Latest / Broken Record with Rick Rubin, Malcolm Gladwell, Bruce Headlam and Justin Richmond / David Gilmour

Transcript

David Gilmour · Broken Record with Rick Rubin, Malcolm Gladwell, Bruce Headlam and Justin Richmond

0:15
Speaker 1: Pushkin.
0:20
Speaker 2: It's no exaggeration when I say David Gilmour is one
0:22
Speaker 2: of the most influential guitarists in rock history. Since joining
0:26
Speaker 2: Pink Floyd in nineteen sixty seven, his songwriting, vocals and
0:28
Speaker 2: distinctive guitar approach have helped shaped classic albums like Metal
0:33
Speaker 2: Which You would Hear, Animals in a Momentary Lapse of Reason,
0:36
Speaker 2: amongst many others. In nineteen seventy eight he began releasing
0:40
Speaker 2: solo work, and over the past four decades has recorded
0:42
Speaker 2: five solo albums, his last few albums starting with On
0:45
Speaker 2: An Island in two thousand and six, on Too Ritter
0:47
Speaker 2: Out Locke in twenty fifteen, All Feel of a Piece,
0:50
Speaker 2: including his latest twenty twenty four's Luck and Strange, which
0:53
Speaker 2: is also his third album to reach number one on
0:56
Speaker 2: the UK album's charter. As usual, his latest album features
1:00
Speaker 2: lyrics by his wife and longtime collaborator, Polly Sampson, but
1:03
Speaker 2: this time also features substantial contributions from his children. One
1:07
Speaker 2: of those collaborations with Roman and Gilmore is Astounding and
1:10
Speaker 2: it was jaw dropping in live performance, which you can
1:13
Speaker 2: now see for yourself with the release of the live
1:15
Speaker 2: concert David Gilmour at the Circus Maximus and listening. With
1:19
Speaker 2: the release of the Luck and Strange concerts now available
1:21
Speaker 2: wherever you get your music. On today's episode, I was
1:24
Speaker 2: offered thirty minutes or so on Zoom with David Gilmore
1:27
Speaker 2: and how could you say no to a quick chat
1:29
Speaker 2: with the Hero. I spoke with Gilmour about writing songs
1:32
Speaker 2: with Polly, the experience of mastering his latest album on
1:34
Speaker 2: a houseboat, and why he can never truly recreate a
1:37
Speaker 2: guitar solo even when playing it. No for no, this
1:43
Speaker 2: is broken record, real musicians, real conversations. Here's my conversation
1:52
Speaker 2: with David Gilmore. I justin great to meet you. Say,
1:57
Speaker 2: are you coming from your studio on the riverboat or
2:01
Speaker 2: from home one of my vast collection of studios.
2:04
Speaker 1: This is just a little room in the house, got it.
2:08
Speaker 2: When I spoke with Townsend, I was from a river
2:11
Speaker 2: boat or from a boat of some sort as well,
2:13
Speaker 2: and so I wasn't sure.
2:14
Speaker 1: He was on a boat. Was he He was on
2:16
Speaker 1: a boat. His studio boats just down the river from
2:19
Speaker 1: my studio boat. Have you checked it out?
2:22
Speaker 3: Yeah, I've been in it several many times over. Yeah,
2:26
Speaker 3: I haven't been there for a long time. It's got
2:28
Speaker 3: to be a little precarious. No recording on a boat
2:32
Speaker 3: or less than you would imagine.
2:34
Speaker 1: Less than you would imagine. It all works pretty well.
2:36
Speaker 1: I mean mine is sort of moored very securely. It's
2:41
Speaker 1: got a big poster at each end, and if the
2:43
Speaker 1: river level goes up, it just slides up and down
2:47
Speaker 1: the post perfectly. And the other great thing, of course,
2:51
Speaker 1: the thing that you get on a boat is that
2:54
Speaker 1: the road that's just nearby, there's no rumble. All that
2:58
Speaker 1: traffic noise if you're floating doesn't happen. It doesn't reverberate
3:03
Speaker 1: over it to you. It doesn't go through the ground,
3:06
Speaker 1: you know, like in most buildings, there's always a bit
3:09
Speaker 1: of rumble from something.
3:11
Speaker 2: Was it you got the boat and became inspired to
3:17
Speaker 2: create on it, or was it just was it a
3:19
Speaker 2: novel idea you had and thought, okay, let me buy
3:21
Speaker 2: a boat and convert it.
3:22
Speaker 1: What was the How did it come to be? I
3:25
Speaker 1: was driving down the road, being driven in fact, and
3:29
Speaker 1: I won't tell you why, and I just saw this
3:32
Speaker 1: metal and glass thing over a wall, and I got
3:36
Speaker 1: everyone's driving me to pull over, and we looked down
3:39
Speaker 1: there and we saw this beautiful boat moored up against
3:42
Speaker 1: the bank and I thought, that's gorgeous, lovely, And literally
3:48
Speaker 1: the next week I was in the dentist's waiting room
3:52
Speaker 1: and picked up a magazine and there it was for
3:56
Speaker 1: sale in that magazine. And that was in nineteen eighty six,
4:01
Speaker 1: eighty six, okay, And I rang up and said can
4:04
Speaker 1: I see it? And I put in an offer the
4:06
Speaker 1: same day. That's pretty furtuitous, And initially I didn't even
4:12
Speaker 1: know that I was going to make it into a studio.
4:15
Speaker 1: What of the new album Looking Strange was done on there?
4:19
Speaker 1: The mixing. It's got a very big, lovely control room
4:25
Speaker 1: and we did the mixing on there, and we set
4:28
Speaker 1: up a Dolby Atmos mix room in another room at
4:33
Speaker 1: the other end of the boat, so we could be
4:34
Speaker 1: running two things at once. So all the mixing pretty
4:39
Speaker 1: much and all the Dolby Atmos mixes were done in there,
4:43
Speaker 1: and the other things we went off to various recording studios.
