How mystifying and amazing it is that some occupations suit the in-built talents of a person while others are mismatched and only serve to exemplify inadequacies. I don't know if Pete Greenwood has ever been an incompetent office clerk, a salesman shit-at-shifting, or a bar tender bereft of bottle, but if he has, he should not worry: because, with guitar in hand, he’s found a job he’s damn fine at.
Drawing on Tom Waits, Leonard Cohen and Tom Hardin, for inspiration, Greenwood's acoustic tunes are pensive, lyrically offbeat and poetically resonant, and totally belie his 18-months experience as a songwriter not to mention the fact he only put pen to paper to fulfil coursework requirements of a music degree.
Greenwood, though clearly adhering to a folk songwriting tradition, tried his best to fight against his natural leanings towards the genre.
"My dad is a massive folkie and used to run clubs in the Sixties. So I’ve always been surrounded with that kind of music but I preferred listening to Megadeth when I was younger. I then went through a grunge phase and got into dance and jazz.
"But, bizarrely, when I write I'm back to folk. I should have known the stuff I listened to when I was young would seep out in the end."
Hailing from Leeds but now living in London, the troubadour from Yorkshire also has a refreshing approach regarding the subject matter of his songs.
"I just got sick trying to write songs about what is going on in my life and being subjective. I made a rule that I wouldn't write about love or getting dumped, but that I would make up stories and sing it from the first person."
"With 'Bats over Barstow' I was reading Hunter S. Thompson's Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and was completely stuck for lyrics with a deadline looming - so I just nicked a load of lines, tried to condense the whole book in to four verses and wrote with a stream of consciousness."
The storytelling approach is demonstrated most strongly in 'Negotiations and Last Words', the highlight of Greenwood’s music thus far, where a hostage faces death with a stiff upper lip.
Though, despite his attempt to be subjective, it seems personal emotion, like the deep-rooted love for folk, can’t help but seep into the song.
"My dad had a heart attack last year and my mate thought it was about that, there are parts of the song that is about me subconsciously but none of it was intended."
Look out for a new multi-instrument album release in 2008.
