Why The Smiths' Guitar Legend Johnny Marr Still Practices Every Day | Guy Raz

Key Takeaway

Treat improvement as a daily practice, not a verdict on your talent. Set aside 20 focused minutes today to study one piece of work you admire: replay it, identify its individual elements, and recreate or apply one small detail yourself. Johnny Marr’s edge came from obsessive listening, consistent practice, and showing up with ideas ready—long before inspiration arrived. Build the habit of working first; better ideas follow.

Episode Overview

Johnny Marr reflects on teaching himself guitar through intense listening, the creative formation of The Smiths, and his collaborations with artists including Modest Mouse and Hans Zimmer. He argues that lasting creativity comes from craft, preparation, productive output, and honoring the work enough to practice every day.

Full Transcript

Transcript of Why The Smiths' Guitar Legend Johnny Marr Still Practices Every Day | Guy Raz from How I Built This. Auto-generated from episode audio; may contain minor errors.

when you were growing up did you um I know you went to Catholic schools did you did you guys go to church regularly was required it was oh yeah you were an alter boy yeah I think um yeah I think my parents because they're so very obsessed with music um and still are and um so you know my mother she my mother would be S you know late 70s now when I go around partly because I'm a musician but she's done this all my life and now she will um she'll show me what current country song or singer songwriter from usually from America that she's into on YouTube so that's become an amazing thing and when I was a a youngster they would phone up the local radio station and make requests three times a week you know the the the DJs on in the local radio would know my parents were they'd phone up and want a a George Jones track or a Don Williams track I mean I know so much mhm consequently me and my sister rebelled against it but I know quite a lot about old school country music whether I like it or not um and um but the only thing so they're very happy that I'm a professional musician and uh and that I'm a lifer as we call it but um the only thing that would have been um more impressive to them if i' had have been um a guitar playing priest probably so you um I mean you you were born in in the early 60s but really you were you're you were sort of teenager in the 70s and I I want to I'm I'm C first of all we'll talk about your book which is beautiful um and the guitars in that book um but I I mean obviously we're going to talk and I'm going to ask you about the sound that you created in music and certainly is such a young man I mean essentially he a teenager but um I read that you I mean and you written about this I mean you learned to play guitar without any lessons I mean you you learned it by like looking at books and on how mostly on from 45s did and kind of hanging around older boys like a sponge like a very very dedicated and obsessive uh student uh so for you seriously I um I wasn't aware that there was even such a thing as guitar lessons my friends we all were doing the same thing we were all learning off T-Rex records and glamrock records and M the hoop and all of that how how did you un unpack what you were listening to Ian you mentioned T-Rex and mat the hoop and I mean incredible bands right but how are you like unraveling their what they were making the sounds they were making and translate that into your fingers and you know into good question because I learned all of that from listening over and over again to Sparks and these early' 70s records which luckily luckily for me at this really formative formative age of 10 11 12 happened to be built on pretty great rock guitar music so I to answer your question I would play those records going round and I would watch them which is the same as my mother used to do with the Everly Brothers and all that stuff you'd watch the records you watch watch them go around and round and I would so my mother said to once um years ago I heard to say to somebody this was after I sort of got known she's said well Johnny doesn't so much listen to music as study it so I would study it so for example a fade out if the fade was too quick it would annoy me another one when things got to the second chorus the guitari would be why is that oh it's doubled by an organ oh okay which so all of these things I enjoy doing now so I studied at the same time as I was learning to put my fingers in the right places so that's why I play the way I do really yeah it it I mean there's so so many questions I have for you which which helps explain a lot of the arpeggio and and that approach certainly early in your career just kind of taking things apart into their their individual elements um but I want to go back to to you at age 14 and and just kind of the world you grew up in because obviously I mean as you your parents were into music they loved music you you you had a home where music was played and you you were just attracted to the guitar I mean it was just something that you played like you know and there's some kids who are forced to take lessons and then they stop playing music and there's some kids who just there it's like a you know a a beat of honey it's just you're just attracted to it what what was it about the guitar I mean 14 years old you were already a pretty good guitar player um playing with friends and but what was it about that instrument about playing the guitar that like kept you just sitting in your bedroom you know playing chords and unfortunately I can't actually answer what it is about that instrument because I begged for this toy one a toy little wooden one when I was five and I do actually remember owning that guitar it's like one of my first memories and um so that was hanging in a window and I so at that age of five um you know you sort of wonder why that is uh so it wasn't because because I wanted to be famous or you know get girls or anything it wasn't any of that the AG of five it wasn't not five I meant but oh later on the guitar is is is I mean I'm a I'm the guitar is so great for all of that stuff it's great for attracting friends you know friends and partners and showing off and it's also very good paradoxically it's it's also very very good for getting away in my case uh because I'm quite sociable I used to treat it some way it was a way of me peeling off and getting away from activity so in the middle of a football game or climbing trees or playing with my friends I would just disappear because I'd had enough of small talk and I wanted to go and play so I use that in a way that a lot of people Journal is an esap a way of being private and meditative and with myself yeah which is actually the the classic description of an introvert right which is somebody who who over time loses energy from interacting with people um and you both actually I've got the guitar sort of uh because I moved from the inner city to the suburbs at at the age of 10 or 11 11 10 um because I'd started playing then uh um the guitar gave me uh an opportunity to reinvent myself so you talk to anyone who knows me they'll say Johnny's an extrovert but actually at har if you actually listen to a lot of my music it's very introspective music uh but the guitar gave me yeah a chance to change my identity really because people are oh you're a guitar player that guy plays in he's in a band and I looked like I was in a band so I kind of pretended that I was much more confident than I was and then it kind of worked another great thing about you know liking pop music and guitar I liked it On liked it and still do like it on all levels so I can talk about music pop music any kind of music on a very esoteric level if you like so as a child and still to this day if if I hear something that is very evocative or or uh it it can make me it's kind of like the word is transcendent you know it make me really get high and I want to play 17 times and they used to do that to me as a child some Melodies my aunt is us to sing some Irish songs stuff oh man it just make the world completely shut out so I can I can wax rap sodic about music being on a esoteric level but to get back to what you're talking about with