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when you ask him to play, it’s an incredible explosion of dynamic guitar playing. Because they
knew each other and they were friends and they’d worked together, when I came into that
environment, it felt very warm and very conducive to making a very real album and it was just
a great experience. In fact, I didn’t want to leave [laughing]. At the end of the day, I was saying,
can we do some more? We pretty much recorded them in a traditional live setting. Of course,
you add additional guitars on and percussion and things. They’re a great group of guys and
they’re going to be doing the touring with me on the bigger gigs like the festivals and things.

BiTS: Tell me something about some of the other songs on it. Are they all your work? There’s
no covers at all.

EW: No covers. Ten original songs. I thought that was the best way. Even if you put one cover
on, you’re sort of diluting the water. ‘Wish Her Well’, which you know about. There’s a song
called ‘Mary Lou’, which is kind of my touch on the sort of Motown/Stax feel of music, Otis
Redding sort of feel, and it’s about being on the phone to somebody and are they looking out
the window at another girl? It’s another girl story. There’s a great song called ‘Nuthin’ which
has turned into a sort of northern soul real groovy track about looking out into the audience at
all these handsome men, but all you can think about is another man [laughing]. There’s a
theme here, isn’t there? And ‘Not Paying’ is a real rock number. In fact, ‘Not Paying’ was

recorded - we were rehearsing ‘Not Paying’ in the studio and I was singing through a
traditional SM58 mic which is a stage mic, traditionally, and I was really going for it, and I was
trying to sing it to get the guys to play like a train rushing down a track - yes, let’s go for it. I
was really belting it and Mat said, “Mark can you just record this vocal for my reference”,
which was very clever of him. “Just open the track because I want to listen back to this” and I
went for it like a steam train on this track
because I was trying to get across this
Mavis
energetic dramatic feel and when we listened
Staples
back to the take, Mat just said, “That’s got to
be your vocal tape. That’s it. You can’t do it
any better”, and that’s the take on the album
[laughs].

BiTS: It sounds as though that might be your
favourite. Do you have a favourite?

EW: Do I have a favourite? I’m really lucky
that I listen to it in the car, and I love it. I love
them all and I hope that when anybody buys
the album or hears the album, you will hear that it is ten very individual stories about different

aspects of love. One of them ‘Blossom Like Snow’ is about my father and that’s in a waltz feel -
ba doom da da, ba do da, because he was born in the 30s and I wanted this waltz-y feel. I love
that. Some days that’s my favourite and then at the very end of the session, Ian, there was a
song that I’d written, but it just didn’t feel right. The lyrics were a bit cheesy, and it just didn’t
work, so I said to the guys, we’ve got to nail this last song or else the album’s not complete, and
I went back to my hotel, and I didn’t even go in the hotel room. I sat in the car, and I played this
track over and over again and rewrote it and that song is called ‘Then I’m Gone’ and that’s the
last song on the record and I do really love that one [chuckling] because I always wanted to
make a Mavis Staples like, dusty. I just love Mavis Staples’ style and her latest album I really,
really love and I wanted that kind of ba boom ba boom ba boom, bass-y sort of marching along
feel. Sort of New Orleans style and a vocal. That’s a completely new lyric over an older song.
That was exciting for me because it came together beautifully, yes.