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00:00:16Hey there, everybody. I hope you're all well and I hope you enjoy what happens here over
00:00:20the next hour or so. To find out who our first guest is, let me hand you over to the
00:00:25MC for
00:00:26the evening, the very beautiful Fred Cook. Thank you, Tommy. Our first guest is Mr. Ray Goggins.
00:00:41Ray. Tommy. How are you? Pleasure. You're going. Who's this fella? No, I think I was watching
00:00:46it the other night. Were you? You shouted people in the fog. Oh, I did, yeah. I'm so now though.
00:00:54I've changed. I've changed. I've changed. And I built up a prejudice against you. Did you? Yeah. Good.
00:01:03I'll try and reverse over that for the next bit of time. We'll see how we get on. Yeah, we'll
00:01:09come back
00:01:09to that because, so how did you end up doing that show? Okay, so I, yeah, I spent most of
00:01:18my career in the
00:01:19Army. So 26 years doing that and a lot of that in Special Operations. The Army Ranger Wing, it used
00:01:27to be
00:01:27called, you know, it's called Irish Special Ops. So, so I was a combat diver, commando, all that kind of
00:01:34stuff.
00:01:35Did you get used? We did, yeah, we got used. And what way now? As in doing your job or
00:01:41being shafted by the government or whoever else?
00:01:43Well, you know, if someone says to me, oh, we're Special Ops and we're in the American Army, we kind
00:01:48of go, all right, you'd be up to stuff.
00:01:49Yeah, but you could be, no, I get it. Like, we're not, we're not a, like a war, fighting, invasion
00:01:54army.
00:01:54Bwakis Lajia. Bwakis Lajia. And we don't want to be either. But like a lot of, you know, hostage rescue
00:02:00stuff, you know, interdiction
00:02:01stuff, stuff in places like, you know, Africa, Middle East, you know, protection work. Yeah.
00:02:06You know, it's, it's, it's quite varied. Why did you join the army? I love the army. My father was
00:02:12a soldier.
00:02:13He was a Congo veteran. My older brother was in the army, but I grew up in a house in
00:02:19Cork, the north side, in a corporation house.
00:02:22Eight of us kids and my parents. And like, as long as I can remember, I wanted to be a
00:02:27soldier.
00:02:27And strangely enough, never because my father used to talk about it, because he was retired by the time I
00:02:32came along, really.
00:02:34Like, you know, I barely knew he was in the army. There was just something in me that I wanted
00:02:38to do it.
00:02:38Like, I always wanted to be a soldier. And that's what I was for all my career.
00:02:43Something, like, fulfilled me about being a soldier. And I'm older now. I'm in my mid-fifties now.
00:02:49And I always thought it was, you know, the sharp end, being a ranger and all this kind of stuff
00:02:53and jumping out of planes and eating snakes and blowing shit up.
00:02:56It's actually none of that. Like, for me, the fulfillment was minding people.
00:03:02So, were you attracted to the structure?
00:03:04I loved structure. Like, I was 18 when I joined the army in Cork, right?
00:03:08And like, I love, like, the armed forces in any country and Ireland are the best for building a team.
00:03:15Why? Because they make you accountable from the start.
00:03:18They have a system called the buddy system. So, you and me are buddies.
00:03:21And if I'm good at something, you better be good at it too or I'll get punished like you and
00:03:26vice versa.
00:03:27So, it gives you a fantastic sense of others around you.
00:03:31So, when you're making the decision or doing something, okay, how's that going to affect my buddy?
00:03:35How's that going to affect the team?
00:03:36So, it gives you almost a selfless and a kind of an ego-pairing idea of life, which is incredible,
00:03:44you know?
00:03:44And like, when you build that team of people and you connect that people, that's what gets you through those
00:03:49hard, maybe, combat environments.
00:03:50So, it's a mental training as much as a physical?
00:03:52Oh, completely. It's 90% mindset.
00:03:54Like, the physical stuff and the skill stuff you can learn, it's mindset.
00:04:00Like, mindset is the most important aspect of any high-intensity environment, whether it's sport, military, in your world, you
00:04:07know, what you do.
00:04:07When you stand out on the stage or you do a show or whatever, you have to be, no, you
00:04:11don't have to necessarily prepare, but your mindset has to be ready.
00:04:14Like, if your mindset isn't good, you don't go well.
00:04:16Because I know my mindset isn't good.
00:04:19The arse falls over for me, like, you know?
00:04:21Because you win or lose in your head before you even start.
00:04:24That's kind of, you know, our ethos and being trained to do that.
00:04:30Is there a massive fear of failure?
00:04:33No.
00:04:36Because you fail so much, it becomes acceptable.
00:04:39So, to get into special ops, in my day, you go on what's called selection.
00:04:45So, selection is them knocking the bollocks out here for a year, basically, right?
00:04:49And you fail so much and you get so used to...
00:04:52And this is special ops Irish Army.
00:04:55Irish Army, yeah.
00:04:57I think the selection course process now is slightly different now.
00:05:00But the last time I spoke to people about it, it takes like 11 months.
00:05:05And like that TV show we talked about, you said you saw me do.
00:05:08And that's a week we bring people on and we simulate that training.
00:05:11But the real course is the best part of a year.
00:05:13Where it's your mindset, your belief, your sense of purpose is what they're training.
00:05:18And all the physicality and the cold and the pain is to get you to that place where it's your
00:05:23mindset gets you through stuff, you know?
00:05:25Are you, in a sense, declaring war on yourself?
00:05:28You are.
00:05:29You're going through, like, a mill to get to somewhere else where...
00:05:33And I'm not saying it makes you infallible, you know what I mean?
00:05:35You don't become perfect.
00:05:36You still make balls and stuff, like, it's fine.
00:05:38But, you know, your sense of, like, who you are and what you can do, your sense of trust in
00:05:42yourself and the people you work with becomes all important.
00:05:46It just sounds a bit macho or something.
00:05:48No, don't get me wrong.
00:05:50There is a certain amount of chess beating in it.
00:05:51But the most important quality and value in those teams, right, is vulnerability.
00:05:57Like, you go there as an individual with these other 100 guys and, like, 10 of you will get through
00:06:02it.
00:06:03So why do you get through it?
00:06:04Is it that hard?
00:06:04Yeah.
00:06:05Why do you get through it?
00:06:06You get through it because you link with those people.
00:06:07Because you hate yourself.
00:06:08You don't.
00:06:09No, you do.
00:06:10Yeah.
00:06:10Yeah.
00:06:11I think I'm a...
00:06:12It's like, yeah, it is, yeah.
00:06:14It's like going to Loughdurk on a retreat.
00:06:16Like, I did it twice.
00:06:16I failed the first time.
00:06:17Because they're looking for somebody who can, like, not be the best at everything, but be absolutely excellent at doing
00:06:23simple things all the time.
00:06:25Even when you're absolutely exhausted.
00:06:27Even when you're absolutely done.
00:06:28When you don't want to play.
00:06:30When you have a pain in your hole.
00:06:31You still can do that.
00:06:32Do you have to be a bit of a kind of a psychopath to pass it?
00:06:35Oh, fucking absolutely.
00:06:36Completely.
00:06:37Like, the madness is embraced in it.
00:06:39Like, we live in a world now where we try and sanitize our human madness.
00:06:45But you need to embrace it sometimes.
00:06:46Like, sometimes that gets you over the line.
00:06:48That absolute, like, you know, connection to yourself and other people.
00:06:52Like, it's like a strength, you know.
