Laura Marling - A Candid Prodigy

Ahead of the release of her seventh album, the English singer-songwriter reveals the genesis of her new songs and opens up about maternal memories, veiled tributes to Leonard Cohen and Paul McCartney, voracious reading, a home recording studio, memories tied to London's Royal Albert Hall, and impromptu tutorials for fans on social media, while we all wait for better times to come…

"Song For Our Daughter" is a song about innocence fading away too soon. Is it all the fault of this increasingly fast, dynamic and "inhuman" society?

Well, if there's anything positive to take from what the world has unfortunately been going through lately, perhaps it's a renewed awareness of just how much this frantic-paced society weighs on us. An awareness we'd all lost, but one we can recover fairly "easily", maybe by slowing our pace down a little. Younger generations might actually be better equipped for all this than we are.

What would you say to a young girl who feels the need to write songs and pursue a career in music?

I'd say that everyone is unique, and that you have to do everything you can to hold on to that uniqueness, but above all not feel obliged to do what others tell you. Within reasonable limits, of course.

Who is Alexandra, the woman at the centre of the song of the same name?

It's a loose response to "Alexandra Leaving", the beautiful Leonard Cohen song I discovered recently. That song is actually his own response to a poem. When I wrote mine, I was thinking about the afterlife of a woman who has survived the passions of a great man.

In "Fortune" you sing "Money for running away", as well as lines about "things left unsaid". Who are those words addressed to?

The song is about how fortunes change their meaning. The idea that someone might inherit this money, which once held the promise of freedom, but which in someone else's hands becomes excessive frivolity. My mother kept a kind of "escape fund" for years, a collection of coins in a pot sitting on top of the washing machine. She did it following in her own mother's footsteps. Luckily, neither of them ever actually needed it. That's exactly what I mean when I sing those words.

I know you have a studio in your basement, where you can spend your time enjoying "a lot of sonic experimentation"…

I recorded some songs in a "proper" studio in Wales, but most of the arrangements were done at home, with guitar and vocal overdubs. It took me a long time to have a room of my own. It was a great luxury to experiment alone.

On “Semper Femina”, you focused on the female universe. How much have you changed as a woman compared to three years ago? Was there any experience that enriched you?

I think “Semper Femina” helped me anchor myself to femininity. I feel it's a source of great strength now, whereas before I wasn't sure what it meant, especially in relation to creativity. Today I see that there's something unique about the female perspective, and perhaps all of this was simply undervalued in the past.

You described “Blow By Blow” as your “little tribute to Paul McCartney”. You sing: “Sometimes the hardest thing to learn is what you get from what you loose”. What's “the thing” you lost that taught you the most?

This song, along with others from “Song For Our Daughter”, is about the experience of being forced to take responsibility for your own life, which is at once liberating and uncomfortable. Especially when it comes to ending any kind of relationship.

Who have been your musical guiding lights? And what are you listening to most these days?

I grew up with Joni Mitchell, Bob Dylan, Stevie Wonder and Neil Young. And they remain very important to me, obviously. In recent years, Paul McCartney, Paul Simon and Tom Waits have joined that list. And right now I mostly listen to Big Thief.

You've played with countless musicians, including the celebrated Bbc Scottish Symphony Orchestra. Which concert you played moved you the most? And which one you attended struck you the most?

I played at the Royal Albert Hall in London a few years ago, and it was a unique occasion for me. I'm afraid I haven't been to many concerts lately. I saw Big Thief when they were in town last year. A surprisingly fantastic show.

In “For You” you sing: “Now that I have you I will not forget/ What a miracle you are/No childish expectation/ Love in not the answer/ But the line that marks the start”. Where do those words come from?

Honestly, I couldn't tell you. This song originally started out as a series of demos left on the windowsill, reassembled after recording everything with my partner on guitar, humming along over the top. I didn't think much about the lyrics, which ended up making it a bit "unconscious". It's, in the end, my real tribute to McCartney.

Before the album's release, you said: “In light of the change in all of our circumstances, I saw no reason to withhold something that could, at the very least, entertain and, in the best case, provide a sense of togetherness”. How are you experiencing this historically difficult moment for humanity? I know your guitar lessons on social media are still going strong…

The guitar tutorials were a “happy accident”. They help me practice the instrument and at the same time make possible a bit of communion with an audience. I was terribly sad about not going on tour, since I love touring, and although nothing can replace that experience, I wanted to offer something to the people who would have come to my shows.

“My writing, as always, was months, years, ahead of my conscious mind. It had always been there, gently guiding me through the chaos of life”. These words of yours say a lot about your well-known love of literature. Who are your favourite writers?

Right now: Robertson Davies, Ottessa Moshfegh and Alison Bechdel.

When this difficult time is over, will you be coming back to Italy too?

There's nothing I'd love more than to play in Italy. I haven't done it in years, and it's by far the most beautiful country I've ever been to. Last autumn I spent a few months travelling around Italy in my beat-up little van, sleeping in vineyards. What a country. I'm so sorry for the horrible time it's going through right now.

Ride the wave of great music

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