Episode 38: Harry Hudson-Taylor & Seraphina Taylor

Seraphina Taylor: And so we're on the motorway and I'm like, you have to take the next turn. I have to come off at a junction. We don't even get there. I start peeing myself. I open the car door and I literally vomit. Car's still going. Car hasn't stopped.

Josh Caldwell: Hello my atypical daydreamers. Welcome to the show. My first guest today is singer-songwriter Harry Hudson-Taylor. When meeting your musical heroes, it's always a little surreal, even when they turn out to be exactly as you imagined.

Harry Hudson-Taylor: The history of this goes back to my dad. My dad was actually in a band with Sting before the Police. The Police was Sting's band when he was like 18 or 19. But he was in a big band, a brass band, a big jazz band when he was 14, 15. It was called the Newcastle Big Band. And my dad was the band lead, the conductor, the keyboard player, trumpet player. And Sting, therefore, has been sort of like an adjacent part of my life in a weird way where my dad would just say, Sting this, Sting that, and you'd be like, all right, yeah, cool, whatever. He got his name actually from someone in that band. The name Sting came because he used to go to band practice wearing his rugby gear, his black and yellow wasps gear. And then some Geordie guy would say, Sting, get over here. You're late. But anyway, that's where he got his name, which is not my story, that's just his story.

So there are a couple of points to this story. First of all, the Police come and they play in Dublin. So this is the first time I actually meet Sting. I was like, wow, okay, yeah. I guess my dad wasn't just talking the talk. So I'm in a room with Sting and Stewart Copeland and Andy Summers and we got a picture with them and he signed the poster and all this crazy stuff.

Fast forward a few years later. My band, which I started with my brother, we start busking on the streets. That's our initial thing. We would have been playing all sorts of cover songs, police songs as well, just making money on the street. But then we start writing our own songs. Fifteen, sixteen years old. What does my dad do without asking us? He sends our song to Sting.

I have an email that Sting sent to me and my brother where he gave us some critique on the song. Sting says: Not wishing to be Simon Cowell, if I were to look for a template for the Hudson Boys, it would be a souped up modern day version of the Everly Brothers, fraternal voices in close harmony, minus the personal enmity. They should do a cover of All I Gotta Do Is Dream. Small Talk was the name of the song. It's not a bad beginning. It felt a little long though.

Harry Hudson-Taylor: Does it have a bridge? I don't remember, and this is important. I should have remembered as I have only listened to it a few minutes ago. If it already has a bridge, then it needs a better one. What is a bridge? And why is it important? Well, it signifies a change in viewpoint, a way out of the song's conundrum. I'm lonely. How do I feel better? The most successful bridges take this change of viewpoint to its next logical step, a key change. You have eight bars to modulate into something outside of the loop. It should feel liberating. Like somebody opened all the windows on a summer's day. Enough. I know absolutely nothing. I'm in Chicago. Good luck. It's all good. Sting.

So that's a nice little thing. Very embarrassing because it was literally the first song we ever wrote. I wish my dad had just waited for that card, pulled it a few years later. It would have been nice for a social media thing. But anyway.

So we met Sting, got a little feedback on our song, and then more time goes by. Now we're signed to a record label, we're in LA. Sting and Paul Simon are doing a tour, I think it was 2016 or 2017, a headline tour where they're playing each other's songs, just riffing off each other. So me and my brother went to the soundcheck. We're standing there watching Paul Simon and Sting banter on the stage, just having a laugh at each other, pulling each other's leg. And then the funniest thing happens. Sting's PA tells Sting, the boys are here, Andy's sons are here. So we're in the Forum, this whole empty venue where they're doing the soundcheck. And then Sting kind of saunters off the stage and comes towards us.

Harry Hudson-Taylor: But like as he's walking towards us, he's doing yoga. He's stretching his legs out. He's almost pirouetting across the floor like a ballet dancer. And he comes up to us and he goes, Well, hey Hudson boys, how are you? And while he's talking to us, he's got his leg at a full ninety degree angle against the barrier. Just leaning, doing his stretches, stretching his arms, doing all these weird, awkward yoga poses. He's just like, yeah, how's your dad? How's the music going for you? Small talk. Such a bizarre experience. So I watched the gig, amazing gig. And then with all-access passes, we go backstage after the show.

We went into this tiny little bar and it was clearly just friends and family of Paul and Sting. And then me and my brother in the corner going, what the hell is this? Super anxious, super nervous. And then Paul Simon walks in. He's literally my hero. He's my favourite musician of all time. He's the tiniest man ever. And me and my brother are like, oh my god, what are we gonna do? He's going around working the room. We're like, no, play cool, let him talk to his family. Then we see our opportunity. He has his back to us but he's at the end of the bar and he's by himself. We're like, it's now or never. So me and Alfie, my brother, go up to him and we're just like, hey Paul, how's it going? We're huge fans. We're from Ireland.

And he's like, Ireland, guys, great to see you. And then he just launched straight into an anecdote. We told him we're musicians, that we love to play his songs, all the old Simon and Garfunkel stuff. And he was like, wow, let me tell you something. How old are you guys? I was like, twenty-four or five. He's like, you know, when I was about twenty, I wrote a song called The Sound of Silence. Do you know it? And you're like, yeah, yeah, yeah. He says, I have absolutely no idea where that came from. To this day I have never been able to write a song like that. I don't think I ever will. It was just a moment in time. I was there. It just came through me.

