As a regular visitor to these shores, James Yorkston has been embraced by Ireland’s singer-songwriter community.

However, his love affair with Ireland began long before he released his debut album under the James Yorkston and the Athletes’ handle, Moving Up Country.
“I’ve been going to Ireland since I was two years old,” he enthuses. “We’d spend every summer in Skibbereen in Co. Cork. It continued all through my teens and 20s and I do it even now. I’ve always felt at home in Ireland. I don’t really like saying so, as it seems like I am trying to make some kind of claim to the place. I don’t want to sound like some American saying ‘My great grandmother’s from Ireland!’ Those summers in Cork appear to have been well-spent, if his laid-back acoustic, beachy sound is anything to go by. Unlike many Irish singer-songwriters however, Yorkston switched to the acoustic guitar in a bid to turn against the tide.
“I stopped doing what I was doing, the loud punk thing, to do acoustic music, because I didn’t want to make any compromises for anyone else,” he explains. “I don’t feel any pressure to do anything other than what I do. I hadn’t given up music but I had given up hope on a career in music, and then Domino came along and liked what I was doing. They let me record this album without hearing so much as a note of it. They’re great for being open and letting me do my thing.”
Domino’s trust in their artist’s instincts has certainly paid off, what with fellow Scots and labelmates Franz Ferdinand recently scooping the Mercury Music Prize.
“I was so rooting for them to win the Mercury,” he admits. “People seem to be getting really upset about it, but I think it’s brilliant. As a Domino artist, I’m delighted that a Scottish act on Domino won it. I’m so glad for them and for the label; they’re real believers in music.
“They were a great band, but they were nothing before Domino signed them. Lawrence Bell (Domino MD) wasn’t chasing the buck, he signed them because he liked them. So in that respect I’m delighted for him.”
Of course, Domino also hooked Yorkston up with Four Tet maverick Kieran Hebden for production duties on his second album, Just Beyond The River. Although the electronic wizard Hebden and the doggedly folkish Yorkston seem an unlikely pairing, the two found common sonic ground, and the results are little short of alchemic.
“When it came to the second album he threw his hat into the ring, but I didn’t want an electronic album at all,” recalls Yorkston. “He was like, ‘Don’t be an idiot’. He played me some demos and they sounded wonderful, really warm. He was like a pressure sponge, soaking it all up. He had the exact same vision as I did.”
The pair holed themselves up in a windswept house off the coast of Wales, and the environs themselves seem to permeate the sound of the album.
“There’s loads of creaking on the album,” he agrees. “At one point there was a downpour in Wales – in fact at the end of ‘Heron’, you can hear the rain coming down in the recording studio. Another thing Kieran was great for was mopping up the water in the studio!”
Risking death by electrocution to record the album? Just one of the many reasons that Just Beyond The River, in all its understated, rained-on glory, is begging to be heard

James Yorkston & The Athletes' second album, Just Beyond The River is out on Domino on September 24. James Yorkston & The Athletes play Auntie Annie's in Antrim, October 5; Whelan's, Dublin, October 6; Róisín Dubh, Galway, October 7; Cleere's Theatre, Kilkenny, October 8; and Dolan's Warehouse, Limerick, October 9