David Ryder Prangley’s new album “If You Were To Kiss Me Now All History Would Pour From My Lips” is a brilliant solo album again and would be selling millions in a perfect world. We asked David a few questions about the album, its making and influences.
Your new album was released on Halloween. Have you worked on it for long?
That’s a good question – in some ways it was a very quick album to make and in other ways it’s been created over a long period of time. The actual recording and mixing process only took about 14 days but it was spread out over about a year.
On the other hand – some of the songs are really old. I think I wrote at least part of ‘Jesus Christ Is Coming To Town’ in around 2005 and I wrote ‘Falling From The Stars Down To Earth’ in 2006, so in that way the album took a VERY long time to make…
Can you tell us about the recording of the album?
The way I make albums is that I get my band, which on this occasion was me on bass guitar, Drew Richards on electric guitar and Paul Winter-Heart on drums, and the three of us went into a studio called Perry Vale with recording engineer Jess Corcoran and we just played the songs together live. That’s what you hear on the album. After we played the songs, I plugged in my old Gibson SG and overdubbed my electric guitar parts and then I did the vocals and extra stuff at Drew’s home studio The Patch Bay. A lot of the backing vocals and synths were recorded by the people who and played them at their home studios and sent over. Grog Lisee, for example, recorded all of her vocals in Los Angeles and sent them over. I’m very lucky to work with some extraordinarily talented friends on my albums.
There’s a photo of you on the cover in the same style as your previous solo releases. Is there a concept behind these portraits?
I work with a photographer called Rowan Spray and between us we come up with the concepts of the album covers. I want to tell a story with the pictures, but not have the story be totally obvious. On the cover of Black Magic & True Love I’m holding an apple – the apple of wisdom from the Garden of Eden, and you don’t know if I ever took a bite or not. For Vampire Deluxe, I wanted to go for a very emotionless portrait, and the blood speaks for itself. For the new album If You Were To Kiss Me Now All History Would Pour From My Lips I wanted an almost angelic, or chivalrous air. I’m fascinated by the Arthurian legends and I wanted to look like a cosmic knight, on a sacred quest.
Something that is important to me is we don’t use photoshop or AI or editing for these pictures. Rowan is so skilled that she can set up the lighting and just capture the images. It’s just me and her in a small photo studio, except for the latest album where an amazing make up artist called Sammm Agnew came in to do the makeup and she painted my face in those swirls that were based on how I used to paint my face in Rachel Stamp. It’s a definite reference to that.
“Die Alone” was originally written for a project you were working on with Inger Lorre. Can you tell us more about it?
Inger’s band the Nymphs were a big influence on everyone in Rachel Stamp. You could say they were Rachel Stamp’s favourite band. Inger then made a solo album called Transcendental Medication, which is my favourite album of all time. I just adore it. Her voice sends shivers down my spine, it’s so full of passion, pain and beauty. That album got me through some very tough periods in my life.
A few years ago Rachel Stamp performed the Nymphs song ‘Sad and Damned’ at a gig, someone in the audience filmed it and put it on Youtube and I got a message from Inger saying she really liked our version. In all honesty I was blown away. My favourite artist was writing to me saying she liked our version of her song ! From that point on we wrote to each other, and spoke on the phone and we came up with a plan to record together. The band was going to be called Haunted House, and the songs would have the two of us sharing vocals. I sent her a demo, which included early, unfinished versions of ‘Die Alone’, ‘Forever In Starlight’ and ‘In The Palace of Dead Stars’. In fact the lyric in ‘Forever In Starlight’ that says ‘Inger it’s your time to sing’ was on the demo as a cue for the part that Inger would sing, and I just kept it and made that verse about her. For various reasons, mainly the fact that she was in Los Angeles and I was in London, we kept putting it off and then she died. I was heartbroken to lose my friend, and devastated that we never got to play music together. It’s probably the only real regret I have in my life. She was a really special musician and a truly magical being.
In several songs, there’s a kind of bluesy and poetic vibe. Was it a natural mood for you when you wrote these songs?
