Show Notes
Jamie Webster joins Kieron Banerji on The Hardest Part to break down the writing, meaning and performance of his song “Small Town Life.” Jamie explains how years spent touring through towns across the UK inspired him to write a song celebrating the people, characters and communities that exist beyond the country’s biggest cities, places that might look imperfect from the outside, but mean everything to the people who call them home. Jamie takes us inside his songwriting process, from keeping fragments and ideas in his phone to beginning “Small Town Life” with a musical manifesto: make it anthemic, make the chorus immediate and write something people can sing together. Jamie also discusses how growing up in Liverpool shaped him as both a person and songwriter, the passion and defiance he associates with his hometown, his working-class identity, and why speaking from the heart remains central to his music. This episode also features an intimate live performance of “Small Town Life.” Subscribe for more conversations and exclusive live sessions from The Hardest Part. - 00:00 Jamie Webster on Working-Class Life 01:16 The Story Behind ‘Small Town Life’ 05:20 Turning Where You’re From Into a Strength 08:50 Jamie Webster’s Songwriting Process 09:36 Building the Perfect Chorus 11:12 Finding the Idea for ‘Small Town Life’ 12:37 Don’t Play the Game, Change It 14:38 The Characters That Make a Town 15:12 A Wild Small-Town Pub Story 18:18 Liverpool, Football and Finding an Audience 21:15 How Liverpool Shaped Jamie’s Songwriting 24:30 Paddy Pimblett and the Scouse Mentality 25:27 Writing About Working-Class Life 28:18 The Hardest Part of ‘Small Town Life’ 33:21 Why Jamie Won’t Comp His Vocals 34:06 ‘Small Town Life’ – Full Performance - The Hardest Part dives deep into the most emotionally complex songs ever written. Every two weeks, host Kieron Banerji sits down with artists to unpack the creative process behind their hardest songs—exploring songwriting breakdowns, emotional storytelling, cultural influences, and moments of personal growth. Each episode ends with an intimate, stripped-back performance—raw, real, and sometimes heard this way for the first time. Produced by Palm Tree Island, a London-based creative studio known for standout music documentaries and original voices. Kieron Banerji is a seasoned producer and engineer based in London with extensive experience in music, media, and entertainment. He’s worked with Grammy and Academy Award winners, and has recorded sessions with Portugal. The Man, Jason Isbell, Katie Melua, Rae Morris, Jason Mraz, BROODS, Baio (Vampire Weekend), and more. 🎧 Follow the Podcast: https://linktr.ee/thehardestpart - #jamiewebster #musicpodcast #smalltownlife See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
More from The Hardest Part
Dan Croll spent seven years on "Hail Mary," a song about last chances, time running out, and coming to terms with a career that didn't keep the shape it started with. On this episode of The Hardest Part with Kieron Banerji, he opens it up with rare honesty: the early success he feels he squandered, the full-time job he works outside music now, and why everything, ideas, songs, deals, and touring, feels like one more throw of the ball. And why he's still here, still giving it a go. They talk about craft as persistence: the archivist's method of reopening a session every few months for years; a full notebook per song and "murder-map" lyric walls; the voice-notes ritual that makes sure no good idea slips the net; collaborating for the first time in his career; and the influences behind the album Winning Streak — a rekindled Burt Bacharach obsession ("Budget Bacharach": real vibraphone, coffin-sized studio), Frank Sinatra endings, Glen Campbell, and country's unapologetic honesty. Then the nuance that changes the song: the bridge line that surprised him as he wrote it — "and I'm praying you won't forget me." His biggest fear, out loud. Then Dan performs "Hail Mary" live in the studio. 