Train (Pat Monahan)

Part 1

0:04that yet and this is pat monahan train how you doing good how you do it i'm good i bet you're on top of the world this week yet it's really fun and about the gylin airplane to go to new york to be on tv show and man we're just so busy that it's hard to you know sit and celebrate but i plan on doing that next week when we get back from the by yet yeah do buy so what's uh... and you buy is just like a one-off thing you plan for like the sultan or something i think that there's a there's a the divide jazz festival of the first issue you've never we've never gone there but man i think i'm not going to go up for you interesting time i think yeah for sure it's uh... it's a whole well you must you must have been to that part of the world before the way i think i've never been to the middle east or anywhere called all of that the air countries at all now crazy it's a it's gonna be gonna be crazy for me how about you have you

0:51no i haven't have you you didn't even have time though to to look around i think that we'll get in a day early and uh... and have a time i have a living on my day to look around a little bit but basically that's it then the next uh... the morning after the show will have to hit it that's that's the rockstar life i suppose in and out hey are you guys excited about arcade fighter we are as a country yes it's uh it's uh it's uh it's like the pinnacle we we've we've had such a good music scene up here for a few years and it's kind of like finally it's recognized do you know a lot of our acts like are you you're in Seattle so you're not you're not too far no i'm not too far no i just i love that man it's just like everybody who announces they're from Canada i go god man i can't believe what a small place compared to the United States has so much talent like when it comes to music and comedy

1:36yeah rule the world it's a work we're coming along we're going for for you guys soon soon enough amazing well you were there the other day how i guess i'm gonna start off like this how how manufactured was the show i mean even with arcade fire winning it was almost like two to pre-plan that they were gonna play the last song after they won you know i don't know man i i i think that those guys were probably psyched to play music i don't know that they expected to win there were a lot of acts that performed on the grammys that didn't win anything i mean Justin Bieber was up there and katie perry was up there and you know uh beryl mars ended up winning one out of ten but man i don't know i i was really shocked by so many things best new artist i mean i was shocked yeah and uh i think that the voters of the grammys this year were really voting for

2:25like i don't know something different something very organic or something it seemed like it was about musicianship and song lighting and kind of the basics and not really the popularity of the whole thing i was really blown away even though arcade fire is incredibly popular you know and they sell out the Madison Square Garden among other places were definitely popular but it didn't seem like a popularity contest at all i mean how did it seem to you i dug it i thought it was one of the better put on shows in years actually like it just it worked and you know sure they don't give away many awards on tv but i'd rather watch performances anyway i think yeah yeah i think that as much as it's an award show it's mostly about music and so you know getting nominated and being able to perform i mean that's it that's a humongous uh you know honor and

3:14and privilege and that's the win you know you get to perform your songs on tv and millions of people all over the world have a huge win how come it was a live cut for you guys i was a little confused about that why soul sister live was the nominated track i think that soul sister was uh it was not it couldn't be it couldn't qualify because of the prior year uh we i think our record company really had no idea how massive the song would get and when it was kind of big they put it in last year oh we recorded a live version of it to try to um you know anyway and people responded to it so it was uh i don't know if we're really voting for the live version or just for the song itself but i really care at this point no and you shouldn't it doesn't matter what i find interesting too is that it wins you know soul sister wins pop record but you've also won a grammy for

4:02drops of jupiter for rock song and yeah okay stylistic yeah it's a little it's stylistically it's a little different but it's still you know it's still that train sound and i i wonder what you think about the difference between pop and rock and if there is one you know i don't i i think that whatever they whatever they do to determine that i'm not sure i know that when you come out with an album you know it gets categorized and i think that that album the the drops of jupiter album was categorized as a rock record i don't know who decided that i don't know how that gets decided i think that's strange thing because we're the same band and yeah we're categorized as rock and the you know it's a few years later we're categorized as pop but it may have changed over the years as well i don't know i mean i feel like we're a pop rock band you know that's just what we do in pop means popular and man i'm just excited that

