The Divine Comedy / The SDE Interview

“This is my deep into middle age album…” – Neil Hannon

The Divine Comedy’s new album, Rainy Sunday Afternoon, is a melancholy and reflective orchestral pop record.

Made at Abbey Road and written, produced and arranged by main man, Neil Hannon, lyrically it tackles subjects including the First World War (‘Achilles’), the loss of his father to Alzheimer’s disease (‘The Last Time I Saw the Old Man’), Trump’s presidency (‘Mar-A-Lago By The Sea’) and the wonder of a childhood Christmas (‘All The Pretty Lights’).

Whilst sometimes cinematic, moody and powerful – the haunting string arrangement on ‘I Want You’ has a touch of vintage John Barry, and ‘The Last Time I Saw the Old Man’ is ‘60s-Scott-Walker-meets-late-night-jazz – there are also lighter moments, like the breezy Bacharach pop of the title track, and the optimistic and pastoral closer, ‘Invisible Thread,’ which features Hannon’s daughter, Willow, on guest vocals.

In an exclusive interview, he talks to SDE about the new album, which is released tomorrow, reveals his frustration at never having a Christmas hit, and tells us what he most likes to do on a rainy Sunday afternoon. Sean Hannam asks the questions…

SDE: Hi Neil – how are you doing?

Neil Hannon: I’m good. How are you?

I’m doing alright. The last time I interviewed you was in 1996 – when Casanova, was released. You’ve done pretty well since then…

The main thing is that I’m still here and you still want to talk to me…

So, let’s talk about the new album, Rainy Sunday Afternoon.  I think it’s a great record – one of the best things you’ve ever done…

Oh, thank you very much.

It was recorded at Abbey Road, with an orchestra and a choir, and it embraces the more melancholy and reflective sides of your character. There are some lighter moments, but it’s an album that’s been influenced by darker times – both personally, but also in the wider world. Was it a reaction against some of the more jaunty and offbeat music you’ve done in recent years, like the Wonka film soundtrack, and 2019’s Office Politics, which was an eclectic concept album?

It’s just the way the cookie crumbles – I don’t have 10-year plans or anything. You could go back to Foreverland [2016 album] – it was five years after Cathy [his wife – Irish singer-songwriter, Cathy Davey] and I had got together.

So naturally, I’d accumulated quite a few songs about us being us, and then Office Politics, in 2019, Brexit and Trump – the nightmare of the 21st century. Maybe I’d got that all out of my system…

Wonka was a big deal, and, on and off, it took up three years of my life, being quite jaunty and chocolatey. It was really enjoyable and very satisfying, but difficult…

Rainy Sunday Afternoon is an ambitious record and it’s not cheap to make an album at Abbey Road with an orchestra – did the commercial success of Wonka help to fund it?

The chocolate money…

It was a golden ticket…

(Laughs). It wasn’t like, ‘Oh – I’ve got all this money, so I’m going to go to Abbey Road…’ It was more that I felt less fragile economically.

We could have probably done it that way in previous times, but I never felt that confident that I was going to get it right first time, and I’d be completely screwed if it was a failure.

So, this time I felt confident that I knew what I was doing, and we’d done a lot of Wonka in [Studio] Three in Abbey Road, and it was like, ‘Oh, this is so cool – I really have to do one of my own [albums] here before I die.’

Had you worked in Abbey Road before?

We’ve done bits and pieces over the years, but it’s always been a string session here, and a friend’s wedding there… (laughs). I have discovered, over the years, that you can do string sections in the smaller rooms, and they can often sound a bit cooler and ELO-ish…

With this one, it was more about being in the one room for the whole thing – often you end up getting jolted around studios, and you don’t get a real flow going. We had 10 days in Abbey Road – that was all we could manage – but it was only possible because we did 10 days of rehearsals, so we knew we could go in there and just play the songs.

You arranged and produced the album too…

When it comes to the arrangements, I do very strict demos of what I imagine it will sound like, but then the strings and brass arrangements go through the wonderful technical filter of Andrew Skeet, who also plays piano with us. So, I kind of more or less write the notes, but he makes it viable.

Was it a special experience making the record?

It was, but I guess it would’ve been more special had I not experienced that kind of thing before. It was just really satisfying and pleasing to be able to do it, and to do it right for once.

It was also nice that we put the string and brass sessions and the choir in the body of the week [of recording] – usually all the guys in the band are nowhere near those things, but they all came in every day, and we all got to have that high (laughs).

And some of them mentioned little things as those sessions happened, which might’ve passed me and Andrew by, so that was good.

Let’s talk about some of the songs on the album. It opens with ‘Achilles’, which was also the first single, although don’t they call them ‘focus tracks’ these days?

