June 28, 2024 • 60 mins
In Episode 33 we have the pleaseure of hearing from Frank Watkinson! Despite not having a tradional career in music Frank began sharing his songs and cover songs on YouTube where he quickly resonated with a global audience going viral and even had cuts featured in a show on Apple TV's Original Series "Home Before Dark". He ranked 2nd place in the American Songwriter Magzine contest with his song "This Could Be My Last Song". We discuss Frank's songs, pets, fame and listen to "This Could Be My Last Song"
Frank Watkinson on YouTube
"This Could Be My Last Song"
This episode was sponsored by 9 To 5 Warriors : A 90'S INSPIRED ACTION FIGURE SERIES
RECAPTURING THE MAGIC OF THE SATURDAY MORNING CARTOON ERA
Episode intro music written by Brandon Carswell & produced by Micah Tawlks - "Back To Us"
Worktapes show cover art designed by Harrison Hudson
**All songs used by permission**
Frank Watkinson on YouTube
"This Could Be My Last Song"
This episode was sponsored by 9 To 5 Warriors : A 90'S INSPIRED ACTION FIGURE SERIES
RECAPTURING THE MAGIC OF THE SATURDAY MORNING CARTOON ERA
Episode intro music written by Brandon Carswell & produced by Micah Tawlks - "Back To Us"
Worktapes show cover art designed by Harrison Hudson
**All songs used by permission**
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:11):
Welcome to Work Tapes. This isa podcast where we tear of our songs.
Why was the song written, what'sit about? What's the context and
emotion behind it? Where were youat the time, what were you going
through? How did certain lines cometo you? What's the inspiration? How
long did it take to write?I'm Brandon Carswell and I'm fascinated with songwriting
(00:33):
and how songs are built from theground up. It's easy to hear a
full production song on the radio anddismiss its origin story. I want to
hear the rough draft of the songfor the work tapes. I want to
explore the very beginning of how songsthat move us and make us move are
born. We're looking back on mylife. It's hard to understand how time
(01:14):
just seems to fly when you're anolder man. Whatever happened to all the
dreams I had and all those crazyplans I never got the chance to do.
They just slipped right through my head, through my head, through my
(01:47):
Welcome to Work tapes. Everyone,This is Brandon as usual. I was
fortunate enough to come across the videorecently and my scrolling on and where I
found uh Frank Watkinson and he waskind enough to join us today to talk
(02:07):
about some of his songs and hopefullywe'll get a little insight into who Frank
is as well. How are youdoing, Frank, I'm fine, Thanks,
thanks for being here, Thanks fordoing this. I got the time
difference. I think I was offby an hour. Yeah, you're over
(02:28):
You're in the UK, right,yeah, six hours now. Yeah,
so I'm sorry about that. Bythe way, what I'm glad I checked
my email. I'm glad you messagedme because I would have missed it.
Let's just kind of jump in.I'm gonna ask I'll just ask you a
couple of standard questions. When didso? I assume that you've been doing
(02:53):
music for a while, Is thatcorrect? Uh? Yeah, I've I
think I've been sort of learning learningto play the guitar since I was about
fourteen. Me too, I'm stilllearning as well. Yeah, but it's
(03:15):
that's it sounds like a long time. But there was a lot of years
where I didn't really touch the guitar. You know, when you're when you're
working and everything like that, andso I should I should be really,
I should be sort of virtuo soguitar player, but I'm not I'm still
(03:37):
I'm still well, like a beginner. Life gets in the way a little
bit as far as that goes responsibilitiesand working family and all of that,
and that's okay. When did thingsas far as I kind of feel like
this is less important just me personally, But when did things online start kind
(04:01):
of blowing up for you? Whendid you realize I've got people that are
watching my videos and watching me coverthese songs. I think it's about I
think it was lockdown. Is thatwhat you posting? I've been posting a
couple of years before, and Ihad I was surprised to have about I
(04:28):
think about twelve twelve thousand subscribers mmhmm and on YouTube, and I thought
that was sort of amazing. Andthen I did a cover of a rock,
like a heavy metal song. SoI did a cover of that.
(04:49):
Is that a slip slip Knots song? Slipknot song? Yeah? Yeah,
it got posted in all the heavymetal metal magazines and things around the world.
Oh wow, And it was likeand then so that not the subscribers
right up, and then more andmore people. Once you start going like
(05:09):
that, more and more people startcoming in and and not long after that
I released this could be my lastsong, and for some reason that went
the sort of viral as well,And yeah, that it surprised me.
(05:35):
I think people were posting it becauseI wasn't on Instagram or TikTok or anything
like that, but I think peoplewere posting it on them because it was
coming and the subs just kept goingup and up. And I can't seem
to I'm not I'm not complaining,but I can't seem to stop. Sure,
I haven't tried. This is thething. I haven't tried to get
(06:00):
subscribers. I've not sent anything offpromoting myself to anybody. And if you
watch my YouTube, you won't seeanything studio professional because I don't do that.
I don't even play outside of thehouse anywhere. I've never played a
gig anywhere. I'd just like tosit at home songs and play. Yeah,
(06:29):
I was going to ask you aboutthat actually, as if, as
if you do kind of gig aroundwhere you live in your town or no,
would you would you be open todoing that or you don't want to
do that? It's not It's notsomething I've really felt like doing because I'm
not very good at remembering lyrics,and so I tend to write the song
(06:55):
or to learn a song on YouTubeand play it, get it on YouTube,
and I'd probably never go back toit again. Yea, even my
own songs, right, I justget I'll just get an idea for a
song. All my songs are reallyideas. They never finished properly, look
(07:16):
as you know, take it toa studio and do something with it.
They're all sort of I've written asong, there it is. That's I
always think that's for someone else todo. I think it's good enough.
Well, it seems to me likemillions of people think you're good enough,
Frank, and I would say,you absolutely are. I mean, I
(07:45):
know why I think it works.I'm wondering what you think about it.
You know, you said, yousaid you went from that metal song,
that Slipknot song, right, youknow, to this latest song. But
there's a whole slew of songs inbetween. Like the song that caught my
attention was Radioheads creep that you did, and that's one of Radioheads, one
(08:09):
of my all time favorite bands,and that song is one of my favorite
songs up there is probably in thetop five. I'm a big Radiohead nerd
so and that was another one.It was I did a cover of No
Surprises. Yep, that's that.That's actually one I saw first. Yeah,
(08:31):
that's right, that's right, Andthey like the way I adapted that.
Yeah. The reason I adapt themis because I can't play them light
the original. I'm not well,your your your your humility is on on
shine right now, because you sayit's not that clever, but it really
(08:54):
works because and the reason I thinkit works is because you make these songs
your own and you can say,yeah, I don't know how to play
the real of course you can't playthe full production version, you're one man.
But you also I've done a coverof No Surprises before, and it
(09:15):
doesn't sound like uh, you know, it sounds like me and I would
never pretend to do justice to TomYork or Radiohead, but because they're them,
right, But I think there's athere's a conviction in your voice and
then you're playing that comes across you. It's almost like you know in every
(09:37):
cover that you do, whether it'syou know, you've done Radiohead, Metallica,
slip Knot, I mean, whowho haven't you covered? I guess
at this point there's a lot ofvideos you haven't you have, you've done,
But in every one of those songs, there's an emotion in your voices
(10:00):
if you know exactly why you're singingit and who you're singing it too,
and you can feel it, andmaybe that's just how you how you sing
do you pick? I just Iget a lot of these songs are requests
because a lot of these songs Ihaven't heard before. And if I like
(10:22):
it straight off, that's that's athat's a bonus. And then I read
the lyrics and I just try toput myself in that story as if it
was me. You know, ifit's a sad song, it's about I
try to be the sad person thatsinging the song. If you that's how
(10:46):
I to get it. You getyou've got to sort of live the song,
even though you might play it badly. I like you said, I'm
trying. I'm at least trying toconvey the shouldn't that the song should have.
Yeah, And I think you doa great job of that. I
think that that's why it sticks.You're but it's not just the cover songs.
(11:11):
Your songs do the same thing,and your songs your songs have that
depth, you know, they theyall sound true. I assume they are.
But if they're not, you're doinga fantastic job making me believe they
are. You know, I havethere are. You do get a lot
(11:37):
of rumors or people thinking they knowwhy right and then nearly always wrong.
Right, of course, they don'tknow your story. No, I wrote,
I do a song. I wrotea song called miss You, and
if you go on my YouTube,it's the one that's in the thing playing
(12:01):
at the beginning and for ages.They all thought it was about my wife
that I'd lost years ago, andthat's what the song is about, that
sort of thing, But it isn'tme. I still still hanging around,
right, But yeah, And that'sone of the greatest things about songwriting is
(12:24):
you can I like to take anidea sometimes that is true, either embellish
it or strip it back into somethingso that maybe I don't have to wear
my heart on my sleeve. Butthen sometimes the song is served really well
by wearing your heart on your sleeveand just telling the truth and just putting
(12:48):
yourself out there. You mentioned earlierin this conversation that you hadn't had time
for guitar you know in your youngeryears because of work and whatever else.
