Emma: Wimbledon / Lisa: Manchester

DATE OF BIRTH:

Emma: 10/06/63 / Lisa: 07/10/73

Emma: If you don’t ask, you never get

Lisa: Man plans, God laughs

Emma: pop, folk, electronica, guitars all rolled into one big happy bundle of ordered confusion

Emma: Optimistic, crookedly humoured, hungry, daydreaming

Lisa: Tired, grumpy, achy, pregnant woman

 

Drawing on such diverse influences as folk rock, heavy metal hammer-ons, a bit of Motown drumming, and out-and-out indie pop, ‘Sing-Sing and I’ carries their distinctive sound. Probably due to extensive American touring, the songs are edgier, favouring guitars over the electronic samples that dominated their debut album ‘The Joy of Sing-Sing’, whilst retaining their trademark lyricism – personal and observational but still combined with a charm and wit. Emma was originally in the band Lush. They put out four albums, graced the pop charts and toured the world until tragedy struck in 1996 with the suicide of their drummer, Chris Acland, and Lush was over. It had been eight fantastic and hard years but Emma was ready for new challenges. Lisa and Emma have survived many punches since their inception in 1998. There was never any doubt in their minds that what they were doing was good, so when push came to shove, the old adage “if you want to do something properly, do it yourself,” was applied.

Emma: With the band? Making the album ourselves with no label to fund it.

Personally? Learning from my mistakes – I won’t say more than that.

Emma: Kate Bush, Laura Nyro, Robin Guthrie, The Carpenters, Pauline Murray, Gene Clarke, Margo Guryan, early Human League and Simple Minds.

Emma: We have been playing live recently but due to time and money constraints, the shows have been acoustic only (Lisa and I plus a cellist and extra guitarist and backing vocalist). The response has been so good that I think it might be heralding a slightly new direction.

Emma: Well, I am hoping that 2006 will be a good one. Lisa is going to have a baby but I am thinking of moving out of London (not too far) and doing some other creative things. Would also like to complete Sing-Sing album number three next year. There was a four year gap between our first and second albums – determined that that won’t happen before album three.

Lisa: I’d like to work with Roy Ayers, I love his music and have seen him live a few times now, he’s a great performer. I think it’s good to work with people outside of your normal genre - to test the music and see what comes out.

Emma: I agree with Lisa. It’s good to work with people outside of your comfort zone so perhaps someone in hip hop or metal...though that kind of goes against what I said about the acoustic thing, doesn’t it? Ha.

Lisa: ‘The Debt Collection’ by Shortwave Set. Andy produced a couple of songs for us on ‘Sing-Sing and I’. He has a novel way of working, it’s very fresh and spontaneous. They’re great live, very loose and sweet, a pleasure to watch.

Emma: Anyone who would come to Cricklewood and not complain because it’s not on the tube! Diarmuid Gavin, Christopher Eccleston, Germaine Greer and Michael Bracewell. I think that would be a good dinner party, don’t you? I would then just have to cook and listen.

Lisa: iPods on the tube. Every bugger has got one and it’s really irritating to be surrounded by that horrible high hat ticking noise on the way to work. What’s wrong with people that they can’t leave the house without having their whole record collection in their pockets? It’s totally unnecessary and quite frankly a pretentious pose.

Lisa: ‘Sara’ by Fleetwood Mac. I feel slightly embarrassed to love Fleetwood Mac. I don’t know why because they have written some incredible music. Mind you, there are some shockers in there too, but nobody’s perfect I suppose!

THE ALBUM SING-SING AND I AND THE SINGLE COME, SING ME A SONG ARE AVAILABLE NOW

ON AERIAL RECORDS.