The Art of Longevity Episode 5: James, with Tim Booth

When you’ve been getting away with it as a seven piece band for nearly four decades, with 22 albums behind you - something’s got to give when it comes to longevity. Especially when, in the case of James and Tim Booth, you’re on yet another roll. The band has made another vital album (All The Colours of You) despite the backdrop of a global pandemic and, in Booth’s case, an unsettling period on the run from the increasingly virulent wildfires encroaching on his family home in the Topanga Canyon of L.A. 

I wanted to find out just what has driven James on, through a prolonged pre-breakthrough struggle in the 80s, a break-up in 2001 and what must have been many creative ups and downs in-between. One has a sense of Booth as shaman, a leader of his merry band of brothers (and now sisters, with the addition of percussionists and vocalists Deborah Knox-Hewson and Chloe Alper). And leader too by divine inspiration, of James’ devoted audience. A cult, but one with entirely positive vibes. 

James creates songs from jams, that’s how they work: nobody controls it. For James, it’s all about inviting the muse to descend and join together with the band’s four core jamming members (Booth, Saul Davies, Dave Banton-Power and bassist founder Jim Glennie). That’s perhaps why uber-producer and electronic music god Brian Eno (who has turned everyone down from The Red Hot Chili Peppers to REM) put in a request to be that muse and produce the band’s 1992 masterpiece Laid. ‘Honour thy error as a hidden intention’ was a card drawn from Brian Eno’s oblique strategies deck in one session, but James already lived by that particular axiom. 

From day one in 1983, the band had a philosophy and pact to always take risks - whether that be creating new songs from jam sessions to walking out on stage in front of the crowd before finalising the set. James’ are driven to experiment, and it’s remarkable that such fully formed songs as Beautiful Beaches, Sometimes, Say Something, Fred Astaire or Sit Down came from short improvisations. Then again, the band will jam over 100 pieces of music and zone in on the best 10-15 to make an album, setting the quality bar high. 

As such, the band has survived members coming and going and the music industry  changing beyond recognition - such that their last single to chart was Getting Away With It in 2001. That unsuccessful single slow-burned its way to become one of James’ anthems and their third biggest song on streaming, typically atypical James. 

As Tim Booth enters his sixth decade on this earth, he is of course the polymath one might expect - teaching transcendental dance, writing a novel, acting a little here and there and meditating throughout. But as All The Colours of You beds in as another vital James album, Booth and James' three other core jamming members were already due to be in Scotland working on the next 100 jams that might lead to album 23. 

Let’s hope the muse lays in wait. 

Tim Booth spoke with Keith for The Art of Longevity, ep. 5!

Transcript

Keith Jopling: 0:01

Hello, I'm Keith Jopling, and the song summon eight. And you're listening to the art of longevity. Brett Anderson from suede once said that successful artists have all followed a similar journey. Rising four stages struggle, a stratospheric rise to the top, the crash down to the bottom. And then the Renaissance will reflect on the learnings wisdom, battle scars and wounds of major artists that have been decades in the music business and ask what really defines success? It's a question many fans and fellow musicians and aspiring musicians want to know the answers to we find out on the art of longevity. Tim booth from James, how're you doing this morning?

Tim Booth, James: 0:50

Very good. Thanks, Keith. Really good.

Keith Jopling: 0:53

Are you glad to be back in the UK now we finally have delivered a summer for you. It must have been quite shocked for the most of me.

Tim Booth, James: 1:00

You know, I've been living in climate LIS countries like LA and then I was living in Costa Rica for a bit. And it was so hot that it's quite a relief to come back and experience rain and overcast. And for several weeks, I was like no problem with it. And then it started to be like, hang on. I haven't seen the sun in about five weeks. So you know, it's nice that it's turned out when it has but I'm quite. I like the contrast of seasons.

Keith Jopling: 1:34

Yeah, I was wondering about that. Because, you know, from reading tweets and just, you know, following you for a while you've been escaping, you know, the wildfires in California and all of that. So I thought maybe that we'd laid that on for you. Just so that you felt you felt safe to rehearse for

Tim Booth, James: 1:53

your moisturize hydrated, graduated here.

Keith Jopling: 1:58

So you're holed up in Broughton Hall rehearsing for first of all London's opening night and then I think you're doing a few festivals just just tell me about what the arrangements are. There. What's what's a typical day like?

Tim Booth, James: 2:13

So when we were living in Costa Rica, I met this gentleman, Roger Tempest. And we got on great with him and his wife, Paris and hung out with them a few times. Neither of us really knew who each other was, which is always the best way. And they actually helped me out I needed album, shoot photos. For this new record we've got coming out and we're in the middle of Costa Rica, how am I going to get that done? And Paris is like I'll take your photos and then I'll shoot your video of you dancing on the beach and and he said what you do when you come to England. I said we're going into some crappy little rehearsal room in London and we'll start rehearsing for coming out of lockdown. He said I'll come to my place. And his place turned out to be Broughton Hall, which is this kind of 3000 acre estate in near Skipton, which is kind of the most beautifully preserved manor house I've ever encountered. You know, we need some dilapidated rundown chateaus in our time. But this wasn't that. And I think the whole band was in shock. I mean, we you know, we come out of lockdown and not really seeing people and we came into this COVID bubble where we could hug each other and, you know, be really close to each other not wear masks. We've been tested quite a bit. We've all had the vaccine. And we get to rehearse and sing and perform in a room with each other in this kind of Old English aristocratic paradise. And I think it took us a few days to not be overwhelmed by the building. And we were doing tons of rehearsals trying to learn the new songs, working on old songs working on new arrangements. We became a nine piece like four years ago when we released living in extraordinary times. There were many drums on that album that couldn't be played by one drummer. So we looked for an extra drummer female backing vocalist wanted someone who could do both. And this 25 year old called Debbie auditioned for me in a center up to Sheffield to order to play with the band for a day to see if she fitted in went up the following day. And it was as if she'd been in that band all her life, which was deeply shocking considering all old Grumpy Old Men and this kind of blonde 25 year old gay woman just completely slotted in as if she was born to the manor and she can I'm on tour this the following Monday after rehearsing with a 70 on Friday, playing to 20,000 people you know, and a night on some of the event gigs. And we got an brilliantly with her. Then she brought her girlfriend, Chloe, on tour, and we met her and everyone loved her. And she's a singer and a drummer. And after a year, Debbie said, Tim, I got to go and work with Netflix, it will pay my mortgage, it will get me a house, and I'm really sorry, I've got to leave. But maybe take my girlfriend, Chloe. And we took her girlfriend, Chloe, captive, and and she was just wonderful and totally fitted in. So we toured with her. And then they both turned up at Broughton Hall