Hum is that the same for asongwriting? Do you feel like you're you're
(13:11):
writing more now because you have thetime. Is it a dream you always
wanted to pursue and didn't have timefor. No, I I think I
think it is. I think I'mprobably writing more more songs, like you
said, because I have the timenow. But I've always even when I
(13:37):
was working, I'd have ideas forsongs while I was at work and go
home and I try to write downwhat I was thinking of that, you
know, while I was out.But I do have more time now,
But I I rarely sit down andsay I'm going to write a song.
(13:58):
It's usually something comes into my headand before I know it, there's a
song. You know. If youknow me, I could go I could
go weeks not even think of anythingto write, and then all of a
sudden, I might just be justpicking at the guitar and think of a
(14:20):
line or something. The next minutethere's another song. I'm not saying a
great songs, but if I doget an idea for a song, I
have to get it out because ifI don't finish it, I can't play
anything else because I'm constantly got ahalf a song stuck, right, I
(14:43):
understand that. It's yeah, I'vebeen in that position for sure, and
I find when I'm not able towrite or create, you know, sometimes
I will even draw like it's justgot to be something creative sometimes where if
I'm working too much, you know, to pay the bills, which I
(15:05):
don't I'm not complaining about, butif that creative outlet isn't isn't sussed out,
then I will I feel like I'mgoing crazy. I've got to do
something, so I and I resonatewith that on songwriting as well, especially
if you feel like it's a goodidea, you gotta finish it. It's
got to be done well, isit. Generally? Sometimes they're not that
(15:30):
they're not very good, but it'sstill got to go because it it'll keep
on coming back if I don't drawa line under it. Yeah, I
think that's good advice, even forfor any writer. It doesn't matter whether
the song is good or not.Just finish the song. Just finish what
(15:50):
you started. That's good life advicein general, to finish what you started.
But for songs, you know,it puts another one in the bank.
And also if you don't like itvery much, you might start a
song next week and you can't thinkof a line, and then you're like,
well, I've got this song Idon't like very much. Let me
tear it apart and see if there'sany good lines I can steal from you.
(16:11):
And I've done that. I havedone that. I was going to
ask you also, do you havea favorite cover so far that you've posted.
I think the one that I reallyenjoyed doing was was I'll Follow You
(16:33):
into the Dark. That was agreat one. What a great song?
Death Cab for Cutie right, Yeah? That but that made that that that
got made even better when Apple TVgot in touch to put it on a
TV series. Oh did they?So they used yours? They used my
(16:56):
cover? Yeah? Oh that's amazing. I don't know that. Uh yeah,
it's TV series. It's called HomeBefore Dark. Okay. It's about
about a young girl reporter. She'sabout nine years old, but she's a
a reporter and and in season twomy song comes up in it. And
(17:25):
that's fantastic. I just keep Ijust kept thinking how many seven year olds
can retire from work and end upYeah, well that's that's a that's an
interesting subject. Because you're retired nowand a different world or different timeline,
(17:48):
this would be a lot less likelyfor you to have this kind of success
without the tools we have now onoh no, with no YouTube and all
this stuff, how would it havehappened? You know? I thought about
that when I was I was goingthrough your feed last night just to prepare
for this conversation, and I thought, you know, even twenty thirty years
(18:15):
ago, it just wouldn't have beena possibility. It would have Well,
it's possibility, I suppose, butvery very hard. Yeah, very likely.
It's when people ask me about theyquite say, can you do a
(18:37):
tutorial on how you played a certainsong? And I could do that probably
I've done a couple. I didone for No Surprises and one for Snuff.
And then I think when I whenI first had the guitar, the
only way I could learn was froma book or go watching people play in
(18:57):
somewhere and watching their hands right,And it's not easy because if they're quick,
you're thinking what did they do?What did they do? And and
another thing with books is you getthe book out, a music book,
and where whereas I would play,say, say, I played what I
(19:25):
would call a C and an F, but because we've got the capital and
it isn't a C or an F, right, it's whatever that is.
So when you get the books out, it'll say things like D flat minor
in F sharp minus seven and allthis lot. And it's not easy to
learn when you're trying to learn chordshapes that you know that the person playing
(19:48):
the song didn't play. But it'sall to do with keys and that,
and so they've got it a loteasier nowadays. And it's just a i'll
Off'm wonder how anybody got anywhere I'llput it. It's true, It's true.
I when I was learning guitar,about twelve or thirteen years old,
(20:11):
I had a chord poster hanging inmy bedroom. So but again, if
I wanted to learn a song,the only way for me to know what
it sounded like when I was akid was either listening to the radio or
buy the album. You know,I had a tape player when I was
(20:33):
grown up, so I could buythat album and throw the tape in and
try to learn it. But I'mhaving to learn the chords off the poster
on my wall and then try toline them up with the song and figure
out which one is which. Soyou're right, you know, but people
that are obsessed with songwriting or guitarplaying or whatever it is, they're going
to figure it out. I could. I could just if I want to
(21:03):
learn a song now, I couldjust go name of the song, stroke
lesson on YouTube and there'll be someoneshowing me how to do it. Because
when I cover, when I coversongs, because when I they say,
like they said, can you play? Can you do I'll follow you into
(21:26):
dark or something like that. SoI listened to the song. There's some
of the songs I get asked todo, there's so much going on that
I can't. I couldn't even guessthose chords because there's too much other stuff
going on. So I like tolook to see if somebody has done an
acoustic cover mm hmm, and ifthey have, I watch what they're playing,
(21:49):
and then I say, someone elsehas done an acoustic cover until I
and I'll go I like the wayhe did that part, but I didn't
like the way he did, andthen this person did, and then I
mixed and then to do mine right, I'll do it. Make mine out
of out of whatever I see.But sometimes there is there is none,
(22:11):
and I just have to make itout myself. Yeah, well you're doing
a great job. And let meask you what what do you like?
So people send you a lot ofsongs to cover. What are your what?
What have been your biggest influences musically? What? What do you listen
to? What do you like?I was when I when I was sort
(22:37):
of fifteen sixteen, I was intoI really liked bands like Jeff row Toe
yeah, playing the flute and allthis lot. I love Jeff row Towell,
but I was into it was thebeginning of the folks, so Simon
and Garf Uncle and Ralph Mattel andall the British folk musicians that you probably
(23:06):
don't know. But then what's itthe James Taylor come out, m hmm,
all those kind And I realized thatI really liked anything that was acoustic.
So it could even be it canbe the cheesiest of pop song,
(23:29):
but if there was an acoustic guitarin it, that made it for me.
I'm terrible with electric guitars. Ican't I've got two electric guitars,
and every time I've strumgled, I'vejumped back with a shock of the noise.
I just can't get on with electric. And maybe that's why part of
this works, right, is thatyou know, you you take your your
(23:55):
biggest musical influences and you take youknow, if you're being sent a song
and you look up a Slipknot songor a Metallica song that maybe is not
in your personal interest musically, hand you just take it. And but
the lyrics, the lyrics are thelyrics are great. Yeah, you know,
(24:19):
the heavy part and everything right,not it's not for me. But
the lyrics are so good that ifthe lyrics are good, then you can
play any way you want, right, That's true if you've got bad,
if you've only got a few.Because I have been asked to do some
covers and I've listened to them andthere's a there's about four lines of singing.
(24:47):
The rest of it is instrumental.Well, that's not going to work.
That's not going to work with myacoustic guitar for form, and it's
just picking like I do and thenfour lights. You know, So some
covers I just can't do. Idon't do instrumentals. I'm not good enough
to do instrumentals. I mean,I think you've got the niche. I
(25:08):
think you found it. I thinkit sounds like you're really smart about choosing
which ones. You're not doing itjust for views, and that's apparent to
me because you didn't start doing itfor reviews. And when it happens organically
like that, it's really fun towatch. It's fun to see. But
(25:33):
what I'm also trying to do isthere are so many because I was like
this, Oh, I'm not goingto bother doing that because I'm not good
enough. I'm not gonna see withsomeone just some of them want to have
a go with a guitar and doa song, and it was all and
I'm not good enough. I'm notgoing to do that. Well, as
(25:55):
you get older, you tend tocareless, and I'm just trying to show
people even if you can't play thissong properly, which I rarely can,
you could still do the song.Yeah, if you like it, you
can still do it, and nothingshould stop you from doing what you like.
(26:15):
And so that's great, great advice, great message, and segues really
well into the song that you wrotethat I contact you about. This could
be my last song is that partof the reason that you wrote this song
is that you know life is whereit is for you, and you spend
(26:38):
enough time going, well, I'mnot good enough for I didn't have time,
and and now I'm just that songkeeps being analyzed like madalyzed. You're
not going to like the answer.They're not well, I'm going to say.
