Interview: Ruthven

First surfacing in 2017 as one of the Paul Institute’s earliest acolytes, the prospect of Sean “Ruthven” Nelson’s arrival proper has been as tantalising as it’s been unpredictable. The South London artist bucked the family tradition of becoming a musician at first, focusing on a career in the London Fire Brigade to support his children. In time, the call to create proved too compelling to ignore, and he found himself developing his own refreshing expression of R&B in between callouts at the fire station. This style would marry classic R&B with funk and jazz tendencies, whole-hearted soulfulness and a breezy, contemporary swagger, all the while wearing its influences on its sleeve: Prince, D’Angelo, Steely Dan, Peter Gabriel and Phil Collins to name a few.

The promise shown by early singles “Evil” and “Hypothalamus” was followed up emphatically on 2020’s “Have You Decided?”, a dreamy bit of Prince-inspired brilliance that sets alight an extended fuse for the intro before exploding into the sort of fireworks that linger long in the air afterwards. (That the track’s proven to be a heavy influence on “Little Bit More” from Mk.gee’s Two Star & the Dream Police underscores its excellence.) But before Ruthven’s first album would ever materialise, he’d lose his hard drive, contest with a global pandemic, grapple with the shifting horizons of his personal life, tour the US opening for and playing with Sampha (including stops on NPR Tiny Desk and Later… with Jools Holland) and feature on an Overmono interpolation of his earlier work.

When debut full-length Rough & Ready did arrive in late 2024, it revealed new dimensions to Ruthven’s singing and songwriting. His collaborative chemistry with A. K. Paul shines through the record, the airiness and buoyancy of their instrumentation met by equally lively falsettos (and the occasional growl). Strip away his gorgeous melodies and harmonies, dynamic arrangements, and the satisfying textures of his studio recordings, and you’ll still be left with all the charming relatability of Ruthven’s lyricism. It’s hard to pick a favourite thing about the album – sometimes it’s the upbeat percussion of depression jam “123 Days”, other times it might be the tongue-in-cheek flirtiness of “Itch” or the way “I Can’t Go There” faces uncertainty head-on. It’s all had heavy rotation in this house.

While the arrangements are retooled for the road, his live show retains the innate qualities that make his releases stand out: the bandmembers playfully hype and crack each other up, Ruthven himself positively glows with a winning passion for performing, and he invites the audience to join in as he hits every note. The tour provides an opportune moment for an in-person chat, so we sit down with a hot beverage before the Leeds soundcheck and get into it.

Ruthven: “I’ve got so many bruises on my body.”

Tayyab: Are they recent ones?

“I’m guessing so. Just noticed it now. I got changed earlier on and I had a big one on my chest. It’s probably just from loading up and unpacking gear, it’s a little bit awkward and clunky. Could be… I don’t know. I regularly burn myself as well, but I also don’t feel it that much. I got that [pointing to burn] from putting something in the oven. Not like, intentional. I don’t really feel that much heat.”

It takes a few seconds to register it.

“Yeah, maybe. I’m not sure if that’s some sort of neurodiverse thing? Or, I don’t know, firefighting I guess.”

Do you think you’ve built a resistance?

“Yeah, tolerance levels or something. I definitely can take things out of the oven with my hand, like a tray, and just put it down on the side. I’ve got a seven-second window from that to like, oh it’s a bit too hot, better put this down, but I’m not like, screaming.”

But why do you know that?

“Because I always do it. I’m the kind of person who would impulsively do that, instead of finding mitts. I’ll just use my hands. That’s my kind of vibe.”

Rough and ready.

“Exactly. Slightly impulsive.”

Looking at all of the interviews you’ve done, especially when the album came out, every time anyone asked you about it, the first thing you’d say is “I just wanna get the live show ready”. You weren’t thinking about the recordings. But now, with the live shows happening, how’s the tour been going?

“It’s really fun. I’m really happy to be playing with the people I’m playing with. Blake Cascoe, who’s the drummer, and Rosetta Carr who’s on bass, and recently in Hoxton we added a guitarist who I worked with previously – we did a live recording at 180 The Strand, so Calum Duncan who played guitar on that, he’s joining up. I’m trying to make it cost-efficient because touring is expensive, but I feel like we’ve got something. It’s pretty cool in terms of chemistry. I actually worked with Blake and Rosetta when I was touring with Sampha as well, they’re part of that band. So they’re now just very good friends. Working with some of my closest people, it’s cool.”

It’s wild that you had all of the shows in the US opening for Sampha and then playing as part of his group as well, and the NPR Tiny Desk Concert, before you were –

“Doing this stuff.”

Which is not really the order most people go in, playing the shows away from home.

“It does feel a little in-reverse, in some regards. I guess that’s just how things have gone for me. I get a little taste to see what could be, for me, down the line. These are the levels, in that Sampha’s a really, really talented man and I think that the shows – without trying to toot my own horn – I think that the shows were excellent. Really, really well created. The levels were set, the standard was made, and I think that I can kind of see the future a little bit, in regards to where it could go. Having excellent musicians in the band, but also, we’re at the very beginning stages and it already feels really nice. I’m really happy with it.