That’s an interesting question. I always liked simple songs with great lyrics, and I’m fascinated by old rock and roll records that have what appear to be throwaway lyrics but that are actually coded language for sex and rebellion. Even the phrase ‘Burn Baby Burn’, which a lot of people know from the song Disco Inferno by The Trammps but originated in the 60s with an American radio DJ called Magnificent Montague. He would say it during the Watts Riots and it became associated with that. Then I used it in my song ‘Joanie Loves Davey’, which is about Joan of Arc. I used it in full knowledge of the history of the phrase and the irony of me using it, and the fact it would just float over most people’s heads and also piss some people off. That’s one of the advantages of being a lesser know artist – you can get away with stuff bigger artists would get heat for!
On the other hand, there’s also a strong glam rock touch in songs like “Jesus Christ Is Coming To Town” or “Box Of Dead Lovers”. What are these two songs about?
‘Jesus Christ Is Coming To Town’ is a straight up Christian Rock song about how great Jesus was and about how the right wing in America have totally missed the point when it comes to Christianity. I wanted to reclaim some of Jesus’s magic and piss off some American ‘Christians’, who are, in my opinion, like the anti-Christ. I mean when Donald Trump claims to be a Christian? That’s so offensive to me. The key line in that song is ‘God is love not Holy War’. Musically, it’s influenced by the Velvet Underground and the Bangles. And the Runaways. The sax/guitar solo is straight up plagiarised from ‘Queens Of Noise’, and I’m amazed no-one has noticed that.
‘Box Of Dead Lovers’ is a mixture of ancient mythology and modern romance. I really do have a green and gold box that has artefacts of my ex lovers in it. Musically it’s almost a grunge song, but I always thought of Nirvana as being a 90s version of T. Rex.
There are some interesting and original arrangements in the songs. Do you usually add the arrangements at the very end of the recording process?
I usually have a good idea of how I want a song to sound when I start recording it, and what instruments I want to use on them, but I also leave space for the musicians to be inventive. For example, when I ask Grog Lisee to sing harmonies on a song I just send the track and lyrics to her and she comes up with things I would never have thought of. The same goes for all of the musicians. On ‘The Devil Has Come To Dinas Powys’, I had the arrangement as piano and vocals but then Laurie Black came up with a lot of synthesizer parts that took the song in a whole new direction and I came up with the guitar parts after that. That’s the great thing with having so many amazing musicians as friends – they all bring a lot to the songs. In my opinion, if you’re going to collaborate with people, you should let them have enough space to do their thing. It’s pointless working with other musicians if you’re just going to tell them what to do.
Have you been influenced by any specific writer, book or film for this new album?
I’m always influenced by the same people really, on my solo albums. Musically I would say the main influences are Laura Nyro, Todd Rundgren, Marc Bolan, the Womenfolk and Jim Steinman. I listen to a lot of Prince-related artists too – Jill Jones and Mazarati, but they’re more of a spiritual influence than a direct musical one. Lyrically, I would say my main inspirations are Jim Steinman, Warren Zevon and the author Angela Carter. My lyrics are a mix of abstract science fiction, Christian and Greek mythology, melodrama and humour.
There’s also a cinematic atmosphere at times on this new record. Have any of your solo songs ever been used as a film or series soundtrack?
Rachel Stamp’s music has been used a few times on TV shows and movies – in fact there’s a horror movie coming out just now called Whistle’ which has ‘Witches of Angelholm’ on the soundtrack.
You play a lot of solo gigs. Have you played any with a backing band?
I mainly play as a duo with Drew Richards on electric guitar and me on acoustic and vocals but I do play with a full band too. I’m looking at doing a show next year with the full band and hopefully filming it.
According to you, what are the good and the bad things when you’re a solo artist?
A good thing is that I can turn up to a gig on my own and play! And have final say over songs and albums etc. A bad thing is the pressure to make all the decisions.
How was the RACHEL STAMP show at 100 Club? Are you going to play more gigs in the future?
It was a very emotional and magical night. It was our first show since Robin Guy died and to be honest I didn’t know if I wanted to carry on the band without him, but we spoke with our friend Joe Holweger who agreed to play drums and we commited to the gig at the 100 Club and worked really hard to make the band sound great and the fans were incredible – they welcomed Joe with open arms and the whole thing was a celebration of Robin, and the band and the fans and I was very glad that we did it – there will be more shows in the future!
What’s coming for you in a near future?
I really want to make a concert film. I don‘t get to tour and there are people all over the world who want to see me play live and I figure that a concert film is the next best thing, so that’s my goal for 2026. There will also be a book of the lyrics from the three solo albums coming out.
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