Sam Fender - People Watching

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Sam Fender is a singer and songwriter from the town of North Shields in England.

He won the Brit Award for Best Rock and Alternative Act twice.

His most recent album is called People Watching, and just like his first two albums, it went to number one on the UK album charts.

To help produce the album, Sam enlisted Adam Grandeale, the singer and frontman of the Grammy-winning band The War on Drugs.

For this episode, I talked to Sam and his bandmate Joe Atkinson about the title track from People Watching and the long journey that it took to get made.

From Sam's kitchen to the Hollywood Hills to Abbey Road.

Can I just ask you each to introduce yourselves?

Yeah,

I'm Sam Fender.

I'm Joe Atkinson.

I play keyboards for Sam and help him in the studio with the production and stuff like that.

Yes.

And we've known each other for ages.

Yeah.

When did you first meet?

Probably 14.

Yeah.

We used to be in rival bands.

When you were 14 years old?

Yeah.

If there was ever like a local band competition, it would always be like us two pitted against each other.

Because where we live, North Shields, it's like, I love it.

It's the best town in the world, but it's not connected to the music industry or anything.

You know, it's a fishing town.

Back in those days, was your relationship mainly about playing music together or did you hang out otherwise as well?

I think with us, it's like we all grew up together, you know?

Yeah.

And like, we are family, really.

Like, Joe's just like a brother to me so what was happening in your life around the time when the first ideas for people watching started coming to you i was back home and

somebody who was very very close to me she's called annie or win she was an actor and she was like my surrogate mother she got sick and she was sick for quite a long time and how did you first meet annie so when i was a kid My grandmother was like, he's hyper and we should put him in something that'll, you know, that he can express himself in and do some.

So she put me in this local community centre acting class when I was like 13.

And that was like my grandma would pay for that.

And I think it was only like a fiver.

And some kids actually didn't even pay.

Like, she was like a community hero, Annie.

And

I had quite a low self-esteem when I first met her.

I was getting bullied in school.

And I didn't really have a lot of confidence.

And she gave us pretty much, I think, all of the confidence that I have.

So I did like loads of little bits of acting and stuff when I was a kid, like just sort of community theater stuff.

But it made us be able to go on stage and do what we do, you know.

And, you know, there was loads of plans.

Like, we had a plan, like when I was a kid, there was a, we were planning to move down to London.

And she was like, you know, we can try out your music and your acting down there.

She was always really supportive.

And she was the first person, I think, in my life that ever

made me believe that this was like a viable thing to do as a career.

You know, she was always like, you're a star kid, so she meant a lot to us.

You know, she became like one of my best friends, and even once the acting stuff stopped, I was like still, you know, really good friends with her in my 20s.

And

I used to go around to hers, and she had periods where she was a lot better, and periods where like our cancer was under control.

And,

you know, we used to just drink a bottle of wine, and bitch, to be honest, like most of the time, she used to always go, you never mentioned me in any of these awards.

Like, you get an award and you don't mention my name at all and i used to be like well i'm sorry like she's like i should be the first person you think of whenever you get an award for something and i was like oh jesus i've liked i'm sorry you know was she joking or was she

serious

she was joking but she was there was definitely an element of

she was like no you see she was serious about it

And then,

not last year, but the year beforehand, I basically got a call off my other good friend, Joe, who was also like one of her proteges.

And he was like, you know, I think, I think this is gonna happen.

It was really bizarre because I went to see her.

And the whole plan was I was gonna get her out of the care home.

And she was seemed in fine spirits.

And I think some doctor came in and basically was really negative.

And she just started deteriorating really quickly.

So she said, you know, she didn't want to be alone.

So I was like, well, we'll s I'll stay.

And so did Joe and

and so did our wonderful nieces.

We just slept on the chair next to her, you know, for like five days, in and out, trying to do shifts.

We'd go home for a couple of hours to try and get some sleep.

And it was really, really like

grueling,

but like beautiful thing.

Like it was a, I was, it was an honor to be able to be there with her at the very end, you know?

Yeah.

You know, she died.

you know in my arms you know like i i held her hand

and um whoa I just, you know, it is, I haven't actually spoken about it, like,

yeah,

um,

and it was like,

but it was it was beautiful in the end.