“Unfortunately I haven’t been 100% in terms of my wellness – I’m ever so slightly trying to keep myself back from you because I don’t want to make you ill – but yeah, last night for example, one side of my neck was completely swollen. One side of my nose was completely blocked. I just had to breathe through my mouth. But, it worked. I was still able to hit the high notes that I wanted to hit.”

So was it the Sampha tour that brought you and the rest of the band together as a unit?

“Yeah, I hadn’t met them before. Touring, they ended up just being like my family. My travelling family. We did rehearsals and then we did tour pretty quick, actually. I think we got together in April 2023 and then we were in the States in June. The music was challenging and spiritual-feeling, and there was something that ended up making it feel like a bond over this complex… We were all quite into our alternative stuff already, so having something that was like, this is deep, this is stuff we really respect, something that’s a little bit bigger than ourselves, d’you know what I mean? Kind of came together as a group. And also, we’re all quite quirky people. Kooky people. ADHD as fuck, I think some people would put it as. We generally just bonded really well. Me, Blake and Rosetta – yeah, they’re my people.”

You talked about neurodivergence in a couple of interviews as well. Is it a recent diagnosis or a recent discovery about yourself?

“I’ve had an inkling for a while but I actually did get diagnosed in the last year-and-a-half. I’m not on medication or anything, but I think that the better you know yourself, the more you can be kind to yourself, and the more you can put practical things in place to stop anyone making mistakes again and again and again. It’s about growth more than anything else. I do realise, [at] certain times, that I’m not listening to what you’re saying – someone will be talking and I’ll be in a different world but I just have to snap out of it. Certain things I had to realise. I feel like I knew but I didn’t know when I was 14, 15. I knew that I would get lost quite quickly, but it’s become really clear.”

That’s like half of your life ago, that you had an inkling. What’s it meant for you to have this affirmed knowledge about yourself?

“I don’t know, it’s not that deep. I just find it funny in some regards, like, of course you are man! Obviously! Also, it’s such a spoken-about topic over the last two years, especially after lockdown, it seems to be a buzzing thing on social media. So I was a little reticent to say anything about it at first, but then I was like actually, there’s no point trying to hide anything. Just be real. Say the stuff. Wear it on your sleeve, rough and ready.”

Are you on social media much?

“I’m on all the social media!”

You have a professional presence but are you using social media?

“I can doomscroll from time to time, it happens. I do try to focus on other stuff, I’ve got other stuff to focus on. I’ve got music to write. Live music to arrange. People to see. Sons to raise. A wife to be a good husband to. A son to be a good mum to – sorry, the other way round – a mum to be a good son to. I’m trying to not allow social media to suck up too much of my time, but it’s also probably the most consumed media in the world now, more than TV. More than probably Netflix, it’s just people scrolling through, looking at reels.”

Is there a specific thing you’re on there for, or are you just following where the algorithm takes you?

“I’m trying to pick my battles. I know that my algorithm is quite good now. Funny stuff will usually come up at certain times of the day as well. So if I wake up really early, which I have a habit of doing, like 4 in the morning sometimes and I just can’t get back to sleep, that is a perfect window. Between 4am and 6am, some of the funniest shit – weird, really weird but my sense of humour. Wacky stuff, a bit far out-there sometimes. But yeah I’ve been enjoying the algorithm.

“At the moment, I’ve been looking a lot at music production nerds talking about which plugins they use and why they use them. I didn’t realise that content was a thing until a few weeks ago, but aight, cool, let me go see these people and find out what they’re talking about, because I haven’t actually updated any of my stuff for a while. I have my stuff that, I use this, I trust this, so why don’t I just carry on using it, but there’s a lot of stuff that’s come up that people are describing that’s gonna come in handy when the time comes. I’m prepping to do album two in a short space of time, so trying to get everything lined up for that.”

There’s a few things I want to ask about that, but let’s just go with what you’re using for production.

“OK, so I’m on Logic Pro. It’s not what I started out with – the first one I ever made a beat on was Cubase at my aunt’s house. My aunt’s also a musician and I guess I would have been not even a teenager yet. She lives on an island in the countryside, in a farmhouse. They bought it when it was derelict, it had been derelict for 100 years. They did a 20-year Grand Designs or something, they did it up gradually in 20 years. I got to grow up seeing it change. There was always a room that was specifically for my aunt to make music in. That was just my hangout spot when I was there, I was like, this is where I’m going to plug in and start learning to do this shit. Yeah, I was just on her Cubase learning to do basic production stuff.

“And then at school, I did GCSE music, using Cubase for that as well. If you asked me to make a beat on Cubase now, I wouldn’t be able to do it, I’m pretty sure. I’m now stuck in Logic, always.”

What kind of beats were you making back then?

“When I was a kid kid, just trying to layer melodies, trying to stack melodies and see what different melodies coming together felt like. And then silly, stupid songwriting because I was a kid. I tried to sing, “world peace rocks!” [laughing], d’you know what I mean?”

