Feb. 20, 2021

Son of Dave interview

Son of Dave interview
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Season 1 Diatonic Harmonica Pop Harmonica

Son of Dave is originally from Winnipeg, Canada, where he enjoyed pop chart success for ten years with folk-rock band Crash Test Dummies. He then moved to London and pursued a solo career.
After two albums he decided to quite literally go it alone and become the all singing, all dancing solo performer that is the Son of Dave act. While doing so he quite possibly invented a brand new genre of harmonica, incorporating beat-boxing and loop pedals to compliment his strong rhythmic harmonica style of playing. His catalogue of albums are littered with songs he has composed by dreaming up melodies on the harmonica.
Son of Dave has thrilled audiences around the world with his cartoony Bluesman persona, dragging his suitcase fulls of tricks behind him. His one-man show has got to be seen to be believed.

Select the Chapter Markers tab above to select different sections of the podcast (website version only).

Links:
Son of Dave's website:
https://sonofdave.bandcamp.com/


Videos:
Son of Dave's YouTube channel:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCu5UgKvTbjsw2VfDfTQXSfQ

Black Betty:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DlDH8zDLHxw

Crash Test Dummies: The Ballad of Peter Pumpkinhead
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nLt60MUv7AU


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

Spotify Playlist:
Also check out the Spotify Playlist, which contains most of the songs discussed in the podcast:
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5QC6RF2VTfs4iPuasJBqwT?si=M-j3IkiISeefhR7ybm9qIQ

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
and Blows Me Away Productions: http://www.blowsmeaway.com/

Support the show

01:13 - Origins of the Son of Dave name

01:32 - Had his Covid vaccination just yesterday and age mis-representation

02:20 - Originally from Winnipeg, Canada and Winnipeg Folk Festival

04:00 - First got interested in blues harmonica after seeing James Cotton playing live

05:20 - Small collection of blues records which got SoD going

06:20 - Didn’t spend lots of time studying the greats, but learnt in his own way

07:02 - Other instruments learnt when young

07:23 - SoD was a member of the successful Crash Test Dummies Folk-Rock band

09:18 - After leaving Crash Test Dummies SoD had to start from scratch again

11:12 - Sold 8 million records with Crash Test Dummies

11:40 - Moved to London in 1998

12:20 - Wild West Show album, released in 1999, and O1 album in 2001

13:10 - Started busking in London, which was the start of the SoD one man show

14:43 - Invented a new genre of harmonica with beat-boxing? Or at least the first to record it

16:33 - Loop pedal came early on

17:36 - Is nervous before shows with the one-man format

18:31 - What gear used during the live show, and live demo of the sound

19:23 - Important thing is the song and melody, not enough to just jam it

20:29 - How started incorporating beat-boxing into the show

22:46 - SoD has an instinctive way of learning and developing his act

23:06 - Distinctive image to the act: Bluesman look and cartoony album covers

24:07 - O2 album, the first mainly solo album

26:27 - SoD song used in a Robin Williams movie, and also The Preacher film

27:32 - Some blues songs covered on O2 album

29:57 - How SoD uses the piano and the guitar in creating his music

31:24 - How he uses the harmonica in composing his songs

33:15 - The themes of songs that SoD writes

35:18 - 03 album and cover of Low Rider song, and meeting Lee Oskar

36:58 - Does some basic maintenance of his harmonicas, but has Seydel do that for him now

38:28 - Song used in TV series Breaking Bad

41:40 - Also had a song in the TV series Preacher

42:30 - The Blues At The Grand album featured a large number of guest musicians

44:20 - Explosive Hits album from 2016 is a covers album

45:37 - Music For Cop Shows album

47:29 - Has been releasing singles instead of albums over the last few years, due to the new world of streaming

48:11 - Has two albums in the pipeline

48:53 - Most recent single is What A Life

49:26 - Does a lot of touring and has played all around the world

50:15 - Admires other harmonica players

51:08 - SoD is strong with rhythm and hooks and melodies, similar to a comment Lee Oskar made on his podcast

52:21 - Has given some harmonica workshops

53:09 - Recently has been playing more songs without the looping pedal, with harmonica and voice and a rattle

53:55 - 10 minute question

54:43 - Seydel endorser and low harmonicas

55:49 - Plays some Chromatic harmonica

56:11 - Favourite keys of diatonic are down to what matches his vocal range

57:03 - Embouchre

57:18 - Amps and mics

58:28 - Future Plans

WEBVTT

00:00:00.322 --> 00:00:02.463
Son of Dave joins me on episode 33.

00:00:03.365 --> 00:00:09.893
Originally from Winnipeg, Canada, he enjoyed pop chart success for 10 years with folk rock band Crush Test Dummies.

00:00:10.233 --> 00:00:12.596
He then moved to London and pursued a solo career.

00:00:12.615 --> 00:00:19.923
After two albums, he decided to quite literally go it alone and became the old singing, old dancing solo performer that is the Son of Dave act.

00:00:20.123 --> 00:00:28.693
While doing so, he quite possibly invented a brand new genre of harmonica, incorporating beatboxing and loop pedals to complement his strong rhythmic harmonica playing.

00:00:29.410 --> 00:00:34.195
His catalogue of albums are littered with songs he has composed by Dreaming Up Melodies and the Harmonica.

00:00:35.177 --> 00:00:42.186
Son of Dave has thrilled audiences around the world with his cartoony bluesman persona, dragging his suitcase full of tricks behind him.

00:00:42.606 --> 00:00:44.909
His one-man show has got to be seen to be believed.

00:00:45.710 --> 00:01:11.319
Oh, and he's had his Covid jab now too! And welcome to the podcast.

00:01:11.900 --> 00:01:13.641
Hey, thanks for having me in.

00:01:13.942 --> 00:01:15.203
First of all, we'll start with your name.

00:01:15.325 --> 00:01:17.326
Your father really is called Dave, yeah?

00:01:17.566 --> 00:01:17.987
He is.

00:01:18.067 --> 00:01:18.688
He is Dave.

00:01:18.808 --> 00:01:19.650
It was the 70s.

00:01:20.070 --> 00:01:22.352
I grew up calling him Dave rather than Dad.

00:01:22.373 --> 00:01:25.597
I think I started calling him Dad sometime in my 20s.

00:01:25.918 --> 00:01:28.861
And it came up from some people calling me son of Dave, yeah.

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But man, I've been over here 25 years.

00:01:31.745 --> 00:01:32.305
Do you know what?

00:01:32.465 --> 00:01:34.989
I went for the COVID shot just yesterday.

00:01:35.030 --> 00:01:38.353
They've given me a shot of asthma for the win.

00:01:38.721 --> 00:01:41.284
I had a form that I had to sort of look at and fill out.

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And it told me my age on the top of the sheet.

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It said, you're 54 years old.

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And I thought, they've got that wrong, man.

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I'm 53.

00:01:49.615 --> 00:01:52.700
Then I looked at, you know, well, they've got the birth date right.

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They must have done the math wrong.

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And I sat there and I did the math.

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And I did the math like three or four times.

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And I realized that I've just celebrated two 53rd birthdays in a row, I think.

00:02:03.682 --> 00:02:04.623
I lost count.

00:02:04.924 --> 00:02:06.165
Well, so you've had your COVID jab.

00:02:06.206 --> 00:02:06.626
How was that?

00:02:06.667 --> 00:02:08.949
You might want to encourage people to get out there and have the jab.

00:02:09.009 --> 00:02:10.611
Any bad side effects so far?

00:02:10.853 --> 00:02:11.653
No, none at all.

00:02:11.774 --> 00:02:15.379
I encourage people to go out and get it and also to buy Microsoft products.

00:02:17.562 --> 00:02:21.127
So you, as you say there, you're originally from Canada, from Winnipeg in Canada.

00:02:21.489 --> 00:02:24.713
What was it like musically around Winnipeg when you were growing up?

00:02:25.026 --> 00:02:26.068
Winnipeg, well,

00:02:26.228 --> 00:02:29.593
it's a smallish city in the prairies in Canada.

00:02:29.935 --> 00:02:32.179
It's a long drive to any other city.

00:02:32.419 --> 00:02:36.466
You're going to drive for eight hours to get to another city, and that's not a nice one.

00:02:37.268 --> 00:02:39.551
You might get to Minneapolis or something in 10 hours.

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That said, even the vaudevillians used to come up to Winnipeg.

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They weren't used to these long drives, and they would come up to the...

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vaudeville theaters in winnipeg it had it was it saw its chaplains and buster keaton's and and uh and and all all the folks that were doing vaudeville come up and then it saw its share of musicians coming up from uh as they would tour across the northern united states the american musicians it it also got its um its players come up from chicago when the when the blues thing was happening now you know not all it it trickled up when i was a kid there were blues bands in town, and they would have been, you know, maybe my sisters.

00:03:23.091 --> 00:03:25.974
They were walking around with bell-bottoms and bare feet.

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And there would be guys, yeah, a little older than them, already playing in the bars.

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I guess that's when, early in mid-'70s.

00:03:32.965 --> 00:03:35.307
I don't remember that far back.

00:03:35.748 --> 00:03:38.673
And the blues scene was already kicking off in Winnipeg.

00:03:39.032 --> 00:03:46.644
Winnipeg then also developed, around that time, it developed a folk festival called, imaginatively enough, the Winnipeg Folk Festival.

00:03:47.305 --> 00:03:48.126
It was a pearl festival.

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It was the best festival in Canada for decades.

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I mean, we had Pete Seeger and Bill Monroe.

00:03:55.475 --> 00:04:00.621
I mean, it all came through there, all the great hippie acts.

00:04:00.901 --> 00:04:08.829
But for the blues, I twigged on when I heard James Cotton, and it was maybe 76 or 78 or something.

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He

00:04:09.750 --> 00:04:11.450
played at the Winnipeg Festival.

00:04:11.471 --> 00:04:13.293
Yeah, the big stage of the folk festival there.

00:04:13.432 --> 00:04:18.497
I don't know, 4,000 or 5,000 people who feel just...

