Photo of Matt Schofield by Sam Hare

By Paul Freeman [July 2016 Interview]

British guitar dynamo Matt Schofield speaks blues fluently. “One reason I was drawn to the blues is that it’s a language,” he tells Pop Culture Classics, “a language that people understand, people respond to.”

Schofield, 38, plays with a rare fluidity, power and intelligence. He was named British Blues Awards Guitarist of the Year for three consecutive years, 2010, 2011 and 2012, earning induction into the British Blues Hall of Fame. Guitar and Bass Magazine rated him among the top ten British blues guitarists of all time, joining such legends Eric Clapton and Peter Green.

Schofield puts his own unique spin on the blues. On his latest album, “Far As I Can See,” the opening song, “From Far Away,” was inspired by Carl Sagan’s “Pale Blue Dot” monologue from the “Cosmos” series.

Schofield spent his childhood in Manchester and the Cotswolds of England. When his parents split up, his father, a blues buff, relocated to America, leaving behind some VHS tapes. One was a B.B. King TV performance. Schofield watched it every day before school. When he visited his dad in California, he watched a concert tape featuring B.B. King, Albert Collins and Stevie Ray Vaughan.

At that point, Schofield was hooked on the blues. He began playing guitar by age 12. At 13, he was already gigging.

Constantly expanding his musical knowledge, Schofield moved to London and worked as a sideman, before fronting his own band at age 25. He honed his singing and songwriting skills. Though he continued listening to Chicago and Texas blues, Schofield absorbed jazz, funk and rock influences.

Over the years, Schofield met many of his idols, jamming with Buddy Guy and Robben Ford and conversing at length with B.B. King.

Schofield is currently based in Florida, where his young bandmates reside. He dazzles audiences with his live performances.

POP CULTURE CLASSICS:
On the “Far As I Can See” album, the opening song, “From Far Away,” was inspired by Carl Sagan?

MATT SCHOFIELD:
That’s right, by his monologue, “Pale Blue Dot,” which was in the original “Cosmos” series.

PCC:
Is that something you’re fascinated by, generally, astronomy, the sciences?

SCHOFIELD:
Yeah, science, history, philosophy, all that kind of stuff. Particularly science. It’s just something I’ve always been into, learning the truth about things, as far back as I can remember, as a kid. So I like to try to integrate that in some way into music.

PCC:
So musical inspiration can really come from anywhere?

SCHOFIELD:
Absolutely, yeah. And somebody once said, “Write about what you know.” Obviously, in the blues genre, there’s a lot of stories about relationships and things like that - the classic man-and-woman tales. But particularly around that time, and perhaps now as well, with what’s going on in the world, that perspective that Carl provided in his “Pale Blue Dot” monologue, certainly is a perspective I wish more people would be able to take. That’s why that ended up becoming a song.

PCC:
What is it about that perspective that you find so essential?

SCHOFIELD:
Just that we’re all together hurtling through space and the fact that people are killing each other, left, right and center, all over the world, for all kinds of different reasons, if everybody could just zoom out a little bit and go, “What are we doing?” None of us knows what’s going on, where we are, on an existential level, I’m talking about. And everybody’s got bad answers for the wrong questions. I was reading about an astronaut the other day who said, “I just wish everybody could see Earth from space. And everybody would just stop being horrible to each other, because you’d just go, ‘Wow, that’s really all we’ve got. We’re just all on this thing, in space.’ Your neighbors seem so far away some times, particularly, spending time here in the U.S., with the election going on, everybody seems to define themselves by their differences. And yet, really, everywhere you go in the world, as much as I’ve traveled, playing music, everybody is much more the same than different. Everybody wants to have a family and friends and be happy. Yet everybody defines themselves by their differences. And if we defined ourselves by our similarities, particularly on a global level of - “This is all there is. It’s all we know about is this planet,” then I think things would be quite different. But, hey, I’m being an idealist there, of course [laughs].

PCC:
But do you find that maybe music is one way of unifying people, breaking down differences and changing perspectives?

SCHOFIELD:
Yeah, it is unifying. I think that’s one of reasons I was drawn to the blues is that it’s a language. It’s a language that people understand, people respond to. And it’s always been a shared experience. There’s a misconception of it being sad music. That’s a very strong misconception. It’s actually about sharing experiences. The blues, to me, is somebody telling their stories… and the listeners being able to relate, hopefully, in whatever way they can. And not only lyrically, but from an instrumental point of view, it’s a vocal music. The great blues guitar players say something with their instrument. They speak to you, you know?

