NEWS
Gary Barlow: 'I've given a lot of my discs to charity... I don't really need discs on the wall to remind me'
27 February 2025
BBC Radio 2's Vernon Kay show this morning marked the 100th Piano Room performance. To celebrate, Gary Barlow performed with the BBC Concert Orchestra live from the BBC Maida Vale studios.
Gary first sang his classic track - Back For Good (which celebrates its 30th anniversary in March 2025) then - in a Piano Room exclusive - he announced his brand new single, If There's Not A Song About It, and performed it for the first time with Colbie Caillat. He finished the set with a cover of Sam Fender’s People Watching.
He chatted with Vernon about using AI to help his songwriting process, being away from his wife 10 months last year, being in Take That in the 90s, his new single, terrible haircuts and more! Transcribed lines below.
Vernon asked Gary about his songwriting process:
Gary: It is an odd thing trying to explain how a song starts, and for me it definitely comes through the fingers. Its sitting here and just playing a continuation of patterns, that’s how songs begin for me. Now and again I have a lyric before I get there but in general the music starts the process.
Vernon asks about whose idea it was to make the Take That shows so big:
Gary: It's all of ours. We always feel like, just sitting and singing songs, we want to give the audience more - and we're so appreciative that we do still have great audiences that come and watch us - it wasn't enough to just stand and sing, we wanted to give them more.
Vernon: So with Back For Good it was a complete flip side of that because its a lovely, slow one I guess.
Gary: Yeah exactly, it gives everyone a break.
Vernon: Yeah, aaaah gives you a rest! There you go!
Gary: [Laughs] Gotta have a rest!
Gary on the hey day of Take That:
Vernon: Stupid question, did you have a good time?
Gary: It’s not a stupid question at all. We had a wonderful time and, honestly, if this is the end today - let’s face it, every time we go on something like this it could be! - [and] if it is, we have had the most terrific time and the advantage is that I obviously do stuff by myself, but my place is really in that band. With my friends and my brothers. It’s my safe place and it’s been so good to us that band has.
Vernon: Early 90s Manchester was a buzz wasn't it?
Gary: Wasn't it just?
Vernon: Yeah it was amazing, it really was, there was yourself, there was the rise of Oasis coming through, the whole city was really buzzing because of its music.
Gary: That's exactly right, in an old fashioned way the way Liverpool was, and it was a brilliant time and it was great to be a part of it.
Vernon: And it's all your fault that I had a terrible haircut for many many years.
Gary : Can’t have been as bad as mine!
On taking a break from singing post-Take That:
Vernon: We're going to dive into our archive, our BBC archive. We do it with every artist. This clip is from 2011 and you're talking about that period after Take That when you were considering stopping singing.
** I spent years telling everyone around me, I'll never be an artist again. Never want to sing again. And didn't, subsequently, didn't really sing for about six, seven years, and until I heard the first Coldplay album, and for the first time in years, I could see a place again. **
Vernon: It's strong stuff that Gary!
Gary: Longer! It was actually eight years that, yeah. It's a funny time because, you know... if there's a problem area of being in a band, is that the one thing you always do is you're always comparing where you are to everybody else. And we had a very successful member of our band at that point, and it felt like there wasn't room for two and so I'd been kind of left behind at that point, and sort of in protest to that, those years of being an artist, I really didn't sing for a long, long time.
Vernon: There's been a lot of documentaries about boy bands in particular. And I think the general message we're getting is [they were] overworked, underpaid, like a lot of bands were put out there, constantly working, constantly grafting. Bit of an issue with their manager, and it just seemed like, wow, we loved all the glitz and the glamour from the outside, but on the inside, it's quite difficult, it seems.
Gary: Do you know what I think, if you ask most musicians, what their rise to where they are is, I think it's difficult for everybody, and it isn't just pop bands or I think that if it's something really, truly worth working for, put the work in! Because honestly, you're right, there was definitely schedules, which went on for months and months and months. However, we got to do our job, at the end of the day, walk on the stage in front of 1000s of people and sell records. And it was kind of part and parcel I felt, yeah.
On Gary’s new single:
Vernon: How did that come about, how did that collaboration happen?
Gary: I know Colbie because she worked with a producer that we made two albums with, John Shanks, so I knew her music, and then we got connected through our agent, and I love her voice so much.
Vernon: What a track. What's the inspiration behind that?
Gary: You know what? I always feel like I've played every love song.
Vernon: [jokes] A million love songs. Sorry!
Gary: There you go, I've played a million of them. But that one particularly [on the new single] is a different kind of break-up, and it's [about] someone who is quite close to me. I don't need to say who it is, but they had a very happy break-up. They'd realised this is the end of the road and let's leave on great terms. And I don't think there's a song about that, but there is now, there you go!
