My understanding is you kind of get a deal with Disney's Hollywood records and they just kind of stall you for a while. You kind of do that spin that they would do. Well, what happened is they delivered the record that was 16-star to them and that's the story as according to the guy from my label, Rob Kane, that they, the record, the company, they threw this CD and they said not only that those singles on this record there's no

album tracks and at the record, the company, they threw this CD in, they said, not only that those singles on this record, there's no album tracks and threw the record at him. Everybody of course talks about Nirvana and there's good reasons for that. But really it was the pixies that I think cracked our heads open. We thought we can be cool and play rock. It seemed to all kind of mash it together at the right moment. I was lost. It'd be fair to say that what I'd done exactly that point is I had been in London and my second band had failed. And I was left looking what to do. And the first time in my life I was worried about it because before I had like brazen youth like it would come right, it would come right. And that was just the most helpful sort of signpost in a bleak on a bleak mountain. Thank you very much for being here. Thank you for having me. I'm so thrilled. We've known each other now about almost 30 years, somewhere in there, somewhere on. Yeah, it's crazy crazy and I was saying that I was so happy that so

Not many things are not surprising. I got that cold to come in. I was like it's so exciting. Yeah, absolutely

Okay, so let's start at the beginning. I usually like to start different places

But with you I want to start at the beginning. So is it true you didn't speak to you were four years old?

Yes, I

think I had a lot of bossy older sister so she took a care of a lot of that and for whatever reason there seemed to be no point. Maybe I hadn't thought of anything good to say. What was it, it wasn't a developmental thing, it wasn't tongue tied. No, it just was a, just a feral attribute, early feral signs of life. It's pretty early age to say, you know what I'm snacking to talk? Yeah, I'm just, you know, I have this thing anyway about making music that, you know, there's, because there's already too much music in the world, but not enough great music. It's like, you just should make things when you can improve the silence. And I couldn't figure out how to improve that silence. That's an interesting cut. I didn't figure it out.

And it was, you know, I was just sort of point what I needed. And I think my sister enjoyed the control over me. So I learned to be controlled by women at an early age. We'll get to that. I didn't find a lot of information on what your parents were like. Right. Yeah. Very interesting. It's sad in a way because when they met my dad was doing driving rally cars, was doing rally, but amateur, right? Doing rally driving. But like F1 track, type tracks, or road rally? Rally, like way down the thing, but he was in a little... But it's where they go through the villages and you know, almost run people over. Yeah, and then, and my mom was from Scotland, from a small town in Scotland, and she'd become to London to be a model in the swinging sixties, whether. And when they met, they both, well, he stopped driving and she stopped modeling to sort of like, oh, you know, I don't have a marriage, but I thought it was a real shame, they sort of like continued on. I know about that. So they would together till I was 12 and then I grew up just with my dad. But what were their personalities like? Well, my dad is really, he passed a couple of years ago, four years ago. It's so weird, everything is two years ago now. COVID destroyed all the time. Right. My brain just goes, everything if I, if it's not now, it's two years ago. It's almost like pre-COVID post-COVID brain.

Do you feel that?

Yeah, BC, it's literally. So he was a really gentle, really funny, sly, like sushi chef, like cut you up with wit, but very demure, understated. and then my mom was really fun. She was like,

wanted just to... with wit, but very demure, understated. And then my mom was really fun. She was like, she was the best at our dinner, like, you know, with a nice cold white wine, and just like, living the life. She was sort of a, she lived like that. So it was an interesting balance between the two. So I think I have mostly my dad's characteristics, I think a little bit more laid back. It's like I'm not the kind of artist that is in a room for the people, just really must play everyone I knew so. Some people want to do that, check it out, and then everyone sort of, I'll do it, but it's not a I've got a nine-mile natural state. Why did your parents get divorced, you know?

I think my mom wanted a, was looking for just that bigger life. And I think that he was a bit more, not looking for that big life. And so I think there's a disconnect there. And so I felt the searching which I thought was a really good lesson to learn at 12, you know That just to understand where someone leaves because they're searching for something and we reconnected when I was about 20 20s, you know, and I'd seen it over a year more or less, but it was two different Husbands boy boyfriends and on. So it was a bit disconnected, which is really frettive for our world. That's really, really good. That's really good. But I mean, it's a little bit like the John Lennon story where his mom kind of goes out of his life. She's around, but he ends up living with an auntie. Right.

