Introducing: Merrowfolk
Introducing:Merrowfolk
Rooted in folk but drawing on indie rock, gothic noir and theatrical pop, Glasgow’s seven-piece collective Merrowfolk emerged from Irish singer-songwriter Clare McBrien’s solo project, Mima Merrow. Their debut album, Understory, arrives via Iffy Folk Records, bringing together soaring harmonies, lush brass, grungy guitars and dynamic keys in a sound that’s as unpredictable as it is infectious. From the shimmering, synth-led folk of “Beckoning Back” to the dark romanticism of “Let Me Be Yours”, Merrowfolk move effortlessly between the whimsical and the wonderfully strange.
At the heart of Merrowfolk’s sound, there’s a playful, often powerful streak running through their arrangements. Soaring harmonies, brass, keys and an elastic rhythm section bring a restless energy to the seven-piece Glasgow collective, with Freya Giles (vocals, electric guitar), Nicola Denman (vocals, synth, percussion), Ali Hendry (vocals, trumpet, flugelhorn), Douglas Knight (drums, percussion, backing vocals), Andrew Macdonell (keys, clarinet, saxophone, backing vocals) and Alexander Meyer (bass, acoustic guitar, backing vocals) expanding the vision of bandleader Clare McBrien.
Nature and mythology provide a lyrical undercurrent throughout Understory, while questions of community and belonging sit alongside a quietly defiant belief in the need for joy, love and comfort in an increasingly precarious world. Merrowfolk’s approach to songwriting and performance embraces these contrasts, balancing intricate arrangements and darker textures with warmth, spontaneity and an infectious sense of collective expression.
Photography Credit: Rhianonne Stone
How would you describe your sound to someone hearing you for the first time?
“We struggle to know how to describe our sound so we’ve been asking folk what they think. Some of our favourite responses have been,
‘It’s giving witches wailing in the forest in the most complimentary way.’
‘A comforting hand in the darkness guiding you through a fragrant forest littered with broken glass.’
‘It’s edgy alt-folk sound with a driving almost gothic pulse rooted in big female energy reminiscent of powerhouses like Laura Marling, Souxsie Sioux and PJ Harvey.”
When did this project start to feel like something substantial?
“When we took the trip up to BlackBay Studio on the Isle of Lewis to record the album. We had 4.5 days to record 11 tracks and we were nervous but ready. We’d worked so hard to get there and couldn’t quite believe it. We travelled up and spent a night in Stornoway before we headed to the studio the next day. We drank lots of prosecco, danced round the rental house and celebrated getting to that point having spent months rehearsing and gigging. Then when we arrived at BlackBay the next day we couldn’t believe what a special place it was - the beautiful surroundings, the incredible studio, the opportunity to work with Pete and Cal. It was a very intense week - full of laughing, tears and hard work. We felt incredibly lucky to have had the opportunity to work together in this way.”
What usually comes first for you: lyrics, melody, rhythm, or atmosphere?
“For this album it was different for every song. Let Me Be Yours started off as a poem that was then put to music, Green and Cosy Comfy were written at the piano as quiet ballads where the lyrics and melody came at the same time before we changed them into the upbeat songs you hear on the record and Beckoning Back and Tweet Tweet started as a repeating riff, before lyrics and melody were added. It’s fun to approach it differently as much as possible - it keeps it interesting and takes away the over critical voice in your head that can get in the way of writing.”
Do you find themes returning in writing process, even unintentionally?
“Yes - for me writing is really a process of trying to understand myself and others and therefore it’s quite cyclical. I often find myself writing about the same themes or surroundings over and over again until I have finally figured something out. Or until I am bored of listening to myself and want to move on. I think that’s why it's so therapeutic. It allows me to explore something endlessly until I’m ready to let it go or I’ve finally found a way to give words/ sound to something that’s been beyond reach yet deeply ingrained in me for ages. It’s a way of making sense of, or providing a container for, chaos.
I’ll often have one line that I’ll put in a couple of different songs. It feels like I’m trying to find a safe place to leave it, or I am dressing it up in different clothes to see what fits. Usually the songs don’t end up all being recorded so it doesn’t matter but on this album there is one repeated lyric in two songs because we loved them both and both of them needed to have that lyric in it.”
What does your live show offer that listeners won’t get from the recordings?
“We tried to make this record have the same energy, vibrancy and humanness of our live shows. We chose to record it pretty quickly, Doug, our drummer, didn’t use a click track and we recorded as many instruments as possible at the same time - thanks to the amazing facilities and technical skills of Cal who was working with us. There were minimal overdubs, we left mistakes in and during the mixing process we kept coming back to the key focus of - this should sound like us. From chair squeaks, to making sure we could hear breath through the brass and fingers on strings - we wanted people to hear our physical presence in the space in the hopes it would lead to more connection and excitement for the listener.
Our live shows are even more dynamic, warm and fun. We don’t take ourselves too seriously, we really love playing together and we’re lucky to have an amazing community of folks around us who come along and have a laugh with us. It’s a chance to let go, feel a range of emotions and hopefully come out the other side feeling a bit lighter.”
