Back in 2012 we interviewed Simon Raymonde, formerly the bassist with Cocteau Twins and the co-founder of Bella Union. The reason for the interview was that the label were celebrating their 15th Anniversary with a special line-up at End of the Road festival. Melanie dug around a fair bit to try and get an understanding of how Simon personally went about deciding who to sign to Bella Union. He came out with this nugget:
I never had a particular plan as to which direction the label would go. I still don’t. I just go on what I hear, like “Wow I just love that so much let’s try and sign it”. That’s the driving force; just being so excited by something that you can’t stop listening to it. Of course you can’t sign everybody you think is amazing, it’s just physically not possible. The way I do it now? I wouldn’t sign anybody I wouldn’t want to have round for dinner, and anybody that my dog would bark at!’ Read the full interview here.
Well, Holly Macve appears to have passed the ‘dinner and dog test’ as she’s the latest signing to Bella Union, not that there’s very much known about her, as Simon recently revealed: “…she is a 20 year old from Yorkshire who appeared out of nowhere in Brighton late last year. I had a tip-off to go to a basement bar where she was playing. In a room full of beery boys chatting across all the music beforehand, the minute Holly opened her mouth the room fell silent. Hers is a rare gift.”
Listen to her performing The Corner of My Mind, our Song of the Day, which was recorded in a bedroom of a small bedsit in Brighton on Garageband two months ago:
According to Bella Union she is currently writing and recording in the North-East of England with Paul Gregory (Lanterns On The Lake) and is today announced as the Special Guest of Yael Naim’s 2 forthcoming Paris shows, at Théâtre Des Bouffes Du Nord on 26 Oct and at Le Trianon on 30 Nov. In between she will be joining the mighty John Grant who within five minutes of hearing her voice, invited her to support him on his UK tour! More dates to follow very soon!!