The Art of Longevity

The Wombats have defied all UK press scepticism (and cynicism) to become one of the country’s biggest indie pop bands. Big streaming audiences, huge social media followings and a multi-generational fanbase now pretty much guarantee the Wombats will hit no. 1 on the album charts, as new album ‘Fix Yourself Not the World’ has proved. They also secure headline festival slots and sell out shows and tours, not just at home but even in the USA.  Having come to know and admire the band’s songcraft on their previous record Beautiful People Will Ruin Your Life In 2018, I’m fascinated by The Wombats’ story. How did the band defy the critics and cultural trends (indie has hardly been in cultural favour for the past 20 years) to become every young bands dream: independent, popular, commercially successful and on a seemingly unstoppable creative roll? The answer is multi-faceted of course. The band is a close knit, collaborative unit of multi-instrumentalists, all trained in music and sound production at Liverpool’s LIPA. They have ridden a wave of ‘pop as the new indie’, adjusting their sound to be something way beyond their early post-punk/grunge guitars of the early 2000s. At the core of their success are those songs - catchy, bouncy, poppy earworms - some of which have topped 100 million streams. When I was reading through the reviews for The Wombats’ latest album Fix Yourself, Not the World, it was The Guardian’s Alexi Petridis who put it best:“Scroll down the Wombats’ Spotify page and you come to the section headed “Fans also like”. It features a selection of their mid-00s contemporaries, fellow strivers in the league of what was cruelly dubbed “landfill indie”: the Pigeon Detectives, the Kooks, the Enemy, Scouting for Girls”.In my conversation with Dan Haggis of The Wombats for The Art of Longevity, I didn’t want to be the one to bring up the phrase landfill indie but I didn’t have to...Support the showGet more related content at: https://www.songsommelier.com/

In a warm and whimsical conversation with Yan (Scott Wilkinson) of Sea Power, I learned to appreciate just what this unique band has achieved. With the recent name change, I might suggest the band wears its status as National Treasure with a certain irony. But over the course of two decades the band has made a batch of fine songs, really solid albums, award winning soundtracks and plays sold out, highly renowned live shows. Sea Power  also had some hits in the early days but the band's true supporters are its core fan base, who buy all their records and see them live repeatedly, religiously you might say. Those fans, and the band's creative momentum, have pushed Sea Power to get better and better. 2017’s album Let The Dancers Inherit The Party was a fine record, with across the board four star reviews. Yan: “It did okay, not as well as some people might think. It didn’t do an Ed Sheeran or anything like that”. Well it looks like that might change with new L.P. Everything Was Forever, an amalgam of everything the band has done and have ever sounded like, wrapped within some genuine quality songwriting, the sort that can be achieved only after a band has put in its time working together as one. As we published this episode, Sea Power is vying for a number one position on the UK album charts, with their main rival being...the ginger genius himself (who said the band can’t sell as much as Ed Sheeran?). That might say more about the chart than it does about the popularity of Sea Power, but it’s a remarkable achievement nonetheless. Yan himself is less sanguine about all this than he was when the band formed:“I thought we were destined to do really well. That the world would fall gently at our feet”. Perhaps the world is. Just a gentler and longer fall than the band expected. Everything Was Forever should be the start of a new journey for a band with a new name.“I saw this album as both the last record and the start of anything new, if it is going to happen. Getting the best of our influences over the years, before we move on to something new or, just stop”. It's pretty clear that the music scene is better off if that new something does happen. Whether we are British or otherwise, we could do with Sea Power. More at https://www.songsommelier.com/podcastsSupport the showGet more related content at: https://www.songsommelier.com/

