Having been long-mooted since 2017, Foals frontman Yannis Philippakis has finally shared the music he made with the late, great Fela Kuti drummer Tony Allen. Philippakis invited NME down to Damon Albarn's 13 Studios in London to talk us through his new new collaborative project Yannis & The Law, the "Parisian protest spirit" that runs through the EP 'Lagos Paris London', getting high and political with Kuti, the future of Foals, and having a fan in 'Friends' icon David Schwimmer
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MusicTranscript
00:00 (upbeat music)
00:02 - Hi, I'm Andrew Trundle, you're watching NME,
00:04 and we're here today with Janis Filipakis.
00:06 - Hey.
00:07 (laughing)
00:08 - We'll keep this in.
00:09 - I don't know why that's--
00:10 - We'll do like behind the scenes,
00:12 this is like the fifth intro we've done.
00:13 - To be fair, in our interviews that we do with you,
00:16 it is always better, you know,
00:17 the funny shit's always off camera.
00:18 - Yeah, yeah, yeah, but that's why we're gonna keep this--
00:20 - We try to keep it. - In this time.
00:22 Are we actually doing this?
00:23 - Okay, cool, right.
00:24 Hey man.
00:25 - Oh, are we doing it?
00:26 - Yeah, yeah, yeah, we're doing it.
00:27 Yeah, we can like--
00:28 - We'll do one at the end, do one at the end.
00:28 - Yeah, yeah, we'll do some CGI stuff too.
00:30 So Janis, where are we?
00:32 - We're in 13 Studios in West London.
00:35 So we're here to hang out.
00:39 This is like Damon's studio, Damon Albarn's studio,
00:42 and he did a bunch of the recordings with Tony here
00:46 for the good, bad, and the queen,
00:47 and Tony lived upstairs for periods of time,
00:50 he would come and record here,
00:51 so like we're in kind of,
00:53 definitely not my spiritual home,
00:55 but more like Tony Allen's, I guess,
00:57 like spiritual home in London.
01:00 When he would be in London, he'd be in here,
01:01 so it seemed fitting to hang out with you here,
01:03 and we were gonna play some of the record
01:04 and stuff in a bit.
01:05 - Nice, do you bump into Damon by the kettle?
01:08 - No, no, I don't.
01:10 I've bumped into Damon a couple of times.
01:12 That's a story for another day, I think.
01:14 - Yeah, well we're here to announce,
01:16 finally, Janis and the yaw.
01:18 For those who aren't aware, a yaw is the twisting
01:21 or oscillation of a moving ship or aircraft
01:23 about a vertical axis.
01:25 - Part, no.
01:26 - So we're finally announcing this record
01:30 that you started with Tony Allen quite a while ago.
01:32 Feels like we've been talking about this for years.
01:34 - Yeah, it does, doesn't it?
01:35 - How does it feel to, well we have, literally have.
01:38 How does it feel to kind of finally have it
01:40 at this stage of completion?
01:41 - Good, I feel unburdened now.
01:44 I feel like it's something,
01:46 there's been like this kind of unfinished business
01:48 that's been occupying my vision for the future,
01:53 so it's like I had to kind of finish it,
01:55 and especially after Tony passed away
01:58 and in the midst of COVID,
01:59 it became kind of much more of a serious project
02:02 to try and make sure we did it justice.
02:06 So it feels good, and I just want people to hear it
02:10 and for it to be out, and yeah,
02:14 just to kind of release it into the world
02:16 will be a great relief in a way for me.
02:20 - Well, take us back to the very, very genesis of it.
02:22 So my understanding is that when you
02:24 and all the Foles lads shared a house,
02:25 you would put some slamming fellow cootie on an evening
02:28 to get you guys going.
02:29 - Yeah, as you do, you know,
02:30 and we'd listen to a bunch of old Afrobeat records.
02:34 In fact, the record we played more than any other
02:37 was a compiled Tony Allen best of
02:40 that had like Progress, Afro Disco Beat,
02:43 all his classic tracks from over the years,
02:45 and that record got absolutely hammered.
02:47 It got worn out.