00:06:54Are you a very goal-focused person?
00:06:57No, I'm not.
00:06:58I am kind of a person that, if I choose to do something, I'll keep going until it gets done.
00:07:06Yeah, that's a goal-focused person.
00:07:07I, you make it sound like, I don't necessarily agree, right?
00:07:14Because.
00:07:14Do you need goals?
00:07:16No, I don't need goals.
00:07:17I fucking sit a hole and scratch my hole with the best of them.
00:07:19Like, I actually love enjoying, relaxing.
00:07:22I don't have to be, I'm not a hyper person that I have to be doing stuff all the time.
00:07:26Like, I can sit back and let people off and I'll follow them happily.
00:07:30Like, you know, at times I'm happy enough.
00:07:32But if they're making the balls of it, then I might jump in, you know yourself.
00:07:34Have you been in therapy?
00:07:36Not in depth.
00:07:39Not in depth.
00:07:39We used to have army therapists.
00:07:41We used to call them the care bears when they'd come in.
00:07:43And they'd give you a little cuddle and tell you everything's all right.
00:07:45And they were great.
00:07:46Even the way you demean it.
00:07:47I'm only messing.
00:07:48I'm only.
00:07:48No, I have.
00:07:49I've done.
00:07:49I have been in therapy.
00:07:50I have.
00:07:51Because, like, I have.
00:07:52Not that I have massive issues, but, like, it's the life I chose.
00:07:56And, like, there was a lot of, like, if you're dealing with a chaotic environment,
00:08:00like, you know, the aftermath of a truck bomb in Afghanistan or, you know, whatever.
00:08:05Like, shootouts and wherever you are.
00:08:07Like, you can get through it because you're trained to get through it.
00:08:10And you get to the end of it.
00:08:11And then that's where that comes at you.
00:08:14After the fact.
00:08:15It's never during it.
00:08:16Because your training takes over.
00:08:17Of course, yeah, yeah.
00:08:17It comes in, it comes in, it comes in.
00:08:18But, like, yeah.
00:08:19I had a few chats with, like, different kind of psychologists.
00:08:22So, you know, with, like, bits and pieces.
00:08:24Do you feel, as you were talking there twice now, I've had this image of people coming back from war.
00:08:33Like, we say the Afghanistan thing and a bomb in a truck.
00:08:40Of what it must be like to, you know, as you say, you're trained to deal with that situation when
00:08:47it happens.
00:09:15Hmm.
00:09:17I don't see the Irish military like that.
00:09:18Like, they see us as, like, Dad's Army or something or whatever.
00:09:21I don't know, like, and I, as a younger soldier, that used to fucking piss me off no end.
00:09:26Like, because, you know, I'd done four tours in Lebanon where fellows have been killed there, like, saving lives.
00:09:31And people are saying, ah, sure, it's only the Lebanon.
00:09:33You go out there to get, like, gold and the suntan.
00:09:36You know what I mean?
00:09:39Do you have a lot of anger?
00:09:41I don't.
00:09:41I'm actually quite a calm person.
00:09:43I have a very kind of unique way.
00:09:45Not unique.
00:09:46I like to train.
00:09:46I like to be physically active.
00:09:49My most important thing that I try and maintain is peace, like, with my head.
00:09:54Calm, composure.
00:09:54No, I don't always do it.
00:09:56Like, you know, second half of the RR in the final, being a Corkman, sitting in the stand there.
00:10:00That wasn't, you know, I wasn't enjoying that.
00:10:02But, like, I don't have a lot of anger.
00:10:05Because I try and work it out of me.
00:10:07Like, when I don't do it, then I will.
00:10:09You know what I mean?
00:10:09So you do have a lot of anger?
00:10:11I don't.
00:10:11I just, I don't allow it to build.
00:10:12You do, but you have a lot of anger, but you deal with it.
00:10:14I have no more anger than most people, like.
00:10:17Ah.
00:10:18Like, I don't.
00:10:19I don't.
00:10:20Like, I'm actually a very, as I discovered, like, I'm a very kind of people-orientated person.
00:10:26Like, I enjoy people.
00:10:27I enjoy different cultures.
00:10:29I enjoy different people.
00:10:30You know what I mean?
00:10:32Are you ever not in control?
00:10:35Of me?
00:10:36Anything.
00:10:37Oh, fucking loads of times.
00:10:38They joke me.
00:10:39Yeah.
00:10:39Lots of times.
00:10:41It doesn't, I don't mind not being in control.
00:10:43Because, like, what can you actually control at the end of the day?
00:10:48Well, I, if.
00:10:49You can't control anything.
00:10:50Think about it.
00:10:50Can you control the situation?
00:10:52You can't.
00:10:53Can you control people?
00:10:54You can't.
00:10:54What can you actually control?
00:10:58Are you leading me down a road where I'm going to say yourself?
00:11:01Of course.
00:11:01That's all you can do.
00:11:02Your actions, your attitude, your work rate, what you do.
00:11:07I had a conversation with a.
00:11:08Can you control yourself, though, Ray?
00:11:10Within reason.
00:11:10You can to a certain extent.
00:11:11I'm not sure you can.
00:11:12You can a lot.
00:11:14I'm not saying it's infallible and you can completely.
00:11:17Like, you get a line or sometimes you don't.
00:11:19But I find when I remain in a disciplined environment in myself and I follow my structures and my habits,
00:11:25my routines, I can stay in more control.
00:11:28What would happen if you didn't have those things?
00:11:30Oh, probably not much.
00:11:32I might just, it's not like, I'm not going to be up in the rooftop of a sniper rifle fucking
00:11:36shooting postmen or anything like that.
00:11:37Do you know what I mean?
00:11:38That's not how it works.
00:11:40I'd go with a Harley instead.
00:11:41Yeah, no, but the image came fairly quick to you there.
00:11:43Yeah, I could tell you were thinking, you were sending it to me, Tommy, you were sending it.
00:11:48Did you have a sense of, or do you have a sense of living a slightly more diluted life working
00:11:58with television companies?
00:12:00Yeah, so like, my day-to-day job now is I have a training company and I train, I work
00:12:05with teams and people and I've worked in prisons and I've worked with school kids about stress and dealing with,
00:12:11like, anxiety.
00:12:12And when something makes you afraid, how you can still do your best, like, whatever that is for you.
00:12:19So, like, you know, and I learned that over years.
00:12:22No, I haven't all the answers, but, like, I might have the next one if you're not sure about something
00:12:26that I've learned.
00:12:27And I don't force it on people.
00:12:28It sounds very performance-based.
00:12:29No, it's not performance-based at all.
00:12:31It's you understanding how things affect you, like, particularly your emotions.
00:12:35Because, like, you might think when I came on I'm some sort of fucking robot.
00:12:39Do you know what I mean?
00:12:39A T-800 or whatever.
00:12:41But, like, your emotions are really important and you understand how they affect you, you know?
00:12:46Like, because you can't stop them.
00:12:48You know, they'll come along, whether it's anger, fear, whatever it is, you know, like, stress.
00:12:53They'll all come.
00:12:54But you understand what it tastes like when you have them means, okay, this is what it felt like the
00:12:59last time.
00:13:28I can still do this.
00:13:30So no matter how bad it can be, like, you can win that moment, that two, three seconds you have
00:13:35to decide what you're going to do or how you're going to deal with it.
00:13:37It's the fight or flight.
00:13:38By willpower?
00:13:39No, not willpower at all.