football and stuff I can also as let's call it an indie fan I also have a real deep appreciation about how great it is to see a band who all look the same and who wear great clothes on that kind of level Su in a way superficial level also the what what a great thing it is what rock and roll music is for boys and girls on a different level whether it's Rebellion whether it's identification whether it's Tribal whether it's just purely aesthetic they look great look at The Strokes you know um the that yeah that superficial haircuts uh uh identity gangs uh Debbie Harry suie Sue Chrissy hind you know um it doesn't all have to be it's it's the whole thing for me it can go it goes from esoteric uh and if you like spiritual to um to absolutely superficial and shallow and it's still all great Johnny I want to sort of ask you about you know this this kind of I think it was a sort of a pivotal time in your in your early life you know 14 15 years old punk is starting to blow up in the UK sort of this is 777 and um you mentioned nol Gallagher and and there's a line from and he grew up of course in Manchester and there's a I think it's the line in in in Shaker Shaker maker he says Mr sister sold me songs when I was just 16 tell me about the record stores was that was that a record store in Manchester like do you remember going and and like finding records and and how would you find them how would you know what to well sifters uh was one near where no lived which is in the suburbs in South Manchester I went to sifters uh often and um so in the downtown of Manchester which was near where I lived and where I I would go all the time there was a a whole loot of record stores and um some of those record stores also sold kind of Pulp this was in the late 70s um pul paper bocks by usually it's kind of Science Fiction he writers there was JG Ballard and Philip K dick why I mentioned that was because I remember going at for I listen to us to I took all of this very seriously and I wanted to be where the action was if you like okay so I would go down there and I now know that these older guys that I would see hanging out and buying these science fiction books um so it was a very fertile kind of um illicit because the other thing about these shops that sold back then see bootlegs as they were known then were illegal so you walked in these little shops you were aware that if you had enough money and if you had the the guts to ask for the Bowie bootleg uh don't touch that dial you might be a to get it the place also had a exotic smell of it about it which was very alluring okay what's this about and because it's all crappy paperback some of that stuff was kind of kind of tacky soft porn so these places were quite alluring you know and they were they weren't like mainstream and and um everybody went to those sort of places that ended up being in bands in Manchester from the punk and Post Punk period whether it was Maris Smith from the fall or members of The Smiths or the Buss Cox guys so these are all older guys that I used to watch because I just felt like I constantly felt like an apprentice which I was uh and then of course I went to all the gigs and being the youngest and small uh I was always uh dispatched to go up the drain p or sneak in the window or open the doors or sneak in so Manchester for American people listening Manchester is like a cross between very much it has the kind of so sole of Chicago the kind of edge of Detroit and the kind of as a modern city it's very much like um Seattle so it has that kind of vibe going on you know as the Chicago kind of irishi blue color industrial thing and the but as the kind of edge the sort of industrial Edge that Detroit used to have back in the 70s and and then it's but right now and because it rains a lot it it reminds me of Seattle so it's it has a lot of that stuff going you know so yeah yeah it was it was a really exciting kind of place to be an apprentice you met Andy roor I think when you were 10 or 11 or 12 I mean and he would go on to of course become the basis for the Smiths and you you you had early bands a few early bands with him but take me into like your I don't know bedroom or like the the the places you you'd like try to work out what you wanted your music to sound like when you were a teenager like you get a guitar you learn how to play it by 19 which we're going to get to in a minute like you're creating music that that is going to be listened to around the world but before we get there how are you working out that sound like was it with Andy was it with other people were you going to other people's homes and just like kind of just playing around with Andy and I first playing in Earnest around 14 although we first time we ever played together I went to his house we were 11 11 or 12 uh so Andy and I were best friends uh kind of still are really uh well yes we are and um which is amazing and um you know we both encouraged each other he we're very different people um I sped him up and he kind of calm me down and um he was a really good guitar player but I you know I always had the plan and I was like okay well he was great on the bass so I was like well you know you're amazing so play the bass but we so what happened was we we uh we had first we started off playing and I was writing songs and it was me and a couple of Pals just to give people some kind of idea of what we sounded like we used to do American Girl so we had that kind of twin guitar jungle sort of thing that kind of thing which I'm very happy they still a big part of what I do now but I was the singer in those bands really just because I had the be the best haircut which is a decent enough reason to be a front man when you're 14 anyway um and also I was able to come up with words you know so that was that and then at the same time I got kind of head hunted to be this is a still going into 15 you got to understand this is what I this we we um we regarded that band called Paris Valentinos that we regarded that as our day job that school was kind of interfering with yeah but then um whilst I was doing that a Bandu made a record called sister Ray who were adults and I think without being too disrespectful even they'd admit that the were they were reprobates uh they uh they um they made an approach to me through a friend and said they wanted me to be in their band and they really Tau me into it and they were a scary bunch of dudes but they sounded and they made a record so I said to my pals look I'm going to go and join sister Ray for a bit and they were all up fine you're working us too hard anyway you know they I was like a bit of a kind of driver and Andy was just my pal and was like Johnny go and do it that's fine so I went and and joined this band with adults uh called sister Ray when I was 15 and so now when I asked in my mind now I regard kind of that as when I started being a professional musician when I joined a band with adults at 15 so I did that and uh I was with those guys for about probably about a year and then they just got too crazy for me I did one show and the rest of the Valentinos came came to the show and after the show I I thought I just want to be with my own band and I also wanted to get back to singing We started rehearsing and I was got back to write my own songs I was living with Andy at the time with him and his brothers with no parents around no adults right them why why did why did you do that were you having conflicts with your parents and Andy's parents un unfortunately but conveniently had split up and we had a free house so it was a very Bohemian opportunity does that make sense you know like I was able we were able to re we were able to rehearse me and his brothers his other brothers play guitar Andy and I were I live there often um yeah and um we smoked lots of pot and listened to records and dissected them and stayed up all night and he became an amazing bass player overnight yeah but I mean certainly not like a a formula for like a stable life right like a 15-year-old kid like no like I mean you probably maybe in your head you thought yeah I'll be a professional musician that's what I'll do one day but like the chances of that happening were still pretty slim I mean were you convinced that you that you could make