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Danny West 'Rain' by The Sunday Service Choir
77 Plays6 months ago
Danny thought he had his go-to survival songs sorted. Then, a year ago, this one hit him from left field and handed him the entire, survival toolkit in 4 minutes. This is a really special conversation and another, new perspective. We hope you love it.
Danny West, a proud native of Leeds, serves as the Publishing Manager at Come Play With Me Records (CPWM), where his passion for music and creativity fuels his work. Known for being a connector of people and ideas, Danny has been instrumental in forging key partnerships for CPWM, including their significant collaboration with Universal Music Publishing Group—a move that has opened new doors for artists under the label.
Outside of his work at CPWM, Danny’s love for storytelling shines through his career as a videographer. He’s had the opportunity to work with some of the biggest brands in the world, including Amazon Prime Video, Adidas, Reebok, and MTV, bringing vibrant visual content to life. His work around Yorkshire is particularly close to his heart, where he’s worked closely with local talent like Graft, the 2020 winner of BBC's 'The Rap Game'.
Danny’s deep connection to Leeds and Yorkshire drives him to champion local talent, while his creative vision and network continue to elevate artists and projects to a national stage. His ability to blend business savvy with creative flair has made him a key figure in the region’s creative and music scenes.
Show Notes:
Danny West: https://www.instagram.com/dannywestjr/
Welcome to Survival Songs, a podcast where each episode our guest tells us about a songs that gets them through the best and worst of times.
https://open.spotify.com/artist/286u8X9g8zCa5OODERzaPX?si=GK6SD3uhQt-2ztJ8ycCOOg
Help us a grow a community of survival song listeners by joining us on over on Substack:
https://survivalsongs.substack.com/
'Rain' by The Sunday Service Choir can be found on our community playlist on Spotify along with our listener’s Survival Songs. Check it out and add your own!
This episode contains small portions of ’ 'Rain' by The Sunday Service Choir. 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/2c9O21YLFy4tFI9zCVhbFg?si=BWHvv5kyTmeNIU5tTn9H7g
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Transcript
Introduction to Survival Songs Podcast
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 it got us thinking, what are other people's Survival Songs? So we thought we'd find out.
00:00:15
Speaker
Welcome to 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.
Guest Introduction: Danny West
00:00:49
Speaker
Welcome to Survival Songs, I'm Ed. This week's guest is Danny West. I met Danny back in March and he was one of those guys that I immediately got on with. He's funny, warm, generous, committed and just one of those big-hearted people that when he walks into a room he lights up the place.
00:01:06
Speaker
He's also one of those people who looks to build bridges and he's quickly become someone who I really trust and will go to for advice and thoughts on things. so For those of you who haven't had the pleasure of working with Danny, he is an artist manager, a record producer and the publishing manager for Come Play With Me Records, a Leeds based independent label who support upcoming artists. I genuinely thought I knew what Danny was going to choose and I was like the first time I know what someone was going to choose.
00:01:31
Speaker
but he honestly came out of left field with this one and I'm really glad he did. This is a beautiful piece of music. So let's hear a little bit of Danny's survival song before we talk to him. This is Rain by Sunday Service Choir.
00:01:55
Speaker
so That was A Little Bit of Rain by Sunday Service Quiet, the choice of today's guest, Danny West. Hello, Danny. Hello. hello How are you? I'm good. Thank you. Thank you so much for joining us. and and Thank you for choosing such a beautiful song and like such a like spiritual, beautiful, uplifting track. um Tell me, when did this first arrive in your life and like what did it make
Discovery of 'Rain' by Sunday Service Choir
00:02:18
Speaker
you feel? like what What was your sort of overriding emotions?
00:02:21
Speaker
Yeah, totally. So I found this track on TikTok through like someone who's kind of doing a cover of it, and I didn't know what like the original was. So I kind of scrolled through TikTok forever to kind of find who it was by. Then I came across Sunday Service and that that kind of project. And when I heard that original, I was like, wow. like I just felt such a village, community-loving feeling from that song. And it kind of ah it was a hug for the ears kind of feeling. so So how long ago was that, do you think? I'm going to say like June last year, maybe. yeah so it's quite and So it's quite a new arrival in your life. so sort of Yeah, absolutely. It's a new arrival, because I think like when you did approach me about a survival song, initially I was going to say J. Cole, because I've been listening to 2014 Forest Hills Drive for the past.
