Much like her music, the path that led Ane Brun to It All Starts With One was peaceful, unhurried and full of unexpected, subtle surprises. She has, you could say, taken the scenic route. Born in the small Norwegian city of Molde, she was exposed to music from an early age, thanks both to her mother’s profession as a piano and vocal coach and the city’s annual jazz festival. But, though she learned a little piano and sang in a choir, her main interests as a youth were dancing and gymnastics, and she was 21 before she finally picked up the family guitar. It swiftly became an addiction.
Drawn to Spain by her love of languages, she began performing in the streets of Barcelona a year later. “I played odd covers in the side streets of the ramblas a few times,” she recalls. “I didn’t make much money, I wasn’t very mainstream, but I met a lot of interesting people and became a good guitar player rehearsing for those ‘gigs’.” Her Spanish language and literature studies took her back to Oslo after six months, and from there she moved on, first to Bergen and then, in her mid twenties – thanks, inevitably, to romance – on to Stockholm. She’s called it home ever since, and now defines herself as Scandinavian.
“I believe that it matters where you come from,” she continues, discussing her work as an artist, “because the music you hear throughout your life becomes a part of a source of melodies, phrasing and tone. Growing up in Scandinavia means hearing and seeing music and culture from the English-speaking world combined with the Scandinavian culture. So I believe my music is of course influenced by old popular Scandinavian folk music – I can hear that in some of my songs – but I believe that it's more a result of me listening to pop, jazz, classical music and music from other parts of the world mixed with traditional music from Norway and Sweden.”
She first laid down demos while living in Bergen, but her debut album – 2003’s Spending Time With Morgan, named after her beloved acoustic guitar – was recorded a year after Brun moved to Stockholm. Inspired by Ani Di Franco’s independent approach – “her guitar playing was my school, and her way of releasing music independently was also very inspiring and became an example of an alternative to the traditional way of being an artist” – she set up a label with Ellekari Larsson of The Tiny, and, after securing distribution with V2, the album went on to win widespread acclaim. It was enough to encourage her to record a second, 2005’s A Temporary Dive, and to earn the presence of Ron Sexsmith, Teitur and Syd Matters within its tracks. The global response was even more enthusiastic, and all three were amongst those who appeared on a second album later that same year, Duets, whose collaboration with Madrugada ,‘Lift Me’, won her a Norwegian Grammy.
Though her distinctive style was informed early on by her fingerpicking and a remarkable voice, Brun has always exhibited a need to shift the shape of her songs, and her next release – 2007’s Live In Scandinavia – reflected this, her work rearranged to feature a string quintet. Two years later, following 2008’s Changing Of The Seasons – featuring string arrangements by Nico Mulhy, and the recipient of yet more critical plaudits – she released another live recording (and film), Live At Stockholm Concert Hall, the songs again taking on a new identity. “I feel that a recording is a piece of art itself,” she says, “maybe more than the song itself. Depending upon how you arrange and perform it, it can affect people in different ways. I tour quite a lot and play the same songs over and over, so to make touring interesting I need to be intrigued on stage, so after a while I need to change songs to make myself inspired. One of the perks of having your own label is you can decide what to release, and since my live shows have changed a lot over the years I felt like documenting them.”
It’s unlikely, however, that anything prepared her for what lay ahead. “I met Peter Gabriel after a show in Norway in 2005,” she remembers. “He came up to me and said, “Great set!” which made me very proud since I’ve listened to his music since I was 10.” Five years later she received an email asking if she would join him on his New Blood tour, both as support act and also as part of his show, performing – amongst other things – the role of Kate Bush for the rendition of ‘Don’t Give Up’. ”I’ve been very inspired by singing with him and the magnificent symphonic orchestra,” she says of the almost 50 gigs they shared. “The challenge of singing new stuff was great for me and my vocal technique, and has influenced my new album. The whole experience has given me a more open mind towards the fact that anything is possible. I am braver in many ways, without saying I've been a coward before. It's just that I've discovered more creative territories to conquer with my musical expression.”
Her audience, however, may not have expected the consequently huge leap that new album, It All Starts With One, represents. She denies there was any conscious effort to change, but admits that, “I've moved into new territories because it's been 3 years since my last album, and lots of music has passed through me since then. I've tried new directions on stage and singing with other artists. I've been inspired to break my musical boundaries. I've wanted to take risks to get to new places.” The result is her most extraordinary record to date. Produced by her friend Tobias Fröberg, it exhibits a bigger, more atmospheric sound, more extravagant arrangements and some of the most immediate melodies of her career. The compositions are also the result of a new approach to her writing. “I gave myself the liberty of writing the songs without making a fixed guitar/piano arrangement in the composing process,” she explains. “I just found chords l liked and focused on making a great melody and lyrics. I wanted to let the musicians and Tobias get the chance to use their potential in the studio to create a sound together with me. And to write songs in this way was very intuitive and free. The choice of not having a picking folk guitar as a basis of many of the songs made this album different, because it's the voice that leads the music forward somehow.”
