Led by Newcastle-based artist Jayne Dent who takes influence from folk, art-pop, ambient and improvised music, Me Lost Me have unveiled their new album. Georgina Shine caught up with Jayne to find out more.
What can listeners expect from the new album?
Listeners can expect songs about the weather, the elements, gardens, video games, the passing of time, witnessing fights in nightclubs, the joy of creativity, reality and unreality. Musically, it has all my usual mish-mash of sounds and influences, from folk to electronic, ambient, jazz and art-pop, but we’ve gone bigger on production and the variety of instruments (voice and electronics as standard, of course, but also clarinet, double bass, flute and fiddle). I’m so excited to expand the sound palette. The album is called ‘RPG’, so some songs are directly about games, but I also wanted to generally suggest the idea of songwriting being a role-playing game: each song is a new character, a new snippet of a story to explore.
Where do you draw inspiration from when it comes to songwriting?
I draw inspiration from almost everything. I feel like I’m never fully turned off from looking for things to write about; my brain is always ticking over and it sneaks up on me when I’m least expecting it. I’m often inspired when I’m immersed in other artforms such as film, games, art exhibitions, when reading about history or exploring landscapes. A view, a passing noise or a painting can spark a whole song idea too. Recently, I’ve been using random chance word games to generate ideas for moods, lyrics and sound pallets.
How did you find the creative process for this new album?
Most of the songs were written in the latter half of 2021 and beginning of 2022, though a couple like ‘Festive Day’ are ones I’d had on the back burner for a while – ones I couldn’t quite work out how to finish. I had a wonderful time co-writing on this album, something I’m fairly new to in this context, with Faye MacCalman (Collide), Rhodri Davies (Side Quest) and Ditte Elly (The Oldest Trees Hold the Earth). That was a really fun thing to do; not only is it great to work with such brilliant musicians and write these three great songs together, but it was just generally inspiring to spend time talking about the songwriting process, getting really nerdy about it. We had all the demos together by June last year and recorded it at Blank Studios in Newcastle in August 2022, so it feels like such a long time ago. Working with Sam Grant in the studio was a treat and really inspiring.
If you could select any track from the new album to feature in a film, which track would you select?
I think the third single from the album called ‘Heat’ could be fun in a Midsomer or Wickerman-type film, broad daylight folk horror. When I was arranging it I specifically had that kind of atmosphere in mind, hidden in plain sight eeriness. The arrangement is so unnerving, and the lyrics are mostly very cheerful sounding. I was aiming deliberately for that juxtaposition with this one, both bright and frightening.
Can audiences look forward to a tour announcement to celebrate the new release anytime soon?
I’ll be touring in the autumn, with a few dates throughout September, and then a big chunk around the UK in October. I can’t wait to get out and perform these songs live.
You can listen to the album now on all major streaming platforms.
