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Kenny Thomas: His Life In Soul Music · TRi THIS Music: The Podcast

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Speaker 2: Could you sort of start us off by telling me
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Speaker 2: a little bit about your early days? How did Kenny
0:27
Speaker 2: Thomas come to be as a musician? What about those
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Speaker 2: early days with your family, friends, school, whatever it might
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Speaker 2: be that influenced you towards a music career?
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Speaker 3: Well, really, it began to take shape always listening to music.
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Speaker 3: My father was, you know, used to buy vinyl and
0:44
Speaker 3: he liked the crooners. He liked Johnny Mathis. But he
0:47
Speaker 3: would also buy other stuff, you know, that he was into. Yeah,
0:53
Speaker 3: just different records if a song took his fancy. So, yeah.
0:56
Speaker 3: And my mum was Spanish. So that was English. My
0:59
Speaker 3: mother was Spanish. So obviously there was the Latin vibes
1:02
Speaker 3: going on. But she also, you know, had a fondness
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Speaker 3: for crooners like Nat King Cole and people like that.
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Speaker 3: But she would, you know, she wouldn't be, she'd be
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Speaker 3: one minute Nat King Cole and next minute Maria Lanza
1:16
Speaker 3: and then some flamenco, you know, and stuff like that.
1:19
Speaker 3: So it was right across the board, you know. But
1:22
Speaker 3: ultimately I would say it's because I grew up in a,
1:26
Speaker 3: a poorer part of town in London, a poorer part
1:29
Speaker 3: of North London. I lived on a council estate, born
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Speaker 3: in Islington, but eventually ended up in Hackney, which is
1:35
Speaker 3: rather posh now, but it wasn't then. On a council estate,
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Speaker 3: but I was surrounded by my friends of all walks
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Speaker 3: of life, all different creeds and stuff, and Jamaicans, Africans,
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Speaker 3: some of my friends from Pakistan and Jewish and But
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Speaker 3: the one thing we were all into, we were heavily
1:55
Speaker 3: into our soul music, heavily into our reggae and dub,
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Speaker 3: love as rock as that was emerging, and also jazz funk,
2:04
Speaker 3: you know, and the Brit funk. The thing is, we
2:08
Speaker 3: grew up in that kind of, that melting pot. It
2:11
Speaker 3: was wonderful. And it was some of my other Jamaican friends,
2:14
Speaker 3: they had older brothers who had pretty good record collections
2:17
Speaker 3: and had a greater knowledge of the stuff that had
2:19
Speaker 3: gone before and And as that decade wore on, obviously,
2:23
Speaker 3: it was exploding, wasn't it, on radio, on pirate radio.
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Speaker 3: You were getting the input, you know, the stuff from America.
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Speaker 3: The flats we lived on were positioned quite nicely opposite
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Speaker 3: an independent record shop with R & B records on
2:39
Speaker 3: a place called Stanford Hill, North London. R & B
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Speaker 3: didn't stand for rhythm and blues. It stood for Rita
2:45
Speaker 3: and Benny. And Rita and Benny were a middle-aged Jewish
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Speaker 3: couple who, And they really knew their music. They knew
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Speaker 3: their soul, their jazz funk, and she really knew her
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Speaker 3: reggae and lover's rock. And that's where I would buy
2:57
Speaker 3: my 12 inches, my imports, you know. And so we
3:02
Speaker 3: grew up around that. And I was also involved with
3:06
Speaker 3: the church near my house and I got involved singing there.
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Speaker 3: It was very noticeable early on that I could mimic
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Speaker 3: certain records. I could mimic singers and I had quite
3:17
Speaker 3: a nice tone and a good vibrato and all of
3:19
Speaker 3: those sort of things. And I was beginning to be
3:24
Speaker 3: pushed more to the forefront at the church doing songs there.
3:29
Speaker 3: And then, of course, the 80s, it was a friend
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Speaker 3: of mine, a Jamaican friend of mine Derek Woods he
3:35
Speaker 3: bought his first bass guitar and was learning that and
3:37
Speaker 3: he bought his first mini Moog and an SH-101 keyboard
3:41
Speaker 3: then the four track and we were just starting to
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Speaker 3: try to make music and and jam you know and
3:46
Speaker 3: I bought my guitar and I was playing guitar and
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Speaker 3: learning my chords and it was all of that was
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Speaker 3: going on and and so it was coming from all
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Speaker 3: different directions what we were listening to what what was
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Speaker 3: music I was buying what was going on around us
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Speaker 3: and then I suppose it was just a natural progression
4:02
Speaker 3: that I knew I wanted to be involved with music.
4:05
Speaker 3: I knew I wanted to be in studios. I hadn't
4:07
Speaker 3: managed to get in a studio yet, but I yearned
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Speaker 3: for it and I wanted to just be around. I
4:12
Speaker 3: wasn't a youngster that thought I'd need to be famous
4:15
Speaker 3: or when I watched Top of the Pops and saw
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Speaker 3: people like Loose Ends on it and Junior Gizcom and
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Speaker 3: people like that or Jackie Graham or Imagination, I did
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Speaker 3: think that would be good. I'd like that. It was
4:26
Speaker 3: towards the late 80s that I started to think, well, maybe,
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Speaker 3: you know, I could really be a solo singer, you know.
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Speaker 3: And it was around about 1988 that my friend, my
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Speaker 3: best friend, David Sassoon, who's like a brother from another mother,
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Speaker 3: my Jewish friend, David, he passed away now a few
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Speaker 3: years ago, bless him. His father was quite connected and
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Speaker 3: he knew the brother of Eddie Grant. And Eddie Grant's
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Speaker 3: studio wasn't the studio he used to use. it was
4:57
Speaker 3: not very far from where I lived. And then, so
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Speaker 3: one very cold winter's night, we went around there and
5:02
Speaker 3: knocked on the door and got no response. I was
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Speaker 3: a bit disheartened. And then we went back another night. Again,
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Speaker 3: it was during that winter and eventually it opened and
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Speaker 3: Eddie Grant's brother, Patrick opened it and he was still
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Speaker 3: producing records there. And Eddie was, Eddie was, you know,
5:16
Speaker 3: traveling backwards and forwards from Barbados because he had a
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Speaker 3: lovely studio he built out there, which some of the
5:21
Speaker 3: big superstars were using, you know, in that period of time.