Keith Jopling: 5:46

based on invited,

Tim Booth, James: 5:49

kind of inviting is Debbie's like an amazing drummer. And she was helping work out the drum parts. And, you know, Jimmy had said to me, she's just she's the one who was really working out the drum parts here for everybody. And she's very together. And the first night went for a walk with her and said, you know, Debbie, if we can afford it, we become a nine piece and she said, Oh, you know, I can with Chloe, you get two for the price of one. And so it was like, wow, okay, we've become an eyepiece. Because they both felt part of James in their own separate way. And so at the, for this iteration of James, and for this album cycle, we're 90s, which

Keith Jopling: 6:34

is amazing, it's gonna be great to see that on stage. rare these days as well. I mean, you know, we'll talk about this in a bit. But you can't survive, as you know, a five piece, let alone a seven or a nine piece.

Tim Booth, James: 6:51

And then you feel these kind of, I get really a bit disillusioned when I go and see, like individuals standing on stage for two hours, most of the time thinking that's entertainment, you know, and saving on not by not hiring musicians, you know, and not hiring the musicians to actually play the instruments, because I love watching people play things live rather than hear it back on tape. So yeah, it is quite an anathema right now to then expand ourselves from seven to nine. But it just works. They just fit. And it's fantastic having them in the band, well

Keith Jopling: 7:30

we go, we're just going to keep everything crossed. Because as we as we chat here, the first of June, it's 2024 days to London's opening night and I'm just praying that you get to actually turn up at Kenwood House and play that. And I'll be you know, you know, we're going to be there. And it's it's just I think it's it's always been a bit of a sign for me of coming back to some kind of reality actually to obviously go and see bands, but to see James play as is, you know, is probably the pinnacle of just getting life back. So I just hope it happens. Thank

Tim Booth, James: 8:09

you. Thank you. Yeah, we we, obviously deep looking forward to this gig and be Yeah, but it's so you know, we're opening eventually, we know we're getting there now with the vaccine. So if it's not now it will be August, September, whatever we're

Keith Jopling: 8:29

gonna be you based in the UK now until those shows happen.

Tim Booth, James: 8:33

And based in the UK until October, yeah, we're kind of floating my family. We sold up in Topanga Canyon, because it was such a fire Canyon. It's we lived under trees, and we were getting alerts every couple of weeks have a fire near you within five miles, but the wind is okay. So you should be okay. And with bags packed by the door for like three, four months every year for the last couple of years. And it was just getting stressful and insane. And you knew that your luck would run out at some point. I actually had a kind of a there's a new song on the album called beautiful beaches, which was really and I use this word I know it sounds really pompous. But I had a vision in our during a ceremony with a Peruvian Shaman. I think that sounds that sounds great. Bompas do. But, you know I've I've had lots of you know, I'm a meditator of, you know 40 years experience and I've seen many things in experience many things but this was seeing California have a major earthquake and seeing fires just decimate the place. And it went on a loop for 25 minutes until my mind completely stopped. And I normally you know you can, I can change things when I see things like that I can go, I can talk to them and try and work out what they are. This was just on a loop. But it showed my family escaping in a car, like frequently, but then it will go back to the beginning. And we start again. And we'll go back to the beginning and start again. And we woke up the next morning, after I'd convinced myself that this was some kind of projection of my fears. And California was on fire. This was a couple of years ago, where the first major fires and smell of smoke, we had to evacuate the house immediately. And so I took this as a warning that I should act on this. And we sold our house last December, and have left our community which we love. And I'm missing already. And we're trying to see what climate change brings in the next year or so to decide where we're going to live.

Keith Jopling: 10:58

Well, I think you know, in that process you you've got another theme tune out of it somehow with with beautiful beaches, it's and it's got the double meaning right? So you're You're escaping this dangerous world that you know, you you're stuck in a loop with. But But for us, it's just getting in the car, going down to finding any beautiful beach and it totally works on both levels.

Tim Booth, James: 11:20

I figured I shouldn't actually tell people that story because people will in lockdown would be going yes, I'm dreaming of beautiful beaches. Leave it as a happy song. It's such an uplifting, joyful song too. Because I'd tell you when we left when we sold our house, I was so overjoyed. Because the stress was getting really intense. Yeah, yeah.

Keith Jopling: 11:44

Well, so on the eve of your 16th album, I think it is all because of you. It's coming out in a few days time. Just tell me how you feel these days when when it comes to this time. And you're about to to drop a record, you know, how excited are you? What do you expect to happen? All of that stuff.

