Toby Chapman, Spandau Ballet / Tom Jones / Belinda Carlisle (Part 2)

In Part 2 we move on to Toby’s work with Belinda Carlisle, Cher, Tom Jones, Tina Arena, Aqua, boy bands, Rick Astley and a whole bunch more. Do check out Part 1 here. To listen / watch: Audio-only: click on the play button in the audio player above, or: Video: watch the embedded video below...

The post Toby Chapman, Spandau Ballet / Tom Jones / Belinda Carlisle (Part 2) appeared first on The Keyboard Chronicles.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
I'm just blessed to work with a lot of these people and that some bloke that didn't getany qualifications at school, didn't do any formal musical education.
I've blagged my way through all these years and I'm still getting away with it.

(00:23):
Hello and welcome to the Keyboard Chronicles, a podcast for keyboard players.
I'm your host, David Holloway, and I'm pumped to be back here for part two of ourinterview with Toby Chapman.
For those of you that have listened to part one, you're in for a treat as well with parttwo.
We continue the discussion throughout Toby's career.
Toby gives some good advice to younger players, chooses his desert island discs and awhole bunch more.

(00:47):
So yeah, lots to enjoy in this second part as well.
And I'll talk to you at the end of the show.
This is where it's so difficult with someone that's had as an amazing career as you haveToby.

(01:07):
I mean, I'm acutely aware we're sort of coming up to where I barely scratched the surfaceand there are a number of others.
So if you don't mind, I'm going to go a little bit scattershot across a whole range oficonic artists you've worked with.
Let's just talk, while we're still in 80s mode, Paul Young.
Yeah, Paul Young, did.
We did a few little TV shows and a few things.
That was Post Spandale.

(01:30):
Yeah, that was a great experience.
He's such a lovely guy.
um And yeah, we just did some TV stuff.
yeah, it's just I've never really toured with him, but we did done quite a lot of stuff.
we did.
I mean, I suppose just scooting across the rest of it.
I then saw where did I go after that?

(01:52):
I'm just looking at what I've written down here.
I was the MD for D-Ream.
Yep, did a lot of, did a few tours with them.
And then I met up with Paul Carrack, who's um sort of, I call him the UK version ofMichael McDonald really, know.

(02:12):
Yeah, fantastic voice, fantastic keyboard player and writer.
And I got to do some extra keyboards with him.
on some dates and I actually ended up co-producing an album with him as well.
Well the other thing was then I went on to I saw Co-MD did keyboards for a band calledAqua in the middle 90s.

(02:35):
Yes.
Oh, okay.
All right.
We've got it.
I'm going to stop you there.
We've got to talk aqua.
All right.
So that's something that's really different.
And obviously they were iconic in the 90s.
tell us, yeah, tell us a little bit in depth, if you don't mind.
good friend of mine, Gary Wallace, who is an amazing drummer, percussionist.
You know, he did all those Pink Floyd tours and did the early Nick Kershaw stuff.

(03:01):
We worked an awful lot together and he, I think, I don't know, obviously somebodycontacted him.
They wanted to do some shows.
I mean, they're still big to this day over there, you know what mean?
And it was all in Scandinavia.
But yeah, so they just said, look, we want to go out.
We want to do like the green tour, which is quite a big tour in Denmark.

(03:24):
They have a massive like 20,000 seater gigs.
so yeah, Gary and I were involved in just programming it up, getting it to sound like theoriginal record because we thought that's what it should be.
you know, I mean, I remember there was one song that she wasn't happy to sing if shedidn't have to.

(03:48):
I can't remember why, but I remember we were still using Akai S1100s or whatever they wereat the time, 3000 XLs or whatever.
But I had to put a whole vocal in, is all, know, anybody who's listened to it knows aboutkeyboards, it just has a trigger point and God help it there's any spikes in anything.

(04:11):
And once you start it, you can't really stop it because it was a freewheeling thing.
I mean, it was with a sequencer and all of that.
But it was, no, they were fun times actually.
She's crazy.
She's such a crazy one.
And then I can't remember the other guy's name now.
Let's go, Barbra.
Yeah.
I was calling Hen.

