Wings of Joy, Cranes return.
My interview with Alison Shaw and Jim Shaw.
Cranes will play their first show in 11 years next month in their hometown of Portsmouth, with dates in London to follow. Originating from the nucleus of siblings Alison and Jim Shaw, from their first cassette only releases of the late 1980’s, to John Peel sessions, a Melody Maker front cover, to world tour support to The Cure on the Wish tour, onto limited edition releases featuring the use of lyrics by French existentialist Jean-Paul Sartre. In the new millennia they faded away, their last record in 2008, and by 2012 making their last appearances on a stage.
Cranes never really fitted in anywhere. They shone with uniqueness. "Imagine a small child singing lullabies at the bottom of the well” one U.S reviewer once wrote. Not shoegaze, and certainly not ‘dream pop’; this was not a term used in the early 1990’s. At times early in their career they certainly had an industrial grind, with thumping drumbeats, jagged guitar noise, as a key early song in their repertoire, Starblood illustrates. Often piano part accompaniment, in time replaced with flowing guitars and orchestration. For many, always with a deep sense of gothic undertow. Cranes just did their own thing, ethereal, at times otherworldly. Perhaps the soundtrack to magical dreams and fairy tales.
Debut album Wings of Joy was followed by Forever, with single Jewel mixed by Robert Smith and onto Loved. The more stripped down and acoustic Population 4, their 5th album, was the next studio album following their Sartre inspired La tragédie d'Oreste et Électre project. Population 4 would come to be their last major label funded album, via Dedicated (funded by BMG), a label upon which they counted Spiritualized among their peers. A tour began to promote the album. It was at this time that I met them in London pre-show for a conversation for Planet of Sound.
“Did we really fuck it up again” Alison Shaw sings on opener Tangled Up. Alison had at this time returned from travelling the Americas. After Cranes finished their last tour for Loved, Alison stayed in Mexico. Meanwhile Jim travelled to Canada and then home and into a darker place altogether.
“Every aspect of my life was in a mess. Drinking too much, taking anything, I was given”. Meanwhile Matt Cope left Cranes to emigrate to New Zealand and got married. Three of four original Cranes reunited. Mark Francombe remaining on bass, and new Parisian recruit Manu Ros taking on drumming duties, as Jim moved onto guitar.
“To me it’s just a natural thing to do what we haven’t done before” Jim Shaw
“As soon as anyone says this sounds like such and such, he’ll be like we can’t use it”. Alison Shaw.
“Trouble can creep up on you with the best of intentions, the weirdest shit you can imagine”. Jim tells me more about the challenges he’s faced in recent times. He’s now in a better place. Visiting Alison in Los Angeles, writing began, but “it wasn’t Cranes. “Two or three songs were vaguely rap”. Only one song ‘Sweet Unknown’ was carried forward. Bags packed on LA, Population 4 was eventually written and recorded in a farmhouse off the A23 in Sussex.
“Travelling gives you pictures in your head…, I think everything you see and do indirectly affects you when you start writing again” Alison states. Jim’s theory is one of a musical journey rather than geographic, “to me its just a natural thing to do what we haven’t done before, and if what we’re doing is more in line with what everyone else is doing most of the time, that is because we haven’t done it before. Which is the exact answer I wish I had given when people had said earlier, why are you so different? We probably did an album in between (the last and present albums) of songs that did not feel right”.
“It might not have worked if we had carried on as before. We felt like we needed a change.” Alison Shaw
Cranes have recognised they are working more as a collaborative band. In the past Jim and Alison’s process of making music has involved little communication. It usually just clicks between brother and sister. Jim brings the music and Alison the vocal melody. This time they have been swapping roles, Alison playing acoustic guitar. Jim even sings on one song ‘Stalk’, and that’s a first. “We had something that was different from before. It’s probably a good thing” remarks Alison. “It might not have worked if we had carried on as before. We felt like we needed a change. We wanted to get away from strings too”.
“I don’t like perfect things... We are not a perfect band and we don’t care”. Jim Shaw.
Jim talks of where the music takes you. “I have very little control over what I’m writing. It just comes out. It’s very much dictated by sound. I think our band is about not being good musicians and not being perfect. I think that is the truth about us. I don’t like perfect things. Everything is a product; everything must be perfect. People aren’t perfect, why should everything they buy be perfect. We are not a perfect band and we don’t care”.
“You know we make huge mistakes on our records, and I don’t give a flying fuck. If it feels right when you’re doing it, the that’s cool”. The fragile beauty of imperfection.
I raise that ‘On Top Of The World’ sounds a little like Sonic Youth. “Unfortunately. Very unfortunately. I’ve noticed that myself. It’s the drum beat”. Jim insists it originated from a demo from years ago, “I’ve got documented proof I did that drum beat before any fucker did”.
“We loved Sonic Youth at The Forum. But I never really listen to them” Jim confesses. Later Alison confides in me that “he’s always like that. As soon as anyone says this sounds like such and such, he’ll be like we can’t use it”.
I learn Alison loves Joy Division, but Jim was freaked out by them when he was younger. “People can subconsciously see something, and it really scares them away”. Jim tells me of his love for Tom Waits.
We talk of interactions with the music press. “One bloke had said he’d been briefed to stitch us up”. Jim declares. “Strangely enough just as the Melody Maker put us on the front page, the NME suddenly turned against us”. The fickle world of the British weekly music press is discussed.
This interview occurred with the appearance of an album and a return many thought they would never see.
Now, years later, in 2023, Cranes are returning to the stage once again to celebrate the 30th anniversary of Forever. Mark Francombe and Matt Cope will play with the Shaws for the first time since the 1990s.
“We literally didn’t know if there would be much interest or not. But it sold out really quickly—in two or three days. We were astonished! We had all started to talk last October. A two-hour phone call with Mark from Oslo and then a two-hour call with Matt in Brighton, and then we all got together in January. It’s amazing. It’s all our old friends back.” Alison told Bandcamp in May.
Like many of their contemporaries, at times bashed for not fitting into the popular zeitgeist (Slowdive for instance); for being different, outsiders, over time their audience has grown, and their music has resonated down the generations since. Cranes music has certainly lasted longer than the fate of their critics. Cranes still fly.
Cranes play Portsmouth Southsea Wedgewood Rooms October 6th and Earth, London, October 14th, with further dates in 2024. Check here for details.
Recommended album Forever
