Ethan P Flynn: ‘Convincing myself that what I’m doing is good is a battle’

Ethan P Flynn knew the time was right to drop out of a prestigious place at London’s Guildhall School of Music when he worked with David Byrne on the big-suited icon’s American Utopia album. “My tutor was like: ‘That’s pretty cool,’” Flynn deadpans from his London home-slash-studio. Flynn was already alienated by the academic side of his course (“I just didn’t want to write an essay”) but nevertheless admits leaving was a big step. “It was less jumping in at the deep end as it was diving into the ocean,” he says, looking back.

He needn’t have worried. It wasn’t long until the Yorkshire-born musician’s ostentatious bedroom pop caught the ear of Young Turks and he joined the tastemaker label’s roster. Now just 21, he tells me his mum used to play labelmates the xx when he was a child, but his idiosyncratic songs call to mind vintage and off-kilter influences including Daniel Johnston and the Beta Band. Later this month he’ll release his amusingly titled debut project, B-Sides & Rarities: Vol 1, a startlingly unique and assured collection of experimental pop writing. He describes the lead single Are You Doing This to Hurt Me as “a punch in the face but completely vulnerable”, which offers a hint at the breadth of ideas and talent on display. Just don’t let him hear you say that. “Convincing myself that what I’m doing is good is a battle,” he laments.

Wildly prolific, Flynn says he writes a song a day but chooses to sit on them due to a deep-seated insecurity. “I just can’t convince myself that anyone is going to care.” Also, he jokes, “I wouldn’t want to be some outsider artist releasing 30 albums a year.”

This self-doubt even showed up when he was being courted by his label. “They told me their business is artists, not making money,” he recalls. “I was, like, OK because I’m not the guy that’s going to be making fucking money.”

That’s not to say Flynn is a complete bag of nerves. He wrote the sardonic Everybody’s Dying to Meet You – think the Flaming Lips with more schmoozing – while in Los Angeles working with FKA twigs on her latest album, Magdelene.

Working with A-listers doesn’t faze him, though he lets slip that the song is pretty quiet because everyone was sleeping while he recorded it and he didn’t want to wake them up. Since then he’s worked with Slowthai and recently played a socially distanced gig at an east London cinema. “That’s literally my dream concert,” he says of the low-key, all-seated show. Simultaneously insecure and self-assured, Flynn says lockdown has given him a much-needed “carpe diem” attitude. “I was dreading playing live,” he concedes, “but now I’m just down to go out and be a rock star.”