Music: Apology Song by People Poems – UK

Apology SongPeople Poems is a pen-name that doubles as the title of a body of work from Leeds musician Harry Orme. Having studied jazz guitar at degree level and spent 4 years as part of Leeds’ instrumental/improvised music scene, Orme wanted to experiment with transferring what he’d learned from that aesthetic into the arena of stripped-back, acoustic songwriting. The resulting EP, Monologues, was released last Autumn, after which he augmented the lineup to duo with Francesca Haincourt (Redpine & Solo). A follow-up EP is currently being recorded and is slated for a June release, followed by UK/European tours later in the year.
Check out their wonderful song called, “Apology Song” and find out why it became the single.
Why did you select this song as your current single?
I chose Apology Song as the single from this EP because when I was first performing all of the material live, when I spoke to people after the set it almost always seemed to have elicited the strongest response in the audience, or to have been the thing that resonated the most. Also, a lot of the time I’m going through a cycle of falling in and out of love with each of the songs, but so far I’ve managed to remain pretty consistently fond of this one.
How does the single relate to the rest of the EP?
Lyrically, I think Apology Song plays quite a big part in bringing some sort of balance to the EP. A lot of the rest of the material is quite outwardly directed, or quite scrutinising of the behaviour of others. Whilst I wouldn’t necessarily say this song is any more introspective than the other tracks, there’s definitely a much greater degree of self-examination, or a greater attempt at objectivity in relation to your own behaviour.
What was the writing process for the song?
Writing the music started with those very simple first few bars, and a lot of the rest of the harmony came from developing that kind of opening theme. The bridge took a little while to get right – I spent a while on something that just felt far too similar to the rest of the song, and it took me an embarrassingly long time to arrive at that (again, very simple) contrasting rhythm/harmony. The lyrics had actually been written for months before I started writing the music, and the events they’re referring to happened years ago. So, by the time the music had taken shape, in a way the whole thing had been a long time coming.
What does this song’s lyric mean to you?
It’s about a specific person and a very specific time – for me it’s not so much a malleable thing, it’s just about the thing that it’s about. I’m always happy for people to turn it into something else for themselves, though, whatever they see through the kind of prism of their own experience. I try not to dilute that too much by telling any more of the specifics of the story than are already in the song.
What would it be like to see you in person performing this song?
It’s always a nice part of the set, we use it quite a lot as a closer or an opener. It doesn’t reach the kind of upper extreme of volume that some of the other songs do, but on a good night it definitely reaches the same intensity as the more raucous tunes, just in a very different way.
Could your fans summaries who you are as an artist by this song?
I’m not sure this song would be a very complete summary – there are a lot of other influences and other textures in the other tracks. But I would say that it would be a very good starting point.
One last question – what is the motivation behind your music?
I’m not sure, I’m still trying to work that out. There’s definitely a part of it that’s cathartic, but that’s not all of it. I think I’ve always been drawn to storytelling, in any medium, so having spent a few years playing pretty strictly instrumental music, the opportunity to add words as an extra layer seemed too good to pass up.

Social Media

https://www.facebook.com/peoplepoems

https://peoplepoems.bandcamp.com

https://soundcloud.com/people-poems

Upcoming Dates

3rd May – Live at Leeds (Milo Bar)
23rd May – The Den, Harrogate
24th May – Springboard Festival

 
 
 
 
 

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