Archive for October 25th, 2014

Interview: the Guardian

Posted on 25. Oct, 2014 by admin.

There’s a rare interview with Damien in last Thursday’s edition of The Guardian.

‘I went scuba diving in the brain, free diving in the brain’

Multi-platinum success left Damien Rice convinced people were using him. He sacked his band, retreated from music and ‘cleansed his mind’. Now, after eight years, he’s back …

Damien Rice sits on an ornate sofa in a room above a restaurant in Reykjavik, a gaping tear in the arm of his jacket, trying to explain what he’s been doing since the release of his second solo album, 2006’s platinum-selling 9. He’s polite enough, but it’s hard to miss his discomfort. His answers come punctuated by pauses so vast you could drive a truck through them: after a while, you just get used to sitting in silence while he searches for the right words. When he finds them, they’re frequently metaphors so convoluted they sound more like riddles. “I took a break, and I went off to do something,” he says of the period after 9. “People say, ‘What did you do?’ Erm, let’s say” – a mammoth pause – “let’s say I was a lover of the sea. And I …” – another pause – “I was a sea swimmer, that’s what I was doing. I went off to do a free-diving course, I learned how to scuba dive, I also learned sailing, I also learned surfing.”

Continued…