Good morning, and welcome to the Phile for a Monday. How are you? Canadian ice dancing pair Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir got a bit to hot on the ice. Their skate through the soundtrack of Moulin Rouge featured a lift which quickly had her vagina close to his face, and that's too sexy for the world "The Toronto Star" reported that "The Canadian Press was leery of moving photos which captured the pose," and that the pair will cool down the routine when they compete in South Korea. With the heat turned all the way up, Virtue and Moir got a perfect score at the Canadian Skating Nationals in Vancouver. Moir insists that the tweak to the routine is for aesthetic, not sexiness, reasons. "What it came down to actually was that when we slowed it down and looked on the video, it wasn’t aesthetically that beautiful of a position, so we wanted to change it, make it a little bit better," Moir told the "Star" on Wednesday at the Gangneung Ice Arena in PyeongChang. In the new version,"Virtue straddles Moir’s shoulders for a brief moment before dipping one knee down and then dismounting." "We wanted to make a bit of a different statement. If that was bringing an edge or sexuality or darkness, or a contemporary feel to it, then mission accomplished I guess," Virtue told the "Toronto Star." Virtue and Moir have been skating together for 20 years. The team won the gold for ice dancing at the 2010 Vancouver Olympics and silver at the 2010 Sochi games. Keep killing it. Sexy lift or no sexy lift, you make Team Canada proud!
Robert O'Neill is a former Navy Seal who participated in the raid on Osama bin Laden and, although there are reports from another Seal claiming the same, O'Neill says he fired the bullets that killed him. On Thursday, O'Neill took to Twitter to deal with reports that Trump gave "marching orders" to the Pentagon demanding a military parade and show of strength down the streets of Washington. He hates it. He tweeted about third world bullshit. "A military parade is third world bullshit," wrote O'Neill. "We prepare. We deter. We fight. Stop this conversation." Inevitably, reporters, news outlets, and bystanders across the Internet were eager to discuss the usually "politically conservative" Navy Seal's opposition to Trump on a military issue. O'Neill kept the conversation going, retweeting criticism and applause alike. He continued his thoughts with a reference to the invasion of Iraq. His point seems to be that rather than a show of force in Washington, the United States historically shows its might in actual wartime. O'Neill isn't the only one criticizing Trump's parade idea. Trump allies like Republican Senator Lindsey Graham said it would be a "sign of weakness" to parade through Washington. Several other Republicans piled on, and of course Democratic Senator Tammy Duckworth... who coined the nickname Cadet Bone Spurs for the draft-averse POTUS... said the idea was "a waste of resources." Look at this one last comment from Robert O'Neill, commenting on criticism of his first tweet. "Where is Osama's body by the way?"
During a heated interview on CNN's "New Day," anchor Alisyn Camerota laid into former leader of the American Nazi Party, Arthur Jones, who is currently running for an Illinois Congressional seat. Camerota kicked off the interview by showing footage of a deeply unhinged Jones speech at a neo-Nazi event. Then, she swooped in with a refreshingly straightforward question. “Mr. Jones, It is shocking to hear how vocally and unapologetically racist you are. Are you a Nazi?” Jones eschewed the direct label of nazi, while conveniently neglecting to condemn his recent nazism. "I do not belong to any formal national socialist organization anymore. I haven’t belonged to the American Nazi Party since about 1990," Jones said. "I call myself an American patriot and statesman." “You’ve been part of anti-Semitic groups since the 1970s,” Camerota responded. “You’re part of the White People’s Party. You dress in Nazi garb, you celebrate Hitler’s birthday. You’re a Nazi.” The intensely heated interview only got more tense when Camerota confronted Jones about the views expressed on his political website, which includes a section that calls Holocaust survivors "peddlers of propaganda." "Your website is filled with the most vile, rancid rhetoric I think I’ve ever read,” Camerota confronted. The criticism towards his website set Jones off onto a tirade about the "two party, Jew party" system. "Yes, I deny the Holocaust. It is an extortion racket, pure and simple. If you did an honest investigation of the Holocaust, you'd realize it is nothing but an international extortion racket by the Jews... to suck us into one war after another in the mideast," Jones explained. While Jones continued on his breathless rant against Holocaust survivors, Camerota shot back with the facts, before assuring him that his political run would end in failure. "You lose virtually everything that you run for. You’ve run for Congress and you’ve lost, for mayor, for alderman. And we’re not in the business of predicting the news, but I can say that you will lose this race. You couldn’t win dog catcher,” Camerota said. Luckily, Jones is running in Illinois' 3rd district, which has a solid track record of voting Democrat. Nonetheless, the fact that he is running unopposed in the Republican primary is terrifying in itself.
