A Conversation with Lisa Hannigan – HuffPost 9.16.11

Mike Ragogna: Hello, Lisa.

Lisa Hannigan: Hello, how are you?

MR: I’m very fine, how are you?

LH: I’m very well–I’m enjoying the rare sunshine that we’re having in Dublin this afternoon.

MR: You’re in Dublin?

LH: I am, I am.

MR: Sweet. Okay, you have a new album called Passenger, which we’ll get to immediately. But Lisa, you were on The Colbert Report. Did I mention you were on The Colbert Report?

LH: I was, I was–it was an absolute treat and an honor, to be honest. What made it so special was how lucky it was that we were on it. I think Stephen Colbert was looking up Sean Hannity or something on YouTube and there was a little song there in the corner of me, because obviously my name is only a few letters different. He thought that it looked sort of interesting, so he watched the video of myself and my band playing a song in a pub and he said, “Who are those people? Maybe they’d come on the show.” We happened to be on tour in the U.S. at the time, so we swung by. It was such a treat…wow.

MR: What was it like on the set with him?

LH: I hope I’m not giving away any trade secrets, but he was just the nicest man ever. He was amazing. It was very interesting to see the show develop over the course of the day, you know, from when they start and they have their first run through. Just to see how it sort of is knocked into shape and is changed and polished over the course of a couple of hours, and then bam–there it is in the evening, perfectly done. It’s an incredible feat that they do every day there.

MR: Do they have, like many live shows do, a warm-up guy?

LH: Yeah, although I was probably a little too nervous to be paying much attention. I’m sure I was just shaking, slightly, backstage…quaking in my boots. (laughs)

MR: (laughs) Let’s talk about your previous album, Sea Sew. What are your thoughts looking back at that album?

LH: Well, because it was my first solo record, there was so much learning involved in doing it, and the songs came out in a really mad sort of time of change and flux. So, in my mind, it’s quite all over the place, just in terms of theme and what the songs are about because it was such a mad time. I think this record is a much more cohesive body of work, and it’s so hard to look back on things that you’ve done before–I think anybody looking back on stuff they’ve done just says, “Wow. I see.” (laughs) It’s quite a difficult thing.

MR: It comes really close to being a concept album, starting with my favorite song on the album, “Home.” The songs on this album were written on the road, and it seems, perhaps, to have that longing to be home at certain points.

LH: Yeah. A lot of them were written on the road, and I suppose that definitely instilled the songs with a sense of nostalgia, really, for both home and also–with some of the songs–a period of innocence as well. There’s definitely a lot of mention of home, but then also the idea of home as a feeling as well. A lot of the songs are about that, yes. It’s weird…being away from home does sort of bring you into sharper focus, really.

MR: Joe Henry is an incredible producer, and he worked with you on this project. What were the dynamics with him were like in the studio.

LH: Oh, I mean, he is just an absolute wonder. He really is amazing. I was very lucky to meet him, and I just knew straightaway that he was the man for the job. He has an incredible, quiet confidence and elegance about him, and he really steered the record in the right way. We ended up going to sort of a converted farmhouse place in Wales in the depths of winter, and Joe came over from L.A. wrapped up very warm, and we made the record in a week–mostly in Wales, and one day in London. It was a wonderful experience. It was a very relaxed experience, considering how short it was. There was a lot of whiskey and wine and strong coffee drunk, and we had regular meal times–it was all very civilized and relaxed, and with a lot of pondering over dinner and in the farmhouse discussing what we had done for the day. It was just a beautiful, relaxed experience. We really just had the most grown-up summer camp that you’d ever imagine…or winter camp, it was more like. But we recorded it pretty much live, so everyone was in the room together and we would do two or three or four takes, and then Joe would say, “Yeah, I think that’s the one,” and then we would work on that a bit. So, it was really a very natural sort of experience, there wasn’t too much frothing on the knobs. Records sometimes can be difficult in that way, but it was a very organic and relaxed experience. It was wonderful.

MR: That all seems like the appropriate way to approach your music. What a nice combination the two of you were.

LH: Oh, it was such a gift that I got to meet him.

MR: Another one of my favorite songs on this album is “O Sleep,” on which you have Mr. Ray LaMontagne. I want to say his name over and over because it sounds so great.

LH: Oh, yes, a beautiful name for a beautiful voice. He’s such a wonderful man, such a wonderful singer. I always wanted a duet on the record, like a proper duet, where people are singing to each other, not just doing harmonies. I thought to myself, “Who would I really love to sing with?” and Ray was at the top of the list. So, I asked him, thinking, “He probably won’t be able to or be around,” and the day that we were doing our over-dubs in London–which is just putting down the strings and the horns–Ray had a day off. He had a gig the next day, I think, in London. We nabbed him and he just came in and his voice was stunning. And it sounds great. It was such a treat.