(04:32):
I mean, as you know, Toby, they're extremely popular in Europe.
I mean, in other areas, they are best known for Barbie Girl, but they had a string, evenin Australia, they had a string of hits and you know, even that back to the 80s song only
a handful of years ago.
Like it's amazing stuff to how long their career has run.

(04:56):
Cern Rasted, who's one of the sort of masterminds behind it, because they had a studio.
They were doing, I think one of reasons why we met with them, because they had a studiooff the Woolworth Road, which is in the middle of London, you know, it's a real old London
area.

(05:17):
Not Cockney traditionally, but it's that sort of area.
One I was familiar with, and they hired a studio there.
So we went.
We went and worked in there and did the rehearsals and all of that.
But he was, yeah, he's great.
the partner, I can't remember the other guy, but the main, what I'd call the mainprotagonist behind it was Søren and the other guy.

(05:42):
Søren was great at the lyrics and the cheeky tunes.
Well, they were both great.
They were fantastic.
Absolutely.
mean, Søren and I ended up doing an album.
for what was the first Pop Stars record in, whenever that would have been, mid 90s, a guycalled Yawn.

(06:04):
And so we co-wrote and produced that and that went straight number one over there.
So yeah, that was that.
then I kind of, after that, was, we did some gigs with somebody you may very well know,Tina Arena.
Absolutely.
And what a great name.
If you can have a surname that sounds great.

(06:27):
Yeah, mean, you don't call yourself, like, know, Tina Working Men's Club, do you?
That's true.
so for the sake of non-UK, well, for the sake of non-European, because I Tina's had a goodcareer in Europe, but for the sake of American and Canadian, is Tina Arenda is an iconic

(06:48):
Italian heritage Australian born artist that had huge success in Australia and thenmigrated to Europe and had an enormous career over there.
So yeah, she certainly revered here and elsewhere.
amazing when it came up I'd always liked that hit in the early 90s I'm in Chains and Iknow she's a great singer and I always thought oh you know that's real talent and when

(07:11):
Gary and I got a chance to work with her we did we were actually flying over the privateplane to do where the in Monaco where they obviously do the the f1 we had our own little
boat or what am I talking about you know it was a
very luxurious boat should we call it, a yacht I think is the term I'm looking for.

(07:34):
And I, there was one song both myself and the bass player we had to duet, he had to duetone and I had to duet another one and this one was not an easy song to sing.
It was Antonio Bandero's, I can't remember what it was called but anyway.

(07:58):
Thanks to Gary.
He said I said that you're seeing that with her and I'm out cheers.
Yeah, you know so anyway rehearsals I started doing I said Tina by the way, I said I'll bebetter off behind the piano.
I don't know what stand up the front business, you know shit Fuck you are she said, youknow, I don't know if you know her but There was no she said she said fuck that you're

(08:25):
coming down the front to sing with me whether you like it or not
And so of course we went down, we went and did it and it was just a 45 minute set.
And there was big names in the audience, know, there's me, this bloke claiming he can'ttune, you know.
So he came to it, she announced me and I walked down, you know, and of course I've neverreally done all that, you know.

(08:50):
So she immediately holds my hand and she says, Toby's going to do it with me on this song.
So we did do that to track because it was one of those ones, it's one of those massivesort of Disney things.
There's no point in trying to replicate that.
And obviously I couldn't play the keyboard.
you know, and it was keyboard orientated.
So I just remember she always said to me, she turned, she turned one side to me,whispering in my ear.

(09:14):
She said, look, just make out you fucking love me.
So of course I had to sing with her and.
you know, look into her eyes and all this, you know, but it's a pity.
I'd love to have seen, I mean, people weren't filming so much in those days, but I'd loveto, I'd love to have seen how that looked.

(09:36):
I'd have, it'd have been funny.
But moving on.
was about to say, yeah, I was about to say I'll be searching for video of that Toby, butit sounds like that.
If you do find it, I'd love to see it.
After that, I went on to produce two or three share songs.
Yeah, over at her house.

