Reference Points: Josh Record

Josh Record (yes – his real name) carries a positive spirituality that extends further than just the lush aura of his musical output. Be it volunteering in his local area to working charitably in the slums of Nairobi, the singer-songwriter is a pretty objectively “good egg”.

We asked him to write a little bit about the personal inspiration that this area of his life gives him. Stream him new single below, and read on for his thoughts on Culture and Community.

So much in the world inspires me, some things take me back so much that I can’t write music for a long time afterwards as I’m in awe of the beauty of the people around me.

My friends and I started doing road trips a while ago, all clubbing together £100 and driving from London to Istanbul, then going onto driving from London to northern Norway, before flying to New York buying an old school bus and driving from New York to Alaska. It was the most epic trip. Going from city to city, places like Detroit, New Orleans, Northern Canada and California were some of my favourite places, but the best had to be Alaska, where I spent some time alone, seeing huge bears and watching the Northern Lights! I wrote 3 songs there, one of them is called even called Alaska – it was just so inspiring….

I had stopped writing songs as my work and other things in life had got in the way, and a pinnacle time for me was when I first visited Kenya. Travelling to a dumpsite where people lived and going into their homes, eating together and sharing stories. I saw musicians there, playing their songs that were written in joy, desperation, sorrow and it was so so genuine, that I couldn’t help but be moved to write real songs again… Ive just finished re-reading my favourite book called Shantaram. It’s set in India, which is my next stop…

When I was young, my parents had an open door policy at the house, we ended up having a lot of guys over from the local rehab centre, sharing dinner together. This inspired me so much, and helped me to realise that we should open our hearts and doors to those in the community, to learn together. I ended up opening up my house on the middle of a council estate in South London, and lived with 9 people in a 4 bed house for a couple of years. It was awesome. We used to a run gigs in our house, and also put on music festivals in middle of the estate. This was always overwhelming to see all of the community pull together and come together… Here’s a little video of the music festival we did!

“For Your Love” is out now on Virgin Records. Josh is set to play the Scala on 29 May – tickets are available here.