Ed Harcourt

May-June 2013: English Tour Dates with support from @CatherineAD

I’m standing in a wood thinking about how most art materializes from nothing, the otherworldly mystery of it. The spark that bleeds and so on.

I went to my best friend’s house last night and gave him a painting of a monkey I had done in the day as a welcoming present.

It’s terrifying, little cymbals and stripey pants. Demented eyes. Monkey is sitting in the middle of hell. I stuck ‘You’re my best friend’  on it using cut out newspaper hostage letters, it’s now on his kitchen wall where it should remain forever. 

The notion arrived yesterday morning, ‘I know I’ll paint a grimacing monkey for my friend, he’ll like that’. I’m not sure if I should apply these little catalysts in the brain to chaos theory or not, but I’m very happy to be the recipient of them. Random chaos, random mumbling.

You might be wondering what I’ve been up to for the last 2 years. Same as ever, writing with lots of singers, especially female for some reason, working on film soundtracks that may never happen, sampling fireworks and the creaky metal gate in the playground, the odd gig here and there and being a father. Back Into The Woods is out in a week which is always quite odd, I’ve been eviscerating myself from any papers and magazines and mainly social networks, best I just knuckle down and keep writing, working on the next record which is going to be dark, sultry, cinematic and playful in all the right places. I feel like I’m in an eternal transitional shift but this really will be a new sound (there’s only so many melancholy piano opuses to write before the needle gets stuck in the groove man). But before all that, there is the small matter of finding someone to feed my cat and kids, packing my case and heading out on a tour of England’s churches and concert halls - everywhere else, don’t worry, I’ll be coming soon…

On a final note here’s one of my favourite Dorothy Parker poems

There’s little in taking or giving,

There’s little in water or wine;

This living, this living, this living

Was never a project of mine.

Oh, hard is the struggle, and sparse is

The gain of the one at the top,

For art is a form of catharsis,

And love is a permanent flop,

And work is the province of cattle,

And rest’s for a clam in a shell,

So I’m thinking of throwing the battle-

Would you kindly direct me to hell? 

Thanks for reading my ramblings. I was going to go for a long sunday walk but then I woke up beside a river.

Yours,

Ed x