In musicians’ parlance, a ‘roast’ refers to a particularly challenging gig. I am currently stuck in snowy Gatwick awaiting a plane to the Matterhorn, on the way to a prog-rock roast presided over by the impossibly affable Jon Lord (of Deep Purple fame). When I received the sheet music a day before the rehearsal, and saw page after page densely blackened with semiquavers, I panicked slightly and started to think of ways to escape. But then I cast my mind back to my college days when I used to be able to play that sort of thing, and decided to ‘get my chops back’. It’s been a stimulating experience.

Most of the last month has been spent in my studio, working on a number of projects. I produced a song for Beth Rowley which will feature on a forthcoming Dusty Springfield compilation, recorded for a My Robot Friend track, did 4 new Smoke Fairies songs, continued work on the Brian Eno/David Byrne project, and had a great couple of days with drummer Seb Rochford, starting new tracks for my next record. It’s being overseen by David Holmes; he always seems to get the best out of me when we work on other projects, so I’m looking forward to seeing what happens when we do something of mine. I’m trying not to write or plan too much in advance, and letting the tracks evolve instead, avoiding my usual sounds and tendencies.

Also this month I was asked to contribute a track to an album put together by Rosetta Life - a charity that uses the arts to enhance the lives of terminally ill children. They gave me a 15 minute cd of a 5 year old girl called Kimberley, who at birth was given just weeks to live. She is unable to speak, but can sing and imitate sounds. So music is the way she communicates. I made an electronic track using only sounds that she had produced, and overlaid a commentary by her mother explaining her condition. As with the previous thing I did for this charity, it seemed like a blessed project in a way - there were so many happy accidents, and unlikely alignments of disparate elements turning out to be in time, or in the same key. It was a joy to work on.

A friend in LA is producing an album called ‘Headless Heroes’, featuring a lovely new American folk artist called Alela Diane covering obscure 60s songs. He asked me to do string arrangements for 3 of them, and it was great to be able to record them all at home and send the files by email. I’ve been so enjoying working at home and having these wonderful projects come to me. It’s the kind of life I want at the moment (especially now that I am at Gatwick in a 5-hour delay).

A couple of forays into adland, one successful and one not. I just deleted the paragraph I wrote about the experience, but if you can imagine a situation where bullshit also has the capacity to break your heart (though at no fault of the people you are working for I hasten to add), then you’ll get the jist. I have a lot of respect for people who spend their whole careers doing that kind of thing. Even when it goes well, it’s decimating.

A session for Jon Hopkins’ new album and a few tweaks to the closing credits of the Hunger soundtrack, and that’s pretty much it. Spare moments were spent thinking about with lyrical approaches to my next solo project. I think I want to sing this time and, whereas I’ve often written for others (and 10 years ago used to write and sing my own songs), I have a pathological aversion to most of the lyrics I hear and write. But I’m finding another way to approach things, partly inspired by The Books. I’ve also really enjoyed singing again, and ended up adding backing vocals to the Beth Rowley and Headless Heroes tracks. Like the unexpected prog roast, it’s a new challenge and I’m going to take it slow and steady.