Tim Minchin on his new punchline-free album, lustful lyrics and Merlot Mondays

Virgin Radio

23 Nov 2020, 12:00

Is it too early on a Monday to have a Merlot with Tim Minchin? Unfortunately, the answer is probably yes, but for the man Down Under, he's sipping on (no more than) three glasses of red at the end of a busy day. The Aussie comedian, singer, songwriter, actor and composer has talent in truckloads - and sounds like he's got the self control to match. 

Live from Sydney, the musical genius joined the Chris Evans Breakfast Show with Sky earlier to talk about his new straight, gag-free album, monogamy in marriage and his precise drinking pattern.

The 45-year-old said: "I'm not a very adventurous drinker. I really love my red wine but I also have a pretty quick flicking-off switch, so I really just have a wine to, like, get off the day, especially with kids.

"I just need something to make me feel slightly less anxious and then I might have a second one or maybe a third one, and that's usually it for me, whatever night of the week."

Referring to 'Merlot Mondays' he laughed: “I made up Merlot Mondays about ten minutes ago on Twitter and it’s really taken off! I didn’t make up the fact I’m having a couple of wines though. It's 7.30pm here."

The performer has a shiny new album out showing off a more serious side to his music. He explained: "This is the first album where I don't feel obliged to either provide a punchline, nor a story that belongs in a musical, I guess it's just me.

"It's not so much a change as a reversion to before I became known as a comedian and before I became known for writing theatre.

"They've all been sitting here, these songs, and actually even while I was known as a comedian, songs of this style - kind of quirky, observational storytelling songs - were in my set, it's just not what I got known for so much.

"So yeah, I guess I'm just kind of finally getting an album done. There's no big, big career move happening."

But even though it's more straight, it's not without humour. Tim told Chris: "I write very 'wordily' and my songs don't tend to follow a normal pop format, they tell stories... after you've gone past three minutes there's usually still something to find out which is not normal in pop music.

"But yeah, I do tend to look for the gag and actually my mission for the last ten years, post comedy, has been to make art that makes people laugh and cry, preferably within the same minute. I'm really interested in that knife point."

There are no punchlines as such in his album, but a lot of 'pithy, witty observations,' said Chris, such as a nod to sour-faced women in posh cars. 

Tim expained: “Well, yeah. Women in SUV Porsches always look miserable. I don't know why they're so sad. Maybe it's the calories they could have had filling them up with regret, so that line is incredibly pretentious.

“Look, I'm a bit shameless with my lyrics, obviously, but I just find great joy in language so the idea that someone could be thin because the calories they could have had are filling them up with regret, I find that joyous as a concept.

"Most songwriters would say, 'Yeah, but that's ridiculous and doesn't belong in a song,' and I sort of think, 'Well, I've got nothing else to do today, I might as well try and make that work.' 

His new song 'I’ll Take Lonely Tonight’ is about 'temptation' in long-term relationships and whether you can resist or not.

Tim said: "Once or twice in your marriage when you're in a hotel or a city away from where you live, having had a few too many drinks and you find yourself in a situation where you realise you could cheat on your partner. 

“I find those situations incredibly human and very, very interesting in how they test you, especially if you really, really like having sex and especially if you've been with the same person since you were 17, like I have, mostly.

"I find that an interesting subject but, again, no one writes about this stuff because that's not how love is meant to go. 

“But I am obsessed with writing love songs that are more about life. I have a song about how love is actually about watching each other decay towards death. 

“I actually think that's more romantic than a bunch of lyrics rhyming 'love with dove' or saying 'you're my soul mate, we're going to feel like this forever', which is just not true."

So what is Tim's wife Sarah's take on his new lust-driven lyrics?

"Sarah is so unimpressed by me - she's not the only one in the world who isn't impressed by me - but she really likes the song because she's not an idiot. 

“We've been together for a very long time. We've talked about how sometimes you get in situations where you have to make a choice, and that's what love is, right?"

He continued: "At one point she did say to me, 'You're just trying to write this really sexually-charged situation because your self esteem’s so pathetic that you just want your audience to think of you as a sexual person.' And I'm going, 'No, no, no, no! You've got me all wrong!'"