Ed O'Brien Ep Draft
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Sierra Shafer: Everybody. Great to see you all. Thank you for being here. Our final day of Outside Days. You guys having a good weekend? Awesome. Well, I am so excited to introduce this next segment. Uh, our next guest is best known as the guitarist and songwriter of a little band you may have heard of called Radiohead.
Uh, what brings him... Yes.
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PADDYO VO:
Every year at the end of May, Outside throws a huge festival called Outside Days—think music and art and films and ideas. Shot through all of it are stories about how the outdoors impacts people from every walk of life. Sure, there are always big names that you might expect—I definitely saw Alex Honnold drinking a lemonade and Jeremy Jones rocking out to the Flaming Lips. But the beauty of Outside Days is that it pulls people into the greater outdoor community who [00:01:00] you probably aren’t expecting—people like songwriter and guitarist Ed O’Brien.
You might not know Ed, but you’ve heard him. As one of the driving creative forces behind Radiohead, he’s responsible for some of the most influential music of the past 30 years. In recent years, Ed’s branched out into solo work, which has culminated in the recently released album and short film called Blue Morpho. Both explore his journey through pandemic-induced depression, a time Ed describes as his “dark night of the soul.”
What does any of this have to do with the outdoors? Well, Ed’s journey through that darkness took place largely in the rugged, remote Welsh countryside, which became both a sanctuary and a muse. It provided a routine and a context within which he began to heal, and it revealed to him sounds quite literally on different wavelengths from the ones he used to hear.
Blue Morpho [00:02:00] is an expression of transformation and a representation of how music and landscape shapes and holds us if we allow it to. This conversation, recorded live at this year’s Outside Days, is about all of that and quite a bit more. I hope you enjoy it and, if it doesn’t convince you to explore Wales, it should at least inspire you to join us next year at Outside Days.
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for what's sure to be a fascinating discussion, so please stick around for that.
And for now, please enjoy the short film.
Ed O'Brien: I fell in a hole. It felt like a very deep hole.
You know, you can call it depression. I call it my, my, uh, my dark night of the soul
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A quick note, here we showed Blue Morpho the film to the audience. [00:03:00] It's about 16 minutes long and in deeply moving, ethereal scenes filmed in the woods of Wales, it follows Ed through walks on ancient celtic paths. As he gathers totems from the woods, each scene is narrated by Ed and the film is scored by his new music. The final scene shows Ed adding the totems to others previously gathered around a campfire in a ceremony of thanks. It is a absorbing short documentary that represents Ed's personal transformation and creative process, a wonderful representation of the outdoors' influence on art and our hearts. You can check it out on Ed's Youtube channel. For now, enjoy this chat I had with Ed. I know I sure did.
Sierra Shafer: All right, please join me in welcoming to the stage Paddy O'Connell and Ed O'Brien
Ed O'Brien: [00:04:00] Thank you
Paddy: There's the Outside days I know and love.
Ed O'Brien: Lovely to see you all on a Sunday evening, right? Yeah. Or afternoon.
Paddy: Church with Ed. Ed, I've got several billion questions for you, but we've only got about 35 minutes, so we're just gonna jump into the meat of the matter. The film and the album are amazing. Thank you and congratulations.
Thank you. Uh, in large part, we have the countryside of Wales to thank for this. Can you tell us all who have not been to those woods why they're so special for you and what they do for you?
Ed O'Brien: Who's been to Wales here? Hands up. Oh, pretty good. Well, you probably feel the same way as I do. It's a [00:05:00] very, very ancient land.
Paddy: Mm.
Ed O'Brien: Um, it's Celtic, so it very much likes Scotland, Ireland, Cornwall, Brittany, that west coast, even down to Galicia in Spain, and there's something very, very, very old about this place. It has... You feel it. I mean, I've always felt it. We always used to go on holiday, you know. We always used to head west from Oxford, and you get into these valleys and hills and trees and old oak trees and rivers.
There's lots of rain, there's lots of water. And I've always felt, I've always felt at home there. Mm-hmm. I can't explain. The first time I went to Mid Wales is where, where I live 12 years ago. I'm so- I've, I've lived in Oxfordshire, Oxford, Manchester, London. This was the first place. There is something per- And you go on these walks and these [00:06:00] old trails and paths, and you know people have been walking them for thousands of years.
Mm-hmm. So it's old. Nature is in abundance. Um, it's, uh... And, and the seasons hit, you know. It's, it's, it's... You know, winter out there is tough. You know, I'm... Probably not as tough as a winter in Minnesota. Not that I've had a winter in Minnesota.
Paddy: I have, and it's- Okay ... colder than hell.
Ed O'Brien: Yeah. Yeah, it's... But it's that same you, you feel the seasons.
So you feel, you feel part... You feel connected to this incredible, beautiful planet that we live on.
Paddy: Well, i- in part is the specialness of the place maybe the lack of urbanization? Is it the openness there? Because I know you and your family, during COVID, left London and went to Wales. So what was the [00:07:00] impetus of that decision?