Harry Hudson-Taylor: And we just said, yeah, yes, Paul. Yes, of course. He said, guys, just keep doing what you're doing. Keep writing. We were influenced by all sorts of things, the Everly Brothers. I said yeah, we're kind of like that, we do close harmonies. He said, that's great to hear, that's great to hear. Well guys, it was really good to meet you. And that was it. I was like, what the hell. What a weird day.

I have this solo project, Ladybird Lad, and it's related to just my love of those creatures. We call them ladybirds in the UK and Ireland, ladybugs in America. It's seen as lucky in almost every culture. In Ireland it's called Boine De, which means God's little cow, which is quite a sweet name. It ended up being the name of my solo project. And after being in a band with my brother for twelve, thirteen years, it was quite a big deal to try and do something solo. Seraphina helped me along the way, doing a bit of singing and writing songs.

The first gig we were ever gonna do was in Mullingar, a town in Ireland where I actually went to school. We took the train from Dublin to Mullingar, about a ninety minute journey. And just as we were pulling into the station, having been moving away from any station for at least half an hour, sitting at a table on the train with the set list written out in front of me, a ladybird walked out onto the table. On a train. It just walked right across the paper. I feel like musician life aids the awareness of synchronistic events. Artistic minded people tend to think about it more, like, ooh, it's a sign. I have a lot of those little moments along the way, to do with symbology and little creatures. It's like God saying, hello, I'm here, I'm everywhere. A quantum wink.

Josh Caldwell: Hey, it's Josh. Hope you're enjoying the podcast. And if so, are you wanting more road stories? Well, good news. I've got you covered. Consider becoming a patron. You'll have access to loads of great bonus stories that there just wasn't time for. And you'll be supporting a truly independent podcast. Find the link in the show notes and thanks. Now back to the show.

My next guest is another great singer-songwriter, Seraphina Taylor, Harry's partner. Unlike Harry's story, Seraphina reminds us that when things go wrong on tour, they can really go wrong. Like the old adage says, when it rains, it pours.

Seraphina Taylor: So we were doing Ladybird Lad in Ireland. We were doing a little tour in Ireland. Harry was doing his solo thing just on his own with no funding. He was getting really stressed about the fact that tickets weren't really selling so well. Before, in the Hudson Taylor machine, you don't necessarily get to see how many people are doing something behind the scenes or where the money is coming from. So his ability to suddenly manage what a whole team of people was doing was really overextended. He was just quite stressed.

We were playing Roisin Dubh and then a friend had given us a place to stay. We literally got to the place and were there for about ten minutes so we could have a shower. As we were leaving, I'd rented a car and I said, do you have the keys? And he went, yeah, patted his pocket. We go and do the gig. Then there was a band coming on afterwards for a different show. We ended up doing a writing session backstage and I was riffing lyrics and he was playing along. Gets to about two o'clock in the morning. We leave, get in the car, and he's like, I don't know where the keys are. I was like, what do you mean? And we're staying in the middle of nowhere, it's pitch black. He has like 14 percent battery on his phone. No one's picking up. So he had to get the booker to get a hotel in the middle of Galway. It was like 400 euros, which was the entire guarantee of the gig.

Seraphina Taylor: Part of my routine is that I don't eat before stage because no matter how smooth things are, I will choke on it when I sing. So I haven't eaten in like nine hours at this point. It's like four in the morning. And I was like, Harry, I need food. And he gets a pot noodle and a bag of gummy sweets. That was my meal of the day.

But then the next day, when we were driving back, we had to drive all the way to Dublin Airport. And I was feeling very, very not well. We were on the motorway and I suddenly start sweating profusely, uncontrollable sweating. And I'm like, I don't know where this is going, and it just doesn't feel good. And so we're on the motorway and I'm like, you have to take the next turn. I have to come off at a junction. We don't even get there. I start peeing myself in the car because I'm retching so hard. And then before we've even come to a stop, I open the car door and I literally vomit. Across me, across the front of the car, over the side of the car, onto the side of the road. Car's still going. Car hasn't stopped. I'm peeing myself through the effort of retching. And then I just lean over, haven't even unbuckled myself, just lean over, profusely vomit for like a full minute. Unbuckle myself, just in public, pee on the side of the road. He hasn't pulled over. He's still just rolling. Cars are going full speed past us.

I've got my butt out and I can literally see all these Irish people like, what is happening? Vomit down my front, half naked. And then I get back in the car and he's like, are you okay? And I'm like, no, you know I'm not okay.

Seraphina Taylor: And then we still had to go all the way to Dublin Airport. He'd managed to scrape the side of the rental car in a tiny parking garage in Galway, but I'd been too ill and preoccupied to really take note of that. So there's literally still vomit on the side of the car when we pull into the rental place at Dublin Airport. And I'm just like, is there any way to cover up the scuff on the side? And then I was like, you know what, the car literally has vomit in it, piss on the seat, vomit down the side, and a scuff. At this point I'm like, whatever, we just have to make it to the plane. So we're literally taking trash and casually trying to wipe chunks of puke off the side of the car and maybe cover a scuff at the same time. And then we just got the flight and went home.

Josh Caldwell: I want to thank Harry and Seraphina for sharing their experience. Be sure to check out Seraphina's music project, Feathered Fire. She just released two new singles and is midway through production on her new upcoming album. Also check out Harry's music project, Ladybird Lad. Links in the show notes. This podcast is created and produced by me, Josh Caldwell. Music by Visual Aid, my side music project. General support and copywriting by Miranda Caldwell. And if you know someone who you think might enjoy this show, send them this episode. The support really helps. Thank you for listening, and I hope you come back next time.