Interview: Jiminil

Other Men’s Flowers is the debut album from Nottingham-based folk artist Jiminil, a carefully crafted and sensitive collection of songs written and recorded in Nottingham but looking outward to the wilderness. Jiminil has created an album of dark, rural folk written through the lens of city life, exploring longstanding emotions and feelings in this contraindicative environment. Jiminil spoke to Left Lion about his influences, the importance and value of collaboration in the Nottingham music scene and the creative process leading up to Other Men’s Flowers.

Were there any main influences or themes for the album?
Yeah, I'd definitely say so. There's quite a lot of rural, landscape imagery, but while telling stories about being in a city. The hybrid of going for a walk at Colwick Lake and ending up kicking a can down the street at five in the morning. Wander is actually about my dream to go travelling in South America and being on a cliff top, like being at Machu Picchu.

Lyrically, I think there's a lot of processing feelings like guilt. 100 French Matches is based on when I accidentally stole a toy soldier when I was six from school,  and I couldn't sleep for like three years because I was so guilty about it. I had to take it back on my last day school. Bleach is a lot of remorse and dealing with the guilt of your own decisions. I think there's a lot of guilt tied up in it, which is a bit weird, but I think I just wanted to try and have a nice hybrid of the wholesome and the gritty reality. Writing a folk album but living in a city, it's a bit weird.

Where did the album title, Other Men’s Flowers, come from?
So, I actually stole the title, it's from a collection of poetry that I found. This guy, who I think was a soldier, made this collection of all his favourite poems from different poets, and then he put one of his poems at the start. And then the rest of the book is just other people’s stuff. I'd written the song Other Men's Flowers around the same time I bought that book, and that's kind of about comparing yourself to other people and living in a city.  In Nottingham, musician-wise and arts-wise, everyone's incredible. I'm such good friends with so many incredible artists, and it’s very difficult not to compare yourself to other people. You can get yourself into a real hole with that. I think I did that a few times, like wilting with other men's lives, and that's just exactly what that's about.

The one the reason I wanted to call the album Other Men’s Flowers was because I just wrote some songs in my bedroom with my guitar, and then I had these incredible six musicians, and beyond that Tom Rees mixing it, Cam Worne recording it, and Adrian Vitelleschi Cook with the photography. They're the people that really made it what it is to me. They took my little songs and made them beautiful for me. Like I can listen back to it and be proud of it. It doesn't feel like it's my thing. It just feels like a really lovely collective. So that was kind of why I wanted to name the album that.

So although Jiminil is the artist, do you feel like the album is more of a collective Nottingham collaboration?
Yeah, for sure. I'd been going under [previous solo project] Jimi Mack for years and doing a solo thing, and then like I started to play with other people, but I just wanted to start again. I guess Jiminil has got my name on it, but it will just be whatever it is and whoever is around to collaborate whenever, and that's sort of how the album worked out.

Like, every time I play my guitar with Cam, he sits behind the drum kit and the first thing that he plays, I'm like: “Yeah, that's perfect. That's it.” And it was the same with everyone else. Alice Robbins (Grain Mother) always loves coming and ‘honking on her cello’ for me. It's just amazing because it gives it that really wholesome folky 60s, John Martin/ Nick Drake sound, which I love. But then that juxtaposed with Henry’s (Fang Jr.) incredible guitar chords. He's honestly my favourite guitar player in the world. He agreed to play on this album, and I love doing anything with Henry. Like in Bleach, it starts out as a little folk song and then towards the end it feels like The Verve to me, which is amazing, and means there's another huge influence on my views.

Was the album a long time in the making?
Yeah - I'd actually recorded a version of both Wander and Other Men's Flowers in 2017, so those songs are really old, but I just wasn't happy with them. I wrote loads of songs and I'd still wanted to keep those in, but I think lockdown definitely didn't help. It probably didn't really hinder either because I work, and I didn't really take any time off work. It was all done in the evenings or on Saturdays, or a couple of hours here and there with different people, or people doing it remotely.

I did also sit on the mixes for nearly a year. I've done that before with the previous thing I'd done, and then it got to the stage where I’d taken a year to listen to it and I wasn’t proud of it. I didn't want to put it out. But I definitely am proud of this album, and I really want to put it out. I think it will just speak for itself and I just wanted it to be what it is. It feels nice to have made something and be proud of it and not feel like a pompous asshole.

Is there any other music on the horizon?
We've been recording quite a lot; I think Jiminil has progressed into more of a recording project. Alongside recording the more electric stuff with Cam, I've been recording like a tape acoustic instrumental album which I'm really excited about. This album is like the amalgamation of the two sides, which is like the electric kind of ‘night city’ and then the ‘rural day’ - the wholesome bit. I think for the new stuff, they're going to be separated, but I’m hoping to release them both at the same time. I’ve got visions of grandeur that I'm going to be like King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard and release five albums because I've got so many songs. And then I speak to Cam and he says, “hold your horses, man. We've only got like, the odd Monday evening, and maybe a Wednesday when you're free.”

Can we catch Jiminil performing in Nottingham any time soon?
We spoke about doing something around the album for a long time, but obviously I'm so busy with [other projects] Midnight Rodeo and Grain Mother, Alice Robbin's project, as well. But we are playing a show at the King Billy Pub in Sneinton on the 30th of April. It's called BillyFest and it is raising the money for the King Billy all day.

I think I'd maybe like to do a really tiny gig. There’s this tiny art gallery in Mapperley. I think I might do a little instrumental gig there because I really like that.  And I think there probably will be a Jam Café session soon.

Oh, yeah, and I'm opening for Midnight Rodeo in France, which will be nice.

Is there anything else you want to add?
The main thing that I would want to make sure I added would be to thank and shout out all the people that worked on the album. Cam Worne of course. Alice Robbins, Henry on guitar, John on the bass - I remember seeing him play and just thinking, ‘this guy's incredible.’ Sam Potts, as well as playing keys, we're in Midnight Rodeo together. It's just like it's an all family band. It's really nice. And Adrian Vitelleschi Cook, he did such a great job on photos. He just came round to my house and took pictures of me looking moody, and you know, I looked like a model.

Over the years, I'd got the courage to cherry pick all these amazing musicians that I'd admired for so long and they came and played and just made it. There was so much freedom for everyone because it was just like, “yeah, I love what you do. I love doing it with you. So whatever you do is going to be perfect.” It was just such a freeing experience. Every time somebody came round to record, I'd be up at the desk, looking back and just smiling. And it was such a wholesome record to make. It's nice.

Instagram : @jiminil_