Undefeated: Frank Turner talks about his creative processes and affiliation with Nottingham ahead of his Rock City show

Hi Frank – firstly, let’s talk about Nottingham. You’ve played here a lot: two shows last year and an upcoming one for the Undefeated Tour on 6th April. What does the city mean to you?

I love Nottingham. The main thing for me is Rock City. It’s the only venue I have tattooed on my arm, and I played my 2000th show there back in 2016. It’s an amazing place to be around!

I’ve heard it’s your favourite venue. What makes it so special to you?

It’s a great space, great PA. The people who run it and the attitude is brilliant. Not many people do it like that. It has an amazing reputation and a DIY attitude, I would say. The stage too, the mechanics behind it. It’s run differently and the people behind it know what they are doing and have turned it into an amazing space. 

I agree, it’s a really special place for live music. You’ve played smaller venues here too including Saltbox last year for your successful world record attempt for the greatest number of gigs played in 24 hours. How was that whole experience?

Brutal and gruelling - something I’m filing under “extremely glad I did it and glad I don’t have to do it again!” Nottingham wasn’t too bad as it was in the first half. We had cabs from place to place too. It was fun - I don’t want to be gloomy, but it was hard work. Guinness World Records originally wanted a huge amount of money to cover it, but it was a charity thing raising money for small venues, so giving to this big corporation didn’t feel right and we said no. However, it’ll be in the next Guinness Book of World Records, so it’ll be all official soon. 

In April, you embark on the UK leg of the Undefeated tour. How did Undefeated come to fruition as an album? 

I try to low-level write all the time. Over the pandemic, I had a bunch of songs I was pleased with and decided to produce it myself. That was different. We decided to record it at my house, which was an experience too. It feels like a pretty natural record to me. There’s a new drummer, too. We’ve been doing it on tour for a while now but it’s amazing to play live. The band is adaptive so the songs can be punk if they need to be punk or folk if they need to be folk - they’re really good.

How do you turn your vast and diverse catalogue into a tour-ready selection? Is there any fear over missing fan-favourites out?

Well, everyone’s going to miss something out. I spend an unhealthy amount of time thinking about set lists and gigs and tours and what to play. Sometimes I’ll take requests by email. 

Normally, if it’s an album tour, I’ll play things off that album first and foremost. It’s never really the same every night though. Every show is different. It’s amazing though, to have these “play it or get killed” songs, that people need to hear at shows. For me it's Recovery and Get Better. Some people come to see me at every show at a place, others every three to five years - so it’s hard really to pick what’s best for everyone.

How do you see your older work, for example Sleep is for the Week? I’ve heard you say live that it was written when you were at a very different point in your life, but do those songs hold up for you personally?

I mean there’s so much that goes into it - each album is a snapshot of a period of time. Sleep is for the Week is me at 24/25, and it has this naivety that I don’t have any more. Not to say that I don’t like it, but it’s different - I’m different. I mean I had no idea when I released that album that anyone would listen to it, let alone that eighteen years later we’d be having a conversation about it now - it’s crazy to me. 

So how do you write songs and has this process changed over the years?

Every song is different, I don’t really have a set process and that’s never changed. Like for On My Way from Undefeated, we did about nine different versions and arrangements, then decided to have it just me and the guitar. But other tracks I know what I want straight away, like No Thank You for the Music - I knew it would have that sound.

What are your big musical influences at the minute?

Well, I listen to entire catalogues of songwriters, bordering on obsession. Once I learnt every ABBA song just because I liked the chord structures! Man, I love Nick Cave too - he’s just incredible. I listened to every song of his in chronological order recently. I was a fan for a while then it became just obsessive. I’m not pretentious but I really like to study songwriters. 

And finally, what are your influences that maybe aren’t musical?

Not to sound pretentious but I really love poetry - 20th Century modernism, Larkin etc. It all seeps its way into my work, too. The song Undefeated, most of it comes from a book by Carl Jung, it’s all just in there and you can see it if you’ve read the book. It just leaks into the song.

Frank Turner plays Rock City on Sunday 6 April

@frankturner