Busy Barat Hasn’t Seen Pete
Libertines man talks gigs, book, stage and solo to Xfm.
As one half of the most famously chaotic front pairing of the last decade, Carl Barat should probably have learnt not to juggle too many balls at once.
But the Dirty Pretty Thing dropped into Xfm Monday night to talk to Steve Harris about the three projects he’s currently got on the boil, and another completed back in March.
With The Libertines reunion gigs at Reading and Leeds less than a month away, he admitted communications with Pete Doherty are still a bit sketchy. He said, “(The band) met for a drink recently, but Pete wasn’t there because he was in Crewe or somewhere. I’ve emailed Pete but he doesn’t do his emails. We've had a few chats, but we’re both really busy, funnily enough….So we’ve got a few weeks blocked out to have a proper social and get the rehearsals done as well.”
Barat is also working on a book, provisionally titled ‘A Threepenny Memoir’, which reflects on the mad, and occasionally bad, times of The Libertines. “It talks a lot about the days in the band and why things happened like they did. I don’t want it to have this arrogance - my memoirs, at the age of 32 - but there’s a lot of good stories in there, I think it should be a good read,” Barat said.
He also talked about his new roles as actor and solo artist. Of the former, playing alongside Sadie Frost in ‘Fool For Love’ earlier this year, he said, “Some nights were just blinding, it’s usually with a hangover that that happens. Often I had a rollover from the night before and you just tear through it. It’s easier to detach yourself, I guess.”
And he promised a new Carl Barat on his forthcoming solo album, due for release in September, even though he’s found the whole process testing. “It’s definitely odd being on your own, not having anyone as a foil to bounce off. Basically I want to strip it away from guitars. It’s definitely very different from any of the bands I had before, it is more exposed. There’s a lot of strings and things like that in there as well.”
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