Sarah McLachlan

Part 1

0:0395 7 the sound Sarah McLachlan I'm sitting here backstage with her at the Jubilee in Edmonton and Such a pleasure to be sitting down with you new record laws of illusions absolutely lovely you're on tour now How's the tour going? Oh fantastic. It's really really amazing. It's my I think my funnest show yet Well, it's different than I think anything you've done. Yeah, it's a lot more inclusive in the past. We've always had opening acts You know, which is great and I've had the luxury to choose but this time around After doing Lilith this summer I ended up playing with a bunch of the musicians who are in my band They are also solo artists songwriters and I ended up going and playing in their sets and rest my band follows So we're putting this tour together. Well, why would we have opening acts? We were already all up on stage together playing and I'll just do one big mashup and also for me

0:52You know, I I feel like I have a pretty great audience and I think they're pretty open-minded And I really want to give these gals as much of a step up as I can as opposed to oh a butterfly voucher He's my bass player great songwriter and Melissa McClellan As well as in my band people are getting their money's worth. This is like a three hour show from what I'm told I think it's almost three hours in the end. Yeah, there's a 15-in-minute intermission in the middle I do a lot of Q&A, which is really fun too. Really? How do you pull that off? You put like a microphone in the audience? Well, that would be very time-consuming So when we thought this through we thought let's get people to ask questions They write them down on a piece of paper at the merch table It goes in a box and then they come up on stage and get put in a little hat and a couple times throughout the show I'll answer questions and I pretty much will I will answer anything nice. What's a crazy question?

1:39They're having a really crazy ones. There's been you know, there's been a couple real lowbrow ones like you know There's a carpet match the drapes and things like that, but you know, I just that's just really really okay, but You know, it runs the gamut to stupidity like that too, you know, what's your your sense of spirituality and you know It is it is but okay. Well, do you have a bottle of wine in three hours? I mean, it's not a it's not a quick and simple 30-second blurb which you kind of need to do unless you want to you know be going till 3 o'clock in the morning which You know, I don't think the house know the house wouldn't like it because you know, there's always curfews, right? So the kids are on the road with you. Yes, they are they went out to the bus about half an hour ago I think my little one's gonna come watch a few songs. It's very McCartney every time I see a family on the road

2:27I always think of McCartney back in the 70s bringing the family on the road It's it's a luxury to be able to take my kids with me I couldn't do this if I had to leave them at home. I just wouldn't be possible for me I they're my never one priority and luckily they both they take to it like pigs Do you know what they just they love being out here and at homeschool my oldest I spend like an hour and a half every day with her teaching and in the morning and we just we go Swimming we went to West Edmonton mall today and one of the roller coasters So fun are they into music are they playing anything? They're not playing so much Yeah, India my oldest one took piano lessons for a couple years, but it didn't go so well because she's not one of those She's like a punk rocker, you know, she doesn't want anybody telling her what to do but anything. I already know how to do that

3:14So She's a bit tricky. I think my younger one might be interested But you know, I feel like they are almost rebelling against it because they see me doing it But they're both very musical they sing in the dance and they both have pretty good pitch You need to use them as a choir on a track. Yeah, you never know they clam up whenever the mic, you know, I go here sing What was first for you guitar piano? What do you grow up? You collately When I was four years old yeah, you collately I wanted to be Joan Baez when I was four Couldn't was too small for you can earn a guitar Oh, she's got just said one of those beautiful pure honey like voices And I doubt I could hit all the notes back then but I really I loved her And so my mom got me ukulele and then I moved on to classical guitar and then started taking piano

4:02I think we know as eleven it's interesting because a lot of kids were bell against the piano. I loved it I mean we got a someone a family moved away and gave us their own love right and I loved it because you know Coming from a guitar background Piano felt so so simple and I got on it instantly could just play things by ear because all the notes are laid out And so it was a much easier instrument for me to learn. What do you find easier to write on these days piano? I'm more I'm more fluid on piano more and more natural I can I can let go and sort of have the two entities separate whereas guitar I feel a lot more beholden to getting the notes right now I'm just not quite as comfortable on it and while singing at the same time I know we're a little rusty because you got to get on stage in like 15 minutes But I was hoping we get a couple of storytellers clips from you on a few the songs you play on the station sure I can try

4:52I might not remember Terrible this but okay Loving you easy is is just a simple joyous fluffy first throes of lust love song where after you know a long Dry spell you think there's possibility it can happen. You know all the flowers start blooming and birds start singing It's like springtime fallen fallen fallen. Oh now you're getting me have to think of the lyrics Well, it's about screwing up and I think it speaks to a really common human condition of falling into patterns and making the same mistakes over and over again and You know trying to trying to pull yourself out of that and taking a different path Cool and building a mystery building mystery is essentially about

5:42Creating an interesting facade for yourself because of you masking Insecurities or something and you know putting putting forth a really Creative and mysterious exterior pretty simple just it's sort of like a character study really like that We do something called five questions five quick questions one more answers. Okay rotor studio easy Depending on my mood, but today road Yeah, Leonard McCartney Lemon most important thing in a song lyrics melody or rhythm melody song you've written your most proud of angel and in one word Sarah McLaughlin One word one word