00:03:13
Speaker
nine years, has it been out? Religiously, I've been listening to the live version and the but studio version. Yeah, so it's definitely a recent change up in terms of you know what I reach for in times of need. Having spoken to you before, I know how much Jekyll and the album means to you. what Why has this become such a big part of your life?
00:03:36
Speaker
we' we've With Rain, it's such an integral part now because within the space of four minutes or so, the entire feeling that I got from Jekyll's album, I get from that four minutes.
00:03:52
Speaker
and It's such an emotional journey that it takes me on, that I've just been reaching for that religiously. i mean Speaking of religiously, it's obviously a big religious record on faith-based. Does that tap into that stuff that's kind of fundamental to you then?
00:04:10
Speaker
Absolutely. I think, like, growing up, it was all about, you know, going to church, you know, singing the praise of the Lord, essentially. And it's quite nice because I've been quite distant from that in my like adult years. And, like, that project by Sunday Services brought me back to God did within a way. There's a higher being at play in terms of life in general. and What makes it your
Impact of 'Rain' as a Survival Song
00:04:33
Speaker
survival song? Like, why why specifically survival?
00:04:37
Speaker
survival Survival more so this year when unfortunately one of my best friends passed away in January and that was the only song I listened to for like two, three months.
00:04:52
Speaker
And that was one of the first times I've kind of dealt with a death close to me. So I kind of didn't know what to do or how to feel or who to talk to and all these emotions. But I think rain just absolutely consolidated my feelings. And like it was my outlet to cry, laugh, be joyful. And like all those feelings were just in this one song.
00:05:16
Speaker
And I think that's that's probably why it's now my survival song. and How often do you find yourself reaching for it now? Like, because obviously that takes you to quite a specific time, but is it something you still... And does it take you back there or does it actually just help you connect may with that kind of the good stuff? Yeah. I think, I want to say at least once or twice a week, it's um um on my Spotify and Now I've got such a weird connection with the song and that's why I still want to call it my survival song because at times it takes me back to that moment that you know I lost my friend and then it also takes me back to moments of last year when I'm celebrating massive wins with you know the artists that I manage and that's the song I'm reaching for to feel the gratitude like almost like the gratitude of the Lord in a way so it's kind of two-pronged but I also enjoy and I can't enjoy that
00:06:14
Speaker
You're involved in music in such a wide way. You're a manager, a producer, you work with, can play with me, a brilliant label. But do you think you ever will kind of find yourself making kind of spiritually based music? I don't know. Or do you think it does come in there, but it's just in different flavours? Yeah, definitely. I think I've just come off the back of producing an EP for an artist called Graff, who's a rapper from Leeds.
Gospel Influences in Music Production
00:06:43
Speaker
um The last track on his EP is called Golden Child, and that was heavily, heavily influenced by gospel and Sunday service. That was like one of the first times I've put gospel into the music I create. Traditionally, I make UK rap and you know drill and track, that kind of sign and stuff. Whereas this is the first time you know we got a choir in and I've composed their bits and we're doing violin bits. and It kind of just felt like we were in a church in the studio. and but That was a first for me, but also like you know to tie it back round to that survival song, it's almost a survival album because gospel just takes you to enough ah another dimension entirely. Yeah, it's so because as as a music, like obviously it's so steeped in faith.
00:07:32
Speaker
But I think it's one of those that like, I think it speaks to all of us, right? You know, you think of like, I mean, for me, like Amazing Grace by Aretha Franklin, which is one of the greatest records ever made, regardless of it being gospel, like, and It reminds you that, like, because I'm not someone who has a kind of traditional faith, but, like, it reminds you that you are one part of a universe. I think it just connects, like, spiritually. I tend to, like, separate the spirit and the faith. So I feel like a lot of the work that Sunday Service do, and Rain in particular, is a spiritual song. Yes, they're talking about Jesus and the Lord and stuff, but
00:08:17
Speaker
On a deeper level, I think it's all about connecting spiritually rather than your faith in whoever your faith is in. I think that seems to have been a lot of the work you do as well, isn't it? Because like you know and because me and you have just worked together a bit this year and like what I can see your your entire role seems to be in life is just building bridges, right? Connecting and connecting up the dots right between people.