02:49 So like fast forward a few years later,
02:52 somebody we knew in common who was basically trying to get,
02:56 you know, Tony to collab with more people
03:00 and different people, you know,
03:02 maybe unexpected collaborations,
03:04 called me and said, "Do you want to go over to Paris
03:08 "to write some tracks for Tony?"
03:10 And I was like, I jumped at the opportunity,
03:12 but it was down the line, we were on tour.
03:15 We were like somewhere in Europe, I think.
03:19 And then time passed, the tour took its toll.
03:23 I came back kind of knackered,
03:25 and then I almost didn't go.
03:26 I was just kind of like,
03:28 I was just pretty like broken by the end of the tour.
03:30 And the idea of like schlepping the guitar
03:33 and going to Paris for a session was just kind of,
03:36 but anyway, I was encouraged to go,
03:38 and then I went and it kind of, you know,
03:41 it kind of changed my life.
03:42 Like it was one of the best musical experiences of my life.
03:45 So yeah, it was definitely good that I got the nudge
03:48 that I needed to.
03:49 So I went to Paris and then that's when we first met.
03:53 - Okay, so you walk into the room,
03:55 Tony Allen sat there, what's he like?
03:57 - So I get to Paris and I took my bead on the train
04:01 and stuff and I walked to a little bit nerdy
04:03 and nervously into this studio
04:05 where everyone was smoking obviously,
04:06 'cause it's France.
04:08 And it was a big basement studio,
04:09 kind of it's very 70s, kind of naff,
04:12 but full of amazing instruments.
04:15 And it had like lots of airs, synths in there.
04:18 There was a bunch of different like West African percussion
04:21 and Tony was just sort of sitting there
04:23 in a fog of smoke, to be honest.
04:25 And I don't think the whiskey bottles had been opened yet,
04:28 but they were in proximity.
04:30 He wasn't like, you know, super,
04:32 I think it was kind of early.
04:33 He wasn't like super friendly, straight away.
04:37 But like, so there was some producers and collaborators.
04:40 He had been writing with these French guys,
04:42 the Vincents they should be called,
04:44 'cause there's two of them, both called Vincent.
04:46 They're kind of the Frenchest men in the world.
04:48 But yeah, so they were like, they kind of set me up.
04:52 And then we chatted a little bit, me and Tony,
04:55 but really like we got in the room straight away.
04:58 And then we just, I pulled out the riff
05:02 that is "Walk Through Fire"
05:03 and I just started playing that.
05:04 And then he came in into his,
05:07 into like into the room, into like his drum area.
05:09 And then just started playing.
05:11 And it was just kind of crazy.
05:13 Like I felt like I was lifting off slightly.
05:16 And we just jammed it.
05:17 And then by the end of that day,
05:19 we had kind of cut the majority
05:21 of the first three tracks on the EP.
05:25 I went back the next morning,
05:26 we did a couple of like quick structural things,
05:28 did some hand claps all together.
05:31 And then, yeah, and then that was kind of it, you know.
05:34 It was sort of set in motion.
05:37 We were, I think we just kind of had,
05:41 we became friends just through that jam,
05:45 that initial jam.
05:46 It was just felt like the whole room warmed up.
05:49 - Yeah.
05:49 - Yeah.
05:50 - Well, that's it.
05:51 At what point did it feel like
05:52 you kind of broke the walls down
05:53 where Tony started being frosty?
05:54 And was like, "We're friends."
05:56 I've never heard him speak.
05:57 - After that jam, I think we basically just came out
05:59 and then he was just kind of like,
06:00 "Okay, this guy's kind of all right."
06:01 You know, rather than just some random dude
06:03 that's walked in off the street or something.
06:05 But yeah, it just felt like the music connected us.
06:10 Especially like once I started singing,
06:12 I think he might not have,
06:13 he didn't expect me to sing the way that,
06:16 maybe it was just unexpected to him.
06:18 I really don't think he was even that familiar
06:20 with who I was, when I went in or like,
06:22 really I think somebody just said like,
06:24 "You should just try this out."
06:25 And Tony was collaborating with lots of people in Paris.
