Patrick Wolf

Patrick Wolf (born on June 30, 1983 at St Thomas' Hospital, London ) is an English singer-songwriter from South London. Wolf plays many instruments including harp, clavinet, harpsichord, guitar, piano, autoharp, kantele, organ, mountain dulcimer, clavichord, harmonium, accordion, theremin, ukulele, viola and violin.

Biography
Born into a creative household, Patrick's musical education started at a tender age with violin lessons and church choirs. He first began recording songs with his violin, voice and car boot sale organs on a four-track tape recorder at the age of twelve, he famously made his first Theremin at the age of 11. At fourteen, he joined and performed with pop art collective Minty. Two years later, he left home, choosing to live wild and free around London. During this period, Patrick earned money from busking in a string quartet and also formed a group called Maison Crimineaux, a noisy trio built on destructive ethics around white noise and pop music. He also continued to record and write his own material. A Maison Crimineaux gig in Paris was attended by electronic maestro Kristian Robinson (aka Capitol K), who would then go on to release Patrick's debut album Lycanthropy.

Patrick's ongoing writings and recordings caught the attention of Fat Cat Records, which donated an Atari computer and a mixing console to Patrick. During the recording of Lycanthropy, Patrick studied composition at Trinity College of Music for one year. Lycanthropy was released in the summer of 2003. He also made some guest appearances as a viola player with Chicks on Speed and The Hidden Cameras. The German-based record label Tomlab later released the album for America and Europe. His sophomore album of 2005, Wind in the Wires, was released on the same label and likewise met with a wave of critical acclaim.

Following the greater success brought by Wind in the Wires, Patrick signed a record deal with Loog in late 2005 and began recording his third album, The Magic Position, featuring collaborations with Marianne Faithfull and Edward Larrikin of Larrikin Love. The album leaked onto file-sharing networks in its entirety on January 3, 2007 before its official release on February 26. "The Magic Position" will be released in the US on Low Altitude Records on May 1, 2007.

Starting in January 2007, a vodcast, the first of six, was made available on iTunes. This series of vodcasts includes live performances of old and new material and interviews with Gill Mills. These can currently also be downloaded from the iCast website.

On February 27, 2007, in an interview with The London Paper, Patrick Wolf openly awknowledged his sexual ambiguity: “In the same way I don’t know if my sixth album is going to be a death-metal record or children’s pop, I don’t know whether I’m destined to live my life with a horse, a woman or a man. It makes life easier.” He encourages other guys to 'raid their mother's make-up box'.

Links

 * Official Website
 * Myspace
 * The Wolf's Lair: Patrick Wolf Media Archive
 * Patrick Wolf - The cub grown to a wolf - Interview
 * The Mind's Construction Quarterly Interview/Article
 * May 2004 email Interview
 * Pitchfork February 2005 Interview
 * Stylus Magazine February 2007 Interview
 * February 2007 Popmatters article
 * "There was a Fire Inside Me" The Guardian Ferbruary 2007