Tim Booth, James: 12:07

I mean, it's our 22nd album if you include compilations and I always like I'm a big fan of that number. This record I can't speak for every record is it's different for every record. But it's always the sense of giving birth. It's you know, until you release it, it's a private affair. It's something you made for yourself and the people who made it with you. And it's this kind of secret. Joy, you know, creativity is one of the greatest things on earth. It's just, you know, an absolute pleasure and giving birth is the metaphor. You know, men can't give birth, which is probably why all the male dominant religions were created, because they were so jealous and over awed by the power that women have. So this is as close as we get in creativity apart from fathering a child, of course, which is some some contribution. But it's this record in particular, I can speak to which is, we know it's one of the best things we've ever made. And we were just so lucky during COVID to manage to complete it and complete it with a producer like Jack Knife Lee, who is the producer, who happened to live in Topanga Canyon, two miles from me. And it was really when I went to meet him as the path of least resistance because we couldn't work with the producer Charlie Andrews, who we had man to work with who worked on our last album who we love. So I went to meet Jack Knife. Late one night in Topanga got on with him brilliantly. drove back at 830 through the windy hills of Topanga, no streetlights to women flag my car down, I pull over. They say there's a rattlesnake on the road. They can hear it, and they can't see it. And it's they can't get past it to get home. And they've got a dog with them and they're worried for the puppy. And so I say jump in and I drive them back up the hill a mile and it's Jack knifes wife and daughter and Jack and I kind of looked at each other like, Okay, this looks like it's gonna be happening. And then we just had the most amazing time finishing a record we'd already started the James had already written the songs done the demos. We took them to Jackknife and he kind of jammed with our demos and really purposely you know, we asked him to we said, you know, we want some more grooves and I want some kind of psychedelic contemporary psychedelic disorientation in there And Jackknife is brilliant and just would mess around with our tracks and send them down alleyways, they probably wouldn't have gone down without him. And we've made this remarkable record that we're dying to show people, we've we've obviously released a few tracks, but there's some really big surprises on that record that people haven't heard yet. And it's, it's just exciting. It's just like, you've got this thing in your back pocket, and you're dying to share it with people, you know, you know how they're going to react really after this long of performing. And this long as making records, we know what we've made. So we're all buzzing,

Keith Jopling: 15:42

when you're on a great run as well, aren't you? So I'm, I'm intrigued as to how you commercially how you look at a record? I mean, will you be looking at streams? And I'm looking at the chart, are you bothered at all? Because I feel like actually, it could be a number one album. It's been a while since, you

Tim Booth, James: 16:03

know, our managers told us we'll fallacy releasing an album.

Keith Jopling: 16:08

So that might Yeah, bit of competition.

Tim Booth, James: 16:10

I mean, it just doesn't mean anything anymore. I mean, to be honest, I never was that interested, James had seven years in the wilderness. Before we had any success. Nobody played our music on daytime radio. And yet, by the end of the seven years, we were playing to 20,000 people in Manchester, without any support from radio or TV. So we were like, We're do it our own way. And that was how we did it. And so when fame came, it was like, oh, you know, you turn up party. And and that's, that's interesting. And we were a bit disdainful of it. And we saw how it comes in cycles, you know, they'll love one album, the press, and then they'll, they tend to then hate the next one, because expectation has been put at a certain place. And so it's really predictable human reactions to many things. Hence, we're so easily manipulable by algorithms, and the internet and social media. So it's always been, we just make music for ourselves. And every so often, a song comes along that you go, Oh, this sounds like it might cross over that it might be a single. We don't know what that is. But we know it's something that seems a bit more robust. And can walk in a room like a gunslinger walking into a bar, and the piano player stops and everybody turns around and stares at it. It has have a certain Genesee quoi kind of it, I don't know, just makes you go, Oh, my goodness, that's different. And we every so often, we jam one of those. And we know it usually at the jam stage, we kind of go, Whoa, that was an interesting jam. I don't know where that came from. But we love every song equally. And some of the songs which are much more low key ended up being the songs that people loved the most, you know, out to get us, you know, probably one of our most loved songs. And that never was released as a single getting away with it was really unsuccessful, single, and yet is now probably our third most streamed song. And I get given this information about streaming by our management only in the last few years. And I I kind of, you know, I used to never listen to read any interviews, I asked people never send me interviews never send me reviews. So for years, I never touched any of that. And then the last few years, I've kind of gone. Okay, let's let's see what people are saying or see what's going on. Because the world's changed so fast that I figured out what to get informed. But it doesn't really interest me. I mean, I said to my manager last week, you know, can we not do the chart thing on the next album? Can we just do you know, the gigs, we sold out 50,000 tickets for next December. And that'd be many more than the album's will ever sell on this record. And it was like, let's just package the CD with the ticket. So at least all our fans get the album. And they'll see what we're doing in a way that they weren't. If we just release it, and try and get a chart position. We'll get a chart position. We've had Top 10 Top Five. Yeah,

Keith Jopling: 19:32

yeah, definitely have. And there's, yeah, it's interesting to me, but there's a bit of a paradox there because your album, every new record you make is entirely relevant to the live show. I remember when we'll come on to this that we're not going in a linear fashion at all here, but when you reformed back in 2007 it was the head Mark record, I went to see your show in Brixton for that. And, you know, you play as many songs from the new the new album as you want to. But the audience were just singing along to every new song, you know, they kind of knew every word. And so when you make a new record, it just feels so relevant to, to the James canon overall, as opposed to, you know, so many bands have been going as long as you, you know, the audience just turn up to hear the old stuff, really. And it's not like that with with a James show, or origins new record, it's just, it's really fascinating that you've got into that position. And it sounds like you've just arrived there, just because you've arrived there. It's not like, you know,

