The One You Feed - Justin Sullivan (New Model Army)

Episode Date: July 21, 2015

[powerpress] This week we talk to Justin Sullivan from New Model ArmyJustin Sullivan is an English singer and songwriter. He is the frontman and lyricist of the British rock band New Model Army, which he formed in 1980 together with drummer Robert Heaton and bassist Stuart Morrow in their hometown of Bradford, Yorkshire. In the early 1980s he performed under the stage name of "Slade the Leveller". Their latest record is called Between Dog and Wold released in 2013.The New Model Army record, Thunder and Consolation, is one of our favorite records ever. Eric says it is in his top 5 of all time.In This Interview Justin and I Discuss...The One You Feed parable.Whether we really live by our values.How money doesn't make us happy but we still chase itThat human systems mimic nature.New Model Army songs about the weather.Nature vs. NurtureHow much people can actually change.How education helps make the world more interesting and enjoyable.The inevitability of change.How it's always the ones that want to be saved that do all of the saving.Additional show notes on our websiteSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

I always felt terribly sorry for pop bands, or like comedians, you know, people that have to go on stage and be happy, and they're paid to be happy. That must be hell on earth. Welcome to The One You Feed. Throughout time, great thinkers have recognized the importance of the thoughts we have. Quotes like, garbage in, garbage out, or you are what you think ring true. And yet for many of us, our thoughts don't strengthen or empower us. We tend toward negativity, self-pity, jealousy, or fear. We see what we don't have instead of what we do. We think things that hold us back and dampen our spirit. But it's not just about thinking. Our actions matter. It takes conscious, consistent, and creative effort to make a life worth living. This podcast is about

how other people keep themselves moving in the right direction, how they feed their good wolf. I'm Jason Alexander. And I'm Peter Tilden. And together, our mission on the Really Know Really podcast is to get the true answers to life's baffling questions like... Why the bathroom door doesn't go all the way to the floor? What's in the museum of failure? And does your dog truly love you? We have the answer. Go to reallynoreally.com

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Our guest this week is Justin Edward Sullivan, English singer and songwriter. He's the frontman and lyricist of the British rock band New Model Army, which he formed in 1980, together with drummer Robert Heaton and bassist Stuart Morrow in their hometown of Bradford, Yorkshire. In the early 80s, he performed under the stage name Slade the Leveler. Their latest record is called Between Dog and Wolf and was released in 2013. The new Model Army record, Thunder and Consolation, is one of Eric and I's favorite records ever. Here's the interview. Hi, Justin. Welcome to the show. Hi. I am extremely excited to get you on.

Every once in a while, we are able to get a guest who has meant a lot to me over the years. Your music, I mean, since I was 15, has been some of my favorite. And I think Thunder and Consolation is probably in my top five records of all time. So I'm really excited to talk with you. Lovely. Good. So our podcast is called The One You Feed, and it's based on the parable of two wolves where there's a grandfather who's talking with his grandson. He says, in life, there's two wolves inside of us that are always at battle. One's a good wolf, which represents things like kindness and bravery and love. And the other is a bad wolf, which represents things like greed and hatred and fear.

And the grandson stops and thinks about it. He says, well, grandfather, which one wins? And the grandfather says, the one you feed. So I'd like to start off by asking you what that parable means to you in your life and in the work that you feed. So I'd like to start off by asking you what that parable means to you in your life and in the work that you do. Quite a lot, actually. I came across this parable a bit ago from you and somebody else simultaneously. And I like it. It's a good parable. Do I live by it? Well, do any of us live by the parables that we know are wise and good? Sometimes. It's like every poet, religious leader, wise man, singer, every wise person who's ever lived in the world has always told people that money doesn't make you happy.

It doesn't stop everyone chasing it. Yep. What does this mean to me it makes good sense but i do actually think there's something interesting about people which is that people you know being part of nature and being a microcosm of all the forces of nature in the world act collectively rather like nature acts in the sense that uh life on earth you know this is a basic chaos theory i guess the life on earth exists because of the sort of constant movement within parameters so wherever you go in the world whatever political system whatever religion whatever um standard of living in a poverty or wealth or whatever you seem to end up with the

same balance of characters you get people that are basically happy by nature you get people that are basically miserable by nature you get people that are lucky people are unlucky you get people that like complaining about everything. You get people, you know what I mean? There always seems to be the same balance of all these different forces going on in groups of people, just like there are all these same balances within nature,

