The reunited duo tell how they made their comeback album without the help of a major record label
My first encounter with Lamb takes place by the boot of their manager's car. I have just arrived at Lou Rhodes's home in rural Wiltshire and, once I've said hello to Rhodes and Andy Barlow ? she does the lyrics and vocals, he programs the music ? it's time to knuckle down and do some work.
The car boot is full of boxes to be carried into Rhodes's kitchen. Each box contains deluxe vinyl copies of Lamb's first new album in seven years, which the duo will presently sign. As I totter down the steps under a cargo of earthy folk and intricate electronica ? the band's signature musical blend ? Barlow shoots me an apologetic glance. "This is what it's like without a major label doing everything for you."
In 1995, on the basis of just three songs, Rhodes and Barlow signed a six-album deal with a subsidiary of Mercury Records. Nine years later, after the release of their fourth album Between Darkness and Wonder, the band fell apart. There were deeper personal reasons for the split, but part of the problem, they say, was label interference. Their bosses wanted them to ease up on the tricky beats and melancholy lyrics and sound a little more like Dido.
Now, after a five-year separation, Lamb are back together, and this time they've decided to go it alone. That means doing everything themselves, from funding the recording process, to doing the album artwork, to setting up their own live shows ? and ferrying vinyl from their manager's car.
We stow the boxes in Rhodes's apartment. Since the break-up of her marriage to percussionist Crispin Robinson in 2004, Rhodes has favoured communal living, and she and her two sons share this building, an enormous old country pile near Bath, with several other families. Barlow, by contrast, lives alone on a remote hilltop outside Brighton.
They are an odd pairing. Rhodes, who is in her mid- 40s but looks much younger, is breezily stylish in a silky black top and a flowing wool cardigan. Barlow, 35, wears a green camouflage jacket and bulky jeans. He seems to fulfil a younger brother role in the partnership, and his remarks, over lunch at the local pub, provoke a few older-sisterly raised eyebrows.
They met through a mutual friend on the Manchester music scene. Rhodes was a photographer with a background in folk music. Barlow was a sound engineer obsessed with drum'n'bass. "We were polar opposites," says Rhodes, but in spite of their differences they decided to collaborate. "My motives weren't entirely honourable," Barlow confesses. "I thought she was really hot, and maybe if we were in a band together we could get it on. But we never did, thank God."
On record, their divergent interests fitted together unexpectedly well, and their self-titled debut album won the band a loyal following. On a personal level, however, they suffered from "yin-yang abrasions", as Barlow puts it. "How Lamb works is we take each other out of our comfort zones," he explains ? but after nine years they were getting on each other's nerves.
Family matters added to the strain. "When we were touring before we split," Rhodes says, turning to Barlow, "you were the party animal and I had young babies with me. I'd try to take them somewhere on the tour bus that wasn't full of fag-ends and empty bottles and the general debris of rock'n'roll. It was pretty intense at times."
After the split, Barlow became a father for the first time ? he travels to Dublin regularly to see his three-year-old son ? and Rhodes believes this has strengthened their friendship. "Having a kid makes you grow up real quick and knocks a lot of stuff out of the way," she says. "I think we relate to each other differently as a result."
"Kids aside," says Barlow, "I think something's happened with us where we don't allow ourselves to wind each other up. We understand that we're different now and we enjoy that. I remember thinking, if it wasn't for Lamb I wouldn't actually hang out with Lou. Now I want to hang out with her."
The product of their reconciled differences is a strong fifth album, simply called 5, which should please their existing fans and win over some new ones. Their ambition was to return to the raw, stripped-back feel of their debut, and they follow this through on tracks such as "Strong the Root" and "Build a Fire", a guitar-heavy number inspired by Barlow's recent trip to the Burning Man festival in Nevada. "Rounds", meanwhile, is a nod to the dreamy analogue sound Rhodes has been cultivating in her solo career. On the new album she decided not to sing about romantic love, her default subject matter in the past. Instead, she takes on grief, the limits of language and, on "Wise Enough", the future of humanity.
If the pair were worried about being forgotten by their fanbase, their anxieties were soon laid to rest. The six comeback gigs they agreed to do in 2009 mushroomed into 33 shows, taking them to Singapore and Australia, and their show at Manchester Cathedral last month sold out in less than a day. To ensure that the new album got made, 2,500 Lamb enthusiasts pre-ordered it, raising around �30,000. "It was a huge leap of faith for us and the fans," Barlow says, "but I think it's good to live a little more on the edge like that."
Now, rather than fielding the whims of label bosses, Lamb answer directly to fans. If it means leaps of faith and some heavy lifting now and then, it's a price they seem happy to pay.
5 is out on Phantom Domestic.
Lamb play Somerset House on 16 July
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