Tom McGuire & the Brassholes have recently released a couple of top quality soul funk singles and on the eve(ish) of their gig this Thursday at the Euro Championships fan-zone in Glasgow Green, I had to the opportunity to pose Mr McGuire some questions.
Oh Savanna
The Ginger Quiff: You’ve returned recently with a brace of stunning singles, most recently Oh Savanna, and prior to that Super Solid Soul Vehicle. I read that Oh Savanna was based on a meeting with a real person, and Super Solid Soul Vehicle is inspired by the wonderful Bill Withers. Tell us more about the story behind Savanna.
Tom McGuire: The story behind “Oh Savanna” is an interesting one. It’s partly about a chance encounter with an actual person, Savanna, during a trip to New Orleans. It was at a time when I was flying high and felt like I was on a roll in life, really crushing it. Me and a friend ended up hanging with Savanna, who is a super interesting and unique person, we talked late into the night about life and art and everything. We each were carrying notebooks, being creative types, so we wrote each a list of life tasks, which I’ve been diligently working through. It was a really nice encounter on a really nice trip during a period in life where I felt really well and good.
Fast forward to exactly one year later, I found myself in a very different state, as a result of various pressures I was really at my lowest ebb mentally. A feeling of having lost my way, and how different the person I was from that of a year before, and what seemed like the long road back to that sort of pinnacle of wellness. So the song is asking myself, and Savanna, who only ever met me in this prime mode, “What went wrong?”.
I suppose the song is really about examining the highs and lows of life and how you can very easily lose your way. It’s also coming out the back of that and mercifully finding it again, by focussing energies on the correct things, the things that bring joy and levity.
Bill Withers
TGQ: A song very much based on personal experiences, the other on musical influences?
TMcG: Super Solid Soul Vehicle is about influences but it actually shares a lot of the same experiential themes as Savanna, it’s also searching for the right way to live, but searching through the messages given by those who have influenced me. That song is about Bill Withers, but also the philosophy in music that he would espouse. That you have to be careful not to let the extraneous things in music tear you away from the visceral soulful FEEL of it. This was a trap that I was definitely falling into in my approach to music and life in general, and when he died, a lot of the retrospectives highlighted this sort of wisdom, and it really hit home for me at a time when I was struggling.
TGQ: When you started playing music, what made you choose the funk and soul route?
TMcG: I actually played metal and other heavy stuff for a long time, but I always had a proper voice and a passion for the funk end of the spectrum. Stevie Wonder especially. He’s the guy.
I was always reluctant to make a proper go of it with music, seemed like a pipe dream with a lot of thankless hard work, so it was when I finally started putting some energy into writing some good funk stuff, I thought, right this is the one to really make a go of. It’s the most directly expressive and also immediately relatable and powerful for other people.
Metal is powerful and cathartic for me for sure, but it’s fairly limited in it’s appeal for others.
Inspiration
TGQ: What else inspires you to write songs?
TMcG: My life and struggles and revelations are the things that make me write songs, and the occasional story, but even then I always end up relating it back to my own experiences and struggles. A lot of it is dark and very honest and heart on sleeve, but packaged in hi energy good time music. Sort of a sneak attack to trick people into listening to deep yet hopefully rewarding and relatable songs about the struggles of modern existence.
TGQ: You’ve mentioned writing from your own perspectives and struggles with Oh Savannah being a direct questioning of that. When we were first in touch, you mentioned the mental health aspect of why I started the blog. Is this something you have been always been impacted by, and has it influenced your music in any way.
TMcG: I certainly have my struggles with mental health, and I’m trying to be less sheepish about talking about it directly. I am however am very frank, explicit and honest about my struggles in song. It’s pretty much the inspiration for most of my songwriting, however I really try to attack It from an optimistic and healing angle. I’m sort of trying to heal myself through writing about the struggles. I suppose that in a way the songs are a reminder to myself of the revelations I’ve had on how to keep living and being well.
Maybe its also useful and helpful to others too. I certainly hope it is to at least someone.
Mental Health
TGQ:A similar reason as to why I started writing. A personal release for me. I also find that listening to music and going to gigs is one of my releases, it allows me to take myself out of myself and lose myself in the music for a while, this is one of the reasons I miss live music. What is it you do to try to keep yourself mentally healthy?
TMcG: This is a hard question because I haven’t really figured out a very reliable way if im honest. I have certainly recognised live musical performance as an important thing for me, mainly because of it’s absence over the last year. It’s a thing that I can sort of sneak up on myself and lose myself in. When I am feeling well I can observe it’s because I’ve been able to embrace the unintelectualisable joys in life, singing, dancing, levity, fun. I’ve discovered that live performance is a sort of cheat code to allow me to access that sort of vital feeling.
In general I try to meditate and try to make sure I’m spending at least a bit of time doing doing certain things that I think contribute to wellbeing, and not think too much or work too hard. I don’t always manage, but I’m trying.
Playing Live
TGQ: I first came across you outside Love Music playing live for Record Store Day when your first album was released. You were clearly having a great time, and musically you blew me away, the passion you put into playing live was palpable. So much so, as soon as you’d played your last note I was in buying a copy of the album from Sandy.
TMcG: Thanks! That was a hell of a gig. I was flying on a high from releasing that record for some time!
TGQ: Now that we are on a route out of lockdown, you’ve got several festival type gigs coming up, a couple of pretty special ones stand out, immediately on the horizon, you have one at the Euro’s fanzone and later in the summer at the Playground Festival where you are sharing the stage with some bona fide legends. How did these gigs come about and what are you looking forward to most about them.
TMcG: I guess they came about because we are fortunate enough to be on a few people’s radars. Really excited to be playing in front of people in general, its going to be a really good feeling to have people there to respond to. We have a whole batch of very sick new music that we are super keen to share with people.
Looking forward to Playgrounds festival especially, thats going to be a big one for us. There will be a few eyes on us then and I think we are ready to crush it to death.
TGQ: About playing live, your music has the ability to go off on a little detour and you seemingly get lost in the moment when you play live. Are these improvised on the spur of the moment or are they planned/rehearsed?
TMcG: There is a certain amount of impromptu things that can happen in a show. The guys are all super accomplished musicians so are able to play on the fly or respond to calls that I’m making. The show has got to be a show, not just us playing the songs, there’s got to be something vital and alive fluid happening. So yeah there are things that will happen on the spur of the moment if I get a bit excited.
Releases
TGQ: What about a new album, is that in the pipeline?
TMcG: We have a load of tunes that are ready for an album and we are arranging to go into the studio in the autumn. Its going to be sick. The response to the recent singles has been great, and I feel like we have developed a lot as a band. So the next batch of songs is going to be a killer record for sure.
TGQ: What are your hopes for the rest of 2021 and into 2022?
TMcG: Couple more singles this year. Theres going to be what I think might be a VERY BIG one in the summer. Make another album, hopefully release next year. Take over the world. Be well.
Thanks to Tom for taking time out to answer a few questions. I look forward to that VERY BIG single…
I’d just like to take Tom’s last couple of words there and re-emphasise them. Be well Tom, and everyone else who may be reading.
Tom McGuire & the Brassholes – Website
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