Damien Rice is a young Irish singer/songwriter whose debut album ‘O‘ is a distinct, very beautiful and remarkable highlight of the album release year. Here Rice talks about the album.

“Almost two years have passed since I started working on this record, and the picture I had in my head back then is very different to the one I have ended up with now. I fought and eventually surrendered. ‘O‘ recorded itself, I obeyed.”

“The album opens so quietly you barely notice. My favourite song at the moment is ‘Delicate‘. It and ‘Volcano‘ were recorded live on the wooden mezzanine floor with the slanted roof, in a midnight session, while neighbours slept. They had to go first on the album because it was the last and most poignant session we had during the recording.”

“‘The Blowers Daughter‘ I recorded solo in the same room a good couple of months earlier in a necessary moment; again live and click-less. The cello went down later. The fourth song ‘Cannonball‘ was different. The guitars went down first, layer after layer. I left this song aside for months without a vocal take. Lisa told me to finish it, so I did. I remember writing ‘Older Chests‘ in a friend’s apartment beside Christchurch as the bells were ringing. One day I recorded a demo kneeling on the floor with two mics leaning on shoes pointing in my direction. I sang the song. Months later, when I got into the studio I couldn’t improve on the performance, even with all my new gear. So I used the demo on the album. The street children are from St. Brigids in Celbridge; I stood there as they poured out of school, some looking strangely at me with a microphone in my hand.”

“David Arnold transformed ‘Amie‘. It started out in 4/4, he made some suggestions, and it ended up in 6/8 with a string arrangement that still causes me to breathe deep. Reminds me of the day I lay by a radiator by a big window, stared at the sky and asked for a sign.”

“Probably the most spontaneous recording on the whole album is ‘Cheers Darlin‘. The night it happened I was still un-sober when I got home, set up the studio, looped some noises and a sad guitar part, grabbed the mic and sang. Whatever came out in that instant went down. The words just fell out, and I love listening back thinking, ‘that was 3am on that night’. Then I went to visit Jean in Paris, set up some mics over his piano, played him the song and I pressed record while he casually improvised along, finishing the song.”

“‘Cold Water‘… when ill and brushing death we sometimes get very focused and sometimes, all of a sudden, religious. No past, no future, just now. Desperate, lost. I spent some time alone in an abbey in the South of France with a monk who composed Gregorian Chants, perhaps influencing this song.”

“I remember very well walking home from the GAA club in Celbridge alone, one cold night, writing ‘I Remember‘. Passers-by staring, probably assuming I was drunk. I was freezing and had to keep going so I wouldn’t forget the words. I was elated.”

“The album, like a gig, finishes with ‘Eskimo‘, the hardest song on the album to record because I had done it before, a couple of years back in Windmill Lane recording studios; in an energy-charged couple of days with an orchestra and an opera singer. The recording rights were not mine, so I had to do it all over again. The worst thing to do when recording is to compare and, of course, I compared. Drove myself mad at this song, until I stopped.”

“Something turned and then time said I was finished.”

“And so I was.”

“And so it is, nothing like I said it would be…”