Speaker 1Hello and welcome to the James Kennedy podcast for December the 21st. This will be the final podcast of 2022. There won't be one next week because you know what? I'll be sitting on my ass getting drunk and enjoying the Christmas holidays as should you be doing. But what a roller coaster this year has been man. This time of year I quite like this time of year because it's a chance to reflect you know look back at the year that's happened and you know things you've done, things you've learned, things you've had to overcome and it's a time to kind of reflect and take stock and recharge you know and get yourself fired up for the new year ahead of you you know. This year has seen some of the lowest points for me and also some of the highest. I mean you know I lost my father in May which is you know one of the biggest tragedies anyone can have to deal with. You know I think about him every day and I probably always will but I also got engaged to my wonderful love of my life overlooking the caldera in gorgeous Santorini not long after and then I had the the police incident of course you know which was uh stressful to say the least um front page news here in Wales so which which you know it's not the kind of attention I want really so that's just kind of added to the prolonging the whole drama of the thing and then I've been getting these weird kind of um like I got back in 2019 where I was getting these vertigo attacks and I had I don't know if I've spoken about this before back in 2019 I had um a heart monitor on I had an MRI scan I had all my bloods done I had my eyes checked I had everything done right um and everything came back fine uh which was good to know you know but I was I was getting this vertigo fainting thing and nausea and sensitivity to light and it was like a migraine and it was happening all the time and uh yeah I felt like I was having a stroke or I was having a heart attack or something like that so I went to A&E twice and they checked everything checked my brain and checked my heart and everything was hunky-dory which was amazing but it turned out that um it was exhaustion I was drinking way too much caffeine which wasn't helping and just burning the candle at both ends basically my body was just kind of closing down on multiple fronts and I've had that back this year so it's been three years since I've had it and it's back in all of its glory so I think that's my body telling me that um you know it's time to put the brakes on you know that this year has been you know a hell of a lot of stress a hell of a lot of upset a hell of a lot of massively highs and lows quite intense um I haven't really been doing my true calling which is music I haven't been doing any of that shit because I've just been deep into the other stuff you know and I mentioned to get back you know I've got this awesome band and um I want to get out there and do some shows for you guys but I can't do that if I'm not you know mentally ready so I'm gonna put the brakes on I'm gonna recharge I'm gonna enjoy some Christmas cheer and some uh good food good drink and good company and hopefully I'll be back roaring like a lion straight out of the gates in January 2023 rearing to go and kick some fucking asses so that's why I like this time of year you know it's a chance to kind of sit back reflect you know do some do some soul searching and then I'm gonna make some plans get your mojo back and come out this swinging so speaking of good company today on the podcast we've got my best friend in the world I saved the best till last this is the final podcast of the year like I said um those of you that have read my book noise damage will know of my long-term friendship with Mr. Alec Clifford lead singer of the incredible band Henry's Funeral Shoe he's going to be joining us today to chat all things about the band and give us the lowdown on the show and um just shoot the shit you know what I mean so um I actually only got him on because this is it's the only way that I can actually get to chat to him these days because he's so busy in his in his cool awesome life so I had to say you know do you want to come to the podcast because I knew he'd say yes to that whereas you know he normally just avoids my calls I'm joking of course because I speak to that dude every day every day um I've been best friends with Alec now since uh you know we were in college which seems like you know a long long time ago because it was and telling him you couldn't meet a better dude honestly he's hilarious and he's a solid upstanding awesome awesome dude and also an incredible musician with an amazing band so if you haven't heard Henry's Funeral Shoe yet what is wrong with you and how is that possible even because they're everywhere um if you haven't heard them just press stop in the podcast and go and have your eardrums and your mind blown first by checking out the band and then come back and listen to the podcast making sure to subscribe and like and follow and share and click the ratings and all that jazz that I always ask you to do every single time whilst you're there but for those of you who are already in the Henry's Funeral Shoe fan club like myself we'll just get straight down to business and welcome on to the show not only one of the nicest most talented and loveliest guys in the world but my best friend on the planet and one half of the amazing bone shattering band Henry's Funeral Shoe Mr. Alec Clifford it's uh bizarre to speak to you through this medium how you doing man
Speaker 2I'm all right I'm all right I'm just um I'm just chuffed to be on this podcast because it is going you're I'd never be able to be on this ever get on a podcast of this caliber if I wasn't friends with a host
Speaker 1would I well no no you wouldn't let's
Speaker 2be brutally honest not at all man
Speaker 1it's a privilege to have you on you dude I you know I'm privileged you're you're gracing my humble podcast because you know I know there's a shitload of Henry's Funeral Shoe fans out there that want to know the lowdown and the goss as to what's happening in the camp you know um but for those like I always I say this so often you know for the three douchebags who don't know uh you know who you are um because they are out there somewhere let's let's let's let's set the terrain just just for those guys that haven't been introduced to the mad world of the band yet and just like give us a lowdown on who you are what's the band you know what's what's the
Speaker 2crack we're just two brothers in a rock and roll band really and that's it I suppose it's unfashionable to be in a duo maybe it was um but it just came around purely by serendipity osmosis wherever you want to put it just bloody happen um and that's it really and we've been described as like blues uh blues rock whatever we're just a rock and roll band and and that is it and it's just you
Speaker 1and your younger brother in it you and bren so it's me and you sing and play guitar yeah with the better hair yeah
Speaker 2yes yes yes better
Speaker 1everything I know yeah uh so we've got brennan clifford smashing the skins behind you and uh and mr the main man here mr ali clifford playing guitar and vocals there's two brothers uh in a band called henry's funeral shoe and you know kicking fucking ass basically for the past how long the band been together
Speaker 2you know I was thinking this the other day I don't know really it's like it kind of stopped started because I think it's at least 10 years but we we went into like a limp mode beginning we kind of we did a bit and then we didn't do anything it was just like we didn't but it kind of just I don't know it sort of took off then really without first album so um it's definitely like a full 10 of of full on because I think yeah no second album came out in 2011 so was it 2011 I can't remember but yeah so it's all but 10 years anyway really that's crazy it's nuts in it considering yeah I was thinking that the other day and I was like wow it's gotta be at least that um but it's just down to my brother that we we formed because I was like not even asked that you well you know you know it's like we've done yourself including so many like um different projects if you want to call it that that um and I was listening to the the um the blackout interview the other day the guy from the blackout what's his name sean oh there's class that was just like summed everything up it's brilliant because I know like I'm your mate and all that but I'm a really I'm a massive fan of the podcast I do like genuinely listen to it all the time listen to everything because it's right up my street on every subject and um that one was really interesting because he summed it all up there I was thinking like when you asked me on I was thinking what more can I say he just summed everything up you know he's just like christ has he been living in this band with me as well yeah yeah yeah yeah but I kind of think that's where the band that's why the band started my brother like I think I was like I think I was like 29 when we started but I'd been in another band which were quite they had like really um top management and we worked in like all the best studios in london and abbey road and stuff like that but I spent a lot of time with the engineer um because we were into the same music and um and all I heard was horror stories just like you know and I was just thinking jesus man this is like what a weird business and it's true I think I'm fortunate because I never I never got into music to be rich and famous really I just play music you know and I'm like I'm not going to play music I'm not going to play music I'm not which is probably the wrong wrong sort of attitude to have maybe but so yeah and then I just remember coming back from london because I probably lived there for that time of year and a bit doing all those like all these mad things you know um and playing with all these massive bands and all I was hearing was like horror stories and I was thinking fucking hell like I'm just gonna go home and play acoustic guitar and enjoy myself yeah because my other band magic dog quit had finished and that broke my heart and I was like you know you're in bands and just gigging all the time I think one time I was just like I'm just gonna go home and play acoustic guitar and like four different like bands or projects jesus as you meant to be like I was doing like magic dog then I did another project then I was doing my solo thing and then I was doing like like a jazz blues duo thing what the hell I remember that yeah yeah yeah yeah who the hell do I think I am playing jazz but you know you're out all the time you know that's what you meant to do when you're younger just be out and do it and trap yourself in all these different situations and stuff and um yeah I just it kind of like I come back from london and I was just like thinking I'm not gonna I remember like amy rogers was doing loads of acoustic stuff once at the time before And she'd go, well, she is now. I was thinking, that's all right, I'll do that with her. And I did a couple of gigs with Amy and just, you know, and people like that, I was just going around, I was happy. But I started jamming with my brother. He just pestered the hell out of me to jam because he was so young at the time. And we got in the room and it just felt right. And it was, almost created a monster. Yeah. You know? It's his fault, really. It's his fault for my 10 years of misery. I could have been happy and rich by now. I might as well put my 10 years of effort into something else. Do you know what I mean?
