Talk about double standards: UK rappers are always being crucified for copying the Yanks, but 24-year-old Americana nut Dan Lea gets away with it with ease. As By The Fireside, he’s part of a new breed of British songwriter completely obsessed with the most retarded bits of American culture. His music could’ve been recorded in a rusty tin shack in Fuck-Your-Three-Eyed-Sisterville, Wyoming, and he makes Will Oldham sound like Will Young. Dan actually records in a shed in Stoke Newington, north London.
Over the past two years he’s assembled a creepy collection of war-time photographs and 70s toy pianos, set up a studio called The Goldenhum, made records for M Kraft and Whitey and put out two EPs of his own. As it’s the “Living With” issue, we wanted to do this piece in the style of that “Life In The Day” column in The Sunday Times Magazine, but Dan didn’t really get it.
Vice: Can you tell us about moving into your new studio day by day and how it’s become a major fixture in your exciting musician life?
Dan: I was meant to move all my stuff into this place last week but couldn’t because I was supporting The Magic Numbers on tour. We got back on Sunday night, so my friend Martin helped me chuck all my stuff in here while we still had a van. Then I spent the week traipsing round old wood yards. I couldn’t afford to buy old tables, so I bought some from Ikea and covered them in wood from a skip I found outside. I just can’t stand being around new shiny stuff, so I have to fuck it up a bit. Apart from that I’ve just been doing general moving shit.
Okay, but that wasn’t day by day.
I can’t remember what I’ve done every day, it all just blurs into one.
Right. What’s with the Americana obsession?
I just don’t really like much British music. I mean, I like Nick Drake and stuff like that. There aren’t many new things that excite me, apart from King Creosote, and there’s this great band from Dalston called Flotation Toy Warning.
You’ve surrounded yourself with weird old ornaments. What’s wrong with new stuff?
I just can’t work with clean tools. I’ve never been able to get anything perfect, it always sounds scrappy. I’ve tried to do more polished stuff but it always ends up sounding shit.
JAIMIE HODGSON
The “Then Came Noon” and “Battles That Add Up To None” EPs are out on Good Science Records. www.bythefireside.co.uk