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absolutely transfixed and dancing her hineys off.

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He played that 100% Cotton album.

00:04:27.233 --> 00:04:29.916
Fever, Boogie Thing, Creeper.

00:04:46.197 --> 00:04:47.160
I had a harmonica.

00:04:47.620 --> 00:04:48.901
I used to noodle on it.

00:04:49.793 --> 00:04:55.713
I could play a couple sort of jigs and reels and, you know, follow the little fold-up instructions that came in the box.

00:04:56.394 --> 00:04:58.040
And my dad showed me a couple of things.

00:04:59.062 --> 00:05:03.357
I didn't know its pure sexual power until I saw Cotton do that.

00:05:03.874 --> 00:05:08.238
Yeah, no, I saw James Cotton play, yeah, a high energy act and loved a lot of his songs, yeah.

00:05:08.259 --> 00:05:14.127
So he turned you on to harmonica, like you said, you had one, but he's the one who really sort of got you interested and then you started playing blues then, did

00:05:14.166 --> 00:05:14.286
you?

00:05:14.307 --> 00:05:19.774
Yeah, as a kid, yeah, and then I just found anyone that was playing it at the festival, I'd go and seek it out.

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I started with a handful of records only.

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There was 100% Cotton, a Sonny Terry, Brownie McGee compilation, and then I had a couple records by John Hammond Jr., I just fell in love with his vibe.

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One or two others.

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And then that was it.

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You know, I kept buying records, but all kinds of music.

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But I wouldn't buy blues records.

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I would hear it in the bars.

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And by the time I was a teenager, I was going in the Sunday jams.

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They'd sneak me in.

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They'd get me on stage.

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And I could play with these guys.

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All the classic blues songs, I heard live versions of.

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That was it.

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It wasn't played on the radio.

00:06:00.418 --> 00:06:01.560
in Winnipeg.

00:06:01.819 --> 00:06:05.346
You know, we had Rock FM and you wouldn't hear much.

00:06:05.485 --> 00:06:09.132
You had to go to a record shop and maybe ask around.

00:06:09.673 --> 00:06:19.588
I could get it, but I just sucked it up by hearing it and playing it in mostly a live situation after just having two or three records.

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This shines through now because I have a complete lack of discipline and knowledge.

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I don't know who did what, and I can't attribute any lick to any player.

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I'm a bum, I'm telling you.

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I don't understand this stuff because I never did my homework.

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Maybe 10, 20 years ago, I started collecting singles, slowly piecing together a bit of a knowledge about these players and and the evolution of harmonica.

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But it's interesting, people learn in different ways.

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So you say you learn not such from records, but going to jams and jamming in bars and playing along with other people and obviously hearing some harmonic and playing along with some records.

00:07:01.461 --> 00:07:02.242
Yeah.

00:07:02.262 --> 00:07:04.204
Did you learn any other instruments when you were young?

00:07:04.264 --> 00:07:06.447
Have you been sent for piano lessons or anything like that?

00:07:06.687 --> 00:07:12.593
Well, again, my natural lack of discipline, I taught myself some guitar and mandolin.

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rudimentary stuff.

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And right away, it was all about having fun and playing bands, writing some songs, not really knowing what I was doing.

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And then going to college, then the summer, the band that I was sort of playing with, a weekend band, started to write some really good songs, and that took off.

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Kept me on the road for 10 years playing with them.

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Still not doing the right kind of homework

00:07:42.333 --> 00:07:56.545
so this is crash test dummies that you're alluding to there yeah so a successful canadian folk rock band you know we're pretty well known yeah so you had a successful career with those guys and i think you played what guitar mandolin and harmonica with that band as well yeah

00:07:56.605 --> 00:08:21.990
yeah that's right i'd try to stick the harmonica wherever i could get it in it worked well for the first record or two uh and then afterwards it was i was a bit of a sore thumb in the band because uh you know the other the other players had everything covered, so I'd do odd bits here and there, and they were kind enough to keep me on for the four records and ten years of the high time of that.

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When I'd go home, I'd work on my own insane kind of blues recordings and stuff, and I made a couple of quite unusual records on my downtime, but there was a lot of touring.

00:08:48.033 --> 00:09:15.557
in quite a unique position as a on the podcast in as a harmonica player having been in what was quite a commercially successful band i don't know how commercially successful but i'd certainly heard of crash test dummies in the uk when i was younger so i mean you were then in the sort of full-blown music industry yeah with uh proper record labels and uh proper and all that yeah so there was that was an advantage to you i will get on to maybe you'd quite like getting away from that side of things but how was that you know working in the sort of full-blown music industry

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um It was dynamic.

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When it was over, I started completely at ground zero again.

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There was no connections left over.

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The music industry was changing, crashing.

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It was quite bizarre.

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I mean, I have a few friends that I kept, associates, comrades, colleagues from back then.

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Some people that I can still ring up and maybe get a job from and that kind of thing, or who can help me with a little PR or something.

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But really, it was starting from the bottom up, absolutely.

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I wouldn't go out and get a gig using the name of that band to bring fans in.

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It was just not like that.

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I was just the harmonica

00:10:00.888 --> 00:10:01.970
player from that band.

00:10:02.390 --> 00:10:04.634
Would you say your main instrument was the harmonica of that band?

00:10:04.653 --> 00:10:07.518
Because I know obviously you did play mandolin and some guitar with them as well.

00:10:07.837 --> 00:10:09.220
Yeah, that's right, mandolin and guitar.

00:10:09.240 --> 00:10:10.621
And I was doing lots of percussion.

00:10:10.942 --> 00:10:16.590
It was an old little percussion station I'd built for it.

00:10:17.451 --> 00:10:21.576
So yeah, I was pretty much an entertaining guy on stage right.

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A really, really good gig to have.

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I'm very lucky to have it.

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A lot of it is about entertaining an audience in front of you.

00:10:29.865 --> 00:10:32.250
I did my own share of vaudeville and stuff.

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I used to play in a medicine show in my younger years, 18, 19.

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I was in this horse-drawn wagon.

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The side would fold down, and we'd go out and crack people up.

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So I love all that stuff, and I was studying theater since I was a little kid.

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So just having it up on stage is my first go-to talent.

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The big band took me 10 years, and a little longer than I foresaw, sort of playing someone

00:11:04.899 --> 00:11:06.182
else's songs in a way.

00:11:06.721 --> 00:11:12.229
How did it compare working in a kind of commercial band like that to working in the sort of one-man band that you're in now?

00:11:12.649 --> 00:11:14.130
There was a lot of money to be made.

00:11:14.171 --> 00:11:18.056
We sold 8 million records or CDs back then.

00:11:18.076 --> 00:11:18.275
Wow.

00:11:18.615 --> 00:11:20.177
So it was the height of that stuff.

00:11:21.359 --> 00:11:24.163
A lot of people were making a lot of money in the industry.

00:11:24.462 --> 00:11:27.066
Like I say, I saw ridiculous opulence.

00:11:27.807 --> 00:11:33.533
But we were not an opulent band, and I made enough to get a little flat income.

00:11:33.634 --> 00:11:34.254
In London.

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And then there was a few years where I was living off that money.

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And some still comes in.

00:11:39.884 --> 00:11:43.330
So you moved over to the UK and to London in 1998.

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Why the decision to come to move to London?

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I fell in love when I stayed.

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I mean, I fell in love with the place and the people and the opportunities.

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It was still an older feel to London then.

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And I loved being able to just get on it.

00:12:00.929 --> 00:12:05.796
a train or a short boat ride and be somewhere in Europe.

00:12:05.916 --> 00:12:06.616
It was brilliant.

00:12:07.898 --> 00:12:11.182
I believe you started out just busking in London.

00:12:11.743 --> 00:12:13.085
Was that a sort of decision then?

00:12:13.485 --> 00:12:18.671
You wanted to continue your music as your one-man band and you just decided to just bus for fun and they decided to pick up on it?

00:12:18.691 --> 00:12:19.712
So what was the decision there?

00:12:19.732 --> 00:12:19.753
I

00:12:20.113 --> 00:12:31.150
started out making two really fancy and bizarre records with bits of studio gear and and things that I'd pieced together and buddies

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I'd hired to help engineer it.

00:12:33.514 --> 00:12:36.037
So this is your Wild West show album in 1999.

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That's your first one.

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Right, and an album called 01.

00:12:40.503 --> 00:12:42.326
Yeah, and 01 in 2000, yeah.

00:12:42.726 --> 00:12:43.126
That's right.

00:12:43.246 --> 00:13:03.004
And so I made those, but I realized I tried to tour them briefly in Canada and it was, you know, there's 20 people showing up and we had a tour bus and great musicians and it was, you know, The 20 people, their jaw would drop, but it's just shoveling money out a window.

00:13:03.085 --> 00:13:05.086
It's just ridiculous.

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I realized, wow, I'm really starting from the beginning.

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I got to scale down, man.

00:13:10.533 --> 00:13:13.876
So back here, I went busking, like you said.

00:13:13.917 --> 00:13:14.597
That's right.

00:13:14.658 --> 00:13:15.499
Back here, I just went.

00:13:15.940 --> 00:13:17.682
I realized I've got to start all over again.

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What do I want to do?

00:13:18.543 --> 00:13:20.705
I want to make music to make people.

00:13:20.745 --> 00:13:22.126
How can I do that?

00:13:22.768 --> 00:13:24.109
By going into the studio?

00:13:24.129 --> 00:13:24.730
No.

00:13:25.121 --> 00:13:29.529
I should just go out on the street and do it and busk like I did when I was a teenager.

00:13:30.250 --> 00:13:31.273
And that gave me great

00:13:31.312 --> 00:13:31.552
joy.

00:13:32.293 --> 00:13:38.024
So those first two albums, just to touch on briefly, the Wild West show and the 01 album, like you say, you had a band in those.

00:13:38.043 --> 00:13:40.207
You've got other instruments on there.

00:13:40.248 --> 00:13:41.691
You've got singers on there.

00:13:41.730 --> 00:13:45.557
So these were albums that you sort of produced, did you?

