A Chat with Curly Mouth (16.04.26)
Curly Mouth’s new album, Watermelon & Ginger, arrives as a bold declaration of artistic freedom, embracing fluidity over genre constraints. Shaped over five transformative years, the record captures the emotional nuances of growth, change, and perseverance with striking sincerity. Playful yet intricate, its guitar-led arrangements and gentle vocals weave through folk, jazz, indie rock, and experimental textures, creating a sound that is constantly in motion. We chat with Curly Mouth below.
OSR: You describe Curly Mouth as a mixed-genre project. What freedom does that give you creatively?
Curly Mouth: It gives me the ultimate freedom, I think. I can lead with curiosity and dedicate albums to different genres and explorations without getting bogged down with the idea that I need to represent a certain style or sound. I also think that no matter what genre I tackle, it’s still going to come out sounding like me. I think the exciting thing about taking on different genres is seeing how much of yourself you can pour into them whilst doing the genre justice.
OSR: How has your songwriting evolved over the five years it took to make Watermelon & Ginger?
Curly Mouth: My cunning craft for chords has taken a big evolution. As the first songs were being written, I made a real effort to improve my creativity, speed and precision on guitar. This allowed me to develop a deeper relationship with the guitar neck, and it took my songwriting and composing to new places.
OSR: What role does improvisation play in your compositions, if any?
Curly Mouth: Improvisation has made up a big part of my compositions over the years. Having made the bulk of my music in my bedroom up until recently, it has given me the freedom of taking my time to come up with arrangements without the pressure of paying for studio time and being conscious of the day rate costs of hiring one. At home, you can just record take after take, find and refine things as you go. Watermelon & Ginger is my first studio album, and unfortunately, spontaneity had to take a bit of a back seat. I had to prepare things in advance of coming to the studio.
OSR: How do you decide when a track is ‘finished’, given your tendency to explore so many directions?
Curly Mouth: I think, as creative as songwriting is, it is also very administrative. It’s one thing to start a song and another to finish one. I think deciding a song is done is just as much about discipline as it is about creativity.
OSR: What was the biggest challenge in translating bedroom recordings into a studio setting?
Curly Mouth: I think the biggest challenge is trusting in someone else to help you engineer it. It’s about towing the balance of listening to someone’s input whilst also trusting yourself to communicate what you want when it matters. A studio is a safe place for an artist to be, but you still have to own your songs and trust your instincts.
OSR: Can you talk about the emotional thread that ties the album together?
Curly Mouth: The emotional thread is probably the returning feeling of loneliness and longing to use my energy in the way I know I can, but can’t always muster. Sad, but in hindsight, this is perhaps a slump I kept getting myself in.
OSR: How do you balance playfulness with structure in your music?
Curly Mouth: I think the playfulness can come in many different guises – chords, voicing, melodies, lyrics or production. Sometimes a song’s structure can be solely focused around serving a melody or a progression, and that is enough. Some songs rely on structure because perhaps the content of the song itself is not interesting enough. If you have something exciting to work with, then the structure often takes care of itself.
OSR: Were there any songs that changed dramatically from their original version?
Curly Mouth: I’d like to say yes, but honestly, I spent so long imagining these songs in my head that when it came to recording them, I was very much ready to execute them as close to what I imagined as I possibly could.
OSR: How does environment (cities, homes, movement) influence your sound?
Curly Mouth: I think changing environments certainly has an effect on a person’s music. I rely on having quite a simple routine to allow my music to keep on simmering in the background. I like suburban life: cafes, snooker clubs and local walks. If I can set that up in each place I move to, then I can rely on the music to keep coming. When I move somewhere new, often the main thing I can rely on for familiarity in the beginning is my guitar or keyboard, and so usually I end up playing my instrument a whole lot, and so it grounds me when there are lots of changes going on in my life. I often write a lot of songs when I first move to a new place.
OSR: What does success mean to you with a project like this?
Curly Mouth: The success is always in the commitment and execution of a project. It frees up space in my head to look onwards to the next album. That being said, I think I definitely want this album to reach a wider audience just because I put so much effort in getting it done. I haven’t really made much of an attempt to promote my music in the past, and I feel as though I should at least give it a go this time round.
Many thanks to Curly Mouth for speaking with us. Find out more about Curly Mouth on their Instagram, YouTube, Bandcamp, and Spotify.