Vernon: Thank you Gary. It's obvious and evident that you still get a real buzz, an injection of excitement when you sit and perform one of your own tracks in particular.
Gary: Do you know what, it's just such an I mean, look at this [looks around the room], what a way to start a day. I know that all the artists are so appreciative to have a show like this where we can do this. We don't have many chances to, but to play with the orchestra as well and my own band. It's just fantastic. We absolutely love it.
Gary on his life spent touring and the beginning of Take That:
Vernon: You're heading out doing the Songbook Tour.
GAry: Yes, yes. We toured for 10 months last year. It's not enough! I'm going back out! Vernon, I love playing live. Look, before I joined the band, 11 to 19 [years old] I played every night of the week, and I miss it.
Vernon: Hang on. Say that again.
Gary: 11 to 19 years old, I played every night of the week. Yeah, yeah.
Vernon: So when you started the band and you became the front person, were you in any way nervous? Or did you kind of think, Oh, this is a bit of me.
Gary: Yeah, no. Early on, a few of the guys had had experience, but not much.
Vernon: They were break dancers, weren't they?
Gary: Howard and Jason were break dancers. Robbie had done theatre. Mark had done, like, a youth theatre, but standing and singing, I don't think anyone had done that so it was kind of useful that I had, and I was sort of helping everyone get their act together in a way.
Vernon: So when you're under the stage, let's say, at a big Take That Arena show, today, do you kind of look at each other and go, 'We're still here. Come on!'?
Gary: Do you know what, it's better than that. Quite often we go out in the middle of the audience and we're on like a round platform and, now and again, we turn in and face each other, and I can see the two faces of the guys and behind them, chaos, yeah, 1000s of people going and it's beautiful.
Gary on not displaying his awards at home:
Vernon: Hey, have you got a room - I went to, when we were doing T4, I went to a very famous rock star's house, and they had a room that was just full of discs. Have you got a Gary Barlow or Take That room?
Gary: Do you know what, I've actually given a lot of my discs to charity. I think I've got a couple left, but I don't know I feel about that, you know, welcome to my house, everybody and here's my award!
Vernon: You must have something that recognises the fact that, you know, 'who lives in a house like this?' type moment?
Gary: I think my studio is that for me, right? It's my place of work. But I don't really need discs on the wall to remind me.
Vernon: When you walk into the kitchen after a studio session at home, do you have a sip of tea and go 'three more tunes, bangers... here we go, Tenerife next week. Come on!'?
Gary: You know what, it's it's kind of a thing with songwriters that every day you feel like you've written the next big one [then] really, quite often when you wake up the next day, you realise you didn't. Definitely the sleep is an important key. The key to it, you sleep, you're listening, and then you go, 'oh, there is something there', right, or not!
Gary on being away from his wife:
Vernon plays a message from a listener:
**Hi, Gary and Vernon. It's Natasha from sunny Southend. Gary, you have been at lunch here in Southend. So if you could go anywhere with anyone, where would you go for lunch? And who would it be with?**
Gary: That's a great question, isn't it? Well, I'd be with my wife, because she said she gave me a yellow card last year. I was away a lot. She called me when we were in Asia. She said, 'where are you?' I said, 'you can check the website.' ... but she [said] 'when are you home?' I was like 'four weeks' ... I mean it was a rotten year, rotten year for home so I'm busy scoring points at the moment.
Vernon: Get a magnetic pin board for the fridge...
Gary: Honestly, that's what last year was like.
Gary on using AI when writing music:
Question for Gary from Teddy Swims [who performed for yesterday's Piano Room]
Teddy: I got a question for you. What was your favorite toy growing up?
Gary: Toy? This is gonna chime with you. I know it is Big Track. Yes, I knew you'd know that [to Vernon]. Yeah, of course, Big Track, yeah. Did you ever actually get it to do what it did on the advert?
Vernon: Do you know what, we had one at primary school and we actually had a lesson on how you programme Big Track. Because one, it was the length of the actual Big Track itself so if you typed in five, it would go five lengths of itself...
Gary: Yeah, I think it was the way into computing. For me, that was the top of the Big Track because I was very early with computers. I got computer at, like, 14 and was making music on it. It was an Atari ST computer.
Vernon: You know, Calvin Harris wrote his very first album on the Commodore Amiga. All of it on that, really, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Gary: I always use technology as a tool, because interesting with all the AI stuff being talked about now, because I use a lot of AI as well for making music, right, [but] not coming up with it instead of me.
Gary on being a Sam Fender fan:
Vernon: Gary... what are you going to close with please, your cover version?