(09:57):
It was just after the album where she'd had that big resurgence with Do You Believe inLife?
So we went over, one of the teams of producers that went over there and basically, inthose days it was quite hard to do because we had to hire Pro Tools, Wigs and all of that.
And we set it up in her...
She had a place on Malibu, so we set up these uh systems in one of the guest bedrooms.

(10:22):
And I remember it was funny trying to truncate this a little bit, but we had to do tielines all to the next guest bedroom where she was gonna sing.
And we'd done the vast majority of the track work in London at Metropolis.
So we went, we came there.
So we had a lot of it there.

(10:42):
I remember she said,
She said, tell me, you come and conduct me?
I said, Cher, I don't do any of that nonsense.
I said, you know, I'm a programmer, you know, I'm a player a bit, I can do a bit of thisand that, but I don't conduct.
She said, I don't care, just throw your fucking arms around a bit, you know what I mean?
Which is what I did.
And I just doing this in front of her, you know, I'm thinking, fucking hell, this is Cher.

(11:06):
This is some no good bloke from Southeast London, do you know what I mean?
How did this ever happen?
So then I got in front of Sharon, I'm waving my hands.
She said, really helps.
It really helps.
So that was quite an amazing experience.
And then going on after that, we did all the girl and boy bands.

(11:28):
I did Gary Barlow, I MD'd him for a little bit, just after Take That broke out for thefirst time.
And then we did like Atomic Kitten, Westlife, Boyzone, Balloon.
We were like the house band for all of those.
things and we were running track for a lot of that was very track based stuff we wereusing Tascam 16 tracks that's the way you did it in those days and they were they were

(11:52):
pretty reliable do you know what I mean I mean these days I probably used I still likethat simatic thing actually which seems to work quite well but that's how we ran all that
so
Look, that's amazing Toby to say the least.
Some of those stories are absolutely incredible.
So I can't let you go without talking about another three artists.

(12:13):
Let's start with Sir Tom Jones.
Again, we've had the privilege of having Patty Milner on in the last couple of years.
Sir Tom's current keyboard player.
Just tell us about working with Tom.
Once again, that was an opportunity I got via Gary Wallace, who had MD'd him in the early90s when Tom had his sort of comeback, if you like.

(12:39):
And then I think he lost touch with that area a bit.
then I think it was one of these shows we were doing with Blue, Atomic Kitten or whatever,and Tom was coming on to do it.
And I think
We were kind of, Gary and I were emding the whole thing together.

(13:01):
so we, Tom came on and he came into rehearsals.
I did the six bomb and not usual, whatever it was, you know.
And then, then his son, who's his manager, Mark, he said, look, we want to, we want to doa proper English European turnout, which ended up being the whole world.
Cause he had a band over there as well.

(13:23):
But I think,
that band, not to diss them, but I think it got a little bit cocktail bar, a little bitkind cabaret.
And his son is very, very good at reinventing him and making current, you know what Imean?
So his brief to us was, look, we're going to do the hits, but we want them to sound likethe original records, but how they would be done now.

(13:50):
So which is what we duly took on.
I mean, I remember one of the ones we did.
was Thunderball which I don't know if you know the song but it was it one of the Bondthings from about 1967 obviously with John Barry um he told me a story about that how he
said well he said you know it was that big high note at the end and uh he said he saidwhen you when you go for that note he said just don't end it sorry about the terrible

(14:16):
impression um
That's a good Welsh accent.
uh
So he went for this big note and apparently he says I just ran out of steam at the end ofit and I just keeled over and he said if you listen close to the records you can hear
thunderbolt where he just I mean he holds the note for a fair bit then it fades out youknow what I mean and yeah that was funny but anyway one of the things we did we had the

(14:42):
basic drums bass two keyboard players and a guitar and we had a three part horn section
So that's got lot of horns and strings on it.
So we decided what would be great is if I basically made a whole remake of the track fromthe original John Barry thing, which is, it's amazing when you look in, what I call when

(15:04):
you look inside these records, you know, I feel like I'm standing in the middle of therecord and I can, there's that part going on, oh, there's that, this, that and the other.
And we did, we did a, I think it was for the Oscars or something in London and they said,
we want you to, because there was something to do with James Bond, we want Tom to come andsing now.

