Follow The Leader: Richard Swift

Ok hands up, it is honesty time here at Gigwise. Who has heard the first two Richard Swift albums ‘Walking without Effort’ and ‘The Novelist’? We are taking a punt here but we are guessing not many arms are in the air. Not that this fact bothers the laid back American singer, pianist and guitar maestro as he prepares for the release of his third long player ‘Dressed Up For The Letdown’.

“In the lyrics for ‘Dressed Up’ there is one that says ‘the right songs for the wrong crowd’. I’m genuinely a patient guy and I kind of like slow burning things I mean I’ve never been one to be excited about the flash in the pan kind of artists” he tells us in the make shift meeting room in a west London hotel. The room is a bedroom with a desk instead of a bed, which looking at Swift he’d probably rather be in. “I was talking to somebody the other day and they were like (puts on the worst English accent) ‘Oh have you heard this record?’ and I was like ‘what’s it sound like?’ and he goes ’It’s like the new Arctic Monkeys’ and I thought fuck me the Arctic Monkeys record only came out like nine months ago. Everything is moving so quick and are these bands gonna be around in five years from now? Probably not, they’re gonna be hanging around with The Vines or something.”

Maybe it is his self confessed ‘natural stoner state’ that helps formulate his approach to his career and deny the pressures of success but he also concedes that now he is signed to Polydor he is happy to let others bear the burden. “I’m dealing with this guy Seb Chew who has just had a number one record with Klaxons, he signed Scissor Sisters, Rufus Wainwright - all artists who have had loads of success and it doesn’t put extra pressure on me rather alleviates pressure as I can be who I am in their system without having to worry about paying the record companies bills because there are plenty of people doing that.”

Formerly keyboardist in Starflyer 59 Swift’s third solo album is released in March. His previous albums achieved critical acclaim yet struggled for commerical success and at the first glance the title of the new album hints at an uneasy relationship with the music industry, a suggestion his doesn’t fully refute. “I have always had a pretty clear perspective in my relationship to and in the music industry," he explains. "I have basically spent the last three or four years touring and recording, not only my own stuff but by being slowed down by working with a bunch of other people that I’m just not excited about. So I was just able to hang about behind the scenes as a kind of right hand man or just as a keyboard player or drummer or whatever. I’ve learned from other people’s mistakes, some of it’s my experience and some of it is definitely other people’s experiences. I’ve had loads of friends who have been signed to majors and been dropped immediately for either business or personal reasons or whatever it might be. You finish a great album and all of a sudden Time-Warner buys something and you are left without anything, not even the masters to your own records.”