STACK #148 Feb 2017

MUSIC NEWS

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KASEY CHAMBERS Kasey Chambers' new album Dragonfly is a collection of typically confessional, instrumentally gorgeous tracks which the singer-songwriter recorded with the help of two Australian icons. We shot her some questions about the stunning release.

TOURING 09/02 - 25/02

The track with Foy Vance ( Romeo & Juliet ) couldn’t be more perfect in showing the strengths of each of your voices. What were you hoping to bring out in a collaboration with Foy? Foy is one of my favourite singer- songwriters so it was a huge thrill to have him on the record. But what he did with the song was beyond my wildest dreams; he took the whole song to another level. For Talkin' Baby Blues , what gave you the idea to do this kind of Cliff’s Notes about your life? I wasn’t allowed to sing for eight weeks after having vocal surgery, so the only song I could write was a talking song (I grew up listening to a lot of Woody

( Jonestown , Dragonfly , Satellite ) are we hearing Nash? Jonestown and Dragonfly [are] Harry Hookey (Harry co-wrote a lot of the album and played a lot of the instruments, and sings a lot of the harmonies; he is a very big part of Dragonfly ). Satellite : Ed Sheeran sings the backing vocal on this one.

Each disc of this double release was produced by an Australian legend: one Paul Kelly, one your brother Nash. Were they completely separate sessions, and what is the major way that each of these men differ in approach? They were completely separate sessions, but they actually both have very similar approaches to production. They both let the song come to life itself first, before pushing it in any direction. They let the musos be as creative as they need to be. They both love to work live, which suits me great. Was it very clear to you straight-up which songs belonged with which producer, or did you begin some tracks with one and then switch after their feel became apparent? Some songs were very clear right from the start, mainly because I had been

working with my live band for a couple of years and trying out some of the new songs, so I knew to save those for the Foggy Mountain sessions. But I also had more songs than I’d ever had before, so I sent most of them to PK to pick his favourites. His first picks were Ain’t No Little Girl , Behind The Eyes Of Henry Young , Pompeii , and Jonestown . Golden Rails has a really cool shuffle beat that almost makes me think of half-time disco ( Dancing Queen style)! How do you describe those extra little snare kicks that give it such a jaunty feel? I can honestly say, I don’t think I’ve ever had a song of mine compared to Dancing Queen . But I owe all of this to the drummer of the Sing Sing session: Evan Mannell. He blew my mind on the whole session.

Guthrie and Bob Dylan), and I had a long time to reflect on how my life had started playing music around the campfire on the Nullarbor Plain. If I Died has some fantastic, wide instrumentation. How you know that a song

Dragonfly by Kasey Chambers is out now via Warner.

wants these thick layers of sound as opposed to a stripped-back accompaniment – is this exactly how you imagined the song would turn out when you were writing its bones? The song was written in a lot more of a laid-back style. But I jammed it one day at sound check with my live band and they smashed it, and I fell in love with it, so this is one of the songs I saved for the Foggy Mountain sessions.

How did writing harmonies work with Vika and Linda Bull ( No Ordinary Man ) – was it a joint effort within the studio, or did you write out what you wanted before you recorded? As if I’m ever going to tell Vika and Linda Bull how to sing harmonies?! Obviously I left this one up to them and they smashed it.

When we hear male harmonies

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FEBRUARY 2017

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