Nov. 18, 2021

Rory McLeod interview

Rory McLeod interview

Rory Mcleod joins me on episode 49. Rory is a modern day wandering minstrel . A multi-instrumentalist ‘folk singing’ troubadour, Rory has travelled far and wide, his trusty harmonica (plus an assortment of other instruments) has been with him every step of the way, including working as a musical clown in Mexico. His first band was ‘Have Mercy’, formed jamming in the markets of London alongside Steve Baker and another harmonica player. Rory has jammed and gone onto collaborate with a wide ran...

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Season 1 Diatonic Harmonica Folk Harmonica Rack Harmonica

Rory Mcleod joins me on episode 49.
Rory is a modern day wandering minstrel . A multi-instrumentalist ‘folk singing’ troubadour, Rory has travelled far and wide, his trusty harmonica (plus an assortment of other instruments) has been with him every step of the way, including working as a musical clown in Mexico.
His first band was ‘Have Mercy’, formed jamming in the markets of London alongside Steve Baker and another harmonica player. Rory has jammed and gone onto collaborate with a wide range of different performers around the world, including Michelle Shocked from the US and Australian Aboriginal Kev Carmody. From his travels he has picked up tunes which have armed his harmonica repertoire with complex rhythms and unique angles.
Rory won the Edinburgh Festival Street Busker of the Year and was the Texas Harmonica Champion of 1981.

Links:

Rory's website:
http://www.rorymcleod.com/

Bandcamp page:
https://rorymcleod.bandcamp.com/music

Buy a Sheng Chinese Harmonica:
https://harmonicas-direct.com/product/sheng/

Road Diaries:
http://www.rorymcleod.com/diaries/list.htm


Videos:

Have Mercy ‘Boodlam’ album:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WOkOZUD9GNg

NHL Festival 2011 with glass and telephone call:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqDqHkA-e2w

Loves Like A Rock:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B4gFDlm4oe0

Short interview on YouTube: Bluesman don’t really sing about their Grandmas:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_XPXxQDukBg


Some of the harmonica songs on Rory's albums (including the ones played in the podcast):

Album: Angry Love
Farewell welfare

Album: Kicking the sawdust
Baksheesh
Harmonicas dream

Album: Footsteps and Heartbeats
Love like a Rock
Moments shared
Take me home

Album: Travelling Home
India matea
Black Brown and White

Album: Lullabies for big babies
Come with me when I go
Long lost friend

Album: Mouth to mouth
Miners Picket dance
Sandpaper blues
One track mind  (with have mercy)

Album: Brave Faces
Klezmer tune: The Disciple of the Rabbi from Trisk.
Cut in Pay
Emperor’s new clothes

Album: Swings and Roundabouts
Lassoing the bees

Album: Songs for big little people
Train
Deep breath waltz
Winds March (played on Sheng Zheng)
Balloon dance
Direction song
Feather race

Album: Gusto
Disturbing The comfortable
Galloway girl
Wrong side of the wall

Single:
Didn’t he ramble


Podcast website:
https://www.harmonicahappyhour.com

Donations:
If you want to make a voluntary donation to help support the running costs of the podcast then please use this link (or visit the podcast website link above):
https://paypal.me/harmonicahappyhour?locale.x=en_GB

Podcast sponsors:
This podcast is sponsored by SEYDEL harmonicas - visit the oldest harmonica factory in the world at www.seydel1847.com  or on Facebook or Instagram at SEYDEL HARMONICAS
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01:35 - Born in London, with a Scottish Father and Russian Jewish mother, now living in Scotland

02:55 - Rory plays numerous instruments, but the harmonica was his first instrument along with guitar

04:29 - Harmonica is a travelling instrument, and he’s taken it with him all around the world

04:46 - Has been making up songs since he was young, all with a sense of rhythm

05:16 - First band was ‘Have Mercy’, along with Steve Baker.

06:31 - Started out playing with blues records, on the chromatic initially

08:24 - Bought his first bass harmonica from a shop in Germany

09:34 - Rory uses lots of whooping and hollering in his harmonica playing and influence of early blues harmonica players

10:21 - Have Mercy band had three harmonica players

11:13 - Have Mercy used to soak their harmonicas in water (not a good idea)

12:44 - The band started out busking on the streets of London and were invited to Germany, where they stayed for several years

13:02 - Rory has travelled all around the world with his harmonica, including working as a musical clown

14:17 - Time he almost met the composer Yip Harburg, who wrote Somewhere Over The Rainbow

15:04 - Travelled to China and Africa, and the invention of the harmonica in China (the ‘Sheng’)

15:48 - Why Rory travelled

16:28 - Played with a reggae band (Pressure) in Austin, Texas

17:08 - Has a real entertainment element to his live shows

19:08 - How Rory transitioned from a traveller to a recording artist, and lyrics

20:56 - How Rory became a solo artist

22:51 - Different approaches to songwriting

24:41 - Albums released on cassette before Angry Love album

24:53 - Angry Love album from 1981 and whooping started by pigmies?

26:22 - Kicking The Sawdust album in 1983, with Baksheesh Dance song

28:19 - Harmonika’s Dream song

30:03 - Footsteps and Heartbeats album from 1987, including Loves Like A Rock Song

33:50 - How Rory learns some of the exotic tunes and rhythms he has picked up from other countries

35:00 - Long Lost Friend song played using a glass

36:06 - Does a lot of instrumental songs on harmonica on his albums

36:57 - Often uses chromatic to play tunes

37:30 - Klezmer tunes on harmonica (Rory has Russian Jewish descendants)

38:24 - Lassoing The Bees song choreographed by Rory’s partner

39:27 - Most recent song Didn’t He Ramble, written as a eulogy

40:05 - Where you can get hold of Rory’s songs

40:29 - Other artists Rory has performed and recorded with

43:07 - Recorded the theme tune to UK TV programme, Creature Comforts

44:05 - Has released a book of his lyrics and chords

44:21 - On his website is a diary of Rory’s travels

45:02 - Won the Edinburgh Festival Street Busker of the Year and has also been arrested for busking in London

46:48 - Texas Harmonica Champion of 1981 and BBC best live Folk Act in 2002

48:02 - 10 minute question

49:43 - Harmonicas of choice

50:38 - Favoured keys of diatonic

51:04 - Different tunings

52:13 - Amps and mics

52:53 - Using a rack and first position

53:27 - More on mics and amps

54:21 - During lockdown realised how playing keeps him fit

54:38 - Embouchre

55:16 - Equipment used for recording

56:00 - Future plans

56:16 - Has been writing a book during lockdown

WEBVTT

00:00:00.322 --> 00:00:02.263
Rory McLeod joins me on episode 49.

00:00:03.024 --> 00:00:08.048
Rory is a modern day wandering minstrel, a multi-instrumentalist folk singing troubadour.

00:00:08.089 --> 00:00:10.050
Rory has travelled far and wide.

00:00:10.230 --> 00:00:18.077
His trusty harmonica, plus an assortment of other instruments, has been with him every step of the way, including working as a musical clown in Mexico.

00:00:18.318 --> 00:00:24.803
His first band was Have Mercy, formed jamming in the markets of London alongside Steve Baker and another harmonica player.

00:00:25.123 --> 00:00:34.274
Rory has jammed and gone on to collaborate with a wide range of different performers around the world, including Michelle from the US and Australian Aboriginal Kev Carmody.

00:00:34.433 --> 00:00:40.622
From his travels, he has picked up tunes which have armed his harmonica repertoire with complex rhythms and unique angles.

00:00:40.942 --> 00:00:46.691
Rory won the Edinburgh Festival Street Busker of the Year and was the Texas Harmonica Champion of 1981.

00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:00.000
.

00:01:18.146 --> 00:01:20.367
Hello Rory McLeod and welcome to the podcast.

00:01:20.927 --> 00:01:22.250
Hi Neil, thanks for having me mate.

00:01:22.670 --> 00:01:34.299
Thank you very much for joining today Rory and yes you were quite an all-rounder as we'll get into but of course harmonica has been an important part of your music since the early days.

00:01:34.599 --> 00:01:36.921
You were born in London but you've now moved to Scotland.

00:01:37.001 --> 00:01:41.745
I think you've got a Scottish father and what kind of Russian descendants as well on your mother's side.

00:01:42.227 --> 00:01:43.587
Yeah that's right, Russian Jewish.

00:01:43.688 --> 00:01:51.656
Mum and dad ran away to get married because of religion and I was the first born so yeah that's right Mum was from East End, Grandma was from Russia, Mum was from Hackney, Dad's from Glavin.

00:01:51.896 --> 00:01:54.358
Okay, so now you're back up in Scotland.

00:01:54.459 --> 00:01:55.439
Is that in Glasgow?

00:01:55.640 --> 00:01:56.980
No, I was in Glasgow just now.

00:01:57.022 --> 00:02:01.206
I'm in the Scottish Borders now, further south, going towards Lothumbria.

00:02:01.605 --> 00:02:02.466
No, I'm not in Glasgow now.

00:02:02.507 --> 00:02:05.370
I was there last week, singing around campfires and various things.

00:02:06.010 --> 00:02:11.317
I often ask people about what the music seems like, where they are and when they grew up, but you're currently in Scotland.

00:02:11.356 --> 00:02:14.479
Is that from a musical perspective or other reasons?

00:02:15.221 --> 00:02:16.021
All kinds of reasons.

00:02:16.062 --> 00:02:19.384
Yeah, love probably, kids being born up here.

00:02:19.425 --> 00:02:21.227
It's cheaper than London.

00:02:21.427 --> 00:02:22.968
London, I couldn't afford to live in London anymore.

00:02:23.049 --> 00:02:24.270
I love visiting London.

00:02:24.390 --> 00:02:26.612
I was there playing last month.

00:02:27.033 --> 00:02:32.058
Music up here, there's sessions and things I go to and have fun around fires, that kind of thing.

00:02:32.258 --> 00:02:33.099
Bring the trombone.

00:02:33.721 --> 00:02:34.741
I bring the moothies as well.

00:02:34.782 --> 00:02:37.344
We call them moothies up here, of course, in Northumbria and Scotland.

00:02:37.544 --> 00:02:41.848
And I love jamming and playing along with people, apart from singing my own songs, of course.

00:02:42.389 --> 00:02:43.730
That's kind of what I do, really.

00:02:44.331 --> 00:02:49.497
So it's hard not to know where to start with you, Rory, because looking over your life, you have done so much.

00:02:49.538 --> 00:02:50.679
It's pretty incredible.

00:02:50.758 --> 00:02:54.502
So we'll touch on that, but obviously focus on the harmonica as much as we can.

00:02:54.543 --> 00:02:56.224
So you mentioned the trombone there.

00:02:56.264 --> 00:02:58.026
You play numerous instruments.

00:02:58.106 --> 00:03:01.691
So what instruments do you play and where did the harmonica come into that?

00:03:02.010 --> 00:03:04.112
Okay, well, the harmonica really was first.

00:03:04.173 --> 00:03:09.699
So my dad bought me a 10-hole chromatic when I was about 10 or 11 and I found tunes on it.

00:03:09.739 --> 00:03:13.103
You know, I just started trying to play tunes on it and even some blues.

00:03:13.562 --> 00:03:22.872
Eventually, I don't know how it happened, but I guess I was brought up with the Beatles and then that turned into rock and roll And then the word rock, I went looking for secondhand records and found blues by accident.

00:03:23.213 --> 00:03:24.955
Rock Island Lion and things like that.

