NIGHT TRAIN TRACK BY TRACK #6: YOUR LOVE

The sixth Night Train track-by-track video, features Tom chatting about Your Love, in which lead vocals are handled by Tim.Track 5: Ishin Denshin (You've Got To Help Yourself)Track 4: Clear SkiesTrack 3: Stop For A MinuteTrack 2: Back In TimeTrack 1: House LightsNight Train is out tomorrow! You can order it from the official Keane store by clicking here.

TIM INTERVIEW IN TODAY'S INDEPENDENT

There's a great interview with Tim in today's edition of the Independent newspaper, here in the UK. Click here if you'd like to read it online.

TIM ON RADIO 2 SHOW ON MONDAY

BBC Radio 2's Great British Songbook is celebrating the work of the nation's finest songwriters by creating a landmark collection of their very best songs. As part of this, on Monday (May 3rd) at 1pm, they're broadcasting a special show, the Songwriters' Great British Songbook, in which a host of British songwriters talk about the craft of songwriting and inspiration for writing hit records. One of those songwriters is our very own Tim Rice-Oxley.

You can listen online to the show - wherever in the world you are - by clicking here and then pressing the Listen Live button at the top. At that same link, you can also watch a clip of Keane performing Pulp's Disco 2000 in November 2008, as well as an interview with Tim and Tom about their cover of the song.

If you can't hear the show on Monday, it will also be available to listen on the BBC iPlayer for seven days after broadcast.

TIM'S BOOK CLUB #6

American Pastoral by Philip Roth

I read this quite a while ago, when I was writing songs for the second album. It's a very heavy family epic that follows a guy called the Swede. He runs a successful business in New York City and has a lovely family, and it basically charts the disintegration of his family and his values. I'm sure there have been lots and lots of books written about that kind of thing, but this particular one stands out because it's so psychologically complex and you never know what is going to happen next.

The character does everything that you think would be the right thing to do. You don't have that sense you often get with a film or maybe a less dense book, where you can see the mistakes being made and you think "Oh God, that's going to go wrong." He has as much intelligence as you could ask him to have. He attempts to do everything sensitively and tries to be a good parent and husband. But the twists and turns of the way that it all works out are really complex. It's essentially just a totally unglamourous story that could be happening to any of us really. But from a human and psychological point of view, it's incredibly interesting. It's also really quite depressing.

The book definitely shares some of that darkness that runs through Under The Iron Sea. Songs like Atlantic are probably closely related. And, actually, at one point Crystal Ball was called American Pastoral, after the book. The lyrics of that song were actually based around the phrase "American Pastoral" and some of the story, for quite a while. I can't remember why I changed it in the end.

I think my influences as a songwriter come from far and wide, but especially from books. I'm quite a slow reader, and I think I really engage with a book emotionally. Often a book will really be a big part of my life for however long it takes me to read it. Sometimes I'll be dipping into it for weeks and months, reading a few pages at a time, because I have a terribly short attention span. And when I'm not reading it, I'll find myself thinking about it, and talking to other people about it. I think all that does definitely come out in my songwriting.

Tim

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TIM'S BOOK CLUB #5

The Pilgrimage by Paulo Coelho

Paulo Coelho is one of those writers that intellectuals can be a bit sneery about, because he writes these very wide-eyed books about spiritual adventures and everything is always a metaphor for some kind of spiritual discovery or philosophy. And he's also quite religious in places. But I was recommended the book - by Jesse, actually - and I really enjoyed it.

It's a very interesting read. It's based on Coelho going on this journey where he wants to become part of some kind of spiritual brotherhood. The book starts with him failing his initiation test to get into this brotherhood, then in order to make up for this failure, he's sent on a pilgrimage through Spain. He and his guide, who's also in the brotherhood, have to walk hundreds of miles through the mountains, and all along the way there are these tests that he has to do. Each challenge takes up a chapter of the book. There's one where he has to pretend that he's being buried alive, so that he experiences what it's like to face your death. Then there's another where he has to pretend that everything is happening much more slowly than it is, in order that he loses the sense of time. By facing all these challenges, he's trying to attain some kind of particular spiritual purity, wisdom and power

It's not the sort of thing I've ever read before, but I loved it. It does make you think about the way you live your own life. And I felt that I actually learned a lot from it. Coelho will have achieved something at the end of each chapter, and learned things about himself that are really fundamental and important to him on his journey. It's nice to be able to flick back through the pages and think about what did he did, what he said, and what the thought process was that he went through. And it is amazing how much you find yourself identifying with the character.