How do you know when a song is finished—or do you ever?
“I don’t think that songs are ever truly finished. They always continue to change and even since recording ‘understory’ last October, the songs have grown as we have spent more time playing them. For me, the most exciting ‘finishing’ moments I have with a song are when you play through the melody, lyrics and chords for the first time and you know it’s got a shape. Then there’s a moment when as a group we all click together and come to a common understanding of what the song is and how all our parts work together. Then there’s the moment you decide to stop adding anything else to the recording or the moment we all sat and listened to the final mix and master. All of them feel like an ending and a new beginning of sorts and all feel special.”
Photography Credit: Rhianonne Stone
Which artist, album, or moment changed how you think about making music?
Freya - Shakespeare Sister - Stay, “I still remember so clearly, as a wee girl, the first time I saw Shakespeare Sister ‘Stay’ appear on Top of the Pops. It felt so unbelievably powerful. I grew up in a really musical family but had no idea voices could sound like that or women could perform and look like that. I was utterly captivated, and I still get goosebumps when I hear it now. It’s a solid source of inspiration that still holds today, incredible.”
Doug - Reuben - Suffocation of the Soul, “I've always been heavily inspired by Reuben's drummer Guy Davis. His approach to playing and ability to hold down complex beats in odd time signatures had a huge effect on my own approach to drumming in bands. Also, songwriter Jamie Lenman is a musical hero of mine, his songwriting throughout Reuben's time and indeed his solo music has and always will be some of my favourite.”
Nicola - Tempest - Lucius, “I’m a harmonies gal - I just love a really good crunchy harmony. Bands like Fleet Foxes, Animal Collective, Beirut, Grizzly Bears, and Flyte do this so beautifully, often with an ethereal, almost otherworldly quality. They’ve really shaped how I think about vocals and arrangements, and made me appreciate how voices don’t have to be perfectly polished to work beautifully together. I love the call and response, the unexpected textures, and that feeling of voices locking together to create something bigger than any one of us.”
Andrew - Billy Joel - Summer Highland Falls, “I remember hearing this when I was young and thinking that the piano part and the dueting soprano saxophones were the most incredible thing. I loved Billy Joel and I loved the way Richie Cannata played saxophone! It really inspires the way I play and how I write and improvise horn lines.”
Clare - The Frames - God Bless Mom, “I went to a Frames concert when I was 15 and saw this live and it BLEW MY MIND. I bought the album - The Set List - on CD and listened to it endlessly before going in search of all their earlier albums in HMV. I remember standing in the crowd when they played this and thinking I wanted to be in a band and sing songs like this - absurd but earnest, melodramatic but grounded.”
Alex - Korn - Trash, “Korn was the first band that got me into Nu metal at the age of 10/11. The style in which Fieldy plays was mindblowing at the time and still is. Korn was a band that made me want to be with other musicians creating something together. It was such a change of pace of music for me compared to other things I was listening to at the time. It was new for me to experience that feeling of belonging in a genre of music. It was what inspired me to want to be in a collective and be able to put my own emotions into playing music with others.”
Ali - Belle & Sebastian - I’m a cuckoo, “I got a loan of Dear Catastrophe Waitress for 50p from the library. The arrangements on it are so good - my initial road in was the single ’I’m a cuckoo’ with that big brassy outro. I think it was the first time that teenage me realised I could play trumpet in an indie band if I wanted to and that these parts didn’t have to be incredibly difficult to play, they would still sound huge!.”
What do you hope people take away after spending time with your music?
“A nice warm fuzz, an earworn or two and a strong compulsion to dive in again and pull the album around them like a blanket. - Ali
I hope they feel like they’re going on a journey with us through different emotions that we all share. I hope they can feel what we went through when practicing and recording the album together. It is quite an emotional album and we have put our whole selves into it. I want our music to show that all feelings are accepted just as we as a band have learned to accept ourselves and others by making music together. - Alex
Whenever I hear something clever or beautiful or inspiring in a piece of music, it always makes me laugh, like I’ve heard a joke or figured out a puzzle. I hope our music gives someone that same kind of pleasure. - Andrew
Making this album has been such a joy and playing with this band has given me space to be myself. I hope some of that comes through in the music - that sense of connection, fun and being able to let go a little. -Nicola.
I hope people feel inspired to write their own songs or take up an instrument they’ve always wanted to play. It would also be great if it gave people hope or joy or a feeling of camaraderie as that is what the project has given me being a part of it - Doug
I hope people find a piece of themselves in it and know we’re just like them, emotional, confused, silly and capable of having a right good laugh - Freya
The albums that are most precious to me are the ones that have been places for me to escape into throughout my life. A sonic world, available to me when I needed it, where I could go to feel what I needed to feel without embarrassment or to imagine myself somewhere else dancing with friends, or to take me back to a memory. They always felt like physical places that I could float away to and feel understood and less alone. If this album could offer a tiny bit of that to someone else I would be delighted.” - Clare
