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Rory Faithfield.
 "Things
are going very well with the tour," singer/songwriter Rory Faithfield
begins from a phone in outback Queensland. He's busy touring
his second album, 'Blood, Bones & Soul' right across Australia.
"I'm doing the major capital cities, and a lot of towns in between
as well. I'm in Rockhampton at the moment. It's the sort of
place you can't just come up for a night then leave, so I'm
spending a few days up here."
Faithfield hails from Sydney but has now based himself in Ireland, where he is at home among the songwriters, poets and artists. Although he has undertaken much touring throughout Europe, this is his first real Aussie tour. "...Although I've played some shows here and there. I live in Dublin now, although sometimes it feels like I don't even know where I live anymore. I travel so much and come back to Australia fairly often, so it does get a bit confusing sometimes."
Faithfield's album is new to us, but has already been released in the UK. "Well it was recorded some eighteen months ago but it has taken that long to have it released in Australia, with discussions with distributors going on for quite a while. Getting everything setting up, and creating a network of people to get behind me."
I wondered if Faithfield had moved on now from the songs on the album, seeing as they were written and recorded so long ago. "I haven't," he declares. "The songs are still very much a part of what I do. I think the songs and my presentation of them has certainly evolved over time, but they're still essentially the same songs."
When the talk turns to the inspiration behind Faithfield's intelligent and heartfelt lyrics, an admission is made about his less than proper past. "I made a mess of my adolescence through drug use, so I think there's an element of those experiences that come through. I constantly question what life's about and the struggles with people and what they go through. My songwriting has always been in that vein. In some ways it's about redemption and overcoming adversity."
When things were at their lowest point for Faithfield, he insists that could never have imagined he would be at this point now in his life, with a healthy creative career. "Absolutely not. I never even saw myself as being a singer. I didn't really want to be a singer. I played in bands and was always happy to let others sing. But it became artistically frustrating for me. I'd write things, but other singers would communicate them differently to how I would have liked. I always believed I couldn't sing, wasn't good enough, but I became so desperate to have my songs played and sung how I wanted them to be, that it was inevitable that I would sing them, even if it was a struggle. In the end I didn't care anymore, I was just going to do it regardless."
Chris Niehus
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Rory Faithfield plays at the SA Folk Centre on Sat 27 Nov.
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