Eddi Reader

Eddi Reader is a Scottish folk singer-songwriter from Glasgow. She is known for her work with Fairground Attraction and for a long solo career. Her music also includes material associated with Scottish folk song and the work of Robert Burns.

Early life and beginnings

Reader is born in Glasgow in 1959 and grows up as the eldest of seven children. Her father works as a welder. She begins playing guitar at the age of ten and starts performing by busking in Glasgow’s Sauchiehall Street.

In the early 1980s she busks around Europe and also works with circus and performance artists. After returning to Scotland, she joins the punk band Gang of Four as a backing singer, which leads to her first tour of the United States.

Session work and early collaborations

After leaving Gang of Four, Reader works in London as a session vocalist. During this period she sings with Eurythmics, Alison Moyet and Language. In 1984 she also sings briefly with the disco group Outbar Squeek.

She then records a few of guitarist and songwriter Mark E. Nevin’s songs with him. This collaboration leads to the formation of Fairground Attraction, with Simon Edwards and Roy Dodds joining the group.

Fairground Attraction

Fairground Attraction release their first single, “Perfect”, in 1988. The song reaches number one in the UK singles chart and wins Best Single at the 1989 Brit Awards. The band’s first album, The First of a Million Kisses, reaches number two in the UK album chart and wins Best Album at the 1989 Brit Awards.

The band’s success is short-lived. After a break, during which Reader has her first child, Charlie, with her French-Algerian partner Milou, Mark Nevin leaves a recording session for the second album in November 1989. A later release, Ay Fond Kiss, is assembled from B-sides and live tracks.

Solo work and acting

Before focusing fully on solo work, Reader appears in John Byrne’s BBC television comedy-drama Your Cheatin’ Heart, playing Jolene Jowett, a singer and accordionist in a Scotland-set country music story.

She then records with a backing band called The Patron Saints of Imperfection, made up of Roy Dodds, Neill and Calum MacColl, and Phil Steriopoulos. This becomes her first solo album, Mirmama, released on RCA in 1992. It is followed by Eddi Reader in 1994, Candyfloss and Medicine in 1996, Angels & Electricity in 1998, Simple Soul in 2001 and Driftwood in 2002, which is a homegrown release drawn from the Simple Soul sessions.

Robert Burns project and later work

In 2003, Reader records an album of material by Robert Burns with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra. The record attracts strong reviews and renews wider interest in Burns’s work.

Her eighth studio album, Peacetime, is released on Rough Trade in the UK in 2007. It is produced by John McCusker and includes Burns songs as well as new material by Boo Hewerdine and John Douglas of the Trashcan Sinatras. Reader also records the song “Bell Book And Candle”, which appears on the soundtrack Charmed: The Final Chapter.

Awards and honours

Reader wins the Brit Award for Best Female Singer in 1994. In the 2006 New Year Honours, she is awarded the MBE for services to music.

Associations

Her career includes work with The Waterboys, Fairground Attraction, Eddi Reader & John Douglas, and Language. She is associated with folk, and her wider work also connects her to pop and singer-songwriter traditions.