soFem: Because your first album was such a runaway success, did you feel as if there was a lot of pressure on you while you were recording the second album?
James: Lots of people ask me about the pressure of the second album, but I didn't feel the pressure because I knew I wouldn't sell as many albums on the second, because the first was crazy, and also I knew that I couldn't control the reviews: you get a good review, you get a bad review, you can't control any of that. So I needed not to write in order to please other people but to enjoy music and to get to the heart of why I started to do music and what I needed out of music and my personal expression. So I wrote songs that meant a great deal to me and that were free of pressure or expectation and I wrote it for a need to and for a passion for music, on my own, with the knowledge that I would take it to my band and that they would bring their own musicianship to it, and I also had the experience along the road of working as a musician every single day and working with others every single day, and a depth of songwriting and experience have come from that. So there's a sense of calm to the wrtiting and a sense of confidence with it as well.
soFem: Would you say that this new album is as sad and melancholic as the first one, or is there a slightly different feel?
James: In the first, I think, there was a melancholy aspect but always with a sense of hope. I think that this album has a sense of nostalgia for what has been before, but is a great celebration of the present and it also musically opens me up to the future; it's diverse. But lyrically it's a real celebration and it's observational, it talks about the change in perception I've experienced as I've gone from an aspiring musician to a musician in the public eye. And then it's a celebration of life itself, how short life is but how one can fill it with so much.
soFem: The first single, 1973, has a much rockier sound. You described the album as a celebration of life; is that why you've added a bit more rhythm to your sound?
James: Well no, just because I wrote my first album on a guitar or on a piano, not knowing if anyone would ever hear it, not knowing that I would have a band to play with. This album I have written knowing I have four other friends who are in my band who I tour with, so I now know that I can think about the drums and I can think about the bass as I write the song and I can have an understanding of where we're going to take the song in the first place, so that's a sense of freedom that I have as a songwriter now. I'd been out to lots of clubs, I'd been enjoying myself and I was just trying to capture a nostalgia of those shared moments that I'd had with people in those places. Although I dtill don't want to go back to those places, I still miss them and enjoy them a great deal.
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