I actually can’t believe I hadn’t heard it until I was getting ready to talk to you, but “Why can’t we have some fun?”

“Ayy!”

I saw that it’s still up, still online.

“Yeah, why not? That’s what I’ve been thinking. I saw it recently, actually, on SoundCloud. I still like it.”

It was great, I really enjoyed that the upload waveform was super blown out and everything.

“Part of the process, innit [laughs].”

Do you have any music from before those times, that you’ve heard?

“I actually lost a lot of music. I dropped my hard drive and everything got corrupted.”

When you say “dropped your hard drive”…

“I dropped it hard off of the table, and then it wouldn’t work when I plugged it in.”

It’s heartbreaking but also when you just say it, it sounds funny.

“It’s me, to be honest with you. Me dropping something from the table and then it’s valuable and doesn’t work anymore…”

Well this happens a lot actually. You hear about DJs who’ve lost all their tracks, musicians who’ve lost their hard drives. Can you talk about what you felt in that moment?

“I was gutted because throughout this whole process, I started making music, making beats and calling them names before I made the songs ’cause I wanted to save [them] and have something to remember. Which to me started feeling dumb after certain period of time because I don’t know what the song feels like, so why am I gonna label it? So I call it “Untitled”. So I went from “Untitled 1” to 120 or something like that. Projects, things that felt like they had something to it. And then lost of all them. Some of them were the finished song. Some of them actually made it through because I bounced out stems, like “Don’t Keep It To Yourself”, that was one of the untitled ones. “Hypothalamus” was one of the untitled ones. “Have You Decided?” was one of the untitled ones. There were loads of them.”

I’m so glad that you still had that one, that was my favourite track from that year, “Have You Decided?” It’s so good.

“I was a little heartbroken, but when I started coming into the final bits of the album, like let me try and properly finalise these tracks, the stuff that I needed from those periods of time was actually still up here [gestures to head]. So there’s lines – for example, “Don’t Keep It To Yourself”, it was a blend of two different versions. I had a funk version, you know in the last chorus, that vibe, that was the whole vibe of the song. It was more upbeat and syncopated. The synth was going ta-ka-TA-ka-ta-KA, just going like that all the way through. But I thought it sounded too happy, I wanted it to have a bit of an edge, so I made this other version which is what you can hear in “Don’t Keep It To Yourself”, with the toms. But I thought I’d blend it, change it up. So I went back and reverted to it, and I remembered the chords, I had the chord shapes still in mind, I was like alright cool, let’s just find an appropriate sound. And it came together really quickly, the blend. When I needed it, it came through for me. There’s other ones as well. “Drive It” was one of the untitled ones. Those chords were on a really siney, funky synth and I just completely changed that and kept the piano, but the chords were from years before. Most of the stuff I wrote for the album was made a long time ago.”

It’s interesting having been forced to rebuild.

“It was actually kind of cool, it reopened those songs for me. Some of them felt really old. I wrote “Don’t Keep It To Yourself”, the actual song, lyrics and stuff, eight years ago. That’s crazy to me. The song came out four years ago. My album came out five months ago. Kind of crazy. But yeah, that reopening, going back into the production process made it fresher for me.”

How has playing the songs live changed the relationship you have with the recorded versions?

“Some of it is still gonna have the same format, ish, but there is a different life that gets taken on when I’m performing the things live. I think people might find it easier to connect to my music when seeing it performed. I’ve had a few comments that it’s better live than it is in the recording, not to say that I believe the recordings aren’t good, but maybe it just breathes different life into it. It feels good. There’s a dynamic thing that happens vocally and energetically.”

On the flipside of that dynamic, what has it meant for you to have these songs out and see audiences react to them? When you were writing them, you didn’t have an audience you were showing them to.

“I really enjoy performing “Drive It” and just throwing people off. For the people that have listened to the album, they’ve got an understanding of what’s coming when it comes, but just defying expectations and delivering a good vocal performance goes quite a long way. Again, not trying to toot my own horn but hopefully I am doing that, defying expectations. The thing that you’re hearing in the recording, I can do that in real life.

“In terms of the songs, when I was in Dublin for example, people were singing along to the songs with me and that was beautiful. I think at the stage that we’re at now, in terms of the live thing, the only people that are here are people that want to be here. It’s not so much of a tagalong thing, you might get a few guestlist people but these are actually fans. That’s nice for me to actually see. You’re actually here because you’re in, and it’s not a trendy thing to do, to go to the show. I’m here for that, I’m very grateful for it. When anyone wants to come to any of my stuff, it’s hard to know what to expect, ’cause I didn’t know what people were gonna feel when they heard the music.”

You’ve talked about expectations, and the Sampha tour setting the levels. You’ve also talked about your musical influences, and they’re all perfectionists. But also there’s this dynamic, like you say, you’re rough and ready.

“I’m trying to be both of those things, basically. When I write a song, I always just want that song to get released now. To just drop it.”