The book left me with a sense of wanting to try to apply some of those crazy adventures to my own life. We're all slaves to the same obsessions and limitations and fears and dreams and so on. There are all these common threads that link pretty much every person on the planet and a lot of them are talked about in this book. That makes it feel quite universal. So, it's really, really interesting and very inspiring. One of those books which makes you feel that you could potentially be a better person.

Tim

Click here to read the prologue of the book at Paulo Coelho's website

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TOM AND TIM TALK BRITS WITH ITN

Hello folks - and welcome to another week! Here's a video clip from an interview which Tom and Tim filmed last week, in which they discuss the nominations for this year's Brit Awards (where Keane are up for the Best Album of 30 Years award).

TIM'S BOOK CLUB #4

Bit Of A Blur by Alex James

I read this book when we were recording Perfect Symmetry in Berlin and I found it to be very, very funny and inspiring. Alex James is the bass player from Blur and I really liked the juxtaposition of his very throwaway gung-ho approach to being in Blur and living it up, against his more serious insight into the working process of a band. I actually found it very inspiring. He has some quite interesting ideas - one philosophy that he keeps mentioning is that being creative is so much about confidence and that the things you do quickly without really thinking about them are normally the best things. That was a really interesting creative inspiration for me.

Reading the book made me go back to Blur. I've always been a huge fan of theirs, but I guess I hadn't actually listened to them that much recently. It was really nice to hear the albums again in the context of being reminded about all the excitement around that time, be it related to Blur themselves, or the wider context of politics and art and everything. And they really have made some brilliant records.

It's great being able to get inside a musician's head in the way that a book like this lets you. Getting people to open up like that and talk seriously about their life and their music can be almost impossible, unless you get to know them really, really well. But that seems to change when someone writes a book. I wouldn't be surprised if Alex James has gone through his whole life without ever expressing half of the stuff that he wrote in that book. There seems to be something about writing a book that makes you write as if nobody's ever going to read it. I guess that's why confessional things often come out in books, rather than in interviews or any form.

I'm not sure whether I'd like to write a book myself. I don't feel like I've got quite enough wisdom to share just yet. But I'll keep hoping...

Tim


Buy Bit Of A Blur from Amazon UK / USA / Canada / Germany / France / Japan

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The Dharma Bums by Jack Kerouac

I read this in the summer of 2009, while we were out on tour. I read quite a lot when we're touring, partly because I hate flying so much and I find reading on planes is quite a good distraction. I found the book really, really inspiring. I had a similar feeling when I read another Kerouac book, On The Road. There's something about his writing which really appeals to me. It's probably quite a male thing, actually, that yearning to jump on a flat-top train carriage and lie in the sun all the way from one coast of America to the other, or some sort of romantic dream.

The book is based very closely on Kerouac's life, with pretty much every character based on a real person. So there's a character called Ray Smith which is him and his friend in the book, Japhy Ryder, is based on a poet called Gary Snyder. Plus Allen Ginsberg makes an appearance and that sort of thing. They're all a bunch of poets and amateur Buddhists and they spend a lot of time reading poetry, getting drunk, talking about Buddhism, writing these crazy spiritual haiku and going on big walks up mountains. They're basically drifters, but poetic, philosophical drifters.

It's a very romantic story, I suppose, but it also has a lot of very interesting thoughts about the way we live our lives and what matters and what doesn't matter. All of the characters have different opinions on those things. So it's quite an intellectually stimulating book as well as being set against the backdrop of the great outdoors and Kerouac going on these directionless adventures. He goes on a couple of great train journeys and also hitchhikes back and forth across the States. And it ends with him going off to a fire lookout station on top of a mountain in Washington State. He has to stay in this little hut for several months, all on his own, thousands of feet up. He just sits there looking out for fires and thinking about the world.

I would say that my character and beliefs have been shaped by reading books like this. I'm not the kind of person who'll take anything that's been handed down to me and I don't really feel that I've adopted any sort of belief system directly. But I'm interested in people's philosophical approaches to life. I guess the only thing I really believe in is people and it's always interesting to experience the psychological studies of people that you get in a really good book. I find that definitely shapes the way I think about myself and the way I think about other people.