The changes are apparent from the off, with opener ‘These Days’ seeing her delicate vocals accompanied by the soft hum of an organ and the distant roll of drums, like thunder on the horizon. ‘Do You Remember’ is a euphoric, almost tribal track that could be a more energetic take on Kate Bush’s ‘Cloudbusting’, characterised by three drummers and backing vocals from fellow Swedes First Aid Kit, while ‘Undertow’ is a widescreen epic that brings the album to a heartrending climax. Their size is deceptive, however. “The songs might feel bigger,” Brun explains, “but there's not really so much happening in them. There are not many musicians playing or many layers of music on top of each other. The sound is bigger than before, but it's still very open, almost three-dimensional. I want to keep the listener focused on the melody and the words. I guess that's why I've been so sparse. And somehow I feel that my expression gets even more space on this album then on some of the other recordings I've done.”
So, despite wider instrumentation than she’s previously employed on her studio recordings, including strings that recall Robert Kirby’s work for Nick Drake, the familiar essence of Ane Brun is still very much in evidence, as the achingly fragile ‘Oh Love’ and ‘Life Line’ prove, her voice still an angelic mixture of Billie Holliday, Beth Gibbons, Ella Fitzgerald and Dolly Parton. (She cites Jeff Buckley and Ray LaMontagne as further influences.) Her contemporaries have also queued up to show their respects once again, with Per Eklund (Lykke Li, Miike Snow) and Ola Hultgren (Loney Dear, thus Owls) taking their place behind the drumkit, Martin Hederos (Soundtrack Of Our Lives) on keyboards, and José Gonzales making a wonderfully understated appearance on ‘Worship’. “It took me not more than a second to realise that Jose’s voice was perfect for the song,” Brun reminisces. “Both me and Tobias know and respect José so much, and I've always wanted to sing with him. It does sound like a song made for him, doesn't it? But it wasn't!” For his part, Gonzales – who describes Brun as, “one of my favourite female folk artists” – says, “The repetitive and eerie vibe fits my taste perfectly. I really like how the song came out, and the album as a whole is awesome and beautiful. I feel proud to be part of it.”
The themes addressed on the record will be familiar to fans: “moving forward, dealing with things, difficult relationships, but also a lot about fighting and finding strength,” Brun summarises. “I am an optimistic person, but some of my music is written about rather pessimistic moments. I always tend to put in an element of hope in my darkness, though.” She admits that her evocative, impressionist work’s content is often very personal, but argues that, “It doesn't feel like I reveal myself that much, because many of the lyrics are about seconds or minutes of my life, and only I know the whole picture. I don't feel I'm leaving my diary out for everyone to see.” This time she’s also looked beyond her own surroundings, with ‘One’ inspired by recent events in the Middle East. “I wanted to write a song about how change starts,” she elaborates, “how someone’s initiative can make a whole society start a revolution or at least a change, how the individual has the power to take the first small step. I was trying to finish this idea during the dramatic weeks of January/February when the Arab revolutions started. I felt that strong energy from the young people, and it was then easy to finish the words for the song and to find the right energy in the vocals and the arrangements.”
It’s not the first time she’s confronted grander themes: No More Lullabies, a concert organised by Brun and graphic designer Johan Rutherhagen in 2009 to highlight environmental concerns for the Copenhagen Environmental Conference, has now developed into an artist network addressing wider issues. But, for the most part, Brun’s greatest strength lies in taking the intimate and articulating it, and the fact that she continues to pursue her path at her own speed, making her own choices, moving independently and cautiously, has ensured that she’s maintained her integrity, remaining entirely in touch with what it is that makes her so unique.
“For me it was right to take it slowly,” she concludes, “and to have the time to develop my music, my expression and my guts to step up on the big stages. I wanted to feel ready for every new step on the ladder, and not be thrown to the lions before I was ready. I also wanted to be present in what I was doing, and to do it for me, not for lots of people expecting things from me. The freedom of creativity is important, and I can't imagine how I would have done all these things without it.”
It All Starts With One, then. But, with her eighth album, Ane Brun can be typically, quietly confident that there’s no limit to how far it will lead…
You can rate this item one to five stars, but bear in mind you can do so only once. The higher the rating the higher the item will appear within the IHOUSEU Albums Chart!
Terms & Conditions• Privacy Statement• Accessibility Policy• Purchase Policy• IHOUSEU 2012 All Rights Reserved
