Interview
David Eagle
There is a theory that if you lose one of your senses then the others heighten to compensate. Well if there is any truth in it, when it comes to David Eagle of The Young'uns, who has been blind since he was nine months old, speech has come to the fore.
David Eagle, Michael Hughes and Sean Cooney, The Young'uns |
His strong Teesside twang gives everything he says a depth that translates to the singing as part of the North East vocal trio.
Last month The Young'uns have, to general approval from the folk world
and fans, won the best group category at the 2015 Radio2 Folk Awards and now they are setting off on tour to promote their new album
Another Man's Ground. If you heard their acceptance speech at the awards then you
would know that his cheeky intervention hinted that their rather chance move
into the world of folk music was more to do with illegal drinking than any
desire to be an award-winning singing group.
"Michael and Sean have known each other from primary
school and I met them through a mutual friend when I was about 16,"
relates Eagle.
"Then we just happened on our local folk club at a pub
in Stockton which was one of the few places that would serve us beer even
though we were underage.
"We just stumbled on the folk club scene and were
completely taken aback by people singing harmonies and in Teesside accents;
singing about Teesside stories and doing shanties and that kind of thing, we
had never heard anything like it," he says with obvious enthusiasm.
The fact people just got up and sang in pubs and in local accents made a big impression on the trio and enthused them to give it go.
"Michael and myself sang in choirs but it was nothing like this type of music, especially the unaccompanied stuff, which we had never really heard.
"First we started singing a lot of traditional songs
based around a lot of what we had heard from The Wilsons, five
brothers from Teesside who sing a lot of unaccompanied harmonies.
"Then as time went on we started singing a lot of local
songs; there were a lot of songs about Teesside, songs from the pen of GraemeMiles and Ron Angel who was the founder of the folk club that we went to in
Stockton, then this led us to write our own.
"Sean started writing songs about Hartlepool and
history and as time's gone on we started writing about more modern day things, so we sing songs about today's issues as well now. We've progressed quite a bit
I suppose."
The Young'uns in the studio |
That progression over more than a decade has seen them
become among the most popular and sought after groups on the folk circuit so do
they see themselves now as part of that long tradition of community and folk
singing?
"I don't really know, would it be arrogant to say yes?
"We feel a part of it and hopefully other people feel
we are a part of it.
"We love going to singarounds and joining in, we love
them in pubs, obviously we do this professionally, so when we get a day off the
first thing we do isn't necessarily go to a singaround but when we're at
festivals we still pop in to a singaround or a pub and sing these songs.
"We are not just doing this because it's a job, we have
always done it, but it was never a job, it was never intended to be a
job."
So what happened at your first gig?
"Our first was in October 2005 and it was at the Sun
Inn which was our folk club, that's where it all began and Ron Angel, who wrote
things like the Chemical Workers' Song and was in a group called the TeessideFettlers, gave us our first gig and it was probably a bit
rubbish on our account.
"We tried to imitate The Wilsons and what they tend to
do is talk a lot in between the songs, drink a lot of beer and sing very loudly.
"So we thought all right we will shout really loudly, which is what we did, we'll talk a lot between the
songs, which we did only we didn't talk any sense, and drank a lot of
beer."
With that episode behind them they eventually had to face
the decision to turn professional but this proved to be problematic with one of
the band almost leaving the idea dead in the water.
The Wilsons from Teesside |
"Michael was an RE teacher in a Catholic School. Sean
did a lot of educational projects and was the resident storyteller in a
Manchester school.
"Then we all decided it was untenable to finish a day's
work at four or five o'clock then zoom down the motorway to do a gig or a
festival or something all weekend, get back on Monday at something like 2am
then go back to work again and maybe do a few evening gigs.
"If you are going to take it seriously then you have to
make that decision. Do you continue in your job and exhaust yourself doing even
more work or are you going to say right let's just give it a go as
professionals and see how it goes?
"It's been nearly two years now and it seems to be
going all right," he says with genuine modesty. "It was an easier decision for me because I was
already down to three days to accommodate some of the other freelance work.
"Michael's was probably the hardest decision, I think
he was in a bit of a dilemma. He was on a much bigger wage than I was, in a proper, respected job.
"But Michael nearly put the scuppers on it because we
had just decided to do it and he said 'I have just seen this placement at a
grammar school I might attend and the salary is much better but it would mean
if I was going to do that then essentially I would have to knock the folk
singing on the head entirely'.
"I think he had a bit of a crisis of confidence."
"It's a bit like when you're in a relationship and you
decide you're going to get married, you've been going along for however many
years, then you say you're going to get married then all of a sudden that
decision gives someone a crisis of confidence and the entire thing breaks up.
"Fortunately Mike came to his senses, remained with
the dark side and stayed true to folk music," laughs Eagle.