5:24
Speaker 3: And then we got in there and, um, yeah. And
5:27
Speaker 3: eventually that's where I cut my first kind of first
5:31
Speaker 3: two songs that I attempted to write and record. And,
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Speaker 3: and that's where I got my foot under the door
5:37
Speaker 3: in what I call the beginnings of the music world,
5:39
Speaker 3: you know?
5:39
Speaker 2: So did that come easy to you?
5:42
Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah.
5:43
Speaker 2: But did that come easy to you writing those first songs?
5:46
Speaker 3: Yeah. Melodies did, you know, came, uh, and lyrics and, uh,
5:51
Speaker 3: I mean, yeah, I listen back to that stuff now.
5:52
Speaker 3: It was all very kind of the beginnings of things,
5:55
Speaker 3: but it was, it was something I wanted to do. And,
5:59
Speaker 3: but I also, you know, as you know, from my career,
6:01
Speaker 3: anyone who knows my career, I've also got a fondness
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Speaker 3: for taking a record and cut and covering it, you know,
6:07
Speaker 3: and I, and the industry's fruit for years and years,
6:10
Speaker 3: many artists have done that. And so I, you know,
6:14
Speaker 3: there were some records, you know, I fancied, having a
6:17
Speaker 3: go at, you know, or being brave enough. And even
6:20
Speaker 3: the records that were quite risky to touch for, for
6:23
Speaker 3: a young white lad from Hackney to touch some of
6:26
Speaker 3: those records was a bit risky, but then I've always
6:28
Speaker 3: had that kind of fearless character that, that nothing's impossible
6:33
Speaker 3: and you just, what could go wrong, you know, just
6:35
Speaker 3: do it and crack on, you know?
6:37
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No, I, there's one song that was
6:41
Speaker 2: in your set list that I noticed the Lou rules
6:45
Speaker 2: you'll never find, you know, Yeah. Which is one of
6:48
Speaker 2: my all-time favourite tracks.
6:51
Speaker 3: Great song.
6:53
Speaker 2: Great song. It's one of those songs that it's like
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Speaker 2: a Barry White or something like that. You can pick
7:03
Speaker 2: it up as many times as you want to and
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Speaker 2: it'll move you the same way as it moved you
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Speaker 2: the first time you heard it. But you haven't recorded that,
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Speaker 2: have you?
7:16
Speaker 3: No, I haven't recorded that. It's something that I just
7:18
Speaker 3: threw in live and I thought this would be fun,
7:20
Speaker 3: you know, because when you're singing, there's songs out there
7:22
Speaker 3: and you think, it's a bit like someone who climbs mountains.
7:25
Speaker 3: He's not going to keep climbing the same mountain, is he?
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Speaker 3: You know, he's going to go, right, you know, I've
7:30
Speaker 3: done that one. I want to do a bigger one now. Yeah, yeah.
7:33
Speaker 2: So.
7:34
Speaker 3: it was just one of those where I thought, let's
7:35
Speaker 3: put it in there. I just had a gut feeling
7:36
Speaker 3: that it'd go down well. Not a lot of people
7:38
Speaker 3: hear it much anymore. Lou Rawls, bless him, isn't around anymore.
7:41
Speaker 3: I thought, let's do it. You know, my tone is,
7:44
Speaker 3: you know, could suit it. And I, you know, never
7:48
Speaker 3: would it ever be, you know, in the league of
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Speaker 3: Lou Rawls. But I thought, well, I could do what
7:53
Speaker 3: I've done with the other records. I could bring it
7:54
Speaker 3: into my own sort of zone and personalise it. But
7:59
Speaker 3: keeping the song true to itself.
8:01
Speaker 2: Absolutely.
8:02
Speaker 3: And And, you know, it went down a real storm,
8:04
Speaker 3: the first gig we ever did. I said, well, let's
8:06
Speaker 3: just leave it in the set because this is, you know,
8:08
Speaker 3: this is fun. I mean, people do forget that not
8:11
Speaker 3: everything's about chart position, success, sales and money. It's something
8:16
Speaker 3: that's just about, I love, I just want to do it.
8:20
Speaker 3: This is going to be great.
8:22
Speaker 2: This is going to be fun. Yeah, exactly. So what
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Speaker 2: does the word soul mean to you then?
8:29
Speaker 3: Well, that's a tricky one because, you know, you could
8:32
Speaker 3: say there's a lot of singers that aren't class of
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Speaker 3: soul singers, but they're very, very soulful, you know, and
8:36
Speaker 3: they may not be in that typical genre, you know,
8:39
Speaker 3: that pigeonholed genre of soul, but their voices are soulful. And,
8:44
Speaker 3: you know, there are interviews where there's an interview that
8:47
Speaker 3: we got our hands on. We've been listening to a
8:48
Speaker 3: lot of things recently because we used some snippets in
8:51
Speaker 3: the opening part of the show where we have, you know,
8:55
Speaker 3: people like talking and that will be Sam Cooke or,
8:58
Speaker 3: Marvin Gaye, their voices over some music. And it's fun.
9:01
Speaker 3: And this is where Marvin Gaye is saying Sinatra had soul. Well,
9:04
Speaker 3: anyone who knows Marvin Gaye knows that Marvin Gaye secretly
9:06
Speaker 3: wanted to be a crooner.
9:08
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah.
9:10
Speaker 3: It was Barry Gordy that steered him away from it.
9:12
Speaker 3: But he did make that one album, didn't he? I've
9:14
Speaker 3: got it here on vinyl where he covered Fly Me
9:16
Speaker 3: to the Moon, et cetera, et cetera.
