1. The First Song I Wrote
The first song I ever wrote was a track called ‘My Baby Don’t Love Me Anymore’. It was a 12-bar blues number, mainly, but not exclusively, about my ‘baby’ not loving me anymore. I was about 13 years old and playing in my first band. It didn’t show an enormous amount of promise, and was more or less a B.B. King rip-off. In truth, I had no ‘baby’, and would not have a ‘baby’ for many years to come.
2. The Last Song I Released
‘Hollering Hearts’ is the first official single from my fifth album, But For All These Shrinking Hearts. It’s a song about hope and fear and following the thing that makes you feel the most inspired and joyful. I recorded half of it at home, and then John Castle and I recorded various other bits at Alberts Studios and Sony Studios in Sydney, and then mixed it in Melbourne at John’s studio. I always want to be able to stand by the songs I’ve released in 20 years’ time, and I wouldn’t bother releasing something if I felt that wouldn’t be the case, so I love it!
3. Songwriting Secrets
Songwriting is still a great mystery to me. I can sit down and write a song anytime, but to write a song that I truly love and believe in needs to happen via some kind of lightning strike of creativity. I try and facilitate the right environment for that strike to happen by having a studio at home, by working away at music every day, by reading, writing and looking at art, et cetera, but at the end of the day I’m still waiting for the really special songs to emerge from somewhere I can’t access at will. It’s become a numbers game for me. If I write 50 songs a year, I know about seven of them will be really great and deserve to be on an album.
4. The Song That Makes Me Proud
The songs of mine that have always been my favourites are rarely the singles. I love all my songs and am proud that any of them were able to forge a career for me, but my favourites are generally the album tracks. Songs like ‘Even In Corners’, ‘Stories That Get Told’ and ‘New Years Song’ are lyrically some of my favourites, and encapsulate the way I see the world pretty well. They’re like little diaries for me to look back on moments of my life.
5. The Song That Changed My Life
I reckon the song that actually changed my relationship with music was ‘The House At Pooh Corner’. It was a version done by the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, and my folks had the record and played it when I was about four. I remember sitting on the stairs and crying at the lyrics, and feeling so sad, but so happy and excited at the same time. I remember vividly not being able to explain what had upset me, and also being really drawn to that feeling that the song was eliciting. From then on, I always wanted to feel songs. I wanted to chase that feeling of overwhelming emotion that comes with a great storytelling song. I still chase that, and most recently have loved getting that feeling from Sufjan Stevens’ new record.
Josh Pyke’s But For All These Shrinking Hearts out Friday July 31 through Wonderlick/Sony.