Ed O'Brien: Just to be in the country. And you're right, it's the, the, the, the county Powys is one of the largest counties in the, in, in Britain, but it ha- It's the least populated. So you're right, there is the, the... There aren't that many people there. But at the same time- The land. You know, you go to these places around the world.
I f- I resonate strongly with ... I've, I mean, I think America is an extraordinary country. I travel... I was very blessed, very fortunate in 1987 between high school and college to travel around by Greyhound.
Paddy: Mm.
Ed O'Brien: And, and I came- You
Paddy: said that that's fortunate, the Greyhound?
Ed O'Brien: Listen, it was-
Paddy: Ed, I love the way you think, brother.
Ed O'Brien: It was a great, it was a great education for a, for a, for a 19-year-old- ... kid. And it was amazing. And I ha- I, you know, 'cause I was, like, the only 19-year-old white kid on the... You know- Yeah ... it was so amazing for me to experience the underbelly [00:08:00] of America, which was really important. The people who, the dispossessed- Mm
who seem to always, you know, and the places where the great... Anyway, I won't get into that. Um, but what was amazing was, and I came here and I came to Denver, and we took a some- we, we took a bus then up to Boulder, and then this truck picked us up and from this dude ranch and took us to Estes Park, but that was great.
But the reason I'm mentioning this is because America is so beautiful. And, you know, certain parts of America, you feel the pa... I, I resonate with, I've always loved New Mexico.
Paddy: Mm.
Ed O'Brien: Something about that place, and y- and those places where we feel alive and we feel connected, and we feel like a, a tiny part.
You know, we're not centered. You know, human-
Paddy: Is that, is that what you felt also in the, in the woods of Wales? Yeah.
Ed O'Brien: A little bit of tininess? I feel like, I
Paddy: think,
Ed O'Brien: I think part of the problem of the, part of the problem about being a human being right now on our planet is that- [00:09:00] Human beings think they're the center of the universe.
Paddy: Mm.
Ed O'Brien: And we're not.
Mm.
Ed O'Brien: And that's part of the problem. We're like these sort of, like, you know, uh... Again, I won't get into this. But I like feeling like we are part of something bigger. You know, we are part of... We are, we, we, we, we, we, we are, yeah, we're, we're immersed in nature. That's when I feel happiest.
Paddy: Mm-hmm.
Ed O'Brien: When I, I think with mental health and things like that, and, and, and all that stuff, I know that when I'm in nature and really in nature, but being in her and not trying to dominate her-
Paddy: Mm ...
Ed O'Brien: trying to be in there- Yeah ... and just move consciously and carefully and appreciatively, and I feel better.
Paddy: Well, let's dig into that.
You, you alluded to the mental health aspect of being outside and its importance, um, in, in [00:10:00] this season of your life where Blue Morpho came from. And, and during COVID, COVID was weird- ... for all of us.
Ed O'Brien: Really?
Paddy: It was a little odd, you could say. Yeah. Um, uh, especially for you personally. You've described this time as being one of the deepest depressive episodes of your life, and I'm wondering if that was brought on by the isolation of the pandemic or if something else triggered that prior to all the lockdowns.
Ed O'Brien: I, I think there are, i- it's, there are many things, but one of the things, you get to a point, as I was alluding to in the film, where- What, what are midlife crises? What are breakdowns? My understanding, my-- the way I frame it was my body said, "Enough."
Paddy: Mm.
Ed O'Brien: These things that we... You know, I was reading Gabor Maté, [00:11:00] and Gabor Maté says-- talks about addiction, autoimmunes, everything.
He s- it goes, always goes back to the childhood. And I was just like, "Ah, yes." And literally my-- what my body was saying, "You have to process this stuff that you never processed."
Crowd: Mm-hmm.
Ed O'Brien: And, and I, I had the feeling, "Once you do, you'll be fine." And so that's literally what it was. What COVID did, and it was the second lockdown, we were in London 'cause the kids had had the-- we'd had the first lockdown in Wales, but they-- even though they couldn't school together, they didn't want the isolation of Wales.
Mm-hmm. So they-- we all went back to London. And what happened was that lockdown forced me to stop, like so many of us. Mm-hmm. And probably, like, I don't know if this resonates with many people out here, but I was always busy. I was always doing stuff. And I realized that was partly to keep running from the ghosts.
Paddy: Oh, yeah.
Ed O'Brien: Yeah?
Paddy: Oh, yeah.
Ed O'Brien: And, you know, [00:12:00] the hardest thing often is to sit still and not do anything, right? And, and lockdown forced me to do that, and that's when I, that's when I fell into the hole, and it was just-- And my body's saying, literally my body's saying, "You need to process this. This is, this is not sustainable."
I was a classic-- I, I was heading for an autoimmune, definitely. You know, I had all the symptoms. And, um, yeah. And, and, and what I also wanna frame it as well, I also wanna frame it as something incredibly beautiful to experience because, you know- We have this thing as human beings, don't we? We, we, we try to run from pain.
Paddy: Oh, yeah.
