This week our guest is Glen Phillips of Toad the Wet Sprocket.
The band is out on the road this summer celebrating the 25th anniversary of their classic fear album. We spoke with Glen shortly before the tour began to talk about his memories of making that record and he also shared a lot of details with us about his upcoming solo album, Swallowed By The New, which will be released on October 7.
You can pre-order the album right now via Glen’s website or Bandcamp.
“It’s strange for me to look at this record now, because I did it a year ago and I did it at a time when I was having to really fight for hope, because I was still extremely resistant to the change in my life,” Phillips tells us, regarding his new album. “I was still kind of being consumed by shitty thoughts. You know, going through a divorce after 25 years, I thought all of the terrible thoughts that everybody thinks in that situation. And there’s a question of whether you choose to believe in those thoughts or not and I’ve met a lot of people who doubled down on hate or blame or bitterness and really did not want to be that. Because I felt like if I took that road, I knew it would not end any place good. Looking at this record [now], I can see it as these series of tools and I feel good about where I was trying to aim, even though I couldn’t see it yet. There are some songs that are more directly about relationships and there’s a lot more songs that are about facing the unknown and about facing the difficult questions and about not losing yourself to blame or self-hatred or anger or any of those traps.”
Toad will be on the road through early October playing shows and if you’re heading out to one of those shows, you’ll be able to pick up Glen’s record early. He’s selling advance copies at the merch stand prior to the scheduled October release.
Our thanks to Glen for spending a good amount of time talking music with us!
Lost Together with Matt Wardlaw, Episode 23: Glen Phillips (Toad the Wet Sprocket)
Photo Credit: Ashtin Paige
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