The New Cue #426 October 14: Paul Heaton

"We were convinced we'd written My Old Man's A Dustman."

Morning,

Come in, make yourself a brew and settle down for fifteen minutes of soft-eyed, warm-hearted wisdom and revelation from Britain’s favourite sixty-something singer, Paul Heaton. I could stick in an ‘arguably’ in there, but it’s Monday morning. Who wants to start the week with an argument?

Every right-minded music fan loves Paul Heaton, surely. He’s sold millions of albums of lyrical pop excellence across five decades now, in The Housemartins, The Beautiful South, as a solo artist, sometimes with Jacqui Abbott, and now back on his own. He’s just delivered twelve new melody-rich songs sung tenderly by Paul and his guest vocalists Rianne Downey, Yvonne Shelton and Danny Muldoon on The Mighty Several, which was released last Friday.

“Oh, it’s an album of my usual gripes,” Paul told Ted, self-deprecatingly, when called last week and asked what The Mighty Several was about. “People I feel interesting. Underrated people. Quiet people. I write most of it in bars and I try to read the room, wonder why people are in there. You do meet incredible people in these bars. For example, I met one guy in a pub on the Belgian and Dutch border who collected recipes right back from the fourteenth century. Every day he took one of his recipes to the pub, had a couple of drinks, then went to the shop to buy the ingredients and cooked his wife a meal. Cornelius! That was his name. He was showing me this menu from 1920, but it was in Flemish so I couldn’t understand it.”   

Paul gamely took part in our Life & Times questionnaire, and you can read the results below, for free. If you enjoy it, please consider joining paying subscribers like Paul Heaton for a modest £5 a month, enabling us to do this work while also occasionally paying our electricity bills. You can do that by hitting the first button below. And if you enjoy the interview, feel free to share it electronically to all your pals by hitting the second button.

See you on Wednesday,

Ted and Niall.

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The Life & Times Of…Paul Heaton

What was the first record you loved?
Probably Rockin’ Robin by Michael Jackson – or maybe the original if I’d heard that. I loved My Old Man’s A Dustman, weirdly. My friend and I were convinced – until disproven by the invention of the Internet - that we wrote it. We told people we wrote it too, though we were only eight or nine. You know how you’re in the playground and singing something, it feels like you’re inventing it? But what you’re doing in fact is recalling it. I read later that it had come out before I was born, so I was dashed.

Lonnie Donegan performing My Old Man’s A Dustman in 1961.

And the last?
Do you know The Courettes? I don’t normally like stuff that’s that heavily stylised but there’s a song they do called California that I really like:

Larry Campbell and Theresa Campbell, a married couple. I like their new stuff, too.

What is your earliest memory? 
It’s about being somewhere around West Kirby. I’ve got a very good memory for being young. But when I was really, really young the first thing I remember is Adrian, my brother, hiding behind a bin because one of our dogs was trying to pinch his biscuits. Adrian was quite a chubby kid. He liked his food, and he didn’t like the dogs going near it. I think it was around when I learnt to walk, so I’d have been two or three. Watching Adrian looking guilty with his biscuit behind the bin.

What is your daily domestic routine?
Because I subscribe to The New Cue, I was reading your one of these with Matt Johnson last week and thinking, ‘Fucking hell: that’s the opposite of my domestic routine.’ Meditation and all that. I am sure he’s lovely, but that is the very opposite of my routine. If my youngest daughter is here, I get up very early, 6.15, help her get ready for school. But normally, I get up early, have some breakfast, and then go back to bed. I read that Morrissey does that, has toast and then goes back to bed. I like leaving the window open and hearing other people going to work. One of the reasons I wanted to be a professional musician was to sleep in. Then, when I do get up, I tend to listen to music. Last night from midnight and all day today I’m downloading stuff to make up my charts. I spend pretty much from Friday to Tuesday narrowing down those charts. It’s very laborious. I normally tend to go to bed half an hour after my wife. If she’s late, I still have to have that half an hour. So generally, around half twelve, but sometimes half two.  

Who or what is the love of your life?
Well, she’s just walked by and she’s heard that. “Other than Sheffield United,” she says. So, I’ll say me kids and me wife. There’s lot of ‘things’ that I love. I love travelling. I love cycling. I love going into pubs I’ve never been into. Talking, I suppose, love that. So, there’s inanimate objects, there are people, and there are ‘things’ that I love.  

What's your worst habit? 
Ooh, she’s just out of earshot. [Wife Linda says something in the background]. Don’t you try and join in! He doesn’t want to know anything nasty or personal, like scratching my arse. I suppose just chunnering on all the time, talking too much, talking when I’m driving. [Wife Linda in background: ‘his worst habit is flitting between conversations.’]  That’s true, I do flit between conversations. Just earlier I said to her, ‘Oh, that ginger was OK in the salmon.’ I’d forgotten that conversation had been three days ago when she’d asked at tea what the ginger in my salmon was like. That’s pretty annoying getting an answer three days late, I imagine.

