October 02, 2010

Publication title: marcandrewsblog.blogspot.com, vol. -, Iss. -, pg. –
Place: Unknown
Writer: Marc Andrews

Blog Exclusive: Sarah McLachlan interview (Sep 2010)

Hi Sarah. How are you?
I’m very well, how are you?

Good. Where are you as we speak?
I’m in Vancouver, British Columbia. I just got my kids to bed and finished up the dishes and now I’m talking to you.

The glamorous life of a pop star!
It’s soooo glamorous [laughs].

Has bringing Lilith Fair to Australia been on the cards for a while?
We’ve been talking about it on and off for a while. We confirmed it around August 1. The promoter from Australia came over and we had a meeting with him and decided to try it out. It’s like a mini Lilith – thus the shows that are coming with Courtyard Hounds (NB: now no longer attended) and Kate Miller-Heidke.

Is this the first time it’s been outside of North America?
It’s the first thing that is a little bit like a tour. We did Lilith at Royal Albert Hall in London about 11 or 12 years ago. We stuck to North America though because it was an outdoor, summer festival thing and really getting it going took a huge infrastructure. To take it anywhere else was almost inconceivable costwise.

What made you decide to take up Lilith Fair again now?
Really I missed it and I missed the community it created. I missed making music with other people. It seemed like the perfect opportunity to bring it back because I had a new record coming out as well and really thought at the time that I would only tour in summer because my oldest daughter is in grade three now. I used to perceive touring as going out for a year and a half at a time and I didn’t think about the fact you could go out for two weeks and stay home for a month. It’s more expensive to do it that way, but it’s way more civilised as well. We did the tour this summer, which was brilliant and so much fun. I felt so recharged and invigorated by being out there again. I’ve done a lot of gigs the past few years by myself – small charity events where I would play half an hour or something, but it had been four or five years since I got on stage in front of a big audience and played with a band. It was amazing to be adult again and to be doing the job that I was meant to do, other than being a parent, which is an amazing gig too. I got to do both again and realised I could do both and I didn’t want it to stop. When (promoter) Michael Chugg came and said, ‘do you want to come and do this in Australia?” I said, “I love Australia and New Zealand and give me any opportunity to come down there’. Especially heading into summer, which is the time is starts to get a bit snotty over here, so it’s perfect.

Are you bringing your kids with you on the tour?
Yeah, they are going to come. I will get Sydney under my belt and then we have to go to Perth. They will meet me in Adelaide. India, my oldest, did a worldwide tour from 18 months to 3 and a half years. She remembers part of it. They came out on the road with me this summer and loved it. They are very excited. India is not thrilled though that we have to fly a lot in Australia and there’s no tour bus. She wants her tour bus!

She is going to be a rock’n’roll chick!
I don’t know [laughs]. I feel like it’s the younger one because my oldest, India, who loves the tour bus loves it because it is her own personal jungle gym. She never wants to leave it. My 3-and-a-half year old wants to out front watching every act.

How long was your new album “Laws of Illusion” in the works for?
It was a really quick record to make. I had been writing it for a while, but I started recording it in earnest on March 1 and it was done June 1. It was really quick and a fun, easy record to make considering the content, or some of the content [laughs].

You’ve always touched on personal material in your music, but did you just need to get this one out like cathartic?
Writing music is always very cathartic for me and I always need a certain amount of time and space to have any objectivity about the stuff I’m going through. I write from a very emotional point of view and it’s often from personal experience, but also often putting myself in other people’s shoes and trying to figure out how they feel. This is the creative license in there as well. That is my out when somebody asks me if I’m getting a little too personal [laughs]. I say, “Oh no, that’s not about that, I’m talking about somebody else there!” It’s a good excuse [laughs]. Some people have been jokingly calling this the divorce album. I find it vaguely comedic now. I think I can because I’m so on the other side of it now. It was a really hard and tumultuous time for me. It took me a while to come out of that swamp [laughs]. When I made this record and finished it…people asked me if it really hard to talk about being separated and I said that I don’t, I just talk about it in the music. No one has asked me any intensive personal questions and if they do I usually ignore it.

