Welcome to a breath of fresh air with Sandy Kaye. Hello to you. I hope you’re having a great week.
I’m super excited to be bringing you yet another wonderful artist in conversation today. My guest is best known as the guitarist and chief songwriter in British new romantic outfit, Spandau Ballet. And I think you’re going to really enjoy meeting him.
He’s the multi-talented Gary Kemp, whose career has ranged from playing sold out shows right across the globe to treading the boards of London’s West End, as well as acting in Hollywood blockbusters. In today’s show, Gary tells us all about his musical life, including how Spandau Ballet came to be, what it was like to be part of one of the most successful British bands of the 80s, and why massive hits like this one have managed to stand the test of time. Welcome to a breath of fresh air.
Fabulous to have you company. What I know about you is that you grew up in Islington in London, and you actually started playing guitar and writing songs at the age of 11. Did your parents condone all the music? Let me just explain a little bit of how we were.
It’s a pretty poor working class background in that, you know, we lived in a rented accommodation, took up a floor of a house in London, North London, and we had no bathroom. The house also had two other families in it. And we all shared one outside lavatory in a yard.
And I lived like that till I was 15 with my brother, who’s two years younger than me, Martin. But it was a house of love, most certainly. And my dad was a printer in a factory, and he did everything he could to put bread on the table.
My mom was a dinner lady in a local school. And when I was 11, for Christmas, I was given a guitar. And my dad had seen it in the in the window of a local electrical shop for five pounds, which was a lot of money.
And I was, yeah, I woke up to this guitar one morning and a book by Burt Weedon, which is a bit of a classic called Playing a Day. You know, I, I talked to a lot of other musicians who, who also grew up on that book as well, and learnt their first few chords. I was a bit disappointed at first, because I actually probably wanted a toy.
But the days were over now. And I sort of went off into my bedroom over the next few weeks and taught myself these chords. There were songs in this book, and I think one of them was something like If I Had a Hammer, which was four classic chords.
But I really liked those chords. But I really don’t like this tune. And I don’t like these words.
So I wrote my own tune and my own words over the top and showed them to a teacher at school. I then wrote another song called Alone, which my mum said you can’t play that to anyone because they’ll think you’re depressed. But I ended up playing those two songs at my school prize giving at the end of that year.
And at present handing out the prizes was this amazing man called Trevor Huddleston, who was the Bishop of Stepney. He was also the head of the anti-apartheid movement in the UK. And he ended up coming to our house.
He just arrived at the house a few days later. And it was a Thursday night because Top of the Pops was on. Maggie May was being sung by Rod Stewart.
He’d come round to give me a Philips cassette recorder, which were kind of brand new science. And he said, every time you write a song, I want you to record it and send it to me. And I did that for a while.
I didn’t meet him again until 1985. When I met him, when he was giving me this cassette recorder, and I remember it quite clearly, he said, I gave a trumpet to a jazz trumpet player in Africa. So I like to do these sort of things.
He also said that he’d just organized one of the first charity concerts with The Who. So when I re-met him in 85, he actually got in touch with me and asked me to play at an anti-apartheid concert in Clapham Common. And I’d just written through the barricades.
So I was going to perform that on my own. And when I got there, he said, this is amazing day for me, he said, because I gave a trumpet to an African trumpet player many years ago. And he’s here too.
And it was Hugh Masekela. What a great story. So, I mean, you were right into it from such a tender age.
When did you actually decide that you wanted to form a band? I think that was the kind of thing that was just apparent to me straight away, pretty much. I fell in love with glam rock and Mark Bolan, T-Rex, and Electric Warrior was my first album that was given to me for the following Christmas, I think. And then David Bowie, of course.
I was into all kinds of music. I was listening to everything. And I remember actually distinctly miming to Stay With Me by The Faces when I was 11 with a bunch of my mates, all pretending to be The Faces and Rod Stewart.
So I remember that being such a buzz. I’m thinking this would be a great thing to do for a living. There was a guy at my school who was older than me, a couple years older than me.
We started making music together. And he was quite into bands like Steely Dan and a lot of the Americana that was floating around at that time. Little Feet and people like that.
I then joined a band of guys much older than me. They were late 20s. And I was 14.
And they started to sing my songs that I was writing. And we were doing some covers as well. Like, as I mentioned, Steely Dan and people like that.
