Paul Carrack

Paul Carrack wrote and sang the classic "How Long" for his band Ace, and sang "Tempted" for Squeeze and "Silent Running" and "The Living Years" for Mike and the Mechanics. Carrack also played keys on such varied albums as Roxy Music's "Avalon," the Pretenders' "Learning to Crawl" and Elton John's "Made in England." He's part of Eric Clapton's touring band and is on the road doing solo shows. Listen to how a boy from Sheffield makes a life in music.

Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:08):
Welcome, welcome, welcome back to the Bob Left That podcast.
My yesterday is fall care full. Good to happen here, Huck?
How good? So you have a new album one on one.
What inspires you to continue to write and record new
music in this crazy musical era? I'm not sure. I

(00:30):
do ask myself that same question every now and again.
I think there's a couple of things. Um A, I've
on a bit of a mission to have my own
body of work. Um you know, I've been in a
several bends, as you probably know, and I've had the
great pleasure and honor to play with some fantastic people

(00:54):
over the years, even song you know, lead vocal on
some you know, quite well known song and everything. But
I realized I came to the conclusion that I didn't
have um any rights to a lot of these things.
And also I just wanted to have my own, my
own body of work, my own catalog. Yeah, that's one reason.

(01:17):
Let's talk about body work. Especially about eighteen months ago,
you put out five live albums simultaneously. Tell me the
back story there. Well, the backstory is that for I
guess for the last twenty years of a of a
very long career. I started to release my solo stuff

(01:37):
on my own label. It's a very small time thing. Um.
But we also started to record um our live shows.
I mean I've done. I started touring constantly to established
myself because even back then, nobody knew to who the

(02:00):
hell Paul Carrot was. They may have known the songs
or the voice or what have you been, I didn't
know the name. So we started to record all the shows.
And my good friend, a guy called Peter Van Hook
is kind of I guess you would call him a manager. Um,
he's my mate basically of thirty odd years. Okay, now,
he ultimately was a musician. Then he produced records with

(02:23):
Rod Origin. How do you know Peter van Hook? Well,
I first met Peter when at the beginning of the
Mike and the Mechanics project. Peter was the drummer, original
drummer in Mike and the Mechanics. He was a very
kind of busy session guys back in those days when
sessions were the thing, and he played I think for

(02:47):
about ten years with Van Morrison and I met him
at the photo session for the Mike and the Mechanics
album and I took an instant disliked okay, because he
was talking away in this he was talking to the
keyboard player Adrian Lee in this language. I didn't understand.

(03:10):
It was all about Middy and all that sort of stuff,
and I had not yet been introduced to Middy. I
was still very low tech. But anyway, that's when I
met Pete and but I got to know him and
really love him on as I got to know him,

(03:30):
and he's my biggest fan, is my biggest supporter. He
had the unenviable task of sifting through all these recordings
and and and put together this sort of compilation of
life stuff. I be honest with you, I've not heard
a lot of it because I understand that you understand good.

(03:51):
I mean, if I write something, I don't reread it.
It's too crazy, exactly exactly, okay, But I five albums simultaneously,
and what has been the reception there too, We had
a pretty good response to it. Actually, Um, why five albums?
I don't know, You'll have to ask him. I mean,

(04:13):
we've been, as I said, on a mission to establish
myself as a singer songwriter independently, and it's involved a
lot of gigs. So we've we've recorded a lot of shows.
There's been a lot of songs. I mean, I don't know.
Somebody told me it's something like seventeen or eighteen albums

(04:35):
we've released on my own label, so we have a
lot of songs. Well, I will say, on those five
live albums and I'm talking to I'm talking to you,
do sound like kype like I'm blowing smoke up your
rear around. They're phenomenal. I mean really the only problem
with those albums is people haven't heard of because I'm

(04:57):
surprised at the quality of the live performance, almost like
a studio performance. Well I'm surprised. Um, that's that's good
to know. Maybe I should give them a listen. But
as I say, we've made quite a few albums in
the in the studio. But as you say, they're not
really that well known in the States, which is to

(05:20):
my great regrets. Okay, let's go back to go twenty
years ago, going independent. Tell me that story. Well, Um,
you know, I I just meandered along there for many years.
As I said, got to play with a lot of
great people. I'd made one or two albums for several

(05:44):
record companies, and the case would usually be that would
make an album. They'd released a couple of singles and
then I'd move on or they dropped me. It's probably
the way it really was. And I got to the
point where I thought that I made it. I started

(06:05):
to make an album here at home. It's called Satisfy
My Soul. And I liked the way it sounded. I
just and I didn't like the thought of having to
go around to record companies trying to hawk it because
I knew what they would say, Well, it's fine, but
you know, maybe you need to do this, or maybe
you need to that or the other. And I liked

(06:27):
it the way it was. And this guy, Peter van Hook,
he said he had some experience, he had had a
little jazz label, and he said, well, why don't you
just do it yourself, just release it yourself. And at
the time it was a bit scary because people weren't
really doing that and I had no idea how you
released a record. Um, but we did it. We we

(06:52):
just started. It was, as I say, very small time.
We just got it an independent radio plugger to take
the record around and we got a a great airplay
on the mainstream radio here in the UK, and things
sort of you know grew from that. Okay, let's go
back to something you said earlier, the body of work.

(07:13):
I understand, But what was your motivation at this point
in your life to want to create a body of work? Well,
there were several things. I mean, as I said, I
realized that I had contributed to a lot of other
projects and other people's careers, and I was happy to
do that. I was just happy to be involved in

(07:36):
music and I loved it, every minute of it. Um.
But when I started this little label of mine, and
I wanted to release a compilation of stuff that I've
done over the years, and I was happy to license
it from and pay the royalties to the to the majors.

(07:57):
But then a couple of things happened. And when that
I wanted that there were a couple of tracks, significant
tracks that I've been involved with, and I wasn't allowed
to license them and put them on my And that's
that's kind of when the penny really dropped and I thought,
you know, I need to have my own stuff that
I control and then and that's mine. Okay, so twenty

(08:20):
years ago, you start your own label. Traditionally, musicians are
good musicians. They're not good business people. There's a lot
of business involved in running your own label. Who does
that business? Well? As I said, it's it started on
a very small time level. Um, I didn't really have

(08:43):
a clue how it worked, how they're not some bolts
of it worked, but it was quite simple. We uh
just got a distribution kind of deal, you know, somebody
who was prepared to put this stuff out. And we
employ Lloyd, a couple of independent radio pluggers that we

(09:04):
had worked with in the in the other bands and
that we knew well. And we started from there. And
I'm was quite prepared to get my hands dirty. I'm
from a very kind of working class northern upbringing. My

(09:25):
folks actually were kind of independent inasmuch as my father
was what you call a painter and decorator, you know,
you would paint people's houses. And my mom ran a
small store where we sold paint and wallpaper. And we
lived in the back of the store in a in
a one room at the back with two bedrooms in

(09:48):
an attic at the outside, toilet and no bathroom and
all that sort of stuff. And I saw my folks,
you know, after kind of what they'd gone through, who
they've gone through, the Depression and then World War two,
and and they work their backsides off just to make things.
So I definitely saw how hard they worked, and and

(10:12):
it's kind of in my genes too. I was prepared to,
as I say, get my hands dirty and and and
and try and build something. Okay, So your first experience
with the first independent label, do you feel, in terms
of the effect of the independent as you put its
song pluggers, etcetera, that you got as good as shot

(10:34):
as you got when you were a label. Um, probably
got as good as shot as I did as a
solo artist, but I'm not as as with the bands.
I mean, for example, Mike and the Mechanics. Of course,
Mike is the guitar player in Genesis, and so they
had a lot of help from record companies. You know,

(10:57):
we had TV spots and the record were given a
real good chance, and we had great airplace. So no,
I wasn't getting that. I didn't have that kind of clout,
but I had a little bit of momentum from involvement
with this such as them, and and it grew, it

(11:18):
really grew. I mean it wasn't my intention to Um,
I've never chased I never wanted to be famous or
anything like that. But I just wanted to uh survive
and make music and have a good band and do
my shows and make my albums, as simple as that. Okay,
so you're making your albums, you're paying for the whole thing.