00:13:40It's by calming yourself, like, breathing techniques, understanding yourself, what your assets are, who you are, why you're doing it,
00:13:48your purpose, how much you trust yourself.
00:13:50There's so much involved in that two seconds of thought, you know?
00:13:53And that's why I talk about training all the time.
00:13:55And the only way I manage calm and composure, for me, no, not all the time, it doesn't always work,
00:14:00is simple breathing techniques.
00:14:02A really simple breathing technique where you're almost tricking your body into thinking that it's going to relax soon.
00:14:08It's going to either be eating.
00:14:09It's going to either be having a rest.
00:14:11So you change your breathing techniques.
00:14:13So you breathe into your nose, out, through your mouth.
00:14:15I'm sure you've done stuff like that.
00:14:16Everyone does know there's breathing techniques online.
00:14:18There's all these different things you can do.
00:14:20But we used to call it tactical breathing in the military.
00:14:22And I'll give you a practical example.
00:14:23I'm not just, like, talking bullshit here.
00:14:25Like, I saw and did that in my career in the military.
00:14:28Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't.
00:14:31But for me, where it worked the most was, I mentioned Afghanistan.
00:14:35I got blown up in Afghanistan by a truck bomb once.
00:14:38I was in a building, and I was protecting a lot of people, 120 people.
00:14:42So I had a 20-guy team, and we had 120, you know, telephone operators, salespeople, engineers.
00:14:49Living with us.
00:14:50So the Taliban, what they do is they'll drive a vehicle up to your compound.
00:14:55They'll detonate a suicide bomber in a vehicle.
00:14:58They'll blow in the wall.
00:14:58Then they'll send in suicide bombers, and they'll kill everybody.
00:15:01So it was a truck bomb of a tonne and a half of TNT.
00:15:04It was a nice bang off it.
00:15:06I got blown in through the door of my room.
00:15:08Like, it was evening time, 7 o'clock in the winter's evening.
00:15:11Minus 7.
00:15:12Getting ready to go for dinner.
00:15:14Just locking me door.
00:15:15Bang.
00:15:16Blowing into the room.
00:15:17Lying in there in the dark, in the cold, right?
00:15:19And I talked about training earlier.
00:15:21So after an initial check, and my brain had been kind of wobbly for a minute, I just kind of
00:15:26refocused.
00:15:27And all the stuff I'd been doing for the 20 or 30 years before started kicking in.
00:15:31So I got all my equipment ready.
00:15:33All the simple techniques I do to keep myself composed.
00:15:35I'm doing the breathing technique the whole time.
00:15:37I'm getting my gear on, my body armor.
00:15:40And every fiber in my body wants me to stay in that room and hide under the bed.
00:15:45But I have 120 people all over that compound that I have to go out and mine them.
00:15:50So that's my job.
00:15:51So my breathing technique then, my purpose, my trust in myself, my belief, all the stuff that I trained to
00:15:58do over all the years,
00:15:59I go out and I do that for the next seven or eight hours.
00:16:03What thing most surprised you about being in war zones?
00:16:09The humanity of people, how beautiful people are in the most horrendous of events, like, you know, how kind people
00:16:19are.
00:16:20Because, like, people with good spirit, like, you know, good people, stay good people, you know, even when they have
00:16:26nothing, when they have nothing left.
00:16:29Like, you know, particularly in Afghanistan, again, like, you know, when people talk about Afghanistan, they talk about, like, bombs
00:16:35and death and the Taliban.
00:16:36Like, when I remember Afghanistan, I spent three years there or whatever it was, like, you know, I remember seeing
00:16:42kids, like, flying kites on the street, like, that's fucking obliterated, you know, playing cricket, like, playing ball, you know.
00:16:50They have wedding halls, these absolutely like palatial buildings in each kind of block, each kind of city block.
00:16:58Where they celebrate life and being families and weddings and get together in the middle of all this, like, and,
00:17:04like, these guys are at war for, like, 30 years.
00:17:06I mean, everyone's fucking fighting them, you know, amazing.
00:17:09Like, you just, it just humbles it to see it and you go, Jesus, like, the power of people, the
00:17:14power of connection, the power of community, the power of team, you know.
00:17:23What most hurt you emotionally in your life?
00:17:28What hurt me emotionally in my life?
00:17:30The most.
00:17:31Oh.
00:17:38I suppose the thing that hurt me the most emotionally in my life is I was very close to my
00:17:44parents and my mother in particular was a very strong person.
00:17:49And when she passed away in 2013, years ago now, like, initially, it was, you know, you just go through
00:17:59the motions of this happening, but I found for weeks and months after it, I could feel the kind of
00:18:06pain of it or something, you know what I mean?
00:18:08And my father had died a couple of years before that and I felt it to a certain extent with
00:18:13him, but, like, with her, though.
00:18:16And I was trying to make peace of the why and, like, it was because she has such a profound
00:18:20impact on my life, I suppose, as a person.
00:18:22And, you know, and the way she was and how she conducted herself.
00:18:25So, yeah, that's probably the most emotionally kind of burnt I've been.
00:18:30But there have been other things, like, you know what I mean?
00:18:32Like, you know, splitting up with, like, partners and, like, that all hurts.
00:18:36Like, it's all painful, like, isn't it?
00:18:38Do you feel that there's still a connection between you and your mom?
00:18:41Oh, yeah, all the time.
00:18:42I feel her all the time, like.
00:18:44Yeah, I do.
00:18:45Like, I, you know, I suppose, like, again, you know, particularly with the maternal side of things, like, you know,
00:18:55you're part of that person for a period of time.
00:18:58And everyone has different relationships with their parents, I get it, like.
00:19:00But I think for me and my mother in particular, like, yeah, it just felt like there was always that
00:19:07amazing connection.
00:19:08And, like, I don't feel like, I don't go to her grave or anything like that, but I feel it
00:19:12from her when I listen to certain music, you know, when I eat certain food.
00:19:16And sometimes I cook a particular meal so I can do that, like, and have a particular music on in
00:19:22the background.
00:19:23And I just feel it then, like, I feel her.
00:19:25And you're not afraid of feeling that?
00:19:28No.
00:19:29I actually like it.
00:19:29It's like a comfort.
00:19:32It's a comfort.
00:19:35What do you think is happening there?
00:19:38That sense of connection to...
00:19:42Is it a connection to an emptiness?
00:19:45Ooh, the connection of an emptiness.
00:19:47No, I think it's a connection to a familiarity, like, something that I had all my life with her.
00:19:51You know, of this person who had, like, you know, her own struggles and mother loads of kids and tough
00:19:59enough life and was still a kind of person who was very good to people.
00:20:05Would do good for people, would do the right thing, you know, nearly all of the time.
00:20:12Now, I tried to do that, but I didn't in my life, of course.
00:20:15We're all flawed.
00:20:18But I think, like, for me, it's a familiarity and it's a warmth, almost, you know.
00:20:22And, like, even when I served away, like, when I was a young guy, you know, I'd always ring her,
00:20:28no matter where I was in the world, like, your ma is always your ma.
00:20:31I'd always ring her somewhere or there'd be something going on, you know what I mean?
00:20:35Like, she's just a very powerful person, like, and very kind of, just decent or good or something, you know
00:20:43what I mean?
00:20:43Without even trying.
00:20:44And, like, no, she'd cut the legs off, you don't get me wrong, you know.
00:20:47But, yeah.
00:20:52Thank you so much, Ray, for being so open and chatting with me.
00:20:58Yeah, it sounds...
00:20:58It's been great, fella.
00:20:59Pleasure, Tommy.
