FIRST LOVE ALTERNATE COVER

We made First Love in early spring in 2008, and it was mixed by the end of summer. Because of the way records were released in those days, my manager Laura suggested that we waited til February 2009 to release it. Back then it was good for new acts to release music in the first quarter of the year, rather than compete with the biggest acts in the run-up to Christmas. So, we waited. We, being Euan, Tom, Laura and I.

Waiting for so long had an effect on my ability to make decisions. I remember agonising over the cover art. I’d found this photo of my mum in England. I think one of these trips in the 70’s with my dad was the first time she saw snow. I know she looks happy, but she hates the cold and I’ve never seen her in the snow other than in this photo.

I wanted to use this photo because old photos had formed the basis of so much of First Love’s imagery. I asked my uncle, Pete Suart, to design a frame for it, which he did, and as you can see it was incredible. The promos for the album went out with this on the cover, and then I freaked out that the photograph was blurry and my friend Anna Pesquidous offered to help me make a new one.

We locked ourselves in her bedroom, in the Belsize Park flat she shared with my oldest friend Dan. After 24 hours, we emerged with a gold foil cover that looked like a flyer for popular 00’s clubnight Trash. Dan sent us back in. That’s when we made the cover that it was released with.

I love the Anna cover, and I love the unknown element of this one, with the blurry image, which never made it beyond the promo CDs. Maybe this cover contains the secret heart of the album!