But you had the opposite experience because it’s been such a long journey.

“It’s been such a long experience. I actually had the album finished for two-and-a-half years and then before that, every track was mixed bar one song, which was “I Can’t Go There”, the one I wrote with Eg White. We went in there with the expectations of trying to write a ‘pop tune’, and it felt right – we held off on the album release to get the mixing and mastering done. And then getting the recording finished took a little while because it was session – Eg is a really busy guy. It took longer than I wanted it to take, basically.”

Can you talk about working with Eg White? Obviously he has a bunch of achievements in his career, and is someone who is acclimatised in the industry that you’re entering into.

“He’s got the same energy as me with regards to studio stuff. Zany, mad scientist in the studio. Pull this thing out, try it out and experiment. He’s good energy to have in the studio for that reason. Same shit with A. K. [Paul] as well, bouncing ideas off each other. Did it work? No, but it was fun [laughter]. Just throwing as many things as possible and then peeling back what is vital and not vital. I think that’s ultimately what it is.

“I think he’s a really good songwriter, super talented. I’m actually going to go back into the studio with him not next week, the week after. Try and get another song down. He is good at drawing things out of people. We’ll have conversations, sometimes I might feel like I’m oversharing, almost like a therapy session, like I don’t even know if I wanna write a song about this topic!”

But your music is so deeply personal as well.

“There are tidbits of real that come through, but I flip it between fiction. Trying to paint a picture with the words, make up some sort of narrative or story like here’s my take on this stuff. Here’s how I feel on this topic. Some of it is probably a little too real. It’s not my natural inclination, to be really open. I also do like the idea of being really open and having people feel like they can be open with me as a result. I like having conversations like that with people, so why not do that in my music as well? I think people respond to that in conversations, why not also musically and in songwriting?”

Has music always been the way that you’ve expressed yourself?

“Yeah, largely. I just remember being a frustrated teenager playing drums. I’d go home and practise for an hour, hour-and-a-half every day.”

I was interested in hearing more about your experience with different instruments, because there’s piano, drums, stuff you were doing at the Centre for Young Musicians, and then obviously you’re doing vocals. It made me wonder, especially when you’re approaching songwriting, but also just how you are naturally inclined to express yourself musically, is there certain instrumentation or sounds that you’re drawn to?

“I really like percussive stuff. Quite syncopated, percussive rhythms. When that gets put into stuff that feels nice musically. ‘Nice’ is really subjective. I’m very eclectic in terms of musical tastes. It’s weird for there not to be a percussive element in the music I make. It’s also unlikely for me to make a song that doesn’t include some form of piano-playing in it, and it’s unlikely there’ll be no harmonies at any point throughout a song.”

Is there a place that you stop at first?

“It varies. “The Window” started as a harmony stack. That was it. That was as far as I got, and it was left like that for about a year-and-a-half. I had a mixdown with it, just to play it over and think about, do I like this or not? I played it to my wife and she was like, you should 100% make something out of that, what are you doing, why didn’t you do anything with that in the first place! So then I went to the studio with the intention of trying to write a song and then I just wrote the song on piano, start to finish in a year and a half. It worked, now was the right time for me to do it, it just came to be.”

You mentioned your wife there – I’ve got to ask you about family. Firstly, with the videos, Francesca is very much a creative partner in what you’re doing now as well. Can you talk a bit about that dynamic?

“It just feels absolutely correct, how we should do things. Francesca’s a very key creative, visual person, really talented. So I found myself asking for her advice quite a lot throughout the process. She’s also got a really nice singing voice as well. She’s good at everything! When I came to making videos, it felt completely natural to talk to her, and to go through the whole thing together. She’s done a lot of my photoshoots. She’s great. It’s not my natural habitat, taking photos – I actually enjoyed the video process to be fair. I’d say Cesca was the practical, let’s get it done, here’s how to put those practical things into place…”

You did the two videos pretty much at the same time.

“Yeah. We did both of them over two days, it was intense. We’ve got Josh at XL to thank for that, Josh [Renaut] and Tayo [Rapoport]. Working with them has been really cool.”

There’s maybe an Easter egg in “Thru The Walls”. There’s a record that says Songs For Revenge, XL, Paul Institute.

“Yeah.”

Is that real?

“Nah.”

Just made up?

“We made it up for the video, it just felt like fun.”

There’s people online speculating about whether it’s a real release.

“That’s amazing.”

I saw it and was like, “is that real?” as well. It looks like a real record.

“That’s the whole point! But never say never. Maybe I’ll end up writing a song.”

Have you been doing much writing on the road?

“Not on the road. I’ve been feeling quite unwell man, to be honest with you. The last couple days. It’s one of them, in the hotel, locking myself away, closing my eyes. Easier to than with Sampha in the States, just being hotel-to-hotel. Way less easy on a tour bus, our tour bus was a nightmare for that stuff. But being in hotels, I find it quite restoring, energy-wise.”

Are there periods of rest you take in between periods of creativity?