(27:00):
But I had a chorus. Iwas sat there and I was going,
this could be my last song,my final so on and so,
and I thought I needed some verses. I like that chorus, and I
didn't have any verses, and Ijust I just wrote. I just wrote
(27:22):
it within It couldn't have taken twentyminutes, really, because all the words
just seemed to come for looking backon my life and all that fits that
and that, and because I'd writtenthat first one, I thought, oh,
I could go now looking back onall I've learned instead of just my
(27:44):
life, because and then I realizedwhere it was going then, and it's
it's a it's like someone an oldman that he's just he's got regrets now
he hasn't got time to do anythingabout it, and he's still unsure about
(28:06):
everything. He's got old but hedoesn't know anything. Is there a heaven
or is there a help? Becauseit's that that line is because it's been
what's in an age old conversation that'sbeen going on forever mm hmm, no
one, nobody knows. And butit came out so quick. I didn't
(28:26):
really have time to think about it. And then I watched read comments and
people analyzing it, and I think, oh, that's clever. You know,
well, that's that you know Icould agree with that one. Yeah,
that's why. Because it just cameout so quickly. I'm more surprised
(28:47):
than anybody that anybody even bothered listeningto it. Right. I did actually
send that away because everyone was likingit. I sent it to there's a
magazine in America called The American Songwriter. Yeah, I sent it to them
(29:07):
for a competition, and I camesecond. Wow, congratulations, that's that's
awesome. When did you write thissong? It must have been four or
five years ago now. But becauseI came second, I now get uh
lifetime free magazines coming through the AmericanSongwriter magazine. That's great. Well,
(29:33):
let's have a listen to this couldbe my last song. Mm hmmm.
We're looking back on my life,it's hard to understand how time just seem
(30:00):
to fly when you're an older man. Whatever happened to all the dreams id
and all those crazy plans I nevergot the chance to do, They just
slipped right through my head, throughmy hand, through my hands, And
(30:34):
looking back on all I've learned andfinding it hard to tell if there really
is a heaven or if there reallyis a hell. It's an age old
conversation that's been the head since dawnbegan, but it just seemed to spend
(30:57):
more time money. Now you're anolder man, an older man, an
older man, and this could bemy last song, my final swan song
(31:30):
before the curtain. Call I hopeI played my part well, for I
know so well there's no one called. I often wonder what it is that
(31:59):
we're all craving for some kind ofjustification. Now time is getting shot.
Is it intelligence or arrogance that makesus say there must be more? We
can accept that this could be,and it leads us so unshow, so
(32:28):
unshure. So shall they say thatwisdom comes with age? But that's not
always the case. It'd be afool to judge a wise man by the
(32:52):
lines upon his face. Well,I know I've done some stupid things,
some things I can't forget, andno time left to try and put them
right. It's the one thing Iregret. Who I regret, I really
(33:22):
regret. And this could be mylast song, my final swan song before
the curtain called, and I hopeI'll play my part well, for I
(33:46):
know so well there's no one called, and this to be my last song,
my final one song before the cookand I whope I play my pa
(34:15):
when for I know so well there'sno one. It's interesting to me you
said that people analyze songs and youknow we won't like the answer to how
you wrote it. I happen tolike that answer because I identify with it
(34:37):
as a songwriter. But people do. Really, I talk about it on
this podcast quite often, as youknow. I'll I would always show my
songs to my mom and sometimes she'll, you know, kind of look at
me, concerned, are you okay? And I'm like, yeah, this
isn't necessarily true about me, butit's a the song. And I do
(35:01):
think that a lot of times,unless you're really intentional about it. These
songs, the content of these songsdoes come from you somewhere, there's some
idea of there's some truth in itfor you that just even if you wrote
it and it fell out within tenminutes or whatever, there's some bit of
(35:27):
truth to it, right. Ihave since since people have analyzed it so
much, I have gone back andlike read my own lines and basically everything
that is in that up until thelast bit where that he has no he's
(35:50):
got regrets but can't do anything aboutwhat a lot of people are. That's
true as well, But most ofthe lines are basically just truth. The
first one it says, looking backon my life, what was it?
(36:13):
How tight was it? How timeseems to fly when you're an older man.
Well, we all know that theolder you get, the week seem
to be zooming by. You know, when I was, like at school,
we would have six weeks holiday,which would seem a lifetime. In
summer that would seem like forever.The six weeks has just gone like that.
(36:37):
Now it's as if the world.The older you get, the faster
the world is spinning. And thenext line about the heaven and hell,
everyone has those thoughts. Sooner orlater is it real? Is it not?
I don't know, but I sortof made a made a bit of
(37:00):
a mistake with that one, becausethe number of Bible people getting in touch
is ridiculous. I mean, youcan always tell if you're going to get
a comment from a Bible person becauseit's about three foot long on the YouTube
and it's just copy and paste Biblequotes like the start off easy, Hey,
(37:22):
Frank, I just like to sayone thing, and then you get
half the Bible to read. They'retelling you why it's why Heaven and Hell
is real. Yeah, and you'reyou're like, well, I just wrote
a song here, But I supposeif people will It's like me, I
(37:44):
like songs for different reasons. Ilike some songs because I really like a
guitar solo. I like others becauseI really like them lyrics. And I
like other ones because I was somewherereally good when I first heard it,
you know, or I knew somebodythat really liked that song who's probably gone,
(38:06):
or something like that. There's amillion different reasons why you like a
tune. Yes, I was tellingsomeone recently, I think on this podcast.
I was asking them what they're kindof guilty pleasure song is, and
then I realized we're both too oldto have guilty pleasure songs. And the
(38:30):
reason is because we like what welike. And that just falls right into
what you're saying, and there's nomore reason to be ashamed of like a
song. I do have a songthat's so simple. I keep thinking of
doing it. It's not I justI honestly keep thinking, will I do
(38:52):
it? And it's a simple songand you'll know the song. It is
like a guilty pleasure because there's justsomething about it, well there is,
there is a story behind it.I just oh, yeah, it's that
m yes, h m h mhm m h hay, snoopy snoopy hang
(39:25):
on, Yes, snoopy stoopie hangon, And it's that all the way
through, and do it. ButI might have to do it like that
because that's my style. M hhang non Snoopie, Snoopie hang on.
(39:57):
K mmmmm, scoopy won't carry oncorrect way. I would love to hear
that that was from you know,there is a story behind me liking that
(40:22):
song, and we were we usedto go. I don't know if you
have in America youth youth clubs,you know where the teenagers all used to
go Usually they're usually connected with thechurch. They do your youth club.
And we used to all go toa youth club and I think I was
(40:44):
about thirteen and that song was outand there was there was a two lads
come in and we were like thirteenfourteen, and they were in their twenties,
so they were really too old forthe youth cub but they used to
come in and bully people, pushingeveryone about, and it was like,
(41:10):
this isn't right. And there wasabout must have been about twenty to thirty
of there's thirty and fourteen year oldsand these two twenty odd year olds one
of them was one of them wasa lorry driver. And there's us still
at school and this is a lorrydriver coming to this youth club. So
we decided we're not having this anymore. So we said the next time he
(41:32):
picks on somebody, we all jumpin, and that's what and that song
was playing, Snoopy and he pickedon someone and we all dived in and
we couldn't. We were we wereall punching, and that we were only
young, so that it's not reallyhurting him, but it's embarrassing because he
(41:54):
was like we were like ants allover him and he couldn't do it and
they never came back. That's great. It sounds like a movie scene everything,
but it was all to the tuneof hang On, Snoopy. That's
so funny. I would be amess if I didn't ask you about your
(42:16):
animals. You're clearly love your dogsand your animals. Yeah, I listened.
I listened to that song Buster,which is such a great song,
and that that's about your dog,right, Yeah, that's he's five.
(42:37):
Two Yorkers were eighteen, So that'stwenty three, twenty four, So Buster,
that was written twenty four years ago. Oh wow, you wrote that
song twenty four years ago. Yeah, it was a he was a pup.
He was only about a year anda half old. He got out
(42:57):
and got run over by a car, got hit by a car, and
he was only about a year anda half old. And a couple of
weeks later I wrote that for himbecause it's called Buster, it's about my
dog, but there's no mention ofthe dog in the song, right,
men of Buster in the song,so that it could be about anybody.
(43:23):
You could have it about a personif you want. It could be about
anything. It's but I did that, and that dog behind us, that's
Marshall. He's the I think he'shalf the reason people watch me on YouTube
because if he's not there, wherehe is now, I'll get questioned.
(43:46):
Yeah, is that the back ofyour couch? I've usually got this minim
blanket is usually over the couch.So I'm I've got from blanket on.