4:47
Speaker 1: I have a studio myself in Brighton which works very well,
4:52
Speaker 1: and we did some in another studio in Brighton called Salvation,
4:56
Speaker 1: and we also did a lot of the stuff the
4:59
Speaker 1: basic tracks with Steve Gadd and the other guys at
5:03
Speaker 1: Mark Knopflith Studio in British Grog in London. Incredible.
5:08
Speaker 2: I saw one the shows at the Hollywood Bowl last
5:11
Speaker 2: October and it exceeded expecting. I had not seen you
5:16
Speaker 2: in the past. Somehow it deluded me, and it was amazing,
5:20
Speaker 2: and your band was phenomenal, like a brilliant and I
5:26
Speaker 2: didn't know Phil. I didn't know Phil, and Gaines was
5:28
Speaker 2: playing with you.
5:28
Speaker 1: That was like a joy to see. And well, I've
5:31
Speaker 1: known I've known Greg since the sort of middle till
5:35
Speaker 1: late eighties when he was out on the road with
5:38
Speaker 1: Michael Jackson and I was up on the road with
5:40
Speaker 1: Pink Floyd and we got quite friendly, and I've always
5:44
Speaker 1: wanted to find a time where he could join up
5:48
Speaker 1: with my band, which he did actually in two thy
5:52
Speaker 1: sixteen for a whole leg of the last leg of
5:55
Speaker 1: my tw twenty fifteen sixteen to and I got him
5:59
Speaker 1: back in this time.
6:01
Speaker 2: A lot of people tend to not meet up with
6:04
Speaker 2: other musicians because they're on the road or you know,
6:07
Speaker 2: friendships sort of saying some sort of stasis because you're
6:10
Speaker 2: out on the rst. So how did you how did
6:12
Speaker 2: that Pink Floyd Michael Jackson wound up in concentric circles.
6:17
Speaker 1: Well. Strangely enough, in nineteen eighty seven, Michael Jackson's tour
6:22
Speaker 1: and ar tour was sort of following each other around,
6:26
Speaker 1: you know, and we'd be you know, He'd be in
6:30
Speaker 1: one city and we'd be in the same city three
6:32
Speaker 1: days later, and they had a day or two oft
6:35
Speaker 1: in between, so would just bump into people who were,
6:39
Speaker 1: you know, and and I I think I first met
6:42
Speaker 1: up with Greg in Paris when Michael and Pint Floyd
6:47
Speaker 1: were all playing there within two or three days with
6:49
Speaker 1: each other, and we just met up. What did you
6:53
Speaker 1: make of their show? Brilliant show? But I saw that.
6:57
Speaker 1: I mean I didn't see that show at that time,
7:00
Speaker 1: and I saw it in the States I think probably
7:02
Speaker 1: the next year or a few months later, when we
7:05
Speaker 1: met up again and Greg invited us to one those shows.
7:09
Speaker 1: So we legend Michael Jackson.
7:13
Speaker 2: Did Greg and Richard Bright have any sort of connection?
7:16
Speaker 2: Both pretty incredible players.
7:19
Speaker 1: I don't think. I don't think I really properly met
7:22
Speaker 1: I'm not sure to be honest.
7:24
Speaker 2: Okay, well, I brought that. I brought up that because
7:27
Speaker 2: we're talking about looking strange. You know, you have Steve
7:31
Speaker 2: Gadd on the record and so many other also incredible
7:34
Speaker 2: players on the record. How do you decide who could
7:39
Speaker 2: fit for any particular song when you're going to record something.
7:44
Speaker 1: Well, we started off we'd booked five days I think,
7:48
Speaker 1: with Steve Gadd, who's the best, you know, the absolute
7:52
Speaker 1: best drummer in the world. And I'd never worked with
7:57
Speaker 1: him before. I'd met him a few times, but I
8:00
Speaker 1: always wanted to, and I managed to get five days
8:04
Speaker 1: of his time, and he flew over to London, and
8:07
Speaker 1: and I had booked for the studio, and I got
8:11
Speaker 1: the other guys in there, and we had some songs
8:15
Speaker 1: we wanted to try, and we spent a very intense
8:19
Speaker 1: week working on putting down those songs with Steve, with
8:24
Speaker 1: Rob Gentry on keys and Guy Pratt playing the bass,
8:30
Speaker 1: and yeah, what what songs did you do in those
8:33
Speaker 1: those in those five days we did sings and Piper's Call, Darkened,
8:44
Speaker 1: Velvet Nights, Scattered, what else? I mean, most of the
8:50
Speaker 1: songs actually we got the basic tracks down. One or
8:53
Speaker 1: two more we did a single Spark and one other
8:59
Speaker 1: with Adam Betts on drums and Tom Herbert on bass,
9:05
Speaker 1: and can't I remember now tried to remember all the
9:11
Speaker 1: all the songs and the moments that final we had
9:14
Speaker 1: and putting those tracks down.
9:16
Speaker 2: Was it that session or was it any particular session
9:19
Speaker 2: if not that one that sort of clarified what you
9:23
Speaker 2: were doing or clarified that in fact, you were actually
9:27
Speaker 2: had something that could become an album.
9:30
Speaker 1: And we were going in there. We knew we could
9:32
Speaker 1: hang out an album. We knew where we were going.
9:35
Speaker 1: We had Charlie Andrew as a producer, co producing with me,
9:42
Speaker 1: and an engineer that he brought to the project called
9:45
Speaker 1: Matt Glasby, who was just brilliant, brilliant and knew things
9:51
Speaker 1: about pro tools and the recording process that I didn't
9:55
Speaker 1: even imagine were possible. Yeah, and so yeah, Charlie Andrew
9:59
Speaker 1: was pushing us forward and telling us how he saw
10:04
Speaker 1: the way things might be and between us, Yeah, we
10:09
Speaker 1: a lot done very quickly at that point.
10:12
Speaker 2: You know, at this point you've gone in the studio,
10:14
Speaker 2: made a lot of records. What does working with the
10:17
Speaker 2: producer bring to a project that would in otherwise?