00:03:25.156 --> 00:03:26.377
And I love Chuck Berry.

00:03:26.437 --> 00:03:29.139
So that kind of developed from there, evolved.

00:03:29.620 --> 00:03:31.442
I found, I guess, a Titanic.

00:03:31.502 --> 00:03:34.765
I don't know what made me buy that or if someone told me about it.

00:03:35.126 --> 00:03:36.467
But I started playing that, really.

00:03:36.508 --> 00:03:40.352
Started playing that and listened to the blues guys, really, who I liked.

00:03:40.431 --> 00:03:45.877
And I'd walk my girlfriend home and I missed the last bus and I walked everywhere then because most of my friends had motorbikes.

00:03:45.918 --> 00:03:49.542
But I was walking to girlfriend home and And that's how I learned to play.

00:03:49.581 --> 00:03:52.344
I just played to myself as a way of using that time, working home.

00:03:52.805 --> 00:03:54.706
So was the harmonica your first instrument?

00:03:55.048 --> 00:03:55.687
It kind of was.

00:03:55.768 --> 00:04:03.135
I knew three chords on the guitar probably back then, a Woody Guthrie song probably or something, country-ish, old-timey kind of things.

00:04:03.256 --> 00:04:05.157
But yeah, I'd say harmonica was actually,

00:04:05.318 --> 00:04:05.479
yeah.

00:04:05.998 --> 00:04:12.086
Some of the many instruments you play in your very entertaining sets are, you know, you play guitars, you say they're trombone.

00:04:12.385 --> 00:04:13.606
You have a kind of stomp box.

00:04:13.668 --> 00:04:17.872
I think you made yourself, you sing, you play banjo, finger cymbals.

00:04:17.872 --> 00:04:20.589
So various more exotic instruments as well.

00:04:20.690 --> 00:04:22.684
So spoons as well.

00:04:27.266 --> 00:04:28.766
Where does the harmonica fit into all that?

00:04:29.187 --> 00:04:29.927
Go on, let's see.

00:04:30.007 --> 00:04:33.190
Well, I guess harmonica's small, and it's a travelling instrument, really.

00:04:33.550 --> 00:04:37.095
Unlike a piano, you can't say, you know, oh, I left my piano in my other trouser pocket.

00:04:37.175 --> 00:04:41.517
But travelling, I guess, and walking, that's probably why I play harmonica.

00:04:41.577 --> 00:04:46.343
I used to want a piano, but never had room for one at home, and I wish I'd known accordions existed then.

00:04:46.382 --> 00:04:51.666
I was making songs as well, pretty young age, you know, making up things, you know, that I liked.

00:04:51.966 --> 00:04:53.369
So I liked rock and roll, so I liked rhythm.

00:04:53.749 --> 00:04:56.752
I was playing rhythmically and playing melodically and...

00:04:57.232 --> 00:05:05.581
So the spoons also are easy to hold and travel and quite useful if you're travelling because you have a bowl of soup given to you or whatever instead of plastic spoons.

00:05:05.600 --> 00:05:06.701
So they're quite percussive.

00:05:07.103 --> 00:05:15.471
I've played along with oud players or Moroccan or flamenco palmers and jamming with people led me on different musical journeys.

00:05:16.112 --> 00:05:19.214
I ended up joining a band or been asked to join.

00:05:19.716 --> 00:05:23.339
You might have heard of Have Mercy, but they were a jug band and we played acoustic.

00:05:23.839 --> 00:05:25.221
Was this the band with Steve Baker?

00:05:25.401 --> 00:05:26.463
Steve Baker was in it too.

00:05:26.663 --> 00:05:30.048
Chris Turner I was the original harmonica player in the band.

00:05:30.288 --> 00:05:33.192
Chris moved to the States, left the band in Henry's hands.

00:05:33.252 --> 00:05:35.956
Henry Hegan, who plays harmonica too, actually lives in Germany now.

00:05:36.156 --> 00:05:40.221
And Henry and I met, we got chucked out of school together, ended up in the same school.

00:05:40.423 --> 00:05:41.423
And that's how we first met.

00:05:41.564 --> 00:05:44.408
So this was in London when Steve, before Steve moved to Germany.

00:05:44.728 --> 00:05:45.209
That's right.

00:05:45.329 --> 00:05:48.334
We were busking down Portobello Market and had Camden Lock.

00:05:48.577 --> 00:05:50.959
That's when I started playing with other people more.

00:05:51.220 --> 00:05:52.461
I played with a friend at school.

00:05:52.560 --> 00:05:53.682
I loved Muddy Waters.

00:05:53.721 --> 00:05:55.463
You know, I loved the slide guitar.

00:05:55.483 --> 00:05:56.725
So I was playing a bit of that.

00:05:57.064 --> 00:05:58.726
It was really playing with Have Mercy, I guess.

00:05:59.026 --> 00:06:02.209
So, yeah, so we'll get on to your many travels shortly.

00:06:02.629 --> 00:06:06.533
You're a folk musician, yeah, but you go into various different genres.

00:06:06.574 --> 00:06:12.699
You know, you play some blues, as you said there, some flamenco, calypso, Celtic, all sorts of stuff, yeah, you play.

00:06:12.939 --> 00:06:18.543
And you write some great songs as well yourself, you know, in the true folk singer mould.

00:06:18.543 --> 00:06:19.665
of a kind of protest

00:06:23.211 --> 00:06:24.454
song.

00:06:24.653 --> 00:06:29.843
So you talked about,

00:06:30.524 --> 00:06:37.576
you know, getting some old records and I think you picked up some sort of Sonny Terry, Sonny Boy Williams sort of records.

00:06:37.636 --> 00:06:40.461
Is that how you started sort of learning the harmonica in earnest?

00:06:40.641 --> 00:06:43.144
And presumably you got diatonic by that stage as well.

00:06:43.649 --> 00:06:44.870
Yeah, I think it was.

00:06:44.971 --> 00:06:47.312
Although it's funny because I think I had a Jimmy Reese.

00:06:47.353 --> 00:06:50.495
I was trying to play stuff on the chromatic, but it didn't have the same tone.

00:06:50.536 --> 00:06:57.901
I was playing straight as well, blowing and using the button, but it just sounded quite tame, really, compared with the diatonic sound where you can bend notes.

00:06:58.002 --> 00:07:01.384
So I loved Rice Miller, Sonny Boy 2.

00:07:01.504 --> 00:07:03.607
I loved Sonny Boy 1 as well, and Big Walter.

00:07:03.887 --> 00:07:06.149
I loved Louis Armstrong, funnily enough, though, as well.

00:07:06.250 --> 00:07:10.333
I mean, I loved jazz, and I loved hearing his trumpet solos were fantastic.

00:07:10.733 --> 00:07:43.947
The way he constructed a solo on West End Blues for example long notes and then flying off in some dynamic way that inspired me as much as anything else and the hot club stuff Django Reinhardt stuff I loved it all to be honest Neil it was all the folk music I mean we grew up listening to at school reggae all my Caribbean friends you know we loved reggae we heard reggae at school Bob Marley of course eventually came into the scene with Desmond Decker and the Israelites and those were hits when I was at school so all that kind of stuff fed in somewhere somewhere it's rhythm I love rhythm them a lot

00:07:44.168 --> 00:07:57.942
as you say so it sounded like you probably first started listening to harmonica blues harmonica which most people do yeah but then you you know you diversified your harmonica sound from all these different influences yeah so did you just kind of pick that up yourself as you know from the music you liked and playing along to it

00:07:58.524 --> 00:08:18.826
yeah i think i did i mean i'd be a tune in my head like when i was first playing chromatic i i was making up tunes as well but the having the button obviously gave me notes that i couldn't normally get but i didn't i didn't know that at the time that i couldn't get certain notes i was just playing along so um Eventually, I loved the different octaves you can get on a chromatic, the rich low notes and the high notes.

00:08:19.286 --> 00:08:24.250
I just found tunes I liked, and I was jamming quite a lot, playing with Irish friends from Donegal.

00:08:24.692 --> 00:08:28.636
When I lived in Germany, I would go along to Hohner in Hamburg there.

00:08:28.956 --> 00:08:30.338
They'd say, oh, we've got this scene.

00:08:30.358 --> 00:08:30.798
Would you like it?

00:08:30.817 --> 00:08:31.338
It was spinning.

00:08:31.418 --> 00:08:36.323
On the shelf was dust, gathering dust for ages, and it was a bass harmonica, an Educator.

00:08:36.344 --> 00:08:37.586
It was called Educator Bass.

00:08:38.066 --> 00:08:39.427
And I said, God, yeah.

00:08:39.488 --> 00:08:41.048
And he said, well, 12 marks and it's yours.

00:08:41.089 --> 00:08:41.710
So I did that.

00:08:41.769 --> 00:08:42.171
I got that.

00:08:42.730 --> 00:08:43.471
I don't think I played it.

00:08:43.471 --> 00:08:45.214
that much at the time, but it was great for recording.

00:08:45.835 --> 00:08:47.876
I just loved the sounds you can get from that.

00:08:48.057 --> 00:08:54.803
You know, the bass harmonica is all blow notes, but the way it fills space without getting in the way, you can feel it breathing like a bullfrog.

00:08:55.184 --> 00:08:57.966
You've done some recordings with the bass harmonica as well.

00:08:58.008 --> 00:08:58.807
Yeah, that's right.

00:08:59.009 --> 00:09:01.390
And I mean, in a way, that's what took me to the trombone.

00:09:01.551 --> 00:09:07.157
I was looking for a tuba, actually, but that fat bass sound that you get, that bullfrog-y sound on the bass harmonica.

00:09:07.177 --> 00:09:08.138
I've got one here, actually.

00:09:09.960 --> 00:09:12.102
You can take your mouth away and it's still humming.

00:09:12.163 --> 00:09:27.599
You know, I love that, like a joha so it's beautiful and it's yeah I kind of arrange in my head if I'm jamming with people I'm really listening quite a lot and I just think oh I think some bass would be nice on this bit or some spoons and it's just you know trying not to get in the way

00:09:27.940 --> 00:09:43.816
you talk about rhythm being key to you and you see that's that works very well in the harmonica and you do play quite a lot you've got quite a lot of sort of Sonny Terry type style with a rhythm and it's kind of whooping and hollering so that's something that was quite key in your harmonica playing early on as well, was it?

00:09:44.116 --> 00:09:45.958
Well, I loved Noah Lewis, actually.

00:09:46.259 --> 00:09:46.980
He was fantastic.

00:09:47.019 --> 00:09:49.001
I loved Noah, and there was a guy, D.

00:09:49.022 --> 00:09:51.605
Ford Bailey was someone I discovered.

00:09:52.004 --> 00:09:54.607
They played rhythm, lovely rhythms and swell.

00:09:54.927 --> 00:09:55.589
I remember D.

00:09:56.049 --> 00:09:58.591
Ford Bailey was the first black guy to play at the Grand Ole Opry, I think.

00:09:58.873 --> 00:10:07.902
And it was funny because I was in Zimbabwe playing, and I found out I was the first white guy to play at this particular hall in Bulawayo, and I was playing the harmonica.

00:10:07.981 --> 00:10:10.664
So I was thinking, harmonica players of the world unite, kind of thing.

00:10:10.725 --> 00:10:13.687
But yeah, so their rhythm playing was great, that kind stuff.

00:10:14.269 --> 00:10:19.374
Obviously, trains feature a lot in things like that, but of course I love Sonny Terry and Gus Cannon.