A few days ago on Reddit's "WTF" forum, a video that definitely fits that description surfaced, titled "The 'Hot Coil' Challenge." The post was appropriately tagged as "not safe for work" and that's truly the only appropriate thing about the video, featuring a screaming lunatic pressing his arm down on a burning hot stovetop. "See that hot fucking coil?" says the man about to make a massive mistake. "I gotta get your face too," responds his friend, positioning his camera for the perfect angle. I'll note here that the camera did not get the perfect angle, filming vertically, but that's hardly these two guys' worst offense. "Your reaction will be priceless," he says. You can definitely put a price on his reaction... depending on how good your health insurance is. The guy predictably screams in pain, and by the look of his arm, he'll have to go to the hospital to treat the intense third degree burns all over it. The Internet quickly feared for humanity, with places like Maxim and LadBible making the apt comparison to the equally stupid stunt of eating tide pods. On Reddit, the post got thousands of upvotes and hundreds of comments, with most falling along the lines of...
Luckily, no other videos or images from the "hot coil challenge" have gone viral, and let's seriously hope it stays that way. Hey everyone, there are better ways to get Internet points than by torturing yourself.
Figure skater Adam Rippon, the first openly gay athlete to represent the United States at the Winter Olympics had already made headlines for a contentious exchange with Vice President Mike Pence, the first open politician about calling his wife "mother." But after telling "USA Today" that he would prefer not to meet "the same Mike Pence that funded gay conversion therapy" and receiving a tweet from the VP himself, it was time for Rippon to skate. This morning in South Korea was his Olympic debut. Today is the Day of Adam. It's Rippon Hour. After a stellar performance in men's free skate, Rippon was ranked second behind Russian Mikhail Kolyada. He later fell to third after Canadian Patrick Chan. That helped the U.S. take bronze in the team event. People in the United States were furious about Rippon's third place ranking, especially because the two athletes in the top spots fell during their performances. Of course, since most of you watching only gained figure skating expertise from watching I, Tonya a week ago, there are nuances to the rules we don't understand. Via HuffPo, "even though skaters are penalized one point for falling they may earn more points overall for attempting [different and challenging moves]." Apparently, Kolyada and Chan both performed routines with "higher degrees of difficulty than Rippon's." Time weighed in that there were "inconsistencies with [the] jumps" in Rippon's otherwise "fluid and at times mesmerizing routine." But if Americans were brought down by Rippon's scoring, they were brought up again by his post-skate interview (which is misleading, since Xanax is a downer). Talking to NBC, Rippon said, "I've been waiting 28 years to get out there. And let me tell you, it was worth the wait..." But how does it feel on the ice? "I want to throw up. I want to go over to the judge and say, 'Can I just have a Xanax and a quick drink. I'll be fine.' But I kept it together. I just took it one element at a time." He also name dropped Reese Witherspoon and "highly recommended" being an Olympian. Enjoy the rest of Adam Rippon Day.
So, my son asked me what is so great about the Olympics and why he should watch it and I said how about Canadian hockey player Sarah Nurse?
Ever see those flyers hanging on lamp posts where you rip off a phone number at the bottom? Well, how about this one?
