Nathaniel J. Forrester
They say you can take the boy out of Northern England, but you can’t take Northern Englishness out of the boy. That’s certainly true of Nathaniel J. Forrester, who traded his native Halifax, West Yorkshire for the uber hipster cool of Berlin, but hasn’t lost his Northern wariness for pretentiousness, stoic attitude to the melancholic, and wry sense of humour in the cooler-than-thou aloofness of the big city.
Imbuing his music with the electronic sensibility of his adopted hometown, Forrester nevertheless marries the lo-fi DIY aesthetic of anti-folk to heavy synth pop hooks and irresistibly danceable melodies. Still clinging proudly to its roots as a bedroom project exploded, Forrester’s music maintains an approachability and warmth in an urban vista of soulless techno beats and ten-a-penny post punk bands.
His first album ‘Weirdos Dance in Dark Places’ is an ode to this sense of being an outsider in a foreign place, feeling alienated at parties, and the loneliness of the quest to find a permanent living space. Yet it’s all delivered with a dry wit and knowing wink, as showcased on songs such as ‘Subletting’; “They have no taste in furnishings, there’s a big deposit so we can’t burn everything, or sell it to pay the rent, even the rubber duck should be unscratched at the end.”
Despite singing about urban isolation, Forrester is no stranger in the world of indie pop, having played with the likes of Jeffrey Lewis, Metronomy, The Wave Pictures, and the Lovely Eggs, as well as achieving the star-studded fandom of BBC6 DJs Marc Riley and Steve Lamacq as the songwriter of his former band The Hornblower Brothers.
Moving to Berlin, Forrester packed in his suitcase many of the pop tricks he honed back in England but embarked on a new and playful experimentalism with sounds that is often difficult to pigeonhole. At times bringing to mind the quirky synth-laden immediacy of Devo, at others the lo-fi bounciness of some of the Awesome Tapes from Africa roster, Forrester’s live shows – performed with a full band – invariably leave sweaty audiences dancing to an infectious beat.