Ed O'Brien: You know? Right. It's a reflex that we all have.
Paddy: Yeah.
Ed O'Brien: And it's a pretty good reflex, right? Yeah. 'Cause it's-
Paddy: Yeah ...
Ed O'Brien: you know, let's face it, when we, when we were being chased by wild animals or something like that, it's... We want to avoid that. However, [00:13:00] I do think that we've got to this point in our life where, or in society, where there's this kind of almost absurd aversion to pain.
Now, some pain is important in our life because those challenges in our life, they are where we grow. That's where we... And literally those things, and I don't know if this again resonates, you know, if you've been through a really challenging part in your life and you've got through the other side, there are days, and many days, when all you, all you have to, all you do is hold on, right?
Yeah. It's one foot in front of the other. But I look back on that whole time, 'cause I came through it, and I look back on it as a, you know, as a really beautiful time because I was really hurting. Yeah. I was really in pain. But there is a beauty and a power in that if you can come through it, and I think that's the thing.
I think, you know, there's, there's, again, like I allude to, I [00:14:00] think as human beings we're capable of, of, of, of so much and absorbing so much.
Paddy: Yeah, that really resonates with me. I can understand that. There's a, a specific time period in my life where I felt almost as if I was a slave to sensation. You know?
Paddy like, Paddy run toward. You know? This hurts me, I will run away from this thing as, as, as fast and as hard as humanly possible. And one of the things that is interesting about the film and the album is that, you know, the backstory behind this is while you were deciding to turn and face this darkness and, and, and confront the things from the past, you set up a routine.
Mm. And I think a lot of times when we think about the creative process, we don't think about routines and schedules. But you had one that I, I wanna talk about because it's very interesting to [00:15:00] me. In the morning you would start off with Wim Hof breathing and cold water, and then you would play music from 8:00 until noon until, quote, "your brain frayed," and then you were too tired to do anything else.
Tell us how that set you up for success in facing the darkness, and also in the creative process.
Ed O'Brien: I... So I'm gonna add to that because that's... The, the framework is really important. It's, it's been something as well that I, I, um- I've learned, you know, like you, you... As you get older, you, you, you-- in order to deal with this stuff or to be as that cliché, the best version of yourself-
Crowd: Mm-hmm
Ed O'Brien: I find I have a framework to the day. And what I find with fr- what I find with creativity, and this was always the case with Radiohead, you know, you start at eleven. W- In Radiohead, we'd start at eleven and work through the day, and when [00:16:00] we finished was... You know, but you'd have breaks for lunch, you'd have breaks for supper.
Um, but, but creativity hangs off framework. I remember... So my day actually starts, I get up and I meditate for half an hour, and then when I meditate-- after I've meditated, I might do a bit of movement, a bit of Tai Chi, and then I'll drink some tea, and then I do the cold water and then... So, but I remember talking to, um, he didn't teach me meditation, but he said-- he talked to me about meditation and he said, "The thing about meditation is, an important thing is, is turning up at the same time each day on your mat."
Paddy: Mm.
Ed O'Brien: You know? And he said, "Because spirit, spirit first of all wants you..." So there's a commitment. It's that daily practice is a commitment. Spirit wants to see commitment, but also wants to know when you're gonna turn up, when you're gonna be there. And I know it sounds
Paddy: crazy- Oh, so it's like a re- it's like a relationship then.
Ed O'Brien: Yeah, it's like a relationship. It's, it's, it's kind of a [00:17:00] respectful thing and, and I feel the same thi-thing with creativity and I... Again, let's take... I've heard Paul McCartney say this about the Beatles. You know, those first few Beatles albums, they were in at nine and worked through till five.
Paddy: Mm.
Ed O'Brien: And during that window, that nine to five, so much creativity happened.
And I, so I, and for me, creativity is, it's a co-creation with spirit.
Paddy: Mm-hmm.
Ed O'Brien: That's how I see it. I mean... And so for me, that routine, what usually happens is the first two weeks you're given little things just to keep you on... Go, "This, this feels good." Then you suddenly have a, you, you, you have a sort of a major shift after a, after a couple of weeks or whatever it is, and then that time that you've, you've committed to, stuff starts pouring in.
Um, you should never expect it. It's not like a conditional thing. You're not like, "Well, if I'm gonna do that, then this is gonna happen." It's like [00:18:00] you... It's like Zen. You just do it, and- You just do it and you don't expect to have any rewards, and if stuff happens, great, and if it doesn't, great. And it, there's a sort of for me the whole process is of, and I'm learning this, it's like letting go.
But having this practice for me is, is really important and it feels really good. It feels like a, it feels like getting into a rhythm of life. Mm-hmm
Paddy: Can you tell us what was the relate- your relationship to the outdoors and its influence on the album? I mean, there's, there's s- you know, bird song, there's babbling brooks, there's ambient wood sounds in it.
So what was your personal time in the outdoors like within that routine, that daily practice?
Ed O'Brien: Well, in that daily practice, when we really got into it, so the wa- the cold water thing was walking barefoot, which I don't know, [00:19:00] I'm a... I didn't walk barefoot in the woods and stuff before down to the river.