Speaker 1Frigging hell. Well, yeah, we've had that conversation before, haven't we? It's like, you know, what if I'd gotten my, I think I mentioned it in the book, actually, because Mr. Alec Clifford here is the very Alec that I mentioned in the book, noise damage, quite frequently. And I think towards the end, I mentioned that me and you used to talk all the time to me about, like, you know, I wish I'd gotten a bloody apprenticeship in carpentry or something, you know, a trade that I could actually earn a decent wage from, you know?
Speaker 2Yeah, yeah, yeah. And it's funny. Going back to what Sean said, you know, it's not always me, but it's like, it is literally like people sometimes just expect you to be grateful to play for nothing. It's like, fuck me, like, do you know what I mean? And I mean, we've all got, we've all got those stories, but yeah, I've looked back and I've thought, shit, man, you know, you think like how much time and effort that is driving it and done the more the ways and all the rest when you do it because you love it. But it does come to a point where you think like, and it's not an age thing, I don't think, because I know people doing it still a lot older than me. So it's a, it's just a state of mind where you come to and you're like, fuck, this is really taking over everything. And I am not good. I am, I am mentally fucking. And I think now doing, because like, you know, everyone's got a podcast and I'm naturally curious. I was thinking like doing podcasts, listen to podcasts and stuff on sleep and things. And I think, fucking hell, probably give myself dementia now from the lack of sleep, my bad. It's fucking insane. I remember when we played like, we come back from Mississippi, we did a tour of Mississippi. I came back, missed the flight back, I think. So anyway, we got back Tuesday afternoon. I was back in work Wednesday morning. Wow. And then moving house on a Friday, like.
Speaker 1Yeah, that's the thing. It's like people see, especially a band like Henry's Funeral Show, they've got such a fierce live show. You know what I mean? It's like a real tour de force. And it's two people making all that, all the noise of 10 men, you know. And, you know, you can see how much you guys love it and how much passion and energy is there when you're on stage together. It's like a real fucking kinetic kind of force. But then the true reality, like you say, is that, you know, like the next day then, once you get back from, you know, driving back from London or, you know, Nottingham or wherever it might be, you know, you've got two kids in the house, you know, you've got a job. And people don't see that side of it. They just think you're rocking on to some party and then you're rocking on to another gig, you know, you live in this little fantasy world, you know.
Speaker 2Yeah. I mean, I don't. I don't blame them for that because, like, nobody wants to come to a show and you're somebody moaning. It's just like, I remember a mate, I think, I think we just got lucky. When we, I'd done, I kind of got all the playing out of my system, really. And like I said, I was in a band with some of my best mates, Magic Dog, and I loved it. And I really loved it, you know. It was hard, but the fun was immense. And, like, when I quit, like, you kind of, like, it's almost like losing a girlfriend or something. Yeah, totally. It's really, really weird. I suppose anyone who's played sport or whatever, and they're with their mates every weekend, and then they get injured and they can't play. It's that type of thing, isn't it? Yeah, yeah. And then I got in another situation, which I didn't really like the music with a band, but I just thought, I've got to do this. This is what I've got to do to be a musician. So, you know, practically living in London for a year, and, you know, I bought a house at the time I was doing that, so I'd come back and then I'd be, like, ripping up floorboards and fucking knocking down walls and all that. But it's just what you do, right? But I lost my train of thought now. Shit, where have I gone? See, it's mad.
Speaker 1It's the drugs. We forgot to mention that Alan is a raging drug addict. This is going to happen throughout the conversation.
Speaker 2That's it. Yeah, it's all the heroin.
Speaker 1Don't ever go out in the car with me, dude. It won't be worth your while.
Speaker 2Trust me. Yeah, that's going to be interesting. But, yeah, coffee, yeah, coffee is my drug. No, but it's like, you just do it, don't you? You just do it. But then listening, I was always, like, thinking, we always run the band as a business as much as we could from the word off because the band started, we had a couple of songs, and then in the MySpace days, you know, when we got signed through MySpace, that was my brother's, like, tenacity. He put it out there. He's, like, the biggest fan of the band. I wasn't that bothered. I just loved playing, you know, and I wasn't, I was adamant I wouldn't chase that again, you know, after chasing it for how many years, you know. And they were, like, oh, have you got enough songs to record an album? And we're, like, yeah, but we didn't. Right. So I asked the boys in Magic Dog if I could use the songs I pretty much, I wrote, like, one or two songs fully in the band. And then we'd, like, we'd worked out the arrangement. But that's how we would work in a band. Somebody would, we'd either work on something together or they'd have something separately or whatever. And these just happened to be ones that I'd more or less written all myself. Certainly lyrically, like. And they were, like, I was, like, boys, can I use these? To beef up the album? And they were, like, yeah. And I had an acoustic song and that was it. And we just, like, four or five we'd written as the band because we'd been together a couple of months. But what we did is we didn't scrimp on savings from the beginning, savings, sorry, recording. So we made sure we spent as much money as we could down in Sonic 1 with Tim, which is amazing. I bet him through Magic Dog. I love this drum sound, the sound of the gone drum. So we went down there and I think what happened was with the MySpace, we had a better sound coming over the speakers than anyone else. And I think, so right off the off then, we did that and then it was like, oh, do you want to go on a tour? Because they had good connections with a tour, a good touring agent who'd done, like, you know, the White Stripes and the Datsuns and all these other bands. And so I sold my car. Wow. Bought a van and just went on tour up to Holland and, like, slept in the van. And it was just like that. But I think we did that in September. By the March then, we did a two-month tour of Europe. We did, like, five or six countries. But I'd seen the business then from a touring side and then I'd seen it from being in, like, you know, working with some, you know, the producer we were working with was doing, like, I think he'd done, like, the Arctic Monkeys and he'd done, all I know is, like, 50 grand for three songs and he'd done huge bands in the 90s, like, all the big selling. I think he did the biggest selling Travis album, he did the Darkness, he did the Mannix albums, you know, the Everything Must Go album, is his album? Yeah. Right. So he did, like, five or six countries. He'd done all that. And I spent a lot of time with him rather than going up on the piss, like, after we'd done recording. Who are you talking about?
Speaker 1You're talking about Steve Bush?
Speaker 2No, I've done some work with Steve afterwards, but this is Ian Grimble.
Speaker 1Right, okay, yeah.
Speaker 2Two kilohertz. I don't know if he's still there. But he was a really interesting character and we got on really well because we were just into music, the same music. I remember we'd stay up, well, we stayed up one night in his house just drinking vodka and listening to, like, he was playing me basically all these artists he'd recorded and they were freaking amazing and how they were doing it. He'd not got it anyway. Right, yeah. I was like, how is this not got, you know, and then he would tell me the horror story behind it and how the, you know, a band would be shelved and blah, blah, blah. And then he'd say, oh, this band, this female artist is big in, I don't know, fucking Indonesia or something. It was just bizarre. But I just got to hear all the horror stories and then I spent some time with the mixing engineer in Abbey Road who I'd gone really well with and he would do the same. And then he, so he wasn't like, say they wouldn't do it on purpose, like horror stories, just tell me about the, you know, Well, yeah, exactly, yeah.
Speaker 1You know, he's just chatting. Everyone's anecdotes, unfortunately, you know, tend to end badly, don't they? They don't tend to end with a happy ending. Like, you know, it's just the nature of the business.
Speaker 2Yeah, and it wasn't like, it wasn't all doom and gloom, man. I mean, he'd be playing me stuff and I'd be going, wow, this is amazing. You know, what are they doing? What's she doing? What's he doing? And he'd be like, well, actually, nothing. And then he'd tell me the reason why. And you realise it's like, it's more about politics and timing, isn't it?
Speaker 1Yeah, and luck. And luck, you know.
