User talk:Theisleoflosse

James Francis

In 1993, James Francis, one time lead singer of British grunge band Coma, was offered a one-album deal by Troubled Man Records (a minor subsidiary of Sub Pop Records). Coma had only been of interest due to the guitar work of Richard Nolan. Many felt that the band would in fact have achieved more success without Francis. However, many at Sub Pop, frightened that the era of grunge was coming to an end, were desperate to keep bands together or sign ex-members onto their own contracts. A&R man Terry Stephens and label boss Doug Emery wanted Francis to record the album with other ex-members of bands on their roster, almost as a swansong album to the dying scene. Francis, who had more confidence than talent, refused, convinced that he could play all the instruments himself. It was during these discussions that tragedy struck Francis, when his parents were both killed in a car accident. Feeling sympathy for Francis, who appeared to have gone into a state of shock, and wary that if pushed he might not record anything at all, Emery advanced him some of the cost of the production and left him to it.

In what must have been a morbid state of mind, Francis left his London flat on September the 14th to record the album in the house of his dead parents. Francis' parents had lived a somewhat alternative lifestyle and lived in a tiny stone cottage situated on a remote island of the east coast of Scotland.

Despite numerous attempts, neither Emery nor Stephens were ever able to contact Francis again (Stephens even visited the Francis home a number of time, only to find it empty, seemingly abandoned). The few neighbours on the Isle of Losse seemed to know nothing or were unwilling to talk to Stephens. Articles appeared briefly in the British music papers, but Francis was not well known and had only one moderately successful record to his name. Francis's story was also soon eclipsed by the disappearance of Richey Edwards, guitarist for the Manic Street Preachers, in February 1995.

As James was an only child and, as he had no living relatives, the Francis family home was repossessed by the local government. The house laid forgotten in the depths of Scottish bureaucracy until in 2006 when it was rediscovered by Alan Nesbitt. Nesbitt worked for the Scottish government and had a passion for the Scottish coastline. Working through a backlogue of repossessions and unclaimed property, he discovered the four-hundred year old cottage. Knowing nothing of James Francis, he was inspired more by a photograph of the island in his decision to visit it.

'I had never heard of the island, despite being keenly interested in the geography of Scotland and so I was eager to explore it. The Francis house reclamation seemed like a good excuse.

When I arrived, the cottage appeared from the outside to have been untouched since James had stayed there in the early nineties, but someone must have been inside as the door had been forced open. I remember that both the island (which is only ten miles square) and the house had a lonely quality that was very disturbing. Inside, the rooms were messy and chaotic. There appeared to be little, what I can only describe as shrines everywhere, made up of collected objects. Bric-a-brac mainly. Bits of shells, wood, stones, bird skulls. There were also scraps of paper stuck everywhere with words, lyrics I suppose and drawings, crossing outs. James appeared to have been living mainly in one room, where the window overlooked the sea. He had put a mattress in there and that is where I found his guitar and the tape recordings. There was no electricity in the house and I was just so perplexed by atmosphere of the place and its contents that I became frightened and had to leave. I took the tapes away with me. I didn't think it would matter'.

Nesbitt found other strange artefacts within the house, but it was the Island itself that he was most intrigued by.

'Although the Island had been inhabited, there was no one left living on the Island at all by this stage as the coastline was gradually eroding. A number of small cottages had already been swallowed up by the sea. However I never felt alone there and I left without exploring the island fully'.

Nesbitt had hired a boat to get to the island and it wasn't until he was safely back in his car that he was able to play the tapes. There were seven in all, each labelled merely with a number. At first Nesbitt thought they were blank, as they appeared only to be filled with crackles and occasionally what seemed to be field recordings of natural sounds. After fast-forwarding one he discovered amidst the warped and distorted noises the sounds of a guitar and voice, recorded at the end of each tape. Why Francis recorded only at the end of the tape, and what the material at the beginning is, remains a mystery.

'I had been a fan of music in the sixties and seventies,' said Stubbs. 'All that psychedelic stuff, the Beatles, David Bowie, but I hadn't heard anything like the music on the tapes. Perhaps it was all just because of the heightened situation and the discovery within the Francis House, but I became bewitched by them.'

The songs were just Francis and his guitar occasionally multi-tracked with other material. The songs themselves are filled with strange and cryptic lyrics. The recordings had suffered from being kept in the cold and damp cottage and were warped and distorted.

Perhaps it is the mystery of the story and the transformations that the music has undergone over time, but the recordings, despite their simplicity, do have a strange and ethereal lasting appeal.

Eventually, Nesbitt managed to discover the story of James Francis and even tracked down Emery, who is now working for a subsidiary label of Warner Bros. Emery initially expressed interest in releasing the material, but nothing has yet been resolved as the house and possessions of Francis officially still belong to the Scottish Government. Nesbitt, however, became obsessed with the story and the recordings and returned to the house several time to take photographs and smuggle out various artefacts.

Terry Stephens, who recently heard the recordings, is reported to have stated:

'It's ridiculous, the recordings sound nothing like Francis. I'm sure all of this is just some kind of hoax'.

Link to music www.myspace.com/theisleoflosse