06:28 So once that happened, we had like,
06:31 "Rain Can't Reach Us" and "Walk Through Fire."
06:35 Those, once those first two tracks had been played,
06:38 I think then we were just,
06:40 we were sharing a spliff and drinking whiskey
06:42 and getting on.
06:43 - Yeah.
06:44 Well, how would you describe how you landed
06:45 on that kind of the sonic DNA of this EP?
06:47 Because you know, you obviously don't want to do
06:49 folds with like a different flavor, you know?
06:53 I mean, you don't just want to like,
06:55 Tony Allen featuring Yanis.
06:56 I mean, how did you land on the kind of
06:58 sonic palette of this?
07:00 - I mean, we didn't really have any pre,
07:02 like pre destined idea for it.
07:04 So the first riff was just one
07:06 that I thought would be cool to play.
07:08 I mean, I didn't even intend it as a track really.
07:11 It was just meant to be like a kind of jam.
07:13 So we just guided it through through intuition,
07:17 just like, just, we just followed the creative impulse.
07:20 And I think by the nature of like,
07:24 the mix of the influence between Tony and I,
07:27 it was bound to be something slightly other, you know?
07:30 There's obviously aspects of what people might identify
07:34 as like a false sounding riff.
07:35 And because obviously, like it's me playing guitar.
07:39 One of the tracks actually was like a loop
07:41 that was written in the same era
07:45 as some of the Everything Not Saved stuff
07:48 and then just didn't make it into the room with the boys.
07:50 So I had it and I was like,
07:51 oh, this would be great to work with Tony.
07:53 So there are some similar DNA strands
07:57 with like false tracks.
07:58 And obviously Tony's style of drumming is inimitable.
08:01 Like, you know, it's Tony Allen on the drums.
08:05 But I think that by virtue of the collab,
08:09 it's just kind of, it's something slightly other, you know?
08:11 - Yeah. Did Jack get jealous?
08:14 - I don't know, but Tony's like his favorite,
08:17 you know, one of his favorite drummers.
08:18 So he was always super, super positive about it.
08:22 I think that, you know, maybe he wished like,
08:24 it could have been like a, you know,
08:25 something with all of us or something,
08:27 or maybe, you know, we could have all played together
08:29 as well, it could have been cool.
08:32 I did it, we did one live kind of improv gig,
08:35 Tony and I and Jimmy joined in for that.
08:37 It was like a milk thing and we did it in Paris
08:39 and Tony came on for bits of that.
08:40 So that hope, you know, we were hoping
08:42 that we'd do more live together.
08:43 But. - Yeah.
08:44 Alas, yeah.
08:45 - Yeah.
08:46 But I remember talking to you once
08:48 and it was during one of the many, many, many French strikes
08:52 and you said you were walking around
08:53 and there was like trash piled high in the streets
08:55 and shit was on fire.
08:56 - Yeah.
08:57 - Obviously a lot of what Tony's done
08:58 is quite socially minded.
08:59 I mean, how did you approach the lyrics to this record
09:01 and kind of bake in that kind of French defiance to it?
09:05 - Yeah, I mean, that's that,
09:06 I just needed to not write the lyrics
09:09 from like the same perspective
09:11 as I would probably write more intimate false tracks.
09:14 So I wanted it to be more protest driven
09:18 or at least in the language that Tony and I shared
09:21 was like him encouraging me to write lyrics
09:24 that were more socially engaged.
09:26 And like you're saying, like we were,
09:27 it was, you couldn't shy away from it.
09:30 There was literally like mice peeking out of you
09:32 from garbage like piles on the way to the studio and stuff.
09:35 So I think that that sense of like combat and social decay,
09:40 which is the lives that we're living in many ways,
09:45 it's like that is just, that permeates the record.
09:47 And it was something that instead of like,
09:50 you know, Tony just encouraged me not to shy away from it.
09:53 You know, and I think by virtue of it being a collaboration
09:56 between the two of us,
09:57 I probably felt empowered to write a certain type of lyric
10:02 that perhaps within falls wouldn't feel quite right
10:05 for whatever reason, you know?