MR: Lisa, what’s your creative process like?

LH: Well, I find the blank piece of paper quite a negative force upon working. It’s a little oppressive, the blank piece of paper. So, I tend to be wandering about humming, like a mad person. And often, I will go for big long walks and just be mumbling to myself melodiously, and then when I’ve got something solid, I just record it in my phone or scribble it on the back of a napkin or something, just so I don’t forget them. Often, I come home and figure the chords out later, and then with some other ones, I’ll be sitting down messing with the guitar or the harmonium or something and start a melody. But it usually ends up at some point with me wandering around like a loon.

MR: Lisa, this album–from top to bottom–is very personal. What is the most personal song to you?

LH: I would say “Little Bird” or “Paper House.” They were initially the most difficult to sing in front of people, but over the course of the time that I’ve been playing them live, they’ve actually become my favorites to sing. Initially, they felt a little too personal, even though they’re probably not massively personal to people listening. I certainly found those quite difficult.

MR: I think my favorite lyrics on the album are from “Little Bird”: “Your heart sings like a kettle, and your words, they boil away like steam.”

LH: (laughs)

MR: Lisa, what advice do you have for new artists?

LH: Oh, wow–I don’t know. I think, really, you just have to work really hard at what you do. It’s a very long journey, I think, becoming a songwriter or a writer of any kind. You’re never at the end. I have so far to go with being a songwriter, and I’m excited about it. You can’t be put off by the obstacles in your way. It’s life-long path that you’ve chosen, and it’s important not to be disheartened.

MR: Nice. Now, Herbie Hancock put you on his The Imagine Project, on “The Times, They Are A-Changin’.”

LH: Yeah, I’d met Herbie a few years before that. Myself and Damien Rice had done a song on another record that he’d done, and we got on really well. He’s such a lovely man, and we just got on really well. And then, yeah, he wanted me for The Imagine Project. It was wonderful. I went over to his house and I tackled “The Times, They Are A-Changin’,” which is pretty daunting in itself. You know, anything Herbie Hancock asks me to do, I’ll say yes. (laughs) It was a daunting thing to get involved with, but it worked out very well. He’s wonderful. I came over to L.A., actually, to do his 70th birthday party at the Hollywood Bowl, which was an incredible experience.

MR: Was Joni Mitchell there?

LH: She wasn’t, no. I would’ve lost my mind if she’d been there.

MR: I do have to say, there are moments when I listen to your music and I hear the artistic essence of where she came from.

LH: Well, that’s a great compliment. Thank you very much. My mother was a massive Joni Mitchell fan when we were growing up, and it was one of the main tapes that were in the car for those big, long journeys on summer holidays. So, I’m a huge fan of Joni’s–she’s amazing.

MR: I’m also a huge Herbie Hancock fan, and I wanted to mention how great your appearance also was on his Possibilities album.

LH: He’s such a wonderful way of being–he really puts a smile on everybody’s face.

MR: What’s got your eye in the papers recently around the world? I know you’re in Dublin, and it wouldn’t be appropriate to ask you about American politics, but is there anything around the globe that’s concerning you right now?

LH: Well, in Ireland, obviously, we’re going through a severe economic crisis at the moment, and that’s really affecting everyone that you meet all day long when you’re walking around Dublin city. So, that’s definitely at the forefront of everybody’s minds here at the moment.

MR: It seems like the whole world is going through it. You can really see, for the first time, that it’s the world’s problem, it’s not just our economy.

LH: Everyone’s economy is pretty dismal at the moment. Yeah, it’s definitely not just you guys. We’re all in this together.

MR: Yeah, yeah we are. And that’s the point people are missing as they’re doling out the blame. Anyway, is there anything else about Lisa Hannigan we need to know?

LH: Um, I… don’t know. (laughs) I find driving uphill really unpleasant. I’ve got such a strange sense of vertigo. That’s something I’ve never told anyone before. (laughs)

MR: You heard it here first! Lisa Hannigan’s faux-vertigo.

LH: Yeah, it’s very weird–it’s a secret.

MR: Will you will be touring here in the states, yes?

LH: Yes, I’m coming over in the next couple of weeks and starting on the 27th in Los Angeles, and then working my way across to New York on the 21st of October, with lots of places in between. The website is www.lisahannigan.ie if anybody would like to come and see.

MR: Lisa, all the best, thank you so much for your time.

LH: Thanks, Mike.

Transcribed by Claire Wellin