AND START AGAIN

It’s not so long since Edwyn Collins could not work, remember lyrics, or sing. Now he’s running his own vinyl label and hitting top form with his own work. Rob Hughes meets one of the most admirable men in rock

Edwyn Collins’ studio really is something else. A cosy reception room, complete with tableau of stuffed wild cat savaging preserved bird, leads into a narrow corridor. Slumped against the wall are legions of keyboards and consoles, jutting out like rubble. Above them are old framed pictures, including JH Lynch’s kitsch classic Tina, used as the sleeve to his 1994 monster hit, A Girl Like You. Guitars are everywhere. There’s a ruck of them in reception, heaps more in an adjoining room.

The corridor leads to two recording rooms – both rigged up as if either expecting company or having recently played host – and a production space, dominated by an enormous mixing desk, with a Kim Wilde picture sleeve propped between a bunch of dials (I don’t ask). Lining one wall is a set of retro-looking toys and Star Wars figurines. At the far end of the corridor is a room you’d need sturdy footwear and a set of crampons to get around. It’s a tangle of wires and cables and boxy things that constitute a tech-head’s paradise. In amongst it all is a set of masters from Collins’ 80s indie heroes, Orange Juice.

This West Hampstead building once served as stables for the horses from the nearby fire station, but now it feels like the livery yard of some vast and random musical brain. It’s wonderful. …

by Rob Hughes
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