like the weather really, you know? And, uh, if anything, ever true of new model army songs is they've all got the weather in them. Yeah. The songs all do have the weather in them yeah the songs

all do have the weather someone did someone did tell me your songs are like a bloody weather forecast well it's such a good way to set the stage i think it's because when i it's because i think so yeah i think that every i hate lyrics which abstract lyrics about the inside of the writer's head they just don't interest me they don't draw you in i like stories and to tell a story i always think you need time of day and place and weather and then you're kind of halfway there and then you tell the story maybe maybe maybe it's just a british obsession with the weather you know yes one time we one time we were working with nika bolas you know when we did the love of hopes courses he's a's a wonderful guy. He did a lot of the Neil Young stuff. And he was producing an album.

We were doing it in Liverpool. And he's a Greek-American and spent a lot of his life in Los Angeles. And one day we were walking through Liverpool and it was cold and wet and I was complaining about it. And he goes, you British are so lucky.

You got weather. Give him about six months there you might think you might think differently i think he's moved back to chicago now actually yeah i was in california for a while and i i did miss the change in the seasons but now that i'm back in uh back in a colder climate i sometimes wonder if i uh if i misjudged how much I missed the seasons. I remember years and years ago, I was thinking, I've never terribly liked Southern California, or something about it. I'm not sure. And one time we were doing a rather grim tour in the Northeastern United States, and it was cold and wet. And we played a particularly grim club

somewhere in the Northeast. uh on a freezing cold night in a really really horrible rundown punk club and um and it was you know it was a rock bottom really and the next day we flew to los angeles and we ended up on someone's balcony up in the hollywood hills looking in the sunshine and corgan villia on the veranda and stuff and thinking, hmm, this is pretty good. Yeah, exactly. So I'll come completely off your point. We were talking about a parable. Yeah. So the parable, you were talking about how all things in nature seem to have sort of a balance. It seems to balance itself out. And I'm always curious about the ability of humans to change who they are. What's our ability to improve, to become different people?

In your song Inheritance, right, you're really getting right at that thing. How much of this is our parents versus how much of it is ours? So that's sort of the genetic piece. The genetic piece. Mother, father, all those battles that have been. The long, long silences that lay in between. Please don't try to tell me that all those were in vain. Sometimes these things are hard

we line up at the wedding in rows of deep set eyes in our finest formal dresses yeah

and our proper suits and ties like a family of monsters in a really bad disguise mostly love do I thank you?

Or do I curse you? These tracks stretch out before me The ones you left behind The way I feel And what I want And what I feel It's yours Not mine What do you think about people's ability to make change in their own life?

Nature versus nurture. Yeah, it's a question. It's like chicken and egg, isn't it? But change in your own life? I think that people's nature stays essentially the same how early it forms is very difficult to say you know whether whether your nature is already formed when you're in the womb or there's that old jesuit saying is now give me a child till six and he's he's mine for life i think that i think that people's nature in their very very early

life doesn't essentially change but what you do with that nature obviously yes you can change you can learn um and that doesn't it does depend on you know a lot on your environment whether you're lucky enough to have education i think education is a wonderful thing and it's terrible how little valued it is in certain parts of the western society you know where we fought for everybody to have good schooling and then and then it's not valued which is a disaster i think um and i was lucky enough to have education and i sort of appreciate it i think the thing about education is that the more you know, the more interesting the world is, because you start to see connections between everything,

and just life becomes so much richer. As you get older, you get a bit wiser, and you get a bit harder, and I think that's inevitable. I think that change is inevitable, and trying to hold it back is pointless. So as you feel yourself change, you've got to go with it. I'm Jason Alexander. And I'm Peter Tilden.

And together on the Really No Really podcast, our mission is to get the true answers to life's baffling questions like why they refuse to make the bathroom door go all the way to the floor. We got the answer. Will space junk block your cell signal? The astronaut who almost drowned during a spacewalk gives us the answer. We talk with the scientist who figured out if your dog truly loves you and the one bringing back the woolly mammoth.

Plus, does Tom Cruise really do his own stunts? His stuntman reveals the answer. And you never know who's going to drop by. Mr. Brian Cranston is with us today. How are you, too? Hello, my friend. Wayne Knight about Jurassic Park. Wayne Knight, welcome to Really No Really, sir. Bless you all. Hello, Newman. And you never know when Howie Mandel might just stop by to talk about judging. Really? That's the opening? Really No Really. Yeah, Really No Really. Go to

reallynoreally.com and register to win $500 a guest spot on our podcast or a limited edition sign Jason bobblehead. It's called really know really and you can find it on the I heart radio app on Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Excellent. So off of your most recent record, you've got a song called March in September, which I really love a couple of the lines in it. You can count up everything that you have. It never stops the craving. And ain't it always the ones that want to be saved and do all the saving. Yeah, that's very true.