(15:24):
And they said, if we could make it sound live, but mime it, we said, that's fine, becausea lot of it's on track and we'll just do a take of it.
uh We had some, might we track of it somewhere.
So Tom just mime to it.
But when you watch it with the track, because I had extra horns tracked up, I had allthese beautiful high strings and it...

(15:47):
You know, lot of people said that sounds amazing what you've done.
It really captured the record, but sounding more high-fi, I suppose, you know what I mean?
But no, working with Tom basically, mean, he's legendary, he's proper legend, isn't he?
know, I mean, the amount of times, because people were telling me what he was like aboutstories, you know, he loves telling stories.

(16:10):
And of course, a lot of the time when you're on tour,
you come back, if you maybe you've had an evening off, know, or a travel day, whateverthey call it, and you go, let's go and have some dinner.
So go and have some dinner, maybe a little worse for a few shandies or two.
You come in and there's always, you always go and look in the bar, because Tom reallywouldn't go out of the hotel because it was easy for him.

(16:31):
And I remember going, I mean this shows, it must be a few years ago, going in and I'mlooking around to see who's in the bar.
And I'm going, oh fuck, Tom's in the bar.
This is by the time I've done a few nights with him.
And I'm thinking, I just want to have an early night.
And there's a little plume of smoke comes out.
goes, I Chapman, where do you think you're going?

(16:52):
so I went, Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,
I had enough but they couldn't take any more enjoyment if you know what I mean.

(17:16):
And he said, Tommy, instead I'll have another bottle of champagne before I go to bed.
I mean this is four o'clock in the morning.
So I listened to all the stories and he was listening to my stories of how I started outand they're very similar.
I mean obviously just a good decade or two apart but very similar stories and he's justsuch a fucking lovely guy and fuck can he sing.

(17:40):
And that's what, and that's what I wanted to ask you about Toby, you know, being in thepresence of that voice.
And I mean, I had the privilege of seeing him a year ago or so, I mean, at age 84, stillhitting some amazing notes like his voice.
Uh, and I don't mean this in a patronizing way for his age because 84 is not aninsignificant age.

(18:00):
His voice is still incredible.
what's it like?
been in the presence of that voice and how do you need to adjust how you play or interactwith that based on the power of that voice?
The only thing, cause my affiliation with him, I mean, I do the odd gig once the bloomroom, I basically, think around 2012, 13, I started working with another guy, Alfie Bose.

(18:26):
He's quite a big sort of singer from basically the West End stuff and all that.
Anyway, I'm digressing, but when I worked with him at that period, when we did actuallygoing back to Thunderball, which was
It's originally in B flat minor and he took it down to A flat minor to give himself half achance.
you know, a top, you know, A flat is not a small feat.

(18:50):
I even by as he says, I think I was a tenor, but he says I'm a low baritone now.
You know what I mean?
Cause it, cause people get mixed up with, you know, tenor just means the timbre of yourvoice.
doesn't mean what you can have high baritones, but they've just got deeper voices.
which he definitely has, he's got that little thing that's come through.

(19:14):
But I always remember when he used to, he'd be singing it along and where I was not faraway from him, he'd turn round to me and he'd go, he'd sing the thunder bow!
And then when it finished, nearly nine times out of ten, he'd turn round to me go, thugfuck for that.
David, I've seen him, I saw him this year and you're right, he's 84, 85.

(19:36):
Yeah, I mean, and it's...
I mean, it's that typical thing, the vibrato's got a little bit wide and all of that sortof thing, but it doesn't matter, he's still there, he's still the cheeky chappy from
Wales, you know what I mean?
He's still got a great personality on stage, he can still do it on stage, I mean, he hasto sit down, he's had to have two hip replacements.
The man is of a certain age, as you rightly point out, you know, but you know what?

