Talking to: James — The Everyday

If anything, iconic alternative rock band James just won’t stop evolving. Known for their impressive discography and electric live shows, James have managed to retain a sense of concentrated passion and vibrant spontaneity across all aspects of their musical career. Having released their first single in 1983, the band are keeping their foot pressed down on the accelerator, with arena tours and new music in the near future.

Off the back of their 2025 release - a ‘Definitive Best Of’ compilation entitled ‘Nothing But Love’ - we caught up with bassist and founding member Jim Glennie to talk about changing setlists, grassroots venues, and Cameron Winter.

I’ll jump right in and ask how you’re feeling about the upcoming tour - the big one!

Yeah, the big one! It's exciting. It still seems like quite a way off. We've got quite a lot to do between now and then. We’re doing some writing next week; we're just finishing the writing of what will be the next new album. And then we're straight from there into a week of promo.

Amazing. Is there one show that you're most looking forward to or do you just take it all as it comes?

Manchester's always amazing just because it's our hometown, you know, and the place always goes ballistic; the crowd has a different connection to you when you’re from the place. Manchester's been amazing to us over the years, lots of places have been, but a lot of the time we couldn't really get any gigs other than in Manchester. Co-op Live will be a huge one, absolutely.

I know you sold out Co-op Live last time you played there, which must feel like a huge moment, especially being situated in Manchester.

The sound is ridiculous. They’ve put so much effort into making it work as a venue. Viewing the standing area from the stage is amazing, as it’s wide rather than deep. People feel close to you, but it still feels massive. Some venues you play, the crowd just seems to disappear off into the distance, but this one doesn't, it's right in front of you. They've worked so hard with the acoustics and they've put a lot of time and trouble into getting it to sound great; it's such a good venue. I’m really looking forward to it. It was a great show last time. We'll be playing with Doves, who are from Manchester as well.

I want to talk some more about your come-up in Manchester - I went to university there and I got to experience the music scene. It’s just like nothing else, and the venues there are incredible. I would go to a lot of indie nights and obviously hear a lot of James songs, so it feels like a very full circle moment for me today. I was wondering if there are any other venues in Manchester that stick out to you with specific good memories?

For me personally, there's the Students' Union bar on Oxford Road. Back in the day when I was getting into music, you didn't have the Academy there, it was just the university, so there was a tiny room on the top floor, which we played once for a lunchtime gig for some bizarre reason. I saw all the bands I loved there and it was really important to me. O2 Apollo in Manchester as well. That holds fond memories for me again.

How important were grassroots venues to James when you were starting up? It is really sad to see so many great venues closing their doors.

The Cypress Tavern, which doesn’t exist anymore, was massively important to James. It was just a small little club, they'd put loads of bands on. You didn't have to be successful or big to play there, you could just get gigs, you know. And that was our learning ground. Whenever we could, we supported anybody and everybody there. I know a lot of small venues are struggling though there are a lot of support campaigns to help. You need those stepping stones, you're not born a stadium band. You have to have those rungs on the ladder. It's critically important, we've all been there. It's vital that they exist.

It does feel very hard to get into the arts and it can be hard to keep motivation as a young artist or musician. Would you have any advice to up-and-coming musicians?

I suppose what I would say is you've got to do it for the right reasons. You're not going to do it for success and fame. You have to do it because you have to. You've got to do it because of what you get for it in its own right. The job aspect of it, the industry aspect of it, comes much later. You need to do it for the correct reasons: passion and heart and finding a way for you to express who you are and what you want to say in your art, whether it's music or a painting or writing or whatever it might be, that's the important bit. In that respect, you can't lose, because you will get everything that you need from it that's important. You can be a great artist and not get that success, so you have to do it for another reason than that.

Yeah, I completely agree with that. You have to do it for yourself, because of an inhernet passion. Off the back of that, would you say that the band’s passion has transformed over the years, or do you think that's remained at a certain level?

Well, we're a funny band. We've got an unwritten code that was formulated very early in James's existence and it's carried through. We don't want to sound like anybody else. If we ever bumped into a song that we thought sounded like someone else, we'd drop it, so it's about originality. It's about trying to find something different. It's about improvisation. We want to take risks in concerts. We don't want to rehearse things to death. We rehearse up to a point and then we leave the last little bit for the gig. The best performance of a song for us should be in the gig, not in the rehearsal room. Most bands rehearse things to death, because they want to take the fear out of it. They want to take the unpredictability out of it. We want that unpredictability. We want the fear. We change the setlist every night, we're quite often changing the setlist up to the point of just going on stage, but it just keeps us alive, it keeps us there. It's got to be fresh, it's got to be alive, it's got to be based in new music. We’re constantly writing and working on songs. It's not something we step into and step out of. We're always working on new material.

I feel like through all of that spontaneity, it must have been difficult to figure out what your definitive ‘Best of’ is. Was that a difficult process?

It was a nightmare. Initially it was presented to us as being a singles collection. The list was sent through and we were a bit like, “oh, but you can't not put this on”. We've got massive James songs that were never singles. I think there are 58 songs on the three CDs collectively, but we've written over 400, so the problem was every time you put one on you had to take one off. That was the difficult bit. So, me and Tim did it like horse trading - “I'll put this one on and you take that one off”. It was a fun thing to plough through all the catalogue, to go back into the dark ages of James. Those early spindly days of the early 80s. They’re like little time machines these songs, so you get pulled back to where you were at that time.

When you were looking back, did you have a favourite era to relive through the memories?

I mean, the really early stuff is a joy because it's so different compared to where we are now. It's like a different planet. It's like you're going back to a different life. You can never lose touch with it, but going back to that degree completely pulled me in. The first guitar player in the band, called Paul Gilbertson, his playing was amazing and I kind of didn't appreciate that at the time, I don't think. I think I knew he was a good player, but he was amazing. So original, wonderful.

It's been a crazy journey. I'm very excited to go to the London show, and I'm keen to see what set list we get.

On this tour it will be a real mixture. In typical James fashion, we might not even play anything off the “Best of”.

I think that's what everyone wants when they see James. They want to be surprised.

You know what you're going to get when you come to see us, which is you're going to get the unexpected, you're going to get the unpredictable, you're not going to get what you think you might get. It's our challenge to make it an amazing show regardless. That's what we try to do. We want to uplift. We want people to go away, knackered and hot and sweaty and having lost their voice through singing and shouting. That's what we're aiming for. Best job ever. I'm very excited.

I'll ask one more question. I was wondering if there's any new music that you're enjoying at the moment, just in your own time?

I kind of go through phases with music: I’ll be listening to stuff a lot of the time, but then backing off when we're really busy. Radio 6 Music is important to me, that's kind of where I stumble into the things that I like. I think James are probably more Radio 2 now. I love that new Geese album. I think Cameron Winter is a really interesting chap. He's got something really, really special. He's great.

James head out on their ‘Love Is The Answer’ Tour in April, with the following dates:

Fri 03 Birmingham Utilita Arena

Sat 04 Leeds First Direct Arena

Tue 07 Aberdeen P&J Live Arena

Wed 08 Glasgow OVO Hydro Arena

Fri 10 Newcastle Utilita Arena

Sat 11 Liverpool M&S Bank Arena

Mon 13 Cardiff Utilita Arena

Tue 14 Nottingham Motorpoint Arena

Fri 17 London The O2 Arena

Sat 18 Manchester Co-op Live Arena

You can grab tickets here.