HE’S BEEN NOMINATED FOR nine Grammys; shared Newark Festival’s stage with the Rolling Stones’ Mick Taylor; is signed by legendary bass player Andy Fraser – and, in his native UK, he’s barely old enough to vote. Tobi Earnshaw, just 18 years old and already being critically compared to rock monoliths John Mayer, Stevie Ray Vaughn and Eric Clapton, is rather more boy-next-door than such accolades might imply. Until, that is, his fingertips meet the strings of a guitar. What happens next shouldn’t be possible for someone who produced an unholy cacophony when he cradled one for the very first time aged 12, but the success of his debut album Spirit In Me, recorded just three years later, suggests the improbable is precisely what this young, London-born biker does best. The only artist handpicked by Andy Fraser, of Free fame, for his label Mctrax International, Tobi is poised to release his second album as he sets out in August on his first tour of Asia (expect workshops and performances at ICAN International School and The Youth School in Phnom Penh). The Advisor cornered Tobi in the studio to talk man-crushes, selling his soul to the Devil and being described by dmme.net as the ‘British answer to Justin Bieber’.
Dad was a saxophonist, but you picked up your first instrument relatively late.
We had this guitar which one of Dad’s old band mates had given to him. I found it in his room, picked it up and thought: ‘I’ll try to play it.’ I went downstairs and said to Dad: ‘Is this a chord?’ ‘Um, no…’ I’d made this noise that was absolutely awful, so he showed me a basic A chord and an E chord and then said to me: ‘Do you actually want to learn the guitar?’ At the time my parents owned a theatre school and there was a student whose dad was a session musician called Billy Liesegang – he’s played with Nina Hagen, David Bowie, Red Hot Chili Peppers – and he’d lent me a guitar. I hated singing at the time.
And your mum had to blackmail you into singing at your first open mic?
It was even worse than that! She didn’t expect me to sing; that’s why she said she’d buy me a guitar if I did. I was 14 at this point, which was when I started really getting into the blues. This is when I first found Gary Moore. Mum said: ‘If you learn the Gary Moore song Still Got The Blues and play the solo, I’ll buy you a new guitar.’ So I played it and got my new guitar and I’ve been singing ever since. After that I really got into John Mayer, because I saw him at the Crossroads Guitar Festival with Eric Clapton. That’s when I started songwriting: I looked him up on YouTube and was absolutely amazed with the way he writes his songs. I became obsessed; I call him my man-crush. That’s how deep it goes. You can imagine: I’m sitting at school with my headphones on and my guitar, learning Hotel California, while everyone else is listening to the stereo. Stevie Ray Vaughn, Jimi Hendrix, Johnny Winter, Gary Moore, George Benson…
You’ve been compared to some extraordinary musicians already: from folk you’ve cited as influences, such as Mayer and Vaughn, the list goes wildly off the deep end and you’ve been called – and I quote – ‘Britain’s Justin Bieber.’ How do you feel about that? In certain places, that’s considered an insult…
[Laughs] It is! It is! To be perfectly honest, I try to look at it from a positive point of view: he’s definitely done something right. Maybe if it’s also being said that I’m influenced by John Mayer and Stevie Ray Vaughn I can be more of a respected musician. You won’t be hearing any Justin Bieber covers from me, I can tell you that. If you’re going to introduce me to anyone while I’m in Cambodia, the worst thing to say would be: ‘He’s the English version of Justin Bieber.’
Have you been asked to define your own sound yet?
As a musician I’m really critical, so if I was asked to define myself I don’t know; I just sort of sing a melody and try to stay in tune! There are pop magazines who say: ‘We won’t take you because you’re too blues for us.’ Then there are blues magazines that say: ‘We won’t take you because you’re not blues enough.’ I’ve had interviews with MOBO… and there’s something else I was going to say but I’ve completely forgotten what. I’m having a senior moment and I’m only 18! I’ve been doing radio interviews all week and this keeps happening; it’s ridiculous!