So is this the definitive line-up and if one of you decides to
pull there would be no more Young'uns?
Ron Angel |
"I don't know what I would do if I weren't doing this.
I am experimenting and working on different freelance things, doing stand up
stuff which goes well and I could still do some audio work, but yeah
essentially it is very fragile because we are dependent on the other two
people.
"One of us could decide to do anything, so it is a bit
worrying, however, we are talking about plans for 2016 and even things for 2017
but yes it could all end at any minute.
"For all I know one of them might have decided already
and this interview would be a waste of time," he adds with a hearty
Teesside laugh.
What are you views on the album now it's finished?
"It's not very good but we had to make it anyway,"
he jokes.
"We are really happy with it. It's interesting because
we have done a lot more unaccompanied songs on this album.
"It's very short, we put together 12 tracks and we
thought that's enough for an album and it came to just over half an hour.
"I think the songs are very good and I can say that
because I don't write the songs as such. I do the melody and occasionally help
with a few words. I will say why don't we have an 'and' here instead
of a 'but' and Sean will say, that's an excellent idea which is the
contribution I have with the songs generally.
"The songs about the honour killing of Farzana Parveen and
Benefits Street and the story of Pvt
Hughes and the message in a bottle and all of these songs, the subject matter is brilliant I really love the songs.
Hughes and the message in a bottle and all of these songs, the subject matter is brilliant I really love the songs.
"Then we have a Billy Bragg song which, doing it
unaccompanied, sounds really raw.
"With Benefits Street all the words were there from the
start, they hardly changed. But the interesting thing was the melody.
"Sean had written it on the guitar and it was a very
slow, languid kind of song and I thought it doesn't really fit the thing. So we
experimented with something else, then I came up with a jazz kind of thing and
we decided that wasn't right either so we thought we would try it
unaccompanied.
"We did these harmonies and chord structure and again
it worked quite well because when you sing unaccompanied it just sounds
abrasive; in your face."
"We are not really sure where it hails from, I think
it's classed as a traditional Teesside song.
"We got it from this album which was a compilation of
north eastern songs and it was from a singer called Mary Duffy, we tried to
track her down and find out more about her but no one seems to know so it was
like an undiscovered gem.
"It gives you an insight into the humour which I
suppose is earthy. Think how many songs like that have been lost but this
one had been passed down and recorded on an album so it's been preserved and
obviously with us singing it, it's been preserved in that way as well."
Do you each have definite roles when putting together a song
or an album?
"Sean is primarily the song writer and may come up with
a basic melody and then I might change it, he might write three or four chords.
I don't really interfere with Sean and the music but he may write something and
then I might suggest putting a bit in the middle.
"The piano arrangement for example for something such
as Pvt Hughes, that was a completely different chord sequence, it was a case of
changing different chords around trying to make it sound more interesting.
"There's nothing wrong with making music with three
chords, that's all well and good, but personally it's nice when you can have
more of that.
"I think when Sean's writing a song it's more a case of
he's getting the words down and he writes brilliant lyrics and so then I will
try and inject some different chords and melodies.
"But even so the music is still very stripped back and
in the background, and the lyrics are to the foreground and that's something
that's quite interesting, it's something that Andy Bell, who produced the album
and Sean are quite keen to do.
"Maybe if it was left to me then the songs would be
more "spiced up". They would have all kinds of odd instrumentation in
them and that kind of thing but maybe it's for the best that I am not.
"At first if I am not so sure I might say this sounds
really stripped down, is that all you want me to do? Because I would like
quite fancy arrangements for the songs but Andy is like, 'No, no, strip that
back, take that chord out,' and I will say, 'All I am doing is plonking my
hands down on the keys', but when I listen back to it I then think, he's done a
good call there, it sounds quite good.
"Plus, it also means if I get arthritis I should still be
able to play the songs," he states mischievously.
Why did you come up with a name with built in obsolescence?
"There was nothing we could do about that, it was given
to us and as you get more popular, when do you change it? When you start
doing gigs known as The Young'uns you can't really change it.
You could always drop the apostrophe and claim you were
always The Young Guns?
"But there is already a band called the Young Guns who
we get mistaken for and they're a popular sort of indie band and there
is already a band in Canada called the Young'uns which we also get mistaken for."We could call ourselves The Young Nuns which is slightly similar that would probably bring in a different clientèle entirely, they would be expecting strippers."
You can read a review of the new album Another Man's Ground at http://folkall.blogspot.co.uk/2015/04/the-younguns.html
The Young'uns are appearing at Henry Tudor House, Shrewsbury on May 3. Doors open 8pm and the show starts 8.30pm. Tickets are £10 plus a booking fee. On May 13 they play the Red Lion Folk Club, King's Heath, Birmingham. Doors open 7.15pm and show starts 7.45. Tickets are £13.20 including booking fee.
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