00:13:45.638 --> 00:13:47.240
And you wrote yourself and composed them?

00:13:48.142 --> 00:13:48.221
Yeah.

00:13:59.841 --> 00:14:01.965
Yeah,

00:14:04.269 --> 00:14:09.657
I've always been one for writing a song and experimenting with recordings.

00:14:10.719 --> 00:14:19.211
But yeah, it came time to really sink or swim and find a way to be useful rather than dropping off demo tapes.

00:14:20.354 --> 00:14:25.182
It was a bit of a reckoning, like I have to do something very realistic to make myself useful.

00:14:25.221 --> 00:14:26.864
And let me try this.

00:14:26.964 --> 00:14:27.365
I'll take...

00:14:28.450 --> 00:15:01.999
microphone a little battery operated amp a bullet mic out there with a shaker and just hit the street and uh i quickly thought okay i'm playing harmonica and and singing and stuff people are looking at me odd and it just came to me just start thumping some beats into the microphone and and as soon as i did mix that with with the harmonica the uh It's just rhythmic.

00:15:02.038 --> 00:15:04.842
I wasn't thinking in terms of hip-hop or anything.

00:15:04.903 --> 00:15:08.087
I was just trying to put some more rhythm and punch into it.

00:15:08.548 --> 00:15:09.428
As soon as I did that,

00:15:09.990 --> 00:15:10.791
coins come into

00:15:10.831 --> 00:15:10.910
the

00:15:11.072 --> 00:15:11.471
box.

00:15:11.993 --> 00:15:15.498
You've potentially invented a new genre of harmonica.

00:15:16.057 --> 00:15:19.884
Were you the first to do this beatboxing harmonica together that you're aware of?

00:15:20.423 --> 00:15:24.350
There were probably 20 guys doing it at exactly the same time.

00:15:24.738 --> 00:15:26.519
But we were unaware of each other.

00:15:26.740 --> 00:15:31.986
As far as I know, I was certainly the first to be recording it.

00:15:32.547 --> 00:15:39.255
Right after that, people said, come and play at my club, just these open nights where you get up and do three tunes.

00:15:39.895 --> 00:15:47.785
So right away, I screwed the tunes together, and I got myself a cheap little looping pedal to run the beats underneath it.

00:15:48.547 --> 00:15:49.408
It grew really fast.

00:15:49.447 --> 00:15:54.354
Within a year, I was doing a full set and into the studio.

00:15:54.850 --> 00:15:55.296
to do it.

00:15:55.336 --> 00:15:55.985
So I think I was the

00:15:56.025 --> 00:15:57.831
first to record this stuff.

00:15:58.594 --> 00:15:59.654
Yeah, no, I'm fantastic.

00:15:59.674 --> 00:16:03.138
I think you can definitely take the pride in inventing this genre.

00:16:03.337 --> 00:16:07.160
Your live show, I want to make this comparison between your live show and your albums.

00:16:07.181 --> 00:16:10.924
We'll get into your sort of solo albums now, which it sounds like from the old two.

00:16:10.945 --> 00:16:21.573
But when you're performing, you're sort of layering up the sounds with the loop boxes and you're doing lots of kind of wailing, kind of a great sort of effective minimal lyrics.

00:16:21.614 --> 00:16:27.658
At what point did it develop over time about you using loop pedals and things like this and layering up your sound in that way?

00:16:27.918 --> 00:16:56.614
Yeah, the loop pedal came pretty early on there was busking where you can only do so much to get in and play a set you know to hold people's attention for half an hour to an hour or more to hold them attention I knew I can't do that without some cheap box you know and it's either drum machines or other musicians so I figured the looping pedal so right away I was incorporating the loops in there

00:16:57.186 --> 00:17:12.432
When you started out working solo and using the loop pedal, was part of that decision was, you know, you wanted to work solo so you had complete control or was it more to do with the fact that you could take what little money was available from the gigs to if you just work solo?

00:17:12.573 --> 00:17:13.935
I can't say that the more for me

00:17:14.016 --> 00:17:16.420
attitude wasn't just about keeping the money.

00:17:16.460 --> 00:17:19.345
It wasn't just about having full control either.

00:17:19.365 --> 00:17:21.950
It was just a natural thing to do.

00:17:22.402 --> 00:17:24.405
People loved it, and I had fun.

00:17:24.445 --> 00:17:34.223
And yeah, I'm free to make people chuckle in between tunes, and I don't have to play the same set list, and I don't have to play the song the same way twice.

00:17:34.243 --> 00:17:35.526
It's real freedom.

00:17:35.705 --> 00:17:37.028
But it also comes with...

00:17:37.857 --> 00:17:40.240
Fear, fear like I had not had before.

00:17:40.501 --> 00:17:48.192
And still, I am nervous before every concert, like really nervous, sick, nothing like being with a band.

00:17:48.573 --> 00:17:50.256
It didn't have those kind of nerves, no.

00:17:50.695 --> 00:17:52.298
You know, you're up there completely by yourself.

00:17:52.338 --> 00:17:55.041
You've got to entertain the crowd by yourself for your set.

00:17:55.083 --> 00:17:58.007
You know, that's a pretty daunting experience, isn't it?

00:17:58.067 --> 00:17:59.228
So how do you do that?

00:18:00.170 --> 00:18:04.896
I don't know how I'm going to do it, but once you're up there, it comes pretty easy.

00:18:05.517 --> 00:18:05.917
Yeah.

00:18:06.082 --> 00:18:08.805
We all know repetition and practice.

00:18:09.346 --> 00:18:16.053
I don't have to be thinking too much about the pedals or that, and I know the shape of each tune.

00:18:16.073 --> 00:18:30.549
And I know there are little places in each song where I can stretch time or change things around, keeping myself amused, keeping myself fresh, and then the audience gets that too.

00:18:30.849 --> 00:18:37.818
It's probably worth now just giving an overview of what sort of gear do you use in your shows to make your sound?

00:18:38.159 --> 00:18:42.585
Well, there's a microphone in front of the face, which is a normal vocal mic.

00:18:43.346 --> 00:18:45.228
And then there's the handheld mic.

00:18:46.148 --> 00:18:54.259
And that goes into loop and octave pedals so that you can hum bass lines and loop up beats, which you're making through the...

00:19:00.289 --> 00:19:21.896
And once the loops are going, then you can play over top or add more or less.

00:19:22.597 --> 00:19:48.229
The most important thing that I found, you know, other than just showing off with that stuff and jamming with myself it's all about the song and always was so the songs and the melody you can impress people with a jam for about 15 seconds 30 seconds and then you need something that's important or feels important you know and that's that's where the song and the melody comes in

00:19:49.377 --> 00:19:53.182
Yeah, I remember when I first saw you, I was really kind of blown away by that.

00:19:53.202 --> 00:19:58.509
You're up there by yourself, and it's amazing what you create, the atmosphere, and you're layering it up.

00:19:59.028 --> 00:20:08.339
But back then, when you started using loop pedals and stuff, and I'm not so sure, but around the year 2000, I presume that was reasonably new technology at that point, was it?

00:20:08.681 --> 00:20:10.383
The loop pedal was pretty new.

00:20:10.462 --> 00:20:15.808
I think they were selling them to guitar players so that they could noodle along with themselves.

00:20:16.269 --> 00:20:16.349
Yeah.

00:20:17.218 --> 00:20:18.359
So you were cutting edge.

00:20:19.040 --> 00:20:21.884
So I didn't know anybody else was using them.

00:20:21.924 --> 00:20:24.690
Yeah, I was the first one of the early people on it.

00:20:25.191 --> 00:20:28.536
I think it actually suits beatbox so well.

00:20:29.297 --> 00:20:35.606
So is beatboxing something that you already did or did you develop it as a part, you know, when you decided to start putting it into your act?

00:20:36.107 --> 00:20:43.803
The beatbox was, it just came to me while I was trying to, like I was saying, I wasn't into beatboxing at all.

00:20:44.203 --> 00:20:48.009
It just happened as a natural thing to be doing

00:20:48.029 --> 00:20:49.531
while I was playing harmonica.

00:20:50.053 --> 00:20:52.896
It's kind of like the Sonny Terry thing in a way, with the whooping between.

00:20:52.997 --> 00:20:55.621
Is that where you sort of maybe got the original idea about the music?

00:20:55.641 --> 00:20:57.384
Yeah, and other people have played me things.

00:20:57.683 --> 00:21:03.813
They've played me old Sonny Boy recording as well, where he's clicking and then like...

00:21:06.057 --> 00:21:08.400
You

00:21:08.420 --> 00:21:09.301
know, so...

00:21:09.730 --> 00:21:11.432
It wasn't totally unheard of.

00:21:11.491 --> 00:21:12.452
It comes naturally.

00:21:12.613 --> 00:21:15.656
But I think there's a thing about the boom.

00:21:18.039 --> 00:21:20.262
I don't want it to sound like a drum machine.

00:21:20.282 --> 00:21:22.464
I don't want it to sound like a hip-hop record.

00:21:22.925 --> 00:21:25.249
I want it to sound human.

00:21:25.288 --> 00:21:28.031
So that's why I go boom, boom, boom.

00:21:28.112 --> 00:21:35.981
Because it's a human sound as opposed to something that imitates a drum and bass record.

00:21:39.170 --> 00:21:42.335
You know, the stuff that actual beatboxers do.

00:21:43.376 --> 00:21:44.518
I use it my own way.

00:21:44.538 --> 00:21:49.666
I try to use it like just a rough kind of a little blues band behind me.

00:21:50.086 --> 00:21:56.738
So when you did start realizing that, you know, you were going to start using beatboxing, did you go to like beatboxing university or something then?

00:21:56.998 --> 00:22:01.746
Did you actually kind of try and study it properly or was it just a case of kind of picking up whatever worked for you as you went along?

00:22:02.210 --> 00:22:08.037
There's a through line here, and that is that I lack discipline in every respect.

00:22:09.439 --> 00:22:19.050
In the long run, I'll end up having some skills and knowing some stuff, but it ain't through sitting down and properly doing the homework.