00:10:19.634 --> 00:10:21.155
Peg Leg Sam was another guy I liked.

00:10:21.437 --> 00:10:23.278
Chris, who was with Have Mercy, was a great player.

00:10:23.418 --> 00:10:26.822
He was a wonderful player and had a nice ear for stuff, you know.

00:10:27.163 --> 00:10:28.104
So did you have three

00:10:28.163 --> 00:10:29.565
harmonica players in this band then?

00:10:29.985 --> 00:10:31.126
Well, it was actually Jan.

00:10:31.246 --> 00:10:33.990
So Chris had left, but Chris, I knew before he left.

00:10:34.009 --> 00:10:36.032
So it was Jan Eccles.

00:10:36.131 --> 00:10:37.474
Jan was from Louisiana.

00:10:37.874 --> 00:10:39.014
Jan played quite rhythmic stuff.

00:10:39.255 --> 00:10:40.777
It was Steve and myself.

00:10:40.998 --> 00:10:41.798
Yeah, and Henry.

00:10:42.198 --> 00:10:42.719
Henry sang.

00:10:42.739 --> 00:11:51.599
Well, I had was lead singer too Henry now plays harmonica these days he's got a lovely feel actually Henry I like his feel so yeah that was we kind of found ways of arranging cross rhythms without getting in each other's way you know we shared you know someone else would take a solo and then I'd chug the rhythm and then it was my turn and you know Jan would play a chug and we got some really good cross rhythms going you know Jan and I he was a rhythmic player too so it was acoustic you know we were an acoustic band it wasn't electric harp we blow the reeds to bits I mean we're trying to find volume you know we foolishly soaked them in water back then it was the time when harmonicas were put together with tacks you know they were like carpet tacks almost tear them apart and uh you know they leaked like anything you know the air so i think the water somehow sealed them a little for a wee while but of course then you got the combs swelling up and tearing your mouth to bits yeah we arranged stuff together there was an album called boodle lamb so But we were playing Jug Band stuff.

00:11:51.639 --> 00:11:54.866
So we played Gus Cannon stuff, going to German.

00:11:54.907 --> 00:11:56.250
We played Stealing, of course.

00:11:56.291 --> 00:11:58.154
There was a bit of Ragtime.

00:11:58.375 --> 00:12:00.541
We played some Muddy Waters.

00:12:00.994 --> 00:12:03.956
stuff, Mud's Boogie, we played Wine Spodioli, it was a big hit.

00:12:04.297 --> 00:12:10.001
In fact, Big Walter's tune, Have a Good Time, was a real stable kind of song for us.

00:12:10.241 --> 00:12:11.023
I Feel So Good.

00:12:11.643 --> 00:12:19.929
We were running around on each other's piggybacks, you know, and playing through hosepipes and swinging them around our heads, playing through them like some Leslie Speaker.

00:12:19.950 --> 00:12:21.652
It was quite physical actually.

00:12:21.812 --> 00:12:25.754
The folk clubs weren't that fond of us because we were quite physical players.

00:12:25.775 --> 00:12:29.619
We wasn't quite polite and precious like, you know, some folk tunes can be.

00:12:29.759 --> 00:12:35.063
Sounds like you the great tradition of harmonica groups, you know, doing all these kind of physical things, isn't

00:12:35.083 --> 00:12:35.124
it?

00:12:35.144 --> 00:12:36.145
Yeah, that's true, yeah.

00:12:36.405 --> 00:12:38.248
This is how you got started, isn't it?

00:12:38.268 --> 00:12:43.432
You were busking on the streets of London with this jug band and your music career started from there, didn't it?

00:12:43.933 --> 00:12:44.695
That's right, really.

00:12:44.735 --> 00:12:54.205
Yeah, I mean, we were busking and I don't have an amp now, but I even busked with a little box escort, tiny little thing, battery, and got crowds sometimes doing my songs, of course.

00:12:54.284 --> 00:12:56.908
But yeah, as a band, that's how we started.

00:12:57.168 --> 00:13:00.772
We got invited to play in Germany and then we stayed living there for quite a while.

00:13:00.912 --> 00:13:02.033
touring around, playing.

00:13:02.333 --> 00:13:10.062
So you went from London to Germany and this gets onto the topic of you were a very well-traveled man and that you've traveled all around the world playing music.

00:13:10.142 --> 00:13:12.764
And you've talked about the portability, the harmonica and the spoons.

00:13:12.845 --> 00:13:15.326
And so this is, you know, you've really lived a life, haven't you?

00:13:15.788 --> 00:13:21.354
You were a fire eater in a Mexican circus where you also, I think, played a bit of harmonica as part of that as well.

00:13:21.553 --> 00:13:22.335
I did, that's right.

00:13:22.375 --> 00:13:23.956
Yes, I was a musical clown.

00:13:24.197 --> 00:13:24.736
How did I join?

00:13:24.817 --> 00:13:27.059
I joined as a fire eater because I'd learned to do that.

00:13:27.120 --> 00:13:30.864
In fact, when we were busking with Ab Mercy and then Portobello, we broke a string.

00:13:30.864 --> 00:15:03.743
then my turn to go and eat some fire and keep the crowd that's what I did in the circus but I also did a bit of pantomime clowning I was a vagabond clown with my harmonica so I did a train and I did a kind of pantomime thing going around the circus ring and saying goodbye and it was a little narrative that I had that's right Mexico that's where I learnt my Spanish really no one spoke English so I was in the deep end there so yeah jamming here and there that's right travelling and it's a way between earning a living farming or digging or cooking or whatever else there was the music this course as well yeah and it's it's it's a universal language so i was making songs still singing to people who didn't understand the words but i was i'd made all these songs and tunes that i was playing to people who might not necessarily understand english until actually there was someone who came up to me i ended up in it was in chiapas and a woman came up i was singing a couple of songs she said i wish to work with this guy god i was his secretary you must meet him i'm going to give his phone number he's in new york city and it was yip harburg who wrote over the rainbow and wrote buddy can you spare a dime i never got there in time I end up in Texas waylaid there in Austin and on my way to New Orleans never got to New Orleans on that particular trip yeah no it's music's a passport in a way definitely a language China Gambia parts of Africa playing with people playing in Zimbabwe there as I said earlier they've got a whole tradition of mouth bows chip and darnies they're called Frank Gombo I found him he was on a postage stamp and I found him he was a baker for a music teacher so I jammed with him interviewed him a little But I've got some footage of him somewhere on a video, somewhere that I took.

00:15:03.903 --> 00:15:06.285
And in China, well, that's where the harmonica came from.

00:15:06.485 --> 00:15:07.947
So you've got the Sheng there.

00:15:08.148 --> 00:15:09.789
I enjoyed all the street musicians there.

00:15:10.110 --> 00:15:11.672
Lovely accordion playing.

00:15:11.711 --> 00:15:13.714
And there was two string fiddles called an Ahu.

00:15:14.033 --> 00:15:18.499
And that was tribal, 68 different tribes in China that play with their own folk music and language.

00:15:18.818 --> 00:15:22.423
People in China appreciate the fact that the harmonica comes from China originally.

00:15:22.602 --> 00:15:23.784
I don't know whether they know that.

00:15:24.125 --> 00:15:27.589
I mean, obviously the accordion, the free-flowing reeds, again, accordions there.

00:15:27.629 --> 00:15:33.995
And the pentatonic scales they play, like Robbie Byrne's tunes go down well, Scottish tunes, because they're quite pentatonic, like the pipes.

00:15:34.395 --> 00:15:36.177
But I don't know if I knew that.

00:15:36.217 --> 00:15:37.799
I mean, the banjos there were fantastic.

00:15:37.820 --> 00:15:40.543
There were these fretless banjos, but they had snakeskin on them, you know.

00:15:40.763 --> 00:15:42.684
I was jamming and playing, got a crowd.

00:15:42.745 --> 00:15:47.789
I think I would have got a crowd anyway, to be honest, Neil, because I was quite exotic being, you know, some tall guy with a big nose.

00:15:48.191 --> 00:15:53.135
So you travelled to play music, or did you travel and play music where you went?

00:15:53.196 --> 00:15:54.116
Which way round was it?

00:15:54.496 --> 00:15:55.678
Oh, God, different things.

00:15:55.899 --> 00:15:59.142
We travelled meant to mend a broken heart, see what's round the next corner.

00:15:59.403 --> 00:16:34.639
Music was a way of surviving I think on the way playing for your next meal that kind of thing and having fun with it and also as I say busking language it is a language so I'd be with parties and people are playing singing there'll be fiddles so jamming along and being taken on journeys I mean that's kind of how we all might learn you know different how to play different things but music has different accents rhythms have different accents where syncopations happen or you realize that you can play harmonica or anything with a reggae band I play with a reggae band in Austin and they That reggae band called Pressure, we supported Peter Tosh and we supported Dennis Brown.

00:16:35.041 --> 00:16:37.423
The harmonica fits all kinds of, yeah.

00:16:37.644 --> 00:16:41.908
It's the kind of instrument that keeps people, keeps you company if you're on your own as well.

00:16:41.947 --> 00:16:48.735
And it's got grace notes to it, you know, bends and so, like the pipes have and obviously fiddles have, so.

00:16:48.816 --> 00:16:48.995
Yeah,

00:16:49.716 --> 00:16:55.438
it's good to hear that, you know, like you say, the harmonica fits in so much, different types of music.

00:16:55.678 --> 00:17:08.130
People think that it doesn't, yeah, people think that it's just a blues instrument, yeah, so, but, you know, I think you show, and the different people I have on the podcast with the different styles, but you really show that, yeah, it can kind of fit anywhere, yeah, and you can just play along in it and it fits in great, so.

00:17:08.490 --> 00:17:19.460
One thing that you, that comes out from all your traveling and running from your shows is your level of entertainment, like, you know, you've worked in the circus, you've traveled all around the world, you've done all these different things and been to all these exotic places.

00:17:19.740 --> 00:17:31.958
You know, has that really sort of helped shape your show so that, you know, the entertainment, the fact that you're playing today I

00:17:31.978 --> 00:17:37.567
think it is, I mean

00:17:38.817 --> 00:18:37.894
Had Mercy themselves, as a band, we were quite physical, you know, we weren't playing in our heads, we were physically playing harmonica, blowing, you know, blowing our faces or something we call it, whipping it to a plank, you know, I mean, quite physical with a guitar sometimes, you know, like, I think it does, yeah, I mean, because it's a language, I mean, just like juggling and pantomime is a kind of language, you know, even trying to describe something and we're using your hands, so, yeah, all that did feed into stuff, I mean, obviously the circus stuff, I developed some kind of act, how just by improvising living in the moment sometimes at a gig things happen a baby might start crying or if there's a baby there that is or a dog or a police car might go by and you jam along with that all kinds of things can happen that trigger off things and you're kind of being quite playful.

00:18:38.173 --> 00:18:43.239
If you're sensitive, you know, you're listening, because I think obviously listening to people, that's like the secret for anything really.

00:18:43.278 --> 00:18:46.961
Like if you're jamming with people, if you're in conversation, listening's the secret.

00:18:47.041 --> 00:18:53.067
So being kind of tuned in to what's around you, I suppose, then you become creative in that kind of way and have fun.

00:18:53.387 --> 00:18:55.869
It's kind of having fun and living in the moment, I suppose.

00:18:56.190 --> 00:19:01.494
You know, obviously live performance, I think, is where you're really at, yeah, and that really comes out from what you're saying there.

