youlikewelike.com:

Imagine a modern day Gracie Fields with a penchant for folk music who was just stepped from the canvas of a renaissance painting, and you have Nancy Elizabeth. A no airs-and-graces harp-wielding northern girl with a spine-tingling voice and the kind of drive and determination that could win wars, that’s our Elizabeth.

Her debut album Battle and Victory (Leaf Records, a label fast gaining a reputation for it’s innovative and critically acclaimed roster) was a stunning debut, and a beautifully haunting English folk record. Refreshing in its originality, it’s hard to imagine that something quite so enchanting could have emerged from Wigan, where Elizabeth began her musical career at the age of 10 with the obligatory piano lessons, and an obsession with Michael Jackson.

"My older brother used to listen to him all the time, so I thought it was cool to like him – I still do," she giggles.

She taught herself guitar at the age of 15, before going on to study music at the Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts, only picking up the harp at the age of 21, after an inspirational meeting with a intriguing looking man on a bicycle.

"I used to live next to a big old empty building which had once been an ice skating rink. One day my housemate spotted a man riding around in circles on our street dressed in a tutu with a large handlebar moustache."

The mysterious stranger hailed from a company of artists known as The Art Organisation, a group who travel the country turning derelict buildings into makeshift galleries. He invited the girls to a party that evening where the future star was to discover an old man tucked in a corner playing a Celtic harp.

"I was transfixed by it," she gasps. “I dreamt about owning one from that day but simply couldn’t afford it."

And it’s at this point that Billy Fury enters the frame.

A few weeks later Elizabeth applied for a grant from the Billy Fury Memorial Fund, and to her amazement got it!

"It meant spending a day in Blackpool with a bunch of old leather clad bequaffed rockers at the Billy Fury Memorial day, but they couldn’t have been a nicer bunch."

Fortunately, her moderate prize money was enough to buy the harp, though any girl with a harp in her hand these days will inevitably invite comparisons to Joanna Newsom.

"I like her, but musically I think we are very different," Elzizabeth sighs, though the childlike innocence of Newsom’s voice is comparable to Elizabeth’s unaffected vocals. There is also something uniquely British about her songs, Hey Son sounds like a Gallic sea shanty, where as Off With Your Axe makes you think it is only a matter of time before Bert Jansch will be knocking at her door for a duet, and of course.

Elizabeth is diverse in her musical inspirations; she talks passionately about artists from John Renbourne through to Aphex Twin, though her favourite record is Laughing Stock by Mark Hollis, originally of Talk Talk.

"I first heard the album a couple of years ago, I couldn’t speak, I was completely encapsulated. I love the honesty and spirit of it."

When asked if honesty is something that seems as important in her music, she says "It’s very important, I have been reading the Julian Cope biography Head On recently and there is a bit in the book where he says he hates music that is made to impress people. I’ve never heard any of his records but I couldn’t agree more."

At present the songwriter lives in Manchester where she still has a day job to help fund her musical career.

"I work hard at my music and I don’t begrudge having to work to support myself," before explaining she will have to quit to go on tour in November. Elizabeth is unpretentious in her ambition, and when asked what she wants to do next she says she says she doesn’t know how yet but plans to tour Japan because she is "very determined."

You’d be a fool not believe her.

words: Janine Warren

nancyelizabeth.co.uk

Robert Reich + Shack + Twisted Charm + Matix + Jose Gonzales + Canon Blue + Four Tet + Biker Gangs + X Factor Jungle + Kyte + Fareshare + American Apparel + Fair Trials Abroad + Kissaway Trail + Asghar Bukhari + London Gangs + Ava Leigh +
Queer Advertising + Emmy The Great + Honour Killings + Sideshow + Private Armies + Gloria
Cycles + Kate, Leonardo & Sam

Robyn Hitchcock interview...

Singer-songwriter Robyn Hitchcock (previously of The Soft Boys...more

South Coast interviews...

Packed full of great tunes, stories, graff', eccentric characters and dazzling live performances...more