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Artist Interviews
Q&A: James Blackshaw
By CMU Editorial | Published on Thursday 26 August 2010
Originally starting out in punk bands, James Blackshaw now primarily plays an acoustic twelve-string guitar and has been compared to the likes of Bert Jansch, Robbie Basho and Jack Rose. Having already released eight studio albums, James is about to release his ninth, ‘All Is Falling’.
Produced by John Hannon and Blackshaw himself, the album was recorded last December and sees James’ first foray into the realm of the electric twelve-string guitar. With that album out on 30 Aug via Young God Records, we caught up with James to ask the Same Six.
Q1 How did you start out making music?
I’ve been making music in some form or another since I was about thirteen years old. I used to play electric guitar and bass guitar in a couple of punk rock bands as a teenager, sang a bit, even attempted drums, which I was terrible at, and the piano. Guitar was definitely the first instrument I took seriously, but conversely, for a while I totally lost interest in it, until I was in my early 20s. I had heard John Fahey some years before and was kind of fascinated and bemused by his music, but at some point I got really engrossed with the idea of guitar as a solo instrument. I listened to Fahey, Robbie Basho, a lot of old blues and initially just copied what I heard. I also started to get interested in classical music, minimalism, drone and a lot of different types of music from India, Japanese koto playing and Indonesian gamelan, and wondered if I could incorporate all these interests somehow. When I picked up a twelve-string guitar for the first time when I was 23, everything just seemed to fall into place.
Q2 What inspired your latest album?
I really don’t have any kind of grand plan when I start work on an album, but this time I bought an electric twelve-string guitar and became really interested with the sonic properties of the instrument. I think by default it meant my playing style changed or adapted to fit the guitar itself. At some point, I was coming up with a lot of different ideas, all in the same alternative tuning, and I could just hear that these parts or fragments somehow belonged together to make one long piece in different movements. I also bought some better home recording equipment around that time. The album wasn’t recorded at home, but it did allow me to figure out arrangements for other instruments, like violin, cello and winds, way in advance, so it was more carefully composed ahead of time, as opposed to some previous occasions where that sort of thing has been more spontaneous. ‘All Is Falling’, the title itself, was a phrase I stole from one of Dutch artist Bas Jan Ader’s notebooks. I’m a big fan and I liked the ambiguity of how that could be interpreted.
Q3 What process do you go through in creating a track?
Things almost always start life with me sitting and playing, usually guitar or sometimes piano. As I said, I normally have no idea what I want to play or where it’ll go from there. I guess I’m attempting to channel some kind of mood or feeling I might not be able to articulate in words. I can’t really explain it much better than that. Starting work on something is the hardest part for me, then when I have a certain amount of material, my overall sense of the what the album is starts to take shape – how it should be recorded, what other instruments I’d like to hear etc.
Q4 Which artists influence your work?
A lot of minimalist composers – Philip Glass, Steve Reich, Terry Riley, La Monte Young, Charlemagne Palestine, Rhys Chatham etc – and of course a lot of those guitarists on the Takoma label. I think recently I’m also kind of influenced by a lot of stuff I don’t like, if that makes sense, in terms of what I don’t want to do. I just really appreciate anything that’s well crafted, has been carefully thought out and has a lot of heart. In terms of more recent stuff, Jim O’Rourke is definitely someone whose music I’m genuinely in awe of.
Q5 What would you say to someone experiencing your music for the first time?
Just to try to be patient and open-minded, I guess. My music’s not for everybody, but I’m happy that some people really get something from it, whatever that might be.
Q6 What are your ambitions for your latest album, and for the future?
I’ve got a lot of touring coming up soon with Swans in the UK and Europe this autumn/winter. I’ve just been taking a break, so am looking forward to getting out there again. Beyond that, I really don’t know. I’m certain I’ll start on another album at some point next year and continue working with Current 93, but at this point, I don’t want to force myself to keep working on music for the sake of it. I’ve got one or two ideas, but they’ll need to some time to come to fruition. I’d love to do a soundtrack for a film sometime, that’s long been an ambition for me.
MORE>> www.myspace.com/jamesblackshaw