10:06 So it's a bit more,
10:08 it has that kind of Parisian protest spirit to it.
10:11 A lot of the tracks do anyway.
10:12 - Yeah. I mean, what do you think the EP tells us
10:14 as a result of that?
10:15 Is it just a portrait of the time or?
10:17 - I think that it should have a kind of galvanizing,
10:20 there should be a feeling of galvanization
10:24 that all isn't lost, you know?
10:27 And that, you know, you can create beauty
10:32 around and outside of the fire,
10:35 outside of things being on fire.
10:36 And the record, if anything, to me is soundtracking
10:40 like this feeling of precipice.
10:43 So it doesn't impart like a specific message
10:48 other than the, to me it's the soundtrack
10:52 for the protest, you know?
10:54 So that was the kind of way I was thinking about it.
10:56 It isn't didactic in any way.
10:58 Like, you know, that's not really my style, so.
11:00 - Yeah.
11:01 And then fast forward to 2020, sadly we lose Tony.
11:04 - Yeah.
11:05 - How did that kind of impact your relationship
11:08 to the songs?
11:09 - So what happened is like, we had done a couple
11:15 of other extra sessions afterwards.
11:17 Then I would stay on in the studio
11:19 and like Tony would leave some days.
11:22 And then I started working on some of "Everything Not Saved"
11:25 in the same studio with the same guys.
11:27 So there was a kind of crossover.
11:29 And then COVID struck.
11:32 So we kind of obviously lost all momentum
11:34 and it just became something that was slightly
11:36 in the back burner that probably quite easily
11:39 could have dissolved, you know, into the ether.
11:42 But then I think, you know, we'd had plans to try
11:47 to pick stuff up again after COVID.
11:49 But then obviously I was just hit with this news
11:51 that he passed away and it was quite sudden.
11:53 Nobody expected it.
11:54 - Yeah.
11:55 - But you know, he was, he wasn't young,
11:59 but he was healthy, you know, and he was strong.
12:02 And I think it just shocked everyone.
12:04 So I got the news through the Vincents.
12:08 And I think the moment that in a way that news had set in
12:13 after like just feeling grief and then putting a bunch
12:17 of his records on that evening
12:18 in the next couple of days and stuff,
12:20 it just became clear to me that we like just had
12:24 to finish it because I just think that there was something,
12:27 there was something crushing about not having completed it,
12:33 you know, while he was alive.
12:35 And it was so close to completion that I just felt
12:38 like it needed doing justice, you know,
12:40 just to finish it off and get it out and show people
12:43 what a cool thing that we had made.
12:44 - Yeah.
12:45 - It should just be done right, you know, in his memory
12:47 and like, and out of respect to the,
12:50 what was a chance encounter with him in a way
12:52 where we met in a studio, didn't really know who I was.
12:55 He didn't really give a fuck.
12:56 We smoked some hash together
12:58 and then we wrote some wicked tunes
12:59 and we became kind of, I feel like, you know,
13:02 I'm not like a, you know, it sounds a bit hippie,
13:05 but it's like our spirits got on, you know?
13:07 It's like something larger than just like how, you know,
13:11 the realities of our life, we wouldn't exchange stories.
13:14 There were lots of things that we didn't have in common,
13:17 but what we had in common was a kind of a shared language
13:20 that was separate from your everyday experience
13:23 of making a friend, you know?
13:25 And that's why it's such a special experience
13:29 for me in my life.
13:30 - So what can you tell us about how you kind of overcame
13:33 that challenge of wanting to finish this,
13:35 but kind of keep it imbued with the spirit of Tony
13:37 and sort of, did you hear like Tony's voice in the studio?
13:40 You're like, turn that up, turn that down,
13:41 play that faster.
13:42 - But thankfully, yeah.
13:44 Thankfully, like the Vincents had worked with him
13:47 a bunch on other projects.
13:49 They could almost be, you know,
13:50 they would say like Tony wouldn't have wanted
13:52 that part louder.
13:53 He wanted his kick drum sounding exactly like this,
13:56 his snare sounding exactly like this.
13:58 So they guided a lot of that principle,
14:00 but also a lot of the tracks were so finished,
14:03 essentially the only bits that needed completing
14:06 were some of mine.
