Songwriting is an esoteric and mysterious art. Somehow the great artists of our time channel their life experiences, observations, politics, heartbreak and genius into lyrics that resonate across the globe. Somehow great songs bridge the gap between emotion and understanding. Polished, potent and four-minutes long, these microcosms of songwriter’s lives reach us through the radio as ready-to-hear capsules of fast food for the soul. But how often do we consider the processes behind this art? All too eager to consume the finished product, we forget that a song is a delicate and intricate combination of astute technical knowledge and poetic genius. They are can be profoundly honest, genuinely funny, utterly heartbreaking or utterly uplifting. At their best they are all of the above.

The complexity of the art is not lost on Daniel Rachel. Drawing on a career as musician and songwriter himself, Rachel investigated the craft further, conducting a series of comprehensive interviews with Britain’s most revered songwriters. His probing questions reach the very core of the songwriters’ minds, extracting information that sheds brilliant light onto the arcane and captures the concentrated essence of the art. His interviews are published in full in his book Isle of Noises: Conversations with Great British Songwriters providing a rare view into the minds of artists as diverse as John Lydon, Damon Albarn and Lily Allen. We’ve selected a few of our favourite extracts to give just a snippet of the privileged insight that Rachel’s book offers it’s readers…

JARVIS COCKER ON THE INSPIRATIONAL EFFECTS OF SPANISH BRANDY…

RACHEL: What are your thoughts on drinking as an inspirational force?

JARVIS COCKER: Yeah, drinking has helped me in the past, but it’s very volatile. It happened when we did Different Class: I wrote a lot of stuff in a one-night session aided by a lot of Spanish brandy. It wasn’t like I came up with all the songs in one night. I’d get lots of envelopes and things like that with ideas on and put it all together in one night, but then I tried it again a few months later and I fell asleep.  It can help…

LILY ALLEN ON THE ONES THAT GOT AWAY…

RACHEL: Do you not collect any thoughts?

LILY ALLEN: Sometimes I’ll be talking about something… usually some kind of contradictory conversation comes up and I’ll think “That’s quite funny. I could turn that into a song,” but more often or not I forget it. Sometimes I do think during everyday life “Oh that would make an interesting subject matter,” but I never right it down. I should.

NOEL GALLAGHER ON DOING A FAVOUR FOR THE BEATLES…

RACHEL: You have an honourable reputation for plundering from the past.

NOEL GALLAGHER: I don’t give a fuck, that’s what it’s there for. I never said I was inventing anything. I’m a lover of music. If I nicked guitar riffs here and there I’d think the songwriter would be quite fucking pleased. The guitar riff in “Supersonic” is a bit George Harrison but I wasn’t expecting anybody not to notice. As saw it as when you see interviews with The Jam and they’d always accuse Weller of the same thing. Then he’d mention these bands and you’d go, “I’m going to find that, ‘cause if he’s into it I’m going to be fucking into it.” People would say “it’s just Beatles this and Beatles that” There were kids all over the country starting bands because of that, because they were going to buy Beatles records because they’d never heard of them before.

ANNIE LENNOX ON MEN DOMINATING THE LAST 50 YEARS OF SONGWRITING…

RACHEL: Why do you think the last fifty years of British performance/songwriting has been dominated by men?

ANNIE LENNOX: I suppose it’s simply a reflection of the gender bias that’s dominated the world for centuries in terms of what women can or can’t do. When I first had the glimmer of an idea that I wanted to writ songs, in the very early seventies, there were very few female singer-songwriters around at the time – Joni Mitchell and Carole King are the two that spring to mind. All the female artists who influenced and inspired me were incredible singers and performers, but not necessarily songwriters per se. I used to feel somewhat patronized when interviewers would ask me what it felt like to be a “female” singer-songwriter. I’d usually have to point out that I didn’t actually know the difference, because I was just being myself. Things have been evolving significantly since then… but there’s still so much more to be done in terms of gender equality and parity in every walk of life.

BILLY BRAGG ON BRITISH SONGWRITING…

RACHEL: How would you differentiate British songwriting from American?

BILLY BRAGG: Mmmm… American’s tend to write in cinemascope: wide open spaces, mind-expanding poetry. The British tend to write with much more characterization and detail, more kitchen sink. Those aspects of British songwriting that I admire are looking at detail and examining it closely, drawing a conclusion from that rather than the sort of broad lyrics of “This Land is Your Land”.

PAUL WELLER ON BRITISH SONGWRITING TOO…

RACHEL: What is the appeal of chronicling the mundane?

PAUL WELLER: It’s a very English thing, the way we like to moan about the weather or we like a cup of tea or a particular fucking biscuit and all that nonsense, but it’s us. It’s our identity isn’t it?

JOHN LYDON ON THE FIRST SONG HE EVER WROTE…

RACHEL: Do you remember the first set of lyrics you wrote?

JOHN LYDON: Yes I do. It was a song called “Mandy”. It was about a girl I knew. It was really silly. There was blood on the carpet, blood on the stairs. Mandy I did it for you. It’s not about murder at all. We had a party round her house. Sid (Vicious) invited me. I got sick on the punch; it was a mix of Martini, Cinzano Bianco and red wine. I vomited everywhere, particularly the stairs, and Bingo! I’ve lost the original song. We never even rehearsed it. The Pistols died of laughter.

DAMON ALBARN ON THE CRITICS…

RACHEL: Who is a soundboard, a barometer for your work?

DAMON ALBARN: Who do I play my stuff to? My Mates. They’ve had to put up with far too many late nights listening to my demos over the years. My daughter is my harshest critic. Absolutely brutal.

BRYAN FERRY ON APPROVAL…

RACHEL: Do you seek approval?

BRYAN FERRY: I think everybody does. ‘Course the only time you get that is when you play to a live audience. I suppose if you get an amazing review. I’ve always been very wary about analysing songwriting. It’s always been a mystery to me where ideas come from. The lucky thing for me is I listened to loads of music at a very early age: jazz and blues, everything really. It helps if you have a lot of influences. It makes things more interesting. I better go and write a song!

JOHNNY MARR ON GETTING TO KNOW MORRISSEY…

RACHEL: Did your music change as you became familiar with Morrissey’s personality?

JOHNY MARR: Not the way I composed or the technique, we both expressed things…there’s a lot of our relationship in those songs. That’s not to say the words are about our relationship, but the feeling in the recordings and some of the songs are a product of our relationship because we were so wrapped up in each other.

Isle of Noises: Conversations with Great British songwriters by Daniel Rachel is published by Picador