00:19:01.515 --> 00:19:07.780
But you have recorded a lot albums going back to 1981, your first album, which was Angry Love.

00:19:08.040 --> 00:19:17.632
So at what stage did you go from being, you know, travelling around, playing music with all sorts of different people, all sorts of different cultures to start, you know, to start recording?

00:19:17.672 --> 00:19:22.396
You said that you went from London to Germany and then, you know, sort of what happened with your sort of recording career?

00:19:22.876 --> 00:19:23.176
Yes.

00:19:23.258 --> 00:19:24.719
Well, we did record in Germany, that's right.

00:19:25.079 --> 00:19:26.641
And I did a few demos here and there.

00:19:26.701 --> 00:19:28.282
There was a youth club that I played in.

00:19:28.864 --> 00:19:31.987
First thing I probably recorded was all voice, it was all acapella.

00:19:32.207 --> 00:20:14.531
And I was singing all the bass parts on it worked out an arrangement so even the rhythm at the time i think i called it mouth music now it might be called beatbox i suppose but i was using my you know my teeth and my you know for percussive things and my uh so experimenting even with recording in austin i got a chance because someone has some some money do a bit of recording there for quite a while i was a bit worried about uh recording because i thought i'm going to be captured here on they won't want to hear the songs after they've heard them of course i was very foolish and green about that because actually it kind of go hand in hand getting other work but I enjoyed the recording process because it's like painting and arranging basics all around the songs, love songs and stories, and illustrating those somehow using music, different textures with the spoons.

00:20:15.012 --> 00:20:19.176
I think that's one thing, you know, I really want to get people to check out and listen to you.

00:20:19.277 --> 00:20:29.008
As much as this is a harmonica podcast and your harmonica is great, you know, your lyrics are fantastic and you're a real folk singer in that sort of tradition, but in all sorts of the different topics that you just talked about

00:20:29.067 --> 00:20:30.388
there.

00:20:30.409 --> 00:20:32.912
The criminals and little fiends, it's the big things ruled alive

00:20:32.912 --> 00:20:40.359
you know

00:20:45.786 --> 00:20:56.478
when did you start you know reading i think you were saying when you were playing in the jug band you know you couldn't really play your your own songs that you'd written and you wanted to and you sort of started out doing your one-man show but

00:20:57.089 --> 00:21:03.214
Actually, I'll tell you what happened, because we had mostly split up, and I was playing with a guitarist for a while, Dick, who's great ragtime.

00:21:03.255 --> 00:21:07.058
He loved Blind Boy Fuller, kind of staff, Robert Johnson, of course, Brunzi.

00:21:07.098 --> 00:21:12.542
I was playing some jazzy riffs, a bit like Jazz Gillen would have done, you know, that kind of jazz straight playing.

00:21:12.743 --> 00:21:14.924
But what happened was, so I'd arranged some gigs.

00:21:15.006 --> 00:21:17.928
We were playing in Greek restaurants and being fed, getting 50 marks.

00:21:18.188 --> 00:21:20.971
I'd arranged gigs, and then suddenly, Dick wasn't showing up to them.

00:21:21.030 --> 00:21:22.632
He just wasn't that reliable.

00:21:22.832 --> 00:21:27.056
This happened, and I thought, well, I did a whole night of playing harmonica, and I thought, well, hold on a minute.

00:21:27.056 --> 00:22:23.836
I've got these songs I've got the guitar next time I'll just start doing my song I just started doing my songs and started it like that because of really because my mate let me down so it wasn't out of choice because I love playing with other people I just realised that there I was left in the lurch so I did a whole evening playing harmonica and tunes and everything I could think of and they liked it and I was having fun with it being silly because trying to entertain people a bit while they're eating and drinking that's when I started playing my own songs really I suppose they're folk I mean I think of them as country I mean it's all folk to me reggae folk music Jamaican folk music it's you know whether it's country or quite simple I was doing songs that I hoped that the band might sing you know might sing and we did a couple of them with the band we recorded them when we did record but I was more and more singing in my own accent I suppose as well when you're singing with other people you're forced to sing in American accent and I kind of wanted to just be myself someone from London with whatever heritage I've got so I was making songs about my mum and my gran and

00:22:25.818 --> 00:22:38.311
I'm salty And girls I went

00:22:38.332 --> 00:22:45.740
to school with and love songs, of course, and songs about enjoying nature, I could say, because I love looking at nature and celebrating all that.

00:22:45.940 --> 00:22:50.644
I guess it was all came from wanting to kind of express myself in my own way, that kind of way.

00:22:51.346 --> 00:22:52.287
Yeah, interesting.

00:22:52.326 --> 00:22:56.391
You know, you obviously spend a lot of time doing songwriting and how do you go about that?

00:22:56.511 --> 00:23:01.904
How do you put together a song do you you know do you sit down the guitar or do you write the lyrics first you know how do you approach it

00:23:02.241 --> 00:23:06.746
I mean, sometimes you have lyrics first, sometimes you'll have a tune, or the best is when they come together.

00:23:06.945 --> 00:23:08.887
I used to get riffs sometimes, harmonica riffs.

00:23:09.048 --> 00:23:10.729
I've still got loads I've never ever used.

00:23:10.910 --> 00:23:13.090
I quite like, what was it, Captain Beefart back then?

00:23:13.111 --> 00:23:13.991
There was some weird stuff.

00:23:14.291 --> 00:23:19.257
I quite like Little Feet, talking about, this is other, more contemporary stuff, and Sly Guitar.

00:23:19.277 --> 00:23:23.079
So I liked percussive, clangy sounds, you know, Beefart might have used.

00:23:23.099 --> 00:23:26.323
I think Tom Waits uses a bit of that sometimes these days.

00:23:26.702 --> 00:24:21.901
I was experimenting with riffs, so I'd get two tape recorders together and I'd try and construct these rhythms and playing one and then playing into the other you know into the mic and playing over that there was no um port studios back then or ways of doing it so i was experimenting with riffs and arrangements like that trying to making up songs sometimes the melody comes together and you get the idea come at one other things the stories and i'm trying to make them interesting a whole story like the circus song suddenly goes into a waltz in the middle because just to change that but it's also someone madly running around a ring juggling so try to change the rhythm in the middle of something to to magnify a moment or bring another moment out slowing down does that sometimes you can slow things down to magnify a moment and then speed up again or I'll drop the percussion out I'll drop my feet out and I might just be me and the guitar and that suddenly you're focusing more on the words and it's quieter so it's dynamics as well involved in that so it's all kinds of things it's hard there's no set rule really

00:24:22.241 --> 00:24:28.467
we can turn now to talking through some of your many albums as i say you did your first album 40 years ago now

00:24:28.647 --> 00:24:53.249
yes well it's it's funny if i hear them i think oh god you know i'm singing sometimes the playing or the singing slightly rough because sometimes i was experimenting and in public really sometimes and some were even recorded before that because before angry love they were on a cassette you know i had these and i think angry love and the double album the second album were on a lot of those things were on cassette that was selling cool talking music i think was cool because i didn't have a record deal I was doing it all myself.

00:24:53.730 --> 00:24:56.392
So with Angry Love, you had a full band with that, didn't you?

00:24:56.432 --> 00:24:59.695
But you don't have, I think, most, if not all the albums.

00:24:59.776 --> 00:24:59.996
That's

00:25:00.076 --> 00:25:00.277
right.

00:25:00.336 --> 00:25:03.759
Well, it wasn't a band so much as people I brought in, like a drummer.

00:25:04.181 --> 00:25:06.182
I love tuba, so I tried to find a tuba player.

00:25:06.383 --> 00:25:11.008
So Elements came together and I found, because I was in Austin at the time, some of them recordings.

00:25:11.087 --> 00:25:15.252
Ponty Bone played with Butch Hancock, so I knew Butch and Jimmy Delgill more quite well.

00:25:15.313 --> 00:25:16.854
And Lucinda Williams was playing.

00:25:16.894 --> 00:25:18.476
We were playing in the same bars, Nancy Griffith.

00:25:18.675 --> 00:25:21.019
And because I was jamming around, I knew people.

00:25:21.038 --> 00:25:22.160
I said, could you come and...

00:25:22.160 --> 00:25:25.608
It wasn't a band so much as trying to bring people together, try these arrangements out.

00:25:26.029 --> 00:25:29.859
I picked out Farewell Welfare on there, which is definitely a Sonny Terry song.

00:25:32.046 --> 00:25:32.125
It's...

00:25:43.137 --> 00:25:45.065
You've got quite a distorted sound

00:25:45.105 --> 00:25:45.827
on the harmonica.

00:25:46.128 --> 00:25:46.811
That's right, yeah.

00:25:46.832 --> 00:25:50.003
And there's a bit of slide guitar, electric, well, plugged in kind of riff.

00:25:50.023 --> 00:25:52.010
There's a little riff in there, which was done on the guitar.

00:25:52.673 --> 00:25:54.138
That was someone I met at one of the...

00:25:55.170 --> 00:26:01.695
East Anglian Fairs, actually, Mike Story, who helped me record that, put some mad keyboard stuff on it.

00:26:01.996 --> 00:26:04.577
I've tried to get my feet in there, so that's a gravelly foot there.

00:26:04.837 --> 00:26:05.199
You can hear.

00:26:05.419 --> 00:26:07.099
I've got tap shoes off later on.

00:26:07.340 --> 00:26:10.083
I started using the tap shoes more, but I guess it is quite sunny, Terry.

00:26:10.844 --> 00:26:13.645
It's funny, though, because the whooping, that Pygmies did that.

00:26:13.826 --> 00:26:14.946
I mean, you could do it with a bottle.

00:26:14.967 --> 00:26:19.590
I've done it with bottles filled with water, and you can get more than one note on a bottle.

00:26:19.911 --> 00:26:22.252
So it's a similar kind of technique, really, that.

00:26:22.693 --> 00:26:49.325
So, yeah, so in your 1983, you had kicking the soda so you had a song called Bakshish Dance I think this is inspired from your time in Afghanistan and you're playing two harmonicas on there are you?

00:26:49.484 --> 00:26:58.910
I'm playing bass harmonica and I'm playing I think I'm playing yeah diatonic I normally do, I record it live as I'm doing it, the song, and then I put the bass on when I go after.

00:26:59.150 --> 00:27:07.478
And some of this breath sounds and I mean, I've got a whole thing of wind and breath, but I'm using, again, I'm using the mouth, those rhythms and using breath.

00:27:08.038 --> 00:27:16.885
So, and again, showing that, you know, that you're playing this kind of exotic music, you might say, exotic, you know, from other countries, Afghanistan and playing that tune on the harmonica there.

00:27:16.945 --> 00:27:20.648
Is that a tune you picked up on the harmonica whilst playing it over in Afghanistan with people?

00:27:21.028 --> 00:27:21.589
Not really.

00:27:21.930 --> 00:27:24.231
Although I did play, I played with a generator once.

00:27:24.292 --> 00:27:24.792
It was funny.

00:27:24.993 --> 00:27:27.938
It kept changing because it was a drone in Herat.

00:27:28.439 --> 00:27:38.413
That song was made, I was in love with someone who was in Peshawar in Pakistan over the Khyber Pass and that journey was me going to meet her at the time.

00:27:38.894 --> 00:27:39.555
I went from Hamburg.

00:27:39.615 --> 00:27:42.799
I started going on a train, met these people on the way through Herat.

00:27:42.839 --> 00:27:46.224
So that's where all the desert and the drinking the tea and those words come from.