Tim Booth, James: 20:47

we had a philosophy and a pact really, from day one, you know, 1983, it was that we would take risks. And came from one particular gig, we named ourselves James from an awful name we had before model Team International, which was the name of a modeling agency who threatened to sue us. So we named the band James because we felt that didn't give away what kind of music we played. And it sounded like a human being, which could therefore be multifaceted. And the first gig we had in Blackburn, the promoter put on the poster James brackets, not a poet. And we, I said to Paul, who really ran the band in those days, that guitar player who God bless him ended up in psychiatric hospital and not not, you know, his story was a really sad story. And he was really the founder of James in many ways. We loved him very much. I said to Paul, Wouldn't it be funny if I turned up and read a poem and they went, Oh, God, damn, it's a fucking poet. Paul went great idea, write a poem. And this was like, the night before we were doing the gig. So I wrote a poem and stayed up all night writing a poem, a long poem, and a poem that I could semi sing. And I learned it the next day terrified on the way to this gig, we were, we were not a very good band live in those days, we would all be terrified, and we'd be very hit and miss, we could be really good onstage for a couple of songs, and then we'd fall apart. Because being on stage amplifies everything. So the good is amplified, the bad is amplified, it's like taking hallucinogenics if it gets into your mind in the wrong way, suddenly, all your traumas multiplied and exposed in front of an audience, and it's terrifying. If you have an ecstatic time and get into the cosmic part of your subconscious, it's fantastic. That's the addiction and love of performing. So I had a deal with the band. Okay, I'll go out onstage. And I'll start, I stand at the microphone, you turn the lights down, and then I will start this poem. So I go and stand at the stages, probably any 40 people in the room, and it makes no difference, it could be 20,000 at that point. And they forget to turn the lights down. So I'm standing there staring at the audience, until eventually the audience go really quiet, like what's standing on stage for a minute, just staring at us. And I realized the lights aren't gonna go down. And I start this poem. And it goes on for, you know, four minutes. And at the end, they burst into applause. And the band Come on, and I turn to Paul and go, What the hell and Paul goes. Just play and we played the next four songs, surfing that energy of what we just done. And then we fell apart. And we realized that it was the appreciation they could, they could see my fear, they could see that there was something in that moment of taking that risk that generated something magical between us in the audience for the first time. And we decided from that day onwards, we would improvise on stage. The next gig we played, we were supporting new audit at Brixton Academy. And, and Paul said, Okay, it's mine and Jim is turned to take the risk and they went out with acoustic guitars and just improvise for four minutes before we came in, join them. And Jimmy didn't play acoustic guitar. He played bass, he didn't know how to play acoustic guitar. So we just went, Okay, doesn't matter how good or bad you are. Let's just put ourselves in terrifying positions and then and then serve that. And there's something about the spontaneity of that. out that an audience senses, there's something about the aliveness of that, that an audience senses. So and it became a philosophy for James. And we've, we've stuck to it except for like a two year period in the 90s. That's why we change the set every night change, you know, we might have 80 songs in our catalogue. But if we have a couple of sound checks, we can get together to play. And we'll play them knowing that we don't really know them. So it will be really scary when we look down at the setlist and see the song down there that I can't remember. And I've got lyrics written on the stage floor to remind myself of the key lyrics just in case I forget, if I forget how to make it up, and the other band members are gonna go, what key is this in, and we put those in the set on purpose because it gives us the adrenaline that takes us into the zone that we need to perform at our highest. So it was a philosophy, a choice. And we still hold it. The audience know it, I make it very clear in interviews. It's not my it's a posted on my Twitter account that we change the set every night, you might not hear your favorite song. We've got 280 songs, everybody's going to be at some point, let down because everybody has a different favorite song. So you're going to come see us and kind of go, are they didn't play sometimes or sit down? Or? Yeah, you know, we rest songs. We rest songs when we're starting to feel like we'd becoming karaoke if we're not careful. Yeah,

Keith Jopling: 26:40

I think you have to do that for the health of the band as well, don't you I mean, you wouldn't want to play those songs over and over. Or, in fact, you know, play a different interpretation of the song. And

Tim Booth, James: 26:53

it's more than that it's playing to an audience in California on Monday night is totally different to playing Barcelona on Saturday, Saturday, they've come out for a good night out, they may be all completely up for it. Or there may have been some appalling news that day about some disaster that's taken place in in, in, in the town you're playing or in the state you're playing or mass shooting, in which case, we change the setlist to allow that anger or grief to be expressed, or band member may have just lost somebody that they love. And it's like, well, we have to put this song in here. So there are many different factors why a setlist gets chosen each night. But basically an hour before we go on stage. I try and take the temperature of what's going on in that city what's going on amongst the band where I'm at. And I'll write a setlist and then we'll might even change it then in the middle of the gig. If it isn't working, but it's it's to try and keep the thing a living, breathing piece of communication. Yeah,

Keith Jopling: 28:02

that's how it feels. It feels like yeah, like a live kind of organism and, and that's as you say, the your audience goes with that. And sometimes there are just real surprises. I mean, Your Royal Albert Hall Show 2014 You played a song called All Good boys. I love that song. It's not anywhere. It's it's on YouTube. That's that's where I think it was a beside from millionaires, wasn't it? It was. That's a beautiful song. Where did that come from? Who chose to suddenly pluck that one out of the bag?

