Fink’s Journey To The Top Not Revolutionary, But It Works

Posted by Emma Renda on September 30th, 2009

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Fin Greenall, more famously known as UK singer-songwriter Fink, tours in a bus just like every other mid-level musician out there.

But if it were up to him, his ultimate tour would go a little something like this: roaming through the English countryside or vast stretches of North American highway on a motorbike, with the rest of his band and gear following in a van behind him. Granted he lifted most of the idea from biker-metal band Slayer, Greenall can’t be blamed for inventing a rock star fantasy to give an edge to his gentle acoustic guitar-wielding persona.

He muses for a moment about the very bad-ass nature of such a tour, blithely tallying the unpleasant logistics involved. But Greenall isn’t about to let a stiff behind and a few bugs in his teeth cramp his style.

“The problem with fantasies, the reality is that they’re a bummer,” says Greenall. “Sometimes you gotta go, ‘Well yeah, in Easy Rider those bikes look pretty uncomfortable. But you still look pretty fucking cool when you’re driving down the street.’”

It seems an unlikely way to start an interview with the angel-voiced tenor from Brighton, England. Yet Greenall somehow morphs the motorcycle daydream into an allegory for his music career, and ultimately, his life.

“You have to find the balance between what is doable and ‘Actually, that would suck,’” Greenall tells andPOP. “I wouldn’t be doing music at all. [People said] ‘Dude, you’re not going to be able to do it.’ And I said, ‘Well, fuck it. I’ll do it anyway.’”

That was almost nine years ago when he released his mellow groove debut, Fresh Produce. His next release, Biscuits for Breakfast in 2006, was the first in what would become a trio – so far – of his signature acoustic sound. Sort of Revolution, his next installment with the legendary Ninja Tunes label (home of Kid Koala, among others),  dropped worldwide Sept. 8.

Greenall’s career began with some casual DJ gigs throughout England, which eventually boosted him to cult-level celebrity status. He started to produce dance tracks, then began penning songs for other musicians before he decided to take on a few of his tunes himself. “It definitely wasn’t the plan. I was working with other singers and songwriters as a writer,” says Greenall. “I worked with this chick Amy Winehouse who was right out of school. She was just awesome, mind-bendingly brilliant.”

Amy Winehouse isn’t the only household name Greenall can list on his resume. He actually co-wrote John Legend’s single, “Green Light” featuring Andre 3000, a favour which was reciprocated by Legend co-writing two songs and adding guest piano on Sort of Revolution. During his studio days, Greenall remixed songs for Nina Simone, Elbow, Ryuichi Sakamoto and Robert Belfour. He has toured endlessly throughout the United Kingdom – notching roughly 300 dates with his band, bassist Guy Whittaker and Tim Thornton – and has opened for the likes of Massive Attack and Zero 7, as well as appearing at a number of major musical institutions, including London’s Royal Albert Hall, Carnegie Hall in NYC, and most recently had a gig at BBC’s Maida Vale studios.

The decision to pursue his own career was an offhand one, which he pitched to Ninja Tunes and got the go ahead, to the point of being signed on as the label’s first singer-songwriter.
“It was like, ‘Damn, I wish I’d done this earlier,’” says Greenall. “But I didn’t have the life experience or the baggage, I needed something to write about.”

Despite being almost a decade into his solo career, Greenall says he is still trying to work out what it all means.

“My first battle was whether or not I wanted how I feel about stuff on record,” says Greenall.
But Greenall isn’t exactly shy, just cunning. Although his lyrics are never entirely direct, Greenall doesn’t avoid candid subject matter. He describes his approach to song-writing as a retreat back in time where he relives the moment that triggered the idea for the song in the first place. Often it means disappearing into a dark hole for days on end if the content is particularly sensitive.

Sometimes it means legwork, in the case of “Six Weeks,” when a girl Greenall was involved with dropped the infamous “L” word and he didn’t know how to respond.

“It’s a situation that everybody’s been in and I wanted to write a song about it, because [Bob] Dylan hasn’t done it and he’s pretty much done everything else,” says Greenall, with a chuckle. “I asked my mates and I asked my girlfriends. I said, ‘I’m not in love with her yet, what should I do?’ And they said, ‘Pretty much you’ve got a month maybe. If she’s not worth having, she’ll leave you.’”

It’s not exactly a love song, but Greenall’s deep coo and lullaby melodies give every song of his a romantic touch.

The album’s first single, “Sort of Revolution” is a six-and-a-half-minute acoustic epic that reads like a mild protest song and actually flows like a ballad.  Rather than pointing fingers, Greenall is extending his hand to the disenchanted around him, suggesting a revolution is not only possible but imminent. (“We come so far, there’s no going back/ All this time we’ve been running from it/ Where we are and where we’re going to / We’ll organise a Sort of Revolution.”)

“Most songs, the idea happens whenever. It takes a couple of minutes to go, ‘I love that, I must remember that,’” says Greenall. “Lyric writing happens in spurts. I have to be ready to catch it when it comes out. With enough whiskey and marijuana, it will definitely happen.”
As for the music, Greenall uses a minimalist’s blend of acoustic guitar and lush vocal harmonies to round out his track lists, and often a dash of synth probably out of habit. “Walkin’ in the Sun” even features a gospel choir, while “Q & A” is backed by a vague beat-boxing riff.

His sound is diverse but accessible – like a Damien Rice demo set to the soundscape of Thom Yorke’s Eraser. It’s sparse, but with the touching lyrical charm, it’s no wonder Greenall is still in demand after three albums of this kind.

After spending the month of August at his home in Brighton playing sporadic gigs through Europe, including several musical festivals, Greenall is about to embark once again on the road. With Sort of Revolution now in record stores worldwide, he has scheduled an extended tour of the UK, France, Germany and North America to promote it. Despite the stretches spent on a tour bus – rather than his whimsical two-wheeled mode of transportation – Greenall says being overbooked is a good problem.

“It’s good to be busy, it’s good to be in demand,” says Greenall. “The weirdest thing is that we’ve already put so much time, effort, money, blood, sweat and tears and we’ve only just begun. We’re a quarter of the way through. We have to get our energy back, we’ve just started and that is a bit terrifying.”

Tags: Amy Winehouse, Blues, CSI, Dub, Fin Greenalll, Fink, folk, john legend, sort of revolution

Categories: Interviews, Music, Pop