It's only for him really, butI'm leaving the other one on because I'm
waiting for the comments for where's theminium blanket? Because I know they'll come.
(44:10):
I know because people they are expectingto see a minium blanket. You're
having a little fun with your famenow, Yeah, I've got that,
and I've got to I've got torescue cats as well. I did have
(44:31):
a little kitten he went and gotrun over. There's a road out I've
got. One side of my houseis all a big field and the other
side is a small road, whichhard. It's it's not even a road
where you can go fast down becauseit's too short. And my cat had
to go and get himself run over. Mm hmm. Summer because his favorite
(44:53):
trip was running in front of thecars as he heard them coming. Try
to get across the road quick,and so I thought that was I brought
him up from a little kitten.He was nearly two, and I thought,
I'm going to get rescue cats thatare a bit older and a bit
(45:14):
more street wise. Yeah. SoI got to rescue cats. And when
I picked them up, the photographslook slowly different to what I got because
they look like cut cute cats inthe photograph. I get around there and
one of them is nearly as bigas my marshall. He's a big fat
(45:35):
cat. Could hardly pick him up. But they're all right. They're great.
So that's funny. I used tohave a cat growing up, and
it always anytime we opened the door, is just started out. Yeah,
couldn't keep up with them. Doyou have any You've released a lot of
music. Do you have any plansof doing more records you? I mean,
(45:59):
it seems like you're releasing a lot. You have a lot of songs
kind of waiting around to get recorded. Yeah, I've got I've got a
request list, and this is aboutabout a year or so ago. I
did say that if I could learnone song a day, it would take
(46:24):
me seven years to do all theserequests because I've got so many. Well
that was about a year and ahalf and that so it's going to take
me about fourteen years now because ifI do a radio Head song, I
get requested nearly every other radio Headsong, right, So then I'll do
(46:44):
a Leonard Cohen song, and thenI get requests for every other Leonard Cohen
song, So it's never ending.So I just I just look at them
and go yeah, and I justpick something. Have a listen there.
If they're a simple song, threechord song or something, then I'll do
(47:05):
it. But do you get overwhelmedby the response at all? Or you
or I like it? I don't. There are a lot of people that
think I'm that think I'm like famous, like I'm a celebrity, and I'm
(47:27):
as far away from a celebrity asyou can get. I hate I hate
the thought of like celebrities look atme, you know, do you know
who I am? Taught that sortof Oh no, And and I did
say answer to someone else. Theysaid, if you especially where I live,
if you don't see me on YouTube, because that's one place people might
(47:52):
see me. The only other realplace is in a supermarket doing the shopping.
We carried two carrier bags. It'sand nobody knows me. Nobody.
Yeah, I mean, if Iever get stopped in the street, oh
you're like that, I will beso surprised. But the things you're going
(48:15):
mm hmm. I think I thinkif I went to America, I'll get
recognized because my following is nearly allAmerica. Yeah. Yeah. I sent
a couple of videos and to Ithink a friend of mine, I said,
I'm I want you to check thisout. I'm doing an interview a
(48:37):
podcast with this guy. And hesaid, oh, yeah, I've seen
his stuff as he's great. SoI don't even get to brag about meeting
you. They already all know you. It doesn't matter. I think it's
great. I think I read someof the comments. Obviously there's too many
(48:59):
to read, but I did reada few. I think it was under
the Metallica song you did Nothing elsematters. And I was encouraged by him
because you know, for all theall the things that you think this doesn't
matter or you don't understand why it'sblowing up, it seems to be helping
(49:21):
some people. And I think that'sthat is what I've noticed. I seem
to have created a lot will Accidentally, a lot of people are calling it
their safe place, their safe placeon the internet. Is my page interesting
because there's not a lot of hateon there? And I remind so many
(49:46):
people of their granddads or dads andthings like that that they've probably lost.
And that that's why I've got virtualgranddad on the on the post because people
keep asking can I can I canyou be my granddad and all that,
and all I can say is yeah, okay, then you know, treat
(50:09):
me. But I do say rememberme at Christmas. Then you don't forget
Granddad at Christmas. But they theyseem to be forgetting. Nobody's sending you
anything, huh. They wouldn't knowwhere to send it now anyway, it
(50:30):
is I seem to have created.I realized early on that got to be
careful if I answer, because somepeople give you their life story, the
things that have happened, and soI think, oh, I can't sort
of say anything flippant because this isserious to them, and so I have
(50:53):
to to really watch what I whatI how I reply to things. And
then you can't be everything to everyone. That doesn't work too much. I'll
just let them I'll let them,let them get their feelings out on the
comments. And you quite often seesomeone will got some sad story of their
(51:16):
life and other people will join,not not me, but other commenters will
comment to them, and then theystart their own little chat off, you
know, and their own little things. And so yeah, and that's amazing
(51:36):
that you know a song that youposted and may have helped someone connect with
someone else to get some kind ofhealing or connection or something, and and
that's great. I do you haveany advice for songwriters, up and coming,
(51:57):
younger artists or anything like that asfar as writing goes, posting goes.
I know you already mentioned just notbeing afraid to do it. I
think that's about the only advice isdon't don't think of don't think of like
what's the worst that can happen,you know, or don't worry about what
(52:23):
might happen, like people won't likeme, Well, if they don't like
you, they don't like you.But you'll never know unless you post it,
and not everybody. I do havesome people think I'm really bad,
and I'm probably one of them.So I can't let it. I can't
(52:46):
let it. So many people seemto like me, I can't go,
oh, I've got a bad comment. I'm not posting anymore. We've got
different tastes. We're not for everybody, are we. Whatever kind of music
you do is never going to befor everybody. And so I think with
young young songwriters is just get geton with it. Just just go out
(53:10):
and do it. But another thingis, I don't think you're going to
be world famous and rich because thatonly happens to a few. I always
say, for every for every bandor singer that you really like that's big,
(53:31):
there's probably thousands better singings of themthat don't get anywhere. So I
think that's what's depressing where people becausepeople ask me, oh, I've been
doing this for a long time andI can't get any followers a night,
and how do I get the recognition? Like you, if you're going to
worry about that, you might aswell give in because it'll either come or
(53:58):
it doesn't come. You shouldn't stopyou from doing what you like, That's
right. So yeah, that's greatadvice I am. Before we go,
I'm going to give you can Igive you two requests from me and you
can add them to your list.Maybe you should get to him in about
(54:19):
fourteen years. The two songs thatcame to mind instantly was a Deftone song
called Change House of Flies, that'sthe title of the song, and then
a Portous Head song called Roads.I'm gonna I'll email you those over so
(54:40):
you have them, but if youif you want to take a listen,
Yeah, I think that you yeah, oh you did. Oh really,
yeah, I need to find I'mgoing to find that. I love that.
You won't like it. That's athing you keep saying that. It's
only recently. It's only the lastyear or so that I've got a fairly
(55:05):
decent microphone. That's tough. Onethat was on a USB MIC that had
an echo on that I couldn't turnoff. It would nearly turn off,
but it was still echo. That'swhy it's so Some people say, you,
oh, you could turn the turndown the tremlo a bit because it's
a bit, But it wasn't.It wasn't intentional. It was this mic.
(55:28):
Well, you could re record someof those from I could do,
but I tend to yeh if Igo, if I start going back recording
them re record, I'll never getanywhere. I could I could be honest,
I could go right back to thebeginning and start again. Because I
had the worst. The microphones Ihad were like bargain basement Michael, I'll
(55:51):
try that one then. And becauseit wasn't supposed to be it wasn't supposed
to be seen by anybody. Mmhmmm. It was just I posted on
YouTube one night. I thought,wonder how it easy is to post on
YouTube? But I posted a song. I thought, oh, that's easy,
(56:12):
not expecting anybody to ever hear me. But I'm not complaining now here.
You are, well, I guesssaid, thanks so much for for
being here and for doing what you'redoing. I'm a fan for sure,
(56:35):
and I appreciate you talking about yoursong and just doing it. I hope
you keep doing it. I'll keepgoing as long as I can keep thinking
of things to do. I don'tthink you're going to have a short supply
of songs still in from I've gotI've always I'll always have songs to learn.
(56:58):
But I do like to I dolike to slip one of mine in
every now and then. But I'vegot no I've got no ideas. Nothing's
coming in. Yeah m hm,my voice mm hmmm, I think probably
(57:21):
because it's morning here. Before wego, will you tell us the story.
I've heard you tell this story beforeabout the boy you ran across on
the street. Do you know whatI'm talking about, the one eating grass?
(57:42):
Yeah? Yeah, well that wasI said that on the Nirvana.
I think it wasn't Yeah. Isaid. I was going home and I
saw this boy. I'm just sittingon the you call it the sidewalk,
don't you, and he was pickingup grass, he's eating it. And
I said, I said, don'tdo that. That's that's bad for you.
