One of my first musical reminiscences is of being given a Beatles wig. They bought them in Woolworths but it surely wasn’t a traditional wig with particular person strands of hair – it was vacuum-formed plastic and felt like carrying a crash helmet. When it was on you seemed such as you had Paul’s hair, however while you took it off you have been left with what seemed like a scar in your brow.
The Beatles have been large in my home but it surely was the lovable moptop Beatles, the London Palladium Beatles. As soon as they’d grown their hair and change into hippie-ish, my household have been at all times a bit down on them. I bear in mind taking a shoebox and remodeling it right into a miniature duplicate of the set of Prepared, Regular, Go, the tv music present that was like a precursor to High of the Pops. I reduce off the entrance, drew little exit indicators and reduce out little Beatles. Trying again, that was after I began utilizing music to create these little worlds.
I’m not a really skilled songwriter however I learn that John Lennon would generally suppose: “I wish to do one thing like Roy Orbison.” They’d fairly brazenly copy genres. So a track like Candy Phantasm, on my new album, is unquestionably me having a go at a 60s track.
One other affect it’s possible you’ll hear is Frank Sinatra, who my mother and father additionally listened to. They didn’t have a giant document assortment. In reality they by no means appeared to purchase data, so I’ve no concept the place these ones got here from, however that they had a few Sinatra albums. After a couple of drinks everybody within the household would take part singing That’s Life. I didn’t realise it till later as a result of my mother and father have been within the ice cream enterprise and we lived in a tenement, however my household have been really very musical. My father performed piano, my uncle performed guitar, one other uncle performed accordion and one other uncle sang and did comedy bits. So after they received collectively at household dos they have been a band, and everybody would tear into it. My uncle’s guitar was extra like a chunk of furnishings than an instrument – it had enormous strings that you just wanted large Italian peasant fingers to play, however he battered the hell out of it and it sounded nice.
I used to be very fortunate to not get into drama faculty. They stated “you’re terrible don’t come right here” – fairly rightfully on the time – so I went to artwork faculty as a substitute. It was nice. All of us turned up dressed like Neil Younger circa After the Gold Rush, carrying lengthy hair and cheesecloth shirts. Then, throughout my first summer time there, the Intercourse Pistols exploded and everybody got here again in plastic trousers with cheaply dyed hair. Abruptly there was this ethos that you possibly can be in a band, so I received concerned with that. Mine have been known as the Dream Boys. Our influences have been Bowie, Speaking Heads and the Cramps, who have been like a voodoo-swamp model of the Munsters. For some purpose, that appeared just like the path to go in. Maybe not very properly.
This was round 1977, and again then you possibly can take a tape to a venue and get a gig. The artwork faculty had a really staid pupil physique that sorted leisure. They tended to usher in hippie bands, jazz acts and George Melly. We wished extra aggressive music, so we ended up offering it ourselves. However our exhibits weren’t full of individuals spitting. There was fairly a schism between London and the remainder of the nation – I believe the folks of Glasgow frowned on all of the spitting and that type of nonsense.
We at all times struggled with drummers. It was like Spinal Faucet – some drummer or different would come and sit in for us. Then, one night time at a spot known as the Rock Backyard, I requested if anybody knew a drummer who wished to affix our band. A 17 yr previous within the viewers requested if he might have a go and, relatively grandly, we stated we might audition him – as if we had any concept what we have been doing. He turned out to be a superb drummer and he was very humorous too – you’ll know him now because the comic and US talkshow host Craig Ferguson.
All of it goes again to that shoebox. On the time I assumed I simply liked exhibiting off however actually what I liked was having the ability to create an entire world on stage and presenting our concepts to folks. We stored at it. We tried and tried however we weren’t getting anyplace. Ultimately you run out of steam as a result of you don’t have any cash and also you’re consuming Pot Noodles on Christmas Day. It appeared like everyone else in Glasgow was getting signed or doing a Peel Session and we weren’t. I might get the coach all the way down to London and go spherical all of the document labels however nothing ever occurred.
