Frankie Archer: Giving Up The Ghosts

While Frankie Archer grew up playing in the Northumbria trad scene, it was only when she came to try singing folk songs as a solo performer that she noticed just how many of them depicted male violence towards women. She began rearranging traditional songs for voice and fiddle, incorporating aspects of electronic music, hoping to shed light on the shared experiences of British women throughout history. “When I started actively seeking out songs and going through lyrics it became apparent that some of the shit that women in these 300-year-old songs went through is the same shit women are going through now.”

The resonances between the songs Archer sings and misogyny as experienced by women today are uncanny, if not unsurprising: drink spiking, victim blaming and gaslighting all feature across the lyrics of her back catalogue, alongside frank descriptions of physical violence and rape. Archer insists that she didn’t intentionally seek out songs on this theme, but admits: “Probably there’s been some kind of unconscious drive within me because obviously, we’re aware of the kind of constant sexism and misogyny that women today face, so it’s been at the back of my mind and influencing my choices.”

This hyper-awareness of the real physical threat women face under patriarchy is palpable on songs like ‘Lovely Joan’, the lead single from her forthcoming Pressure and Persuasion EP, in which the female protagonist manages to evade the advances of a coercive male suitor, but with a lingering sense that things could all too easily have gone differently. Elsewhere, Archer chooses to insert verses through which conventionally voiceless characters can assert autonomy over their own stories: Barbara Allen, portrayed as ‘cruel-hearted’ in the traditional version, here quite reasonably tells a predatory older man ‘I don’t owe you anything / And lechery is not a compliment.’

Archer’s use of electronic sounds and textures to present these songs might seem out of keeping with the timelessness of their lyrical content, but the dance music influence serves to bring out the urgency and catharsis of folk narratives. While she initially turned to sequencers and MIDI controllers as a means of fleshing out her live show, Archer now builds her music on the conviction that “dance music moves people. There’s something about a driving beat and repetition that just works and now we’ve got the technology to create such bone-shaking sounds it just hits you on a really visceral level.”

Having enjoyed high-profile live performances at Glastonbury, on Later with Jools Holland and supporting baroque-pop group The Last Dinner Party, Archer will now road-test the songs from Pressure and Persuasion on a solo UK tour. While she admits to “[putting] quite a lot of pressure on [herself] to perform,” especially with the emotional burden of singing some “quite harrowing” songs, Archer says that her priority is to “stay connected to the soul of the song, whether I’m playing to one person or it’s going out on national telly.”

+ Frankie Archer is touring the UK from October 4. ‘Lovely Joan’ is featured on this issue’s Top of the World compilation, track 15

This article originally appeared in the November 2024 issue of Songlines. Never miss an issue – subscribe today