R.Y.F. - Petals in Flames

On her second album, “Shameful Tomboy”, Francesca Morello, aka R.Y.F., channels the emotional flow of a soul with unbridled sensitivity and a heart perpetually ablaze, through ten songs that are devastating in their visceral force, capable of cutting like “bloodied” blades. It's an intense album, intimately genuine and, when needed, fierce, the fruit of an introspection that stands apart from the crowd. In the interview that follows, Morello opens up on every front, touching on solitary tensions, tributes to the great Russian writer and playwright Mikhail Afanasyevich Bulgakov, queer battles waged in the name of a sacred freedom, her headphone listening habits and her plans for the future.

On “Shameful Tomboy” you do everything yourself, the only person helping you is Roberto Villa. Is there a particular reason behind this choice? Why this “solitude”?

There can be two explanations behind this choice. The album is so personal that I felt it was the right way to do it. I wanted to face certain things from my past on my own; I did a lot of introspective and narrative work to strike the right balance between the personal and the public. I laid bare certain parts of myself, even literally when it comes to the cover art. The other reason, less poetic, is that I set myself a deadline for recording the album by booking the studio, so as not to drag out the writing process and to have an actual deadline. Unfortunately, I ended up cutting it too close to the date and, once again, I didn't have time to bring in any of the many talented musician friends I'm lucky enough to have. R.Y.F. is a bit like my bubble: I share it with the audience, but I like to hold on to that solitary tension before playing, and the emptiness all around it.

“Follow me, reader! Let the tongue be torn out of the liar who denied the existence of true, faithful, eternal love on this earth!”. That's the opening of the second book of Bulgakov's “The Master and Margarita”, a text you're particularly attached to. Well, I think that before listening to your music and your words, one could easily swap “reader” for “listener” and finally hit play. Do you agree? Also, beyond that passage, Bulgakov's “The Master and Margarita” is also where your stage name comes from. Can you point me to another part of the novel where you saw yourself reflected, one that feels most “yours”?

I agree with you. R.Y.F. stands for Restless Yellow Flowers, and I took it directly from “The Master and Margarita”: “She was carrying repulsive yellow flowers. I don't know what they're called, but they're always the first to appear in Moscow. These flowers stood out sharply against her black spring coat. She was carrying yellow flowers! A dreadful color. From Tverskaya she turned into a side street and looked back. You know Tverskaya, don't you? Thousands of people were walking along Tverskaya, but I can assure you that she saw only me, and looked at me, not just anxiously, but almost with a kind of morbid intensity. I was struck not so much by her beauty as by the extraordinary loneliness in her eyes, unlike anything I had ever seen! Obeying that yellow summons, I too turned into the side street and followed her. We walked in silence along the sad, crooked lane, I on one side, she on the other. And imagine, there wasn't a living soul around. I was tormented because I felt I had to speak to her, and I was afraid I wouldn't manage to utter a single word, and she would walk away, and I would never see her again”. When I first read that passage, it struck me deeply and I felt it was mine. I knew that feeling described by the Master all too well, and at the time I felt restless, just like those flowers. What I was trying to do was let that restlessness out through my lyrics, and that's how I became R.Y.F.

“Then I realize I was really really gay. Cause I can love the world whatever sex it may be”. The world moves at different speeds. On the ethical and human level, we're still stuck in a kind of dark age of emotions. In your view, is bigotry a contemptible shield for one's own fears — I'm thinking, for instance, of Colonel Fitts in “American Beauty” — or is it the bitterest fruit of an essentially inhuman inability to relate to others? Or is it something else entirely?

I'd like to hope that by 2020 there would be no more Colonel Fittses left, but I fear that's too optimistic a view for our country, given the rise in violence against those who are “different”, against women, and against everything that can't be neatly categorized, and the way it keeps getting justified. I don't think human beings are incapable of relating to others, but simply, since it takes so much effort and energy to understand other people and be empathetic, it's easier not to, and to let individual interests and selfishness win out instead. The bigger problem, though, is that on top of restricting their own freedom, these narrow-minded and violent people also want to restrict the freedom of those who had to fight to earn it, and to erase 40 years of struggles that trans and queer people have fought, carried forward with courage, and the results they've achieved. And that is unacceptable.

Your guitar: what's your relationship with "her"? When did you start playing?

I started playing guitar at 15, after a study holiday in Malta where, to keep us entertained, a bunch of desperate twenty-something camp counsellors taught us a chord progression: Am- C D- G7. With those chords you could play "the theme tune" of the evening entertainment shows. Obviously it was horrible, but the idea of playing guitar appealed to me, and it was also a way to avoid interacting too much with people my own age. Once I got home, I said I wanted a guitar, and in November, for my 15th birthday, I went to the instrument shop in the nearby town and picked out my Fender Gemini II acoustic, which I still own and still play. My grandfather bought it for me. I'm basically self-taught: I took fingerpicking lessons for a short while, but I wanted to play what I liked at the time, so I quit the lessons, bought a book of chords and started working out the chords of my favourite songs by ear. After a year or so, I started writing my own songs. The guitar has always been, and still is, a friend and companion that I love dearly. Thanks to recording the latest album I've played it an enormous amount (when you record in analogue you can't do much editing), because I wanted to arrive in the studio fully prepared, and I really feel the difference compared to before.

