James Yuill
Location: London
Websites:
Bio: James Yuill presents ‘First In Line’, the second single to be released from James’s latest album ‘Movement In A Storm’ and a song that perfectly ... (more)
encapsulates his unique sound.
A man with a quasi-monastic lifestyle, James Yuill is never happier than when he's making music, alone in his Dalston flat, entirely oblivious to the whims of the east London scene, or the rules and regulations of wider music culture. Here, in Yuill’s spare bedroom studio, there is no contradiction between working on a remix for electro hipsters, We Have Band, while raving about Take That - "Gary Barlow is a genius" - and your teenage obsession with Nirvana. That's James Yuill's world. And he’s happy in it.
"I've never followed fashion," he laughs, which probably explains why, when he first came to London, he took immense pride in his job sourcing music for TV adverts. "If I think track X is a fantastic record it doesn't matter who the singer is, or who wrote it. To me, I have the best of both worlds. I grew up on grunge, so I love hard bass drums and distorted bass lines, and all that heavy Ed Banger electro, Justice and Boys Noize, but I also appreciate the skill in songwriting and pop. And I think the way I bring them together is unique."
Indeed, in ‘First In Line’ and right across ‘Movement In A Storm’, that is demonstrably true. Where James constructs and develops strummed ideas on his acoustic guitar, it’s the way he radically manipulates such outlines that makes him standout. Coloured-in with great neon splashes of data, he upgrades, reboots and digitalises the core of his latest output in a way that only enhances his melancholic tone, heightening the emotional impact immeasurably.
Certainly, it should make any journalist think twice before ever mentioning "folktronica" and James Yuill, in the same sentence, ever again. In France and Germany, where his records get plenty of airtime on daytime independent radio, he can pull a few hundred people at stand-alone gigs, and is regularly booked to add pizzazz to techno and electro all-nighters. Although, as a drug-free and nearly teetotal musician James cuts an eccentric swathe through clubland. "I'm not remotely rock 'n' roll," he admits. "My interest in electronic music is an interest in sound. I never had some drugs 'n' clubbing epiphany and, on tour, I can happily sit backstage, reading Philip K Dick, go on, blast some manic electronic music, then go home, have a cup of tea, and go to bed, perfectly content. What can I say? I'm all about the music."
As a lanky, bespectacled self-confessed "music geek", he may not see himself as a future pop star, but he does see himself as one among a small band of visionary British musicians (people as different as Patrick Wolf, Cinnamon Chasers and Hot Chip), who are trying to alter the way pop music sounds. By writing songs informed by the electronica of, say, Modeselektor or Warp's Chris Clark, such musicians may well catalyse pop's next great leap forward. "Ultimately," says James, "the Aphex Twin-isation of the charts is inevitable. Computer music is boundless, there's just so much there to explore."
Others will trail in his wake, but you should get onboard now. It's going to be quite an ear-opener.
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