KATHRYN CALDER with ETIQUETTE and ED SCHRADER’S MUSIC BEAT at Adelaide Hall (250 Adelaide West), Tuesday (September 8), 8 pm. $12. rotate.com, soundscapesmusic.com, ticketfly.com.
What’s better than making a new album? Learning how to record it yourself, according to soft-pop singer/songwriter Kathryn Calder, who did just that on her self-titled latest.
“It was me upstairs in my little nook with my synths on either side and an electric guitar, a vocal mic and Pro Tools,” she says over the phone from her home just outside of Victoria. “So I had all this time to go up there and spend forever doing it. I wasn’t on a studio timeline. I didn’t have to make decisions right away. I could sleep on it and see how I felt.
“It was really empowering, because up until that point I’d been relying on other people to record for me.”
One of those people is her husband, Colin Stewart, whose in-demand and sprawling Hive Creative Labs has churned out albums by Black Mountain, Frog Eyes and Destroyer and takes up the bulk of the house’s bottom floor and garage. But her upstairs space is more “hobbit-like.”
“Oh my god, I keep hitting my guitar on everything. But I like being up there because it’s cozy and my own space. Remember that Hayden song where he’s singing about getting murdered in his house while he has headphones on, recording? I always think of that. It’s why I like being upstairs as opposed to downstairs. It’s this small space where I can see everything.”
The set-up seems to be working for Calder sonically, too. The new album takes a step back from the power-pop hooks heard on earlier albums, which she’s honed through her work as backup singer/keyboardist in the New Pornographers. Instead, atmosphere was the goal, with the melodies – sung in her high, clear voice – coming later. Arrangements are less full-band bold and more sparse and contemplative.
“I’m not sure if I was going for sparse, but I was definitely going for gentle. I was in a mood where I wanted to make a beautiful record.”
The lyrics are particularly front-and-centre and reflect the continued healing process Calder has been undergoing since her mother’s death six years ago and her father’s five years ago.
“It just takes forever to process,” she says. “I feel like I’ve made a little trilogy. The first record was very much for my mom, when she was sick and before she passed away. The next record was a total haze. I barely remember recording it. And then this one I think I was just getting my energy back. It took a little while to make, and I think I needed those years to regroup and get my energy back from all those emotional things.”
carlag@nowtoronto.com | @carlagillis