That's great, right? Once in awhile I like to show you what some people actually look like when they are reading the Phile. Like this guy for instance...
I think he's looking at a Mindphuck. There's a new Porgs movie that is coming out that looks interesting, kids. Here's the poster...
Wait a minute... I've actually seen a poster vaguely looking like that before...
I knew it. Oh, man, that's so stupid. That's as stupid as...
Hahaha. So, I don't know if you know this but I can't stand Betty White. Don't get me started on her. I saw this pic and it's another reason not to like her...
Ugh. So, parents, I hope your kids in school are as clever as the student that came up with this...
That would of been my answer as well. If he 8 is sideways why can't the 5 be sideways as well, right? So, Valentine's Day is two days away and you might still be looking for a card to give your loved one. How about this old time creepy looking one?
Yikes. So, my son and I were talking about how we used to watch "Sesame Street" together when he was little. I'm glad we don't watch it together now because that show sure has changed a lot since then...
If you don't spot this Mindphuck then I don't know what to say. Haha. Okay, so, you know I live in Florida, right? Well, there's somethings that happen in this state that happens nowhere else. So, once again it's time for a story from...
A Trump supporter in high school who tried to get his classmate deported ended up getting kicked out himself. Kicked out of school, that is. Cory Carnley, a prolific pro-Trump, anti-immigrant Redditor from Gainesville, Florida, posted a gleeful selfie after allegedly reporting an undocumented classmate to Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
His photo went viral, because regardless of your views on immigration policy, you have to admit that reporting somebody to ICE is a dick move. This is high school student Cory Carnley. Cory brags about calling ICE on people, dreams of torturing immigrants, and makes racist posts about blacks and Jews. Cory is too young to have voted for Trump and lives in a cushy college town. This is the face of the alt-right. According to Babe.net, Carnley explained on Reddit, "The person I reported hasn’t even been here long enough to speak more than basic essential English. They’re no DACA baby like everyone seems to be assuming for some reason. Also, don’t worry about their family. They’re illegal too." Babe also scanned through his previous Reddit posts to find extremely racist posts about black people and Jews, and his fantasies about torturing immigrants to death. He also wrote about threatening to rape people. Once the piece was published, he deleted his Reddit account. In a follow-up article, Babe reported that Carnley has been expelled from school. In a statement to Babe, Cory's former principal added, "I could not disagree more with the ideas in these posts. They certainly do not represent our school's culture. GHS is a wonderfully diverse school where students come together and do amazing things. One student does not speak for 1,800 classmates. While this is an extremely unfortunate situation, I hope it will also serve as a learning opportunity for our students." Good-bye, loon.
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The 75h book to be pheatured in the Phile's Book Club is...
Bruce will be the guest on the Phile next Monday. And now for some...
Phact 1. In 1903, after camping with John Muir, Teddy Roosevelt established Yosemite as a national park to preserve its “majestic beauty all unmarred.” As president, T.R. signed into existence four other national parks, 18 national monuments, 55 national bird and wildlife refuges, and 150 national forests.
Phact 2. In 1919, William Little, an African American soldier who fought in World War I, was lynched because he refused to take off his uniform when he got back home to Blakey, Georgia.
Phact 3. Pulp Fiction was originally rejected by TriStar, with them saying, “This is the worst thing ever written. It makes no sense. Someone’s dead and then they’re alive. It’s too long, violent, and unfilmable.”
Phact 4. Albert Göring, the younger brother of the head of Luftwaffe Hermann Göring, helped many Jews and dissidents survive in Germany by forging his brother’s signature and falsifying transit documents.
Phact 5. JFK had a younger sister, Rosemary, who received a lobotomy which made her unable to walk or speak. This was his and his brother’s main motivation for all they did for individuals with special needs.
Today's guest is a British singer-songwriter and guitarist, best known as being the lead vocalist and frontman for the rock group the Feeling, whose latest self-titled CD is available on iTunes, Amazon and Spotify. Please welcome to the Phile... Dan Gillespie Sells.
