Hot Seat: Billy Bragg – Tooth And Nail
If the pen is mightier than the sword, then Billy Bragg’s songbook is a mighty powerful weapon. The Bard of Barking is the embodiment of the great protest singer, an artist with the talent and drive to shape cultures. He speaks his mind through song, and millions listen.
The British songsmith’s fighting spirit is legendary. In the ’80s, he helped to set up Red Wedge, a loose umbrella organization that brought together like-minded artists to campaign for the election of a Labour government. Bragg once addressed the British parliament wearing a Clash t-shirt.
A fiercely independent artist, Bragg’s career will be celebrated when the U.K. trade association AIM presents him with the “outstanding contribution to music award” at its September 3 ceremony in London.
Soon after, Bragg will be a guest of the Bigsound conference in Brisbane, where he’ll be a keynote speaker. As usual, he’ll draw a big crowd. TMN caught up with Bragg to talk politics, the road ahead and what it is to be an independent artist.
What’s vexing you right now?
I guess it’s elections. You’ve got one coming up, we’ve got one soon – the year after next. The Labour Party in the U.K. aren’t showing signs of engaging or doing anything other than just trying to get the centre-ground. So, it’s worrying about what is there going to be to vote for. The Tories will promise a referendum on Europe, Labour will do that. The Tories will promise more cuts; Labour will say they will make the same spending cuts, in order to not get attacked by the papers. Where’s the choice? There doesn’t seem to be any choice in our democracy anymore. That’s one of the things that’s vexing me.
Of course you helped set up Red Wedge all those years ago. Will you be playing some kind of role with the upcoming elections?
I doubt it very much. I was involved in the last election, working with the Labour Party in Barking, in East London, where I come from. But that’s because they were under threat from the far right, whites-only party, the British National Party (BNP). So I got stuck in over there. But on a broader level, there’s no appetite for that among the arts. I don’t think there’s much appetite from the party either; they don’t need people like me wondering around saying what we think. So, the space for doing that sort of thing has closed down in the last couple of years. Back in the day, the Labour Party were the opposite of the Conservative Party. That’s not true anymore. The centre-ground moves all the time. You want an alternative view of society from which to choose from. You don’t get that anymore. You just get the same thing, it’s just own-brand. It’s a different thing on the box.
You’ll arrive in Australia too late for the nonsense that is the Australian federal campaign, which is cracking on right now.
Thank Christ for that. It looks like being a total car-wreck, from what I can see at this end. I did pick-up on Tony Abbott’s “suppository of all knowledge” comment. It’s difficult when they try to outbid each other to attack the asylum seekers. It’s the same sort of politics here, really.
Your new album Tooth & Nail was a shift away from political themes. It’s more personal.
There were a couple of reasons for that. The first reason would be that the Internet allows me to load-up topical songs within hours of writing them. When I wrote my song about the phone-hacking scandal, Never Buy The Sun, I wrote it on a Friday, performed it for the first time on a Saturday, put up a clip of me playing it on a Sunday, and recorded a version and made it available. Since the last album, I’ve put five topical songs up on the Internet. So instead of having to wait until I made a new album, I can get them out now. The knock-on effect of that is, when I come to making an album, I tend to have more personal songs. On the album I’m a bit more reflective; I don’t think that’s necessarily a bad thing. The other thing is that my Mum passed away in 2011, and the album became the way to move on from that. It became the next thing to do. After me and my brother sorted out everything, I thought “I need to move on to the next thing now. What is the next thing?” And the next thing was making an album. So I got on the phone to Joe Henry, who had been telling me for the last few years that we could make an album in five days in his basement. I said, “What about it. Are we going to try and make this album?” I admit I was a bit sceptical. But it worked out in the end. And it has allowed me to move on, which has been good.
You said you’ve offered five new downloads for free from your Website. You still have a recording deal with Martin Goldschmidt’s Cooking Vinyl. How does that work, being with a record company but having the freedom to release music as you want?
