Interview: Frankie Morrow on Finding Honesty in ‘Way Out West’

With every release and live show, Frankie Morrow offers a different style. All enjoyable, all unique. It left us wondering what shape the debut album would take; we weren’t disappointed, and neither will you be.

The SNACK Chats To podcast tells the full story, but here we discuss musical influences, channelling personal pain, and the best and worst of being an independent artist.

Frankie, we’ve listened to your debut album, Way Out West… are you all right?

Am I all right right now? Largely, yes. Was I all right when I was writing that album? Definitely not, definitely not.

I was going through a break-up and I also lost my dad at the same time, so I really was relying on music so much to pull me through. It’s the first time people have been directly reaching out to me, saying this specific song and this specific lyric means this to me, which has been just really touching.

It’s our job as artists to be brave and be honest, and if we can’t do it, who will? That feeling overrides any level of self-consciousness or vulnerability, because really that’s what it’s all about, isn’t it? We’re not here for very long.

Any album that influenced the recording process?

I was listening to Blood on the Tracks a lot, which is obviously the record that is meant to be about the breakdown of Bob Dylan’s marriage.

The thing I love most about that record is that Dylan doesn’t shy away from any of the spectrum of emotions. It can be easy to just get caught in one thing – a break-up is a sad thing, or I’m angry – but you might feel relief and joy at times as well, and you do ultimately want that person to be well and happy. All of those thoughts and feelings coexist in your head.

I was also listening to Jason Molina [Magnolia Electric Co., Songs: Ohia]. I found this documentary and it talked about how he would literally come into the studio, assemble these musicians, they’d play through it a couple of times in the morning and they’d get one take in the afternoon, and that was it – they’d move on to the next song. I didn’t know you could record like this.

I didn’t want to end up with all of these isolated tracks and have all of the choice that comes with that. I wanted it to just capture it as it was. There’s loads of mistakes in it and there’s loads of things where I play it a certain way on the album and I never usually play it like that. I like that all of that is in it.

There’s a few moments, notably on ‘Star Jasmine’, where the Scottish accent comes out. Has living in London dulled that part of you, or does it come out stronger at the right time?

When you are in school you’re actually taught to not sing in a Scottish accent, so it’s kind of a thing you have to unlearn. I’m trying to consciously do it a bit more, actually.

Tell me about the guitar sound and the solo on ‘There Is A Place’.

That guitar sound is all JC Palmer, pedal steel player, and it’s his steel going through a mad fuzz pedal. I played him this song and he was like, ‘oh my god, I love this’. He came in, put that down, and we were like, ‘yep, thank you, next’. No further questions!

You’re an independent artist. What’s the biggest challenge and benefit of this?

Biggest challenge is money. I’m not going to pretend otherwise. But if you’re putting in your own cash, you own your own masters, and you have ultimate creative control over everything you do. And I think there’s a lot of value in having had to learn how to do a lot of things yourself.

Way Out West is released 26th June

Frankie Morrow plays Some Great Reward, Glasgow, on 4th July and Leith Depot Bar on 5th July

Photo credit (top): Tabitha Wykeham