4:49i'm popular on some level you know i know that arcade fire is popular on some level but i don't think people would call them pop music you know no you you alluded to something in your speech about hardships in recent years what were you talking about what went on i mean you know we've been through different bandmates and different managers and different wives and different everything you could think of and the fact that we're still standing the three of us is really remarkable most bands i think would have definitely divorced by now and on their own way uh but somehow you know i think we saw that uh if we kind of wiped the the slate clear and got rid of some of the baggage that was holding us back you know personally and also you know as songwriters and everything we stopped liking music man you know it's like arcade fire was

5:37inspirational at the end of his day and we got it like and then we like music so we're gonna go play another song it's like that kind of meant a lot to musicians like me because i get it you know i know what it's like to lose faith in music and go like you know what it's like fun anymore i'm just gonna go like make a meal for somebody really you stop you stop liking music altogether yeah i didn't really have an interest to make music what made you get back into it then what did it for you well i feel like we uh got to the point where we decided we have to have fun or it's not worth it anymore because the reward for us was hey if we're gonna spend time together because we're not happy together we have to be successful and that means monetarily and that's a that's a pretty crappy goal you know what i mean saying hey we're gonna be psyched but only if we're happy

6:24and uh so we stopped with that attitude and went from and went to hey let's be happy making music and uh and then if the rewards come then they come and that's what we decided to do and it made a humongous difference and you know here we are returning to the grammys years later because we kind of changed our attitude how do you guys write songs is it is it you coming with ideas or is it a group thing uh you know uh i wrote that song with a couple of friends in new york but each song is different you know i write a law but the guy's been trained i write a lot with people outside of train and you know we just try to constantly mix it up and you know try to stay diverse as much as we can but sound like us yeah how hard is that to do that to want to diversify but still yeah it can be it can be pretty hard so now i think i got to be quiet because

7:12i'm about to get on this airplane with a bunch of people okay then we do something real quick all five questions five quick questions one more answers okay road or studio oh man right now studio i'm dying for the studio but it always changes lennener mccartney part of me most important thing in a song lyrics melody or rhythm man i used to be lyrics only and now it's melody song you've written you're most proud of probably drops of sugar why do you say it like that um because i love all of them and so to say one thing over another is hard really it's like saying what's your favorite child right fair enough fair enough and in one word train sincere

Part 2

0:00So cool, right? So that's, actually, I want to start with the gun. Because I saw you tweet that that's the actual dirty hairy gun. Yeah, they told me that when they, there was, when you have firearms on any site, a movie or a video. If you take them off the night, I got to take them off. I don't know, I'm going to put them back on.

0:47Okay. Then I'll keep it on. I just want to see your beautiful face without the shades. Gotcha. The, the guy, there's always a firearm person. If there's any kind of real gun on site. So he handed me the gun and he said, please don't drop this gun. This is a classic. It was the original dirty hairy gun. And I was like, I'm not going to just not drop it. I'm going to steal this thing. Are you kidding? So, yeah. So you have it now. So you're saying? So now I have it. Yeah. I tried to get it into the Canada. No. I don't have it. That'd be a problem on an airplane. They probably don't like that so much. I don't have it. And, but it was so cool to like be around that kind of thing. You know, history. I heard that you wrote this record maybe even this song. Like on the last run. On the last tour. You know, I've been writing. Do you typically write on the road? I've been writing for so long that I just write wherever like on the road or travel to places or go home.

1:38I have a little studio there that I like to work in. But this record was brutal. Why? That's interesting. You know what? Because there's something that happens when you get older where you go like, why am I doing this? And if the answer isn't because you want to make people's life a little better, then you're probably not going the right direction. But to make music that might enhance people's lives is pretty difficult if that's the task. If it's like, hey man, let's get on the radio. It just changes, you know, the essence of what you would be writing for. And so I think because of where I was coming from, where I want to make music, like I want to talk about some stuff that hurts a little bit, you know, that made it more difficult.

2:28Well, I've only heard the single then from this record. So what else is going to be on Bulletproof? Well, there's a song called that kind of stuff. There's a song called Bulletproof Picasso. I think the most, I think my best writing on this record is a song called Give It All. And I just was brutally honest about, you know, what it's like to be who I am on this planet and I would love it to be a single because I think that a lot of people would relate to it. Is that something you learn from just being a writer and wanting to get stuff out? Is that something you've learned talking to other writers now that you're doing that podcast? No, it's not from that. It's just from, you know what, it's from having good leaders. Like I have really good managers and they guide me. And they recognize just like you have people in your life that go like, here are your strengths.