Let’s talk more about these interviews. How does it feel being catapulted into the professional rock realm at your age?
Three days after my GCSE exams, I flew over to America to do a three-month tour to promote my first album, which is where that Justin Bieber-ish video, Brighten Up My Day, happened – I was only 15 and signed to Andy Fraser, the bass player with Free. Everyone wanted to talk to Andy and hear what he’d done in his past, maybe bringing me in at the end because I’m his new project. I’d just sit there and be really nervous. Now I’ve been doing interviews for a couple of years, I just roll with it. People ask me: ‘Have you figured out what you’re going to say yet?’ Well, no. Everything comes naturally. When you say it naturally, you mean it.
Do you remember your first meeting with Andy Fraser?
Yes I do! It was actually quite similar to this; you meet all the important people on Skype [Laughs]. I had my guitar in my hand – that was the only difference. He emailed me and we sent over the Brighten Up My Day video before he’d remixed it then Nothing’s Going To Stop Us, from my first album. We talked on Skype and then another email came through with a recording contract and publishing contract. Being 15 at the time, you don’t really understand these things. Even now it doesn’t seem like it’s happening. I don’t know whether it’s that I’m the least excitable person, but I just thought: ‘Yeah, that’s cool.’ The cool thing was when he flew me out to America for the meeting: I get a flight to LAX and I’m there with my dad, who’s my headmaster as well, and we got picked up in a limo. It was a bit strange because I’d never met him before, but I know who he is because one of the first songs I learned was The Stealer, by Free. My guitar teacher’s band was named after that song. So I went up to him, he smiled at me and gave me a hug and goes: ‘Do you want some sushi?’ By the end of the trip, it felt like we’d known each other for years. Andy’s very warm and open.
You’ve said in a previous interview that he spends most of his time locked in the hotel toilet when you’re on tour together because you can’t stop playing guitar.
[Laughs] There are two truths to that: I play guitar loads and he does get fed up with it sometimes, but not as much as my parents because I play during Coronation Street and that’s on every night. The other truth is that Andy does spend most of his time in the toilet: after every meal he’ll go to the toilet, brush his teeth and do his mouthwash. The other day we were sitting outside in the smouldering heat and he spent ages in there. Is he having a shower in there or something?!
Let’s talk about your first album: nine tracks, recorded when you were just 15.
We did it in Andy’s house; he has a studio there. We did the album in three weeks. We’d have a day to do each thing: a day to do the guitar; a day to do the vocals. It was an amazing experience, listening to Andy talk – especially when I was younger, because now I’ve heard the majority of his stories but they never, ever get boring [Laughs]. One of the stories was about when him and Paul Rodgers got together and helped each other out by finishing each other’s songs. They learned a lot about how to write. I’ve met Paul, but because Free split up they don’t really talk much; even Andy says they’re never really on the same page.
There can be more politics in music than there is in actual politics.
Funny you should say that because – and this is another of Andy’s little stories – when Free first got together, Andy said to Paul Kossoff and Paul Rodgers: ‘Right, now, I’m the leader.’ Apparently they just looked at each other and Paul Rodgers was really angry. When I listen to their songs – I listen to Rodgers in Bad Company and the Free stuff – the choruses are so much like each other; very blues based. That’s what I like about working with Andy: he can teach me this stuff. Having someone else look over your song and bring it all back to the centre. I’ll do some R&B and then he’ll somehow bring it back to pop-rock. I don’t know how he does it. It’s great because I have half-written songs: I’ll write a guitar riff down on my phone, start it and then stop it. It’s great to get a different perspective. A lot of people say you should write a song all in one go, but if I do that and then go back to it I think: ‘What was all that about? Why was I whining so much?’
Hang on: don’t you have to be 60 and toothless to write in the great blues tradition?