So I had this piano chord progression,

and I've got this little piano which I got from like a school, and we just put a load of pin tacks into the keys which make it sound like metallic.

The hammers are obviously metal-hitting metal,

really percussive, really bright, kind of like an old honky-tonk piano.

And I've got that in my kitchen, and I was like, What's this song about?

It's definitely about something.

And then Annie died, and I was like going through all of that.

And then it was like, oh, it's Annie's song.

I was doing a demo on my phone, my garage band.

And I don't use a microphone or anything.

I just, I don't have it plugged into any gear because I'm like, I'm like an idiot when it comes to tech.

So I'll just go like

in the freaking loop it like a bajillion bars.

I'll record a piano for two bars and then just

copy and paste that along.

And then I'll find a bass.

What I tend to do is find a loop so that I can listen to it and then eventually the lyrics come and the melody forms around it.

When I walked back from the care home back to my house, I was people watching, you know, like that was my

sort of escapism was just watching people pass by and seeing what was going on in their lives and I was obviously thinking a lot about life and death at the time and how such a big character like was about to leave this plane of existence

and how kind of you know everything just keeps moving the world keeps turning and everybody's still living their lives and going through their struggles and you know and I think at the time I was also thinking about Britain being

you know the cost of living crisis was a lot in the news at the time and you know there was an element of guilt that I had because we're doing well.

And a lot of the people that we know back home are, you know, struggling to even feed their kids.

And

so, you know, it was all of that was kind of swimming in the atmos.

I used to feel it was a world world dreaming of back on the gas work, screaming a song.

Just the beauty of youth would quell my aching heart.

Oh, I feel so dumb

for my learning.

Oh, my heart,

I feel so dumb.

Joe, do you remember the first time you heard this iPhone demo?

Yeah, we went into the studio, Sleep of Sounds, and Sam was playing it to us, and we were just like, wow, me and Dean and Drew was there as well.

And we were like, wow, this is awesome.

Sam, when you played the demo for them, did the sort of grief and the feelings that you were feeling about Annie's passing, did they still feel fresh at the time?

Yeah, it was mega fresh because it was only in November, you know, aside from Annie as well, like there'd been a a lot of death

in all of our lives.

Yeah.

So I think the band connected to it because we'd all kind of lost people and friends.

And it was,

I think that's the only way we know how to sort of deal with these things and process these things as an artist.

Like, that's how you deal with these things.

Joe, did you know how much Annie meant to Sam?

Yeah.

But unfortunately, I'd never met Annie in my life, but Sam would always fondly talk about her.

And even when we were kids, I remember him being like i'm going to do my acting thing i want to see annie and stuff and

yeah so obviously it you know it did strike a chord because i knew how close they were

and why sleeper sounds why were you working there it's a decent space to just to write things and get things moving you know you just sat there doing it and it it just comes together really quickly and i like to work fast because i feel like a lot of the time with a song You've got to strike while the iron's hot.

Because if you don't, you lose that energy and that excitement for the song.

There's nothing better than when you're like, it's like you're chasing a song.

I feel like you're always chasing them down.

You're like, let's get to the next bit, right?

Okay, let's record this acoustic.

Let's put some synths in.

Then you came up with a melody and it was just a little doop

on the whirly.

Who's playing drums here?

That's Drew.

Is that what I drew?

That's Drew, yeah.

Could I ask you about the tempo of this song?

Because given what the song's about,

I could imagine an inclination towards, you know, writing something more like a ballad or just something much slower as a tribute to grief.

I mean, like, that feels maybe like a natural place to go.

What was it about this kind of tempo that felt right to you about what you were writing about?

Well, I wanted it to be like that feeling of liberation when you're kind of getting over grief or like coming to the more accepting phase of grief.

I think because I was so desperately wanting to get there myself,

I wanted the music to get us there as well, like I suppose, you know.

Yeah.

Sounds wanky saying that, you know what I mean?

But

not at all, yeah.

Annie was such a larger-than-life person, and I wanted something to be more celebratory and have that kind of euphoria.