00:00 "Everything's a bit of a Hail Mary" 01:04 Seven years, one song 02:22 Last chance saloon 03:51 Chords first, chorus first 07:46 Voice notes & keeping ideas alive 11:00 Collaborating for the first time 12:38 Budget Bacharach & Sinatra endings 17:12 Country, Cohen & honest simplicity 20:36 "Praying you won't forget me" 22:54 🎸 Live: Hail Mary - The Hardest Part dives deep into the most emotionally complex songs ever written. Every two weeks, host Kieron Banerji sits down with artists to unpack the creative process behind their hardest songs—exploring songwriting breakdowns, emotional storytelling, cultural influences, and moments of personal growth. Each episode ends with an intimate, stripped-back performance—raw, real, and sometimes heard this way for the first time. Produced by Palm Tree Island, a London-based creative studio known for standout music documentaries and original voices. Kieron Banerji is a seasoned producer and engineer based in London with extensive experience in music, media, and entertainment. He’s worked with Grammy and Academy Award winners, and has recorded sessions with Portugal. The Man, Jason Isbell, Katie Melua, Rae Morris, Jason Mraz, BROODS, Baio (Vampire Weekend), and more. 🎧 Follow the Podcast: https://linktr.ee/thehardestpart - #DanCroll #HailMary #MusicPodcast #TheHardestPart #Songwriting #LiveSession See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Luke Hart wrote "Biding" about seeing someone, an infatuation that felt amazing and awful at once. Then he posted it online, people found it, and strangers started messaging him that the song holds their grief, their old cities, their goodbyes. On this episode of The Hardest Part with Kieron Banerji, he opens up the song that's done more than he ever intended. Kieron and Luke talk about the song written on the couch of his old Manchester flat under a salt lamp, the diminished chords he learned from listening to his friends, the inspiration of Adrianne Lenker, and why songwriting is the only way he knows to process anything. Luke also performs an exclusive stripped back version of the track for us live in our studio. 00:00 "It's done so much more than I intended" 01:20 Introducing "Biding" 01:48 An infatuation, in the cold 03:42 The salt lamp & the Manchester flat 05:06 Diminished chords & learning from friends 07:43 Songwriting as the only way to process 11:33 Pinegrove, Laura Marling & peers who push you 14:09 Open D, Chris Smither & Adrianne Lenker 14:42 The song that outgrew him 16:24 Live Session: Biding - The Hardest Part dives deep into the most emotionally complex songs ever written. Every two weeks, host Kieron Banerji sits down with artists to unpack the creative process behind their hardest songs—exploring songwriting breakdowns, emotional storytelling, cultural influences, and moments of personal growth. Each episode ends with an intimate, stripped-back performance—raw, real, and sometimes heard this way for the first time. Produced by Palm Tree Island, a London-based creative studio known for standout music documentaries and original voices. Kieron Banerji is a seasoned producer and engineer based in London with extensive experience in music, media, and entertainment. He’s worked with Grammy and Academy Award winners, and has recorded sessions with Portugal. The Man, Jason Isbell, Katie Melua, Rae Morris, Jason Mraz, BROODS, Baio (Vampire Weekend), and more. - #LukeHart #Biding #MusicPodcast #TheHardestPart #NewMusic #Songwriting #LiveSession See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Maddie Zahm was watching Meryl Streep deliver "that is all" in The Devil Wears Prada when she had a realisation: "that's gay." On this episode of The Hardest Part with Kieron Banerji, she opens up "Meryl," a flirty, joyful, proudly queer song about loving older women. It's a conversation about honesty as a superpower: how she came out through a song she accidentally sent to her mom, why she writes hyper-specifically, as though no one will ever hear it, and why the songs that scare her most always resonate most. At the end of the interview, Maddie performs an exclusive stripped back version of the track. 00:00 "That's gay": the Meryl Streep moment 01:14 Introducing "Meryl" 01:57 Coming out through a song (by accident) 02:55 Writing literally — & the eyelash story 05:00 Writing like throwing up 05:45 Editing on gut instinct 07:39 Griffin, Summer & turning the car around 10:21 Does Meryl know? 11:40 "I've never done a thing that I'm told" 12:20 Live Session: Meryl - The Hardest Part dives deep into the most emotionally complex songs ever written. Every two weeks, host Kieron Banerji sits down with artists to unpack the creative process behind their hardest songs—exploring songwriting breakdowns, emotional storytelling, cultural influences, and moments of personal growth. Each episode ends with an intimate, stripped-back performance—raw, real, and sometimes heard this way for the first time. Produced by Palm Tree Island, a London-based creative studio known for standout music documentaries and original voices. Kieron Banerji is a seasoned producer and engineer based in London with extensive experience in music, media, and entertainment. He’s worked with Grammy and Academy Award winners, and has recorded sessions with Portugal. The Man, Jason Isbell, Katie Melua, Rae Morris, Jason Mraz, BROODS, Baio (Vampire Weekend), and more. 