Ledfoot – 18-01-2020

Interview with: Tim Scott McConnell

Tim Scott McConnell is an American singer-songwriter playing a twelve string guitar. In his earlier career he has been plaing in bands like The Havalinas and The Rockats but under the name of Ledfoot he releases his own material. Musically he describes it as Gothic Blues and he has set himself quite a name with that.

As a solo artist Tim has a variety of albums, and with his latest album called ‘White Crow’ out we were wondering how they relate with the music he released before.
He tells us: “Honestly…I don’t think that way… you write…than you write more till it makes some kind of sense…what sounded right yesterday doesn’t sound right today. It only relates as a time line continued and constantly disrupted.”.

As it seems Tim is one of these artists that goes with the flow and writes from his feeling of what works rather than looking back to see if it fits in line with earlier releases. As we try to find out how his fans are looking at it, some may be following the man from as early 80s, he seem to not be concerned. Asking where these long time followers would be surprised when listening to “White Crow” he simply replies: “In whichever song they find themselves in.”

The cover was one of these elements that drew our attention right away. Magazine’s like ours get a significant amount of albums in so elements like the cover an artist can get a quick win. This of course, also goes out to the curious browser in a musicstore. Tim tells us that his son is behind the drawing of the crow. “My oldest son did the white crow illustration and I did the rest. I asked him to draw me if I was a crow… he was very flattering….I never look that good!”. Well, as it stood out so much we can only agree to that.

When writing an album an artist can come against some struggles, so we wondered if Tim has experienced any. “I’m a compulsive writer, too much material…and what makes sense together? I’m releasing a new record soon, none of the new songs would make sense on White Crow.” he tells us. Seems like a luxury problem to us, but also some good news for the fans, knowing some new material is on the way.
On this way of working we wondered how is his approach. Tim explains that he does not decide on what he want to write about himself, “The subject chooses you, then you walk around it like an abandoned house and look in every window. Then you decide which room is yours and describe your surroundings. And what’s beyond your door, who’s looking at you through the window, what’s under the the bed, who isn’t with you who should be, is it warm cold, do I want to be here? Where would I rather be? Too much to say in three verses and a chorus, but you do your best.”

A wilde exploration trip for Tim and certainly shines light on these mystical songs. We decided to look a bit closer to the songs on this release and see their topics. Maybe feel like you joined him in that abandoned house. Urbex-ing is quite a trend for a while after all.

‘Nobody’ is the first we are looking into. Tim is quite solid on that: “I’m an international deportee …it’s about accepting you’ll never be accepted with dignity”. A sad truth that many people can relate to. This may also be the case with ‘This Wayward Son’. Tim tells about that: “I’m 61 years old, at one point you question the choices you’ve made and path you’ve taken…then you spit twice, curse all man made gods and whisper ‘fuck it , who cares’ and accept the man you’ve become”

The last track we look into is the dramatic ‘When Angels Fall’. “Everybody falls, but nobody notices if you’re falling from the gutter. The reason you go to a circus is to see the lion tamer eaten or someone to fall from the high wire with no net… don’t want to see it..but can’t help but look….I spend a lot of time up on that wire…although I’ll never be an angel , I have witnessed them fall enough to write about it.” he explains. And with that we conclude our interview.
‘White Crow’ is getting released on a wider territory on 24th January after an initial release in Norway.

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