a career out of this already at 15 no a life but not a career no of course not you know I was I I genuinely was not that uh so sure of myself I was very driven which and um that which is was just I got to say as a as I became an adult I look back and I identified that a lot of that drive was desperation because my dreams H and honestly when I say my dreams I I don't mean swimming pools and um uh and big cars my dreams were to play on to play and the main dream was to make records the actual performing the thing that most musicians their go-to is to stand on a stage and show off I genuinely that that was not my main motivator was putting these mosaics of guitars together with really interest in singing and uh the the Performing bit back then I've changed now was just kind of a necessary part of the job really tell me about this idea of that you had to create a band this is obviously how you know you went and approached morisy who I guess was Steven Mory at the time um you had known I guess you guys had met briefly years before and you kind of knew a little bit about him but from what I I I understand you had an idea in your head of what you wanted your next band to sound like you'd gone through a bunch of different band but like you were and what what was that sound that like if you could articulate in words and you were like this is what it what was that it was um so in the late 70s luckily for me because I grew up again you know a house that played a lot of uh 60s records in the late '70s the bands that were around in the mainstream I don't really want to name names because it I I don't want to be negative but the were the bands that were supposed to be the modern say New Wave bands I kind of thought would yeah I didn't really like a lot of those bands because of the Sy no just because they were bad the boom time routes I didn't like oh go all right I'm going to go there no disrespect but the bands I liked I really like I love Blondie and I love um but did you like new are liked but so Human League you like that kind yeah Human League came a little bit later you know I mean they um so you know I mean television were a game changer Richard Lloyd's guitar playing game changer uh I was the big band for me was there was two bands late 70s there was a band called the only ones who were from the who were from London they did a famous song called another girl the planet and I was a big fan of them and I went to see them quite a lot and then the other band I was obsessed with with the Patty Smith group uh you know I mean really obsessed you know so I know every every one of those first three Patty Smith's albums backwards including the fourth one really so and I saw Patty Smith when when I was 14 you know and um on my own and that was when you say Mory and I met we literally I he was with stood with three other people and I I he I was just introduced to three people and everyone just nodded nodded at each other so we were in each other's pres but we didn't talk uh right you were 14 he was 19 at the time and he was with a bunch of old yeah you were like AA you as a kid thought I was kind of a switched on young kid and I wanted to go and watch the band So yeah so um so I I was working in clo shops I was working that was very important I was working in clo shops because I need money you know my parents weren't going to even if they had money they weren't going to give it me which is quite right it's one of the things about things that John Leiden and I have talked about being the oldest oldest uh in the in an Irish family you you you either get out get out and work or you get out of the house which happened to me you know so I worked in closeth shops uh and I was a busy boy uh and um so when and and you were kind of thinking of what the sound of a band would be like and you mentioned Patty Smith and so so I mean obviously the Smiths sounded quite different from what Patty Smith was doing but what what in your mind was that band that I mean obviously you became the Smith but when you kind of were thinking through what you wanted this next man to be what he was was because was working in clothes shops the city center three worked in three different shops not the same time obviously okay so three different appears what I would do in my break I would go into record stores and I would buy old records so once I discovered that I liked older records more than the modern records so I bought needle and a hay stack I bought up the ladder to the roof I bought all these Supremes records I bought I bought going to a go go by by um Smokey Robinson but all these old these I was I couldn't believe that these records were available and they were quite cheap it was like discovering it was like Christopher Columbus or what it was like I discovered an entire continent so you were listening to to to mtown records mainly women and then the girl G like bands like about being into Patty Smith of course the Smith didn't sound like Patty Smith but because I was so into Patty Smith and also the New York Dolls both Pat Smith and David Johansson would site the girl groups the Sherelle and the 60s groups and all of that you know so Patty Smith did you know she did time is on my side with the um herma Thomas song Rolling Stones and she did the B underground song so what happens with your Heroes you want to know what they're into and because I was a student I went oh I need okay well if I need to know about this and then I fell in love with I got very obsessed with the crystals and the charel and particular cly the shangar and the important thing to remember is so in 1980 881 again not trying to you know diss any other any other bands but those records just sounded way better than the records at why was they sounded better than to me I liked them better than the Thompson Twins and Tears for Fears or whatever uh they sounded more interesting they sounded just like what they are which is actually if you listen to them they're kind of godamn odd so yeah I'm my concept if you like in a way but obviously nothing thankfully in art it's all very well having a concept but you are bound by your your limitations thank God so it comes out as yourself I had this I moved back into my parents house temporarily uh to uh and just cut myself off from everybody and I had this little tape machine and no drum machine or anything I used to make the Beats just scratching the strings and I started playing what I thought were girl groups core changes and Mo and some of you hear that in the early Smith stuff in songs like I don't owe you anything that was me obviously trying to be Bert bakarak you know and then you here uh and you know stuff like accept yourself as a very obviously a Motown RI all those kind of things and um really around the fountain and all that I was trying to trying to play those kind of core changes and but I without thinking about it too much once I'd got a Les Paul and and or a Gretch and a Fender Twin Reverb in other words the equipment of the Patty Smith group I just didn't even have a second thought about the gear the equipment it was just then learning to write and then then an accident a sort of weird thing at which I I didn't I didn't conceptualize and I I wasn't even cons I I just got really really into overdubbing and overdubbing and trying to find a way of making I would just make these tapes with lots and lots of guitar parts on that all kind of fitted together and that was just something that was probably a quirk I don't know whether how quirky it is but I do it to this day that's that's probably a quirk of my personality I just was was able to put different voicings together and that I suppose that's just the original bit it it's so interesting to hear you talk about the influences because um you know obviously Patty Smith had massive influence on many bands notably RM right which which was around at the same time as the Smiths and and obviously different sound but there you can like if you look at that sort of family tree starting Patty Smith you can see you know elements in in these different bands and you mentioned the Motown girl groups and then earlier you talked about covering American Girl by Tom Petty and it's it's it's like all started to come together you know