Coup Cullen

Setanta Records. Home in the past to such luminaries as The Divine Comedy, A House, Edwyn Collins, The Frank And Walters and The Harvest Ministers. A label with a hatful of history, and one of the mainstays of quality independent alternative rock during the 1990s in particular. And yet, the label almost folded earlier this year when founder and head honcho, Keith Cullen found himself disillusioned with the music business in general.

In the fallout following the departure of The Divine Comedy from the label, Cullen felt that “it was getting harder and harder for indie labels”. Neil Hannon & Co. had fulfilled their contract with Setanta and then moved on to pastures new.

“I wasn’t pissed off that The Divine Comedy left, because it was a mutual thing,” he stresses. “To sign The Divine Comedy again would have cost a fortune. But I just started thinking about how unpredictable this business is. Plus I wasn’t being inspired by anything that I was hearing.”

His mood, however, changed in one fell swoop when he heard a demo by a young man called Richard Hawley, a former guitarist with Longpigs and session musician with the likes of Pulp and Finley Quaye. Hawley soon proved that he had a voice to match his fretwork and on the evidence of his debut eponymous mini-album, it is easy to hear what impressed the Setanta boss so much.

“When you hear a record that you really love, it makes you realise why you got into it in the first place,” enthuses Cullen. “Sometimes records grab your attention and the fact that Richard was doing something that other people aren’t has definitely made it work.

“Melodically, Richard’s music is very ‘50s, not ‘60s, and so many people hark on about the fucking ‘60s and The Beatles and all that bullshit,” Cullen states. “I think that’s what sets this music apart, in a way. [BBC] Radio 2 have played Richard Hawley’s record and Steve Lamacq has played it, and they are polar opposites. What he is doing is original, because his inspiration is a different era to Oasis or whoever else is talking about The Beatles this month.”

Hawley, it transpires, has his roots firmly in music like that of Roy Orbison and The Everley Brothers, while early rock ‘n’ roll/blues music also forms part of his heritage. Richard Hawley’s father played with the likes of Chuck Berry and Joe Cocker, and the latter also happens to be young Richard’s godfather.

“He is entrenched in all of that, and that is what makes the music so authentic,” Cullen stresses. “I want him to build up in the same way that Neil [Hannon] did, as a prolific artist, creating a body of work that is not so dependent on hit singles.”

So far, Cullen has been really encouraged by the response to the eponymous Richard Hawley mini-album, which the label boss feels is selling purely through word of mouth.

The fact that Cullen was woken out of his reverie and that Setanta has been reborn is good news for music listeners. Not only have we Hawley’s mini-album and full album proper (Late Night Final) to soothe our ears, Setanta is also releasing two really special debut albums from, ahem, non-traditional rock acts.

New York’s Hem are unlike any band I’ve heard from the big apple. “A brilliant American six-piece with a female vocalist,” is how Cullen describes them, but there is so much more to their lush instrumentation and songs that hark back through the ages of classic almost folky American songwriting, as evidenced on the wonderful Rabbit Songs. Then you have Noonday Underground, which the label head describes as “a DJ act, a departure for Setanta”: their Self Assembly album showcases Daisy Martey’s sweet vocals and Simon Dine’s musical majesty over a modern Northern soul classic.

The Setanta philosophy, according to Cullen, is “not unambitious, but is about trying to put out records as cheaply as possible and letting them get their own base before throwing money at them.

“You’ve got to have a feelgood reaction from the media and from people going into record shops and asking the guy behind the counter if he has the record. You can’t force that. Certain records like Moby and Goldfrapp started with word-of-mouth and it is far easier to push those records.”