When were you most creatively satisfied?
Probably now. I find it more pleasurable to create at the moment. There are no frustrations for me at the moment. I feel like I can write about anything. I feel there’s a freedom that I’ve got at the moment, and over last few years, where I can relax and write in my own time. I write by habit anyway, I tend to like it. I feel creatively free. I know I’ve not made any jazz records recently, but I like the people I’ve been working with for the last fourteen years – that’s good.

Has anyone you've met ever made you feel starstruck? 
I’m always pretty impressed by people, me. I got the bloke’s autograph from the Carling Black Label ad, from the ‘80s.

I was starstruck with Al Green, actually. I’ve found that a good thing if you’re about to meet someone is to have something to say rather than, ‘You’re really good.’ I didn’t know what to say to Al Green. Years later when I met Smokey Robinson, I remember thinking that I should think of something I like that he’s done. So, I said to him how I liked First I Look At The Purse, how clever I thought it was, how he did it. Then it became a conversation between two people about something, but with Al Green I just said, ‘Oh, you’re really good.’ He was, ‘Thank you very much.’ But what was he supposed to say?

Who or what is the greatest influence on your work?
In hindsight, me mum and dad. They definitely enabled me to express myself. My mum was pretty opinionated and often wrong – and that was good. She wouldn’t be angry that she was wrong. She’d stick it out there, keep at it. I learnt quickly that there’s no harm putting your head above the parapet. I also have this imaginary figure in my head that I’m trying to impress. I don’t know what they look like, I don’t even know what sex they are. It’s just someone I talk to: a friendly, helpful critic, that I always think I have to make them happy. When I finish is when I know they’re happy. So that’s a big influence too.  

What would people be surprised to learn about you?
I’m pretty daft, I think. If you look at my lyrics, you might think this is a really serious person. Someone who takes themselves really seriously and is actually quite depressed. But then they meet me, and they may think that I’m a bit shyer and a bit dafter, and sometimes out and out stupid. It’s probably quite disappointing, because I don’t think people want others to be like an eight-year-old kid in front of them. I had a thing in Belgium once where Dave Rotheray and Sean Welch from the Beautiful South were being interviewed on a separate table. I’d been being daft with the bar staff, and the journalist asked Dave and Sean who writes the lyrics: they pointed to me. The journalist said, ‘No, who really writes the lyrics?’ From then on in it became a bit of band slogan whenever I did something daft: who really writes the lyrics?!   

The Beautiful South performing Bell Bottomed Tear live, in 1992.

What do you wish the 18-year-old you knew?
That I was going to live so long. Especially coming through punk, when you were 15, 16 and punk happened you assumed that everybody over 25 was ancient. When I was 18, I was working in an office and I had another two years to go. If I’d have known then that I had more time I’d have done something different. I had no vision beyond 30. I certainly didn’t think you could be in a band then. And 60! Christ, that would have made me physically sick, the thought of me going on stage at the age of 60. So, I wish I’d know that all ages come with different rewards and satisfactions. I’ve said it before that each part of your life is like being relegated into a new footballing league. But when the fixtures come out for the new league – say, if QPR went down to League 2, God forbid – you’d be thinking, ‘Oh, this is so embarrassing.’ But then you be thinking, ‘Actually, Colchester away? Let’s go to that, have a few beers there…’ Suddenly, you have these different plans. Less pressure of Man United away. That’s how life feels. You’re gradually sinking down towards the Northern Premier and it’s actually quite nice. I wish I’d know that.    

What one book would you recommend we read?
If I was going to say a political one, which I should probably avoid, I’d say Look Out Whitey! Black Power’s Gon’ Get Your Mama by Julius Lester.  In terms of novel, I like A Touch of Daniel by Peter Tinniswood. He’s double Northern, but there’s a charm to his writing, and he’s funny. He’s got very dark humour. I really like those books. A Touch of Daniel is when he’s just lost his son at birth, and he’s still talking to the baby and the baby is taking the piss out of him constantly. Very funny and quite deep, which suits me.       

What was the home you grew up in like?
We moved about a lot, lived in lots of places. Home-wise, three boys, and it was a football-house. My dad ran football teams and we all played in football teams. The one in Sheffield was smaller, but it neighbourly. We had great friends on the grove that we grew up in, from the age of four until twelve, still stay on touch with some. Unfortunately, though I did like Surrey and had some good friends at school and football, the first day we got there and got the ball out we had a knock on the door and one of the neighbours said, ‘You don’t play football on the street here. That’s what your back garden is for.” A bad start, but both enjoyable on opposite ends of the scale. I liked living at home. I didn’t move out until I was 21, because none of us went to university. My dad was away a lot, but I got on really well with my mum. No complications. It was a good upbringing.

How do you spark creativity?
If it is a spark, I’m constantly walking around with a match in my hands. I don’t think that I’d better walk to the shop to think of a song; I walk to the shop and a song pops in my head. Usually a lyric, sometimes a tune, often a bit of nonsense. Whenever my daughters were born and I went out pushing them in a pram, I found that was useful. Because I don’t often go out for a walk – I should, but I don’t. When you’re pushing a pram, you’re not really going anywhere, going round in circles was good. So that flitting brain that Linda said was a bad habit, it’s also a good habit because I’m constantly thinking of new things and silly stories.

