Track By Track: Bastien Keb on 22.02.85

Intro

This started with an old demo, with the drums and synths. I started 'ooh'-ing and the lead line came out and a few finger-tapping guitars later it was born. The lyrics are actually a real thing - as in I have a photo of an ex-girlfriend, in a book, in a cupboard beneath loads of clothes I don’t wear, truth, ennit.

Pick Up

I’d had the horn hook and progression to this track for ages but never quite knew how to use it, until I had a drink with my flatmate one night and his thing is to get really baked and go and write stories, so when he went off to his room, I went to mine and started putting this tune together and at about 2am after a box of wine it was sorta... all there.

Cashmere

This one was started and wrapped up really quickly as I was really feeling it, for a while it was my favourite song of mine. It’s kinda the song on the album that started the whole city at night story! It’s dirty and sexy(?)(haha), so it’s the captain of the album for me!

My Lovely Wool

I was in a practice studio on my ones using a piano for the soundtrack to a mate's film and the piano was fucked and outta tune. It was a tiny room but it was sounding so sick to me, I fucked about with it a little more later. I also had this lead line I wanted to play on a saw, until I met Claudia Kane and her voice is killer so I was desperate to get her on some tracks. She ended up tweaking the line and that’s what starts the tune.

The Lug

I just wanted to fill the early Dr. John void on the album so I popped this in there. I dunno if it fits the night time vibe but who knows, will anyone ever know? Fuck it, who knows?

Night Hustle

Just a dirty sorta funk thing! I really liked it slowed down so I dropped it a few semitones but after a mistake in the project the second half ended up full speed, thankfully it sounded sick so I ran with it. I was missing some harmony a cappella stuff on the album so I decided to chuck on the lead line later, then was desperate for the groove to drop back; it’s probably a bit of a strange arrangement.

Rare Fit

I just like it when the side stick comes in, I had it for a long time and then wrote "Fit Rare" and once it had that bit I thought It sat well with the other tunes.

Fit Rare ft. Cappo

I had written this soundtrack for a strange radio play that never happened and so I had all these funk tunes - I don’t think this was one of them but it was the same sorta period. I was trying to get as funky as possible! I needed something to throw on top of it and after doing a remix for Cappo I asked him and he was down - I didn’t expect him to sort it so quick but when it came back I knew it was forcing its way on to the album. Thanks Capps! Big up Eisha and Caitlin for the screams too!

Glue (The End)

Tom Waits is the best dude and I was listening to some spoken word off Orphans, that and some John Carpenter soundtracks led to this happening. The ‘sample’ in it is an old song I’d written for a film that was never used, so was happy that it got a chance to make it onto the album.

Nocturnal/Midnight Shift (Serious Thumb)

Claudia Kane’s the best - go listen, trust me! I wanted to do a Taxi Driver sort of theme?

Town

This was written on a Christmas holiday in Wales, I think it happened in the wee hours on my ones watching telly. I had a couple of lines but not enough - so I asked my mate Will Morrison (who also did the artwork) to write some lyrics, he banged them out in about 20 mins. The lead lines, harmonies, and overdubs came later, back in the Midlands.

Yela

This one was almost on the first album, it’s been around for a longgggg time. The main bit was written really quickly during half time of a World Cup game!

The Cut

After the first album Alex Chase (One Handed Music) asked me to write a Christmas song, it might have been for Tom Ravenscroft - anyway this was one of the demos that never made it. I was feeling the chorus though so I dropped it down a few semitones and chucked a bunch of reverb on it and it was there! The girl at the beginning is Camille Limoges, she’s a mate of the guy who did the artwork, who was out in Canada at the time. I asked him to ask her to talk about a break up on her own in a room with a dictaphone and she did. Which is dope. Thanks Camille!

Glue (Daydream)

I wanted people to get that this was part two to the tune "Glue". The way I see it in the first "Glue" tune, is that it’s a dude talking about a break up hoping it’ll be alright. This one may or may not be a daydream of the girlfriend saying 'it’ll be good as new' - either way it’s meant to be comforting with the girl telling you it’ll be alright.

Younger

I had the chorus bit for a while and the rest of the song was a load of synth arpeggios. I scrapped them cause I was listening to a load of '80s pop music at the time, so wanted to write something hooky! Hopefully it works?

Crumbs

The hidden one?!