Speaker 2And I just remember thinking, the type of music I love is not going to, I'm not going to make a living out of this properly. Or did I think, like, I just think, I just think I was a bit bummed out, to be honest. I was like, man, this is just depressing. This is one fucking horror story after another with people who are far more talented than I am. And will ever be. And I just like, well, I'm just going to go back to Wales and I'm just going to play acoustic shows and play the songs I love and keep it simple. And so then when I did come and we did do all that with the band, it was kind of like, I was like, I'm going to run this like a business. I remember thinking that. We would gig and we'd get like 30 quid, 20 quid, 50 quid, whatever. We just chucked it in a pot. And then when it came the time to like buy a van or reinvest in better recordings, I remember thinking, I was thinking, I'm not going to make crap recordings. I want to make good recordings of anything we do. So it all went into that. It was always regenerating itself.
Speaker 1Yeah. You were very sensible like that. Because I remember, I mean, I was privy to like the very first demo that you guys did as Henry's Funeral Show. And like, yeah, before that you were doing kind of solo acoustic stuff and, you know, playing in different bands and things. But I remember you sent me the first demo for Henry's Funeral Show. I was like, fucking hell, Jesus, I'd never heard you doing anything like that before. You know, the way you were singing and the music was so aggressive. And I was like, man, this is, yeah, this is, I like this. This is my kind of thing. And it was a real shock, but it sounded like a real together sound. It sounded like the band was like, have been together for ages but you know straight off the huff they just had that kind of vibe there you know it just seemed to obviously something worked in the room and it was meant to be you know i
Speaker 2think you're right i think my wife came once for rehearsal and she was like and we played the song first song we wrote together i remember writing henry's funeral shoe in the bedroom i wanted to sound like the first you know like bleach you know i love that album yeah yeah the sound of the drums and stuff and um she came i remember coming to rehearsal and we did and she was just like gobsmacked you know and i was like oh really is that good and she was like fucking hell and i was because i hate being a front man so right i really hate it i don't like people looking at me i'm not very like i'm not a people person i'm really a miserable bastard to be honest yeah he is yeah and i just like to keep myself from it i think that's what i enjoyed about the other bands is i would like i'd be the guy on the side so i could just like make noise and you know but so the idea was is we record a demo as best we could and then get in a singer and a bass player and whatever build the band up but it was evident really on the recorders that we didn't people we played it to were like well you don't need anywhere else yeah you know yeah totally um and it wasn't you know you know my background in terms of my music so like it wasn't trying to follow the black keys or the white stripes or whatever because when they came along i wasn't even impressed by them in the way that it wasn't new to me because it just sounded like bucker white or um or just like uh sun house and things like that it just sounded like that electrified you know i wasn't really like i liked it it was all right but i wasn't listening to it you know i wasn't like thinking right i'm gonna put a duo together now it just it just didn't you know i mean people you know following the band or what's the band or you know we've been like people say oh they're poor man's black keys or whatever i don't mind people are always
Speaker 1going to make those associations with things and they don't
Speaker 2mean yeah yeah yeah and and if they've got nothing else to compare it to that's absolutely fine but it was never my intention you know our intention it was so that's how i know it happened just naturally and without without any sort of plan we didn't have a plan other than just keep going you know um and that's it really that's how the band sort of evolved and we just kind of got on that for a long time we got on that circuit and well it took
Speaker 1off quite quick for you guys as well didn't it because you literally went from nothing really yeah like here's our first demo here's the sound it's all there and then suddenly you know you're signed to a live records in america and you're touring europe and you know the the car advert with um charlie sheen you know on the uh the fiat ad and stuff and it was just like it was like it was one of those it was one of those stories you hear about time and time again and it were like a band just hits that kind of zeitgeist off you know what i mean and normally like sean bring it back bring it back to what sean was talking about last week um yeah normally what happens is like in the case of a band like pretty vicious you know they're on that roller coaster and then all of a sudden it fucking explodes or implodes whereas for you guys like coming back to what you said about being business savvy was almost like you kind of rode that wave and then you jumped off when it was a you know when it was in full full speed and then you took the reins yourself you kind of went independent yeah took the wheel and you used your business and you kind of went independent and you kind of went independent to um to actually continue to finance the band to this day i think you're still you're still doing
Speaker 2that model right oh yeah yeah i think like going back to what you said about being business it was almost a case of like we got offered some we got some you know i wouldn't name any labels but we got offered some decent stuff um you know we got the you know you go to london you do all the the whining and dining yeah but ultimately just like sean was saying he's like funny enough when i was hearing his pretty vicious stories i heard all those stories as well because i know people associated with all that and i feel really sorry for him because they got really hoodwinked but we got not to that level but we did get offered a hell of a lot of things and you go there and you do that and spend a day with them with these people and then you know they want to want to sign over all your music for for the rest of your life and give you nothing for it yeah and they'd say yeah but we're gonna send you to japan and stuff and i'd be like well yeah that's fine but i need to fucking eat like yeah do you know what i mean it's not like i just maybe because again going back to being like i'm really like i am quite like sort of i suppose negative but i just i just could see through the bullshit i just wasn't impressed i'm not impressed with flashy things so i didn't give a fuck like do you know what i mean it's like yeah but we'll give you these amplifiers to use and i'm like yeah i've got a decent amplifier yeah but what about this guitar it's all right but i got a fucking guitar i'll work with it and i'm like yeah but we'll give you it's like literally like how am i gonna pay the bills that's all i give a fuck about yeah it's like you know and again i think by so many times i've been to so many parts of the world again it sounds like that i because i always want to travel but i want to do a few music and i never got to do it all of a sudden the band hit off and i beat fucking monumental players so when you get like promised all these things i was just like and i think because we've done a lot on our own back by the time anyone got a sniff of any bigger they'd be saying oh my god we send you this and you know i've fucking already been there yeah you know it's like you know it's like where's the money you know and it's not all about the money but it fucking
Speaker 1is about the money but you've made money though you're one of the few bands i know that have actually made money you know it's and you have been very clever about it but also i suppose the nature of what you do like like two men can make the same noise as 10 men in your band so i suppose you've got a tight ship in that sense you know you you yeah you haven't got like a you know your show is very like punk rock and and and you know it's just you two on the stage there's no fucking frills or fireworks you know what i mean and you just i think that's what it
Speaker 2was it's like again i was going back it's what you learned and it's like i'd learn i played in another band and it was like it was very professional we had all these backing tracks you played to a click track right we had string sections coming over but fuck me like you know you turn up for a sound check and you'd be there for hours then if the sound engineer decided to have a joint or a fucking drink you'd fuck up and you'd be there for hours and you'd be there for you know so it's like oh go for three o'clock boys yeah you drive all the way to fucking nottingham for three o'clock and then for like 45 minutes of a show to be fucked up so if that was a conscious effort i'm everything and i'm going to strip this back yeah so that it works so like really like on the tracks like say if you get the albums or the eps or there'll be holes on stuff there'll be piano there'll be there'll be different instrumentation because then i thought well there's a different listening experience for the right that's why we've not been a live album it's like well we're not bringing anything new it's just like two guys on stage people gonna hold their phones up right so before lockdown we were gonna do a live album we had a we had a tour in russia ironically and germany and a few other places then a further summer tour but obviously that was but our idea was because what we do is self-funding so like like right we'll go out there on tour we'll get some money then we'll pull that back and make a live album with like a horn section fucking harmonica players all these things to make like if we do make a live album then that's something you know we can't play live like that all the time so when people buy it it's a different experience different yeah yeah so like our albums they do have elements of everything because then when they come to see us live it's no frills it's you know we're gonna kick your head in from the stage and then when they have the album it's like oh there's an album you know that that that was always conscious but i think we have made money and we've put it back in but we've fucking lost it you know it's the same as like you said we i remember when we had our car advert in 2012 12 it was like it's weird how the business works we were on a tiny little label great label they were brilliant to us but like they were like wouldn't put any money into promoting the song on they were like well that's not very cool i'm so in a car but i was like okay right okay but it is the biggest car advert in america right now do you know what i mean it's like it's got the biggest you know controversial actor on the advert it was it was all these things you know and they bought it for a lot of money yeah but this is how we were naive at the time we'd only been going a couple of years and it was just like we lost 30 grand from dollars to pounds yeah during just the transfer and i was like where's the rest of my money and then we hired this accountant who subsequently went to prison so he's like we had all this money more money we'd ever seen in our life and then it went during me it was like i remember us falling up and going oh can we speak to where i won't mention the guy's name he's like oh he's not with us anymore he's like oh sorry he thought he's dead and she was like he's in prison i was like oh fuck and then um he actually made the paper like do you know i mean wow he did two years tax evasion and made the national press fucking hell so you go from there you go from there you go from there you go like and then we got slammed for time like we'd go down there you know they were like oh we got they wouldn't take our calls and the thing is you know what it's like with the hmrc they like it's your accounts right do you know what i mean it's like if it fucks up it's all on your head
Speaker 1yeah what the fuck do we know about that shit you know what i mean we just play guitar like
Speaker 2exactly that's why when they go oh fucking social didn't play his attacks and you know they're really hard maybe on a rock star or what yeah now i used to be that person and now i realize like how can's fuck you up it's not germany we don't
Speaker 1know anything about it you know we employ these people to just take care of it for
Speaker 2us you know exactly just like in the space of like, I don't know, two years. We had more money than I had seen in my whole life and it went. It was just like, but everyone, you know, going back, everyone's got that, you know, it did lead to like, because we had that press then it was like, we did manage to get like on tour with Kiss things and stuff like that but all these little sharks come, you know, we had a dodgy man who kind of put me in this, we were too trusting, you know, and it's like, you know, trust, I tell you what, let's put it this way, if I had that type of money now, I wouldn't fucking be so stupid as to trust other people. I would literally be like, reinvested in the band but not reinvested in other people, you know. You just kind of, you do the things, it was all really, we reinvested in the band to its detriment, you know, we wanted to grow it and stuff and it just, we got, ultimately, we got fucking drafted but, in the way that we weren't daft enough not to give up our jobs and things like that, it was always, I knew, you know, when we went on tour for six weeks or two months across Europe, in the early stages of the band, I was like, this is fucking hard work because like, yeah, we made money but we drove ourselves. So it was like, and we always do, so other bands would hire drivers, they'd hire merch guys, we were like, okay, we need, you know, to survive, you've got to do this yourself, so you could have like a, a nine to 14 hour drive across France, you know, then, you know, there's crack, you do the sound check, blah, blah, blah. I remember my buddy going, oh, that sounds really hard, joking, you know, I was like, well, it isn't hard physically, but mentally, like, it's like, you know, you get, we get into a hotel in Switzerland at four in the morning and the concierge was just like, do you want breakfast?
