To anyone even casually acquainted with this country’s music scene, Jenny Lindfors will be a familiar name. A singer/songwriter of some note, Lindfors has been quietly building her reputation for five years now.
In the past 12 months, her progress has been brought to wider public attention. In 2004, she contributed to the soundtrack of the Stephen Rea film, The Halo Effect. Last February, meanwhile, Lindfors was the soulful vocalist adding backing to a remix of Mundy’s ‘Soulmate’ single. In May, her debut EP was finally released.
“I’m so happy that I decided to just do an EP, because I’ve taken the criticism and praise in equal measure,” she says. “I’m still learning, and I learnt a lot from the EP.”
Her next challenge will be to put together an album. However, she is determined not to rush into things. “I’m going to be as patient as I possibly can and tour the same 16 songs for at least six months or a year before doing the album.”
She has enough material for an LP but says she wants to build an audience first, through touring.
“I’ve just seen so many people releasing really good albums to an audience that isn’t there. It’s just disheartening, disappointing, and financially draining. Morale-wise, it just takes so much energy out of you when you put so much energy into it.”
Lindfors speaks from experience. In 2001, she made an album that remains, to this day, in the vaults. “It just wasn’t good enough,” she says, in a matter of fact manner.
“I was only 21 and I’d written, recorded and produced the whole thing, which I thought was very ambitious. It took about a year for me to get that energy back. I listen back to that record, and just think it’s awful.
The album was just too derivative, she feels. “I was singing in an American accent, and you could hear my influences really clearly. You can hear what I love to listen to, and nothing annoys me more than when you listen to stuff and you can hear their influences pouring out. You just think ‘what’s the point of this album? It already exists better, elsewhere and in the past.’”
Listening to her debut EP however, it’s quite easy to unpick her influences. Carry Us Away is a four-track collection steeped in the sounds of Neil Young, Crosby, Stills and Nash, Joni Mitchell, John Martyn and ‘70s folk. Crucially, however, there’s a strong sense of Jenny Lindfors evident throughout.
Her vocals are smooth, wistful and engaging. She gives the impression of being far wiser – and older – than a 25 year old ought to be.
Lindfors says her musical outlook was forged during a childhood spent raiding her father’s record collection.
“I just drank in all the stuff my dad and my uncles had in their collections,” she says. “When I was really little, it was Rumours by Fleetwood Mac and Stevie Nicks’ first solo album which got me. Then I went on to '70s folk music, like The Band, Joni Mitchell and Neil Young. Also, I got into darker stuff such as Hendrix and Patti Smith. By the time I was 11, I used to just put on the head phones and be fascinated by all this music.”
Sometimes Lindfors sound a little like a hippie. She makes music like one too, often favouring a simple, four-track recorder. “I don’t ever sit down at a computer and record,” she asserts. “I hate that idea. I associate computers with offices. It takes the whole vibe off it completely. I love being able to hear every mistake. Very often, to me, when things sound impeccable, they sound dead.”