Bernard Butler will release ‘Good Grief’ – his first solo album in 25 years – on May 31.
The new LP from the former Suede guitarist marks a long-awaited return to the spotlight for the musician, who was “scarred and scared” by his past experiences.
“I was happily distracted and joyously involved with so much music,” he says of his work on projects with everyone from Neneh Cherry and Pet Shop Boys, to Paloma Faith and Duffy. “I realised just being there was more than I had ever hoped for.”
“I gave a lot to other people, but realised that my story was defined by what I was, rather than what I am. I set myself a modest commercial goal, an expectant creative one: perform to 10 people without being bottled, then find 11 the next night.
“Thus began the undoing of my own embarrassment. I would write as I thought and sing as I wrote until the bottles fly. And so, the songs arrived.”
Making roots in a rehearsal space in Holloway, the first song to flourish from the sessions was the single Camber Sands, of which he adds: “For years and years I have drawn straight lines from North London to every coastline I could see.
“To life-worn Londoners escape is the dream and return most likely. The story I found was not the sea but the journey. Camber Sands, Mersea Island, Dunwich, or a dozen more horizons of possibility, the sea and the seawalls, and the endless return to face the city.
“Camber Sands is a love song – we flee the past, the present, ourselves, to survive, to defy. The loneliest music of the resolute, the half-light and the saddest tunes.”
Listen to Bernard Butler’s Camber Sands below.
Tracklist: Bernard Butler – Good Grief
1. Camber Sands
2. Deep Emotions
3. Living The Dream
4. Preaching To The Choir
5. Pretty D
6. The Forty Foot
7. London Snow
8. Clean
9. The Wind