Me: Hi, Dan, welcome to the Phile, how are you sir?
Dan: I'm good. My pleasure, and you're welcome.
Me: So, I love your latest self-titled album and "Spiraling" is a great song. It could be about my life. Maybe it'll become my theme song. What was the story behind that song?
Dan: I supposed it's one of those songs you could write after a break up I suppose. The whole fourth album was full of break up songs and I was sick of writing break up songs. The one exception on this album was "Spiraling" where I had a brief affair with which I really bought into it actually and it didn't work out, but when it did work out I thought shit, here it goes again. It was almost that repetitive thing when I have that sinking feeling but I have to recognize it and that's what I suppose I was writing when it comes to song, that sort of nature when I came to realize that I've done it again and hasn't worked out. Musically it was really stripped... we recorded the drums over a single microphone and it gave it a tight on the demo. We demoed all the songs before we did the proper recordings and we just liked the way the drums just oiled along. It's one of those tracks where you have very little cymbals and a very strict minimal approach. I thought the melody could handle that.
Me: Does songwriting come easy for you, Dan? A lot of your songs are so catchy.
Dan: Kinda... if it's annoyingly catchy. I feel songs should have a giving nature, and for me if it's providing me with a strong melody I'd rather not be there.
Me: Your singing sometimes goes from one end of the spectrum to the other, Dan. When you are writing are you thinking about that?
Dan: What I intend to do is write in keys that are as uncomfortable as possible because it makes me go to different places. I think after five albums in and many years of writing songs I never wanted to be any of those writers that falls into the same trap all the time. I think of I do that thing where I change a key I start writing in E flat and my voice goes to a funny place because I'm in a key I don't usually write in. I kind of push my voice to uncomfortable places and write melodies that continue to be fresh. It's bit like instruments... if I get stuck on the piano I pick up a guitar and I start playing it with a funny tuning and I almost try and trip myself up all the time because otherwise easily I become automatic. It's like a box of tricks, I unconsciously become boring. I'm terrified of that happening so I'm always trying to trip myself up.
Me: So, how is recording and songwriting different now then when you started?
Dan: In the early days I demoed stuff on a really bad bit of software that was obviously entirely illegal. It would crash all the time and sometimes when it would crash it would put the stuff back, either in the wrong order or would shift a couple of beats or something, Or even worse I would lose half of what I recorded, but sometimes when I would play what I had back and it was random and lost a couple of tracks or something it'll just be better. It was kinda great, I wasn't expecting that to happen. I force those things now, now that the software is much more stable I have to find other ways to force accidents. Like playing in keys my fingers don't like. It's like being beginner again, I wrote some really good songs when I began because I was limited, nothing stopped me going down those chops.
Me: "Spiraling" ends right into the next song, "Feel Something." Was that planned, Dan?
Dan: We did that at the end when we were putting the album together itself. I listened to a lot of concept albums when I was younger. My dad's record collection was full of that kind of albums thing. I love sound scapes and I love the idea of an album. Sometimes linking the songs with an outro and intro can help the experience of an album listen. Opposed to there's a song, there's a song, there's a song, with nothing happening between every song. We'd always done it, and it's something we do as a band. There's always some weird bit left of noise left of the track, or sometimes we'll post something in from another whole song like an experimental guitar thing that never really worked but we could use it in a weird way. I like that, but we have to do it if they work or not. Other times we have a gap and say that's fine. There's a lot of instinct going on, as opposed to planning,
Me: So, you play guitar and piano I believe... which one of those do you write on?
Dan: I've got a piano and I sit at the piano and write most of the time. Occasionally I'd grab the guitar, actually our latest one I wrote on the guitar more than the piano. It was a deliberate thing because I've done the whole 4th album sitting at the piano, and wrote the whole thing at the piano. I wanted to go somewhere different, I didn't want to write another breaking up album. Other than "Spiraling," all the other songs are about completely different things. So I thought I'll play the guitar for most of my writing and it got me into a different head space and a different place.
