Johnny Marr talks to The Current's Jill Riley about his new record "Fever Dreams Pts. 1-4," and his continuous journey to keep evolving in his music. Marr tells us about his Crazy Face Factory, how the new album title shaped his songwriting, and his latest work with Billie Eilish and Finneas on the new Bond film "No Time To Die".

Interview Transcript

Edited for clarity and length.

JILL RILEY: By the power of technology and zoom and the way that we've been connecting during this global pandemic, we have been able to check in with so many of the artists that she listened to on The Current and probably artists that we wouldn't be able to connect with, which is, I mean, I don't ever want to say that there's an upside to a global pandemic. But we've been able to connect with a lot of great folks and my guest today, you would know from The Smiths in the 1980s. He's played with a number of bands like The The, The Pretenders and The Cribs and Modest Mouse, great session guy, a solo career. He's always staying busy doing something. We got Mr. Johnny Marr. Hi, how are you?

JOHNNY MARR: Hi, Jill. I'm good, thank you. Thanks for inviting me.

Thank you for doing this. You alright? You're staying healthy?

Yeah, I am actually yeah, doing okay, still got some some of my brain cells intact after this this time. I made a record, I just reverted back to being a studio rat. The question I've been most asked, as a musician, how I've coped with not being on the road and not going out and playing during all this time, but I made a record. I resorted back to my old habits of being a studio rat. So I was very fortunate that I had something to do in my time, and I was able to actually do that. And I've recently got out on the road and played a few shows, which has been amazing, given, you know, the coming out of a world nervous breakdown. So I've got a lot to be thankful for. Yeah.

We have a lot to talk about. I want to talk about Fever Dreams Pts. 1-4, which is coming out in the new year. The new Bond film is finally in theaters, and "No Time To Die," you know, Billy Eilish and Finneas, I connect their names with the theme, but I didn't realize that you had played guitar and that you worked on the music for that film. Can you kind of take me back to how that started and how that came together?

Hans Zimmer was doing the music, I've made quite a few films with Hans. Now, the first one I did with him was in 2010, which was Inception. I was very lucky because I got to be kind of the featured instrument, the guitar was the featured thing on Inception. And we've done a few movies since: Spider Man and Freeheld and a couple of other things. Hans is like family to me now. So he got me the bond gig. And it's a guitar theme or it should be a guitar thing, you know, traditionally. So I've been kind of his guitar guy, sort of, I guess for the last 10 years. So he called me up and asked me would I do it so of course I was there like a shot. That was maybe two years ago or something. And we got done with the movie just before the pandemic hit. For my involvement in the movie, it seemed like I was working on it just a couple of weeks, and then the idea of Billie doing her song came up. And before I'd even heard the song, I thought it was a great idea because I knew Billy's stuff and I knew about Finneas, you know, her brother, they work together obviously. I couldn't wait to hear it. Then when I heard the song I thought it was great, I thought was fantastic. Then really it was just a matter of Bond-ifying it without it changing--moving away from being a Billie Eilish song. In truth all I had to do is just play some little guitar bits on it. At first I play too much, and then it was a matter of reduce reduce reduce. But Billie and Finneas were kind of in the driving seat really because they know what they're doing. It was a great song. So I'm playing on a Bond movie and because I was brought up in the UK, you know, for a British kid--British guitar player--playing that theme with the orchestra was definitely a career highlight. And I like the movie, so it was all a win-win really, for me. It was a labor of love.

I'm talking with Johnny Marr. We were just talking about the "No Time To Die" theme song that Johnny Marr did with the Billy Eilish and Finneas, being able to bring his guitar stylings to a Bond theme, which, like you said, career highlight when you grow up with something, and then you're able to do it that has to be one of those cool full circle moments for you.

Over the last, I guess, forty years of Bond movies, since I was a little kid, the guitar has--sometimes it's been in there. And sometimes it's not, and there's been a different kind of sound going. So I'm glad to have brought it back into the forefront in the movie, it's a real honor.

I'm talking with guitar player, Johnny Marr, looking forward to a new record due out toward the end of February. So in the new year, it's called "Fever Dreams Pts. 1-4" and I know that you've got this live streaming special coming up in November, November 10th through the 14th. And it's live at the Crazy Face Factory, which, it's kind of your hub. For anybody that doesn't know, what is the Crazy Face Factory?

