On Approaching A New Album As A 'Somebody'
S.T: So the new album is out on Monday. What was it like approaching the album with the pressure of such huge success online, as well as being known in guitar circles a lot more now than ever before?
J.G: Its funny, I mean this is a weird thing as Im always much too honest, but media pressure, isnt a thing. Because the media are gonna like it more, than they ever did before, theres a pressure on them to like it, because right now Im this guy that youre kind of supposed to like, you know what I mean? The pressure is on them to review the album, so if theyre gonna slag it off, theyre gonna have to back that up, because they know Ive got people who are fans, and they know that Ive got now, so its actually more pressure on them! The pressure that I do feel, which is really intense, is the pressure of expectation more just from people wanting to listen to it. Ive got a way bigger audience now, so I dont wanna let them down with something thats no good, so Ive just done my best not to do that. You cant help thinking about it when youre recording, like what are people gonna think of this, but you have to try and not be distracted by it.
S.T: So with your style of playing theres a very heavy percussive side to how you create songs alongside the vocals. What was the balance between leaning more heavily into instrumentation as oppose to vocals?
J.G: Well theres four instrumental pieces, which is more than Ive ever had before, and I really like instrumental music, but its a very different thing to make and perform as well. Its funny because there are no tunes on the album which arent in some way kind of weird or crazy guitar-wise; they all are, they just all are. Even the ones that maybe dont sound like they are, like theres a song called Theres No Need To Be Afraid, which sounds very simple, but actually its not! (laughs) Its really hard to play, or its hard for me anyway! I think its just in the way I approach it where I write the first and then do the guitar parts, Im not really thinking Ahh sh*t this is just gonna be a guitar w*nkfest (laughs) If Ive already written a song and I already know what its about, it doesnt really matter how much guitar w*nkery there is, the meaning is still there, so thats how I approach it. Sometimes therell be an area within a song which is just okay. Like some of my songs have guitar solos, which sounds quite weird I suppose! But theres a song on the new album called Orville, that has a
proper guitar solo even though its an instrumental, theres a section in the middle where its a proper, yno its quite shred (laughs) guitar solo! So for that it was like Is this possible/Can I do this? would it be possible to play? I virtually never play that song live, its really really hard. Ive got a groove going with the left hand, like kind of tapping and doing a bit of percussion on the neck, and then the right is doing multiple-string legato runs and arpeggios and stuff, which are completely separate, so its a really, really insane thing (laughs). What Im hoping with the technical aspect, is that people will watchin it on Youtube and therell be some kid in his bedroom whos like Lets play that! and theyll go on to make something ten-times more incredible, a few years from now.