Gary: We're going to, 'cause one of my faves, well, he's been my favourite artist for two or three years - Sam Fender - went to see him live last year. Love the new record. Of course, I really want to try and do this justice because it's a brand new song, we thought, why rethink something that's so new, so I'm kind of copying his version, but it's a wonderful track.
Gary first sang his classic track - Back For Good (which celebrates its 30th anniversary in March 2025) then - in a Piano Room exclusive - he announced his brand new single, If There's Not A Song About It, and performed it for the first time with Colbie Caillat. He finished the set with a cover of Sam Fender’s People Watching.
Vernon asked Gary about his songwriting process:
Gary: It is an odd thing trying to explain how a song starts, and for me it definitely comes through the fingers. Its sitting here and just playing a continuation of patterns, that’s how songs begin for me. Now and again I have a lyric before I get there but in general the music starts the process.
Vernon asks about whose idea it was to make the Take That shows so big:
Gary: It's all of ours. We always feel like, just sitting and singing songs, we want to give the audience more - and we're so appreciative that we do still have great audiences that come and watch us - it wasn't enough to just stand and sing, we wanted to give them more.
Vernon: So with Back For Good it was a complete flip side of that because its a lovely, slow one I guess.
Gary: Yeah exactly, it gives everyone a break.
Vernon: Yeah, aaaah gives you a rest! There you go!
Gary: [Laughs] Gotta have a rest!
Gary on the hey day of Take That:
Vernon: Stupid question, did you have a good time?
Gary: It’s not a stupid question at all. We had a wonderful time and, honestly, if this is the end today - let’s face it, every time we go on something like this it could be! - [and] if it is, we have had the most terrific time and the advantage is that I obviously do stuff by myself, but my place is really in that band. With my friends and my brothers. It’s my safe place and it’s been so good to us that band has.
Vernon: Early 90s Manchester was a buzz wasn't it?
Gary: Wasn't it just?
Vernon: Yeah it was amazing, it really was, there was yourself, there was the rise of Oasis coming through, the whole city was really buzzing because of its music.
Gary: That's exactly right, in an old fashioned way the way Liverpool was, and it was a brilliant time and it was great to be a part of it.
Vernon: And it's all your fault that I had a terrible haircut for many many years.
Gary : Can’t have been as bad as mine!
On taking a break from singing post-Take That:
Vernon: We're going to dive into our archive, our BBC archive. We do it with every artist. This clip is from 2011 and you're talking about that period after Take That when you were considering stopping singing.
** I spent years telling everyone around me, I'll never be an artist again. Never want to sing again. And didn't, subsequently, didn't really sing for about six, seven years, and until I heard the first Coldplay album, and for the first time in years, I could see a place again. **
Vernon: It's strong stuff that Gary!
Gary: Longer! It was actually eight years that, yeah. It's a funny time because, you know... if there's a problem area of being in a band, is that the one thing you always do is you're always comparing where you are to everybody else. And we had a very successful member of our band at that point, and it felt like there wasn't room for two and so I'd been kind of left behind at that point, and sort of in protest to that, those years of being an artist, I really didn't sing for a long, long time.
Vernon: There's been a lot of documentaries about boy bands in particular. And I think the general message we're getting is [they were] overworked, underpaid, like a lot of bands were put out there, constantly working, constantly grafting. Bit of an issue with their manager, and it just seemed like, wow, we loved all the glitz and the glamour from the outside, but on the inside, it's quite difficult, it seems.
Gary: Do you know what I think, if you ask most musicians, what their rise to where they are is, I think it's difficult for everybody, and it isn't just pop bands or I think that if it's something really, truly worth working for, put the work in! Because honestly, you're right, there was definitely schedules, which went on for months and months and months. However, we got to do our job, at the end of the day, walk on the stage in front of 1000s of people and sell records. And it was kind of part and parcel I felt, yeah.
On Gary’s new single:
Vernon: How did that come about, how did that collaboration happen?
Gary: I know Colbie because she worked with a producer that we made two albums with, John Shanks, so I knew her music, and then we got connected through our agent, and I love her voice so much.
Vernon: What a track. What's the inspiration behind that?
Gary: You know what? I always feel like I've played every love song.
Vernon: [jokes] A million love songs. Sorry!
Gary: There you go, I've played a million of them. But that one particularly [on the new single] is a different kind of break-up, and it's [about] someone who is quite close to me. I don't need to say who it is, but they had a very happy break-up. They'd realised this is the end of the road and let's leave on great terms. And I don't think there's a song about that, but there is now, there you go!
Vernon: Thank you Gary. It's obvious and evident that you still get a real buzz, an injection of excitement when you sit and perform one of your own tracks in particular.
