Interview: Andy Burrows Grows Up and Gives Back With New LP “Company”

By: Curtis Sindrey –

Going solo is difficult for any artist, especially if you’re coming from a platinum selling band like U.K. based Razorlight. Andy Burrows, former drummer of the aforementioned quartet, and currently a member of New York-based indie rockers We Are Scientists, is branching out into a solo career. With his second solo album Company being released mid-October, Burrows can finally put the past behind him.

“I think the main thing that [working with projects like Smith and Burrows, and I am Arrows] did were help gain me a little confidence to get up the front and enjoy singing my own songs,” says Burrows. “I feel much more comfortable with it post-Smith & Burrows, and working with Tom [Smith] [of Editors] was hugely inspiring and very influential to this record.”

Burrows wrote many of the tracks that appear on Company recently this year, expect for the track “Hometown,” that he wrote towards the end of his tenure in Razorlight. “The song ‘Hometown’ has waited a long time for its musical home,” says Burrows. “It’s very much the centerpiece of Company and I wrote the rest around it.”

The recording process for his debut album, Colour of my Dreams, and Company were both recorded in unconventional spaces such as his bedroom and co-producer Tim Baxter’s attic. “It was a great experience making Colour of my Dreams because it got me in to doing things by myself,” says Burrows.

With Company being an all-acoustic-sounding album, Burrows didn’t think too much about exactly how it should sound. “We just wanted the songs and the instrumentation to develop naturally, and what we ended up with was quite a stripped back, acoustic organic vibe,” says Burrows.

Burrows admits that Company is “definitely a heart-on-sleeve affair,” and that while his debut album was personal in nature, “this time it’s über personal.” He goes on to candidly say that many of the themes that he explored for Company are universal in nature such as, “heartache and heartbreak, longing, missing home and life and the universe.”

While promoting his debut album, Burrows actively campaigned for MENCAP, which seeks to support people with learning disabilities, along with their families and careers. Throughout the promotion cycle for Company, Burrows continues to give back to charities like a children’s hospice in his hometown of Hampshire, U.K., called Naomi House because, “it makes sense to most of the time and if you can help even in just the smallest way, then I think its well worth it.”