I was doing pub gigs then when I was 14, 15 around town. And it was quite good because I was too young to roadie really because I had to be home really quick. So I left the gear to them at the end.
You got the best of it. But that was really it. And then punk came along, of course.
And that made me then I had to leave that band and form a different one. So people like the Sex Pistols influenced you too? Well, I saw the Sex Pistols play when I was 16. And they had their following at the front called the Bromley Contingent, which included Billy Idol and Suzie Sue and none of whom were musicians at that point.
And I thought this was mind blowing stuff. And I absolutely loved it. It was so exciting and full of great energy and aggression and sort of two fingers up to the establishment of music.
And I had a rehearsal with my band the next day. And I went in, I said, I’m leaving. I’m just seeing the Sex Pistols.
And I don’t want to be in this band anymore. I take the queen. She ain’t no human being.
There’s no future in England. It’s always the one you want and it’s always the one you need. There’s no future, no future, no future for you.
Steve Norman, who was also at the gig, and I went back to school in September after the summer holidays. And we started putting together what became Spandau Ballet. So you were never really the shy and retiring type, huh? I don’t know about that.
You know, I was a child actor as well. So I was used to doing stuff like that. If you met me at a party when I was a kid, I wouldn’t be the life and soul I was.
I wasn’t sitting there playing guitar to everyone. And I think I found, you know, some relationships, especially with girls, say impossible for a long time. So I think there’s that thing about people who are musicians.
Quite often, you know, they’re great on stage or in front of the camera, but maybe they’re not so forthcoming in real life. You said that you formed Spandau Ballet. Of course, Spandau Ballet weren’t known as Spandau Ballet initially gone through a couple of iterations in names.
I think you were the cut first. And then, you know, we were playing we were playing punk, you know, and we were playing power pop without my brother. Actually, it was with a different bass player at that time.
My brother was he was 14. And then it wasn’t until a couple of years later, a few years later, 78, when we first started, we were kind of almost giving up really with the band. It wasn’t, we were sort of too young in many ways.
And then along came this amazing place to go, which was the Blitz Club on a Tuesday night. It was a wine bar in town that was, you know, taken over by two young kids. And it was a Bowie night.
So it was all the kids who would love Bowie and really into him and what he achieved in his glam rock era and his Berlin era. And we went I to the first club actually was called Billy’s. It was in Soho.
And it was a Tuesday night Bowie night. And I went there with Steve Norman and a couple of other friends. And it was the most incredible experience I’d ever had.
You know, I walked down into this dark club and the music was Kraftwerk or some other electronic German music. And there were these kids all dressed in the most weirdest way I’ve ever seen. They were kids who had grown up in who were going to the local fashion school, St. Martin’s, or they were making their own clothes or finding stuff they could they could dress up in and wear makeup and doing this kind of slow jive to this pulsating music.
We started hanging out with those guys. And then the club moved to a place called the Blitz. It was still only a Tuesday night because that was the worst night of the week.
So they were allowed to take it. And we started creating quite a lot of attention in the media. And, and you know, there were a lot of really interesting kids in there who wanted to shape the next decade, you know, who wanted to be the writers who wanted to be the choreographers, the filmmakers, the graphic designers, and of course, us as the house band.
And that’s when you changed your name to Spandau Ballet? Yeah, that’s when we became Spandau Ballet. Where did the name come from? A friend of ours called Robert Elms suggested it. We thought it sounded cool.
You know, Germany was definitely the hit place. You know, Cabaret was the biggest film. But Berlin was where Bowie had done three albums.
You know, it sort of sounded post-punk. And he came up with it. It was an amazing time to grow up, wasn’t it? There was so much going on.
And you were really in the right place at the right time for all this creativity. We had to make that place, right. So we were part of the guys who were making that place happen.
We were vocal about it. We knew how to create a philosophy around it, a manifesto. What we didn’t realize is there was a similar thing happening in Sheffield with the Human League and NABC, and then down in Birmingham, a similar thing happening, the Rum Runner with Duran Duran.
So there was something in the air. But of course, we were from London, we were the London ones. So we were going to get more attention.
And a woman here called Janet Street Porter made a documentary. It was about us and about our following. And it was put out in black and white, which added to the mystique.
We were playing gigs. We wouldn’t play anywhere that any other band played. We played places that we chose to play that our crowd could turn up at that was kind of exclusive and different.