00:22:19.531 --> 00:22:23.676
So I just learned one sound, and I'd get one sound, and then it'd last me six months.

00:22:24.798 --> 00:22:26.619
It was just my kick, snare, and hat.

00:22:26.941 --> 00:22:30.164
It's just learning kick, snare, and hat.

00:22:30.224 --> 00:22:31.165
It's just...

00:22:31.362 --> 00:22:34.226
After a year or two, I learned a new snare sound.

00:22:34.866 --> 00:22:36.348
That's good to hear for someone like me.

00:22:36.449 --> 00:22:37.170
I'm quite anal.

00:22:37.190 --> 00:22:39.153
Yeah, I feel I have to go away and study things.

00:22:39.173 --> 00:22:42.596
Yeah, but it's always quite a nice, you know, I think a lot of people get hung up on that.

00:22:42.617 --> 00:22:44.539
You know, they feel they have to go and learn stuff.

00:22:44.579 --> 00:22:47.384
Yeah, but it's like you're saying, you're just kind of doing it as you go along.

00:22:47.443 --> 00:22:48.786
Maybe that's the better way to do it.

00:22:48.806 --> 00:22:49.006
Yeah.

00:22:49.026 --> 00:22:52.050
And people kind of stop themselves doing things in a lot of ways, don't they?

00:22:52.070 --> 00:22:53.352
Because they feel they're not ready for it.

00:22:53.833 --> 00:22:54.073
Yeah.

00:22:54.753 --> 00:22:57.357
Or they're more polite than I am.

00:22:57.498 --> 00:23:03.281
Because, you know, before I know how to do something properly, I'll I'll have it out and air it in public.

00:23:05.724 --> 00:23:07.248
So you've got a very distinctive image.

00:23:07.407 --> 00:23:11.594
You wear a fedora hat and you've got a big wide-shouldered business suit on.

00:23:11.634 --> 00:23:14.178
And you've got quite a wacky persona.

00:23:14.198 --> 00:23:17.742
Your album covers, you've got these kind of cartoony kind of things.

00:23:17.803 --> 00:23:20.066
So what about that image that you developed?

00:23:20.125 --> 00:23:21.288
Is that something you did from early on?

00:23:21.528 --> 00:23:22.890
Yeah, that just comes organically.

00:23:22.910 --> 00:23:24.833
You start to wake up in the suits.

00:23:24.873 --> 00:23:25.653
They just appear.

00:23:25.673 --> 00:23:26.596
The

00:23:26.635 --> 00:23:27.998
life turns into a cartoon.

00:23:28.417 --> 00:23:29.179
For

00:23:29.219 --> 00:23:30.401
the audience's entertainment.

00:23:31.821 --> 00:23:33.744
Again, it shows you need that image, don't you?

00:23:33.865 --> 00:23:34.826
You've been very successful.

00:23:34.846 --> 00:23:36.208
You've got that one-man act.

00:23:36.268 --> 00:23:37.348
You've got the image.

00:23:37.368 --> 00:23:39.332
I think the image is important to that, isn't it?

00:23:40.874 --> 00:23:49.785
Like any good blues man knows, you want to look a little bit sharp so that people can distinguish who's working and who's not.

00:23:50.405 --> 00:23:53.470
Who's there just to have a good time and who's actually working.

00:23:53.986 --> 00:23:54.866
at the office

00:23:56.269 --> 00:24:20.859
so yeah i'm working i better dress up yeah i mean i agree you see a lot of bands that are in the sort of t-shirt and jeans and you sort of think yeah you know having an image and looking better is important yeah so so great so moving on a little bit more into your recording so we talked about the first two recordings you did and then when you did the o2 album was that a uh a solo album or at least more of a solo album than the first two That was the record where there

00:24:20.900 --> 00:24:21.240
was a...

00:24:21.882 --> 00:24:24.105
When the one-man band thing started, isn't it?

00:24:24.846 --> 00:24:27.571
Yeah, that's when the beatbox and harmonica...

00:24:27.592 --> 00:24:31.759
I took that into a studio with a great fellow I met.

00:24:32.661 --> 00:24:33.863
And that's where we started to...

00:24:33.883 --> 00:24:35.807
That's where I started to do that.

00:24:35.826 --> 00:24:37.369
The sort of most...

00:24:37.794 --> 00:24:45.042
A lot of it live off the floor, and some of it was multi-track and overtub, a mixture of the two.

00:24:45.123 --> 00:24:46.885
And since then, I've done the same thing.

00:24:46.905 --> 00:24:56.377
Also, to keep people's entertainment, keep them focused all the way, listening through a record, 10, 14 tracks.

00:24:57.499 --> 00:25:01.203
That's difficult if you're just going to sit there with a guitar and sing.

00:25:01.243 --> 00:25:05.650
It can be done, and it has been done, but the listening experience...

00:25:06.049 --> 00:25:17.749
When you don't have much to look at, if you're carrying on with your day and just listening to a record, you know, you want to keep people's attention and give them a little more to listen to.

00:25:17.828 --> 00:25:24.559
And when you don't have so much to look at and the wise cracks between songs, then you've got to throw a little more at it.

00:25:24.980 --> 00:25:31.631
And that's why in the studio I take more liberties than I do with just the one-man band show.

00:25:31.751 --> 00:25:32.772
And some songs will be...

00:25:33.442 --> 00:25:35.325
Quite layered up and more complicated.

00:25:35.365 --> 00:25:37.487
And I love all that stuff, to be honest.

00:25:37.607 --> 00:25:39.670
I like writing songs and I like recording.

00:25:39.750 --> 00:25:40.050
I love it.

00:25:40.451 --> 00:25:42.894
On that album, are you the only musician on there?

00:25:42.914 --> 00:25:44.376
Or did you have other musicians?

00:25:44.537 --> 00:25:45.979
And on your later albums, too.

00:25:46.159 --> 00:25:47.180
First album, I think I

00:25:48.221 --> 00:25:50.825
had a lady singer on a couple of songs.

00:25:50.964 --> 00:25:53.729
I think Devil Take My Soul was on there.

00:25:53.769 --> 00:25:58.035
And that was, of course, with Martina singing the chorus with me.

00:25:58.596 --> 00:25:59.958
Subsequent albums...

00:26:00.481 --> 00:26:01.423
It's usually me.

00:26:02.307 --> 00:26:06.356
I'm quite selfish and I play a lot of the stuff.

00:26:07.219 --> 00:26:11.088
But depending on the record, we're nine, ten records in now.

00:26:11.630 --> 00:26:17.766
And sometimes I love to have a lot of players on an album and sometimes not.

00:26:18.082 --> 00:26:26.973
A song on the O2 album is the Devil Take My Soul, which was featured in a film, as we like to say over here, or a movie, Americans might say.

00:26:27.394 --> 00:26:28.435
Was it this one from this album?

00:26:28.455 --> 00:26:30.317
Because I know you recorded it on another album as well.

00:26:30.357 --> 00:26:32.961
So this was a movie with Robin Williams in, yeah?

00:26:33.001 --> 00:26:34.123
So quite a big movie.

00:26:41.373 --> 00:26:42.334
Devil Take My Soul Devil Take My Soul

00:26:55.394 --> 00:26:57.737
Yeah, they put that in a Robin Williams film.

00:26:57.777 --> 00:27:02.182
It's not folks' favorite Robin Williams film.

00:27:02.643 --> 00:27:04.785
I don't think it got too good reviews.

00:27:05.125 --> 00:27:07.367
I took it as quite an honor anyway.

00:27:08.890 --> 00:27:10.050
Yeah.

00:27:10.070 --> 00:27:19.041
I've had songs go into TV shows and films, not frequently enough, because that actually...

00:27:19.394 --> 00:27:20.194
pay some bills.

00:27:20.315 --> 00:27:20.756
It's good.

00:27:20.836 --> 00:27:21.916
And it reaches people.

00:27:22.518 --> 00:27:23.179
So it's lovely.

00:27:23.239 --> 00:27:25.201
Everybody, everyone wants to sink

00:27:25.301 --> 00:27:25.362
as

00:27:25.422 --> 00:27:25.982
they call it.

00:27:26.483 --> 00:27:26.703
Yeah.

00:27:26.743 --> 00:27:28.365
We'll touch on the big one later on.

00:27:28.586 --> 00:27:32.171
We'll save that for people to hear about which TV show you did appear on.

00:27:32.531 --> 00:27:36.576
But on that O2 album, you do, you do quite a few blues songs, you know, pure blues songs.

00:27:36.596 --> 00:27:42.224
You do Manish Boy where you're singing this kind of nice high pitch singing, your usual funny take on the song.

00:27:42.244 --> 00:27:43.507
And then you've got Crossroads rolling in.

00:27:43.547 --> 00:27:45.308
So quite a few blues songs on that one.

00:27:48.814 --> 00:27:48.894
Yeah.

00:27:49.377 --> 00:28:08.263
Those

00:28:08.325 --> 00:28:14.613
are two traditionals that I did on there, and I really took liberties with them as I was doing back then.

00:28:14.633 --> 00:28:17.738
I don't think I'll be so rude now with...

00:28:18.306 --> 00:28:20.921
with songs that are so holy in a way.

00:28:20.980 --> 00:28:23.053
I did really take

00:28:23.113 --> 00:28:23.695
the mickey.

00:28:25.057 --> 00:28:28.924
I think you're modernizing the blues and giving it to a modern audience.

00:28:28.964 --> 00:28:30.067
So let's put it that way.

00:28:30.428 --> 00:28:30.969
I don't know.

00:28:31.009 --> 00:28:31.730
I don't know.

00:28:31.750 --> 00:28:32.692
I'm not so sure.

00:28:32.731 --> 00:28:34.935
It was just, it was, it was odd.

00:28:34.976 --> 00:28:37.800
It's my way of doing things in, in a playful way.

00:28:37.820 --> 00:28:40.085
I don't know about so modern.

00:28:40.105 --> 00:28:49.181
I don't think you could play that to anybody and think, yeah, that sounds really modern, you know, because it doesn't, it sounds just odd.

