MBW’s Key Songs In The Life Of… is a collection during which we ask influential music trade figures concerning the tracks which have – thus far – outlined their journey and their existence. Taking her flip this time spherical is Warner Music UK‘s Chief Working Officer (and former head of the legendary Abbey Street Studios), Isabel Garvey. The Key Songs… collection is supported by Sony Music Publishing.
Isabel Garvey is at pains to level out (twice, in actual fact) that she is “not an A&R particular person”.
And it’s true, she isn’t. She is Chief Working Officer at Warner Music UK.
She joined the main in Could 2023, having beforehand been the Managing Director of Abbey Street Studios for the very best a part of a decade.
Her insistence on readability re. the absence of A&R obligations isn’t, nevertheless, in case of any job title confusion, it’s as a result of she’s nervous that her selection of Key Songs is “too mainstream” on account of the truth that “I’m basically a Prime 40 fan”.
She needn’t fear, after all. Mainly as a result of, frankly, what the hell’s incorrect with that? But in addition as a result of her picks are what they need to be: a mirrored image on her life and a soundtrack to her profession. Or, as she places it: “I picked songs that took me again to moments, both in my private life or my working life. The issue got here once I began second guessing myself: ‘Is the proper listing to place in entrance of the trade?’
“I’m additionally surrounded by music day-after-day, so there’s a lot to select from, which is why I saved coming again to that steerage of associating my ultimate selections with essential reminiscences.”
The top consequence goes from jazz to consummate dance pop through the best group to ever decide up guitars. From Brubek to bangers through The Beatles. And nobody, not even the snootiest A&R, goes to have an issue with that…
1) Dave Brubek, Take 5 (1959)
I’m one in every of 4 women, and once I was rising up my dad used to take himself off on a Sunday to hearken to jazz on vinyl, it was fairly spiritual for him. Jazz was very a lot a part of the soundtrack to my very earliest days, listening to trumpets and piano popping out of his room whereas he escaped for a few hours!
It introduced a type of calm to the home – which wasn’t all the time there due to there being 4 women. I affiliate it with the scent of print from the Sunday papers, and it’s only a very heat reminiscence for me.
“I nonetheless love jazz to today, to the extent that I’m at present making an attempt desperately to drive my eight-year-old to study the trumpet.”
It additionally clearly seeped in, as a result of I nonetheless love jazz to today, to the extent that I’m at present making an attempt desperately to drive my eight-year-old to study the trumpet.
There was lots of music in the home typically. My mum really grew up in a really classical music surroundings. And, like I say, my dad was actually into his jazz. However then each time we’d go on automobile journeys we’d drive him to place musical soundtracks on whereas all 4 of us sang our heads off.
I feel that’s why he wanted his Sundays.
2) Aha, Take On Me (1985)
I’m a pop woman at coronary heart, with fairly mainstream tastes, and that is simply nice pop music that viscerally takes me again to my teenagers.
It’s additionally most likely to do with my first crush, as a result of it coincided with a time the place you’ve beforehand simply been listening to the Prime 40 on radio, then you definitely begin to join the songs with the movies. This was a very intelligent video after all, and it didn’t damage that Morten Harket was such a good-looking frontman.
I keep in mind going to purchase the vinyl and enjoying it to dying. It was the period of Top of the Pops, which was like a spiritual expertise, and recording the Prime 40 on my cassette recorder despartately making an attempt to verify I pressed pause play in the proper sequence to keep away from the DJ voice over!
3) Corona, Rhythm of the Night time (1993)
This takes me again to nighttime golf equipment, rising up in Dublin and being with all my childhood associates.
This was our track, it was the one the place you place your bag down and also you went onto the dance ground.
I struggled to choose only one observe from that period of dance music, as a result of there was a lot of it that we beloved.
There was Haddaway, there was Daft Punk, there was Darude… they’re all tracks that take me again to an actual time and place and convey me so many pleasure, nonetheless to today.
“I used to be at a party just lately, this got here on and I couldn’t have been happier! It’s wonderful the impression one observe can have.”
In actual fact, I used to be at a party just lately and this got here on and I couldn’t have been happier! It’s wonderful the impression one observe can have.
It was a good time to be going out in Dublin, whether or not to bars that hosted dwell gigs with DJs approaching after. or the golf equipment on Leeson Road.
4) U2, I Nonetheless Haven’t Discovered What I’m Wanting For (1987)
Being Irish, I can’t undergo this listing with out having a U2 observe – it’s the regulation. So I’ve gone with I Nonetheless Haven’t Discovered What I’m Wanting For.
I got here to The Joshua Tree fairly late, really. I imply clearly U2 have been all over the place in Eire, particularly Dublin, once I was rising up, however I got here to the storytelling side of this period some time after it first got here out. It’s now an album and a track that I’m going again to time and time once more.
I feel it simply hit me greater than the early stuff and it’s most likely extra my musical model. There are some fairly arduous hitting political lyrics in there, however with this one, on a private degree, you’re in your twenties and also you’re like, so the place is that this bloody knight in shining armor?!
I’ve seen them dwell lots of instances, however the one I keep in mind most was from their Elevation tour once they performed Earl’s Courtroom. I received in actually early and I used to be proper on the entrance. It was simply such a second.
“they couldn’t consider an Irish lady runs Abbey Street! They beloved that.”