Nonetheless, all of the native bands have been very candy to us and supplied us assist slots. We supported Altered Photos a couple of occasions and their singer Clare Grogan had simply accomplished the movie Gregory’s Lady. One night time the director Invoice Forsyth was within the viewers, and after the gig he invited me to be in his movie Native Hero. If somebody standing backstage at a sweaty gig tells you they’re making a movie in Scotland, you assume it’s going to be a 16mm, half-hour factor with out a script. But it surely turned out to be a correct movie. It felt like destiny was pushing me in the direction of performing and away from music, so I embraced that.
To be trustworthy, I’d by no means been that enthusiastic about writing songs. And I used to be by no means the man on the occasion who introduced out the guitar. However I grew to become pleasant with Dr Robert of the Blow Monkeys and he is that man on the occasion with the guitar. He’s a residing jukebox, a incredible singer and participant. He would invite me to play together with him, after which he challenged me to put in writing my very own materials.
I wrote the songs for my debut album St Christopher whereas I used to be filming The Suicide Squad in 2019. I had a lot downtime on set that I assumed I’d spend it writing and see what occurred. Numerous it was garbage however a few of it was OK. I really like the Kinks and stay in Muswell Hill so we booked their studio Konk to document all of it. However then the pandemic hit and we couldn’t go. As a substitute we took the GarageBand demos and despatched them off to folks. Then they might come again with an incredible sax participant on or no matter.
There should not many individuals who launch their debut album on the age of 62, however that’s the beauty of expertise: anyone can do it. Once I was initially making an attempt to be within the music enterprise you needed to be signed to Sony or RCA to launch one thing, however now you simply want a pc.
I wasn’t nervous of placing this music out. It doesn’t matter. It’s not my career. My mates who’re musicians have had excessive ups and downs and maintained their dedication to music by all of that. My cousin’s son is Lewis Capaldi and he’s a living proof of somebody who has devoted his life to music. His dad was driving him round Leith and Aberdeen – anyplace with a pub he might stand in with a guitar and sing – as a result of he needed to do it. I really appeared in his video for Somebody You Beloved – which was the track of his that exploded, so I used to be delighted to be in it. He’s incredible, however he’s in a wholly totally different league from me. My songs have been initially extra one thing I used to be doing for myself. I assumed, OK, if I’m going to have a go at making music it needs to be music I wish to make. I’m not going to do a Peter Capaldi Christmas album. It couldn’t be Malcolm Tucker sings Sinatra: “Have your self a merry fucking Christmas.”
My new album Candy Illusions is absolutely my means of choosing up the place I left off 40 years in the past as an artwork faculty pupil. It jogs my memory of Glasgow in 1984, when there have been a variety of synths and fuzzy guitars, a number of echo and reverb, and many dreamers whose goals have been being crushed. Town has a noir-ish high quality to it, a bit like Liverpool and Manchester do. It’s the Victorian metropolis centres and the rain and the night time and all that. Very cinematic. You’ll be able to conjure up photos and tales.
Numerous the songs take care of growing older. Questioning the place on a regular basis has gone. Huge Man is about these individuals who have been as soon as stuffed with braggadocio and swagger however are actually dribbling on their jumpers. We bear in mind them as one thing else now.
The only Bin Evening is a lullaby. I’m a grandparent now so immediately I’ve infants and lullabies in my life once more. It’s fantastic, however being Scottish there’s at all times a melancholic streak in me that can hunt down the awful factor about it. On this case it’s the ticking clock. These fabulous kids carry all this vigour and chaos into your life, however how lengthy do you may have left to spend with them? That made me consider the entropy of the universe and the way terrible the world is. And the way nearly the one second I’ve any management over is placing the bins out. I don’t know if it’s the one track ever written about bin night time but it surely’s an incredible topic.
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