00:21:00No, absolutely.
00:21:01I really enjoyed it, yeah.
00:21:02Thanks, yeah.
00:21:03You kind of look like Pep Guardiola.
00:21:05Everyone tells me that.
00:21:19Welcome back to the second half, everybody.
00:21:21Who's next, Freddie?
00:21:22Tommy.
00:21:23Our next guest is Amano de Londra Miura.
00:21:30Hello.
00:21:32Hello there.
00:21:33Hello there.
00:21:34It's very nice to meet you.
00:21:35Good to meet you, sir.
00:21:36Great now.
00:21:38That's a great name.
00:21:40Thank you, yeah, it's a bit of a mouthful.
00:21:43I'm trying to...
00:21:44You're Irish.
00:21:45I am, yeah.
00:21:46I'm half Irish and half Japanese.
00:21:47And I'm a singer, a writer.
00:21:52I'm mostly working with song, people, land, spirit, perhaps.
00:21:59Either goilgog spirle.
00:22:03There's a weird thing.
00:22:04I might have been listening to you...
00:22:08I'm reading about you this morning.
00:22:09That's so strange.
00:22:11Yeah.
00:22:12I'm not sure.
00:22:14These things circle that way, I think.
00:22:16Who's Japanese in your family?
00:22:18My father, yeah.
00:22:20And how did he end up over here?
00:22:22He didn't.
00:22:22Okay.
00:22:23At all, actually, really.
00:22:26So, I was born in Japan.
00:22:28My parents met when my mother was teaching English there.
00:22:33And I'd say she was expecting to go somewhere like Tokyo or Osaka,
00:22:38you know, big city lights in Japan and the booming economy in the 80s.
00:22:42But she got stationed in a small village,
00:22:46a small town called Yamaga, where my dad is from.
00:22:50And they met and they were together for a few years.
00:22:52She came back to Ireland.
00:22:53She went back over again and they had me eventually.
00:22:57And a couple of years after that, they parted.
00:23:01And so, before that, we'd come back to Ireland, my mom and I,
00:23:05and moved in with my grandparents in Killarney.
00:23:07So, I'm a Kerry woman born in Cushu,
00:23:10which was its own thing, really, in the 90s, to be honest with you.
00:23:16But, yeah, that's my life.
00:23:18That's how I'm here.
00:23:19And I grew up with my grandparents.
00:23:20So, although I didn't have my dad in the picture,
00:23:24I was raised, really, by three people.
00:23:26So, my mom, my nana and my granddad.
00:23:28Nana, her parents were dubs, and she had married.
00:23:33And how old were you when you came back?
00:23:35Two and a half.
00:23:36Okay.
00:23:37Yeah, two and a half.
00:23:38I'd say my dad came over a couple of times,
00:23:44but was gone by the time I was four entirely.
00:23:48I think I ran away from being Japanese
00:23:53when I did start to become conscious that I was different.
00:23:56and that came in different waves.
00:23:58Like, it came in a kid in a playground asking,
00:24:04why are you yellow?
00:24:05And I'm not yellow.
00:24:07No.
00:24:07But that's obviously a word that someone's learned at home
00:24:10to associate with someone whose eyes or cheekbones
00:24:13or something are like mine, yellow.
00:24:15And I think I was of the generation
00:24:17that had this added...
00:24:21...dakracht.
00:24:23Doolan challenge of also being given phones
00:24:27and access to the internet for the first time.
00:24:29And unfortunately,
00:24:33the exposure that kids my age,
00:24:35say from like 11, 12, 13 onwards,
00:24:37would have to Asian women was through pornography.
00:24:39So I did start to be treated quite differently
00:24:42from there on in by my peers.
00:24:44And that was very difficult
00:24:45because I was really ashamed to talk about that at home.
00:24:49That's so surprising to hear.
00:24:51And what...
00:24:53Can you talk about that?
00:24:54Because I don't understand how the...
00:24:57Yeah, could you tell me that story?
00:25:00Yeah.
00:25:02I suppose there are...
00:25:06In that ecosystem,
00:25:08in that marketplace,
00:25:10of sex and pornography on the internet,
00:25:13people tend to be categorised
00:25:16into boxes based on their features.
00:25:19Asian babes.
00:25:19Yeah.
00:25:21That type of thing.
00:25:22And as kids,
00:25:23if that's the only Asian person you're seeing
00:25:26doing certain things,
00:25:28and there's a whole vocabulary that goes with that,
00:25:30it's quite edgy or fun to like throw that out
00:25:33at the Asian girl in town, right?
00:25:36And I wouldn't even know necessarily
00:25:39what some of those words meant.
00:25:41So, like, I was going home,
00:25:44then Googling,
00:25:45then realising that that's what they thought
00:25:48when they saw me.
00:25:49And I guess from there,
00:25:52my protection mechanism was,
00:25:53OK, I'm going to be militantly Irish now.
00:25:56So, um...
00:25:57So, how old were the people
00:25:58that were shouting this stuff out?
00:26:01Oh, I'd say, like,
00:26:03anywhere from 13 to 17, 18.
00:26:07Yeah.
00:26:10I don't have a memory of that happening
00:26:13when I was growing up.
00:26:14Really?
00:26:15Of fellas talking like that to girls.
00:26:17Mm.
00:26:18And it's just...
00:26:19I mean...
00:26:21The lack of respect of it is...
00:26:24profound.
00:26:26Yeah.
00:26:28Do you like Japan?
00:26:30I've been there now three times.
00:26:33I do like it.
00:26:35I went for the first time when I was 22.
00:26:38So, that's a 19-year gap.
00:26:40And I met my dad that trip as well.
00:26:45I went on my own.
00:26:49And I don't remember a huge amount of those three weeks
00:26:52because I think I was on such a level of adrenaline.
00:26:57There aren't many people who get to meet a parent
00:26:59for the first time as an adult
00:27:01unless you've been adopted or estranged in some way.
00:27:04Yeah.
00:27:05Mm.
00:27:08So, my first interaction with Japan was so intense
00:27:12that I had an ephemeral feeling of it being beautiful.
00:27:17And I had a feeling that the land was somehow familiar to me
00:27:22in my spirit.
00:27:24But other than that, of course,
00:27:26I didn't have the language or the physical language.
00:27:31There's a lot of physicality that goes with being Japanese.
00:27:37Um...
00:27:39I'm imagining you're meeting your dad.
00:27:41And I'm curious as to what that...
00:27:42Did he invite you over the first time?
00:27:45No.
00:27:46My granny, his mother, got in contact with me
00:27:49on the internet via another relative.
00:27:55So, when I was a teenager,
00:27:58I started singing
00:27:59and I started making YouTube videos
00:28:02of my songs and doing covers and stuff like that.
00:28:07And they seemed to have found me.
00:28:10I didn't know.
00:28:11I didn't know for years that they were watching my videos
00:28:14or had any knowledge of my online presence.
00:28:16But I got a message on Facebook one day
00:28:17from a lady who said she was my cousin
00:28:19and that my granny had a message for me.
00:28:21So, that started it.
00:28:24And we spoke for a few months
00:28:26and it was really emotional.
00:28:27Like, to know that someone on the other side of the world
00:28:29has been praying for you every day of your life.
00:28:32Was there a...
00:28:33a gap in your life
00:28:35that she was filling?
00:28:38Because you're talking about, like,
00:28:40living with your grandparents in...
00:28:41in Clarnie.
00:28:43Was there a kind of...
00:28:45So, then finding out that this woman
00:28:46has been thinking about you.