Tim Booth, James: 28:37

So I think when can we play all good boys. I mean, we've got lots of besides that probably should have been major songs. We did a another song called a defeat I did a duet with Sinead O'Connor and anyone else would have released that as their single ended up as a beside on the album and you know a typical James anti commercial move so you know we've got a few of those auger boys is one of our favorite besides and should have been on the album and yeah, we resurrected it and really worked on the vocals and it's one of our favorite songs to play live which we do occasionally.

Keith Jopling: 29:32

Want to go back to too late because there was something really special going on there. You work with Brian Eno you have that body of songs and a particular sound come together. I don't know how you are looking back but when you look back to that time, what was the kind of feeling in the band, then having come and come out the 80s struggle some success at the end of it. And then you made this album but just I don't know, it was a landmark album.

Tim Booth, James: 30:03

And it was more for us about working with Brian Eno. We tried to work with him from the very first album and at three or four. And, you know, brand turns everybody down, you know, I made the chili peppers, and they go, how do you get to work with Brian, you know, five times? We've been trying for years, he just won't. You know, Michael from REM would go, how do you work with Brian Eno, we've been trying for years, you know, so Brian was the person that everybody wants to work with. And finally, you know, I sent him these pretty badly recorded demos, and wrote a personal letter to him. And he rang me up one morning, 9am in the morning, and we just had a conversation about perfume and pornography and music and the state of the world. And we got on brilliantly. And at the end of it, he said, I'd like to make your next record, if that's okay with you. And we, you know, we we've been massive Talking Heads fans, I mean, impressed obviously, with YouTube, of course, but talking heads were the one the way we went, Oh, my God liquidy bought out that band. And just every band he worked with, from Devo to Jeffrey REM has record to, you know, he just seemed to bring out the best in artists, Bowery, obviously. So it was getting to work with Brian. And it was just such a relief. We'd never worked with a producer like him. And I'd always felt quite a responsibility for pushing us to make the best records we could until that point. And really, after two days, I remember thinking, I don't have to do this anymore. This guy is just so beyond anything I can bring to the table. I mean, we're just gonna like, listen to him. It was just a joy to work with him, essentially. And he had this mad idea, you know, we've got six weeks, which isn't a long time to make an album in those days. And we'll make two, we'll make two albums, we'll actually do an improvised album. Once he heard us improvising. He was like smitten. And we'll make laid, and we'll do them at the same time and just see what we get. And so we made we attempt was to make a double album, which the record company then wouldn't really let us release it as a double album, unfortunately, and kind of blew our career in America, because they later release released the improvisations. And Americans thought it was our follow up to laid which was just a disaster. For us in America, and you know, that's live. And so yeah, it was that's what I remember so much is working at real world, hanging out with Peter Gabriel. Just having to frantically write lyrics to as many songs as I possibly could in very short period of time. At one point, we had five studios going simultaneously, where we were trying to finish these mixes in six weeks and get everything done and Bran would walk through each studio with the clipboard, and we'd all be following him excitedly. You know, we were probably the most amazing musical moment because we respected him so much. He'd been really drawn to the song sometimes. And I haven't got lyrics. I just my jams I single would be gook and weird phrases and sounds. So he didn't have lyrics, but he was really drawn to that song. And he was like, Have you got lyrics yet? No, I haven't quite finished yet. Brian. I'm working on it. Have you got lyrics yet? No, we can't we can't do that yet. And he had a set up live around him while he's in the middle of the room. So towards the end of the recordings, I go, okay, Brian, I think I've got the lyric for the song now. We can record it. And he's really excited. And he's standing in the middle of the room. And we start this song. And I can see he's nervous and he's listening. And we get to the chorus and I sing the chorus, which you've never heard that lyric, sometimes when I look deep in your eyes, I swear I can see your soul. And he goes why does the sheets and goes and sits down and puts his hands in his head. And we carry on with the song but I'm thinking oh, something's wrong. He doesn't like it. You know? I thought this was pretty good. And we we finished the song and the whole band stopped we're all a bit freaked out by his reaction. And we all kind of go very quiet and carrot and walk to him and stand around him and go, You okay, Brian? And he goes, I think I just had one of the highlights of My musical life. And were like

Keith Jopling: 35:06

it was just territory now. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, he was totally reciprocated, wasn't it? He, he brought you to a new level. But he, I think he's mentioned more than a few times that sometimes is one of his favorite songs. I've seen him to sing it with you on stage, actually. And he was absolutely rapturous. During that performance. He clearly was just in an in another place.

Tim Booth, James: 35:33

Yeah, we're still very closely connected. And like he's helped us out and a couple of songs in the last few years I go around to him go brown, we're stuck on this song What What are we done wrong, and he will go you know, within a day he'll send me back some mad little arpeggio he's put over it that makes the whole song make sense. So I can go to him and and again, his script doctor to change a few things.

Keith Jopling: 35:59

And after that, so everything, as you said, with your success in the states and laid went ballistic in the States, it was like a college radio smash hit and everything. So you had suddenly, everything came together, like creatively when you are on a different level, commercially, you become, I

Tim Booth, James: 36:20

would disagree I because I actually would say, gold mother and seven before it were equally as good, I love laid, it's just one of my favorite records. But I'd say those two are equally as good and have equally as good songs. But, and but we had 123 in a row, and so laid reap the benefits of being the third really good album that we released that people went, Oh, my God, this band developing in a really powerful way. So I can't quite take it out of context in the same way as you are.

Keith Jopling: 36:56

And then what happened in America, as you say, I didn't actually realize that. The follow up, you know, was was released as a follow up in the stage because there was oh, it was always the kind of the, you know, the sister album wasn't that the the Wawa because you went on huge tours after late in the US. And you were probably set up for success there. How was that? What was that time, like?