00:27:46.605 --> 00:27:48.067
I mean, I always come up with different rhythms.

00:27:48.828 --> 00:27:50.832
I've got things in seven, eight rhythms that are fun.

00:27:51.232 --> 00:28:24.007
It was just a rhythm that came out so i used it for the song that's how it happens just by chance jamming sometimes you jam with yourself and you come up with rhythms that you wouldn't normally you know they just come out of the air obviously the all that rhythm playing is comes from somewhere i mean obviously listening hearing it probably not sunny you know those guys i'm sure you know really because there's no one else doing it obviously sometimes you end up making things your own somehow you know because you spend so much time with the harmonica traveling it does become part of you which is where harmonica dreams come from that's got definitely got more than one harmonica on it, that recording.

00:28:24.527 --> 00:28:46.099
Well, I love my harmonica note for note She gives me my soul, she shouts, let's go She's my eleventh finger and my second tone At night she warms me like a rising sunny memo Feels so good, all the time she goes Keeps me close to please me Oh, how I love my home Oh, how I love my home Oh, how I love my

00:28:47.342 --> 00:29:14.796
home When

00:29:14.915 --> 00:29:18.781
I play her or she plays me, I can't tell anymore, but she's company.

00:29:18.821 --> 00:29:21.164
I give her rhythm, she give me notes to cry.

00:29:21.586 --> 00:29:23.769
Once I put a dying man back to life, she can...

00:29:24.865 --> 00:29:38.805
Yeah, there's

00:29:39.445 --> 00:29:40.346
a good video of that.

00:29:40.366 --> 00:29:48.037
I'll put a link onto that onto the podcast page of you doing the harmonica stream, which is all kind of about your relationship with the harmonica, yeah?

00:29:48.657 --> 00:29:49.439
Yeah, exactly.

00:29:49.479 --> 00:29:51.501
You know, these things start as lyrics and then...

00:29:51.905 --> 00:30:02.603
realize well that's when the harmonica you know you've got to have harmonica on this it's about the harmonica harmonica's dream so yeah yeah it's celebrating the harmonica i suppose and how it is you know how close it is it becomes part of you

00:30:03.203 --> 00:30:12.578
and then the album um footsteps and heartbeats where i first heard you when i really loved that album so love like a rock is a great one and again sort of sonny terry style that one but um

00:30:16.163 --> 00:30:19.410
so won't you rock with me well now

00:30:19.690 --> 00:30:19.710
i

00:30:20.513 --> 00:30:30.445
Bye.

00:30:30.465 --> 00:30:30.526
Bye.

00:30:31.682 --> 00:30:37.007
I did that live and then I started putting the bass notes in, singing the bass notes and the harmonies.

00:30:37.207 --> 00:30:39.127
And there's a djembe, I think there's a djembe on there.

00:30:39.368 --> 00:30:43.491
I'm quite wary of drum kits because they just take over and the rhythm gets lost.

00:30:43.531 --> 00:30:46.074
So I quite like real organic sounds.

00:30:46.535 --> 00:30:50.038
So yeah, I've overdubbed all those other voices and things.

00:30:50.377 --> 00:30:51.659
I think it's more than Sonny Terry.

00:30:51.719 --> 00:30:53.760
I would say Peg Leg Sand, actually.

00:30:53.921 --> 00:30:55.903
I'd give him credit for that because he doesn't get much.

00:30:57.604 --> 00:31:12.159
And then you do the song Take Me Home, which again, I have Mick Concello on the podcast a while back and he does a version of Take Me Home instrumentally which I really love and I've sort of been playing that song ever since I talked to Mick and discovered him playing that song

00:31:12.219 --> 00:31:19.047
and of course he took that from you That's right it's an honour I haven't had many people doing my tunes which is lovely Have you heard Mick's version?

00:31:19.086 --> 00:31:35.804
I have yes he gave me I think I've got a CD somewhere and he's playing it because we met at a session playing in Ireland Larry Roddy introduced us I think at sessions and that was nice to meet him he's lovely he's a nice player too I love the band and Joe and the mandolin on that recording of mine as well with Paul Rodden and Steve.

00:31:35.944 --> 00:31:38.086
You can hear that the colour is all there.

00:31:38.207 --> 00:31:44.253
And in some ways that kind of led me, I just love the colour of those instruments, you know, the picking and the plucking and fantastic playing.

00:31:44.814 --> 00:31:55.345
I'm very interested in, you know, our interactions with harmonicas and other instruments, particularly for people like you who play more than one instrument, you know, how that helps formulate the harmonica playing, you know, alongside the other instruments.

00:31:55.365 --> 00:32:07.550
Of course, we're playing, obviously, those tunes are my own, and you can hear some Latin kind of influence in some of those South American American ideas, you know, six, eight kind of rhythms that they, well, even in, in Mexico, those kind of rhythms exist, which I love.

00:32:07.731 --> 00:32:08.153
Yeah.

00:32:08.413 --> 00:32:13.148
Talking about the Mexican and then later on, you do this, uh, India, Mattia.

00:32:29.538 --> 00:32:31.118
Yes, a Colombian Indian tune, that's right.

00:32:31.299 --> 00:32:37.805
That recording on Travelling Home, it's not stilted, but it's slightly because it's with a band and it speeds up.

00:32:37.924 --> 00:32:39.185
I do it quite differently now.

00:32:39.246 --> 00:32:41.969
So it's funny how phrasing changes, you know.

00:32:42.009 --> 00:33:19.625
It's funny, even with singing, let alone tunes, the phrasing can change from something you recorded and you haven't played through so many times and suddenly you inhabit it a bit more and the lyrics change or the phrases change and the rhythm kind of settle in or you're more experimented a bit more and be more playful and you discover little things about the tune so these things come out as well you know i don't speed it up like that anymore i just but i'm playing different notes and i play it a different way and use it i've kind of filled the air a lot with it i mean especially in a the resonance of a room away from the microphone sometimes is lovely you know because it feels depending on the acoustics of a room but that takes some time can affect the way i play i

00:33:20.145 --> 00:33:31.157
think you know again that song though is a good example of how you play these you know these these kind of tunes from different countries or you know and you're applying that to the harmonica which is really interesting you know to hear that you know because it's very unique what you're playing

00:33:31.278 --> 00:33:50.719
yeah i think moments shared that other tune on it's a song as well but um um on footsteps is uh is another example of that definitely because i when i played with uh some mexican guys we met we were bus i mean that mariachi song is is is about playing with them and stories but leading each other down small villages and dark alleys and things with the music there's mariachis

00:33:51.078 --> 00:33:59.407
you know i say it gives you a very unique sound to a lot of your songs and so is that something you know you literally just kind of learned the tune and played it yourself on the harmonic and it came out like that

00:33:59.407 --> 00:34:01.028
Sometimes the tunes come out.

00:34:01.130 --> 00:34:04.853
I mean, there's one on another album called Come With Me When I Go.

00:34:04.893 --> 00:34:07.154
It started off as a whistling tune when I was whistling.

00:34:07.355 --> 00:34:08.356
And I had a tooth removed.

00:34:08.376 --> 00:34:09.217
I couldn't whistle the same.

00:34:09.237 --> 00:34:10.958
So when I whistle, just normally like...

00:34:14.121 --> 00:34:16.382
So the tune before it became a harmonica tune was...

00:34:22.949 --> 00:34:24.391
The rhythm was the thing of it, really.

00:34:24.710 --> 00:34:27.333
So then I ended up playing it on the harmonica because it fitted as well.

00:34:31.585 --> 00:34:41.501
so

00:34:41.985 --> 00:34:49.351
Or some songs sometimes I'll embellish colour or add a harmony with a harmonica and it comes out in a different way then as well.

00:34:49.713 --> 00:34:56.898
I might play a harmony which gives more depth to the song or I'm playing with a line of the guitar and playing a harmony or the guitar's playing a harmony.

00:34:57.219 --> 00:35:01.643
Yeah, and you play on that same album which is Little Bites for Babies, you play Long Lost Friend.

00:35:01.983 --> 00:35:03.824
I think you're playing with a glass.

00:35:04.244 --> 00:35:05.166
Yeah, I do play a glass.

00:35:05.525 --> 00:35:13.034
On that tune I did an arrangement using other harmonicas but then I got Richard to play baritone sax and and some soprano sax.

00:35:13.135 --> 00:35:14.036
I wanted all reeds on it.

00:35:14.077 --> 00:35:17.403
You know, there's pipes that come in, fill in, and there's an accordion wash that comes in.

00:35:17.483 --> 00:35:19.688
I wanted all the reeds to be playing together.

00:35:19.869 --> 00:35:23.456
I always think of the accordions, the big brother or big sister or grand, you know, of the harmonica.

00:35:23.476 --> 00:35:26.182
So I kind of wanted to use the colours, those colours.

00:35:26.643 --> 00:35:27.867
But yeah, you're right about the glass.

00:35:31.074 --> 00:35:31.293
MUSIC PLAYS

00:35:47.713 --> 00:35:53.059
I mean, I've used that sometimes as a bit on other things when I'm doing my travelling song.

00:35:53.378 --> 00:35:56.621
I get a phone call in the middle of that sometimes when my Auntie Sadie rings me up.

00:35:56.782 --> 00:35:57.001
Yeah.

00:35:57.302 --> 00:36:00.144
And I have a bit of mischief on it.

00:36:00.465 --> 00:36:05.869
It's all part of taking people on a journey, I think, which is what storytelling is, and also the live thing.

00:36:06.110 --> 00:36:08.492
You do a lot of instrumentals, don't you, on Harmonica, I think?

00:36:08.751 --> 00:36:09.512
There's quite a lot.

00:36:09.672 --> 00:36:14.496
When I go to a session, I mean, there's a lot of tunes I do that I haven't recorded, really, even.

00:36:15.458 --> 00:36:18.882
Even the Northumbrian pipe tune, I've got I've got

00:36:33.545 --> 00:36:44.222
one here.

00:36:54.146 --> 00:36:55.811
you're playing chromatic there yes

00:36:56.112 --> 00:37:31.952
oh yeah that's chromatic I play chromatic sometimes at sessions when it's normally they're tune sessions so I'll come in with a tune that or I play along with other people with a chromatic just because it's fun because there's different notes I can't get on the diatonic and it's just a different tone and richness but there's more interesting tunes sometimes because you've got the lever which is the button and the klezmer tunes and what I also love about the chromatic is the octave so I'll do a tune in the middle and then I'll go lower or I might start low really quiet and then do the tune again but an octave higher and it just lifts the tune it gives a bit of variety You mentioned klezmer tunes there

00:37:31.952 --> 00:37:45.432
Oh,

00:37:45.452 --> 00:37:48.318
well, it's called the follower or the disciple of the rabbi from Trisk.

00:37:48.610 --> 00:37:54.735
It's funny you mentioned the klezmer because just a few episodes ago I had a guy called Jason Rosenblatt on there.

00:37:54.875 --> 00:37:57.978
He plays these amazing klezmer tunes.

00:37:58.057 --> 00:38:03.063
So I discovered Jason and I was listening to him thinking, God, these tunes sound fantastic on the harmonica.

00:38:03.103 --> 00:38:04.923
You've got to check out Jason Rosenblatt.

00:38:04.943 --> 00:38:07.666
He plays some amazing stuff on those klezmer tunes.

00:38:07.686 --> 00:38:09.047
It works so well on that music.

00:38:09.088 --> 00:38:10.068
I was astounded.