00:28:47Like, did you...
00:28:48did you need it?
00:28:50I think it gave me...
00:28:57permission to...
00:28:58explore what it might feel like
00:29:00to also say I'm Japanese.
00:29:07Because before that,
00:29:10when someone would ask me where I'm from,
00:29:13I would say I'm Irish
00:29:14in such a strong way
00:29:17that I'd almost be telling them
00:29:19that I don't want this conversation
00:29:20to go any further, you know.
00:29:21Yeah, yeah.
00:29:22Because there's always a follow-up question.
00:29:23Where are you really from?
00:29:25Or, you don't look Irish.
00:29:27Or, like, you know...
00:29:29I also think...
00:29:32the absence of...
00:29:35the source of my Japanese-ness in my life,
00:29:38yes, it definitely created a void.
00:29:40But that's almost the well of my work now.
00:29:43Okay.
00:29:44And that has given me an empathy,
00:29:47especially in things like language
00:29:49or feeling a little bit adrift culturally
00:29:51in Ireland that a lot of people struggle with.
00:29:53That's given me empathy,
00:29:56like, this deep well
00:29:57that allows me to talk to people
00:30:00and, for example,
00:30:01inspire them to move past
00:30:04whatever shame or rejection
00:30:06they're feeling within the Irish language.
00:30:08How do you do that?
00:30:10At the moment,
00:30:11I was doing it through songs, mostly.
00:30:14So...
00:30:15I teach online...
00:30:18courses to adults.
00:30:20Four weeks,
00:30:21they come and they learn songs in Irish.
00:30:23But they don't just do that.
00:30:24They talk about why they've gotten here
00:30:26to this online class with me.
00:30:29Do you get...
00:30:32Do you get people doing double takes?
00:30:34Yes.
00:30:35Of you?
00:30:35Yeah.
00:30:37Yeah.
00:30:37It can be a bit isolating.
00:30:39Like, I sing Shannos mostly.
00:30:45I sing pop music as well, like fusion, hip-hop, all that.
00:30:50But Shannos is kind of my musical route.
00:30:55I love it.
00:30:57And...
00:30:59I'm always the only person in the room
00:31:02who is ethnically non-Caucasian, let's say.
00:31:06Um...
00:31:07The Gaelge in my family...
00:31:10I lived quite literally with the missing link.
00:31:14Like, my granddad, Pat, who was at home with us,
00:31:19was a native speaker from Jingle.
00:31:22But by the time he was an elderly man,
00:31:24he didn't speak at all
00:31:26and he had very negative associations with the language.
00:31:29His kids, my mum and her siblings,
00:31:32of course, did it at school
00:31:33and had a decent level, but never kept it up.
00:31:37But I think there...
00:31:38I had a great...
00:31:40There was...
00:31:41People were really receptive.
00:31:43With support from the Arts Council, I spent a year...
00:31:46I did five masterclasses across different regions
00:31:48and people were very grateful
00:31:51that I was going to all the effort
00:31:53of travelling and meeting people
00:31:55and trying to get down into the roots of something
00:31:57that has been so precious and vulnerable for a long time.
00:32:02It might feel like it's exploding now
00:32:04and there's so much interest and resurgence,
00:32:06but it wasn't always like this
00:32:08and things were...
00:32:09Things have been lost.
00:32:11Songs have been lost.
00:32:13There are far more lyrics surviving
00:32:17than there are melodies.
00:32:20There are many melodies that we don't know.
00:32:23And...
00:32:24But would you be tempted to put melodies on them?
00:32:26People are doing...
00:32:27There are great people doing that,
00:32:28like Zoe Conway and...
00:32:31People have done fantastic work
00:32:33setting poetry to...
00:32:35Setting poetry to music again.
00:32:37And yeah, of course there would be.
00:32:39Of course there would be.
00:32:40I want to write new songs as well.
00:32:42You know, I...
00:32:44We have new stories to tell.
00:32:45We have entirely new cultural contexts
00:32:47to preserve and enliven.
00:32:49Wouldn't that be a thing?
00:32:51Yeah.
00:32:51Wouldn't it?
00:32:52Brand new Shannos.
00:32:53It's happening.
00:32:54People are doing it every year.
00:32:56You know, at the Oireachtas and that,
00:32:57there's a competition for newly composed songs
00:33:01in the kind of old style.
00:33:03Could you sing something for me
00:33:05and maybe explain...
00:33:07Explain a bit about it as well?
00:33:10Can't I?
00:33:11Yeah.
00:33:19So, I'll give you a few verses of
00:33:21Benacht o JÃn na HÃne,
00:33:23a blessing from the King of Friday,
00:33:25so from the Oireacht himself.
00:33:26It's a song from the Blaskets.
00:33:29And this one is an immigration song,
00:33:33but not in like a deep, heavy way.
00:33:35It's just like, I'm going.
00:33:38And there's a hint of that
00:33:40there might have even been a break-up.
00:33:42You know, the kind of everyday reasons
00:33:44that someone might have to leave.
00:33:47And of course, the tragedy of saying goodbye.
00:33:50But I like it particularly
00:33:52because I think in this moment,
00:33:54things like migration, immigration,
00:33:55they're such hot and heated topics.
00:33:59And sometimes we want to like over-rationalise them
00:34:04or everyone has to have a massive story
00:34:06to go with it.
00:34:07But like in this song,
00:34:09there's always just been people
00:34:11who've left and wandered and gone
00:34:13for various reasons from every culture.
00:34:16And that's kind of how you end up
00:34:18with people who look like me
00:34:19or, yeah, have an extra flavour
00:34:24added to the world.
00:34:25So, yeah.
00:34:27Okay.
00:34:27Or ginger-haired freckledy people in Osaka.
00:34:30Exactly.
00:34:31I haven't met them yet,
00:34:33but sure, I'm sure they're there.
00:34:35Hmm.
00:34:48Yeah.
00:34:56Ooh.
00:34:59Ooh.
00:35:29SONG PLAYS
00:35:58CHOIR SINGS
00:36:02Ah, the lovely little run at the end where it's almost like, thank you very much now, good luck.
00:36:09Coming back into speech, like coming back into here.
00:36:15You'd also have the wine doll.
00:36:18And for me, my energetic interpretation of that today is like it's a grounding rod in the room.
00:36:24It's someone keeping you here in case you end up off there with the spirits in the middle of the
00:36:28song.
00:36:29You know, you've got to have someone keeping you here.
00:36:31It's a vulnerable place, I think.
00:36:36I'm thinking of one concert last year around April in Ballinskellex in the Parish Hall.
00:36:43And I sang Queen in the Tree of Wyrra.
00:36:45And I was playing with...
00:36:47Oh, hones.
00:36:48Yeah, yeah.
00:36:49I was playing with Mike Dowd, my friend, my former teacher.
00:36:53And I was thinking about mothers in Palestine.
00:37:00And I was...
00:37:01The song is about Jesus and the song is about Mary recognising her own child in agony.
00:37:08And I was really like...
00:37:13In that emotion.
00:37:16In a way that's bigger than my own lived experience.
00:37:19In a sense, that lived experience is living in the song at that point, right?
00:37:22And I'm then a conduit for that.
00:37:25And I could feel...
00:37:32My limbs...
00:37:37Like...
00:37:38I don't know how to describe it.
00:37:39Being pricked or something throughout that experience, throughout the song.
00:37:42And like knowing you have to just keep going.
00:37:47And it...
00:37:48It's hard to remember to like...
