Ginger Wildheart Interview

Ginger – Ghost in the Tanglewood

Ginger Wildheart has recently released his latest solo album, Ghost in the Tanglewood, recently reviewed on my blog. Personally, I found the album to be inspirational. I wanted to talk to Ginger about the background to this very personal album,  much of which focuses on his own battle with depression.

While people are more open about talking about Mental Health these days, there is still too much of a stigma around it. The more people like Ginger are willing to share their personal experiences, the further society can progress. It can only help in understanding and supporting those who do battle depression and other Mental Health issues.

Interview

Ginger kindly agreed to answer some questions for my blog, and I appreciate him taking the time to do so and being so frank, open and honest in his responses.

The Ginger Quiff: As someone who has experienced depression and anxiety first hand, I am always keen to take any opportunities to raise awareness of mental health issues.

I’ve followed your career for years. I specifically got in touch on the back of Ghost in the Tanglewood due to the deeply personal nature of the songs on the album and the obvious link to your own mental health. I know you have battled with this over the years.

I’ll start just with a question or two about the music. What was the reason you went down the route of roots/country/Americana particularly for this album?

Ginger: I’ve always loved Country music. It’s often been a safe haven for me, there’s just something very comforting about the elements in country. The close harmonies, the major keys, the lonesome lyrics and the sound of the pedal steel. There’s an honesty I find in country based music that I’ve always needed in my life, but the older I get the more essential it seems to be for me.

TGQ: Tell us about who played on the album. How did you go about getting the musicians together?

Ginger: I wanted to have experienced players from the folk and country scene play on this album. When you sing country in a Geordie accent you get folk, so I wanted to embrace both styles, which have so many similarities already.

The first person I wanted to get involved was John Kettle, who plays with, writes for and records Merry Hell, a band that came from The Tansads and one that I respect massively. John invited people in to play that he thought would enhance the songs. It was a great feeling to relinquish the reins and just enjoy the process.

TGQ: How different was it recording this album compared to, e.g., The
Wildhearts, Hey! Hello or Mutation?

Ginger: The main difference was how relaxed the sessions were. I was able to let people drive on this album, normally I’m at the steering wheel the whole time, which can make the experience more of a labour. I still listen to music from Ghost In The Tanglewood and it feels fresh. Normally I can’t listen to an album of mine for at least a year or two after it’s finished.

TGQ: The first song on the album ‘The Daylight Hotel’ is a tremendously upbeat experience, unexpectedly so, especially when you listen to the lyrics and realise what the song is about.

There is a lot of this song that resonates with me. I’ll just take a couple of these – “Yeah, we all just wanna be well” for starters. Although mental health seems to be more in the forefront of society with loads of organisations raising awareness of the importance of mental health and what it means, there are still too many people that dismiss it. Maybe they have the attitude that people are wallowing in self-pity, or think that being depressed is a lifestyle choice.

That line seems to me to be a comment on that attitude, the 1 in 4 of us who do experience mental health issues certainly don’t want to. We would do anything not to feel like that. How do you respond to people with that type of ‘man up and get on with it’ attitude?

Ginger: I still get it every day, people thinking that I want this fucking illness. Anyone who suffers from this gets the “cheer up” treatment regularly from people, and it just makes you realise that we’ve got a very long way to go in understanding what this actually is. But I can’t hate someone for not understanding something that even I don’t understand.

I’d give anything to be happy. Medication doesn’t do that for me, and my illness certainly doesn’t want me to be happy. I continue to just wait for either a breakthrough or a terminal illness.

TGQ: The other line I want to pick up on is “Your mind is your cell, ’til the demons have been expelled”. Another succinct way of summing up a lot of the mental health issues people experience. The negative thoughts you have are often exacerbated by the way your own brain processes them and builds them up to be monumental. You can only move on with life when you sort your head out.

I know different things work for different people. I’m interested in what it takes/what strategies you use stay well and keep your demons at bay?

Ginger: I don’t keep them at bay, they’re always there waiting to fuck everything up. People are turned away from me and a lot of problems seem unsurmountable. I exercise and I eat fairly healthy, and I try my best to be positive. I really do try. It’s just that sometimes it all falls down around me and I’m back ‘there’ again. I am right now. I just managed to turn away another girlfriend. Trouble is I understand completely why she will leave. This is my lot. It doesn’t seem like it will ever get better. I put my feelings into music, and sometimes that helps. But I am tired. Very tired.

TQG: Your frankness with your answers is admirable. And as I said, when I listen to the album and the lyrics, one of the things that strikes me is that you are laying yourself bare for all to see. As an entertainer you are someone who comes across as a genuine, warm and funny person. Not just in your music but your between song banter, and your relaying of personal experiences during the book/spoken word/acoustic tour for “Words & Music”.

Stuart Adamson was also a great musician and very personable, someone I admired. He was also someone who battled demons but in his case, unfortunately they won. Big Country often played
‘Tracks of My Tears’ live. When you listen back to it now and realise  what he was experiencing, it is tragic.