6:32Goof

Part 2

0:00I don't know how many vocal tracks are on that thing? Do you think? I'm just the ooze and the bampas and the aus and there's so much stuff on it. No more so than normal I think. I like doing backgrounds and I like using my voice as an instrument so it usually ends up on their... How do you use different ways? I'm not using your voice as an instrument because no one does it better than you and I'm fascinated by it. Thank you. Talk to Bobby McFerrin. He's pretty good. Okay fine Bobby McFerr is pretty good too. I want to deny that. Yeah, yeah true. But yeah, I mean it's a tool that I have and it's versatile so I like to play with it

0:49and do as much as I can with it. Usually when we're tracking and the chorus of in your shoes there's a lead vocal and this... And that was actually from another part and we thought hey that would sound good over here and so we stuck it over there. I've heard you talk about that. How songs, the chorus is from this song will end up in this verse and you'll mix it together. And it's a process too. I mean it is a bit of piecing together puzzles. I mean that actually didn't happen so much on this record because the songs melodically came out a little more in their entirety whereas for a while with a lot of other records there'd be I've just got a verse for a year and I have no chorus. But I noticed when you played it when you played the song on Cute Today just on the piano you were doing the Luke's guitar parts on the piano.

1:36That's right? Yeah but the solo part that... I wrote that on piano. Okay and that was doing my question. And I asked the guitar player to play that over dub that. Thank you very much. I'm curious. Like where do songs typically start for you? It will start melodically. No I'm in it on what instrument? Usually piano. I tend to write mostly on piano although I went back to guitar a song for my father was on guitar but it's nice to have the ability to move around both instruments. I find as a songwriting tool it's great if you're at a certain place and you're stuck with a chord progression or whatever you take it to a different instrument and it'll usually spark something different. Is it safe to say the dominant instrument we hear on track is that usually what it started with or does it change from time to time?

2:22Well flesh and blood that the guitar part that was a piano part originally but it sounded too much like Coldplay so I... The heavy intro that you made for me for me for the last night? Yeah I like it. That's the Smiths thing yeah. Smiths. I hear that too. Yeah yeah. Or you too I know I've heard that reference as well but... It's alright. Or Sarah McLaughlin. Thank you. Yeah I think so. What I'm gonna take is about trying to be... I always wonder about this when you're seven records deep and artists always talk about trying to reinvent themselves and the song kind of talks about that a little bit too. Well that was an interesting one to do. That was actually for King Kong which is a... To be a Broadway musical it started in Australia. I think there's this 50 plus foot anatromic gorilla that they have on stage and Marius Devries was doing the music for it and he approached me and asked me if I wanted to

3:08write a song for it for the part of Anne. It's such a great story and it was interesting to have sort of that template from which Shurite where it's not just coming out of my head out of the pulling it from the author. It's like no here's a story right about it and right about her struggle. I'm like oh I know how to write about struggle. I can do this. Sure. And it was fun and it was for Broadway right. I have a lot of song ideas that are little... I don't want to say schmaltzy but they're a little too far in that direction and I tend to sort of leave them for something else when if something like a movie or something comes along it makes more sense for them having it on the record. That being said it is on the deluxe version. Oh it's just on the luxe. That's why people should make a deluxe version. Yeah. There's a couple extra tracks and there's a really sweet little lullaby on there as well.

3:54Yeah. Little B. Little B. I wrote that down. Lullaby. It had to close the record obviously. Well what happened was I have a free music school in Vancouver and we had a big charity event and one of the auction items was I would personally write a lullaby for someone for lots of money. And this lovely man who's actually a friend of mine gave me lots of money to write this lullaby and about six months later he found me and said so how's that lullaby going? I'm like oh god. I forgot. Sorry Frank. And he said well I have some lyrics and so he sent me those lyrics and literally three or four hours later I'm like okay I know exactly what to do with this and it was so easy to write the song having those words. They were so sweet. Do you find that for yourself as a writer? Do you ever write the words first?

4:40No. Very rarely. The music comes first melody with maybe one or two lyrics. Like in your shoes started you turn the radio on and play your favorite song and cry and then I had to figure out where does that come from? What does it mean? Why did I say that? And how do I mind that? And you know thinking about bullying, thinking about myself as a kid, sitting on the couch, feeling sorry for myself because I had no friends, you know playing my double record, double genesis live and bawling my eyes out. But that must have informed you as an artist. Oh absolutely. I think everyone that shows you that kind of trauma. Yeah. Yeah I mean that's the stuff that hard stuff that you push up against. That's I think what defines most of us. That's when you figure out what you're made of, when you can work through that stuff and come out on the other side. What did you learn from this record about what you're made of?

5:26After now that you've gone through it and talked about a lot. I'm a survivor. I have a pretty great work ethic. This is great. This is great. It's a nice thing about myself. Let's go for it. I think I have a healthy dose of self-loathing and self-doubt which continues to propel me as a musician, certainly as an artist but as a human being too to try and not be so hard on myself and recognize that we are all human, we're all fallible, we make mistakes and again it's what you do with those mistakes. As a mom of two girls what advice would you offer for raising a grounded daughter? I would say live by example, teach by example. I found that whenever I try and teach by saying things you should do this, you should do that. Instantly they go deaf and I don't want to hear anything.

