Sisters sing the songs of Nick Drake’s mother
Unthanks take on a great family legacy
Ireland has never suffered a dearth of native folk acts but we still welcome with open arms acts from overseas within the genre, not least from the neighbouring island. The Unthanks can visit Ireland any time they like and often do. They will play Vicar Street in Dublin on Thursday night in their biggest Irish headline show to date.
Two sisters, Becky and Rachel Unthank front the band with its roots deep in Northumberland in the north-east of England. Of course, stories of star-crossed lovers, ne’er do wells and work songs of the 19th and 20th centuries feature in their work as they do in our tradition and those of many other countries.
As well as traditional songs from their own area, they’ve recorded whole albums of covers written by artists as diverse as Antony And The Johnsons and Robert Wyatt for their Diversions series.
The latest one, which is out on Friday, interprets the songs of Molly Drake who died in 1993. She was a songwriter, who composed for her own satisfaction and who generally performed for small groups of friends and family.
They included her youngest son Nick Drake who tragically died in 1974 but with albums such as Bryter Layter and Five Leaves Left has had a profound influence on not only The Unthanks but REM and The Cure. Brad Pitt is among celebrity fans.
Becky says: ‘We recorded Nick Drake’s River Man on our first album Cruel Sister. We all love the music of Nick Drake.
‘We knew his mother Molly had been a songwriter. Then we heard the Drake estate was releasing an album of her home recordings and a book of her lovely poems. We were intrigued to see what was there was to discover. We didn’t expect to find this treasure of deep and emotional songs.’
The album was simply entitled Molly Drake and was released in 2013.
Gabrielle Drake, the actress, is Nick’s sister and acts as custodian of the works of both her brother and mother. Gabrielle, it transpired, was a fan of The Unthanks.
‘Gabrielle and Cally [Collomon who look helps her with the Drakes’ musical legacy] came along to see us a good few years ago. We met up and we got on really well,’ Becky says.
‘Later, she decided to write a book to put the record straight about her brother. She was giving a talk about it and invited us along to perform. I had to sing Riverman about a metre away from Gabrielle. That was terrifying but she was very kind and always very encouraging of us.
‘We chatted on and off about doing this album of her mother’s songs for ages. Yes it is intimidating to take on an album of someone’s mum’s songs. At the same time all we could do was trust our instincts and see where it led us.
‘Based on the songs by Molly that we’ve heard, she had great empathy for the human condition. It is wonderful now to listen to Nick’s music and identify those elements that they had in common.’
Becky expresses a hope that they will do a ‘regular’ Unthanks album next time around. The last one of that type came out in 2015 and won a prestigious BBC Radio 2 Folk Award.
‘We have a list a mile long of things we want to do,’ she says.
‘There are a load of songs knocking around the band so we do want to make another regular Unthanks album, if that’s the right word. Diversions wise, we have loads of ideas too.’
I wondered had they or would they consider an Irish Diversions in the near or distant future. It’s not as if there aren’t many artists and writers to choose from.
‘Oh! Who would you suggest?’ She asks. Caught off-guard I instinctively suggest Cavan singer Lisa O’Neill or Conor O’Brien’s vehicle Villagers.
She indicates she would try to check out the plaintive tones of O’Neill before revealing O’Brien as a friend. ‘I did a project called Crow’s Bones with Martin Green from [experimental folk group] Lau where we took spooky Christmas stories and made them into songs,’ she says.
‘Then we went further and just made it generally spooky tales and we chose I Saw The Dead by Villagers. We are friends with Conor and have spoken about doing things together. But we just end up going to the pub and chatting instead.
‘One Irish group that has always been of massive interest to us is The Voice Squad; doing a Diversions album with them would be a dream come true.’
There’s ‘a come and get us plea’ to the Kilkenny-based vocal group if ever there was one.
Diversions Vol. 4 – The Songs And Poems Of Molly Drake is out on Friday
‘Listen to Nick’s music and identify the elements he and his mother shared’