About the original songs on “Grand Isle”
Harvest Time is a follow-up to a song called “Common Loon” on my “There Are Birds” album. The previous song is a mostly fictional account of characters based on my family in Aroostook County, Maine. “Harvest Time” is the real story of my great-great-grandfather John Caron coming down from Canada and settling in Grand Isle, Maine, and more broadly, my entire mother’s side of the family, who mostly came from Canada and France. We have family trees that go back to the early 1700s, and I’m still digging around for information. It’s fascinating to read accounts from my great-grandmother Sophie LeVasseur about their lives during that time – potato farming, working at the mills, etc.
One Trick Away is a song that just flowed out of my head very quickly one day. I had the other tracks written and somewhat recorded and was not planning on doing more, but this song just needed to exist. We actually ended up completing it before all the others. We had a great time recording the gang vocals in our home studio. I joined seven of my good friends and fellow musicians as we gathered around some mics and belted out the choruses. It’s a song about the twists and turns that life has in store for everyone. Although many people have told me they find it uplifting, to me, it’s a bit of a darker song, especially the last chorus. I like songs that don’t have a happy ending.
Scour Your Heart is a song I wrote about and for Lisa Marie Presley. If you know me, you know I’m a tad obsessed with Priscilla and Lisa Presley. But separately, I’m also a big fan of Lisa’s music and was lucky enough to have seen her in concert twice and to have met her once. Her death was a real shock to me. There was a melancholy around her life that touched me deeply, and it seems to me that she was very misunderstood. I had already written a completely different set of lyrics for this song, but it never sat right with me. When Lisa passed away, I took the title only and wrote the new set of lyrics in just a few hours.
About the cover songs on “Grand Isle”
You Brains is an amazing song on Chris Harford’s fantastic album “Be Headed,” released in 1992. If you don’t have this album, go find it right away. Sean Coleman Keenan wrote the lyrics. I’ve loved this song so much since I first heard it, because it is a two-minute pop gem. I also think the lyrics remain as true today as they did almost 35 years ago.
Words We Never Use is a true beauty of a song by Ron Sexsmith, who is still making some of my favorite music. This tune appears on his brilliant self-titled debut album released in 1995. It’s always had a pull on me, and I think it suits my voice well.
The Messenger by Daniel Lanois is the opening track to one of my top 10 favorite albums of all time called “For the Beauty of Wynona,” released in 1993. Again, if you don’t have this album, you need it. If you listen to the Modern Musicology podcast, you will hear me blather on about my love for Daniel Lanois and his music, so much so that we require the listener to take a shot every time I mention his name. So it was just natural that I picked one of his songs to interpret.
Produced and engineered by Bob Perry
Mixed by Bob Perry and Stephanie Seymour
Mastered by Scott Anthony/Storybook Sound
(All songs recorded at Chrometop Studio, except for drums on “Harvest Time,” recorded at Shedley Grange, Sarasota, FL)
Cover art by Brian Rusnica
Photo by Sandra Nissen/Sandra Nissen Photography