More about: Ezra Furman

Known to many as the folk-punk composer of the soundtrack for Netflix's hit show Sex Education, Ezra Furman's knack for spinning a heart-wrenching yarn is earnestly unique. Dealing with topics such as loss, love and life as an outcast, her capability of cutting to the core is notable and impressive. Like Lou Reed, a hero of Furman's, her no-nonsense lyricism and brash acoustic charm have resonated with many, earning her rave reviews and acclaim. 

Speaking to Gigwise on a sunny London afternoon, Furman chats breezily but thoughfully. Her conversational manner is sincerely humble, introspective, quiet, yet gracefully enchanting. 

"The thing is, I know other artists where it created empty space for them to fill." Like many, when the pandemic hit in 2020, Ezra was confronted with the conundrum of staying creative. Contrary to what several musicians found, Ezra became busier than ever — but frustratingly uninspired musically. "For me, it had a counterintuitive effect. I had no time anymore because we had been sending our kid to daycare, and our friend moved into our house. My life just got so much more. I had less time. That made me work harder to make time that was sacred for just writing." But not all hope was lost; a refuge for creativity, fortunately, presented itself when it was most required. "There was so little time and space; I just had to build a little sanctuary, which ended up being my car where I wrote. It gave me a sense of the preciousness of the time I was able to spend working." 

Growing up in Chicago, dodging and weaving social anxieties, Furman felt adrift in a sea of adolescence. "I had lots of problems with my social life. I would lose myself in every social situation. The whole thing would just steamroll me." It was in discovering music that a true measure of solace was found. "From a young age, I needed to be alone to understand myself. I went to my room, listened to records, and realised I had my own perspective. I felt like I had a problem with forgetting who I was around other people. Now I don't give a damn about that." With a newfound love of all things sonic, Ezra began a journey of self-discovery. "It was a slow crawl toward freedom. Just little sideways steps with my back against the wall until I got to the door. I'm just an inch closer to freedom every day. I can think of certain milestones. Some are in my showbiz life and others in my personal life. These little milestones are markers on the path to freedom. When, in 2011, I first wore a dress in front of anyone else. I didn't know it meant anything, but I knew it made me feel more."

Slowly but surely, with confidence gradually increasing, Furman found it offering a new sense of self-worth. Upon discovering her own quantum of happiness, she allowed a sense of personal expression to reign free: "I didn't know why I felt so much better when I was allowed to be trans. But I did. Eventually, it doesn't really matter why." Her lyrics reflect much of that journey. In her view, the most striking aspect of her creative mindset is how songwriting allowed her to process emotions without initially intending on doing so: "I look back on some of them and think I was making some spiritual breakthrough by writing which I didn't understand until years later. The songs were confessing things I didn't consciously know. That happens a lot with songs. You're unconscious, and they come out in art before you know them yourself".

Arriving on the back of a US support slot for Jack White, Furman's new album All Of Us Flames, lands on the eve of a European tour. It’s a title she pondered over for some time. "It had to be in the first person plural. I looked through the lyrics. All the songs except one have the word 'we' in them, which I didn't do on purpose. It's what I have to say right now. It has to do with collective identity and solidarity".

Buzzing with integrity, wit and curiosity, the record captures the essence of what has made her a unique force in the music world. Brimming with her unpolished charm, Ezra assures that the record is wholly authentic ("it's my area of expertise"), but writing from a third-person approach has been her newfound love. "I like a lot of non-personal writing. Many writers I admire do not include their personal lives in their writing. John Darnielle's The Mountain Goats comes to mind. He was a fiction writer when he wrote as a songwriter. I think that's so cool."

Observing the chaotic nature of the world has been another habit of hers. Mindful of such awareness, culturally and politically, she considers her perceptions of challenging events in recent years. "There have been various stages. It has been frightening and panicky at times. You can hear it on [previous record] Twelve Nudes. It's like I'm panicking. Things are this bad, you know? It's hitting me. But I have to get past that panic, and you're like, 'okay, things are this bad'. What's my job here? What is our job? Our job is to take care of one another. I feel like that's the dominant theme of the record." 

Amid the stories on the album, some filled with sorrow, others with love, one track sits as the centre point for the whole record. ‘“Point Me Towards The Real”. That song contains a lot. It shows I've been hurt. It dispenses with illusion. I don't know why I have felt so much that way recently. Aren't we all always trying to think about the truth? Somehow I got a boost toward it." During our conversation, piano music is trickling in the background. Furman realises it is her keyboard player and it provides the interview with a hauntingly beautiful atmospheric soundtrack. 

Following five years fronting Ezra Furman & the Harpoons, she founded a new backing band, 'The Visions'. Since then, she has released five albums, each with its own unique characteristics. From the wildly experimental Transangelic Exodus to the politically charged aforementioned Twelve Nudes, her music defies pigeonholing. All Of Us Flames follows suit. Of what she would like listeners to take away from it, Furman is confident in the strength of both the songs and the musicians playing them. "I've been with this band for ten years now. My intention on this record was to let them be great musicians and not be as controlling as I've been in the past. I wanted to be more collaborative. Without sounding incredibly vain, I feel that I wrote these songs knowing they would be good. It doesn't matter what you do to them. It would take somebody who's very bad at music to make these bad songs. These songs are self-sufficient; you could try to knock them down with a bad drum sound, but they'd still be good." 

After finding her creative groove, it was a look back into the past where she found a trove of inspiration. "I was aspiring to the old standards. They are songs that don't rely on cleverness. I listened to traditional country music and blues songs." And she found herself writing with a more and analytical and methodical approach than before: "I thought, 'what is the theme? What are these things?' I was being structural rather than traditional. Still, we made some weird, excellent choices."

Although having once said artists shouldn't feel responsible for their work, Furman knows the importance of satisfying her creative self. "I just want to make something cool. I think the songs themselvs create a responsibility. You're responsible for the idea. The best songs have their own logic that the author either follows or doesn't. You get a little seed of an idea that comes from somewhere mysterious. And then all the work begins, like how do I make this idea come out and blossom? How do we get it to come out of its hole into the sun so we can feel it? And you just gotta ask it what it wants. Be nice to it!" 

Now over ten years into her solo career, a sixth album, and international recognition, it's fair to say that Ezra Furman has earned the right to undertake artistic risks. But one stands out amongst the rest: "The record Transangelic Exodus. I was meant to explain the world of government surveillance. I thought 'here's all the stuff that makes it make sense'. And then I said well, it doesn't mean any of that. The beautiful thing was just the situation. The glimpse of it came to me like a movie trailer rather than a movie. And to me, it's better as an unfinished world. That's just what that world wanted. It wanted to give you a strange and thrilling glimpse. It lets the listener fill in the gaps."

Like many, she is often eager to seek out the next idea. The thrill of the new is ever-present. Whether it be a lyric, a chord progression or a melody, Furman is buoyantly curious at finding that particular special frisson. "I get excited when I see that something works and I can see something's worthy of somebody else's time." Despite all this, Ezra remains humble about success. "I don't expect a medal. I certainly don't get awards. And, like, why should I?"

Such recognition isn't why she does it. Flying the flag for authenticity in a world of prescribed conventionalism, Ezra Furman is a tenacious outlier fueled by truth, boisterousness, and an unyielding determination to embrace the oddities of life. Wrapping up the interview we thank her for her being a positive light in a uncertain and busy world. She laughs gently and replies back: "Yeah, uncertain and busy, just as it always has been."

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More about: Ezra Furman