Mollie Marriott – Back In Action

 As Mollie gears up for a return to live performances and delivering a fresh set of material, the singer-songwriter daughter of The Small Faces and Humble Pie star Steve speaks to us about events and the future. To say that Miss Marriott is down to earth would be a great understatement…indeed our last encounter was in a field in Oxfordshire! Seems a good conversation starter…..

JLTT: Hi Mollie..we were last together in a field in Oxfordshire …

MM: Yesss! That’s right, Pete – when I was playing Cornbury Festival!

We had a chat before you performed, but what I remember best is how well-behaved your daughter was..how did things settle down re recordings? As I know there was  a problem with the intended label..

It all kind of came crashing down..but I’m now working with the team I want to use and I went back into the studio in November to start recording some new songs and moving on. This is with help from the folk that put together the musical on The Small Faces, the theatre production so I can count myself lucky there… this will make you laugh but due to some problems I had to take care of my voice and I had to be silent for a few weeks..

This is hard to believe!!

It’s true! Being a parent as well, it was a really scary time and I thought what if she runs out in the road and I can’t shout??

A whistle, babe, that’s your answer..

She was so sweet, she’d ask me a question and then kind of answer it for me OR I’d start to answer it with signs and she’d say ‘Don’t worry about it ‘

We were at Country 2 Country and some parents let their kids run riot, quite dangerously

Well, she’s been brought up in the industry so she knows how to behave. She’d be on my knee at shows from a very young  age, watching famous people perform. And then my bits of the performance.

That’s true and then your child is at ease being around people that others might be in awe of

Yeah I agree, I did Bill Wyman’s Birthday Gig at the Indigo

I know, I was there..

Oh yes! I saw the review and the pictures..it was such a great night – Joe Brown and Imelda May and everybody..she was in the audience and afterwards there was a little afterparty backstage so she came and met everyone. Bill was laughing and said ‘Just look at her !’ and she was chatting on the sofa to Robert Plant. Driving home I put the radio on and they played ‘Whole Lotta Love” and she said ‘This man is the BEST rock singer!’..so I had to tell he she’d been talking to him earlier..haha! A friend of mine does bv’s for Adele and my daughter met her and she just flipped out then ‘You’re Adele ? The real Adele?’

Let’s talk songwriting..I find that sometimes two separate unfinished partial songs can fall together into one composition that I am really happy to use. Just me?

 (Laughs) Yeah, funny that! And it has often happened with me. So I really agree that it can very often work out that the compete piece just appears. And the verses, say and chorus can be in different keys or tempo’s BUT just fit together, with a bit of thought.

Dave Crosby says that if The Muse drops something on your head, don’t do anything but use it…are you writing at the moment? 

Yes I am..I always have my phone by my bed in case I suddenly get an idea or a line or a melody and want to keep it. Even at three in the morning there I am singing into the phone to record it! Sometimes when listened to later it’s just ****. I have a session booked in with my lovely friend Judie Tzuke.

Ah! She works with Harriet doing joint compositions, talented lady. Don’t her kids sing?

Oh yeah! The three of them together, harmonising, I have never heard anything so rich. I saw Judie at Bush Hall for the first time, with the girls and I cried my eyes out.

I love Judie so much and with all my heart. The voices together, there is something quite magically special about the sound. Just born to sing together and that’s it. I sat with my friend Anna Krantz and they did Uninvited. Anna and I were streaming with tears. She is such a British legend, she really is.

 Talent. There are still so many females in the business who just like being photographed

I know, it’s sad.

Glenn said to ask you who will be in the band at The Borderline

 Oh say Hi from me – well, it’s Michael of course plus Sam Cannon on keys, Izzy Chase on backing vocals, John on guitar who you saw at Cornbury, C J Evans on drums and Henrik Irgens who’s on my album on bass, he’s flying over from Copenhagen to help out. It’s a rockin’ band and we’re looking forward to it. And Anna Krantz will be on the bill and Pocket Johnson – two badass performers in the lineup which I what I want. A night of women! (Laughs)

How very sexist of you! And you want us blokes to come along and enjoy it

Exactly!

Materialwise – Ship Of Fools?

I don’t play that anymore. It was forced upon me by my record company and I didn’t want to do it. I don’t feel connected to it. A lot of people did like it…

Well I liked the video. It had some ambience

Yes, I loved the video…it looks so cold…but it was on Brighton beach, thirty degrees and I had to wear that ******* jumper !!!

Well I shall now back away from that question, which has caused anger and resentment…Are you ever tempted to do Black Coffee, which yer dad used to sing the back off ?

(Emphatically) What I want to do with Black Coffee is always the backing vocals! Cos I think they are just amazing ! I started my career as a backing vocalist and I still will sing bv’s for people. A good friend of mine has put a band together and I said I would do bv’s for him and he said ‘You’re not a bv’s singer any more..’ and I said ‘Woah woah! I am always a bv’s girl when I want to be..’  ..I also like doing versions of men’s songs

Yeah it’s for that very reason I do ‘Ain’t Nobody’, no bloke ever does that number, but I like the chords and words

So it becomes something different, yes I get that! We do one Aretha song in the set but it’s not an obvious one at all.

Which song of yours do you find yourself explaining the most?

(Ponders) Transformer. In some ways it’s pretty obvious and in some ways it’s not. Not to everyone. Oh and Lucky Bones, people say it’s so happy but actually it’s not.

Pete Sargeant

(Thanks Mollie)