They’ll always be singles to me…

Me too. ‘Achilles’ is a very powerful and dramatic song, with strings and a choir on it, and it was inspired by Patrick Shaw-Stewart’s 1915 poem, Achilles in the Trench, which was written about his experience of Gallipoli during World War 1. Can you tell me how that influenced you?

Well, I have to admit that most of the lyrics were written in 2014, which was the centenary of the beginning of the First World War.

There was a piece in the paper about the poem, and it resonated with me – not least because I hadn’t come across this dude, and it was just terribly sad… He was obviously a brilliant classics student, he’d immediately gone into the war, written some nice poems, and then got killed.

He died in 1917…

Yes – it was out of one frying pan into a much worse frying pan… I’d had a birthday and had been moping around, going, ‘Oh, God – I’m so old…’

Now I dream of being 43, but it made me think that was all bloody ridiculous, because that guy died at half my age – so, you’ve just got to be thankful for everything that’s already happened. So that’s where the song emanates from.

The second song on the album is ‘The Last Time I Saw the Old Man’ – it’s very personal, as it concerns itself with your father, who died after suffering from Alzheimer’s disease. It’s a sad yet very moving song – lyrically you’re not trying to be too clever – it’s simply observational – and it’s the music that makes it so powerful…

Yeah – hopefully. With a lot of these things, you don’t really set out to write a song… I was walking the dogs one day and went (he sings the main melody): ‘The last time I saw my papa.’

I changed that bit… I thought, ‘Oh, shit – that’s quite a good tune…’ And I knew exactly what the song had to be about. I don’t know why the line popped into my head, but, as you can imagine, I suppose it’s just subconscious.

Musically, the song has a vintage Scott Walker feel, but with some late-night jazz too – it has a flugelhorn solo on it…

Yeah. I’ve always loved ‘Shipbuilding’ – the Elvis Costello song by Robert Wyatt.

I can see it has a similar atmosphere…

Exactly – a doomed kind of atmosphere. The funny thing was I had the tune and the words, and I knew what key it would be in, but the music just wasn’t happening.

Then, I was up at my mum’s, and I was noodling at the old piano, which I’d written so many songs on when I was a kid, and my dad played it… Then the descending line which goes through the whole song just happened, and, suddenly, the whole thing made sense.So, there is a degree of weird synchronicity to the whole thing.

People always accuse me of being literate and thoughtful, but I’m constantly battling with myself to not overthink things and to try and just get on with it and don’t think about it. I feel like that song is particularly successful because I sort of tried to get out of my own way.

There are several songs on the album that mention your childhood, including ‘The Man Who Turned Into a Chair,’ which also has references to regenerating as a bird, and literally becoming part of the furniture – it’s a song about an older man who is settled in his ways, and has just accepted what he is…

Indeed, and that becomes a present concern when you’re in your fifties. It’s all linked – it’s a deep into middle-age album.

I’m not particularly anti morphing into a chair… (laughs). It’s the sort of line I might’ve heard from Cathy after I’ve been watching five days of Test cricket: ‘If you sit there any longer, you’ll turn into the chair…’

I just wrote in my notebook one day, ‘the man who turned into a chair,’ and I thought it had a nice ring about it. I had the music, but with completely different words – I didn’t like the words, so I took them out, and realised that (sings): ‘The man who turned into a chair,’ fitted with the tune, so it became that song instead.

Some of the songs, like ‘Achilles’, ‘The Last Time I Saw the Old Man’ and ‘I Want You’ have a cinematic sound – the arrangement on ‘I Want You’ has a section that reminds me of ‘60s John Barry…

Good – I love all of that, and when you mix it in with the classical stuff, and a chanson, that’s what you get.

Have you ever fancied doing a Bond theme?

I did in my early days – I would’ve loved to, but I don’t care now.

Your song ‘Thrillseeker’ [from 1998’s Fin de Siècle] had a Bond soundtrack feel…

Indeed, but I’ve done a Hollywood movie now, so I don’t care! But if they came along and said, ‘You’re up…’ I’d be amazed, but I would also say, ‘yay!’

I think they want younger artists for it now…

Exactly. I did stuff a demo into David Arnold’s hand in a club one day back in the ‘90s. He was very sweet, but he said, ‘I can’t take it – it’s too risky because of legal action…’ So, he gave it straight back.

In ‘I Want You,’ there are the lines: ‘Some people want to meet their heroes, pay money just to shake their hand.’ Is that a reference to the celebrity ‘meet and greet’ VIP fan culture in the music world?’