00:38:10.128 --> 00:38:10.728
Yeah, yeah.

00:38:10.748 --> 00:38:13.692
I think in Brighton there's another, oh, there's a few.

00:38:13.831 --> 00:38:15.152
You can just get that lovely...

00:38:18.576 --> 00:38:22.201
So a

00:38:24.905 --> 00:38:28.090
song where you do that lasso in the B.

00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:00.000
.

00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:00.000
.

00:38:42.914 --> 00:38:50.721
That was made for, actually, Claire, my partner, is a choreographer, and we met 30 years ago when I was working with a physical theatre group, making songs.

00:38:50.960 --> 00:38:56.666
She wanted to choreograph a piece based on around the cycle of Bs, so that's where that came from.

00:38:56.985 --> 00:38:58.807
And then, of course, there's some bass harmonica there too.

00:38:59.228 --> 00:39:00.349
I recorded a lot of that.

00:39:00.628 --> 00:39:05.233
With that album, Brave Faces and that track particularly, I did at home.

00:39:05.273 --> 00:39:09.277
I engineered and recorded them myself, but these days I prefer having an engineer.

00:39:09.317 --> 00:39:11.378
It's just too much to try and do, but learning.

00:39:11.639 --> 00:39:12.760
But Lasso and the Bs were fun.

00:39:12.880 --> 00:39:13.561
Yeah, it was fun.

00:39:13.601 --> 00:39:15.447
And I obviously got some baritone.

00:39:15.768 --> 00:39:16.291
Yeah, he did play.

00:39:16.331 --> 00:39:18.518
That was before he gave up playing clarinet.

00:39:18.538 --> 00:39:19.862
So again, it's the reeds together.

00:39:20.103 --> 00:39:23.612
Again, you know, that kind of combination on that particular one.

00:39:24.001 --> 00:39:27.806
And recently, I think you've released a couple of singles, haven't you?

00:39:27.887 --> 00:39:29.469
One of them, Didn't He Ramble.

00:39:29.510 --> 00:39:30.471
Is that your most recent

00:39:30.630 --> 00:39:30.690
one?

00:39:30.710 --> 00:39:32.152
Oh, that was, yeah, Claire's dad.

00:39:32.333 --> 00:39:32.893
Yeah, he passed away.

00:39:32.954 --> 00:39:35.358
I made a song for him, sang at his graveside.

00:39:35.637 --> 00:39:40.123
I did it with a harmonica just to keep pitching and just have something so it's not all just the words.

00:39:40.204 --> 00:39:41.385
But they'd ask for a copy of it.

00:39:41.405 --> 00:39:43.329
I thought, well, rather than, I just thought, well, I'll record it.

00:39:43.429 --> 00:39:44.570
And so I used a drone.

00:39:44.951 --> 00:39:49.416
I made a drone using a bass harmonica and a, well, a guitar, Ebo on the guitar.

00:39:49.657 --> 00:39:51.619
So it kind of has a breathing kind of drone for

00:39:52.822 --> 00:39:52.862
it.

00:39:54.177 --> 00:39:57.726
Thank you.

00:40:05.282 --> 00:40:15.550
you don't have your songs on Spotify not much there's the odd one but you've got a Bandcamp site which again I've put the link to the podcast so I urge people to go along and buy some of Rory's songs to support the artists

00:40:15.931 --> 00:40:26.019
or even come on to the website I get more for that I mean Bandcamp's great I'm happy if people want to go to Bandcamp I've got my own little shop I think I get a bit more of a cut than Bandcamp take a bit of a cut

00:40:26.199 --> 00:40:46.440
no absolutely do that instead yeah go to Rory's website so you play with various people on your travels as well Michelle's shot in the US you play with an Australian artist original but one song which i again i heard quite a few years ago and i really loved the song was just the one by the levelers and they discovered you singing and playing harmonica on a different version so how did that come about

00:40:46.760 --> 00:41:01.516
oh god yeah what they i think it was in brighton and they asked me to come and come in and do one of this cover their song and i thought well i could i'll do it this way so i did it kind of bluesy way and i'm playing sly guitar harmonica and trombone singing it too i can't quite remember how it sounded in the end how it came out

00:41:01.556 --> 00:41:07.527
you shouldn't do it can see no reason why so you blow your Yes, yes, aha

00:41:19.521 --> 00:41:25.467
I think they were getting all kinds of people to cover their songs in their own way, which actually is quite a good idea.

00:41:25.809 --> 00:41:30.273
I was thinking, if anyone wanted to cover my songs, it'd be nice to hear different versions of them.

00:41:31.635 --> 00:41:32.615
Make people do them their own way.

00:41:33.036 --> 00:41:37.621
I discovered The Levellers with a great song, Devil Went Down to Georgia, which you might know.

00:41:37.641 --> 00:41:38.981
A superb song of theirs.

00:41:39.021 --> 00:41:40.324
And then that Just The One's a good one.

00:41:40.543 --> 00:41:41.925
I think it works really well with your voice.

00:41:41.985 --> 00:41:44.208
I think you kind of do a better version with your vocals.

00:41:44.467 --> 00:41:46.030
I'll have to go and look that up, actually, Neil.

00:41:46.402 --> 00:41:49.083
But Ali Fakhtour was, well, actually, how did that happen?

00:41:49.264 --> 00:41:52.086
It was through Hassan, Hassan Araji, I met Ali.

00:41:52.327 --> 00:41:54.568
He's a oud player, a blind Moroccan oud player.

00:41:54.588 --> 00:41:57.110
He was on a train, found out we're going to the same festival.

00:41:57.190 --> 00:41:58.271
And I said, what's in there?

00:41:58.331 --> 00:41:58.992
Because he had an oud.

00:41:59.032 --> 00:42:00.153
It was quite a weird shaped case.

00:42:00.213 --> 00:42:05.318
So he told me and we became friends and he came to stay with me and I went to visit him and we ended up playing a bit together.

00:42:05.478 --> 00:42:06.920
And Moroccan music, oud.

00:42:07.320 --> 00:42:09.262
In fact, he's on Footsteps and Heartbeats, thinking about that.

00:42:09.442 --> 00:42:11.483
Yeah, he's playing oud on that and some Bendia.

00:42:11.684 --> 00:42:12.224
Lovely guy.

00:42:12.585 --> 00:42:13.865
And it was through him I met Ali.

00:42:13.885 --> 00:43:04.739
And then Tarika, I just had to jam with him on stage in Canada we were on the same festival I played some slide guitar with him and Ali with him and Taj Mahal really because they were so respectful of each other that they didn't kind of take off they were so waiting for each other to take off and didn't want their egos or whatever to take over so I was asked to come and put some slide on that but I'm playing on the river and the source anyway one of Ali's and Michelle I was her band actually so we played we toured UK and Italy I think and then sometimes she did have a band I was still there and I did some so I played on Graffiti Limbo live she was recording all her stuff live actually eventually I think she did it so Graffiti Limbo the police come so I did the police siren and solo part of the solo I think she eventually recorded it again and anyway someone else was asked to play my solo somewhere in LA I don't know who it was but yeah playing with different people like that

00:43:04.960 --> 00:43:14.550
and you've also had some television work you did the theme tune to the TV program Creature Comforts which is a program about kind of speaking animals wasn't it animation

00:43:14.670 --> 00:43:44.893
that's right that was through um it was someone who'd heard me golly his name is goleski he's one of the animators uh heard me in bristol and he i think he heard angry love or he liked the songs just the feel of the songs maybe there's a rawness they liked and so he asked me to do do a theme tune and had to be so long and you know so many seconds and minutes or whatever so

00:43:45.282 --> 00:43:49.646
That

00:43:49.686 --> 00:43:50.365
was quite a privilege.

00:43:50.586 --> 00:43:51.947
So I was in Orkney at the time.

00:43:51.987 --> 00:43:53.248
We were waiting for Finn to be born.

00:43:53.528 --> 00:43:56.351
So this must be 18, 19 years ago because Finn's 18 now.

00:43:56.612 --> 00:43:58.594
I was in Orkney and all I had was a harmonica.

00:43:58.934 --> 00:44:02.396
I borrowed my mother-in-law's pots and pans and my father-in-law's mandolin for that.

00:44:02.637 --> 00:44:02.876
Yeah.

00:44:03.197 --> 00:44:04.217
So I had to come up with a tune.

00:44:04.398 --> 00:44:05.039
So yeah, that was it.

00:44:05.378 --> 00:44:11.664
Well, as to a book, you've released a digital songbook of your songs, 148 lyrics and 34 chords.

00:44:11.704 --> 00:44:12.945
Is that available on your website?

00:44:12.985 --> 00:44:13.686
Yes, that's right.

00:44:13.706 --> 00:44:14.387
It's a digital one.

00:44:14.427 --> 00:44:14.907
It's not a...

00:44:15.248 --> 00:44:18.931
I did want to make a hard copy that people could take around at the campfire.

00:44:19.311 --> 00:44:21.313
But yeah, it's all the lyrics, really.

00:44:21.655 --> 00:44:26.039
Another great thing I want to mention on your website is this kind of diary of a lot of your travels.

00:44:26.800 --> 00:44:28.041
Again, I'll put a link onto that.

00:44:28.302 --> 00:44:30.885
I was reading through some of that and really fascinating stuff.

00:44:31.164 --> 00:44:32.206
Yeah, that's right.

00:44:32.525 --> 00:44:35.590
I guess sometimes I'd write letters to people and it ended up...

00:44:35.989 --> 00:44:38.273
Actually, the Chinese one became an article, I think.

00:44:38.693 --> 00:44:44.139
I sent a long, long letter to someone and said, can we take some of that and use it for an article?

00:44:44.159 --> 00:44:45.639
I think it was in Folk Roots magazine or something.

00:44:45.780 --> 00:44:49.083
But I said, yeah, sure, because I've got photographs as well that went with it.

00:44:49.344 --> 00:44:53.648
I had some recordings I'd left at the National Sound Archive, but they were in such disarray.

00:44:53.768 --> 00:44:56.012
In the end, I've given it to Edinburgh University now.

00:44:56.291 --> 00:44:58.934
Some street music, you know, stuff that was from there.

00:44:58.994 --> 00:45:02.699
There's a Chinese department there, so they've got that now.

00:45:03.018 --> 00:45:06.101
So you mentioned Edinburgh, and you've already mentioned busking.

00:45:06.161 --> 00:45:10.246
So in 1985, you were Edinburgh Festival Street Busker of the Year.

00:45:10.306 --> 00:45:10.806
Yeah, it's true.

00:45:11.047 --> 00:45:11.989
I didn't know it was a competition.

00:45:12.048 --> 00:45:18.596
I just was there busking, and someone came up to me and said, you've got to come tonight to wherever it was, you know, the final, and it was a final, and then who was the judge?

00:45:18.675 --> 00:45:23.221
I think Loudon Wainwright and Hank Wainfield were the judges at the time, and yeah, I think I did a harmonica thing.

00:45:23.400 --> 00:45:23.820
That's nice.

00:45:23.981 --> 00:45:24.842
The money came in handy.

00:45:24.902 --> 00:45:26.603
I mean, it wasn't a lot, but yeah, it was fun.

00:45:26.864 --> 00:45:29.007
And you also got arrested for busking in Leicester Square.

00:45:29.166 --> 00:45:30.789
Yeah, that was a long while ago.

00:45:30.809 --> 00:45:35.733
I'd come back from Germany, I think, and that was when I used a little Vox Escort amp to play harmonica through.

