SIMON Tong has many claims to fame, not least being named 'the 40th greatest guitarist of the last 30 years’ according to the BBC’s `'The Axe Factor’ poll.
Tong was a guitarist in The Verve during their late-90s heyday and he worked with Damon Albarn in Gorillaz, The Good, the Bad & the Queen and Blur (stepping in on tour following Graham Coxon’s departure from the band in 2002).
Now he’s back on the scene with Prospect of Skelmersdale, the second album from The Magnetic North – the band featuring Tong, Co Armagh-born singer Hannah Peel and Erland Cooper (Erland and the Carnival) – and it’s a cracker.
Interestingly, the song Signs (see link, below) has real echoes of Albarn and Blur, while Tong ensures that there is brilliant guitar throughout (notably on the epic Remains of Elmer).
The album is full of exquisite string arrangements and Peel and Cooper’s vocals work perfectly. The track Little Jerusalem even sounds like an old Verve slow-burner, while both A Death in the Woods and Pennylands deserve to be hit singles.
In one glowing review of the album, the trio were referred to as our “premier musical psycho-geographers”. This is because their 2012 debut was an ode to the Orkney Islands, whereas the new one is all about Skelmersdale, a northern English town that dates back to 1087 but which was designated a 'new town’ by the British government in 1961.
Part of the UK’s second wave of postwar population redistribution, it was failing within 20 years. Then, in the 80s, Skelmersdale became the official UK home of the Transcendental Meditation (TM) movement. Simon Tong’s father wanted to be a part of the TM community, so the Tong family moved from Bolton to 'Skem’ – as it’s known – in 1984.
Did you come up with the idea of making an album all about Skelmersdale?
It was actually Hannah. We were talking about a follow-up album and Hannah was grilling me about where I came from. I told her I was born in Bolton and moved to this place called Skelmersdale. Bizarrely, her dad had worked there in the 80s when their family lived in Yorkshire.
So how did the songs start to come together?
We just started thinking about the town. On the surface it was a new town built for the overflow from Liverpool back in the 60s and I think they did the same thing in Northern Ireland too. So it was this slightly failed ‘new town’. The people who were doing TM wanted to build a little community and chose Skelmersdale. It had these modern buildings and brutalist architecture and then in the 80s these almost-hippies moved in and we just realised there was a real story there and that we could write some songs about the place and the people and the landscape. Then it all just fell into place.
Did you all spend time up in Skelmersdale?
I sent Hannah and Erland up with a little guide and told them where they should go. They did a bit of exploring and wrote and took photos and met people. They got a lot out of that, so we had a rich bank of material to draw on. They got a documentary from the sixties that had been made to promote the town. It was this typical po-faced English and patronising corporate film. It’s hilarious to watch now. But the title of it was Prospect of Skelmersdale, so we thought that was great. We were like 'What are the prospects for this place now in the 21st century?’ It’s not a depressing album of 'God, isn’t this place awful?’; it’s more about finding the positive stories and positive ideas from Skelmersdale.
How many years did you spend in Skelmersdale?
I was there from the age of 11 until I was in my early 20s when I left home, so that’s where I grew up and spent my formative years. I met the other guys in The Verve there – they were from between Skelmersdale and Wigan. The TM community is still there and it’s still a surreal place.
Have you heard Verve frontman Richard Ashcroft’s new solo album? Are you still in touch?
No, not really. I’ve heard little bits of the album, so it seems like a return to form. I wish him the best of luck with it.
You and fellow Verve member Simon Jones worked on Dublin singer Cathy Davey’s debut album Something Ilk in 2004 – did you enjoy that?
Yeah, it was great working with her. I’ve fond memories of recording that album in Rockfield in Wales. She’s such a talented singer and songwriter but it’s weird that it never really happened for her outside of Ireland.
You’ve been involved with some great bands – including The Verve, Blur, Gorillaz and The Good, the Bad & the Queen – what have some of the highlights been?
Well they were all great things to be involved in. With Blur I was just kind of stepping into someone else’s [Graham Coxon’s] shoes, but the Good the Bad and the Queen was a great project. There’s been talk about doing more Good the Bad and the Queen stuff for quite a while, but Damon is just so busy. But I think something will happen at some point.
With Paris, London, Salford and Skelmersdale gigs confirmed, is there any chance of a Magnetic North Irish date or festival appearance?
Definitely. Obviously Hannah has roots there, so we’d love to.
Are you already thinking about the next Magnetic North album?
Yeah, it feels like we need to start the third one quite soon because we’ve got a bit of momentum going now. Maybe we’ll go into Hannah’s story next – so maybe the next album will take us to Ireland!
Prospect of Skelmersdale is out now on Full Time Hobby. For tour updates, see www.facebook.com/themagneticnorth / www.symphonyofthemagneticnorth.com