(11:41):
So what kind of budget for one of these albums
is there? Well, um, for example, with the first one,
UH Satisfy my Soul, I made it here at home,
and I played more or less everything on the record,
and I engineered it myself. So it didn't cost a
whole lot to make the record, but as it doesn't

(12:03):
these days, if you kind of know what you're doing,
but you know, the problem is, or the difficulty is
to get it hurt. And so as an independent in
the UK, it wasn't too difficult because I had a
little bit of history and the UK is a small place,

(12:25):
so you know, we we had good support from the
mainstream radio, the BBC radio too, that's the big kind
of mainstream radio, and they liked what I did. It
worked for them, and subsequent albums also it really worked
very well for them. So but to try to expand

(12:45):
and internationally and and it's much more difficult. But I
had a thing going, you know, and now I was
getting support. I had a band that we're really into it.
We we love going to work. We toured up and
down the country, and I was I am happy. Okay,
a couple of things. You essentially put out an album

(13:05):
every other year. Most artists of the of your vintage
they don't put out new music at all. So what
keeps you writing and recording? Well, as I said, I'm
not exactly sure, but I think it's the fact that
although I've had, you know, little bits of success here

(13:26):
and there and a look inside the window, Um, I
never felt that I had that body of work that
I could point to, or that album that I could
say that is the quintessential album. So I think it's
it's purely just to keep self satisfaction. I still keep

(13:48):
thinking I could do better, you know. Okay, so this
lightest album, tell me about the making of that. First,
When do you decide you have a target when you
want to make a record, or you said or you
all probably write it off songs and saying it's time
to make a record. No, I just in this particular case,
I had no plan whatsoever to record last year. I mean,

(14:11):
I had a whole diary of life stuff. UM. I
had a UK too with my band. I was going
to go to Australia, Japan, Europe, and I also have
been involved quite a bit in the last nine years
or so playing keyboards and Eric Clapton's band and touring
around with him. So we had a whole year, um,

(14:35):
but thirty odd shows into the year. In the middle
of March, of course, the pandemic hit and venues were
closed down, and initially everybody thought, well, well, we'll be
back up there in a month or two, but that
pretty soon became obvious that that wasn't going to be

(14:57):
the case. And so having this little facility here I
have at home, which is fantastic, and I just started
coming in and playing with my toys and recording stuff
and it evolved into an album. Okay, So on these
albums to this day, you're the producer, you're the engineer.

(15:17):
To what degree are there outside musicians and what degree
you do everything yourself? On this particular album, it was
almost totally myself engineering, um, playing all the instruments, UM.
But towards the and and end of the thing. For

(15:39):
an example, I had written and recorded some horn parts,
but using samples in et cetera and didn't sound too
bad actually, But um, when it became possible to get
people in, I got in a horn section that i'd
worked before, include in the fantastic pee Wee Ellis, which

(16:01):
we can talk about at some point if you like.
And and I had one track that needed a real
good guitar solo solo on it, and I'm not a
great soloist. I got my friend Robbie macintosh to remotely
play a great solo on the guitar. But other than that,
it's pretty much me. Robbie McIntyre, average white beard right.

(16:22):
Uh No, Um, you're thinking of the drummer. His name
escapes me. But Robbie McIntosh. No, he was in the Pretenders,
he was with Paul McCartney and play people like Nora
Jones and Dire Straits. And he's a fabulous musician. Okay,
So tell me about pee Wee Ellis. Well, pee Wee

(16:45):
I got to know through Peter Van Hook and because
they worked together with Van Morrison for many years. Pee
Wee of course as a legend. He worked with James
Brown and did some of those incredible horn arrangements, and
Peter introduced me to Pee Wee on my previous album,

(17:07):
which is called These Days. It's about three years ago,
and Pee Wee wrote some great authentic horn arrangements for that,
and he did one horn arrangement on this new record,
on a track called Lighten Up Your Mood. But it's
a beautiful guy. Unfortunately he passed away in September at

(17:30):
the age of eighty. Um. But he was a real
he was a proper legend, and he was a authentic,
real deal and he lived it large. Just talking about
this album obviously class for low. You finished the record,
you eque it yourself and you go to an outside
mastering house. Well, for the first time ever. I mean,

(17:53):
I'd never even mixed my own albums before because I'm
I'm not a technical guy either as a musician or
an engineer. I kind of know how to work pro
tools in my own cack handed way, but I never
trusted myself two mix. To me, it was a you know,

(18:16):
a oh that's real. That's a technical person. He's got
to be somebody who knows what they're doing. And in
the past I've gotten things to the mixed stage and
then handed it over to a proper, proper mixing engineer,
and they then bring the whole thing back to scratch

(18:36):
and build it back up again, and it never hangs
together in the way that I've heard it. So this
time again, this guy Peter van Hook said, I mean, no,
you have to mix this record, and I was like,
oh no, I can't me I don't know what I'm doing,
And but I did. I we went with my mixes
that I've worked with as we went along, and then

(18:59):
there's this other age called the mastering situation, which is
like I never understood. It's like, you get your mixes,
they sound great, and then they go to this other
stage mastering, and then they do another process, which is
they add EQ and compression and again it changes the thing.

(19:19):
So to be honest, we did hand it over to
a couple of mastering guys who had a shot at it,
and when it came back I didn't like it because
it didn't sound how I wanted it to sound. I
like the way it sounds. It's engaging, it doesn't hit
you in the face. But of course a lot of

(19:39):
these mastering guys now are trying to get it on
the radio and make it a kind of more aggressive
and hi fi in order to get the radio attention.
But I didn't like it. I liked it the way
it was, and that's what we went with. Okay, there's
one thing to balance all the instruments, another thing to delay, echo, reverb, etcetera.

(20:02):
You just figured that out all by yourself. In the
mixing stage. Well, it's not like you record it and
then you mix it it. It's you're mixing it as
you go along, and that's what happens. You get used
to that. I'm not an expert, as I say, but
I have he is, and I know the kind of

(20:24):
reverbs and echoes and things I like to hear. I mean,
they might not be the ultimate, but when they are working,
you have to go with them, because then that's when
you start changing that stuff. The whole balance changes. And
so yeah, we went with my my ideas. What kind

(20:47):
of equipment do you have in your studio? Well, I
have a pro tools rig, right, and what kind of board.
It's just a control surface, really, it's a it's a
control twenty four. It's just a it's not a big
fancy knive or anything like that. I have some nice
pre amps, uh, some Nive pre amps and and the

(21:08):
like and the stuff is pretty much recorded organically, you know,
it's just I just plug it in and when it
sounds okay, that's when that's what I go with. You
record in the same room that the equipment is in. Yeah,
by and large, Yes. And what speakers do you listen to? Now?

(21:29):
What are these things called? They sound great PCMs? I
think they're called they're real nice speakers. But they're not flattering,
but they're not tiring. It just sound good. Okay. How
do you end up working with clapped? Well? I think

(21:50):
years ago, it must over ten years. I think I
played a few sort of charity type gigs where Gary,
you know from prop Gary it's very good at putting
these things together. He would put that together a house
band kind of thing too, and he would get in

(22:11):
some real stars like Eric Clapton, Roger Waters, people like that,
and for various charity events. And then I played on
a few of Eric's albums, things like Pilgrim Um Reptile
and a few other albums, just a few tracks. And

(22:31):
then one day, as I say, eight nine years ago,
he called me up and asked if I could come
on the road with him. And I was delighted to
say that. Yeah, dovetail beautifully into the what I had
going with my own band, and I guess I did

(22:52):
what was pretty much probably the last world tour inasmuch
as we did. We played in the States, we went
to Far East, we played it in Europe, Japan, and
it was just a marvelous experience. Well, he's on the
road now, needless to say, you're not in the band. No,
that's not true. We we I was in the Bend
the whole of September when we just did some shows.

(23:15):
Oh oh I didn't know that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, so
those goods. So they those dates were done. We we
did eight nine shows I think in the Southern States. Yeah,
I didn't know you were in the band on those. Yeah. Okay.
One has to ask what do you think of his
viewpoints of vaccines for COVID. Well, I don't think I'm

(23:38):
gonna be drawn into that too much because I don't
even know exactly where he stands on what he said
about it. But I know all I do know, and
I think I'm at liberty to say that, is that
he had the vaccine twice and he had a very
bad reaction, and he spoken about that personally. I've also

(24:03):
had the vaccine, and so I don't precisely no or
agree or uh about where he stands on where where
he stands at the moment, but I must admit I
have my skeptical thoughts about what it's all about. And
it's a little skeptical about mandating people who don't wish

(24:30):
to for whatever reason, have the vaccine. As I say, personally,
myself and my family we have had the vaccine, and
I don't think we've had a bad response to it.
But I think I think people are entitled to their
own opinion. Okay, so you go on on the road
with Eric. How much rehearsal is there if you're gonna

(24:51):
do nine dates? Well there was a couple of weeks.
But bear in mind most of the musicians, in fact,
all of the musicians involved played with Eric b Floor before,
and so when you rehearse with Eric, it's not so
much about you're not learning parts. You know, you're not
getting the parts tight and accurate and all that. It's

(25:13):
more about it it's more like getting to know everybody again.
And because you never play this stuff the same twice,
it's all on instinct and vibe, you know, so that
the I can't say that the rehearsals are that intense.
You know, we play some music, we chat, we chat,

(25:35):
we have a cup of tea, we play a bit more,
we have lunch, we play a bit more, and then
that's it. So and it comes together. Okay, you're on
the road to what degree are the settlers and the
parts setting stone into what degree does that change every
night and improvisation changing? Oh well, it's totally improvisation. I

