Carmel Smickersgill

Emerging modern classical / outsider pop artist CARMEL SMICKERSGILL announces brand new EP Unsolicited Advice, released 16th May via PRAH Recordings.

Today she launches first single “Build The Habit” built around a relentless sounding 5/4 rhythm and a reversed saxophone sample performed by Pip De La Sayers. Inspired by artists such as Jlin, KABEUSHÉ and Verraco, its lyrics are repeated like a mantra (a technique deployed by Smickersgill throughout the EP’s five tracks).

“Build The Habit is about people developing habits as coping mechanisms and how your relationship to the thing you habitually partake in warps, even if on the surface it may seem quite healthy. After playing around with the sax sample I re-recorded the line with Pip De La Sayers (of the band Bethlehem Casuals). And some of the more unconventional percussion sounds were recorded with Atanas Dochev” - Carmel Smickersgill on “Build The Habit”

About Carmel Smickersgill and Unsolicited Advice

“Silly music that comes from serious places” is how Smickersgill modestly described the crackling flashpoints and thrillingly assembled palette of sounds that made up her PRAH Recordings debut We Get What We Get & We Don’t Get Upset back in 2022.

Since then, Smickersgill’s career has taken her down a rich array of different paths. She has performed as a support act for her mentor Anna Meredith on multiple occasions and appeared on Elizabeth Alker’s BBC Radio 3 programme Northern Drift.

She describes forthcoming new EP Unsolicited Advice as “...a letter to a past self through the filter of hindsight.” Each track was written from a place of learning, a shift in perspective or a hard truth she feels her former self wasn’t ready to hear.

Subtly darker in tone to its predecessor, Smickersgill is keen to stress that “Unsolicited Advice still has a good amount of taking silly noises very seriously.” The EP’s genesis and  development was hugely collaborative, with the composer working closely with Pip De La Sayers (saxophone), Marco Woolf (production) and Atanas Dochev (percussion).

Originally from Leeds, Smickersgill grew up playing guitar in indie bands and jazz combos, before quickly finding herself drawn to the writing and arranging aspects of these various projects. Now based in Manchester, she writes music for concert halls and theatre productions having recently written scores appearing in the West End as well as The Royal Exchange in Manchester. Her orchestral music was part of a concert mentioned in The Guardian’s top ten concerts of 2024 and was met with multiple 5* reviews last year. She was also commissioned by PRS to remix music by Philip Glass as part of an EP released in celebration of the composer’s 85th birthday.

Carmel studied composition at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester under the tutelage of Gary Carpenter – who can list associate music director for The Wicker Man among his many credits – she’s since written for theatre as well as as classical ensembles including Liverpool Philharmonic, BCMG, Manchester Camerata and Laura Bowler. She currently performs with psych pop band She Drew the Gun, jazz storyteller Marco Woolf and dutch alt pop artist Bunny Hoova. Previously she has performed with Nwando Ebizie, and in 2017 she performed with New Order as part of ∑(No,12k,Lg,17Mif) – the legendary group’s 2017 Manchester International Festival commission.

The composer lists the likes of Arthur Russell and Mica Levi among her influences, but those who listen and recall Anna Meredith’s work aren’t far from the mark either: the Scottish composer and performer has been acting as a mentor for Smickersgill during the creative process, listening to demos and offering feedback.

Carmel is also one half of Bothy, an initiative that aims to provide free and accessible rehearsal space to classical musicians in Manchester as well as support in producing and facilitating performance opportunities. She runs this alongside cellist Dan Springate.