Nick Drake is still alive in our hearts and minds, says Elbow frontman Guy Garvey on curated tribute album
GUY GARVEY well remembers when he first became captivated by the music of Nick Drake.
The Elbow frontman was 20, “two or three years into being a weed smoker and a music fan”.
He’d already discovered another folk singer from these shores, John Martyn, and Drake, he learned from his friends in the know, was the logical next step.
First, he acquired a copy of Pink Moon, the third and final album released by Drake during his short life.
Probably on account of the weed, admits Garvey, the surreal artwork in the style of Salvador Dali, “said something to me”.
“As with John Martyn, I then bought everything I could lay my hands on,” he says.
“In those days, buying a record meant spending two or three pounds at Bolton flea market.”
I’m talking to Garvey, 49, because he’s contributing to a lovingly curated tribute album, The Endless Coloured Ways: The Songs Of Nick Drake.
It is the brainchild of Cally Callomon, manager of the singer’s estate, and Jeremy Lascelles, CEO of Chrysalis Records.
Callomon says: “Nick was not that concerned with promoting himself as an artist, but I think he would have been overjoyed to hear his art revisited and newly promoted by so many vibrant and talented artists.”
Among the acts given free rein to fashion startling reinventions are Fontaines D.C., Self Esteem, Let’s Eat Grandma, John Grant, Emeli Sandé, Ben Harper and Camille.
‘Completely in love’
The 24 songs, split into four groups representing the seasons, draw from the three original LPs, Five Leaves Left (1969), Bryter Later (1971) and Pink Moon (1972), plus non-album tracks.
Drake’s work was released by Island Records, home to other revered folk acts of the day such as Martyn, Sandy Denny and Fairport Convention.
Never a big seller in his lifetime, he was a troubled soul who died aged 26, in 1974, from an overdose of anti-depressants.
Towards the end, this shy, enigmatic character couldn’t even face singing to live audiences.
But, nearly 50 years on, his songs such as Time Has Told Me, River Man, Hazey Jane II and Northern Sky, which stretch pastoral folk into the realms of jazz and classical, continue to enchant legions of new listeners.
His story saddens Garvey, who says: “I was already completely in love with his music before I knew what happened to him.
“I’ve never been a fan of the idea that tragedy gives credence to music because, ultimately, I’d prefer it if my heroes lived.
“But when I found out about Nick being unable to perform and, of course, his death, all his songs jumped in their resonance.
“I still can’t listen to Black Eyed Dog (one of the last songs he recorded), it’s too difficult. He sounds genuinely terrified on that.”
Using the familiar “black dog” metaphor for depression is typical of Drake’s unflinching lyrics.
Garvey says: “There’s no getting away from it. He wrote about dying.
“And he’ll be the age he died at for ever and ever, won’t he?
“Some of my favourite songwriters are still alive,” he continues. “Take Joni Mitchell. She was at her most poignant when she was 20 years younger than I am now.
“I remember looking up to her and feeling as if she was an auntie. Then, when Elbow suddenly got into their stride, I saw her as a contemporary, maybe a sister or a cousin.
“Now when I listen to her work and hear its freshness, its excitement and its naivety, I see Joni as a little sister and as an auntie all at once.
“Whereas Nick remains this kid and will always be this kid. He’ll be a companion for those who don’t want to leave their room.”
Garvey says the blessing of the Drake family, including Nick’s sister, the actress Gabrielle, “cemented my involvement” in the tribute album.
He contributes empathetic vocals to a richly atmospheric reading of Saturday Sun, with music by Tunng’s Mike Lindsay.
He also takes co-production duties with Barney Lister (Jessie Ware, Joy Crookes) for a searing take on Cello Song by Irish post-punk outfit Fontaines D.C.
Garvey loves the idea that these covers will introduce Nick Drake to new audiences.
“Many thousands of 17 and 18-year-olds have been touched by Fontaines’ music in a way that they haven’t been touched before,” he says.
“Then they hear that their favourite band is covering this guy Nick Drake. It’s a real endorsement, isn’t it?
‘Two glorious days’
“It’s saying, ‘Look over here, this is important’. Whole new generations getting into Nick’s music must make his family very proud.”
Garvey explains that Fontaines frontman Grian Chatten chose to do Cello Song.
“I said to Grian, ‘Just sing it freely, don’t worry about singing it accurately’,’’ he says.
“We had two glorious days at the studio because Fontaines, as well as being a cool-as-f* band, are absolute gentlemen.
“They’re truly rock and roll and they’ve become truly good friends.
“They’ve got the most charismatic and talented frontman in Grian and the b***ds are even cool enough to be Irish. They’re the whole package, easily the greatest current band.”