“I’m trying to make it as normal as possible now because at first I was doing too much. I was dropping my kids off to school, going to the studio, staying at the studio from like 10, and then coming home at four in the morning. 16, 18-hour shifts. Out of the time that I was in there, the stuff that was the most fruitful was the stuff I was doing in the evening. So I’m wondering if I need to do slightly more routine stuff like I’m doing a dayjob, and then maybe once a week, try and get a late one in. Like for example, “Afterglow”, I think I started writing like 10 o’clock in the evening and finished it at three o’clock in the morning. There was a five-hour period of time where I was in the zone, locked in. Same thing for “The Window”, just got into the studio and it flowed.”

How do you handle having a day when it isn’t flowing?

“The music flows easily enough, but in terms of the writing process, I’m very much led by melody. Melody is the primary element. Does it feel it’s something people can sing along to? Does it sound like the kind of thing I want to sing? Then words is the secondary. Cool, I have this melody, but what am I saying? I’ve struggled with that a little bit in the past. For example, “Drive It”, [sings melody], I was playing that in my car with the chords, pressing play, trying to sing when I was driving. I was driving, so I was like, [sings] “I’ll drive it.”

“There’s always a flow; it feels like you’re receiving something, actually. When you go into those spaces, two, three, four hours just passes. That feels more like it didn’t come from me and I just received something and I’m here, what just happened, where did the time pass, you know? That kind of a flow isn’t everyday, you just have to be ready for it. So, of the days where I feel like I’ve wasted the whole day, maybe I haven’t wasted it, maybe I’ve been warming up, making this beat, making this thing on Logic so when I do need to do this, it’s not gonna be long for later on and I’ll know how to do it. I’m just warmed up, mobilised, and when it’s time [clicks], in you go, good to go. That’s probably the key, being ready for whenever that time is gonna strike.”

Was there a moment where you adopted the identity in your head of, “I’m a musician”?

“I always felt like I was that, and I was moonlighting as a firefighter. I was focused on doing that to take it seriously as a career, family to feed, etcetera, but I always felt like I was a music artist – or a musician trapped in a firefighter’s body. It was different, me getting that kind of a job. Everybody in my family’s a musician. My mum, my aunt, my uncle, my dad. Everybody in my life, pretty much.”

I was interested in what your family think of your music as well.

“They’re in. My uncle was there yesterday. My uncle, my aunt, my cousin and her kid and husband. That was really nice. My mum came through as well, she travelled up from London. They’re in, they believe in it. It’s encouraging and inspiring, to have that, because I really respect them as musicians. And I’ve been the kid around their ankles going to their shows when I was a kid, seeing them doing these things like wow, you can play like that. And now I’m here doing what I do, they’re now giving me all the compliments. It’s really nice.”

What do your kids think of your music?

“I think they rate it but they’re also like, yeah but Dad, you’re not this guy, you ain’t Kendrick. They like what other kids like, their age. If I play something and they really like it, it’s good to balance ideas off of them. If I play something and they really don’t like, it’s not a given, but usually for me, I’m like maybe I don’t need to spend as much time on this. Maybe. I also think my taste in music, compared to the rest of my immediate family – wife and kids – it’s a bit weird. They’ll listen to jazz records and put vinyl on but I’ll be like right, I wanna listen to some Brazilian percussive music, that’s what I’m doing for the next hour, and then after track three, they’ll be like, I’ve heard this a bit too much, can we change it? For me, I’m like nah, that’s my background music, I need that to function. So I will take their feedback but at the same time, I do make kinda weird music so if you don’t like it, that’s okay as well.”

I don’t know if you’re into hip-hop at all but I was gonna ask if you knew the rapper Ka?

“Ka? Nah.”

He recently passed away sadly, but he’s the only other person I knew of who’s a firefighter and musician.

“Wow.”

Based in New York, really wonderful hip-hop storyteller.

“[typing on phone] K-A. From Brooklyn.”

He’s got an album called The Night’s Gambit that’s really good.

“It’s kind of cool to hear a story about somebody in a similar…”

Are you still in touch with anyone you used to work with?

“If I see them out and about – we’ve all got each other’s phone numbers – but sometimes I’ll see them driving fire engines, so I’ll be like, what’s going on Tom, you cool?”

Like bus drivers waving or flashing their lights.

“Usually I’ll just send them a WhatsApp. We’re definitely cool I just don’t see them that often. For a little while, I was going every Christmas to drop off a tin of chocolates or something but I think Covid turned a load of relationships… It’s kind of died a bit of a death, I’ll see you when I see you. It’s love, they know it’s love.”

One of the craziest things about the time gap between “Evil” and then the album is Covid in the middle of it.

“It just sucked a lot of time out as well, talking about the amount of time we’ve lost. My dad died around the same time as well. He was already quite unwell but him getting Covid just like, quick – a day or something after he contracted Covid, he was dead. I had to process all them feelings. I didn’t know him really well… A lot of stuff to process and think about. Also, quite an interesting thing, I connected with my family, on that side of my family. I have loads of siblings from my dad, I have like, maybe 30 siblings.”

