The Hip-Hop loving folk man!
For those of you unaware of the talent that is James Vincent McMorrow, prepare yourselves for some folk loving chit chat. The sun may be gloriously lighting the British isles on this more than average Sunday afternoon, but no amount of sun or faux summer heat can melt the wintry, soulful folk sounds of Dublin born singer/songwriter James Vincent Mcmorrow. RED Light Fever talks with McMorrow about inflicted isolation, heartbreak, London, summer festival and his love for hip hop music and Sam Beam!
How would you describe you and your sound?
I want people to view me however they want to view me. I describe my music as folk music because it is the closest comparison and easiest comparison. But for me there are elements of folk but it’s not Neil Young. I’ve heard lots of different comparisons. I prefer hearing people opinions of it like wistful, wintry, eerie folk those kind of things. Something I read was someone describing it as Cee lo greens younger shire.
You have been likened to the sorts of Jamie Woon, James Blake, James Morrison and Bon Iver. What do you think sets you apart from such artists?
I love that three of the four names are James. I mean I think that there are understandable comparisons on the face of it when a group of singers have a similar singing style and it’s not what you call necessarily the norm. When I listen to that James Blake record I can hear thing’s that link with my music. But comparisons just make it easier for people to understand music. If someone says that something sounds like something then they may be more compelled to listen to it. In the early stages comparisons are a necessary thing. If I was to just come out and go "I sound like nothing and look like nothing", then it’s nothing. People will be confused and I’d get nowhere. I understand the Bon Iver comparison because of how our records were made. The nature of the music coupled with the sentiment behind how it was made means that there are similar comparisons to Bon Iver.
In a similar nature to Bon Iver, you wrote Early in the Morning in total isolation in a remote beach house on the Irish coast. How much do you feel that your location and surroundings effect the sound of your record?
Had I made this album in another way, we wouldn’t even be sat here talking. It would have been a completely different record. I made the album without context, without a plan in mind. Without any back story. I hadn’t played any live shows, I didn’t have any songs. The reason I moved to this isolated house was because I wanted to remove myself from all the distraction and outside voices and all the people I had accumulated in my life whose ideas I didn’t want to hear anymore. So yeah that was the goal. So without that house, the album wouldn’t have worked. So the isolation and the intent behind the record is in every track, every line, in every instrument on there.
Well the year before the album was made was a strange year. I moved to London with really grand ideas of making records and everything was going really well really quickly and then it stalled a little bit. I wasn’t writing music that I had any heart for. I was just pretending to be happy about where I was going. I was hoping that reality would catch up with me and that if I moved to London I could manifest reality with my music, but that didn’t happen.
I went from having no money and no sense of what I was doing to suddenly having more money that I knew what to do with because I signed a publishing deal. I went back to Ireland with not quite a sense of failure and defeat but it was very close to that. It was very surreal year definitely. All of that strangeness and failed attempts in those 8/9 months in London fed back into itself and made me write Early in the Morning in a simple and an unpretentious way as humanly possible. No studios, no engineers, no money, just nothing. The main thing I learned from that year was that by adding these entire things to your life doesn’t mean that the end product is going to be any good.
I went from having no money and no sense of what I was doing to suddenly having more money that I knew what to do with because I signed a publishing deal. I went back to Ireland with not quite a sense of failure and defeat but it was very close to that. It was very surreal year definitely. All of that strangeness and failed attempts in those 8/9 months in London fed back into itself and made me write Early in the Morning in a simple and an unpretentious way as humanly possible. No studios, no engineers, no money, just nothing. The main thing I learned from that year was that by adding these entire things to your life doesn’t mean that the end product is going to be any good.
taken by Jasmine Mitchell
So what was the final straw for you leaving London?
