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RK: Well, first up, we’ve always got more ideas than resources, so I could go in every other month
and record something that I think would sound good. That would be lovely and that is the plan
for next year and I’ve got this idea of having quite a big line-up. Perhaps a Hammond organ, but
perhaps also a piano player. A trombone player, a trumpet player, a rhythm section, obviously.
Possibly with double-bass, so really rootsy, really earthy, really raw. Not rock blues raw, but raw.

BiTS: I love bands with horn sections, I have to say. They make the hair on the back of my neck
stand on end.

RK: [Laughs] Yes. Mine too. We just did a horn section because we’ve had a horn section on most
of our albums on various tracks, as you have no doubt noticed, but we don’t often have the
opportunity to do that live because of economics.

BiTS: Oh, of course.

RK: But we did just last month on the Isle of
Wight play a Boogaloo weekend festival. One
gig as a duo and one gig with a band, plus horns.
So that was nice.

BiTS: That was very good indeed. Are you
writing music all the time?

RK: No, no, not at all. No. We tend to sit down
and come up with music when we know we
want to record, so that’s how we do it normally.

BiTS: Right.

RK: Our days are pretty chocka as they are and
running our, what do you call it? Our little
industry. There’s a word for it which has
escaped me now, but cottage. Cottage industry.

BiTS: Cottage industry, yes, that’s right.

RK: Which is music and it’s our living, obviously and all the unseen parts of it that make it work
that go on behind the scenes, they’re quite time-consuming. Messages coming in and questions
and queries and all that stuff’s got to be done too. It’s not all glamorous [chuckles].

BiTS: When the two of you are writing together, how does it work? Does somebody come up
with lyrics and then you add a melody, or do you have a melody to start off with? How do you
actually go about it?

RK: I suspect, generally speaking, I come up with an idea, I’ll say riff, as a simple term, but usually
a harmonic idea. A mood, a sense of a mood, a groove, some nice changes and knock that into
some sort of shape which then provokes lyrics. It’s happened the other way round too. I mean
Pete Feenstra gave us lyrics on three occasions and we put them to music. Sometimes Zoe’s got
lyrics and then we try and put something to them. More often than not, the other way, though.
Riff, idea or groove, chord changes, some nice changes and then put the lyrics and melody to that.

BiTS: And that works well for you?

RK: So far, I think it’s worked well. We’ve got 68 original songs recorded on those six, so that’s
Blue Commotion studio albums.

BiTS: That’s very impressive. That’s another Guinness Book of Records thing [laughing].