Tim Booth, James: 37:23

quite overwhelming. You know, America is such a vast planet in itself. And we were we'd never really been there. And you know, Neil Young took us on tour first with his solo tour, and we had play acoustic with him. And that was wonderful. And he really looked after us. And we played the most beautiful venues on the planet, you know, overlooking the Grand Canyon red rocks and where we were improvising acoustically, not really knowing what we were doing and going down a storm. Then we went on this kind of mixed bag of a thing with the soup dragons in the TomTom club. And we got a great with those bands. And we were but we were breaking. So you know, you could tell something was going on about us, which was, you know, powerful. But it's all a bit overwhelming. You know, you're living on a tour bus for three months, and you you go to bed in a place that's full of snow, and you wake up and 80 degrees of heat the next morning, and you know, and you're meeting the you know, the America is such an extreme country. And it was difficult, you know, it was a struggle. We weren't used to this. And I just had a baby, about a year earlier now has been having to be away from him quite a lot. And that was hard work. And me and his mom had split up and she was our managers. So that was really hard work. So, you know, it was a difficult time. Really? Oh, no, God, I've slightly mixed up that actually. It was He was about five at that point. My son was five at that point. And it was hard being away from him basically. Three months. Yeah. And so very mixed. Which it always is, it's like, you know nothing is you always think that when the thing happens to you, it's going to be this great shining moment. And there's always other things to counterbalance it. Oh, absolutely. Yeah.

Keith Jopling: 39:32

And I guess it's all encompassing. When you you know, you get a hit in America, you have to go over there and talk because it then absorbs you.

Tim Booth, James: 39:41

Well, there's also this thing where you're, you know, we'd had that with the album's before, where you were at that point flown around the world, the capital cities and they book you from eight in the morning till eight at night. Non Stop talking about your record, and it's just after two, you know, De, you're just bored to tears. You're like, how do you talk about this record that you love? In an interesting way? When you're on a kind of production line? That's the bit that kills you. You're just going I didn't make music to do this. This is bullshit. Yeah, it

Keith Jopling: 40:17

was that was the height of having to do all that wasn't it? When you recruits have to have to lead and then you did whiplash and millionaires. You were having top 10 hits. Certainly in the UK, there were top 10 hits you were all over the radio. So imagine that then just continued and you became, you know, just a really, really big pop band? How did how did that sit with you personally and the rest of the band, because you must have been on a treadmill.

Tim Booth, James: 40:46

I mean, it was tricky. We luckily, you know, because we'd spent seven years improvising with each other five days a week, we renew our music, we could always make good music, we have very high standards. So for an album, we might jam 100 110 pieces of music, and then choose the best 15 to work on for an album. So we we try to keep our quality high. And we work with Brian Eno. So again, so you know, you got a lot of wind behind you. We can we will artic we artists we believe, you know, I came from Patti Smith, who from day one said I am an artist. And people laughed at her. And I would say we are artists and we make music that we consider to be art. And every so often, we make a song that actually crosses over into commercial realms. It's never intentional. Never intentional. It just happens. And it's like, oh, okay, this seems to be what we've made. And we'll put it out and fine. But then the consequences can be draining because you're expected to do all this showbiz ship. And we, we wouldn't do it, you know, when we went to America, bands, at that point to become huge, you had to meet a radio station, meet and greet with an audience before you go on stage for half an hour and shake hands and smile and sign autographs. And I can't do that to do to do great performance that night, I can't do that I go to sleep, I meditate, I get ready to do the performance. So just refuse to do point blank. And that that damaged us because the radio stations who really supported us, we then felt really let down and you know, they stopped supporting you. But it was just impossible for me physically to be able to keep my head together and to do that performance for that people who paid money to see us. Some DME Meet and Greet sign autographs for half an hour beforehand. So you know, there were, we were just coming up against that kind of thing. And we were just, we were bloody minded. So we just refused to do shit like that. And it, it damaged us in many, many places. And those are choices we had to make to limit our commercial popularity, in order to keep our heads together and to to maintain our integrity as artists who don't want to let an audience down. You know, when you we go out every night, we want to give that audience the best show they've ever seen. And we have a duty to go out and do that to the best of our ability. And we try that every night doesn't always work. But that's our intention, even after 40 years. And that's, that's really one of the keys to our longevity, because we still give a shit. You know, so many bands, their attitude is we don't give a shit. And we've always not been like that. And that attitude is considered cool in the music industry. And I never considered that cool. You know, it's like, you want to be a consistent artist, you want to be an artist, you can make music, as you get old, that's as good as anything, you made Young. This record, we just made this as good as anything we've ever made. I know it is. And it will never maybe affect people in the same way. Because we're in an ageist ghetto, because of our age, so we don't have access to Radio One, they won't play our music because we're too old. So we won't get to young people. And there's something about listening to music when you're in your teens and 20s that you bond with that music in a way that you can't ever again, I think some people may be but it's very rare. And so we can't have that impact with the new music we're making, because we don't have access to those young people. But eventually people will hear this music we're making now and they'll work out that it was as good as anything we made in the 90s That's why we're selling out 50,000 tickets which is more than we ever sold in the 90s because people Come and see it live and they go, Oh my God, we play all those new songs live, because it puts the pressure on us to make them as good as the hits. And that's a terrifying thing to have to try and do to a song. But it, it makes us work really hard. And it's a great, it's a great way of forcing yourself into a corner.