[Laughs] If it would get me somewhere, maybe we could knock a couple of teeth out and I could shave all my hair off! I remember when I was younger, listening to Robert Johnson and trying to sell my soul to the Devil in my bedroom. I was about 13 and I had this little red guitar I’d chipped away at and sanded down. I was sitting in my room, playing this cheap bit of rubbish, thinking about Johnson and thinking I’d sell my soul if I could be one of the best guitarists in the world. I said it just like that, almost with contempt, but I don’t know if it’s happened yet.
Where were we? Ah yes, the first album.
I do that a lot, sorry. You can imagine what my room looks like, comparing it to my mind! Yeah, first album: one of the first songs I wrote was called There’s Always Hope. As you can see, I go off on tangents. When I was 14 I got robbed: three boys took my phone. They didn’t even want it; they put it on the floor and stamped on it and they took a bite out of my Crunchie bar! You can imagine what happened next. I went home and started playing this groovy sort of blues riff. I’d play it all the time and my parents used to get so annoyed with me. Rather than going: ‘Oh, I got robbed yesterday…’
[Singing] Da nah nah nah nah… Wait, I know this one!
[Laughs] It was more about OK, what was that? One day out of my life, just like many others. It’s about turning it around. People can hurt you and hate you… and what? You keep on going; you keep the right mentality. I don’t really care, to be honest, because I’m going somewhere even if it’s not with music and I’ve always believed that – not in a big-headed way, but I’ve always felt that. It’s like a hint that someone’s given you; it’s there in your mind. You’ve got the drive to want to do something and that’s enough. That’s the way I go about writing most of my songs.
Your second album is due out soon. What’s changed since the first?
I was only 15 when I did the first and I listened to the critics – as a musician, I criticise myself a lot but it means more coming from someone else – and it was all: ‘It’s very good but he’s still very young and naive.’ This next album, I want to make it more like I’ve moved on because that was the main thing that stuck in my head: ‘young and naive’. I’ve always been one of those people who want to be older than they are. Ever since I was 13, I was going on 30 anyway – that’s what my mum used to say. Seeing as how I hang around all the old rock musicians, I sort of adopt their way of speaking – in the good way and the bad way.
How far does the new album go in communicating that you’re no longer ‘young and naive’?
I think I could have done better, but I’m always going to criticise myself. I try to be positive, especially in interviews otherwise it seems like I’m moaning all the time, because that’s what I normally do! But talking about the songs, they’re more about a teenager – I say that and I hate myself for calling myself a teenager – there are songs on there, like Lips Of Sin, that I hope show my maturity. That’s one of the songs I’ve written that’s like a story.
Lips Of Sin? That’s something someone your age should know nothing about! Is your mother there? Can I have a word with her?
[Laughs] That’s why the door’s closed! I don’t want her listening to it, but it’s a story I have to tell. For my 18th birthday we went out to a club. A girl I knew turned up quite randomly and we were in the VIP area. She was dancing about – the lyrics are ‘Played me all night, she was reeling me in’ – but I’m not very good at reading the signals. We were dancing and then she pushed me away. We got a cab back – I paid, of course – and we’re sitting there. She pours a drink, gives it to me and I go in for a little kiss then she pushes me away and says: ‘Right, I’m off. See you later.’ What was that all about? Leading you on and then… I don’t know. So that was my very interesting 30-second summing up of what was at least an eight-hour saga.
WHO: Tobi
WHAT: “Likened to John Mayer and Robin Thicke, TOBI is actually right in the middle of the two, with a smooth sound enriched by perfect guitar sweeps.” – Music-News.com
WHERE: Latin Quarter, Street 178; The Village, #1 Street 360; Memphis Pub, Street 118 and The Quay, Riverside
WHEN: August 16 (Latin Quarter), 17 (The Village), 24 (Memphis) & 27 (The Quay)
WHY: “Having Tobi not only on the Grammy eligibility list but in multiple categories is confirmation of my initial instincts that here is a new, young artist to be reckoned with” – Andy Fraser