The break was initiated by guilt. “I did a kind of crazy and exhausting UK tour,” says Sarah Harmer, calling from her Kingston kitchen just before lunch to report on her four-year absence from our collective consciousness. “I read the book Heat by George Monbiot, and it was all about how to stop the planet from burning, a total primer on climate change and if it’s possible to reverse things. And I thought, ‘This is nuts, why am I over here in the UK entertaining people? This is gluttonous ambition.'”
She thought she’d just dial it down, for now—“I live close to a lot of big cities, why don’t I make it more regional? I did think I was going to scale things back, but I just got distracted.” She co-founded the Protecting Escarpment Rural Land organization and became an environmental activist, documented in part on the album I’m a Mountain and in the documentaries Escarpment Blues and Green Heroes.
And then: “I had some personal things happen that waylaid me for awhile.” Also: “I did play drums in a band in Kingston for a couple years. I picked up a few hobbies.”
Then the songs started to come, and unlike those of I’m a Mountain (which Harmer calls “an in-the-room, live-off-the-floor recording; it’s kind of small”), these rocked, Weeping Tile-style, “Weakened State” style.
“I wanted them to sound good turned up loud,” she says. She recorded them in batches across the better part of a year in Gavin Brown’s Toronto studio.
“We did this one so piecemeal. I think only at one time were two people ever recording at the same time. It was definitely built up step by step by step over the course of eight months. On and off, I’d go up to Toronto and we’d just pass instruments back and forth.”
They also traded production approaches. “He’s a meticulous fucking guy,” she says, laughing. “He’s still got a lot of juice, a lot of fuel and energy for sure. The way he’s made records in the past”—for heavier bands like The Reason and The Midway State—“I knew were very much everything was in its place and sonically carved in a certain way, whereas I’m a little more, ‘That felt awesome! That was the take!’ He was less into vibe and more into the construct.”
She called the collection’s 10 songs, plus a cover, Oh Little Fire. It’s taken from a particularly soaring moment in “One Match,” during which she sings “Oh little fire, sleepy in the coals/Open up the door, see a flame unfold.” Though she appears to be speaking of a love, the line could also be a declaration for her return, long-awaited and welcomed. (Yes, you can call it a comeback.)
“Touring with my bandmates, they’ve all been making music consistently throughout the last four years, and I feel like I’m kind of learning from them and remembering, trying to get back in shape in a way,” Harmer says. “We’ve been touring for a few months so now I’m like, ‘OK I’m back, my calluses are back.’
“I don’t know if it’s a constant feeling of ‘You’re a beginner,’ if that’s a disclaimer or something, but I do feel that with most records you feel like you’re starting again. This does feel more like I’ve been out of the picture for awhile.”
This article appears in Oct 28 – Nov 2, 2010.