(20:00):
He'll do that until he can't do it, I, you know, long may carry on is what I say, you
Exactly.
And in no way making a comparison, but someone that's kept it going for decades as well asBelinda Carlisle.
So tell us a little bit about your sort of involvement with her.
Well, hers actually started off, I would say around 94, 96, going back to there actually,because we got a show together.

(20:29):
Once again, this is me and Gary, think.
We got a show together and the bass player we got was now Tom's bass player, guy calledDave Bronze, who's played with Clapton, everybody, know, great, a lovely guy.
I've known him for years.
uh He came and played bass.
James Nisbett who was still a guitarist with her now and her MD but I think at the time Idon't think it was an MD particularly I think we were all just like in it together you

(20:58):
know we all knew what we're doing we didn't need to have anybody guiding us so yeah we didthis show it was a one-off show in Bermuda of all places so we went and did that and she
was great you know what it is with Belinda she's I mean
devastatingly beautiful as well, has to be said.

(21:20):
Even now, she's mid-60s, she looks amazing, absolutely amazing.
But you know what's always great?
was, because I quite liked some of those soft rock, West Coast records.
I think what made, rather than it be, you know, REO Speed Foreign or whatever you want tocall it, you know what I mean?
Rather than it be one of those sort of kind of bands, she came from the go-go, you know,they were, they were

(21:44):
punk outfit really or post-punk.
So she wasn't that sort of traditional style of singer really.
She had her own thing going and the fact of having that very different voice over thatsort of quite lush backdrop I think's amazing and she's you know like I was talking about

(22:06):
when we did the Billboard shows in Japan we've done a few times
you it's not a small feat it's it's an hour an hour 20 twice in one evening and she cameover she said oh my god I don't know I hope I can do this because I've got a cold yeah
well I tell you what she did it she was amazing and then you took about my story she's gotsome incredible stories I could tell you yeah oh dear

(22:33):
I love it.
No, thank you.
definitely last, sorry, definitely not least, but one of our last ones, ABC.
ABC, yeah.
That was another one I was really, you know, chuffed to be asked to do that.
was, I remember, I don't know what I'd been doing.
Oh, I know, because it was that we had a, like there was a comeback tour of Spandau Balletin 2014-15, which took all of that time, which was, which by the way, was great to go

(23:05):
back.
And we did a bigger tour than we probably did back in the day.
of things you're a lot calmer then, but it was great to go back and reminisce about it aswell.
That sort of thing.
Anyway, digressing again.
It was after I did that, I'd sort been out the picture a bit.
So I think there was a few months when I wasn't up too much.
And I used to hang out at the Groucho Club in London, is like, not so much now, but it wasa big place where all the kind of film, media, music people now to...

(23:36):
uh
take part in a sherry or two, know.
And there was a friend of mine who was currently working with him.
And he said, look, is it two keyboard players or one keyboard player?
think it's two keyboard players.
he said, look, we need someone to do the synth parts or something like that.

(23:59):
And I said, I'd love to do it.
I mean, I love those records because they're Trevor Horn records, aren't they?
uh
And it's no mean feat to take on the keyboard side of it as opposed to piano parts.
Because a lot of it, I want to make it sound like the record, you know what I mean?
Because some people go in and do these things half-heartedly.

(24:19):
you know, it doesn't, you know, if they haven't got the budget to pay for me to do thetime I want to spend on it, I'd like to get it done, do know what I mean?
So I did do it.
And it was good because it was at the time they'd just released the, what was that called?
Lexicon of Love 2
Yes.
So they'd just done that and it was all promotion to do with that.

(24:41):
So we were doing some fun things with that.
And we did the Albert Hall.
He still packs it.
He's like Paul Heaton.
I mean, Paul Heaton is ridiculous.
He packs out 25,000 people in arenas and festivals.
And I think the same with Martin.
think, although I only really did that period with him.
But he's another one.

(25:02):
you know, dons his La-Me suit on and goes out.
And because he's got such an individual voice.
no one can sound like, um, Martin Fry, you know, and he's, yeah, he's, he's quite apersonality.
All in all, David, I, I, I'm just blessed to work with a lot of these people and the factthat some bloke that didn't get any, um, qualifications at school, didn't do any formal

(25:32):
musical education.
I've blagged my way through all these years and I'm still getting away with it.
Yeah, look, I mean, there's way too much modesty in there, Toby, but I agree.
mean, it must be-
Sorry can I mention one person that's one of my favorites?
One more mentioned him and he's had the pleasure of doing it.

