has won three BRITs and an Ivor Novello. Its titular lead single, which rippled gently upon release in 2016 before tearing through charts the world over, has 2,176,902 sales. And so Rag’N’Bone Man returns to insert another firework into the middle of the UK music industry. Life By Misadventure is dynamite in the form of expansive, earthy songwriting, steeped in folk, country and rock’n’roll. Just ask Sony Music UK & Ireland CEO and chairman Jason Iley. “Rory has made a beautiful, personal and honest album, wearing his heart on his sleeve,” he tells Music Week. “It’s extremely moving and emotional and I cannot stop playing it.”
Largely recorded at the beginning of 2020 in Mike Elizondo’s Phantom Studios in Gallantin, Tennessee, the album was co-produced by Elizondo (Eminem, 50 Cent, Carrie Underwood) alongside Graham and
BRITs alright: Rag’N’Bone Man at The BRITs in 2017, with Jorja Smith in 2018 (right) and (below) the Life By Misadventure artwork
his musical director and band member Ben Jackson-Cook, who was his main writing partner. Graham’s earliest idea was to make an album in the vein of D’Angelo or Gil Scott-Heron, but that was soon ditched in favour of a rich mix of melody and feeling. Armed with skeleton songs, they headed to America. There, Graham got to work with a select group of co-writers, falling head over heels in love with Nashville during three writing trips to its surrounding countryside. Country legends Allen Shamblin and Mike Reid helped craft the stark, propulsive Breath In Me, while Natalie Hemby (Kacey Musgraves, Maren
Rag’N’Bone Man Meet Team
Management: Josh Tieku-Smith, Polly Comber, Sara Maycroft (Blackfox Management) Label: Columbia CEO & chairman: Jason Iley President: Ferdy Unger-Hamilton MD: Manish Arora A&R: Julian Palmer (senior A&R director) Marketing: Alex Eden-Smith (director of marketing), Denys Wilcox (marketing assistant) Digital Marketing: Sim Rollison (senior digital marketing manager), Mike Hanson (head of digital) Publisher: Warner Chappell Agent: Alex Hardee (Paradigm) Print Press: Barbara Charone (MBCPR) Online Press: Lorraine Long (Longevity PR) Radio: Steph Wilkinson (head of radio & streaming strategy) TV: Rob Clark (head of TV & podcasting strategy)
Morris) added spark to Fireflies and motoring lead single All You Ever Wanted. Also in Nashville, Graham hooked up with Grammy nominee Ruby Amanfu, Sam Ashworth and Americana veteran Pat McLaughlin. In the UK, he worked with Mark Crew, Dan Priddy and Simon Aldred. When they were ready to hit the studio,
Graham flew his bassist Bill Banwell (whom he describes as “the next Pino Palladino, from Weston-super-Mare”) over to join Grammy-winning drummer Daru Jones and guitarist Wendy Melvoin, who played with Prince & The Revolution. No biggie. He recorded closing track Old Habits in his garage at home, where he also built a photo studio in which the artwork was conceived. The record is so much a part of him that he had his friend tattoo its initials on his face. Graham cherishes the homey feel of his album, and that translated to his experience in Nashville. It was so great, he says, that he can’t imagine recording another album anywhere else.
“I’m fucking really happy with it,” he smiles. “Sometimes, in the UK writing scene, I don’t know how to put it, but the top liners and stuff, it ends up being a bit too fast. You don’t have enough time to think about a lyric and whether it services the song and if people will get it.”
Nashville, Graham says, is different. Thanks to his time there, his writing is in full bloom. “I really enjoy listening to music where I instantly know what someone is feeling, that’s what I wanted to do,” he explains. “Certain people who I’ve written with have really helped me realise that I can just be really honest and I don’t have to feel embarrassed in any way about that. I’m a grown man, I shouldn’t feel I have to hide.”
Life By Misadventure, then, is a 14-track epic, a record that finds Graham coming to terms with life as a new parent and the intense reflection that involves, over an electric soundtrack that journeys from folky strumming, through Americana to buzzing new wave.
Above all, he says, this is a rock’n’roll record. The gruff, endlessly deep voice remains, but the bluesy piano ballads have been banished.
“It might have been easy to just work with the same writers, the same producers and cover the same things I’ve done before,” he begins. “But no-one wants to hear two albums the same, it’s boring. Progression is a really good thing and I feel this is a really big progression from the last album. Although Human is good, this makes it look a bit Mickey Mouse if I’m honest…”
H
musicweek.com
aving let the cat out of the bag, Graham looks delighted. He simply cannot wait to write his next chapter. Clearly, Human (which has now racked up 565,849,659 streams on Spotify) remains a monumental song, and its parent album is imprinted on pop history, but Graham reckons his new record will eclipse it. He says so with lashings of modesty.
“There’s a part of me that thinks that maybe this album won’t be as commercially successful,” he states, repeating a sentiment
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PHOTOS: Getty
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