Released last month, Teeth of Time feels like the culmination of everything Joshua Burnside has been quietly perfecting: layered alt-folk that sits somewhere between memory and myth, soundscapes that smuggle in the ambient truths of everyday life and a voice that cuts clean through the noise with understated gravity. A month on from its release, Burnside’s latest LP has already marked itself out as a high watermark and with a new run of live dates ahead – including a return to one of Ireland’s finest folk venues, DeBarra’s in Clonakilty, and a milestone return tothe Ulster Hall in Belfast (among others) – his star continues its steady, brilliant ascent.
We caught up with the Belfast folk master between tour legs to talk about the emotional terrain of Teeth of Time, the peculiar magic of trad sessions, why found sound still holds him in thrall and the quiet joy of seeing Brummies keep time.
Photo by Nathan Magee
Catch Joshua Burnside live in Ireland over the next couple of weeks:
- Mar 26 – Cleere’s Bar & Theatre, Kilkenny
- Mar 27 – DeBarra’s Folk Club, Clonakilty
- Mar 28 – St Catherine’s Cultural Centre, Bandon-Kinsale
- Mar 29 – The Green Room, Dingle
- Mar 30 – Tobar Naofa Community Centre, Tralee
- Apr 1 – Bree’s Bar, Strandhill
- Apr 2 – Róisín Dubh, Galway
- Apr 3 – Whelan’s, Dublin
- Apr 5 – Ulster Hall, Belfast
Hey Josh, congratulations on Teeth of Time. It’s only been out a month but it already feels like your most fully realised release to date – and that’s saying something. Do you feel that too? Did something shift in how you approached this LP compared to previous records?
Thank you, it’s hard for me to say this early on how it holds up against my previous records. But I don’t think I’ve ever had more confidence in my songwriting. And although it took me a longer time to gather this collection of songs, the actual recording and mixing of them was done much faster, and in a shorter time period than previous albums, which perhaps makes the album feel more cohesive.
Like Virginia Woolf’s description of life as “an incessant shower of innumerable atoms,” you have an uncanny ability to catch those moments – homelife, history, past and present, Ulster, the world, the hidden rhythms of it all. Do you see your songwriting as a way of making sense of that constant motion or is it more about preserving something before it slips away?
Yeah, I don’t think I see my songwriting like that, as a tool to make sense of it all, or trying to preserve anything either. For me it’s like a craft. About keeping the hands and head busy. The process of making music is so rewarding. And lyrically, I might look around me at that incessant shower of atoms and catch a glimpse of something beautiful or weird or interesting and try to use that. I try not to overthink it, really.
You’ve always had a way of laying the coldest, hardest truths bare, yet making them feel bearable, even “strangely warm” as a recent review aptly put it. As though simply getting on (and playing, creating, living) with it is the ultimate power. It’s a quality that seems inseparable from who you are. Where does that spirit come from?
It probably has something to do with my family, and some of the things we had to deal with growing up. My siblings and I went through a lot of trauma early on, but we learnt how to talk about it, and even laugh about it. So I’ve always appreciated it when people don’t beat around the bush when it comes to heavy subjects. And why would you in your lyrics? Life is hard, we all die, but life’s also really funny and beautiful and strange.
There’s a deep sense of relativity in these songs – ‘Up and Down’ has a Sun Kil Moon-esque quality, flickering between perspectives and moments, never settling, but somehow capturing something in full. When you finish a song like that, does it feel like something you’ve caught or something you’ve let go?
It feels more like something I’ve caught. That song in particular was written very quickly with minimal effort. It’s rare when that happens, but when it does it feels like the song was already written and you just happened upon it, and then you start carefully excavating it like dinosaur bones.
The swelling opening seconds of ‘Sycamore Queen’ are deeply satisfying – just one of those small but perfect moments that thread through the album, making it feel as vital as anything you’ve done. Are there particular sounds, transitions or little details on this record that bring you the most joy?