10:22
Speaker 1: You know, you want someone there to help and to
10:28
Speaker 1: push and to agree when it's something to agree with
10:33
Speaker 1: and disagree when it's something to disagree with, which is
10:36
Speaker 1: just as important, and to push the whole process forwards
10:42
Speaker 1: and frankly take a lot of the weight off, you know,
10:46
Speaker 1: the side of the process which is producing, which I
10:50
Speaker 1: have done myself as well. But it's exhausting. I mean,
10:53
Speaker 1: it's still quite exhausting when there's a producer there because
10:57
Speaker 1: you but he is going to address things from a
11:01
Speaker 1: slightly different angle, and he's going to make you think
11:04
Speaker 1: about things and rethink about things, and he's going to
11:08
Speaker 1: he's a snappy's fingers. I say, let's go, let's go.
11:12
Speaker 2: You know, is it hard because this is your first
11:15
Speaker 2: record with with Charlie, you've done a couple or two
11:19
Speaker 2: or three with film Men's Era before. Is it hard
11:22
Speaker 2: when you're working with it? Somebody knew to find how
11:26
Speaker 2: to be disagreeable in the moments what you need.
11:29
Speaker 1: To be well, you know, No, I've done, as you say,
11:34
Speaker 1: a couple with film Mensonario, who's my great friend. Eytime
11:38
Speaker 1: moves on. I felt we needed a new direction, not direction,
11:45
Speaker 1: but just a new mind on it, a new opinion
11:51
Speaker 1: on it. And my co collaborator, co writer who happens
11:57
Speaker 1: to be my wife, Polly did a lot of research
12:01
Speaker 1: because we were spending a lot of time talking about
12:04
Speaker 1: which of the people that I had worked before we
12:07
Speaker 1: might work with again, and thinking of who else we
12:12
Speaker 1: could go to, who is new And Polly found an
12:18
Speaker 1: album by a band called Old Jay and she liked
12:21
Speaker 1: the sound and she had listened to this and we
12:24
Speaker 1: liked it both. And Charlie was the producer, so we
12:29
Speaker 1: had a good look at him from far and then
12:33
Speaker 1: asked him to come down and meet up. So that's
12:37
Speaker 1: where it all started, you.
12:39
Speaker 2: Know, because it is you know, kind of it could
12:41
Speaker 2: become fraight rather easily, you know, to your point. You
12:45
Speaker 2: have to agree when it makes sense and disagree when
12:48
Speaker 2: you know something needs to maybe move forward or something's
12:51
Speaker 2: not working, or you know, just find some sort of
12:54
Speaker 2: common ground. Is it difficult to forge a new working
12:58
Speaker 2: relationship with with with someone like that or is it
13:01
Speaker 2: is it easy?
13:02
Speaker 1: Well, Charlie Andrew, as it has been widely said, you know,
13:07
Speaker 1: didn't really know me all my music or Pink Floyd's music,
13:13
Speaker 1: and he comes from a different sort of era of music,
13:19
Speaker 1: and that sort of thing is invaluable. You want to
13:24
Speaker 1: be pushed and you want him to if it's wrong
13:30
Speaker 1: to tell you so. And it's one of the dangers
13:33
Speaker 1: of having a fair amount of success that people get
13:37
Speaker 1: very frightened of disagreeing with you with the one in
13:43
Speaker 1: my position. And one of the lovely things about Charlie
13:47
Speaker 1: is he had no such fear and just came straight
13:51
Speaker 1: out with the questions and the disagreements, if there were any,
13:54
Speaker 1: remarkably few, actually, it has to be said, but on
13:59
Speaker 1: one or two occasions we changed the direction of things
14:04
Speaker 1: around quite a bit, and it was all for the good.
14:08
Speaker 1: Sometimes you need to kick out the backside, you need
14:11
Speaker 1: to look at things from a different pangle, and he
14:15
Speaker 1: was very, very good at that. That's great.
14:18
Speaker 2: You mentioned that you you collaborate quite often with your wife,
14:21
Speaker 2: who's incredible writer. You also had your daughter on this
14:25
Speaker 2: project and on the tour with you, and she's obviously
14:28
Speaker 2: now in the movie, the concert film you guys are
14:30
Speaker 2: putting out.
14:31
Speaker 1: Tell me about that.
14:32
Speaker 2: I mean, the first time you guys did anything, at
14:35
Speaker 2: least publicly, was was the Ghost song?
14:37
Speaker 4: Right, yes, yes, I've said ghost yeah, yeah, Well the
14:41
Speaker 4: yes I have Ghost song came about because of Polly's book,
14:46
Speaker 4: because she writes novels and she had written a novel
14:50
Speaker 4: based on an island in the Greek Island, and.
14:55
Speaker 1: When it got to the release of that book was
15:00
Speaker 1: when COVID started and we were suddenly locked down, and
15:03
Speaker 1: we had some events lined up that she was going
15:06
Speaker 1: to go and do readings and quite q and as
15:09
Speaker 1: and all those things, and they all got canceled. And
15:13
Speaker 1: Chris Salmon, who works in this on something, said why
15:16
Speaker 1: don't you just do it online? You know, this is
15:20
Speaker 1: what people do these days. So he rigged up a
15:23
Speaker 1: little studio online and we had a little set, a
15:27
Speaker 1: little set that we were going to take out to
15:29
Speaker 1: places which was on the front of a Greek cafe,
15:33
Speaker 1: and we put that up in a barn and plugged
15:36
Speaker 1: a microphone into a laptop like this and did the
15:39
Speaker 1: first one. I didn't have an engineer or a soundman
15:46
Speaker 1: or a lifsman or a cameraman. It was just me
15:49
Speaker 1: sort of pressing in the buttons and getting checking that
15:52
Speaker 1: it was actually going up, and then sitting back down
15:55
Speaker 1: and doing the whole thing with a couple of glasses
15:58
Speaker 1: of wine. We're each week as we went on, because
16:02
Speaker 1: we kept it going for quite a while, every Thursday
16:04
Speaker 1: night and had a great time and Polly's book was
16:08
Speaker 1: based on the Street Island in the year nineteen sixty
16:12
Speaker 1: when there were as an English and Australian and other
16:17
Speaker 1: countries contingent of artists and writers, one of whom was
16:22
Speaker 1: Leonard Cohen, who has a small role in Polly's book.
