April 4, 2025 • 15 mins
One of New Zealand’s finest voices, Marlon Williams has released his fourth studio album – written entirely in te reo Māori.
The Kiwi musician has a global presence, having collaborated with the likes of Florence + the Machine, and toured with legends like Bruce Springsteen, bagging six NZ Music Awards and an APRA silver scroll.
But for ‘Te Whare Tīwekaweka’, Williams returned to his roots.
Translating to ‘Messy House’, Williams told Jack Tame the title is a metaphor for the pains of chaos and creation, and how creativity often comes from disorder.
“You have a house full of, of ideas, and, and you sort of sit quietly and let them talk to each other, and then hopefully they form some sort of cohesive thing.”
The idea of writing an album entirely in te reo has been floating around Williams’ brain for a while, he was just waiting for an excuse to begin.
“I grew up speaking a little bit,” he told Tame.
“I went to Kōhanga Reo, but it all sort of drifted away from me again as I went into my, moved on into childhood, into primary school.”
Although he drifted away from speaking the language, Williams didn’t stop singing in te reo.
“It's just such a, a beautifully, a beautifully sung language.”
“I always knew at some point that I was gonna come back around and, and give myself an excuse."
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Speaker 1 (00:07):
You're listening to the Saturday Morning with Jack Tame podcast
from News Talks AB.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
God got tona, hoorah tudor.
Speaker 1 (00:27):
Oh how beautiful that is? Oa Tuda. One of New
Zealand's finest voices, Marlon Williams, has just released his fourth
studio album. This one has written entirely into the or Maldi.
Marlon is, of course, to sing a songwriter who has
collaborated with the likes of Florence and the Machine, toured
with legends such as Bruce Springsteen, and bagged six New
(00:49):
Zealand Music Awards and an opera Silver Scroll. But for
this album, to Fuddy T Wickerwicka, he has returned to
his roots here in Altor and he joins us this morning, Calder,
good morning, Ok you miy Welcome to the studio, te
Fuddy t. WakaWaka. That means the messy house, doesn't it? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (01:11):
Yeah, yeah, the messy house. Yeah. It's a sort of
a I guess I suppose on one level, it's a
sort of a metaphor for the the pains and chaos
of creation and uh, you know how creation comes out
of comes out of disorder, and you know, you just
you have a house full of of ideas and you
(01:32):
sort of sit quietly and let them talk to each
other and then hopefully they they formed some sort of
cohesive thing.
Speaker 1 (01:40):
Okay, explain that to us more. What do you mean
it's a it's a metaphor. So you basically had your
feeling like things were a bit scrambled, and this is
this has been a process of clarifying.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
Yes, you know, I think it's that speaks to the
fact you've got to let you've got to let the
chaos sit for a while before and and and not
try and impose any too much will on them, let
on things before they before they've had a time to
speak to each other and sort of arrange themselves.
Speaker 1 (02:08):
What is striking to many about the album is this
is your first full album entirely in Todell. Marty tell
us about that decision.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
Yeah, well, it's been around. It's been around in my
head for a while, the idea of doing it. You know,
I grew up speaking a little bit, went to Kungladell,
but it will sort of drifted away from me again
as I went into my moved on into my childhood,
into primary school. But I always was always singing singing
(02:37):
in Marty and you know, it's just such a beautifully
beautiful song language. So I always knew at some point
that I was going to come back around and give
myself an excuse to be able to sing sing in Todell.
And yet twenty nineteen came along and I sort of
was in between writing records, and the first sort of
(02:59):
first song came out, came came to me, which was
which is the first single? And I born in a
collaborator and a fellow little Tonian, a rapper and today
or Marty teacher named Commy, and so they, yeah, they
helped me grace very gracious sleep to put the album together.
(03:22):
And then yeah, we just sort of wrote over the
next few years and then recorded at the end of
twenty twenty three and now we're we're releasing.
Speaker 1 (03:29):
So if you compare where you're Marty's at today with
where it was in say twenty eighteen or start twenty nineteen, like,
do you feel like you've you've got a more intimate
relationship with the.
Speaker 2 (03:40):
All it's getting there, it's you know, it's it's a
very humbling process.
