THE STARS REVEAL THE SONIC DELIGHTS GUARANTEED TO GET THEM GOING...
Madeleine Peyroux
What music are you currently grooving to?
Fantastic Negrito’s White Jesus Black Problems. It’s about his own ancestors, a black man who was enslaved from Africa and a white woman from Ireland, who was an indentured servant. The songs are very thoughtful and humanistic.
What, if push comes to shove, is your all-time favourite album?
What would I listen to over and over, and not make me crazy? John Coltrane’s Infinity.
What was the first record you ever bought? And where did you buy it?
I bought Tracy Chapman’s Talkin’ ’Bout A Revolution in a record store in downtown Manhattan. It wasn’t my first record – when I was a little kid, I had the soundtrack to a ’30s cartoon of Gulliver’s Travels, I listened to that record over and over again.
Which musician, other than yourself, have you ever wanted to be?
Bob Dylan. I wanted to be the one that wrote Blowin’ In The Wind, Idiot Wind, I wanted to have that experience, ha ha! But I gave up. I decided I wasn’t gonna be Bob Dylan.
What do you sing in the shower?
The truth is, I do my vocal exercises. I make siren noises – like an ambulance, not like a Greek spirit.
What is your favourite Saturday night record?
Saturday night means it’s time for a party with friends, and I want to hear (Night Time Is) The Right Time by Ray Charles. Then, you can go anywhere.
And your Sunday morning record?
One of the things that I love to listen to, and it changed my life, is Marian Anderson, the contralto, singing spirituals. I don’t want to take away from religion, but I think that her music has got all of the information already in it.
Madeleine Peyroux’s Let’s Walk is out on June 28 via Thirty Tigers.
Conor O’Brien
What music are you currently grooving to?
David Hedderman’s debut album Pulling At The Briars is a real beauty. I’m biased – I produced it – but I keep returning to it. Also, Dory Previn’s Mythical Kings And Iguanas has been in my ears a lot. I stopped drinking and started going to the gym and I’ve found that my favourite workout music tends to be narrative-based folk stuff for some reason; the weirder the better usually.
What, if push comes to shove, is your all-time favourite album?
It always changes… I keep returning to Homogenic by Björk… it’s just so beautiful. Or Amnesiac by Radiohead. I’m a ’90s/noughties kid, but sometimes it feels more like Nina Simone …And Piano! or Once Upon A Time In The West (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) by Ennio Morricone.
What was the first record you ever bought? And where did you buy it?
A cassette tape of Mellow Gold by Beck with my pocket money from Go