(58:08):
And he said, I've got toI'm hungry. I said, we
haven't got any food. And Isaid to him that, no, don't
that that's horrible. You come homewith me, Come home with me.
And as we started walking home,he said, he said, my sister's
hungry too, and I said,oh, I don't know. I've only
(58:28):
got a small lawn. You know. Thank you again, thanks for great
(58:49):
music, great song. When you'regoing to release this and make me even
more food. This episode of workTapes is brought to you by nine to
(59:29):
five Warriors dot Com. When youpunch out, they come punching in nine
to five Warriors dot Com finally areason to go back to the office,
introducing nine to five Warriors, anexciting new toy line created for the Toys
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punch out, they come punching in.
Welcome to Work Tapes. This isa podcast where we tear of our songs.
Why was the song written, what'sit about? What's the context and
emotion behind it? Where were youat the time, what were you going
through? How did certain lines cometo you? What's the inspiration? How
long did it take to write?I'm Brandon Carswell and I'm fascinated with songwriting
(00:33):
and how songs are built from theground up. It's easy to hear a
full production song on the radio anddismiss its origin story. I want to
hear the rough draft of the songfor the work tapes. I want to
explore the very beginning of how songsthat move us and make us move are
born. We're looking back on mylife. It's hard to understand how time
(01:14):
just seems to fly when you're anolder man. Whatever happened to all the
dreams I had and all those crazyplans I never got the chance to do.
They just slipped right through my head, through my head, through my
(01:47):
Welcome to Work tapes. Everyone,This is Brandon as usual. I was
fortunate enough to come across the videorecently and my scrolling on and where I
found uh Frank Watkinson and he waskind enough to join us today to talk
(02:07):
about some of his songs and hopefullywe'll get a little insight into who Frank
is as well. How are youdoing, Frank, I'm fine, Thanks,
thanks for being here, Thanks fordoing this. I got the time
difference. I think I was offby an hour. Yeah, you're over
(02:28):
You're in the UK, right,yeah, six hours now. Yeah,
so I'm sorry about that. Bythe way, what I'm glad I checked
my email. I'm glad you messagedme because I would have missed it.
Let's just kind of jump in.I'm gonna ask I'll just ask you a
couple of standard questions. When didso? I assume that you've been doing
(02:53):
music for a while, Is thatcorrect? Uh? Yeah, I've I
think I've been sort of learning learningto play the guitar since I was about
fourteen. Me too, I'm stilllearning as well. Yeah, but it's
(03:15):
that's it sounds like a long time. But there was a lot of years
where I didn't really touch the guitar. You know, when you're when you're
working and everything like that, andso I should I should be really,
I should be sort of virtuo soguitar player, but I'm not I'm still
(03:37):
I'm still well, like a beginner. Life gets in the way a little
bit as far as that goes responsibilitiesand working family and all of that,
and that's okay. When did thingsas far as I kind of feel like
this is less important just me personally, But when did things online start kind
(04:01):
of blowing up for you? Whendid you realize I've got people that are
watching my videos and watching me coverthese songs. I think it's about I
think it was lockdown. Is thatwhat you posting? I've been posting a
couple of years before, and Ihad I was surprised to have about I
(04:28):
think about twelve twelve thousand subscribers mmhmm and on YouTube, and I thought
that was sort of amazing. Andthen I did a cover of a rock,
like a heavy metal song. SoI did a cover of that.
(04:49):
Is that a slip slip Knots song? Slipknot song? Yeah? Yeah,
it got posted in all the heavymetal metal magazines and things around the world.
Oh wow, And it was likeand then so that not the subscribers
right up, and then more andmore people. Once you start going like
(05:09):
that, more and more people startcoming in and and not long after that
I released this could be my lastsong, and for some reason that went
the sort of viral as well,And yeah, that it surprised me.
(05:35):
I think people were posting it becauseI wasn't on Instagram or TikTok or anything
like that, but I think peoplewere posting it on them because it was
coming and the subs just kept goingup and up. And I can't seem
to I'm not I'm not complaining,but I can't seem to stop. Sure,
I haven't tried. This is thething. I haven't tried to get
(06:00):
subscribers. I've not sent anything offpromoting myself to anybody. And if you
watch my YouTube, you won't seeanything studio professional because I don't do that.
I don't even play outside of thehouse anywhere. I've never played a
gig anywhere. I'd just like tosit at home songs and play. Yeah,
(06:29):
I was going to ask you aboutthat actually, as if, as
if you do kind of gig aroundwhere you live in your town or no,
would you would you be open todoing that or you don't want to
do that? It's not It's notsomething I've really felt like doing because I'm
not very good at remembering lyrics,and so I tend to write the song
(06:55):
or to learn a song on YouTubeand play it, get it on YouTube,
and I'd probably never go back toit again. Yea, even my
own songs, right, I justget I'll just get an idea for a
song. All my songs are reallyideas. They never finished properly, look
(07:16):
as you know, take it toa studio and do something with it.
They're all sort of I've written asong, there it is. That's I
always think that's for someone else todo. I think it's good enough.
Well, it seems to me likemillions of people think you're good enough,
Frank, and I would say,you absolutely are. I mean, I
(07:45):
know why I think it works.I'm wondering what you think about it.
You know, you said, yousaid you went from that metal song,
that Slipknot song, right, youknow, to this latest song. But
there's a whole slew of songs inbetween. Like the song that caught my
attention was Radioheads creep that you did, and that's one of Radioheads, one
(08:09):
of my all time favorite bands,and that song is one of my favorite
songs up there is probably in thetop five. I'm a big Radiohead nerd
so and that was another one.It was I did a cover of No
Surprises. Yep, that's that.That's actually one I saw first. Yeah,
(08:31):
that's right, that's right, Andthey like the way I adapted that.
Yeah. The reason I adapt themis because I can't play them light
the original. I'm not well,your your your your humility is on on
shine right now, because you sayit's not that clever, but it really
(08:54):
works because and the reason I thinkit works is because you make these songs
your own and you can say,yeah, I don't know how to play
the real of course you can't playthe full production version, you're one man.
But you also I've done a coverof No Surprises before, and it
(09:15):
doesn't sound like uh, you know, it sounds like me and I would
never pretend to do justice to TomYork or Radiohead, but because they're them,
right, But I think there's athere's a conviction in your voice and
then you're playing that comes across you. It's almost like you know in every
(09:37):
cover that you do, whether it'syou know, you've done Radiohead, Metallica,
slip Knot, I mean, whowho haven't you covered? I guess
at this point there's a lot ofvideos you haven't you have, you've done,
But in every one of those songs, there's an emotion in your voices
(10:00):
if you know exactly why you're singingit and who you're singing it too,
and you can feel it, andmaybe that's just how you how you sing
do you pick? I just Iget a lot of these songs are requests
because a lot of these songs Ihaven't heard before. And if I like
(10:22):
it straight off, that's that's athat's a bonus. And then I read
the lyrics and I just try toput myself in that story as if it
was me. You know, ifit's a sad song, it's about I
try to be the sad person thatsinging the song. If you that's how
(10:46):
I to get it. You getyou've got to sort of live the song,
even though you might play it badly. I like you said, I'm
trying. I'm at least trying toconvey the shouldn't that the song should have.
Yeah, And I think you doa great job of that. I
think that that's why it sticks.You're but it's not just the cover songs.
(11:11):
Your songs do the same thing,and your songs your songs have that
depth, you know, they theyall sound true. I assume they are.
But if they're not, you're doinga fantastic job making me believe they
are. You know, I havethere are. You do get a lot
(11:37):
of rumors or people thinking they knowwhy right and then nearly always wrong.
Right, of course, they don'tknow your story. No, I wrote,
I do a song. I wrotea song called miss You, and
if you go on my YouTube,it's the one that's in the thing playing
(12:01):
at the beginning and for ages.They all thought it was about my wife
that I'd lost years ago, andthat's what the song is about, that
sort of thing, But it isn'tme. I still still hanging around,
right, But yeah, And that'sone of the greatest things about songwriting is
(12:24):
you can I like to take anidea sometimes that is true, either embellish
it or strip it back into somethingso that maybe I don't have to wear
my heart on my sleeve. Butthen sometimes the song is served really well
by wearing your heart on your sleeveand just telling the truth and just putting
(12:48):
yourself out there. You mentioned earlierin this conversation that you hadn't had time
for guitar you know in your youngeryears because of work and whatever else.
Hum is that the same for asongwriting? Do you feel like you're you're
(13:11):
writing more now because you have thetime. Is it a dream you always
wanted to pursue and didn't have timefor. No, I I think I
think it is. I think I'mprobably writing more more songs, like you
said, because I have the timenow. But I've always even when I
(13:37):
was working, I'd have ideas forsongs while I was at work and go
home and I try to write downwhat I was thinking of that, you
know, while I was out.But I do have more time now,
But I I rarely sit down andsay I'm going to write a song.
