What was the initial concept behind the album?

 

Sammy: Dana and I wanted to make an album of comfort music. I think that over the pandemic, we both found ourselves going back again and again to classic country. At its best, country music is dependable and honest like a good friend should be. I pitched the album to the Edmonton Arts Council as a menu of comfort food. And we got the grant! 

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Dana: I know that my thinking for making this record happen had to do with the fact that I had a few songs kicking around for years that were decidedly "country" songs – to the extent that they didn't fit on any of my solo records. After Sammy got me to sing some backup vocals on his debut album, I think there was a feeling among us, along with the album's producer Harry Gregg, that we should do something together. And I figured Sammy likely had plenty of country songs in his quiver as well. 

 

What factors pushed you two to collaborate on this project? How familiar were you two with each other's work beforehand? 

 

Sammy: Dana and I worked together for the first time while recording vocals for my first album "Be Alright!" but we had met years before that at an open mic night at the Brick and Whiskey on Whyte Ave thanks to the Edmonton musician Jeremy Witten of Baby Jey. Jeremy thought I'd get along with Dana and sure enough we connected through our love for great singer-songwriters like Ray Charles and Joni Mitchell. Dana's reputation as a great artist preceded her; I was thrilled to connect with her and truly honored to know that she felt it would be worth her while to collaborate with me! Dana is uncompromising in her art and I'm really lucky to be a small part of her discography.

 

Describe the process of writing/recording and releasing the album - anything that changed drastically from its initial conception to its final production?

Dana: I don't think so! At least, my memory of it is that it all ticked along rather easily, from pre-production, choosing songs, etc., through to arranging and recording, and in all the post-production stuff too. I don't remember any hitches or changes of direction. That said, I have a rather terrible memory!

 

Sammy: We wrote the songs independently. "Secret Subway Conversations" was written in NYC when I was feeling lonely, homesick, and honestly, on the verge of losing my mind. I saw desperate people on the train who appeared to be having conversations with lovers or friends or enemies in their minds. I realized how close I was to this kind of loneliness.

"Bird Song" was one of the first songs I ever finished! My bedroom window was open and I thought about all the things carried by the wind. Where else has that breeze been, how does it feel to somebody down the street or across the province? Or like, all the things we have in common with each other, even without seeing or knowing about them. It was strange. I felt connected to different people and different times at that moment. The story is about a couple that loses a child and thus their marriage. I don't know where that came from and I honestly wasn't conscious of the story while writing it.

 

"Here Today" was a song I wrote to comfort myself just after John Prine passed away. I loved him.

 

"Saw the End Before We Started" is a song that Harry Gregg (our producer) and Dana were pretty patient with, but I think it turned out really well after some workshopping in the studio. It was my first heartbreak song after a relationship came to an end. My ex told me that every time they were with me, they felt like they "had to step down to my level". That hurt me deeply. I was listening to Blue Rodeo a lot at the time of writing the song and I hope that comes across!

 

"Tears on Parade" is a song I wrote about being in the room when my grandfather peacefully passed away. It's this experience of joy and sorrow at the same time.

 

"Long Long Gone" is far less serious. I kinda just wanted to write something fun and catchy for once, you know? 

 

Finally, there is "There Are Angels" - another really old song for me. I recorded it on my first EP recorded by Scott Franchuk in 2018 - so this is another stab at it. I wrote it while living in a basement apartment in Toronto and thinking about the immortality of emotional bonds, and how we can forgive people in our lives. We can choose to hold onto connections to people we have loved and they can become almost like guardian angels to us. 

 

The upcoming Aviary release show on June 6th is coming soon - anything you'd like newcomers to know? (aka how would you describe your genre of music to a stranger?)

 

Sammy: It's earthy, classic stuff. Country, folk, some bluesy ballad crushing from Dana. Comfort music. There is no artifice or "coolness" to be found here. Just heart songs.

Dana: This is timeless, classic country. The themes of the songs are wide-ranging, lyrically-speaking, and I suppose I might describe the musical/audio approach as "classy." And the course, the vocals are the feature.

Favourite tune off the album?

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Dana: Hard! "Secret Subway Conversations" is certainly a winner. It's got interesting lyrics and a beautiful melody (a joy to sing harmony on), and it's got a fantastic Willie Nelson-esque solo in the middle. It's got everything.

