Esme Bridie - Interview

  by John Clarkson

published: 9 / 2 / 2018

intro

John Clarkson speaks to young Merseyside-based singer-songwriter Esme Bridie about her debut album, ‘Today It Rains’, which is due out in March.

Esme Bridie is a young Merseyside-based singer-songwriter whose debut album, ‘Today It Rains’, is due out in March. Beautifully understated and arranged, ‘Today It Rains’ will be released on vinyl and download only on Liverpool-based label Klee Music. Although Bridie is only 21, the twelve songs on ‘Today It Rains’ carry a great emotional and lyrical depth and Bridie reveals a sharp observational eye, whether she is trying to persuade a friend not to self-implode on album opener ‘Self Destructive’, reflecting on a romance that has long grown stale on ‘Old Love’ or capturing the plight of someone who has fallen victim to the political system on ‘The Queen Bee’. ‘In Love with the City’ in contrast is meanwhile a gorgeously exuberant love song, capturing the intoxication of a new love affair. In one of her first interviews s Esme Bridie spoke to Pennyblackmusic about ‘Today It Rains’. PB: You have called your album ‘Today It Rains’. There are a lot of melancholic songs on the album but also some gorgeously upbeat ones such as ‘In Love with the City’. The title implies that while today it might rain today it may be sunny tomorrow. Was that why you chose that title? EB: ‘Today it Rains’ is a lyric from the second track on the album. I picked it out as a title because it seemed to sum up the overall feeling of the songs and definitely for the reasons you suggested. It is in some ways melancholic but at the same time hopeful, much like the themes of my songs. PB: Over how long a time frame were the songs on the album written? EB: The time frame of these songs is about two and a half to three years, although most of them were written in the last year and a half. As this is my first real release, I wanted to include a couple of older songs as I knew they had never really been heard by anyone else. The older songs on the album include ‘Tower of Regret’ and ‘Dirty Hands’, and the newest songs are ‘In Love with the City’and ‘Strangers’. All the rest fall somewhere in between. PB: Were all of the songs on the album written from and based on personal experience? EB: Yes, all my songs are very personal. If they’re not about my own experience then they’re about someone I’m close to. This is the most enjoyable way to write I think. PB: Why have you decided to release the album on vinyl and download rather than in a CD edition? EB: This just seemed like the best option right now because CDs are quickly going out of fashion and vinyl is coming back. It’s also more of an event to have a big beautiful vinyl and then, of course, you can still listen to the download versions like normal anyway. I’ll let you in on a little secret; I don’t even have a vinyl player myself! But I have been listening to the download tracks and enjoying looking at the vinyl. I still can’t believe it has my name and songs on it Ha ha! PB: ‘Today It Rains’ was produced by Colin McKay who has worked in the past with Martin Hannett, Thomas Lang, and Half Man Half Biscuit and has been the house engineer for Deltasonic Recordings. What do you think he brought to the recording and what was the most important thing that you learnt from him? EB: Working with Colin was amazing. He brought so much to my songs, particularly with arrangements. A lot of the ideas he came up with were things that I wouldn’t have thought of myself. That was the best thing. We spent most of the summer working together and by the end of the process I had learnt so much from him in terms of instrumentation and arrangement. PB: The album avoids excessive production and every instrument used has a distinctive place on it. Who are your backing band the Branches? Are they the same musicians who appeared on the album? EB: As I am currently finishing my degree at Leeds College of Music my backing band are music students that I met there. They are not, however, the musicians on the album. This was merely because most of the album development took place in Liverpool, and, therefore, we worked with musicians based there who are known to Klee Music. My band will be performing the songs with me on the album launch gig though. PB: As you are at university in Leeds and the album was recorded in Liverpool did the album as a result take a long term to record and did it involve a lot of stops and starts? EB: Luckily Leeds and Liverpool are quite close and easy to travel between, so over the past two years I’ve been back and forth between the two. It hasn’t actually caused too many problems. It just meant that we have had to plan dates in advance where possible. It also meant that I spent a lot of time on train. Ha ha! Oh well, I actually wrote some of the song lyrics on those train journeys! PB: You are doing an album launch in Liverpool in March. What other plans do you have for the immediate future? Will it involve a lot of touring? EB: Yes, I’m really excited for the launch! I’m doing one in Leeds in the same week too. I have quite a few dates booked in around that time including a gig in Manchester, York and a festival down south. I want to gig as much as possible after the album is released to keep promoting it. 2018 is looking like a very exciting year so far! PB: Thank you. ‘Today It Rains’ will be released on the 23rd March. Its album launch shows will take place at the Wharf Chambers in Leeds on March 21st and at Studio 2, Parr Street Studios on March 22nd.

Band Links:-

Picture Gallery:-