(25:52):
He's working with Rick Astley.
Of course, yes, please.
finally, again enough, we had John Moulon recently who talked about his.
And so that was really fun because I think they got rid of a couple of people in the bandthat for some reason weren't working out.
So they got another guitarist and then Simon Mary the drummer said, look, you'd be greatfor this.

(26:17):
Do you want to do it?
I said, of course, I'd love to do it.
So I did a year with him and it was an amazing time because Rick's such a pro and hedoesn't take it too seriously.
It's like a bit of a stand up show really when he's on stage.

(26:37):
But it's not just that.
He's got a sense of humor and engages the audience.
love him.
But of course, he's got a good back catalog and people are buying every album he's donesince the album 50 has gone straight to number one.
And I just love him when he really looks after you in every way possible.
And yeah, it just...

(27:00):
I can't say enough about him.
He's just one of the nicest guys and what an amazing talent.
And he's, we did, we owned for him with Belinda at the beginning of last year.
So we're all in the same tour.
So it was great fun.
was the two bands together and all of that.
I mean, I wasn't doing it then.

(27:20):
And, but I was still obviously doing Belinda and it was just great to what I mean, youknow, packing out arenas against 16, 17,000 people.
So, look, we're not done yet because we're going to get back to some questions about you.
you know, let's say you have to do hard labour in this awful music business for another20, 25 years, God forbid.

(27:45):
Toby, what does the last 20 years of your career look like?
What are your aspirations and what do you see happening over the next decade or two, ifyou decide to keep it up?
Well, yeah, depends if anybody wants me anymore.
It's, you know what, it's in the lap of the gods.
I am not, I'm not one of those people.

(28:05):
I'm not very, dare I say, proactive in it.
I suppose I've been lucky enough to have had a checker career that's spanned severaldecades.
And I like to think that I keep up.
I don't keep up, but I just embrace new technology like we were speaking about and thingslike that.

(28:29):
mean, some of it does, a couple of people now, some of these gigs, like Sam Smith and allthat.
I I see the keyboard setups they use.
It's like, wow, what happens if that all breaks down?
know what I mean?
You can't just play bit of rock and roll piano, can you?
But to ask you a question, I don't really know.

(28:49):
think...
I do a lot of additional programming for a lot of the sort of middle of the road acts thata friend of mine, Nick Patrick, he's sort of the producer, of executive producer on all of
these albums.
And of course he farms out a lot of work to people like myself who cover it, who say,we've got the basic tracks together, but what we need is some of what he calls my fairy

(29:15):
dust on keyboards.
And then he said, I think some of the guitars, didn't have time.
Could you replace some of acoustic guitars?
Could you, even if we don't use your harmonies, can you sing some harmonies so can, likeMichael Ball, who I do a lot of albums for, I can sketch the parts out for him, you know?

(29:36):
so I see, I kind of see that as where I'm going, I think.
mean, I do think about...
I've been thinking about maybe creating some content for YouTube and Instagram and all ofthat.
I'm sort of thinking about it because I know that's, mean the young lot, know, the peoplein their 20s, I mean they have to rely on, you know, just having a YouTube channel and I

(30:01):
mean some of these people I follow, I just think, my God, you're putting so much work intoit and they're so well-aversed in business, you know what I mean?
I think they get taught it, you we didn't get taught that.
It...
yeah.
I haven't really got a...
you know, a definitive answer to that question, but...
No.

(30:22):
I think it's cool.
I'll just keep my fingers crossed, really.
Yeah, no, good response.
And it'd probably sink ways into my next question, although before I get onto it, if everanyone should have a memoir, Toby, whether it's via a YouTube channel or actually as a
book, it should be yours.
But, so that's, you know, please do consider that sometime if you can do it withoutgetting sued.