"Valley Of Tears Invading My Mind": how did this acoustic movement come about? Where exactly is this valley?

The valley is in Veneto, the area where I was born and where I lived until I was 30. It's my own personal valley of tears, because it's incredibly hostile and bigoted. In an environment like that, I always felt like an alien (fortunately), and I tried to fight off the attacks coming from that valley. I put on all sorts of armour, but I was still left with quite a few scars. Every now and then pessimism and unease still come to visit and ambush me out of nowhere, but I've learned to dodge them. That's what the lyrics of this track were supposed to say, but I never found the right words. Since I really liked the arpeggio and didn't want to leave it off the album, I gave up, and only the guitar remained.

"You called me shameful tomboy/ And I was only 5". How much weight do these words carry today? Have you let them go, or are they still an open wound that, in a way, you're trying to "exorcise" with this song?

They weighed a lot. Maybe I'd even forgotten them for a while, or hadn't given them the weight they deserved, until they resurfaced and became the title track of the album. They don't weigh on me anymore, but I thought it was important to put into music that feeling of unjustified guilt, the sense of having something wrong inside you, those senseless impositions and that gratuitous violence, and above all my desire for a world without those unhealthy rules aiming for a normality that doesn't actually exist. We're all different from one another, thankfully, and everyone is special in their own uniqueness.

Playing the parallels game so dear to us critics, your music sometimes evokes the rawest side of Pj Harvey. Is she your "muse", or are there other artists no one has ever guessed?

PJ Harvey was one of my most constant listens in the past, but she wasn't my only fixation. Actually, I discovered her a bit late and worked my way backwards - I love her early albums enormously. But there were other obsessive listens too: Björk, Tori Amos, Blonde Redhead, Tool, Cat Power, The Cure, Sigur Rós, and before that Nirvana and Skunk Anansie.

You use strictly vintage gear. Where does that choice come from? Have you ever thought about making an electronic, super, uh, modern record?

My instruments aren't exactly vintage. I went to record in a beautiful, fully analogue and vintage studio near Forlì called L'amor Mio Non Muore, to get a certain warmth and thickness of sound. I also used some vintage instruments to record a few guitar overdubs, on Roberto Villa's advice. It was really wonderful working with him and I'm very happy with the result - he'll always have a special place in my heart. Personally, I'm not too attached to vintage gear, even though I like it a lot and admire people who manage to keep up that passion. And I'm not too attached to the guitar either: it's simply the most spontaneous instrument for me. I'd love to be a good pianist - unfortunately my two years of lessons only left me able to strum out something rough, but I love the weighted keys of a piano. Then, for a few years now, I've had a strong interest in samplers, synths, drum machines - on "1st Times" I used a beat I made with a Pocket Operator by Teenage Engineering. I like playing around with machines.

What have you been listening to lately?

Lately I let myself get swept up by Spotify playlists, because I'm on the road a lot and can't really listen to music at home. I'm on the hunt for new things, so I try to see if the algorithms lead me to discover something good, without any particular preference for genre. These days I've been listening to the new Moor Mother album, since I'll be opening for her very soon, and I find it really beautiful and extreme - I already knew her and liked her immediately. The new Ovo album, which I was lucky enough to hear in advance, is also a real bomb. Then over the last few months I keep coming back to Emma Ruth Rundle, FKA Twigs, Boy Harsher, Buke and Gase and Little Simz. After taking part in Transmissions XII and seeing her live, I often listen to Nadah el Shazly and Middle Eastern sounds, and thanks to some well-aimed playlists I'm discovering other artists I like too. When I'm feeling particularly melancholic I listen to Amenra. When I'm in the car, ever since it came out, I listen to "Bruto Minore" by Ronin and whistle along to the whole thing, start to finish. For doing Shiatsu I put on the ritual by ?Alos, it's perfect as a relaxing backdrop.

What do you think you'll do after this album? Do you already have other musical material in the works?

I don't have any material yet, but every now and then new ideas swirl around in my head. I don't think I'll let another three years go by before making the next album, but for now it's still too early. What's certain is that I want to focus more on music than I have in past years, because it makes me immensely happy.

How do you put together your live shows? Do you rework your songs completely, or do you let them flow as they do on record, staying faithful to the original creation?

Basically, I don't overhaul the songs, but I let the emotional component play its part and make sure every show is special. I don't have a setlist, although I tend to have an order for the songs, but since I can, I like having the chance to change my mind at the last minute. Every show is different from the last, and it changes depending on the venue, the audience, and how much I feel like interacting with them verbally.

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