Musician Matt Johnson Talks Coffee Dates With the Dead and Resurrecting The The

Matt Johnson found an unlikely friend in a dead British poet when he moved into a place not far from the Bunhill Fields Burial Ground in the London borough of Islington.

On quiet mornings, the constant creative force behind the longtime English rock band The The, will stroll through the graveyard that serves as the final resting place for such celebrated writers as Daniel Defoe and John Bunyan. In particular, he likes to relax and ruminate next to a modest headstone engraved with the name “William Blake,” the artist credited with spurring the Romantic movement of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.

Johnson feels a certain connection to Blake, who was buried in an unmarked pauper’s grave upon his death in 1827, and counts the prophetic works he’s left behind among his many inspirations while he worked on The The’s latest album, Ensoulment. Released last month, it’s the first studio record The The has shared in 24 years. After a 2018 reunion tour led to the group’s reactivation, the first song that Johnson came up with, and would eventually include on the latest release, was “Some Days I Drink My Coffee by the Grave of William Blake.”

“I do find him an inspiration. But truth be told, when I first was living close by, I didn’t really know much about him. It was just this very interesting old cemetery with a lot of notable people buried in it,” Johnson explains, adding that Blake is “considered by the establishment in the U.K. as possibly Britain’s greatest poet and painter. But when he was alive, he was despised by the establishment.”

It’s ironic in a way to see how Blake and his works have become celebrated and accepted in the centuries since, he continues. “It’s interesting just to sit there and meditate,” Johnson says. “Thinking about the past, it almost gives us clues to the future, as well. And I find him particularly a very powerful presence, a fascinating character.”

Lyrically, the song is about how London, the city Johnson’s known for so long, is constantly changing, like everything else in life, and coming to terms with that. But it’s a nice little ode to his process and unlikely muse Blake.

“I had that title for a number of years, then I had the first verse, then chorus, but I couldn’t finish it for some reason,” Johnson explains. “But it’s based on real life for me, because I do some days drink my coffee by the grave of William Blake. It’s a fascinating place.

“But it was one of the songs amongst a family of songs of mine about London and my relationship with London and the fact that I’m changing and the city’s changing,” he adds.

Johnson knows about change, as he’s played with dozens of musicians since forming The The in 1979, including late Irish singer Sinéad O’Connor and guitarist Johnny Marr of the Smiths. Along with Johnson, the sole permanent member and composer, the band now consists of bassist James Eller, keys player DC Collar, drummer Earl Harvin and guitarist Barrie Cadogan.

The The is touring Ensoulment and will stop in Denver on Tuesday, October 29, at Mission Ballroom. Other than playing the new record in its entirety, the group is also coming prepared with a separate retrospective set list that follows. In all, The The will blast through 27 songs.

While Johnson didn’t necessarily put The The to sleep after 2000’s NakedSelf, he took time to explore different artistic pursuits, including making film soundtracks and a 2017 multimedia project titled The Inertia Variations. Plus, he was simply exhausted with all the work that went into the band.

“I felt a bit burnt out by the time we did NakedSelf, and the tour was a very grueling tour,” Johnson admits. “I didn’t want to just do records for the sake of it or touring just for money. I valued the integrity of the existing catalogue. To then sully it by just sticking anything out, I’d rather not do anything than do something for the sake of it.”

This was the case even though seemingly everything with The The on it is a hit, especially after the first two albums, Soul Mining (1983) and Infected (1986), were certified gold. Every album after that has charted in the U.K., including the 2021 live album, The Comeback Special: Live at the Royal Albert Hall.

But Johnson just needed a bit of a breather, and maybe some more coffee breaks with Blake. Now, The The has “more of a band feel,” he says, compared to configurations in the past that Johnson would “micromanage.”

“I felt reinvigorated, actually. I felt very recharged,” he says, adding that he doesn’t “like things being too static.”

There are no plans to slow down, but what shape The The takes next is yet to be seen.

“I always want to remain open-minded. The only thing that stays the same is everything must change. It’s kaleidoscopic, the world around us, our own lives. Everything’s constantly in a state of flux,” Johnson concludes. “It’s trying to get comfortable with that in our own lives, but also creatively to be always prepared to shapeshift and move into new directions.”

The The, 7 p.m. Tuesday, October 29, Mission Ballroom, 4242 Wynkoop Street. Tickets are $75-$125.