14:07 So then I didn't really, we didn't actually mess
14:10 with that much of the original tracking.
14:13 Like most of the tracks are literally cut from a jam
14:17 done twice.
14:18 They weren't replayed.
14:19 There weren't multiple takes.
14:20 We didn't make this EP like a record,
14:23 like an album where there was a defined destination
14:26 and there was an idea of like perfection
14:28 that we were striving for.
14:29 It was liberated in the sense that we were just like,
14:33 we're just going to jam twice and then cool,
14:35 let's make something out of it.
14:36 And it was very rough and ready and very fast.
14:39 And once like the instrumentals had been captured,
14:43 they weren't really tinkered with much at all.
14:45 So there's only, there's one track under the strikes
14:47 where we had to do some actual drum editing and stuff
14:51 and general structuring on that,
14:53 like after Tony had passed,
14:56 but everything else was set at least with most of his stuff.
15:00 So there was a kind of feeling,
15:01 that's partly why there was such a feeling
15:05 of like near completion that it just needed,
15:08 we just needed to dot the I's and cross the T's and stuff.
15:12 - And then when it was done,
15:13 how did it feel to kind of have this finished document?
15:15 I mean, did you feel like you had a record
15:17 that Foals would have partied to back in the house
15:19 back in 2008?
15:20 - Yeah, probably, yeah.
15:22 It's to some extent, like me doing karaoke over one of,
15:26 well, at least some of it like felt like a kind of like
15:28 me being invited into a Tony track
15:31 and then getting to do like karaoke over it.
15:33 I felt like I had, you know,
15:36 that we've made something precious and that's like rare.
15:38 It's one of his final recordings.
15:40 It's like, it's a collaboration that can never exist
15:43 at any other time.
15:44 It will never be recreated.
15:45 The combination through generations and through cultures
15:48 of me being born in 1986,
15:50 Tony being 70 something when we started recording
15:54 from Lagos, obviously with an incredible life story,
15:57 him being based in Paris,
15:58 like all of these cultural and generational components
16:02 and experiences that we brought in
16:05 and looking at life through two different lenses
16:08 that this came out just feels like it's a treasure to me.
16:13 - I mean, this isn't a tourism thing either.
16:14 So your mom's South African, right?
16:15 So you've had this music in your life,
16:17 like for as long as you can remember.
16:19 - Yeah, I have.
16:20 I mean, I came to Felicity a bit later,
16:22 but definitely like a lot of Soweto music,
16:25 South African music I grew up with.
16:27 So, which is partly why I play guitar.
16:29 You know, I took more inspiration to be honest
16:31 from records my mom was playing
16:34 and the guitar styles from those records growing up
16:36 than I ever did from like Jimmy Page
16:39 or any kind of rock guitarist.
16:41 That's not really my lineage.
16:45 Like, you know, you can ask the guys in the band
16:47 and people that know me, like, you know,
16:48 I play the guitar like in a kind of very crude way
16:52 where it's not schooled in like the canon of rock music
16:57 from, you know, from the UK or wherever else.
16:59 Like for me, the sound that I chase with the guitar
17:04 is one that comes much more from an African place,
17:08 whether that's from Mali or from South Africa
17:10 or from Nigeria.
17:11 It's like, there's a shared style of guitar playing
17:15 that is the one, that's the one that gets me out of my seat.
17:18 - Yeah. - You know?
17:19 - What can you tell us about the concept of The Yore
17:21 and what you're launching here?
17:24 What happens next?
17:26 - I don't have the answer to that
17:29 and that in itself excites me, you know?
17:32 Like I just wanted to put this record out.
17:35 To me, The Yore is a kind of collaborative orbit
17:39 that can exist going forward
17:40 and that's kind of why I like this idea of it
17:44 being on an axis that spins.
17:45 It's like members can rotate,
17:47 future collaborations could occur if that happens,
17:50 but also it doesn't need to and there's no pressure on it.
17:54 I want this to be something that is fluid
17:56 and solely driven by like, by freedom and creativity
18:01 and not by any kind of concerns in a way, you know?