16:27
Speaker 1: So one of the things we did was to do
16:30
Speaker 1: some Leonard Cohen songs as part of these lockdown sessions.
16:35
Speaker 1: We call them the Von Trapped sessions because we were
16:37
Speaker 1: trapped and they got quite an audience. And one of
16:43
Speaker 1: the songs we did was a new song I wrote
16:46
Speaker 1: called with Polly of course, Polly's Lovely Words. She did
16:50
Speaker 1: an audiobook as well, which she read herself, and we
16:54
Speaker 1: thought it'd be good to do a bit of music,
16:58
Speaker 1: incidental music here and there to emphasize what's going on
17:02
Speaker 1: in the book, which is not the usual way of
17:04
Speaker 1: doing an audio, but it's usually just the words that
17:07
Speaker 1: I wrote a few little bits, and in one of
17:09
Speaker 1: those things basically was yes I have ghost So yeah.
17:14
Speaker 1: So Rony just came on and played her harp and
17:19
Speaker 1: sang on that song and on everything else we did,
17:22
Speaker 1: and just showed us what a great voice, how well
17:26
Speaker 1: her voice blended with mine and that was a treat.
17:31
Speaker 1: So when we got to this album and Polly suggested
17:34
Speaker 1: we do this song called Between two Points from them
17:38
Speaker 1: more Goldfield Brothers who got Romany to sing that, and
17:44
Speaker 1: we thought she'd just come along and be a guest
17:47
Speaker 1: for the one song on some shows, But as soon
17:50
Speaker 1: as we got into rhearsals, she just kicked into gear
17:54
Speaker 1: and it became very quickly obviously that she was going
17:58
Speaker 1: to be coming on the whole tour and being part
18:01
Speaker 1: of our vocal section all too play instruments as well.
18:06
Speaker 1: In fact, funnily enough, the four girls women who were
18:11
Speaker 1: on my tour have formed their own band themselves, which
18:16
Speaker 1: they call Marshall Gilmore Webbs, and they've been doing shows
18:20
Speaker 1: in London and they're great, so we're hoping that's take
18:24
Speaker 1: on some legs.
18:27
Speaker 2: When I saw that they had formed that that group,
18:29
Speaker 2: it didn't shock because when I didn't shock me because
18:32
Speaker 2: they were like their section when they do great against
18:35
Speaker 2: this guy is I mean, it's phenomenal, and the chemistry
18:41
Speaker 2: between them is like palpable.
18:43
Speaker 1: Yeah, Chastry is great. Louise Marshall is just a beautiful
18:47
Speaker 1: piano player, and you know Hattie on the Heart and
18:51
Speaker 1: Romany on the Heart and Who when he plays guitar
18:54
Speaker 1: and Charlie Webb plays guitar and ukulele, and they will
18:57
Speaker 1: be percussion when required. They are a band while and
19:01
Speaker 1: they're in they accompany themselves on these shows. They've been
19:04
Speaker 1: doing us and they played their enormous part in all
19:09
Speaker 1: the music, all the songs that we were doing on
19:12
Speaker 1: the tour.
19:13
Speaker 2: When something's really like clicking like that and you're seeing
19:17
Speaker 2: that chemistry exists within your group, is that inspiring to you?
19:22
Speaker 1: Does that?
19:23
Speaker 2: I mean, you've been around counts, played with so many people,
19:27
Speaker 2: but I mean that that did feel like a pretty
19:30
Speaker 2: special group you put together there that was really clicking
19:33
Speaker 2: on all cylinders.
19:34
Speaker 1: It was really fantastic. These people are really good. They
19:39
Speaker 1: they feel emboldened to add their own things, you know,
19:43
Speaker 1: to be more experimental with the way that we're doing things.
19:47
Speaker 1: I mean, obviously, if I want to, I can always
19:50
Speaker 1: say after we've done something to someone, maybe we will
19:53
Speaker 1: ring that back next time. I didn't think I really
19:55
Speaker 1: had to do that at all, you know. And Roman
19:58
Speaker 1: is enthusiasm on stage and brilliance and she just g
20:05
Speaker 1: the whole band up into being a little bit more
20:08
Speaker 1: extra and and exciting. So I can only thank her
20:15
Speaker 1: and everyone else for what they gave to me in
20:19
Speaker 1: that toll thing.
20:21
Speaker 2: Yeah, we'll be back with more from David Gilmour after
20:25
Speaker 2: the break. I want to ask about the opening. I mean,
20:31
Speaker 2: to your point about pulling things back a bit. I
20:35
Speaker 2: was curious about two things, as it relates to your
20:40
Speaker 2: own plane. When when you're doing something live, particularly this tour,
20:43
Speaker 2: you open up with five Am, which is an incredible,
20:47
Speaker 2: you know, really beautiful guitar song. When I saw you
20:52
Speaker 2: guys at the Bowl, it was the most freezing fridgid
20:55
Speaker 2: night ever and I felt almost nervous as you guys started,
21:00
Speaker 2: because I was like, I don't know if I could
21:01
Speaker 2: get my fingers working this in this sort of environment.
21:07
Speaker 2: So so I guess I'm you're interested in both. How
21:10
Speaker 2: do you on this how did you on this tour
21:13
Speaker 2: gear up to open that way? And then my next
21:18
Speaker 2: question I'll ask next is but it's how do you
21:20
Speaker 2: pull yourself back throughout a gig when you feel yourself
21:24
Speaker 2: maybe if drifting too far one direction or another, are
21:27
Speaker 2: doing too much.
21:29
Speaker 1: I don't know. I mean, I have a desire to
21:32
Speaker 1: get to set a mood before one gets into the
21:38
Speaker 1: into the meat of the whole thing. I just want
21:41
Speaker 1: to quieten the audience down, get them into a more
21:47
Speaker 1: pensive and before bringing them back up into the excitement
21:53
Speaker 1: of the moments that you're going to try and get
21:56
Speaker 1: to later. It's hard to describe. And as for pulling
22:00
Speaker 1: myself back, and don't really try to pull myself back too.
