Music interview '“ Mark Eitzel: '˜When you're older you get an awful lot more compassion for people who aren't healthy and happy, because you kind of have to'

Hey Mr Ferryman, the 12th solo album by American singer songwriter Mark Eitzel, emerged from a transient period in his life, when he was shuttling between San Francisco and Los Angeles.

He admits it took the experienced hands of Bernard Butler, former guitarist with the band Suede turned producer for the likes of Duffy, The Cribs and The Libertines, to knock the record into shape.

Not only did Butler take the producer’s chair, he also played all the electric guitar, bass and keyboard parts.

“Basically he made the record I wanted to make but I didn’t know how to find anyone to help me make a record like that,” says the 58-year-old former frontman of cult alt-rock band American Music Club.

“For me it was because I never knew him. I knew of Suede, but that was years ago, so [when the collaboration was suggested] I thought ‘OK, I’ll give it a shot’ and I’m glad I did.”

Butler’s involvement came about via a chance conversation with Eitzel’s English manager as they were collecting their children from nursery school (“They’re both house husbands,” the singer notes.) But the reason the project progressed beyond initial pleasantries, it seems, was very much down to Butler’s willingness to be hands-on.

“I’ve worked with people before who have famous names and they don’t really have any ideas whereas with Bernard I’d show up and say, ‘Here’s this song, this is what this song means’ and he’d say, ‘No, just play it’. So you play it and he looks at your guitar and says ‘Oh, I know exactly what you’re doing’ and he’ll