So we played a battleship on the Thames. We played warehouses. We played cinemas.
We didn’t play where anyone else played and created events. And there was a big buzz about this. And then when the film came out, the documentary in 1980, the record companies saw it and were all over it.
We were then ready to be signed up and to put this down on record. Soon as I knew you came, I’ll pack my bag one more time. I’ve had so much to do and to say.
Destiny will give me a day, watching the stars in the sky. Journeys to Glory was Spandau Ballet’s debut studio album in 1981. Gary Kemp wrote all the songs on it to appeal to the patrons of that weekly Tuesday night Blitz Club.
And then the band started to gain recognition for that incredible new white funk sound.
This is a breath of fresh air with Sandy Kaye. It’s a beautiful day. So you talk about our crowd, I’d imagine that must have been swelling very quickly everywhere that you did.
Not really. No, no, no, because we weren’t out there trying to find an audience. It was just the kids from that club, the Blitz, and it was them.
And that could only expand as much as Steve Strange allowed it to or as much as that building allowed it to. So when we went out, we just played to those guys. There was a new romantic kind of look, which is what it’s called now, but it was literally just like a hundred people.
So how do you start to get more traction? Well, we get it by getting these documentaries on, by the fact that the press will want to know about us. This is limited access. This is the era of the mystique, when you could keep the mystique up.
It’s the same thing that happened Pink Floyd before us, you know, in 1967, they were the house band of the UFO Club. Same thing happened with them. A few years after that, you’ve got Middle Earth Club, and that’s Bowie and T-Rex.
You go all the way back to the Rolling Stones, 1963, at the Railway Tavern. You go back before then, you’ve got the Two Eyes Club in Soho with Shadows. You know, it’s always been about a place and a scene that is set around a place.
And then the buzz begins. And the buzz started, and of course, we weren’t a band that was going out trying to build bigger following and playing the marquee. That wasn’t us, you know.
This was done from the press. So the press wanted to write about us, the music press wanted to know about us. You know, it was the beginning of a different time.
The old black and white press was fading, and things like the face and colour press was coming, and video was coming, and we could promote ourselves in different ways. Did you realise that it was the start of a different era then? Or only in hindsight? Of course. You did? No, no, no.
I remember standing in that bar and saying, you know, we are the 80s. You know, this is all of us here. You know, we’re determining, you’re going to be editing magazines, you’re going to be doing the graphics for magazines or record sleeves.
You know, there were kids, very ambitious arty kids. We knew that we were definitely the fuel for the next decade. What an amazing realisation.
Well, someone had to do it. There was a history behind us of 20 years of people doing the same thing, and representing their generation in youth culture and pop culture. And it was always about that change, you know, whether it was coming out of glam rock, going into punk, and now it was someone else’s turn.
Well, it was going to be the scene that we were involved in. Gary, on whose music did you base yourself? Did the five of you sit down and go, oh, we’re going to head in this direction, and this is what we’re going to sound like musically? That was because Rusty Egan, the DJ at The Blitz and The Billies, was playing all these things that were blessed by Bowie, really, but most of all German music. So it was Kraftwerk, Ludwig Dusseldorf, Neue.
Then there was Iggy Pop, and there was Bowie, but Bowie’s kind of Berlin period. And there were some other music that was happening. You know, Being Boiled was a record that had already been produced by these young guys called The Human League.
This was before they got the girls and became commercialised. So it was like, we need to go and buy a synthesiser. We need to change.
John’s going to play just dance rhythm, four on the floor, on his drums. And I went and wrote a whole different set of songs that were based on the kind of music that we were hearing in that club. And Martin had already joined you then? Yeah, Martin was in the band.
How did he come to become part of it? They reached the stage in the band about 1977 when Steve Dagger, who was managing us, who was just a friend a few years older than us, who was part of the whole scene, he said, we’ve got to get your brother in the band. And I said, why? He doesn’t play anything. He said, but he’s the best looking bloke we know.
So I taught him the bass. And we all know how that worked out. How would you describe what you were feeling in those times? I mean, you must have been so full of confidence, or at least massive bravado, at the helm of something new.
It must have been incredibly exciting. I don’t know. You’re just always… It’s exciting, but nothing’s a guarantee.