You took the water from the wishing well. You never saw that you shouldn't. You tried to break all the body in the world You never saw that you couldn't You can count up everything that you have It never stops the craving Ain't it always the ones that wanna to be saved that do all the saving, just seems an observation about everybody I know who works in caring jobs

and goes around being caring and being loving and helping people. And often these are the people that really, really want to be helped. And actually the people that are not bothered whether they help or not don't tend to help other people. Which camp do you fall in? I've got a foot in both, actually. Over the years, there's been a kind of dynamic in my writing between myself and and a long time associate jules denby where she comes from i come from a sort of

a liberal background and she comes from an army background and all her instincts are kind of tribal and all my instincts are liberal and individualistic. And the play between those two value systems is run through a lot of what New Model Army has done, I think. That we understand that whole thing of tribalism. You know, my people right or wrong. We don't necessarily adhere to it. We don't necessarily think it's right but we definitely understand it but at the same time there's a lot of kind of liberal you know

follow your own star um you know that quake i was born in a quaker family so that individual um follow your own conscience or listen to your own conscience as opposed to a kind of tribal loyalty system i was born into and they are two different systems and neither is absolutely right or absolutely wrong in most parts of the world people adhere mostly to the tribal one because they have to because you know family is the only family or tribe is the only protection you have in what is a difficult and hostile world. And so most poor people especially adhere to that one. And then it's the luckier or often richer people that can afford to go more the individualistic.

You know, I follow my own conscience um i don't have absolute loyalty to any tribe or family um i must follow my own star you know that's very enshrined in america because that's how america is born in the sense of all the people coming from europe and everywhere else in the world following their own star going to make a better life for themselves irrespective of old tribal loyalties. Like I said, they're interesting systems. And that whole play between those, they're opposing. And that runs through a lot of what we've done too.

What I think is interesting about a lot of your music is, I do think that theme of tribe and family comes up. A yearning for it, and also a fear, distrust, and a recognition of the pain that family or tribe can cause when it's, I'll just call it, you know, dysfunctional, for lack of a better word, right? Yeah, like everything else in life, you know, this is double-edged. Do you feel like you have found for yourself, for lack of a better word, a tribe that works for you? Obviously not in a nationalist sense, but in a sense of finding your people and finding the support that you want in that realm? of reason um i do think that it's good to have some fixed points in life but uh just when you think they're fixed um they turn out not to be in some ways nothing's fixed it's a little bit like relationships you know the the there is a there is a dream that you that when you're a

teenager you meet the love of your life and you start this wonderful partnership and you fall in love and you fancy each other and you stay together for years and you have children you still love each other and fancy each other and then you have grandchildren you grow old together and you die to you know uh it does happen occasionally i do know i do know i do know one person that's happened to you know one person that's happened to, one couple that's happened to. But it's very uncommon, especially in the modern era. And forever people always making kind of relationships they hope are strong. Again, I think relationships change

and you have to let them change. But the one thing i think is the you know everybody learns eventually is that nothing nothing stays the same and nothing is quite predictable i think that's that's what i've learned about life i knew nothing stayed the same but i've been surprised how unpredictable life is actually just in a personal way yeah and it seems like that you know things seem the same seem the same and then boom something you know it's just it's it's so the speed by which sometimes it changes can be so shocking yeah so and that oh go ahead and that's when you that's when you

either need the support of you know family or relationships that are kind of fixed or or something very strong inside. And if you don't have either of those, then that's very hard for people. And I think now, these days, I think that families tend to be more fragile, family relationships a bit more bedraggled, and people's own sense of self inside. I'm not sure if it's as strong as it perhaps. I don't know but but if you don't have one of those then it's a very difficult world i think what do you do for yourself

if you're um you know feeling down or sad or upset how do you find how do you find comfort for yourself i was brought up religious my parents were quakers although actually my dad went to went to mosque as well because he thought and and and and hindu things and also all sorts of stuff because he thought they were all the same um which i sort of adhere to really i think they were all the same at some level uh so the idea of um this kind of idea of god in a very abstract way was something i grew up with and kind of deep and then i find found it in the idea of nature and that's pretty common as well so my idea of god is pretty universal and and it is nature um i find a huge amount of uh I find a huge amount of solace just in the turning seasons and looking at the sky and stuff like that.