Yeah. I don’t want to judge anyone, because it’s a fucking shitty music industry and everybody’s just trying to make a living and trying to make their next record possible, but I have always been disinclined to monetise myself.

If you want to meet me, just linger by the bus after the show. I’m not going to charge you for it

Neil Hannon

I will bleed the music dry (laughs) because it’s a thing that I make, and I’m proud of it, and I want to be successful, but, if you want to meet me, just linger by the bus after the show. I’m not going to charge you for it – it just doesn’t seem right.

A lot of the lyrics on the record are melancholy and reflective, but sometimes they’re juxtaposed with lighter musical arrangements, like on the title track, which deals with the doom and gloom in society, and having the weight on the world on your shoulders after a fight with your partner, but musically it’s breezy and bouncy – it’s like Bacharach…

Yeah – I thought it owed something to Bacharach and Carole King. I just love a lot of music, so it all goes in, and, sometimes, it comes out…

I like the song, but I don’t know whether people will think that it’s particularly brilliant compared to some of the other ones on the record, because it wears its influences on its sleeve, but I don’t care. Sometimes you just write the song and make the song…

Over the years, I’ve tried to become less rigid about it – ‘This song is about this, and it’s going to do this…’

I like that song because it’s just more conversational. It’s just the way your mind wanders sometimes – especially after a fight – we don’t have that many – but you’re all stirred up, and you’re thinking everything’s wrong, like bloody Trump and bloody everything!

I know what you mean – things starts to escalate, and especially on a rainy Sunday afternoon, when the cricket’s been called off…

Well, it was COVID at the time, so nothing was happening.

So, from a rainy Sunday afternoon to childhood memories of a family trip to London at Christmas time… ‘All The Pretty Lights’ is a lovely song, and it’s very evocative. It beautifully captures the wonder of a child experiencing that time of the year…

Thank you – I’ve got these fleeting images of it, and I was trying to put it down, but I couldn’t remember any of it. It’s like the song is as much about trying to remember something from your childhood as it is about the event itself.

It’s probably the most exciting thing that ever happened to me because everything is more exciting when you’re a kid. The furthest we’d been up to that point was the odd caravan in Kerry.

I think it was because my cousin was being christened – her family wanted my dad [who was a Church of Ireland clergyman] to come over and christen her, so that’s how we could afford to suddenly be going to London at Christmas.

There’s a nice bit in the song where you’re an adult and you’re reflecting on how when Christmas takes place now and you see kids enjoying it, it takes you back to that childhood trip…

Exactly – and I miss that too because my daughter has grown up now. So, I’m going to have to find somebody else’s kid…

There’s a great fairground organ instrumental section on ‘All The Pretty Lights’…

Thank you – I’m never averse to just breaking into a weird bit, and I enjoyed creating it. It was mostly done with my stuff at home, like a Mellotron and my Roland CR-78 drum machine, which I’m very proud of. I bought it recently – it’s a classic.

We could have got musicians in to redo it – like a bassoon player and everything – but I thought it sounded right as it was on the demo.

You’ve already done two Christmas songs – ‘Christmas with the Hannons,’ which appeared on the reissue of Liberation, and ‘Home For The Holidays,’ which was a bonus track on the deluxe 3CD version of your Best Of compilation, Charmed Life, so with ‘All The Pretty Lights’ you’ve completed the Christmas trilogy…

Yeah – and I’m going to keep trying until one of them is a hit…

‘Down The Rabbit Hole’ is the heaviest song musically on the new album – it has rock guitar on it. In the lyric, you’re singing about a mythical place, and I’m also reminded of Alice In Wonderland, but it could also be a comment on the state of America…

I guess that’s just the framing of the subject, to make it enjoyable and not just a drag. But, yes, America is obviously super down the rabbit hole, but it’s got everywhere…

I’m sure we all know people who have disappeared into weird internet idiot areas. I was always dubious about this internet thing from when it was in its infancy in the ‘90s, and, I have to say, I’ve been proved right. It’s all bollocks, and as for AI, I mean, give me a break (laughs).

‘Mar-A-Lago By The Sea’ is a song on the album that tackles the Trump presidency with a breezy musical backing. There’s a bossa nova feel and Hawaiian guitar, and I love lines like: ‘All the sycophants and narcs / All the cannibals and sharks / A secluded paradise of spies and cypress trees / Mar-a-Lago by the sea…’

Frankly, I’m just quoting DJT [Donald John Trump].

Yes – you take on his persona in the song…

I was envisaging him feeling nostalgic for his home from his prison cell, but, unfortunately, it didn’t quite pan out… But I was damned if his weird luck was going to stop me from putting a track on my album (laughs).