(13:58):
It's usually something comes into my headand before I know it, there's a
song. You know. If youknow me, I could go I could
go weeks not even think of anythingto write, and then all of a
sudden, I might just be justpicking at the guitar and think of a
(14:20):
line or something. The next minutethere's another song. I'm not saying a
great songs, but if I doget an idea for a song, I
have to get it out because ifI don't finish it, I can't play
anything else because I'm constantly got ahalf a song stuck, right, I
(14:43):
understand that. It's yeah, I'vebeen in that position for sure, and
I find when I'm not able towrite or create, you know, sometimes
I will even draw like it's justgot to be something creative sometimes where if
I'm working too much, you know, to pay the bills, which I
(15:05):
don't I'm not complaining about, butif that creative outlet isn't isn't sussed out,
then I will I feel like I'mgoing crazy. I've got to do
something, so I and I resonatewith that on songwriting as well, especially
if you feel like it's a goodidea, you gotta finish it. It's
got to be done well, isit. Generally? Sometimes they're not that
(15:30):
they're not very good, but it'sstill got to go because it it'll keep
on coming back if I don't drawa line under it. Yeah, I
think that's good advice, even forfor any writer. It doesn't matter whether
the song is good or not.Just finish the song. Just finish what
(15:50):
you started. That's good life advicein general, to finish what you started.
But for songs, you know,it puts another one in the bank.
And also if you don't like itvery much, you might start a
song next week and you can't thinkof a line, and then you're like,
well, I've got this song Idon't like very much. Let me
tear it apart and see if there'sany good lines I can steal from you.
(16:11):
And I've done that. I havedone that. I was going to
ask you also, do you havea favorite cover so far that you've posted.
I think the one that I reallyenjoyed doing was was I'll Follow You
(16:33):
into the Dark. That was agreat one. What a great song?
Death Cab for Cutie right, Yeah? That but that made that that that
got made even better when Apple TVgot in touch to put it on a
TV series. Oh did they?So they used yours? They used my
(16:56):
cover? Yeah? Oh that's amazing. I don't know that. Uh yeah,
it's TV series. It's called HomeBefore Dark. Okay. It's about
about a young girl reporter. She'sabout nine years old, but she's a
a reporter and and in season twomy song comes up in it. And
(17:25):
that's fantastic. I just keep Ijust kept thinking how many seven year olds
can retire from work and end upYeah, well that's that's a that's an
interesting subject. Because you're retired nowand a different world or different timeline,
(17:48):
this would be a lot less likelyfor you to have this kind of success
without the tools we have now onoh no, with no YouTube and all
this stuff, how would it havehappened? You know? I thought about
that when I was I was goingthrough your feed last night just to prepare
for this conversation, and I thought, you know, even twenty thirty years
(18:15):
ago, it just wouldn't have beena possibility. It would have Well,
it's possibility, I suppose, butvery very hard. Yeah, very likely.
It's when people ask me about theyquite say, can you do a
(18:37):
tutorial on how you played a certainsong? And I could do that probably
I've done a couple. I didone for No Surprises and one for Snuff.
And then I think when I whenI first had the guitar, the
only way I could learn was froma book or go watching people play in
(18:57):
somewhere and watching their hands right,And it's not easy because if they're quick,
you're thinking what did they do?What did they do? And and
another thing with books is you getthe book out, a music book,
and where whereas I would play,say, say, I played what I
(19:25):
would call a C and an F, but because we've got the capital and
it isn't a C or an F, right, it's whatever that is.
So when you get the books out, it'll say things like D flat minor
in F sharp minus seven and allthis lot. And it's not easy to
learn when you're trying to learn chordshapes that you know that the person playing
(19:48):
the song didn't play. But it'sall to do with keys and that,
and so they've got it a loteasier nowadays. And it's just a i'll
Off'm wonder how anybody got anywhere I'llput it. It's true, It's true.
I when I was learning guitar,about twelve or thirteen years old,
(20:11):
I had a chord poster hanging inmy bedroom. So but again, if
I wanted to learn a song,the only way for me to know what
it sounded like when I was akid was either listening to the radio or
buy the album. You know,I had a tape player when I was
(20:33):
grown up, so I could buythat album and throw the tape in and
try to learn it. But I'mhaving to learn the chords off the poster
on my wall and then try toline them up with the song and figure
out which one is which. Soyou're right, you know, but people
that are obsessed with songwriting or guitarplaying or whatever it is, they're going
to figure it out. I could. I could just if I want to
(21:03):
learn a song now, I couldjust go name of the song, stroke
lesson on YouTube and there'll be someoneshowing me how to do it. Because
when I cover, when I coversongs, because when I they say,
like they said, can you play? Can you do I'll follow you into
(21:26):
dark or something like that. SoI listened to the song. There's some
of the songs I get asked todo, there's so much going on that
I can't. I couldn't even guessthose chords because there's too much other stuff
going on. So I like tolook to see if somebody has done an
acoustic cover mm hmm, and ifthey have, I watch what they're playing,
(21:49):
and then I say, someone elsehas done an acoustic cover until I
and I'll go I like the wayhe did that part, but I didn't
like the way he did, andthen this person did, and then I
mixed and then to do mine right, I'll do it. Make mine out
of out of whatever I see.But sometimes there is there is none,
(22:11):
and I just have to make itout myself. Yeah, well you're doing
a great job. And let meask you what what do you like?
So people send you a lot ofsongs to cover. What are your what?
What have been your biggest influences musically? What? What do you listen
to? What do you like?I was when I when I was sort
(22:37):
of fifteen sixteen, I was intoI really liked bands like Jeff row Toe
yeah, playing the flute and allthis lot. I love Jeff row Towell,
but I was into it was thebeginning of the folks, so Simon
and Garf Uncle and Ralph Mattel andall the British folk musicians that you probably
(23:06):
don't know. But then what's itthe James Taylor come out, m hmm,
all those kind And I realized thatI really liked anything that was acoustic.
So it could even be it canbe the cheesiest of pop song,
(23:29):
but if there was an acoustic guitarin it, that made it for me.
I'm terrible with electric guitars. Ican't I've got two electric guitars,
and every time I've strumgled, I'vejumped back with a shock of the noise.
I just can't get on with electric. And maybe that's why part of
this works, right, is thatyou know, you you take your your
(23:55):
biggest musical influences and you take youknow, if you're being sent a song
and you look up a Slipknot songor a Metallica song that maybe is not
in your personal interest musically, hand you just take it. And but
the lyrics, the lyrics are thelyrics are great. Yeah, you know,
(24:19):
the heavy part and everything right,not it's not for me. But
the lyrics are so good that ifthe lyrics are good, then you can
play any way you want, right, That's true if you've got bad,
if you've only got a few.Because I have been asked to do some
covers and I've listened to them andthere's a there's about four lines of singing.
(24:47):
The rest of it is instrumental.Well, that's not going to work.
That's not going to work with myacoustic guitar for form, and it's
just picking like I do and thenfour lights. You know, So some
covers I just can't do. Idon't do instrumentals. I'm not good enough
to do instrumentals. I mean,I think you've got the niche. I
(25:08):
think you found it. I thinkit sounds like you're really smart about choosing
which ones. You're not doing itjust for views, and that's apparent to
me because you didn't start doing itfor reviews. And when it happens organically
like that, it's really fun towatch. It's fun to see. But
(25:33):
what I'm also trying to do isthere are so many because I was like
this, Oh, I'm not goingto bother doing that because I'm not good
enough. I'm not gonna see withsomeone just some of them want to have
a go with a guitar and doa song, and it was all and
I'm not good enough. I'm notgoing to do that. Well, as
(25:55):
you get older, you tend tocareless, and I'm just trying to show
people even if you can't play thissong properly, which I rarely can,
you could still do the song.Yeah, if you like it, you
can still do it, and nothingshould stop you from doing what you like.
(26:15):
And so that's great, great advice, great message, and segues really
well into the song that you wrotethat I contact you about. This could
be my last song is that partof the reason that you wrote this song
is that you know life is whereit is for you, and you spend
(26:38):
enough time going, well, I'mnot good enough for I didn't have time,
and and now I'm just that songkeeps being analyzed like madalyzed. You're
not going to like the answer.They're not well, I'm going to say.
