Phi Roy Q & A

Here is the first part of the Phil Roy interview. There's more to come.

Liner Notes: How are things going so far with the new album?

Roy: You're the first person I've talked to. I haven't sent the album to the normal outlets yet. So you're first.

LN: How is the album going to be distributed?

Roy: I have a distribution deal with Sony Red, so it will be in all the normal places where you can buy CDs -- Borders, Best Buy, Amazon iTunes. But, unlike my past records, I wanted to do something different this time. I'm committed to a year of letting it come out slowly to the market slowly. I don't want hype. I had that last time with my last Universal release and I didn't like the results. I had publicists, marketing people and radio promtion people and I was not happy with the way it was handled.

You know, I think there's got to be a different way to release music into the world than to hit them over the head with it. This is an intimate record. It does not call for a "Hey! Look at me!" I want people to find out about the album. I want them to have it in their lives, and I will hire people to help me do that, but I want it to be in a much more intimate way, just like the album.

LN: This album was an interesting concept... Here you are a songwriter and you've put out an album of other people's songs. How did you come up with the idea?

Roy: Well, I'm a huge fan of this particular Sinatra album. It's the first concept album, ever, you know? It's the first long playing record where from start to finish he keeps the same feeling, the same mood.

I came up with the wordplay of "In the weird small hours. The title alone was worth me exploring. I understand the weird small hours.

At first [the album] was going to be an interpretation. I was going to sing the songs on In the Wee Small Hours, but as I got into them, I found that the narrative was from a time that didn't quite sit with me. Just the way people wrote about love and loss and longing... I thought there are other people who write about these things in a way I could relate to...

LN: There are a lot of contemporary artists on this album ... Do you listen to that kind of music a lot?

Roy: Oh yeah, a lot. Elliot Smith, Doug Arthur. His song "Honey and the Moon." When I first that song, it stopped me. Music is so often in the background. It's just on the radio. It doesn't stop you. That song did.

These people on my record, I picked songs from their catalogs specifically for my purposes. Elliot Smith, Not everything in his catalog would work for me, but the song, "Everything Reminds Me Of Her" -- you know, when you've just ended a relationship, just broken up with someone, that line says it all. What else is there to say? Nothing.

I wish I had written all the songs I covered. Maybe on a really good day, I could come up with something similar. Maybe I will.

LN: So you didn't care about these songs' popularity.

Roy:I prefer to have these songs be unknown. I'd prefer if people had never heard them before. You have to be a certain kind of music fan to know these songs, except for "Sign Your Name,"which is such a great song. That first Terrence Trent D'Arby album was a classic. Did you know the song?

LN: Oh yeah, I had that album on tap. It's lost or in a box somewhere. He was a great singer.

Roy: He was a great singer. That whole album, Welcome to the Hardline, is a classic.

LN: So you were looking for songs that weren't hits. What other qualities attracted you to the songs you picked?

Roy: If you're going to call an album "In the Weird Small Hours," it better be a little wierd and small. I really felt like that was the template.

So yeah, thematically, all the songs deal with love. On my last record, there wasn't one love song. I was love-songed out. I had just gone through a divorce so I wanted to write about other things. These songs are all about love -- either celebrating it or cursing it.

LN: How about your collaborator. Julian Coryell?

Roy: He is one of my oldest friends. I spent 20 years in L.A. before I moved back here and to Chestnut Hill.

LN: It's a long strange journey

Roy: Right, It's a long strange journey back to the cobble stones... you know, cobble stones are kinda small and weird (laughs). Maybe I had to come back here for this.

Julian is a musician's guitarist. He's a guitarist's guitarist. A musician's musician. He's best known for being Aimee Mann's guitarist for years. And he's son of Larry Coryell, the real pioneer of fusion guitar.

Julian pulled into town and stayed with me in Chestnut Hill and every night we'd record a song. We'd work it out in the afternoon, go to the studio and record it. We recorded at Morning Star studios in Springhouse, which is where I do most of my work. It's where Melody Gardot did her first record. It's a very fine recording facility only 15 minutes down the road. We'd get a take with no drop-ins, no overdubs. It's so prominent these days to do 5 takes, patch it together for a "master" take.

These songs are all in one take. My vocal isn't touched. When you're listening to a guitar and vocals or two guitars and vocals, its like you're sitting with me right now. Its essentially a live take.

It was important to me to have at the heart of this recording something unscathed. Something untouched. So I think it feels good.

LN: Regarding Radiohead's "All I Need," did you ever arrange something like that before?

Roy: I've used horns before. The concept was mine, to sing the song against a brass quartet and drums and nothing else. But I didn't take those four instruments and write a chart. I found an expert for that. That's one song that doesn't sound like anyone else.

The main compliment I've been getting is that this sounds like an album, which for the most part no longer exists. It doesn't sound like a playlist or something you shuffle. To tell you the truth I don't know if anyone wants that anymore.

With Radiohead, they're your generation's Beatles [Liner Notes is 35 and agrees]. They are the best band of your generation No one else even comes close. I think they'd like my version. I think they'd listen and say, "Wow. He tried." It's all about having a concept and executing.