My record deal with Cooking Vinyl has always been more like a manufacturing and distribution deal. They’ve always given me a lot of room to do what I do in-between records. I think they appreciate its all promotion, it’s keeping me connected between albums. Rather than go through the huge cost of putting out a formal album every couple of years, you can keep interest going and generate income at a smaller level for myself by releasing albums just to sell at gigs. As long as they’re not in the shops, Cooking Vinyl doesn’t seem to mind. And it’s the same with the free downloads. That’s for me a form of promotion. It’s a little bit like a “John Peel session.” Whenever I got invited to do a Peel session, I always tried to have at least two or three new songs to throw in, just to try out really. Just to get them out there. I think putting free stuff up on the Internet is the same as that. And in some ways that’s been proved true. In 2011 I compiled “Fight Songs” from all the songs that I’d made free and available on the Internet, which I now sell at gigs. It’s been probably the best-seller of all my self-released albums.
Will you be selling some of those in Australia?
I hope so. I generally sell stuff at the gigs. It also gives me an opportunity; I find after the show now I might spend an hour — sometimes more — at the T-shirt stall, signing CDs, talking to people. When I played at the QPAC last year in Brisbane, I spent more time at the t-shirt stall than I did on the stage. They just kept the bar open at the foyer, some people went home and returned with their albums for me to sign. Everyone was happy. I was getting my photograph taken, signing records, the bar was open, the venue was making some money. Everyone benefits.
It just goes to show how essential live is nowadays.
It’s really essential. I feel that’s the job I have. I don’t work in the record industry, I work in the music industry. It’s a different thing.
Of course, you’re able to play extensive tours and you’ve a deep playlist to pull from.
Yup. I’m also in a privileged position where people in Australia are still interested in what I’m doing. It’ll soon be 30 years since I first came and played in Australia. On our last trip, not only did we sell-out the dates, we added shows in five cities and sold them out as well. I feel really privileged to still be able to come and do that. The fact that I’m popping over for five days in the middle of an American tour is in some ways tribute to the support that I’ve got from the Australian audience. They’ve really, really helped me last year getting my brain in gear for the new album. The money we made off it has helped to bankroll the promotion for the new record. Coming over for a week makes absolute sense for me, because I’ve got absolute support from the Australian audience. I’m psyched to come. Though I’m not coming over to tour, I do have a band now and I’m really looking forward to bringing the band over next year.
You’ve been with Cooking Vinyl a long time, and you’ve a long-standing professional relationship with Peter Jenner. Is that loyalty something that’s missing in today’s music landscape?
It’s a shame if it is. The long experience with Pete and Martin has been beneficial to all of us. Pete taught me early on that the best record deals are the ones that only last seven years and that you get your rights back at the end of that. To a record label, that might sound a bit disturbing. Martin has been signing those deals with me for 20 years. I think he does really good work, so when we come to the end of the deal I just sign with him again. So he’s getting the long-term commitment, he’s just getting it on my terms. That’s how you want to work as an artist. You have to be willing to make compromises with the industry to get what you want, but you need to make those compromises on your terms. You need a record company that is open-minded and trusting enough, like Cooking Vinyl, to be able to say, “I trust this artist. We’re going to do a really good job on this record and I feel that you’ll benefit from that, and you’ll sign with us again.” And that’s what we’ve done over the last 20 years.
In the time between Tooth & Nail and your previous studio album,Mr Love & Justice in 2008, you made a comment about becoming rather disillusioned with the record industry, wondering if there was “any place for a middle-aged Billy Bragg in a market dominated by the X-Factor.” How do you now look at industry and where you fit in?