00:28:49.280 --> 00:28:51.644
It's, beatbox and strange rhythm.

00:28:51.664 --> 00:28:55.691
It had a more modern, almost drum and bass rhythm, you know.

00:28:55.730 --> 00:29:24.811
Yeah, that's I guess modern, but a more syncopated or stressful beat that a lot of people were hearing in maybe drum and bass or jungle, but When you hear it like that, when you hear it just put in these really human terms, it doesn't sound expensive.

00:29:24.951 --> 00:29:27.617
It still sounds like folk music in a way.

00:29:27.999 --> 00:29:35.134
And that was my idea, that you could just give a new life to it and just do it differently.

00:29:35.586 --> 00:29:39.970
You talked about, you know, you're interested in producing albums, going into the studio.

00:29:40.009 --> 00:29:46.195
Do you think you took some time from, you know, when you were in the crash test dummies, you know, is that something you were able to draw on to help?

00:29:46.395 --> 00:29:51.901
You know, you're playing different instruments that you're playing rhythmically, playing percussion, I think, or did it help to develop your abilities?

00:29:52.761 --> 00:29:53.502
Yeah, absolutely.

00:29:53.563 --> 00:29:56.965
All the other instruments have been key.

00:29:57.145 --> 00:30:07.816
I kicked myself because I never, I didn't learn piano or touch the thing really until a couple of years ago I realized, That's really what I was missing.

00:30:07.836 --> 00:30:13.082
I can play guitar and I can even write good lines on it, but I never love it.

00:30:13.261 --> 00:30:17.626
I think it needs to be back in the band and do its thing back there.

00:30:17.646 --> 00:30:21.170
It needs to go...

00:30:21.190 --> 00:30:28.357
It has that little sort of cheeky sound, but I don't think it should be front and center very often.

00:30:28.498 --> 00:30:32.201
No, near as often as it was for...

00:30:32.769 --> 00:30:33.791
30 years.

00:30:34.712 --> 00:30:35.554
It had its time.

00:30:35.594 --> 00:30:40.500
Now, that doesn't mean that the harp needs to be hogged in front of center.

00:30:41.001 --> 00:30:44.287
What needs to be front and center is the song, eh?

00:30:44.708 --> 00:30:46.711
And the music as a whole.

00:30:46.971 --> 00:30:50.675
And things can do their little voices in there.

00:30:51.237 --> 00:30:55.564
So I like playing and writing the guitar part, but I don't love it.

00:30:55.604 --> 00:30:57.286
And I don't like to compose a song.

00:30:57.346 --> 00:30:59.209
I don't like to write on the guitar either.

00:30:59.630 --> 00:31:02.272
Because it inevitably takes you down these...

00:31:03.105 --> 00:31:05.930
roads that aren't even well-beaten paths.

00:31:05.990 --> 00:31:08.032
They're like eight-lane freeways.

00:31:08.554 --> 00:31:10.457
They're just, everybody goes that way.

00:31:10.517 --> 00:31:12.859
It's full of traffic.

00:31:13.121 --> 00:31:20.131
As soon as you start doing a riff on a guitar, it sounds like 20 other recordings or styles you've heard.

00:31:21.854 --> 00:31:23.496
So it doesn't inspire me so much.

00:31:24.057 --> 00:31:25.219
But what about the harmonica, though?

00:31:25.239 --> 00:31:31.989
Because obviously your harmonica features very heavily, particularly in your show, but on your albums as well, and it's very central to the rhythms that you're playing on there.

00:31:32.009 --> 00:31:32.650
Yeah, that's right.

00:31:33.026 --> 00:31:35.910
So I was writing many records worth of stuff.

00:31:36.009 --> 00:31:47.567
I was writing it starting on the harmonica because you start with a three-note riff and then you improvise a melody on top of that.

00:31:48.249 --> 00:31:49.250
You just pick it up and...

00:31:57.321 --> 00:31:58.243
Whether it's that or...

00:32:03.201 --> 00:32:05.044
Do

00:32:05.124 --> 00:32:05.904
something twice.

00:32:06.346 --> 00:32:07.105
Does it catch you?

00:32:07.125 --> 00:32:12.311
And once you have this little melody curving along, it could even be three notes.

00:32:19.279 --> 00:32:24.326
It's one of the first Son of Dave one-man band tunes that I wrote was like that.

00:32:24.945 --> 00:32:30.972
I put the same notes on the bass almost, and the harp does that, and it's just completely hypnotic.

00:32:31.113 --> 00:32:36.309
And then a similar melody forms in the vocal over top of that.

00:32:37.131 --> 00:32:52.366
Then you carve out parts, not 12 bars, but you carve out verse and chorus and break down middle eight or whatever happens after that, verse and chorus, chunks of songs, so that you're returning to a bit that people can sing to or that people can hum.

00:32:52.386 --> 00:33:07.434
12 bars is great for people playing together and 12 bars is great for some some songs, but it doesn't lend itself so well for people to either sing along or...

00:33:07.476 --> 00:33:10.300
Yeah, it's different.

00:33:10.422 --> 00:33:11.884
The 12 bars is a

00:33:12.285 --> 00:33:13.847
particular form to itself.

00:33:15.394 --> 00:33:17.517
you write lyrics to your songs as well.

00:33:17.557 --> 00:33:29.210
And usually your songs are quite often sort of punctuated with you kind of doing these repeated phrases, which again, is that sort of quite rhythmic, hypnotic sort of approach that you have, meaning you're building up these rhythmic layers.

00:33:29.270 --> 00:33:36.259
But also you can be quite political in what you're saying, maybe partly like you keep buying it, for example, on your recent singles.

00:33:36.318 --> 00:33:39.102
And is that something you've got in mind to try and make statements?

00:33:40.022 --> 00:33:41.744
You wrestle with it, don't we, eh?

00:33:42.125 --> 00:33:42.205
Yeah.

00:33:42.625 --> 00:33:46.492
I like to say often there's five kinds of blues songs.

00:33:47.074 --> 00:33:48.196
There's the drinking song.

00:33:49.419 --> 00:33:50.641
There's the fighting song.

00:33:51.261 --> 00:33:52.805
There's the making love song.

00:33:53.487 --> 00:33:54.248
There's dancing.

00:33:54.969 --> 00:33:56.893
You know, just shaking that thing and moving it.

00:33:57.334 --> 00:34:01.442
And the fifth is something to do with...

00:34:01.857 --> 00:34:17.981
Corporations wanting to control the voice of media in order to bend people's opinion against cooperating and collective thought and organizing themselves in order to keep from being underfunded, underpaid.

00:34:18.001 --> 00:34:26.715
The last one is either the protest or it is also the essence of many blues songs and many songs.

00:34:27.135 --> 00:34:29.699
That last one is the trick.

00:34:30.219 --> 00:34:35.961
To do it without using political and big words is a trick.

00:34:36.021 --> 00:34:47.335
And I quite often just have a song that follows one of the first four categories, and then the second or third verse will deal with the fifth category.

00:34:48.195 --> 00:34:54.623
I think you do it in an effective way, though, because a lot of these songs which try to make a message, you know, they're a bit overt, they're a bit in your face.

00:34:54.663 --> 00:34:58.045
Where you do it very subtly, it's just a little punchy line.

00:34:58.206 --> 00:34:58.847
Thanks.

00:34:58.907 --> 00:34:58.947
I

00:34:59.547 --> 00:35:01.309
wasn't sure if anybody noticed.

00:35:01.442 --> 00:35:06.931
So your album, 2008 or 03, you had an 01, an 02, and an 03.

00:35:07.050 --> 00:35:08.413
What was that naming about?

00:35:08.693 --> 00:35:09.954
I wasn't sure how long

00:35:10.014 --> 00:35:11.257
I could go with it, eh?

00:35:11.597 --> 00:35:12.920
So I just started counting them.

00:35:13.300 --> 00:35:17.708
And then I realized after three, journalists are going to get really...

00:35:18.188 --> 00:35:29.306
Yeah, and so on that 03 album, you did Low Rider, which is a real classic from war, and Lee Oscar playing on a monochrome there.

00:35:29.326 --> 00:35:29.405
Yeah.

00:35:45.858 --> 00:35:47.599
I've raided every tomb.

00:35:47.739 --> 00:35:50.121
I've desecrated every shrine.

00:35:50.163 --> 00:35:58.391
Lee Oscar, I met him in the 90s when I was in Los Angeles.

00:35:59.192 --> 00:36:16.074
I think he was out in Pasadena or somewhere, but he drove in because we'd spoken on the telephone and he drove in and gave me a box of his harps, you know, on the agreement that I'd played his harps and And they were great harmonicas, and I was already all over them.

00:36:16.094 --> 00:36:22.382
And he brought me the little set of tuning things, his toolkit, and that blew my mind.

00:36:22.422 --> 00:36:25.244
I can open it up and actually fix the damn thing?

00:36:25.284 --> 00:36:26.367
So, so good.

00:36:26.487 --> 00:36:28.188
And what a gent, what a sweet guy.

00:36:28.208 --> 00:36:30.771
And I said, okay, come on into the gig.

00:36:30.811 --> 00:36:32.213
It was a really big gig we were playing.

00:36:32.634 --> 00:36:34.657
Come on into the gig, and I'll take you backstage.

00:36:34.677 --> 00:36:38.760
And he goes, nah, I don't like all that schmoozing stuff.

00:36:39.623 --> 00:36:40.744
And he just took off.

00:36:40.784 --> 00:36:40.963
Yeah.

00:36:41.204 --> 00:36:42.525
So he was a private person.

00:36:42.849 --> 00:36:53.083
quieter guy with who had already done his a lot of his his fun wasn't going to waste his time in there he's just real nice to me and i played his harps i played his harps for a bunch of years

00:36:53.503 --> 00:37:02.715
yeah i know he's a nice guy i've had him on the podcast yeah obviously he's done very well business-wise with the harmonica so do you do you customize your harmonicas then uh there you got the toolkit is that something you do i

00:37:03.235 --> 00:37:10.646
can knock out the bits of food i can tune a reed back to pitch if it ain't broke.

