The Underground of Happiness

We had a couple of excerpts on this week's show of a recent interview with Neville Skelly , the Liverpool singer-songwriter, whose debut album Poet & the dreamer is out now through Setanta/PIAS . It was a very interesting conversation, taking in Neville's early big band and song stylist influences (courtesy of his father and uncle), how crooning is not a dirty word, how he hooked up with near-neighbours The Coral who introduced him to Dion Dimucci (of Dion & the Belmonts fame), earning his chops on open-mic slots, and more. Listen to the full interview here. Particularly interesting I thought was Neville's mention of the invention of the microphone, as the catalyst for the style of what he called "lyrical singing". The phrase was new to me but he explained it as a more intimate or soft-spoken singing technique. Up until that time, singers with backing bands would have had to belt out their vocals to be heard, or depend on the consideration/skill of t...