With the Dharma Bums, some of the Buddhist stuff is quite rambling and almost nonsensical, although some of it is very beautiful in its approach to worldly things. But I don't necessarily subscribe to it all. A lot of the book is about each of them thinking the other person's point of view is nonsense and that debate goes on throughout, which is interesting in its own right. But for me, personally, I was almost more interested in the characters of the drifters and what happened to them during their adventuring through the American badlands, the people they meet, and what it means to roam like that. It definitely awakened in me a sense of wanting to go somewhere. I don't know where. But just to go on an adventure, meet people and have no idea where you're heading.

Tim

Buy The Dharma Bums from Amazon UK / USA / Canada / Germany / France / Japan

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Here, There and Everywhere: My Life Recording the Music of the Beatles

I read a lot of music books. I've got a pile of them called things like Tips From Great Record Engineers, which will be endless stories of what microphone they used on the snare drum and stuff. They're specialist to say the least. I've been trying to get back into just reading for pleasure and I suppose also for inspiration, and not trying to get quite so hung up on the technical side of things.

But this book offers the best of both worlds. It's the autobiography of Geoff Emerick, the guy who engineered a lot of the Beatles' most important albums. Being a lifelong Beatles fan, I've read pretty much every book on them that there is. I don't think this one is massively well-known, but I've found it, as a musician, much more insightful, exciting and atmospheric than pretty much any of the others. It's got so much about the creative process of the Beatles. It was interesting to read about the way they spent their time in the studio. You always have this sort of image of the Beatles turning up in a chaotic mess, recording a masterpiece in about three hours, and then speeding off in an E-type Jag to some trendy club. But it really gives you an impression of how hard they worked and how much time they put into their writing and pre-production before they started recording stuff, working out harmonies and polishing up songs. For instance, he talks about sitting there with Paul McCartney all night working on a bassline note by note. I found it quite encouraging, because you always imagine that these guys had an almost supernatural talent to put down these amazing songs and productions without even thinking about it. It's kind of reassuring to know that they had to work really hard for it too.

It's a very, very interesting book if you're into learning about the actual creative process of a band. And this kind of book really does help you as a musician. I was actually reading it while I was writing songs for Perfect Symmetry, and I remember finding it very exciting and having that feeling of being in a room while great music is being made, which is definitely inspiring. It makes you think, "Oh, I could sit at a piano now and try and write a song like that." You get this surge of excitement and a feeling that you can do it too. And that's always a really, really great feeling.

Tim

(This book is not currently in print, but you should be able to find it on eBay or through Amazon sellers)

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TIM LOOKS BACK ON 2009

Hi everyone. Just a quick note to say thank you so much for all your love and amazing enthusiasm and support in 2009.

I think it's been our best year of touring ever - so many new places and new friends, and every tour has been fantastic fun.

It's been great to keep up the creative momentum too, and we've got loads of great memories of recording the Night Train EP on our travels - Berlin, Copenhagen, Washington DC, Brisbane and many others. I think we may well be the luckiest people on the planet!

One thing that has really stuck in my head this year - I already mentioned this in a blog I think - was a message from someone in South America saying thanks for making music that "protests against everything that harms our world". That's a huge compliment for us, but it strikes me that I also think that spirit is embodied by you guys, the fans who come to shows all over the world and are always so passionate and joyful, but also so courteous and considerate of other people. You are a positive force in the world and we couldn't ask for a better bunch of people to share our music with.

2010 is nearly upon us already, and it's nice to have some plans other than "write lots of songs and make a record" already laid. The EP will be fun, and it's great to know we already have some touring booked. And, of course, we can't wait to get into the studio and make new music together once again.

Anyway, thanks again and here's wishing you all a very Happy New Year!

Tim

TIM ON PODCAST XMAS SPECIAL

Yesterday afternoon, Tim headed along to Beyond The Iron Sea Towers to record a special Christmas edition of Chris and Andrew's much-loved unofficial Keane podcast. Head over to beyondtheironsea.com to download it for free.

TIM'S BOOK CLUB #1

We're very pleased to reveal a new regular feature here on keanemusic.com. Over the coming weeks and months, Tim will be telling us a little bit about some of his favourite books. If you folks then read them, feel free to let us know what you thought of them in the comments below. It'll be like a Keane online reading group. And so to Tim's first choice...

The Brooklyn Follies by Paul Auster

I read this book in the summer of 2009, when I was staying in Brooklyn for a few weeks. It was given to me by our manager as a birthday present.