So yeah, music is unifying. And it’s all over the world. Every culture has its music. In India, the classical music there - even though some of that music is as different as you could be from Western music, they’re not even using the same scale, they have extra notes in the 12-tone system - but it’s kind of the same as blues [laughs]. It’s like their blues. Or Arabic music. There’s a vocal quality to it and it can be mournful or it can be exciting and uplifting. But it’s all an expression. As are any of world’s great, I suppose you’d call it, folk music traditions, which is what blues and jazz come out of really, more so than current pop music, which is not something I relate to that much.

PCC:
When you were first hearing your Dad’s blues record collection, was there an immediate visceral response, even as a child? Or did he have to teach you what to appreciate in the music?

SCHOFIELD:
He definitely did teach me what to appreciate, but that’s because I was already delving into it. I realized that my first experience of it wasn’t even really hearing it. He used to go into his little study/office, when I was a kid. I was around seven or eight, when I noticed this - he’d go in and either listen to his vinyl or his reel-to-reel tapes on headphones. And he would he would completely just do that, not doing anything else. And I was very aware of how much he was being moved by what he was listening to, even before I knew exactly what he was listening to [laughs]. So that seemed attractive to me, this personal experience he was having by listening to music on a very deep level.

My Dad doesn’t really play music, but he probably should have, because he taught me how to listen to music like a musician. He’d go, for example, okay, you like Stevie Ray Vaughan, then you should listen to Albert King, because that’s where Stevie got that form. So he took me back through the history of blues guitar music. Also, he’d say, “Listen to what the drummer’s doing here” or “Listen to how great this bass line is,” really picking it apart for me. So listening deeply into music is an important part of learning to play it well and something that I think gets passed over a little bit now, because we have so much information available to us.

People go on YouTube and they flick through things, but I didn’t have that. And I’m glad I didn’t have that. I had some taped copies of a handful of my Dad’s vinyl records. I didn’t live all year with my Dad. I only saw him in summer. He’s there in California. So I would visit him, make some copies of his vinyl records and take them home and basically listen to like half a dozen records over and over again, like really deeply. So it was like extracting the maximum amount of knowledge out of a small amount of source material. So you really, really get to know something. These days you’ve got so much choice of information that’s so easily available, that you don’t actually necessarily always go as far in. Important stuff passes you by.

PCC:
So it was when your parents split up, as your Dad was leaving, that you received a B.B. King video from him that became important to you?

SCHOFIELD:
Yeah, when he moved to the U.S., he left some of his VHS’s. And one of them was B.B. King. I’ve still got it on VHS. My Dad recorded it on his first VCR off TV in like 1984 or something [laughs], off this British TV show. The tape seems to still work, but I’ve transferred it to DVD. So that was a B.B. King concert and I used to watch that before school every day. It’s before I was really playing.

And I actually got a bass first, because I loved B.B.’s bass player, as well. This was when I was like 10 or eleven. I didn’t think I could be B.B. King, but I thought maybe I could play bass for him, initially. It was like too majestic. I mean that in a good way. I thought, “This is so special, I can’t do that. But maybe I can play bass.” But the desire to actually do what B.B. was doing never went away.

And then, when I was visiting my Dad in California, in 1990, it would have been, so I was 12, just about to turn 13, he showed me another video of B.B. with Stevie Ray Vaughan and Albert Collins and all three of them playing together. And then, that was it. I was like, “I’ve got to do it, because I want to be up there like that.” And about two weeks later, Stevie Ray died. So I was like, “Well, now I’ve really got to do it.” It was just this chain of events showing me I really had to do this.

So I went home to England, when back to school in September and said to some friends, “Right, we’re putting a band together.. and I’m playing guitar.” And one of them said, “Okay, I’ll play bass.” Another said, “I’ll play drums.” And my first gig followed in April. That’s 25 years ago in April. And that’s what I’ve done ever since.

PCC:
You must have really quickly taught yourself to play.

SCHOFIELD:
Well, this is the interesting thing, yeah, I didn’t have much vocabulary. It was simple. But then some blues guitar is simple. But I could say something with it pretty quickly. I could improvise with the vocabulary that I had and make a cohesive sort of solo. And I knew the chords. And that’s really what being a good player is all about. It’s not about the amount of knowledge, but what you do with your knowledge. So I’ve certainly amassed more knowledge since that first gig, but, I’ll be honest, it sounds all right [laughs], simple, but well delivered. And convincing enough that, for some reason, people took me seriously, when I said, “Well, I’m going to play guitar. That’s what I do.” So they never sort of went, “All right, well, that’s nice. But you suck.” Everybody went, “Yeah, sounds pretty good.” So I literally have done it ever since.

