Apr. 22, 2009 - Issue #705: Great Outdoors 2009

Melissa McClelland (includes video)

A brand new Day: McClelland unveils her latest record

Sometimes you just need to get out of the comfort zone to get a little work done. If you're a songwriter, that might mean trying out a new chord. Or, it could mean picking up and moving to a whole new country. That's what Hamilton's Melissa McClelland did, along with her husband Luke Doucet, for six months durng the three years between her last album, Thumbelina's One Night Stand and her newest, Victoria Day, when the two of them moved to Nashville. It wasn't a spectacular time for McClelland, but she did get some writing done while she was there.

"It was kind of lonely, actually," she remembers. "It was OK, but Luke and I spend most of our time on the road so we don't get that much time at home, so I spend a lot of my life homesick anyway; so to have our home be this completely new place—it was a fun time but I was also longing for familiar surroundings and I kind of locked myself away during that time and just did a lot of writing and played my guitar a lot.

"There's such a wonderful musical history there that we had a chance to draw from, but the industry is also really huge there and I think it kind of has a negative effect on the art that's being made there, so it kind of rubbed me the wrong way a bit in that regard," she continues. "It was nice to come home to Canada and Toronto, and there's such a thriving music scene here and it's all about making great music and good songwriting—it's all about the craft, it's not about trying to write the next country hit."

But while McClelland was hit by the longing for her Canadian home during her time in Music City, and the music machine weighed heavy on her, she took away some experiences that she is quick to admit are handy tools for a songwriter.



"People have a really different approach to songwriting," she explains. "It can be good in a way, because people are very productive there when it comes to songwriting. It's not just waiting for the inspiration—it's like, no, you've got to sit down at three o'clock in the afternoon with so and so and write a song and just get it done.

"So it can be a good exercise, but I like it to be more of an organic process and a natural experience," she adds. "I find that way kind of sucks the creativity out of the process—but it can be good in ways, because when you're trying to write songs, sometimes the best thing to do is just to sit down and work through all the stuff until you get something good."

And the experience itself is something McClelland is glad to have with her now. Along with a trip along Route 66 she took after the release of Thumbelina she says that her Nashville period—and specifically the feelings she went through when there—will likely inspire a song or two at some point. Not that it always takes a life-changing experience for McClelland to flew her songwriting muscles.

"I draw from everything, like big experiences like that, but then I also write a lot about family, history and dreams that I have at night, memories from my childhood, so a bunch of different things—it can really come from any place," she says. "But those kinds of experiences definitely help—sometimes it takes a couple of years before they actually turn into a song, but they usually, eventually do at some point."

At some point is the key, though; McClelland is not one to rush a song, confessing that she's not the most prolific songwriter around. But when the songs do come—and they do, even if she has to sit down and just get it done—she makes it count. V

 

Fri, Apr 24 (8 pm)
Melissa McClelland
With Jason Plumb
Haven Social Club, $15 

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