00:37:52Well, first of all, give yourself some...
00:37:54Cut yourself some slack in that moment.
00:37:56But to come back and then like move on to the next song.
00:38:00Is the...
00:38:00It's a little bit hard.
00:38:01Yeah.
00:38:02The Ooghoun is Ooghoun.
00:38:06That's Mary...
00:38:09Lamenting to her child.
00:38:11Is that right?
00:38:11Yeah, it's one of the expressions...
00:38:14It's one of the vocalised, vocable expressions of grief that's in our keening tradition.
00:38:21The Ooghoun.
00:38:23But as far as I understand, keening was much more ecstatic as well.
00:38:28So...
00:38:29You might not know what was coming through you.
00:38:32It wasn't as regimented.
00:38:33That's a keen that's kind of been stylised into a song that we sing now.
00:38:39To finish up, could you give us a blast of it?
00:38:43Would you mind?
00:38:43I don't know what's going through you.
00:38:44Okay.
00:38:46I can't hear this.
00:39:07I love you.
00:39:18I love you.
00:39:48I love you.
00:40:02I love you.
00:40:06I love you.
00:40:12I love you.
00:40:32I love you.
00:41:10I love you.
00:41:13I love you.
00:42:07I love you.
00:42:10Yeah, I mean, watered when I was born, till I was seven years old, but of course we'd go back
00:42:16to Banclody, go back to Weakler, Tremor, all those places.
00:42:23I remember listening a lot to you in the 80s, did you have a lot of chart success then?
00:42:37Am I remember, am I remembering that right?
00:42:40No.
00:42:40No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
00:42:43No?
00:42:44Well, you kind of, you know, it's, the 70s was primarily the big, the big successful period.
00:42:49The 70s didn't get to nab until the 80s.
00:42:51OK, right, OK. That's your excuse.
00:42:55OK. Anyway, the 70s was all the success.
00:42:5880s, not so much.
00:43:00How did it happen for you? Do you mind me asking?
00:43:02It's a too boring story for you to tell again.
00:43:05Once I took up songwriting seriously,
00:43:07the publisher of CBS, April Music, really liked the songs.
00:43:12So that got me on the first...
00:43:14I said, I wouldn't sign a publishing deal with you
00:43:16unless I get a recording contract.
00:43:19So they hummed and they hawed.
00:43:21When they saw how I wanted to present myself as a singer,
00:43:24they weren't exactly that impressed.
00:43:27They suggested that I wear, let my hair grow,
00:43:30wear what everybody wore in the 60s and 70s, jeans and whatnot.
00:43:34I had created a character called Gilbert
00:43:37based on Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton.
00:43:40Cap in boots, putting bass in a haircut,
00:43:42which today is the height of fashion.
00:43:43Yeah, yeah.
00:43:44But in those days, he looked like a freak.
00:43:46So that's the difficulty CBS had.
00:43:49Because they would have said, look, Ray, as they knew me,
00:43:52if you drop this image and just wear your jeans,
00:43:55look like James Taylor or somebody,
00:43:57we think you can be successful.
00:43:59But if you maintain this image that you want,
00:44:01we're not going to do much with you.
00:44:04But they realised that dropping me,
00:44:06they'd miss out on the songs.
00:44:09So they said, because we love the songs,
00:44:11we'll give you a recording contract.
00:44:13So they gave me a contract for a couple of singles a year.
00:44:16And what did you do in terms of how you looked?
00:44:19Well, that was the key factor.
00:44:20I told you, I based, I created a character called Gilbert.
00:44:23No, but did you go their way in terms of...
00:44:25Changing? Of course not.
00:44:27Good man.
00:44:27No, no, no, not in a million years.
00:44:30It's...
00:44:30But they weren't the first company to not like what I was in.
00:44:34Nobody liked how I looked.
00:44:36And I loved how I looked.
00:44:37Yeah.
00:44:38Because I just dared to be different.
00:44:40And I figured at this point, maybe what I should do,
00:44:42try and seek a top manager.
00:44:44Yeah.
00:44:44This would be like 68, 69.
00:44:46So the manager of the top of the list for solo singers
00:44:49was Gordon Mills,
00:44:50who managed Tom Jones and Enkerwood Hummering.
00:44:52Now, I didn't want to be like them.
00:44:54I wasn't that type of singer.
00:44:56I had pictures of my image,
00:44:58and I had my songs and my little tape.
00:45:00And so I sent them to him.
00:45:02So I was...
00:45:03Yeah.
00:45:03That was the moment.
00:45:04Then he took over.
00:45:06That meant I could make a really good record
00:45:08and release my first album.
00:45:13The thing is, I never saw success
00:45:16wanting the world to be like a David Bowie
00:45:18to conquer the world.
00:45:19I just wanted to...
00:45:20I was living in England.
00:45:22Ireland was close to me.
00:45:23So I wanted to have a success in England and Ireland.
00:45:26That's all I really wanted.
00:45:28I didn't look to Europe and stuff.
00:45:30Were you ever...
00:45:32After that initial moment,
00:45:35were you ever...
00:45:35Did you ever have doubts about what you were doing?
00:45:37No.
00:45:38Really?
00:45:38No.
00:45:39In the mid-70s, with Gordon, my manager,
00:45:42it became a slight problem.
00:45:43Because by mid-70s, the success was not so high.
00:45:48It was dropping down a bit, which is quite natural.
00:45:50And I hadn't lost that ambition to continue to make...
00:45:54You know, I felt that we could still do more better.
00:45:57Gordon then, by this time, had other interests.
00:46:00He had a private zoo with gorillas and tigers,
00:46:03amongst other things, in his garden.
00:46:06So that was occupying a lot of his time.
00:46:08Can't hide the profits forever.
00:46:11Right.
00:46:13So, you know, he was spending more time in America.
00:46:16And I felt that...
00:46:18You know, the classic thing was...
00:46:20I said to him that there are artists like Rod Stewart
00:46:22who are working with American producers.
00:46:24Why not let me work with them?
00:46:26You're still my manager.
00:46:27Let me work with another producer.
00:46:29Because he produced my records as well as managing me.
00:46:32And he wouldn't go for that.
00:46:34And I really was determined to get more success.
00:46:38That's what we needed to do.
00:46:40So when I couldn't convince him of this by mid-70s,
00:46:44I broke up with him.
00:46:45Which I thought would be...
00:46:50The expression would be...
00:46:52It wouldn't be a bad break-up.
00:46:54It would be acceptable.
00:46:57I remember shaking hands with him when I told him that...
00:47:00That's it.
00:47:03But it wasn't, of course.
00:47:04But that was a time when...
00:47:09It was very different.
00:47:10The belief was still there.
00:47:11But the circumstances of working with new people
00:47:14was going to be something I had to face
00:47:16if I was successful in the break-up with my manager.
00:47:19So what did you do?
00:47:20Did you go to America?
00:47:22At that point?
00:47:23No.
00:47:24At that point, I had to go to court.
00:47:28Because of the work with him?
00:47:31Well, because of him, yeah.
00:47:32Because when...
00:47:35Again, these little things are very important
00:47:37because I get upset when I read articles that say
00:47:39all I was interested in was money and stuff.
00:47:42But when Gordon signed me,
00:47:44I had been promised from the publishing company
00:47:47that they would give me a small company
00:47:49which I would co-own
00:47:51as opposed to just being signed as a writer.
00:47:53If you're signed as a writer,
00:47:55the publisher's 100%
00:47:56and you just get your writer's payments.