Paddy: Mm-hmm.
Ed O'Brien: But I do, and there's, again, there's something incredibly powerful about that. I'm open to everything. Yeah. You know? I, you know, so, like, I will try everything, and someone said, "Oh, you should try, you, you, you," uh, what's the word? You ground. The whole thing about grounding. Yeah. And, um, it's powerful. And what I, and what we do, Paul, Riley, and I, Paul Epworth, Riley McIntyre, we would, we would head down to the, to the river, walk barefoot, get in the river, walk barefoot back, have a really hot shower when we got back 'cause it's freezing.
And then we would start at 11, and we felt alive. Yeah. We felt present. We felt connected. We'd have, you know, a microphone outside- Mm-hmm ... recording the birdsong. Um, we felt ready. We felt ready. And it's interesting because, this [00:20:00] is a slight digression, but it's all part of... I'd always had these sort of hierarchies in my life, like the work comes first.
Paddy: Oh, yeah.
Ed O'Brien: You know? Oh, yeah. You hold this thing up.
Paddy: Yeah.
Ed O'Brien: And I kinda let go of that, and I realized that walk down to the river and how you do it and what you're listening to and how you get in the river is as important as anything I might sing or play during that day. Mm-hmm. And once you release yourself of those sort of, again, use that word hierarchies and this has got to be right and that's got to be g- once you release yourself of that- That's when the flow starts happening.
Mm-hmm. And you just, and oh, something's come acro- So, um, yeah, it's, it's... I found a, I found a way on this album that has, that, which is totally new, a way to create that is for me really exciting and, and makes me like... You know, now I'm on the promoting this album, but today when I was, I walked to a really lovely little spot in [00:21:00] Denver for a matcha, and I've got, um, I've got the songs in progress, uh, that, you know, s- stuff that I've written for the next batch, and I'm like, "I'm feeling it."
So, you know, I, I'm, I'm, I, I re- I love, I love it. I love this thing. I love this way of creating. It's, it's, it's... 'Cause you're, you're in this place of uncertainty the whole time. I don't know what I'm doing, but the more I let go-
Paddy: But it, it sounds like you're in the flow and you're- Yeah ... ready to create even more- It's like, it's-
even though you're on the tour right now. Yeah. The
Ed O'Brien: post-tour pr- Yeah, I've got the promo hat on. Promo hat on,
Paddy: yeah.
Ed O'Brien: I've got-
Paddy: Well, this is gonna be great 'cause Ed's gonna be busking at the local Greyhound station- Yeah. ... tonight, so be on the lookout for that. So, prior to this time in your life, tell us what your relationship to the outdoors was.
Was it, was it COVID that inspired you, like it inspired so many of us, to kind of like, "Oh, man, I gotta get my toes in [00:22:00] the dirt right now"? Or was this episode in your life kind of a reignition of a lifelong relationship to the outdoors?
Ed O'Brien: It's lifelong, you know?
Paddy: Okay, so tell, tell me about that.
Ed O'Brien: Well, I grew up in Oxford up until the age of 10, but Oxford was a very leafy, very kind of...
And you know, I c- I was born in '68, and our parents hated us watching TV. It was always, "Get outside."
Paddy: Yep.
Ed O'Brien: You know, "Get outside. Play football. Play, you know, get outside." And we'd always go for walks, and I also come from, my mom's side of the family are just, they love being outdoors.
Paddy: Yeah.
Ed O'Brien: You know, my grandfather was a, was an ornithology...
He loved bird watching and, and our kind of, you know, our, our Sundays, we'd always have a big family walk.
Crowd: Mm.
Ed O'Brien: We'd always have a big family walk, and then we'd come in for the roast, you know, which is... And that, that, that, [00:23:00] I loved that, and I still love that. Yeah. You know, your three-hour walk, and then you come in and you cook the roast, and you eat at like 6:00, 7:00 in the evening.
I still love, so-
Paddy: I'm giggling because I think everybody in this room who loves the outdoors is like, "I'm going outside so I can eat something like that."
Ed O'Brien: Yeah. Come around to mine 'cause we'll have a nice slow- Nice
Paddy: English roast?
Ed O'Brien: Yeah. Yeah. Okay, Ed. Slow, slow-roasted shoulder of
Paddy: lamb. Everybody ready to go to Ed's place for dinner tonight?
Ed O'Brien: Cool. But yeah, I always loved it. And then I, I was... And then when my parents split up, my sister, my mom, and I moved to West Oxfordshire.
Crowd: Mm-hmm.
Ed O'Brien: And we were about two miles from the Uffington White Horse, which is an old Neolithic, beautiful... It's this hill called Dragon Hill, and there's this beautiful chalk, um, carving- Mm
of this immaculate white horse. It was the cover of, of, of XTC's English Settlement, and it's so beautiful, and we were two miles away from it. And again, it's a very, very old part of Britain. Avebury, the stone [00:24:00] circle, is 10 miles down the road, and I just loved being outside. Yeah. I wasn't... I didn't have the...