Me: So, how far into all this do you show the songs to the band?
Dan: Ummm. do you know what? That completely varies. It depends when the band will appear. If the band appear that morning I might come up with a bunch of different hooks and go okay, let's jam it. Or it could be a whole song that I finished and never had a chance to work with the band. Or it could be a song I almost finished and I'd say, "You boys know what to do. 1, 2, 3... go." That's kind of it, they seem to know what they're doing. Sometimes we have these jam sessions where we play and it's nonsense, it's really groggy and really stupid. We're expressing whatever in a really free way, and sometimes don't play the correct instruments. I'll go and play bass, Rich will play guitar, or the drums or something and out of that often comes a little suggest where I think that's a weird groove, I love it, or that's a strange little twist on the normal chords. Or a melody often, where I'll go away, and use that as song and being to a band. All those ways have been fruitful over the years.
Me: What comes first? Lyrics or the music?
Dan: I'll tell you what happens, usually a line that is strong will come with a lyric. I would sing a melody and the lyric would come out with it. That's often what happens, then I have to go away and come build the rest of the lyric and that takes a long time. That's the last thing that gets finished, is the lyric. But the melody can be a problem if you come up with a melody without any words. Sometimes I get a great hook and a really strong melody and it has no word attached to it. And now I'm like now I got to find words that are gong to be good enough to go into this melody. I really struggle with that. There's melodies that I love and really into but because they don't come with the words attached already, that they didn't come out in one go, I really struggle as nothing ever feels right.
Me: So, do the lyrics get finished before you start recording with the guys?
Dan: Depends, With this album we had to, because the way we recorded it live in the studio. We had to now the songs inside and out and I had to have there lyrics finished. I wasn't over dubbing anything, but with previous albums I'd get as far as the whole song being recorded and I have to finish off the lyric. It normally os the last thing that goes down and I'm usually penning it literally as the boys go, "Come on, get on with it." I didn't want that for this album, I wanted to have everything written and be happy with everything before we even pressed record. We rehearsed everything, we recorded at rehearsals, in a rough way, and I new everything was sounding good in the room, and we pressed record and did the album. It's such a different, I had a chance to finish the lyrics, rehearse with the lyrics, and tweak the lyrics, and when we got into the studio the lyrics were set in stone. I think lyrically this album was the strongest thing I've written and I get better at lyrics while lots of other stuff is getting worse.
Me: I love the song "Non-Stop American." Tell the readers what that song is about.
Dan: I don't know, the words in the title sounded like they should go together but what it's about is the difference between British culture and American culture I suppose. We're so different than the Americans, and when I go to work in L.A. or work with writers in L.A. which I don't do it very often, but I have done I really notice the culture difference and they are non-stop, aren't they? The work ethic and the drive and the hunger and the thirst and the success for whatever it is is just relentless. I actually love it, I feed off it, I do enjoy it, but it's so different from England whew we are more laid back about things. So, I wrote that song about the difference between us Brits and the Americans. I kinda just noticed it and wanted to write about it and that's what that song is about.
Me: Do you write down titles when they come to you and keep them in a notebook or something?
Dan: I have started to do that, I never used to do that but only after the last few years ago because I would lose the notebook. I thought it was pointless as I was really useless and good at losing things, but now I got the iPhone and got the little notes thing and I can keep notes of stuff. I always kept thinking I heard people say on a bus or sometimes I miss hear things, I like to use those. I live in Hackney, east London, and there are people from all over the world here, and use all different sort of language. Someone talked about young people having a talent for living, and I thought, okay, I'm using that.
Me: What's easier to write, Dan, faster songs or ballads?