So you’re just always trying to push and trying to get… So we get a record label and we make our first album and then all you’re worried about is, can we get on top of the Pops, which was the big TV show here for music? Can we get in the charts? Is anyone interested? But what I loved is all the design that went with it. We had this great guy called Graham Smith who came out of the club scene as well. We said, right, you’re doing the record sleeve.
We had another guy from the club and we said, you’re doing the lights. And so we were interested in the label, right down to saying we wanted our own label, which we called Reformation. And it was a sort of 360 thing, really, where all of our friends were the only ones who could take pictures.
We used that pool from that club of young people who could design our clothes and make our look and everything. So that was really exciting. I remember that being very exciting.
Yeah, of course. You know, previous to that, my parents were kind of involved as well because my mum was a seamstress. And so I’d say, right, mum, look, if I draw this on a piece of paper, can you make that pair of trousers for me? Can you make that jacket for me? So she was helping to create our clothes out of our designs.
What an incredibly collaborative effort from everybody. And perhaps that was what was primarily responsible for the initial success. I mean, of course, the music was revolutionary and mainstream caught on very quickly, didn’t it? You know, going on Top of the Pops and looking the way we looked, you know, it was always going to be, to cut a long story short, it was always going to create attention.
It pissed some people off and made other kids really excited. But, you know, I wanted that first Top of the Pops to be like when Bowie did Starman. And I saw Bowie doing Starman on Top of the Pops and it changed my life at that point.
And I thought, well, when we go on TV, we want this to change other kids’ lives, you know, like Bowie did for me. So what had you designed for yourself for that appearance? Oh, I can’t remember. You know, I think there was this kind of tartan was happening.
And so Steve Norman’s wearing a kilt. I’m wearing some military jacket that I’d found in an old army and navy store with jodhpurs and little kind of slippers as well. I mean, you know, it was like and my brother’s wearing all these tartan sash, big tartan kind of looked like he’d just walked off of some 17th century battle.
But you know, it was all made by friends of ours. How did it change your world after that appearance? It didn’t really, you know, because I’m still living at home. I’m living at home until I’m 22, 23.
I live at home for the next two albums, three albums. I’m still living in a council house. My mom, you know, the money’s just getting, isn’t really flowing in and it’s getting ploughed into whatever we’re doing, you know, whether it’s touring or running and finding an office to run.
And so none of us were putting money really in our pockets. It was going to change our lives. By the time the second album came, we had a tiny little slump where I think the third single off the album didn’t get into the top 40.
And it was really like, is this it? And of course I’m writing the song, so I’m feeling guilty. But I was going in different directions at that point. We’d sort of gone out of the electronica, we’d done a funk track, Chant No.
1, I don’t need this pressure on. I was interested in going in a different direction. In fact, the second side of our second album was more like Pink Floyd, funnily enough.
And I started, I became friends with Claire Grogan and these guys from Altered Images and I spent a lot of time up in Glasgow hanging out with them and they were listening to a lot of soul music, which I kind of really enjoyed a lot in the 70s as well. I was a sort of soul boy for a period and especially Marvin Gaye and Al Green. And I knew that I had to write a third album, but I was really inspired by that kind of music.
And so there I am sitting at home in my council house, in my bedroom, my mum and dad in the living room, and I’m sitting in the room trying to write songs. And I wrote, that’s when I wrote Gold and I wrote True and all the songs on the True album. Thank you for coming home, sorry that the trees are all worn.
And with them here I could pass on. These are my salad days, maybe I’ll turn away. Just another play for today.
Oh but I’m proud of you, but I’m proud of you. Nothing left to make me feel small. Love just left me standing so tall.
Gold heart. Always believe in your soul. You’ve got the power to know you’re indestructible.
Always believe in you are gold heart. So much has gone, I hope it’s only two years ago. The man with the sentimental face he knew that he was there on the case.
Now he’s in love with you, he’s in love with you. Lots of girls parked outside your house waiting to catch a glimpse of you. Not at that point, no.
I don’t think we’d broken into that mass market until True really. You know, before then, yeah, we were successful, but it was a different kind of audience. And I think that that was about to happen.
What were you writing about Gary? Talk about that third album and your favourite songs on that. Where were you drawing inspiration? Well, as I say, Marvin Gaye. If we look at True, what was that about? That was about a guy trying to write, that was about me trying to write a song about someone that they were drawn to, attracted to, but not having the nerve to actually say who it was.