What's the best advice you've ever been given? 
My dad’s advice when The Housemartins exploded. I said to him, ‘They’re adding more and more to this tour. I’ve not been home for two months.’ He said, ‘If you want time off, they’ll try and buy it off you. You’ll start getting taxis everywhere.  When taxis aren’t good enough, they’ll offer to fly you in a helicopter.’ I ended up actually being flown home to play in quite an important semi-final because I was away doing a video. On the pitch, the guy who played centre back next to me said I’d better wipe my face because I had all the make-up from the video running down onto my shirt. It became crazy. From then on, I started saying no to things. Saying, ‘We don’t have to do this.’ I see it with so many young bands, the burn-out. You see them split up, or they develop drug habits. Or they start to cover themselves in tattoos because they haven’t got anything that connects them to anything. You need steady ground.

Think For A Minute by The Housemartins.

What's the secret to a happy relationship? 
Luckily, I’m outside now. I think with age, I realise it’s just being nice to each other. And doing things together. It helps with me going away with my wife and writing lyrics. Before I’d be going away and drinking constantly for three weeks, with just the odd phone call home. I think it’s important to do things together, but I’ve not been successful in relationships. I’d describe this one as successful, it’s the first time I’ve been married. I’m not an expert on relationships, as the songs probably translate.  

What's your greatest regret?
I don’t have many regrets. One is that I wish my dad had seen me have children. He died in ’97, so I would have been 35 and I didn’t have my first child until I was 39. He was such a good grandad to my brother’s children, and I think he would have been delighted. It’s not a massive regret, I don’t have regrets to do with him generally. I think very fondly about everyone I’ve lost. I’m not that sort of person in general. But it would have been nice.

When and where were you happiest?
Today. Always today. There’s always something that makes me smile, even if it’s just a daft answer. There’s a bloke doing a dance on one of the adverts and every time I see it, I explode with laughter. I’m looking at my sunflowers now and that makes me very happy, the different colours. So, yeah, today.

What's your favourite film and why? 
Ooh, I’m not very good with films. Previously I’ve said Free Willy, and I do like it, but it’s not really my favourite film. I like Scent of a Woman. And a couple of films I watch with the kids, like School of Rock, Nacho Libre and Napoleon Dynamite. Those kind of light comedies.    

Can you cook - what's your signature dish?
Salmon with ginger? I’m not brilliant in the kitchen, though I have got better in the last couple of years. A dish I enjoy cooking for both my wife and eldest daughter is couscous, a salad and put fish on top of it. So, a sea bass grilled, on top of couscous, tomato, spring onion. You know, it is quite nice. I make that once or twice a week.

Have you ever broken the law? 
Yes, I’ve broken the law. On several occasions. Are you going to ask me if I was innocent or not? No, I’m joking. Let’s leave it at that. It’s in the past.

When and why did you last cry? 
Let me try and remember what the doctors has been like recently. That always gets a tear in my eye. Considering I am prone to it, I can’t remember any tears recently. Linda and I had a little hug after Glastonbury, after we came off stage. The audience had been so nice that we welled up and a had a little [makes crying noise] for about ten seconds. Afterwards it was emotional too. We left Glastonbury and stayed in a pub in Birmingham, and at two in the morning I was pissed watching it back shouting, ‘I’m on telly!’

Do you have a temper and, if so, how does it manifest?
I did have a temper. I used to swing out when I was young. A couple of times I was told to turn the other cheek and I did, and it didn’t have good results. I wasn’t forever fighting but I did occasionally lash out. I don’t properly lose my temper these days. When I’m driving, I mutter under my breath occasionally. I think it’s close to losing my temper, but I don’t because I’m older and I’ve only driven for five or six years so everything is still funny. I learnt when I was 55. I learnt because my daughter was swimming competitively and as soon as I passed my test she stopped swimming. I drive an automatic and I really enjoy it, passed first time.   

Which talent would you most like to have?
I think I’d like to play the piano. That would be nice. Magic, maybe? It would probably really annoy everyone because you’d be constantly hiding everything. Guitar, I’d like play that properly. It would be nice to write some music on an instrument rather than in your brain.

Do you have any phobias?
I used to be scared of wasps, but I’m not anymore. Just slowly disappeared. I’m still fairly scared of flying. Maybe heights a little bit? If I lean over something I can feel my stomach going. Flying is the main one, but I got better since I stopped smoking. Smoking felt a bit like you were taking your last cigarette because you were going to die.

What do you consider your greatest achievement?
I suppose me collection of songs.

The songs I’ve written and still write. It sounds boring, but it’s my longevity. To be talking now about something that’s happening next week, is not just an achievement, it’s a sort of privilege that you don’t imagine lasting this long. So, being here and doing what I’m doing now.