Because she put so much euphoria into the world, and you know, into my world especially you know as a young lad and like i wanted that to be reflected in the music but i never got the chorus

the biggest crime in this town has always been the dead

streets

i can't forget when tragedy came calling

it

So this chorus, the original chorus, this just wasn't good enough enough for you.

Yeah.

I was like, oh, I've got to get it right.

I can't make it, like, it can't be crap.

Do you know what I mean?

It's about Annie.

So, it kind of just sat like half a song for like a few months.

Yeah, a little while, yeah.

For quite a few months.

Normally, the songs come together so quick.

And this one was such a bastard.

We needed somebody else to kind of help get it across the line.

I mean, we could have done it ourselves, really, but it was like we're at this point in our career where, like, we're really lucky that we could pretty much call on anybody and the label would back it

so it was like i want to work with one of my heroes do you know what i mean i was like why not

we have a saying in newcastle where we're from it's uh shy bands getting out and that means like shy kids get nothing so i just asked the label i was like could ask adam ranasil from war on drugs and they're like yeah of course we'll get his number and then i just called him up and spoke to him about this idea.

I sent him some songs and he was like, he fell in love with them and he called back straight away.

And then we were just on the phone for like an hour and a half talking about Tom Petty.

So it went from that to LA with Adam.

My conversation with Sam Fender and Joe Atkinson continues after this.

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So Adam Grandeale jumped in and then we went out to LA and started working with him and it was magic, you know?

Yeah.

I was sat in the house that we're staying in.

We're like staying up in the hills and it was amazing.

Like a bunch of Jordi boys in Hollywood.

What the hell has happened?

This is ridiculous.

Like in the beautiful sunshine.

And I just sat with the guitar because I was like I've got to get this song sussed out I remember just sitting up on there looking over the hills and looking across the city and all of that and I was just sat thinking about Annie and thinking about because she was an actor and she was like such a big movie buff you know obviously being in Hollywood where like every bloody movie's ever been made I mean so I sat there thinking about her and just thinking God she would love this She would love being here with me.

And we're driving down Hollywood Boulevard and there was just so many homeless people on the street.

And then it made us think of home because the homelessness is getting really bad back home.

So it was like bizarre because then, like, the first half of that song is all talking about walking back from the care home, watching people back there.

And then it was like, suddenly, I was like out in LA and I was doing the exact same thing, you know.

And then these lines just came out of us:

Happy Boo out, Tony, back home.

Everybody on the treadmill running.

Out of the billboards, out of the heat.

Somebody's darling's on the street tonight.

No, somebody's darling's on the street tonight.

That was inspired because Billy Connolly was he did this TV show.

He found this grave in Scotland and it said somebody's sweetheart and the village had found this random person that had no idea who this person was.

And somebody says, well, it's somebody's sweetheart.

And they buried the person as somebody's sweetheart, which I think is so beautiful.

It's like, no matter who you are, where you go in the world, like you're loved by somebody.

And that's what I thought when I saw all these people on the streets.

like i was like that's somebody's darling that's somebody's kid you know i remembered that as i was writing the song

it took so long to get it right and then that was like this overwhelming like joy and relief

that we've got this chorus that was good such a great feeling totally because we'd had that song for ages ages at this point.

And we're kind of like, we knew there was something so special within it.

And after that, we just straight to the studio.

Got Drew's drums down.

Oh, he's so on it, man.

Yeah, dude.

I mean, he's so on it that I actually wondered if these were samples when I got the stamps.

No, no, that's Drew's playing.

Adam was kind of like, hey, Drew, can you just do like a straight, just putikata, bootikata?

And he just rocked that.

We overdubbed some toms, bootaka, boo gaka, and then we started building from there.

Did your ideas about that little riff change when you got to this stage of the song?

Yeah, we wanted it to be a whirly, but then I remember it like doesn't quite poke out as much as we expected it to poke out.

Yeah.

So I'll double it and I'll do like a kind of Mark Knopfla, dire straight style pick and pattern version of it.

I love the tiny bend,

which you obviously can't do on the Wurlitzer, and so there it makes them more distinct as well.

Exactly.

It sounds more like a band when there's like slightly different things happening.

But we felt there was something missing in the high end, and I wanted something that was going to come out and sort of mirror the melody.