Speaker 1Yeah, people don't get it, man. People don't get it.
Speaker 2And I was like, five star hotel, I was like, this is amazing, but I've got three hours of sleep until I've got to get to France now. And it's great, right? And all that is awesome, but it's not sustainable for any length of time. It's like, because if you're not on tour, you're not making money because you're not making money from album sales and stuff. We thought we'd be going to a real good fan base and that sustains us in some model, right? In some way when we're not on tour, but like, we went on tour with this band and they had a driver and a merch guy and he was from America and he was like, and we started the tour with them. I think we started in St. Marlo. I can't remember. Anyway, and we finished with them in, I think we finished with them in Germany and we'd be, so we'd like, we'd see them along now and again along this tour. We'd meet at a certain festival and then blah, blah, blah. And no word of a lie, right? By the end of that two months, he was green. He looked fucking terrible. I was just like, fucking hell. He was trying to stay up the party and he tried, and I was like, fucking no chance.
Speaker 1God, do it, man.
Speaker 2It's impossible. It's impossible. And like, it was just funny and I just remember thinking, I want to do this for the rest of my life but on my terms because it's not, you know, I just, I just want to do it and then having kids, I mean, my kids are a bit older now so I don't mind being away longer but I remember when my boy was really young and like, we were six weeks in France. We'd have like three days off so I'd just drive home to see him.
Speaker 1I remember, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2Drive home to see him for a couple hours and go again.
Speaker 1It's a wild life, man. You know, people, they, yeah, you either get it or you don't. I think anyone that's done it, you know, kind of doesn't need that explained because they just totally get it but like, we talked about Ian Winwood's book, Bodies. I don't know if you've had a chance to read that yet.
Speaker 2I haven't read it yet. Not very good. The interview was amazing.
Speaker 1Oh, it's brilliant. He talks about this thing of like, you can't complain about any of it because it's not seen as a proper job. It's seen as glamorous that you'll go into Switzerland and stay in these five-star hotels to then go on to play a show and have people, you know, worship you and buy you free drinks and stuff, you know, you're not allowed to complain about any of that but the toll it takes on you as a human being is fucking huge, man. And it's just weird as well that feeling of always being in a state of flux because, you know, you go somewhere, you have this really intense experience and then like an hour later you're on the motorway in the dark again, you know, it's weird.
Speaker 2Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. And it's very much like, don't get me, the thing is like, you have to back it up. Same as what Sean was doing with What Was Me. Don't get me wrong. I'm not, it's not lost on me but it's like you were saying, it's just like, oh, there's a gig in Switzerland, cool, what time do you fly in? Okay, rah, rah. So you'd like, so you book a day off on work, you know, you book a day or afternoon off and then you go, where's the cheapest flights from? Oh, Birmingham. Fuck, right, okay. You drive to Birmingham, you know, you drive to Birmingham at 12, 12 midnight, you know, drive up, you get the plane, you go over, you do it and you come back, you drive back and you get up for work the next day. That's literally it and it's like, so you could, it's not like, you're driving in and you're going to sit on your ass for a couple of days like, oh, back to work, you know, and that's just how it is and like, I wouldn't do it if I didn't love it but it is emotionally and like, yeah, emotionally, like lack of sleep and I can really like, it fucking ruins you like, but you have to, that's, you know, you keep doing it because you love it but it's like, for me, I had massive, I have massive stage fright which is even worse, I think, like, when the band were doing really well and we were gigging a lot and we were in Europe a lot and blah, blah, blah and I just like, it got to the stage where like, I had to have a word with myself because I was like, I think I need to stop, you know, because it would have, I had to stop the band or because, I don't like being on stage, I love being on stage and I love playing the music, I fucking love that but I hate, I hate being a front man, I hate people looking at me, it's wrong, isn't it? I hate people looking at me, I hate having to talk on between the mic because like, I've got pretty like, dark humour and I'm thinking like, they're just looking at me going, oh, look at that prick up there, you know, and it's not until like, if you gig with your man and they're very, they're very positive like, when they're like, hey man, nobody wants you to fail and blah, but I just come from that mindset of like,
Speaker 1we're British, you know, nobody wants you to succeed, everybody gets, that makes them feel bad, everybody wants you to fail, you know, so it's like, we push each other down here, it's like, look at that guy playing the guitar, he thinks he's somebody, what a pretentious wanker, you know what I mean, stay in your box like us, you prick. Yeah,
Speaker 2that's it, and the worst thing is like, people say to me, oh, you look like Noah Gallagher or Liam Gallagher, so I've thought about shaving my head because I'm like, I don't even listen to that music, so it's not, do you know what I mean, so it's not like, it just doesn't come naturally to me, I don't like it, I have a very dark sense of humour, so when I'm on the microphone, I do sound like I'm trying to be smug and I'm not, and I don't, and all these things and like, the way I play guitar, it would all come back, it's like I play in different tunings, so I'd be worried going, fuck man, if, or if this breaks now, how do I, you know, go from one song to the other, my guitar's tuned like this, and do you know what I mean, it would be all these stresses and anxieties, and I remember when we did the gig with Kiss, funnily enough, I was, I'd lay on the floor in no word of life for like 45 minutes, and I'm not even a fucking fan of Kiss, right, don't even know anything by him, we got on there through our manager, a dodgy manager, I suppose really, but anyway, because I got so worked up, yeah, you know the story about that, but I just, I was laying on the floor of the shower, right, on this fucking massive cruise ship, just not enjoying it, just freaked right out, and I think, my brother got, he got to the stage where I was bumming my brother out, I think, because he was just like, and you know, I was making him too nervous, I did, we do sound checks, and I'd be like, oh that's alright, that's alright, I just, I just want, you know, and if we do a gig, and they go, we only, go on half an hour, I'd be happy, do you know what I mean, because it's like, always making excuses, always worried about my voice, because how I sing is, it just, it just happened, that wasn't, again, it wasn't like, any sort of conscious choice, to sing as aggressively, as I do, it just happens, that's why sometimes on the albums, or the EPs, people, if there's a slower song, they think my brother's singing, you know, and then I'd blow my voice, and I'd be worried about blowing my voice, and all those things, and I just thought in the end, I've got to start learning to enjoy this, otherwise there's no point doing it, and I started to, ironically, just before, just before lockdown, so all those fucking years, I literally was having monumental experiences, and not enjoying them, because I was too nervous on stage, and I hated being on, I loved the music, it always felt like something, I used to say like, after the gig, oh, the third member was here tonight, it would swamp around you, you know, but yeah, I just, you know, it's like, I don't, I don't know, I just, I don't like people looking at me, I don't like people,
Speaker 1it's just, well, it's not, yeah, I mean, that's not what we get into, I mean, there are people who are naturally exhibitionists, who need that kind of attention, but I mean, I don't think that's true of most performers, you know, and honestly, I think like we, our passion is for the music, and the instrument, and then, you know, there's this other element, that it just comes with the job, you know what I mean,
Speaker 2which, yeah, yeah, I suppose, yeah, I think, when I played it, I think I said, I played in a band before, and the guy would say like, when I was doing like, I suppose he's called like, Sashman, if you want to call it that, but anyway, he would, you know, we're doing all the work in London, and we were playing with some pretty fucking big bands, and, like, he'd look out in the audience, you know, or we'd be in a festival, and he'd look up, and he'd say like, I can't wait to play to these chicks all night, man, and I'd be thinking the officer, I was thinking, I just don't think, like, I'd be thinking, I hope I don't fuck up, I hope my guitar sounds good, I hope they don't look at me, do you know what I mean, it's just like, it's just, I, you know, i'm the wrong basically i'm the wrong person for the fucking
Speaker 1job you know i think your fans would disagree with that man and i think it'd be like probably fascinating i think for the fans of the band to hear this because like i said that the the the the personality on stage uh looks like the sort of guy that could smash a fucking hole through you know what i mean and the force of energy coming from the band so it's really it's great to hear all this open and honest about it because i think it's really interesting i don't think anyone that's ever seen the band live would ever imagine that all that was going on in your head whilst you were doing what you do on stage
Speaker 2i think it's probably this is more than anything is an age thing is before you have to they put on a front now i just i don't give a fuck like it's just like well you know i've kind of i think when released comfortable skin is why i that title is i always wanted to have comfortable skin right feel confident on the stage yeah but i don't and i still don't but it's i think maybe that's why it sounds like that is through frustration and the only way to do that is to do it on stage and i think that's the only way to do it on stage the only reason i've gone through a lot of them is my brother he's like the biggest fan of the band he just loves playing the music of the band um and he would get excited and his excitement would i would feed off his excitement and he's an ultimate professional you know yeah he'd i do his head in because like if we come up with a song and there's an arrangement he will not forget that arrangement but there's i'm melding over going maybe it should go like this maybe should change it and you know we get rehearsals and i go oh he's like oh fuck i've learned this song this way now you know yeah yeah but it's always he's insane man