🎧 Follow the Podcast: https://linktr.ee/thehardestpart - #MaddieZahm #Meryl #MusicPodcast #TheHardestPart #Pride #QueerMusic #Songwriting #LiveSession See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
On this episode of The Hardest Part with Kieron Banerji, the band's songwriter and frontwoman opens up "Serpent," the song that fought her hardest on The Bestiary: the one where every band member hated a different part, and the only fix was to scrap everything but the lyrics and start again. It's a conversation about ego and letting go, the first genuinely collaborative Castle Rat album, tears in the rehearsal space, the heart-to-heart that revealed her bandmates wanted to write too, and the fear that sharing even 10% of a song would void her contribution, sharpened by years of being a woman in metal whose riffs get credited to "the boys." Plus: the "creepies and crawlies" joke that killed the old chorus, a Dio-style rebuild, a 10-foot rat puppet with the wrong wings, and the "Riley filter" through which everything still passes. 00:00 "That's my riff" 01:32 The hardest song on The Bestiary 01:57 Tears in the rehearsal space 03:39 Everyone hated a different part 04:39 Scrap it, keep the lyrics 06:03 "Creepies and crawlies" 09:21 The 10-foot rat puppet 14:09 Being a woman in metal 15:15 The heart-to-heart & Franco's blindside 19:27 Serpent: Full Track - The Hardest Part dives deep into the most emotionally complex songs ever written. Every two weeks, host Kieron Banerji sits down with artists to unpack the creative process behind their hardest songs—exploring songwriting breakdowns, emotional storytelling, cultural influences, and moments of personal growth. Each episode ends with an intimate, stripped-back performance—raw, real, and sometimes heard this way for the first time. Produced by Palm Tree Island, a London-based creative studio known for standout music documentaries and original voices. Kieron Banerji is a seasoned producer and engineer based in London with extensive experience in music, media, and entertainment. He’s worked with Grammy and Academy Award winners, and has recorded sessions with Portugal. The Man, Jason Isbell, Katie Melua, Rae Morris, Jason Mraz, BROODS, Baio (Vampire Weekend), and more. 🎧 Follow the Podcast: https://linktr.ee/thehardestpart - #CastleRat #Serpent #TheBestiary #TheHardestPart See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
One of these songs took Gently Tender three years. The other took two minutes. On this episode of The Hardest Part with Kieron Banerji, Gently Tender's Sam Fryer and Francesca Brierley opens up "Staring at Fields" and "The City of the Beast," both from their upcoming album ,This Was Once Fields. It's a conversation about a lifelong Londoner mourning the city's lost magic, think the Astoria and Madame Jojo's, and about why he keeps escaping it on foot: the hyperacusis that makes city noise painful, the walks that became meditation, the "I'm staring at fields" mantra sung alone in a dark London studio. They talk about craft: the song he nearly binned and fought the whole band over, sneaking it onto the album after delivery, why the band always finds his real chorus, and the two-minute drum-machine stream of consciousness that produced one of his favourite lyrics he's ever written. Gently Tender perform also play both songs live and stripped back exclusively for The Hardest Part. 00:00 Two songs, one walk 00:14 "City of the Beast": London's lost magic 00:57 "Staring at Fields" & the walk 01:43 Why the city hurts his ears 03:51 Three years, many versions, nearly binned 07:36 Best idea wins: how the band edits Sam 10:42 "I don't understand my own songs" 13:55 The Mountain Goats & concept albums 15:27 Writer's block: bail the water out 17:33 Mussel shoals & stream of consciousness 22:52: Staring at Fields 28:10: The City of the Beast See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.