Paul Auster is a brilliant writer, who's also written a couple of great films, but this was the first book of his that I'd read. I like stories that have a lot of different threads, which kind of intertwine as it goes on. And I also like ones that are quite psychological, in that they'll be written in the first person and you'll get a real insight into someone's mind. With books like that, you really feel like you learn something about the way people think. And probably even about the way you think yourself. The Brooklyn Follies is definitely like that, but it's also a really cracking story - it's almost a thriller, I suppose, written in a way that's very beautiful and powerful. I've always enjoyed books that are based on seemingly very ordinary people, like the retired insurance salesman at the centre of the Brooklyn Follies. The story explores dramas that could really happen to anyone, just through good luck or bad luck - and then looks at how those chance occurrences effect the way the characters act and think.

The book is set right in Park Slope which is where we were staying when we were over in Brooklyn. It was quite exciting knowing that I was walking along the same streets as I was reading about. The atmosphere of that particular community is a very important part of the book, and quite a lot of Auster's books, as far as I can gather. So it was nice being able to picture the actual buildings that he was writing about and to almost feel like part of it. I think being in Brooklyn while I read it probably did help me to appreciate the book more. And I suppose, in a way, it helped me to appreciate Brooklyn more too. The story helped give a sense of it being a real place, full of real people, rather than just a tourist destination.

I absolutely loved it. I read the whole thing in about two days, which is very quick for me, as I'm a very slow reader normally. And I've since acquired a huge pile of all his other books. I'm very much looking forward to working my through them.

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Buy The Brooklyn Follies from Amazon UK / USA / Canada / Germany / France

Tim Talks About The Mini-Album And The Band's Future

One of the most successful British bands of the last half-decade
is London’s Keane. Arriving five years ago with their debut Hopes
and Fears, the guitar free trio followed in Coldplay’s early
success, prodding the listener with biting piano pop that stormed
the charts both at home and abroad. Now, fast–forward five
years, and Keane is equally as successful three albums in, if not
more so. Yet, the dark piano–pop slapped on Hopes and Fears
was expanded upon on the last two albums, Under the Iron Sea
and more recently, Perfect Symmetry. But Perfect Symmetry
landed nearly two years ago, and the band has been busy at
work, mostly crossing the globe playing gigs and intermittingly
recording back home in London. And what comes next,
according to pianist Tim Rice–Oxley, is anybody’s guess. “I think
the story of a band takes many years to be told,” replies the
songwriter, who shares duties with vocalist Tom Chaplin. “My
hope is that as we continue to prove that we are musically brave
and hungry, people will continue to be intrigued and excited by
our music. Personally, I didn’t get in to U2 until they released
Achtung Baby, and similarly I’m sure there are many people who
weren't into Keane after Hopes and Fears who suddenly found
that they got a kick out of Perfect Symmetry.”
After another lengthy tour taking them from Japan to
Kitchener and back, Keane will prep a mini-album of sorts, a set
of new songs and odds and ends set for release early next year.
“We’ve made another record, albeit what we’re calling a “mini–
album”,” reveals Rice–Oxley. “We did it mostly while we’ve been
on the road. There should be four or five new songs on there,
plus a couple of other stragglers —remixes and such like — and
it’s going to be a really interesting piece of work. There are two
songs that we did in collaboration with the genius Somalian rapper K’naan — sometime resident of your fine country — and
they’re really different for Keane. One of them is one of the most
instant and accessible tracks we've ever done I think. Aside form
that, I’ve been writing whenever I can, although I don’t find it
easy on tour. I’ve got one song pretty much in the bag that I
think could be a future single, but everything else is flotsam and
jetsam at the moment, waiting to be kicked into shape once we
get off the road.”
This mini–album is not just a stopgap solution in between
albums, stressed Rice–Oxley. Instead, it’s a completely new work
in its own right, and one in which the band is excited to see
unleashed as another addition to their catalogue. “Most of it is
recorded and mixed already, as we’ve worked really hard on it
while we’ve been traveling, going into studios all over the world
and working on the tour bus all night,” adds Rice–Oxley. To me,
the songs are pretty philosophical, K’naan’s influence possibly,
except one that is a kind of Fleetwood Mac–style love song. I
guess that’s because with the very new stuff that isn’t finished
yet, I’ve found myself reaching back to the very basic things I feel
passionately about, like old friends, hopes, regrets, small town
dreams and disappointments, and the ruthless passage of time.”
Until that, the band will simply hit the road, debuting new
songs alongside older favourites, as Rice–Oxley is promising a
strong assembly of both at the Kitchener gig. “There’ll be a
bunch of new songs, all the old favourites, maybe a cover and
maybe a few songs played acoustically,” continues Rice–Oxley. To
be honest, it depends what we’re feeling on the day, but I
promise it will be a lot of fun. Plus, Tom is one of the best
frontmen around, and I can guarantee that he will be racing
around the stage and doing everything humanly possible to get people singing and dancing. We really love playing live, more so
than ever before, and we go out there with a fire and a
determination to entertain that I hope is pretty irresistible to any
crowd.”
Yet, despite all Keane’s success, the band feels that they
have just begun, and that a fresh piece of slate is being prepared
once more. “To me, we really have just begun,” concludes Rice–
Oxley. “You always have to write as the person you really are, and
not believe the hype about being a rock star or whatever, as that
doesn’t mean anything. When I listen to music I want to hear
about things I can relate to, and I want to know that the writer is
giving me access to their most personal and honest thoughts and
ideas. It's not always easy to do that when you live in the bubble
that comes with being in a band, but that's what I hope we will
always do.” Keane headline Centre in the Square on Saturday,
September 19th. Lights support.

