Watch Gaz Coombes' live session - featuring new single Long Live The Strange

Virgin Radio

13 Jan 2023, 12:48

Supergrass frontman Gaz Coombes is back with his fourth solo record, Turn The Car Around, which is out today (Friday 13th January). 

This album has been a long time coming for the rocker, with the process taking seven years following on the work from his second album in 2015, Matador. 

While on The Chris Evans Breakfast Show with Sky, during his Stool of Rock session with The Roxy's, Gaz revealed: “The seeds were planted in 2015 with Matador I guess, just in terms of songwriting approach and the process of recording. I think I started that in 2015, and it's kind of continued into this record.”

Check out Gaz’s performance of new single Long Live The Strange: 

Speaking about writing new music and melodies, Gaz shared some behind-the-scenes secrets on his process. 

The musician said: “There's a lot of just kind of feeling my way around and so I guess waiting for the idea to show itself quite a lot of the time. That is definitely… sort of seeds there when you start something but I often have to wait for it to hit me or just to kind of get a buzz.

“I've got a lot of music and then I'll get the microphone, I'll walk around the studio with it. Just add some bits. I might just sing a lyric without realising, and then that will be the hook lyric.”

Making Turn The Car Around has taken Gaz through the coronavirus pandemic, which began when the Supergrass reunion tour was just starting out back in March 2020. 

For the Alright hitmaker, he was lucky when it came to making music in lockdown, and it’s all down to some help from his neighbours. 

He explained: “I’ve got a builder who lives next door to me, and he had no work, I had no work, and so he helped me build a little studio. So just across the way from the house, we sort of just converted this garage space.”

While at the top of the Tower, Gaz also performed The Girls Who Fell To Earth, from his 2015 album - Matador. 

Check out Gaz’s performance of The Girl Who Fell To Earth: 

Now we’re all allowed back outside, Gaz has lined up a mammoth tour Europe in March and the UK in April, starting with a run of intimate record shop shows. Tonight, he’ll play Banquet Records in Kingston. 

Landing in the UK in April for the tour, Gaz and his band will kick things off in Dublin on 14th, before finishing it all at the Electric Ballroom in London on the 29th. 

Gaz Coombes’ new single, Long Live The Strange, is out now. The new album, Turn The Car Around is out today (Friday 13th January).

For more great interviews listen to  The Chris Evans Breakfast Show with Sky, weekdays from 6:30am on Virgin Radio, or  catch up on-demand here.