Speaker 1he's insane like like i remember um he was doing some drum stuff down at the studio that i used to work in and he just smashes everything one take he is the one take bastard you know you can just knock it out flawless first time no problem done you know what i mean it's like i hate people
Speaker 2either he's honestly i'm not just saying it's my brother he's fascinating in the fact like again nerves anxiety thing we're like to the toilet he was he said that he said to him he's like oh i'm just going to lay the drums down for this because he's nervous about this song blah blah so he went in and played the drums right to a click track right but fuck all else perfect so i do you know like usually now right you know when you you program a song don't you know it's not a click track they program the drums they program the beats you can play along yes so i was paid i was playing along to an actual drummer that has played a song and i was playing along to an actual drummer that has played a song and i was played to a fucking click track he is fucking insane and i'm not saying no no no man i could
Speaker 1testify to that as well man
Speaker 2he's done it before we had this song right on the second album which again the other thing is i play with different tunings and that pisses him off and i can't remember what tunings or settings on the amps or fucking anything on the pedals we've we've left some songs off stuff which i because we can't nearly because i can't remember what i had my pedals on which night take pictures on right now and blah blah but we had this one and like it was just a loop right so it's a guitar loop which sounds easy but there would be parts on there then when the drums had to change because like the vocalized changed or whatever and he fucking went in and did it in fucking one right so this this is a loop i did a loop i give it to the guy and he just played right and i was like fucking all i had to do was go in and sing it he literally i was like he knew the song that well that he could play and he knew how i sang it yeah would would be it's fucking nuts it is nuts yeah it's fucking nuts and like that's how like i've gone through so much because like i go in the studio and i'd second guess everything and he wouldn't be like no it's fine he'd always like you know he's always a voice of reason but like especially gigging i i he wouldn't tell me like sometimes people would turn up they'd drive like two hours to come and watch us and things like that and he just wouldn't tell me because he knew right i'd freak you out yeah freak out because also because i'm always like oh fuck you know they pick two hours to come and see us no what if we're fucking shit what if my voice grows you know i'm gonna waste the money but do you know what i mean it's not like that that's
Speaker 1just how i am that's mad but i mean that's that's part of like that's part of what makes you you though in it it's like if you didn't have those parts you wouldn't be the musician you are you wouldn't make the music you make and you wouldn't perform it the way you do so it's kind of like that bittersweet thing where it's like you wish you didn't have that but then if you didn't have that you maybe the music would lose something you know he's
Speaker 2my ass he's almost like that pushy mother that gets you on the stage right do you know what i mean okay i'm fucking pushing your child on the stage um so i kind of had to enjoy it for my brother's benefit as much as anything else but it's just um that's how we got frustrated because you know we had lockdown and like i was kind of like yeah okay i think i think i'm comfortable now i think i'm our third album did so well um critically and all and i was really like chuffed with him we had a hell of a lot planned um and i was like right i am going to enjoy this now i am going to do this and then like just got the rug pulled but so did everyone yeah but what i mean is i was in a different state um with the band sort of mentally do you know what i mean so it was like it wasn't i just learned to enjoy myself um and then we got stopped you know so now you got to
Speaker 1start from scratch again now after after getting your head into that place where you were ready to do that and now you've got to try and get your head back in that zone again after all this time off you
Speaker 2know exactly you know as a you know lockdown lots of things have happened and we lost our we had a fantastic booking agent in europe we lost him because he wanted to scale things back which is which is fine you know we still made some stuff but he his business got exceptionally bigger and his bands got bigger um you know we couldn't commit to like he would want us to want to talk for like two or three months and we were like no we're not we're you know we're not comfortable doing that yeah um because we've got families and we've got jobs and for the very reasons we spoke about earlier you know it's too fickle you know so where are things at now then i
Speaker 1mean you know it's it's been a mad few years for for both of us in in different ways you know i mean and you know for everybody i suppose in the world as well going in terms of the lockdown and stuff and the shake-up that our industry has had you know we've come out a lockdown as we talked about on previous episodes um you know with the venues are closing down and every fucking band on the planet is now trying to catch up on three years of lost touring so it's chaos yeah uh we're coming to a new world now which is very kind of different to what we knew before um but we've also you know there's life stuff as well you know what i mean so so where is the band at now in terms of you know the road ahead and what's happening right
Speaker 2now well in the summer we were going to record um a new single we were going to do something we've not done we're just going to do a pure single we've not had a single campaign you know i mean we've done the albums and then chuck some stuff out randomly we've because you know we've not had the finances i suppose like i've noticed like bands are just they would do like eps and then make an album yeah have a campaign but again there's no point in us releasing eps because well we did once because we had a dodgy manager and we needed to get back on and it was kind of there was a strategy to that but because we make our money on the road there's no point releasing an ep because there's no money in it you can't charge enough for what it costs me so we were like so we were like okay well we'll just do a single and then we're going to do a new one and then we're going to do a new one and then we'll do a video and we'll make we'll do a campaign for that build it up to our next album but our mom got really ill um and again we just you know it's only rock and roll but i'm not prepared to like you know give up sort of spending time with our parents and all the rest family
Speaker 1first man always yeah
Speaker 2it's always family first so we've been quiet because emotionally we well first of all with brexit i'm not brexit first of all we had the brexit thing we were and it didn't really affect us to begin with we were i was like okay let's see how that plans out but then we had covid so we didn't we couldn't do anything about brexit and then you know these hurdles with fucking brexit we need to deal with now but it was just like we when mom got ill then we were just like okay we're not we're not emotionally in the headspace because we didn't we didn't we couldn't get in the room together during covid yeah and then when we started it to like cast their memories back it's gone quick but oh yeah it was there it wasn't straight for a while you know um and whereas in the past i used to write just on my own this is the band is involved in the fact that it's more like um uh sort of what's the word really it's it's the two of us writing together i'll write the guitarist and all the lyrics and the melody and stuff but the arrangements it's more collaborative right and we couldn't really get in the room to thrash out when we did we were starting to get in the room and we were starting to get in the room and we were like oh bill as it felt again we were like oh this is amazing yeah yeah start practicing everything because we did with the third album like right we got some fucking great song we started playing them live and that's all we always do test smoke live and stuff and the ideas were flowing for for albert for songs that maybe wouldn't make it live but they'll make the record it got like that and then and then mom got ill and um it was just like family first and it's been room without mom and stuff and the band is a family band than this but me and my brother yeah um my dad ironically is a big part if you go on tour he's kind of fucking east unless it's not an airplane he's coming but he wants to come um so all that's come to a stop really and it's just like basically because again going back to what a lot of what sean says is we i we know the shit the industry is and and this this is more important because like yeah The industry's so fickle and found isn't so we you know we totally haven't stopped and i haven't stopped writing i still i'm still writing you just parked up for a bit just parked up we've got half an album i mean sweet really but it's not you know we're going to build on that because it's a lot acoustic based and it's not really what you know we're a bit
Speaker 1of both that's awesome man so so all the uh henry's funeral shoe fans out there that have been thinking you know what what's going on so basically the band is is just parked up in the pit stop for a bit you know and when you guys are ready you'll be back stronger than ever
Speaker 2yeah yeah we just had to pull i went a couple of gigs like we just had to pull them because it's just there's too much going on all right like right um mom doesn't mind us talking about that and that's fine but it's because i can't imagine the band ever stopping really you guys
Speaker 1will be the last band standing man honestly i never thought my last band was going to end and you've outlived us you know what
Speaker 2i mean it's very funny you should say my brother would text me oh they've stopped again these good bands yeah we started the same time there's a lot of bands right but we kept it simple we kept it just us um we we kept reinvesting um we bought out to our record contract which i'm not sure looking back was a good idea i'm not sure but we had other people giving us the wrong impression to be honest they were a great label but they wanted us to release stuff so frequently it's like yeah it was almost pointless and i'm not very prolific and we're not prolific as a band it's hard being a duo because it's what it's weird the music we make is you know maybe it can be deemed as american something but like i can't if we were american band like probably we probably would have released about 10 albums but it's like you make a sound which is almost american or high or a hybrid maybe and you have to sing as a as i have to bring it across as a welsh person don't i or as a you know it's like i think