9:19
Speaker 2: It's strange. If I had to pick the songs, my
9:24
Speaker 2: top ten, so to speak, my desk island discs, You know,
9:29
Speaker 2: Glenn Miller's in there. Frank Sinatra's in there. Dean Martin's
9:33
Speaker 2: in there. Barry White's in there. Do you know, it's
9:37
Speaker 2: really weird how you just can't get past the quality. No. Age.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, and they were, you know, they were sort of
9:45
Speaker 3: like the leaders of, you know, they were charging at
9:49
Speaker 3: the front of the war. You know, they're the ones
9:51
Speaker 3: that were fighting and cutting new ground and doing things
9:54
Speaker 3: that hadn't been done before. And now we live in
9:57
Speaker 3: an age where everything might have been already done before,
10:01
Speaker 3: you know. Certainly what's going on now with what I'm
10:04
Speaker 3: hearing with AI, it's only doing what's ever been done before.
10:08
Speaker 3: It's not making an Earth, Wind and Fire and it's
10:11
Speaker 3: not going to make a Pink Floyd, you know. Yeah. So, yeah,
10:16
Speaker 3: my my choice of records would be right because we
10:18
Speaker 3: would have some reggae in there, maybe a bit of
10:20
Speaker 3: John Holt from a thousand volts of Holt or it
10:22
Speaker 3: would have all sorts in there. So, yeah, my my
10:26
Speaker 3: taste is wide, but I would say that the thing
10:29
Speaker 3: that I've been hyper focused on most of my life
10:31
Speaker 3: is really soul music and, you know, rhythm and blues
10:34
Speaker 3: and jazz funk. And, you know, and I love jazz
10:37
Speaker 3: fusion as well. the whole Herbie Hancock thing and some
10:43
Speaker 3: of the stuff that's been in the 70s was just incredible. So,
10:47
Speaker 3: you know, yeah, that's where I started and I got
10:49
Speaker 3: into Eddie Grant's studio. I met Eddie. He said, you know,
10:53
Speaker 3: he thought my voice was a really, he thought I
10:55
Speaker 3: had a really good pop voice and, you know, he
10:58
Speaker 3: didn't say soul. He just said that you've got a
10:59
Speaker 3: really good pop voice. And I know what he meant.
11:00
Speaker 3: He meant this has got, this has got commercial legs,
11:03
Speaker 3: this voice.
11:04
Speaker 2: Yes.
11:04
Speaker 3: Yes. He's got the potential to cross over and he
11:08
Speaker 3: was quite right to be, you know, that was 88.
11:10
Speaker 3: And by 91, we're in, I was in the charts
11:13
Speaker 3: and dancing around on top of the pops, you know.
11:16
Speaker 2: And that, and in that period, was that, was that, um,
11:22
Speaker 2: were you just flying along or did you have time
11:24
Speaker 2: to reflect on it or how were you feeling at
11:27
Speaker 2: that time when, when you hit that success?
11:30
Speaker 3: Well, it's a whirlwind because it's happening very fast. Although
11:33
Speaker 3: you've done a lot of work leading up to it,
11:35
Speaker 3: a lot of slapping around the country, going in and
11:37
Speaker 3: out of nightclubs, trying to gain fans, singing to audiences
11:40
Speaker 3: that aren't interested and eventually they are. And, um, And
11:45
Speaker 3: all those days and days in the studio cutting your
11:47
Speaker 3: demos and everything was really laborious. And you had to
11:50
Speaker 3: have a lot of patience because it took a long
11:52
Speaker 3: time back then. The way we were recording, it was
11:53
Speaker 3: all analog. And there wasn't, you know, it wasn't the
11:57
Speaker 3: speed of things now in studios or the way you
12:00
Speaker 3: could capture things. But it was real and it was solid.
12:03
Speaker 3: You either got it right or you didn't. And that
12:06
Speaker 3: was it, you know. Yeah. So we were doing that.
12:09
Speaker 3: But then when it did take off, it was like,
12:11
Speaker 3: your feet do not touch the floor because you're flying here,
12:14
Speaker 3: flying there. You're having a hit in this country. And
12:16
Speaker 3: by the way, two months later, that same records are
12:18
Speaker 3: hit in another country. So you'll be doing their version
12:20
Speaker 3: of Top of the Pops over there or their version
12:23
Speaker 3: of Wogan, whatever it is, you know? And so you
12:28
Speaker 3: are literally all going for it. And there is not
12:32
Speaker 3: as much time to reflect. And then also I was
12:35
Speaker 3: a youngster. I was 22, 23. So, you know, come
12:41
Speaker 3: from a background where I worked, I had nine to
12:42
Speaker 3: fives before I got into music. So I always paid
12:45
Speaker 3: my way and earned a crust, but then you've got
12:47
Speaker 3: access to more money than you've ever had before. And
12:51
Speaker 3: so you kind of, it can be quite a, it's
12:56
Speaker 3: a whirlwind. You've got to find your feet and get
12:59
Speaker 3: with it. But also it was the nineties, which was
13:02
Speaker 3: the late, the last great decade, I would imagine. And,
13:07
Speaker 3: you know, in terms of, certainly socially in London with
13:10
Speaker 3: the music industry. So we were also having too much
13:13
Speaker 3: fun as well, you know, and going out and doing
13:16
Speaker 3: the clubs and having some crazy times, you know. And
13:20
Speaker 3: the whole music industry seemed to be sort of seduced
13:26
Speaker 3: into that kind of thing as well, that thing of
13:30
Speaker 3: excess and all the rest that was going on in
13:33
Speaker 3: the 90s. They were spending enormous amounts of money on
13:35
Speaker 3: videos and all sorts of And it was an abundance.
13:38
Speaker 3: So we were going along with the tide and having
13:44
Speaker 3: some good times. But it's only when it sort of
13:46
Speaker 3: starts to slow down and comes to a standstill and
13:48
Speaker 3: you start to get into recording the next album and
13:50
Speaker 3: things settle down that you can begin to think, whoa,
13:53
Speaker 3: what a ride that's been, you know? Yeah. Next one.