6:12A very smart man once said to me, you want your kids to eat your vegetables? Just eat your vegetables and say I love these vegetables. I love how they make me feel. They taste so good and leave it at that. They're like oh, you know, it's good to tell them to eat these because they're good for you. They're going to be, I don't care. I want candy. So I think that's a really good lesson for me to try and lead by example and of course I can't kick my mouth shut. I do try and tell them certain things but you know I'm a working mom and I think it's important for them to see as young girls who are going to become young women that I do work. I love my job, I'm passionate about what I do and it informs the rest of my life. I say they get mad at me sometimes and say why are you always gone? Like my little girl said to me the day, how come you never picked me up from school anymore? Said honey I've picked you up every day for the last six years with the exception of

7:01the last couple months. Mommy's been really busy. I have this job which I really love and I say when I do this thing that I do it really fulfills me in a lot of ways and I come back and I'm a way better mommy for it. So I do try and explain that, the balance and I say you know I'm also really lucky because I get a chunk of time off in between and oh you don't remember that right now but you know I was home with you for a lot of years and you came with me so. They come on over here. They do yeah. That's cool. It's going to be a little more challenging now because my oldest is 12 and you know she's in grade six. The wife now and you know. Well and school is tough and it's hard to take them out of school I mean when she was younger I homeschooled her for the couple weeks which is you know sounds wasn't that hard it's just you know she was in grade one I could manage that. Now it's like grade six math I'm like I'm already lost.

7:49So we all have phones now with calculators. Oh my god see a mommy needs to Google this just give me a minute. What are your tips for instilling an appreciation of music in the arts and kids? Introducing them to a lot of different kinds of music at an early age is great. What do you play around the house? Tom Waits, Joni Mitchell, Cat Stevens, Cole Play, Peter Gabriel, U2, Annie Lennox. Pretty broad spectrum. And then they say can we please turn this off and listen to Top 40? Well you like the happy song. I love that. Oh and that's great I mean we'd have bonded over that because basically you know that song comes on in the morning and we all just get up and start dancing.

8:34And we have dance parties. We do often before bedtime we have little dance parties to get the yayas out. The yayas out. That's the Rolling Stones record. Yay yay yayas out. What are some of your favorite things to cook? A favorite recipe for you? I am more of a baker than a cook although I've kind of gone into cooking a little more because it's more forgiving. Baking is kind of particular but I love pies. I'm really I make a wicked rhubarb pie. But I'm very much into comfort food like you know beautiful mac and cheese with lobster and a little butter fat and sugar I mean I'm terrible. But I make a wicked salad. I've got really some really great kale recipes and braised lamb shank.

9:21That's a good one. Cool. And oh also I just harvested my rhubarb and I stole this from Sean George in ABC Kitchen in New York but fresh ricotta and rhubarb compote with pepper and olive oil and you dip that in your bread and our bread into that. Oh it's like heaven. Yeah I know I'm going to have a beginner now. I'm going to find some rhubarb. You can mail me something. I think it would have been nice. You travel a lot obviously. I do. For your job. In all of your travels where have you felt most welcomed? Probably Thailand. Oh come that's interesting. I don't know. Well because they're a very loving welcoming people. They're very kind and generous and of spirit you know they really they seem to really love people and I went travel all through there.

10:07In India as well. I spent a lot of time in India. Well I got 13 years ago now and just really warm and open. Everybody come on and have a cup of tea and it's very very communal. Very community. Yeah which is great. I mean you know here we're also isolated and separated and on our devices all the time. As are they but still it's you know when you're with a culture that is they're all people are crammed together and you just have to get along. You have to learn how to get along when you're in that kind of situation. You can't just go and close your door and be by yourself. There is no being by yourself. So I think they have a much greater understanding of how to how to communicate and how to be in a community. What are your favorite places to visit in Canada? Tofino, West Coast of Vancouver.

10:53Surfing. Absolutely. Cold water surfing. Yeah. San Jose del Cabo in Mexico for surfing without the wetsuit. I love New York City. I love Paris. But usually quiet. When I travel like when I travel personally for myself it's to escape. It's to go someplace quiet where there are no big cities and noise. Right. Well that actually is the next one. Where do you go to relax? I've went to get off the ferry. Yeah it was beautiful too. It feels like Jurassic Park. Two and a half if you drive like mad people. Is that how you drive? You're a fast driver. Sometimes I don't have the kids without me. If you don't have the kids it's very smart. Yes. Safety first. Precious cargo. There are a few of your favorite family travel destinations.

11:38Tofino. Mexico, Hawaii for sure. I love the big island. It's my favorite. We try and spend, go there at least once a year which is very decadent. I'm really simple. I'm very habitual. I go to the same restaurants. So it seems the Tofino answer for everything. Yeah. Well it's my happy place. I love Tofino. It's heaven on earth. Thanks Sarah. Appreciate it.