And also just people. I don't know. I get, like everybody else, I have my down moments. But I don't suffer from depression. I know a lot of people that do. And I'm desperately grateful that I don't. I tend to bounce of my own accord back out of that. I'm also dead lucky because I've got music. So music is a wonderful catharsis.

I always felt terribly sorry for pop bands or like comedians, people that have to go on stage and be happy and they're paid to be happy. That must be hell on earth, I think. That's why comedians are all mad and pop acts tend to be much, you know, more troubled people than bands that play aggressive or cathartic music. Because we've got a perfect expression for all our demons. That's a very interesting uh concept i never thought of it that way oh most of the most troubled people are in other people that have to go on stage and smile yeah yep you know it's easy it's easy to manufacture

that must take a huge amount of effort to go on stage and manufacture anger even when you don't feel it it's pretty easy actually you can just take it off the audience and give it back to them. That's easy. But smiling when you're dead inside, that's hard, hard. I'm glad I never had to do that. We've had a few. I've found on tours sometimes when something real happens in the outside world or even within the tour, whether you're going through bad and something bad happens on the tour or just, you know,

what's going on in the world, that being able to go on stage and do the catharsis thing is wonderful. Lucky, we're lucky, we're lucky. You were just talking about finding some comfort in nature and one of the songs I really like of yours is called High. And you talk about how life is about perspective. And that when you are, you know, you describe being up on a hill, but also within nature, that puts things back in perspective. All these things you fear so much

Depend on angles of vision Down in the maze of walls You can't see what's coming But from high on the high It all looks like nothing I'm Jason Alexander. And I'm Peter Tilden. And together on the Really No Really podcast, our mission is to get the true answers to life's baffling questions like

why they refuse to make the bathroom door go all the way to the floor. We got the answer. Will space junk block your cell signal? The astronaut who almost drowned during a spacewalk gives us the answer. We talk with the scientist who figured out if your dog truly loves you and the one bringing back the woolly mammoth. Plus, does Tom Cruise really do his own stunts? His stuntman reveals the answer.

And you never know who's going to drop by. Mr. Bryan Cranston is with us tonight. How are you, too? Hello, my friend. Wayne Knight about Jurassic Park. Wayne Knight, welcome to Really, No Really, sir. Bless you all. Hello, Newman.

And you never know when Howie Mandel might just stop by to talk about judging. Really? That's the opening? Really, No Really. Yeah, Really. And you never know when Howie Mandel might just stop by to talk about judging. Really? That's the opening? Really, no, really. Yeah, really. No, really. Go to reallynoreally.com. And register to win $500, a guest spot on our podcast, or a limited edition signed Jason bobblehead. It's called Really, No, Really, and you can find it on the iHeartRadio app, on Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

or wherever you get your podcasts. I've got this theory which I've sort of put together over many, many years that works for me. I'm not saying it's true for everyone. But I've got a theory that when you have, you can see internally in exactly the same perspective that you can see externally. So if you are on top of a mountain or in a desert or by the ocean and you can see for miles then all as you look inside yourself all the everything goes into perspective you can see what's close and what's far away what's

important what's not and and i think that when you're in a city, particularly some cities more claustrophobic than others, especially flat cities, where all you can see is wall, wall, wall, or actually I'm not too keen on forests either, where you can see is tree, tree, tree, and you feel hemmed in, then when you look inside yourself,

then you can't see perspective and everything gets look inside yourself, then you can't see perspective and everything gets terribly confused. And then you can't see what's important and what isn't. And I find that I like to be in, I like being on top of the mountains. And, or, you know, if I'm stuck in a city, then I like to be high in the city, high above, you know, get up to the top,

get up on the roof of the high buildings to get that sense of perspective. I think the thing about the sea is that it represents nature to us in a way that is kind of operating in our time scale. So you can see the constant play of water, waves and so on. You can also see daily the tides come in and go out. Whereas mountains are also moving, but they're not moving in our time scale, so you can't really feel that. But with the sea, it's like,

it's a kind of mirror of what's going on inside us I think storms come you know you had said once that and it's an interview that was a few years old but that the most played person on your iPod was Gillian Welch

do you think that's still the case? I mean I'm a big fan of her stuff but I'm curious if there's been any I haven't looked I haven't done the count recently so I'm a big fan of her stuff, but I'm curious if there's been any. I haven't looked. I haven't done the count recently, so I'm not sure. But she'll definitely be up there. I think there's something. I think she's a brilliant artist, actually.

