EXCLUSIVE: Johnny Flynn talks new album 'Country Mile' ahead of Whelan's show

Musician, actor, husband, father; just where does Johnny Flynn find the time? On the eve of Flynn's Whelan's show (Weds 16th October) and as he embarks on a European tour in support of his third album 'Country Mile', Flynn discusses with John Balfe his 'demoing with intent' recording process, juggling two separate but distinctly successful careers and exactly how a segment of his lyrics was name-checked on Alt-J's award-winning 'An Awesome Wave' album.

You had a more measured approach to recording Country Mile than on your previous albums, laying it down over a longer period of time instead of spending six week furiously working away in the studio. Did you find that this approach works better for you?

I think they're both valid ways of working and both produce good but different results. I was doing theatre and I've got a wife and young son, so I had to be at home quite a lot of the time. It would kind of like a purpose built way of working. Having done two studio albums in compressed periods of time, it was really nice to do it like this and it suited the way we were recording. A lot of it was based on hanging out and sharing ideas with Adam [Beach, bass player & co-producer] and I found it refreshing not being tied into studio clock time. We just tinkered with it until everything was exactly where we wanted it.

How profound was Adam's influence on the album?

He was central to it, really. He's the person in the band that I take ideas to first and play songs to, and trust his intuition. I can understand where the song sits by his reaction. The way he talks about a song will inform a lot about how I proceed. It's nice to have a relationship like that.

I understand that you harbour ambitions to write a novel one day. Is it be possible to transfer your songwriting to a much more long-form approach like that?

I don't really know. I've practiced writing longer and longer pieces over the last few years and tried to retain the level of concentration that I apply to songwriting, which is just something that I feel more confident with. I think creativity is a transferable entity and it's about idea. I had to learn how to work in a studio at first because it's a totally different creative environment to the 'bedroom recordings' I'd done before, where I could translate my own ideas without having to explain them to anyone. It's about using your intuition and an understanding of conveying a narrative. Maybe it would work but I'm not pretending I would anything of a novelist but I've always been attracted to writing something.

You mentioned theatre. Do you find yourself identifying more with either aspect of your career?

It's quite a nice position to be in. I get to weigh up the pros and cons of something that's on the horizon, be it a play or writing a piece of music. It's quite hand-to-mouth, I can't really think that far in advance. The other thing is the consideration for my family. The reason I stopped music for a while and concentrated on theatre was that it was more conducive to parenting; having the days free was quite handy. I love them both, I hope I don't have to compromise one for the other.

"I'm glad I don't have to make any records about the views from hotel windows."

It must be fulfilling to be able to satisfy those separate creative itches, too?

I don't know if it's me, or my attention span, but I need that recycling and change. In the three albums we've done the period of time immediately before I tend to need something quite different, a theatre production or a tour of a play. It had provided a lot of the weight and impetus behind the records. Working with language - if you're doing Shakespeare - travelling the world, experiencing different cultures... A lot of my friends do one thing or the other and get bogged down, so I'm glad I don't have to make any records about the views from hotel windows.

Is the feeling you get five minutes before a live gig comparable to the feeling five minutes before a play?

I think the process for both is trusting that all the technical work is done and it's a process of ushering the coach off the field, as it were. The thing I find really special in performance is that there is this slightly mystical thing that takes over when you're responding to a crowd and engaging in people's imaginations collectively in a room. I've always thought that one of the most incredible things about being alive is going to see some kind of performance like that. Whether I'm about to go on stage for a play or a gig, I'm just trying to empty my mind and meet that moment, really.

Does Johnny Flynn, husband and father, feeling differently about touring nowadays compared to how the mid-twenties version of yourself did?

This period of time is the first proper stretch on tour since my son was born. It's been quite tough, working it out with my wife. [My tour] is quite sporadic and that's the only way I've been allowed do it! I find it slightly heartbreaking to leave them behind. I've gone off and done acting jobs here and there and it's been difficult but I think the main thing is, because my wife works in theatre as well, we both love our work but it's not healthy for us to be away too long. In other respects, lots of things have changed. In my early twenties the whole experience of going on tour was like losing myself in this slightly wild environment. I'm probably more sensible now but we spent a few crazy nights with people that we met around the country and around the world.

I have to ask too, how did the Alt-J name-check in their song 'Matilda' come about? Did they run it by you first? (The lyrics to Alt-J's 'Matilda' contains a reference to Flynn's song 'The Wrote and the Writ')

They didn't run it by me. I was flattered, I really love the record. I remember them sending it to me years ago, well before the record came out.

Do you know those guys personally?

I've only met them since the record came out. I almost forgot about [the namecheck] and then my wife became quite a big fan and she was listening to them, so I said 'Oh, you know that they mention me in their lyrics?'. They're really one of the first bands in a while that I've been a slightly geeky fanboy about. After the record came out I got tickets for my wife and I to go see them in the Electric Ballroom, which will probably be one of the last moderately-sized venues that they'll ever play because it was booked well before they'd blown up and won the Mercury Prize. Afterwards we were in the bar upstairs and we saw the keyboard player (Gus Unger-Hamilton) and he ran over and was like, 'Johnny Flynn! I need to take a picture with you!'. We've struck up a friendship and are talking about a collaboration. We both have a love of traditional folk music, so we talked about doing a song swap recording process where we send sound files back and forth based around traditional songs. It's in the works.