Another long walk precedes the interview, I think this is becoming a nice habit. This time I'm interviewing Glasgow based Michael Timmons. I discovered Michael's music by accident when I was looking at gig listing and Michael was supporting, I had a listen to him and instantly loved 'Material'. I was quite surprised to find an electric based a singer/songwriter. The venue this time was the Rio Café in Glasgow's west end. An out of the way venue but surprisingly busy.
We start by talking about Timmons beginnings as a solo musician. It seemed like the best place to start. "About two and a half years now, Just kind of gigging and trying to figure out if it was something I could do. I quite like weird instrumentally stuff so I started off with like 10 minutes of just weird noises and there was maybe only one guy in the audience who actually liked it. It took me a while to change." He goes on to say "At the very start I was just lots of effects. I started changing, making the instrumental bits smaller and the songs longer."
Talking about the sound of his music he tells me "It's all kind of melodic and quite quiet I guess. I use an electric, I was always a bit afraid it was gonna be quite gimmicky using an electric but it was more I can't really play an acoustic, it never sounded right it was dead clumsy, I just kind of fell into the sound that I've got. It's kind of slightly reverby and ambient with weird noises. Yeah it's all kind of like that." For me the unique sound of Michael's music was something I loved instantly. His voice and the sound of the guitar is a great combination.
"My stuff is a bit of everything. A bit of Bon Iver, Alexi Murdoch and there's quite a lot of weird ambient music that I listen to with not really much singing. I love King Creosote too. When writing songs now the biggest thing that kind of spurs me on is when I'm playing with other musicians and I see that their songs are so much better than mine that inspires me to try and write more. There's a guy called David Lan, Dear Lara he's called. One of my early gigs I played a show with him and that just kind of changed the way I was writing cos I just thought this guy is amazing and that spurred me on, he's a good friend, you should have a listen to his albums. So I do that with everyone I play shows with, I pick up a wee thing here and there."
I ask Timmons about the themes of his songs. Are they inspired by love, growing up or change? Has he wrote a song for someone and played it for them? "No I've never done that yeah probably the opposite. Things happen and change especially when you are growing up, lot of change in different ways, I put that into music. I don't think there are kind of any happy love songs - not yet anyway. I don't really write about specific events just a combination of things kind of pulled together into one kind of theme. I've never had to explain it before, it's strange." He goes on to say "Something will happen, a change or something. I don't sit down right away and think of something, a song. I'll kind of write about it over time, I struggle to force out a song, so just gradually pull it together with different things like I could be out and maybe on the train and you'll over hear a conversation and you'll mentally note down what that person said and put those ideas in there too. It just kind of falls together."
We go on to talk about on of my favourite songs 'Material'. "It's kind of just about changes. People kind of growing apart and relationships grow up and go different ways. That's kind of what that was about and as I've said there is different things pulled within that song. That's why some of the lyrics might seem a bit weird at times. I really like playing Material but I can't ever remember sitting down and writing it."
If you watch the video for 'Material' and some other videos on Timmons YouTube channel you will notice the frequent use of archive footage.
"I used a lot of archive footage, I used internet archive and got obsessed watching different clips and stumbled on the clips I used for the video. I got obsessed with it, They are really old home movies from a couple that their ancestors have put online to be shared, and there were so many great videos, it started with them very young meeting, to getting married, to travelling and having children. I tried to find a contact somewhere to get in touch with their family, as I imagine they have passed away now, couldn't find anything."
Timmons is also the latest addition to Gargleblast Records, a small independent record label based in Hamilton. They will be releasing Timmons debut album later this year with a single being released before the album. "I'm due to release a single and an album with Gargleblast Records this year which I'm really excited about. I've known of Gargleblast for years and when it was time to record I didn't even have to think about it. So I recorded the whole album with Andy Miller, who is an amzing producer and such a nice guy. He has so much music knowledge and is so generous with it, really helps you get the best out of you. We just set up my guitar and microphones and I just pefromed the songs live and we captured most of them in one day. We felt this kept the sound quite raw and personal and seemed to work. I'm really excited to be working with Andy, Shaun, Pat at Gargleblast and also thier other newest signing Mayor Stubbs. They have released some great music in the past, if you didn't hear Martin John Henry's stuff you should check it out."