(25:58):
mean we're not totally. I mean, there's a framework, there's
a set. It changes only a little predominantly. On this
last thing. The changes were in the acoustic section in
the middle, and he did some new things there, and
he also only used he used microphones on the acoustic thing,

(26:22):
like on the guitars and stuff like that. And he
didn't use pickups because I understand why, because the pickups,
even great as they're getting, they don't really sound like
an acoustic guitar sounds when it's played in the room.
And he was very much trying to get you know,
that real sound of the acoustic guitars. So we had

(26:44):
to play very very quietly in the acoustic section, and
that changed a little bit. But the set pretty much
stayed the same. Okay, So you have these endeavors, you're
making records, you're going on the road, going on the
road by yourself with Eric Clapton. Let's just say you
never worked another day in your life. Have you made

(27:05):
enough money in the music business to get to the
end where you gotta work for a living? M depends
what you mean. I think I probably I would probably
be okay. I'm trying to help my kids. I have
four grown up kids. They're all basically have regular salaried
kind of jobs, which I'm quite happy about, or not jobs,

(27:28):
but careers. And I have one son who's a chip
off the old block who plays in my band. Um,
and the cost of living and the cost of you know,
real estate has just gone crazy, and they have small
apartments and stuff. I'm trying to help them as much

(27:49):
as I possibly can while I'm still here. We have
a nice life. We're okay, We're I think we're what
they called the comfortable poor. We're do we're do okay okay.
And then so forgetting COVID. Before COVID, how many dates
a year were you on on the road? Uh, who's counting?

(28:12):
I mean, we would definitely with my own band. We
would play January February, March into April. We would play
three to four nights a week in theaters up and
down the UK, and then we would generally at that
point do some shows maybe in the Netherlands that's Holland, Germany,

(28:35):
and then I would uh if I you know, probably
play with Eric as I said, going to Japan or
US shows. I don't know. I'm not not counting, but
I'm busy. I've been very, very busy. It's crazy. Last
ten twenty years, when you know you should be winded down,

(28:56):
have been the busiest of my career. Now an email,
you say you're going to go work in Spain momentarily.
So I'm going on vacation. Oh yeah, I thought you
were playing gigs. No, we're doing I'm going away for
a couple of weeks vacation with my wife to Spain.

(29:17):
We have a small apartment over there. Oh you know,
I don't need the address, but we're in Spain, his
son in the south on the costadel Soul. Okay, you
know that's big. You know Brits are really into that.
Let's go back to the beginning. You're from Sheffield, what
was What was it like growing up in Sheffield. I
think it was pretty good. It was pretty good. It

(29:39):
was very by today standard. It was extremely austere, but
so is everywhere up in the north of England. You know,
I've come from a pretty poor, basic working class family.
My dad's family they were they went too bad. But
my my mom's family was very poor. Um my grand

(30:02):
and I never met either of my grandfather's They were
both deceased by the time I came along. But my
maternal grandfather was died around thirty six, left six kids.
He was from Ireland and he left six kids, so
they were very, very poor. Even when we grow grew

(30:23):
up as kids, we were We didn't think we were,
but we were poor. We didn't have a We had
a tin bath in the front of the fire once
a week. We had an outside toilet, but most people
did around where we lived, and but we had we
could go out and play. We could playing the open
air all day long. We're no worries, so I think

(30:46):
actually it was great. It was great way to live. Okay, well,
we know about Sheffield in America and we don't know much.
We know there was still there and Joe Cocker was
from there. Were you aware of Joke Parker? Oh yeah,
he was about two streets away from me, really, oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
But he was a bit older. He was a bit older,

(31:08):
and he was he was a man. I was a
boy and he I was a little bit Oh this guy,
he's a bit little bit scary, this guy, you know.
But he was a legend in England, of course, in
Sheffield and he was playing. He could play any night
of the week in a pub or a club. And
I eventually got to see. I mean I was about

(31:29):
fifteen something like that and I snuck into a pub
and I saw Joe playing and it was amazing, absolutely amazing.
And Chris Stainton, who's plays in the in the Clapton band,
was playing with him back in those days as well.
So I've been having hitting Chris for all the old

(31:50):
Cocker stories. Fantastic. Any other musicians who came from Sheffield
but back then, no, not really. There was a guy
called Dave Berry. He had a little bit of success,
but Joe really, honestly was the first one to to
come through and we were all so delighted, and little
help from my friends. It was so exciting because it's

(32:13):
such a great record, and then when he finally sort
of broke through, it was just great. Well, everybody loved it.
So you're growing up. How many kids in the family,
and it was just me and my brother, older brother. Okay,
you go to school, you good student, bad student? I
was just I was a good boy. I did what

(32:35):
I was told when I wasn't very academic at all. Um.
You know, unfortunately, my father had a fatal accident. I
don't know if I if you knew that, but he
had a fatal accident when I was eleven, my brother
was fifteen, and that that was pretty uh profound experience.

(32:57):
But my brother grew up overnight. He he took charge
of the shop where we lift the store, and while
my mom tried to recover from this incredible blow. And
I just kind of as long as I was going
to school and not being any trouble, it was fine.
But I had no interest in school at all. I

(33:20):
didn't like it at all. I I like sports and
I like music. That was it. And were you an outsider?
We were a member of a a group, a lot of friends.
No friends, Oh no, I had a lot. I know,
I was I think I was a pretty popular kid.
I was, you know, as I said, it wasn't academic.
I was. Probably I was a bit of a clown,

(33:40):
you know, if we had a soft teacher, I would
be a clown. And no, I think I was pretty popular.
I think so. I had plenty of friends here. Okay,
So you talk about the outdoor toilet, you talk about
the tin tub. At what point does that change? M Well,
it got worse actually because I left home the comforts. Okay,

(34:10):
when you left, when you left comforts, when you left
home there you were still using an outdoor toilet. No,
we had at that point, not long after my father died.
Maybe he had an insurance policy. I don't know what,
but we we actually moved from living behind the shop

(34:33):
to a little semi detached a couple of streets away.
Still kept the shop, but we had a little semi
detached house which had a bathroom, which was luxury. Okay,
So what was your introduction in music? Your parents playing
a lot of music. My father's side were musical, definitely.

(34:53):
My grandmother and my aunt both played the piano um,
and my father dabbled in the drums. I think so.
But even prior to his untimely death. But even most
so after we didn't have much contact with his side
of the family, but we had a lot of contact

(35:14):
with my mother's side of the family, who were very
you know, lovely people. You know, it's tough and common,
you know, poor but great. They were such great support
for us in in emotionally after my father's passing. It

(35:34):
was unbelievable. Yeah. So, you know, from the East Coast,
I mean from the United States viewpoint, we had the
Beach Boys, we had the Four Seasons, we had a
lot of crap, and then all of a sudden the
Beatles hip. But the Beatles hitting sixty four in America
being sixty four where they actually hitting sixty two in

(35:57):
the UK. So what point did you become into popular music? Well,
I was into it. I was into it already. I
liked all those bands, you know, I like the Ventures
and people like that. And as I say, my brother,
my older brother, he but then and there was an
instrumental band called the Shadows in the UK. They were

(36:19):
the backing band for a guy called Cliff Richard. But
I love the But when the Beatles came, that was it.
You know. In all the Liverpool bands and all that,
all that stuff. I saw the Beatles a couple of
times Sheffield City Hall. Everybody came through there, you know,
everybody came through town. And you saw him at the
city Hall. So the Stones, Roy Orbison, Dylan, chuck Berry,

(36:45):
you name it. So how what was it? Like? How
good were they? I don't know. I couldn't hear him,
but it was just electric, you know. And and to
see them, and I saw, you know, see ringo Lane.
I was playing drums by this time in a little
band at school and when I saw a ringoing, you know,

(37:07):
the high hacks going like this like, oh my god,
you know I've been tickling these drums. I need to
give him some stick, you know. So you know, I
only know the American experience where we all had transistor radios,
but we also had uh commercial radio. So did you

(37:28):
have transistor radios? And was it just the BBC or
radio Caroline pop radio? When? When? What was the listening experience?
Did you buy records? Did you have money to do that?
There us hardly anything on the radio back in those days.
There's so little I'm not like today where you can't
get away from it. But yeah, we had the little
transistor radio my brother under the bedclothes and we would

(37:51):
try and tune into Radio Caroline and it would come
and go Radio Luxembourg. And but um, we didn't even
have a proper record player. We had we had a
wind up record I'm not kidding, I am. I find
it hard to believe myself, but we did. But the
girl at the end of our yard where we lived, um,

(38:15):
she had one. And then when she got a new model,
she gave us her old electric record player and a
lot of records like um Everly Brothers and Ricky Nelson
and Dwayne Eddie and things like this. And it was like, wow,
this was great. Why did she give you her records?

