eking it out? And how
much of it is a bolt of lightning raw inspiration?

Speaker 2 (01:20:00):
Oh, it's all most of it digging. And then then
you see the little the little something. And I think
if there's any talent involved in song ring its identities,
knowing that when you see it, it's having the patience
to dig, and knowing having the sense to sense the

(01:20:22):
glitter when you see it or when you feel it,
and know that that's worth pursuing, and you pull it
out very gently, you know, like a little thread of
nylon out of the the ether, out of nothing, and
you can make I mean, I was talking to someone
the other day about what's that like? Two notes? Right?

(01:20:48):
Is that that classical music place? Dun damn dunn dwn Right,
that's two notes. And he took that and he made
it into a symphony. Two notes, the whole fucking thing
two notes. And that's what I mean, Like it can be.
He's so he recognized in that little two notes an

(01:21:12):
entire He made an entire. It's like you can pick
it out and you can make a symphony out of it.
You can make a two minute pop song out of it.
You can make a poem, you can write a paint
of painting. It's so there is a flash of lightning
and that's but most of it is darkness. That you

(01:21:33):
don't see the lightning unless it's dark.

Speaker 1 (01:21:34):
Okay, so let's assume at what point do you say
it's time to record, and how does that happen since
everybody lives in a different location.

Speaker 2 (01:21:46):
I'm well, you we so you go right, we can't
just I don't want to. There's there there's a natural
sort of cycle to it. So you get your you're
sort of maybe three quarters. You've got maybe you've written

(01:22:06):
hundreds and hundreds of ideas, but there's maybe seven that
are that have a heartbeat or a pulse. So then
you start talking about like, shoot, like let's let's maybe
plan for in nine or six or nine months going
to the studio and make a record. And it's as
simple as that. You just book the time, put a
line in the sand, and you go everything has to

(01:22:26):
be written and demoed and ready to go by that
line then you like in our case, the band came
to Los Angeles, we all went into the studio with
US producer Tony Hoffer and we spent three weeks which
recorded the album and it was done.

Speaker 1 (01:22:44):
So you've worked with a lot of producers. To what
degree our producers influential and what have you learned?

Speaker 2 (01:22:50):
There are hugely influential, hugely And they're influential in that
they're a calm, very calm hand on the wheel there.
They know how to talk to their like musician whisperers.
Speaking to a drummer and a guitarist, there's two different languages,
there's two different types. And they're very very good at

(01:23:12):
talking to people and getting the best possible performance out
of them and almost like the songwriter, they're brilliant at
spotting the best performance not of that person's life, but
that goes perfectly with the song. So when you put
it all together, it's just it's like it sounds like records.
Nigel Gotshi would would be like I'd be like singing

(01:23:35):
and I'd be like that one was brilliant. I was
I was like that's the best one, and Nigel would
come on my headphones like that was ship.

Speaker 1 (01:23:44):
Do it again.

Speaker 2 (01:23:46):
I'm like, okay, and we do it again. I mean
he would say that, but we we were like very
good friends and would joke and he wouldn't mean it shit,
just mean it's not good enough, so can do it again.
I'm like, and to the point again, it may be
an ego thing where I'm like that I'll finished singing something.

(01:24:08):
I'm like, that's the worst I've sung that in the
entire session. And he's like his voice comes on the
count that was great. He's like, come in and you're like,
I'm like, it's not great. There's the worst one. And
you you go in and and plays it back and

(01:24:31):
you're just like it's fair because it's a funny again,
it's like magic, It's really it's really cool.

Speaker 1 (01:24:41):
So you know there was a peak in the UK
the turn of the century for Travis. You won these
brittle awards. All that is great, but emotionally, how is that?
Do you feel like I want to climb the mountaintop
or you say that's just one side detour and a trip.
What do you say you got? I'm pissed that people

(01:25:04):
were not getting recognized on that level.

