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Simeon Walker: '22. Death Of All Romance' by The Dears
64 Plays9 months ago
Sim isn’t a die hard fan of many things, but this band had him at this song. We hope you enjoy what turned out to be a lovely chat about the right tune landing at the right time, and all the joy that’s rolled out since.
This is our pal and neighbour Sim Walker, and his chosen Survival Song, ‘22: The Death of All the Romance’ by The Dears.
Leeds-based pianist and composer Simeon Walker has quickly emerged as a leading light in the burgeoning modern classical scene. Regularly performing and touring across the UK and Europe, he has appeared at Latitude and Timber festival and supported musicians such as S. Carey, LYR, Submotion Orchestra, Neil Cowley and Erland Cooper. He’s received over 40 million streams across platforms, with his music frequently broadcast across a range of radio stations.
An in-demand collaborator, speaker, consultant, educator and arranger, he also works as a session musician. He founded and continues to curate Brudenell Piano Sessions - an event series highlighting the diverse and eclectic music being written and performed with the piano, hosted at one of the UK’s most iconic grassroots music venues, Brudenell Social Club in Leeds.
Help us a grow a community of survival song listeners by joining us on over on Substack:
https://survivalsongs.substack.com/
‘22. Death Of All Romance'’ by The Dears can be found on our community playlist on Spotify along with our listener’s Survival Songs. Check it out and add your own!
‘22. Death Of All Romance'’ by The Dears Survival Songs claims no copyright of this work. This is included as a form of music review and criticism and as a way to celebrate, promote and encourage the listener to seek out the artists work.
Find out more about ARTIST here:
https://open.spotify.com/artist/2qljmykdCfgGy9zUw7UqkX?si=fZ9bNYqBTdqwUFNv3Kz3HA
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Transcript
Introduction and Concept
00:00:01
Speaker
I'm Lydia. I'm Ed. We're friends with a playlist for everything. And it turns out, we both have one called Survival Songs. And he got us thinking, what are other other people's Survival Songs? So we thought we'd find out. Welcome to
Guest Spotlights and Social Engagement
00:00:16
Speaker
Survival Songs. A podcast where each episode our guest tells us about a song that gets them through the best and worst of times. Sensitive topics might be discussed. So look after yourself. The show contains portions of copyrighted material. We'd love for you to support and celebrate the artists by streaming, downloading and buying their brilliant music. And go give our guests a follow on social media.
00:00:38
Speaker
Help us grow the community of survival song listeners by joining us over on Substack and add to our public playlist on Spotify. Links are in the show notes. We hope you enjoy the show. Hi,
Highlight on Simian Walker
00:00:51
Speaker
it's Lydia, and I just had the most beautiful conversation with Simian Walker, who, as you're about to hear, is a bit of a fanboy for this week's song. Sim is a lead-based pianist and composer who's quickly emerged as a leading light in the burgeoning modern classical scene. Regularly performing and touring across the UK and Europe, he's appeared at Latitude and Timber festivals, supported S. Carey, LYR, Submotion Orchestra, Neil Cowley and Erland Cooper, and received over 40 million streams and listens across platforms, with his music frequently broadcast and featured across a range of BBC output.
00:01:32
Speaker
An in-demand speaker, collaborator, consultant, educator and arranger, he also works as a session musician, working in various recording and live contexts across multiple musical styles and genres. He founded and continues to curate Brutonelle Piano Sessions, an established, captivating and eclectic live music series, highlighting the diverse music being composed and performed on the piano. hosted at one of the UK's most iconic grassroots music venues, Brudinel Social Club, here in Leeds. This is
Sim's Survival Song Choice
00:02:06
Speaker
Sim's song, 22, The Death of All the Romance, by The Dias. I can't believe the things you say I can't believe the things you say Tell me, tell me, tell me why
00:02:27
Speaker
So that was 22, The Death of All the Romance by the Deers, which is our survival song from Sim Walker. Hi, Sim. How are you? Hello. I'm fine, thank you. It's really, really nice to be with you in person today. You're my first in-person guest. I know. It's a real pleasure not to be on the end of a Zoom and here in Ed's basement. I know it's the sunniest day we've had of the entire summer so far and we're all in Ed's soundproofed and blacked out basement. Thank you for making that choice. I feel like we should go and get a four pack of tinnies and go and sit in the park after this. But first, I'm going to talk to you about your survival song, which I hadn't heard and I feel like I say that to a lot of our guests, but that's part of the joy of this as I'm discovering new music all the time. How did you first meet this song? Where did it find you?