Speaker 1 (03:46):
So there is there are a few things more humbling
than learning a language. But I can imagine as someone
with Marty Fucker Pupper like it takes on another kind
of level.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
Yeah, there's there's lots of there's lots of layers going
on there, but you know, it's yeah, I've still got
I've still got a lot a long way to go
on the journey. But writing right in the language and
and and you know, and working with working with the
collaborat with a proficient collaborator was Yeah, it was a
really nice step along the way.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
You said that you grew up singing in Maudi alot, so,
so in what context was that?
Speaker 2 (04:22):
There was that every year we'd have the kita who
who we are to, which would be at various various
muddie around the takua down there, and yeah, every year
Mum and I would get in get in her old
Volvo and and Kram learn all this all the songs
that we're going to be sung, which were beautiful, beautiful
wiat from down there. There's songs by the craft Sisters
(04:43):
and and other other great composers that have come out
of out of Kota who. So yeah, it was it
was that was always there as a at least in
musical form.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
And so how would you learn it. She would just
teach you.
Speaker 2 (04:57):
We had there were tapes, there were there were cassette
tapes that we play in the car and god, we're
getting old.
Speaker 1 (05:05):
That's amazing.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
But yeah, so it was, you know, it was, it
was great. It was just it would take a good
you know sometimes that I would be five hours away,
so we had five hours to just play it over
and over.
Speaker 1 (05:15):
Yeah. I was gonna say, if you're in if you're
in like Autoitaian christ Church and you've got to go
to or it's only like an hour or so.
Speaker 2 (05:21):
Then you might extract the prep.
Speaker 1 (05:24):
Yeah, yeah, you're stuff on Little River for a couple
of hours on the way.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (05:27):
Isn't that amazing how you can reflect on things like
that and it you know, I don't know how you
felt about it at the time, but it turns out
to be quite a foundational thing in your in your life,
you know, like, yeah, the kind of you know, in
the moment, you don't think about, oh, you don't think
I'm learning anything here, You don't think that this is
something that's necessarily super meaningful or you know, matters that
(05:49):
much in my life. But then you look back on
it after twenty or thirty years and you go, oh
my god, actually that was quite significant.
Speaker 2 (05:53):
Well it's yeah, I think that's the directness of music too.
You know, it's just it's it's music's just there and
it's compelling and it's and it draws you in. So
it was just obviously, you know, it was a very
prey into music as a child, So it just it
just it took me on and it never you know,
I've been singing those songs at least in my head
(06:15):
ever since. For sure.
Speaker 1 (06:16):
Is your mama good singer?
Speaker 2 (06:17):
Yeah, she's a great singer. Yeah, she's got a lovely,
lovely soprano.
Speaker 1 (06:21):
Oh that's so leading up to I say twenty nineteen,
because you've seen this album's taken about five years to
kind of organize. It struck me that you were like
living the kind of international jet set of life in
a good way. I mean, you were traveling the world,
experiencing all these different cities and cultures and playing and
all sorts of amazing places and stuff. Why do you
(06:42):
think that process has ultimately ended up with you really
focusing on your place here.
Speaker 2 (06:50):
I think it's a few reasons. Yeah, I think it
was a general desire to be to be home, you know.
And obviously COVID came in the middle of that and
sort of further further consolidated that feeling. And you know,
I think, yeah, it's just it's just been there as
a sort of yawning chasm in my in my I guess,
(07:14):
in some sense of my self knowledge, you know. So
it was, yeah, it was it felt it just felt inevitable, inevitable.
I didn't I didn't know when it was going to happen,
but it just yeah, I just felt like all things
get all things considered, that this is there was the
right time to do it.
Speaker 1 (07:28):
Yeah, yeah, it was going to happen at some point,
and you felt like you kind of owed it to
yourself at some point, but you.
Speaker 2 (07:34):
Need to get there and yeah, and it's yeah, it's
just as I say, it's just another excuse to be
able to hang out at home and just yeah, spend
time in this beautiful country.