So why do I find it hard to write the next line when I want the truth to be said? You know, that was me talking to myself. It mentions Marvin Gaye. There’s some lines from Lolita that I adapted, you know, the book by Nabokov.
Seaside Arms comes from that book and With a Thrill in My Head and a Pill on My Tongue comes from that book. And that was a book that I was given by someone who I was, you know, having this kind of platonic relationship with, if you like. So that was an inspiration.
There were other places, you know, I’m gold, I’m trying to write a James Bond movie theme, I think, you know. But it was definitely more sort of melody first, songs first. That’s really what the change was, where before I was writing for the clubs and writing stuff that was more rhythmic and riff first.
Now these wanted to be songs that you could play on acoustic guitar and sing to someone without any other arrangements. And were you mindful at that point about wanting radio play too? I don’t think I ever wrote cynically, ever. Of course I wanted to keep the band going.
Of course I wanted it to be successful. You can either do these things or you can’t. And when you’re 23, you know, I’m not a businessman.
I’m writing what’s coming from my heart and what I’m enjoying to write. Oh my God, if we could decide what was successful or not as a songwriter, you know, we’d all be hugely successful, but it’s not like that. And you can’t trust that one.
People can smell cynicism. Dreams always in time But never in line for dreams Head over heels when toe to toe This is the sound of my soul This is the sound I wanna take you to the world But now I’ve come back I can’t forget Hard to write the next line Oh, I want the truth to say Hey, hey, hey, hey Much is true Hey, hey, hey, hey I know this Much is true But after that album, though, you did start getting lots of radio play and you did start getting lots of mainstream. Well, I think what happened is we were successful in the UK, but that album made us successful in America.
Everywhere. Europe, Australia. Definitely changed everything for us, especially that song, you know, because that song, you know, went to number one in so many countries and still to this day, True is, like, used.
I mean, True and Gold are the two biggest songs from that album. So True gets used in American movies and commercials so much and television. It’s been on The Simpsons four times in different episodes.
Do you still pinch yourself? Yeah, I appreciate how good that song’s been to me. It certainly has been. In 1983, as the title track and third single from their third studio album, Gary had written it to express his feelings for Altered Images lead singer Claire Grogan.
It reached number one on the UK singles charts and made the top ten in several other countries, including the US, where it became the band’s first song to make the grade.
This is a breath of fresh air with Sandy Kaye. It’s a beautiful day. Gary Kemp and Spandau Ballet kept going as international pop stars for 11 years, earning critical acclaim for all of their albums.
By 1990, though, the group had split and Gary, with his brother Martin, decided to return to their acting roots. I didn’t want to do the band after that for quite a while. I’d lost interest in doing it.
Through the Barricades, I think, was our kind of peak, is for me. I mean, that tour was amazing. It did really well across Europe.
And, you know, I still think that’s the best Spandau song, Through the Barricades, and lyrically and musically, I think it’s the most complete song that I ever wrote for the band. It’s a song that was inspired by a trip to Belfast that I made when I was playing and taken to a friend’s grave who had been shot in the Troubles. And I wrote this song about the… a sort of Romeo and Juliet song about a boy and a girl who were obviously on opposing sides in Northern Ireland.
You know, we played it there, which was amazing, the reaction we got. And then a few years later, we’re in Berlin, and the wall’s coming down. And then we play it that night.
It had just the same resonance there. It’s a song that I’m hugely proud of. My mother doesn’t know where love has gone She says it must be youth that keeps us feeling strong I see her in a face that’s turned to ice And when she smiles she shows the lines of sacrifice And now I know what they’re saying As our sun begins to fade And we made our love on wasteland Into the barricades Then we did another album after that, and I just think it was… It felt like I was just getting frustrated by being the only songwriter in the group.
And just we weren’t getting on as well, and things were changing. The rave culture was happening. It was 1990, and I’d been offered a movie.
So it was the turn of the decade again. It was time for change again. I think it felt like that.
But also, my brother and I had just done a big film here called The Krays, which was about the Kray twins. True story about two gangsters in London in the 60s. And I just think it was a good time for me to just drop out for a bit.
And I went to live in Hollywood, and I pretty soon after that got The Bodyguard, you know, with Whitney Houston and Kenan Costner. Amazing. And then I did a film for Quentin Tarantino and some TV stuff in America.
You know, I saw myself getting back into acting, and I put my guitar away. I was a bit cynical. And then in 93, 94, my marriage broke down.