But just to be clear, even though the guitar bit came relatively easy, all the rest of it you need to put around that, I would consider still a work in progress - writing songs and singing. I mean, I sang a bit early on. But when I started doing my own band seriously, after being a sideman, around 2003, I was like, “Well, shit, I’d better learn how to sing properly.” I wanted to get that up to another level, because I’d kind of ignored that for the previous 13 years of playing music.

So I’m kind of 13 years behind on my singing. And all my heroes, like B.B. King, the complete package - incredible vocalist, iconic genre-defining guitar player and great entertainer, very charismatic, everything. So even though the guitar is first and foremost, and I’ll always be a guitar player who sings, as well, I already like how I play guitar, so I’m not really trying to get some arbitrary idea of “better” at guitar anymore. I want to refine what I do more. I am trying to be a better singer or a better songwriter.

PCC:
So did the singing also involve a process of studying vocalists you admired? How did you hone that skill?

SCHOFIELD:
Just doing it. Just doing it and going, “That’s not good enough. I need to do that more. Same with songwriting. Writing a lot of rubbish songs, throwing them out and starting again. Really the whole experience for me is a sort of selfish pursuit, because I’m not what I would consider practiced, if you know what I mean. But I’ve done it every day. That’s the process, for me, of trying to get better at it. Just play every day. But I’ve never had a practice regime. I’ve never practiced technique just for the sake of it, on any of those things. So it’s possibly a slow road, but it’s just the way I need to do it to feel sincere and authentic about it. So it’s kind of just being in it all the time. That’s the best way for me. Some people can learn by a fixed practice schedule. But I just have to be it, if you know what I mean.

PCC:
So how early did you begin writing?

SCHOFIELD:
Around the time I did my first studio record, actually. I’d done a few bits and pieces, but up until then, it was more about playing. And then you find yourself with your own band and realize, “I need some songs of my own now.” We made a little live record to get some more gigs. And it was blues covers and funky covers. And it was really only to get some more gigs under my own name, do less side work. But people liked it and so it was like, “Well, I’d better make my own record now. [laughs]. So I’d better write some songs!” A couple of them, I still throw in live, from the first record, so they’ve survived the test of time, a couple of those early tunes.

But it’s about finding a context for your guitar playing to be in, because I don’t actually listen to straight-up guitar music. What I listen to is largely, aside from quite a bit of jazz piano, is vocal music. And so again, my heroes all sang and played songs. So, yeah, it’s about getting a context… of course, there’s still a lot of guitar on my stuff. But I want it to be tempered by some other colors.

And then you get into trying to find your own version of trying to play blues, because I don’t want to play straight-up traditional Chicago or Texas blues, even though I love all the original stuff. It’s mostly what Iisten to. But I don’t feel sincere playing that and that is kind of how you end up writing a song inspired by Carl Sagan [laughs]. It’s about being sincere about where you come from. I can’t feel authentic standing there and talking about growing up in a cotton field or segregation or that sort of stuff. That feels totally inauthentic to me. And even though I can relate and admire the struggles that my heroes went through, they weren’t struggles that I faced in any way, being a middle-class white boy from England [laughs]. So that becomes the focus of things, trying to find a way to be authentic in your own way. So that’s an ongoing journey. That’s one I keep working on.

PCC:
So do you consciously go about delving into jazz and funk and rock to absorb other influences? Or does that just happen on its own?

SCHOFIELD:
Again, it just happens on its own. Nothing is deliberate about what I’ve done [laughs]. I just love music, really. And you always, of course, get hung on a peg. I’m predominately a bluesy guitar player, because that’s mostly what I like. But I just want to be a musician, rather than even just a guitarist. So I found myself with a thirst for enjoyment, rather than specifically searching for new inspiration. I just want to listen to music I enjoy.

