Music Buzzz Podcast - Music Interviews, Commentary & History · Music Buzzz Podcast

Ep. 128: Phil Manzanera & Andy Mackay (Roxy Music & more)

·1 hr 9 min·2 clips

The Music Buzz Podcast welcomes guitarist Phil Manzanera and saxophonist Andy McKay. Dan Clark, Hugh Sign, and Andy Wilson open with the live double disc, double vinyl set AM, PM, Soho Live. That record is the starting point, but the conversation soon opens into stories from the Roxy Music years. They go back to the very early days, when the band did not yet have many songs. On those first tours, they had to make the set long enough by stretching out with instrumental sections. Those passages often began as a solo and then kept moving. Sometimes Eno would loop something. Sometimes Phil would answer with another line. Andy describes that as the band reacting instinctively to one another in real time. Fifty years later, he says, that same kind of interaction still feels fun rather than forced. The talk keeps coming back to listening. The players are not just performing parts. They are talking through their instruments. The hosts compare that to jazz in the practical sense, not as a genre flex, but as a way of describing spontaneous playing that still has shape. Phil agrees that a big arena show still has to serve the song. People come expecting to hear the song as it is known. That leaves room, but not endless room. The band has to keep the shape of the tune while still letting something happen in the room. The episode also folds in the covid lockdown period that helped shape the live record. That part of the story gives the project a more therapeutic edge. From there, the conversation drifts into more career memory and side-road chat. It feels like a backstage hang among people who have lived with records, tours, artwork, and band lore for decades.

As heard by us

A loose, engaging Roxy Music conversation that shows how the band turned live improvisation into something disciplined.

Phil Manzanera and Andy Mackay talk through AM, PM, Soho Live on the Music Buzz Podcast, and the best part is how unforced it feels. The discussion keeps circling back to Roxy Music's long live passages, built when the band had only a small songbook to work with.

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Why you'd press play

Press play for a Roxy Music hang built around AM, PM, Soho Live and the band instinct behind it.

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