I didn't... You know, things like birdsong really came about and COVID my ears suddenly. I was... I sort of couldn't listen to music. All I could listen to was birdsong. But I've always loved being outside. I've always, um... I, I don't... And one of the things that drives me fucking crazy in hotels in America is you can't open the window.
It's, like, air con. It's, like, I... Even if it's, like, 90 degrees outside, I want the window open. It's like- I've had a lot of diva fits about not being able to open my window. Not about riders or potential drugs or... It's just- ... can someone please open this window? So yeah, I like to feel... I, I'm, I, I'm low maintenance.
Um- I just think it's
Paddy: funny that the, the stories we hear of rock stars throwing TVs out the window- Yeah ... at hotels is like, oh, it's just because Ed wants to hear the birdsong.
Ed O'Brien: That's exactly, [00:25:00] exactly. I like, I like feeling connected with the out- outdoors. Yeah. I love... I mean, I love animals. We grew up with dogs and...
But I love all animals, and I love, I love the natural world- Yeah ... in a very profound way. And you have. I mean, I was in Colorado last year in the, deep in near Salida and stuff.
Paddy: Mm.
Ed O'Brien: And, um, y- it's just extraordinary. I mean, your country's unbelievable. I mean, we've got these little valleys, and you've got, like, these- Wow, Mount Shavano, and it's like, what?
You know, on steroids. Yes. Countryside on steroids. That's
Paddy: the name of a new national park, actually. Yeah. Um,
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Paddy: was there a specific moment in the woods of Wales where, uh, uh- A flip of a switch [00:26:00] happened and, and you decided that the outdoors was going to become your next record studio, recording studio?
Because you've spent your life, you know, creating in the studio, uh, um, playing arenas, playing clubs. So when did the switch happen from the outdoors being a bit of a respite from that to this is, this is gonna be where and how I record?
Ed O'Brien: I don't know. I think it was a, like a process of osmosis. I've got no idea how it happened.
I, I'm, I'm... Like I said, I, I'm sort of letting go, so a lot of it is I'm kinda trying to switch off the mind and let it come up from the subconscious.
Paddy: Mm.
Ed O'Brien: So what it is, it's like a journey of intuition, so you're following what feels good, what doesn't feel good.
Paddy: Yeah.
Ed O'Brien: And just, and really- Really being true to that.
You know, I, I [00:27:00] always say this, I think your mind is the sum... It ha- it's the sum aggre- aggregation of all your experiences, right?
Paddy: Mm-hmm.
Ed O'Brien: I know how life is because of what I've experienced and what I can see.
Paddy: Okay.
Ed O'Brien: But the intuition works on a much deeper level. Your intuition, I believe, can see around the corner that your mind can't see.
It can also... It's tapped into the life arc, into the, to the, to the arc, the journey of our lives.
Paddy: Mm-hmm.
Ed O'Brien: So you think about... And so this is what I think that, you know, if you, if you, if you follow your intuition, often you'll find things that your mind will go, "Well, that doesn't make sense." You know, being in a band.
Paddy: Mm-hmm.
Ed O'Brien: You know, if my mind, you know... Take Radiohead. So we formed this band up from 17. The moment I... I think for all of us, the moment we connect with one another, this is it.
Crowd: Mm-hmm.
Ed O'Brien: But we've got university, we've got all this stuff, and if you look at all the s- [00:28:00] and if you look at all the stats about bands that get signed and bands...
Nobody got signed as a band from Oxford. And, and then bands that are successful, you would not be in a band. Your mind would say, "There is no point." But I think our intuitio- my intuition was screaming, "This is it."
Crowd: Mm-hmm.
Ed O'Brien: And intellectually, it makes no sense whatsoever, you know? But you feel it. And so I think that is, that's...
I've been very lucky because I had that blast of that very early on. I was just like, "Okay, this is it, and this is what I'm gonna do." So that has been my journey, is to, is to re- and is to, is to follow my intuition, to try and help, you know, not to, not to dull it, because I think there are things that you can do that can sway it, and you can get a bit...
But to preserve it, to, to try and look after it, and, and to, and to be true to it.
Paddy: Yeah. Uh, in addition to the intuition [00:29:00] that goes into songwriting and creating something like Blue Morpho, you also did make some very conscious decisions here, not just with the natural sounds being on the album, but how to tune the album.
Yeah. And Ed, I consider myself a bit of a music nerd, and the tuning on this album is way above my pay grade. Typical albums are tuned at 440 hertz, correct?
Ed O'Brien: Correct.
Paddy: Okay. Now, this entire album is tuned to 432 hertz, which is widely considered the natural or, get ready for this, cosmic tuning frequency of the natural world.
Everybody go, "Ooh."
Ed O'Brien: Can I, can I just interrupt you, Paddy?
Paddy: Absolutely, you can interrupt me,
Ed O'Brien: Ed. I'd be really interested. Who in this auditorium is aware of 432 hertz?
Crowd: You
Paddy: guys are so cool.