22:04
Speaker 1: What I'm more trying to push myself forward.
22:07
Speaker 2: Is there an internal monologue you're having with yourself during.
22:11
Speaker 1: A show constant? Yes, about is this going the way
22:16
Speaker 1: that I wanted to? Is it going to lead on
22:19
Speaker 1: into the next thing in the most perfect way? Again,
22:23
Speaker 1: tough to explain how how those processes work.
22:27
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, is it more? I can't imagine you're
22:30
Speaker 2: you're able to put into words in those moments on
22:33
Speaker 2: stage exactly what might not be working or exactly what
22:36
Speaker 2: you want to happen next to lead to the next thing.
22:39
Speaker 2: But it must exist as a feeling in you right
22:40
Speaker 2: that you recognize, Yes.
22:42
Speaker 1: It is really just a feeling, and you know, just
22:45
Speaker 1: moving on into the next moment and hoping that everything
22:51
Speaker 1: will stay as wonderful as it is.
22:54
Speaker 2: You know, I was trying to think about as I
22:56
Speaker 2: was listening to to all your stuff again like kind
22:58
Speaker 2: of what you know, not to just just to try
23:01
Speaker 2: to get a sense of like my bearings of like
23:04
Speaker 2: what the kind of like if there's anything close to
23:07
Speaker 2: what you do and the closest I Again, this is
23:10
Speaker 2: not to like butter you up or anything, but you know,
23:13
Speaker 2: it's like it's almost like, you know, the way Miles
23:15
Speaker 2: Davis approached music or played, where it's this both you're
23:20
Speaker 2: able to craft and write these really beautiful lines but
23:24
Speaker 2: then also do a fair amount of improvising but tastefully.
23:30
Speaker 2: How have you honed those two skills? Like how do
23:34
Speaker 2: you hone both crafting beautiful melodic lines but then also
23:40
Speaker 2: going out and sometimes taking those to other places.
23:44
Speaker 1: Gosh, you ask tricky questions and you know, I'm just
23:50
Speaker 1: hunting for magic and emotion And that is the same
23:56
Speaker 1: process in the studio as it is on stage, you know.
24:00
Speaker 1: But then you've got all the opportunities in the world
24:04
Speaker 1: to go back and perfect things in the studio and
24:07
Speaker 1: work until you think things are as you know, as
24:13
Speaker 1: good as you're going to get them. But that is
24:16
Speaker 1: then a decision and it's made and you've got there
24:21
Speaker 1: and then when you get onto a stage, you can
24:26
Speaker 1: use that as your template, but then just kind of
24:29
Speaker 1: forget about it and just go off anywhere you want
24:32
Speaker 1: to at any time and feel free to just play.
24:37
Speaker 1: I mean, I've never well I did on this album
24:41
Speaker 1: on one track, maybe two tracks, actually learning one of
24:46
Speaker 1: my guitar sert's or a record. Never done it in
24:49
Speaker 1: the past, you know, I never did it with comfortably
24:51
Speaker 1: enim or any of those things. But you know, you've
24:55
Speaker 1: got a template of how the solo's going to start,
24:59
Speaker 1: and then your mind comes back to other lines you've
25:03
Speaker 1: done and might be a line on the record, but
25:07
Speaker 1: not a consistent solo from beginning to end. I leave
25:12
Speaker 1: that to other people. But luckily I can just leave
25:17
Speaker 1: that and be me, and that is that is a
25:20
Speaker 1: great joy.
25:22
Speaker 2: Have you found there's a way to practice improvisation for
25:25
Speaker 2: you or do you have to work yourself to a
25:27
Speaker 2: place to be able to freely improvise, or are you
25:31
Speaker 2: sort of.
25:31
Speaker 1: Just is that just how you are, that you're always
25:34
Speaker 1: sort of that's just how I am. I mean, some
25:37
Speaker 1: of some of the solos in the studios are pretty
25:41
Speaker 1: much one take things that you just have to find
25:44
Speaker 1: the right moment and just play it. And some of
25:48
Speaker 1: them are put together in all sorts of different ways.
25:52
Speaker 1: Sometimes you know, you do one, then you do another,
25:56
Speaker 1: and then you find good bits on different tracks and
26:00
Speaker 1: join them all together. Sometimes you sing a solo. Sometimes
26:05
Speaker 1: I get the microphone and sing, and because your voice
26:11
Speaker 1: can leap in leaps that are unusually you might not
26:15
Speaker 1: quite get to on the guitar, then you kind of
26:18
Speaker 1: learn them. There's a hundred different ways, and I still
26:22
Speaker 1: haven't quite worked out one proper way of getting to that.
26:29
Speaker 1: But once they're done and they've embedded themselves in your brain,
26:36
Speaker 1: it's then a joy to play them live and to
26:40
Speaker 1: be able to depart from them knowing that you can
26:42
Speaker 1: find your way back into something that is both new
26:46
Speaker 1: but familiar at the same time.
26:48
Speaker 2: Yeah, the singing is that is quite like I guess,
26:51
Speaker 2: like a jazz player, you know, like an ascopeters along
26:54
Speaker 2: and you know you can. I think that that is
26:57
Speaker 2: an interesting way of sort of imagining how to approach
27:00
Speaker 2: your instrument. Yeah, what made you want to learn note
27:06
Speaker 2: perfect or close to note perfect a couple of the
27:08
Speaker 2: solos on this particular record If you haven't done that before,
27:11
Speaker 2: and there was I.
