Londoners Magazine

Johnny Flynn is an exciting prospect…

All young (24), smart and handsome, a musician as well as acting on TV; he’s one of those “good at everything” guys. He’s been around a while too. In an interview over a year ago, he and I discussed his newest song “The Box”.

It was, he said, based on a pamphlet written by a member of the early green movement, David Thoreau. Based on his experiences of living hand to mouth in a shed just outside New York, it centred on the idea that when you die, you can’t take anything with you, and when you’re alive, stuff just gets stolen or broken, so why not just live with what you need?

Flynn was impressive, knowledgeable and engaging, and so is “The Box”, the first track on A Larum. The name A Larum, meanwhile, may or may not be based on the play A Larum for London, or the Siedge of Antwerp, a play about a battle in Antwerp in 1956, which is considered to be awful.

This is speculation, but it would make sense. Flynn has toured with a Shakespearian acting company, appeared on TV and is deeply interested in literature, plays and the like. This comes through forcefully, on the record, with is rammed with words. It will definitely be too wordy for some, and that’s a good thing.

But there’s no point being wordy, unless your words are good ones. In this respect he wins also. “Pray for the people inside your head, for they won’t be there when you’re dead,” he advises on one album highlight, “Tickle Me Pink”. On “Leftovers” he charms with “Leftovers is what I want, don’t need no fine cuisine/Give me a dime for bacon rind, or slip me some of that old sardine.”

Flynn’s heroes include Jeffery Lewis and Diane Cluck of the New York anti-folk crowd. Yet he is way more traditional than that particular scene. Rather than the kind of spitty, edgy, argumentative folk that they peddle, Flynn’s sounds are wholesome. The Sussex Wit behind him provide violins, a very angelic sounding female backing singer and banjos while he spins his imagery. He’s more Bert Jansch and Nick Drake than anything else.

“Brown Trout Blues” is pure Drake, with depressed lyrics and gentle, earthy finger-picking. And a lot of the guitar throughout the record is Jansch inspired. Plus he’s got a barn-dance vibe, and “Eyeless in Holloway” could be the soundtrack to a 50s barn dance.

Most enjoyable though, is his colliding of traditions with pop culture. Perhaps the best track here is “Wayne Rooney”, sounding like a Nick Drake bootleg but commenting on bar men that look like George Best. It is subtle and beautiful. “If I know better, I don’t know better,” he confesses. And he does it so perfectly that you want to spill your heart out to Flynn in exchange. “Tunnels” is almost as good, and has the best harmonica moment on the record.

To be hypercritical, the record is a tad too long and getting rid of few almost-duds in the middle section would make it zip along better. No one wants a record that drags. A Larum doesn’t, but only just.

A product of some good schooling and loads of reading, Flynn has been subjected to “posh” jibes. But fuck it, when you’re this good, it’s hard to care. If he plays his cards right, he could fill the age-old gap that is a folk star. When you think about, there hasn’t been one since Dylan.