Major's Tom

“Oh, we’re all about Tom Baxter in the office these days,” gushes the Sony PR person in advance of my interview with the newest singer-songwriter on the block.

Now, this may sound like common-or-garden PR hyperbole, but on first impressions, I know exactly what she means. Not only is Baxter imbued with the soulful romanticism of Jeff Buckley and the majestically dramatic best of Sigur Ros, he has the rugged looks of Orlando Bloom. Talk about a license to print money for any label. No wonder the Sony staff are crazy about him.
Baxter himself seems a little underwhelmed with his newly acquired ‘sex symbol’ tag.
“I haven’t really gotten any of it first hand yet,” he admits. “I don’t read reviews, I try to keep separated from it. I’ve done my music, I’ve done my bit, I try to put on a good show…whether I’m an arse or a genius to people, it doesn’t matter. You have to try to take the piss out of yourself in that respect – I don’t wake up in the morning and think ‘fuckin’ ‘ell, how am I going to lose that gut?’ (laughs). It’s something that’s detached from me. It’s complimentary I suppose. But you don’t want to let it go to your head.”
Despite the fact that Baxter is a hot topic of conversation not only at the Sony water cooler but in music magazines across the UK, he says he’s mindful that sharks patrol these musical waters.
“I did a similar thing to Damien Rice: I got so disillusioned with the music industry, that I just stopped trying to appeal to any taste or fashion,” he admits.
Although the marketing machine has gone into overdrive vis-à-vis the comparisons to Jeff Buckley, it’s a situation with which Baxter is not hugely uncomfortable.
“I was prepared for it,” he notes. “It’s not a problem, but I would never put myself on that pedestal. People will either be disappointed or they’ll work out for themselves that I’m doing something else. I guess the live shows are in keeping with his shows, but he would have gone off in a different direction. Then again, I’ve been told I sound like Al Green, so….”
Baxter clearly has the smarts to keep his head above water in the industry; perhaps the ease with which he deals with people from every walk of life stems from his unusual childhood, growing up in his parents’ hotel.
“How Basil Fawlty was it on a scale of one to 10? It was 10!” he laughs. “Actually, my mum’s got the whole video collection. We can’t watch it as it’s so spot on. That’s the comical side of it, but there’s the reality in amongst the comedy. It wasn’t a particularly wonderful family upbringing…in fact, it was mad. In the catering industry, you don’t get to see your kids, you spend your time stressed. My parents broke up and had separate breakdowns.
“On the other hand, I got to see lots of great music. I would come home from school, I’d sit at the bar and I’d meet new people all the time. Drunks would be in every day, so in that respect it’s a really good grounding for dealing with life and meeting different people.”
Does he think this upbringing had any direct affect on his songwriting approach?
“Your parenting has a lot to do with how you end up, how you educate yourself,” he reckons. “I wasn’t academic so I became interested in the arts. You can learn lots about life simply through listening to a record.”
Despite his obvious bankability, Baxter remains both realistic and idealistic about the future.
“In two years’ time, you’ll be sitting here with another artist, and that’s just the way it works,” he offers. “There’s no malice in it, you accept it, make the most out of it. Maybe I’ll go off and do something else, maybe I’ll make more records, maybe I’ll buy a house in Ireland, maybe I’ll return to painting and decorating…or maybe I’ll be working as a fishmonger in Devon like my brother. It’s scary at times, you’re trying to stay mellow amid it all, but it’s hard. But that’s the element of the unknown, I guess.”
After his mindblowing Irish debut at Dublin’s Sugar Club, I shoot an e-mail to the Sony PR executive, with the word ‘Speechless’ in the subject header. Seems that I’m all about Tom Baxter now too.

Tom Baxter’s Feather & Stone album is out now on Sony.