Listen With Your Eyes is a torch song about picking up on subtle body language queues, the kind of unintentional clues that might lead you to reassess a relationship and question the fidelity of a partner.
I began the process of writing the song about five or six years ago, but put it to one side until I was in the right position to do it justice in the studio.
It was originally written on a battered old nylon string guitar I borrowed from a pal whilst working in Spain. I was staying in a stone room with really high ceilings, acoustics which lent a church-like, dramatic reverb that sounded quite eerie. Writing this track was probably the moment I decided to dial back my work as a jazz singer and start trying to forge a career as a singer-songwriter.
With LWYE, I began experimenting with alternative guitar tunings and happened upon a tuning that rang out an open Dm9; from there, I effectively followed my ear until I had written the sections of the song separately. I was in quite an angsty, self-reflective mood at this time, and I can still hear my emotions of that time in this tune.
When I started working on the song with the band, I realised how much the rockier parts of the track reminded me of Jeff Buckley and Led Zeppelin. I then found myself wondering how it would be if that kind of sound was complimented by string parts similar to those that Robert Kirby had written to accompany Nick Drake’s music on the album ‘Five Leaves Left’. I decided to commission my friend Lewis Murphy to arrange some string parts to compliment sections of the song and then filled in other sections with the mellotron flutes that also instinctively suggested themselves.
I'm forever indebted to the people that patiently helped me finally bring this one to life:
Duncan Brookfield: Co-Producer/Recording Engineer/Mixing Engineer
Luke Maher: Co-Producer/Piano/Recording Engineer
Richard Rayner: Drums
Jack Tustin: Bass
Nick Fitch: Baritone Guitar/Additional Electric Guitar
Lewis Murphy: String Arrangement
Jamie Evans: Co-write/Revisions
Annabel Drummond - Violin
SueIn Kang - Violin
Anna Barseghyan - Viola
David Råberg-Schrello - Cello
Luke Farnell - Assistant Engineer