00:37:11.447 --> 00:37:15.913
And I can sort of tweak it for some very rudimentary overblowing.

00:37:15.972 --> 00:37:17.034
That's as far as I've gone.

00:37:17.835 --> 00:37:21.880
Customize is, I don't know, customize, no, I don't do that.

00:37:22.461 --> 00:37:32.596
Now, Sadal, great guy from Bertram, he called me up five or ten years ago and said, love it, let me send you a couple of harmonicas.

00:37:33.476 --> 00:38:04.893
And bless him, he sent me some cool stuff because he knew right away that i was playing the low keys and uh most of my tunes are in low just because it it works more of a like a rhythm instrument if it's not it's not tweeting it's not like a you know it's like one man band with a voice and trumpet it's not no you want it just a little lower so you want you want it around the voice or below the the voice to keep keep rhythm, like working like a rhythm instrument.

00:38:04.913 --> 00:38:13.141
So he knew I was playing the lower keys, and he sent me a couple of those, and they were just fine dandy.

00:38:13.521 --> 00:38:16.224
And they can fix the reed plates.

00:38:16.585 --> 00:38:21.471
You can take the reed plate off, send them in, and they'll repair them for relatively cheap.

00:38:21.811 --> 00:38:28.038
So to bless them, they've been my harmonica allies for a good many years now.

00:38:28.610 --> 00:38:30.972
Getting on to the big song we were talking about.

00:38:31.032 --> 00:38:37.018
So you had a song which featured in season three, episode 11 of Breaking Bad, which is Shake a Bone.

00:38:37.057 --> 00:38:37.297
Yeah.

00:38:37.358 --> 00:38:38.318
So how did that come about?

00:38:38.360 --> 00:38:39.860
Yeah, that's really weird.

00:38:40.081 --> 00:38:43.885
And I put myself through the agony of watching that whole series.

00:38:43.985 --> 00:38:46.827
I'm not sure you want to dedicate so much of your life to watching it.

00:38:47.047 --> 00:38:50.490
I did it because they told me my song was in there.

00:38:50.632 --> 00:38:51.652
I didn't know when.

00:38:51.693 --> 00:38:53.715
Right.

00:38:53.855 --> 00:38:55.715
I didn't really do the research.

00:38:56.117 --> 00:38:57.277
I could have just jumped in.

00:38:57.538 --> 00:39:01.943
fast-forwarded to that scene and listened to the song in there.

00:39:02.545 --> 00:39:02.965
But I didn't.

00:39:03.567 --> 00:39:15.483
I just started the beginning of series and watched until there's Jesse and Walter in their camper van, like an action montage of them cooking meth.

00:39:16.324 --> 00:39:22.494
And then my song is playing, and I was looking around the room like, why have I left a laptop on or something?

00:39:22.795 --> 00:39:24.958
Why is my work interrupting music?

00:39:25.057 --> 00:39:37.972
my programming and it took me a few seconds to realize oh god my song is playing in the actual television

00:39:42.898 --> 00:39:50.465
show

00:39:50.485 --> 00:39:55.945
so They seem to like it.

00:39:56.105 --> 00:39:57.045
People seem to like it.

00:39:57.385 --> 00:39:59.288
To me, it seems really strange.

00:39:59.768 --> 00:40:03.193
Why is my work going on while they're cooking meth?

00:40:03.632 --> 00:40:04.393
Were you outraged?

00:40:04.813 --> 00:40:06.255
Was I outraged?

00:40:07.237 --> 00:40:07.456
No.

00:40:08.318 --> 00:40:10.501
Again, I was very honored and grateful.

00:40:10.960 --> 00:40:18.068
Well, that song has got by far the most hits for you on Spotify with over 1.5 million plays on Spotify.

00:40:18.088 --> 00:40:22.853
So that sort of exposure from a big TV show like that, did you see the benefits of that?

00:40:23.106 --> 00:40:24.929
It gets passed around on Spotify.

00:40:24.989 --> 00:40:30.896
Yeah, it stretched the streaming audience far and wide.

00:40:30.916 --> 00:40:34.601
You know, I have one fan in every town now.

00:40:36.784 --> 00:40:40.489
So did they contact you and specifically ask for permission to get your song?

00:40:40.871 --> 00:40:40.911
I

00:40:40.971 --> 00:40:42.532
don't know how that one came through.

00:40:42.572 --> 00:40:49.443
There are people that shop the music, that do sync, and they'll take it and shop it around.

00:40:49.842 --> 00:40:51.385
And it may have come through...

00:40:52.097 --> 00:40:57.791
through one of those agencies that works with label services.

00:40:57.911 --> 00:40:59.554
It's not like a label, but it was...

00:40:59.894 --> 00:41:06.269
Everything's changed since the old days where you'd have a record label, you'd work 10 years until you were almost...

00:41:06.561 --> 00:41:10.367
drop dead, and then they'd give you a Cadillac and throw you out on the street.

00:41:10.947 --> 00:41:12.210
You'd sleep in the Cadillac.

00:41:12.269 --> 00:41:16.655
That sounded fine back then, but now it's very complicated and difficult.

00:41:16.815 --> 00:41:19.159
The label services will do certain jobs for you.

00:41:19.179 --> 00:41:20.239
You pay them.

00:41:20.440 --> 00:41:28.811
At one point, there was someone shopping songs around in Los Angeles in the early days of Netflix.

00:41:29.793 --> 00:41:30.554
Yeah, great.

00:41:30.594 --> 00:41:31.775
They might have

00:41:32.016 --> 00:41:32.777
brought that one up.

00:41:33.793 --> 00:41:36.556
Well, you've been immortalized in Breaking Bad, cooking meth.

00:41:36.737 --> 00:41:39.039
You know, everyone's going to associate you with that forever to come.

00:41:39.960 --> 00:41:41.382
Did you know the program Preacher?

00:41:42.103 --> 00:41:42.844
No, I never saw that.

00:41:42.923 --> 00:41:43.824
I was aware you were on that one.

00:41:43.844 --> 00:41:45.045
But yeah, go and tell us about that

00:41:45.226 --> 00:41:45.346
one.

00:41:45.405 --> 00:41:46.748
Yeah, that's wild.

00:41:46.847 --> 00:41:49.269
It's a hilarious, wild, crazy thing.

00:41:49.349 --> 00:41:55.637
After the comic called Preacher, the opening episode ends with my song Voodoo Doll.

00:41:56.418 --> 00:42:00.041
They played almost the whole song at the end while these...

00:42:00.385 --> 00:42:04.476
two bad characters that are walking up to a house is really nice.

00:42:04.916 --> 00:42:05.858
So yeah, I love it.

00:42:06.380 --> 00:42:07.583
That one, I got it.

00:42:07.603 --> 00:42:10.389
I understood why the music really matched the scene.

00:42:28.802 --> 00:42:32.387
So you got Blues at the Grand in 2013.

00:42:33.168 --> 00:42:34.190
Yeah,

00:42:34.351 --> 00:42:41.922
more players on there, drums, lady vocals, great horns, organs.

00:42:42.764 --> 00:42:48.893
It was the idea of putting the blues band into the Grand Hotel.

00:42:50.081 --> 00:42:52.505
So blues at the grand.

00:42:52.605 --> 00:42:55.728
And it was a more grand production.

00:42:55.789 --> 00:42:57.371
There was my little idea there.

00:42:57.670 --> 00:43:00.474
And I had some other themes running throughout it.

00:43:00.715 --> 00:43:03.798
It was a lot of work.

00:43:04.639 --> 00:43:11.829
And I had a really good producer friend that I've been working more with lately who helped me all the way through it.

00:43:18.257 --> 00:43:19.358
So

00:43:27.938 --> 00:43:31.121
Big grand production, and it wasn't something that I could really tour.

00:43:31.161 --> 00:43:35.806
There's only one or two songs I can sort of play live as a one-man band.

00:43:36.226 --> 00:43:47.480
I tried to put a band together for it, and we played in Paris at the Duc de Lombard, which we had a residency for three nights at a jazz club there that's really top of the line.

00:43:48.641 --> 00:43:52.646
But even that was, you know, shoveling money out a window right away.

00:43:52.686 --> 00:43:56.309
When you're trying to actually pay grown-up musicians and put them in a hotel...

00:43:56.929 --> 00:44:01.396
These guys are great players, and they're my friends.

00:44:01.878 --> 00:44:03.000
They're going to get paid well.

00:44:03.541 --> 00:44:12.494
So right away, I just dug a debt to make that record because I wanted to, and I love it, and I just love the art, but I can't tour it.

00:44:13.056 --> 00:44:15.780
I've got to keep on with the one-man band show.

00:44:15.820 --> 00:44:19.106
To be honest, people like the one-man band show more.

00:44:19.969 --> 00:44:23.155
So your album, Explosive Hit, this is all covers, yeah?

00:44:23.195 --> 00:44:26.280
And you're doing songs which are well-known songs like Black Betty.

00:44:26.300 --> 00:44:26.501
Oh, Black

00:44:27.081 --> 00:44:39.702
Betty.

00:44:39.722 --> 00:44:44.030
Oh, Black Betty.

00:44:44.769 --> 00:44:53.746
That's what the gig is, eh?

00:44:54.067 --> 00:44:55.969
At some

00:44:59.657 --> 00:45:03.603
point in the set, you need to play something that makes everybody go...

00:45:05.409 --> 00:45:08.652
They dragged their honey onto the dance floor to dance.

00:45:08.873 --> 00:45:09.974
Oh, God, here we go.

00:45:10.074 --> 00:45:11.034
You got to do it.

00:45:11.275 --> 00:45:20.282
And so I built up a number of these over the years, the tunes that people recognize, either, you know, blues lovers or just pop music lovers.

00:45:20.402 --> 00:45:21.864
So there's one by Daft Punk.

00:45:21.923 --> 00:45:23.125
There's ACDC.

00:45:23.144 --> 00:45:25.807
There's Soul Finger, like you say.

00:45:25.867 --> 00:45:28.050
Pump Up the Jam is on there, man.