00:45:35.893 --> 00:45:48.413
I used to go to Camden Lock sometimes, and I had a really good crowd at Leicester Square, and I was done for willful obstruction, and people were booing the police, so they took me away in the meet- I didn't even get a chance to, you know, they were trying to put money through the window and I couldn't get it.

00:45:48.612 --> 00:45:49.695
Might have made a bit of money that day.

00:45:49.896 --> 00:45:53.565
And then I was in court and I pleaded not guilty to willful obstruction.

00:45:53.706 --> 00:45:56.554
And then they said, well, you have to come back then if you plead not guilty.

00:45:56.753 --> 00:45:58.217
And I thought, well, I'm living in Germany.

00:45:58.237 --> 00:46:01.146
It's going to cost me more to get back because I've over-visited my mum.

00:46:01.346 --> 00:46:02.367
My mum and dad were splitting up.

00:46:02.527 --> 00:46:04.889
I said, look, I'll plead guilty.

00:46:05.829 --> 00:46:08.271
But the harmonica, I was playing harmonica then.

00:46:08.652 --> 00:46:09.532
Busking's really good.

00:46:09.592 --> 00:46:10.914
It saves you getting a gig.

00:46:10.934 --> 00:46:15.197
You don't have to book a gig and wait for a week until you can do it.

00:46:15.378 --> 00:46:17.000
You just go and play, and I like that.

00:46:17.139 --> 00:46:17.920
I've jammed with people.

00:46:17.960 --> 00:46:18.900
I've taken a trombone.

00:46:18.920 --> 00:46:19.742
We've done tangos.

00:46:20.262 --> 00:46:21.664
Portobello Road was good, Portobello.

00:46:21.824 --> 00:46:24.786
But I remember there was these tango dancers playing with a backing track.

00:46:25.007 --> 00:46:25.646
It was a couple.

00:46:25.827 --> 00:46:27.289
One of them was actually an ex-bus conductor.

00:46:27.489 --> 00:46:31.311
And I thought, if you want me to play a real tango for you, that's lovely.

00:46:31.311 --> 00:46:47.929
and he did and my mate Bob was with me he was a clarinet and we got a really big crowd then he got a crowd because he was actually tango doing tango dancing with live music so yeah that was trombone but I've got a few tangos I did on the harmonica actually I did it yeah I used it in a show I don't think I recorded them

00:46:48.289 --> 00:46:52.094
talking about some musical awards in 1981 you were the Texas harmonica champion

00:46:52.434 --> 00:47:02.865
yeah that was a I think all the good guys didn't enter it to be honest but yeah that was at Kerrville and I think I didn't have the money to go in for it people because I've been back asking around all the campfires and was there.

00:47:02.885 --> 00:47:04.547
I think people clubbed together, bless them.

00:47:04.568 --> 00:47:05.447
$50 was it?

00:47:05.568 --> 00:47:07.269
Whatever it was to enter me and I won.

00:47:07.590 --> 00:47:09.652
I felt I could pay them all back, but they didn't want it back.

00:47:09.833 --> 00:47:10.112
Bless them.

00:47:10.233 --> 00:47:10.753
Lovely people.

00:47:11.074 --> 00:47:12.735
And I'm talking about another award.

00:47:12.916 --> 00:47:16.340
In 2002, you won the BBC Best Live Folk Act.

00:47:16.740 --> 00:47:17.481
Yeah, that's true.

00:47:17.722 --> 00:47:18.541
That was a nice feather.

00:47:18.561 --> 00:47:19.724
So you are a folk musician.

00:47:19.804 --> 00:47:20.364
Well, I must be.

00:47:20.403 --> 00:47:20.925
You know, I am.

00:47:20.945 --> 00:47:21.525
Of course I am.

00:47:21.565 --> 00:47:22.806
I mean, for me, it covers everything.

00:47:23.007 --> 00:47:23.588
Country music.

00:47:23.628 --> 00:47:25.190
Hank Williams was folk music, I think.

00:47:25.289 --> 00:47:25.769
So it's all...

00:47:26.150 --> 00:47:26.891
Talking of Hank

00:47:26.931 --> 00:47:27.972
Williams, again, I was listening to you.

00:47:27.992 --> 00:47:30.514
You did Ramblin' Man, which I really love of his.

00:47:30.635 --> 00:47:35.059
Again, again I was checking through and he said oh is this the Hank Williams version it is I really love that song yeah

00:47:35.360 --> 00:47:42.228
that's acapella that track is me no instruments I'm singing all the it's all the parts even including the probably for the drama or something

00:47:42.447 --> 00:47:59.306
he made a ramblin' man now some folks might say that I'm no good that I wouldn't settle

00:47:59.746 --> 00:48:08.956
down in The question I ask each time is if you had 10 minutes to practice on the harmonica, what would you spend those 10 minutes doing?

00:48:08.976 --> 00:48:13.001
I'd say jamming with people is great, but that's playing what you know.

00:48:13.041 --> 00:48:14.621
So I wouldn't do scales.

00:48:14.681 --> 00:48:18.326
If there was a tune you really loved, I'd try and learn the tune, really.

00:48:18.507 --> 00:48:20.728
Try and learn the tune, because tunes are lovely.

00:48:21.228 --> 00:48:26.414
Scales are probably really useful, I'm sure, but I'd just try and learn a tune that you like, even if it's difficult.

00:48:26.675 --> 00:48:48.438
I think if a tune is difficult, I mean, I did that on the trombone as well, you have to develop techniques techniques to play that tune then and that's so that's kind of practicing and i'm getting your breathing and the phrasing and uh you know the the tone of it perhaps using the diaphragm perhaps to get the tone which you would if you were singing i mean most wind instruments you use that tone get trying to get that tone with using your muscles there

00:48:48.679 --> 00:48:50.340
you learn tunes by playing by ear

00:48:50.661 --> 00:49:33.427
yeah i do i don't read yeah i just play by ear i play everything by ear and i arrange as i say i've arranged using my voice there's recordings in fact i even put them on the album in the end there was a whole demos of arrangements of me singing in all the parts and I thought I'm going to put that on instead it's like the Mills Brothers singing all the parts but I play by ear I can't think of any other way of doing it I wish I'd learned to read as well and write because that would be interesting the stuff you could write I've started a few years ago I inherited a piano finally got a piano and I sat at that and I'm picking out just sitting on it picking tunes out and they were more melodically led and quite different very light with lyrics but very I was singing in my head less physical completely and some of those I thought I could play that on my money and if they were tunes that were Maybe you could be playing on the harmonica as well, but very simple.

00:49:33.686 --> 00:49:38.811
I stuck all the labels of the notes, put them all down so I could remember what notes I was playing, but black and white

00:49:38.891 --> 00:49:39.492
notes.

00:49:39.632 --> 00:49:42.556
So we're getting to the gear side of things now.

00:49:43.496 --> 00:49:46.981
So talking about harmonicas, so what sort of harmonicas do you play?

00:49:47.021 --> 00:49:47.762
Yeah, sure.

00:49:48.141 --> 00:49:48.902
We play Vampers.

00:49:49.043 --> 00:49:50.304
I did play Special Twenties.

00:49:50.344 --> 00:49:50.824
I've tried them.

00:49:51.105 --> 00:49:52.507
Now I play, I like the cross harp.

00:49:52.746 --> 00:49:53.907
I like the bamboo cross harp.

00:49:53.947 --> 00:49:58.893
They don't swell and they're pretty airtight with the four bolts on them.

00:49:59.094 --> 00:49:59.675
So I like those.

00:49:59.775 --> 00:50:00.454
The crossovers.

00:50:00.474 --> 00:50:00.976
The crossovers.

00:50:00.976 --> 00:50:01.916
Sorry, crossovers.

00:50:01.956 --> 00:50:02.978
Yeah, that's what they're called.

00:50:03.197 --> 00:50:03.438
Yeah, yeah.

00:50:03.498 --> 00:50:04.400
With a bamboo laminate.

00:50:04.599 --> 00:50:05.701
Bamboo, I think it's laminate.

00:50:05.721 --> 00:50:06.501
Yeah, I like those.

00:50:06.581 --> 00:50:10.847
And the chromatic one, to be honest, a lot of my stuff needs repairing.

00:50:10.887 --> 00:50:12.708
I've had it for years, but the button came off.

00:50:12.768 --> 00:50:16.012
But it's a Chromonica thing, 64-hole thing.

00:50:16.331 --> 00:50:18.875
So is it a 16-hole, did you say, then, or a

00:50:18.894 --> 00:50:19.356
10-hole?

00:50:19.516 --> 00:50:20.597
Well, they started with a 10-hole.

00:50:20.677 --> 00:50:21.378
How many has this got?

00:50:21.398 --> 00:50:22.199
12-hole.

00:50:22.599 --> 00:50:23.219
Yeah.

00:50:23.280 --> 00:50:26.983
I've got a big C, one of Steve's, Steve Baker's, with the chord.

00:50:27.023 --> 00:50:30.927
We used to play the big C's, low ones, you know, together when we played.

00:50:30.927 --> 00:50:33.030
We did Bye Bye Bird as a band.

00:50:33.271 --> 00:50:34.472
There's all of us playing harmonicas.

00:50:34.711 --> 00:50:35.152
Lovely low.

00:50:35.253 --> 00:50:36.693
I love the low harmonicas.

00:50:36.954 --> 00:50:37.775
I like high too.

00:50:38.096 --> 00:50:39.657
I guess it depends on my voice.

00:50:39.717 --> 00:50:43.641
So I tend to use C harmonicas for playing G for the voice.

00:50:44.302 --> 00:50:46.485
Sometimes obviously A for playing along with...

00:50:46.724 --> 00:50:48.626
People want to play blues, it's normally they're going to play an E.

00:50:48.806 --> 00:50:50.409
But I quite like the G.

00:50:51.048 --> 00:50:52.130
I like the low F as well.

00:50:52.351 --> 00:50:55.173
So that lovely, buzzy, low sound.

00:50:55.233 --> 00:50:57.036
I like kind of bassy things, I suppose.

00:50:57.215 --> 00:50:57.856
Of course they're lovely.

00:50:58.016 --> 00:51:00.880
But also for bending, they're just quite nice to bend.

00:51:00.880 --> 00:51:01.420
end, you know.

00:51:01.701 --> 00:51:03.001
Yeah, those low ones are nice, yeah.

00:51:03.161 --> 00:51:05.885
And what about any different tunings, anything like that?

00:51:05.965 --> 00:51:06.967
Do you use anything like that?

00:51:07.266 --> 00:51:12.952
Yeah, I discovered, God, years ago, it was Amol, which means minor, but in German.

00:51:13.293 --> 00:51:14.775
So the minor harp I liked.

00:51:15.074 --> 00:51:23.583
I mean, I can play minors, you know, you can play, obviously play minor on a diatonic normally, but I quite like the chords you get from them as well, you know, different things you couldn't normally get.

00:51:23.764 --> 00:51:26.067
So yeah, definitely use a minor, harmonic minor.

00:51:26.807 --> 00:51:30.692
And some of the tunes we talked about, you know, they do have different sounds to them.

00:51:30.731 --> 00:51:32.978
I you know are you playing different positions in there

00:51:33.159 --> 00:51:42.045
yeah

00:51:52.449 --> 00:51:54.452
You know, you're aware of that when you're playing these tunes,

00:51:54.472 --> 00:51:55.172
yeah.

