“I get to live out my prog fantasies!”
Former XTC guitarist Dave Gregory on being part of BBT.
How did you end up playing in Big Big Train?
It’s all thanks to David Longdon. He and I met in 1996, working with a French singer-songwriter called Louis Philipe. We stayed in touch, and then in March 2009, he called me to ask if I felt like playing guitar on something. That turned out to be the song Last Train from The Underfall Yard. It was the first time anyone had asked for a solo of that length from me in years: “You can’t be serious! No one wants to hear that!”
How did you end up becoming a full-time member? I just got morphed into it. Really the only full-time members are Greg and David. The rest of us are called upon when needed. I don’t need mean that in a negative way. It’s just a pragmatic way of looking at it. You’re all based in different places. How does the writing process work for you?
I’ll get a basic track, with Nick’s drums and usually a guide vocal and a title or sense of what the song is about. Then I’ll load it into my system at home and start thinking what guitars would sound best. The downside is that I’ll come up with something and half of it won’t be used, so I’ve wasted a lot of time, that’s become a bit of an issue. But for the most part everything works.
The band weren’t a live proposition when you joined. Was that scary?
I’d listen to Victorian Brickwork and think how fantastic it’d sound in a concert hall. But part of me wondered if we could ever reproduce those songs onstage. We did, of course, but it involved a lot of work.
How are Big Big Train different to what you’ve been involved in before?
The quality of the musicianship has made me raise my game. Plus you’ve got two seriously good songwriters who are getting better and better. And it means I finally get to live out my prog fantasies and they don’t mind.