00:47:59So what was being offered was
00:48:00to give you a little company
00:48:02where you get a little bit of the publishing
00:48:03as well as your writer's share.
00:48:04It was brand new.
00:48:06So I thought that's great for me
00:48:07because I had two more years left
00:48:09of my agreement with the publisher.
00:48:11And Gordon said to me,
00:48:13you're not going to get it now,
00:48:14but if you're successful,
00:48:15I'll give it to you.
00:48:17Right?
00:48:17So the years went by,
00:48:1972, 73, massive success.
00:48:21I would occasionally say to Gordon,
00:48:22any news on my little publishing company
00:48:24and stuff?
00:48:25I said, don't worry,
00:48:25you're going to get it and stuff.
00:48:27Years go by, another year,
00:48:28but I would drop hints and say,
00:48:30any news on the...
00:48:31It's all, yeah,
00:48:32it's all going to be happening.
00:48:33When we broke up,
00:48:34I shook hands with him
00:48:35and I left his home
00:48:36thinking it was an amicable split.
00:48:38That's the word I was looking for,
00:48:40amicable.
00:48:41I said to him,
00:48:42do I still get,
00:48:42well, I still get my little small company.
00:48:45He said, yeah,
00:48:45you go into the office,
00:48:47this is the weekend,
00:48:49go into the office on Monday
00:48:49and Bill Smith,
00:48:50his chairman of the company,
00:48:53they'll do a sort out for you.
00:48:54Great, I shook hands with him.
00:48:55I saw a government with my wife on the Monday,
00:48:58walked in,
00:48:59the head of the board,
00:49:00the chairman of the company was there,
00:49:02and said, you know,
00:49:03you're not going to get anything.
00:49:05You're not going to get anything.
00:49:08So, I then had to decide what to do.
00:49:10So, all my business had been looked after
00:49:13by MEM lawyers and all that stuff.
00:49:15I had no experience of any of that.
00:49:17So, I needed a lawyer.
00:49:19And what I thought would be just a case
00:49:22about the little interest for me,
00:49:24it became a whole can of worms,
00:49:26which lasted two,
00:49:28nearly three years.
00:49:30What was the outcome of it?
00:49:31I won it.
00:49:33You said that like a mafia boss.
00:49:36Well, I have to make it clear
00:49:38that I fought really hard.
00:49:41Yeah.
00:49:41And I deserved to be able to express it
00:49:43in that way,
00:49:44because it was a very painful experience.
00:49:47You want to go to court?
00:49:48Who wants to go to court?
00:49:50Thinking that maybe,
00:49:51or if I have to go to court,
00:49:52it might be over in a day,
00:49:52but this is going on for weeks.
00:49:55So, you won the court case.
00:49:56So, you were then given
00:49:57a small publishing company?
00:49:59Well, I was given all the publishing.
00:50:01I was given all their publishing.
00:50:02I was given everything.
00:50:03You were given the...
00:50:04The record.
00:50:05I was given the whole thing.
00:50:07The rights to your songs.
00:50:08Everything, 100%.
00:50:09So, people might not understand
00:50:11that if you own the publishing,
00:50:13you're entitled to whatever
00:50:15that publishing earns.
00:50:17Yeah.
00:50:17When it's owned by a company,
00:50:18you might get 10 or 15% of it or something,
00:50:20but you own it all now.
00:50:21Yeah.
00:50:22Wow.
00:50:22I wasn't looking for that.
00:50:24I was given all my masters,
00:50:25all my recordings,
00:50:26which they owned because they made,
00:50:28were all given to me.
00:50:29I'm blessed with that.
00:50:31Because to this day,
00:50:33it becomes very lucrative
00:50:35for people involved with me.
00:50:39Wow.
00:50:39That's a fortunate constant to have in your life,
00:50:44isn't it?
00:50:45That the publishing has all the time
00:50:47been earning something over the years.
00:50:49That's a wonderful thing to have.
00:50:51Yeah, it's incredible.
00:50:51The rights to that.
00:50:52Yeah.
00:50:52Absolutely.
00:50:54Are you able to look back on parts of your career
00:50:56and kind of go,
00:50:57well, I always made an effort,
00:50:58but maybe for those few years,
00:51:01the angel of inspiration wasn't on my shoulder?
00:51:04No,
00:51:05because it can't have been there
00:51:07because I've never had that,
00:51:08what do they call it?
00:51:10When you have a...
00:51:12Like a muse.
00:51:15It's when you can't write.
00:51:16Or writer's block.
00:51:18Writer's block and stuff.
00:51:19I've never suffered from that.
00:51:20So I've never had the experience of losing.
00:51:23What I might have,
00:51:25you know,
00:51:25I'm 79 years of age now,
00:51:27how much longer do I want to continue?
00:51:29Irvin Boleyn was 100 when he stopped writing.
00:51:33If I felt that I just wanted to stop,
00:51:37then,
00:51:38or if I couldn't write,
00:51:40you know, it's possible.
00:51:41You never know.
00:51:42Maybe I'll lose it.
00:51:43Then I would just...
00:51:45I love to walk.
00:51:46You know,
00:51:46we've got my family,
00:51:47so we'd take trips together and stuff.
00:51:49So I didn't, you know,
00:51:50have a good time.
00:51:51The only thing I can really compare what you do
00:51:55is, say, stuff that I have,
00:51:57not to the same level,
00:51:58but, you know,
00:52:00that buzz of starting off
00:52:02and getting recognition
00:52:05and feeling,
00:52:06okay, geez,
00:52:06I am able to do this.
00:52:09Then people come out of nowhere
00:52:11and they're so much more successful.
00:52:17Are those familiar feelings to you?
00:52:20Well, they're...
00:52:21I'm aware of them.
00:52:22Very conscious of the business and stuff.
00:52:23I mean, I want...
00:52:24I mean, it's always disgruntled.
00:52:26I've always been dismayed a little
00:52:27by the serious music press.
00:52:30Don't have no interest in me
00:52:31because of how I looked.
00:52:32It's the image I created
00:52:33that hurt me badly for credibility.
00:52:36The credibility factor
00:52:37was rife with me
00:52:38because very few music magazines
00:52:41that wrote about songwriters
00:52:45and songwriting and stuff
00:52:46weren't interested in me
00:52:49because, you know,
00:52:49what I represented, they hated.
00:52:52And so I can understand that.
00:52:53I mean, you know,
00:52:54I could have been on their side
00:52:56if I had given up the image
00:52:57early on and stuff.
00:52:58What do you think you represented?
00:53:00Hmm?
00:53:00What do you think you represented?
00:53:02What I represented was...
00:53:03I have no interest, anyway.
00:53:04You know...
00:53:06Well, I...
00:53:06Again, I'm not going into
00:53:08what other people were thinking,
00:53:09but I was conscious of it.
00:53:10I was just aware of it,
00:53:11how little interest there was in me
00:53:13as a songwriter
00:53:14and as an artist and stuff.
00:53:16And I've worked hard to change that.
00:53:19And I've actually done very well
00:53:20in doing that.
00:53:21The 90s and the 2000s
00:53:23up to here in 25, 26.
00:53:25I've got to a stage now
00:53:27where the credibility is creeping in.
00:53:29The reviews I'm getting from my albums
00:53:30are there where they never were.
00:53:32So that's a positive thing.
00:53:35It's...
00:53:35And it's good that that's happening
00:53:37because I'm very active
00:53:38wanting to perform,
00:53:40wanting to write,
00:53:41wanting to record.