27:13
Speaker 1: Think between two points was one of the moments where
27:17
Speaker 1: I was in my studio room a bit like this,
27:21
Speaker 1: and I plugged the gut through a little box called
27:24
Speaker 1: a zoom and that went straight to tape. And I
27:29
Speaker 1: don't know how this works or how it happened, but
27:33
Speaker 1: I felt I would write in the zone. And I
27:35
Speaker 1: just played a solo once that was it and left
27:40
Speaker 1: it on there, and I thought I really ought to
27:42
Speaker 1: go back and do that, plug it through a proper
27:44
Speaker 1: amp in a studio and do that, but I never
27:46
Speaker 1: did that, and the one recorded with my little zoom
27:50
Speaker 1: here replugged out through an amp in the studio later
27:54
Speaker 1: was the final one. And I liked that solo so
27:56
Speaker 1: much I thought I had nailed it. Didn't want to
28:01
Speaker 1: sound overconfident, but I thought I'd nailed it, and I thought, well,
28:05
Speaker 1: it's worth playing that one almost note from them when
28:09
Speaker 1: I'm doing it live, so I do actually learn it.
28:13
Speaker 1: And it's quite hard to learn and get them did right.
28:17
Speaker 1: And I've better. I know it is I've tried.
28:20
Speaker 2: I've tried getting your solos note perfect before it's and
28:22
Speaker 2: that's not easy. You know that idea of like, well
28:26
Speaker 2: I should maybe I should record that better. I probably
28:27
Speaker 2: could do that better if I put it, if I
28:29
Speaker 2: go to a proper studio, or I use this amp,
28:31
Speaker 2: or I like this particular sound if as a listener,
28:35
Speaker 2: just as a listener and a fan, it feels like that's.
28:38
Speaker 1: A tricky decision to make so many great I mean, I'm.
28:41
Speaker 2: Thinking when you said that made me think of you know,
28:44
Speaker 2: I guess the guitar line on like satisfaction for instance,
28:47
Speaker 2: right like Keith put that down as like a demo
28:49
Speaker 2: for horns. But then it's like, yeah, wait, why change that?
28:53
Speaker 2: You know, And those kinds of decisions.
28:56
Speaker 1: Are if it's a perfect that invested it, but you know,
28:58
Speaker 1: the the it's you've got to stick with when something
29:05
Speaker 1: is right, and if there's something not perfect about the sound,
29:11
Speaker 1: that's kind of secondary. I just think I could have
29:16
Speaker 1: learnt that solo, which I eventually did anyway, and just
29:20
Speaker 1: played it again for the record, but you'd always think
29:25
Speaker 1: something about the phrasing or the way the tremula was working,
29:32
Speaker 1: and the way this and that was not quite perfect.
29:37
Speaker 1: I did it once on the Animals Out years and
29:39
Speaker 1: years ago on on Dogs, where I did a solo
29:44
Speaker 1: and for some reason it got a raised but I
29:50
Speaker 1: had a stereo mix that I'd taken home because I
29:54
Speaker 1: thought that's nice, really nice, so I could learn it
29:57
Speaker 1: off that, and then I redid it. But I never
30:00
Speaker 1: thought that I got it quite as good again, you know,
30:03
Speaker 1: even though it's sort of note for note perfect, But
30:06
Speaker 1: how can you describe that, that difference between note for
30:11
Speaker 1: note perfect and original note for note perfect? You can't explain.
30:16
Speaker 2: Yeah, missing a touch, missing a feeling, missing, just something
30:19
Speaker 2: that's not quite which is why I guess for you,
30:21
Speaker 2: you don't find it necessarily worth it always to recreate
30:25
Speaker 2: those things, you know, How do you go about I
30:28
Speaker 2: was curious how you decide on a set list? You know,
30:32
Speaker 2: you have such a deep catalog. There's things like, you know,
30:37
Speaker 2: there's no way out of here right that I'm sure
30:39
Speaker 2: you haven't played in a long time.
30:40
Speaker 1: Yeah, that I bet people would love to hear. Yeah.
30:44
Speaker 2: Do you it is it more you in your band
30:49
Speaker 2: or just you picking things out? Do you consider what
30:51
Speaker 2: the audience like? How do you decide what a set list.
30:55
Speaker 1: Or should be? Well, we had a big list of
30:58
Speaker 1: everything that was reasonably possible, and that included all of
31:03
Speaker 1: the new album, and and given that I want to
31:08
Speaker 1: do some older songs, some from the seventies Pink Floyd.
31:13
Speaker 1: Here are some from the eighties and nineties Pink Floyd era.
31:18
Speaker 1: And we wrote all those songs down, a lot of them.
31:20
Speaker 1: And you know, you just can't do everything. And in fact,
31:25
Speaker 1: Polly kept saying to me, have you got your set
31:28
Speaker 1: list yet? And I say, getting to it, getting to it,
31:32
Speaker 1: and she say, have you got your set this yet?
31:36
Speaker 1: I'm getting there. I'm getting there. And I said, one day,
31:40
Speaker 1: have you got a set list? And she said, yep,
31:42
Speaker 1: here he is, and pretty much her sett list is
31:47
Speaker 1: what we did.
31:48
Speaker 2: That's great, that's that's useful to have a decisive decision maker.
31:53
Speaker 1: In the family. Yeah, it so it is.
31:57
Speaker 2: I'm so lucky when you say all reasonable songs are
32:01
Speaker 2: on the table. That qualifier reasonable, what is that?
32:05
Speaker 1: And entail for you? Well, you know there are you
32:08
Speaker 1: can I can play through my David Gilmour album from
32:12
Speaker 1: seventy eight and my About Face album and I really
32:15
Speaker 1: like them, but they feel like another lifetime to me.
32:18
Speaker 1: I haven't managed to go back to either of those
32:22
Speaker 1: two albums, although there's great tracks on there. But you
32:25
Speaker 1: can only do so so much. And I suppose I
32:29
Speaker 1: was thinking to some extent if they're that old, I
32:32
Speaker 1: should be doing more from the pleasing the audience aspect,
32:38
Speaker 1: from the pink Floyd eras of the day. You know,
32:43
Speaker 1: it's a it's a tough question, but I hope we
32:46
Speaker 1: got a good.
32:47
Speaker 2: Balance when you do revis well, I think you did
32:51
Speaker 2: by the way I mean, like the the blend the show,
32:54
Speaker 2: from the way the show rises and falls was quite spectacular.
