Callum Burrows, also know as Saint Raymond is an up and coming singer-songwriter from Nottingham. Having released two EPs independently and gaining recognition along the way, the singer is set to make a name for himself as a bright new artist. Talking about performing under a pseudonym he says: “Saint is to do with the area I live in and Raymond was my grandad’s name. When I started out there were a lot of singer-songwriters doing a thing and I didn’t just want to fall into a certain mould or trap or get labelled as something before I had even performed so to speak – so I just kind of wanted to step away a bit from that” performing under a different name “makes it a bit more interesting definitely”
For many it would seem like Callum’s rise to recognition has been quite quick but as he explains himself: “I’ve been doing music as a thing for a good four years now, but I think the last eighteen months have been a bit crazy. From an outsiders point of view people don’t realise but it’s been a work in progress for a good while now so it’s a nice thing to see people start recognising it, it’s great.“.
The crazy year and half has included him touring with Haim and playing festivals and loads of concerts. As he explains, he has also been playing and singing for a lot longer than this: “From playing guitar from about the age of seven and then just started to sing with it naturally with that from the age of 12-13 and then just started doing any gigs I could from the age of 15. It kind of just went hand in hand which is exciting.”. As he says that musically everything came quite naturally, he explains also how his writing process is quite a natural one, that he doesn’t decide to do the music or the lyrics first necessarily, he just lets whatever seems the most natural to happen.
The fact that Saint Raymond is beginning to become well known at a young enough age, brings about advantages and disadvantages, he says that “it’s a mixture of both really. It can be a disadvantage because you’ve got to try and make people believe your lyrics, I think I want to sound a bit mature, but I don’t want to sound like I’m forcing maturity upon 18-19 year olds. It’s just a case of writing what I felt was right.”
When listening to his music it’s hard to describe exactly what genre Saint Raymond falls into, so in his own words he said that his influences came mainly from seeing live music at festivals and the effect that it has on people: “When I wanted to write I just wanted to write festival music really. When you’ve been to a festival and you’ve seen that whole moment of craziness and euphoria that can be created. So I kind of just wanted to create that and yeah that was the aim. I think sound-wise it’s pieced together a little bit more over the last two years which is cool”. When it comes to preferring to play festivals or just normal shows Callum doesn’t even hesitate “I do prefer festivals. Especially in the sunshine when everyone has had a drink and everyone’s having a laugh and people are interested in discovering new music which is great.”
His influences come from far and wide but he says how he is a big Oasis fan and says that Noel Gallagher would be “the dream” to collaborate with and Justin Vernon (of Bon Iver) being another person he’d love to work with. On what’s changed in his life in the last year or so he talks about going to The Brits (which he notes made him also want to collaborate with Lorde after her performance with Disclosure), buying a dog (his “rock’n’roll” statement), and just touring in general, you really get the sense that he is absolutely loving what he is doing.
The beginning of 2014 has already been a busy one for the artist, and it looks like the rest of 2014 isn’t going to be much different, with him touring, doing his first proper festival run, and hoping to release the album at the end of summer. It looks like this year is going to be filled with lots of exciting moments, and he deserves every one of them.