SINGER-SONGWRITERS come in all shapes and sizes, all hues and tones. Sometimes, they are all mouth and no trousers and sometimes, they say something in a song that means so much to anyone with half a brain that they are worth, if not treasuring, then certainly developing a relationship with, writes Tony Clayton-Lea.
Enter then Laura Marling, a 17-year-old from Eversley, a small Berkshire village.
"I was surrounded by quiet and beauty," she chimes. She has been described in certain sections of the media as "elfin-like", "ghostly", "impossibly tiny" and "an astonishing talent" and for the most part, you'd have to agree with each one.
She has also been heralded as the pin-up girl for the underage music scene, a Luna Lovegood-type figurine with a penchant for quirky tunes, abstract lyrics and a husky delivery that bodes well for future offerings.
Is her music the soundtrack for youthful melancholia in 2008? Time will answer that. What is a more pressing question is the age factor - do some sections of the media patronise her because of her youth?
"Well, yes, but I forgive them that because it's an easy thing to do," she says in a typically precise Berkshire accent.
"I don't mind it and when they do I'm generally polite, which is the way I've been brought up. It's rare that I feel I'm being patronised and if I am, it isn't to the degree that it irritates me. If I were to be truthful, I'd have to say that I patronise some people who are younger than me."
And what about the pigeonholing? All the veiled hints that her music is to be listened to while watching The Wicker Man in a candle-lit room where thick velvet curtains are drawn, with the spectres of Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee lurking in the shadows.
Marling's music - her new album, just released, is called Alas, I Cannot Swim- isn't necessarily otherworldly, but it does contain the kind of elemental imagery that takes it a world away from the likes of Kate Nash and Adele, singers to whom Marling is regularly compared.
"I think me being put into the 'strange' box makes life a little bit more interesting," she contends.
"I don't necessarily care about using conventional routes to success because success is relative, isn't it? When I started out, I recall saying to anyone who'd listen that I wouldn't be doing this or that in relation to promotion or the music industry, but it has turned out that to release an album properly, I've had to do certain conventional-type things.
"To be honest, I haven't minded doing it too much. The worst thing is that when you do these things, some people think you actually want to do them, when in fact you don't. I'm slightly nervous about that. I think what separates me from other people in a similar position is that I don't do interviews for anything other than music magazines or arts pages in broadsheets."
Whether this is the truly smart thing to do is arguable - so much for the "any press is good press" argument - but clearly, Marling has set her sights on something beyond the norm.
She sighs in reference to many other teenagers - some younger, some older - that would put their loved one's ashes on eBay in exchange for even a misplaced stab at the fame game.
Marling is also saddened about the implication that it's widely accepted in the music industry, and even society in general, that fame for doing effectively nothing is, for the most part, a temporary reward.
"Everyone has their own view of success and mine is different from others. My idea, for one, is being able to write, record and release an album. To a degree, that is my success to date and I'm very pleased about that. But it's important to have a balance. For example, I never wanted to force my music on anyone and I never wanted my album to sell in bucketloads because I needed to remain calm about the whole thing, and to be able to fill 200-300 people venues, intimate gigs. In saying that, I have to make a career out of this, because I've left school. My plan is to be able to keep writing, recording and releasing albums at a relaxing and calm pace."
Relaxing? Calm? How can someone in Marling's position - on the cusp of crossover success, despite her witchy edges - be so tranquil in the face of competition from her contemporaries?
In response, she says firmly that she is very much a standalone person.
"I feel that bands such as Arctic Monkeys aren't competition because that isn't the area of music I'm in, nor indeed the type of music I listen to or that influences me. The music that I listen to and am influenced by is the only thing that I'm interested in," she says.
Alas, I Cannot Swimis on Virgin/EMI