Much of David J Haskins’ latest solo album was written in 1997 after his mother, Joan Nancy Haskins, passed away. “I stayed up for three days, pouring everything into it,” says Haskins, best known as David J, co-founder of influential post-punk acts Bauhaus and Love And Rockets.
An achingly personal, chronologically expansive song cycle that conjoins family history and the vagaries of mortality, The Mother Tree (Erototox Decodings) isn’t an easy listen—nothing about grief is easy. The leadoff track alone is almost 22 minutes long.
“It was completed only after I’d released her ashes into a sacred place, to which I refer in the poem,” says Haskins of the title track, which was written in New York City the same year as The Mother Tree’s second song, “Ashes And Tea.”
MAGNET’s Hobart Rowland tapped Haskins for some insight into the other tracks as well
3) “Incantation To Herne”
“This was conjured forth in my hometown of Northampton, England, back in 1995, during an intense period when I was immersed in magic and folklore. When we came to record this, I found an antler someone randomly left in the room where I was to record my vocal. It was so strangely apropos to the subject matter of the ancient pagan deity, and I actually found myself wielding it in a semi trance-like state while doing the take. There’s such a powerful spirit to that track in which (drummer Brad) Dutz shines brightly. An invocation indeed.”
4) “Elegy To Beale Street”
“This was written in Memphis back in the early ’90s when I was there to scout out recording studios. The place is so steeped in great music, and it made a deep impression on me. I did indeed sense those ghosts crowding in.”
5) “Saviour In The City”
“I was riding through Times Square in a yellow cab in the early ’90s on my way to a recording session when I had a vision of Christ visiting modern-day Manhattan. What would he do there? What would happen? Would we fear him? Would we fall in love with him? Would we kill him?”