-

Source

Tim Rice-Oxley Talks On Lily Allen's Blog

Idontwanttochangetheworld.blogspot.com is the new blog from Lily Allen, which goes against illegaly file-sharing downloads. Lots of famous people agree with her opinion, including Mr. Tim Rice-Oxley. Here's what he said:



Lily,

Greetings from the badlands of Canada, and apologies for the slow reply. Rather than ramble on at length about how I feel about the various aspects of this, I'll happily state that I support you in this movement and agree that we have to act now.

I also feel strongly that the most vital step at this moment is to ensure that 'the artists', whether FAC-related or not, present a united front and a simple message. Otherwise the old 'divide and conquer' routine will be meted out to us and the artist community will be fobbed off by the ISPs, labels and government.

For example, do you/we go in with the simple message that file-sharing is wrong; or that file-sharing on a large scale is wrong; or that file sharing is an inevitability and we should focus on finding new ways of making money from music and supporting new talent?

I guess your view is that the FAC (or at least the likes of Nick Mason and Ed O'Brien) have been leaning too much towards the latter, which I would agree is not a strong enough line to be taking. If your view is that any file-sharing at all is wrong, then I can't agree with that either.

For what it's worth my opinion is that the second of those options should form the basis of the clear message that the artist community delivers to the government. Judging by the proposed 'industry statement', the FAC as a whole is ready to deliver and support that message, and if there can be agreement between them and the rest of us as to how the ISPs should 'police' large-scale piracy, and how to ensure that this doesn't become grounds for an excessive erosion of civil liberties (as Matthew says below), then that would put the artist community in a really strong position. (It also seems obvious to me that legal action should be taken against sites that blatantly encourage large-scale file-sharing, cf Pirate Bay in Sweden etc. The 'reasons' for not doing this seem very flimsy, and this issue could easily be covered by new legislation.)

The issue of how to generate money going forward seems sketchy at the moment, and presumably if we're hoping to license music to the ISPs in a TV/radio style then that would again be a matter of legislation. This doesn't appear to be covered by the current statement and is obviously pretty vital. Maybe it needs to be one step at a time - I can see the sense in that. On the other hand, it seems like this could be the moment for sweeping change that includes new licensing rules for ISPs.

Anyway, that's more than enough from me. Hopefully by articulating my thoughts I'm not merely repeating what you already think, but either way I'm with you.

See you soon,

Tim

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Source

Tim Rice-Oxley On Soundcheck Telehit

Keane about performing the Netherlands and the new mini-album

3VOOR12 DEN HAAG Susanne Kooijman
Monday 24th August



That the British Topband Keane will perform at the Beatstad Festival has not escaped many people. The inner city of The Hague is covered with posters of the three men. 3VOOR12 the Hague had an exclusive interview with Tim Rice-Oxley, songwriter and keyboardist of Keane.