now start you start to see where that you know I'm thinking of hand and glove which became the first single that that you would you would compose morisy would write the lyrics and that you know that's coming out in 1983 I mean that's a completely different sound tell me about about morisy what what you saw in him because he was a couple years older than you you'd heard about him but why was why did you feel like he his voice his his sort of sensibility was that was the guy didn't know about his voice sensibility until we met because I just had heard from my an older friend who was Billy Duffy then went on to form the cult who I met in 1975 Billy had been in a band with morisy and um and he had a reputation for writing really good words and Uh I gleaned that he was someone who took the business of being was serious about being a singer and you know not just someone who kind of because some yeah some people they they they wanted to do it for a few weeks and then they didn't really have the Huts sper or the dedication commit so that's that was it but I had no idea about really about his sensibilities oh I I kind of I know what it was um I knew that he was a New York Dolls fan because everybody knew that cuz he written to the music papers and I knew that he was into Patty Smith too so those um you know those those kind of criteria when you're young are very important so that's why I did that and so was there an immediate SP I mean between the two of you because um I mean he's he he reckons he he doesn't really want me to talk about this kind of thing but but he says I hesitate CU I know he's but he says it in public which is kind of peculiar but anyway um he's written that he want he doesn't want anybody to talk about it and it's a shame because it's such important I'm very proud yeah I'm very proud of uh a lot of the story and I'm very proud of the band and I'm very proud of the records you know whil we as as you should be so should no there was a immediate uh absolute immediate connection um for many reasons we recognized uh the the the talent we were just we're very impressed with each other and quite rightly so I think yeah I think rightly so I mean you were 19 he was 24 you had a guitar sound that you were really developing which you know it's a kind of a I'm just Shand but kind of a jangly sound and and he had still has but he had such a different voice unusual resonant very distinctive voice and when you heard that kind of if you can reach back and think about how you started to write music for his lyrics his voice well it was the other way around he wrote the lyrics to the music which was just the way we did it and that was the way it worked our first the very first songwriting session I wrote the music to the words and we just fell into this process of writing getting together in the early days because remember the thing that people very important thing about the formation of Smith that for quite a long time it was just me and him uh and that was it you know and we were on this Mission uh we looking for other band members because I hadn't seen Andy for a while and um I was yet to go back and find and you know recruit Andy if you like Andy Rock I I was new and in my heart that he was the right person cuz no one played bass like him you know and still doesn't still don't um but there was just the two of us so our process was that for some reason it was I I always thought three was a magic number because uh you know just two just wasn't enough and four was too many to be getting on with so we wrote uh very uh prolifically lots of in batches of three and so the music after that first initial writing period writing day from then on almost on a weekly BAS bis we would get together face to face and um and I and then I just put these three songs down on a cassette and um within a few days the two of us would then own another we'd have another three songs uh and then band MERS and there's a whole formation of the band when we got the the Bas and drums sorted out and then started doing little gigs we still really didn't have that many songs in our repertoire but as I say we were quite prolific and we were just on this amazing Mission and it was a really magical uh creative um and and a very you know uh uh successful kind of uh inspired time in our lives I mean I think about how young you are 19 I mean you and you know tragically the Smith ended when you were 23 right 19 to 23 which was this incredible period in your life where there was just this like outpouring of creativity and there was something that was going on certainly between you and morisy that generated that creativity and and this very distinctive sound we can talk about any number of songs how soon is now or what difference does it make I mean just the the guitar in those songs is so so distinctive and the the words and the and the singing is too and they come together so obviously we're talking about the music here in in this conversation how did you I mean the even how soon as now you know the beginning of that song right how how did do you remember how you created that sound well yeah I mean the short version of it this is one of the great things about productivity um and creativity sometimes it's out of necessity so I'd written the track the so for my part of it I'd written the music not long before and and it didn't have that tremolo sound you're talking about on it and what had happened is we' laid the track down without it on and later on when it was just me and the producer and the engineer about maybe whatever 11:00 at night because everyone quite rightly just let well okay well Johnny by tomorrow Johnny will have all the guitars and the track will be finished I thought the track was missing something I I just didn't it as to say out of adversity it unfortunately it just wasn't C in it and so then um so as also creativity is involves quite a bit of lateral thinking I um yeah in my mind you know for as I do now I had these little Notions that I was working on looking for an opportunity and for a couple of a number of years really I I wanted to put tremolo on something and I just hadn't got round to it and then at what 11:45 on this Sunday night having been working on this track all day I just this was this opportunity I basically I needed to fix it and I kind of was like oh I've got a good idea that guitar part that that is very ordinary let's send that out through a t through some amplifiers that I've got tremolo on it and hey Presto it came out of needing a good idea and it's said there you go and then we worked all the way through the night and then the slide part I don't know on the demo it's very pretty that thing that sounds like like a thing on the demo is quite a pretty fairly plain thing but luckily by 3:30 in the morning I just made the creative call to go make it sound paranoid it would be a good idea it's the thing about you know being in a altered state if you like it wasn't like I was crazy high but I was like it would be good to be brave so yeah I made that creative decision in in 4 seconds and then 40 years later you and I are talking about it um you know that other stuff about and it still sounds I mean I'll be driving and I'll be listening to first wave on SiriusXM you know Richard Blade right who who who's always talking about the Smiths or depes mode and and he'll play that track and it sounds and it's it's kind of amazing that it's 40 years old because it it it could be really I I just feel incredibly blessed to for all of those things to have come together the band the song I'd written the night the the moment every everyone involved in it um because I'm you I'm a fan of rock music I try not to you know do that thing so I try not to get too kind of go along with too much sort of self analysis too much but I've got enough about me to know that it it it does cut it uh with some of those classic Rock tracks really you know which is amazing that I was so I feel very very fortunate to have you know from my life to have been where I was who I was where I was at that you know when I was kind of thing it was it's a whole number of a Kind of Perfect Storm of a load of things coming together and um yeah it's great amazing I mean you mention you mentioned this idea