Gary: Do you know what, it's just such an I mean, look at this [looks around the room], what a way to start a day. I know that all the artists are so appreciative to have a show like this where we can do this. We don't have many chances to, but to play with the orchestra as well and my own band. It's just fantastic. We absolutely love it.
Gary on his life spent touring and the beginning of Take That:
Vernon: You're heading out doing the Songbook Tour.
GAry: Yes, yes. We toured for 10 months last year. It's not enough! I'm going back out! Vernon, I love playing live. Look, before I joined the band, 11 to 19 [years old] I played every night of the week, and I miss it.
Vernon: Hang on. Say that again.
Gary: 11 to 19 years old, I played every night of the week. Yeah, yeah.
Vernon: So when you started the band and you became the front person, were you in any way nervous? Or did you kind of think, Oh, this is a bit of me.
Gary: Yeah, no. Early on, a few of the guys had had experience, but not much.
Vernon: They were break dancers, weren't they?
Gary: Howard and Jason were break dancers. Robbie had done theatre. Mark had done, like, a youth theatre, but standing and singing, I don't think anyone had done that so it was kind of useful that I had, and I was sort of helping everyone get their act together in a way.
Vernon: So when you're under the stage, let's say, at a big Take That Arena show, today, do you kind of look at each other and go, 'We're still here. Come on!'?
Gary: Do you know what, it's better than that. Quite often we go out in the middle of the audience and we're on like a round platform and, now and again, we turn in and face each other, and I can see the two faces of the guys and behind them, chaos, yeah, 1000s of people going and it's beautiful.
Gary on not displaying his awards at home:
Vernon: Hey, have you got a room - I went to, when we were doing T4, I went to a very famous rock star's house, and they had a room that was just full of discs. Have you got a Gary Barlow or Take That room?
Gary: Do you know what, I've actually given a lot of my discs to charity. I think I've got a couple left, but I don't know I feel about that, you know, welcome to my house, everybody and here's my award!
Vernon: You must have something that recognises the fact that, you know, 'who lives in a house like this?' type moment?
Gary: I think my studio is that for me, right? It's my place of work. But I don't really need discs on the wall to remind me.
Vernon: When you walk into the kitchen after a studio session at home, do you have a sip of tea and go 'three more tunes, bangers... here we go, Tenerife next week. Come on!'?
Gary: You know what, it's it's kind of a thing with songwriters that every day you feel like you've written the next big one [then] really, quite often when you wake up the next day, you realise you didn't. Definitely the sleep is an important key. The key to it, you sleep, you're listening, and then you go, 'oh, there is something there', right, or not!
Gary on being away from his wife:
Vernon plays a message from a listener:
**Hi, Gary and Vernon. It's Natasha from sunny Southend. Gary, you have been at lunch here in Southend. So if you could go anywhere with anyone, where would you go for lunch? And who would it be with?**
Gary: That's a great question, isn't it? Well, I'd be with my wife, because she said she gave me a yellow card last year. I was away a lot. She called me when we were in Asia. She said, 'where are you?' I said, 'you can check the website.' ... but she [said] 'when are you home?' I was like 'four weeks' ... I mean it was a rotten year, rotten year for home so I'm busy scoring points at the moment.
Vernon: Get a magnetic pin board for the fridge...
Gary: Honestly, that's what last year was like.
Gary on using AI when writing music:
Question for Gary from Teddy Swims [who performed for yesterday's Piano Room]
Teddy: I got a question for you. What was your favorite toy growing up?
Gary: Toy? This is gonna chime with you. I know it is Big Track. Yes, I knew you'd know that [to Vernon]. Yeah, of course, Big Track, yeah. Did you ever actually get it to do what it did on the advert?
Vernon: Do you know what, we had one at primary school and we actually had a lesson on how you programme Big Track. Because one, it was the length of the actual Big Track itself so if you typed in five, it would go five lengths of itself...
Gary: Yeah, I think it was the way into computing. For me, that was the top of the Big Track because I was very early with computers. I got computer at, like, 14 and was making music on it. It was an Atari ST computer.
Vernon: You know, Calvin Harris wrote his very first album on the Commodore Amiga. All of it on that, really, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Gary: I always use technology as a tool, because interesting with all the AI stuff being talked about now, because I use a lot of AI as well for making music, right, [but] not coming up with it instead of me.
Gary on being a Sam Fender fan:
Gary: We're going to, 'cause one of my faves, well, he's been my favourite artist for two or three years - Sam Fender - went to see him live last year. Love the new record. Of course, I really want to try and do this justice because it's a brand new song, we thought, why rethink something that's so new, so I'm kind of copying his version, but it's a wonderful track.