13:57
Speaker 2: So you're finding yourself, everything's going well in the 90s. Yeah.
14:02
Speaker 2: You've got a five-year run, roughly, haven't you, of hits?
14:07
Speaker 2: success at the top and and and then things slows
14:10
Speaker 2: down and and i think the music scene kind of
14:15
Speaker 2: changed didn't it you you had the influence of the
14:19
Speaker 2: boy girl bands and things like that into pop serious
14:23
Speaker 2: serious pop and that's when you know in previous decades
14:27
Speaker 2: you always had these different genres that had a space
14:32
Speaker 2: everybody and then all of a sudden it became very
14:35
Speaker 2: machine orientated, you know, that it must, you know, goes
14:39
Speaker 2: in one end, comes out the other end, you know,
14:41
Speaker 2: you had your boy bands, your girl bands, like I say,
14:43
Speaker 2: you had your Brit pop arguments with Blur and Oasis
14:47
Speaker 2: and people like that. And things became very narrow, you know,
14:51
Speaker 2: and I would imagine for you and other artists, you know,
14:56
Speaker 2: it's difficult to hold onto your place.
14:59
Speaker 3: Well, I was forewarned of that in about 93. I
15:03
Speaker 3: was forewarned that that's coming by someone who's very, very
15:06
Speaker 3: savvy and knows the industry. I'm sure he's got a
15:10
Speaker 3: crystal ball somewhere.
15:11
Speaker 2: It's a bit like AI, isn't it? You know something's
15:15
Speaker 2: going to change.
15:16
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was coming. And I think he knew what
15:18
Speaker 3: the record companies were signing and what they were looking
15:21
Speaker 3: at and where they were going. And he said, you're
15:22
Speaker 3: going to have to ride it out. There's going to
15:24
Speaker 3: be a period where you may not get a look in.
15:28
Speaker 3: but you'd have to just, you know, keep going with
15:30
Speaker 3: your fans, keep writing, keep gigging, just keep going. And then,
15:33
Speaker 3: you know, it'll come out the other side of it
15:35
Speaker 3: because that thing won't last and real things do. Not
15:40
Speaker 3: saying some of those weren't real, by the way, because
15:42
Speaker 3: some of them have had enormously huge careers and they've,
15:45
Speaker 3: you know, and they're doing really, really well now still,
15:49
Speaker 3: you know, some of the bands and the boy bands
15:52
Speaker 3: are the ones that have gone solo off the back
15:54
Speaker 3: of those. Now, So the thing is, but the main
15:57
Speaker 3: thing that people may or may not realize is that
16:02
Speaker 3: in 95, I went into a legal situation with EMI Records.
16:09
Speaker 3: So they literally, EMI folded Chrysalis. They owned Chrysalis Records.
16:13
Speaker 3: They folded it. It was lock, stock and barrel. They
16:16
Speaker 3: only kept two members of staff. So everyone I'd worked
16:18
Speaker 3: with for all those years had been basically given the elbow.
16:23
Speaker 3: And we were left holding the album, the Hymn album, H-I-M,
16:26
Speaker 3: Hymn album, which I'd written that title track with Jonathan Butler.
16:30
Speaker 3: And we'd had one single off it called When I
16:32
Speaker 3: Think of You. The album was meant to come out.
16:34
Speaker 3: We'd all had a bit of Radio 1. We'd had
16:36
Speaker 3: a bit of, you know, national support to a degree.
16:39
Speaker 3: And it was time to put the album out. But
16:42
Speaker 3: the label folded and it was left in limbo. So
16:44
Speaker 3: I was left with no choice but to enter into,
16:47
Speaker 3: you know, litigation. And then in the end, we settled
16:51
Speaker 3: and didn't go to court, settled. But sadly, I had
16:55
Speaker 3: to let that album go because they paid for it.
16:58
Speaker 3: They owned it. And they go, it's only it's only
17:02
Speaker 3: something like 30 years later that we managed to get
17:05
Speaker 3: it back and release it only in the last couple
17:07
Speaker 3: of years recently. So we've actually so the people have
17:10
Speaker 3: actually got the first time got to hear what that
17:14
Speaker 3: album was. And, you know, it's of its time. Obviously,
17:19
Speaker 3: it's not an album that would work now, but it's
17:22
Speaker 3: some lovely cuts on there. So that's really what brought
17:26
Speaker 3: things to a standstill. And then, of course, you think, well, naturally,
17:29
Speaker 3: with the success I had with the double platinum and
17:31
Speaker 3: this and the other and the Brit nominations and the
17:33
Speaker 3: rest of it, you'd think I'd naturally walk through the
17:35
Speaker 3: door into another major. But when I did have a
17:38
Speaker 3: meeting or two with some of the other majors, which
17:40
Speaker 3: were set up for me, and I'd have to go
17:45
Speaker 3: back to square one and record a new album. That
17:47
Speaker 3: would have been tough. And I would have had to
17:51
Speaker 3: write a bunch more songs, which wouldn't have been impossible.
17:55
Speaker 3: But really they were beginning to, you could see they
17:57
Speaker 3: were focusing, like you say, on those other things that
18:01
Speaker 3: were not really the solo artists doing that more mature sound.
18:05
Speaker 2: Yeah. So what did you do with your time then?
18:10
Speaker 2: Did you turn your back on music or did you, yeah,
18:13
Speaker 2: what did you get?
18:15
Speaker 3: I mean, I kept writing and I kept gigging because
18:19
Speaker 3: there was no shortage of those. There was still a
18:22
Speaker 3: demand for people to see me. So I kept doing
18:25
Speaker 3: gigs and I kept writing and I then went into,
18:28
Speaker 3: I went into a period where I thought, well, look,
18:31
Speaker 3: you know, if you can't beat them, let's join them.
18:33
Speaker 3: So I did a lot of pop writing as well.
18:36
Speaker 3: And in that time, you know, I got, you know,
18:38
Speaker 3: I managed to get some cuts and, you know, Rod
18:40
Speaker 3: Stewart recorded a song of mine, George Benson recorded one.
