James star Tim Booth on his singing secret and why reality pop is over

JAMES frontman Tim Booth has revealed his secret when it comes to hitting the difficult high notes… a tight squeeze.

After 35 years in the game and still going strong, Tim joked that his voice still gets up there in hits such as She’s A Star by ‘squeezing my balls very hard’.

However, in an exclusive catch-up with Guilty Pleasures, he admitted: ‘It’s getting harder… She’s A Star is tricky holding that note.’

The 58-year-old Sit Down singer, who says he keeps going ‘to pay the rent’ is no fan of throwaway reality pop. ‘The longevity that we’ve got has become much more difficult,’ he added.

‘I think because of programmes like The Voice and other celebrity shows a whole generation has come to believe music is about chart positions and becoming famous, rather than music being about expressing something from your soul or your heart. That’s the way you discover yourself, through music. That’s an old-fashioned belief now.’

James have scored four No.2 albums, with the most recent, Girl At The End Of The World, being kept off the top slot by Adele two years ago.

Now back with their 16th album, Living In Extraordinary Times, Tim predicts salvation is on the way for fans sick of manufactured pop hits.

‘There will be a backlash against it eventually,’ he said. ‘People always want to connect to a deep level at some point. These things are cyclical in the music industry.

‘You see a very commercial phase followed by an amazing outbreak of punk in Detroit or rappers in Florida coming up with really interesting stuff for a few years as it swings back to authenticity levels.’

He said the current nondescript chart hits and free streaming are ‘part of the devaluation of music… because it’s so cheap’, adding: ‘People value what they pay for.’

Tim also told us that unfortunately he has Donald Trump to thank for the inspiration behind Living In Extraordinary Times, which comes out tomorrow.

‘I was writing the album as Trump was being elected,’ he added. ‘I live in America, so that hit me quite hard. He kept cropping up in different songs. I banished him to two songs, I didn’t want him to have the album.’

Author: Andrei Harmsworth