What the world doesn't want these days is another stultifyingly boring singer-songwriter. Which is why, despite claims to the contrary, Tom McRae - who gave a concert in Vicar Street last week - is pleasing a lot of people at the moment. McRae, a 27-year old, Suffolk-born, former politics student, has been disdainfully described as the "new" David Gray. It's a catch-all term used to describe a wide variety of men who can strum an acoustic guitar while simultaneously looking lovelorn, winsome and windswept. It's also insulting, as even a cursory listen to his recently released debut album, Tom McRae, proves. That said, there's no little irony in the fact that McRae is talking to The Irish Times just minutes after the water tank in his London flat has overflowed.
Depression, drip-drip-dripping water and sensitive singer-songwriters - they go hand in hand, don't they?
"Well, I had hoped to be depressed in a slightly drier climate," says McRae, seeing the humorous side (another first for any self-serving miserablist songwriter?). "People have said that my music is melancholy, but I don't think it's necessarily depressing. There are little elements of triumphs and moments of spiritual transcendence as well, but it's not just about being depressed all the time."
Taking his lead from songwriters such as Paul Simon, Bruce Springsteen, Tim Hardin and Roy Harper ("people who affect me by what they say and by the emotion in the music"), McRae says he was always interested in finding something beneath mere tunes. His own material, he stresses, is not message-driven, yet he attempts "to capture some sort of moment and emotion that seems to be lacking in music and in the modern world. There doesn't seem to be anything beyond the superficial at the moment."
Almost 10 years of scratching for success has inculcated a strict sense of discipline in his work ethic. The "struggling artist" years tell the usual story of collecting the dole, writing songs on a bread line existence and performing in London pubs and clubs. He came close to quitting on a few occasions. "There was a sense that I'd never get anywhere, and that no one was going to appreciate my music," he says. "Short of making the compromises you think will get you through record companies' doors - yet ultimately not preparing to make those - you find yourself quite alienated and feel like you're operating in a vacuum. At one point, just as I was about to give up, my record producer became my manager and managed to get me a record deal. It wasn't easy but you have to go through those times to get somewhere better."
McRae sees the current resurgence of the singer-songwriter (from busking to winning Mercury Prizes in the space of five years) as a reaction to the years of Britpop and to bands whose music failed to live up to the hype: "Singer-songwriters never stopped writing songs, they just disappeared from the mainstream, and the wheel of fashion has come full circle. We're back to people who are more interested in simple songs presented simply and with an honesty to them that is quite refreshing. "The way that superficial pop music has clogged up the mainstream has made the mainstream a lot narrower, so people are looking for music outside those narrow confines, and tuning off from mainstream radio shows and television programmes and finding it in other ways."
His current high profile as one of the best, new, sedate singer-songwriters looks set to rise. He still needs the one song that will make him a crossover name, however - not that he's particularly concerned. "I made a choice quite early on that the sort of music I wanted to make was not going to make me a huge global star, but it might allow me to live the life I want to lead, which is to make music for as long as I've got the energy for it.
"If I still want to go out on the road when I'm 50 or 60 then I'll do it and keep moving, creating. If that means you have to work harder because you don't reach the mainstream, then I'm happy to do that, because it means the quality of the work is going to be better. I'd love to be able to keep going, touring, to have the fire still burning."
Despite this, McRae aches to hide behind the anonymity of his gentle, articulate songs, finding the slow but sure increase of public profile something that threatens the writing and performing of them. "You have to find ways of handling it," he reasons. "I'm getting less time to write at the moment, and I would far rather shut my door and be left alone to write and record, but it doesn't work like that. I didn't expect any of this - and we're still talking bottom rung of the ladder. It's a complete surprise, me finding the audience I wanted to find."