I tried to make a record in London. We physically sat down and tried to make a record. One of my best friends is the engineer in my studio in London and we talked about making a record and we mapped it out. The whole time going into it I knew that the songs weren’t right. I didn’t like them at all. The seeds of the idea were there when trying to make the record in London but I hadn’t captured what instruments and sounds I wanted. It all became pretty generic like this is a standard template for a song, drums, bass, guitar and I have no interest in drums, bass or guitar, standard Americana sense. It was just never for me. I like the idea of having a song, pulling it apart and then putting it back together and being in the studio with Scott (engineer friend) who is brilliant and so easy to work with and me not being able to make something happen made me realise that making a record in this situation was never going to work. Once I realised that, that was when I came home and tried to think of a way that I can make something from start to finish and if it doesn’t work then at least I can say this is mine and I’ve made it. It’s very easy to say in hindsight that everything happens for a reason but they certainly did.
You've just recently released Early in the Morning in America, how have they received you?
That’s a broad question. My influences come from everywhere. The records I’ve been listening to this year are like James Blake, not just because of the press comparison early on. I think it’s a really lovely piece of work. There’s a record that came out by this Canadian guy called The Weekend that came out about a month ago which has elements of old 90’s ambient and then there’s Wye Oak, a two piece band from America, they’re incredible. So I listen to everything. Just because I play folk music doesn't mean that’s all I listen too. I think it would be really pointless and disappointing only to listen to just folk. If I met somebody and found out that all they listened to was the same kind of music that they played I’d be really sad. I find it interesting when people find out how I learn how to record music because of my fascination with hip hop with people like The Neptune’s, Timberland and the first N.E.R.D record. People say that it doesn't make any sense, but why not?
It’s going incredibly well considering I have no time to spend there. I’m trying to find a way to spend as much time there as possible, because the album is selling really well and is out there and going. It’s the biggest of biggest nuts to crack and you need to spend so much time there so I’m trying to figure out a way to balance all the stuff that’s happening here which has taken me really by surprise.
How’s the tour going so far?
Amazing. I’m touring in America at the start of June for three weeks and then we’re back here for Glastonbury, Latitude, Green man, Camp Bestial and more tours and then back to America for a full US tour. We’re doing a lot of festivals on the continent as well. About 5 or 6 in France, we’re doing the Montreal jazz festival in Switzerland with Arcade fire and such. So that’s vaguely ridiculous. I’m really looking forward to Green Man, the line up is unbelievable, that sounds wildly narcissistic because I’m on the line up but if you were to take me out of that line up and I was to go to one festival I would go Green Man. The line up is just so incredible. Iron and Wine headlining a festival is always great. Sam Beam is probably my favourite lyricist. One of my favourite memories of that strange year, 2009, was flying back from London to Ireland after a request to support Iron and Wine in my favourite venue in Dublin, The Olympia, and Sam came out on stage after my set and the first thing that he said was that he thought I was fantastic, which was incredible. Meeting him afterwards was amazing. He’s the loveliest man and has a great group of people around him. I think he’s the best songwriter/lyricist on the planet. Nobody’s lyrics make me confused and intrigued like that.
So apart from Sam Beam who would you say you draw your influences from when writing or performing your music?
So do you think you’ll ever dip into the hip hop genre?
I think that I make music that I am supposed to make. At some point that may change. For the second record it will be definitely different than the first album. How that will manifest itself I don’t really know. What I do really like is people taking my songs and pulling them apart and putting it back together. I’ve actually asked quite a few people to do exactly that. There have been two remixes of my songs so far. The first remix is by an English guy call Starsling, who I’m a massive fan of , he took my first track If I had a Boat and turned it into a mid 90’s R n’ B slow jam. It’s really great. There was quite a polarising reaction to it which is why I did it and I think he’s just fantastic. There was another remix made of my tack We Don’t Eat by a Canadian dub step duo called Adventure Club, and turned it into something completely different. The reaction was crazy. Everyone was like “What the fuck!” Someone sent me a link to how far and wide it had gotten in the week since it had been put up on the internet. It had like 300,000 plays and featured on something like 500 blogs. It was ridiculous. It has really seemed to have struck a chord which is exactly what I want. The people who were slightly fearful of that kind of remix thought it was great because essentially Adventure Club took my song, pulled it apart, changed its context and did their own thing to it. Its genius