(27:00):
But I had a chorus. Iwas sat there and I was going,
this could be my last song,my final so on and so,
and I thought I needed some verses. I like that chorus, and I
didn't have any verses, and Ijust I just wrote. I just wrote
(27:22):
it within It couldn't have taken twentyminutes, really, because all the words
just seemed to come for looking backon my life and all that fits that
and that, and because I'd writtenthat first one, I thought, oh,
I could go now looking back onall I've learned instead of just my
(27:44):
life, because and then I realizedwhere it was going then, and it's
it's a it's like someone an oldman that he's just he's got regrets now
he hasn't got time to do anythingabout it, and he's still unsure about
(28:06):
everything. He's got old but hedoesn't know anything. Is there a heaven
or is there a help? Becauseit's that that line is because it's been
what's in an age old conversation that'sbeen going on forever mm hmm, no
one, nobody knows. And butit came out so quick. I didn't
(28:26):
really have time to think about it. And then I watched read comments and
people analyzing it, and I think, oh, that's clever. You know,
well, that's that you know Icould agree with that one. Yeah,
that's why. Because it just cameout so quickly. I'm more surprised
(28:47):
than anybody that anybody even bothered listeningto it. Right. I did actually
send that away because everyone was likingit. I sent it to there's a
magazine in America called The American Songwriter. Yeah, I sent it to them
(29:07):
for a competition, and I camesecond. Wow, congratulations, that's that's
awesome. When did you write thissong? It must have been four or
five years ago now. But becauseI came second, I now get uh
lifetime free magazines coming through the AmericanSongwriter magazine. That's great. Well,
(29:33):
let's have a listen to this couldbe my last song. Mm hmmm.
We're looking back on my life,it's hard to understand how time just seem
(30:00):
to fly when you're an older man. Whatever happened to all the dreams id
and all those crazy plans I nevergot the chance to do, They just
slipped right through my head, throughmy hand, through my hands, And
(30:34):
looking back on all I've learned andfinding it hard to tell if there really
is a heaven or if there reallyis a hell. It's an age old
conversation that's been the head since dawnbegan, but it just seemed to spend
(30:57):
more time money. Now you're anolder man, an older man, an
older man, and this could bemy last song, my final swan song
(31:30):
before the curtain. Call I hopeI played my part well, for I
know so well there's no one called. I often wonder what it is that
(31:59):
we're all craving for some kind ofjustification. Now time is getting shot.
Is it intelligence or arrogance that makesus say there must be more? We
can accept that this could be,and it leads us so unshow, so
(32:28):
unshure. So shall they say thatwisdom comes with age? But that's not
always the case. It'd be afool to judge a wise man by the
(32:52):
lines upon his face. Well,I know I've done some stupid things,
some things I can't forget, andno time left to try and put them
right. It's the one thing Iregret. Who I regret, I really
(33:22):
regret. And this could be mylast song, my final swan song before
the curtain called, and I hopeI'll play my part well, for I
(33:46):
know so well there's no one called, and this to be my last song,
my final one song before the cookand I whope I play my pa
(34:15):
when for I know so well there'sno one. It's interesting to me you
said that people analyze songs and youknow we won't like the answer to how
you wrote it. I happen tolike that answer because I identify with it
(34:37):
as a songwriter. But people do. Really, I talk about it on
this podcast quite often, as youknow. I'll I would always show my
songs to my mom and sometimes she'll, you know, kind of look at
me, concerned, are you okay? And I'm like, yeah, this
isn't necessarily true about me, butit's a the song. And I do
(35:01):
think that a lot of times,unless you're really intentional about it. These
songs, the content of these songsdoes come from you somewhere, there's some
idea of there's some truth in itfor you that just even if you wrote
it and it fell out within tenminutes or whatever, there's some bit of
(35:27):
truth to it, right. Ihave since since people have analyzed it so
much, I have gone back andlike read my own lines and basically everything
that is in that up until thelast bit where that he has no he's
(35:50):
got regrets but can't do anything aboutwhat a lot of people are. That's
true as well, But most ofthe lines are basically just truth. The
first one it says, looking backon my life, what was it?
(36:13):
How tight was it? How timeseems to fly when you're an older man.
Well, we all know that theolder you get, the week seem
to be zooming by. You know, when I was, like at school,
we would have six weeks holiday,which would seem a lifetime. In
summer that would seem like forever.The six weeks has just gone like that.
(36:37):
Now it's as if the world.The older you get, the faster
the world is spinning. And thenext line about the heaven and hell,
everyone has those thoughts. Sooner orlater is it real? Is it not?
I don't know, but I sortof made a made a bit of
(37:00):
a mistake with that one, becausethe number of Bible people getting in touch
is ridiculous. I mean, youcan always tell if you're going to get
a comment from a Bible person becauseit's about three foot long on the YouTube
and it's just copy and paste Biblequotes like the start off easy, Hey,
(37:22):
Frank, I just like to sayone thing, and then you get
half the Bible to read. They'retelling you why it's why Heaven and Hell
is real. Yeah, and you'reyou're like, well, I just wrote
a song here, But I supposeif people will It's like me, I
(37:44):
like songs for different reasons. Ilike some songs because I really like a
guitar solo. I like others becauseI really like them lyrics. And I
like other ones because I was somewherereally good when I first heard it,
you know, or I knew somebodythat really liked that song who's probably gone,
(38:06):
or something like that. There's amillion different reasons why you like a
tune. Yes, I was tellingsomeone recently, I think on this podcast.
I was asking them what they're kindof guilty pleasure song is, and
then I realized we're both too oldto have guilty pleasure songs. And the
(38:30):
reason is because we like what welike. And that just falls right into
what you're saying, and there's nomore reason to be ashamed of like a
song. I do have a songthat's so simple. I keep thinking of
doing it. It's not I justI honestly keep thinking, will I do
(38:52):
it? And it's a simple songand you'll know the song. It is
like a guilty pleasure because there's justsomething about it, well there is,
there is a story behind it.I just oh, yeah, it's that
m yes, h m h mhm m h hay, snoopy snoopy hang
(39:25):
on, Yes, snoopy stoopie hangon, And it's that all the way
through, and do it. ButI might have to do it like that
because that's my style. M hhang non Snoopie, Snoopie hang on.
(39:57):
K mmmmm, scoopy won't carry oncorrect way. I would love to hear
that that was from you know,there is a story behind me liking that
(40:22):
song, and we were we usedto go. I don't know if you
have in America youth youth clubs,you know where the teenagers all used to
go Usually they're usually connected with thechurch. They do your youth club.
And we used to all go toa youth club and I think I was
(40:44):
about thirteen and that song was outand there was there was a two lads
come in and we were like thirteenfourteen, and they were in their twenties,
so they were really too old forthe youth cub but they used to
come in and bully people, pushingeveryone about, and it was like,
(41:10):
this isn't right. And there wasabout must have been about twenty to thirty
of there's thirty and fourteen year oldsand these two twenty odd year olds one
of them was one of them wasa lorry driver. And there's us still
at school and this is a lorrydriver coming to this youth club. So
we decided we're not having this anymore. So we said the next time he
(41:32):
picks on somebody, we all jumpin, and that's what and that song
was playing, Snoopy and he pickedon someone and we all dived in and
we couldn't. We were we wereall punching, and that we were only
young, so that it's not reallyhurting him, but it's embarrassing because he
(41:54):
was like we were like ants allover him and he couldn't do it and
they never came back. That's great. It sounds like a movie scene everything,
but it was all to the tuneof hang On, Snoopy. That's
so funny. I would be amess if I didn't ask you about your
(42:16):
animals. You're clearly love your dogsand your animals. Yeah, I listened.
I listened to that song Buster,which is such a great song,
and that that's about your dog,right, Yeah, that's he's five.
(42:37):
Two Yorkers were eighteen, So that'stwenty three, twenty four, So Buster,
that was written twenty four years ago. Oh wow, you wrote that
song twenty four years ago. Yeah, it was a he was a pup.
He was only about a year anda half old. He got out
(42:57):
and got run over by a car, got hit by a car, and
he was only about a year anda half old. And a couple of
weeks later I wrote that for himbecause it's called Buster, it's about my
dog, but there's no mention ofthe dog in the song, right,
men of Buster in the song,so that it could be about anybody.
(43:23):
You could have it about a personif you want. It could be about
anything. It's but I did that, and that dog behind us, that's
Marshall. He's the I think he'shalf the reason people watch me on YouTube
because if he's not there, wherehe is now, I'll get questioned.
(43:46):
Yeah, is that the back ofyour couch? I've usually got this minim
blanket is usually over the couch.So I'm I've got from blanket on.
It's only for him really, butI'm leaving the other one on because I'm
waiting for the comments for where's theminium blanket? Because I know they'll come.
(44:10):
I know because people they are expectingto see a minium blanket. You're
having a little fun with your famenow, Yeah, I've got that,
and I've got to I've got torescue cats as well. I did have
(44:31):
a little kitten he went and gotrun over. There's a road out I've
got. One side of my houseis all a big field and the other
side is a small road, whichhard. It's it's not even a road
where you can go fast down becauseit's too short. And my cat had
to go and get himself run over. Mm hmm. Summer because his favorite
(44:53):
trip was running in front of thecars as he heard them coming. Try
to get across the road quick,and so I thought that was I brought
him up from a little kitten.He was nearly two, and I thought,
I'm going to get rescue cats thatare a bit older and a bit
(45:14):
more street wise. Yeah. SoI got to rescue cats. And when
I picked them up, the photographslook slowly different to what I got because
they look like cut cute cats inthe photograph. I get around there and
one of them is nearly as bigas my marshall. He's a big fat
(45:35):
cat. Could hardly pick him up. But they're all right. They're great.