Everybody in Dublin has a narrative about Bono. There’s a pub they hand around in Dalkey, which is the world they dwell in. I’d seen them in there a few instances and stated howdy. After which in true Irish model you spend the remainder of the night pretending they’re not well-known.
After which at Abbey Street I had a beautiful second. They did a Christmas particular in Studio One and I received to face within the room whereas they recorded. To face two ft away from U2 doing all of the hits was simply unimaginable.
And they’re so beautiful, so good. I keep in mind them saying they couldn’t consider an Irish lady runs Abbey Street! They beloved that.
5) Coldplay, Velocity of Sound (2005)
This isn’t really my favourite Coldplay track, however the motive I picked it’s as a result of it has a extremely particular place in my reminiscence financial institution.
I joined EMI Music, which was my first job within the music trade, in late 2004, simply as X&Y was about to return out. It was clearly a massively essential album for the band and for EMI.
The build-up to it contained one in every of my most surreal moments of being an government in recorded music. I used to be in a boardroom as a part of a gaggle who have been all males, other than me. It was the Parlophone gang and all the management of EMI, listening to the report to attempt to resolve the lead single.
They performed three songs and ultimately selected Velocity of Sound. So, to start with, how thrilling is it to be one of many first folks on this planet to listen to this? However, extra bizarrely, in a boardroom filled with music males, when this track began, everybody began doing one thing: air guitar, air drums, standing up and correctly swaying round and dancing.
I used to be like, what the hell… I didn’t realise you needed to do one thing? Can I get away with simply tapping a pencil?
It was a tremendous period for EMI. Coldplay have been critically established at that stage, plus there was Gorillaz, there was Corinne Bailey Raye, there was KT Tunstall. We have been on an actual run, and it was all actually resonating within the US as nicely.
Extra just lately, I noticed Coldplay at Glastonbury final 12 months they usually have been simply wonderful. The best way they’ll get 100,000 folks to expertise one thing that’s really unqiue and transferring… I really took my youngsters to that and at one level my seven-year-old son stated, ‘Are all gigs like this?’ If solely!
6) Ed Sheeran, The A Workforce (2011)
One other beautiful human, and being only a small a part of his profession is one other privilege of working on this trade, which we are able to typically take as a right.
Ed was newly signed to Atlantic once I joined Warner first time round. He got here into a world assembly and performed A Workforce, simply him and a ukelele. At the same time as a non-A&R particular person, I knew he was wonderful right away – to see such uncooked expertise at that proximity was unimaginable.
“he turns into one of many largest artists on this planet. And I’m left pondering, I noticed him in a boardroom!”
It’s a part of the magic of this enterprise that now we have A&R folks like Ed Howard and Max Lousada, who discovered Ed and understood utterly his artistic imaginative and prescient and the success he needed to realize, plus advertising groups who understood place every thing and get behind it – and from there he turns into one of many largest artists on this planet. And I’m left pondering, I noticed him in a boardroom!
Ed has an absolute magic system: an amazingly proficient artist, an distinctive songwriter, an exceptional performer, a wonderful character who can win over the media and followers – and who can do all of it with good grace.
7) The Beatles, Come Collectively (1969)
Clearly I needed to have a minimum of one observe with an Abbey Street connection, and this one simply appeared good.
Operating Abbey Street for eight years has been one of many absolute privileges of my life. It’s only a phenomenal place, steeped in historical past. You continue to get the goosebumps going up the steps.
After all its story is so interwoven with the Beatles, and this specific track is from Abbey Street, which is the album that named the studio. Till then, it had all the time been often called EMI Studios.
The connection between the 2 is magical, and while you convey folks to the studio, the very first thing they need to see is Studio Two, the Girl Madonna piano, and so on.
These are the fables that the studio is constructed on, however they’re not fables; they’re a part of the fact of that constructing, they’re the results of how the Fab 4 – together with Sir George Martin – labored with that studio.
We did lots of playbacks of Beatles songs, and that is one which we used rather a lot, so it’s ingrained in me as a observe that represents my time there.
My time at Abbey Street was filled with very surreal moments: I’m in Abbey Street, which is mad sufficient, I’m operating Abbey Street, which is loopy – and now I’m simply casually saying howdy to Paul McCartney within the hall!
8) Dua Lipa, Levitating (2020)
I really really feel like I owe so much to Dua Lipa, for this track and this album. It got here out in lockdown after we have been all within the depths of melancholy, lots of us struggling fairly a bit with this unprecedented state of affairs, after which there’s this irresistibly joyful and uplifting album reminding us that we are going to be again on the market at a while sooner or later.
One factor I did to protect my sanity in lockdown was go for a run alongside the Thames, and I’d ensure that I planted this track midway via my playlists to carry me and preserve me going.
It was the album all of us wanted. It was type of a throw again to the eighties, and to the times of disco, so it was each acquainted and new – all made even higher by an exceptional voice. It was my salvation.
At Sony Music Publishing (SMP), we consider each voice issues. We’re the #1 international music writer, advancing the artistry of the world’s best songwriters and composers for over 25 years. We preserve songwriters on the forefront of every thing we do, and design our suite of providers to amplify alternatives, construct connections, and defend their rights. Our roster advantages from a world group dedicated to offering help at each profession stage. From basic catalogues to up to date hitmakers, historical past is all the time being written. We’re part of the Sony household of world firms. Study extra about SMP right here.Music Enterprise Worldwide
