Rock and Pop: Interview - Frank Turner
Published: 12 May, 2011
by ROISIN GADELRAB
FRANK Turner’s the first to admit he’s got a touch of OCD about him. But a quick glance at his website could tell you that.
Much like those tour T-shirts with the tiny print detailing all the dates a veteran band has played, Turner’s website lists every gig he’s played over the past few years.
Speaking on the eve of his 1,000th solo show, he is not satisfied.
“I’m slightly OCD in keeping a list of all the gigs I’ve played,” he said. “I did it for the last band I was in but I’m really annoyed with myself that I didn’t do it for the two touring bands I was in before. It would be amazing to have a complete list of every show I’ve ever played in my life.”
Turner has become renowned for his punk-folk style, in his case punk being more of a mindset than a description of his music.
He releases his fourth album, England Keep My Bones – said to be more folky than predecessor Poetry of the Dead – on June 6 and the first official single is Peggy Sang the Blues.
The album features contributions from ex-Hold Steady keyboardist Franz Nicolay and folk singers Emily Barker and Chris T-T.
These days Turner, who plays Barfly Camden on June 6, is more used to playing to large audiences but, after some pleading from die-hard fans, he’s appearing at some of the UK’s smaller venues.
Touring seems to be an addiction. “I love doing it,” says Turner. “I like to think of myself more in the tradition of BB King and old blues and jazz players, people who played every day. There’s this thing where people call themselves musicians and do 20 shows in a year. That seems slightly weird because to me being a musician means actually playing.”
And he really is a proper rolling stone. Until recently, home was a room at his mum’s house where he stashed his things while on the road, but the house has now been sold and he doesn’t own or rent his own place.
“I’m now very much detached from all ties but the more time I spend moving around – and it’s been pretty solid the last five or six years – I kind of think of England generally as home,” says Turner. “I feel at home if I can sit in a greasy spoon café, read an English newspaper and watch some cricket on the telly.”
His father’s family is from north London and he’s got a soft spot for Camden.
“I spent an awful lot of time there,” says Turner.
That said, he harbours ambitions to settle on the other side of the Atlantic.
“I’m very much an Americaphile,” says Turner.
“America’s an endlessly wonderful country. One of my pet hates is these boring, ill-informed armchair anti-Americans which you get a lot of in this country.
“I’m an enormous fan of the Deep South. It gets a bad press in terms of international stereotypes. It’s a fantastic place, very beautiful, an honest, salt of the earth culture out there. People look out for their own, build their own houses.”