Saturday, 29th of August, time for a new edition of Beatstad. The Festival at the Hague's Malieveld has managed to book Keane as the festival closer. The band itself look very much forward to the gig. “ We like to play in the Netherlands. To play for a large audience in the finale of Beatstad Festival, we think is ace. It moves us and we therefore consider it a great honour. The Dutch public was one of the first that really appreciated our music outside England. Our first show in the Netherlands we played in the Melkweg, in 2003 I believe. The Netherlands has always welcomed us with open arms, and the public always reacts to us with much enthusiasm and the music. ”

Keane is Ambassador of War Child. Part of the proceeds from ticket sales from Beatstad goes to a good purpose. “ War Child was one of the first to link good music to a charity. That appealed to us. But the most important thing is, of course, that I think it is unfair that children are victims of war. Children are always innocent in my view. ”

The band frequently plays in sold out stadiums to often wild fans. They are not however burdened by nerves. "There's always a little bit of nerves, but doing a festival we feel it more. There the visitors don't know you that well. That keeps it exciting for us. ”

On the latest album, ‘Perfect Symmetry ’, the band took a new path. "The album is very philosophical. And more positive than the last two albums, I am pretty proud of that. The texts for this album came very naturally. We just looked around us, at people and to the world. It is also an album about the love that we have for humanity. This is the vision we have on the world at this point in time. ”

Tim is the main writer of the band and has therefore already considerable hits in his pocket. "My favorite song in terms of text? [long silence] That is a difficult question. I think Spiralling. On the surface, it is a very dancable and poppy song, but the text is pretty deep, if that doesn't somewhat sound arrogant of me. I have taken a long time on this text, it is a pretty complex text. ”

In the back of his mind, Tim is occupied with the following album. “ I am trying to write, but we are still too busy touring. It would be nice if we could record the next album again in different countries. I found Berlin to be a very inspiring city, and I would like to go back there. It is important for us to sometimes have a change of environment. You meet new people and you can see new places. Before you know it you find yourself in a strange situation, like some weird pub at 4 o'clock in the morning. That inspires us. ”

Despite the fact that there won't be a new Keane album for a while, the band will however release a mini album at the beginning of next year. “ It will be an album with 6 or 7 songs. Somewhat larger than an EP, so we called it a mini album. There will be new songs on it, remixes and collaberations with other artists. We will be doing some promotion for that album in the spring next year. If it is picked up in the Netherlands, then we will probably come to the Netherlands as well for some promotion."

Life is treating Tim well at the moment. His role in the band suits him just fine. “ I feel very happy when I see a sea of people that enjoys our music. Smiling and crying people, and that you yourself are in the moment, then we really have the time of our lives. I love that feeling. It does give you a useful feeling, that we have a sense of purpose in life. We know what the difficulties are to see a band live. The costs and travel and, therefore, we appreciate the fact that people pay to see us. It continues to surprise me always. ”

The band still has a couple of weeks of touring to do, with shows in Switzerland, Russia, America and Canada. Then there will be some peace and quiet for the band members. “ We will however go back into the studio and the mini album is also coming up. But it is good to go back to the real world, to reality. I love being with my family and friends. Nice to play some guitar. Perhaps I am shortly going to live in America for a couple of months. But I often have other mad plans, which does not mean that they will all come true ”!

Keane will close the Beatstad Festival . The band's gig will start at 10 p.m..

http://3voor12.vpro.nl/artikelen/artikel/42379793

Tim's Video Interview

The Walnut Tree: Tim's Interview

Hello everyone. As you will probably read here, a couple of years ago there was born the first Keane fanzine, with the intention of selling it at gigs during the October/November UK tour. It has never been printed, but here we have some exclusive content that you can find on Kma, now. This are some kind of mini-funny-interviews to the band in 2004. Now, we are going to start with Tim's. You will have to click on the pictures to check them out in all their glory, with all the information...

TIM'S GLASTONBLOG

Tim's very kindly written a blog/diary letting us know what he's been up to since Keane's last show, in Sweden on June 25th...

Wednesday/Thursday

After a lovely couple of days in Copenhagen we headed up to Borlänge in Sweden. We had the best part of two days off there since we weren’t playing until 00.30 on Thursday night. I spent most of the time either working on new tracks or sunning myself in the park. Some large and delicious ice creams may also have been consumed.

Lykke Li was playing just before us on another stage, so we watched as much of that as we could. She was utterly brilliant – I love Youth Novels but hadn’t seen her live before – much more arch and dramatic than I had imagined, and a great singer too. I was kind of blown away by it, to be honest.

Anyway, I rushed back from that just in time to go on stage, only to be greeted with rumours that Michael Jackson had died. Felt pretty deflated after that, but the gig was still fun and the crowd were incredibly friendly. Backstage we ran into Anders Friberg, who, as tour manager of The Ark, brought us over to Malmo in 2003 (I think) for our first ever gig outside the UK.