Dan: I always found both easy really. Some people say ballads are very easy to write, which is true, they're kinda easy to write, but good ones are not easy to write. Anyone could write a crap ballad, but then again anyone could write a crap any type of song. What it is ballads get judged less harshly than up-tempo songs. People get more confident writing ballads because they know that. I love ballads, but it's gotta be a good ballad, and they're not easy to write. Up-tempo songs are not easy to write, but when someone writes a shit up-tempo song gets most harshly judged because for some reason happy music gets some hard press. It gets a tough reception because it's up-tempo, and happy, or whatever. It's all bullshit. A great pop song is a great pop song, I don't care if it's an up-tempo or down-tempo, fast or slow, difficult, on-key, off-key, it's all of these rules and there's a kinda music establishment that tries to make these rules and it's often to do with class. People who write sci-fi novels will never get taken seriously as people that write historical fiction. There's a kind of snobbery against escapism because that's what draws people that have tougher lives and I think you have to be at a level of privilege in order to enjoy miserable music, and music that is totally awkward. That's not to say that music is not extremely valuable, because I think it is, but ain't something someones goin to listen to after they come home from a bloody tough day at work and they are struggling and having a hard time with it. That's not the type of music they're listening to... they are not putting difficult music on. Difficult music is music where you are in a place and could afford to listen to that kind of music emotionally. I think that's where the judgement comes from. Once you got me started on this subject I could go on forever. I'm pretty passionate about it because I think music should be judged on emotional response to what you feel when you hear it and that's it. Anything beyond that is not really valid.
Me: Well, let me remove that soap box, Dan. Hahaha. Okay, so, who were your influences growing up, Dan?
Dan: I grew up with all kinds of music. My music was kind of informed by mostly pop, also lots of other styles of music. You know when you hear writers that work with just pentatonic stuff, that everything they do is with a blues scale, a lot of pop writing is just popping around the blues scale. But for me there's only so far I can go with that and I start introducing other notes, otherwise I just get so bored. So, I feel like I got a lot of places to go, if you know what I mean.
Me: Have you guys always been self sufficient with the writing and recording?
Dan: Yeah, out of necessity rather than out of design. We had a record deal when we were 19, but it was one of those development deals, and I wasn't the singer at the time, I just wrote most of the songs and did backing vocals and played the guitar. The woman who was the lead singer was signed to a solo contract, and we got chucked out the back door. That happened a lot back in those days, because bands were not popular in 2000. Then by 2006 bands were popular again so we got record deal basically. To cut a long story short, I've became the lead singer because no one would. We also learned how to produce records because no one else would. I got that dodgy piece of crap software and all of a sudden I could record on a PC I built for myself for s couple hundred quid. I could multi track, and do it in a shed. The first record, we did it in a shed that Kevin and Ciaran, the two brothers in the band, their mum had a place in Sussex and they had this out building, so it was a kind of brick shed, and there was enough space in there for a drum kit and amps so we made the album in there. We just learnt on the job, just experimenting or whatever, and it sounded terrible but what happened was an amazing box engineer named Spike rerecorded some of the drums and guitars.
Me: Didn't Brian May from Queen play on one of your tracks? How did that happen and what track?
Dan: "Love It When You Call" from our first album. What's weird about the Brian May thing, Dicky was playing this whole Brian may riff thing anyway. We were hung on the guitar from "One Vision," but extended, it was very much like that but different enough. I wrote a whole song based on Dicky's playing guitar riff and when the song was done I thought can we really get away with that. Turns out we could, and then Brian May ended up recording it. I ended up playing it with Brian May and I remember Brian May asking me how I played it, and I said, "I could tell you how I came up with it, I just ripped you off, mate." Then he gave me his guitar because I went to sing with him at the Albert Hall. His strap was really long because he's much taller than me, and I didn't have a pick. He said, "Just show me how you do it." I couldn't believe this was happening, I'm playing the riff which his so based on the guitar playing of Brian May with Brian May's guitar, through his rig. It was a lovely day, and obviously he could hear his own style in that song. He said, "I like that." I bet you do.
Me: I hear Queen, Supertramp and 10cc in your music, Dan. Did you ever study those bands' music?
