Edward F Butler
Warm and enveloping
WHO?
Edward’s 26, and currently living in Watlington near King’s Lynn. Born in London, raised in Norfolk, educated in Manchester. He’s just completed the Sonic Arts course at Queen’s, Belfast. Now he being released into the world and trying to conjoin his background in acoustic singer songwriting with his love of weird electronica.
WHAT?
Describing himself as Grace Jones meets Tom Jones, Edward’s a man with a headful of influences, and they show. There are lots of weird sounds, and his music definitely pushes at the boundaries, but somehow Edward keeps it warm and enveloping rather than cold and distant. Much of it is in his voice, which guides you through everything. He’d say it’s all about the people he collaborates with, including producers from Northern Ireland like Matt Duke and Koichi and singers and musicians like Katharine Philippa. They rework and add to his ideas. Every song is an experience though, a mosaic of genres with Edward filling the gaps between, making it comforting, when in the hands of someone else it wouldn’t be. “It’s not a gimmick,” Edward says, “and it won’t always sound like this, but what I am doing right now seems to work for my songs. Really, I’d like to be Norfolk’s answer to Bjork! Like Bjorfolk!”
LIVE?
We will be waiting on this one for a while here in Norfolk, but it will come, he assures us. He has performed lots in the past with his previous band H:owl and still plays acoustically, but the current collaborations are harder to get right live. Edward is definitely going to make it up to us in other ways. Through an Arts Council Northern Ireland grant he will be producing one new song and an accompanying video every month for the next year, starting in January. “I’m hoping this will then turn into an album at the end of it all,” he told us. Check out this previous videos on his website.
THE FUTURE?
Aside from his video and music project, it’s all about building on his advancing reputation. He may be new to us here in Norfolk, but over in Belfast he has already received a nomination for Track of 2015 for Future’s Full by the Northern Ireland Daily Mirror. It’s exciting for an artist to have a foot in so many camps geographically and musically – and great for us as we sit back and enjoy the unfolding of this talent in front of us.
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