Eagle-Eye Cherry: Born to be a wild child

He's the son of a jazz legend, and the half-brother of a pop superstar. But Eagle-Eye Cherry's music is very much his own. Still, he says, his 'hip and happening' parents and a Swedish childhood touch everything he does

It's a very blustery day indeed - lowering clouds, sleeting rain, practically sub-zero temperatures; just right when you've got a streaming cold. It's warm and dry inside the television studios on the South Bank where Eagle-Eye Cherry is appearing alongside Ant and Dec, Madasun, Hanson and a vast cast of teenage fans, but Mr Cherry's manager isn't happy as I honk into another tissue. "Wow," he murmurs, frowning, "he's got quite a schedule, it could really throw a wrench in our plans if he got sick." Weighted with guilt, I traipse upstairs, the screaming of fans outside ringing in my ears.

In his dressing-room, Cherry looks younger than you'd imagine but is the soul of easy-going urbanity, shrugging off the laryngitis threat and seeming a world away from the mania outside. Maybe it's the Scandinavian in him. The son of the legendary jazz trumpeter Don Cherry, and half-brother of pop star Neneh, he grew up in Sweden's rural south, a place of lakes and mountains. "That's where Neneh is now," he says. "She goes there quite a lot these days."

The family is ever-present in Cherry's life and work. Eagle-Eye included a recrafted version of one of his father's numbers, "Desireless", on his 1998 album of the same name - a début, made at the age of 26, which went platinum, and whose biggest single, "Save Tonight", was Grammy-nominated. His father died during the album's recording, but Don has clearly left his imprint.

When I ask how his parents met, Eagle-Eye drawls, "Jaaazz. I wouldn't be around but for that. My dad was touring, and Stockholm in the Sixties was a serious jazz venue. There was a club called the Golden Circle that everyone played at. And, y'know, my mom was hip and happenin'."

Cherry's Swedish mother, Moki, a conceptual artist, is now New York-based; Eagle-Eye describes her as "eccentric". "My mom does some fantastic art, but her masterpiece is her life." A grin. "She hates Sweden because it's so straight, which is exactly why I like it."

The Cherry family home became a stop-over for every jazz musician passing through, but it wasn't until Eagle-Eye went on tour with Don - the inventor, some say, of free-form jazz - that, "I saw him being worshipped, it was kind of funny". As Eagle-Eye grew older, Don would call him up and tell him to check out various things he'd heard. He sounds an energetic, youthful chap. "He was, that's what you loved about him and that's what you hated. He was such a fun, life-loving person, often it was like hanging out with a buddy, but there are certain times you want to have just a father."

Still, his vivaciousness was worth a lot. "He really developed my musical tastes. He was incredibly curious." He stirs his coffee thoughtfully. "Y'know, Ian Dury just passed away - that was my first ever rock concert. My dad was really into the Blockheads, and Ian was a big jazz fan. I watched the Blockheads gig sitting on my dad's shoulders and I was blown away, because I realised you could bring humour into it, and what I'd seen jazz-wise was very serious."

Cherry senior died of liver problems. "Too much jazz, is what I say - but ageing wasn't suiting him. The last five, ten years, he couldn't play the horn the way he used to, he couldn't dance - he was like, 'Man, I just can't dance'. I miss him, really miss having him around."

The family moved to the States when Eagle-Eye was 12. At 16 he enrolled in the New York School of Performing Arts, in the same class as Jennifer Aniston and Cher's daughter, Chastity Bono. He had been writing music secretly, having made a decision to steer well clear of a job already being done pretty well by one family member, and soon, with Neneh's success, by two.

"I was just flowin' with the go. When I was young, I was a bit of a joker. I think being different you realise quite quickly the power of humour - people accept you faster if you make 'em laugh. In Sweden, I was the only coloured kid in the class, plus my parents were hippies and wore funny clothes. In New York, I was a country boy with a Swedish accent. I was into Peter Sellers, Monty Python, and I thought I'd get on-stage and entertain." There followed a few movie roles and appearances on The Cosby Show, but something wasn't right.

"I had no real focus." Plus, New York was getting too much. A sensitive bloke, Eagle-Eye was highly aware of the homelessness, the "crackhead prostitutes" who lived one road from him - "really young girls, about 14, 15, that you know are gonna be dead in a couple of years. That's something which just wears you out in the long run, but what got me was that you end up putting a bubble round you, and I could pass by them without feeling anything."

The crux came when a long-time friend died of an overdose. "I felt very let down by the city and I thought, OK, let's go." On a trip back to Sweden, he met and fell in love with Helena, an actress who is still his partner. They moved into a borrowed apartment where someone had left an acoustic guitar. Coming from a jazz background, this was the one instrument that Eagle-Eye had never really encountered. Strumming away, he heard and liked his own voice for the first time. He had tapped into a whole new sphere of creativity and broke away from the Cherry tradition.

His début, Desireless, was an album of simple songs and melodic hooks, each one freighted with the darkness of New York. Not surprisingly, he is often mentioned in the same breath as Ben Harper and Gil Scott-Heron. Since then Eagle-Eye has clearly moved on and his new LP, Living in the Present Future, is more complex, a heavier blend of country, rock, slide guitar and electric blues. His new producer, Rick (Red Hot Chili Peppers) Rubin, probably helped to get the sound down and thoroughly dirty. The suddenly funky Eagle-Eye is now working with Maxim from the Prodigy, and has contributed a track to the recently rejuvenated Santana.

As for lyrics, the thrust of each track is the urge to grasp the moment. Cherry has said the music is not personal, though there is some touching stuff, such as the Colin Blunstone-tinged "Promises Made", a confessional that was hard to do. "It's much easier to be a hip-hop boy and grab your balls and be cool than to show your feelings."

Some critics called Desireless unexciting, coffee-table music. It wasn't, and neither is this, but you do need to listen up. "When I play the songs back, it's to see if the words are clear, if I've expressed something. That's what Don always did, that's why he liked Ian Dury, because he was honest. I listen to so many kinds of music, and all I want is to be touched somehow." A reasonable note on which to end, and for Cherry, affably, to accept a lemon Strepsil.

'Living in the Present Future' is released on 8 May