Edwyn Collins: Rip It Up and Start Again

Helmsdale is not simply somewhere I pass through with guests, because living about an hour away gives Sally-Ann and me plenty of opportunities to enjoy it ourselves. Sometimes we come for its history and tranquillity, while on other occasions the prospect of some of the best fish and chips in the North Highlands provides all the encouragement we need. It is also home to a musician whose work I knew before I knew much about the man himself, with Edwyn Collins already represented in my music collection long before I made the connection between the songs and the person living above this familiar village.

You may recognise him in much the same way, through “Rip It Up”, recorded with his band Orange Juice, or the international solo hit “A Girl Like You”. Knowing those songs makes what happened in 2005 particularly difficult to comprehend, because two cerebral haemorrhages left Collins with severely impaired speech, movement and memory, taking away abilities upon which his life and career had depended. Among the few phrases he could initially say was “the possibilities are endless”, an extraordinary expression to retain while facing such profound limitations. With his wife, Grace Maxwell, beside him, recovering a means of expressing himself became part of the long work of rebuilding their lives.

Singing proved more accessible than ordinary conversation, while drawing offered another way forward, although losing the use of his right hand meant learning to work with his left. He began drawing birds and later identified that first drawing as the beginning of his real recovery, giving a small image on paper a significance far beyond its appearance. From there, the return to recording and performing becomes more than the familiar account of a musician making a comeback, because creating anything again required him to find ways around difficulties that had once seemed insurmountable. “Rip It Up” acquires a rather different resonance in that context, although the achievement lies in how much he has continued to create, rather than simply in what he has overcome.

Helmsdale belongs within that story through family ties and childhood visits, rather than as a picturesque retreat discovered after fame. Collins and Grace established their home and recording studio at Clashnarrow above the village, while the surrounding country found its way into his work through Badbea, an album named after the nearby clearance settlement. His bird drawings have been exhibited at Timespan, and serving as chieftain of the Helmsdale Highland Games connected him with an honour previously held by his grandfather. For somewhere I often introduce through its past, it is a welcome reminder of the creative life continuing here, with a musician whose songs reached far beyond the Highlands finding reasons to make more of them at home.

To learn more, book one of our North Coast Explorer private tours.