So we had to figure out what it was going to be.

And I remember Adam thinking about that synth sound, and he was like, Yeah, it's like dire straits.

Yeah.

He's like, hey, try this OB-8.

We get it, OB-8.

Yeah.

Literally, we pressed like one sound and Sam was like, oh my god, this is the sound.

This is the one.

This is like, get it on now.

Everybody on the treadmill running.

I know the billboards out of the heat.

Somebody's darling down the street tonight.

It just adds that's a lush-like part of the palette, I think.

I keep saying palette because Adam, we stole some of his terminology because he always kind of looks at it like he's painting.

He's like, Yeah, let's go paint.

We wanted to do acoustics, and Adam was like, I want to get a bit more like a rhythm.

And he was like, I think we should just do it together.

So we set up a binaural head mic.

We've seen them before.

Yeah.

So I love them.

I mean, spooky, aren't they?

Like, it's literally just like a human head on a stick.

And the ears of the microphone.

Yeah, the ears of the microphones is nuts.

So, like, we use that quite a lot to try and get a bit of that sort of like in the room feel.

Adam sat on one side of it and I sat on the other side, and we both did the whole song, just one take, just jamming it out.

Did it change the way that you played to have him playing it with you?

It was just like, for me, that was like one of them, it was really special.

What made it so special?

Because he's like my hero, isn't he?

Do you know what I mean?

It was like I was sad and I was thinking, like, I was like, 10 years ago, I was in hospital.

I was like, living with my mother, and me and my mom were both unemployed, didn't have any money.

Black mold all over my bedroom wall.

And when I was in hospital, the Lost in the Dream album, Adam's album, I become obsessed with it.

And that's all I listened to during that whole time that I was recovering.

And it really meant a lot to me, that reggae.

I used to listen to this album and dream about doing this as a job and being able to pay my bills.

And now I'm in LA.

sat with the guy who made that album playing an acoustic track with him, but both doing it at the same time.

It was like literally one of my biggest heroes.

It was, you couldn't write it.

Can you tell me about the horns that come in later?

Oh, my rip tones.

The riffs.

So the rift tones were basically a combination of our brass players, which is Mark Webb and Johnny Bluehat.

And then the war on drugs, Adam invited his mate, John Natchez, and they came as a trio.

and we started calling them the Riptones

John Natchez is on Barry, Mark Webb Trumpet, Johnny Bluehat on Tennis Act.

The solo actually in the tune, which comes in the outro, that was done on johnny's first day to la walked in adam's studio jet lagged he walked in and just ripped that in one

insane it's the highest note i think i've ever heard him hit on a tennis ox it was ridiculous

How was it recording your final vocals for the song?

So I get quite fearful in the studio and booths, like just singing.

And I only really feel comfortable doing my vocals at home because I just feel a lot less stressed.

You don't have that, like, oh my god, it's we're against the clock.

So I've always kind of done my vocals

either like in the flat or like or in our place back home.

Oh, I stayed all night

till you left this life.

But that's just love.

Happy Boo Acts on the way back home.

Everybody on the treadmill running.

Who's singing back and booking?

That's Brooke, the newest member of our band.

Under the billboards, out of the heat, somebody started staring straight tonight.

So, me and Brooke have been friends since we're like 17.

And the first time I ever heard her sing, she was doing a cover of Dancing in the Dark by Bruce Springsteen.

And my jaw was on the floor.

I was like, That's how you sing.

I actually started trying to emulate her vibrato as we grew up together, which made me a better singer.

Like, I kind of learned how to sing through Brooke, really.

How do you think it affected the song to have her voice in there on those choruses as well?

It's like singing with a family member or something.

You know what I mean?

It's like

we have that, yeah, is it telepathy?

Yeah, I can sing anything, and she'll just find a harmony immediately, you know.

And then the middle A's didn't come until

after that.

Yeah, I didn't have the lyrics for it, and I was like, But I knew I wanted to round it off and make it about Annie and just kind of like a final gesture of love to Annie

above the rain-soaked garden of remembrance, Katie wakes at your initials in the sky.

Oh, I was like, I can hear strings in this section.

