By Katie Ryan
Bri-anne Swan thinks people are great. And given her latest, upcoming project, they really are.
Following her Western Canada tour which she begins today, the musician will then take to the road once more with her boyfriend and complete The Bruce Trail.
“He’s the walker and I’m the rocker,” said Swan of her boyfriend who has embarked on Spain’s Camino, B.C.’s West Coast Trail, among other famous treks. “I just couldn’t walk with my guitar.”
Swan, who will be in the Border City on March 23 to play at the Singing Waitress Cafe, will meet up with her boyfriend at each of her concerts during the 885 kilometre journey, which kicks off in Niagara Falls on April 18 and wraps up in Tobermory, on the shores of Lake Huron. It’s a walk with purpose, explained Swan, with all of the proceeds raised through donations and by her shows destined for the MS Society – half to the national office and the rest to local chapters. Already they have raised $5,000 of their $10,000 goal.
“We are really excited and the response has been astronomical. He always knew he wanted to do this walk and we realized being able to do the shows along the way is something that might make it more special,” she said.
Prior to their charitable jaunt, Swan will set up shop in Lloyd during the middle of her Western Canada tour. Having never ventured west of Brandon, Manitoba, Swan is excited to hit the road and perform.
“My head is spinning, just trying to think of all the things I need to do,” said Swan during a phone conversation on Tuesday. “I end up in Lloydminster which is apparently both Alberta and Saskatchewan – dual personalities. This is the farthest west I’ll be going, I am heading all the way out to British Columbia. I am really looking forward to seeing the mountains.”
An indie/ roots/ folk musician, Swan will be touring in support of her debut album entitled, these are all my friends.
“When I have been booking shows, I have been describing the sounds as Regina Spektor and Joan Baez meeting for drinks and then going to visit Gordon Lightfoot in the Canadian woods for a late night jam session,” she said laughing.
“It doesn’t really fit into any one genre. The record itself goes from country, to really organic folk, to indie pop with horns and stuff. When I am solo it is hard to get all of those instruments – I only have so many limbs that I can work with – when it’s just me solo it’s much more acoustic.”
After she gives her all on stage, Swan wants to keep giving by inspiring others with her music, imbuing them with optimism.
“I really want my music to touch people, I don’t mean that they need to be weeping,” she said. “Although, I do seem to have a specialty at making grown men cry. Somebody mentioned in a review of the album that after you listen to it a sense of hope is sort of hard to deny and that is sort of the feeling I want to leave after the performance – that the world ain’t so bad.”
Hailing from the same hometown of Orillia, Ontario, as her hero – Gordon Lightfoot – Swan is eager to make new friends on the road and share her music.
“I’d like to think that I sound a little bit like him,” she said, referring to Lightfoot.
“(The album is) a bunch of songs that have been mostly inspired by characters in literature, sort of Old Testament, biblical stuff as well as pretty standard ‘love gone wrong’ songs, because you need to have a couple of those on every album.
“I like it, my Mom likes it, other people seem to like it. My brothers give out copies to their university buddies, so I kind of feel like if my brothers like it, it can’t be all that bad.”
The album features 10 original songs Swan penned, which she’s come to refer to as her “friends,” hence the album’s name.
“I was realizing when I was putting the CD together that a lot of the songs dealt with certain archetypes and certain characters that come up again and again, and as I was going through the recording process I started talking about each of the songs as if they were real people,” Swan said.
The album title was further confirmed by four dreams she had, which countered the original title, Milk and Honey, in favour of these are all my friends.
“If my dreams are telling me then that’s what the record should be called,” she said with a laugh.
Swan, who once wrote for Orillia’s newspaper, said plunging into the music scene was an “organic” process. She started by performing in coffee houses at open mic nights, was soon asked to open for other artists and then to headline her own shows. Swan took the ‘why mess with a good thing’ approach and ditched her day job.
“I realized that I was so much happier doing this than any of the other jobs or school work I was doing. I made a five year plan, because I like plans and I like spread sheets, and decided to just go for it,” she said, adding she is in year three of five year plan and so far so good. “Everything is going forward instead of back, which is nice.”
Check out Bri-anne Swan at the Singing Waitress Cafe on March 23.