From the earliest beginnings of 1983’s The Hurting to the band’s huge 1985 LP Songs From The Big Chair, Tears For Fears songs captured sadness, ambition, pain - confessional levels of emotional honesty. All this conveyed with the magic touch of songwriters who were also not afraid to get weird. But as the 80s music scene spun out of control so did Tears For Fears, famously making one of the longest, most tortuous and expensive albums in history in The Seeds Of Love. The aim was flawlessness but the result was a flawed masterpiece, an album that literally exhausted the band (at least as a duo) until a reformation 15 years later. When they came back in 2004 with Everyone Loves a Happy Ending. Roland Orzabal describes that record as “Seeds Of Love’s little brother…it was lighter but the songs lacked the emotional honesty”. But now Tears For Fears are back. In this streaming age of always-on music, when most artists are terrified to take a month off, let alone a year, let alone 18 years, Tears For Fears return with brand new album The Tipping Point. It comes at a time when their music is back in vogue (a gentle groundswell has seen more than 140 versions of Everybody Wants To Rule The World dropped onto streaming services in the past decade or so, urging the song towards one billion streams).The duo has always navigated an intriguing relationship, often distanced from each other. Yet the two troubled souls that grew up together have come to accept each other as brothers, musically speaking. In the band’s early years, it was Curt who sang the hits and appeared to be the frontman and pop star of the band, with Roland the “backroom boy” (his words). Yet Roland stepped forth to dominate on The Seeds Of Love, his “musical Tourette's” allowed to run amok. But a recent revelation is how Roland has learned to listen to Curt again. "When I saw were he was coming from the process of making the record became a joy. I felt the wind was blowing in our favour". It is Curt’s self-critical leanings that stepped-in on The Tipping Point, firstly to throw out most of a batch of songs written in a ‘songwriting camp’ (a fascinating and tragicomic scenario in a way given the songs written as a duo). Second, to step forward once again as co-lead singer and a co-writer in Tears For Fears as a duo, not a committee of songwriters. The band is even enjoying their time in the music industry’s fickle spotlight together once again - from Zoom calls to accepting the Ivor's lifetime award. “Curt and I have both got something to say and they are very different things”. And here’s the rub. Tears For Fears are back into the culture at a time when many of their 80s peers, from Duran Duran to Gary Numan to Aha, are in fine form, making great records and sounding fabulous live too. After the two years we’ve spent at home, the contagion we now need is to see legends playing truly great pop songs with smiles on their faces. Forget 2004, the happy ending is happening right now and long may it last. Support the showGet more related content at: https://www.songsommelier.com/

After the release of a ‘best of’ collection Everything Hits at Once in 2019, Spoon are back at long last with brand new material - the album Lucifer On The Sofa - a raw, rollicking rock album (complete with new players on lead guitar and bass) recorded as near-as-dammit live. It is an antidote to Spoon’s previous (superb, but far more produced) Hot Thoughts (2017). In 30 years, the band has come full circle in the best possible way. Their first record (“not my favourite” says Britt) Telephono was released on indie label Matador, yet Spoon soon found themselves in a dalliance with a major label for their second outing A Series of Sneaks (1998). While that did not end well, it turned out to be the making of the band in a way, Spoon’s true beginning. The bitter experience of being dropped gave the band its first big song, the naming-and-shaming ‘Laffitte Don’t Fail Me Now’ (featured heavily in The Song Sommelier collection ‘Stick It To The Man’), the second song we discuss on the podcast. Almost two decades later the band was back on the Matador label and in a happy place - having consolidated their unique sound on a run of brilliant LPs. The most indie of bands was somehow destined to make their best work while signed to an iconic indie label. I’m glad to say that Spoon’s hot streak doesn’t end with 'Lucifer'. The album is a fine addition to an outstanding catalogue, already receiving those glowing 4 & 5 star reviews. “It fits perfectly as number 10” in Britt’s own economic language. It does indeed. Not only that but the title track and album closer is something different entirely, an inspired (by the pandemic in part) and momentous stroke of genius from a band at the peak of its powers. The only downer on a thoroughly enjoyable career-spanning conversation is the fact that poor old blighty is losing out big time, yet again. Spoon is touring extensively in the USA but has no immediate plans to come to Europe. That doesn’t stop me trying to persuade them however. In concluding our chat with the suggestion that Spoon comes over to London in 2023 (the band’s 30th anniversary year) to do not just a show but a residency, I’ve set to work on the very idea…watch this space. Meantime, check out the impressive new record and back catalogue of my favourite - and your new favourite - indie band. Ladies & gentlemen this is…Spoon, as brought to you by Britt himself!Support the showGet more related content at: https://www.songsommelier.com/