My Dad’s stuff was pretty much old school blues. Stevie Ray Vaughan and Robert Cray were about as modern as he got at that time. So actually the first thing I listened to that was really different, that I sort of discovered on my own, was Robben Ford, as a guitar player, and thought, “Where on Earth is he getting this stuff?” He had more notes than the other guys [laughs]. Not only faster, but I mean more choice stuff. I thought, “How can anybody play like that? It doesn’t sound like the blues I’ve listened to. It still feels the same as the blues I’ve been listening to me, it moves me in the same way. But he’s got more vocabulary. “

And again, pre-internet, I didn’t really have anybody to say, “Well, that’s jazz” [laughs]. So I was just finding my way through it. And so eventually, I discovered that he was listening to jazz, as well as the blues. And so I checked some of that out and I read an interview where he said, “You have to have ‘Kind of Blue’ by Miles Davis.” So I got that. So hearing his playing sent me down a path of finding out where he got it from. And then eventually I discovered one of my favorite artists - Oscar Peterson, the jazz piano player. To me, Oscar Peterson and B.B. King are the same thing, in terms of what I get from it.

And then at some point, I discovered the music of New Orleans, which is perfect, to me, because it’s everything. New Orleans music is jazz and blues and funk and soul and gospel. It’s all the American roots music, art forms, all at once. So I heard a band called The Meters. I already knew about Dr. John, because the first real gig I ever got to see, that my Dad took me to in California, was B.B. King, Buddy Guy, Dr. John and The Fabulous Thunderbirds. I was like 14 or something. And I thought, “Man, that’s cool.”

So you just shouldn’t censor yourself… and there’s a lot of pressure to do that. People don’t seem to be able to like diverse albums. Or they seem to struggle with it on the industry side. It’s like, “What are you?” So you end up being a blues guitarist. But when we play these kind of jam band festivals that they have down here in Florida, where I am right now, they don’t seem to worry about that so much. It’s funky and it’s energetic, powerful music. So that’s really my own concern, is just to make music that feels good, rather than that it be strictly blues or something. But at the same time there’s nothing better, there’s no higher honor than being accepted as being able to play the blues. It’s all good to me.

Photo of Matt Schofield by Sam Hare

PCC:
Have you had the opportunity to jam with some of your heroes over the years?

SCHOFIELD:
Yeah. I jammed Buddy Guy. And Robben, who I mentioned, we’ve recently talked about working on a record together. And we’ve played together many times. And going back to New Orleans, when I was down there in December, George Porter from The Meters came out and sat in with my band, which was a huge honor, that he turned up to play bass with me for a minute. I recorded a Meters song on that first little live album of covers. And then also on my first studio album, one of the covers was a Meters song. So yeah, stuff like that. I just last night sat in with Butch Trucks from the Allman Brothers. So until I started spending more time in the U.S., those are opportunities that didn’t present themselves on our little island, in the U.K. But lately I’ve had these fantastic little opportunities.

I never did get to play with B.B. unfortunately. That’s my major, not regret, but I wish I would have had that opportunity. But I did get to sit down and chat with him for quite a while. So most of the guys I love, to be honest, are gone now, the stuff I listen to, even though I don’t play the same kind of music as they did. We’re definitely on the end of an era.

PCC:
Was there anything in particular you took away from that conversation with B.B. King?

SCHOFIELD:
You know what? I’ve tried to remember what we talked about and it was so overwhelming, I actually can’t really remember what the conversation was about [laughs]. We just both sat in his dressing room, talking, like two human beings. It was just so sort of crazy and amazing. So the main takeway from it, for me, was just how gracious he was to me, when he must meet a million people in his career. You know? And they all want to chat with him.

We were on a jazz festival together. And I played a couple of bands before him. So he didn’t see my set, but somebody said, “There’s this kid… “ - I guess to B.B. King I was a kid [laughs] - “and you’re his hero.” So he sent for me. He said, “Bring him in.” And they brought him out in a wheelchair. This was in 2011, so he was already really old and tired. And he didn’t have to do that, he didn’t have to make time for me like that. I would have quite happily just shook his hand on the way past. But he sent for me, brought me into the dressing room and we just talked. I just remember saying, “Thank you for everything you’ve given me.” But he was so gracious. Signed my guitar. Never had anybody sign a guitar before. And we talked about guitars a bit. He didn’t normally sign anything that wasn’t a Gibson.

So anytime that I’m tired after a gig if somebody wants a picture taken or get an album signed, I try and think about B.B., at 85 or whatever he was when I met him, how gracious he was about that. Because it’s easier to be like, ‘Oh, God, I’m not doing this now. I’m tired.” Well, he did that every night for sixty years or something, you know?