(38:36):
I don't know. I guess they got maybe they got
tired of him, you know that back then, and it
was onto the next thing and the next thing, you know.
But yeah, we weren't asking. We weren't asking questions. How
did you playing drobs? Well, as I said, we had
an attic at this shop where we lived, and there
were a couple of bits up there. There was a

(38:57):
snare drum. There was a thing it was like almost
like a toy based drum, And I said about playing
this kit I would play along to two records. And
one year my father he one Christmas he got this thing.

(39:19):
It was like the old you know when the like
from the twenties, this kit with like the wooden blocks,
the skulls about five skulls and and I used to
mess around on that, and I was in. I was
into it. But the year my when my my father
passed away, and the Christmas after that, my mother bought

(39:48):
with what the thing called hy purchase where you pay
you know, installments very much. They actually bought me a
proper kit of drums. I mean it was way too
good for what was but I mean it was just
spectacular kit of drums and tell tricks and tell star
remember it well. And so that's when I really started

(40:11):
getting into it. And then tell me about forming bands.
We had a little band at school played the school
concert when I was twelve thirteen. It was fantastic. We
did four Beatles songs and the girls through jelly Babies
and asked and asked for my autograph, you know, the

(40:32):
same girls in in the in the class, you know.
So that was fantastic. And I think just before I
left school at fifteen or sixteen, I started to play
in the local soul band. I sold those drums that
my mother works so hard to buy and put down

(40:54):
payments on an organ and started playing in this solan.
How did you get involved in the Oregon? Yeah, good question,
because they needed one, They needed an organist. And I
had had a go on a on a Hammond organ
that was in a recording studio that my friend had
a session there and great, and he sold me a

(41:16):
couple of chords, and as I say, then I wanted
to join this, this band, and I just started to
teach myself, learned some cords and stood at the back
and played quietly. Then what kind of Oregon did you buy? Well?
I wanted to buy the Vox Continental, which you probably

(41:40):
remember with the of course the back to front black
and white keys. But I couldn't stretch to that, so
I bought this other thing. It was awful. Actually, it
was made by Selma Selma Capri, and it was it
was rubbish. But many years later again I got my
mom to sign papers again and we bought the low,
the low version of a Hammond organ. And then you

(42:03):
were always buying the equipment. It's hard to slap you know.
You got the drums you got them and to work again.
I mean, get into the gig is a big deal. Yeah,
that's that's a good point, one of my favorite things
about But when I did the tour with the Ringo
Star All Star Band, and he would he told a

(42:24):
story about getting to the gigs. He said, it was
always easy to get to the gig on the bus,
you know, everybody give your hand, but getting home you'd
have to do it yourself, and you have to walk
down the street five yards with two cases, then go
back for the other two and walk down. Fortunately I
had my uncle, and you know I mentioned my mother's

(42:45):
family and how supportive they was. My my uncle used
to used to take me in his car. That's right,
I remember now my uncle Percy. Bless him. So he
finished with school. So how does your musical career unfold? Well,

(43:08):
as I said, I was already playing in kind of
semipro bands and I left school with no qualifications and
I just wanted to gig with Abandon. That's what we did.
I think. The next step was when I was about seventeen,
we did the thing where you go to Germany and
play the clubs over there. Of course, that was the

(43:31):
way that the Beatles have done it years a few
years before. So we went over there. I played for
a month at the Top ten club in Hamburg, for example,
that kind of thing, and it was great. We loved it.
I mean, we're we were we were very thin back
in those days, but we were just having a great time.

(43:54):
So you come back from Germany and um, well I
remember now on this because we were playing covers. Yeah,
we we We were playing with the two bands would alternate.
You play forty fifty minutes, the turnaround, the other band
would play fifty minutes, and that went on through the night.

(44:14):
And we met up with these other guys who were
doing you know, on with us, and we we started
to get into music and we were listening to music
and smoking pot and listening to the stuff that was
happening in the sixties, and wow, this is happening. And
we decided we were going to go progressive. So we

(44:36):
we formed this band. I'm trying to keep it a secret,
but it seems to be coming out of it's pretty dreadful.
Um we were. Our big heroes was Frank Zappa and
the Mothers of Invention exact. Yeah, good heroes, but hard,
hard act to follow. So yeah, we went through that

(44:56):
sort of phase and you know, live in hand to mouth,
but you know, and then it was playing in Germany
and the college circuit and everybody wanted free music. And
that was that when you had the kids storm in
the place, they wouldn't pay to come in and stuff,
and it all got a bit political and serious and crazy,

(45:17):
and then everybody went, hang on a minute, now, this
is ridiculous. And that's when we started to go back
to rock and roll, playing in pubs around London and
this is called pub rock. Very original idea. But and
that's when we formed ACE, playing around the pubs in London.
And so what point do you become a songwriter about? Then?

(45:44):
Prior to that, with this um sort of mothers of
invention type band, we used to write these long pieces
and that went on for twenty minutes or whatever, and
then and then would go free form. But then we started.
I start when with ACE, I started to write songs
and one of the first songs I wrote was how long? Okay,

(46:04):
how could you write such a good song right at
the beginning of your career? I don't know it. I
often think it's great that people say it's a great song.
It's a very simple song. Don't tell anybody, but I
mean it's nothing much too. It's got a big old
hook and a verse that repeats itself. Um. But I

(46:25):
think back then I was naive enough to think, you know,
that I was inventing this stuff. I'd learn a new
chord and it'll be like, oh, I'd like the sound
of that and make a song from it. So I
didn't have any trouble writing songs. Then, Okay, who owns
that song today? God knows. It's changed hands a number

(46:47):
of times. I think it's partly owned by Universal in
America and in some of territories it's owned now by BMG,
a couple of people who've had it along the way
of rich iired and living in living in on a
desert island. But no, it was a pretty crappy deal.

(47:09):
Then do you still get songwriter royalties? We get some,
I get some, yeah, but nothing like I've tried to
shame them. I've tried to shame them into, you know,
making it more civilized kind of deal, but they won't
have it. And how about public performance? You know here
it's called Aska b M. I yeah, yeah, thank goodness,

(47:31):
that that was the only money I saw for a while,
to be honest, from them, from that song. But I
do it does trickle through. It's still been good, don't
get me wrong. I mean if I get a half
or a quarter of what I should have a song
like that that hangs around for all those years, it's
it's pretty incredible really. So it goes on for a

(47:52):
couple of years with Ace. How did that end? Uh?
Not very dramatically. It fizzled out, really, is the truth.
We had that one big hit and it was the
only song like that on the record. To be honest, um,

(48:15):
the two of the other main writers, because I was
the last one to join and to come in and
write stuff that it was formed by two other writists,
Phil Harris and Bam King, and their stuff was a
little more guitar blues country kind of stuff, and there
was nothing else that really caught the eye. Caught a

(48:37):
year and we made another album that didn't really happen.
So it kind of fizzled out, is what happened. How
do you get hooked up with Jake Rivieria? Well I
knew Jake back in those days, but he was a
roadie for a band called Chili Willie and the Red
Hot Peppers, not obviously not to be confused used with

(49:01):
a band of a similar name. But so, while I
was in in Ace and we lived for about a
year in the mid seventies nineties six, while I was
living over there doing the Being all Californian and everything,
how does the Being relocate to the United States? It

(49:23):
was our manager's idea. He thought that we, you know,
we'd had this huge radio hit in in the States
and that we should try and make a go of
it in the States, which is what we did. So
what was it like, boy from Sheffield is living in
sunny southern California. Well, it was a bit unreal really
because it was beautiful, it was fantastic, but we didn't

(49:47):
get any work done. You know, we were messing around
and going to the beach and playing soccer and all
the rest of it, but and not writing any good songs.
So but meanwhile in the UK things had gone changed
completely and Jake, Jake Riveria had helped to found Stiff Records,

(50:13):
which was, you know, at the forefront of all the
punk and new wave stuff. They found Elvis Costello and
in fact, our good friend when we were living in California.
Down the road was our friend Pete Thomas, who had
played in this band Chili Willie and the Red Hot Peppers,
and he was living over in the States and playing

(50:35):
with some people like John Stewart and the Country People,
and he got the call from Jake to go and
play with this guy, Elvis Costello. So Pete went back
to UK and six months or sold later we went
back and it was like, oh my goodness, it's all changed,
you know, it's all it's over. You know, we've got

(50:55):
beards and long hair and everything. They hate us so
but anyway, so I just started to work around London
doing sessions. I worked with with Roxy Music, helped made
a couple of records with them and toured with them.
And then Jake had taken on Squeeze. He started to

(51:19):
manage Squeeze and the keyboard player Jules Holland had left
the band. They auditioned tons of people and Jake said, well,
why don't he try Paul Carrot. He's back in town.
He's been playing with Roxy Music. He shaved his beard off.
You're getting me and I went down an audition with
them about a week before the recording of east Side

(51:40):
Story album and and the next thing I know, I
was in the studio with him. Okay, how did you
end up playing You're a guy with one hit from
a failed band, how do you end up working with
Roxy Music? Well, um, I don't know how interesting this is,
but now it's interesting to Okay, Well this is what happened.