Ed O'Brien: Pretty good. And so
Sierra Shafer: much cooler than
Ed O'Brien: I am. I guarantee in 10 years... I- if this was 10 years [00:30:00] ago, if I'd asked you this question, I don't...
Maybe not one of you. I, uh... But it's growing. And I reckon if I asked this... If you, if we all come back in 10 years' time, I reckon over half of you will
Paddy: have heard of it. Ed's gonna send you guys a calendar invite for 10 years from now Clear your calendars. Okay. Yes. So now- Oh,
Crowd: you know it now. Exactly.
Paddy: So, so again, this is above my pay grade, so I, I'm wondering, I'm hoping- Yeah
because this is... there's a bit of woo-woo research behind this.
Ed O'Brien: No woo-woo, Paddy.
Paddy: It's all based in science.
Ed O'Brien: No, you take your... There is science.
Paddy: Tell me the science, because this, I- Okay ... I, it's... So I can't wrap my numbskull brain around it. This is
Ed O'Brien: what gets thrown at it's woo-woo. I remember when I, I w- first went on this deep dive.
So basically, 440 hertz is standard tuning.
Paddy: Right.
Ed O'Brien: And it was standardized at the end of the 1930s. Up until the 1930s, tuning fluctuated. We have concert pitch now, which is 442, [00:31:00] which is slightly sharper. So there are lots of old books which I've now read that said basically most music up until the end of the 19th century was played, and obviously, uh, written, composed at 432 hertz.
So the idea being... You threw in the cosmic thing, which makes it sound woo-woo, which is, you know... Uh, what I say is it's... What I feel is it makes music more whole, and the scientific part of it is there's this science of what's called cymatics.
Paddy: Mm-hmm.
Ed O'Brien: Do you know about that?
Paddy: I'm about to.
Ed O'Brien: You are. This, you won't be saying woo-woo anymore, Paddy, will
Paddy: you?
No, I... Well, the, the research that- No
Ed O'Brien: more woo-woo, Paddy ...
Paddy: the research that I know about this is that it can... 432 can lower your heart rate when listening to it. Well, I
Ed O'Brien: d- I, I, I don't know about that. I'm not cl- I'm not making those claims. Okay. What I am saying... So the science of cymatics is they basic- you basic blow frequencies at sand, and it forms shapes.
So [00:32:00] often in a studio sometimes you have an oscillator.
Paddy: Mm-hmm.
Ed O'Brien: And it will, it will move to the sound of the sound wave, so it's the same thing. So at 440, when you, when you blow the frequency at 440, you get these very, very, very frazzled kinda shapes. At 432 you get perfect geometric pattern. And, um- And this is also backed up by ad- Ayurvedic, by Eastern medicine.
So I had an experience. I've been on this deep dive now for about 12 years on this. I went to Bhutan, um, with my family 10 years ago on a holiday, was in this emporium. There was a man there in the corner, and he had all these bowls out, and he had his phone up, and he was measuring them. So what... I knew what he was doing, but I wanted to talk to him about it, so I went up and asked him what he was doing.
He was from Pune in India, from an ashram. He was a, he was an Ayurvedic, uh, doctor, and he was telling me that, [00:33:00] you know, in Ayurvedic medicine you... we have the seven chakras in our body-
Crowd: Mm-hmm ...
Ed O'Brien: that each of these bowls, these frequencies, tunes each of the e- each of the chakras has a frequency. Now, if you hit that frequency, you can start some incredible...
incredibly powerful work, healing, and they use it a lot, and four-three-two is one of these frequencies. So I am now on this... I have n- I, I've done AB tests in the studio where I've recorded someone at... something at four-forty, something at four-three-two, done a blindfold test, and for me it just feels whole.
And, and you know, it's interesting, there are musicians so, um, who was it? Um, uh, Ziggy Marley. There was an article Rolling Stone did recently, James Blake, and we... There's this kind... And, and, and musicians, um, Shabaka Hutchings who played on the record, musicians are starting to have this conversation. The music...
So the idea is it's not just pleasant on the ear, [00:34:00] but it... but if you think about those, what it, that, that, that pattern of four-three-two which is perfect and, and, and that's what's going on with every cell in our body.
Crowd: Mm.
Ed O'Brien: So I'm interested in perhaps there's a healing component or there's something that calms us or makes the music becomes more whole and particularly in the time that we're living in.
Paddy: Well, is, is that why you chose four-three-two?
Ed O'Brien: Because of the- I didn't choose it. I didn't choose it. Four- It
Paddy: chose you?
Ed O'Brien: Four-three-two it's, it's, it's, it's a very well-known... It's like A, it's middle A equals four-three-two hertz, so it's slightly flat from four-forty hertz.
Paddy: I guess what I'm trying to get at though- Yeah ... is in, y- you know, Blue Morpho to me is this like, this, this reckoning of your own emotional state, you know, given out to the world, and I'm wondering if in the tuning along with the r- composition, [00:35:00] the writing of the lyrics, y-
you are trying to promote a larger healing from your own personal journey, and if the 432 goes into that.