Sammy: Hmmm. I think I'd have to choose "Secret Subway Conversations" and "Tears On Parade" from my own songs. I think that in writing them, I was able to be a weirdo and emotional at the same time without being pretentious or inscrutable. I'm proud of that. Most importantly I love how those two sound. My favourite Dana track on the album song-writing-wise is "The Day Had To Come". Partly because I already feel nostalgic about it. It was one of the first country songs I heard from her and I remember being totally blown away by the power of it. It just feels like a timeless, classic country song. My favourite Dana song audio-production-wise is "Ain't Found Heaven Yet" because it is an absolute dream of a musical party. Listen to all the beautiful things going on with the band there! Amazing. Was the western-swing approach my idea? If so, I deserve a gold star. I watched and listened to the band sessions for that one through a video call as I was very sick with Covid at the time. I remember falling asleep while the incredible violin parts were being tracked. How could I!? It's just so good. Some real legends are playing there, too. Check out the credits!* But then, the band is breathtaking on every track on the album. 

 

How long has this project been in the works? How does it feel to finally have them released out for the general public?)

 

Dana: We've been sitting on this for a long time, for sure. I'm very excited to get the songs out there and to get to perform them on the 6th (at the Aviary) with all the same crack musicians who played on the record.

 

Sammy: Yep, we recorded the songs in 2022. Feels like one hundred years ago. I'm so happy to release these tracks. I think that we achieved exactly what we set out to do, and that is a great feeling. I sincerely hope that people take comfort in what we are offering here. 

 

"All successful artists have followed a similar career arc with the same points plotted grimly along the way like the Stations of the Cross: struggle, success, excess, disintegration, and if you're lucky - enlightenment."  stages of a band/artist according to Brett Anderson of Suede. For the both of you, what is your own personal take on the idea of success when you're making music?

 

Dana: I've been making music for 25 years, and recording for 20 and I've never achieved the kind of success that Anderson is talking about. I do feel I've emerged from the "struggle" period relatively recently (I've sometimes said I've been an emerging artist for so long, that I'm liable to die in the birth canal), but that's not necessarily because I've achieved the kind of success that will lead to excess, disintegration and enlightenment. In my experience, life is a simultaneity of struggle, disintegration, enlightenment, and also "success," I suppose. Lather, rinse, repeat. There are always lessons to learn. But when you reach middle age, if you're lucky, and if you've taken your lessons seriously, you can feel satisfied with the life you've built, and relatively prepared for the lessons that are still to come.

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Sammy: I feel like I've been successful in making music if I can remain true to the initial spark of a feeling that got the song started. To get from conceptualizing, to writing, to recording, and ultimately, to releasing the song while staying connected to what inspired it. It's easy to get sidetracked at any of those stages. There is something very special in carrying an emotion out of your body, onto the page, into the hands of other musicians, through a recording medium, and finally into somebody else's body. It's a transfer of energy and a form of emotional communication that I think of as a unique form of alchemy. Going to a live performance (ideally) skips a couple of those steps but I don't think that one experience is better than the other. I want to be a giver in both of those forms. Loving recorded music is what got me into this in the first place so I strive to be a part of that tradition. 

 

When an album is released, what is your personal take on the concept of art ownership in regards to the relationship between the artist and the audience? Once art is released, what control does an artist have over their work and its reception (if any)?

 

Dana: I love this question. To me, everything is a relationship. The songs come to be in a relationship – with spirit, with collaborators, with the world you're moving through – they're recorded in a relationship (and they grow outside of and apart from their recorded versions in the relationship in live performance), and whoever listens to the recorded version of the song has their own relationship with the song, which may be momentary or may last a lifetime and have its own journey. You could say it's out of the artist's hands at that point, but I don't believe it was ever really fully in the artist's hands. Our contemporary Western understandings of copyright and intellectual property can't take this into account (and obviously these understandings are needed in all kinds of practical ways), but for me, that's the way it is.

Sammy: When I perform a song, I have some say in how I convey the music to an audience, but I want listeners to have their own relationship with my songs that is private and that only they can understand. When I record a song, I'm only partly in control until the album is made available to people who were not involved in its production, and there again, I want the song to be something else for each person who hears it. I love the idea of a song existing for somebody in a way that I could never have conceived of. It's a little like acting in that a part of me can go out into the world, and I can guide it only so far, until it goes beyond me and exists apart from me. It's this cool extension of a feeling; it starts in me but exists beyond me. 

*Credits include: Brendan Lyons on Drums/Percussion, Harry Gregg on bass, Ryan Funk on pedal steel, Nico Laroche-Humby on the mandolin, Elliot Thomas on the dobro, Bob Tildesley on the trumpet, Chris Tabbert on guitar, Brennan Cameron on keys, alongside violinists Daniel Gervais and Calvin Thomas.