James Ellis Ford (Interview)

Best known for his work as a producer -- and one of the finest of his generation, at that -- James Ellis Ford demonstrated his gift for recording his own songs this year, with a beautiful and vulnerable album called Lost In Another World that he released over the summer. His second album under his own name, the latest LP was made under the most difficult and life-changing of circumstances, while Ford was undergoing treatment for acute myeloid leukemia. The album was literally written in his hospital room, between rounds of chemotherapy. In episode 147 of the LSQ podcast, we talk about that experience, but also delve into his entire creative history: how he started playing music as a kid at the local pub in his small town of Leek, setting up his first makeshift recording space in his basement and beginning to amass some of the gear he still uses in the studio, his time spent as a touring drummer for acid house legends 808 State when he was still in his teens, how his band Simian evolved into the electronic project Simian Mobile Disco, and how he began to work as a producer for other artists in his scene in the mid- '00s, building a catalog of credits that includes important albums by artists such as Arctic Monkeys, Blur, Fontaines DC, Depeche Mode, Geese, Beth Gibbons and more.