Bryan Ferry’s New Album is ‘The Kind of Record I Always Wanted to Make’

There used to be a music trivia game show in the UK called Pop Quiz where the contestants were pop stars of the time. When Bryan Ferry joins me via virtual call to talk about his latest work, Loose Talk, I ask him if he remembers the show. He doesn’t, although he says he remembers Top of the Pops. I explain the reason I’m up bringing Pop Quiz is because his pioneering group Roxy Music turns up often in the questions. If the teams include a member of Duran Duran or Spandau Ballet (who actually did battle each other in this episode), for example, they invariably know the answer. Bryan nods, his signature hair swoop moving with him. He’s aware of those musicians’ Roxy Music stan status. “John’s a big fan and a really nice guy,” he says, of bassist John Taylor. “I did a podcast the other day with Gary Kemp [Spandau Ballet] and Guy Pratt [Rockonteurs]. I know Guy very well, but Gary seemed to know a lot about my history, a connoisseur.”

It must be tiring for Ferry to constantly hear how influential he’s been to countless musicians. Especially as he doesn’t dwell in the past, other than to put together collectible box sets such as last year’s Retrospective: Selected Recordings 1973-2023. He holds up this hefty item in his delicate, long-fingered hands. He shuffles through the records as he talks about the thought process that went into his song choices and how they’re categorized.

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Ferry then shows me a vinyl copy of Loose Talk, which is brand-new material—although some of the music goes back decades, unearthed from his vaults. A collaborative album with multidisciplinary artist Amelia Barratt, Ferry provides the backing tracks for her spoken word style fiction on 11 visually charged vignettes. The result is captivating, like an aural backrub. Barratt’s clean delivery is almost cold, but her cadence draws the listener in, immersing them in the world she’s creating and the characters who populate it. Ferry’s music is unobtrusive but essential, playing a supporting role to the words and enhancing them in the process.

There is more than a four-decade age difference between Ferry and Barratt, which the former leans into. Ferry turns 80 this year, but he still has the swagger of 50 years ago, and there is no sign of him slowing down. I point out that musicians never quite retire, and Ferry says, “How could you? It’s the same with most creative artists. They go on ‘til they drop.” I mention a radio program I recently heard that reported watching television is the primary activity for older individuals. “I never switch it on,” Ferry says, “Except for the NFL, which, bizarrely, I love. It’s very exciting to me. They’re such great athletes, like supermen.”

This is the absolute last thing I expect to hear from Ferry, so I must ask which team he supports. There are a couple. “I’m very fond of the Green Bay Packers. I like an old-fashioned football team. They play in the snow and blizzards with a passionate fan base,” he says animatedly. Then he adds, “I also like Kansas City. The last few years I followed them. They have a great coach and great quarterback. Of course they have Travis Kelce as well. It’s a very good team. I like the way they operate.”

Ferry might seem like he’s losing the thread of the conversation, but he is excellent at cycling through topics. He can switch from talking about Roxy Music to tennis to visiting museums to packages being delivered and when I tell him I really like the kitchen tweezers Gavin Rossdale recommended to me, he says, “I like tweezers. I like scissors as well.” What’s difficult is keeping the focus on Loose Talk, but Ferry brings the conversation back to it, “It’s the kind of record I’ve always wanted to make and never got around to.”

SPIN: How did this collaboration come about?

Bryan Ferry: I had seen Amelia performing a piece in London. She came here to the studio to record an audiobook called Readings from Real Life. I thought the texts were spellbinding. I said, “Can you write some stuff, we put it to music and see how it works?” This was 2020. The first thing she did was a lyric for this track called “Star,” which was on the Retrospective box set we did last year. I really liked the words and her delivery. It’s kind of cool and measured. There’s an underlying emotional thing in the text and in the delivery. It suited my music. I’ve been having a great time trying to get the music to marry with the words and not get in the way, and hopefully help the moods that are already in the writing.

Some of the music is from quite some time ago?

The original inspiration for the piano parts, which are the core of the music bits on the album are me at home, just me and the piano and the cassette player or the phone or whatever is recording. I never throw anything away. Occasionally I dip into tapes, things that haven’t found a home, haven’t turned into songs and I flesh them out with keyboards and some other musicians who I really like to work with.

With music, you want to create another world and drift off into it. That’s the beauty of doing things which are not studied. The original piano inspirations for all the pieces, they’re just free flowing, improvisations really. I like to structure them a bit and elaborate with other sounds. I’m not the world’s best piano player, but I’m sort of idiosyncratic, I guess. I play very seldom. Every time I play anything that’s not in the studio in the daytime, when it’s at night at home, that’s just me going into space, but I try to structure things. It’s trying to get the romantic side of it, the free flowing stuff, into some sort of structural thing too. That’s what I find interesting about creation.

Did it give you freedom to not have to worry about lyrics? Or did you want to interfere with Amelia’s words?

It did give me freedom to not have that responsibility of pinpointing emotions. I helped her on “Star,” but that was midway between spoken word and a song so there were more lyrics. But these stories are everyday life things, and yet, there’s always a bit of a twist, I like that. I like the slight film noir aspect of it. That’s something a bit unexpected. I think she was being herself. I didn’t try to guide or interfere or say, “I think you should write about this or that.” I supplied a couple of titles, and she likes me to feed her a phrase which she may or may not use in some piece. We have a lot of respect for each other. That’s essential if you’re working with somebody.

Are you planning on doing live shows?

I haven’t made any plans for it, but it’s not impossible in the future, I wanted to have a sizable repertoire before even thinking about that. We started the second album last year. There is a playback at the ICA in London next Friday, in the dark, listening to the album in spatial audio.

Listening to such a visual album in the dark is perfect, but you created some visuals for it?

Yeah, that’s what we both think too. A niche project that a lot of people wouldn’t know about or find out about, we thought, let’s do some videos for people to see on YouTube or Instagram or whatever. That’s been interesting because I got to be an art student again. We did it ourselves. I was behind the camera, filming little video clips on the phone. It’s quite extraordinary that you can do that nowadays. I remember when we did videos years ago. You’d have huge crews of people, and you weren’t really making it yourself. That is not so much fun. This was. Doing this, it’s been really good for me, creatively, and as an artist.

You said “It’s the kind of record I’ve always wanted to make and never got around to.” Why do you think it took so long for you to get there?

Life got in the way. I’ve had a busy career and trying to fit life in between tours and albums with me as the singer, as the focus, and whatever, I never really had the space. I suppose when there was the lockdown, a lot of people had more time to think. Maybe now is the time to do something which was more instrumental based. Then I met Amelia and her work, and I thought, “This is better than instrumental. It’s got words I really like.” I’m quite picky about words, and there’s nothing I don’t like. It reflects my taste. This kind of work suits me, something free-flowing and not a song that would go on the radio.

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