I really like how the second half of ‘Teeth of Time/Mountain’ sounds when the bass and drums come in. That comfy, roomy sound. And those Nirvana-esque chords are so satisfying to play.
You’ve spoken about capturing the ambient sounds of the city, home and family life – those elements feel woven in so naturally that they almost function as instruments in themselves. There’s a touch of The Microphones or even The Books in that approach, where the setting, sometimes spliced with another, isn’t just backdrop but part of the composition itself. Tell me a little about that.
Yeah, those bands have been a huge influence on me. It was pretty transformative actually when I first listened to The Books, it was like this whole new world opened up… every sound is musical! I guess that’s what John Cage and all those mid-century composers were doing. But when I heard found sounds and noise used to make folky, indie music, well that changed everything for me.
When you step back from Teeth of Time, what’s the first thing that stands out as different from Into the Depths of Hell?
I think it’s a bit more chill, and perhaps more self-assured. I kept calling it my ‘dad rock’ album as I’ve sort of done away with the distorted guitars and big drums. And lyrically it’s probably a bit more sentimental.
The Ulster sample in the title track caught my ear. You’ve represented this part of the world with remarkable singularity, capturing the sheer, supreme multiplicity of growing up and living here. What keeps pulling you back to that sense of place?
I think if you want to give the listener an honest insight into your world, to your life, then how could you not bring a sense of place into it? I also think we’re all starved of it a little bit, like neo-liberalism strives to take that sense of place away from us, to homogenise every town and city. And to generate a sense of community and togetherness, people need to see themselves and their homelands reflected in art and music. Belfast and the north in general is a pretty fascinating place to live, it’s always inspiring me.
You’ve been heavy on the sessions, even more so in recent years – especially with the folk club and First Slip. I’ve heard musicians compare regular sessions to sharpening a knife. How do you see them? Are they a kind of discipline or something looser – maybe more about dissolving into the music than refining it?
I see the sessions as a way to just play music with people for sheer joy of it. That’s the beautiful thing about a good trad session, it’s not about money or ego, it’s a collaboration. It’s not individualistic. It’s about trying to collectively generate as much craic as possible and it’s the closest thing to when I started playing music with friends in bands when I was a teenager. I love it.
Your arc has been well and truly your own since starting out. You’ve never seemed uncertain, but there’s a poise to this record that always felt inevitable. Do you feel a shift in how you carry these songs compared to earlier records?
I don’t know really. Like I said before, I think I am probably more self-confident in my songwriting now, and perhaps that comes across. But I’ve written stuff 15 years or more ago that I think is as good. So aye I’m not sure!
You’ve just finished the first leg of the Teeth of Time tour. What was the absolute highlight?
I really enjoyed playing in places we hadn’t been before, like Birmingham and Leeds. And playing in smaller or out-of-the-way cities like Aberdeen. People were so grateful that we’d made the journey up there. I have to give a shout out to the Brummies though, they started clapping along to a song and I thought ‘Oh no, here we go’, but man can they keep time. Fair play.
Some huge shows coming up – Ulster Hall on April 5th, Whelan’s in Dublin and before that, the likes of DeBarra’s on March 27th, one of the island’s best folk venues. What’s your headspace going into this next leg? What is it about zig-zagging across this island – Ulster and beyond – that continues to do it for you?
I’m buzzing for the next leg of the tour, and places like DeBarras have always been so good to me so it’ll be great to be back there. And to finish up at the Ulster Hall will be really special. We’ve got a lot of cool stuff planned for Dublin and Belfast too, we’ll have the Lambeg with us…
It’s somehow been 12 years since you launched If You’re Goin’ That Way upstairs in Whites, with Hannah McPhillimy and Alana Henderson supporting. Wednesday night, £3 (!) in. If you could sit that Joshua down and tell him one thing, what would it be?
I’d probably not tell him anything. You have to work everything out yourself, make your own mistakes and all that.