00:08:41
Speaker
hundred percent right Like he just said, my I think we spiritually connected before we even spoke about money or or whatever publishing or whatever it was and then everything came after the fact and I think I've been lucky enough that my life has just been met. I've been invited and done crazy things just because I've connected with people on a deeper level than just, you can do this for me, I can do this for you. Yeah, absolutely. And in back to sort of the song, is there is there a bit in the song? Is there like a moment in the song where you're like, yes, that's my bit? Oh, it's it's the intro, you know, is that I just I can't even. And then this is audio, right? So people can't see my reaction. But like, yeah like,
00:09:31
Speaker
the first three seconds of like oh god that that just transports me into like i want to say like a monk level of meditation that's when i just become one with the sonics almost and I'm just like entrenched in what's going on. The amount of listening to that song, I feel like I could probably sing it, hum it, mime it word for word, lyric for lyric, melody for melody. like ah What really blew me away was the arrangement of the vocal. like They're so tight and it's so like and and and like it's it's gospel, but it it feels like it's like
00:10:20
Speaker
it seems like it's been sampled almost like because it's just so like cuts in and out and they're all like moving between each other it's like a dance almost it's it's such a reflection of like traditional black music from the roots and the core like going back you know to african music that's you know call and response and then to hear that kind of transfer into something like rain where you've got the tenors doing one thing and then you've got the sopranos just absolutely going wild in bits of the song it's like yeah like i don't know black cultures in me and i i love i love it till i die and this is a true representation of what we're capable of so so a lot of the music you work in would be seen as traditional white music i suppose like indie music and so like how do you ever feel like you're like
00:11:12
Speaker
guys you know there's like another flavor of music sometimes do you ever feel like that you know what no because a lot of a lot Like you said, a lot of the music I do you know come across and work on um as a part of my like daily job has an influence of soul and R&B and hip-hop and blues.
Cultural Influences in Modern Music
00:11:35
Speaker
And it's only when I like really listen to it, I'm like, you guys don't even realise that you've been influenced by hundreds and hundreds of years of culture being poured into this.
00:11:46
Speaker
So um I'm very respectful of the music that's happening now, although I'd love for it to change. But I definitely respect it because I think without knowing people, you know,
00:11:59
Speaker
taken from Martha Reeves from Whitney Houston and not even realizing it in their genres. But isn't that kind of like incredible about music? is that it just like when So it's when someone's single that as like, oh, this person invented this and changed everything. And as much as they might have had massive influence.
00:12:18
Speaker
They are just an amplification of everything that's gone before them, right? And they've just they might have amplified it differently, but ultimately they've taken something that's already been and and built on it, right? that's the and And that's not a bad thing. That's not criticism. That's actually the beauty of music. It's just an amalgam.
00:12:37
Speaker
Yeah, 100 percent. I think it's it's a tricky one because I guess there's a lot of people that say, you know, don't disrespect a certain thing or, you know, you got to do it this way, you got to do it this way. I don't see it like that. I think everyone just needs to take it in their own stride. If people like it, people like it. Like, I don't think anything should be gate kept in the music industry because I'm hearing post punk tracks with jazz shakers in. So I'm like, yeah, man, this is working. This sounds flavors to me. So let's leave it alone.
00:13:07
Speaker
yeah absolutely But it's interesting because the ah this particular act we just talked about, is obviously they were on tour with Kanye. And obviously with his music, particularly his earlier music, which was, now like like for me, he brought so much of that stuff in like to to his music. But obviously they've gone off and done their own thing. and And just that kind of way, the music just follows its own pathway. And it's never just a straight line, is it? Never a straight line. And I think Kanye did such a great thing to platform.
00:13:39
Speaker
gospel. like you know He stood in the middle of the field with 200 people around him singing gospel every Sunday. like That's 13, 14, 15-year-olds getting introduced to gospel and thinking, Kanye is pioneering this brand new thing, but in actual fact, he's got decades and decades of of history behind it. But at whatever point people log in,
00:14:04
Speaker
I don't think that's the problem.
Contact Information for Danny West
00:14:06
Speaker
I think the logging in is the most important part. Sure. Danny, thanks so much for coming and talking to us and sharing your survival song. ah Where can people find out about you, if you want people to find out about you? Yeah, I'm Danny West, as I just said, it's Monday time. I'm Danny West JR on Instagram. That's probably the main place.
00:14:28
Speaker
um Come and talk to me. I make music. I'm also the publishing manager in A&R for Complaining Me Records based in Leeds. Let's do some fun stuff. Brilliant. Thanks, Danny. You take care, mate. Thank you. See you later.
00:14:50
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'd just love it if you told your friends about what we're up to. Thanks for listening.