In the music videos for ‘Lilith’ and ‘Loomis’, the first two singles to be taken from Faith Eliott’s debut album Impossible Bodies, a glorious and near-constant duel plays out between the sparkling and the mundane. Flashes of electric pink and lightning gold illuminate the washed-out scenes around them, and we taste both senses of the word “impossible”: not only as frustration towards something that can never be achieved, but also as something thrillingly beyond the limitations of the present. We live in our own impossible bodies, but we also yearn towards wilder ones.
As a songwriter, Eliott covers an extraordinary range of styles: the album sways back and forth between dextrous, Newsom-esque folk parables and straighter acoustic ballads, with a few louder and softer variations between. But most of all, the Minneapolis-born artist – now a fixture in the Edinburgh scene – will surely be championed for years to come as one of the finest lyricists of their generation. When you’ve found your heart swelling up inside your chest at the tale of a liberated python being bundled through a giftshop and out onto the M8, you’ll know.
But that’s the magic of it: all the granite and starlight and mud and glittery papier-mâché blurs into one on Impossible Bodies, until the listener has lost track of the cleave between everyday and fantastic realms. Not only has Faith Eliott found the eloquence and artistry to convey those ideas, but also the industrious spirit to start up OK Pal, their new record label (founded alongside long-time friend and collaborator Hailey Beavis) that will bring the album into the world. I wanted to speak to the artist and find out where all this wild ambition and imagination came from.
DiS: I love the idea of each song on the album forming a modern bestiary. Was that an idea you'd had for a while?
Faith Eliott: Ah, cheers! Well, I've been interested in medieval bestiaries for ages... when I had the idea to properly base my album around the concept, I already had half an albums worth of songs about animals. So it just sort of fell into place. From there I really enjoyed having the structure of a theme to work to and started collecting stories to write about.
The concept of dual (or manifold) identity seems to be threaded through the album. Do you feel that your art communicates various layers of your own identity?
Yeah, absolutely. The songs were written over a span of about three years when I was thinking a lot about identity, gender, and just going through a bit of a shift in general. In hindsight, there seems to be this recurring story of a creature stuck in some prescribed environment that it wants to escape from. 'Loomis', 'Lilith', and 'Laika' all end in apocalypse, and then a sense of relief. Ha! If I was going to psychoanalyse myself, I would say maybe I was constructing these different situations so I could narratively destroy them. Like piñatas in song form.
A lot of your lyrics delve into science, evolution, the history of the cosmos. Have you always had a particular fascination with those themes?
Earth's history is something I've been particularly interested in over the past few years. For one, it’s just really fascinating to think about. I am really drawn to the imagery, the surreal creatures and landscapes... But also, I find it weirdly reassuring. Climate change is so daunting that it's a consolation in some ways to know that the world has a really volatile track record. Maybe its just a trick of perspective, but it seems to relieve some of the guilt and panic which comes with being a human under late capitalism.
What were the primary musical inspirations for the record?
One of my absolute favourite songwriters out there is Richard Dawson. I don't think I sound much like him, but I am totally in awe of his grasp on narrative, performance, delivery, etc. At the moment I'm really interested in the idea of songs as a way of dealing with history and writing fiction, but I think with that there's often a risk of appropriating a style. Richard Dawson's stuff is full of references to history and folklore, but still never seems to compromise his own expression. Some other big influences include Diane Cluck, Jeffrey Lewis, O Paon, Songs: Ohia...
And non-musical? It seems like the kind of record that isn’t just informed by songs…
Yes! I actually considered including a bibliography with my album but didn't get round to it. Firstly, there are a ton of medieval bestiaries and translations online. The 12th century Aberdeen Bestiary is a pretty famous one. It's full of delights, such as griffins, multicolored panthers, and salamanders that live in fire. The drawings are beautiful too.
Then there's the Book of Imagined Beings by Jorge Luis Borges, which is a compilation of short descriptions of imaginary animals. Borges is one of my fave authors to boot. And A Book of Barely Imagined Beings by Caspar Henderson. I love this book; it's a modern-day bestiary which is full of incredible stories as well as natural history. There's a great chapter on sea sponges which I got most of my inspiration from for 'Loomis'.
What was the recording process like?
I met the album's producer, Colin Nelson, in Seattle when I was touring a few summers ago. He’s the drummer in Virgin of the Birds, who are Song By Toad label mates. Last winter I was living in Montana and drove through to Seattle a handful of times for week-long stints of recording in Colin's home-studio set up. He’s a multi-instrumentalist wonder and we got most of the tracking done between the two of us, then brought people in from Colin's community, and people who I had met whilst touring to play additional bits like cello and saw. They were quite intensive sessions, but also felt pretty straightforward. I think I am prone to a lot of faff and if left alone I will easily agonise over which of 16 semi-identical vocal takes to use. But Colin is good at being decisive and drawing a line under things, so it was a nice balance.
Why did you decide to start your own label?
When I got back to the UK after living in the states, Song By Toad (who I released an EP with in 2016) closed up shop and I wasn't sure what to do with this album I had made. I asked my best pal Hailey Beavis if she wanted to start a label with me on a whim and when she said yes I was like, "Of course! What on earth have we been doing all this time?"
It's becoming more and more clear to me that one of the things I love most about art is being part of a community. I think it's important to both Hailey and I to try and create something that feels collective and inclusive. We're both visual artists too and interested in supporting people working in all sorts of disciplines in addition to music. Mainly, it just feels like the right time to knuckle down and start building something substantial that is based on our own priorities.
Impossible Bodies is out 19 April 2019 via OK Pal. For more information about Faith Eliott, including forthcoming tour dates, please visit their official website.