18:44
Speaker 3: And so I kind of like, you know, I did
18:47
Speaker 3: those things, you know.
18:49
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah.
18:50
Speaker 3: In the studio with some of those boy bands and
18:52
Speaker 3: did some writing. And that also was fun. And also
18:56
Speaker 3: it kept me creatively going and it taught me how
18:59
Speaker 3: to write in other ways, you know. Yeah. Yeah. But
19:03
Speaker 3: then the other thing that comes along is, you know,
19:07
Speaker 3: in that time, my mother fell ill. She passed away
19:12
Speaker 3: also at the age of 56, only a year younger
19:15
Speaker 3: than what I am now. And then my father that
19:18
Speaker 3: after that, my father fell ill within a couple of
19:21
Speaker 3: years with dementia, Alzheimer's. So then I spent a number
19:24
Speaker 3: of years single handedly kind of pretty much caring for him.
19:29
Speaker 3: until it become, you know, unmanageable and it needed a
19:32
Speaker 3: nursing home environment. And that was tough. So, but meanwhile,
19:36
Speaker 3: in throughout all of those years, I was still managing
19:39
Speaker 3: to gig and do this and do writing and keep creative.
19:43
Speaker 3: So that's kind of like where the 90s got to
19:47
Speaker 3: and then we get into the 2000s the noughties and
19:49
Speaker 3: i'm and then there's a little you know we're beginning
19:52
Speaker 3: to experience some renaissance a bit of renaissance you know
19:55
Speaker 3: because i'm putting out some cuts like crazy world and
19:58
Speaker 3: that's that's you've got a real kind of the people
20:01
Speaker 3: on the northern soul scene took to that record and
20:04
Speaker 3: i'm putting out some not not so commercial but very
20:07
Speaker 3: some nice soul records and Yes. And that, again, gives
20:12
Speaker 3: me another sort of resurgence in that world. And I'm in,
20:17
Speaker 3: you know, your festivals and your weekenders. Yeah.
20:22
Speaker 2: So, yeah, I'm guessing.
20:25
Speaker 3: Basically, I've never stopped. Yes.
20:27
Speaker 2: And you're still gigging today. You're not on tour at
20:30
Speaker 2: the moment, though, are you?
20:32
Speaker 3: I just finished a tour. And the irony of it
20:34
Speaker 3: is I'm doing the biggest venues of my career ever. Right.
20:38
Speaker 3: So I did, you know, Hammersmith Apollo earlier this year,
20:42
Speaker 3: sold that out, Birmingham Symphony. And it's like, these are
20:45
Speaker 3: venues I didn't sell out at the peak of my career.
20:48
Speaker 3: I didn't do them, let alone sell them out.
20:50
Speaker 2: Yes.
20:51
Speaker 3: So now I'm selling out these places that are not
20:56
Speaker 3: to be sniffed at, really.
20:57
Speaker 2: Yeah. And I think that's the other side of the
21:00
Speaker 2: coin in today's industry, that you haven't got the top
21:03
Speaker 2: of the pops and you haven't got the narrow way
21:06
Speaker 2: to market. You've got, you know, it's very difficult to
21:09
Speaker 2: make a name for yourself, but you can still make
21:13
Speaker 2: a living and you can reach an even bigger audience,
21:18
Speaker 2: even though people don't know you exist. Isn't that the
21:20
Speaker 2: weirdest thing? It used to be that you were at
21:24
Speaker 2: the top and everybody knew you existed. Now you can
21:27
Speaker 2: have the same size audience. but only that audience knows
21:32
Speaker 2: about you.
21:33
Speaker 3: Yeah. And you can get to a lot of people
21:35
Speaker 3: in a very short space of time online. And it's
21:39
Speaker 3: an interesting thing. You know, record companies used to pay
21:42
Speaker 3: enormous amounts of money to try to get to that
21:44
Speaker 3: many people in one day. Yeah. And they couldn't do it.
21:48
Speaker 3: And now you can. And I've got a loyal fan base.
21:51
Speaker 3: Thank goodness, you know, some great fans and I've become super,
21:56
Speaker 3: you know, become friends with some of them.
21:58
Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly.
21:59
Speaker 3: And I've become friends with them, you know.
22:01
Speaker 2: Because of the technology, you've got more of a hands-on approach,
22:05
Speaker 2: haven't you?
22:05
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, and it's more personal in many ways. Yeah, yeah.
22:10
Speaker 3: There's the dark side of that and some of the abuse,
22:14
Speaker 3: the trolling you get online. But I've got, and again,
22:17
Speaker 3: I've got a younger manager who's very savvy and and
22:21
Speaker 3: he's very clued up with the whole thing and and
22:23
Speaker 3: me with that frees me up he runs the socials
22:26
Speaker 3: and that reason that frees me up to be in
22:27
Speaker 3: the studio make music right record and get on with
22:33
Speaker 3: what i do and then and do the gigs you
22:35
Speaker 3: know with the band.
22:36
Speaker 2: So what what what are you making what music are
22:39
Speaker 2: you making now.
22:39
Speaker 3: It's still still soulful also also yeah but I'm making
22:44
Speaker 3: stuff with Oppo Loppo, this guy in Sweden, producer in Sweden.
22:48
Speaker 3: So that has a kind of different edges of dance producer,
22:51
Speaker 3: but we are like, I've always done that. I've always
22:53
Speaker 3: done dance music. So it's always been soulful and dance,
22:57
Speaker 3: you know? So cause he called Tempo the label I
22:59
Speaker 3: was signed to was a dance label. It was a
23:01
Speaker 3: club label, you know? So I still do that. And
23:05
Speaker 3: I still, I'm still making some cuts, making some of the,
23:08
Speaker 3: some American producers at the moment of record over there. with, with,
23:11
Speaker 3: with Opeloper in Sweden. And I'm just, just cut two
23:14
Speaker 3: soul records with some producers in London and there, and
23:18
Speaker 3: the stuff's sounding great, man. It's sounding great. It's just
23:21
Speaker 3: some great musicians on there. And it's just, it's real.