Speaker 1 (07:42):
Yes, there's I don't know who it was. It was
like T Lawrence or someone had this phrase about traveling
or was quote about traveling that I always liked. It's
a bit cheesy, but it definitely rings true in my experience,
and it was that the more a man travels, the
more he learns about his own home. But the more
perspective you get it on the world in different cultures
and places and all of that, the one place you
(08:04):
learned the most about is home because you were to contextualize.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
Totally it's been on I definitely definitely felt that, you know,
and I also think conversely, you've got to go away
to You've got to go away to appreciate it, to
be able to contextualize it. You know. I don't think
it's I think it's no use telling a disgruntled teenager
that that they've got that they live in the best
(08:29):
place in the world, and that there's no point in
them traveling, because it's a lie. But but it's also
true that they'll, you know, they'll more more often than not,
they'll fall back in love with with home again.
Speaker 1 (08:41):
Yeah, and that was your experience.
Speaker 2 (08:43):
Yeah, absolutely, Yeah, I've always loved it here, but definitely, Yeah,
crystallized from from all those years of traveling.
Speaker 1 (08:51):
You mentioned and you mentioned, and when I listened to it,
the first single from the album, it just sounded so
much like the kind of sixties show band stuff. And
then I saw afterwards that that's exactly what. It kind
of inspired that sound. So have you been listening to
a lot of that kind of music?
Speaker 2 (09:09):
Yeah, I mean I grew up on Elvis and and
the Platters and and you know all those and in
Howard Morrison Quartette more locally people like that. So yeah,
it's that's always been there in my you know, in
my listening habits. And I think, yeah, Mary is a language,
like the pure phonetics of it just lend themselves so
(09:31):
beautifully to that that style of singing. And you know,
there's just I think there's a sort of a there's
a correlation globally with indigenous cultures and crooners I found. Yeah, yeah,
I think you know, there's there's lots of all. You know,
there's a there's a real big crooning crooning scene over
in Australia. Yeah, I've just I've always noticed that there's people, Yeah,
(09:56):
people from indigenous cultures tend to love to warble.
Speaker 1 (10:00):
That's interesting. What do you think that is?
Speaker 2 (10:02):
I don't know, it's something in the I don't know
that the just some sort of alignment of I guess, yeah,
but it's I don't know. For me, it's it's a
happy happy marriage because I've yeah, I love that, love
that stuff.
Speaker 1 (10:14):
Okay, just think off the top of my head, could
it be that a lot of indigenous cultures aren't driven
by the same kind of like urgency of like of
modern life, like like you know, like well, like we're
so always in a rush for everything, and I feel
like I feel like indigenous cultures even the way that
(10:36):
we think about like how Maldi kind of contextualizes everything
in over longer time time spans. And I wonder if
being able to slink sing slowly kind of reflects that
maybe I'm thinking too deep.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
No, I mean that's good. Let's get into ISNA musicology.
Speaker 1 (10:50):
Yeah, play, or or just simply that the a lot
of Indigenous languages are more poet I.
Speaker 2 (10:58):
Think, yeah, maybe there's I think there's a sense of
romance and and a sort of h yeah, like a
of a version of or a vision of beauty as
it's as it's in terms of singing. That's that. Yeah,
that's closely aligned. And I love I love for for
nice things, for pretty things.
Speaker 1 (11:18):
You know, you's got a big crooning scene. What does
a what does a big crooning scene look like?
Speaker 2 (11:23):
Oh? I just you know, you just going to go
into some of those remote Aboriginal communities and and if
you go, if there's a karaoke machine, then you know,
I think it's from what from my experience, people over
there are singing Freddy Fender in the same way that
they are. Yeah, you know it's like that that that
heart hearty, wrought, passionate singing.
Speaker 1 (11:45):
Yeah, yeah, okay, So you I mean, this is an album,
it's a docco it's a tour as well. To talk
us through the touring process, because I mean you're playing
some diverse places from Moydochy to New York.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
Right, Yeah, yeah, I mean it's there's a lot of
a lot of different people are wanting you had to
perform in front of and yeah, I'm really curious to
you know, it's all music when you put it out
and you perform it in different places, the songs, the
song shift depending on the context of you know, where
you're playing, and certainly going to be true of this record.
