aaamusic | On 27, Jan 2011

Peter and Kerry

‘Clothes, Friends, Photos’ EP – March 21, 2011

Free Download – ‘The Summer House Song’

The Slaughtered Lamb – February 21, 2011

Peter and Kerry will release their beautiful EP, ‘Clothes, Friends, Photos’, on X (Tape Club Records). It is the debut output from two bright new talents; solo artists in their own right, whose chance meeting and collaborative instincts led to them penning a collection of their own original songs. One of the results, ‘The Summer House Song’, is available now as a free download.  They will launch the project officially at a headline gig at The Slaughtered Lamb on February 21.

It is a story, but not in the usual sense, of Boy Meets Girl. Kerry Leatham is a Colchester-born singer and songwriter, managed by ATC’s Kwame Kwaten: the man who discovered the vocal talent of Shola Ama on the Tube, and most recently unearthed a singer called Rumer after posting an open question on his Facebook page (‘Who Is The Most Talented Person You Know?’). Kerry taught herself to play and wrote her first songs on a three-string guitar, developing an early love for the likes of Van Morrison, Erykah Badu and Ani DiFranco (perhaps her biggest influence). Having been signed up by ATC, and busy at work on her debut album, Leatham was discovered by Will Evans on Youtube: co-founder of a boutique London label, Tape Club Records, whose artists all write, record, produce and gig together (and, as the name suggests, often release their results on tape).

Leatham consequently moved to London, balancing work on her solo efforts with other projects within the Tape Club collective. It was there that she was introduced to Peter Lyons, a burgeoning solo artist from Southampton, then jobbing as a writer/producer/arranger for a soundtrack company. In contrast to Kerry, Lyons’ own creative output is based around electronic loops, samples, and a general sense of cut-and-paste pop: he has been producing music since the age of thirteen, and recently worked with Matthew Herbert on a film score. Yet despite their drastically different backgrounds and musical sounds, Peter and Kerry hit it off, and started writing material of their own. Sessions were swift, productive and written and recorded entirely by the pair across a few days in Peter’s artfully dishevelled Southampton bedroom; the exact scene of which is captured on the EP’s striking front cover.

‘Clothes, Friends, Photos’ is an atmospheric and eclectic EP that reflects the tastes and styles of two very different artists, but ends up sounding like neither: in fact, they both cite the likes of Why?, Local Natives, Bon Iver and even Phillip Glass as inspiration for the project. Throughout, there is a definite sense of production flair and subtle experiments with sound and textures: ‘Half Empty’, for instance, adds layer after layer of Peter’s voice to Kerry’s lead vocal, surrounding a simple ukulele line with almost Animal Collective-esque intricacies. The beautiful ‘Knees’, meanwhile, mixes classical, mournful piano with ghostly harmonies and beats that seem to have arisen from just hitting objects in the room to see what sound they’d make. Both Lyons and Leatham were indeed keen to capture the environment of the bedroom in which they recorded the songs. The result is a unique and creative collection of material, which you sense could only have come about in that place and at that time.

Kerry Leatham and Peter Lyons will announce plans for their own solo work shortly, whilst continuing to collaborate, together with their fellow Tape Club members, on other projects.

LIVE DATES: 21 February LONDON The Slaughtered Lamb