Speaker 1you've done the right thing man because it yeah like if you were with the label exactly like you just said it's that hamster wheel thing there and that's that's the model that the labels still stick to you do an album tour it do an album tour it do an album tour and i think you know for you and you've said this several times now you know the music comes first so you'll make an album when you've got the album in you that you want to put out there otherwise what's the point you know what
Speaker 2i mean exactly i remember him saying like oh you should do a covers album and it worked well for other bands i was just thinking i don't really it just i just i know do you know what i mean it was just like no and we were almost like falling off all my stuff and right and it didn't want to come to that and and then we you know we had the money off the car advert so we thought okay we'll buy out of our contract and then i think that worked in our favor i think we've lost out maybe some song placements and things like that as a result because i think you know a lot of people go there for for song placements right to that label they actually they actually seek it out but you know i
Speaker 1mean you've done very well in that area though man and you've had more song placements as a band that i can feel i can think of any other band you've had tons of
Speaker 2since that okay we had we did have we had a song with uh we had a song with our actor chris evans who plays like fucking captain america now it's a good film actually just true film it's in that one before you go massive then we had we had the car we had one or two like things in america which wasn't massive you know just little like sporting things but since like when we come out to the label and we've done ourselves fucking hell we've been like we were the opening credits for i'm a celebrity yeah um a couple years back we were opening for love island love island i've got this like there's a bit of a um caveat there is we didn't give fucking proof that we didn't agree to any of that because like and that's the other thing right fucking music in the industry again it's like itv send you um something or can we use it was a number of songs they wanted it was like oh yeah that's cool and you the way it works is they pay like they pay money or something to use certain songs or songs right from what i understand so if you give them the approval and you go okay and that's it right right but they can use it as they want um so you get like inverted commas the exposure and stuff and we're like oh that's cool so we didn't hear off them for fucking i don't know months right so you just assume it's just one of those emails again and blah blah and then the next thing you know i'm putting the kids to bed and i can hear my phone going mental downstairs and people are going you know what i'm a celebrity you know i don't fucking watch that nonsense so i didn't know but had i known if idv had come back i would have been like oh my god i'm a celebrity i'm a celebrity i'm a celebrity i'm a celebrity was like um yeah we want to use our name as celebrity i'd be like well okay you can fucking cough up and yeah do you know what i mean it's like the biggest show on tv at that time we didn't get nothing right i remember being in football with the boys like and they were like what the fucking hell are you wearing those boots for you should be wearing fucking golden boots yeah people
Speaker 1think you've hit the big time man it's mad it's so mad i think i think tv has got a lot of like simon cowell and all that shit you know like the voice and x factor people think like you know once you you get you know a song on the radio or if you get a song on a tv show or an advert or something like that that somehow you're getting paid millions you know what i mean it's it's mental you're like you're actually probably getting paid fuck all
Speaker 2well yeah and it's almost a double-edged sword because it's like you get that and it seems you know it's like then people are like oh they've sold out right i want the opportunity to fucking sell out thank you very much i mean i've always said man
Speaker 1it's not selling out it's cashing in well
Speaker 2yeah and like and then so they did that and then the next thing i know we're on like so we're not like just like background music we were like the opening credits were in the of the main series for like three minutes when everyone's jumping out of the helicopter and being all introduced and then they did the same thing with fucking what they do with oh they did it with love island and that's another thing i don't know i don't watch you know it's like fucking hell and then so then i think channel four came on to us and wanted us for what sort of the nonsense they do fucking oh big brother celebrity big brother what it was anyway when i was like they actually told us what it's going to be used for and i was like oh my god it's going to be used for it's going to be used for it's going to be used for it's going to be used for it's going to be used for it's okay i want some money for that yeah they wouldn't pay us and i was like you're not having it then do you know what i mean they were like what about the exposure i was like fuck off that's not gonna pay my mortgage it's not gonna buy my kids uniforms yeah i fucking want some money because like it's not like we've give our way we've give our way away our stuff to like independent things you know a lot of people have started off and they're making little films that you say yeah yeah charities or whatever you know fuck that's the same you're in the same position as us you know but when you've got these massive behemoth companies yeah fucking you know you've got these massive behemoth companies come and do them i'm warning you they like your song enough they want to use it they program but they don't want to pay for it yeah well fuck right off then you know you know if it's in a cool film or something great but it's like you know big brother like yeah so it's everything i don't like on tv but i will gladly take the money to fucking feed my kids but they won't pay just my ass but i think just you just see the inner workings of it all and it's just once you can see all that it's quite handy but it's a double-edged sword and like you you know maybe then when you're applying for festivals the type of level we're at we've seen is not cool because we've sold out then you have to like people have to know what went on before you know it's like we can't get a lot of things and it's quite frustrating because we're a bit of an enigma we're not a blues band we're not a rock band we're rock and roll bands yeah we play blues festivals and we offend people we play rock festivals and we do you know i mean it's just like and then you've got these like cool indie festivals and we don't get on but everywhere
Speaker 1you go though you go down well everywhere don't you whether it's if you i can see how you could play a blues festival and and win that audience but you could also play a hard rock festival and win that audience yeah
Speaker 2well we've done it we played like a real big blues festival i can't remember what this was but like you know the promoter was angry because we wouldn't play like an hour and 45 and i was like dude we'll fucking do all like yeah we don't do like you know the blues you know the crack they'd be playing a guitar solo you know the blues you know the crack they'd be playing a guitar solo like we still are going to play 15 songs buddy but you know it just equates to an hour you know yeah and he wouldn't have us back but when we you know we played the festival and we sold it all in merch we had like a line of like people queuing up we've done it and we and we we're good at stealing audiences and other people's and we've played i remember playing like in early days like being played in like football clubs and rugby clubs and i think why are we doing here but you know we're getting offered like 150 quid or something yeah 50 quid and we got a yeah and like people would come up and again it'd be down with my brother because like you know he'd be so animated and such a good drummer they'd be like music shit be a fucking drummer's awesome it's like i'll take that every day week do you know what i mean um but it is frustrating because we tour across europe and you know we do some big festivals blah blah and you come to this country and it's like we can't get on anything and it goes back to like you and i've had that conversation we haven't got a manager anymore we've been through a couple managers more so but all of them have been great and we've been through a couple managers and we've been through a couple um apart from one um we're still friends with them all but i think they get frustrated and they try and book their stuff when they can't get stuff so we are literally like doing everything ourselves yeah you know i'm 90 percent of the time throughout this whole fucking um whatever you want to call it i ain't using that word judy because i fucking hate that oh my dude fuck off it's like a proper american thing i'm excited to see the journey we go fuck it um so this whole episode we've been on this whole travel thing right see me skirting around that word um we've we've done it ourselves like man you'll be sitting there with a laptop totally literally open all the time and it's like the one thing i hate right i hate having my phone all the time i have to i'm in work and i've got to play to you know you'll be on facebook and stuff you know it's like a festival pops up shit i better email him yeah it's going to the ballgame yeah fucking name i'm going to go to the ballgame i'm going to go to the ballgame i'm going to go to the ballgame i'm going to go to the ballgame i'm going to go to the ballgame i'm going to go to the fucking 24-7
Speaker 124-7 man it is
Speaker 224-7 and it's like and again as fickle as the business is if you don't reply to that email as quick as you can you're gonna miss out you know it's like it's all these things i've got endorsement with some amazing companies some of the best pedal companies in the world but if i don't get it for free the pedals or anything really is but it's promotion yeah you know and send those things so you're on the front of of their page or whatever and it's just to keep and that's an uncomfortable truth you know it's like i get again endorse i think we've got a great endorsement with tc electronics the beautiful um pedals but they can't afford to give me anything for free you know and i'll do that and then boys are like oh give me a pedal bud yeah yeah can
Speaker 1you give me a les
Speaker 2ball yeah it's like it's not boys but it's like i mean oh it's like how do you get that then it's like literally sat instead of watching fucking eastenders i'm literally sat there yeah doing that yeah having no life yeah man yeah but i'm not i'm not it sounds like i'm complaining i'm just i'm just no you're just describing the