(12:24):
I think, you know, it's obviously playing to yeah, playing
to a bunch of my Fino and Mdaki, it's going
to be different to playing at it in a bar
and Lower East Side. So yeah, I just I'm I'm
always fascinated to find out how how things resonate differently
in different spaces. And yeah, with this this example, yeah,
it's going to be very interesting.
Speaker 1 (12:45):
Yeah, how do you how do you anticipate an album
entirely into Mardi is going to translate to to New
York or LA or London.
Speaker 2 (12:55):
I think I think we're you know, as a as
a as a world where I'm becoming more used to
to not not needing to understand everything or that little
really all the time, you know, And I think, yeah,
which is a very positive thing and just as well
because it's you know, everyone's knowledge of the world is
(13:17):
expanding at a terrifying rate, so there's just so much
information to take in. But I think people, yeah, my experiences,
people genuinely are are more and more receptive to hearing
things and in other languages.
Speaker 1 (13:33):
Finally, then if this album has been a process of
kind of organizing your own place and identity in your
own mind at the very least, what has changed over
the last five years about the way you kind of
see yourself?
Speaker 2 (13:48):
Of course a big question. I'm not Yeah, damn, I
don't know. Things things change so quickly for me, I
definitely struggle with trying to like work out work out
my identity of a time I die, chronic identity, you know.
(14:10):
It's it's like I honestly couldn't tell you, I couldn't
tell you who I was yesterday.
Speaker 1 (14:15):
Do you feel like it's Do you feel like you've
kind of reached a conclusion though, if if the if
it was to Fuddy Tea Wicker Wicker to start with,
is it any less.
Speaker 2 (14:23):
T No, I think there is. There is for pragmatic purposes,
you know, I've got to present something to the world,
and and you know, but nothing's ever finished, is Yeah.
I think it's pretty pretty natural to sort of get
to the end of a project and be healthily dissatisfied,
(14:44):
you know, and just because it gives you, it spins
you on to find the next next spark of things.
Speaker 1 (14:50):
Yeah. Well, congratulations on the album. I really hope you
enjoy the touring experience, and yeah, look forward to seeing
you soon. Yes, so good that as Marlon Williams. To
Fuddy Tea Wicker Wicker is out now, and the documentary
about the creation of the album is coming out at
the start of May. So the documentary is called Our Rua,
(15:10):
which means two worlds. It's going to be in Cinema's nationwide.
Marlin's going to be on tour across the country throughout
May and June. He's heading heaps and heaps a different
places and we're going to have all the details up
on the news Talks. He'db website for more from Saturday
Morning with Jack Tame. Listen live to news Talks he'd
be from nine am Saturday, or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.
You're listening to the Saturday Morning with Jack Tame podcast
from News Talks AB.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
God got tona, hoorah tudor.
Speaker 1 (00:27):
Oh how beautiful that is? Oa Tuda. One of New
Zealand's finest voices, Marlon Williams, has just released his fourth
studio album. This one has written entirely into the or Maldi.
Marlon is, of course, to sing a songwriter who has
collaborated with the likes of Florence and the Machine, toured
with legends such as Bruce Springsteen, and bagged six New
(00:49):
Zealand Music Awards and an opera Silver Scroll. But for
this album, to Fuddy T Wickerwicka, he has returned to
his roots here in Altor and he joins us this morning, Calder,
good morning, Ok you miy Welcome to the studio, te
Fuddy t. WakaWaka. That means the messy house, doesn't it? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (01:11):
Yeah, yeah, the messy house. Yeah. It's a sort of
a I guess I suppose on one level, it's a
sort of a metaphor for the the pains and chaos
of creation and uh, you know how creation comes out
of comes out of disorder, and you know, you just
you have a house full of of ideas and you
(01:32):
sort of sit quietly and let them talk to each
other and then hopefully they they formed some sort of
cohesive thing.
Speaker 1 (01:40):
Okay, explain that to us more. What do you mean
it's a it's a metaphor. So you basically had your
feeling like things were a bit scrambled, and this is
this has been a process of clarifying.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
Yes, you know, I think it's that speaks to the
fact you've got to let you've got to let the
chaos sit for a while before and and and not
try and impose any too much will on them, let
on things before they before they've had a time to
speak to each other and sort of arrange themselves.
