Black River Falls (Cooking Vinyl, 1996)

The Ghost Of Limehouse Cut

I did two versions of this. The first was a fairly lugubrious version with a full electric band, whose sole highlight, for me, was a classic Grimmo moment on the outro - but, as this was 5 minutes into the track, even the mighty Mr O'G could not save the day. I was at the panic stage of trying to start a new pared-down version with His Grace when the latter dignitary happened to be speaking to Joe Gore, the great San Franciscan guitarist (Tom Waits, Jon Hassell, PJ Harvey - he and His Grace know each other from touring with the latter). Joe offered to do anything I wanted on the album - this track was the only possible outcome at that point, as the rest of it was pretty well finished. He did all his parts at home in SF. I really hope to get out there and do some full-on stuff with him next time. I sang it and we mixed it in a warehouse in Bermondsey.

Black River Falls

Not much I can say about this, really...a truly heart-rending orchestration by the learned M. Renaud Pion, beautifully executed near Paris by Stefan Rodesco. James Woodrow could not play the guitar for three days after doing this. I do not seem to have lost the knack of writing in keys which kill guitar players.

Payday

A companion to the last song. I'm not going to trivialise the subject by trying to describe it outside the songs. What I will say is that I do not apologise for trying to describe certain routinely heartbreaking things which happen to all of us, on the grounds the events described do not involve the trappings of teenage rebellion, puppy love or wilful self-neglect of the photogenic kind. Or on the grounds that my suffering has been no greater than that of millions of others, though that is manifestly the case.