In the States?

“Two brothers, one in London, one of my brothers is in Denmark, and the rest are somewhere, I don’t know. I think there’s a brother and sister in London that I don’t know if I’ll be able to meet up with because I don’t know their surnames. Apparently he was 14 or something when he had his first kid, and he died at the age of 82. Who knows, man! Lots to discover I guess.

“It was actually a journey to discovery, and it’s even reflected in “Cautious”. We were on a Zoom chatting, me and my dad’s sister and all of her descendants. She’s like the matriarch of the family. And then her extended family. 18 of us on the Zoom call. People I’ve never met before, it was crazy, telling me things about my dad, my grandfather, my grandma and what it was like for them in Jamaica however many years ago. But it’s in my blood it turns out, music. My granddad used to run a jazz club that was in a cave in Savanna la Mar, in Jamaica.”

That’s sick.

“Yeah. I’m like, wow, okay! He was a showman and then my dad was taking on that mantle, also being a showman, but he grew up in Manhattan. Jamaican, American, British – my dad ended up settling down in England and was the Mayor of Haringey for a period of time. A little bit wild, my dad’s journey was an interesting one. Going through that path of self-discovery and learning about my family was very beneficial. It feels like part of the album in a big way. Even if the songs aren’t about that, I think about what was going through my mind as I was wrapping the album up. It’s quite deep. That, Covid, my dad’s death, and was what going on with my immediate family at the time. I feel like it’s part of my history condensed into this time.”

Have you travelled much to these places? Jamaica, Manhattan…

“I’ve been to Manhattan. Grateful to be able to go there with Sampha. I didn’t actually know where they lived, but I was like, if I walk around here enough, I will retrace some of those footsteps. It was cool to think of it like that.”

You looked at the same buildings as he has, walked the same streets.

“I’ll have walked on the same path at some point. Not Jamaica yet, haven’t been to Jamaica yet. Feel like I need to go at some point. Hundred percent. Just kind of deep the stuff properly, you know? Also just to connect with people. I’m sure there’s loads of family still out there. I think they’re all spread out, there’s a whole diaspora of them, of Thompsons! They’re in America, Jamaica, Canada, spread out through America as well: Chicago, LA… They’re out there, we’re all out there.”

What have you been listening to on the road?

“Yesterday, we listened to Black Messiah, by D’Angelo. On the way to Manchester we listened to Voodoo.”

How did you feel when Black Messiah came out, out of nowhere?

“It just blew my mind. “Sugah Daddy” blew my mind the first time I heard that song.”

What I love about “Sugah Daddy” is just how funny the ending is. We’ve talked a bit about, I think you can hear it in your music as well, the playfulness.

“It’s kind of stupid, some of the stuff that happens.”

There’s a bit in “Itch” where you just, “yow!” and it’s so good.

“[snorts] Obviously it’s stupid, I’m being stupid.”

But it’s part of the fun of it. So, D’Angelo. Did you get to see him when he played the UK?

“Actually, I booked tickets to go and see him when he was headlining Brixton but it got cancelled. I was gutted. At some point I’ve have to see him perform. I saw his VERZUZ.”

Wait, his VERZUZ? I don’t remember that! Who was it with?

“He did a VERZUZ, I think it was meant to be with Maxwell but it ended up just being him by himself. He was like, I don’t have a vs., I don’t vs. anyone else apart from me. That’s bars to be fair.”

I mean, I love Maxwell, but, it’s D’Angelo.

“Maxwell’s got a bit of a special place for me as well. Like, Maxwell is that guy. His vocal is so good, to this day. But the music that I was tuned into, plugged into when I was a teenager, I was listening to Voodoo a lot.”

Obviously you’re friends with Fabiana [Palladino] through Paul Institute. Have you met Pino [Palladino], or?

“I actually haven’t, I feel like at some point that will happen. I’ve met everybody else, I might have met her mum before.”

I feel like if I was in your shoes, I’d be so annoying.

“Nah, I try not to make it uncomfortable with her, it’s probably something she has to deal with, being a musician who’s also got a famous musician for a father. She knows her dad’s a legend, but also it’s like, no need to bring it up all the time.”

Her album’s incredible. I got to see her perform at the London show with Jai Paul and I think she’s very much carved out her own artistic identity.

“She’s got her pocket. I think that’s something I really like about Paul Institute. As much as there’s a glue, a common thread, we all have our own pockets as well. There is something that also feels individual about all the different projects that are there. I wouldn’t like it if it wasn’t the case. It’s important that we all have our own way of doing things and our own kind of sound, ish. I feel Fabi’s definitely got her sound now, like she’s got it down, it’s her thing.”

You both, and same with Jai and A.K., your music has a kind of – I wouldn’t say timeless because it’s clearly influenced by ’70s and ’80s stuff –

“But that music is timeless, the stuff that hits from them times.”

But I just wonder, you’re coming in a very contemporary environment – that era is so far away now.

“That being said, those tracks still get played at people’s weddings.”

