A little update whilst I find a quiet moment. I say quiet, my neighbour is having an adjacent wall knocked down and BBC 6 Music are having a ‘rave day’. But the dog is asleep, and my coffee has gone cold so….
This past weekend I was at the Sickroom Studios with BROADS working on the final tracks for our project. I’ve got really fond memories of spending time here with both Mark and James, during the recording of their Field Theory LP and way back when I did some guest vocals for previous incarnation Tiger MCs. As someone with a bit of a fear of recording, the Sickrooms is a joy. Nestled in the West Norfolk countryside, surrounded by the trees, birds, chickens, with the world’s friendliest dog, and with equally friendly and calm producer Owen Turner. It felt right to be recording this in rural Norfolk, finalising the tracks for a a body of work which explores Norfolk places, some hidden, some known, some personal to us.
I had been struggling to find my own place in this project, it has brought up a lot of feelings of inadequacy, a frustration with myself that I pigeonholed who I am as an artist very early on and that my fears have stopped me from expanding beyond this. It surprises most people that I listen to music that is very different from the music I make, not through a lack of joy in this genre, but because I am in awe of artists on the opposite end of the spectrum. Anything electronic to me is a marvel, a wonder, I wish I knew how to approach it. The musical grass is always greener. This weekend’s recording and spending time with BROADS has given me an insight into this, unmasking the mysteries, and allowing me to find some space within it. I still find it hard to experiment, to think of myself as a maker of music and sound, and not just a writer of lyrics.
We’re excited to share the songs with you. There was nothing more finer a moment than listening to the mixes whilst driving home under a broad Norfolk sky.
Norfolk dialect: Hin, A chicken.