Speaker 1 (02:08):
What is striking to many about the album is this
is your first full album entirely in Todell. Marty tell
us about that decision.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
Yeah, well, it's been around. It's been around in my
head for a while, the idea of doing it. You know,
I grew up speaking a little bit, went to Kungladell,
but it will sort of drifted away from me again
as I went into my moved on into my childhood,
into primary school. But I always was always singing singing
(02:37):
in Marty and you know, it's just such a beautifully
beautiful song language. So I always knew at some point
that I was going to come back around and give
myself an excuse to be able to sing sing in Todell.
And yet twenty nineteen came along and I sort of
was in between writing records, and the first sort of
(02:59):
first song came out, came came to me, which was
which is the first single? And I born in a
collaborator and a fellow little Tonian, a rapper and today
or Marty teacher named Commy, and so they, yeah, they
helped me grace very gracious sleep to put the album together.
(03:22):
And then yeah, we just sort of wrote over the
next few years and then recorded at the end of
twenty twenty three and now we're we're releasing.
Speaker 1 (03:29):
So if you compare where you're Marty's at today with
where it was in say twenty eighteen or start twenty nineteen, like,
do you feel like you've you've got a more intimate
relationship with the.
Speaker 2 (03:40):
All it's getting there, it's you know, it's it's a
very humbling process.
Speaker 1 (03:46):
So there is there are a few things more humbling
than learning a language. But I can imagine as someone
with Marty Fucker Pupper like it takes on another kind
of level.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
Yeah, there's there's lots of there's lots of layers going
on there, but you know, it's yeah, I've still got
I've still got a lot a long way to go
on the journey. But writing right in the language and
and and you know, and working with working with the
collaborat with a proficient collaborator was Yeah, it was a
really nice step along the way.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
You said that you grew up singing in Maudi alot, so,
so in what context was that?
Speaker 2 (04:22):
There was that every year we'd have the kita who
who we are to, which would be at various various
muddie around the takua down there, and yeah, every year
Mum and I would get in get in her old
Volvo and and Kram learn all this all the songs
that we're going to be sung, which were beautiful, beautiful
wiat from down there. There's songs by the craft Sisters
(04:43):
and and other other great composers that have come out
of out of Kota who. So yeah, it was it
was that was always there as a at least in
musical form.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
And so how would you learn it. She would just
teach you.
Speaker 2 (04:57):
We had there were tapes, there were there were cassette
tapes that we play in the car and god, we're
getting old.
Speaker 1 (05:05):
That's amazing.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
But yeah, so it was, you know, it was, it
was great. It was just it would take a good
you know sometimes that I would be five hours away,
so we had five hours to just play it over
and over.
Speaker 1 (05:15):
Yeah. I was gonna say, if you're in if you're
in like Autoitaian christ Church and you've got to go
to or it's only like an hour or so.
Speaker 2 (05:21):
Then you might extract the prep.
Speaker 1 (05:24):
Yeah, yeah, you're stuff on Little River for a couple
of hours on the way.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (05:27):
Isn't that amazing how you can reflect on things like
that and it you know, I don't know how you
felt about it at the time, but it turns out
to be quite a foundational thing in your in your life,
you know, like, yeah, the kind of you know, in
the moment, you don't think about, oh, you don't think
I'm learning anything here, You don't think that this is
something that's necessarily super meaningful or you know, matters that
(05:49):
much in my life. But then you look back on
it after twenty or thirty years and you go, oh
my god, actually that was quite significant.
Speaker 2 (05:53):
Well it's yeah, I think that's the directness of music too.
You know, it's just it's it's music's just there and
it's compelling and it's and it draws you in. So
it was just obviously, you know, it was a very
prey into music as a child, So it just it
just it took me on and it never you know,
I've been singing those songs at least in my head
(06:15):
ever since. For sure.
Speaker 1 (06:16):
Is your mama good singer?
Speaker 2 (06:17):
Yeah, she's a great singer. Yeah, she's got a lovely,
lovely soprano.
