Alberta singer-songwriter starts out becalmed but eventually lifts herself out of “The Doldrums“.
“The Doldrums” is the debut solo release from Canadian singer-songwriter Ellen Braun. She is based in Canmore, Alberta and is also a member of indie folk duo Trundled with Joe Shea. Braun recorded the 10-song collection mostly live at Montreal’s Hotel2Tango with producer Howard Bilerman. The album features a full-band performance with Stef Schneider (percussion), Sage Reynolds (upright bass), Mike O’Brien (guitars), and Sarah Hiltz (vocals and keys) and the “Nashville” choir, comprising Hiltz, Stephanie Gagnon, Laura Newman, Babette Hayward, William Kuklis, and Joseph Shea.
Of the album’s title, Braun explains: “Someone once told me, ‘It’s not too late to change the name of your album’. Well, it is now, and I’m still happy with “The Doldrums”. All of these songs were written about, or during, a time of active inertia. No matter what I tried, it felt like I was just bobbing along, waiting for the wind. But being stuck never meant I couldn’t dream. When the calm waters started to feel more like peace than prison, songs like ‘Nashville’, ‘Map Reader’ and ‘The Book’ came along.”
There is a certain immediacy to “The Doldrums”, leaving the listener with a sense of having known the songs before first listen. Whether this is simply stylistic or evidence of nuggets from familiar tunes lodging in Braun’s work is hard to say.
The title track has a wistful feel while addressing the decline of a relationship using a shipwreck as a metaphor, countered with the desire to save it embodied in the instinct to survive either personally or to save the other person. ‘Gravity’ exercises its pull via a circular rhythm and some deep chords. Braun’s vocal hovers between singing and spoken word as she contemplates the state of a relationship: “If I dive for you I might drown/ If I surface I will let you down”.
‘You Had My Love’ continues the theme but with the chords in a higher register. This time, the relationship is a goner, though. ‘Fall Away’, the first of two co-writes on “The Doldrums” – this one with Erika Faulkner – begins with a jazzy bass and slips into a more intimate vocal and message while underpinned by some delicate piano. The song addresses themes of closeness, perceptions of unbalanced love, and ultimately trust. Braun wrote ‘Map Reader’ with ZENON and John Wort Hannam. The song’s beat, musical backing and vocal delivery all feel familiar. There is a long organ chord which bridges from verse to chorus, and an understated guitar solo before the voices return with the lead and backing vocals addressing one another.
‘On the Line’ sets an early morning scene with one of the lovers leaving and the narrator feeling doubts whether they will be back while revisiting their intimacy. “Could you love me forever?” asks Braun over the opening beats of ‘The Book’. She then proceeds to cut and dice the relationship, veering from “we wrote the book” to “take one last look” and asking, “Why are we so afraid of change?” Next, ‘Walk On’ cranks up the energy in the vocal and when the instrumentation rocks up after the first verse, and feels much more positive than much of what has gone before. The chord patterns and guitars recall some of the Paisley Underground sound.
The penultimate song, ‘I See You’, reaches out to a female friend who is hiding the way she’s being treated from her friends and her children. At once supportive and sinister, it is a short, powerful song – the chorus of the title being sung against Braun’s lead is especially affecting. The album’s closer, ‘Nashville’, sees Braun reflecting on the importance of music to her sense of self and embracing its recuperative powers. The song is tinged with a degree of uncertainty, but nothing that will derail her conviction that this is what she does and who she is.