Friday

Flew back to the UK after a refreshing 3-hour sleep. Tom and I went straight from Heathrow to Glastonbury Festival. By the time we were settled in and ready to delve into the action, the rain had stopped and the vibes were rosy. Below is a brief and highly subjective report…

Puppini Sisters – glamorous, gorgeous and brilliant as ever.

Little Boots – wanted to check her out as she seems to be suffering the inevitable backlash that comes with being popular. Maybe a little cold I thought, but the songs are great and that’s what matters most to me.

The Ting Tings - amazing to see them playing to such a massive crowd, but they’ve got so many brilliant songs and everyone was loving it. Their video stuff was pretty great too.

Ray Davies – bit of a difficult choice between Ray Davies and Neil Young, but I followed my heart. It was the most enjoyable and emotional gig I’ve ever been to. Every song was a true classic, people were belting them out, willing him on with love, tears were shed. He did four encores, and we still wanted more.

Saturday

Did a lot of chilling out, but still had time for a bit of music.

La Roux – did the 17-mile walk over to Dance East only to find we couldn’t get anywhere near the tent, let alone in it. Quite right too – she’s fantastic.

Passion Pit – really fun. Lots of synth geekery (which I love, of course), and a much more friendly, less uber-cool vibe than I expected, which is an extremely good thing.

Dawdled around the Sensation Seekers stage for a bit of the excellent Dynamo Rhythm Aces, a bit of weird drunken intra-audience kissing choreographed by a hilarious compere, and a bit of Sheelanagig before taking up our positions for The Boss.

Bruce Springsteen - a masterclass in working a huge crowd, not to mention the phenomenal musicianship. But too slick for me. The hyperbole and passion didn’t feel real, but maybe I just wasn’t in the zone. And more to the point, I may just be sulking because I was pinning my hopes on him playing Girls In Their Summer Clothes.

Sunday

Kind of planned for a day lolling around at the Mi7/Chess Club stage in the Departure Lounge.

Beans On Toast – recommended by Jesse. A rambling and very splendid blend of half-songs and genius philosophising.

Glenn Tilbrook – arrived at the Avalon tent to find Teddy Thompson had cancelled. But in his place was the legendary Mr Tilbrook, who ran through a few of Squeeze’s many classic tunes accompanied by his six-year-old son Leon on percussion. Pretty fantastic.

King Charles – back in the Departure Lounge, which frankly had been pretty empty all weekend. There were suddenly hundreds of people crammed into the tiny and incredible hot tent in anticipation of the wondrous triple-bill of King Charles, Mumford and Sons and Laura Marling. King Charles was rocking, and his band were really beautiful, grooving players. Something that hit me over the weekend was how many brilliant musicians and bands there are everywhere you look (and listen). It’s both intimidating and inspiring.

Mumford and Sons – such a great live band, and you can feel that they’re riding high. There was a real sense of excitement and goodwill in the room for their set, everyone screaming along and Marcus charming our pants off as usual.

Blur – things were running an hour late on the Mi7/Chess Club stage by that point so I had to tear myself away from Laura Marling in favour of the band that soundtracked so many great moments of my youth. Blur’s set was everything I had missed in Saturday night’s headline show. The nerves, the tears, the genuine elation and love (from both band and crowd) – it was real and magical in a way that must be almost impossible in a gig of that scale. It also helped that for so many of us each song was like a cherished photograph of a beautiful time; we thought we’d lost all those photographs, but actually they’d just slipped down the back of the sofa.

Blur really are such a truly great and distinctive band, and to hear them play again was to be reminded of just how many perfectly-crafted songs they’ve written, and how many varied styles they explored together. Again, an inspiration to us all.

Back to reality

Monday morning was pretty brutal, another 5am alarm call. But there are always things to do in Keane-land. This week has seen more work on the K’naan tracks – some brass overdubs with our old friend Jerry Clack, who we last played with about 14 years ago, plus some finishing touches (hopefully) on the other song. The latter sounds pretty amazing in my opinion, but I am a little biased, I suppose.

Right, I need to pack for Beirut, Dubai, T, etc. See you there!

Tim

INTERVIEW FROM HURRICANE TO TIM

Click here to check out some pictures from an interview with Tim Rice-Oxley from the Hurricane 2009. Looks like they had a lot of fun...