James Brute

James Brute is the alter ego of James Steel, songwriter and former frontman of the much-loved East London outfit The Brute Chorus. Since the release of Bury Yourself—his debut solo single in 2014—his tales of love, loss, and lust have ventured into ever darker and more mysterious waters. The warp and weft of his songwriting speak to our most primal instincts, weaving together themes and characters that are at once ancient and modern, arcane and mundane. In 2023, he left London—his home for 25 years—to begin a new life on the south coast in Hastings, rediscovering his love of songwriting along the way. He soon stepped out once more to play some of the most intimate shows of his career: unaccompanied, often completely unplugged, standing alone in the middle of a room among those who had gathered to listen. A stranger in the bars and parlours of strangers. Stripped of all adornment, the songs emerged raw and unguarded—sung out, slung out, and strung out for all to hear. Gradually, the songs began to coalesce into a coherent whole: a kind of cinematic folk-noir, capturing a haunted, uncanny feeling of dislocation, full of dreamlike reminiscence and bittersweet partings. Work soon began on the recordings that would become his first full-length album, Move To The Ghost, due in autumn 2026. Images by Chloe Rosser and Kasia Wozniak