They say it usually takes 18 months to get over a break-up.
It’s been two-and-a-half years and I’m feeling great. It was really hard. I found myself 40 and single with two small children. I never thought my life would turn out that way. It’s all for the greater good and I am so happy now. It was the right thing. It was a hard way to go but it was the right thing to do.

Is the next 12 months all planned out for you?
Kind of. We’re working on routing and working around my girls’ vacation time from school, which is a bit tricky. After Australia/NZ I come back and play seven dates in North America and then I go to Dubai to play a gig at the Grand Prix, which will be fun. Then I’m back and have the time off. My dad’s quite sick and nobody knows how much time he’s got. I don’t want to leave any more than I have to for any long period of time. To get this Christmas with him will be really important for me and the kids.

Putting out an album nowadays, compared to even a few years ago is so different. How do you find navigating that?
I don’t really have much to do with it. I just make records and there are other people who deal with putting it out and distributing it and figuring out how to market it.

You don’t want to take the whole process into your own hands?
Essentially that’s the deal I have in Canada. My label deal was done two records ago and I just continue to work with Netwerk and we have a different arrangement. I have a lot more ownership in it than I did. With them I have one more record and then I am free of that deal as well. The more you can control financially the better off you are. These days if you are very established artist you need the label for certain things – there is a certain infrastructure that you still benefit from, but a lot of it you can farm out and pay for yourself, as far as marketing. You know, I am the worst person in the world to ask that question because it’s not something I pay a whole lot of attention to. I thank my lucky stars every day for having the success I did the in late 90s.

When records were still selling!
When records were still being sold, because it doesn’t matter now. I don’t need to sell records now to make a living. I’m so incredibly lucky. If it’s not a big commercial success, then that’s okay. I loved making the record. It’s a great place to be to not need that. Lilith didn’t make any money this summer – we lost money, a pack of money. I knew that going into it and I put that on a shelf and put it away. It was not something I could control and I had an amazing time. I was making music and living life loud and proud. It just felt great. That’s way more important to me than the financial stuff, it always has been.

If one of your daughters were to consider going into music, what advice would you give her?
Ohhh. Make damn sure you want to do it, first [laughs]. This is not something to enter into on a whim. You have to be really passionate and really driven. You have to have a need to do it. If it’s just because you want to be famous then don’t bother. I would apply that to anything you go into it. If you can possibly have the luxury to choose, do something you are passionate about and love to do. As far as the music industry, surround yourself with good people who believe in it and who can help you achieve your goals. That’s you band, your management, your lawyers and everyone.

Is there a “Team Sarah McLachlan”?
I always have. I consider myself incredibly lucky to have been signed by Netwerk. They were a very small independent label and signed me on blind faith. I have a great deal of loyalty to them because they have done amazing things for me. (Netwerk CEO) Terry McBride has always pushed me – he’s pushed me a lot harder than I have pushed myself and sometimes to the point where I couldn’t stand him. There was always a reason behind it and he was pretty much always right [laughs]. He got me to a place where now I don’t have to worry. I can make my music and not have to worry about where the next pay cheque comes from. It’s such a luxurious position to be in. I know how lucky I am. I owe a great deal to him and the team for the work they put in to make it happen. I have a great band – half of my band and crew have been with me for 20 years. It’s a bit of a family.

You dabble in dance music and remixes too. You like throwing curveballs?
I’m pretty much open to trying anything. Dance remixes are something completely out of my comfort zone. A guy called George Metayatis (correct spelling anyone?), who worked at Netwerk, pushed me into doing that. Some one went and did a remix and brought it to my attention and said “Everyone’s playing this on the dancefloors”. Then I went and did the song (“Silence”) with Delerium, which turned out to be a huge thing that kept having new lives over and over. I realised that it worked and he set me up with a bunch of different remixers and sent them different tracks and they did their magic. For me it’s fascinating to have something completely different done with my music.

Dave Aude remixed your last single. “Loving You Is Easy”.
Yeah. It’s good and it lends itself well to it. Sometimes they change it to the point where it’s unrecognisable but he did a really good job with that.

You have a big gay following. What would you like to say to your Australian gay fans?
I hope they all come out and see me [laughs]. I want them to be loud and proud [laughs].

Have a great trip down under and don’t forget to wear gloves when you wash up!
Oh yeah [laughs].