of creativity comes when you're really productive you know and and the more productive you are the more creative you get and it's kind of like the self it's like a flywheel you know you're just kind of when you're in this place and and somehow it just kind of becomes a self-generating force right which which which happen yeah well there's a number of reasons for that you get better at what you do you you create more and you discard more uh there's a whole load of things about creativity that are very not particularly mysterious I mean I do believe I've said this you know many times before it's not it's actually Picasso's quote but you know that inspiration does exist but it has to find you working that thing uh so um you know and as Nick Cave I've heard Nick Cave say just get in and do the work uh yeah and uh it you know I wouldn't be the first person to say that so much of it is craft and perspiration and all that but but but but the things that people say about you know bottling The Muse and the you know inspiration and that that thing that is outside of our uh you know cognitive reasoning if you like it's fantastic it's great but you can't walk I can't walk around for weeks and weeks and weeks on end waiting for some you know piece of music to drop from the sky but I've been like way since I was a kid you know because I used to I was really into drawing when I was a kid you know like 11 12 or whatever and I just assumed like it was just something that everybody did you know like so um the you know uh I I kind of it just was s it felt like a good idea to me as a youngster to keep that flame going keep the flame Keep Your Enthusiasm keep your eyes open enjoy colors enjoy you know if you see a shape and you see a bridge as I say I was quite into drawing so if you if you notice the way you know the the angle of a bridge or you notice a perspective or I I just thought kind of thought everyone was seeing stuff like that really and then um some of my pals I realized were just like would Johnny you know you're you're a bit weird um and and they frankly sometimes had an easier life than me but I I like you know I think I think you have to I guess you know there's all different ways of saying this but I think I think you have to honor creativity and you have to honor that it's a special thing and and if you want going to sit in the bar every night watching sports if that's you think that's cool also not everybody wants to you know look at Angles and colors and listen listen out for Symphonies but um uh I uh I really it feels like you got to do the work but also you got to honor it yeah yeah yeah I mean you got as you say you got to take apart those songs in your mind you you've got I think 130 guitars you've owned more than 130 in your life and um and guitars were a big part of the decisions that you would make around tracks obviously you were known for the the the Telecaster the the rickenbacher um there's a story that um I read in in this book that you put out just basically about your guitars about a Gibson that you got from the legendary seymor Stein who who passed away recently um the the an anr or the head of sire records he was trying to sign you guys right to sire and he's trying to court you and you basically what's yeah tell me the story to go back to the shangar so I knew that Simo Stein was one of the founders of Redbird records which the shangra were on so I was and also that he was he put out Patty Smith's first single so I was already give me the pen where do I sign no problem he was someone I really wanted to know not only to sign to be on his record company which was s records cuz they also had the Talking Heads who I was a big fan of and the Ramones so it was it was a no-brainer we were going to sign there but seore came over to to see the Smith in I guess 83 84 maybe 83 and um he he took us out to dinner which was a new thing for us uh we took him seriously and I was like oh great we're going to meet SEO Stein this is great and uh this is early yeah we weren't with an American record company then we were about to play a show in London and he took us out to a Chinese restaurant beforehand then he let it slip that when the Rolling Stones came into New York a couple of times he he bought Brian Jones from the Rolling Stones a a guitar maybe two guitars so I kind of tricked him I I said to him what seear if you buy me if we sign if the Smith signed to S records will you buy me a guitar because if you do I will we will I will sign we will will sign my band whatever and um he said if you sign with s records Johnny I'll buy you a guitar like okay because I was going to sign anyway as I said and then on the 2nd of January 1984 we signed to s s records which I was more than happy about anyway as I say and then Seymour is a a snowy day in January in New York and then I waited and waited and waited all day and I was going to hold him to this and TR true to his word SEO and I marched across with Andy as well I believe marched to 48th guitars and we went into we bu guitars on 48th Street where all the guitar shops were back then I think sadly that isn't the case anymore and um it got to real late and I was crossing my fingers the shop was still open and I looked through the window and there was this it was the biggest and shiniest guitar and it was probably the most expensive but luckily you know it was it was the best one in there and I just fell in love with this guitar and he and he bought bought me this red 355 which is on the that guitar is the one I'm using well displaying on the cover of this new book that I've done called Mars guitars and anyway so the the story ends with me I then walked from there to the iray hotel and um where we were staying and I took it out the case and I wrote immediately wrote a couple of Smith songs on it the next single and the bside first thing I did as soon as I got the guitar so yeah what was the next sing I wrote Knows I'm Miserable Now and the bside wow which is called girl afraid and they were the very very first things I played I didn't noodle I didn't play one of our other songs they just came out of that guitar they jumped how how do you explain that how do you explain Heaven know are miserable now just the it's very Jazzy that song uh and uh I I've had a few moments like that where the my fingers moved to these places that they've never been before and that used to happen to me a few times when I was younger I've got a few songs that I've done that and you know as most musicians will tell you that they um they don't come about that often uh so yeah I was the G the guitar suggested all kinds of things happen with an instrument again this new book I've done Mars guitars one of the things I talk about in this guitar this book are the choices you make when you buy a guitar so there's a guitar in there that I bought because I was into Elvis Presley at the time and Elvis Presley's guitar player Scotty Moore was used to play that guitar that kind of guitar so you buy it for that reason lots of guitar players will know this there are countless guitar players who play guitars because Jay maskus plays it or or Kurt cabain played it or Jimmy Hendrick or whatever so you have those associations and sometimes when you those Association say for example if someone buys um a rick backer or one of my signature Jags they might try and play like me yeah uh you know so uh there's all these kind of connections that you make in your in your mind uh that are sometimes you're able to trace back and maybe because the 355 to me looks like a jazz guitar maybe I I play jazz but there's also uh there's a little bit of magic in some some instruments you get them and there's nothing in them and other instruments you get them and you write three or four so I just I got a Rick and bucker a friend of mine Lo me a Rick and bucker uh about six weeks ago and I played it and I just everything sounded like a song so I'm trying to keep it yeah I I'm I'm curious when you I mean this this was a an incredibly just you know fertile period in your early life right 19 to 23 and and would would would go on to have a huge impact on on Indie music certainly in rock music and pop music but were you always striving to get better as a guitar player