You know, so in this case, you're living with your father and I think an aunt, I might...

Yeah, my aunt for a while and she... But was that painful for you that your mom's kind of like... Yeah. Around? Well, she wasn't around. She moved out of actually England for a couple years. Okay. and then she moved out of town so she was really elusive. I don't know where she was.

Was she just sort of living the gypsy life? Well, no, she just had two or three

stepfathers, the husbands that she would move with wherever they were. So... But did you feel abandoned my all that or...? Uh, yeah, of course it was... I think about it most now when I look at my kids at age and I just think, you know, If I go upstairs and no one's getting the orange juice out of the fridge and they're like dumbfounded as to how to put the glass of the orange juice together from the other side of the kitchen, all going on tour when I feel horrible when I go on tour and I just, it's easier now because a little bit older but when we're really young, just that guilt, that hollow guilt. So now I reflect

on that a lot and I think that wow because there's no therapy then and all said to me, how you doing? You were right. I was a very mixed up kid. I lived in a quite a rough neighborhood but then went to a really intellectual school. So I had the kind of like the split life where no trusted me, no no one liked me for you know how could you sort of caught into world and So that creates inner worlds you know and those inner worlds are the reason we're here So we got here so I New a little bit about your history in in late 70s 80s Music scene, you, that you were around seeing some of these great artists that are now considered legendary and influential, but at the time they were just kind of punk rock and I don't know who you were particularly influenced by. I saw a couple of things, but I know that's probably a little bit more specific than that, but I think it was attributed to your sister kind of turned you on to this one. You were about 12 years old. Yeah, what happened is she was really very cool punk. So when punk hit, she was really just... Is she dress punk? Yeah, it's all the kind of the egg white in the hair. And just right, the ton of it. And so it was like a real revolution. I mean, it was a revolution in. It was still, I mean we realize it's still now it's such a watershed moment in music. The Italians were the Green Mohawks in Piccadilly Circus are trying their best to keep it going but it really had its mark with them. So it's exciting to be part of that. So for me I fit into that role of the kind of the cute young kid who just was go-along

with him. They tagging along. Yeah. And outside my house where we lived, the 31 bus, right outside my house, would go down to World's End. And what we had there was, and the King's Road was, we had the punks. would be one side of the street and all congregate around seditionaries, a mark of a clarinet

living westwood shop, and then you side of the street and all con day around seditionaries,

a mark on the clarinavine living westward shop, and then you'd have the teds who

they would meant to be the, you know, they were fighting. I never saw marbles like that. It's like the left or the right? Teds, that was that was the, you know, and they're walking up and down. So we'd get a Thay One bus and we'd park up there and walk up and down to Kings Road all day,

going to do damn any money just like the bus money. And then, you know, stuff like that, so at the beginning of public image, public image played on the rooftop of this building. We didn't get in, we were just all in the, you know, on the, you know, it was just like a 12 year old kid, you know, just it was all happening. Amazing. So that really, what that did is it really shook up the fire in the, you know, on the surface, it was just like a 12-year-old kid, you know, just it was all happening. Amazing. And so that really, what that did is it really shook up the fire in me, performance-wise, like I just obsessed with the sex pistols and Johnny Leiden, just his performance, and that I'll reach the third thing, the whole stage thing, was just, it was just, it was just brilliant. Everything about him was just, was just, everything that I wanted to be even though I was not I was not a kid in a council estate. I surrounded by council estates but it just spoke to me that sort of rebellion and that sort of autonomy in that. What about the rebellion spoke to you think? I just think that making your own way and sticking out for yourself and not make you a brat but just make you have that sort of a tenacity to just follow your own way. Like for example, I used to go to school every day where they'd sing Latin hymns, Latin hymns. And I'm not religious at all, right? But I think that's why I learned my sense of cadence in melodies because I would hear those things I always use biblical references in my lyrics, but I'm not and so during that time for example I'd sit in the church and see people I'd be like because I really did not feel connected to a god a living god you know or a god that people see it at traditionally um I was like come on we can't all be. Come on, I'll

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