Ed O'Brien: I wouldn't be as grand as that, but, you know, um-
Paddy: Oh, be grand, Ed.
Ed O'Brien: Come on. No, I'm British. We can't be grand. We're We're, we, we apologize all the time. Sorry.
Paddy: Would you be a little Chicago for us- Yeah, yeah.
Well, tell me ... and just tell us how great you are?
Ed O'Brien: I, I think I, I guess, I guess I'm just putting it out there. I'm interested. I'm, I'm doing it 'cause I can do it.
Paddy: Mm.
Ed O'Brien: You know? I'm, I'm committing to I, I, I don't... I just... It's funny, I just do it. I'm going like, "Oh, that f-..." It's literally that feels right, and that's what I'm going on.
And I... So if people feel that, and it does s- if the... I don't have the answers. I could be barking up the wrong tree with 432.
Crowd: Okay.
Ed O'Brien: And I, I'm, I'm not saying this is right. Yeah. [00:36:00] I'm saying I'm curious. Mm-hmm. And there's some history there, and there's all these things that are happening. And, you know, maybe in 10 years' time I turn around and I go, " Oh, that was a bit of a, a detour, and I got it completely wrong."
And, and... But I, I'm happy to admit that. I mean, there, you know... Yeah, so it's, it's just a... It's... It just feels right at the moment. And, and yeah, I, I'm, I'm... Yeah, feels okay.
Paddy: Well, your, your time in the terrain of Wales creating new mu- music led to a heft of epiphanies. It led to this wonderful album and, and short film.
And I'm wondering if you can tell us what your plan is with these newfound revelations about the power, both creative and in the healing process, the emotional healing process, the power of the outdoors. What is your plan with these new revelations? Are you going to s- Just keep
Ed O'Brien: going outdoors.
Paddy: Are you gonna [00:37:00] spend more time in Wales, though?
I'm spending- Are you gonna come back here next
Ed O'Brien: year as
Paddy: a through hiker? I'm s- I'm spending...
Ed O'Brien: I'm s- I'm spending a lot of time in Wales. I, I think I'm... I feel... It's interesting 'cause, um, I want to... I've always wanted to record in America. I'm not just saying this. Uh, I've always been interested... I went to see the Rick Rubin studio yesterday, Shangri-La in Malibu, which is beautiful.
And that's... I was really... That c- that... Again, that country- that, that land out there feels really, really powerful. I've always wanted to go to Joshua Tree. There's a, there's a, there's a studio out there called El Rancho de la Luna. I wanna go and spend time in... I really wanna go and spend time in West Texas in...
I... Marfa and Big Bend. I would love to, um... Anyone from there? Anyone? We got
Paddy: some West Texas humans in here? Yeah. Oh, yeah.
Ed O'Brien: Yeah, I really wanna... And, uh, I [00:38:00] wanna spend a month in, uh, Estes Park. No. Uh, no, I would do. I'd love to... I love, I love Colorado, but I really wanna... I, I love the idea of... Because for me, I get inspired-
Paddy: Mm-hmm
Ed O'Brien: by the land that I'm in. And I think, not that I've done Wales, I will always, I will always have that, but I feel like I need to go out to these different places.
Paddy: Yeah.
Ed O'Brien: Um- Good one ... there's a note for you, Paddy. Tell him to shut up I
Paddy: just got a note
Ed O'Brien: Tell him to stop passed to
Paddy: me. I love you, Paddy. That's so nice.
It's from my wife.
Ed O'Brien: So, so yeah, I wanna, I wanna be, I wanna come, I wanna, I want to go different... I wanna record in Brazil. I, I want to let the land and see what happens and see what it does to me as a musician and the musicians perhaps that I work with and do stuff. So, um, I, I'm... I guess m- my work is all about, in a [00:39:00] way, it's all about celebrating the beauty of the planet that we live on.
Mm-hmm. She's so magical and I, I just... You know, I always say with my artist friends, oh, here's a sort of joke, supremely talented artist, and I go, "Yeah, but look at that sunset," you know? That's beauty. And in a way, I feel the same way about music. I think the natural world is, when we stop and really feel it and get in it, and, and I'm talking the proper natural world, not the suburbs.
Paddy: Mm-hmm.
Ed O'Brien: You know. That's- That's right ... and I've gr- I've-
Paddy: No shade on everybody from the suburbs ...
Ed O'Brien: I've lived in the suburbs, you know?
Paddy: And- Same ...
Ed O'Brien: that's, you can have all the nice lawns you want and stuff like that. I've done that, and, you know, all the pesticides that kill all the bugs and stuff. That ain't the natural world.
You're not gonna feel it. Get out there. So-
Paddy: Yeah ...
Ed O'Brien: um, yeah?
Paddy: Yeah.
Ed O'Brien: Yeah, we know. We, we know. We... Exactly.
Paddy: Well, the, the final track [00:40:00] of the album is called Obrigado, which is Portuguese for thank you, and it plays in the film's final section when you've collected moss and stone and wood, and then you set fire in the forest in a ceremony of thanks.