32:59
Speaker 2: And there are plenty of crowd pleasing moments for the
33:03
Speaker 2: lay person, you know, who might just be coming to
33:05
Speaker 2: you fresh and stuff that people you know like, you know,
33:09
Speaker 2: stuff from your last couple of albums, and I think,
33:11
Speaker 2: you know, people do want to hear and that are
33:13
Speaker 2: you play beautifully and it's great.
33:15
Speaker 1: Well I felt on the tour, you know, I never
33:18
Speaker 1: felt that there was a moment when the audience were
33:23
Speaker 1: sort of sitting back, sort of griddling their thumbs, going,
33:27
Speaker 1: what's you know, play something that we know a bit more?
33:32
Speaker 1: You know, I never forgot that, and I always got
33:35
Speaker 1: to the end of each of the newer songs and
33:39
Speaker 1: thought that seemed to go really well from my standpoint
33:45
Speaker 1: in the band's sound by and the audience standpoint. So
33:49
Speaker 1: you can't want for more than that.
33:52
Speaker 2: One last break and We'll be back with David Gilmour.
33:57
Speaker 2: Everyone you know at the show I was at was
33:59
Speaker 2: thoroughly engaged, and you know, like I do think sometimes
34:03
Speaker 2: the audience is willing to go where the artist is
34:07
Speaker 2: confident taking them. You know, like I saw Dylan three
34:10
Speaker 2: years ago for the umpteenth time, and its entire set
34:14
Speaker 2: save for two songs were his last album, Rob and
34:18
Speaker 2: Rowdy Ways.
34:20
Speaker 1: It was amazing.
34:21
Speaker 2: Honest, I wouldn't have wanted anything else. I don't at
34:24
Speaker 2: this point, why do I need to hear? You know
34:26
Speaker 2: how fifty one for the eightieth time.
34:28
Speaker 1: You know, it's like it was.
34:30
Speaker 2: Really interesting that he was as bought in on that
34:33
Speaker 2: album as he was. He would just play every song
34:35
Speaker 2: from it, you know, and you know, similar with with you.
34:39
Speaker 2: It's like, you know, to your point, you could go through,
34:42
Speaker 2: play the first Gilmore album, you could play the second,
34:44
Speaker 2: you go back and do some voids, but it's like
34:47
Speaker 2: it really felt like you were bought in. It felt
34:49
Speaker 2: like the set list showed that too. It it just
34:52
Speaker 2: showed that it was more about crafting a not a
34:56
Speaker 2: narrative maybe, but you know, beginning, middle and end and
34:59
Speaker 2: having these moments in between.
35:01
Speaker 1: That's trying to get some narrative into it. It's odd
35:05
Speaker 1: to what it's all about.
35:07
Speaker 2: And I said that, but actually there is, yeah, and
35:09
Speaker 2: there is some one one of them power. One of
35:12
Speaker 2: the really powerful moments of the show, and I think
35:16
Speaker 2: it comes through in the movie too, is when you
35:18
Speaker 2: do in any tongue, how did you arrive at the
35:23
Speaker 2: and maybe I'll let you explain, because don't think I'll
35:25
Speaker 2: do a justice. How did you arrive at that stage?
35:28
Speaker 2: Presentation for that song?
35:30
Speaker 1: Well, that's a lovely song and it's very it feels
35:37
Speaker 1: very current right at the moment with words by Polly
35:40
Speaker 1: brilliant and the video film is by an LA guy
35:46
Speaker 1: called Danny Mdden. It's a brilliant piece of video. But
35:50
Speaker 1: he did it for himself and he won a competition
35:56
Speaker 1: and we had gone to him. A guy who does
36:00
Speaker 1: a lot of artwork Will Repel, saw that and we
36:05
Speaker 1: got him to do a video for another song from
36:09
Speaker 1: All that look called the Girl in the Yellow Dress.
36:13
Speaker 1: He did a beautiful video for that, but when we
36:17
Speaker 1: saw this one he had already done it. Just well
36:21
Speaker 1: that this would be so good for in any time.
36:24
Speaker 1: You said, could we have that one as well, So
36:26
Speaker 1: he said, take it, and it's as if it was
36:30
Speaker 1: made for that song, but it actually wasn't. That they
36:35
Speaker 1: marry together perfectly. It's shocking.
36:38
Speaker 2: It's almost shocking that it wasn't made for that song
36:40
Speaker 2: because they do marry beautifully, and it's interesting that that
36:43
Speaker 2: really is. Then when you think about it the stage presentation,
36:45
Speaker 2: we think about the trajectory of the song. It's a
36:48
Speaker 2: collaboration between you know, your wife, Polly with those words
36:52
Speaker 2: marrying beautifully with your music married.
36:55
Speaker 1: So it's just that's a really.
36:56
Speaker 2: Interesting sort of triumphic collaborative thing that's happening. How did
37:02
Speaker 2: that song come together? Was it her words first?
37:04
Speaker 1: Were you writing the music? And then she was in
37:07
Speaker 1: spy because it is quite quite a powerful song. No,
37:11
Speaker 1: I wrote the music first, and I don't remember quite
37:14
Speaker 1: when I wrote it on the piano, and she came
37:19
Speaker 1: up with that idea for that narrative and it's brilliant,
37:24
Speaker 1: and all those pieces just came together separately and joined
37:30
Speaker 1: together to create that thing Danny's video another thing together.
37:36
Speaker 2: Yeah, are you able to say, you know, working with Polly,
37:41
Speaker 2: are you able to say, I don't know if that
37:43
Speaker 2: one quite works for this, maybe we'd try something different.
37:47
Speaker 1: I don't really have to. I mean I would, we felt,
37:51
Speaker 1: but I mean we've been writing songs together since nineteen
37:55
Speaker 1: ninety four, and you know she has she takes a
38:01
Speaker 1: big part in all of it, you know, and you
38:03
Speaker 1: know she's there for most of the sessions. And you know,
38:07
Speaker 1: back in the early days of Division Bill, she wouldn't
38:11
Speaker 1: be at the sessions, but I take my day's work
38:14
Speaker 1: home with me and play it on my speakers and
38:18
Speaker 1: say what do you think? And she'd always have very good,
38:22
Speaker 1: pertinent ideas about what we were doing. So you could
38:26
Speaker 1: say she's a record producer as well. To some extent.