00:03:17
Speaker
So I
Musical and Emotional Connections
00:03:18
Speaker
came across this band, The Dears, I think it would have been almost exactly 20 years ago. And I was driving along and I think this song came on, not this one, but another one from The Dears from this album, the the single from that album called Lost in the Plot. And it was one of those songs where you just have that moment and you just go... Whoa, what is that? I just need to know about that. But it's in, of course, it's in the days where you're like, you've got to listen for the DJ to say what it is because you can't find the show notes on BBC Sounds or Shazamit. And and yeah, it was just one of those things where I just heard it. I absolutely loved it. And I just.
00:04:01
Speaker
dove headlong into kind of finding out about this band and and who they were. I was intrigued there from Canada um montreal and at the time because I was in higher sixth form year so I was doing A level music, getting ready to come to Leeds to study music at university so I was just such a sponge for musical influences and musical sounds and I studied piano grade 8 doing all the classical stuff but then got to about 14-15 and had sort of my not very rebellious rebellious moment where I was like I want to play guitar I want to play drums I want to sing I want to play Red Hot Chili Peppers I want to play
00:04:42
Speaker
and you know stereophonics or you know bands that were supposed to be cool and then you kind of get to 16 and 17 and then you find out things that are actually a little bit more cool but there was something about this this band that kind of brought in these influences of I guess like the Smiths and an early blur and Radiohead and all of these kind of things that were kind of cool and Brit poppy and still very like stuff that people my age at that time were really getting into. But they were from Montreal and they had this had this kind of jazz in influence as well. And then they were this song and this album had all these orchestral arrangements and I was loving all of that. And it just it just sounded like nothing I'd heard before. It just grabbed me. And so then this I went to go and check out the album and and this song is
00:05:36
Speaker
it's kind of like the It's almost like the the the Apex I think of the album. It's the 10th track on the album. It really builds and builds and builds towards it and then just tails off and it's just an incredible piece of music. You're totally right. yeah it's Cinematic is the word that yeah came to mind for it. It's cinematic. It's almost theatrical, isn't it? The big strings. There's piano in there, which I assume you're a fan of. Yeah, love the piano. And I think you're the first person, or at least the first person I remember, who's chosen something with both a male and a female voice. It's like a conversation song. It's the first one like that. yeah Is that one of the reasons you like it?
00:06:13
Speaker
So these two people are also, they're one of the reasons why this band in particular ah drew me to them. i i'm I'm a very hard-won fan. So i don't really I'm not really a big fan of ah hardly anyone or anything musically, um not because i'm you know but you've got to impress me, but I i i like i like everything, I like so much, and and I tend not to give myself to something ah completely.
00:06:50
Speaker
Life is short, there's a lot of music. There's a lot to listen to, yeah there really is. And I am a proper fanboy of these guys. um And they so the the two people that you hear are a couple, a married couple. ah Murray is is the lead singer I guess and Natalia or his wife is she's the keyboard player and and usually on each album there's maybe a couple of songs that they either switch around or she takes a song or they in this instance they have this song which I guess is a duet but there's something very cool about it because it's not a duet like um
00:07:30
Speaker
Kylie and Jason or Frank Sinatra and whoever else. I love that that's the first duet that came to mind. Thanks for coming, so that was great. The first line is, I have never cried in anybody's arms the way that I have often cried in yours. Please be the one to take my tears away. She sings that. And then he sings, I was 22. I've had my share of views. I just can't steal that happiness from you. I have never cried in anybody's arms The way that I have often cried in yours Please be the one
00:08:17
Speaker
I was 22 I've had my share of views I just can't take that happiness from you And it's just so bleak and so dark and I guess it kind of hit that point right in my life where I was kind of being moody and being teenager-y and whatever But I found it quite This conversational aspect really really interesting and the fact that they're doing it together and they've done this together as a Couple this band it's been them for I mean they say good this formed in 1995 so 30 years of of making music together going on tour and Um, also Murray is, um, is a, is is a black guy. Um,
Industry Reflections and Personal Plans
00:09:06
Speaker
and I, you know, at the time was, you know, getting into, this was 2004. So this is the whole like guitar band revival thing of the early 2000s. So, you know, the strokes and Franz Ferdinand and hard fi and all this stuff. And then the Arctic monkeys and everything, kind of the add-on to Brit pop. And.