So, what I normally do is I'll sing the parts and then I'll send it to Rosie Danvers.

It's just string arrangement.

She's just done everybody like she's the best.

This was in Abbey Road.

Yeah.

Studio 2.

How big of an orchestra is playing that?

It's 30.

Wow.

And it was going through the same compressors used by the Beatles.

Out of the heap.

Somebody's dialing on the street tonight.

Oh, I can't stop running.

as it all down falls.

Happy Beloved on the way back home,

happy perhaps on the way back home.

The first half of that song is like I'm down in the doldrums.

I wasn't in a good way at the time.

I was definitely drinking too much.

It was just,

it was loss.

You know what I mean?

Grief hits you in so many different ways.

And I think I was like kind of focusing more on the loss as opposed to focusing on

the beauty, the beautiful impact she had on me in my life.

I think that's where the song flips.

Being grateful.

That's the end result of grief a lot of the time is just being so grateful.

And it's that really painful love that you'll always carry with you no matter how long I live for.

You know, I'm always going going to remember Annie.

Do you feel like you have responded to Annie's request about you shouting her out in your speeches?

Yeah, well, that was the thinking.

I think, you know, wherever she is now, she'll be like kicking her heels away, like, why didn't you do it when I was there?

You know what I mean?

But yeah, I think she would have liked it.

I think she would have liked the tune.

I don't know what I believe in, but I hope she can hear it wherever she is, you know.

And now, here's People Watching by Sam Fender in its entirety.

People watch all the way back home.

Envious of the glimmer of home.

Gives me a breaking feeling alone.

Gives me a moment out of the ego.

Used to feel so invincible.

I used to feel it was a world worth dreaming of.

Back in the gas works, screaming the song.

Just the beauty of youth would quell my aching heart.

Oh, I feel so dark.

Remember,

oh, my heart.

I feel so dark.

Remember,

I think we watch all the way back home.

Everybody on the train they'll run.

And I feel mortality.

Somebody's dying on the street tonight.

Oh, I can't stop running.

I see the old town farm.

I people want to be back home.

I people want to be back home.

I came back home after sunset.

Wide awake, chasing tracks of her tears.

Colder the nurse and got the gist of it.

I promised her to get her out of the car.

The place was falling to bits.

Understaffed and overruled by Calis.

The blue nurse was around the clock.

And the beauty of you then left my brain

heart.

But it wasn't hard

for me to song.

Oh, I stayed all day.

Do you live this life?

If that's just love,

I think we're watching

back home.

Everybody on the track now.

I know the blue boards out of the heat.

Somebody's done some straight tonight.

Or cast over

as it loads our far.

I think the watch will be back home.

I people watch all the way back home.

I people watch all the way back home.

I people watch all the way back home.

I people watch all the way back home.

I Happy for what you're back home.

Oh,

the rain so burdened of remembrance.

Kitty waves have stored initials in the sky.

Oh, I be for this crippled island and the turmoil of the things

that I hold you in my heart till the day I die.

Happy for one's rolling back home.

Everybody on the train known.

All of the no more, tidy heat.

Somebody started some streets and lay

for past no morning.

Why's it all come?

I think the watch on the web home.

I think the watch on a real

home.

I think the watch on the web home.

I think for watching

home.

Rocket for watching

home.

Rocket and watching

home.

Visit songexploder.net to learn more.

You'll find links to buy or stream people watching, and you can watch the music video.

You might also enjoy the episode with The War on Drugs, featuring Adam Grandeal, who-produced the song.

There's a link to that in the show notes, too.

This episode was produced by me, Craig Ely, Mary Dolan, and Kathleen Smith, with production assistance from Tiger Biscuit.

The episode artwork is by Carlos Lerma, and I made the show's theme music and logo.

Song Exploder is a proud member of Radiotopia from PRX, a network of independent, listener-supported, artist-owned podcasts.

You can learn more about our shows at radiotopia.fm.

If you'd like to hear more from me about what I'm watching and listening to and thinking about, you can subscribe to my newsletter, which you can find on the Song Exploder website.

You can also get a Song Exploder shirt at songexploder.net slash shirt.

I'm Rishikesh Hirway.

Thanks for listening.

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from PRX

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