(52:02):
Is that, Yes, I said, I went back to UK.
I thought I figured it was kind of over, but
I started to play a few sessions. I just wanted
to all the what I thought were the best players
in London that that's what they did. And I used
to hang out with this group of players who I
really admired, and they had played on the Brian Ferry

(52:24):
solo records. And when Roxy reformed to make an album
called Manifesto and then Flesh and Blood, they got Brian
insisted on having these guys play on the records and
they said, well we got this other guy now and
he plays keyboards, let's bring him along. And that was me. Okay,
so good experience, bad experience. Oh yeah, good experience, Yeah,

(52:48):
good experience. I mean it wasn't what I'm a bit
of a soul guy, you know, I wasn't at all
glam rock, you know, as the exact opposite, boring denim
plaid bloke. Um. But to go out on the road
with rock Shore. You know this was fun. You know
it's great. I enjoyed it. Yeah, there's a song on

(53:09):
Flesh and Blood. Oh yeah, I might well be playing
on it. How's it go? I just handed my mind
the song playing on there. I'm playing on that. I'm
playing on that. Yet there's this song playing on the radio.
I'm playing the strings in there. Okay, But you know

(53:30):
what made that record was the bass player, because that
song was not happening. It was like a do walk song.
And then we went down the pub, came back Alan Spinner,
great bass player, and he starts playing that Basseline doo
doo doo doo doo doo make actually made it? Yeah? Anyway,
going you're playing sessions. I know in Los Angeles, you know,

(53:53):
people call their friends in, but usually if they don't
read music, they're squeezed out. Did you re music? And
how extensive was your session career and how did that work?
Not reading music? No, I didn't read music. I don't.
I don't think many of them in London did actually,

(54:15):
But no, I was always pretty scared that I'd get
found out. You know that. You know that I couldn't
really play that well, but you know, my musical instincts
got me through. My ear and the musical instincts got

(54:36):
me through, and I just saw it all as a
learning experience. But I was always terrified for the first
half an hour or an hour that I get found out.
You know, it's very insecure about that. So how did
it end with Roxy? I think it was just that
I did a couple of tours of them and made
a couple of albums, and then the opportunity to do

(54:59):
the Squeeze the thing came up, and I just remember
calling up Roxy and they said they kind of done
what they were going to do, and they said, no,
go for it. And that's when I kind of got
involved with Squeeze. I didn't realize I was joining Squeeze.
I thought I was just playing some sessions. But anyway,

(55:19):
when did you realize you joined? I think when I
was on the plane going over to the States to
to do the first tour with them, UM, which was
a duel billing of Squeeze and Elvis Costello and the Attractions,
two bands on the same bush sixteen people. I think

(55:43):
they were on that bus. There were two bands. There
was a security guy because Elvis had caused some controversy
to a manager. Sixteen people. Can you imagine? So how
did you end up singing Tempted? Okay? Well, as I said,
I was there to play keys, really, and we had

(56:04):
recorded pretty much the album. They had already recorded a
version of this song Tempted, which is completely different different
how it was just I've always think I only heard
it once or twice. It was produced by Dave Edmonds,
and it was more sort of almost like super Tramp

(56:25):
or something and a bad fruit of na um. And
then this one day we started messing around in the studio.
I'm playing Hammond organ and they're doing it in that
kind of soul vibe, and Elvis Costello was producing the record.
He came running in and said like, let's put this down.

(56:46):
Let's put this down and put the track down. Or
everybody's like, ah, this is great, this is great. He said, yeah,
but you know, Paul, you should sing it. So I
went in, why you You must have had a reason.
Perhaps he was just being nice. I don't know. I mean,
I was kind of thought of as a little bit

(57:07):
of you know, the blue eyed soul singer even you know,
and it was his his idea. And how did he
end up playing his response line there? I think he
was just very keen to get in on it because
it was a great song. And yeah, I don't blame him,

(57:31):
it's a great song. So at what point do you
realize you have this great unique voice? Well, I'm I
always fancied myself as a singer. You know, I'd sung
how long, and I'd sung all a lot of songs.
And I'm talking about before that or before that. Well,
as a kid, people remarked and they said, always got

(57:53):
a lovely voice, you know, at school and things like
that when I was little, little, you know. And but
other than that, um, I didn't really do anything else.
Even when I was in bands in the beginning, I
was only doing big backgrounds because usually there was a
one guy, a designated bloke at the front. And so

(58:16):
it wasn't until we we formed Ace and I started
singing lead. That's when I got the hang of it.
I started to get the hang of it. Well, from
an outside perspective, your voice has not changed as good
as it ever was. I mean he's just you know,
freak of DNA or there are certain things you do

(58:36):
to make sure you protect your vocal chords or what's
going on there. Yeah, I think it has changed a
little bit. I think, I like to think in in
a lot of in a lot of ways, it's got better,
it's stronger, it's got a bit more tumbra to it.
And I just try to stay healthy. I don't do

(58:57):
anything stupid like smoke or during hard liquor. Um, did
you used to smoke and drink hard liquor? I've done. Yeah,
obviously it's expected of you, you know, but I like
a glass of wine. But no, as I say, try
and stay healthy. I see all this stuff now and

(59:18):
YouTube and stuff like that. You can, you know, improve
your um, your voice and things like that. But blessed
with decent chords, you know, and and and the musicality.
And I've developed it and used it, you know, keep

(59:39):
using it. That's the thing. Okay, Then you make a
solo album good Experience not so good Experience? Which one
was that? Well, let's go back one chapter. How do
you end up leaving Squeeze? Well, I was there for
about a year and I loved it. I was happy

(01:00:01):
playing keys, to be honest, because they didn't need a singer.
They already had two singers. They didn't need a songwriter,
particularly someone like me that wrote three or four chord
lovey dovey stuff. They had a thing now, had an identity.
It was the songs. It was the sound of Glenn
and Chris singing, and they didn't really need it. So

(01:00:25):
I was having a good time. But it was obvious that,
you know, if I was to develop as a singer
and a songwriter, I couldn't really do it within the
framework of that band, you know. And I wasn't going
to try and impose my style on on them. They
didn't need it. So that's kind of why I left. Well,

(01:00:48):
you're walking from a good gig into the wilderness. It
was a good gig and it was fun. Yeah it
was great. But yeah, I made a lot of strange
decision and in my career, you know, they're not not
always been career moves, but it I'm not in a
bad place now. I love where I am now, you know.

(01:01:11):
So if you have to do it all over again,
what would you have done differently? Mm hmmm. Probably had
a bit more faith in my own self and my
own ability. But that's easier said than done. You know,
it's tough to to make your way in in in
in in this music. It is tough. So and I've

(01:01:32):
also had to have a family, you know, to bear
in mind, and I wasn't prepared for them to suffer
for my art, you know, so I I probably wouldn't
change anything. I'll tell you why, because you know, people
will say, oh, you could have done this, you could
have done more. I could have done a whole lot less.

(01:01:52):
I have had a great, very career, made some great people.
I never expected to do this and get this far.
And my career is actually not in a bad place
at the moment. I haven't a lot of people like
what I do. I have a great band who you know,

(01:02:13):
support me, and I have a great family. I really
don't think I should ask for more. At what point
do you meet your wife in this journey? Well, a
long time ago pre Ace pre Ace nineteen seventy two,

(01:02:40):
I think, and I just I just met her. We've
we've been together since that day Clider met her and
she came her friend had designs on one of the
other guys in the band, and she came along to
a support and I met her. I'm I'm afraid it
was like that, and at what point to get married?

(01:03:04):
Where we were together for seven years and then we
got married and not long before our first son was
born and we have had four great kids and we
now have two and a half grandchildren one on the way.
So yeah, and she's been She is great. She's a

(01:03:27):
great person. She's honest. Being on the road good or
bad for the relationship, Well, it doesn't make life easy.
I mean, goodness knows how she got on with four
young kids, um while I was away, But you know, yes, so,

(01:03:49):
and she never gave me any grief about that. You know,
it was accepted. This was the only way I knew
to make a living and this is the way he's
going to have to be. And it's it's great now
that I've you know, had a little bit of success
here along the way and I can help them. But

(01:04:10):
it was tough, you know, being away for and that
was a sacrifice sometimes, you know, to be away with
a band that you're not fully part of, and yet
you I'm a team player. I am a team player,
and I would always do my best whatever the situation,
and feel obliged sometimes, but you know, my wife, God

(01:04:34):
bless her, gosh, I don't actually did it. So prior
to meeting your wife or maybe after, to what degree
were you enamored of the sex, drugs, and rock and
roll lifestyle. Well, I think I took my share. I
don't like to talk about it. I don't like to

(01:04:56):
talk about it with my kids, um because three of them,
for sure never really never to my knowledge, we're interested
in that one who's the chip of the old block.
I'm pretty sure dabbled in various things. I'm hoping they're
not going to hear this, but I think that you're okay.