Speaker 2 (01:25:08):
Two things from from that that period and maybe like
say the brit Awards, sermon, m we we won two
years or three years in a row, we won something.
We gave our awards away to different people that I
don't really care about awards and that's not bothered, but

(01:25:28):
it's nice to get things and be recognized and it's
a reflection of your success. Walking up to get one
of them, to get the award, I was walking up
with the band and there was two levels. There's there's
like the stages here, there's the first level and then

(01:25:48):
there's another level where there's more tables. And we were
on this level, so you have to get up and
walk along. There's a sort of glass barrier, you know,
where people were leaning on it like and as we
were walking up to get our award for the best
British Band of the Year or whatever it was, this
guy stuck his leg out and tripped me up on

(01:26:11):
the way to on the way to the to the
to get match to to get the award. I didn't
really care about and that he tripped me up and
I went like I went flying and I was going
to knock his block off. I was like, fuck you.
It's it's like come on, and then go up and
like be like thanks everyone, be nice and happy. That's

(01:26:35):
the sort of example of this sort of dichotomy of
like you're on top of the world, but actually there's
still a bully out there that's going to, you know,
trip you up, literally trip you up as you're as
you're in your thing. The other thing was another time
when we went up there, I made a speech about
I was like holding the award talking about if you're

(01:26:58):
sitting in your room right now writing trying to write songs,
this is dedicated to you, and I'm like, don't I
said something like, don't give up. If you really really
want to write and do it, just keep pushing and
keep pushing. And I said something along those lines. And
I met someone who's now one of the biggest songwriters

(01:27:22):
in the world, like a total gun for hire, and
she had been on her last legs and she was
going to give up her thing, songwriting, and she saw
us get the awards and it gave her a little

(01:27:42):
bit of hope to keep going and she did, and
she she's doing really well for herself. She's doing the
other me.

Speaker 1 (01:27:53):
Okay, but going to the point where that was a peak.
Are you constantly trying to eve a peak? Or is
that just another bump in the road.

Speaker 2 (01:28:10):
I don't know. Again, you go back to the thing
where you're you're you're carrying the you're carrying the word,
You're carrying the cure. And so I want you want
to you want to get to as you want to
get the cure to as many people as possible. So
you want to you want that song to get out there.

(01:28:33):
So and with that, if it does get out there,
with that comes a lot of like cruise stuff, but
also kind of like for someone for an introvert, it's
not it's not it's not nice when you get famous.
So with that comes uncomfortable stuff. Uncomfortable stuff. Uh yeah,

(01:28:56):
So I'm constantly pushing, yeah, pushing.

Speaker 1 (01:29:00):
Okay, you say you're an introvert, tell me about that
in your everyday life.

Speaker 2 (01:29:07):
I am. I'm very shy. I'm not, it's just weird.
I'm shy, but I'm not afraid to get up on
the stage. I've like when I'm big, A lot of
people are like parties or social gatherings. I'm not really
I get really anxious, like you know, like too many people,

(01:29:28):
there's I don't know why. I just always got a
bit like I mean, some nights maybe not, but other
nights I get a bit. I spend a lot of
time on my own. I'm an only child, and so
I spend a lot of time by myself, and so
writing songs is quite conducive. There's two things go hand

(01:29:52):
in hand. So again yeah, but again on the other
side of that, I'm not I've never been faced by
getting on a stage and talking songes inder what I'm
going to say.

Speaker 1 (01:30:05):
Okay, you're living in la generally speaking, what are you doing?
You're watching streaming television, you're reading a book, you go
into the studio, you're calling up friends. What is your
everyday life? Like?