Speaker 1the true reality of it man which i think is interesting for people because there is so much mystique and smoke and mirrors you know and part of that is you know we need to maintain some of that because we're in the entertainment game aren't we but i do think it is interesting for people to know that you know the actual living human people behind that you know how they how they live their lives you know
Speaker 2well yeah and it's like listening to the black i listen to sean talk about it and i'm like oh my god i'm like oh my god i'm like oh my god i'm like it was just that was like that was almost i was driving along yeah yeah fucking right you know what i mean it's like i want to join in you know i mean it's like and they obviously like they were at a bigger level and we'll ever be at you know that's not what the type of music the shoe makes and stuff and i'll be honest i was ignorant it was bad i knew it was banned and obviously but i didn't listen to the music i was i'm always lost in my own sort of world of music i always missed same yeah it's funny i remember when oasis were massive and i remember i was in school at the time and the teacher was like um because i just discovered like robert johnson and stuff and he was just like oh you're in the music you are led i think you won't teach i don't know i think he's an english teacher so lovely guy i was like yeah he said do you like oasis and i was like who he was like like almost punched him in the face i'm listening to this like i give him like i give him a fucking tape of robert johnson stuff you know and i just discovered off the film crossroads and um he gave it back to me he was nice about it but i could tell he didn't like it i mean but so that's why like things like the white star anything that our music is associated with it almost passed me by i didn't get i didn't get the the comparisons yeah i just didn't get it you're just making music that you want to hear i get it now and i understand and i understand why you they have to make those references but i'd be like i don't get that i just like same zz top i i've only recently got a zz top album do you know i mean i was like okay i'll i'll find out why you know and it's like oh maybe we do maybe that one sound song of ours does sound like zz top but that wasn't the intention and that time i didn't know any zz top yeah it's just when tori makes you play different types of music sometimes i think oh yeah we're writing something and i'm like that's gonna sound shit on record but i'm gonna kick ass yes yeah totally and you and you do that then you go over there but without that live experience you wouldn't have wrote that song or persevered you'd be like nah nah but now
Speaker 1100 yeah and it's
Speaker 2vice versa some songs i want to play live but we've tried them and it's like nah man they sound fucking dog shit like they sound great on record they're brilliant you know um my my sons are of an age now when they listen to in the car they go my body's like oh what'd you do for a living so they know like i teach music in the days and stuff it's guitars like i want to go on tours and i was playing some of the earlier stuff in the car my ls turned on he went yeah it's not your best song what was it
Speaker 1yeah to your fans you're like their idol but then your kids are always gonna you know you're always gonna be dad to your kids oh
Speaker 2they always mock me they go like fucking hell why don't you write better songs they might you know why don't you they call me alan why do you like better songs i want a fucking ps5 for christmas alan i'm like yeah all right all right you know what i mean and it's like that's funny man but it's funny what's funny is they are friends of like they are friends the songs of the band like one time my but my boy was on the phone on on his bus sorry and he was like he texted me on school he's like dad there's a boy here and he doesn't believe i'm your son he's a massive fan of the band i was like time to buy a t-shirt but we got fucking yeah yeah yeah
Speaker 1tell him to prove it yeah show me the vinyl yeah i gotta fucking i gotta
Speaker 2pay for you a fucking school shoes but it is but it's great in the fact that like no because it's always been great because you've never chased that that dream just chasing the music you know and i think
Speaker 1you've always done it the right way man i think that's why you're still around i think that's why you've got such a passionate fan base i think it's why you still own all of your own masters and your records and and you're able now to park up if you want to and then come back when you're ready which you wouldn't be able to do if you're on a label you'd be dropped like a sack of shit you
Speaker 2know and hundred percent and that makes all i'm like the last big label we went to you know and they want to own everything um for for years and they wouldn't give it it was like 20 odd years and they would and i was like okay well if that's the case i want to you know and they were a big label and i was like i want fucking 50 odd grand
Speaker 1show me the money
Speaker 2yeah and they were like because i was thinking i want that money now because i know fitness industry is and i want that money now so i can work now yeah because jeremy because that's just how it works and they were like oh no well we we can't give you that but on your next album we'll give you five grand towards recording and i was like fuck right off like jeremy and it's like they almost couldn't understand why and it was almost like seen us as being arrogant it's like well no we just see the reality of it yeah and long term yeah you know exactly what you said you know imagine now you turn around and say oh we can't contour our mom's really ill we can't blah you know all these things it'll be like well fuck you get on with it tough shit yeah you know tough shit like and i think i can't remember i've watched so many documentaries but i think i can't remember which one it was but somebody said as soon as the accountants got involved and it became about units and blah blah and shareholders that's when it changes like but it's never been lost to me i've known that anyway but it's i think i've had such a magical time it's only now that i reflect like when we you know fucking hell man we went to mississippi like you've known me since fucking however long and when i went to mississippi and played in mississippi because that's the music that made me want to play music and write songs i honestly felt like i'd won the lottery yeah went there played done the gigs come back done the tour played in all these places that i dreamed about read about and and i didn't even know how to function after everything felt really flat right because it was just like you know imagine like you i don't know you want to play rugby for wales or you wanted to be an act i i you know what everything anything you've ever wanted to achieve at any point imagine achieving that and then sitting back yeah and being like you know i was just like yeah i've done it and
Speaker 1that's um that's sort of like i mean to sort of like i supposed to end on with a bit of balance because i mean you know we talk a lot on the podcast about the negative sides of being in a band in the music industry and stuff like that oh yeah that would be a good place to sort of like to remind people why we do do this it's the it's that magical moments like that you know whereby you may have not have gotten paid and it may have been really difficult but man yeah who else can say they did that you know what i mean when you when you were sat there after the show with the adrenaline cursor through your veins looking out thinking fuck man i'm in mississippi you know what
Speaker 2i mean oh it just and like that's that that's because and what i love is that we've got that through the generosity of other people and loving our music right you know because there's been people out there a lot of people out there who are people just like us who would love music who got the money and these are the people i really admire people like chris johnson um who was a guy right in mississippi no as he minneapolis so he was and he loved music so much that he was he would put festivals on and from everyone off all over the world and would go there and he would lose like sometimes 50 grand a festival right but we got out there and doing these festivals in these places from people like him yeah and they would fly us into switzerland and blah blah just because we were so excited about it and we were so excited they loved the music and they want to but so like we are putting ourselves on the line so are they you know money and everything you know yeah and that's i'm meeting those people traveling those places is it's worth everything like and i think that that's the positive when people say oh would you do it again blah blah it's like well yeah because like it's it's magic there's no other way to describe this like you know obviously true magic is watching your kids and blah blah but that's a feeling that unless you know what it's like to be a musician and there's a state and there's a flow called the flow state and you only get that when you're not thinking yeah and you and you it's a it's a weird thing and i've only felt it a few times because i've been like so anxious and nervous but when you're on stage sometimes and you're in that flow state it's fucking magic and you're not going to get to do that unless you're doing something you love just not i can't imagine like you know unless you love building houses and you're not going to be able to do that in the flow state building houses or whatever everything is like a means to an end isn't it that is just it's just magic so the people i've met along the way and i'm excited to like keep it going it's just you know, it was frustrating at the moment, but life goes in a way like real life is real life and everyone's going through it, you know? And I will go back to that podcast you did with Sean. It was very positive and very honest. And I think everyone should listen to that. Um, because it's a true rep, it's a true reflection of how the industry is, you know? And it's funny saying about Sean, saying about all the bullshit and stuff. And when people say things to me, I always immediately think bullshit first. Let's, let's, let's, you know, not be negative, but it's like, let's see, you know? Um, but, but yeah. And the real people, the people who come to the gigs, people who buy the t-shirts, the vinyls, they fucking love it. And I am one of those people. I've started like consciously going to more gigs now, buying more records, buying more things. Cause like my kids are older now, so I'm able to, and it's being a fan of music. Like, so you always want to put on the best show or make the best music because you don't want to feel like, you're cheating people. Yeah. Because you are that person.