like you know was it did you see it as like I don't know not a challenge but like being an athlete or something like and and if so how how how do you get better it's a vocation you know I'm still the same person I was when uh my my dad bought me my my first proper really decent acoustic when I was eight or nine and um yeah and he expected me to take it to to get good on it you know and I that was an amazing thing between me and my father at that point because I I I I when he did that I saw that he was taking me seriously he didn't think it was like like a skateboard he didn't think it's like you know when some people buy a skateboard or they buy you know they get into a fat and then it ends up being left on top of a closet you so uh I'm still that same person so how you get good at it is is I practice practice practice practice and I and I do that to this day and there's times when I feel good about you still play day yeah and there's times when I feel really good about where I'm at as a guitar player and there's times when I beat myself up do you really there are times where the guy who rolling stone called the 51st greatest guitarist of all time feels like you're not good at oh yeah I should at least be 49 well I think Muddy Waters is 49 fair enough that's you got that's kind of good recall you got there that you can you remember that yeah I I looked at that list oh yeah um that's pretty good but do you ever feel I mean I'm curious like you know you've been called the like the greatest guitarist in the UK by the you know British press and The Queen Is Dead has been called the greatest record of all time by spin I mean do you have you gone through periods where you're like I'm not good oh yeah and I will do again maybe even next week oh yeah totally you know where does that come from uh I think it comes from this constant striving to do something that I I think is great and it only gets satisfied where you know when you when you write a song and it all comes together and the guitar parts are good on it and in my case now the vocals are pretty cool and um and the lyrics are good it's a really good day when that happens it's a good day yeah I mean it you you mentioned um you know the impact of the Smiths and and and the B Ian you talk about Patty Smith and her influence and you think about all of the bands that without Patty Smith wouldn't may not have existed right and you can make the same case for The Smiths I mean most notably Stone Rose is oasis but so many other bands um you know the killers I mean so many bands massively influenced by by that sound this was a hugely important period of your life but then you would go on of course to to record with with many other bands and then really become a member of a another band Modest Mouse and I I I want to ask you about this moment because I from what I understand you went down to you went to Portland like Isaac Brock of Modest Mouse invites you to Portland you don't know him you don't really know their music I guess and you meet and like the night you land in Portland you write the music for dashboard yeah that's right yeah you know in all honesty yes when you put it that way cuz dashboard was a big song and it's a it's a great yeah I know it's a great track thank you great song that's the same person I was when I was 15 when I joined that band with sister Ray I said I'm the same person I'm exact same person but just the adult version so I um Isaac you get into a room and you're around people get together with a stranger because I go over because it sounds like an like like when I joined that band at 15 I thought this is going to be interesting cuz they just invited you to just come out and jam with them I to called me up and asked me did I want to join the band and I said who is this I don't know you man but that's a kind that's look I mean we're now real lifelong friends and I'm really glad that's Isaac uh he asked me to join the band said I don't know you and that's how about and then he's like well maybe you can help us do some writing I went okay well how about I'll come over for 10 days which sounded like quite a plenty of time to be in a room with a bunch of strangers which frankly who frankly had a fairly uh edgy kind of reputation I thought okay 10 days I'll go over and I'll see how this is so two things happened one was that Isaac and I that very first night uh were both shooting for something we're not we both we weren't we both know there was something at stake he' paid for a yeah first class ticket for this guy to come over right and um and I wasn't there dick around but the teenage me learned in a pragmatic way to try and always have a few Rifts ready particularly if you've been invited to go and play someone else's band to have something ready to just play yeah so so I had a few ideas that I was working on and then we were playing and playing Just the Two of Us he and I very loud and a in his in his his yeah in his attic and Isaac had this big huge big he won't mind me saying this he had this big big jug of wine and I was thinking wow who who drinks jugs of jugs of wine and you and by this point you had been you you would have been a teer yeah I was like running I don't know whether I was running marathons and but I was like deep into kind of vegan no alcohol you still still so but uh but hey but listen I'm I'm I will say you know I am a um a sober person who identifies as a pothead very much so so and and more so that's cool by me so anyway um it so and I was all woozy from jet lag and I've been traveling for 15 hours so Midway through this was just playing guitars back and forward which you know don't we do with strangers very much these days he he just leaned in at me and said got any riffs and I went well in my best English hug gr accent I well actually Isaac yeah yes I am I said happens I do I do have a riff yes so um this Jaguar that I've been playing FY Jaguar that he Bor loan me I I started playing this thing that ended up I started playing this riff and immediately he started singing the words to dashboard out of nowhere what was the Riff you played for it ended up being the dashboard but what was what was the Riff it was the not doing well sing it sounds like Scooby but which is no problem I have no problem with that Scooby-Doo song is a good song All about that no problem so um he's so the thing about that I was going to say there's two things one was that um he's brilliant so he started singing These lyrics a whole ream of lyrics that most of which ended up as the song and I generally never in 30 odd years man and boy I'd never seen anyone do that quite like that before that good so I was like damn right okay this is good so then we we kind of got that together just he and I and then by it was still very late now and then we knew we would something good had happened and he said to me got any more riffs and and again you know I said well as it happens yes I do so then I had this other thing that we worked up okay it wasn't fully formed that became this song called we've got everything which is a pretty Co it's a good sounding modest mou song and um yeah so that was one thing that happened so then we as the days went on it was just this very creative time where we HIIT it off his guys all of a each day another member of Modis Mouse someone would come along who was banging something and someone would come along who was playing a banjo and someone to come along who was like you know playing a fiddle or whatever you know it's not really what I was used to but was brilliant and um when I was in the room with Mod's Mouse I looked around and I went the chemistry with this bunch of it happened to be old guys at that point I went the chemistry with this band is really good the personal chemistry is re the personal chemistry is really good and the musical chemistry is really good because I've been around a long time and I know what I know I recognize when when it's good and I told on a daily basis let those guys know as a kind of Outsider this is happening we are happening and um and then we went on and we we wrote These really really good batch of songs so it's kind of Handy my point I'm making is I'm still pretty much the same person I was when I was 15 but I've just got a lot