00:09:31
Speaker
I think it's, I can't think apart from Kelly from Block Party, I can't think of another rock band, a guitar band where the lead singer, the frontman is a black guy or someone who's non-white. and And some of his songs, you can really hear the depth of the real pain and and stuff that he's had to deal with being a black guy in the music industry and in ah in that part of the music industry, which is perhaps, and I presume not very, or didn't feel very welcoming, particularly 30 years ago. and then
00:10:09
Speaker
I found that really interesting as well just musically and them as well as people to be people that just really it just really grabbed me as well as the music and there was so much going going on underneath just oh this is a cool song which really got me into it really. Yeah, they're the family band doing it differently, aren't they? They are. And what I found really cool, so when they released their album after this one, which was called Gang of Losers in 2006, they toured it here. I was in uni at that time, me and my friend went down to the cockpit, R.I.P.
00:10:44
Speaker
amazing music venue in Leeds and they were playing down there and um I'd never really done the whole fan thing ah to any anyone or any music kind of band at all. So I stood outside the the venue, outside the tour bus and they had their first kid on tour with them at the time who was like two in the tour bus I was like oh that's a really cool thing that they're because they're both on tour so they've just taken the kid and that's a cool thing and then their last tour ah in 2022
00:11:19
Speaker
um that kid is now 18 and ah they were like oh we're here in London and this kid is 18 now and we're showing them all of the sites we're going to Camden Market and all of the cool stuff and going to see a gig at the garage and all this stuff and I was like oh yeah I've really seen this band through as a fan from from that time and it's also quite an inspiration because I've just had a kid um and me and my wife and our little boy ah they're going to come on tour with me in November as well because the deers did so I'm going to do it. So the walkers are doing it too. Exactly. Oh that's fascinating and I guess you you you've gone through so many and
00:11:59
Speaker
reasons why this is such an important song to you there. I'm interested in what of those reasons makes it your choice for survival songs because it it could be it could be a lyrical aspect, it could be a musical aspect, it could be the deers themselves and what they what they showed you was possible. why Why have you chosen it for this context? Well, for
Live Music Experience
00:12:19
Speaker
a start, this is the 20th anniversary year. They're gonna do a show in London at the Village Underground in December. I think it's this aspect of ah fandom. They're the only band I've ever been so geeky about, so fandom about. I've got everything, you know, and i've I've seen it through. I just really like what they do. I like what they say. I like what they're... their approaches and in relation to this song specifically, this is the kind of song where I I am able to enjoy it in a live setting I've seen them about four or five times and just forget myself a bit and and and do the whole I'm singing along at the top of my voice
00:13:09
Speaker
I've got my hands in the air. I've got my eyes closed. I'm being a fan. And and I'm not embarrassed about that because I absolutely love it. um And I literally don't do that ah for ah for anything or anyone ah apart from these guys. I don't always listen to words and lyrics because I'm more of a you're a musician. I'm just going and hearing all the strings.
00:13:37
Speaker
And it builds, it drives up to this incredible, like two minute epic outro where it just keeps on going and you're like, oh, there can't be another 16 bars of this. And then there is. And also it's it's a really special thing because my friend Giles, who basically I was at uni with and we kind of became, he he he kind of became a sort of my second, second in commanders, like this super fanboy. And it's just, yeah, it's just something that we, the two of us just share very, very... You found each other. In a special kind of way, you know.
00:14:13
Speaker
My last question is always, Sim, where do people follow you and find out what you're up to? So
Where to Find Sim's Music
00:14:19
Speaker
I'm a musician. I'm making my own music, piano-based music mostly. um And you can find that in all the places. Simian Walker, because I use my posh name. Full name for music. For for music. Simianwalker.co.uk. And I'm on all of the places where, you know, I try to tell people about What's going on? And if you have an opportunity to see sim play live You absolutely should go and see it because it was a delight the couple of times I've seen you play live you you stop time You stop a room you really do. Thank you. Thanks for your time sim. This has been a delight
00:14:54
Speaker
pleasure
00:15:05
Speaker
We really hope you enjoyed the episode. If you want to support the podcast further you can choose to upgrade your subscription on Substack, but most of all we just love it if you told your friends about what we're up to. Thanks for listening.