The High Life: The Streets' Mike Skinner

“Finishing this album was the highlight of my life” says an enthused Mike Skinner to Gigwise, reflecting on his summer of activity before the release of The Streets fourth album ‘Everything Is Borrowed’. It's been a strange ride for Mr Skinner since his previous album ‘The Hardest Way To Make An Easy Living’, even before the latest instalment has hit the shelves he has revealed to the press that he's working on his fifth album which will fulfill his record deal and allow him to make the wild career hop into movies; a natural progression from his Beat Stevie mini movies, which he has been touting around the press of late.

There’s also the small business of that video for ‘The Escapist’ where he appeared to walk the length of France, “the way I experience music mostly these days is on YouTube, so the video you see on YouTube is real events, it’s much better than some corporate video... I just want to do genuine things and that's what The Escapist video was.” Before all that there comes the business of ‘Everything is Borrowed’.

“The intention (of ‘Everything is Borrowed’) was to make something that was undeniably positive”, says Mike from his home, which contrary to the belief of worried fans who misread his blog post about the recent video for ‘Everything Is Borrowed’ has not been repossessed! The album in general seems to be one of personal reflection, a stock take and a musing on the wider implications of the way in which our individual lives fit into the surrounding society as a whole, the impact the individual has and the hole that they create and leave when they depart. Initial singles ‘The Escapist’ and ‘Everything is Borrowed’ in particular set out the stall about the transient nature of possession and belongings, singing “I’ll not feel no fear, Cos' I‘m not really here, I’m nowhere near here” on the former. It is the soundtrack to a million credit crunched hearts. It is also a down tempo sound, low key positivity, with an almost zen quality that rolls with a clam determination, like the cheer that greats the sunrise after a long hard night on a Glastonbury hill.

“I had to throw a lot of songs away as I got a bit too clever,” says Mike before continuing, “society has to be very reductive now as we don’t have very much time. I’ve got my whole life being me and you’ve just got a few minutes of your day so you have to reduce me down. That’s reflected in the album.”

Taking this album to the road Mike has been concocting some extras for the fans to ensure that the next Streets tour offers something a little special. The most outlandish being that fans should bring items for Mike and the gang to ‘borrow’, those fans that have the coolest or most unique items will get to travel with the band to the next date on the tour. “With The Streets there’s not that many of us and everything we do is really genuine, so I’m thinking it could be something really low key for the fans, and obviously it will be really good for filming as well. I haven’t really thought about it yet (what he’s hoping he can borrow) maybe a spare pair of pants, always gets a bit short for that on tour!” He jokes. “They’re all very back to basics The Streets shows, but they are getting really good, and what I get he audience to do, no ones doing what I’m doing in terms of crowd tricks and stuff.”