Speaker 1 (06:21):
Oh that's so leading up to I say twenty nineteen,
because you've seen this album's taken about five years to
kind of organize. It struck me that you were like
living the kind of international jet set of life in
a good way. I mean, you were traveling the world,
experiencing all these different cities and cultures and playing and
all sorts of amazing places and stuff. Why do you
(06:42):
think that process has ultimately ended up with you really
focusing on your place here.
Speaker 2 (06:50):
I think it's a few reasons. Yeah, I think it
was a general desire to be to be home, you know.
And obviously COVID came in the middle of that and
sort of further further consolidated that feeling. And you know,
I think, yeah, it's just it's just been there as
a sort of yawning chasm in my in my I guess,
(07:14):
in some sense of my self knowledge, you know. So
it was, yeah, it was it felt it just felt inevitable, inevitable.
I didn't I didn't know when it was going to happen,
but it just yeah, I just felt like all things
get all things considered, that this is there was the
right time to do it.
Speaker 1 (07:28):
Yeah, yeah, it was going to happen at some point,
and you felt like you kind of owed it to
yourself at some point, but you.
Speaker 2 (07:34):
Need to get there and yeah, and it's yeah, it's
just as I say, it's just another excuse to be
able to hang out at home and just yeah, spend
time in this beautiful country.
Speaker 1 (07:42):
Yes, there's I don't know who it was. It was
like T Lawrence or someone had this phrase about traveling
or was quote about traveling that I always liked. It's
a bit cheesy, but it definitely rings true in my experience,
and it was that the more a man travels, the
more he learns about his own home. But the more
perspective you get it on the world in different cultures
and places and all of that, the one place you
(08:04):
learned the most about is home because you were to contextualize.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
Totally it's been on I definitely definitely felt that, you know,
and I also think conversely, you've got to go away
to You've got to go away to appreciate it, to
be able to contextualize it. You know. I don't think
it's I think it's no use telling a disgruntled teenager
that that they've got that they live in the best
(08:29):
place in the world, and that there's no point in
them traveling, because it's a lie. But but it's also
true that they'll, you know, they'll more more often than not,
they'll fall back in love with with home again.
Speaker 1 (08:41):
Yeah, and that was your experience.
Speaker 2 (08:43):
Yeah, absolutely, Yeah, I've always loved it here, but definitely, Yeah,
crystallized from from all those years of traveling.
Speaker 1 (08:51):
You mentioned and you mentioned, and when I listened to it,
the first single from the album, it just sounded so
much like the kind of sixties show band stuff. And
then I saw afterwards that that's exactly what. It kind
of inspired that sound. So have you been listening to
a lot of that kind of music?
Speaker 2 (09:09):
Yeah, I mean I grew up on Elvis and and
the Platters and and you know all those and in
Howard Morrison Quartette more locally people like that. So yeah,
it's that's always been there in my you know, in
my listening habits. And I think, yeah, Mary is a language,
like the pure phonetics of it just lend themselves so
(09:31):
beautifully to that that style of singing. And you know,
there's just I think there's a sort of a there's
a correlation globally with indigenous cultures and crooners I found. Yeah, yeah,
I think you know, there's there's lots of all. You know,
there's a there's a real big crooning crooning scene over
in Australia. Yeah, I've just I've always noticed that there's people, Yeah,
(09:56):
people from indigenous cultures tend to love to warble.
Speaker 1 (10:00):
That's interesting. What do you think that is?
Speaker 2 (10:02):
I don't know, it's something in the I don't know
that the just some sort of alignment of I guess, yeah,
but it's I don't know. For me, it's it's a
happy happy marriage because I've yeah, I love that, love
that stuff.
Speaker 1 (10:14):
Okay, just think off the top of my head, could
it be that a lot of indigenous cultures aren't driven
by the same kind of like urgency of like of
modern life, like like you know, like well, like we're
so always in a rush for everything, and I feel
like I feel like indigenous cultures even the way that
(10:36):
we think about like how Maldi kind of contextualizes everything
in over longer time time spans. And I wonder if
being able to slink sing slowly kind of reflects that
maybe I'm thinking too deep.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
No, I mean that's good. Let's get into ISNA musicology.
