The 'Mostly Calm' Makings Of His New Album

It’s been three years since his last album, but González still had songs he wanted to work with. “Some of the songs [from Vestiges & Claws] are really old – Open Book and The Forest I’ve had for many years, actually – but mostly the songs were written within the year, from early ‘14, I started writing and early recording.” González speaks as he sounds on his records: quite slowly and rather delicately, “I was choosing from the demos that I’d been collecting and I decided to go with songs that only had one guitar, most similar to my previous two albums. I wrote a couple of newer songs: Carry You is totally different to my first two albums, and other songs have a more Western African vibe, which was fun.”

González has certainly been having plenty of fun the last couple of years between albums – the soundtrack to 2013’s The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty starring Ben Stiller was practically made up of José González songs, some older and some made exclusively for the film. “That was fun. The director had heard one of the Junip songs, and was searching for an artist to do most of the music, so we Skyped, and he told me how excited he was to start things straight away. I went to LA and New York, and worked with the guy in charge of the music score.”

"There’s a clear idea of what I want to do when I’m recording, and it’s important to have deadlines."

Songwriting’s a serious process for González, and he’s comfortable sticking to his signature sound from album to album. Whether he’s playing with Junip or solo, he’s careful not to overwhelm himself with possibilities. “No, I don’t get carried away. [Since In Our Nature] I would say I’m older and more relaxed as a person, and there was a calmness while I was writing those songs – a bit of frustration during mixing, but mostly calm. Part of getting carried away is the time between albums when I’m doing music just for fun. Writing music for albums is also fun, but the aim is always clear. When I’m on tour, it’s fun to play with big acts, but when I’m at home, it’s great to just play for fun, I meddle a lot with synthesisers. There’s a clear idea of what I want to do when I’m recording, and it’s important to have deadlines.”

With the album having just been released, González is itching to share it with the world. “I’m super excited to start playing now – the album comes out and I head out on tour the day after. I’ll be touring throughout the year. I’ll be trying to get to Latin America and Australia and stuff, as well as Europe and North America.”