Dan: No, I never studied anything. As a musician who wants to use chords and modulate and wants to use harmony and do like pristine and rich beautiful sounding recordings, and somebody who is inspired to that within pop music that seemed to be the ultimate challenge to make music that was like that for me. So, I definitely love those bands and am inspired by those bands, and they're varied as well in what they did. They could suddenly do a real rocky song and then do a song inspired by 50s rock and roll, followed by something which is almost classical. Queen just went everywhere and didn't care what anyone thought. They had so many styles within their music, it felt like that's the kind of music I wanted to make. We could turn our hand to anything, and the only job was to make sure each song had kind of a purpose and had a great melodic thing tying together. So that was particularly for our first album, and then as albums have gone on I've dipped my toes in lots of other different styles music. This last record, our fifth album, is probably more inspired by my teenage years listening to indie bands, all those guitar bands of the 90s. There's probably as much of that influenced by that more than anything else.
Me: I love that Abbey Road version of "Rosé," Dan, that you have on iTunes. Who is Rosé?
Dan: I wanted to write about a character that never fitted into any category easily never really was part of that gang or part of this gang, I think everything I did in my career musically, and also as a human being, I take a bit from here and I take a bit there, but I'm not either of those things. The bands not rock band, and we are not a boy band, or pop band, we always have kinda been our own thing. The trouble is though the things that do that sometimes get confused with "middle of the road." I remember thinking back in those days Rosé wine was just beginning to be one of those drinks that people were starting to like. But before then it was red wine that fancy people would drink, and white wine fancy people would drink with fish. And then rose wine was considered naff, I felt like that's me, I'm the naff guy in the middle. I was never one of those gays would was like having his top off, and I was certainly not straight, and I always felt like I don't fit in, and I'm a bit naff because of that, and judged because of that, And I felt that song was sticking upper all of the people that are not one thing or the other.
Me: I get that. Okay, so, I have to talk about "Everyone Is Talking About Jamie," your musical. I have the poster for it here...
Me: What can you tell us about it?
Dan: On February 9th, 2017 we opened at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, and I love that theatre and I love Sheffield so I'm really excited about being there and doing it. It's now at the Apollo, and it's a full scale musical with 21 or something in the cast, a 7 piece band, all singing and dancing, and it's the biggest project I've taken on. It's exciting and wonderful and what I love about doing musical theatre is the collaborative element of it. I get to collaborate with choreographers and writers, and a book writer. I collaborated on the lyrics with a lyric writer with the same guy who wrote the book, I've never done that before. Really I was learning on the biggest learning curve ever.
Me: So, how do you compare the musicals music to the music you write for the Feeling?
Dan: I feel like in theatre it has to have a lot more elements because I have a captive audience who are in there and is totally focused and if I made it as boring as modern radio they'd be like come on, let's get back to the story. But in theatre it needs more, and the more I give and the more fruitful I make the music the better it is for theatre and I feel I have found a home for all those mad ideas that I have. I have found a home for all those songs that are a bit too... melodic. Even the stuff in the Feeling is melodic, but I write stuff that is more melodic and too melodic for the Feeling, and that stuff has a home in musical theatre. It's still pop, there're still pop songs, but I feel like their pop songs with more in them because the nature of it being theatre show, they have to have more in them.
Me: So cool. Dan, thanks so much for being on the Phile. I hope this was fun. Go ahead and mention your website and anything else you want to.
Dan: Thank you for letting me rant. Thanks for having me. Thefeeling.com. Cheers.
Me: You're welcome. Come back on the Phile soon when your next release comes out.
That about does it for this entry of the Phile. Thanks to Dan for a great interview. The Phile will be back on Wednesday with A Peverett Phile Valentine Pheaturing Alannah Myles. Spread the word, not the turd. Don't let snakes and alligators bite you. Bye, love you, bye.
Not if it pleases me. No, you can't stop me, not if it pleases me. - Graham Parker
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