3:16No one's ever told me I had a strength in my life. Well, someday. Yeah, yeah. I'm lucky. But you do have strengths and sometimes you don't see them because you're so caught up in what trying to be this thing and to have good managers who would be like, hey, this is what you're great at. You know, maybe not so much cute on this record. Maybe more go touch people. And that meant a lot to me because I guess, you know, writing things like hefty bag, you know, and soy latte, they just were like, you know, you don't need to do that. Let's see what would happen if you didn't. It's funny how that stuff resonates with people too though. Like just those, maybe it's because you don't hear them in songs all the time. Like those catchphrase words or whatever you want to call them.

4:03Right. And there is a place, you know, it's like, hey, you can go that way. But just don't go so far that it becomes kitsch, you know. No, I got you. Well, even the sound, like, do you mean lyrically or do you mean melodically too? I mean, I mean more lyrically. We got melodically, you know, like, there's such a debate about which is more important, you know, the melody or the lyric. But like the real debate really is like the difference between like Europe and America. Or even Europe and North America, which would be like, ABBA was so massive in Europe during a time where they weren't massive here. And so right now, the biggest songwriters in the world are from Sweden and also from Norway.

4:57And it's because they built their whole listening environment around melody. You know, dancing, playing. They didn't care that the words weren't special. And so I don't know which is cooler or better or more important. Have you done any of those tips? Have you worked with the Neillons guys or tried that co-write thing? I have some of the producers. Co-written with a lot of people from a lot of different countries. Germany and everything else. But I find that, you know, I went to Nashville to do some writing on this record and I wrote some, I wrote with some like, weathered writers. You know, like most of the people I wrote this record with are far above the age of should be on pop radio. And I think that's kind of what's beautiful about this album. Is that one influenced the Western tones? Like I've heard you say it's a Quentin Tarantino song,

5:44Angelou G. You know that song I wrote in New York. So that's the irony I suppose, but because the other ones maybe don't sound so Quentin Tarantino, but they were written in Nashville. Do you ever write like when I read that quote or heard you say that quote, I think it was an interview? I wonder, do you ever write with visuals in mind? Like thinking, I mean, it gives you that feel. You know, the only time I've ever done that is if I wrote specifically for a movie or something visual that I was asked to write for, but not typically with a record. Cool. You know, I just try to write what I've already seen or what people go through. I like something about that song. Maybe it's the four to the floor. I don't know. Maybe it's a new drummer. I don't know. So what's it like working with someone else in the studio, what I reckon?

6:29Because I mean, it's 20 years, right? It's weird. You know, it's weird. How does it change? We miss Scott and we think like, you know, this is all for the best because it's like every other relationship where he can be happier working with other artists and writing. And you know, that was one of his wants in this project where I hogged up all the writing because it was working and he really wanted to be a part of that. And so now he gets to do that. And so we're happier because we, you know, we have a different, we have a fresh new thing right now and it's really fun. And so we're all having more fun. Has it changed anything in the studio? Like has it changed different drums or different vibes, right? You'll hear this record will sound like a different band in a lot of ways because the drumming is just different. And so yeah, you're right. Different band, different vibe.

7:19It's being in different bands. It was the segway. Do you read Bob Lusset's stuff? I don't read it as the Zeppelin thing come across your desk. Yeah, yeah. But I don't follow him because I've been advised not to. So people will just be like, hey, let me just send you the ones that are great. But yeah, when he wrote about me fronting Led Zeppelin, it was really an honor because I have read a bunch of the things that he's written. And I think he knows a lot about this business. I kind of want to ask what's, does anything happen? Does anything go on? No. Because I want to make that a reality. I don't have any clout. I mean, even Jimmy Stafford, my guitar player would be like, dude, that'd be amazing. Did I come backstage? I'd be like, no, probably not. But, you know, it'd be really cool for my band, too. I got a chance to do that for a year and go out with Jimmy Page.