And nature and gratitude are the final themes that we're given, so I've gotta ask, what and who exactly are you thanking for, and for what?
Ed O'Brien: It comes from my, my... I've got a very strong, uh, spiritual framework, spiritual belief. I feel very connected with spirit in nature, with God. And, um, I guess Buddhism is of all them, I'm not a Buddhist, but I really subscribe to a lot of Buddhism, and particularly the, the doctrine of reincarnation I feel, and I feel in myself, I've had many lives, many, many lives on this planet.
So the doc- the, the reincarnation is essentially [00:41:00] the idea that as a soul, we choose, we incarnate, we come into our physical body when we're a, we're a fetus in the womb, and then when we die, that moment of die- dying, we leave our body. We leave our physical body. And I, I got obsessed with reading about near-death experiences and these kind of...
this sort of universal experience that happens. So Obrigado was really... it was putting myself-- At that moment of death, what am I going to be feeling? And I imagine myself coming out the top of my head and just sort of floating up and looking down. And first of all, you look down upon your family who are below you, and you feel, you know, um, this...
You f- you feel that love that you have for family. And, and as you move on up, you see, you see the natural world more and more, and you see this planet. And I think [00:42:00] I just have gratitude for everything and, and, and all the, again, all the challenges that you've had, all the things that, you know, the darkness that you faced, you'd be like, "Thank you.
I hope that, you know, I handled that in the best way that I could." But all-- And you look down on this beautiful planet and all these experiences, and you go, "Thank you for that life." So I was trying to, I was trying to musically kinda do that. I'm very visual. So yeah, that's what it was.
Paddy: That's a clappable moment.
Now, I've, I've got one final question for you, but before we get to that, I wanna let you know this magic note that I got passed. All guests in here today will receive a celestine stone as a gift when you exit, and that gift is from Ed.
Ed O'Brien: And Shelby. [00:43:00] Thank you, Shelby
Paddy: Now, my final question for you is that Outside Days is a festival for people who love the outdoors. Mm-hmm. And it is not always easy for us to get outside. Sometimes the dark monster who does a great impression of our voice keeps us indoors. Mm. And I wanna know, what would you want someone that's been stuck inside struggling with darkness to try the next time they attempt to step out the door?
Ed O'Brien: To trust nature, I think to trust that it might seem like the hardest thing to do, but to get out there and breathe in nature and feel the light and hear the birdsong and just notice it. And if you keep doing that more and more and build up the [00:44:00] rhythm of that, you might start with ten minutes, but just do that every day.
Take your shoes and socks off, even if it's muddy. We don't mind a bit of mud. It's good. Take your shoes and socks off. Walk barefoot. Feel it. Just-- And, and particularly early morning. I've started doing this in the early morning. If you saw me in Wales, you'd thought I were a madman. But in the early morning when the dew...
You know, she-- Nature, she heals, she recalibrates us through the water, the light, the land, her, her, her, her birds, which are, you know, for me, they're like Go-God's messengers.
Crowd: Mm.
Ed O'Brien: Just, just trust in it and build up a practice and do it. And yeah, see how it feels.
Paddy: Folks, Blue Morpho, the album, is out now. Blue Morpho, the film, will be available this Tuesday on YouTube.
I highly recommend you deep dive into both of [00:45:00] them as often as you can. Before you do that, I'd love you to please give it up for Ed O'Brien.
Ed O'Brien: Thank you very much.
Thank you. It's been a real pleasure to be in a room with you all. Thank you
Paddy: Enjoy the rest of the fest, everybody Yeah, enjoy. Thanks for being here.
Ed O'Brien: Thank you
FADE OUT AND DUCK UNDER VO
PADDYO VO:
Ed O’Brien is a songwriter and guitarist best known for his work with Radiohead. As a member of the group, he has helped shape a sound that has continually pushed the boundaries of rock, blending experimentation, atmosphere, and emotional depth. Ed recently published a brand new project, Blue Morpho, both an album and a short film. It draws on themes of nature, spirituality, and healing. And let me [00:46:00] tell ya, both the short film and the album are amazing. Go out and purchase the album at your local record store and watch the film on Ed's YouTube channel today.
You can watch the live on the Outside Days stage taping of this episode -- and other video episodes oh by the way -- on our YouTube channel at Outside Podcast 1. I highly recommend tuning in to all of them but this one specifically becuase Ed is just as tall as I am so there's just a ton of leg on screen. It's amazing. And I hope you come hang out with us at Outside Days next year.
The Outside Podcast is hosted and produced by me, Paddy O'Connell. But you can call me PaddyO. The show is also produced by the storytelling wizard, Micah "I′m a creep, I'm a weirdo. What the hell am I doing here? I don't [00:47:00] belong here." Abrams. Music and Sound Design by Robbie Carver. And booking and research by Jeanette Courts.
The Outside Podcast is made possible by our Outside Plus members. Learn about all the extra rad benefits and become a member yourself at Outside Online Dot Com Slash Pod Plus.