18:07 So The Yore is just kind of an open parachute
18:09 and we'll just see when it gets deployed.
18:12 - Yeah, so you could meet Damon by the kettle this afternoon
18:14 or we could be waiting 12 years.
18:15 - Yeah, yeah, exactly.
18:16 - Anyone on your bucket list to pull into The Yore's orbit?
18:19 Yore bit, there you go.
18:20 - Into the Yore bit, I like that.
18:22 I've been talking to a Marlion guitarist
18:25 called Gimba who's in Paris and who also knows The Vincents.
18:30 So I might do some sessions with him.
18:33 I've got some like old recordings
18:38 with Carl Hyde from Underworld
18:40 and I feel like it'd be cool to revisit those
18:42 and maybe do some collaborations there.
18:45 But I'm not sure really.
18:48 I think it would be cool just to keep it open-ended,
18:51 but yeah, and maybe even some Greek musicians.
18:55 But like, I like the idea that The Yore would be like,
18:58 it would be a culturally diverse project, you know?
19:04 So that it's not staying in one place for too long.
19:08 - What can you tell us about the aesthetic of the record,
19:10 the artwork, the visuals, the videos?
19:12 What are we gonna see?
19:14 - Oh, well, the artworks,
19:16 it's just some paintings made by a British artist
19:19 called Barker, who's really cool.
19:21 I absolutely love his stuff.
19:23 I kind of came across it through,
19:25 he did some artwork for Yusuf Deyes.
19:27 So it's super colorful.
19:30 Obviously, this record is called Lagos, Paris, London.
19:34 It's meant to be postcards
19:37 from these respective places in a way,
19:40 so the artwork reflects that.
19:41 They're kind of like collage postcard figments
19:45 of these places.
19:46 And I mean, I guess also to answer one thing about The Yore,
19:48 maybe the next one will be like Berlin, Athens, Burundi
19:52 or something like, have these triangular locations
19:55 and then see how the records come about.
19:58 So this record was done by Barker.
20:00 It's illustrative.
20:02 He did some amazing artwork for us.
20:04 The videos, we're just discussing
20:07 about how that's gonna work,
20:08 but yeah, we'll see.
20:10 It's kind of some of this stuff is to be figured out,
20:12 I think.
20:13 - Yeah, and there are live shows on the way too, right?
20:14 - Yeah, there's some live shows.
20:16 I'm not sure what is like definitely confirmed,
20:18 but there will be like some live performances of the music.
20:22 And probably the band will be made up of the collaborators
20:26 who worked on the record and then some players
20:29 that used to play with Tony
20:30 or from that like lineage maybe in some way.
20:34 But yeah, definitely gonna get the Vincents on stage
20:37 and some other players that played with Tony
20:39 from largely from Paris.
20:41 - Yeah, is that just gonna be the EP
20:42 and some extended jam?
20:43 - Yeah, probably, yeah.
20:44 - Checking an album cover for us.
20:47 I don't know.
20:48 (laughing)
20:48 - No, it'll be cool.
20:49 Like it'll be the EP and then there'll probably be like
20:52 maybe some other material that was like floating around
20:54 at the time or stuff from those milk nights that we did.
20:57 And yeah, it'll have quite a wild
20:59 and free improvised spirit to it.
21:02 I think it's gonna be like a jam.
21:04 - Yeah, and this is very much a kind of collective idea.
21:08 This isn't like the launch of Yanis the solo artist.
21:11 - Yeah, no, not at all.
21:12 And like, 'cause this isn't actually like
21:15 if I was to do a solo record,
21:16 it wouldn't probably be this.
21:18 This is definitely meant to be an archival presentation
21:23 of an amazing document, an amazing treasure that happened.
21:26 It happened, you know, it started quite a few years ago,
21:28 the sessions with Tony.
21:29 So I very much believe in it.
21:33 I want it to be out now in 2024,
21:34 but it's not necessarily like the creative move.
21:38 If I was to record something from scratch right now,
21:40 it wouldn't, by nature of it not being with Tony,
21:42 wouldn't be that right now.