We start by talking about Timmons beginnings as a solo musician. It seemed like the best place to start. "About two and a half years now, Just kind of gigging and trying to figure out if it was something I could do. I quite like weird instrumentally stuff so I started off with like 10 minutes of just weird noises and there was maybe only one guy in the audience who actually liked it. It took me a while to change." He goes on to say "At the very start I was just lots of effects. I started changing, making the instrumental bits smaller and the songs longer."
Talking about the sound of his music he tells me "It's all kind of melodic and quite quiet I guess. I use an electric, I was always a bit afraid it was gonna be quite gimmicky using an electric but it was more I can't really play an acoustic, it never sounded right it was dead clumsy, I just kind of fell into the sound that I've got. It's kind of slightly reverby and ambient with weird noises. Yeah it's all kind of like that." For me the unique sound of Michael's music was something I loved instantly. His voice and the sound of the guitar is a great combination.
"My stuff is a bit of everything. A bit of Bon Iver, Alexi Murdoch and there's quite a lot of weird ambient music that I listen to with not really much singing. I love King Creosote too. When writing songs now the biggest thing that kind of spurs me on is when I'm playing with other musicians and I see that their songs are so much better than mine that inspires me to try and write more. There's a guy called David Lan, Dear Lara he's called. One of my early gigs I played a show with him and that just kind of changed the way I was writing cos I just thought this guy is amazing and that spurred me on, he's a good friend, you should have a listen to his albums. So I do that with everyone I play shows with, I pick up a wee thing here and there."
I ask Timmons about the themes of his songs. Are they inspired by love, growing up or change? Has he wrote a song for someone and played it for them? "No I've never done that yeah probably the opposite. Things happen and change especially when you are growing up, lot of change in different ways, I put that into music. I don't think there are kind of any happy love songs - not yet anyway. I don't really write about specific events just a combination of things kind of pulled together into one kind of theme. I've never had to explain it before, it's strange." He goes on to say "Something will happen, a change or something. I don't sit down right away and think of something, a song. I'll kind of write about it over time, I struggle to force out a song, so just gradually pull it together with different things like I could be out and maybe on the train and you'll over hear a conversation and you'll mentally note down what that person said and put those ideas in there too. It just kind of falls together."
We go on to talk about on of my favourite songs 'Material'. "It's kind of just about changes. People kind of growing apart and relationships grow up and go different ways. That's kind of what that was about and as I've said there is different things pulled within that song. That's why some of the lyrics might seem a bit weird at times. I really like playing Material but I can't ever remember sitting down and writing it."
If you watch the video for 'Material' and some other videos on Timmons YouTube channel you will notice the frequent use of archive footage.
"I used a lot of archive footage, I used internet archive and got obsessed watching different clips and stumbled on the clips I used for the video. I got obsessed with it, They are really old home movies from a couple that their ancestors have put online to be shared, and there were so many great videos, it started with them very young meeting, to getting married, to travelling and having children. I tried to find a contact somewhere to get in touch with their family, as I imagine they have passed away now, couldn't find anything."
Timmons is also the latest addition to Gargleblast Records, a small independent record label based in Hamilton. They will be releasing Timmons debut album later this year with a single being released before the album. "I'm due to release a single and an album with Gargleblast Records this year which I'm really excited about. I've known of Gargleblast for years and when it was time to record I didn't even have to think about it. So I recorded the whole album with Andy Miller, who is an amzing producer and such a nice guy. He has so much music knowledge and is so generous with it, really helps you get the best out of you. We just set up my guitar and microphones and I just pefromed the songs live and we captured most of them in one day. We felt this kept the sound quite raw and personal and seemed to work. I'm really excited to be working with Andy, Shaun, Pat at Gargleblast and also thier other newest signing Mayor Stubbs. They have released some great music in the past, if you didn't hear Martin John Henry's stuff you should check it out."
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