00:51:55.291 --> 00:51:56.893
I'm aware of that when I'm jamming with people.

00:51:57.034 --> 00:52:05.501
You know, there's, I don't know, they might be playing a minor chord and I'm playing, so I'll be playing probably, I don't know if it's called third position, I think, but people playing minor.

00:52:05.601 --> 00:52:08.164
But Indie Matteo's in a minor, you know, that's a minor key.

00:52:08.603 --> 00:52:13.148
And then going to a major sometimes, I play straight sometimes, bending the notes at the top.

00:52:13.367 --> 00:52:16.190
On Black, Brown and White, I think there's a solo in there.

00:52:16.311 --> 00:52:17.751
It's a Big Bill Brunswick song cover.

00:52:17.911 --> 00:52:20.894
I think I got Richard to play baritone sax and then the harmonica comes in.

00:52:21.034 --> 00:52:23.400
Kind of threw an amp at that one, but Quite a short one.

00:52:23.561 --> 00:52:24.565
Ends up with a police siren.

00:52:35.905 --> 00:52:37.668
Most of the time, I don't often use amps.

00:52:38.088 --> 00:52:42.210
Just to get that cut through, you know, kind of edge to it, I'd use an amp on that, just for fun.

00:52:42.452 --> 00:52:45.273
It's fun playing with a microphone because you don't have to do much work breathing-wise.

00:52:45.333 --> 00:52:47.115
It's really, you can just play sensitive, you know.

00:52:47.436 --> 00:52:47.936
It's good fun.

00:52:48.117 --> 00:52:49.358
I mean, I don't do a lot of that.

00:52:49.398 --> 00:52:53.621
We're not on my own gigs because I just use the mic that's there, a vocal mic, really.

00:52:53.942 --> 00:52:58.905
Well, I was going to say, sometimes you're playing instrumentals, obviously you hold the harmonica, but you also play on a rack as well, don't you, playing guitar at

00:52:58.925 --> 00:52:59.206
the same time?

00:52:59.226 --> 00:53:04.331
Yeah, there's a couple on Galloway Girl and on Wrong Side of the Wall, I'm playing a

00:53:04.371 --> 00:53:05.871
rack.

00:53:05.871 --> 00:53:08.822
from our

00:53:09.344 --> 00:53:12.797
family.

00:53:14.722 --> 00:53:25.010
those tunes I'm playing straight on those I think I'm playing straight on those and on the direction song it's a very silly song that I made had to get to our house that's all straight playing you know it's a jig actually

00:53:25.451 --> 00:53:36.260
that one you mentioned gear there as well so microphones and amp wise are you using you mentioned little practice amp well the busking amp earlier but are you using you know tube amps or always a clean sound

00:53:36.661 --> 00:53:46.068
probably a clean sound now I don't have an amp especially for the harmonica I just use I've got I've got a microphone for hygienic reasons really and for the voice so So that's a Sennheiser, I think.

00:53:46.170 --> 00:53:48.532
But I used to use Shure SM58s.

00:53:48.612 --> 00:53:50.333
I had a Uni-Dyne B years ago.

00:53:50.373 --> 00:53:51.175
I've used those.

00:53:51.275 --> 00:53:52.476
And I don't really use an amp.

00:53:52.737 --> 00:53:54.639
I use the room, play around the room, walk around.

00:53:54.659 --> 00:53:59.623
But when I might jam with a band or there might be a microphone up there, I just, whatever mic's available.

00:54:00.023 --> 00:54:05.230
I did have a radio mic, which I used in a show, and that was great fun because there's no cord.

00:54:05.289 --> 00:54:07.733
So, of course, it was, yeah, it was okay as a mic.

00:54:07.833 --> 00:54:09.875
But it was fun because there's no cords to trip over.

00:54:10.195 --> 00:54:11.195
It is fun playing electric.

00:54:11.255 --> 00:54:14.639
I mean, you know, it's quite, you can play very different and quite sensitively and creatively.

00:54:14.639 --> 00:54:37.364
and straight on tone then you know I'm quite a loud player I think I'm a loud player I tend to I can play quite forcefully because I'm used to that playing acoustic during lockdown I realised how much playing kept me fit actually because I had my first gig I was quite out of breath from singing that was just singing let alone playing harmonica and I cough I've got a I had a congestion of the lung when I was quite young so perhaps that's kept me fit playing trombone and harmonicas I suppose

00:54:37.503 --> 00:54:41.989
yeah on the show wise what do you do you know your lip pursing tongue blocking

00:54:42.028 --> 00:54:50.318
I'm doing both really yeah a lot of blocking, rhythmic playing, but I do purse them, obviously for bending notes at the top, but I use both.

00:54:50.378 --> 00:54:52.199
I'm not really thinking as I'm doing it.

00:54:52.480 --> 00:54:58.226
Obviously, it's got an instinctive thing that I'm doing, but maybe sometimes I want to really push a note, then I'll probably purse my lips.

00:54:58.827 --> 00:55:01.570
If I'm cupping my hands, I probably tend to be tongue blocking.

00:55:01.610 --> 00:55:01.971
I don't know.

00:55:02.210 --> 00:55:03.711
It varies, but I use both.

00:55:04.112 --> 00:55:06.114
I don't have a fast rule about it.

00:55:06.596 --> 00:55:08.838
Bending notes, again, it depends.

00:55:08.958 --> 00:55:10.219
I love the grace notes.

00:55:10.539 --> 00:55:15.684
Bending notes, of course, are baroque kind of things I might play on the chromatic, but it You don't have to bend on the chromatic.

00:55:16.126 --> 00:55:19.389
And you said that, well, at least you used to do a lot of recording yourself.

00:55:19.449 --> 00:55:21.291
Now you're maybe going to more studios.

00:55:21.351 --> 00:55:24.795
Do you use any particular setup when you're recording your harmonica?

00:55:25.195 --> 00:55:26.016
Any microphones?

00:55:26.036 --> 00:55:27.538
Or are you just leaving that to the studio?

00:55:27.878 --> 00:55:29.260
Yeah, normally to the studio.

00:55:29.619 --> 00:55:34.746
When I, in Australia, I bought a Rode mic for recording to go with a Roland desk that I bought in Canada.

00:55:34.985 --> 00:55:36.246
I came back with my wages.

00:55:36.306 --> 00:55:37.588
I decided to buy recording gear.

00:55:37.628 --> 00:55:39.250
So I recorded some of the albums with that.

00:55:39.289 --> 00:55:41.672
But I used a Rode mic, which I'd use for the voice.

00:55:41.713 --> 00:55:42.693
So it's very acoustic.

00:55:42.813 --> 00:55:44.335
You know, I'm not getting too close to that.

00:55:44.356 --> 00:55:45.237
Is that A condenser mic?

00:55:45.476 --> 00:55:47.119
Yeah, you need to plug it in.

00:55:47.239 --> 00:55:47.860
It needs a preamp.

00:55:48.320 --> 00:55:49.581
One place, where was I?

00:55:49.681 --> 00:55:50.141
Golden Oak.

00:55:50.262 --> 00:55:55.086
When I did Swings and Roundabouts, there was a ribbon mic there, an RCA mic, actually, which I think Nat King Cole would have used.

00:55:55.347 --> 00:56:00.233
Again, I didn't swallow it, you know, because that ruined the ribbon, I think, the damp and the humidity of all that.

00:56:00.492 --> 00:56:01.693
What about your future plans?

00:56:01.733 --> 00:56:03.797
You know, you obviously got out gigging again.

00:56:03.817 --> 00:56:06.960
I think your travelling days are mostly behind you now, are they?

00:56:07.019 --> 00:56:08.722
And you're doing gigs?

00:56:09.382 --> 00:56:10.423
I did four gigs recently.

00:56:10.543 --> 00:56:12.945
It wasn't financially viable, but it was great fun.

00:56:13.146 --> 00:56:14.447
I got to play some new songs.

00:56:14.447 --> 00:56:16.670
which is always the most fun is doing the new songs.

00:56:16.911 --> 00:56:20.494
During lockdown, I started writing a book, a story about New York.

00:56:20.894 --> 00:56:22.657
There's lots of music in that, but it's a story.

00:56:22.916 --> 00:56:24.898
I didn't pick up the guitar at all or music.

00:56:25.018 --> 00:56:26.201
I was doing that during lockdown.

00:56:26.541 --> 00:56:27.661
I might get to finish that.

00:56:27.842 --> 00:56:32.547
There's a couple of other things, story ideas that I'd started and never finished that I want to come back to soon.

00:56:32.567 --> 00:56:35.990
So there's songs and music in that as well, and some jams and sessions.

00:56:36.652 --> 00:56:39.193
It's interesting that, you know, it seems to be two extremes.

00:56:39.275 --> 00:56:56.052
Either during lockdown, people either stop playing music altogether or they're kind of obsessively wanting did much more you know as much as they possibly could so it's interesting that there's kind of two extremes but maybe you know taking a break is a good thing or maybe you know practicing excessively for hours in their day is also a good thing as well it is

00:56:56.233 --> 00:57:45.606
well it's funny because I when you pick up an instrument you haven't played like the guitar cool it was fresh it was so fresh it was like new hearing with new ears the same with the harmonica you don't pick it up all the time someone asked me to make a tune up for him there was something about William Blake I did pick up bits at the beginning of lockdown I did a couple of online gigs which were fun yeah it's true but you pick it up and it's all fresh again and it's you know you're hearing it differently but I can understand it's a great it would have been a great opportunity to work out tunes and get your chops and you know learn stuff and practice I'm sure I just felt for me it was a sabbatical I wanted to do this writing and my partner was trying to write she was in exams PhD and so both of us were at home doing that and then walking going for walks and trying to swim twice a week so keep fit for the lungs I suppose but I think everyone's different and for me it was a novelty and a luxury to be able to have the time to write I suppose and not after doing it.

00:57:46.367 --> 00:57:49.773
Well, if it's as good as the song lyrics that you write, I'm sure it'd be a fantastic book.

00:57:49.793 --> 00:57:53.719
So hopefully that'll be available soon and it'll go through your website.

00:57:53.760 --> 00:57:56.804
Yeah, so thanks very much for joining me today, Rory McLeod.

00:57:57.025 --> 00:57:57.485
My pleasure.

00:57:57.525 --> 00:57:59.869
Thanks for having me and good work, mate.

00:58:00.001 --> 00:58:01.422
And great work from Rory.

00:58:01.722 --> 00:58:03.925
I highly recommend everyone checks out his songs.

00:58:03.945 --> 00:58:12.172
I'll put a list of some of the songs which contain his great harmonica playing on the podcast page so you can go and find those on his website and on his Bandcamp page.

00:58:12.512 --> 00:58:13.853
So thanks again, everyone.

00:58:13.893 --> 00:58:15.074
That's another episode done.

00:58:15.175 --> 00:58:16.076
Number 49.

00:58:16.315 --> 00:58:21.099
Thanks very much for the people who have sent me a donation over the PayPal links.

00:58:21.320 --> 00:58:22.922
Very much appreciated.

00:58:22.961 --> 00:58:26.724
And anyone else who wants to do the same, any amount is more than enough.

00:58:26.925 --> 00:58:31.291
The link to the PayPal donation will be on the front to the podcast page again.

00:58:31.331 --> 00:58:40.349
So thanks very much and I'll hand over now to Rory to play us out playing the Chinese Sheng instrument that he mentioned earlier on, the forerunner of the modern harmonica.

00:58:40.389 --> 00:58:44.958
So check this out, Wind's March.