Wallsend Weekend Television was written and recorded off Allerton Road, Smithdown Road, under the Westway, and at 1, 3 and 5 Abbey Road. In summer 2014, I played some shows with a squashed man from London. I loved his songs but he didn’t like my phone number. That same summer in Kelly’s (the old one that was good and didn’t do food), I met a beautiful girl called Frankie who answered all my calls. A few months later, I played at an old people’s home for Merseybeat veterans to raise funds for a statue that wasn’t real. I couldn’t breathe when that show finished so I got an old Casio out and wrote some ringtones. I made all these spreadsheets about Pet Sounds and Frankie showed me a new set of colours. 

First, I filled my pockets with balloons and wrote a song about them in Frankie’s basement. Then I filled my bedroom with balloons to record a first draft. Another house opened on Salisbury Road and using dictaphone recordings I made as a kid, I stitched a song together there. Coral Zuton liked some of my songs so we met up in John Lennon’s living room. They got me on a tour with some lovely Scottish chaps but David Bowie died and I had a stupid stage name which I hated. I electrocuted my alter ego and set off on a world tour of Liverpool with Frankie and Adam. While Frankie napped at my Mum’s, I wrote a pop song called GoGo and magic piano riffs for Sea Miner and Magnificent Advertisement. Everyone was watching ITV2 while I wrote Bootlegs with the headphones on and then I dropped a pot noodle everywhere. 

It all went to the Wirral with Coral Zuton so I moved to Abbey Road with Frankie to live on George Harrison’s shoulder. There is a school at Abbey Road and schools at Abbey Road are a lot better than schools in Heaton. I got to work on my suitcase of songs in the basement next to the tape vaults. Me and David hatched plans in Abbey House and I got so well acquainted with Mrs Mills that she personally allowed me to record Sea Miner with her in Studio 2 (if I did it in one take on a lunch break). One night, I sang Nirvana songs like White Album songs and wrote Over & Over. Another night, I was missing the north and wrote Eureka, I Can See! while locking up the piano by the tradesmen’s entrance where Liam and me had set up a U87 to pop balloons into. Carlos made so much amazing stuff happen at this time and invited me into the big rooms to yodel for the class on Stitches in Studio 3.

Novelty Island got born at the end of 2019, we gigged around London and gave an EP to Vic Reeves who said he’d listen on his hifi. An early version of the album existed but melted along with the planet in 2020. I stopped eating and moved back to my Mum’s in Liverpool to read up on Ringo’s grandparents. I wrote a pub called The Desperately Strange and celebrated my 27th without Frankie but with 3 bottles of Stella and a green apple. I couldn’t listen to my Abbey Road songs in the fog and wrote new ones about birds and cowboys and Michaels. Then Carlos invited me back to Studio 2 to record Eureka, I Can See! by the light of our masks. When we were allowed out the house, I formed a new live band. We came to life at the Handyman and toured with The Pale White. Adam gave hope to my sleeping songs while Jack gave drums to The Desperately Strange at Studio 13. Funny Little Rhythm and Over & Over were also knocked up there with Jan.
 

I tidied the songs up one last time through 2022, drove Carlos insane and Turn To Me popped up in the shadows of the blue. Roger at Think Like A Key in America was joined by Neil, Krystian and Al at 9X9 in Liverpool to begin the arduous process of melting 7000 candles to press the record. The sun set on Battle Hill so it became Wallsend Weekend Television and my first album turned into my second. I bumped into the squashed man after we played Glastonbury last year and it was fine.

Oceans of music preceded the 12 tracks that make up How Are You Coping With This Century? but 2020-onwards was a different planet and required a different soundtrack. The first summer of mass Boris-cide saw the universe evict me and Frankie from Abbey Road. We moved home to Liverpool. Frankie decided to become an even more impressive person and I turned into soup (leek and potato). 

I wrote the songs through October in the Festival Gardens and Greenbank Park (not Sefton Park - don’t know why). After solidifying slightly (marmite on toast), I borrowed some microphones, a banjo, an old honky-tonk piano from my auntie and recorded the songs at home. A brief trip to 13 Studios in London, Brexotica added This Bird, the best harmonium in the world onto Yes and Jan Simson hitting things onto a few others (they say he’s half snare drum). 

Then, I buzzed a million Logic sessions and badly bounced stereo tracks (sorry) to Carlos Lellis - we sat in zoom dystopia for hours on end as he mixed them so brilliantly out of my head and into the world. I had the fully finished record by Christmas.

Without Frankie - my eternal Linda and muse, Carlos - my Abbey Road guru, Mum - who always listens, David, Thom and Ian - for the guidance and phone bills (I’m on GiffGaff with good rates), Joe K - introducer to Roger and Roger himself - the reason you are holding this record now - the album would be another unfinished idea clogging up my brain…