East End singer/songwriter Joesef’s released heartfelt new single The Sun is Up Forever this week, a soulful slice of indie-pop featuring jangling guitars and soaring vocals.

Explaining the track, he told me: “I wrote this song about a month ago after talking to my mum about how relationships affect you in every corner of your life, right down to the way you carry yourself.”

He should be on a UK tour at the moment but he stuck at home in the city centre. I asked him about what he was missing in lockdown.

"It's the whole shebang. Walking about Glasgow at night and seeing it empty, it feels hollowed out. I miss the craic with the people. I want to sit in pubs, go places, and feel that community spirit. Hanging about with people and meeting folk at bus stops and going back to my flat with pals after a night out." 

"I have a pure love affair with Glasgow and it's based on the way people interact with each other, I get a buzz of it, it's not like any other place in the world. I feel like this whole situation shows you don't know what you've got till its gone and I don't think I'll ever take that for granted again."

It's not the most pressing concern right now, but restoring that opportunity for collective camaraderie will be important. 

Small music venues are something that we do very well here in Glasgow. The symbiotic relationship between local crowds and bands has been broken for now, and it will be a while before that is restored. In solidarity, musicians will be appearing on the Glasgowist Facebook page on Saturday to play lockdown sessions in support of the Music Venue Trust's crisis appeal to help these spaces weather the storm in the months ahead. 

Joesef counts himself lucky to have played shows at venues like King Tut's and SWG3, using them as a platform to reach stages in London and other cities. He is spenging his time in unexpected seclusion writing new music that will be part of his live sets. He says new songs are often finished quickly: "I feel that the best songs that I have written have been in a few hours when you are just feeling it and it falls out of you. If you have to force it, the song might not really be there". 

The success of his initial singles launched Joesef into a period of frenetic activity: "Touring was a lesson. I took my recording stuff away and had plans to write, but I had no time at all, I was being pure ragdolled about, tired and on the move. The lockdown has given me a bit of peace. I would have been doing a UK tour the now, but that's been rescheduled to September. I'm excited to play the new stuff when this is over."

He talks about how important his friends are to him when he is about the town but bursts out laughing when I ask if they feature in any of his songs. "I write about my relationships, not about my pals, I couldn't write about half the things they get up to, they are all bams. They are a source of inspiration most of the time, but not in that way. Basically, anybody that ends up going out with me, you will probably get a tune about you at some point." 

The Sun is Up Forever is available in all formats now.