GIG LIST KATHRYN WILLIAMS & NEILL MACCOLL February 2008 Weds 6th FORT WILLIAM,FIRED ART. Thurs 7th INVERNESS, EDENCOURT. Fri 8th STORNAWAY, WOODLANDS CENTRE. Sat 9th ULLAPOOL, THE CEILDIH PLACE
Sat 15th BIRMINGHAM,SYMPHONY HALL - special guest to David Gray. Tel:0121 780 3333 Sun 16th BRIGHTON, KOMEDIA. Tue 18th CARDIFF, LEVEL 3, Weds 19th BURY,THE MET. Thurs 20th LONDON HAMMERSMITH APOLLO - special guest to David Gray. Mon 24th PERTH, RED ROOMS@ PERTH THEATRE Tel: 845 6126321 www.horsecross.co.uk Tue 25th EDINBURGH, CABARET VOLTAIRE. Weds 26th GLASGOW, CLASSIC GRAND. Fri 28th London, Queens Elizabeth Hall. Sat 29th LEICESTER,MUSICIAN. Mon 31st CHESTER,TELFORDS WAREHOUSE.
Tue 1st CARDIGAN, THEATR MWLDAN. Fri 4th ABERYSTWYTH,ARTS CENTRE. Sat 5th DURSLEY,PREMA ARTS CENTRE. Sun 6th WOLVES, WULFRUN. Tue 8th NORWICH,ARTS CENTRE. Thurs 10th LEEDS, CITY VARIETIES. Fri 11th GATESHEAD,THE SAGE. Sat 12th POCKLINGTON, ARTS CENTRE. Sun 13th BRISTOL, ST GEORGES. Tue 15th CAMBRIDGE, THE JUNCTION. Weds 16th NOTTINGHAM, RESCUE ROOM. Thurs 17th BEDFORD, CIVIC THEATRE. Sat 19th MORECAMBE, PLATFORM. MAY Tue 13th DAUGHTERS OF ALBION - CONCERT HALL, BRIGHTON DOME Sun 29th PARK STAGE GLASTONBURY FESTIVAL AUGUST Sun 10th LEICESTER, SUMMER SUNDAE FESTIVAL, THE MUSICIAN STAGE @ Agent: Nigel Morton "In years to come, I’ll look back at the records I’ve made and not have any regrets about a man in a suit making me fit in with fashion. They’re small, sketchy pieces. I’m not trying to make Big Art.’ Kathryn Williams may not be trying to make Big Art. But, for many of us, the art she makes is as big as it gets. It’s to do with the immensity of softly-expressed passions. It’s beauty lies in her ability to take an everyday observation, the kind of thing that might attract anyone’s attention for an instant before we’re distracted by all those Desperately Important Things we’re busy with, in a song that breaks your heart, with a voice that instinctively understands the power of restraint, of intimacy, of melody that drifts like thought, of lyric that pricks like a needle, or conscience, probably both. No need to take my word for it, though. All you have to do is put on Kath’s sixth album, ‘Leave To Remain’, released as (almost) always on her own Caw label. There have been big changes in the 32-year-old singer, guitarist and songwriter’s life since 2004’s major label covers album ‘Relations‘, a period which included the appearance of 2005’s excellent ‘Over Fly Over’ album. Positive changes, sure… but still the kind of changes which can either distract a creative type so completely they lose their muse, or disappear altogether. Thankfully for Kath addicts, these changes have had the opposite effect, and her new record, recorded over the last few months in Newcastle, Glasgow and London, is her best. Yep… even better than 2001’s ‘Little Black Numbers‘, the extraordinary second Williams album that bagged a Mercury Music Prize nomination, and that major label deal, with which we’ll deal a little later. Indeed, ‘Leave To Remain’ is, according to the ever self-critical Kath, ‘The one where, if it wasn’t my voice, I could probably listen to it.’ After originally planning ‘Leave to Remain’ as a stark affair featuring her core band of Dave Scott (guitar) and Laura Reid (cello, keyboards), Liverpool-born and Newcastle-based Williams brought onboard Kate St.John, string and woodwind arranger for the like of Van Morrison and Roger Eno. She and Williams met when St.John provided the arrangements for 2000’s Nick Drake tribute concert at The Barbican, where Williams made her first major live appearance. The pair then got together with producer Darius Kedros and set about creating a fuller sounding album using a mini-orchestra of woodwind and string players, casting haunting and increasingly sophisticated songs in hues that carry the unmistakable tang of classic 60’s Amercian pop, ala Jimmy Webb/Burt Bacharach. Having been associated throughout her seven year recording career - which began with 1999’s ‘Dog Leap Stairs‘, legendarily made for the princely sum of £80 - with the English folk-pop tradition of Nick Drake, Sandy Denny and Fairport Convention, Kath’s happy to own up to her love of Americana. ‘‘That’s more what I grew up with than the English tradition. I was listening to Dylan and Joni Mitchell. This album is more like that. But I also love The Velvets and grungy New York stuff. The things that influence you aren’t necessarily gonna come out in obvious ways, unless you’re trying to copy. I don’t sound like Lou Reed or Tom Waits. But when I listen to them, I learn.’ ‘Leave To Remain’ arrives at a point where singer-songwriters are big business, and where a folk revival, of sorts, is afoot. Does Kathryn Williams finally fit in? ‘Ha! Its really funny. I’m six albums in, and I’ve been labelled in with the singer-songwriters, then with the NAM/New Acoustic Movement, then I was put in the Outsider group. Then I was shoved in with Dido and Norah Jones. And then it was KT Tunstall and Jem and all of that. I’m just in a car passing these things. If people wanna wave to me while I go past then that’s fine. "Beautiful and intense- her best album yet”- The Observer “It is impossible to turn away for a second… emotional stealth-bombing at its most devastating”- Word magazine “Glittering talent”- The Independent “A uniquely personal touch”- Mojo KATHRYN WILLIAMS & NEILL MACCOLL - "TWO" www.williamsmaccoll.com A supremely talented mercury prize nominee with an unrivalled critical reputation teams up with a great session player and member of a hugely influential musical clan... they write and record an album together. This is the story so far of Kathryn Williams and Neill MacColl's “Two”. Kathryn and Neill first met at the Daughters of Albion concert (part of the BBC's Folk Britannia season) where they had been paired to perform “The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face”, a song which Neill's father, Ewan MacColl, wrote for his mother, Peggy Seeger. “We just clicked, we didn't need to say anything on stage, we could read where the other was going” recalls Kathryn; “within a few hours of first saying 'hello' to each other, we were saying 'yeah, lets get together and make a record'... which was both strange and kind of liberating.” “A while later I went to stay with Kathryn up in Newcastle,” says Neill, “we locked ourselves in a room for a few days and the songs just poured out of us. The way we write and play together is like we're both steering the same ship- in the most natural and instinctive way.” The project has been surrounded by goodwill; friends have offered their time or resources for the love of the music- the enthusiasm of Neill and Kathryn is clearly infectious. Kimberley Rew offered his studio to the pair at no cost and they set about making their collection of songs into an album. In just six days, they had recorded 21 songs; thirteen of these became “Two”. Later they brought in another friend, the veteran engineer/producer Phill Brown (whose credits include Stairway To Heaven alongside numerous seminal albums by the likes of the Rolling Stones, John Martyn, Roxy Music and Brian Eno as well as Talk Talk's Spirit Of Eden and Laughing Stock). the record was mixed in just 5 days and the result is one of the most astonishingly beautiful albums to see the light of day in recent years; one which feels like an instant classic and could have been made at any time in the last four decades. If there's an over-arching idea to the album, it's about how to capture a moment before it's lost forever. The album was written, recorded and mixed in a little over two weeks- a miniscule timescale in these times of recording, re-recording and digitally manipulating every note of every part played. This is a record in its truest sense: a record of an event. The event is a group of people standing in a room and playing a song together- this is what you're hearing and this is why listening to these songs feels like such a privilege. We're being invited to share in this world of intimacy, the natural affinity of two human beings moving in symmetry. This is the world of Two. There are so many great lyrical and musical moments in these recordings- you know that this is one of those records where every track is going to be someone's standout moment and they're going to want to sit alone and listen to it all day. “Two” Kathryn Williams and Neill MacColl's first album, is due out on March 3rd 2008.
Published Date: 17 February 2008
It takes twoBy Chitra Ramaswamy 'I HAVEN'T told you this before," says Neill MacColl to Kathryn Williams, "but when you sing on 'Innocent When You Dream' you sound like my mum did when she was in her twenties. It's very odd." Considering MacColl's mother is Peggy Seeger, the American folk singer for whom his father, Ewan MacColl, wrote the classic 'First Time Ever I Saw Your Face', I'm not surprised Williams is tickled pink at the comparison.