For Cello Song, it was Garvey’s idea to bring in “the best violinist I know, Violeta Vicci, who has played with Elbow for many years”.
He says: “She’s an extraordinary artist in her own right — this amazing half Swiss, half Spanish, half conservatoire, half knife-throwing street thug. A gorgeous woman.
“Violeta ended up playing with Fontaines D.C. all over the world after I introduced them.”
Next we talk about Garvey’s other contribution, his vocals on Saturday Sun, which contains some of Drake’s most poetic and melancholic lyrics.
“But Saturday sun has turned to Sunday rain,” is how it ends.
Garvey says: “Melancholy is ingrained into all of Nick’s writing. It never becomes joy and joy alone.
“But we all go through a period when we realise things aren’t permanent and that the world will turn whether we’re on it or not.”
For Garvey, however, life is for living. “We’re a part of this incredible cosmic accident,” he says.
“And it makes so much that happens rare and beautiful, including that young man’s life and his legacy.
“He’s been alive in hearts and minds much longer than he was alive on the earth.
“The power of recording is not lost on me. I record everything. I recorded my father for ten years before he died. I’ve started recording my mum and I’ve got hundreds of my voice notes for my son.”
Without expressly saying so, Saturday Sun has an autumnal feel and this prompts Garvey to reflect on the seasonal nature of his own songwriting.
He says: “Autumn can be bright and cold. It’s beautiful, slightly inhospitable and necessarily nostalgic following summer.
Tearful goodbyes
“A lot of people find it inspiring, not just songwriters. It’s also the time to get busy with your paints.”
One time when the leaves turned red and gold, Garvey discovered a favourite haunt at Manchester’s Piccadilly train station where he got out his notebook and jotted down potential lyrics.
He says: “I was 22 and there was a particularly good spot where you could look down and watch people saying tearful goodbyes or greeting each other joyfully.
“I sat there and wrote something pretty pedestrian — ‘The day is cold with contemplation/He watches mothers meeting at the station’,” he adds with an infectious laugh.
“I’ll still pause there for a coffee when I’m passing through. All human life is there.”
Another recurring theme in Garvey’s writing comes from the moment in his childhood when he was finally “allowed out of earshot of my doting mother and my big sisters”.
He says: “I didn’t grow up in the countryside — a bloody great motorway whistled past our house — but there was a field and a river, albeit quite a dirty one.
“There was also this ruined mill where I did my smoking, my kissing and my imagining. Those days still pop into my mind all the time.”
Returning to Drake again, Garvey says he’s in awe of what the singer achieved in such a solitary way.
“First and foremost, I’m a collaborator,” he affirms. “In terms of Nick’s work, I don’t know how solo artists do it.
“I absolutely haven’t got the self-confidence. If I hadn’t been in my gang, I wouldn’t have come out of my bedroom either.
“In Elbow, we love everything from AC/DC to Elton John — and we first bonded over funk music.
“But when Jamiroquai appeared, we just thought, ‘F*** that then — let’s try something else’. We’re writing our tenth studio album at the moment.”
I ask Garvey if he thinks Drake’s mercurial talent would have blossomed in the music world of today. “It’s better and worse for a young artist,” he replies.
“You can find your audience a bit easier. You can do it through your bedroom now but you couldn’t in his era.
“That said, we’re currently in the middle of an international highway robbery.
“There’s more money being spent on music by music lovers than ever before, and less of it is getting to the artist than ever before.”
As our chat winds up, Garvey gets a “sports day update” from wife Rachael Stirling about his young son, on another line.
“He’s built almost exactly like me,” he says. “Likes running, but more for the noise it makes in his ears. He is an absolute belter, a great kid.”
Like dad, he’s already developing a way with words.
“He’s six and hilarious,” continues Garvey. “We were on our way back from a trip and he’s at that age, particularly when he’s tired, where every question in his mind comes out of his mouth.
“He said, ‘Daddy, can I tell you something?’ And I said, ‘I can’t wait, son’. There was a pause and then he went, ‘You’re using sarcasm’. And I was like, ‘That’s my boy!’ ”
So, is his son proud of his rock star dad? “I wouldn’t go that far,” answers Garvey. “The music he loves most is the music that irritates me.
“We inherited an Alexa, which we wouldn’t have chosen, and he said, ‘Alexa, play I’m a banana’.
“And some dick has actually recorded what can be loosely termed a song called I’m A Banana. I mean, it’s appalling. It’s just him screaming, ‘I’m a banana!’ and I hate it. It’s an uninvited part of the canon.”
One day in the future, Garvey will no doubt have to set his little boy straight . . .
. . . and introduce him to the bruised and beautiful music of Nick Drake.