00:45:28.530 --> 00:45:30.952
Everyone's uncle busts a move to Pump Up the Jam.

00:45:31.353 --> 00:45:33.735
And I built up a number of these over the years.

00:45:34.094 --> 00:45:35.376
And so I thought, okay, that's it.

00:45:35.376 --> 00:45:37.309
It's time to make the cover's album.

00:45:37.889 --> 00:45:48.579
So then your next album, which has got a great name, Music for Cop Shows, I think inspired by your love of the famous 1970s American cop shows, that was back to doing your own stuff, yeah?

00:45:48.599 --> 00:45:50.340
A decision to go back to your own music.

00:45:50.360 --> 00:45:51.922
Yeah, and I needed another sync.

00:45:52.202 --> 00:45:54.664
I needed the money to come in to keep making records.

00:45:54.985 --> 00:45:57.027
So I thought, okay, I really need a sync.

00:45:57.327 --> 00:46:01.170
I wish my tunes would be picked up for television shows.

00:46:01.409 --> 00:46:07.054
And when I think of television shows, I think of the television shows I watched in the 70s, eh?

00:46:07.275 --> 00:46:14.284
So, you know, like old cop shows, you know, Sanford and Son and Quincy and the Rockford Files.

00:46:14.804 --> 00:46:16.266
So music for cop shows.

00:46:16.327 --> 00:46:16.586
Yeah.

00:46:16.606 --> 00:46:19.731
So I started writing these catchy harmonic.

00:46:19.831 --> 00:46:22.474
I thought I'm just going to write a bunch of instrumentals.

00:46:22.916 --> 00:46:23.376
And I did.

00:46:23.456 --> 00:46:25.900
I was like four, three or four instrumental things.

00:46:26.159 --> 00:46:27.961
And I was really digging it.

00:46:28.123 --> 00:46:33.670
But inevitably, I just think, well, maybe I'll just put a couple of words in there.

00:46:34.114 --> 00:46:36.697
and then the words would start growing and the lyrics would come.

00:46:37.478 --> 00:46:43.987
So it ended up being a lot of songs with a little more melody happening on the harmonica.

00:46:44.467 --> 00:46:57.903
You've got blues organ in there, which I'd almost describe as a proper blues harmonica song.

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

00:47:04.226 --> 00:47:09.981
Thank you.

00:47:11.458 --> 00:47:14.139
That's an instrumental, the blues organ, that's right.

00:47:14.701 --> 00:47:21.226
Lots of organ in there, that's a real sort of, almost a Booker T vibe with harmonica in there.

00:47:21.947 --> 00:47:27.112
Yeah, me and Jimmy, who I made the Blues of the Ground with, me and Jimmy co-wrote that

00:47:27.291 --> 00:47:28.873
one, and we had a blast.

00:47:29.534 --> 00:47:34.338
But since that album, which was released in 2017, you've released singles, yeah?

00:47:34.418 --> 00:47:38.501
So have you made a decision to release singles rather than creating whole albums?

00:47:38.782 --> 00:47:39.963
It's been a number of singles,

00:47:39.983 --> 00:47:41.103
yeah, a bunch of them.

00:47:41.423 --> 00:47:42.704
Now, there's two reasons for that.

00:47:42.744 --> 00:47:45.748
One, nobody puts out albums anymore.

00:47:46.829 --> 00:47:47.949
It's a Spotify thing.

00:47:47.989 --> 00:47:49.952
It's a frickin' algorithm thing.

00:47:50.552 --> 00:47:52.333
People stop buying them at shows.

00:47:52.614 --> 00:47:55.197
People are listening to one song at a time by a band.

00:47:55.556 --> 00:48:07.289
I started out just stalling for time and enjoying making tunes with different producers and friends, co-writing or writing it all myself and just doing it in different ways.

00:48:08.210 --> 00:48:08.409
So...

00:48:08.865 --> 00:48:09.648
It's been a while.

00:48:09.668 --> 00:48:14.559
To get to the point, I have two albums under my belt now.

00:48:15.139 --> 00:48:16.282
Lockdown year as well.

00:48:16.362 --> 00:48:17.927
It's been a learning curve.

00:48:18.007 --> 00:48:19.510
I'm recording so much at home.

00:48:20.432 --> 00:48:22.317
I wrote a whole record on piano.

00:48:22.516 --> 00:48:24.342
There's harmonica on almost every song.

00:48:24.641 --> 00:48:26.927
But it's sort of written on the piano.

00:48:27.347 --> 00:48:29.052
That doesn't mean I can play piano well.

00:48:29.512 --> 00:48:32.237
I had to hire a guy to actually play it better than me.

00:48:32.780 --> 00:48:36.387
But I wrote all the tunes on a piano.

00:48:36.807 --> 00:48:40.094
I think it sounds like 1973, kind of like Dr.

00:48:40.175 --> 00:48:42.601
John, a little bit Tom Waits, a little bit...

00:48:43.202 --> 00:48:43.882
Billy Joel.

00:48:44.342 --> 00:48:48.248
Yeah, I look forward to what everyone's coming out with over the last year when everyone's been locked up at home.

00:48:48.329 --> 00:48:50.451
And hopefully we get all these great works coming out.

00:48:50.471 --> 00:48:52.474
I'm sure we can put your name to that list.

00:48:52.614 --> 00:48:56.960
And your most recent single, which is out at the moment, or you've been promoting, is What a Life.

00:48:57.059 --> 00:48:57.440
That's right.

00:48:57.561 --> 00:48:59.824
There's three singles I made with Tim Gordon.

00:49:05.972 --> 00:49:06.873
Butter for the winter, get you in a tight spot.

00:49:06.893 --> 00:49:07.554
You know you gotta keep it locked.

00:49:07.574 --> 00:49:07.773
Wanna ride?

00:49:15.842 --> 00:49:21.248
Devil Take My Soul, and Ain't Going to Night Town was another one I did with him and a few others.

00:49:21.527 --> 00:49:24.050
So I've also been making

00:49:24.090 --> 00:49:24.771
music with him.

00:49:24.811 --> 00:49:28.235
An important part of you is about your touring.

00:49:28.335 --> 00:49:37.666
You're always touring, and I think you played all around, obviously in Europe and Canada and USA, but also in Australia, South Africa, Uganda, Japan, Cuba.

00:49:38.086 --> 00:49:39.628
It's taking you around the world, this music.

00:49:39.809 --> 00:49:40.188
It does.

00:49:40.208 --> 00:49:40.909
I can

00:49:40.949 --> 00:49:44.494
sort of travel a long way and do a couple of shows and come back.

00:49:45.057 --> 00:49:45.958
Because I'm one guy.

00:49:45.978 --> 00:49:52.403
So luckily, I take the train to most shows all over the UK and France and Belgium.

00:49:52.985 --> 00:49:57.568
Or I can take an airplane over to Germany and take trains around there.

00:49:57.608 --> 00:50:00.090
So I love the European experience in that way.

00:50:00.451 --> 00:50:05.195
I mean, I think you probably play yourself down on what I've heard you talk about your own harmonica playing.

00:50:05.215 --> 00:50:06.637
But I think it's very effective what you do.

00:50:06.657 --> 00:50:12.942
You know, you do it and you've got, you maybe invented the genre, as we said, about sort of beatboxing harmonica, layered looping harmonica.

00:50:12.981 --> 00:50:15.023
But it's very effective what you do on harmonica.

00:50:15.023 --> 00:50:16.967
What do you think about yourself as a harmonica player?

00:50:17.007 --> 00:50:21.394
Yeah, I'm always humbled when I hear other people play other harmonica well.

00:50:21.635 --> 00:50:32.094
I'm always astounded at how tight they are, how well they can improvise, how much control they have, the overblowings and everything.

00:50:32.193 --> 00:50:34.916
The tone that they get, the gear that they use.

00:50:34.956 --> 00:50:36.858
I'm always a bit ragged.

00:50:37.380 --> 00:50:38.742
I'm trying to do too many things.

00:50:38.882 --> 00:50:46.650
I'm trying to mix and write the guitar line and help out or do the artwork.

00:50:46.771 --> 00:50:52.538
I'm just in a god-awful process of actually self-promoting.

00:50:52.577 --> 00:50:56.963
There just ain't enough hours in the day for me.

00:50:57.302 --> 00:50:58.945
I can't imagine some people...

00:50:59.617 --> 00:51:07.806
They're doing it their way, and for decades they're going to be focusing on their one instrument and master it.

00:51:07.927 --> 00:51:18.597
I think what I use it for is great rhythm, harmonica playing, and then to find those hooks and melodies.

00:51:19.039 --> 00:51:21.581
That's what it's for, and it gives that vibe.

00:51:22.742 --> 00:51:24.545
And I think Lee Oscar, I heard him.

00:51:25.646 --> 00:51:29.190
Was that one on one of your podcasts, my friend?

00:51:29.570 --> 00:51:30.311
It might be.

00:51:30.710 --> 00:51:31.411
What would he say?

00:51:31.771 --> 00:51:37.557
He was talking about he's good, and it was always good, a talent for coming up with a melody.

00:51:37.797 --> 00:51:38.938
Yeah, he did say that to me, yeah.

00:51:39.059 --> 00:51:39.480
That's right.

00:51:39.500 --> 00:51:41.822
I was listening to him talking to you about that.

00:51:42.342 --> 00:51:48.288
He was always good at coming up with a melody that adds to the song or makes the song sometimes.

00:51:48.688 --> 00:51:54.434
Sometimes you don't want to stand out with a big one, but just have a little thing in there to pull you from one section to another.

00:51:54.474 --> 00:51:59.210
And I realized, yeah, oh, my God, yeah, that's what I've been– trying to do.

00:51:59.510 --> 00:52:04.157
And you've got to decide, that melody, is it to be sung or is it to go on the harmonica?

00:52:04.177 --> 00:52:12.847
Does the harmonica play something like the horns or should it play a rhythm supporting chordal part?

00:52:13.507 --> 00:52:14.429
What should it be doing?