(30:43):
Cause that's always the challenge with some of the most amazing stories.
They can't be aired, but.
I have been approached on a couple of occasions actually about that very thing whilewriting a memoir.
And one guy I met, said, he said, we're looking at Sidemen like you, you know, so we'd beinterested in looking into it.

(31:05):
I mean, since I've lost contact with the guy, but he said, if you can put all the dirt init, he said, I can pay you an allot of money, do you know what I mean?
And I said, well, of course you can.
But I can't put, you know.
To answer your question, I'm working with a good friend of mine who's basically, I mean,could write it myself.

(31:26):
I mean, obviously I'm inputting all the information, but a good friend of mine, PaulWright, he's quite an erudite person and he's read a lot of biographies and he's sort of
putting it together.
And he's heard most of the stories.
said, I might as well put them down, you know.

(31:48):
So yeah, no, it is in the pipeline.
I know he's been busy with other bits of work, but it will.
I'd like to think by this time next year, we'd have something put together.
So yes, no, definitely.
I mean, I don't quite know how I would approach doing it on YouTube.
It's something I actually spoke to my youngest daughter the other day.

(32:08):
She said, how about putting something together with food?
and your music because my hobby is cooking, which of course is an extension of thisanyway, because it's all creative.
And she says, maybe come up with something like that.
It's just my brain's not wired in that way.
Do you know what I mean?
I'm waiting for the phone to ring.

(32:29):
Do you know what I mean?
Yeah, no.
Toby, do need to ask you, you've talked about all the wonderful experiences you've had.
Do you have any advice for young players entering the industry of how they do try and makea career in this challenging time?

(35:49):
Good.
No, amazing.
And um our last question is the dreaded desert Island discs, Toby.
So five albums, if you had to call out five albums that are your favorites of all time,what would they be?

(36:14):
nice.
Beautiful.
No, I see

(36:37):
Okay, if you're happy, I'll just choose one, Toby, but yeah, Coldplay.
Nice.
Toby, that's amazing.

(36:58):
Look, uh in spite of us, you know, spending so much time together, I do feel like we'rebarely scratch the surface and I can't, you mentioned about fairy dust.
I think you've sprinkled lots of fairy dust over many artists lives and it's not throughjust luck, like your main tang, it's through absolute talent.
as you know, part of success is also the hang and you obviously would be an amazing guy tohang with as well.

(37:21):
So.
Yeah, it's been a real privilege speaking with you and we'll definitely keep in touch andhopefully see you down under at some stage.

(38:06):
And there we have it.
I hope you enjoyed that two-parter.
I know I did.
I think you can tell I had a hell of a time talking to Toby.
What a guy and what a raconteur as far as his career and music more broadly.
So yeah, huge thanks to Toby for his time again.
And we do hope to see him in Australia again.
We'd love to follow up.
So a huge thanks to you as well for listening.

(38:29):
And I do want to make it a side.
In the show notes, you'll see that I do link
uh to Paul Heaton and The Beautiful South.
If you're unaware of either of those acts and we opened part one with it, The BeautifulSouth uh had just such an incredible career across five, six, seven albums.
um It's just, yeah, I cannot recommend highly enough checking them out.

(38:52):
I have a personal love for the album Choke, which was their second album from memory, butyeah, do check them out.
But um Toby's influence there is obvious, but
across everything else we covered.
Can't thank him enough for his time.
um A huge shout out again to our gold and silver supporters.
So the amazing Tammy Katcher from Tammy's Musical Studio.
Thank you Tammy, as always, for your support.

(39:14):
The brilliant Mike Wilcox at Midnight Mastering.
If you do create your own music and you need someone to run their eye over it from amixing and mastering viewpoint, Mike is the guy.
I cannot recommend him highly enough.
Dave Bryson, the team at the Keyboard Corner Forum as part of the musicplayer.com.
Do check that out.
a great place it is to hang.
um And last but definitely not least, amazing Dewey Evans from the Sunnyland of Wales.

(39:41):
Thank you Dewey for your ongoing support.
It's hugely appreciated.
Again, thank you for listening.
We'll be back again in a week or two and until then keep on playing.