Keith Jopling: 45:23

When you come back on when you walk back on stage, it is London's opening night, your first the first time you've got to be Yeah, if you're obviously going to face some challenges that weren't there before, particularly with the way you connect with with your audience. You know, I've seen you start gigs in in the audience. And at some point, usually crowd surf, or go down and meet people or, or take people on stage. You can't do any of that. So are you? Are you preparing yourself for doing things differently? Are you are you just going to see how how you feel when you get out there?

Tim Booth, James: 46:04

We'll see how it feels when I get out there. I think we'll see what the rules are to on lockdown. I think people coming out of lockdown. I think there's a lot of post traumatic stress syndrome going on. I think most people don't realize that. So, you know. And James, always we want to uplift people and help people but also you sometimes take them into grief to sing songs about, you know, people who've died. And because of that going on as well. So it's trying to judge what the best medicine is for the night. And that will be a difficult thing to judge. That's going to be the hard bit. And we'll judge it on the night and see what we have to how we should respond to this crowd. And hopefully we'll get it right. We might not. I went out London for the first time in two years. A few days ago, and it was like, I found it quite shocking. Yeah, you could feel the fear and I have a feeling cities might be done. Yeah,

Keith Jopling: 47:13

I It's strange, isn't it? I think I went into London for the first time and I was walking along the South Bank and I was looking at the north bank, it actually looked more like a painting than anything real in this city isn't even particularly real to me anymore. And you're right, I think it may be it is it's a bit of it's gonna be a little bit of PTSD as people come back, because they don't know how to behave. There's a lot of anxiety out there. I'm looking forward to that kind of transcendence that you did James gig, to be honest, to take you out of yourself and just remind you that that's, that's still possible.

Tim Booth, James: 47:55

I think that's, I think that is what people will be hoping for. And hopefully we'll be able to get into the zone to deliver it. You never know it's like, now because we've been going so long 19 out of 20 we get that we get into that zone, you know, into a trance state to be able to deliver that. But it occasionally you have a rough one and we haven't played for two years. So we're seeing what we get. But we've got the two women who will be playing with us, which is really uplifts the band in a very interesting way. It seems like a really important balance to all these men to have these two fantastic, the talented women in the band who just make us happy. Actually, we it feels like wow, this is gonna be interesting. Yeah. So we're really looking forward to it. We'll find ways to make it very exciting.

Keith Jopling: 48:56

I mean, since you came back together all those years ago with with Hey, Ma, and then you you've got on a real run with your I mean, your last six, seven albums. Really? How do you look into the future now? Is it just a case of trying to just take it one step at a time not overthinking it, it doesn't feel like you're you need to do anything different other than you know, just keep making keep together and keep making the records you make. What what's next.

Tim Booth, James: 49:29

And typical James fashion, the record comes out this weekend. And on Tuesday, four of us are in Scotland jamming the next batch of songs because we always like to keep one step ahead of the process. We were going to we lock ourselves in a house in Scotland for six days and we'll just improvise for five hours a day until we and we record it all and there will be the seeds for the next record and it's just something we love doing, it's like, it's the best experience that Jamming is one of the most fun bits of it. No pressure, just recording just four of us. And you if you're lucky, you download some things that are really special and magical. And you have them in your back pocket. We're doing it early, just in case there's another lockdown pandemic situation, because that's the thing we have to have in the James processes for people in a room together, that's the only time they have to be in a room together, then we can work on separately, which is how we managed to make this room this album in COVID, because we'd already done that jamming process. So we're getting the jamming done early, we've got some plans for next year, I'm not gonna tell you what they are yet. We've got some amazing, an amazing concert coming up, which I can't even talk about either, which is not on the map yet. I finished a novel Well, I haven't finished it, I finished a major draft of that, that's with an editor right now. So that's for me, you know, we it's like, we just do our thing, you know, I teach dance classes, and I'll be teaching some more taking people into trance states through dancing. Because I enjoy doing that. And I've been doing that for like 20 years in the background. And it feeds me, you know, going into trance through dancing is a very good way of getting in the sound and writing lyrics that you don't know where they come from. Because you, you get into a state, an altered state that enables you to, to connect to these things,

Keith Jopling: 51:41

Sam, it's been such a pleasure to talk to you. And I just pray that there were was you walk out onto the stage as a nine piece band, Kenwood House, North London, on the 24th, I'll be waving at you from somewhere somewhere near the front. And whatever, you know, the future brings, that's how we can get out of this pandemic. And I think you're going to help, you're certainly going to help me and the rest of your fan base kind of face the future and you you seem to be thriving. So once we get through this, it would just be a pleasure to always follow you and see what you come up with next.

Tim Booth, James: 52:19

Thank you. It's really kind. And as this is called longevity that are a couple of other things I actually thought about that you might wanted. But if you don't, if you finish, then I get no, no, no, I