Speaker 2 (01:30:18):
Well, in everyday life has sort of been upended recently
because my son has graduated now from high school and
he's going to art school next year, and he's having
a year of traveling in gallivanting this year, and I'm touring.
But when he graduated May last year, and then we
went on touring at the end he graduated end of

(01:30:40):
me we went on tour June July or September. I
came back in September and I hadn't processed the whole
life changing. So and I'm still processing that right now
because for seventeen years you are your number one job
is being the father of Clay and that is over

(01:31:03):
everything else. That's my whole day was that and songwriting
and all the other stuff revolved around that. But now
he's off, So I'm now in this new quite nice, like,
oh I've got some got some room. So I do
a lot of work for the band. I mean making

(01:31:26):
videos and making artwork and writing songs and and that
that generally takes up a lot of time. As you'll know.
You can you can sit for the last night, I
was listening to a show we recorded it in Glasgow

(01:31:49):
last December. It was our last show of the year,
and I got all of the files and then just
started fiddling around with it on pro tools in like
three hours, just and so time, and you know, it's
that's what I do with my time.

Speaker 1 (01:32:04):
I just what you in Potter, Okay, But to what
degree are you social? You live in a big city
and to what degree you know, Robbie.

Speaker 2 (01:32:15):
Williams, I'm not social at all.

Speaker 1 (01:32:17):
Okay, So you're not social at all. So generally speaking,
you're a homebody. You're doing your thing.

Speaker 2 (01:32:22):
Yeah, I've never had a dinner party in my entire life.
I've never thrown one.

Speaker 1 (01:32:28):
How about going to one.

Speaker 2 (01:32:30):
I've gone a couple, but I'll leave early. It just
stresses me out too much.

Speaker 1 (01:32:37):
I'm just like, not, Well, you talked about this friend
who moved to Alabama, you talked about the friend who
passed away. Do you have a regular friend network that
you're in contact with?

Speaker 2 (01:32:48):
Yeah, I do, dude, but it's not very big, and
it's yeah, it's not back again. It's like we're living
in a time where you need everyone's like everyone's got
like fifty thousand friends. And I'm like, I tend to

(01:33:08):
think about you sort of mirror your first seven years.
The rest of your life mirrors that. And I grew
up with my mum, just me and her. That was it,
and my granddad, Ma Nana would pop in and I
would pop in there. And that was very small. I
didn't have any brothers and sisters. I didn't. I only

(01:33:29):
have one cousin and I'd see them every few persis.
So my life now very much reflects that time. I
have my my other half sparer, and we spent a
lot of time together, Like she's half our time with
our kids, and when she's not doing that, we were
hanging out. If we can triangulate our times because I'm

(01:33:51):
half with my kid and his mom's half with him.
But yeah, it's very simple.

Speaker 1 (01:33:59):
So what do go your You a student of the game,
someone like Elton John follows it really closely. The guys
at a c DC. Young says, I only listen to
my own music.

Speaker 2 (01:34:13):
I'm not. I don't think I'm a student of the game.
Like I say, I think there's more to the game
than just music. Like Elton John wrote that met the
top line melodies and that's that was the sort of
a lot of emotion comes from that. I think that
it's the melody. And I'm definitely not. I don't watch

(01:34:38):
the I don't watch the wallpaper. I am, I print it.
I do the other the other thing, and I don't
listen to myself either. It's the last thing I'm going
to do. I get out and about and I take
in information and.

Speaker 1 (01:34:54):
Well, friend, we've come to the end of the feeling
we've known. You've been very forthcoming. It's been a great
pleasure to speak with you, and I'm sure your fans
are going to really enjoy the Travis performance is coming up.

Speaker 2 (01:35:10):
Oh thanks, Bob, I am it's been lovely talking to you.
And despite all all the technical and kerfuffle at the beginning,
but we managed that. We got there in the end,
and and hopefully maybe in one hundred years from there
we'll meet again our AI versions of ourselves and in

(01:35:33):
the new stimulation and and we'll well, the next time,
we probably won't need microphones. We'll just we'll just it'll
just happen.

Speaker 1 (01:35:42):
Our avatars will talk.

Speaker 2 (01:35:44):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:35:46):
In any event, until next time. This is Bob Left
Shows