It was the record industry I was wondering about. The music industry, I have no problem with where my place is. And I’m still enjoying it. I was in Denmark last weekend playing a folk festival, I’ll be in Ireland next weekend playing at a rock festival. I know how all that works. But the record industry, when you’re a self-financed artist like me, it’s a huge amount of blood and treasure to put out a proper record without the support of a major record label willing to bankroll it. I’m not complaining about that; I’d prefer to do it this way around, because the rewards are greater if you’re successful. Also, I managed to control the excess of it all. The situation is not just the way the music has changed; I have been around for 30 years. Where do I fit in now? How do I run alongside what’s going on inside the NME, which was hugely supportive of me back in the day. Well, I was happy to find the NME and other magazines were very supportive of Tooth & Nail. That they were interested in a Billy Bragg coming at it from a slightly different angle, and touching on that Mermaid Avenue Americana thing, when I made those albums with Wilco. And I’ve been encouraged by the response by the record industry. Not only have I been invited by Bigsound, but the Association of Independent Music are giving me an award next week. I’ve been encouraged by it. When you look at what’s in the charts, you think to yourself, “hmmm, where do I fit into all that now.” In the end, you can only make an album that expresses where you are at the time. And that’s all I can really do. It’s encouraging to see that still resonates with people.
You’re 30-plus years into your career, and right now the biggest thing in music is Miley Cyrus twerking at the VMAs.
I’m afraid I can’t twerk. I won’t be able to do that at Bigsound. If anyone’s expecting me to do that at Bigsound, I’m afraid they’ll be sorely disappointed.
Speaking of politics and twerking, we have an oversized billionaire mining magnate who is trying to enter federal politics. And he was caught twerking for a radio station. The ends some people will go to.
That is really disturbing.
Peter Jenner was a speaker at Bigsound back in 2008. What will you speak about at the conference?
Broadly, what people want to talk about is activism in music. We’ll talk about that. But also the issues we’ve touched on, about how to be an independent artist in the record industry.
Without giving too much away, do you have any tips for independent artists trying to get ahead in this strange business?
You have to try remain true to yourself. I don’t know what it is that the Australian audience sees in me, that resonates with them. But I like to think it’s because I’m doing my damnedest to be honest about myself, and the way I see the world. If you can do that, and you can reach inside yourself, and put it out there, people respond to that.
You’re a formidable writer in the conventional sense. Do you have more books in you?
I do. I wrote a book five, six years ago called The Progressive Patriot. And it turned out to be a lot harder than writing songs. I would disappear into my office for days on end. I promised my family if I did it again, I would do it in a less pressurized environment. I’m sure I have a book in me, but it’s the sort of thing you do between records, rather than between Brisbane and Los Angeles. That’s going to have to wait.
I wonder how Nick Cave manages it. He’s prolific with screenplays, novels and album projects across a number of bands.
You can channel it. I write a lot of blogs and articles for the newspaper. I’m sure if it came down to it and I needed to write more for books, I’m sure I could work out a way that was more conducive to family life. Someone like Cave is a communicator. He puts his ideas out there. I’d like to think I’m that same type of guy. Whether I’m talking to you or writing posts on Facebook or writing a song or doing a gig, I’m trying to communicate my ideas to people. And that in the end becomes the bottom line, rather than being a songwriter or novelist or whatever.
You’re very much in-cycle with Tooth & Nail, but when will you start work on your next album?
Well, coming to Australia is halfway in this whole process. I’m writing ideas for songs all the time. At the end of this process, I’ll have to stand back and take a long deep breath and put my head in a different space for a little while before I come back to make a new record. The last record, there was five years between them. I don’t think it will be five years again. Hopefully I found a way with Joe Henry to make records that are both viable financially but also for me, really intriguing, really engaging and really interesting. So, a couple or three years hopefully I’ll be out with a new one.
At this stage in your career, what drives you?
The bottom line for me is to carry on making a living doing what I’ve always enjoyed doing. And even if that ends up me playing at the pub at the end of the road, I suppose I’ll carry on doing that. I’ve never had a massive game plan where I would end up twerking with Robin Thicke at the VMAs. Having said that, over these years I’ve had an amazing time, I’ve travelled around the world, made a decent living. I can’t complain about that. If I carry on doing this until I’m not able to do it anymore, I’d be very happy.