(01:05:19):
But no, I mean, you know I was expected of
you and and and no, I'm guilty has charged, but
not for a long time, not what not. As soon
as the family started coming along, it was obvious that
they didn't mix and I didn't. I didn't have a
rock and roll family. I didn't have rock and roll kids.
You know. I wanted a stable I didn't want any

(01:05:44):
of that in their life. So when we were talking
about the Doover thing, you were saying, if you had
more confidence in yourself and your talents, I mean, the
fear is just totally exterior. They don't really see what
goes on in the mind. Are you telling us that
you really didn't have enough confidence both to go out

(01:06:08):
on a business level and artistic level? You just saw
yourself as a band member. Yeah, I think I was
happy being in a banned environment, playing with people having
fun out. Just thought maybe it wasn't for me, you know,
to to have that. I didn't want it. I know.

(01:06:29):
I know the people that want that, you know, they
have to they have to want it. And I was
never that pushy, you know. I'm, as I say, more
of a team player. But I love singing, and so
I've had to some extent make myself do that, you know,
have a bit more confidence, and and I have, I have,

(01:06:53):
I have now, But um, I just don't think you can.
You can. You can't really say would I do it
all again? Because you know, you've got to have the
guts to do it, And maybe I didn't have the guts,
you know or whatever. I don't know. We're where where
we are now. What would the guts have looked like?
I don't know what that means to be honest. Well,

(01:07:15):
I mean you made it from Sheffield with the outdoor, toilet,
to to you know, to the hit parade? What what?
What kind of characteristic would it have taken? They let me.
But is it such that this is your personality or
the boy from Sheffield? He can't take the boy out

(01:07:37):
of Sheffield? Or can people change or not change? It
could be I mean Sheffield people generally speaking, they are
kind of self effacing. They do get their self deprivation.
What's the word um in? They don't like people that

(01:07:58):
get to big for their boots. As I say, I'm
a team player. I could make all the excuses in
the world, but it boils down to the fact that
you know, you've got to want want it, and you've
got to be self orientated. I was. As I say,
I'm not complaining. I think things are gone pretty good.

(01:08:26):
So ultimately, you have a solo record, you have a
hit in the United States, So do you think you're
on your way? Then? What's going through your mind? Are
we talking about don't shed a tear? Yeah no, no,
we're talking about I need you, I need you before
I need you? Yeah, I need you was just kind
of top thirty. Yeah, that was stripped step in the
right direction. Yeah, I thought things were moving. Well, there,

(01:08:50):
I was in working a lot with Nick Lowe um
back in those days, and yeah, I was and a
bit more confident and cocky then. Um, I'm trying to
think chronologically how things happened. I know that after Mike

(01:09:12):
and the Mechanics, I got a solo contract and I
had my first top ten hit, which is the song
Don't Shed a Tear, and that was pretty exciting. Sadly,
my wife got ill at this at this time, and
we I was on tour in the States and I
had to go home and we had to um, you know,

(01:09:37):
take care of her for for for a little while.
So we lost a little bit of momentum there. But
as I say, I'm where I am now, I think
is a pretty good place. So how do you end
up working with Mike and the Mechanics? Um? Do you

(01:09:57):
want the long story? Give us a lot? Sorry, okay, Um, well,
I'm trying to think now. Okay, So I had a
band with Nick low for several years, which, okay, let's
start there. How do you end up thou falling in
with Nickolo? You must have known him from the stiff years,
but how do you reconnect? No, I knew him before
then I knew him before the stiff years. How did

(01:10:18):
you know? How did you know him? Well? Because we
were on this pub rock circuit. I was in Ace.
He had a band called Brinsley Sports, and they were
probably the best band on that circuit, but we were
the ones that had the lucky hit anyway, so we
I didn't then see much of Nick for many years

(01:10:39):
until he became this record new wave record producer, producing
The Damned and Elvis Costello and these people, and and
then we all ended up under the same roof, under
the Jake Rivereia stable because Nick was always with Jake

(01:10:59):
and he'd taken on Squeeze and Nick produced my first album,
which is called Suburban Voodoo, which is a very fueled
kind of record. Um, what does that mean? We were
loaded basically, you know. It sounds like it though, but

(01:11:23):
I bought it. I was happy, did you well? It
was very exciting. Where did this start? Now? Mechanics? Okay,
So one of the reasons I had left Squeeze actually
was because I loved Nick and I wanted to work
with him. Um. He but unfortunately at the time he

(01:11:44):
wasn't having a great time. He was having a divorce
and all this stuff was going on, so he wasn't
a lot of fun a lot of the time. But
we had this band, and if if I had a
record out, we went out as Paul Carrott, and if
Nick had a record out, it was Nick Lowe and
the Cowboy Outfit or Noise to Go or what have you.

(01:12:04):
And so that was great. We had it. We we
were playing up and down the states, either playing in
little dives or opening up for people like Tom Petty
on these long tours, opening up in the arenas and
what have you. Had a lot of fun. But then
it started to get a bit old, and we we've

(01:12:27):
all decided really that it's it's it's run its course.
And coincidentally, I get a call from a guy called b. A. Robertson,
who is um calls me up about the blue I
don't know him from Adam and he he's written this
song that he wants to pitch to a movie and
he says, Um, we should get that guy who sang

(01:12:49):
that song. How long? So he called me up and said,
you're that guy that's saying that. Would you come and
sing this demo for me? Because I'm pitching this. I said, okay, yeah,
because you never know. So I just went and did it.
I didn't get paid or anything like that. Sang this
song for him and he said, oh, by the way,
I'm writing songs with Mike Rutherford from Genesis. He's making

(01:13:11):
a solo record and would you think you'd be interested
in coming down and singing a couple of songs on that?
And I said, sure, yeah, why not? And so I
went down. I met Mike, went down to the Genesis
studio there and they said, just going. You've got this
little song. Here's just three chords, just going there, blues

(01:13:32):
away and it was this song Silent Running or can
you hear Me? So they only had the can you
hear Me a bit at this point and then and
I'm just riffing away and they said, oh, that sounds great,
and b A went away and wrote this weird lyric
and I sang a couple of songs, a couple of

(01:13:53):
three songs on that first album, and then thought no
more about it. And then the record came out and
it was well received, and Mike was in a position
to assemble this kind of studio band into a touring band,
and we became Mike and the Mechanics. Okay, then there's
the second album with Living Years. Yes, so how is

(01:14:14):
that album, ma, because you're a member of the group
now the Mechanics and one of the Mechanics. Yeah, and
not Mike though, as my news agent used to think.
But yeah, well I was. I was really happy to
get to sing that song. Um. Obviously I kind of
felt it was a bit of a tribute to my dad,

(01:14:35):
but it was. The song really was about BEA's relationship
with his father and all the rest of it. But
so that's a kind of a feather in the cap.
We were nominated for Grammy Awards and all sorts. We
didn't get it, but nevertheless we had some good success

(01:14:56):
m for for a few albums, and it was good fun.
But it was it was Mike's project, you know. So
how does it feel when you're not writing the songs? Well,
originally I didn't mind because it was it was different
to anything I would have been involved with. You know,
it still had that sort of genesis kind of connection.

(01:15:17):
I was felt I was more of a root Sie
kind of guy, but it was something different. But I
was happy to be involved. And but then I started
to think, well, you know, it's the songwriters back in
those days that were making any of the money. So
and I also felt that I could contribute to the songwriting,

(01:15:39):
and fortunately Mike had already had this thought and started
to include me more in the songwriting. And how did
you write Over my Shoulder? Very quickly? Pretty quickly anyway,
I mean I went down to Mike's house and he said, okay, well,
I've got this little idea, and he started strumming the

(01:15:59):
open chords as you're probably familiar with, and I started,
and we put the cassette player on and I started
to riff away. And after twenty minutes of riffing on
this on these chords, the tape ran out. And I
had been thinking, I don't think he's digging this because

(01:16:22):
it's it's too pop for him. You know, he's not
gonna like this anyway, and then he said, actually, you
did something at the very beginning of the thing. And
we were around the tape right to the top and
there I'm singing for whatever and it reason looking back
over my Shoulder Lady ballad, and he he loved it.

(01:16:45):
So I was great. It was a whole shape was
there from the get go. And then I took it
away and wrote some lyrics to it and that was it.
But that was a big song in Europe and the UK.
But I don't think it ever took off in the
of that album though. And I certainly know that song.
That was my favorite song on the record. Uh, but

(01:17:06):
how do you normally write a song? I don't know, Bob.
I was hoping you weren't gonna ask me that one.
You know, some people sit down there with a pad
of paper and they write and they scratch. Other people
are taking a shower. They get an idea. Some people
all comes all together, some people working for a year.