‘The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter’ is a beautiful song – it’s about looking for love, but also leaving the past behind, and looking to the future…

I was reading the book [by Carson McCullers] at the time, and I loved the title. The book’s not bad too, but I thought, ‘I’m just going to take this title because it’s the best…’ and the tune sort of wrote itself.

I suppose I kind of drifted off into trying to remember those wilderness years – various times of your life when you feel like you’re just constantly searching for somebody who’s going to make it right. It doesn’t always have to relate to you and where you are now, as long as it’s a real heartfelt idea, then that’s okay.

I just get this vague feeling that you’re always searching until your dying day for the meaning of it all.

The last song on the album, ‘Invisible Thread’ has your daughter, Willow, singing on it. It’s a song about letting go of someone but knowing that you’ll always have a connection – how once you were guiding that person through life, but now they’re guiding you…

Yes – exactly. It’s very much about parents and their offspring – that thing when you realise, ‘My work here is done – off you go…’

My daughter has a band, which makes me very proud, because it’s so noisy and indie – it’s something I would still do if had any of the vigour. I love that she wants to do that, so it seemed obvious to get her to sing on it.

Musically, it’s quite pastoral, and it ends the album on a hopeful and positive note…

If I was a braver artist, maybe I would leave people going, ‘Oh God…’ but I’m afraid I’m rather conservative, with a small c, in that regard, and I do like a happy ending – just so we all don’t do ourselves in (laughs).

The album’s coming out in various formats – the deluxe 2CD version has a bonus disc called Live in Paris & London, which features songs from your 2022 residencies at the Barbican in London and Paris’s Cité de la Musique, and you’ve chosen to include some songs that weren’t often played live…

It’s songs through the years that maybe were played once during the first tour of an album – it seemed like the only opportunity they were going to get to be put on a record and properly mixed. We’ve done live albums, but I didn’t want to just do another one with ‘Tonight We Fly’, ‘National Express’ and all the rest…

You’re touring the new album in the UK this October, including two shows in London, at The Barbican – will you have an orchestra at the London gigs?

The answer is ‘no.’ I’ve always been dubious of too many additions for the capital city shows. I know we did it in the olden days, but my thinking is that Wolverhampton deserves as good a show… So, we’re a seven-piece – we’ve augmented the band with a violinist, and it’s working well in rehearsals. I guarantee you won’t be disappointed, wherever you are.

Over the past few years, you’ve been busy – you made Office Politics, and the Wonka soundtrack, remastered and reissued your back catalogue, and put out the Charmed Life Best Of, and now you’ve made Rainy Sunday Afternoon – does this feel like a new chapter in your career?

In a way, doing a ‘Best Of’ does sort of punctuate your career, but I’ve never thought of it quite like that. We did our first Best Of [A Secret History… The Best of The Divine Comedy] in 1999, but we’d already made six albums by then, which is way more than a lot of bands ever make.

After 2000, it was a very different scene for us – there was a lot of the media that just wanted us to stay in the ‘90s, but I kept going – much to their chagrin.

I felt it was the right time to do Charmed Life – there was so much good stuff after 2000 which needed to be collated.

Sure enough, Rainy Sunday Afternoon does feel like the start of a new chapter. I don’t often like to talk about it in those sort of eras… It’s hard to explain but I feel like I’ve explored all the things I can do or want to try, and this is what I’m best at…

In some respects, musically the new album does feel like a return to the orchestral pop of Casanova or A Short Album About Love…

Maybe it’s more Absent Friends or Victory for the Comic Muse, but the point is that it’s got it all – it’s very me and it’s a lot less jokey.

So, what’s your favourite thing to do on a rainy Sunday afternoon?

If it was a genuinely rainy Sunday afternoon, then I would take the dogs to the canal, because when it rains, nobody walks their dogs.

I really like that – I enjoy walking in miserable weather. There’s something very brutal about it.

Are you not a summer person?

No – I can’t stand it. I think part of the reason is that I get very bad hay fever.

‘The Pop Singer’s Fear of the Pollen Count?’

Yeah – dead on. It’s not that I hate the summer, it’s just that I’m not good at it. I’m not particularly good at any other season, so, I should just stay in my room, write songs, and leave everyone alone.

Thanks to Neil Hannon of The Divine Comedy who was talking to Sean Hannam for SDE. Rainy Sunday Afternoon is released tomorrow, on 19 September, via Divine Comedy Records.

The Divine Comedy Shop highlights

• Pre-order black vinyl + CD bundle with signed print (£34)
• Pre-order 2CD deluxe (£15)
• Pre-order deluxe vinyl book with bonus CD (£60)
• Pre-order dark green coloured vinyl (£27)

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