From the desk in James Chapman’s home studio, you can see two big influences on ‘Colours. Reflect. Time. Loss’, his stunning fourth album under the name Maps. One is the rolling Northamptonshire countryside beyond the window, which provides peace, isolation and inspiration. “Whenever I come to London I can feel my heart rate racing,” he says with a shudder. The other is the bust of classical composer Vaughan Williams sitting on the desk, “and that just shows how pretentious I am,” he jokes. Maps found renown with his critically acclaimed 2007 debut ‘We Can Create’, a joyous bedroom symphony that had a Mercury Prize nomination that same year. The album, and follow-ups ‘Turning The Mind’ and ‘Vicissitude’ earned him the dubious descriptor ‘bedroom producer’, and it has occasionally been an awkward fit. “For starters I don't even work in my bedroom – I do have more than one room in my house,” he says with a laugh. Though it may have always, previously, been homemade, Maps’ music pivots on a shower of emotion and melody, far more expansive in scope than that ‘bedroom producer’ tag implies. With ‘Colours. Reflect. Time. Loss’, Maps embarked on a production to match the scope of his musical ambition, employing guest vocalists, live drums and percussion and even a six-piece classical ensemble.