00:53:42So it's good that there's
00:53:43an aspect of the business
00:53:44which are, you know,
00:53:46allowing me back in.
00:53:48What are they saying about you?
00:53:50Well, just...
00:53:50Just a crap artist and stuff.
00:53:52You know, he's...
00:53:53Well, I mean, you know,
00:53:54the articles are there in papers
00:53:55that I tend not to...
00:53:56No, no.
00:53:57I mean, when you said
00:53:58the good reviews now.
00:53:59Yeah.
00:53:59What do the good reviews say about the songs?
00:54:01Well, they're giving...
00:54:02They're rating the songs.
00:54:03So they're giving me praise
00:54:05for my songwriting.
00:54:06And I'm happy with that.
00:54:08It's nice to be...
00:54:10You know, it's nice to be appreciated.
00:54:15Success in America and Australia.
00:54:18What was that like?
00:54:19Incredible.
00:54:20Well, again, the interesting thing
00:54:21was going back to what I said
00:54:22about wanting to be a success
00:54:23in England and Ireland.
00:54:25That, for me, was a dream.
00:54:26Here I was in 1972
00:54:28with six weeks number one in America.
00:54:30The record company are just...
00:54:32They're floating on air.
00:54:33They're seeing cheques coming in
00:54:34for a million pounds.
00:54:35And I'm at home in Weybridge
00:54:40where I lived.
00:54:42And, yeah, okay, I'm, you know...
00:54:45Am I going to go to America?
00:54:46And, yeah, you've got to go to America
00:54:48because I hadn't gone before.
00:54:49Yeah.
00:54:50And so I'm, you know,
00:54:51it's not that I'm not liking it.
00:54:55I mean, I...
00:54:55You know, it's...
00:54:56What is this?
00:54:57Okay, so I have to go to America?
00:54:59Okay.
00:54:59No concerts, obviously,
00:55:00because I haven't done that much concert-wise.
00:55:04So I go to America to do TV.
00:55:07And I get nominated for three Grammys.
00:55:10And it's...
00:55:11It's...
00:55:12It's...
00:55:12A Dean Martin show.
00:55:13We sang a duet together.
00:55:15And he...
00:55:15I don't think he looked at me once.
00:55:17I was on major shows
00:55:18and doing chat shows and stuff.
00:55:19Johnny Carson and...
00:55:20Yeah, those kind of things.
00:55:21Doing all those and stuff.
00:55:22And did nobody ever say to you,
00:55:24Look, it's great that these massive checks are coming in
00:55:28for album sales.
00:55:29But there's, you know,
00:55:30there's Led Zeppelin stuff to be earned
00:55:32if you will go out and perform live.
00:55:35And do big arenas.
00:55:37Was that ever...
00:55:39An option for you?
00:55:41No, it couldn't have been an option for me.
00:55:43It would have been an option if...
00:55:44If I was having major success now.
00:55:46I have...
00:55:47Success now.
00:55:48The albums chart.
00:55:49All the albums of recent times have charted.
00:55:51Whereas the ones in the last ten years didn't chart.
00:55:53They were released.
00:55:55Reviews became good in the last ten years.
00:55:57So the album are charting.
00:56:00So...
00:56:00I would...
00:56:01You know...
00:56:01The first arena show I'll ever do
00:56:03would be the one I do in Dublin in October.
00:56:05You're kidding me.
00:56:06Yeah.
00:56:07You're kidding me.
00:56:07That will be my first...
00:56:09Yeah.
00:56:10And that's going to be something special.
00:56:14But I'm...
00:56:15I couldn't do those in the UK yet.
00:56:17I couldn't do them.
00:56:18Certainly not in Europe or America.
00:56:20I...
00:56:21I could try and work up to it.
00:56:23Because if I'm getting it in Dublin,
00:56:24the likelihood is that by next year,
00:56:26if this album is as successful as we'd like it to be,
00:56:30it could be that the next stage from going from 2,000 a season
00:56:33will be to arenas and stuff.
00:56:35It can happen.
00:56:36It's there in our minds.
00:56:39And are you excited about putting in the work
00:56:42that would...
00:56:43Yeah.
00:56:44About...
00:56:44Really?
00:56:45All the promo work?
00:56:46Yeah, because I know how different it will be.
00:56:48On stage for the arena.
00:56:49Wow.
00:56:51All...
00:56:51Everything's going to be brought in there.
00:56:53I heard when Dylan was there,
00:56:55they had a bloody wonderful curtain.
00:56:57Yeah, yeah.
00:56:57A gorgeous curtain.
00:56:58Big red thing.
00:56:58I said to our people,
00:57:00make sure the curtain's there.
00:57:02And so...
00:57:02So...
00:57:03Yeah, it's exciting.
00:57:04Because we'll be able to...
00:57:05I'm not working with a drummer.
00:57:06We'll probably bring the drummer back.
00:57:08String Quartet, we might bring back.
00:57:09I think the song we have on the new album with a bit of a choir,
00:57:12we might bring the choir out to do that.
00:57:15So...
00:57:15We can do that with an arena show.
00:57:17It's not about money.
00:57:18It's about being able to just present yourself bigger.
00:57:21So I'm excited about that.
00:57:24When is the show on?
00:57:25The...
00:57:26I mean, that's incredible.
00:57:27The arena show.
00:57:28October.
00:57:28October.
00:57:30That's...
00:57:31What an adventure.
00:57:32Well, you have to...
00:57:33Maybe you should come along and see us.
00:57:34I should.
00:57:35What an...
00:57:35I've never played an arena.
00:57:37That's a great adventure.
00:57:39Erm...
00:57:40Do I call you Gilbert or Ray?
00:57:41Either or.
00:57:43Either or.
00:57:43Either or.
00:57:44I don't mind.
00:57:44Okay.
00:57:46Erm...
00:57:47It's been a pleasure talking to you.
00:57:48Yeah, it's been interesting for me, Tom.
00:57:50I enjoyed it too.
00:57:53Erm...
00:57:55And...
00:57:55It's encouraging and exciting that there's still adventure to be had.
00:57:59Absolutely.
00:57:59And I'll see you in October.
00:58:01Thank you very much.
00:58:02Yeah, I've enjoyed it too.
00:58:04Erm...
00:58:05And now, ladies and gentlemen, all the way from Clare Island, it's Niall McCabe performing his current single, The Heart
00:58:11Remembers.
00:58:16Take me back, back over, over the ocean.
00:58:28The ocean...
00:58:32The ocean white, or wild and white is, a man's emotion.
00:58:42When fate has forced him
00:58:47From heartbound home
00:58:52The heart remembers
00:58:57As morning embers
00:59:02All by the sun gone
00:59:06I expect to the dawn
00:59:11And so enroving
00:59:16And always going
00:59:20I lay the ways to get home again
00:59:54I lay the ways to get home again
01:00:10The land I long for
01:00:14For far too long true
01:00:18Her hills and valleys are
01:00:23No more ground than yours
01:00:27But you's reflection
01:00:32And recollection
01:00:36Is still her waters
01:00:40And her false revels
01:00:44So take me back
01:00:49Back over
01:00:53Over the ocean
01:00:57The ocean wide
01:01:03A while and wide is
01:01:09A man's emotion
01:01:13When fate has forced him
01:01:17From earth and home
01:01:30To be continued
01:01:31To be continued
01:01:33To be continued
01:01:59To be continued
01:02:00To be continued
01:02:01To be continued
01:02:26To be continued
01:02:27To be continued
01:02:28To be continued
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