Amsterdam frontman Ian Prowse and the song that saved his life

SussexWorld

Amsterdam frontman Ian Prowse marks 20 years of the hit Does This Train Stop On Merseyside?, the song, as he says, which saved his life.

Transcript

00:00Good afternoon. My name is Phil Hewitt, Group Arts Editor at Sussex Newspapers. Lovely this

00:06afternoon to speak to Amsterdam frontman Ian Prowse now. It's a significant year this year,

00:11isn't it? You are celebrating 20 years of Does This Train Stop on Merseyside? 20 years. And you

00:17were talking about it. You say you shudder to think what would have happened had it not been

00:22for that song, which brought you back in from the cold, as you say.

00:26Yeah, yeah. Mate, I don't know how my life would have panned out if I'd have even been

00:34here, you know, because I was facing it like an existential crisis. I'm a songwriter and

00:42an artist. And if I'm not allowed to do that, you know, if I can't make the money to live

00:48out of that, then I'm not me, really. All my eggs were in one broken down basket when I

00:53wrote that song. And thankfully, it turned the corner for me.

00:58Isn't it extraordinary? You were saying that you didn't necessarily yourself spot the song's

01:02potential, did you?

01:04No, I didn't. No. We were recording down in South Wales. And we had this system whereby

01:09the new songs I'd written, I'd play to my producer, Tony Kiley. And then we'd pick two

01:13and we'd record them very quickly. And I'd played him three or four songs and he'd selected

01:19two. And then at the end, I said, I've got this other one and I'm not sure about it.

01:24I think some good words, but I'm not sure. And I did the first ever performance of Does

01:29This Train Stop on Merseyside to Tony Kiley, my producer. And he just, when it finished,

01:35he said, you're crazy. That's the best thing you've ever brought me. We're recording it

01:39right now. And I went, really, really? And he saw it straight off the bat. And I was, you

01:46know, he had to tell me, I'm too close to it, you know.

01:49Absolutely. But with distance in time, 20 years now and perspective, you can see why

01:54it's such an important song to people, can't you?

01:56Yeah. Yeah. Well, when you've got, you know, when you've got the likes of John Peel and

02:01Elvis Costello, Damien Dempsey and Christy Moore, you know, Christy's the uncrowned king

02:06of all Ireland, going on about it and showing it so much love, then you've got to take notice

02:14of those people. Right. So cast aside all modesty. Why is it such an important song to people

02:18and to you?

02:21Oh, I think because it's not like a song that's, that is going on about how great Liverpool

02:30is. It's not like a, you know, professional scouse, this is the best city sort of thing,

02:35because it's, it covers some of the darkest periods in all human history. You know, Liverpool's

02:40sexual role in the African slave trade and the, and the Irish famine, you know, is right

02:49in the middle of the song and has an influence all over it. You know, I'm, there's a, there's

02:53a huge streak of Celtic soul in my music. And I think it's because of that, you know, and

02:59there's, there's just honesty, but it's juxtaposed with, with just the, you know, the, the, the

03:05joy of a Saturday night out in Liverpool and the mundanity of EasyJet going overhead.

03:11So it's kind of like.

03:12But also the context of Hillsborough.

03:15Absolutely. Yeah. And the key lines about Hillsborough, which are so important to me, because I've

03:20got so many friends who survived what happened on the 15th of April in 1989 that, you know,

03:28I never, ever sing the song without giving it 100% intent and passion out of respect for

03:35them, you know, it, that's why it's every single time I sing the song, I'm laser focused

03:43on getting it right because for those people, you know.

03:47Well, you're going to be celebrating that song and much else with dates, including Shoreham

03:50and Portsmouth in our area. Really lovely to speak to you and congratulations on that anniversary.

03:56Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much.

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