Sarah McLachlan: 'Right time' for new record
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Sarah McLachlan
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(CNN) -- The landscape of Sarah McLachlan's world has changed dramatically since the release of her last studio album in 1997. The Canadian folk-pop artist lost her mother to cancer and gave birth five months later to a daughter, India.
Now her latest album, "Afterglow," is in stores, and the singer is performing again after a nearly four-year hiatus. McLachlan feels good about her timing.
"I have to sort of get myself back out there and this is sort of out of the frying pan into the fire," McLachlan told The Music Room after a recent performance.
McLachlan is working music in around motherhood and plans to take her daughter with her on tour. She spoke with TMR about "Afterglow" and how being a mother has shifted her priorities.
TMR: How has motherhood affected your music?
MCLACHLAN: Motherhood has affected everything at such a profound level, but musically most of the songs that I'd written for this record were before India was born. Now I find anything that I write after the fact has really been kind of sappy and gooey and feel-good. It's new territory for me and I don't know quite how to deal with it yet.
I have to try to find a twist, and there is no twist because it's all beautiful when I think of her. I can't think of anything. I can't find any way to bring it down and kind of add a dark element to it. It's just beautiful, except for my terror of how much I love her, which is kind of scary. I'm trying to figure out how to write a song about that, because it's scary to love somebody that much. It's a long way to fall.
TMR: How has motherhood changed your priorities as far as how you will continue on as an artist and maybe possibly tour and do promotional work?
MCLACHLAN: My daughter is foremost in my mind in every decision that I make, and I feel like this is the right time to put out this record. I feel like it's ready. I feel like she's strong enough, and I'm strong enough that we can go out and do this. I'm going to take her with me everywhere I go.
She's also still quite young. I'd really have to reconsider it when she's school age because I want her to be in school. I want her to have that stability. So I'm going to tour like crazy now that she's still young and hopefully too young for her to remember, otherwise there will be years of psychotherapy for me to pay for later. I think it's all good.
TMR: Can you tell us about the album?
MCLACHLAN: ... It's quite densely layered. I think it's a lot more of a dynamic record than "Solace" was. A lot of really different musical ideas in there, but I think the essence of me is pretty much still there. I write pretty much the same song, and [producer Pierre Marchand], bless his heart, takes it and works his magic and makes me sound different on every one.
TMR: Your lyrics have always been intensely personal. Do you ever want to hear poetry in your lyrics, is that important to you, or is it whatever comes out of you?
MCLACHLAN: ... Usually one or two lines come out easily and then the rest of the process of trying to write the song is trying to create a story with words and trying to use words and language in an interesting way so that you're not just like, "The sky is blue." Yeah, let's try to say it in a really beautiful and interesting way that makes you think of a few other things.
It's so the meaning is not instantly obvious in the lyrics. I try to hide things a little so the listener can find their own interpretation. And people will often come up to me and say, "What did that song mean?" and I'll say, "What did that mean to you?" They'll tell me, and I'll say, "Oh that's really interesting," and it's completely not what I had in mind. That's the wonderful thing about music. It is what you take it and make for yourself. So I say, "Yeah, that's what it meant."
