I recently had the opportunity to interview Paul Robert Thomas, long time lyricist and songwriter influenced by his time living in the UK as well as Israel.
In this interview, Paul touches on changes in the music industry since the British Invasion, his history as a lyricist and songwriter, as well as dropping a few gems of knowledge from his years of experience.
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You’ve been making music for a long time. When did you start? How long have you been at it?
Well first off, I am a Song Lyricist and only write the words for the songs and the many talented Singer Songwriters that I work with around the world compose the music and perform the songs that we create.
When I worked as a volunteer on Kibbutz Hagoshrim in the north of Israel in my late teens I used to write poems for the girlfriends I had on the kibbutz and it wasn’t until some years later when I saw an advert in the Dylan magazine Isis in 1996 from a German Singer Songwriter from near Kiel called Stefan Pauleit who was looking for someone to put words to his music, that I tried my hand at writing song lyrics instead of poems and we formed a song writing collaboration called The Grils and we made some great songs.
I’d put 1996 as the start of my song lyric writing career and I had plenty of time to do this as I was a London Policeman who had been subjected to anti-Semitic treatment by the very policemen that I work with and so I was off work sick with stress and depression waiting for the court date and I was later to defeat the might of the London Metropolitan Police Force in a court of law for their racial discrimination of me on religious grounds as I had converted to Judaism from Christianity in order to marry my Israeli wife who I had met on the kibbutz whilst a volunteer and she was a soldier guarding the kibbutz.
I also converted out of respect for Dina’s father who is a survivor of Auschwitz Concentration Camp where all of his family were murdered by the Nazi’s and now we live in the safest country in the world, yes Israel, where anyone is free to walk the streets day or night without fear of being attacked or molested and all we have to do is sort out the problem of being surrounded by those who want to throw us into the sea, but we will sort that out I am sure.
What inspired and motivated you to travel down this path? What has kept you going all this time?
I grew up in the 60’s and that was the time of the music revolution with mostly British bands in the fore, I mean The Beatles and the Liverpool sound and it seemed that everything around musically then was exciting and new. I used to sell hot dogs outside the famous Roundhouse concert & theater venue in Chalk Farm, North London which was next to where I lived and I met many what you’d call ‘stars’ today although then I was oblivious to their notoriety and it was there that I met & spoke to Andy Warhol and I actually went to school in St.John’s Wood which is a stone’s throw from the Abbey Road Studio’s and also Paul McCartney’s home.
What we kept me going was the realization that what I do is a dying art form, I mean to be honest just listen to some of today’s songs and it’s not hard to discern that some if not many are sorely lacking good thought inspiring lyrics and that is what I write. I have learnt from the history of music, all that has gone before, ‘tradition’ and my teacher has been a guy who goes by the name these-days of Bob Dylan who has taught me so much and still is.
My first 45 records and also cassette tapes given to me by my uncle when I was about 7 or 8 were with songs by Buddy Holly, Otis Reding, Billy Fury, Count Basie, Louis Armstrong and Frank Sinatra – now there’s a varied mix if ever there was one but I think I was, as were most people greatly influenced by The Beatles and it wasn’t until years later that I discovered the works of Bob Dylan who continues to influence me to this day.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fsFEQlv2dy4
How has the music world changed over time with the development of technology, social media, and everything else that’s happened over the last two decades?
Without a doubt it has drastically changed but not as much as some people might imagine. Back in my day there always was what is called ‘Payola’, that is DJ’s and radio stations bribed or openly paid by record companies and their minions ‘Pluggers’ to play their artists’ songs at prime time regularly on air, now I’m not going to open up a can of worms and say that nothing has changed but look yourself at the charts and what is played on the main terrestrial radio stations and you will draw your own conclusions I think!
In the past we relied on radio to deliver the songs to listen to and the records to buy if we liked the song(s) and of course nowadays we also have the internet where we have access to millions if not billions of songs and the ability to buy or download the songs that we like, which all sounds fine and rosy but in order to want to buy a particular song you have to hear it first and since the major terrestrial radio stations in the main only play those songs they are ‘encouraged’ to play the vast majority of songs, irrespective of how good they may be will never be heard or perhaps will be by a few ‘friends’ on Facebook or by a few listeners to the internet radio station that the song might be played on, so, having your songs ready to download in all of the major download stores is worthless if people don’t even know that those songs exist and so we have 2 levels of ‘songs’, those by the major record company’s played constantly to millions of listeners on terrestrial radio and those heard by a few on social media or on internet radio, that is how it is and perhaps how it has always been. Of course the other way to get your music out there is to perform the songs in concert and for the vast majority of Singer/Songwriters that means performing at a pub or bar for which maybe you’ll be paid a small performance fee by the owner or maybe nor and perhaps some of your audience will be moved enough to download your songs or even buy a physical CD that you might offer for sale at the ‘concert’, but, as before, maybe things have always been like this?
What was the last song you listened to?
Actually I listen to a lot of random choice of 160 of my favourite songs on my Android phone’s song player to & from work each day and the last was a song of ours, ‘Les Paul’s’ (The Paul’s) called ‘The House of ill Repute’ from our latest album also called ‘The House of ill Repute’.
How can an we connect with you online? Stream your music?
On my main website at www.paullyrics.com you can find out what Andy Warhol said to me when we met, what the late great Robert Johnson’s grandson wrote to me or what Buckingham Palace recently sent me and while you’re there you’ll discover 160+ songs, 50+ live concert & promo videos, officially released songs & albums, my Dylan articles, interviews & a special free download on the ‘Songs’ page and much more!
Any last thoughts? Shout outs? Words of wisdom?
Oh well, I have but it might displease some people but I believe life, ALL life is precious and funnily enough I am a vegetarian, actually almost a Vegan and I’ll get there soon. Good must triumph over evil in this world and we must give our all to make sure that it does, the world seems to be suffering from the disease of Apathy as a dark cloud moves in from the East and it needs to wake up before it’s too late!
