Interview with Newton Faulkner

A pocketful of surprises from Newton Faulkner

Newton Faulkner’s latest chapter in his career is his most authentic yet. He is finally relishing in being exactly who he wants to be. A natural-born artist, he has belonged in the room from day one.

He has also adapted to a constantly changing musical landscape; from his debut, to his 2009 sophomore effort Rebuilt by Humans, his second UK #1 album Write It on Your Skin, then Studio Zoo and beyond, Faulkner has never rested on his laurels and always strived for more.

However, that door he first entered – where control over his own music, the highs and lows of fame and critical categorisation all came at a cost – is now a remnant of the past. The door he walks through now is the one that was made for him. This is not just a re-introduction. It is a fresh start.

Seven caught up with Faulkner to talk about his trip to Australia and his new record, Octopus.

Where are you? And what’s the weather like?

I’m in London, East London, and it’s midnight or something, the sun’s gone to bed, and I’ve just finished dinner – but it was super windy today. I didn’t realise how windy it was until I tried to throw a ball for a dog and it came back and hit me in the face. I was like, oh, it’s pretty windy!

You’re prepping for the trip here?

Yes! I can’t wait. It’s been a really long time, I have some new gear. There’s loads of, loads of incredibly fun toys for me to play with, and I’ve got someone building me something. Which is going to be very interesting.

Oh tell me! What it is?

Well, I built something. It’s the second thing I’ve ever built in my life. I built two things. I’ve built a wooden squirrel when I was nine, then I built a pair of MIDI shoes – lens caps and Velcro as a proper hack job, but it did two whole tours, an entire festival season. So I’ve been expanding the idea and dealing with someone that actually knows how to build things, and they have a, like a proper prototype ready to go soon.

How long since you’ve been to Australia?

A good few years. I can’t wait to come back. It was the first place where things kind of kicked off. I’ll never forget the first time I came, because it was that moment where I kind of flew out, and I was at baggage reclaim and doing all that stuff. It’s the furthest I’d ever been from home in my entire life and immediately someone was like, ‘hang on, you’re Newton Faulkner!’ It was amazing.

This record feels to me like you’ve covered just about every possible style of music – was that intentional?

Yes, well the one thing that I tried not to do was cover ground that I’d covered before, and there were so many options for things that I love, and have loved all my life, that I’ve never really done because, for some reason, and I’m still not quite sure where it came from, really, I didn’t feel like I was ‘allowed’. So I was like, ‘okay, so this stuff goes well, this stuff doesn’t go well. I’ll park that stuff for a bit’, and a bit of like, chasing my own tail and trying to retread ground that went better than the ground I hadn’t done.

I asked myself, ‘what do I really want to do? What am I excited about?’ And that really was the kind of turning point for me with the album.

Has the reality matched the vision you had when you started?

I think it’s actually kind of surpassed it. I was never really motivated by anything other than the work. I mean, I remember this really clearly, because when things first kicked off, when the first album did what it did, which no one expected it to do, least of all me, there was a lot going on. And I remember being in a really fancy hotel room and going into the bathroom and looking at myself in the mirror and thinking, ‘okay, we need to have a chat.’ There’s a lot going on. I’m pretty sure that 80 to 95 per cent of it is total bullshit. So we need to tread carefully. We need to work out what we actually want.

Yeah, so what do we want? Because if we just want to be like a kind of household name, it’s doable, but it’s a very different agenda. And I was like, ‘Well, what do I love doing? It’s like, well, I love the work. Yep, I love trying to get better at my job. Yeah. I’ve really held to that, and I still sit and practise scales. I have singing lessons. I like reading books on music theory. I’m watching endless tutorials on how to use compressors. I just love it. I love every aspect of it.’

I’ve got to the stage where I can have an idea and be like, ‘ah, it’d be really cool to do something that sounded like this,’ and I can sit in a room on my own and get to that point.

Do you have an earworm at the moment?

Okay, it’s the strangest thing. Yes, it usually is. I introduced my two-year-old to a piece of music, and I basically needed him to sit still for nine minutes. And I was like, right? What’s approximately that length that will catch him off guard, and he’ll get really intrigued – now it’s just going round and round.

What’s inspiring you to get out of bed and write music?

I’ve been writing three days a week, solidly, and if I haven’t been writing, I’m producing the stuff that I’ve been writing. And I get up at five o’clock every morning, and the thing that I did at five o’clock this morning was start doing research into the science behind what makes something a hook or not a hook. Yeah, to try and right, get scientifically into what makes something catchy or not catchy, which I don’t, it’s not like my main motivation if I’m writing for myself, in some ways, it’s like part of it, but for me, it’s never been enough to get me out of the bed in the morning, just as like a concept, just on its own, but chucking in working for other people, and the combination of working with other people, suddenly, I actually really feel the need to understand it more, if that’s even possible. So science is getting me out of bed. Science has always got me out of bed. My dad gets me the same present every year, for over a decade – a subscription to the New Scientist.

Newton Faulkner is playing The Backroom at The Northern on Friday, 24 April – tickets: www.moshtix.com.au.