Probably best known for his collaboration and tours with Polly Harvey, John Parish has more than your average number of strings to his bow. He’s just completed the soundtrack to oscar-nominated Belgian film Rosie (now out on the Bristol based Swarf Finger label). John says: "I was approached directly by Patrice Toye, the director of the film and she was a fan of the Dance Hall At Louse Point record, the album that Polly and I did together. Patrice had been listening to that record while she was writing the screenplay of the film and always had me in mind to do the score."

John has provided a mainly instrumental soundtrack to the film, which deals with the poignant story of a young teenager’s love of her mother and the unbreakable bond that links them together. One time Tricky vocalist Alison Goldfrapp provides the vocal track Pretty Baby, but as far as lyrics go, John has given them a fairly wide berth.

He says: "For about five or six years, most of the things that I’ve written have been instrumental, mainly because I’m a very slow lyricist. I used to write a lot of lyrics and I used to really like writing them.

"But for me it got harder and harder to find interesting ways of saying interesting things, and getting them into a pop lyric format.

"I wrote a batch of lyrics for the last Automatic Dlamini (a collective that included Polly, Rob Ellis and Andy Henderson from Echobelly) record about eight years ago - and probably took me five years to write them!"

However, when you’ve got Polly Harvey on hand as a potential lyricist, you’re laughing - hence the 1996 Dance Hall At Louse Point Lp, a project that John found particularly satisfying.

He says "It was Polly’s suggestion that we do a record where I write the music and she write the lyrics. That was shortly after I’d come to the conclusion that I was not really interested in writing any more lyrics."

John also cites the Dance Hall At Louse Point album as his most fulfilling project to date. He says "The making of DHALP was something that I was very pleased with, because Polly and I were totally in control."

The film Rosie is yet to be screened in the UK, although its released date is anticipated, particularly following its Oscar nomination for best foreign film. After working on the film score, John is taking a break back in Bristol before beginning another project.

He says "The thing that I think I like doing more than anything else is going from say a film project into a theatre project, into something else - so that I’m not doing the same thing all the time. I find that really invigorating."

As far as plans for the future go, John would rather not plan ahead. He says "I don’t want to know what I’ll be doing in five years, that’s what’s so nice about what I do now."

"Ideally if I can continue to get apportunities to make interesting records and work with interesting people, then I will be absolutely delighted."