00:52:14.449 --> 00:52:16.833
It shouldn't just be given blues licks.

00:52:17.213 --> 00:52:20.978
It's like having another voice that sings melody.

00:52:21.634 --> 00:52:22.675
You've done a few workshops.

00:52:22.695 --> 00:52:28.882
You recently were at the Harping by the Sea workshops in Brighton, well, online, but you've been in there before.

00:52:28.922 --> 00:52:31.085
You do any more sort of workshops, things like that?

00:52:31.545 --> 00:52:35.309
I did theirs, their online workshop, and I'd been down Harping by the Sea.

00:52:35.349 --> 00:52:39.353
I'd been down to do the actual event a few years ago live too.

00:52:40.175 --> 00:52:41.315
So that's the twice.

00:52:41.715 --> 00:52:43.057
I'm really late to the game.

00:52:43.077 --> 00:52:48.483
I never knew harp players other than the few guys that were in my town.

00:52:48.864 --> 00:52:50.266
I didn't play the blue circuit.

00:52:50.498 --> 00:52:53.923
hardly ever do play the blue circuit, so had no contacts.

00:52:54.824 --> 00:53:05.744
It's been since maybe the last 10 years that I start to realize there are great harmonica players out there, and they've heard Son of Dave music.

00:53:06.244 --> 00:53:08.608
And that's like, oh, wow, what an honor.

00:53:08.668 --> 00:53:09.269
That's cool.

00:53:09.791 --> 00:53:16.081
What I've been doing lately, Neil, is try to also make some songs without the looping pedale or without any...

00:53:16.577 --> 00:53:19.322
having to layer a bunch of instruments or have a band.

00:53:19.762 --> 00:53:22.327
Just voice and harmonica and a rattle.

00:53:22.827 --> 00:53:26.012
There'll be a couple of those that I'll put out in the next year.

00:53:26.032 --> 00:53:28.697
I've written a few like that, and that's a joy.

00:53:28.717 --> 00:53:31.981
I realize it's a lovely format.

00:53:32.161 --> 00:53:45.106
Just the harp, just the voice, and you time things back and forth, and you can carry the attention and carry a song like a singer with a with a guitar or a piano.

00:53:45.809 --> 00:53:48.980
You can do it if you have the right bits.

00:53:49.059 --> 00:53:55.262
And of course, the other songs on the record will be covered with bells and whistles and all farm animals and everything.

00:53:55.489 --> 00:54:00.715
A question I ask each time is if you had 10 minutes to practice, what would you spend those 10 minutes doing?

00:54:00.936 --> 00:54:10.025
This is part of my problem is that I quite often sit down thinking I'm going to practice and I'm going to be a better harmonica player and a better person and I'm going to really do this.

00:54:10.465 --> 00:54:13.108
But what you ought to do is arpeggiate.

00:54:13.349 --> 00:54:22.719
So I start arpeggiating and within a very short time, I find a combination of four notes that I like or something.

00:54:23.179 --> 00:54:29.793
And then I'm right into the Just naturally, I start writing a tune around it, and out comes the dictaphone, and I'm writing a song.

00:54:29.873 --> 00:54:33.782
And I never end up practicing harmonic sometimes.

00:54:34.204 --> 00:54:36.931
Not never, but I usually end up...

00:54:36.951 --> 00:54:40.719
It ends up turning into a song.

00:54:40.780 --> 00:54:42.844
It just always evolves that way, rather than me...

00:54:43.266 --> 00:54:49.139
We've already talked about you play saddle harmonicas and you're a saddle endorser and you have been for a few years now.

00:54:50.422 --> 00:54:52.809
So obviously you play saddle harmonicas exclusively.

00:54:52.929 --> 00:54:55.434
Any particular type of saddle that you like?

00:54:55.916 --> 00:54:56.617
I do the 1847.

00:54:56.998 --> 00:55:01.630
Started with the white plastic combs on there and then I got the wooden ones.

00:55:01.858 --> 00:55:04.445
lacquered combs, and they're just fine with me.

00:55:04.505 --> 00:55:06.791
They seem to be lasting for years and years.

00:55:06.911 --> 00:55:10.360
And I use the stainless steel reeds, eh, which last longer.

00:55:11.282 --> 00:55:11.764
So I play

00:55:11.784 --> 00:55:12.385
stainless

00:55:12.405 --> 00:55:13.889
steel reeds, which stay in tune.

00:55:14.498 --> 00:55:19.268
And obviously you play the low harmonic because you're playing the side, these low range that they have.

00:55:19.289 --> 00:55:21.313
They've got this ultra low range as well now, haven't they?

00:55:21.333 --> 00:55:22.414
Is that something that you're using?

00:55:22.675 --> 00:55:26.324
I haven't needed to go, no, it's not quite that low.

00:55:26.423 --> 00:55:34.461
I mean, the low B flat or low A is...

00:55:35.202 --> 00:55:37.704
That's about as low as I need to go.

00:55:37.744 --> 00:55:45.914
It's

00:55:45.954 --> 00:55:47.315
around vocal range.

00:55:48.177 --> 00:55:48.797
That's nice.

00:55:49.579 --> 00:55:51.661
You do play some chromatic harmonica, don't you?

00:55:51.862 --> 00:55:59.070
Yeah, there might be one on each record that I try to use that stiletto and...

00:55:59.266 --> 00:56:01.407
Caledonian Street, I liked that.

00:56:06.494 --> 00:56:06.614
Do you

00:56:06.634 --> 00:56:11.780
have

00:56:11.860 --> 00:56:12.800
a favorite key of

00:56:12.840 --> 00:56:13.481
diatonic?

00:56:13.722 --> 00:56:17.686
It has a lot to do with the pitch of your voice, the range.

00:56:18.007 --> 00:56:25.876
I tend to play a lot of low D, low D flat, low C, and then back up low E flat, low F.

00:56:26.295 --> 00:56:27.597
It's mostly in that range.

00:56:27.969 --> 00:56:30.893
That way I can hit like the two or three octaves of voice.

00:56:30.994 --> 00:56:31.735
It's about...

00:56:36.001 --> 00:56:37.422
That's a low C.

00:56:37.463 --> 00:56:48.818
So, you know, that's as low as you can go, or I can go right now.

00:56:48.858 --> 00:56:53.726
Yeah.

00:56:54.914 --> 00:57:01.045
You can get two or three octaves out of your voice if you're lucky, and you don't want the harmonica to be

00:57:01.126 --> 00:57:02.088
around there in the middle.

00:57:02.128 --> 00:57:05.795
And embouchure, are you puckering or tongue-blocking?

00:57:06.335 --> 00:57:13.329
I was amazed when I found out that people actually debate and argue about that, or that they care.

00:57:13.349 --> 00:57:15.853
I mean, why wouldn't you do both?

00:57:16.054 --> 00:57:17.838
Whatever, there's a slight different effect.

00:57:18.081 --> 00:57:23.349
Just on equipment, on amplifiers and microphones, obviously you're pretty portable carrying around.

00:57:23.389 --> 00:57:26.373
Do you just use a house system or do you use particular amplifiers?

00:57:26.413 --> 00:57:26.634
Yeah,

00:57:26.653 --> 00:57:34.244
man, because I got to carry 30 kilos of pedals, harps, percussion, clothes, merch, snacks.

00:57:34.844 --> 00:57:35.585
All on the train.

00:57:35.666 --> 00:57:37.248
Yeah, flashing lights all on the train.

00:57:37.507 --> 00:57:40.112
Because of that, I hope they got an amp for me.

00:57:40.411 --> 00:57:46.059
So for a lot of years, it just, it weren't working because the amps sound terrible with harmonica.

00:57:46.320 --> 00:57:49.523
And then I figured out, Duh, get the pedal.

00:57:50.045 --> 00:57:51.206
I got a Long Wolf pedal.

00:57:51.628 --> 00:57:56.275
And that helps a twin, a Fender twin, for instance, to sound a lot better.

00:57:56.295 --> 00:57:59.179
It overdrives it in the right way.

00:57:59.360 --> 00:58:06.992
And so you can take the usual guitar amps that they have at gigs, and the pedal will help it sound more like a harp amp.

00:58:07.414 --> 00:58:14.525
Otherwise, and still, I have little amps, like a little transistor 15-watt Vox amp.

00:58:14.722 --> 00:58:28.157
amplifier that's lightweight and tiny you can drag that around and again it's not going to cut across a band but when you mic it up it does the job and it sounds nice and I've recorded tons with that thing

00:58:28.545 --> 00:58:30.809
So last question then, just around your future plans.

00:58:31.130 --> 00:58:36.016
You talked about you're planning to get two albums out and hopefully getting back out playing again soon.

00:58:36.056 --> 00:58:37.398
Have you got any gigs lined up now?

00:58:37.418 --> 00:58:38.661
Man, gigs are lining up.

00:58:39.181 --> 00:58:40.244
Now you've had your jab.

00:58:40.364 --> 00:58:42.025
You've got the jab passport

00:58:42.045 --> 00:58:42.847
to get out playing again.

00:58:43.108 --> 00:58:45.851
I wonder how that's going to go with the jab passport.

00:58:46.072 --> 00:58:55.005
There's a couple of gigs coming up even within the next two months if all goes as planned and plenty showing up for September and October.

00:58:55.650 --> 00:58:55.929
Great.

00:58:55.949 --> 00:58:59.233
Well, it'll be great to see you getting people back out playing again, yourself included.

00:58:59.293 --> 00:59:01.436
So thanks so much for joining me, Son of Dave.

00:59:01.456 --> 00:59:02.637
It's been great to speak to you.

00:59:03.038 --> 00:59:04.739
I've been very lucky to be asked

00:59:05.141 --> 00:59:12.608
to come onto your podcast, which with such an all-star stellar lineup of incredible players.

00:59:12.668 --> 00:59:13.771
So thank you very much.

00:59:14.150 --> 00:59:20.318
Son of Dave, flippers that soul thing.

00:59:27.617 --> 00:59:44.159
Soulfinger! Soulfinger!

00:59:48.706 --> 00:59:48.766
Huh!