"That is weird," says the Mercury-nominated folk singer. "I think our voices fit together, like when you hear a brother and sister singing." "I think we need therapy," MacColl quips. Both of them dissolve into giggles. We're at Inverness's Eden Court theatre, where the duo will later perform songs from their upcoming album, Two, one of which is a whimsical cover of Tom Waits' 'Innocent When You Dream'. They're doing warm-up gigs in the Highlands because, according to Williams, their music goes with the mountains, and because MacColl, whose father was a Scot, takes every opportunity to head north. Two is a sublime record of intimate folk songs, written and recorded by Williams and MacColl in less than a fortnight at her studio in Newcastle. Like all great collaborations, from June Carter and Johnny Cash to Robert Plant and Alison Krauss, it's the frisson between them, in this case the marriage of Williams' sweet, hushed vocals with MacColl's high harmonies and fragile guitar pickings, that makes it so very good. It's not surprising then to see how much affection they have for each other. "It's funny how people suddenly enter your life and shape it," says Williams. "I can't imagine not having Neill around now." In most of their sentences a full-stop is bumped out of the way by a hearty laugh, and, not unlike a brother and sister, they love teasing one another. "You're very quiet, Neill," Williams mocks. "I feel the same," he mumbles, looking pleased. Arriving with Williams' husband, who is also her manager, all three of them sport woolly hats and order poached salmon salads. The night before, they played their first ever gig together in Fort William and, despite being seasoned performers – Williams has released six albums and MacColl has played with Eddi Reader, Steve Earle and KD Lang amongst others – they tell me they had never been so nervous. They made mistakes – it is a warm-up tour after all – and couldn't look at each other because they were terrified they would start laughing and be unable to stop. Sure enough, later that evening on stage, every time their eyes meet I'm convinced it's going to set them off. They first met a couple of years ago at a folk concert in Cork where, aptly, they sang 'First Time Ever I Saw Your Face'. The song was Williams' choice. "It was funny when we rehearsed it because I kept saying 'don't play it like that, do it like this'," she laughs. "I've done it loads of times, and with all due respect to the people I've played it with, I never felt it was to satisfaction," says MacColl. "Until this time." They agreed on the spot that they wanted to work together, but Williams was about to have a baby and it took them more than a year to meet up. In the meantime, they sent each other "haiku jokes". "They weren't strict haikus, because they have to be 17 syllables, don't they?" asks MacColl. "I stuck to 17 syllables," boasts Williams. "No, you didn't. I counted every one of them," he bats back. Eventually, MacColl went to stay with Williams and they headed into her studio, or rather a garage with some instruments in it. Everything happened unbelievably fast. "In six days we had 22 finished songs," says MacColl. They had never written together and had barely been in the same room, but somehow it worked. 'Come With Me', a breathtaking, romantic song about two friends deciding whether to take their relationship further, was completed in an hour and a half. And they were drunk. "It was late at night after dinner and we were like, let's just do one more hour," recalls Williams. "Then whoosh, it came out." Similarly, Williams walked in one day on MacColl singing 'Innocent When You Dream' in the studio to warm up his voice. She insisted they record it, with her backing vocals, and did so in a single take. "Before we started making this album, Neill wasn't confident about singing at all," says Williams. "But it sounded so lovely." "I have sung all my life but I've got out of the habit and if you don't exercise the muscle, you lose confidence," he says. In the past Williams has been described as timid. "I've changed since having a baby," she says. "I used to get terrible stage fright. Doing this used to mean everything to me to the point where I wouldn't be able to sleep if I'd played a wrong note. I'd feel like everything was against me and I had terrible paranoia. But having a baby changed everything because now that's the most important thing. And once you've pushed a human body out of your arse, what is there to be nervous about?" When it came to recording Two, Williams and MacColl wanted to capture the moment instead of tweaking each song endlessly to create something perfect, a process which produces what Williams calls "plastic surgery records, because they're the equivalent of sticking a needle of Botox in your face". They wanted it to be closer in spirit to the folk recordings of the early Seventies, like those of MacColl's parents. Which brings me to their families. Williams' father was a folk musician in Liverpool in the Sixties. After she tells me, with a deadpan expression, that her father is in fact Ewan MacColl, and we get the ensuing laughter out of the way, they tell me a lovely story about an old tape recorder and set of tapes Williams bought years ago at a flea market. She stored them under the bed where MacColl slept while they made Two and only recently rediscovered them. "The tapes were full of rare recordings of his mum and dad playing live at folk festivals in 1962," she says. They both shake their heads, bemused and delighted by the coincidence. Both of them were passionate about music from a young age, though Williams was painfully shy and used to sing and play guitar in secret. This is why she sings so quietly, she reckons. MacColl was touring with his parents at six months old, started playing guitar at 10, and was in his parents' band as a teenager. When did he realise, though, that his was not a conventional childhood? "It was hammered home when they came to my junior school and played," he winces. "I thought I was going to die of embarrassment." Williams' son may only be two years old, but he's already written his first song and is regularly taken on tour with his parents, just like MacColl was, while both of his teenage sons are in bands. For both of them, music really is a family affair. Did MacColl ever make music with his half-sister, Kirsty, the renowned singer-songwriter who tragically died in a boat accident? He falls quiet at her mention. "She was in one of my first bands when I was 15," he says. "We th rew her out because we didn't need a girl singer. Her first proper band, The Drug Addicts, threw her out for the same reason. Maybe that's what gave her the strength that she needed to go, well, f**k you. There were only six months between us so it was a close bond." Williams quickly steps in. "I had a band with my sister when I was 14," she says. "We wore pink tops and mini-skirts and were called Yak Attack." It works: MacColl starts laughing. "That's the perfect name for a band for you," he teases. She sticks two fingers up at him, and just like that they're off again. v • Come With Me is released on February 25, with the album, Two, released March 3 (Caw). Kathryn Williams and Neill MacColl play Red Rooms, Perth, March 24; Cabaret Voltaire, Edinburgh, March 25; and Classic Grand, Glasgow, March 26 www.kathrynwilliams.net/two |