21:43 So this is definitely meant to be a homage
21:47 and a release of this project that happened with Tony Allen.
21:50 It's not like the Yanis Villapakis experience.
21:53 - I think the last time we spoke was just before
21:55 "Confessions", the musical, which you wrote the score for.
22:00 - Yeah, where we hang out with the Schwem.
22:02 - The Schwem, this is what I was gonna say.
22:03 Are you getting a taste for that,
22:04 the theater world for after parties with David Schwimmer?
22:06 - Oh, yeah.
22:08 I mean, he's been coming to Folk shows for years.
22:10 - Has he? - Yeah, yeah, yes, I see.
22:12 Well, a few years, but yeah.
22:14 - I'm so caught up with this feeling.
22:15 - What's the question, am I liking Gleanies and shit
22:17 at the National Theater?
22:18 - Yeah, have you got a taste for that kind of world?
22:19 - Not really.
22:20 I mean, I like the creative world of it.
22:22 Yeah, definitely.
22:23 I like having,
22:24 I wanna have like a hydra-headed creative output.
22:29 I wanna be able to just be expressive and creative
22:32 and be productive and be in different disciplines.
22:36 And like being in the theater world,
22:40 it's not necessarily even the theater world,
22:42 it could be the film world,
22:43 but like being in a world where the music
22:46 has this kind of supporting role
22:48 is a really interesting one to be in,
22:49 where it's not like,
22:51 it's just as creatively challenging,
22:54 it's just as musically inspiring to me,
22:55 but it lives in this kind of other shape
22:58 that isn't to do with being in a band
23:00 and playing on stage and it being to do with my identity.
23:05 I like the fact that you can write music
23:07 that is discreet and is much more based
23:10 on how it interacts with actors or stage.
23:14 I'm into that idea.
23:15 - Have you got anything else in the works at the moment?
23:17 - I'm doing another one, another one, yeah.
23:19 - I see, anything you can tell us about that?
23:21 - Yeah, it's based on Antigone,
23:23 it's by the same director, Alexander Zeldin.
23:25 He is gonna be on at the National next year
23:29 and it's got Tobias Menzies in it
23:30 and Emma Darcy and Emma Mackey.
23:32 And it is set in present day Britain,
23:36 steeped in the housing crisis
23:39 and in the tragedy of our time.
23:42 And it's gonna be intense and dark and heavy
23:45 and it's gonna be cathartic.
23:48 And I'm just starting the music for it now.
23:51 - And the Schwimm will be there.
23:52 - The Schwimm will be there.
23:53 - Is he the most famous Falls fan?
23:55 - I'm not sure actually, I'm not sure.
23:59 - Who's he up against?
24:02 - I don't know, probably one of the Royal Family or something.
24:06 - And how are the rest of you?
24:08 Is Jimmy still working on his Cosmonaut concepts album?
24:12 - Yeah, I think so.
24:13 I don't know, you'd have to check in with him.
24:14 I mean, he is the Cosmonaut.
24:16 So it's hard to hear what he's up to.
24:19 I spoke to him the other day, he's been moving house.
24:21 So he is definitely writing some stuff, yeah.
24:25 I mean, I'm hoping, the thing with Jimmy's stuff
24:27 is it's so good, I kind of always wanna just use it
24:29 for kind of harvest it for Falls.
24:31 - Selfish. - Records, yeah, exactly.
24:32 - Has there been much progress on the follow-up
24:33 to Life Is Yours?
24:34 I mean, it sounds quite selfish question
24:37 given how much shit you've got going on.
24:38 - Yeah, absolutely nothing, which is fine, I think.
24:42 We just finished touring it in January.
24:47 We did an Australian tour and stuff.
24:49 And I think before we make another Falls record,
24:53 we really want to have some time at home and apart
24:58 and to individually just kind of get replenished
25:03 and be inspired and not make one out of a sort of knee-jerk
25:09 sense of obligation or because we don't have
25:11 anything else to do.
25:12 It's like, oh, let's make a Falls record.
25:14 You know, it's like, I think we wanna make the next record.
25:17 We want it to be really special.