When I listen to ‘Minus You’ & ‘Don’t Say Goodbye’ I see two sides of a life, one where you are doing something you love but the other where you miss those who are most important to you. How does this lifestyle impact you, and specifically your mental health. Do you ever feel you are wearing a mask and can’t reveal how you are really feeling?

Ginger: I’m a pretty honest person, and I don’t believe in keeping things to myself if they can benefit anyone at all. I do try to wear a mask, and maintain a level of positivity whenever I can. I’m very sociable and like people to like me. But this fucking illness doesn’t always allow that to happen, and I doubt everything good in my life. I assume it will leave me. And then, of course, I drive it away. I won’t kill myself, as I have children, but I want to die every single day.

TGQ: I think many people will be able to relate to that last answer. As someone who is very much in the public eye, when you have experienced issues with your metal health they have played out on Twitter. I am interested on your thoughts on how being in the public eye, and specifically on social media with its instant knee jerk responses, impacts your mental health?

As Twitter is a public forum I see some responses from people in these situations that shock and disgust me, similarly with Sinead O’Connor & when Chester Bennington took his own life, some of the comments I saw on Twitter showed a massive lack of understanding, compassion or even basic humanity. How do we get through to these people? What is your message for people like that?

Ginger: The simple answer is that if people don’t want to understand then they won’t. And no approach in the world is going to change that. The crippling reality is that these people will realise how serious it is if it affects someone they love, which is an awful way for a lesson to present itself.

But we are human, we have no natural empathy for each other. We condemn and destroy, it’s in our nature. We work with a level of hatred that is supplied naturally, in our very DNA, and the more negativity we surround ourselves with the more this gene is allowed to strengthen. I often think that we’re simply fucked, but part of me carries on believing because I can’t accept giving up.

TGQ: I always think about you as one of the hardest working men in rock. You always seem to have one project or another on the go. Or multiple – you are touring the Tanglewood album and playing on the Britrock must be Destroyed tour in your Wildhearts guise alongside Reef, Terrorvision and Dodgy.

I also see you tweeting regularly about your prolific song-writing productivity and lack of sleep. Does you mental health sometimes increase your productivity, and if so what are the drawbacks of this?  I ask this question as from a personal perspective, when I am feeling most anxious and depressed, it can often increase my productivity – as if I have to prove myself. But I know if that continues for an extended period and I don’t recognise it and act, I’ll crash and fall into a dark place making me totally unproductive and even not getting out of my bed for days in worst case scenario.

Ginger: If I didn’t have music, and work, and commitments, I would be fucked. Utterly fucked. I wouldn’t last a year without a hectic schedule. I genuinely think it is what keeps me going, year in year out. Sometimes it’s more difficult than others, but I’ve got good at pushing myself to do things I consider impossible. That whole ‘if it doesn’t kill you it makes you stronger’ thing is absolutely true. I’m still here and I’m pretty fucking indestructible now.

TGQ: Back to the album, and the positivity of having suffered mental health setbacks and illnesses. What I mean by that is the strength, resilience and attitude that can arise from coming out the other side of depressive illness.

I take inspiration from tracks like ‘Paying it Forward’ and & ‘Golden Tears’. I think the message in these tracks is positive. A message of hope in helping others. Though it feels like hell at the time, the resilience you can build from suffering. Tell me more about these songs & the video and story behind ‘Paying it Forward’?

Ginger: I gave a fiver to someone on the street and a guy said “that’s a wonderful thing to do”, so I said “then you do it”. He looked at me like I just asked him to fly.

Kindness is at its essence when you can’t receive anything back for it. The feeling of doing something good because you can choose to, this is something we seem cool with losing in our evolution. That’s a very powerful message to get across, that if we don’t practice kindness then we’ll convince ourselves that it doesn’t exist. And we can convince ourselves pretty much anything, let’s face it. We can convince ourselves that immigrants are destroying our financial security, and not banking systems and rich people paying themselves massive dividends. And because the banking systems own the media, these people have their worst fears confirmed on a daily basis. And hey presto, you have a social battle that acts as the perfect diversion from what’s actually going on.

The video was simply an attempt to recreate the vocal session from the album, where the students at the Hope School in Wigan let us borrow their voices for the chorus.

TGQ: One of the important things is removing the stigma around mental health so people don’t feel embarrassed about it. I’ve joined a growing list of people who are actively promoting removing stigma in the workplace and talking openly about mental health. (Time to Change website has more details on how you can encourage your employers to sign the pledge) As someone who has gone through it himself, what message do you have for anyone out there who is suffering with depressive illness or other mental health issues?

Ginger: Just keep moving, keep going and don’t stop. Stay alive.

Gigs

TGQ: Plug time. Why should we come and see you on your upcoming tours. Both for Ghost in the Tanglewood and the Britrock gigs?

Ginger: They’ll be fun, and the audience are generally good people.

TGQ: What is next for you?

Ginger: I’m currently writing the follow up to the follow of Ghost In The Tanglewood.

I have an album written of very strange music that I’d like to record this year, and The Wildhearts have an album written that we hope to record in November.

Many thanks to Ginger for taking the time to answer my questions and in such an honest and open manner. I look forward to seeing him and the bands live in Glasgow soon.

Ginger Wildheart’s website.

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