I wanted to ask you actually, you mentioned a wedding band at some point. You played weddings?

“I have played weddings.”

Tell me about that.

“It was actually what made me want to perform my own songs and start writing my own songs. I was performing like, Marvin Gaye tracks.”

Whenabouts was this?

“2014, that kind of time. Before I was involved with Paul Institute. I was literally just relearning how to make beats and knew how to use Logic at this time, I’d just started picking it up. Yeah, we were just doing Motown tunes at weddings and stuff, actually at [the] front of the stage dancing in front of people, setting up the party vibe. I thoroughly enjoyed that, being a force of energy bringing people joy. People wanted to just feel like, ah, well he doesn’t give a shit about what he looks like right now so I’m just gonna dance! That kind of energy, it made me wanna do my own thing. Down the road, I would love it if I had a song that ended up landing in that way. This is a classic, I hear this and I wanna go dance. I’d love to write a tune that feels like that.”

You mentioned church songwriting in another interview, tell me about that.

“I used to go to church when I was a kid and there would be writing sessions to make new songs for people to sing in the congregation.”

Organised by –

“Yeah, organised by the church.”

That’s cool.

“They could see that there were people coming up that were talented and trying these things out. That was an introductory point for me in terms of what does songwriting feel like, what does it look like putting melodies together with words? I wrote some stuff – it doesn’t move me, I don’t have the same religious inclinations as I had when I was a teenager, but it hit at the time and I think people were moved by it. I think back on those times fondly, but it’s a weird dynamic because I have a completely different mindset now.”

But you know what it’s like for it to hit, and that’s gonna stay.

“I mean, there were also people that were really talented – they were basically training up a generation of teenagers to become people that were leading praise and worship and stuff. For me, that was a big part of my musicianship coming up as well.”

One of the things that keeps coming up is, well, you seeing different people taught piano by your mum, going to your aunt’s place where she’s got the artistic retreat set-up, the Centre, the church – what is it that creates a good environment to make music in?

“Willpower. Do you wanna make it? Do you wanna do it? Why are you doing it? I think it’s the same, I was asking myself questions, I had a period of time where I was like, am I just doing this because it feels like a thing to do? I realised there was a deeper element to it than just dropping songs – I do enjoy spreading joy and making people feel good. That’s what my motive is. It doesn’t matter where I was or what I was doing, because I wanted to go ahead and do that. So in the fire station, I was like, I’m eager to learn, to get better. As long as there’s a curiosity and a little bit of motivation, I don’t think it matters where you are. I used to write songs on the train. I remember doing sessions with A. K. around “Hypothalamus”, we had one day left and at the end of the session, I just carved out some chords for the bridge on the train, and I wrote the lyrics and then recorded it to my phone. Went back the next day like, I got it! Same thing with “Have You Decided?”, the bridge, the chords going into the bridge and the bridge section, I did that in a couple of hours before I went to the session. I didn’t wanna lose time trying to figure this out while we’re here, doing this thing. Let me do it now. If you’re encouraged and motivated and you wanna get something done, I think that is what it is.”

The photos I’ve seen you in, it seems like the studios were different every time and you were hopping around.

“Largely now, I’m in my space. I’ve got a space in Peckham, South East London, I’m happy for that. I’ve been in there since 2020, building it out from breezeblocks into what it is now. I’m in there quite a lot. A. K.’s study is right across the way from me now. Every now and then I’ll go and say hi to them in their space there. Majority of the time I’m in my own spot now. I’ve got a really nice vocal chain in terms of hardware and stuff.”

What hardware have you acquired for it? Was there anything you kept your eye out for?

“Rupert Neve Designs 511 preamp. I used the Portico at XL and pretty much from then onwards was like, I need to find myself a Portico. And I didn’t find myself a Portico but I realised the preamp would be easier because all we did was have it flat and using the preamp. I’m using the AKG C414-XLII microphone, it’s gold-plated. I only picked it because it was gold at the time [laughs], but I knew it was gonna be good quality, and it does have an incredibly distinctive sound. The RME interface has really nice pres as well. And now I’m getting into a habit of sending recorded synths and stuff back into the pre and then feeding it back out going through the hardware, it sounds really clean, really nice. That’s the process.”

Did you see anyone else using this stuff, or?

“Literally just went into XL’s studio, they even did it up a few years ago but before that they had this Portico. I was like well, it’s an amazing piece of hardware, I need to grab one. Then I was like wait, I shouldn’t do that, because it costs like four grand. So then let me find a cheaper version, then you could find a small part, the preamp. Alright, say no more, I’ll use that, does the job.”

Seems like XL have been supportive.

“They have been supportive. It’s taken a while, like I said. They’ve been good to me, particularly Ben Beardsworth. He basically A&Red the whole project and he’s the head of the record label. I’m very grateful; it’s not actually his job to do stuff like that. He just seemed really keen to make it work and make it happen, making me a success. So I’m very grateful for that. That he was driving it during Covid. There’s been quite a lot of new people coming through working on the record, it’s been great getting to know people. At this point, I feel like some of them are my friends.”