And the first thing I reached for was my guitar. And I ended up recording my first solo album, Little Bruises. The colors of life Seep out of your day The truth that we’re standing The question is why Does it spread like disease When your rivers run dry Just soak to your knees The sun breaks the priest And you’re sick to your soul The lies and the deals Of a town in its late And there’s no room for dreaming A shelter of pain The craze happened, and that was right in 1989, 1990, when Spandau was still about to go on tour.
And there was a lot of friction, I think, within the band because we’d done this movie, and it wasn’t a popular thing amongst the rest of the group for us to do that, because I think it held up the tour that was about to happen, and there was a conflict. And I think that was the other reason. And then my wife was also an actress, and she’d just got a part in Francis Ford Coppola’s Dracula.
And so we headed off to Hollywood. And while I was there with her filming, I did an audition for Kevin and got the bodyguard. What was that like for you? It was cool.
I mean, it was great. It was great to get to know Whitney. It took four months of shooting, and she was absolutely wonderful.
And I loved hanging out with her. She was clean at that time. She hadn’t met Bobby Brown, and she would hang out with the crew and chat and sing in the makeup trailer gospel.
It was a great privilege. Yeah, it was a good part of my life, a great memory. And what were the other guys doing while you were doing that, just kind of waiting for you to come home? I don’t know what they were doing then.
You’d had a bit of a fallout. I wanted to ask you, though, you said that you’d been the only songwriter for Spandau Ballet. Was that because you wanted to be the only songwriter or nobody else really had the aptitude? Well, no one was coming in with songs.
It was left to you. And I was never the person to want to write with other people. I’m not good at writing with other people.
I’ve tried it, and it doesn’t suit me at all. And I just think, for me, a song is the music and the lyrics are entwined. They’re one and the same thing.
And for me, writing songs is about solving problems now. I think it changed when I wrote Little Bruises and I wrote an album that was, I suppose in many ways, inspired quite a lot by my breakup of my marriage. And those songs were therapeutic for me in answering questions about my life and where I was and who I was.
And I think that was a wake-up call because I suppose it started through the barricades, but the idea of writing songs that were more meaningful lyrically was not what I was doing when I was in Spandau Ballet. And I think it was because I was writing for someone else to sing. But now, as a solo artist, the three albums that I’ve made have all been there, you know, because I needed to write them.
And I couldn’t imagine someone else being in that room writing with me and coming up with ideas when they don’t understand why I’m writing it. So they’ve always been very personal. Certainly since Spandau Ballet, yeah.
About me, you know, very much about me, but in a universal way. It would be dumb for any writer to write a song that was so specifically about them that no-one else could relate to it. But so I think all these, whatever crisis we all go through as humans who want to write, these are universal problems.
I love you with such energy You know I love you always first to the draw As fast as you is something I’ll never be You make me feel like I’ve beaten that road I’m so sorry not the best of myself Still trying to make some sense of the day You’re always reaching for what’s new on the shelf You’re always walking like you weren’t a step away Baby it’s you You’re always up in front and ahead of the game Well you’re riding on the power of innocence You’re just riding on the power of innocence You’re luckier than most where you’ve got the ability to write it and get stuff down onto paper. It must be a very cathartic sort of process. And I think this album.
This is your third album. Yeah, it’s called This Destination. I think probably about two or so years ago I’d been on the road a lot with Nick Mason because I play with Nick Mason from Pink Floyd.
I’ve been doing that for six years before the pandemic and after. And since I’m still playing. I’ve been away a lot.
The most I’d ever toured. I mean, I’ve done 32 countries with Nick touring and spending quite a few months away. I think that makes me feel a bit vulnerable.
I think there’s a certain thing about being of a certain age that makes you aware of your mortality. I lost my parents 16 years ago within four days of each other. And I don’t think I fully grieve that.
I was a couple of years ago feeling hugely anxious. And I don’t know where that was coming from. First time in my life.
And it was kind of expressing itself physically. And I did some therapy, which was helpful. But what was really helpful was writing an album about those crises.
You know, we all sit and doom scroll. We’ve all got the global problems of the world all on our doorstep, in our face, in our bedroom, in our bed when we’re lying there on our phones. And that’s hugely affecting.
