What happens when an ex-hardcore music fan decides to create his own musical project and release it to the masses? Usually it’s a fucking disaster but in this case, Ireland’s James Vincent McMorrow has squashed that assumption and crafted a record that is both vulnerable and intensly moving. Don’t let the ‘ex-hardcore music fan’ thing scare you away either. McMorrow draws most of his influence from 60s style female vocalists like Dusty Springfield and early soul music like Donny Hathaway. However it’s the heart-wrenching delivery of his smooth falsetto voice that disarms any listener into a pile of mush. It’s easy to categorize him with the Bon Ivers and ‘log cabin folk’ but McMorrow is a more unique force than that. Pay attention to this, it’s worth more than one listen.
You can purchase James Vincent McMorrow’s amazing debut here. Also stay tuned to our coverage of SXSW (which we’re very busy on, I SWEAR!) as his live shows are as magical as this record.
This week McMorrow answers the world famous Kuestionnaire and gives us a pretty awesome answer for who he wants to collaborate with.
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1. Could you state your name and what you do?
My name is James Vincent McMorrow and i am a musician and a songwriter.
2. How would you describe your sound?
I rarely describe it, people tend to do that for me. I’ve heard a lot of different ones, dark folk pop, eerie harmony driven indie folk, things like that. The best one I’ve heard was Cee Lo Green’s younger shyer folk guitar wielding brother!
3. What is your favorite local band?
I’m not as up on Irish music right now as I’d like to be, there’s a band called Hired Hands who supported me on my last tour there that I really like, really charming chamber pop, kind of ramshackle, but in an intentional and lovely way.
4. Any concerts that blew your mind recently?
The National at the Olympia theatre in Dublin in December, it was right after a foot and a half of snow fell in 2 hours, the city looked like something from a movie, they got stuck in London and arrived on stage about an hour late, then proceeded to play one of the most spectacular sets I will probably ever see in my lifetime.
On Saturday in Austin we saw Wye Oak play, they were magical, Civilian is my favourite record of the year so far, their playing is gravity defying, I have no idea how they pull it off. She’s creating these huge sonic landscapes with one guitar, and he’s playing drums AND bass on a keyboard at the same time, How is that possible!!??
5. Any non-musical influences you would like to mention?
Too many to ever mention, i read quite a lot while I’m traveling, lately it’s been mainly Cormac Mc Carthy novels, and I just finished 100 years of solitude for about the 20th time.
6. If your music was to be the theme of a film/TV show, what would it be?
Not too sure, perhaps a western or something? I’d say the good the bad and the ugly because it’s such a wonderfully cinematic movie, but then that would mean messing with Ennio Morricone, and that is surely sacrilege of the highest degree.
7. What musician/artist would you like to collaborate with for a day?
Probably d’Angelo, mainly because I’d like to be in a room while he layers his vocals, I’ve always been obsessed with how he records his own voice, no matter how hard I try I cab never figure out how he gets his harmonies to sound like they do, he’s a genius musician.
8. What is the album you listen to on a cold rainy day?
Boxer by the National
9. List four songs you would listen to on a roadtrip?
Dirty cartoons by Menomena
Mr blue sky by ELO
The Waiting by Tom Petty
I drove all night by Roy Orbison
10. Where do you see yourself in 7 years?
Hopefully still making records, both my own and for others. I think I’d like to look at production in a meaningful fashion at some point, I really loved making my own album, recording music is when I’m at my happiest.
11. What is the last book you read?
The invisibles by Paul Auster
12. Is image a factor in music or is it a waste of time?
I think it is a factor, most people who are musicians enjoy the freedom to dress and look as they please I guess, but at the end of the day it’s a fairly incidental thing, I mean a band can look like Led Zeppelin all they want, but if the music can’t stand on it’s own merits then it really doesn’t matter.
13. Any embarrassing moments on stage you would like to share?
When the album first came out in Ireland I played this pretty bizarre show in county Kerry, at the back of a tiny pub, about 15 people there, the engineer set up the mics and then left before I started playing, and there was loads of feedback so I had to play the show unplugged. About halfway through the 3rd or 4th song a cat all of a sudden jumps up on stage and spends the rest of the set right there staring at me! Odd.
14. Any favorite tour locations?
A lot, just finished playing sxsw in Austin, it’s a pretty fantastic music town, as is Toronto where I came from the week before. To be honest everywhere I play right now automatically jumps right to the top of the list, mainly because these are my first shows in these cities and everything still feels so fresh.
15. Lastly, what is your present state of mind?
Pretty positive, or as positive as my state of mind could ever conceivably be I guess, I’m really just enjoying being out in the world playing my songs for new people night after night, it’s what I’ve been working towards all this time.
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James Vincent McMorrow – If I Had A Boat from Early In The Morning (2011)
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Hired Hands – Marie Antoinette from Marie Antoinette 7″ (2010)
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