23:24
Speaker 3: It's real.
23:26
Speaker 2: It's interesting listening to your early stuff and, and the voice,
23:31
Speaker 2: you know, and I was listening to revisit it. You know,
23:34
Speaker 2: the strange thing is what you, you're so used to
23:38
Speaker 2: Spotify in this day and age that you're just, you just,
23:42
Speaker 2: I'm as guilty as anybody. You just, you don't pay
23:45
Speaker 2: respect to the music the way you used to. You know,
23:47
Speaker 2: when you had to save up to buy that piece
23:52
Speaker 2: of vinyl. Yeah, exactly. And so, you know, you forget
23:58
Speaker 2: and you haven't got time because there is so much
24:02
Speaker 2: music in the world. And so when I'm doing an
24:05
Speaker 2: interview and I'm sort of revisiting those artists and I
24:08
Speaker 2: go back to your music, And I think to myself, actually,
24:14
Speaker 2: you talk about the early 90s, and it has got
24:17
Speaker 2: an early 90s sound about it, but it's very contemporary
24:25
Speaker 2: as well. And that's perhaps the world that we live
24:29
Speaker 2: in now, that everything is contemporary. But it's such a
24:32
Speaker 2: pleasure to not listen to it from an oldies perspective.
24:37
Speaker 2: It's a pleasure to listen to it and think, Do
24:40
Speaker 2: you know, I'd buy that today. Yeah. I'd still buy that.
24:44
Speaker 2: It has a value and a presence in itself. And
24:47
Speaker 2: I think that's down to your voice.
24:50
Speaker 3: Yeah, quite possibly. I mean, that's the thread running through it. But,
24:55
Speaker 3: you know, it's also just the, you know, the songwriting,
24:58
Speaker 3: the melodies, the placement, the production values, all those things
25:03
Speaker 3: come together to make this kind of.
25:06
Speaker 3: You know, this whole one thing that's, you know, so
25:11
Speaker 3: many people involved in it, in the making of a record.
25:15
Speaker 2: Yeah.
25:17
Speaker 3: It carries that energy. But you're right, the voice just
25:20
Speaker 3: rides the wave, doesn't it? The voice is the surfer.
25:24
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was listening and I'm thinking, this is like
25:27
Speaker 2: a British Luther Vandross. Do you know?
25:31
Speaker 3: Wow.
25:32
Speaker 2: I'm not blowing smoke up yet. Do you know what
25:34
Speaker 2: I mean? I'm thinking it's not Luther Vandross, but do
25:37
Speaker 2: you know what I mean? If I was a DJ
25:39
Speaker 2: and I was putting a playlist together, you know, I
25:43
Speaker 2: would put Luther Vandross there. I would put Billy Ocean there.
25:47
Speaker 2: I would put Beverly Knight there. Do you know what
25:51
Speaker 2: I mean? All these soulful voices that are so strong
25:56
Speaker 2: and whether they ever had a hit music, a hit
25:59
Speaker 2: song or not, they would still have that immense credibility. Yeah.
26:05
Speaker 3: It's what touches the soul. What does soul music mean? Exactly.
26:09
Speaker 3: What is soul music? It's connection from the inner, most
26:15
Speaker 3: inner part of you. It's got such depth and connection.
26:20
Speaker 3: And it's, you know, without saying a bit too sort
26:23
Speaker 3: of like going off on the edge of a cliff,
26:26
Speaker 3: it's very spiritual.
26:27
Speaker 2: Correct. And that's really why I asked you the question
26:30
Speaker 2: earlier on. Because to me, soul has never been a
26:35
Speaker 2: commercial thing. Soul has always been what moves you in
26:40
Speaker 2: the moment. Why does it move you? You know, I
26:45
Speaker 2: was into, I was into my rock as a teenager
26:47
Speaker 2: and I didn't come to soul. And I mean, I
26:50
Speaker 2: appreciated it, but I didn't collect it.
26:53
Speaker 1: Yeah.
26:53
Speaker 2: I didn't buy it. You know, I'd rather go and
26:56
Speaker 2: buy some glam rock single than I would the drifters
27:01
Speaker 2: or Barry White or the tramps or any of the,
27:04
Speaker 2: you know, temptations whatever um but when i found soul
27:11
Speaker 2: 70s soul for me um it was it it was
27:18
Speaker 2: literally that it opened up your heart to the rest
27:21
Speaker 2: of the world if that makes sense and and you
27:24
Speaker 2: realized that you weren't on your own because people were
27:27
Speaker 2: singing about the condition the human condition and and passing
27:31
Speaker 2: it back to you you know something to laugh at
27:33
Speaker 2: something to cry at something to motivate you, something to,
27:37
Speaker 2: you know, do all those things. So that was Soul
27:40
Speaker 2: to me. And I wondered if Soul was the same
27:42
Speaker 2: for you. And I think it is.
27:44
Speaker 3: Absolutely. You know, I still will listen, you know, sometimes
27:47
Speaker 3: to an old record, but there'll be a new record
27:49
Speaker 3: if someone plays it. And if I can feel the
27:51
Speaker 3: hairs on the back of my neck standing up on
27:53
Speaker 3: my arms, I know it's, you know, it's moving me inwardly.
27:58
Speaker 3: It's manifesting externally by the sort.
28:02
Speaker 2: Of, you know, When was the last time that happened
28:05
Speaker 2: to you? When you're a younger person, that used to
28:09
Speaker 2: happen to me once a week, and then it became
28:12
Speaker 2: once a month, and then once every three or four months,
28:14
Speaker 2: and then once a year. And now it's quite rare
28:18
Speaker 2: for that hairs on the back of your neck moment.
28:23
Speaker 2: Does that happen to you at all today?
28:24
Speaker 3: I think it does because I'm making music. You're right.
28:28
Speaker 3: And when you suddenly discover something, or you write that
28:33
Speaker 3: next part or that melody, and all of a sudden
28:36
Speaker 3: you think, oh, right, you're trying out some melody. And
28:38
Speaker 3: all of a sudden you just hit that one that works.