Speaker 1 (10:50):
Yeah, play, or or just simply that the a lot
of Indigenous languages are more poet I.
Speaker 2 (10:58):
Think, yeah, maybe there's I think there's a sense of
romance and and a sort of h yeah, like a
of a version of or a vision of beauty as
it's as it's in terms of singing. That's that. Yeah,
that's closely aligned. And I love I love for for
nice things, for pretty things.
Speaker 1 (11:18):
You know, you's got a big crooning scene. What does
a what does a big crooning scene look like?
Speaker 2 (11:23):
Oh? I just you know, you just going to go
into some of those remote Aboriginal communities and and if
you go, if there's a karaoke machine, then you know,
I think it's from what from my experience, people over
there are singing Freddy Fender in the same way that
they are. Yeah, you know it's like that that that
heart hearty, wrought, passionate singing.
Speaker 1 (11:45):
Yeah, yeah, okay, So you I mean, this is an album,
it's a docco it's a tour as well. To talk
us through the touring process, because I mean you're playing
some diverse places from Moydochy to New York.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
Right, Yeah, yeah, I mean it's there's a lot of
a lot of different people are wanting you had to
perform in front of and yeah, I'm really curious to
you know, it's all music when you put it out
and you perform it in different places, the songs, the
song shift depending on the context of you know, where
you're playing, and certainly going to be true of this record.
(12:24):
I think, you know, it's obviously playing to yeah, playing
to a bunch of my Fino and Mdaki, it's going
to be different to playing at it in a bar
and Lower East Side. So yeah, I just I'm I'm
always fascinated to find out how how things resonate differently
in different spaces. And yeah, with this this example, yeah,
it's going to be very interesting.
Speaker 1 (12:45):
Yeah, how do you how do you anticipate an album
entirely into Mardi is going to translate to to New
York or LA or London.
Speaker 2 (12:55):
I think I think we're you know, as a as
a as a world where I'm becoming more used to
to not not needing to understand everything or that little
really all the time, you know, And I think, yeah,
which is a very positive thing and just as well
because it's you know, everyone's knowledge of the world is
(13:17):
expanding at a terrifying rate, so there's just so much
information to take in. But I think people, yeah, my experiences,
people genuinely are are more and more receptive to hearing
things and in other languages.
Speaker 1 (13:33):
Finally, then if this album has been a process of
kind of organizing your own place and identity in your
own mind at the very least, what has changed over
the last five years about the way you kind of
see yourself?
Speaker 2 (13:48):
Of course a big question. I'm not Yeah, damn, I
don't know. Things things change so quickly for me, I
definitely struggle with trying to like work out work out
my identity of a time I die, chronic identity, you know.
(14:10):
It's it's like I honestly couldn't tell you, I couldn't
tell you who I was yesterday.
Speaker 1 (14:15):
Do you feel like it's Do you feel like you've
kind of reached a conclusion though, if if the if
it was to Fuddy Tea Wicker Wicker to start with,
is it any less.
Speaker 2 (14:23):
T No, I think there is. There is for pragmatic purposes,
you know, I've got to present something to the world,
and and you know, but nothing's ever finished, is Yeah.
I think it's pretty pretty natural to sort of get
to the end of a project and be healthily dissatisfied,
(14:44):
you know, and just because it gives you, it spins
you on to find the next next spark of things.
Speaker 1 (14:50):
Yeah. Well, congratulations on the album. I really hope you
enjoy the touring experience, and yeah, look forward to seeing
you soon. Yes, so good that as Marlon Williams. To
Fuddy Tea Wicker Wicker is out now, and the documentary
about the creation of the album is coming out at
the start of May. So the documentary is called Our Rua,
(15:10):
which means two worlds. It's going to be in Cinema's nationwide.
Marlin's going to be on tour across the country throughout
May and June. He's heading heaps and heaps a different
places and we're going to have all the details up
on the news Talks. He'db website for more from Saturday
Morning with Jack Tame. Listen live to news Talks he'd
be from nine am Saturday, or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.
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