of uh stories this this might be kind of a self-evident question but I'm just curious because there has to be examples when when when it's counter when it run runs counter this idea but does the chemistry have to be there in order for great music to be created like obviously you know Lena McCartney and then you know you see this documentary that Peter Smith did um not Peter Smith um Jack Peter Jackson did and you see you know there even when their relationship is kind of falling apart there's still a chemistry um you two incredible chemistry they're still going right um You and morisy had a chemistry for some time but is it possible to still create that energy when when the chemistry I believe there no so um because we talking about two things there you talking about maybe a good feeling and chemistry they're not necessarily the same thing thing because I played with the talking heads on their last album and you're uh not like um naked naked the chemistry but yeah but the but the chemistry is a band when we were in a room together uh playing on the studio floor the musical chemistry was good now sometimes that's caused by tension because sometimes bands actually the bet they don't want to communicate so they just play right but the musical chemistry in the talking in Talking Heads was really evident to me it was like okay but um you know but they were I think they were kind of falling out of love with each other I didn't notice any wasn't any you know hostility or anything but um you know we just know that then they that was their last record okay but um uh so I to answer your question I think the chemistry to make something good there has to be the chemistry there I've seen it around r I've seen it in New Order yeah my pales are in bands man so uh you know but when the chemistry goes bad uh you can't make something good you can't make good good music good art it just can't so earlier on when you know you referred to the like the Smith split is tragic I I really don't 40 years later I don't see it as being tragic I know why you say it now I know why you say that though because you know people love the music and it was it was an unusual a very creative combination but it was the right time for it to end the chemistry was over I think by that time so you kind of got to know when to call it not all bands can last 40 years it's cool tell me how you I mean because you you've been a collaborator with so many people you know Chrissy Hind and mentioned the talking heads and you played with You2 and the killers and recorded with Modest Mouse and the the and all these different bands um no Gallagher cited he as a huge influence when he was a nobody you know he knew no one you gave him a guitar you have released a few I think five Studio albums on your own on the last couple years and um one that you wrote during the pandemic um and released a double record in 2022 and some great tracks on that receivers is a really good track um um lightning I think is another track on there um lighting people yeah really really good track how do you when you are not um in a room with a you know a a an Isaac or a morsy um how are you and it's just you and you're writing the music and the lyrics tell me how you well that's the thing I do most of the time now that's that's what I've been doing mostly for for the last 10 years yeah uh yeah and in a weird way you know like I said earlier you know that was it's an echo of what I was doing at 15 when I was the the guy stuck out front um but but yeah cuz you didn't want to be a front man for a long time uh no I didn't um why why I'm doing what I why why I put my own band together and started singing my own songs was because I had the songs I didn't have this idea after Modis Mouse in the cribs I didn't have this idea that oh wouldn't it be good if I was the big shot wouldn't it be good if it had my name over the Marquee what happened was that uh after mod Mouse I kept writing and I had these songs one was called the messenger and another one was called Dynamo and then I was playing with the cribs which was great in the around the UK we played in the states a while a bit and then um I I had this body of songs and I I'd done the demos and a couple of my friends I mean one of the guys in my band just said look why are we looking for a singer why would why would we look for a singer you do it and and then I also didn't want to do it I didn't really want someone to change how did you feel about that really I was like very easy because well it I didn't want someone else to come and change the words and I didn't want someone else to change the way the singing was I didn't want to to join another band and I I just had these songs that I thought were pretty good and I didn't know how it was going to be received I didn't know whether the anyone was I thought okay maybe 500 people might start coming out to see us genuinely uh and then it went really well and the band were my band are really good and then at festivals people started liking us and then blah blah blah on its road to where I am now so to answer your question my my day day life is is me doing my solo stuff with these days rarer excursions to go and work on noll's recent album or or going you know go back and work with h Zimmer and like on the Bond film or whatever I take these excursions these days away from my day job because my me like this is what I've been doing today you know I've been in the studio with my band working on some new stuff we've got a new single coming out so that yeah that's what I'm doing um does it does it fire up other parts of your your sort of creative energ when you go and work with h Zimmer on a and then you come with hands what well yeah tell me what happens what would well the main thing about working on the movies uh well first off Hans uh well Hans is brilliant one of the greatest brilant he's you know he's family I mean right now as we speak my son's out in I think he's in prag or Germany or somewhere right now playing with the H inmer Orchestra so Hans is like he is like family you know and um he employs my son and we love him um so I'm there with my pal but obviously because it's hanim me you end up working with I've always worked with really good directors so how it works which is completely different from me writing songs is in the movies the the director literally calls the shots and um and that's very good because it gives you a remate so when you are given a set of parameters when we're working on something on the movie so hands writes to music but he says to me make it work with your guitar uh I uh I know straight away when something's not right and that's really liberating you know gives you an you can't just have millions of options you well I don't anyway I just kind of do something I go what's the what's this what's the vibe here is it it needs to be dreamy like Inception obviously I needed to be dreamy and also quite uptight and a bit paranoid and um and then when we did this um Julian Mo film freeheld it had a real kind of like down home almost country sort of I don't know a rustic kind of she was a the character was from New Jersey and they were doing that so I kind of was like okay well what would I don't know what would like a Bruce Springstein demo sound like you know and then I got it wrong because I'm from Manchester you know uh and it worked so you have all this you have it has to fit and you know when it's not so it's completely different and and you were a guy who is is like Johnny marah you know rock guitar God all these people want to work with you know you and then but even so you know 10 years ago you're like I'm going to make a solo record and you're putting it out there for people to hear and potentially judge and that's not that's not easy it can't be easy uh I will say I remember MC Jones from The Clash back in the day when the British music press uh stalked to the Earth and uh he said I miss those days actually I'm sure that I'm sure you have mixed feelings you know it's good and bad but I mean some of my favorite you know some of my best friends are them you know one of my best friends in the world is a briest Jour I mean nme Melody Maker those were well I grew up knowing all my stuff from so I can't be too but