When it comes to longevity, Feeder keeps coming back around, and the guitar-rock scene is all the better for it. It was back in January 2001 that “Buck Rogers” reached number five on the UK chart (the song remains a radio standard even in its 21st year). Grant Nicholas originally wrote the song to impress producer Gil Norton in the hope he would be persuaded to work with Feeder. Buck Rogers contains a big guitar riff and stream-of-consciousness lyrics about being jealous of his rival’s brand new Jaguar (with a CD player) and whatever else came into his drunken head. Including drinking cider from a lemon.Having a bona fide top five hit was never going to put Grant Nicholas under any pressure to repeat the trick. Songs just pour out of him and while not all of them are as catchy as Buck Rogers, Nicolas knows his way around a melody and a soaring, anthemic chorus as well as any songwriter in the business. When we spoke on The Art Of Longevity I asked Grant how come he hasn’t often been asked to write for others (he has only a little, and I hesitate to suggest he could do more, not wishing to worry Feeder fans we’ll lead him astray). It remains an option, always. Feeder may not be fashionable but they have made it through the music industry mangle - achieving chart success, playing arenas and having made a bunch of very good albums (with Comfort in Sound a genuine rock classic). These days it’s all about the joy of new songs and playing to the fans. Nicholas and his co-founder member/bassist Taka Hirose soldier on as Feeder through thick and thin, yet they operate with an enthusiasm and energy befitting of any up & coming rock band blossoming for the first time. Where a lot of their contemporaries have fallen by the wayside, Feeder stayed on the bus, and it turned out to be a magic bus!Support the showGet more related content at: https://www.songsommelier.com/

When Suzanne Vega played a short residency at New York’s exclusive, super high-end Cafe Carlisle in 2019 (for the second time in her career) she wanted to put on a show, something special:“I thought, let’s make a show out of it. I wanted to make it like an old style revue, since it’s a small and very upper crust place with out-of-towners and locals as well, from all over New York. So I thought we’d make it about New York songs. It seemed to go down really well. I heard the elevator boys talking about it after the show so I knew it must be good”. Who knows if the Carlisle Hotel elevator boys knew who she was before those shows, but there can be no doubt about Suzanne Vega’s mastery of the craft of songwriting, and of performance, something that comes together perfectly for Suzanne’s current project “An Evening of New York Songs & Stories”. The show comes complete with Suzanne the songwriter but also the raconteur and the ‘show-woman’ (complete with top hat) - something she never expected to become when she was starting out in music at the beginning of the 80s. After all, as a child, she hated being looked at. My chat with Suzanne starts with the concept of storytelling through song - but also between the songs, and why that’s so rare on the music scene these days. We explore the early years of course, and the various lives of some of her greatest songs, like ‘Tom’s Diner’ and ‘Marlene On The Wall’. I wanted to know if she still felt that a song should be an essentially sad thing and I had to ask her about one of the saddest songs I’ve ever heard and a personal obsession for 35 years - her song Ironbound/Fancy Poultry, from the 1987 classic album Solitude Standing. I was excited to hear about the prospect of a new album of brand new Suzanne Vega songs in 2023 and she is to begin the European leg of the New York Songs & Stories tour early in 2022 (pandemic permitting) - whatever you do don’t miss it. In a world in which music is in great abundance, what Suzanne Vega does is as rare as things can get. Hats off to you Suzanne!Support the showGet more related content at: https://www.songsommelier.com/