25:18 And I think that, you know, we've been busy with it.
25:24 So I think it's good to go out and like, you know,
25:27 smell the roses for a bit and then come back in
25:29 and then I think we'll make something really special.
25:31 - Yeah, do you think having Walter back
25:33 is gonna make for a meaty record?
25:35 - Meaty? - Yeah.
25:36 - Yeah, I think it's gonna be, I mean, it's fucking great.
25:40 He's back and I think that it will feel great in the room
25:43 when we're writing together
25:45 and it will probably affect writing somehow.
25:48 I think it could be the best Falls record yet
25:53 'cause I think this space that we're gonna now have
25:58 over the next year and stuff is gonna be crucial
26:00 and then, yeah, I think the only thing we kind of know
26:04 is that it won't be like "Life is Yours," you know?
26:06 As is the Falls way, I'm pretty sure we're gonna go
26:09 and subvert and get into something new,
26:11 some new interesting place and yeah,
26:14 but having Wally back's gonna be great, you know?
26:16 - No desire to get a house together again?
26:18 - I mean, we might make the record in one big house,
26:21 I think, but no.
26:24 - Who's, just make a "Fly on the Wall" doc,
26:26 like "Big Brother" style, I'd watch that.
26:28 Who's the worst person to live with?
26:30 - Who's the worst person to live with?
26:32 Probably, I mean, maybe me, maybe me.
26:34 Back in the day, not anymore, but I mean,
26:36 I was smoking like 40 cigarettes a day.
26:40 The music was just relentless, sort of teasing people,
26:43 probably not cleaning up that much.
26:45 Yeah, just all of us were pretty gross back then
26:49 when you look back at it, it was just super, it was festy.
26:52 - Was Jack like cooking for everyone or just himself?
26:54 - Jack occasionally cooked for us,
26:55 but he was in his kind of fledgling days of being a chef.
26:58 So there's this one dish that he would make
27:01 every few months that we did enjoy,
27:03 but in between that, there wouldn't be that much cooking,
27:05 but there was a lot of just like, yeah,
27:07 it was just a fucking tip, basically.
27:09 - Well, just like chilling out, watching Hollyoaks?
27:13 - What was it like in that house?
27:14 So basically, we had a basement, we went down there,
27:18 we soundproofed, we got these dodgy guys to soundproof it.
27:21 One of them died doing an arm burglary
27:23 a few years later in the center of Oxford.
27:25 He expired in the center of Oxford,
27:28 trying to rob a jeweler's.
27:29 I knew that they were dodgy guys at the time,
27:32 but they gave us a good rate, so it seemed fair enough.
27:36 But yeah, we soundproofed this basement,
27:37 and then there would be three different bands
27:39 rehearsing in there at all times.
27:41 We were mainly writing tunes
27:42 to keep the carpet beetles moving upstairs.
27:45 - The Lady of the Band.
27:48 - I wish.
27:49 Yeah, it was great.
27:51 It was fucking great.
27:52 No one really cooked.
27:53 The fridge was in the middle of the kitchen floor
27:55 for some bizarre reason.
27:56 We drank a lot of whiskey.
27:57 We were watching Mad Men at the time,
28:00 which obviously you can hear in all the records.
28:02 And yeah, it was a good time.
28:06 It was a really good time.
28:07 I mean, we lived in a few houses.
28:09 It wasn't just one.
28:09 Like, we lived in three.
28:10 There was a Holy Fire house, a Tot Life Forever house,
28:13 and the Antidotes house, which was short-lived in Brighton.
28:17 We went there, we put mounds of salt all over the carpets
28:21 where the red wine had been spilt,
28:22 and then we promptly moved out.
28:24 - There's gonna be some fun scenes
28:24 in the Foles movie, I'm sure.
28:26 - Yeah, I mean, well, yeah.
28:27 I think that it will be good,
28:29 and we can get the swim in it.
28:30 - Is he playing you?
28:31 - I mean, of course.
28:33 - Nice one.
28:33 Yanis, thanks so much for your time, man.
28:35 - Thank you. - Thank you.
28:35 (upbeat music)
28:38 (music)
28:40 [music]