U but what he was is I remember Mick saying that write sometimes writing writing a a song is like handing your homework into the music press so um it gladly it's not limore that's a really actually but it's a really interesting idea it's like you know you've worked on this thing forever and ever and ever and ever and now you're putting it out in the world and it's going to be evaluated and judged yeah and look and I done done it before in 2002 three with my ban the healers and what I was trying to do people just didn't get and I look back on it now and that suffered a little bit from me being who I was uh uh and who I am uh because actually cuz people you think people want thought of you as this yeah they wanted they wanted a certain sound in in 2001 whatever it was that sound no one wants to be put in a box you know uh however it's a funny thing you get to a certain point when you get older and um even though I I strive to do things I haven't done before and my my wish is to surprise myself with some of my songs when you're yeah uh you know when you get older in your life you should you you it's a good thing to lose the chip on your shoulder and drop your Hang-Ups so yeah I you know back when I was younger I'd say with electronic the band I had with with Bernard sna from yeah Berard I would do anything anything and did do anything to avoid sounding like people think I sound and Bernard would say oh right you you you very consciously said I do not want to make music that people are going to think of as Smiths and uh well I think it's one of the nice things about getting older I if I thought like that now there would be something wrong with me really I mean I mean but don't get me wrong I don't want to just phone it in or or be by any a parody by any means but I'm glad that so when I play with hands and he he wants me to play like you I know what he's going for and uh yeah so I think you kind of I've dropped those kind of Hang-Ups let's put it that way these days and you judged however you judged whatever I'm just glad people actually give a to listen I'm very very happy that uh one the greatest things easy one of the greatest things about being successful that you never ever forget is judged or not I remember when I just wanted people to hear me and so just have a listen to what I do you know you know you have I I mean having read so much about you and and all the people that you worked with or mentored or you know and a mentors you have I mean you're you know um and you've got great relationships with I think everyone pretty much everyone you've worked with um obviously you know morisy is a and I I would say to him if I was interviewing him a complicated person I I remember asking Graham Nash when when he was on the show about his relationship with um David Crosby which which was you know they which was difficult and and at a certain point they weren't speaking and David Crosby of course passed away and gram Nash a beautiful tribute to him but part of me is sad that they didn't you know reconcile and maybe you know maybe somebody like morsey is just too challenging to and I'm not going to ask you the question about um about uh A Reunion yeah don't worry I'm not asking but I want to ask you about the relationship with him does it matter to you I mean do you think that at some point you know I know that you you've have had contact in the past but or do you just think that you know it is what it is you I'm not trying to sound inflammatory uh but it doesn't matter of course it doesn't yeah you know it's I I feel genuinely uh fortunate that I was I was involved in something that people feel a lot of people feel so fondly of yeah um and have such a fondness for rather but um and that's kind of as much as I can make of it really yeah uh yeah I've got plenty of friends it's fine yeah do you do you Johnny when you I mean you're you know you're I think maybe on that time of our conversation you're close to 60 so you've got I mean you look at Paul McCartney he's touring well into his 80s right I mean you've got a long career of you what do you want to I mean you've gone through all these different phases of your career like any anyone does and different sounds and now you're at a point where you're like you're taking all of those things in the the Modest Mouse The Smiths you know white dice who you know all these different influences in and and and you're comfortable in your own skin as a is sounding like Johnny Mar whatever that means what do you when you challenge yourself and you're working on music now and you're kind of trying to think of expansive ways to make music and and is it is it about making sounds that surprise and delight and blow people's minds or is it just making I don't know just making music that you really you would want I think both those things are the same to be honest guy and luckily for me you know the way things have turned out there's two ways of looking at almost everything isn't there and the way look there's one way of looking at the way things have turned out for me in that cuz I started singing on my own solo records whatever 10 years ago and put my own band together uh yeah I we we're just working on this new track it's probably out by the time people hear this but we're working on this new song that we've got now that I've written called the answer and the singing on it just doesn't sound like anybody else and so because I got that together this band together quite late in my career there's a lot of work to do there where I'm kind of going huh I mean I'm not being in modest here I just hear it when I'm producing it and I go well you've written something quite unusual there so I quite like that that's for me that's even comes as a surprise to me and we sound for anyone who likes the kind of thing I do we actually make a pretty good sound and we've got quite a good repar so some of our some of the some of plenty of things that I'm doing with my own band now I'm proud of and I really like on a more um straightforward tip I think uh you know if I say that uh that I want to give people a good listen underneath that answer is a whole load of uh a whole sea of meaning because well what's a good listen is it well the short version is that's plenty you to be getting along with you know a good I'm fine with that a good listen in in 2023 that's what I want from other music so and that might mean surprise or it might mean emotion it might mean you know whatever drama it might mean that it rocks uh and also I think so I think there's plenty to be getting on with and I think also though that I'm okay with that I that what I do with getting up and playing in front of an audience it goes right back to everyone who's ever performed music in front of people whether that's Vaudeville whether that's on Broadway whether that's in cbgbs it goes back to a tradition usually I think connected with Working Class People uh you know because I'm not I'm not writing operas and I'm not writing Broadway musicals so I I I feel more than happy to to have had a life and continue to have a life in that lineage that you walk out on a stage and then when people walk out of the door an hour and a half later when they're on their way home they go I'm really glad I went out tonight night now you have to be good enough to do that and I want to just be good enough to do that to everybody who comes out and that to me is uh a noble enough aspiration and it's and but you have to work at it you know you have to sing great you have to write the decent material you have to be in good enough shape you have to like you have to just be a good performer and but it's work it doesn't you can't just show up and just hope it Happ I've met and sometimes had the absolute privilege of working some with sometimes some really amazing performers and they all work at it because they honor it um Johnny Mar thank you so much thank you it's been nice chatting with you I I appreciate you spending the time to think about this this conversation I really do it's great hey it's guy and I hope you enjoyed this conversation for more like it don't forget to subscribe to the channel and for the audio version just open up your favorite podcast app search for the great creators and tap follow