So that's funny. I used tohave a cat growing up, and
it always anytime we opened the door, is just started out. Yeah,
couldn't keep up with them. Doyou have any You've released a lot of
music. Do you have any plansof doing more records you? I mean,
(45:59):
it seems like you're releasing a lot. You have a lot of songs
kind of waiting around to get recorded. Yeah, I've got I've got a
request list, and this is aboutabout a year or so ago. I
did say that if I could learnone song a day, it would take
(46:24):
me seven years to do all theserequests because I've got so many. Well
that was about a year and ahalf and that so it's going to take
me about fourteen years now because ifI do a radio Head song, I
get requested nearly every other radio Headsong, right, So then I'll do
(46:44):
a Leonard Cohen song, and thenI get requests for every other Leonard Cohen
song, So it's never ending.So I just I just look at them
and go yeah, and I justpick something. Have a listen there.
If they're a simple song, threechord song or something, then I'll do
(47:05):
it. But do you get overwhelmedby the response at all? Or you
or I like it? I don't. There are a lot of people that
think I'm that think I'm like famous, like I'm a celebrity, and I'm
(47:27):
as far away from a celebrity asyou can get. I hate I hate
the thought of like celebrities look atme, you know, do you know
who I am? Taught that sortof Oh no, And and I did
say answer to someone else. Theysaid, if you especially where I live,
if you don't see me on YouTube, because that's one place people might
(47:52):
see me. The only other realplace is in a supermarket doing the shopping.
We carried two carrier bags. It'sand nobody knows me. Nobody.
Yeah, I mean, if Iever get stopped in the street, oh
you're like that, I will beso surprised. But the things you're going
(48:15):
mm hmm. I think I thinkif I went to America, I'll get
recognized because my following is nearly allAmerica. Yeah. Yeah. I sent
a couple of videos and to Ithink a friend of mine, I said,
I'm I want you to check thisout. I'm doing an interview a
(48:37):
podcast with this guy. And hesaid, oh, yeah, I've seen
his stuff as he's great. SoI don't even get to brag about meeting
you. They already all know you. It doesn't matter. I think it's
great. I think I read someof the comments. Obviously there's too many
(48:59):
to read, but I did reada few. I think it was under
the Metallica song you did Nothing elsematters. And I was encouraged by him
because you know, for all theall the things that you think this doesn't
matter or you don't understand why it'sblowing up, it seems to be helping
(49:21):
some people. And I think that'sthat is what I've noticed. I seem
to have created a lot will Accidentally, a lot of people are calling it
their safe place, their safe placeon the internet. Is my page interesting
because there's not a lot of hateon there? And I remind so many
(49:46):
people of their granddads or dads andthings like that that they've probably lost.
And that that's why I've got virtualgranddad on the on the post because people
keep asking can I can I canyou be my granddad and all that,
and all I can say is yeah, okay, then you know, treat
(50:09):
me. But I do say rememberme at Christmas. Then you don't forget
Granddad at Christmas. But they theyseem to be forgetting. Nobody's sending you
anything, huh. They wouldn't knowwhere to send it now anyway, it
(50:30):
is I seem to have created.I realized early on that got to be
careful if I answer, because somepeople give you their life story, the
things that have happened, and soI think, oh, I can't sort
of say anything flippant because this isserious to them, and so I have
(50:53):
to to really watch what I whatI how I reply to things. And
then you can't be everything to everyone. That doesn't work too much. I'll
just let them I'll let them,let them get their feelings out on the
comments. And you quite often seesomeone will got some sad story of their
(51:16):
life and other people will join,not not me, but other commenters will
comment to them, and then theystart their own little chat off, you
know, and their own little things. And so yeah, and that's amazing
(51:36):
that you know a song that youposted and may have helped someone connect with
someone else to get some kind ofhealing or connection or something, and and
that's great. I do you haveany advice for songwriters, up and coming,
(51:57):
younger artists or anything like that asfar as writing goes, posting goes.
I know you already mentioned just notbeing afraid to do it. I
think that's about the only advice isdon't don't think of don't think of like
what's the worst that can happen,you know, or don't worry about what
(52:23):
might happen, like people won't likeme, Well, if they don't like
you, they don't like you.But you'll never know unless you post it,
and not everybody. I do havesome people think I'm really bad,
and I'm probably one of them.So I can't let it. I can't
(52:46):
let it. So many people seemto like me, I can't go,
oh, I've got a bad comment. I'm not posting anymore. We've got
different tastes. We're not for everybody, are we. Whatever kind of music
you do is never going to befor everybody. And so I think with
young young songwriters is just get geton with it. Just just go out
(53:10):
and do it. But another thingis, I don't think you're going to
be world famous and rich because thatonly happens to a few. I always
say, for every for every bandor singer that you really like that's big,
(53:31):
there's probably thousands better singings of themthat don't get anywhere. So I
think that's what's depressing where people becausepeople ask me, oh, I've been
doing this for a long time andI can't get any followers a night,
and how do I get the recognition? Like you, if you're going to
worry about that, you might aswell give in because it'll either come or
(53:58):
it doesn't come. You shouldn't stopyou from doing what you like, That's
right. So yeah, that's greatadvice I am. Before we go,
I'm going to give you can Igive you two requests from me and you
can add them to your list.Maybe you should get to him in about
(54:19):
fourteen years. The two songs thatcame to mind instantly was a Deftone song
called Change House of Flies, that'sthe title of the song, and then
a Portous Head song called Roads.I'm gonna I'll email you those over so
(54:40):
you have them, but if youif you want to take a listen,
Yeah, I think that you yeah, oh you did. Oh really,
yeah, I need to find I'mgoing to find that. I love that.
You won't like it. That's athing you keep saying that. It's
only recently. It's only the lastyear or so that I've got a fairly
(55:05):
decent microphone. That's tough. Onethat was on a USB MIC that had
an echo on that I couldn't turnoff. It would nearly turn off,
but it was still echo. That'swhy it's so Some people say, you,
oh, you could turn the turndown the tremlo a bit because it's
a bit, But it wasn't.It wasn't intentional. It was this mic.
(55:28):
Well, you could re record someof those from I could do,
but I tend to yeh if Igo, if I start going back recording
them re record, I'll never getanywhere. I could I could be honest,
I could go right back to thebeginning and start again. Because I
had the worst. The microphones Ihad were like bargain basement Michael, I'll
(55:51):
try that one then. And becauseit wasn't supposed to be it wasn't supposed
to be seen by anybody. Mmhmmm. It was just I posted on
YouTube one night. I thought,wonder how it easy is to post on
YouTube? But I posted a song. I thought, oh, that's easy,
(56:12):
not expecting anybody to ever hear me. But I'm not complaining now here.
You are, well, I guesssaid, thanks so much for for
being here and for doing what you'redoing. I'm a fan for sure,
(56:35):
and I appreciate you talking about yoursong and just doing it. I hope
you keep doing it. I'll keepgoing as long as I can keep thinking
of things to do. I don'tthink you're going to have a short supply
of songs still in from I've gotI've always I'll always have songs to learn.
(56:58):
But I do like to I dolike to slip one of mine in
every now and then. But I'vegot no I've got no ideas. Nothing's
coming in. Yeah m hm,my voice mm hmmm, I think probably
(57:21):
because it's morning here. Before wego, will you tell us the story.
I've heard you tell this story beforeabout the boy you ran across on
the street. Do you know whatI'm talking about, the one eating grass?
(57:42):
Yeah? Yeah, well that wasI said that on the Nirvana.
I think it wasn't Yeah. Isaid. I was going home and I
saw this boy. I'm just sittingon the you call it the sidewalk,
don't you, and he was pickingup grass, he's eating it. And
I said, I said, don'tdo that. That's that's bad for you.
(58:08):
And he said, I've got toI'm hungry. I said, we
haven't got any food. And Isaid to him that, no, don't
that that's horrible. You come homewith me, Come home with me.
And as we started walking home,he said, he said, my sister's
hungry too, and I said,oh, I don't know. I've only
(58:28):
got a small lawn. You know. Thank you again, thanks for great
(58:49):
music, great song. When you'regoing to release this and make me even
more food. This episode of workTapes is brought to you by nine to
(59:29):
five Warriors dot Com. When youpunch out, they come punching in nine
to five Warriors dot Com finally areason to go back to the office,
introducing nine to five Warriors, anexciting new toy line created for the Toys
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Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
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If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.