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A soundproofed attic in a terraced house in east London isn’t the kind of location that screams “epicentre of the British music scene”. But James Ford isn’t a typical producer. And from his Hackney eaves — up a hidden staircase lined with gold discs and on through a trap door — the 45-year-old has masterminded some of the most acclaimed music in recent years.
In the past 18 months, Ford has produced albums by Blur, Arctic Monkeys, Jessie Ware, The Last Dinner Party and Depeche Mode, with highly anticipated new albums by Portishead’s Beth Gibbons and the Pet Shop Boys to come. His cramped studio is an audiophile’s paradise, stuffed with vintage synths and fantastical contraptions. “This has got some really cool sounds on it,” he says, turning on a Japanese “haiku synth” that sounds like a koto zither. “It’s not in a western scale.” He moves on to what looks like a cross-section of a tree trunk with golden nodes on it. It’s a Soma Terra synth and it emits a terrifying roar, like Chewbacca yawning.
The studio is “a room within a room. There are two doors, so I can play and my little boy can be asleep downstairs. It’s pretty amazing. And the commute is up some stairs,” Ford says of his sonic Narnia.
I sit on the spot where Ware recorded last year’s joyous disco album That! Feels Good! and Ford swivels from the desk where he mixed Arctic Monkeys’ The Car, recently nominated for three Grammys. Unlike most producers, he doesn’t have assistants or engineers. It’s just him (“partly because I’m a bit of a control freak”). He plays instruments on many of the albums. The set-up is, he concedes, “like a cottage industry”. Perhaps. But it’s a hugely successful one. Since late 2022 he’s had two UK number one albums, two number twos and a number three. “It’s been a good year. I can’t complain,” he says in his soft Staffordshire accent, with trademark modesty.
While some record producers have a signature sound — Phil Spector had his wall of sound, Rick Rubin his stripped-back approach — Ford deliberately doesn’t. “That’s not what producing is for me. A trademark sound is you imprinting your ego on someone else’s project,” he says. “For me it’s about trying to get to the root of what someone else’s vision is.” He learns to play every song he works on. “It’s like pulling a radio apart and putting it back together so I can understand what it’s doing in a musical sense.”
Ford’s career was never a given: he studied biology at Manchester university. But music was his thing. In Manchester in 2000 he formed the band Simian and met Graham Massey of rave pioneers 808 State while drumming in a nightclub, eventually touring with the group. In London, as Simian waned post-university, Ford started side project Simian Mobile Disco and decided to produce. Things happened quickly. A 2002 remix of a Simian song by French dance duo Justice — under the new title “We Are Your Friends” — became an unexpected hit. In 2007, Ford produced both Klaxons’ Mercury Prize-winning album Myths of the Near Future and Arctic Monkeys’ second album, Favourite Worst Nightmare. “It all coalesced,” he says.
A recent big project was Blur’s comeback album The Ballad of Darren. A life-long fan, Ford concedes it was “quite intimidating ostensibly being in charge” of revered Britpop veterans a decade his senior. But he earned their trust by being bold and honest. “Damon [Albarn] is almost addicted to making up new melodies. But he doesn’t love finishing — he loves generating,” says Ford.
Next up are new albums by the Pet Shop Boys (“stripped-down electronic with a cinematic orchestral side”) and Gibbons (“quite pagan Wicker Man folky, quite dark”). The Pet Shop Boys have just announced a five-night residency at London’s Royal Opera House in July. It’s strange to think that some of the bangers that will echo around that hallowed forum were birthed in this garret. Ford has also released a solo album called The Hum under the name James Ellis Ford. The warm, experimental record is essentially his musical toy box made manifest. He performed solo at last year’s Glastonbury on the far-flung Park stage. “I don’t like being the centre of attention,” he says, although coyness didn’t stop him joining Arctic Monkeys on the Pyramid Stage when they headlined the night before.
This is Ford in a nutshell. He is the quiet antithesis of the showbiz auteur but he has a venturous twinkle in his eye and enjoys a good party. He once ended up at a post-Grammys shindig at Lady Gaga’s Hollywood home but only became star-struck when he learnt that it once belonged to his hero Frank Zappa.
Musicians enthuse about working with him. “Even though James is one of the most talented multi-instrumentalists that I know, there’s no ego when you’re in the room with him,” Ware says via email. “He makes me feel like I can do anything and take any risks . . . and we make great music together. He also makes a mean coffee.”
I’m interested in Ford’s take on today’s music industry. Record labels are swimming in money and streaming numbers keep rising, yet many artists struggle financially. Is the system broken? He has a “half and half” view. “Maybe the streaming thing would work if there wasn’t still the old dinosaur model of the music industry in the middle taking the 70 per cent cut of everyone’s thing,” he says.
Yet he believes record labels are crucial filters who invest energy and money in talent. “If you got rid of that, then you’ve just got everybody making noise at the same time. How does anybody get any traction?” He also, unsurprisingly, advocates the enduring power of the album: he calls it an artist’s “calling card”.
Ford’s latest project is female five-piece The Last Dinner Party’s Prelude to Ecstasy, which recently went to number one with the biggest opening week’s sales for a debut album since 2015. The band’s meteoric rise has led some commentators to sniffily accuse them of being industry plants and somehow unworthy of success. Ford has “bitten his tongue” on this. No longer. Some of the criticism is sexist, he says. But what he finds particularly “pernicious” is that much of it comes from “indier than thou” women who allege that The Last Dinner Party are industry puppets but simultaneously bemoan the lack of female headliners at big festivals. He declares himself baffled. “They are brilliant musicians who wrote their songs, played gigs, are a great live act and got signed. Why not support them?”
Four hours after our conversation, the nominations for next month’s Brit Awards are announced. It’s a Ford fiesta. As well as a “rising star” nod for The Last Dinner Party, Blur nab three nominations and Ware gets one. Those Hackney eaves have got a lot to answer for. Not bad for a cottage industry.
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