Discovering a band all to yourself is the best type of music discovery there is. One day in the mid 2000s as my wife and I wandered along London’s South Bank, we were stopped in our tracks by music the likes of which we’d never heard before - jazzy, rhythmic, with a haunting steel drum but also with an element of ‘indie’. There, were four very young men (then in their late teens) busking with a confident authority - more a private performance than a busk, and with quite an audience too. That band was Portico Quartet and we were just two of many thousands of early adopter  fans from those early South Bank busks outside The National Gallery. We bought a copy of the band's very first, self-pressed four-track CD for £5, one of 10,000 sold I recently discovered. When I spoke with Duncan Bellamy (drums and the hang steel drum) and Jack Wylie (sax) for The Art of Longevity, Jack told me:"We'd go off to buy big stacks of blank CDs at Maplins, and we bought this burner machine that could do eight at a time. I think we managed to do 200-250 a day. As a student, it meant we could make a living without working in a bar. It was great fun”. I put it to Duncan and Jack that they would have to achieve 10 million streams to make the equivalent revenues now (20 million if splitting revenues 50:50 with a record label). Who’d have thought that, as part of establishing an early following as an instrumental band, you could create your own perfectly viable business model as well? For the Portico Quartet, those early years of ‘struggle’ were more like an exercise in building a cottage industry. From those early days, the Portico Quartet’s rise was as meteoric as it gets for an instrumental band. In 2008 came the Mercury Music Prize nomination for their full debut album ‘Knee Deep in the North Sea’ and one year later the band signed to Real World Records, the independent label owned by Peter Gabriel. That came with a huge leap in the maturity of their sound (2009’s Isla) and a full stop to the days of busking. As a fan, observing the band’s musical development has been a truly remarkable experience but don't take my word for it, listen to Duncan and Jack's take on things...Support the showGet more related content at: https://www.songsommelier.com/

If one of the secrets to longevity in the music industry is simply taking your time, then Danish alternative rock band Mew are grand masters. Formed in 1995, the band took eight years before a major label deal came along, and with it, international success (the superb breakthrough album Frengers). It did not lead to a rush. Some 26 years into the band’s career, Mew has released just seven studio albums - one every four years. That’s not something Spotify would advocate as an operating model for bands these days, is it?  It’s rare for a European rock band to breakthrough to an international audience and to have a career of real longevity (count them on one hand), but it is even rarer to be so damned cool about it! Yet Jonas Bjerre is unfazed by any concept of FOMO - or the creator equivalent ‘FOBF’ - fear of being forgotten. In fact, when the band released their last LP  ‘Visuals’ in 2017 just two years after the 2015 album ‘+ -’, Jonas’s overwhelming instinct was that fans were not expecting it. Visuals plays from beginning to end like a stage musical, something I put to Mew singer Jonas Bjerre on the Art of Longevity. It may well have been the influence of Prefab Sprout and Paddy McAloon. When it comes to influences, Mew are true musical alchemists. While many ‘rock’ (as in guitar rock) bands have eclectic and ‘classic pop’ influences, very few can meld them successfully into their own sound. Perhaps it’s because of the restrictive formulas of rock, or not wanting to upset fans. Not so with Mew. One minute they’re all off-kilter time signatures and dissonant guitar noises, the next, soaring, beautiful and catchy pop - nicely topped off with Jonas’ angelic vocals. Listen in to hear a truly unique way of working. Jonas and Mew don't rush anything, but the results are often sublime. It is good to hear that the band is talking about another project - even if it is early days and Jonas would also like a break before. Sometimes as a music fan, patience is a virtue and the rewards are all the sweeter. Support the showGet more related content at: https://www.songsommelier.com/