28:42
Speaker 3: That is the melody that goes there. And it just
28:45
Speaker 3: glides and flies and it's beautiful. And then you can
28:48
Speaker 3: have moments like, well, you know, you get the shivers.
28:51
Speaker 2: Yes. And does that happen in partnership as well sometimes?
28:56
Speaker 3: You mean what?
28:57
Speaker 2: If you're working in the studio and you.
29:00
Speaker 3: Can't... You can add that collective, communal thing that's going on.
29:05
Speaker 3: You are basically all experiencing that same rush from a
29:11
Speaker 3: moment when it hits a point, especially when you're recording
29:13
Speaker 3: it and you're in the process of recording it and
29:16
Speaker 3: doing takes with a band as well. That can be
29:19
Speaker 3: absolutely amazing. But I tend to vocal alone now. I
29:22
Speaker 3: work alone in the studio here. Because I, you know,
29:28
Speaker 3: I've learned my way over the last 15, 20 years around,
29:31
Speaker 3: you know, the process of recording. I get some very,
29:35
Speaker 3: very good, very high quality recordings here that will rival
29:39
Speaker 3: any studio. I've worked in. And it gives me the
29:44
Speaker 3: scope and I haven't got the pressure. I can do takes,
29:46
Speaker 3: I can record a song, I can come back to
29:48
Speaker 3: it two days later and think, yeah, I've nailed it.
29:51
Speaker 3: Or I could think, actually, I thought I'd nailed it,
29:53
Speaker 3: but I think I could perform that better. I can
29:57
Speaker 3: go in and record again. And I'm just in my
29:58
Speaker 3: own little world. I'm in my happy place. I'm in
30:01
Speaker 3: my zone. It's a different thing. So I record that way.
30:05
Speaker 3: George Michael used to record on his own in the
30:06
Speaker 3: vocal booth with the controller and stuff and no one
30:10
Speaker 3: in the room. And I thought, wow, that's different because
30:12
Speaker 3: we always recorded with the band and with the producer
30:15
Speaker 3: and with them the other side of the window. But
30:20
Speaker 3: as the years have gone on, for many years now,
30:21
Speaker 3: I've recorded that way myself and I realise why he
30:24
Speaker 3: did it. It's just so personal and just so, like,
30:28
Speaker 3: you can go right into the zone. You know, it
30:31
Speaker 3: doesn't matter, the clock's not ticking and there's no-one waiting
30:34
Speaker 3: to go out and have lunch. You just... You know
30:39
Speaker 3: what I mean? Like, you know, in a studio, you're
30:41
Speaker 3: playing for the studio, the clock's ticking or someone says, right,
30:44
Speaker 3: we're going to break for lunch. No, no, no, there's
30:45
Speaker 3: no break. Because when you're on it, when you hit that,
30:49
Speaker 3: when you hit that moment and you're on the vibe.
30:53
Speaker 3: You don't want to be anywhere else, do you? You
30:55
Speaker 3: have to capture it.
30:56
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah. Capture it. Yeah, yeah. It's what you live for,
31:00
Speaker 2: isn't it?
31:01
Speaker 3: You've got to capture it on, you've got to capture
31:03
Speaker 3: it on tape, as we used to say, or now
31:06
Speaker 3: on Logic X. You've got to capture it.
31:09
Speaker 2: So when you've got this music down and you're happy
31:13
Speaker 2: with it, are you just going through the processes of
31:22
Speaker 2: modern day getting your music to market? Or would you
31:26
Speaker 2: like to get back to the days of celebrity? And
31:32
Speaker 2: I use the term loosely. Are you ambitious to be on?
31:38
Speaker 2: jump on that commercial bandwagon and get on The Voice
31:42
Speaker 2: or anything that gets you exposed, you know, to... No.
31:48
Speaker 3: Well, I did every TV show I could think of
31:49
Speaker 3: back then.
31:50
Speaker 2: Yeah.
31:52
Speaker 3: Which is long before the reality TV thing. I mean,
31:56
Speaker 3: you know, I would do one. If one come along
31:59
Speaker 3: and it'd be fun, everything has to be like, would
32:01
Speaker 3: this be a hoot? Would this be an experience? Not
32:05
Speaker 3: because of any... anything on the other side of it, like,
32:09
Speaker 3: you know, becoming a celebrity. I've never been a celebrity.
32:12
Speaker 3: I don't want to be one. I'm basically, I'm a musician.
32:16
Speaker 3: I'm a singer. I go out and do gigs. Ultimately
32:19
Speaker 3: for me, it's like, so if I did, if I
32:21
Speaker 3: did something like, like you're saying, one of these sort
32:23
Speaker 3: of shows, it only ever has got to ultimately translate into,
32:28
Speaker 3: can you put bums on seats? Can you go and
32:31
Speaker 3: fill an auditorium and do what you do, sing with
32:34
Speaker 3: a band? So it always come down to that. Because
32:38
Speaker 3: I don't want it to come down to anything else.
32:39
Speaker 3: I mean, I was sure the financial rewards of being
32:42
Speaker 3: a celebrity are far greater than just going out and
32:44
Speaker 3: filling auditoriums. But again, that's not been my governor either.
32:49
Speaker 3: That's not my boss. You know, money's never been my governor.
32:54
Speaker 3: And never has fame. Fame has never been my boss.
32:59
Speaker 3: What's driven me is always music. And if I'm going
33:01
Speaker 3: out like I am this coming Friday of this week
33:04
Speaker 3: and we're going to do a festival, with the band,
33:06
Speaker 3: it's going to be great. We're going to have a
33:08
Speaker 3: great time. And we'll enjoy singing the songs now and
33:12
Speaker 3: playing them, you know. But in terms of the celebrity culture,
33:16
Speaker 3: it's fine. And I see it from the outside and
33:19
Speaker 3: I look in on it and I rely more heavily
33:23
Speaker 3: on my wife and my children now to tell me
33:25
Speaker 3: who's famous and who isn't anymore because I see some
33:28
Speaker 3: TV shows that they might be watching and I say,
33:30
Speaker 3: I don't know any of them. And then the next
33:34
Speaker 3: question is, what do they do? And it might show
33:39
Speaker 3: me that two or three of them actually don't do
33:41
Speaker 3: very much.