And I don’t know. So I approach, you know, when I go in and write, it’s often to try and make myself feel better or to put it in perspective or to find metaphors that suit the emotions that I’m feeling. Some of the album came out of that sort of crisis, if you like, and which I think many of us feel.
And then it turned into an incredibly positive experience for me. The last song I wrote was called This Destination, which is about me. It’s a kind of love song, but it’s saying, you know, I’m always here for you if you’re away.
But I’m really, for me, that’s music. You know, that’s what’s there for me. You know, that’s the place I have to go to to get back to, to be healed every time.
You are always on the run Moving from place to place But I’d rather you face to face Where everything’s alright Where everything’s alright This destination’s here for you This destination’s here for you I make you a place to stay I keep it out all day This destination’s here This destination’s here This album is 11 tracks all up. You describe it as being the most personal and the most beloved of anything that you’ve written in your career. Yeah, there’s songs on everything I’ve done that I like.
But, you know, a lot of these songs are about my past as well, about, there’s one that I’m very close to called Work, which was about the commitment that my father gave to working in a factory when I was a kid. And my mum, who worked really hard, she worked with disabled children and watched sheep to put food on the table. And my dad suffered a nervous breakdown because he didn’t feel like he was bringing home enough money for the family and he was stifled in this job he was in.
And that kind of comes into the song and then it’s really about me saying, what kind of worth have I got? How can I live up to them, to what they’ve shown me? Am I good enough? Am I a man? Am I good enough for my family? I think we can all feel that. Are we decent people? And it’s about working it out, trying to make it work. I actually had a really fun experience because I was trying to write a song and I’d reached a little bit of an on-pass and a very successful artist here called Richard Hawley rang me out of the blue and he said, what are you doing, man? I said, I’m just in my room trying to write a song.
He goes, how are you getting on? I said, I’m not. He goes, what are you writing on, piano or guitar? I said, I’m piano. He goes, go to your piano.
And he said, close your eyes, put your hands out above the piano. I said, okay, I’m going to go now and you’re going to write a brilliant song. He inspired me, kicked me up the arse.
We all need that sometimes, don’t we? Gary, all these questions that you ask yourself on this album, have you found all the answers to them? Yeah, I think you do in a way. You know, you find solace. It’s a bit like going to see the therapist.
You know, they’re not going to talk much. You’re going to talk, right? So, and you feel better by putting a finger on it. I don’t want it to sound depressing because it certainly isn’t.
What I can’t do is go in to write a song and think, right, I’ve got to write a love song. You know, of course I’m in love with my wife. We’ve been together 24 years, but there’s only so many love songs one can write before they’re meaningless.
So it’s harder to know what to write about. Some of them are story songs, you know, some of them about my youth, some of them about other people. The I word has to be meaningful.
It can’t be made up. So if it’s not about me, it tends to be third person. I think my favourite song on the album is the final track, I Know Where I’m Going.
I Know Where I’m Going is an interesting song because I still really don’t know fully what it’s about, but I can see the setting. It’s a kind of mystical song, and I suppose it’s about mortality. It’s about spiritual peace.
And that song popped out all in one. It wasn’t lyrics first. It wasn’t music first.
It all came out all in one. I remember writing it one afternoon. My wife came back, and I played it to her, and I could see she was moved by it, and I was moved by it, and it could only go last on the album.
There’s a fire that’s still becoming, still growing. I hope you’ve enjoyed hearing Gary Kemp’s story. To learn more about him, grab a copy of his autobiography.
It’s called I Know This Much, From Soho to Spandau. You should also make it a point to tune in to the podcast that he and Guy Pratt do together. It’s called Rock on Tours.
I love doing that. Guy’s great. You know, Guy played with Pink Floyd.
He played with David Gilmour, and he plays with Sourceful of Secrets with me. I mean, I think it’s really brought me a different audience. I’m someone now who’s seen as a guitar player and a front man and singer and all those things that maybe I wasn’t seen at in the Spandau Ballet setup.
Gary Kemp, thank you so much for your time. What a pleasure. Who knew you were such an amazing all-rounder? Nice to talk to you.
We can’t wait to see what you do next. Whatever you turn your attention to just turns gold. Thank you.
All the best. And thank you for joining me today, too. Hope to see you back here same time next week, okay? Bye now.
It’s a beautiful day You’ve been listening to A Breath of Fresh Air with Sandy Kay. Beautiful day Oh, baby, any day that you’re gone away It’s a beautiful day