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Mr Dorian Sorriaux… It’s been a busy few days for you, I believe? “I’ve just spent a few days in London. That was great. The EP was released, then the day after we were at Ramblin’ Man Festival doing a few VIP sets, and then yesterday we drove up from Maidstone. So I’ve been enjoying Edinburgh since I got here.” You also played with Rival Sons in Malmo? “Yeah that was an awesome show. Friends of mine, and it’s always great to catch up, they’re such a great band, and it’s such a great opportunity for me to play in front of their crowd.” …and now you are out for quite a while with Myles Kennedy. How did you get the tour? “Basically through his booker. She’s worked with Blues Pills in the past and I knew her. One day she sent me a message asking if I was free in July, and yeah, it happened, and I’m really thankful. I’ve been thinking about this tour for months, and this is the first proper show.” It doesn’t seem to happen very often that artists get support slots because they know someone. Buy-ons still seem to be prevalent, so it’s refreshing to hear how you got the tour. “Yeah, it’s been great. Same thing with the Rival Sons, I live an hour away from Malmo, so I just wrote to the drummer, Miley, and a couple of days later he replied. And that was how it came about.” Your debut solo EP, Hungry Ghost, has just been released. How long have you had the songs? “They’re quite fresh, I wrote the songs mostly from September to December last year, and then I wrote maybe 50 others.” Fifty? “At least! But, when I’m home and I have my acoustic guitar and the ideas are coming out, it feels natural. I’ll start playing some to friends and they give me feedback, then the songs grow naturally.” When you hear that a guitarist is releasing a solo album, you get this image of a shredder flying up the fretboard at light speed, but ‘Hungry Ghost’ came as a total surprise. Was that always the intention? “Thank you. I didn’t do the EP for making a drastic change, I did it for the love of folk music. I love playing folk music, and most people that know me for my music know me for that. But with folk, especially with the classic songwriters, it just cuts through the noisy rockstar stuff. It is what it is… here’s a song that I wrote playing in front of an audience, it’s chilled. I’m here in Scotland, and John Martyn is one of my all time favourite guitar players. For the last few years I’ve been getting more into acoustic guitar players and a lot of them are Scottish. I was brought up in Brittany, and this feels similar.” You’ll love Edinburgh then. The folk scene is massive, and there are some incredible traditional music vinyl shops. “Last time I was here I picked up so many rarities, I’m always looking for more! Bert Jansch, Pentangle, John Martyn, I love them. When I knew that I was going to be doing a solo project, I knew it was always going to be an acoustic project. I love blues guitar, but sometimes I don’t love the technical aspects to it. Peter Green and Paul Kossof I love, so emotional. But the electric guitar is taken from the acoustic players, it’s similar but can take away some of the feeling. Speed it up times a thousand, and it’s impressive, but it doesn’t speak to me like an acoustic guitar does. I respect all guitar players, as it takes a lot of practising, but personally, I spend more time thinking about where it comes from; a song, or a melody, or a feeling.” The songs on the EP are very personal. When you play them live, can you step away from them and turn off the feelings captured in the songs? “I can’t step away, because they are so personal. I was afraid to play them in front of anyone else but my best friends and my Mother. If it was a year ago, I would never have played them in front of anyone, it would have been too uncomfortable, but if someone has social anxiety, or lacking in social skills, then they start talking to people, they realise that it’s not a big deal. That’s the same for me letting people hear these songs. It’s not such a big deal, and people are enjoying them, and if they don’t enjoy them, then that’s also fine. It’s my way of expressing feelings that I can’t express otherwise.” Performing live, there is no-one to hide behind. No stack of Marshalls, it’s just you. What was that like the first time? “Exactly. It was good. Sometimes I feel that I’m reading my diary out in front of people! I’ve brought some friends up to play with me. The Rival Sons gig, I had keyboards, drums etc. It was the same songs, but with a band: different dynamics. But when I’m on stage alone, I get into a state of mind, and it’s just myself.” It’s a big adjustment to make. “It is yes. It was a mental shift. The first show was hard to get ready for, but then it just happened, and now, on show days, I’m just like, ‘Yep, all right. Let’s do it’. Tonight is the first show of the Myles tour, so there is a bit of nerves there. It’s a big tour. It’s Europe after these UK and Irish dates, Germany etc, so it’s an important one.” I need to ask you about the Hungry Ghost album sleeve. It’s incredible! “It’s interesting. It’s a piece of artwork from Chekou Cantu Garcia that we were considering with Blues Pills a few years ago. Around 2013, the early days of the band, so it would have been for an EP. I always loved it, the others also loved it, but thought that there was too much going on for Blues Pills. I think it suits this release better. It’s quite a religious piece, and although ‘Hungry Ghost’ is not religious, some people have described it as shamanic folk.” How would you describe it? “I see it as psychedelic folk, although it’s not psychedelic as in all these weird sounds going on. I see it as a late night relaxing experience. I would say, don’t listen to it to go to the party, but check it out after the party!” It was recorded analogue, I believe? “Zack, the bass player from Blues Pills, has his own studio, and he produced the EP. It was recorded with one microphone, nothing separate for the guitars, all analogue. My voice, the guitars, all recorded live, we just overdubbed the Fender Rhodes later on. It was important for me not to overdo it, that takes time and makes no sense. I wanted to get the right feeling so I didn’t rush it, but it was a natural thing and everything you hear are first takes mostly.” So what are the plans for Blues Pills? A quiet 2018? “We have a few festivals planned. Actually, on this tour I fly in and fly out for a few Blues Pills shows on my days off. Perfect scheduling! We have a festival in August, then that will be it for this year. We wanted to take this year off, and mostly we have. It’s for the best. Touring the way that we did, we realised that some bands can do that, but we couldn’t.” It was relentless at one point. I’m certain that I caught Blues Pills on three separate tours over here… in the same year! “Yes, the last shows that we did were wonderful, but it just felt that we’ve done this too much. We need to do something else. We thought that it would be better to take some break so people wanted to see us as we hadn’t toured in so long. If people think that you are always touring, then it becomes a case of “I’ll catch them next time”. But this way, there is some anticipation.” …and with that, he mentions that he has to go set up his merchandise stand and has to leave. And you thought rock stars had minions to do everything for them! Check out the official Dorian Sorriaux website for all forthcoming live dates, as well as details on where you can purchase ‘Hungry Ghost’. Interview: Dave Live shots: Callum Scott]]>