38:30
Speaker 2: Were you playing that album for her in order for
38:33
Speaker 2: her to write something or were you just playing it?
38:34
Speaker 1: And then that started to happen. Actually, you're working, you're
38:38
Speaker 1: working all day, and you're focusing on certain things, and
38:41
Speaker 1: you can you can go home and have a glass
38:46
Speaker 1: of wine and sit down and listen with a different perspective.
38:51
Speaker 1: You know, you left the work there and now it's
38:55
Speaker 1: you're enjoying some of the pleasure in it, but also
39:00
Speaker 1: looking at it more externally and finding things that could
39:07
Speaker 1: be better or could be slightly changed, and Polly was
39:10
Speaker 1: enormously and always has been valuable. You know what.
39:15
Speaker 2: The album came out of the year or so ago,
39:17
Speaker 2: and I listened to it a few times before I
39:20
Speaker 2: realized one of the liner notes and realized that the
39:24
Speaker 2: title track came from a jam you did with Richard
39:28
Speaker 2: Wright from Pink Floyd back in two thousand and seven.
39:32
Speaker 2: Can you tell me the story of that, like why
39:34
Speaker 2: you guys got together then, how you rediscovered this jam?
39:38
Speaker 1: And well we did. We toured in twenty fifteen and
39:43
Speaker 1: twenty sixteen on the back of the album back then,
39:49
Speaker 1: and the band was so sort of cooking and hot
39:53
Speaker 1: and great at the time, different bent and now mostly
39:58
Speaker 1: that I thought it'd be good for us to re
40:01
Speaker 1: gather together in a rule and put some ideas down.
40:05
Speaker 1: And I had lots of bits of snippets of music
40:10
Speaker 1: in my mind, and so we took the core band,
40:15
Speaker 1: not quite all of the band, but most of the band.
40:17
Speaker 1: And you know, when I'm working like that in the studio,
40:20
Speaker 1: I'm usually the only guitar player on stage. Live, you
40:25
Speaker 1: need someone to do some of the other parts and
40:28
Speaker 1: do all the other bits. And when you've got Rick
40:31
Speaker 1: Richard right as your keyboard player. You don't need the
40:35
Speaker 1: other guy around for that. So and we gathered together
40:41
Speaker 1: in a barn, greatly holes between the planks and the walls,
40:47
Speaker 1: and howling January and February wind coming through. We were freezing.
40:54
Speaker 1: We kept having to put bits of material up over
40:57
Speaker 1: the cracks and put heaters on them and try and
41:00
Speaker 1: get it going. But I think on the first morning,
41:03
Speaker 1: first Monday morning of that, I started playing a little
41:08
Speaker 1: riff and everyone was doing other things and thinking about this,
41:13
Speaker 1: and they're all and gradually they hear, and gradually they
41:18
Speaker 1: join in, and then they play that thing. It's only
41:22
Speaker 1: just the one thing that's no court changes, is just
41:25
Speaker 1: the basic riff, and that goes on for about twenty minutes.
41:28
Speaker 1: In fact, we've put the original jam on the album
41:33
Speaker 1: so that if anyone wants to find it, they can
41:37
Speaker 1: hear where it started and where it went to. You know,
41:43
Speaker 1: I had to hack it apart in pro tools and
41:46
Speaker 1: write new sections using the same drums for the choruses
41:51
Speaker 1: and the bridges, and yeah, and Rick's playing on it
41:55
Speaker 1: is just nostalgic and lovely.
41:59
Speaker 2: So was the idea to, you know, maybe to do
42:01
Speaker 2: another Floyd album at that time or now no, I don't.
42:06
Speaker 1: I think I was beyond thinking about doing another Floyd
42:09
Speaker 1: album at that time. We just finished Rattle at Lock
42:14
Speaker 1: album and tour and that whole thing that's up. But
42:16
Speaker 1: you know, these things to our process that take three
42:18
Speaker 1: or four years, and so I was just while the
42:24
Speaker 1: band was felt like we were playing together, like glued together,
42:30
Speaker 1: and because of the all the giegs we've done together,
42:34
Speaker 1: we thought we'd do this, and we did. There's a
42:35
Speaker 1: lot of stuff they're not much of which I've used,
42:39
Speaker 1: you know. That's the only one of those that I've
42:41
Speaker 1: actually properly used. Yeah, I have to have to let
42:45
Speaker 1: you go.
42:45
Speaker 2: But just just to clarify, because I mean, Rick passed
42:48
Speaker 2: before that album.
42:50
Speaker 1: On an Island album and tour two thousand and six,
42:54
Speaker 1: it was in January two thousand and seven that we
42:56
Speaker 1: had got together and played all this stuff, all these
43:00
Speaker 1: all these other tracks and ideas for about a week
43:05
Speaker 1: in a barn, and it took twenty years to get
43:09
Speaker 1: back to that track. So Kneally, glad you did it.
43:13
Speaker 2: Sounds sounds great on the album, sounds amazing live too.
43:18
Speaker 2: Thanks so much. I'm really really honor talking to you.
43:21
Speaker 1: Thank you guy much. In d.
43:25
Speaker 2: An episode description, you'll find a link to a playlist
43:27
Speaker 2: of our favorite songs featuring David Gilmour along with his
43:29
Speaker 2: newest album, Luck and Strange. Be sure to check out
43:32
Speaker 2: YouTube dot com slash Broken Record Podcast to see all
43:35
Speaker 2: of our video interviews, and be sure to follow us
43:38
Speaker 2: on Instagram at the Broken Record Pod. You can follow
43:41
Speaker 2: us on Twitter at Broken Record. Broken Records produced and
43:44
Speaker 2: edited by Leah Rose with marketing help from Eric Sandler
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Speaker 2: and Jordan McMillan. Our engineer is Ben Holladay. Broken Record
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