PCC:
But with all that you’ve accomplished and all the acclaim, when you jam with one of the greats, do you accept that you’re a peer, or do you feel still like it’s surreal, still feel in awe?

SCHOFIELD:
I don’t ever accept it. With people like B.B. and Buddy, that’s when the feeling of authenticity really hits you. Like I played “Stormy Monday” with Buddy Guy. And I thought, “I’d better not sound like an idiot.” [Laughs] I mean, I don’t know what I sound like to him. I know I can play the guitar well, but this is a person who actually contributed to the foundations of the genre and I’m standing there playing with him. So that’s more the feeling with someone like Buddy.

With someone like Robben, it’s more like, “Holy crap, he’s really good!” [Laughs] I’m not comparing myself to him, other than to say, he’s a product of players like B.B. and Buddy, as well, in the same way I am. So that’s a different feeling than with the real originators of the music. That’s the heavy one for me - those guys who made it up in the first place, that’s the realm of true genius.

PCC:
Those kind of guys affect generation after generation. Is that even in the back of your mind, that you hope your music will have timelessness to it, as well?

SCHOFIELD:
Yeah, it is, in a way. I know how rich my life has been, because of the music my heroes made. I know the feeling that I get when I listen to my favorite artists. What it gives me is so magic. Really all I’m trying to do when I’m playing - and this is the core of the whole thing for me - when I play, I’m trying to make people listening to me feel the same way as I do, when I listen to B.B. or Albert King or Albert Collins or any of those guys. What I’m trying to do is to pass that feeling on in my own way. I guess that’s really what it comes down to is just I hope can move someone even a tiny bit as much as they moved me. So I suppose that’s what it is, it’s trying to leave an impression, isn’t it? I want everybody to enjoy it as much as I do, really. That’s the thing.

PCC:
So you transport them for that little moment in time?

SCHOFIELD:
Yeah, it’s a really good place to be. I’m really grateful to have both the experience of listening to music as much as I do and the chance to play it. I don’t really know what I’d do, if I didn’t have that outlet. People find it in all kinds of things, in other arts or sports or caring for children or animals or whatever it is that makes you feel like you’re contributing, which I guess takes us back to our first bit of conversation, about being unifying, really. That’s what’s so great about it - it’s a shared experience. So it’s more than just playing guitar, really. [Laughs]

PCC:
So where are you based now?

SCHOFIELD:
Right now I’m in South Florida, between Miami and Fort Lauderdale, which again, is not some great plan on my part, not by design [laughs]. It’s a long story. I’m still here. But I’ve been working with a band - keyboard player, bass player, drummer - out of here that were already sort of a band. And they’ve been my backing band, predominately, for the past 18 months. I’m enjoying working with these young chaps down here. They’re bringing some fresh energy to my music. It’s quite interesting, the next generation. I

was always the youngest guy in the band for years and years. I’ll be 40 next year. So having these younger players is different, a different energy, in a good way. The response is good. So I’ve been sticking around down here. And it’s very different from anywhere else I’ve called home. It’s a good experience. Definitely pretty crazy, Florida [laughs]. The guys in the band came out of the U.M. jazz program, where a lot of great jazz musicians have gone over the years. Fort Lauderdale has a lot of blues, mostly like bar blues. Miami has no blues at all. But there’s a lot of jazz and like funky jazz, like Snarky Puppy, like modern fusion, I guess you’d call it. There’s a lot of that instrumental music going on in Miami.

They’re also playing real instruments to young people, which is really important. I’ve said I’ll be 40 next year, but often I’m amongst the youngest people at my own gigs. It’s definitely a maturer crowd. And it’s important to spread blues or jazz or any of these American roots music art forms to another generation. A lot of younger folks do enjoy it, when they hear it. They’ve just never even been exposed to a live band in that sense. There’s quite a healthy sort of jam scene down here, so I’ve been dipping my toes into that a little bit, because we can play as a jam band, if we need to.

PCC:
So being on the verge of 40, does that make you reflect back on where you’ve come from musically and where you hope go?

SCHOFIELD:
I suppose so, yeah. I’ll be 40 in 13 months. Yeah, you definitely sort of take stock, I guess. It’s still harder to do this than I expected it to be at 40, let’s put it that way. I didn’t expect to get super rich, playing blues or playing guitar music. But the music industry has been like the economy in general - there’s the one percent… and then everybody else. So for all my contemporaries and colleagues, it’s tough out there. I don’t think I quite expected it to be. I try to say to the young guys in my band, “Only an idiot would have their own band. Only a fool would try and tour with their own band,” because you’re the last one to get paid. [Laughs]

It’s much easier to just turn up and be a sideman in somebody’s band. That’s the main thing, you sort of go, “Bloody hell, I kind of thought it might be a bit more consistent by now,.” But it is making a living playing music.

