‘The chance that my fellow Greenlanders might go from one cruel colonizer to another is too brutal to even imagine,’ the Icelandic singer wrote

Dave Brubeck called her a great and Mary Lou Williams gave her advice. But the prodigy grew frustrated with jazz, quit and started dismantling her instrument. A superb new reissue showcases her findings

Flipping through the jazz section on a visit to his local record store a few years ago, artist Kye Potter found a battered tape by American pianist and composer Jessica Williams. It looked every bit the quintessential DIY release. “The labels had come off the tape,” he says. “It was home-dubbed, with photocopied notes, a little bit of highlighter to accentuate the artwork, and released on her own label, Ear Art.”

As a collector and occasional producer particularly interested in the American musical avant garde after John Cage, Potter was intrigued by a tape called Prepared Piano. Yet it seemed unusual from Williams, who was best known for making sparkling jazz in the straight-ahead tradition of Thelonious Monk and Errol Garner. If the west coast jazz circuit knew her as a musical experimenter – for her concerts, she requested pianos without the cover to make it easier to reach inside and strum the strings – it was a facet that rarely made it to her records.

The Cork-formed band are preparing to release their brilliant debut album, ‘Masquerade’. Frontman Euan Manning and his brother, accordionist Finn, speak to Roisin O’Connor about the art that moves them, their father’s anger at the church, and the violence that inspired one of their most powerful songs to date