The Crazy Face Factory is my studio, which is in a factory. It's at the top of an old factory outside of Manchester. I've been there for quite a while now. I spend way way too much of my time in that place. I did my last record there, and a couple of singles and then this new Fever Dreams album, it's just this is really cool kind of industrial space. There aren't too many places like that in the world anymore. Yeah, I'm reminded of New York in the 50s 60s 70s like a loft space or maybe Cleveland. It's an industrial kind of vibe, which certainly seeps into the music somewhat. I have an association with those kind of places, and a certain kind of music. So me and my band are playing--what we wanted to do was invite people into what it's like when we get together and play. I didn't really fancy doing a live stream from a venue on a stage with lights to an empty room and kind of pretend that there was an audience there. I think that kind of thing works all right, if you're a solo act, but what I do takes a fair bit of energy so I wanted to do it in the daytime and make it kind of a high energy thing. So it's a peek into me and my band getting together and playing during the daytime playing a live set.

I'm talking with Johnny Marr here on The Current, so live at the Crazy Face Factory, again you can find that November 10 through the 14th and it'll be streaming on demand. Where are we right now? I'm just I'm looking behind you and I'm seeing some studio equipment and I see a whole rack of guitars which is very exciting.

This is a room where we do a lot of editing and this is where I do the movie stuff. This is in the studio, but this is the room where I get shipped off to to tinker on. This is where I've been doing the movies. So yes, this is in the studio.

Well, let's talk about the record of which, you know, it's a double record, which is coming out in February, "Fever Dreams Pts. 1-4". I wonder if you could kind of just take us back to the start of the record. When did you start getting ideas together? When did you gather everyone together to start working on it? What was the concept behind it?

Okay, well, we finished touring--I guess 2019, we'd been on the road with the previous album "Call the Comet" for a few years and it's a habit of mine that I've had from really soon as I started out where I look ahead, and usually in the groups that I've been in I'm the annoying one that when everyone wants to have a little bit of a downtime I go, "New record! New record!" And especially with it being my thing now, I was getting the itch to record some new songs. So pretty much the day after we finished the last tour I started writing, getting all my ideas that I've been collecting on the road and little bits and pieces--singing stuff in my phone and recording stuff. That was the first day and the day after the last show. I pretty much got the title "Field Of Dreams Pts. 1-4" within the first week of the writing process. I have no idea what it means. It was just evocative and I find really, as a writer, one of the parts of the process of writing is that if you get an idea and it doesn't suck after like a week, you kind of think, "Oh I'm onto something." And I just liked it. But I had no idea what this "Pts. 1-4" meant. And then with a little bit of artistic lateral thinking, the idea of "Pts. 1-4" really was something exciting to me, it gave me a kind of a framework and something I hadn't done before, and then it occurred to me, "Okay, if it's got four parts then maybe I could have four sides of vinyl." And I've never done a double album before, you know, recorded, written a double album and The Smiths had a compilation album, in the 80s in the States, which was across two vinyls, but I've never done a double album with a band. So then that gave me scope, that gave me--again, you know, thinking artistically before even you get into the writing and you kind of go, "Oh, well, I can make some of the songs a little bit more expansive. And I can experiment a bit." And yeah, so this "Pts. 1-4" gave me a little bit of a license to do something I've never done before. In a way the concept is then the record comes out in four parts. So it's all written and recorded as a double album. But then we release it, and people get four songs, and then they get another four songs, then they get another, and so on. And then the end of it makes up the entire record. When I told the record company what I wanted to do there, they thought I was a genius, I come up with this genius sort of plan, but really it was just because I came up with this title "Pts. 1-4" just sounded good. But indeed, it's given me a nice way of releasing this record. I'm quite impatient Jill. So I don't have to wait till the entire record comes out. At the moment the first EP, the first part of the album is out now at your local streaming service and on vinyl. It's been a nice thing as well, because we've got me and my best buddies--my art direction, we got to design a bunch of different sleeves and make the packaging different for people who wanted the vinyl. The concept just kind of presented itself as an artistic opportunity. And then with the music, of course, I like to--you know, you hope that you--I know this sounds very obvious, but you hope that you evolve from record to record. And you certainly--in my case, anyway, I don't want to make exactly the same record as I made before. The last album was really well received, particularly by fans. And so I didn't want to mess with the program. But as I say, I wanted to evolve. So the first lead track, as I guess it's called these days is called "Spirit Power and Soul" and I deliberately wrote that to be very uptempo, and very energetic and to come back with a bang, really. So that was the idea. I mean, the concepts, it's not all very well having a concept like that. But you do have to actually then just get around to writing a decent song. And but luckily, with "Spirit Power and Soul" it turned out okay. People seem to like it. It's gone down very well.

We're talking about the new record, which is due out later in February. So in the new year, "Fever Dreams Pt. 1-4" and that's the album in its entirety. But kind of this smaller EP release leading up to it. Johnny, you talked about, you know, you hope that you evolve, and I wonder, how do you see your own evolution? I mean, from your days with The Smiths up until now, how do you think your guitar playing has evolved? How have you seen your own progression as an artist?

