Rare beauty in intimate and confessional fifth studio album from Canada’s Mo Kenney
A quick glance at the nine-song track list of Mo Kenney’s fifth studio album might set alarm bells ringing–‘Self Doubt’ and ‘Bad Times’ summoning up a vision of the archetypal singer-songwriter misery narrative – but the first listen is enough to dispel such concerns. Yes, their songs are confessional, and go to the heart of dealing with interpersonal dramas, but throughout the songwriting craft and musicality shine through, with a deft lightness of touch that belies the often unsettling lyrical themes.
Kenney tells that “I sort of thought that getting sober was going to fix all my problems with relationships, and then I would just be fine. Drinking was causing all the issues I was having, but it was just the tip of the iceberg; quitting made all my problems more clear but didn’t resolve any of them.”
Opening track ‘Bad Times’ has a sweetness that contrasts with this realisation, Kenney singing “Is this all there is/ Did I sign up for this?/ I thought when you clean up life gets rich/ I know it ain’t right, but I miss the bad times.” Her voice has both a richness and gentle tone, which draws the listener in, against a mid-tempo arrangement with acoustic guitar and keys up front, supported by bass and drums.
‘Self Doubt’ has a raw stripped back feel, keys drenched with reverb suggesting they’re played in the abandoned house their lyric name checks “Self doubt, self-doubt/ Whatcha worried about/ Just do what you’re doing, you’ll figure it out/ My mind it feels like an abandoned house.”
Title track ‘From Nowhere’ has a folkier vibe, but the feel remains contemporary, with lush vocal harmonies, Kenney’s lyrics suggesting the double-edged nature of relationships, singing “Climb the fruit trees, kissed by warm breeze/ Birds in cages in the branches/ It happened to me/ It happened to me like it happened to you.”
In contrast to the alt-folk vibe across most of the album, downtempo ‘That’s Not Me’ has a funky backbeat and cool jazz keys, rather reminiscent of Joan as Policewoman, suggesting a post break up night in a bar “Blue bottles in a glowing bar, remodelling a broken heart/ For someone else to take apart/ And that’s not me coming down the stairs/ You don’t know me and you don’t care.”
‘Signs of Life’ has an indie feel, with rhythmic strummed acoustic guitar at its heart, while ‘Evening Dream’ shades to a more poppy feel, a farewell to a love that might have been “I’ve been having visions of you, seeing things that I don’t want to/ Crawling into memories that bleed into my evening dreams/ Bathing in the pale green light, no thought of what goes on outside/ No thought of what it all might mean, it doesn’t have to mean a thing/ Goodbye baby, we weren’t ready.”
Credited musicians are Joel Plaskett, Rose Cousins, Victoria Cameron, Siobhan Martin, and Jordan Murphy, and the album was recorded, mixed, and engineered by Thomas Stajcer at Plaskett’s Fang Studios in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia.
A memorable album from Kenney demonstrates fine songwriting tackling personal yet ultimately relatable themes and issues.