Keith Jopling: 52:32

mean, no, please do what we're still recording. So

Tim Booth, James: 52:39

long cavity. For me, as a writer, it's about going into the unconscious, that my Tim booth consciously doesn't write the best of lyrics, it's the best lyrics come at 4am in the morning, when I can't sleep, and some lyrics start coming in, then you just follow them, and you try and get out of the way. And it's the unconscious that has all the riches, not the conscious. And I was lucky enough to have a liver disease for the first 11 years from 11 till 21 that nearly killed me. So it's Western medicine had no cure for it. So it threw me into alternative medicine, it threw me into meditation, it threw me into a way of living that was so the antithesis of what was going on in Manchester in 1980. And it saved my life in many ways, the liver disease meant I couldn't really indulge much in drugs and alcohol, which is a singer in a rock band is really bonus, a big bonus. And it meant I had to find different ways to get into altered states. And that was meditation, that was dance. And that's really been my pursuit. Outside of James teaching workshops, trained as a therapist, trained as an actor, is to get into other zone other ways to get into the zone. They call it now, which I think is the right phrase. And we'll find different technologies to do that. And so that's been a pursuit for me and Jimmy and the band who meditated with me for years and, you know, has his has his ways. And then for me in the last five or six years, I've been looking weirdly at all that kind of psychedelic therapy and working with indigenous shamans. So that's come to me in my late 50s Another way of getting into the unconscious that I can cover with my meditation background. That's been really fascinating. So that's enabled me I think, to keep writing in a way that keeps me feeling it's fresh, even if that's the self self delusion, the way for the band that's given us longer It is instead of there being a single songwriter or two songwriters who after three or four albums have fairly exhausted their supply of, of exploring their conscious mind. There's four who improvise, and nobody controls the process. And so every song can get pulled and pushed in different directions. Honor thy era as a hidden intention was one of Brian Nina's famous cards from his oblique strategy, pack. And we already lived that, in James, we always felt the mistakes we made trying to play something were often more interesting than the times we actually nailed it. So we are and because the error comes from the unconscious, if you honor it, you're honoring your muses in the unconscious.

Keith Jopling: 55:51

And this thing that some of those songs come out of those improvise jams, we talked about, you know, five Oh, before that was a came out of every single

Tim Booth, James: 56:02

song James has ever made, has come out of three or four people going in the room with nothing. And you're often a drum machine just so we can record it to a linear linear beat, and then edit it later to try and chop it up to make it into a fake song. Every single James song that's ever been written has come out from us making a racket and having fun, and not really trying too hard. And then the songs arise. And it's just, that's our process. And it's given us, it means no one controls it a third, there's, there's me, there's that other guys in the room. And then there's a third thing that is a living being that gets created between us that none of us control. And that keeps the music fresh. That, you know, we're not waiting for me or someone else in the band to come up with this inspiration is just created in the moment. And then off we go.

Keith Jopling: 57:05

And it's a moment that you can trust that to happen. And I think you've got into that place where you know that there's that third thing and it comes from the unconscious that it comes from letting just letting it go. But you know, it's there. And it's going to come to you.

Tim Booth, James: 57:20

I think for the first seven years, we kept thinking it would go. And I think I still have this kind of feeling of that if we ever dishonor it, if we ever tried to manipulate the music. Or if I try to, if I don't write it, if there's a lyric comes through, that's really strong but uncomfortable to sing. If I don't sing it, I get the feeling that they may my my my muses might leave me, you know, seems to be a pact going on. So long as you keep your end of the bargain, which is to be as faithful to the music as possible, they will stay with you. But the fear is that, you know, if we that's why we won't compromise songs, try and make a single, because if you do that, I think you'll use this girl that

Keith Jopling: 58:12

it's how you keep in touch with that muse, right is that you know, as you get older, you're you're thriving because you're doing these other things. You know, you're teaching the dancing, you're doing the meditation, you're looking at the, you know, the alternative, psychedelics, the way we think all of that, I think enables you to bring that back in. And so you're not constantly chasing something, you're just there, you're kind of receptive to it.

Tim Booth, James: 58:43

I think it's Yeah, and as we get older rigor mortis sets in, if we're not careful, we just repeat the same patterns and the grooves get deeper and deeper of this idea of who we think we are. And it becomes more and more important to keep blowing up that idea of who we think we are. Life will blow it up for us anyway, as we approach death and our body starts disintegrating and, and BITSAT falling off the vehicle. It will do it for you, whether you like it or not, so we may as well go to meet it unconsciously. You know, my grandfather in World War One won one of the major medals for bravery. And he was stuck in no man's land between the trenches for two three days in hell. And he survived. He was a very uptight, angry man. And then at 74, he had a breakdown. And the breakdown was all about that PTSD he'd experienced as a young man that he'd never released. But as he got older, his body couldn't hold on to it anymore. So he had to experience it in his 70s. And for me, it's like, Don't wait. Don't wait. don't wait go to meet your traumas now go to meet the things that most gay you now, because in then is a huge release of power once you get through terrifying to do at the time, but it's the only way we get to reclaim more bits of who we are and said that, to me is like well, you've just got to keep doing that you've just got to keep going to face your biggest fears because if you don't you'll face them at death anyway. So you may as well meet them head on now.

Keith Jopling: 1:00:33

While they're going into a room with with, with with no songs are going out onto stage, knowing that you're going to mix things up is probably terrifying for most people. But the fact that you'd that's the way you work it's become a modus operandi is, is absolutely key to your longevity and the fact you're still here but still vital with everything that you do. And that's very much appreciated by your entire fan base. I'm sure you're aware of that.

Tim Booth, James: 1:01:06

Thank you. Yeah, we are things.

Keith Jopling: 1:01:10

It's sort of been so good to chat.

Tim Booth, James: 1:01:13

I just want to get that bit across. I thought Yeah, no, thank

Keith Jopling: 1:01:15

you and I really appreciate it. And that's definitely going to go in and talking of getting into the subconscious. I'm going to go out into the first fourth and have a good ol 10 degree swim

Tim Booth, James: 1:01:28

are brilliant. Well done. Guys that way. There are many ways to get in the zone. That's that's

Keith Jopling: 1:01:35

my way. So have a great day and really appreciate this. It takes a couple of weeks for us to get everything together. Yeah, looking forward to releasing it and yeah, looking forward to seeing you. London's opening night. Thank you