And every time I've seen her, three times, I've been stunned, really. And you've got to give Daveave rollins you know equal he's amazing really yeah because they they they've got this kind of telepathy together there um so they don't they've they sort of perfectly work together in sync without even looking at each other because they've done it so many times um and they are in that kind of perfect musical sync. I think she's a great writer actually. I think she's written countless lines that I find myself quoting and it's that ability to write very simple ideas but they're sort of perfectly encapsulated.

I really admire that. There's one of her lines, never mind working hard, it's who I'm working for. I find myself quoting that all the time that's a great one yeah i don't think i've heard that one yeah that's a wonderful line that sums me up pretty well i think the um the song autumn is um i it makes me think of the idea there's in certain you know buddhist circles there's this idea of meditating at the graveyard, at the charnel grounds, because it helps you to remember how precious life is. And I think you're really driving at that in the song Autumn. are falling golden one by one like the paper money balls

or the soldiers stealing the whole world there is only beginning there is beginning of the end for the peoples are moving

like the waters of a great flood everything is beautiful moving like the waters of a crate in the trough everything is beautiful because everything is tight everything is beautiful because

everything is tight I'm quite keen on that song. It's kind of got that everything's fucked sense that we write about sometimes, because I do feel that sometimes when I look at the world. But it's also got the chorus. Okay, everything is beautiful because everything is dying. True, in a Buddhist kind of way um but it's also kind of funny especially when the especially when it's

not exactly a choir it's everywhere we could get in the studio at times we cobbled together 20 people that were lying around um to come and sing the chorus so it sounds a bit like a congregation it's not actually a choir just sound like a congregation. It's not actually a choir. It's just a congregation of people singing, including kids. Singing, everything is beautiful because everything is dying. And it's like, I always wanted to hear that sung by, you know, a church in church. It's sort of, and when they come in at the end singing that, it always makes me smile. It's sort of black humor in a way. Yeah, it definitely is.

And it's a great, great guitar line at the beginning, too. It's awesome. So what would you say is the lesson that's taken you the longest to learn in your life? Well, I haven't quite got there yet. You know, I'm 60 next year, but I don't think it's quite done. I think we've talked about this already. You know, life's quite done. I think we've talked about this already. Life's pretty unpredictable. One last question, and then I'll let you get back to the depressing election results.

But is there anybody else's idea or somebody's work or music that you're kind of coming into now that you're really excited about or that's really making you think actually my favorite current music is the soundtrack from the movie timbuk2 and i don't know a huge amount about it um the movie's out at the moment uh i've never been terribly into a lot of african music or i've never got really into it studied it um but more and more i do there's a kind of a thing on the last couple of new model army albums where we started to get we just got a little bit bored of guitars and bass and drums used in a conventional way and we started using various other instruments and and perhaps different slightly different approaches to arrangements and stuff you know whether that i'm not sure what we're doing next. We've already started on the next album,

but we're not quite sure what shape it's going to take yet. But all that different, slightly different way of looking at instrumentation, particularly rhythm. I mean, everybody knows New Model Army are obsessed by rhythm. We've had two fantastic drummers. Amazing drummers, yeah. And we did go out at christmas with three drummers on stage and that was fantastic uh love drummers i mean my first

first love in music and and what i always go back to is uh late 60s soul northern what we call in england northern soul basically tamla motown and all the copies of tamla motown and it's all about um james jameson and benny benjamin i mean james jameson is my favorite musician of all time by quite a long way the motown bass player i think he astonishing and that use of rhythm which is also melodic uh that cross of rhythm and melody which is at the base of the base of all sort of popular music i guess but i've sort of started to find that a lot in some some of the african stuff excellent well thank you so much for taking the time to come on the show it's been a real pleasure talking with you. Pleasure. Cheers. Cheers.

You can learn more about Justin Edward Sullivan and this podcast at oneufeed.net slash Justin. Nighttime city beat The radio is calling The lost and lonely domain Out here we are running To the wide open faces In the low and small of the lane We are old, we are young We are in this together Animals and children

Christmas forever Pulse and rage We are in this together. Animals and children. Christmas forever. Pulse and rage and eyes full of wonder. Kicking out behind us again.