15 questions with…
Demonstrating astonishing vocal prowess across a salvo of infectious singles, chart-eyed singer Keir is set to be showing up on tastemakers’ radars imminently. We spoke to the southwest-England-hailing powerhouse, alongside his writing partner and producer George Glew to learn about the long process of making his debut album
Seizing our attention upon the first spin of his single Lemonade earlier this year, Keir evokes the flamboyance and bombast of such stadium-appeasing icons as David Bowie, Freddie Mercury and Prince with an emotional, empathetic through-line, dealing with complex themes, including struggling with mental health-related issues. All of which sits within some very elegantlysculpted mixes.
Alongside his songwriting partner and production-guru George Glew, Keir’s songs have been generating serious buzz across the music press for the last year, with his debut self-titled album released over the summer. We spoke to Keir and George right on the cusp of its release, to learn about their collaborative writing process, how they arranged the tracks to accentuate Keir’s immense voice, and the broader themes resonating from Keir’s work.
1 Hi Keir, hi George. Firstly, Keir, how did it all start for you?
Keir: “I was a very lucky person in that I never really played with the idea of doing anything else. I was a support worker with autistic people for a little bit while I was studying at uni. But studying in a small town, as a teenager I was just obsessed with the idea of making songs. You might learn covers but actually I was really, really young when I got intrigued by ‘making’ songs and telling some sort of story. People around me, like my brother and my family, didn’t laugh at me; they encouraged me.
“About five years ago I met George, who became my main songwriting partner and the person that I’ve written this whole album with. We made a song a week for about five years. Loads of bad material, of course, but it meant we could pick and choose the 11 songs on this current album.” George Glew: “When we realised we both did music we made a few things back in my old home studio. We made his first single Shiver on the first day we did a session together. It was very natural. We’ve always worked together well, it all happened organically and it didn’t come from any kind of management.”
2 How do you two typically work together, how do you divide up who does what in the studio?
K: “We get in the room, we’re very open and very instinctive. He knows chords better than me. It’s a strange thing, I can kind of feel the direction more but George can tell me what I’m actually doing. I’ll normally take melodies and lyrics and the overall ‘idea’: ‘what is the story or narrative?’ Sometimes these things develop as the songs develop, though. For me it has to be a collage. I can’t write very ‘litera