Artistically, I don’t really reflect upon things, because basically, I’m on the same road that I set out on when I was 13. And you just wake up one day and you’re 40. But I’ve just done that since then, for 25 years. I just try and keep getting better at doing what I do, being me, artistically. But certainly life, the other side of things, it’s not getting any easier for touring bands. People say, “Oh, you can make some money touring these days, instead of from record sales.” Yeah, well, that’s not getting it anymore for everybody either. Overhead keeps going up all around us. So you just try and hang in there, really. And true for everyone… unless you’re the occasional mega-star.

PCC:
Are you married?

SCHOFIELD:
No, I’m not. No kids. And you know, all my school friends I’ve kept in touch with from back in the day, virtually all of them are married with kids now. And I wouldn’t be able to do this and support a family and be there for my kids. In fact, Jonny Henderson, who played organ on all my records and was touring with me over here in the U.S. through last year. And he’s not been over this year, because he became a dad. And it’s hard to be away all the time. You want to see your kids grow up. So there are choices you make.

What do they say? You can’t serve two gods. And my god is definitely music. So that’s the choice you make. But I wouldn’t have it any other way. I don’t ever want to sound like I’m complaining. I’m extremely grateful that I’ve been able to play my guitar every day for 25 years. I don’t get paid to play music. I’d play music anyway. So I try and get paid for driving around in a van or being on flights or sleeping in bad hotel rooms. That’s my job. That’s what I do for a living. I’d play music anyway.

PCC:
With all the challenges you’ve described, what is the most rewarding aspect, at this point, in the life in music?

SCHOFIELD:
That’s a good question. Probably the moments when it is truly magic, when you have a great gig and everything comes together. But it’s somewhat selfish. It’s a bit like a drug. You want that fix. Once you’ve tasted how good it can be, when it really comes off - and it doesn’t, most of the time. Most of the time it’s not where you want it to be. So there’s a kind of constant struggle. And we had a gig on our tour last week, last Saturday night, and the sound was great in the room. The sound guy was killer. And everything just came together. And I was the happiest person in the world for two hours. So it’s that.

And then the other thing, when other people, especially younger guys playing guitar, they come up and thank you, like I thanked B.B. for what I learnt from him, what he gave us. And that happens, I suppose, increasingly, for me. People come out and tell me how much I’ve influenced them. And then you sort of go, “Well, job done. I’ve made a positive impact in somebody’s experience of music… and perhaps even life. So there’s the side that I do it for, for me, and there’s the side where you snap out of that for a second and somebody goes, “This really means something to me.” And that’s super cool.

PCC:
Are you working on a new album yet?

SCHOFIELD:
Yeah, we’re thinking about one. We were supposed to be starting one last December, we had some studio time booked. But as I always say, the music business - two words that don’t always work well together. [Chuckles] So we had to stretch things out. So I’m sort of ready to get in there and do it, but I’ve got to wait my turn to come up to be released on the label, things like that. But in a way, I guess it’s given me more time with these new musicians I’ve been working with. It’s been getting some legs. So it’ll probably be better than it would have been anyway. So I’ll look at it positively. But yeah, it’s two years since my last record came out, so I’m definitely due to get one out. But yeah, the music industry often has different ideas.

PCC:
You seem able to maintain a positive attitude, generally.

SCHOFIELD:
Yeah, well I get to do what I do, you know? And as much as it’s still a struggle sometimes, it’s still First World problems, isn’t it? That’s what they call it. When we’re on tour I don’t want to hear people in the band moaning. I know we’re in a van for 11 hours, but you’re not working at a landfill site. You’re not the trashman. There’s way worse things. It’s a perspective thing, isn’t it? And you’re not being blown up in Syria or something. I mean we’re playing music here, so 11 hours in a van, we can deal with it [laughs]. It sucks, yeah, but we get to play music. So that’s how you stay positive. And like I say, I get paid for all the other stuff, not playing music. Everybody has to do something they don’t like for a living sometimes. That’s what jobs are [laughs]. Then, if you’re lucky enough, you get to include your passion in your job.

For more on this passionate musician, visit www.mattschofield.com.