8:06He's all of our heroes, you know. But at the same time, I wouldn't want to disrespect Robert Plant because he is my idol. Yeah, of course. But I'd love a chance to get out there and sing some Zeppelin songs with that band. He is your idol? Do you actually mean that? Or is he just one of many? No, I mean that. He was the guy. He was the guy. So, okay, cool. So how's the songwriter is he influenced you? Because you're not singing about like monsters and like that kind of thing. I tried to write like him. Because I tried in the beginning and I was like, wow, I'm terrible. I don't have any chance, you know. But there are other songwriters like Van Morrison and Katz-Devins and James Taylor and, you know, that I'm more resumble, I think, in the songwriting. Because the Robert Plant thing, without the combination of all four of those people doing that thing, it's just like any band, right?

8:55It's maybe. Maybe. Maybe. I don't think every band is like that. You know, I think that a lot of bands like, you know, Aerosmith, there's three guys. There's Steve, Tyler, and Joe Perry. But the real guy who was writing a bunch of those riffs was the rhythm guitar player. I can't remember his name, but he made a huge difference. Tom, maybe? Is that Senator? Wilkinson? Maybe. Maybe. He has a bass player. Like bands like that, you know, where it's two guys or one guy. And Led Zeppelin was, it was all four of them. What is your partnership with Jimmy? Jimmy is a huge part of the train. You know, without Jimmy, I don't think the train could exist. You know, he's got his own thing, his own vibe, his own way of playing, and I think that adds a lot to the band.

9:45I know you got to get going, so I don't want to take up too much of your time, but I just wonder, you're a Niagara tonight playing a show, played there last night. I'm a nihilist. No, no, you're in Niagara. I'm so into the big Lebowski right now, that's right. So good. He's a nihilist. You're hearing things. Yeah, we were at the casino. Who's the seller at the casino? Because you want to play the new songs, I'm sure. You get to get out there. Man, we played one song yesterday that no one's ever heard before called Cadillac Cadillac. And as much as it's upbeat, you know, whatever, I just think it's just best to just play what people know right now until the new record comes out. But man, we want to play all of them new stuff so bad. So you're over the mindset before the record comes out, don't let them out too much. No, it's not because we don't want to. It's because I just think people are like, look man, you have six other records.

10:31My favorite song you didn't play because you had to go play some crap that I don't care about. So maybe they will care about it when they have the album in September, but right now they don't. So I think to respect our audience, we just need to play what they know. Or do the massive songs sit? Like, do you like to open with them, close with them? Like where do they sit in a set? With the more popular songs? Yeah, the huge hits. We usually try to play a couple of them. We'll play a couple in the front and then most of them in the end. Just because it's the middle section is a good time to have people up on stage. Good beer breaks. Real good beer breaks. Take a 20 minute break. We're going to play some crap up here. You don't care about it.

11:17But the whole thing is we've planned it out so that by the time you leave, you're just sighted. Cool. I'm going to let you go. So we do something called Five Questions. Five good questions. One word answers. I'll take my sunglasses off of this because I take these questions very seriously. Okay. Road or studio? Man, I can't have one without the other. Leonard McCartney. Without question McCartney. When you hear a song what usually hits you first, this goes back to one of your answers from before. Lyrics, melody or rhythm? I go with lyrics but it doesn't make me right. Yes. If someone's never heard train before, what song do they start with? I would always say drops of Jupiter or even meet Virginia. I would start from the beginning I think because we become a different version of ourselves.

12:04Yeah, Angel doesn't sound anything like me, Virginia. They came on shuffle back to back this morning. Right. Wow. Totally different. It's like a different band. Hopefully there'll be some... Some essence of the same band. You know, I think this record might be closer to the first record than the other records have. Okay. Except not sonically but more like in the subject. Interesting. Yeah. Interesting. In one word, train. Authentic. That's a good one. Thank you so much man. Thank you. Appreciate it. Check out the eyes. I don't lie. Except to women. I'm just kidding.

12:50I don't lie. I don't lie to anybody. I'm too boring to lie. But I lie to you behind the camera. Cause you're a jerk. Awesome. Alright. Might be the best ending I've ever had. You're not a jerk. And you could probably beat me up. So I beat you.