(01:17:28):
Usually it's it's a musical idea that would just come
from jamming away and a phrase. You take that phrase
and doing and then and you add to it. I
very rarely have a plan. I very rarely have an
idea of a concept or even a title. Um that

(01:17:50):
all seems to come later. If if I'm lucky, something
comes off the top of my head that sings good
and that I can do velop and make into something.
Once I get a start on it, I now have
the confidence that I can make reasonably decent lyric. It's

(01:18:13):
not going to be that original I'm not intellectual, as
you probably guess by now, I should think. But and
I'm not a reader. I'm not. I don't read books
so much. I read news and articles and stuff like that.
But I like to think I can make something it

(01:18:35):
it's probably borderline cliche, but I can make it sound
not too cliche, and it can sound good. It will
sing good, because that's important as well. So the kids
are out of the house, you can't play music seven,
you're not reading books? What do you what takes your
time up all day? What do you do? I don't

(01:18:58):
have any problem filling in my time. I've got this
little studio at home, and if I'm not on the road,
I'm in here messing about um. Yeah, I think that's
where most of my time goes. I still like soccer,
but my team is really awful and terrible. But what's

(01:19:20):
your team? My team Sheffield Wednesday. We're now in the
third division. They've been in the Premier League and back
in how long ago were they in the Premier League?
About twenty years guys? Sorry, when I was growing up,
they were real good. Who owns it now? Oh, it's
owned by a Taiwanese Is there any is there any hope. No,

(01:19:44):
there's hope that we will survive, which was looking a
bit scary at the beginning of this year because this
guy spent a whole lot of money, which are not
allowed to do in the lower divisions, and we were
in all kinds of trouble and we're getting points deducted
for the financial stuff, and he'd blown a load of

(01:20:06):
money on the wrong players and he didn't know what
he was doing, but he insisted he did. So I
thought we were going out of business completely. But there's
hope they will survive. But to be back in the
Premier League, it's a different planet now. The money up
there is just crazy. And then you work with Elton

(01:20:30):
John as a keyboard player himself. How do you end
up working with Elton John. Yeah, he's a great piano player,
but he doesn't play organ, and organ is different thing.
It's just different. I mean, he probably could if he
could be bothered to figure it out. But actually I'm
a better organ player than piano player. It's just because

(01:20:52):
you can get away with murder on the on the
organ if you know how to coax the sound out
of it. And I seemed to have a reputation for
playing the Hammond organ. So he actually he here's a
story for you. Are you're not getting fed up with
these stories for the best parts. So Elton was friendly

(01:21:16):
with Chris, different from Squeeze. I think it was to
do with the the program, you know, And I think
Elton was at one time sponsoring Chris. And one night
Elton turned up at a Squeeze show in a concert
in the in the UK and got up and sang

(01:21:40):
a couple of songs and the place just went crazy.
And of course I've been playing organ that night, and
he must have thought, oh, well, we'll get him in.
And I played on a couple of tracks, one of
which was apparently the B side or the extra track
on the famous Candle in the Wind, which at one

(01:22:01):
point was the best selling record of all times. So
my tenuous link to that is that I played on
the other track, which is called something in the Way
You Look Tonight. Yeah, that that track is a known
track to Okay, so you play the keyboard, you also
play the guitar. Can you just basically play anything you
have that facility? Yeah. I don't play any of the

(01:22:25):
wind instruments, but yeah, I'm not great, you know. But
I it's I've got the musical instincts and I have
a feel a natural field. You know, it's leaving. My
son is the same. You know, he picks up, he
picks up the guitar. He doesn't know what he's doing,
but he looks like he's played it all his life. Um.
So I have a feel, I have a groove, and

(01:22:47):
that gets me a long way. Okay, So at this
point you have a desire to leave a body of work.
Isn't that sort of equivalent to having the hunger that
we spoke of earlier? Possibly? Possibly? I mean, I don't know.

(01:23:13):
I mean, I I it's tempting to say I've given
it a good shot. I've had a great time. We
could probably I could take it easy. Um, I don't know.
I don't know if it's in the genes or what
it is, or I just think I could have done
so much better. Not commercially, but you know, musically I

(01:23:37):
could have done better things. And maybe I had a
bit of recognition. Um that don't worried me too much.
Probably scares me more than anything. But why does it scary? Well,
only because I don't like attention. Really, you know, if
I go to the soccer game. I don't want people
looking at me Paul character. I don't want that. I

(01:23:59):
don't I just like to live normal life, albeit you know, comfortably.
Are you ever recognized? Occasionally? But not much? Okay, So
we go through this history. Unlike someone who starts in
the band stays in that band their whole career, you're

(01:24:20):
constantly making new connections. Now people say, oh, it just happened.
I've been around too long to know it doesn't happen
that way. What was that. I'm not a networker, so
how did it happen? I'm not a networker, and I
don't know. I don't hang out with Eric you know. Yeah,

(01:24:41):
well you know you're established. But over forty or fifty years,
opportunities have come up. Yeah, well they have just happened.
They have just happened. I haven't been out there beating
the bushes looking for this stuff. It has just happened. Okay.
But you know, there were no times to talk about
be getting married, having kids, or no times you're sitting

(01:25:03):
at home saying, man, I need a gig. I gotta
start calling people up. See what's going on. No, well, fortunately,
there for for whatever reason, um, I things have come
up at the right time when I mean, don't get
me wrong, I was when I'm when when I'm in
my mid thirties and my early forties and I've got

(01:25:26):
no hair and I've got four kids. Yeah, I was thinking,
oh my god, what am I gonna do? But thinks
always something always turned up. But I wasn't out there
on the phone hustling. Honestly, I'm not like that. So
you do a couple of songs. You write a couple
songs that end up being done by the Eagles, one

(01:25:49):
on their Health Reasons Over album, another one I'm a
long run out of Eden album? How did that happen? Again?
With the long sto Worice, It's a long story. I
want a long story. That's the best I've been going
to an hour and a half already. Um Well. I

(01:26:15):
first met Timothy B. Schmidt on our first tour, ass
first tour of America, when we were riding high with
our big radio hit and Timothy is in the band
called Pocole. We're both on the same record label. I
met him, seemed like a real nice guy, and I
didn't really meet him again until later when I think

(01:26:40):
I was probably on either doing my gigs with Nick
or in Nick's band, Nick Lowell's band, and Timothy came
down a few times with Don Henley, and I found
out that Don like what I did. He like that
Suburban Voodoo album, and um, so he came down to

(01:27:03):
a few gigs. And then must be skipping a good
few years here. But about in the mid nineties, when
the Eagles hadn't weren't together, you know, for whatever reason,
I have no idea, none of my business. Um but
I got a call from Don Felder who was keen

(01:27:25):
to do something that he and Timothy and at that point,
I believe Joe Walsh also they would wanted to do. So,
they wanted to work, They wanted to do a project,
make a record, maybe do some gigs. And they called
me up out of the blue and said, do you
fancy coming over to California? And you know, see what happens?

(01:27:49):
And I did just like that, just got on a
plane and went over there, stayed at Don's place, and
I think it Joe at this point that bailed and
he'd gone to get himself sorted out. And so there
was done. There was Timothy and another guy called Max Carl,
a great guy. He was in a band called thirty

(01:28:10):
eight Special, great singer, very funny guy, and we spent
some time writing songs, making some recordings, and everybody was
getting out, oh this is interesting, this could be good,
you know, blah blah blah. And one of the songs
I took over there was this song level Keepers Alive,

(01:28:35):
which was i'd co written with Peter Vale Jim Capaldi
and with a view to taking it over for this project.
And so we took it over there. I was singing
it and we were making these recordings, everybody getting cited.
But obviously, to cut this long story short, now the

(01:28:59):
Eagles this I had to get back together. So that
was the end of that project. It never it didn't happen.
But a few weeks later, um, I got a call
from Timothy and said, look, I need a song to
do on the Eagles album. How about I do love
Will Keepers Alive? And of course we said, well, big, yeah, absolutely,

(01:29:24):
So he did that one and it was a big
radio record. It was part of the Unplugged thing and
all that. And likewise on the Health Freezers over Sorry
Long Road Out of Eden album, Timothy rang me up
and there's a there's another long story here, but basically

(01:29:45):
I wrote the song no No No, No, no No. I
want to hear that story. Just telling that story. Timothy
called me up and said, I need a song. We're
making an album. I need a song. Nothing that he'd
you know, presented to the band had been accept it.
And I put the phone. He said, have you got anything?
I said, well, I don't, but I'll try and write something,

(01:30:06):
which I don't usually do. I'm not one of those
guys that does that. But I put the phone down
and literally came up with the chorus for the song
as I could hear the Eagles singing in three part
harmony sort of thing. And I made a little demo
and I sent it to Timothy and I didn't hear
much from him. But then he said, oh, we're coming

(01:30:28):
over to England. We're going to play in London. You
come on down, come to the show. And I did,
and he said by when I went to the show,
he said, have you got anything? And I said, well,
there was that song I sent you. He said, oh yeah, yeah, yeah,
send me that again. So I said, I sent it again.
And then there were weeks and months probably went by

(01:30:50):
and I didn't I wasn't hearing anything, and I sort
of got in touch with him and I said, oh,
that song, I don't want to hear anymore. I said,
if you if you're not going to do it, you
know I'm going to do it. So I think he's
he said, no, we were, Actually, I just you know,
they he put it to the bend and they were
interested in doing it, and and they and the and

(01:31:12):
they recorded it and it went on a long road
out of it. I think it's a good song. Actually,
I don't want to hear anymore. How do you know
wading with Jim Capaldi, I didn't really know Jim. I

(01:31:32):
think at one point he was possibly going to be
part of this project. To be honest with you, I
think they changed their mind about that, but at that
early stage it was possible he might be involved in this,
in this Eagles offshoot thing. And so I met him

(01:31:54):
and we got together with this guy Pete Vail, who
there's a good song writer. Yeah, and that's what we
got together and wrote that song. Okay, So how many
people went today? When you go out on the road,
how many people do you take? How many people are
in your band? There's there are there six or seven.