Speaker 1There's nothing like it, man. It is. It's transcendental is what it is. You said about the flow. And I totally agree with that, man, because you know, once you're up there on that stage, you know, with all the other stuff, you know, the goat we've talked about before, the travel, the tiredness, the business, they're getting screwed over when you're up there on that stage, making that noise, you know, with your brother or your brothers in arms, you know, there is nothing like it, man. And you can't put it into words. It's not, you can't, there's no words to describe that feeling. I think you either know it or you don't.
Speaker 2The last gig we did, I think, yeah, we did in this festival in Devon. And as we were driving down, the lady was like, Oh, everyone's leaving. Do you want to come? She's like, you know, I think she was embarrassed. Like, you know, cause again, we've got that presence online. I think she thought we were like bigger than what we were. We were like, Oh, we're coming. It's only two hours away, three hours, you know, to them. It's like a long drive, but because, you know, we used to tour and it's like, and also God, there must've been 10 people in this tent. And we had an absolute fucking ball. There's no way I was traveling. We were going to travel that far. They're just like to look down upon those people. It was only 10 people. It's like almost be patronizing them. It was like, no man, you paid for us to come down. You were happy to pay for us to come down and entertain you. We are coming. And we had, it was fucking magic. Like, and it's part of that. It's part of some of my favorite songwriters and my mates. Yeah. So I was fascinated about that. And again, going back to, what you're saying before is we're on our own terms is, you know, the next sort of songs we've got for the album, there's going to be a fucking piano and cellos on it. Cause we can, we can do that, you know, we choose to do that. And we, cause we are funding it, you know? Cause you, cause if you're a fan of songs and music, you just want to, whatever song you write, you want it to come up as best you can.
Speaker 1So that's amazing. Well, I know that all the, I know all the Henry's funeral shoe fans listen to this are going to be glad to hear that. They're going to be glad to hear that. The band is, you know, they are just in the pit stop at a moment, you know, and they will be back and there are songs in the works. So yeah, that's good news to all of us, man. So on behalf of all the HFS fans as well, of which I count myself as one, you know, we want to salute you guys for, you know, staying true to your arts and staying independent and doing everything that you've done in order to, to ensure that you guys are the last band standing on. I think we'll continue to be so, you know, and, and we look forward to, you know, when you guys regroup, when, when everything, you know, resolved and, you know, you guys are in a better place. You know, we look forward to having you back smashing all of our eardrums in.
Speaker 2We like, we like the cockroaches of the music industry. No, if it was like an atomic bomb with that, nor do they say the only things that are
Speaker 1going to survive is that the cockroaches and you two fuckers.
Speaker 2That's it. We'll still be here. Honestly, no, your podcast is, um, it's brilliant. You've had some amazing guests. I've thoroughly, thoroughly enjoyed it and always recommend this. So it was like,
Speaker 1thanks man. I was so
Speaker 2honored when you asked, you asked me to come on. Like I've, I've lowered the tone. So you need to get fucking Henry Rollins or something on now.
Speaker 1I'm trying to get Henry. He's, he's, he's, he's playing hardball. He's been hard to get at the moment. But, uh, I'm going to, I'll keep trying. I'll keep trying, but yeah, no, I appreciate it. I wanted to get you on for ages. So, um, you know, I'm honored that you get, you give me your time and, uh, you know, obviously we talk a lot on the phone anyway, you know, but we don't talk about this sort of stuff. We talk about, you know, mate stuff. So I've been able to sort of like, I've been able to, uh, you know, to put my fan boy hat on and ask you what's happening with the band.
Speaker 2I'm only going to charge you 10 grand.
Speaker 1No, Jim, you stingy, but I speak to my accountant when he gets out of jail. Al, thanks for coming on, man. It's been great to speak with you, buddy. And hopefully we'll do it again soon. Best wishes, everything ahead. And I can't wait to see you guys back out there again soon.
Speaker 2No worries. Thanks again, buddy. Thank you,
Speaker 1man. Cheers, Al. Bye. Mr. Alex Clifford of Henry's funeral shoe fame. What a dude. Let's hear it for him. Put it together. So there we go. While you scream in HFS fans, that's good news. The boys are going to be back kicking on your asses and eardrums really soon. And it's nice to hear of a band story or journey to use the word that Alex hates, uh, on the podcast. You know, that this got some positive elements to it. Like the boys are still going strong. You know, they're fully independent. They're in control of their own game and, uh, they haven't been screwed and crushed, and shat out by the industry bullshit machine, you know? So what is possible? As I said, if you haven't yet heard the band do go and check out Henry's funeral shoe. Uh, they're available in on all the, all the streaming platforms. They got some awesome merch as well. The t-shirts and vinyl and, uh, CDs and all that jazz. They've got some awesome music videos and some live footage on YouTube that you can check out as well. If you, if they come to your town, you know, when the band are back in action, do go out and check these guys. You will not fucking believe the sound these two guys make on stage. Honestly, it's insane. I hope you enjoyed the chat as always. If you did, please do subscribe, leave a rating and a review or a comment or whatever you want. Uh, it really helps us to keep this thing moving and I will see you guys on the other side in 2023. We're kicking straight in first week of Jan with some awesome, awesome guests lined up. They just keep coming. So do subscribe, keep an eye on what's happening and stay in touch and keep listening. I hope you all have an amazing Christmas. Thanks so much to everyone that supported the podcast this year. I didn't have a podcast this time last year, you know? And when I started this thing, I had no idea that I would, I would be on episode number 34, you know, I've, I've spoken to some of my heroes and with, with many more lined up as well. So thanks so much for everyone that's like, you know, been listening and subscribing and encouraging me to keep this thing going because, uh, you know, I had no ambition ever to do a podcast and yet here we are going strong. And hopefully this time next year, I'll still be doing this thing. I wish you all an amazing Christmas, whatever you're doing, whoever you're doing it with and wherever you're doing it, I'll be there with you in spirit. And I look forward to reconnecting with all you amazing, amazing people in two short weeks. Take this time to do a little bit of self-care, check in with what's really important in life. You know, at this time of year, it's all about friends and family and the real shit. So anything that still needs to be done can fucking wait. Take this time to recharge, refuel, get some fuel in your tank, ready for January and, uh, put your feet up and enjoy yourself. I wish you all a very, very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Thanks again for all your support and your patience and your understanding and encouragement and general awesomeness. It never goes unnoticed. I really, really do appreciate it. And I look forward to reconnecting with you all really, really soon. In the meantime, I love you as always. Take care of yourself, take care of each other, and I'll see you on the flip side.
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