His most immaculate folkness

It’s been four years since Fionn Regan’s debut album reminded a jilted populace that singer songwriters weren’t crap by default. Here was someone who could not only write interesting, intelligent music, but had lyrics with a depth beyond “aw there goes that girl again.”

With a stripped down sound that came about after he realised he wanted you to feel like the band was in the room with you, he’s back. Recorded in a factory in Wicklow after a series of recordings with Etham Johns didn’t go to plan, The Shadow of an Empire is a fantastic album. It’s as jumpy and fun as The End of History was introspective and beatific.

Polite, nervous and seeming a bit frazzled by all the attention, Fionn Regan was still more than willing to talk about the new album and his music in general.

There seems to a playful air about The Shadow of an Empire, but it deals with current themes. Is humour the most sensible way you see to approach it?

I just like having a laugh. It’s necessary for me to move forward. The whole thing of writing and recording does take a lot of work. There’re a lot of things that’ll go on in my head, but I like things that’ll make me laugh.

You reference both the depression and the optimism of the new frontier. Do you see similarities in these times to now?

If you stand on a street for long enough you’ll learn when the streetlights turn on and when they deliver the bread and I think the record just came from me looking out the back of a van, travelling around the world and seeing things.

Nobody wants to write the same album twice, but was it a worry for you to move too far away from your older material?

It was just how I felt with this record. Everything has to be stripped of cloth out of your soul, it has to be in your bone structure, you have to be able to feel it. A song or a lyric sometimes tells you the swagger it has. The lyric tells you what kind of instrument it is. Sometimes it takes a bit of looking around to find it. I will say that I do think in the way of an album. It’s the whole journey of the record that makes sense, not just one or two and I was conscious making the record that I wanted ten good songs and that takes a bit of work, making sure they all join together.

You’ve said that you’re very much into holding onto the mistake as a way to leave evidence of the act of recording. How much would you be willing to let slide if you felt you’d really captured the essence of a song?

Well all the vocals are live here. In comparison to how a lot of music is done now that’s letting a lot slide. Singing a song the whole way through with a band…some people’d see that as kamikaze.

Are there any artists who’ve helped you? Not even necessarily as a songwriter, just helped in general.

There’s a guy called Lord Buckley. He’s an interesting character. He’s a monologist, has stories with a musical background. But, y’know, influence is a strange word. If something makes you feel great when you listen to it, or if it makes you go “aw! I feel like working today”, I like that. But it’s not a direct thing, you can’t pin it. I think that sometimes people try to simplify things. We’re pattern seeking creatures. People like to get a grip on you and say this is what this is, and this is what box this comes from and I understand this; it’s this is spliced with this and that mixed with that. I see it more as a rainbow. You can’t grab it.

Are there any contemporary artists who you’d listen to?

I like Jack Kerouac and Dylan Thomas. I like his poems a lot, like hearing him speak his own poems. I love to walk around listening to them. Sometimes I’d listen to the radio and like it but I wouldn’t know what it is. I’m quite busy in my own little world and if I’m not listening to an ideal thing, which is usually just words, then I’m generally looking for silence. Just so I can think.

Given the setbacks between the first album and this one do you want to move quickly?

Yeah, absolutely. It’s a learning curve. The amount of time I spent on the road was way longer than normal, so I’ve learnt that I’m not going to do that this time. I’d like to have a record out after this one pretty quickly, but there’s nothing set in stone and a lot of time it’s not worth talking about till you get there. But the songs are there. Once they’re documented and the cover’s drawn up, we’re off.