(01:32:16):
We are We're seven. We have two drummers, one of
which is my son Jack. He's been with us about
ten years. They are bass, guitar, keyboards, sacks, and myself
playing keys and guitar alternating. How many is that that?
Six or seven? I wasn't. Okay Um, yes, so it's

(01:32:38):
it's it's quite a big bend, but it's great. The
guys have been with me for twenty odd years. They're
all from Sheffield, so they're all they're all proper, down
to earth guys than none of these hustling kind of
I know that's I don't want to disrespect anybody here,

(01:32:59):
but you know they're not hustling for gigs like you
have to do in London or l A or New York.
You've got to be busy. They're not. They're up in
in Sheffield and they're not working with me. They play
with their other things. There are other little projects and
it's like a proper band, except I'm the boss. And
how did you meet the guys from Sheffield? Okay? Um,

(01:33:24):
when I started doing this solo thing, nobody knew really
the name Paul Carrock. It's probably like it is in
the States. You go how long? Oh yeah, I know,
how long? Live here? I love that song. It's all
that Paul character. I've never heard of him. So I
started doing these small gigs and I was using guys

(01:33:49):
from London who were, you know, proper session guys used
to a high standard of not just wages but all
the rest of it, the nice hotels, the nice travel
and I couldn't give it to them. But they were
trying to help me. But I felt it was a
burden because I felt I'm not giving them what they
do and what they used to. Anyway, I met I

(01:34:13):
met this guy at the football but the Sheffield Wednesday game,
and he was like this small time agent up in Sheffield,
and I tried to explain to him, oh, yeah, I'm
doing some gigs, but I no, I don't make any money.
No I don't mean yeah, I'm driving the van. And
he couldn't get his head around this anyway. Eventually he

(01:34:34):
said to me, well, listen, I've got this band. They're
really good. Um they got a lead singer but where
he can play the keyboards and he could they could
do your gigs. And I went and I went and
met these guys and they were like oh yeah, great.
So they I bolted myself onto this northern club bend

(01:34:58):
and it was initially a lot of people thought, what's
Paul doing. He's playing with these guys up north, and
but it was worked great because these were these are
great guys. They loved the opportunity to play with me,
and they could all play good. But they didn't have
reputations or big names or anything like that. So and

(01:35:20):
that's it. And from twenty years we've grown to a
really good a really good band. Many people on the
business side would say, you take it out seven people.
Are you supposed to make any money? Well, I don't
pay him much, you know, Well that's that we are.

(01:35:40):
We are doing okay, because we know what we're doing.
It's easy to waste money. It's easy to waste money
making a record or going out on the road if
you don't know what you're doing. But if you do
know what you're doing, and you you spend the money
in the right places, but you don't waste money, then
you know you can make it workinly Okay. We know
there's studio side, What are the dig a little bit

(01:36:02):
deeper on the road side, what are the key things
you must do or not doo. Um, you must be
good every night. You must be good every night. It's
not good being on fire for three nights and then
burnt out for the rest of the tour. You know
you that's one thing, um or are you talking sort

(01:36:24):
of financially again? I like both of them. It wasn't
asked the other question. Yeah. Well, initially we weren't making
any money, um, but I didn't have to lose money
because they took reasonable wages. We didn't over extend ourselves.
We did things very basically, and we've built up a

(01:36:47):
following from digging and gigging and gigging, and each year
our standard has gone up. A standard of sound system,
I standard of production, lighting venues, it goes up each year.
So now we play nice theaters here in the in
the UK and people keep coming back, you know. So

(01:37:10):
it's I think that's how you do it, and how
do you grow the audience you're talking about you have
to be good every night? What are the other keys? Well,
I don't know the secrets to uh, you know, social
media and all that. I'm not a very not really
a social media animal, but I guess you can make

(01:37:31):
that work for you. But in our case, it's been
a case of you know, winning people over. We're we
we we we we take them. We take it seriously,
our responsibility to two people. You might think that people
that's obvious, but it isn't. In a lot of cases.
You know, some people kind of take their audience for

(01:37:54):
granted a little bit. I don't know. I shouldn't be
saying that, but we don't. I know that. So to
what degree does the audience know the material? You're putting
out new records constantly, So when the audience comes, do
they know this music? How much of it can you play? Yeah? Well,
it's a mixture because obviously we always include six or

(01:38:17):
seven songs there that are pretty substantial hits, Living Years,
how long Tempted? Uh, you know, Love will Keepers Alive.
These these are pretty big songs. So we're always going
to do them. We love doing them, we love the response.
So we've got people who know everything we've done, and

(01:38:40):
there's other people who may have heard a couple of things,
and then they're often surprised, Oh I know, right, you know,
they know that they don't realize until they get there
that they know more of the material than they thought.
But we've got some pretty pretty uh great fans. And

(01:39:02):
do you personally go out to the merch table and
sign and meet people? Actually, you know, I used to.
I used to do that just to prove what a
nice guy I am. But I did I realized we're
touring in the middle of winter. People are coming up
to you, going nice to meet your paul. Um. So
we stopped doing that for hygiene reasons. And you say,

(01:39:24):
you you play the first couple of months in the year,
can you go back to the same markets every year?
It seems so wow, that's really great. Okay, So if
you're looking at what we are always changing, we all
we usually have a new album out and we include
new new stuff from that. Look, you're on stage the legends,

(01:39:46):
they play new music. It's a cliche. Everybody goes to
the bathroom. Yeah, how do you decide how much new
music to play and how do you keep the audience interested?
That's a good point. I mean, well, we're not we're
not a greatest hits act. Um. I don't think the
music is the music is not inaccessible, if that's a word. Um,

(01:40:10):
you know you usually get this music or you don't,
you know, it's not that demanding in that sense, I
don't think, um, but I don't know. Obviously, it's uh,
it's something we have to think about. But I think
generally speaking, they like the need, they like to hear
new stuff. Okay, if you look back at the landscape,

(01:40:33):
what are a couple of records not your own, not
once you've worked on that are important to you, that
really motivated you or stick with you or you still play.
I love Talking Book, Oh yeah, especially at the time.
I thought it was a groundbreaking, revolutionary and it was
one guy as well, a lot of it, you know,

(01:40:54):
playing the stuff, and it had this own personality and
it wasn't even quantire back in those early days. It
would just hung together beautifully. And I love Moon Dance
Van Morrison two great records. Just think it's a beautiful
organic record. I love the sound of it, I love

(01:41:17):
the band on it, and of course Vans great. Um.
I think it's a very honest album. I love that album. Yeah, um,
what else is there an Aretha record? I play a lot,
but it's it's a compilation. I guess. I think it's
the greatest hits type thing. But again, it has that

(01:41:38):
great band feel to it. Life feel to it. I've
got a pretty mixed mixed taste in music. And are
you generally just playing your own music or are you
listening to other people's music. Do you keep up on
new music? Where do you fall on that to continue?
I don't. I don't really keep up with what's going on.

(01:41:59):
I haven't a clue what's going on. Um, I don't
listen to my own stuff other than when I'm working
at it, which I mean on the last year it's
been a lot because I've been doing it by herself.
It does mean you're playing it a lot, you know,

(01:42:20):
because you're getting the parts right and all the rest
of it. But no, I don't listen to much new stuff. UM.
I listened to a lot of old stuff. I listened
to like Amos Milbourne and Little Junior Parker and Mose
Allison and Donnie Hathaway, things like that. Some classical, some

(01:42:44):
English classical music which I find quite relaxing. And yeah, okay, Paul,
thanks for filling us in all this. Why you have
good vacation down there on the coast of Spain. Thank you, Bob,
so thanks so much for with this. You're very welcome,
and thank you for your patience listening to us, no listen,

(01:43:06):
is a little deep that it's good until next time.
This is Bob left six h