September 04, 2004

Publication title: CanWest News, vol. -, Iss. -, pg. –
Place: Calgary
Writer: Unknown

Revitalized McLachlan follows up Afterglow tour with Run DMC collaboration

CALGARY – Five minutes with Sarah McLachlan.
That’s all the singer can spare, says the rep from McLachlan’s record label, Vancouver-based Nettwerk Records.

But we managed to wangle a good 10 minutes with the chanteuse. Maybe even 11.

She needs to spare her voice, apparently. It’s been giving her grief of late on her Afterglow tour.

“Yeah, I’ve had a lot of trouble with (my voice),” says the 34-year-old singer. “It’s been really problematic. Halfway through the set I’ve been having incredibly pounding sinus headaches. The pressure just keeps building up the more I sing.

“I’ve tried (prescription) drugs and all sorts of homeopathic hocus-pocus. It didn’t work.”
She needs her voice to be at its best. This has been the year of McLachlan’s comeback. Her latest full-length release, Afterglow, released last year, was her first studio album in six years.

There were plenty of factors that contributed to the long delay over that time.

One was the birth of her daughter, India, whom she had with her husband and drummer, Ashwin Sood. The other was the death of her mother from cancer.

Those factors, combined with the pressure of recording a followup to 1997’s smash Surfacing, paralysed the sensitive balladeer. For months she withdrew from any artistic endeavours. No piano playing or singing. No songwriting. She even stopped writing in her journal.

“It was the best thing I’ve ever done,” McLachlan says. “I just had to walk away from all of it. It had everything to do with becoming a mother. I was completely overwhelmed by the entire thing and instead of allowing myself to be (overwhelmed), I kept forcing myself to finish the record. And really, I didn’t want anything to do with it. I just wanted to be a mother.”

The time off revitalized her love of music, she says, though at times she feared she’d never get her groove back.

“But I experience that with every record,” McLachlan adds. “I pretty much go into my manager’s office hysterical. It happens everytime.”

She needn’t have worried.

When Afterglow was released in November it went straight to No. 1 on the Canadian charts and stayed there for seven weeks. The album also went to No. 2 on the U.S. charts.

Critical response to the record, however, was mixed. Much of the criticism blasted the album for being too middle of the road, New Age and, worst of all, a bore. This is a change for an artist who used to be a critic’s darling.

“I was a critical darling in Canada, but I always got crap reviews in Rolling Stone and Spin magazine,” McLachlan insists. “They always slagged me. I’m far too uncool. I don’t do drugs and I’m not wild and crazy. I’m far to un-rock `n’ roll. . . . I couldn’t care less, really.

“I just do what I do and if you like it, like it, if you don’t, don’t.”

Either way, McLachlan has plenty on the go these days.

Fans will see the soft pop princess branch out when Darryl McDaniels’ solo album is released. McDaniels, a member of pioneering rap band Run DMC, recruited McLachlan for his cover of the Harry Chapin song, Cat’s In The Cradle.

“When you hear it, my part’s not that different (from what I usually do),” she says. “Darryl got me to sing the chorus an do a few oohs and ahhs and then he raps through the verses.”

The current leg of McLachlan’s tour wraps up on Sept. 10.

At that point she’ll be back in the studio to mix a live DVD, which she shot in Toronto recently. Then it’s over to Europe for a tour that will take her through October and November. In December, she’ll be back in North America to promote the DVD release.