Candie continues the musical dynasty

Jun 22 2007 by Emma Johnson, Liverpool Daily Post

LIFE sounds pretty sweet right now for Candie Payne. She is the singer-songwriter on everyone’s lips, her debut album hit shops last month, and she is being hailed as the next big thing by everyone from Jonathan Ross to Jools Holland.

Born in Liverpool, Candie grew up in New York before her family returned to Merseyside in her teens.

With her two older brothers Howie and Sean storming the music industry with The Stands and The Zutons, you might assume music was in Candie’s genes, but she insists she never originally wanted to be a singer.

“I was in art college when I first got into music,” says the waif-like 24-year-old. “I was put off by my brothers being in music because I didn’t want to do the same. When you’re the youngest of four siblings, you want to do your own thing.

“When I was a teenager, I wanted to be an actress or an astronaut – the only thing on the list that wasn’t there was singer-songwriter.”

Nevertheless, Candie succumbed to the lure of the music world. While studying for an art foundation course, with which she found herself becoming more and more disillusioned, she began working in a Liverpool vintage clothing store, where she met all manner of style-makers, musicians and DJs.

“It was in this environment that my interest in music stepped up a gear and my lifestyle began to reflect that,” she recalls. “It was in that shop that I heard bands like Sly and the Family Stone, Funkadelic, and The Metres for the first time; records I may not have heard otherwise. To me, those years spent working in Resurrection were as formative in musical terms as hustling on and off subways in New York was character building.”

After a time spent flitting from one Liverpool band to another, Candie’s path was set when a friend introduced her to producer Simon Dine, who was looking for a singer to co-write with.

The pair went to work in the studio and after being signed to cult Liverpool label Deltasonic – the same label that is home to The Dead 60s, The Coral, The Little Flames – Candie was on her way.

Her album, I Wish I Could Have Loved You More, has been described as evoking Dusty Springfield with an air of Francoise Hardy and Nancy Sinatra. But, despite the comparisons to these ’60s icons, Candie insists she does not deliberately look to the swinging era for inspiration.

“I think anyone who is in a band is influenced by the ’60s; it was such an amazing decade for music and art – a really creative time,” she says.

“But I wouldn’t say I singled that era out any more than I do the forties – I love singers like Billie Holliday, Ella Fitzgerald, Peggy Lee.

“People can put it into boxes if they like, but I don’t. I don’t really follow what’s currently going on in music, and I don’t draw a line between modern music and earlier bands. It’s all just music to me.”

As if her cool quota needed further validation, word is that the modfather Paul Weller provided backing vocals on one of her songs.

“How did you know about that? It’s a secret. He was a lovely guy and very considerate. I think he could tell that I was a little bit nervous, mainly because my hands were shaking so much.

“I went into the studio with Howie – that was the most nervous I’ve ever been in my life. It was my big brother, and I wanted to impress him more than anybody.”

Candie will get the chance to impress both her brothers and thousands more when she takes to the MySpace stage at Knowsley Music Festival on June 24, on the same day that big brother Sean will be laying into the drums for The Zutons on the main stage.

After that, it is fair to say the world will be her oyster but Candie, who admits she has seen the tough side of the music biz through her brothers’ experiences, isn’t counting her chickens too soon.

“Whatever happens in the next few months will shape the next few years for me,” she says. “I’m going on another tour, then doing the summer festivals, and hopefully they’ll let me do a second album, but you just have to see how it goes.”

CANDIE PAYNE is at Knowsley Festival on Sunday, June 24.