You mentioned you’re thinking about album number two. What kind of creative, professional and personal hopes have you got going forwards?

“I really wanna build the live thing. I wanna turn that into something that is financially viable. I also wanna drop album two as soon as possible, I wanna record and drop it. I want to get rid of the idea that I’m slow [laughs]. I just don’t want it to be a thing because I swear down, I had the whole thing finished for a long time! So, for me, that being a thing in people’s heads, Ruthven’s a slow guy. I’m not though, I’m not! I’d like to be able to defy those expectations for album two. I’m always thinking. I’m always in it. For example, my phone, I’m always trying to find new phrases, sayings, idioms and incorporate them into songs. I’m always on the hunt. I just think I need to a get a soundboard. Just thinking in terms of chords, I’ve got like 20 or 30 of them put away. I’m kind of inspired by the Doechii Grammy win, she said she did the whole thing in a month. I think it’s a different experience being a rapper, using someone else’s bits, when someone else has created the instrumental and layering vocals, it’s a different process from what I’m doing, doing everything start to finish, it’s a different process. But I’m gonna try! If I can do 12 tracks in two months, I’ll be very happy with myself. But I do think, seeing as what I said about your question about the ideal setting – where there’s a will there’s a way. If you really want to get it done, it’s possible. I’ll try.”

What do you do for downtime?

“I finally played The Last of Us. Both. Lots of late nights over the last two months, my wind-down mode. I’ve also been reading a little bit. My wife’s quite into fantasy books, spicy fantasy books in fact. She read this book called Quicksilver which I read afterwards and I was like, alright, I actually really liked that, I was quite into it. I read The Beautiful Ones, Prince’s biography. Largely it’s been playing games, playing vinyl. I do a lot of cooking, I really enjoy cooking.”

Do you have a signature dish?

“Shrimp saganaki. It’s like a Greek mezze, ish. I do that with a lemon pilaf. The pilaf and saganaki always bangs. I also make brown stew chicken, Caribbean, delicious if I do say so myself. I always liked that as a meal but I’ve enjoyed getting into cooking Caribbean food over the last year. For my birthdays, we’ve been doing whole different culture days. We had Mexican day with decorations all over the house and wearing sombreros, it’s all very much corny but you just embrace it. That’s been fun. Downtime is just basically having fun with my wife and my kids. Those are the vibes. and then every now and then I might play some computer games.”

Getting some in when the kids have gone to bed I guess.

“I kind of wish I had a piano at home because I would probably just play piano all the time.”

I’m surprised you don’t have one in the home.

“Our house is small. The studio’s only a 20-minute drive away, manageable, there’s 24-hour access.”

But you don’t like that separation?

“Nah. In the fire station, it was always set up. When I was on shift, everything was set up. So I’m finishing an activity, let me go and make some music. I liked that, letting me get loads of things together in a short space of time. I’ll finish this project, let me move on to the next one. Oh, there’s a call? Let’s go out and do the call. Leave. Come back. Let me carry on doing this straight away. Having something like that you can do at home would be great. Down the road, I probably will have a home to do music in. I don’t really like the degree of separation. I did ideally want to have a studio a ten-minute walk away from home or maybe in the back garden.”

Do you worry about forgetting ideas or inspiration when it strikes you?

“It’s more just getting in and doing it. Setting up, doing it, closing down, setting up is… and the kids as well. One of my microphones got broken by one of my sons one time. I left all of my gear out. I woke up in the morning hearing [THUDS]. I was like, what is that noise? I came downstairs and my son had the microphone and was just banging it against the wall. It’s broken, like £900 as well.”

He was just checking it wasn’t working.

“It’s finished. It was a lot of money. They’re older now, I don’t think they’d do that now. Can’t even be angry about it, it’s my fault for leaving it there.”

RIP to that mic. Can’t be leaving the gold-plated one out.

“Gold-plated, for the win. I think I wanna get a pair and record the piano in stereo. All the album cuts on the piano, I recorded it in mono using the vocal mic. I think it sounds pretty good for it as well, the old upright piano. I’m really happy with it, in terms of the engineering stuff as well. We did that!”

To wrap up, when was the last time you danced? What was the last thing that made you laugh as well?

“Last time I properly danced was at the XL Christmas party. It was lively. The people I said I’d become friends with, they were there. Sampha and Jojo were there. Reinen was there, HIRA was there… People DJing were really good as well, we had fun. Outside of that it was probably the festival that I did with Sampha last year in Mexico. Floating Points. Properly going for it, dancing. Did a 2-step, being silly but really going for it. Anyone who looked at me would think I’m deranged but that kind of dancing.

“I was laughing at myself and just how unwell I felt when I was loading in just now. I was like, what the hell am I doing? Blake, my drummer, was looking at me like, you OK? I was like, nope! No, no I’m not! But we move, we keep it going. I’m doing soundcheck now and I’m sure it’ll be fine. Singing will be fine. It’s just teching, doing it is harder than it is usually. But it’ll be fine.”