Well I feel very fortunate and I feel like I'm happy to be in the place that I'm at. So I think that kind of says a lot. I don't ever really think in terms of--I don't really do things--you want to be successful, of course you want to be. But when I started it out with The Smiths, when I formed that band I wanted to do something great. That was the main thing I wanted to--you try and emulate your heroes really, Jill. And my heroes were from the glam period of the UK, what we call glam bands like T. Rex and David Bowie and Roxy Music and things like that--the 60s version of the Rolling Stones and so on. Many, many influences. We just wanted to be great, and no one was more surprised, than me when The Smiths started getting in the charts, you know. So I started off with that band in it with a bit of a bang, really. And then over the years--and then the band, we were together for five years, and then it's almost like the band's stature has almost got more kind of revered as we've gone along. So, you know, started off as a say, with a bit of a band, but I always saw myself doing a lot of different things as a guitar player, in a way, I kind of fancy taking the guitar in some places where I had no business being really, so I played on a lot of pop records. Playing with Pet Shop Boys--Pet Shop Boys have made a lot of records, and I've been on more Pet Shop Boys records than any other musician, which is a real great source of pride to me. So trying to bring the guitar--I saw the guitar as a machine for making interesting pop music, if I was able to do that. And then you know, with bands like The The I evolved again really, my sound became a little bit more experimental and less straightforward. And with the movie stuff that I've done recently, the guy I was in The Smiths, I don't think would have--certainly didn't have the experience, but I probably didn't have the presence to, to do what I did on Inception or on Bond because a lot of what happens on those movies is I'm given pieces of music to fit the guitar into, or I'm given scenes to make music on the guitar. So a lot of that stuff comes with experience, and I've been doing a lot of sessions. So we are working with people out Beck or, and then my time with Modest Mouse being in an American group. So when I look back on all these different roads I've gone down with the guitar, it's kind of amazing to me that I've been able to do this. Speaking to American audience, I can't emphasize enough how great it was for me being in Modest Mouse. We made a really successful, really, what I think, is a very unusual album, "We Were Dead Before The Ship Even Sank," and then we did a follow up album that was kind of done as a little bit of an odd release that doesn't get that much attention. But I was a British kid brought up and I got to being a great alternative American band. So none of that would have happened had I not struck out on my own at the age of 24. I was a baby when The Smiths split. So when I talk about and I'll think about these, you know, this kind of journey--I kind of just followed my own musical whims really, and I've been very fortunate to have been invited to collaborate with all of these amazing people Bernard Sumner from New Order and Chrissy Hine when I was in The Pretenders for a while and played with Nile Rogers with Chic, and the list goes on, I can't quite believe it. In a way my career's almost like backwards because I ended up starting out, you know, now I've had the solo band for I guess, 10 years now. So "Fever Dreams" is the fourth album under my own name. And that's been a lot of touring since 2010. We played the States so many times, and I'm going out again, I'll be over there opening for The Killers next year on their North American tour.

So, you know, I'm really happy being my own--it's funny, because when I was collaborating in the 90s, and I was working with all these different people, I was being asked all the time, "You never wanted to form your own band. Why do you want to form your own band?" And now I have had my own band for 10 years. I'm asked pretty much every interview who I want to collaborate with. It keeps things interesting. I've had an interesting time and I'm looking forward to not knowing what the hell is going to happen over the next few years. I like embracing the mystery, you know, it's done me okay so far, too late to stop now.

I was gonna say it sounds like you've been embracing the mystery for the better part of your career.

I've done it all my life.

Yeah, from what, age 24 when The Smiths dissolved, but such an incredible legacy, and that legacy that has crossed musical generations. There's a new appreciation for The Smiths all the time. Again, all the bands that you mentioned, that you've played with and the artists and now bringing you up to where you are now, with this new record "Fever Dreams Pts. 1-4" which is due out in February in the new year 2022. It's almost weird to say that year out loud because I just feel like we've kind of missed out on a bit of the timeline there. We do look forward to you coming to the States. I saw that you have some shows over in Europe with with Blondie and then you'll be coming over here. September 20 at the Xcel Energy Center, Johnny Marr opening for The Killers. We look forward to your return. Congratulations on the record and I really appreciate you checking in and talking with The Current today.

Thank you for having me. I'm glad you like the record and I'll see you when I get over there.

External Links

Johnny Marr - official site

Credits

Host - Jill Riley
Guest - Johnny Marr
Technical Director - Evan Clark
Producers - Christy Taylor, Jesse Wiza