33:44
Speaker 2: It's true.
33:45
Speaker 3: They're just famous.
33:46
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
33:48
Speaker 3: With that in mind, I think with me, what I
33:50
Speaker 3: do is what I do. I make music, I sing.
33:55
Speaker 3: And in a way, yes, I'm not dancing around on
33:57
Speaker 3: top of the pops and all of that anymore because
34:00
Speaker 3: that doesn't exist anymore. But I think I'm far happier
34:04
Speaker 3: and more content than I ever was back then. Because, yeah,
34:07
Speaker 3: I'm grateful for that happening. And it was privileged. And
34:11
Speaker 3: we worked hard to get there. And it's laid the
34:14
Speaker 3: foundation of what we still stand upon today. But ultimately,
34:19
Speaker 3: I'm happier now just being me, doing my music, doing
34:25
Speaker 3: my gigs, making my tunes, and just getting on with it, man.
34:30
Speaker 2: I like you.
34:33
Speaker 3: I like you too.
34:35
Speaker 2: You're just my sort of person.
34:37
Speaker 3: You are.
34:37
Speaker 2: I'm just, I'm exactly the same. Um, tell me about the, uh, uh, uh, uh,
34:46
Speaker 2: Gary Barlow. Tell me about Gary. Yeah. Yeah.
34:50
Speaker 3: Well, Gary's friends with friends of mine. Right. Um, he's
34:55
Speaker 3: not someone I really know that well personally, but I'd
34:57
Speaker 3: met him in the past. Uh, you know, um, And yeah,
35:02
Speaker 3: and he obviously was doing that crew in the sessions
35:04
Speaker 3: and he approached me at the end of it, really,
35:06
Speaker 3: in the last couple of sessions he was doing. He said,
35:09
Speaker 3: would you like to do it? I said, I'd love to.
35:10
Speaker 3: He just talked me through how you want to do
35:13
Speaker 3: it technically, you know, from my studio to yours and
35:16
Speaker 3: we'll make it happen.
35:17
Speaker 2: And that goes back to just what you were saying,
35:19
Speaker 2: you know, if it's fun, I'll do it, you know.
35:23
Speaker 3: And again, with the technology, you couldn't have done that
35:26
Speaker 3: in the 90s. No, exactly.
35:27
Speaker 2: You can do it now.
35:28
Speaker 3: So, you know, those are the benefits of the of
35:31
Speaker 3: the age and the world we live in now.
35:33
Speaker 2: Isn't it strange that um you know you're doing a
35:37
Speaker 2: a double act with gary barlow and and somebody's next
35:42
Speaker 2: door and they don't know the life that you live
35:44
Speaker 2: you know and they're doing their nine to five and
35:47
Speaker 2: if they knew you know that if they could just
35:50
Speaker 2: walk through your front door and they could have that experience.
35:52
Speaker 3: And So yeah, the, um, no, it was great to
35:55
Speaker 3: do it. And it, you know, listen, it got an
35:57
Speaker 3: enormous amounts of, uh, hits online. Yeah. That, that someone
36:02
Speaker 3: like me is not normally would, would get that level
36:05
Speaker 3: of traction. We have done things that have got, you know,
36:09
Speaker 3: I think it was something like 4 million views, you know,
36:11
Speaker 3: and then we've had, we've done things since then that
36:13
Speaker 3: have matched it, uh, you know, a couple of bits
36:16
Speaker 3: here and there, but yeah, I wasn't in that. I
36:19
Speaker 3: wasn't in that world. It kind of did. It did.
36:21
Speaker 3: kind of placed me immediately into this, this world of
36:24
Speaker 3: likes and, uh, trending and, uh, for a while, for
36:28
Speaker 3: a bit. I'm certainly, I don't know I'm trending today,
36:31
Speaker 3: but I might be next week. Who knows?
36:33
Speaker 2: Who knows? Let me, um, let me ask before we
36:36
Speaker 2: finish up, um, uh, tours and gigs and stuff like that. Um,
36:41
Speaker 2: can we, is it, Is it through your website we
36:43
Speaker 2: can keep up to date?
36:44
Speaker 3: Yeah, go to KennyThomasMusic.com, www.KennyThomasMusic.com, and there you'll find most
36:52
Speaker 3: of the tours and the gigs we're doing.
36:55
Speaker 2: Okay. I wanted to ask.
36:57
Speaker 3: Yeah, so.
37:00
Speaker 2: We're done, basically. I really enjoyed the chat.
37:03
Speaker 3: It's been a pleasure.
37:05
Speaker 2: Yeah, good. I can't say it often enough. Really enjoyed
37:10
Speaker 2: the chat.
37:10
Speaker 3: I'll tell you what I'll tell you. If someone wants
37:12
Speaker 3: to do a deeper dive on me, you can go
37:15
Speaker 3: on Amazon. I did write an autobiography in recent times.
37:19
Speaker 3: It's been out for a little while now, and I
37:21
Speaker 3: did last year update it and added seven more chapters
37:24
Speaker 3: to it. And it's called Bearing My Soul.
37:27
Speaker 2: Okay. Okay.
37:29
Speaker 3: Baring my soul if anyone wants to know a bit
37:34
Speaker 3: more of what happened in the 90s and the the
37:36
Speaker 3: legal wrangle with emi and all the craziness and and
37:40
Speaker 3: life and it's it's in there it unpacks it all
37:42
Speaker 3: and lets you know the you know gives you the
37:44
Speaker 3: ins and outs of the journey yes.
37:47
Speaker 2: And as we grow i'd love to come back and
37:49
Speaker 2: do this again sometime let's do it again yeah thank
37:52
Speaker 2: you so much you take care now