When I sat down with Steve Berlin, the Los Lobos sax player and de facto spokesperson, I was a little more than intrigued. To most people around the world - outside of North America anyways - Los Lobos remain the La Bamba band. How wrong we are.There is a very common thread with the artists we’ve had on the show - and with longevity - every one of the artists (except so far, Laura Veirs and Maximo Park) had a very big song: James, Turin Brakes, Gary Numan, KT Tunstall…But Los Lobos is the most extreme example of a longevity outfit with a big song - the band had no other hits at all. Taking nothing away from La Bamba - a fine record and a justified number one in ten countries back in 1987. But stop right there. Try Googling, as I did, “Los Lobos, greatest American rock band” and there are more than a few articles examining that hypothesis, for good reasons. Built around the soulful songs of drummer Louis Perez and lead vocal and guitar player David Hidalgo (throw in a few rollicking rockers by Cesar Rosas) Los Lobos make solid, classic Americana-rock, but from a Latin point of view - and a deep rooted connection to traditional Mexican music: cumbia, boleros and norteños. Finally, throw the city of LA into the mix and you have the Los Lobos agenda, musically speaking. It’s not surprising that Los Lobos have made a record of cover versions of seminal LA songs (The Beach Boys, Jackson Browne, War, Percy Mayfield) but what is surprising is how long it took to come up with the idea to do just that.“We have a sixth sense of when to do stuff, somehow the muse talks to us. It's important for us to have a boundary - an idea - not just another Los Lobos record. The main thing for us is longevity and being able to do what we do and to answer to nobody other than ourselves, we have such gratitude for that. We have no obligation other than to move forward with our music”. Now that is an agenda for lasting the distance. Yet Steve and I have fun with one idea - for Los Lobos to soundtrack a Netflix (or HBO, or AMC) production of Jaime Hernandez' genius Mexicana soap opera Love & Rockets. What a collaboration that would be.Somebody get Ted Sarandos on the line…it’s Steve Berlin calling, from Los Lobos...Support the showGet more related content at: https://www.songsommelier.com/

On The Art of Longevity, Fin Greenhall explained the ideas behind Fink's new project IIUII: an acoustic retrospective of some of the band's (and fans) favourite, biggest songs. “I’m a better singer now than I was in 2005, so I feel I can do a better job of singing these songs. As a band we are much more loose, grounded and subtle than we used to be - comfortable with who we are”. As such, the idea behind the project is to do a better job of those songs by bringing experience to bear as the songs are revisited and reinterpreted. “I love the fact  that when you write a song, that song exists, but then over time it can be dressed many different ways”. Indeed, we discuss one of the most intriguing concepts in music today - that of making a song something more than simply finite recording. A song should never be set in stone, something Fink seems to understand acutely. Their last studio album, ‘Bloom Innocent’, is a case in point - the band has since released two further versions of the record - an acoustic work and a “Horizontalism” edition (Fink has even sub-branded it’s remix versions under the Horizontalism concept). The IIUII album is the first acoustic retrospective of the whole catalogue, yet already there has been some orchestral versions of some of these songs, in the superb 2013 release ‘Fink Meets The Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra’. While the music industry is littered with ex-musicians and creatives now working on the management side, Fin Greenhall did the opposite - spending nearly half a decade in the offices of labels (hence ‘Biscuits’), figuring out how the industry worked (and working his way up from office skivvy to marketing manager). He flipped from being an executive to a creator - but seems to have picked up on some clever marketing angles along the way. Along with these reworked versions, the 2015 short film “Less Alone” was one of the first examples of an artist manifesto I’d ever seen expressed through the short documentary format. It’s a nice exercise in artistic branding. That might just have something to do with Fin’s thought processes. Another example is the track selection for IIUII. Fin told The Art of Longevity that: “we went back over the streaming stats and thought about our live shows over the years and picked the songs that the fans feel really represent us”. Savvy indeed, now that is how creatives can use industry data simply and effectively. Considered decisions have been part of the band's two decade career, along with a close knit musical understanding between the three members, Fin, Guy Whittaker (bass) and Tim Thornton (drums). The benign dictatorship is a famous formula for some bands but Fink works a very democratic system. The band still enjoys the shared experiences of touring, recording and creating their unique sound. The way Fink works is what most bands would wish for, so tune in to Fin and co's guide to longevity. Support the showGet more related content at: https://www.songsommelier.com/