Media Page

"'Exorcising' Her Cheaters"
by Lynn Saxberg

"Get Home", the tortured first single from Sarah Slean's new disc, The Baroness, will resonate with anyone who's had to deal with a cheater. "Liars and cowards," the tiny, elegant Slean declares with the conviction of one who's been stabbed in the back a few times herself, her vicious condemnation deployed in a deceptively sweet voice.

The hurt that drives the song is unmistakable, and the voice-and-piano-based treatment gives it a simple but powerful appeal. In terms of angry-lover songs, this slow, sad piano tearjerker ranks right up there with Alanis Morissette's fiery "You Oughta Know".

Early indications are that Slean has a hit on her hands. On iTunes, "Get Home" was single of the week a couple of weeks ago, setting a record with close to 30,000 downloads and bumping up interest in Slean's third major-label release. Signed to Warner Music Canada, the multi-talented Slean is also a visual artist, poet and actor -- she's been nominated for both Juno and Gemini awards.

In "Get Home", Slean sends a snivelling coward home to his wife, depicting a romantic situation in which she appears to be the other woman. Excuse me, but it appears our sweet little songbird may not be so sweet. Who is this Mr. Masquerade she refers to in the song?

When reached on her cellphone between classes at the University of Toronto, Slean says the song is not about one man in particular, it's about a situation that seemed to repeat itself in her love life. "Of course it happened to me," she says, "I couldn't have written that narrative and I couldn't have meant it, singing it the way I did, unless it happened to me, and unfortunately it's happened to me more than once. I felt like I was on a tape loop with that situation."

She finally decided to wrap up the whole series of experiences in one song. "I wanted the song to work as a charm, and sort of exorcise that storyline from my life forever, and it worked that way," she says, "The moment I wrote it, I knew that that just wasn't going to happen to me again. It was over."

After wading into deep emotional territory while writing, Slean says her tendency is to bury it in layers of lush strings and angelic background singing. This time, she had Jagori Tanna, the rock-guitar god from the late-'90s Canadian band I Mother Earth, helping her out in the studio. He provided a stable force when she was tearing her hair out over creative decisions. "When I record, I tend to completely shatter mentally," she says. "I think too hard, it's like I'm pre-menstrual for the entire thing. And he is sooo steady. He was very diplomatic and calm and that's exactly what I need in that process because I tend to be really frantic and kind of unpredictable.

"I make these songs but then I get nervous about showing them in their naked form. They're so raw, I want to put a couple of orchestras on top and maybe 3,000 harmonies so that it's nicely hidden in this sheen of artifice ... but Jag would go, 'That's the beauty of these songs, they're so exposed and so vulnerable. People love that. You gotta keep that.' "

Although "Get Home" emerged during recording, most of the other songs were written during a seven-month sojourn in Paris in 2006. Slean moved there when her previous album was released, and she didn't love it at first. That's when she wrote "So Many Miles", a perky-piano song juxtaposed against the emotional balladry of the rest of Baroness. "I was horrendously lonely, the weather was cool, people were awful to me, and I felt utterly lost and completely unarmed and really scared and empty," Slean says, describing the song as a "little anthem" that "kept me afloat, recharged my batteries when I was sinking in the quicksand."

As for the regal album title, The Baroness, it refers to a character Slean has used before in short stories and film projects. "She's really audacious, has a bit of a strut, wears red gowns," Slean says. "She's kind of the spirit I call on when I go on stage, to get some courage and some brassiness. She's strong and fearless. I consider myself a bit of a wallflower and a bit shy. To go on stage and to do what I do I need to pretend almost, and she is it."

The new album is released today in Canada and France. Her new management company, the same folks who handle Rufus Wainwright's career, is sure to land a U.S. release, and Slean is ready for an intense period of touring, likely to start this spring, after exams. (She is studying music and philosophy at U of T.)

With a hit single and a high-powered new manager, it sounds like it could be a big year for Slean -- may the baroness be with her.

Online: "I discovered I had feelings!"

To see how some fans react to Sarah Slean's music, see a video from the listening party Lynn Saxberg hosted last week. It's on Lynn's blog, "Face the Music".

March 11, 2008
The Ottawa Citizen