entertainment

Jann Arden“I liken (the book) a little bit to songwriting in that you are honest in it,” Arden says. “In pop music you basically have three and a half minutes to tell your tale. When I was writing it there are lots of things I decided not to write about because I would never want to do anything to hurt my family any more then I already did. I just wanted to paint an accurate, really fair picture of life in the 1970s on the prairies – crock pots and wagon wheels and huffing gas and shooting shit and not understanding my parents’ relationship and how I fit in anywhere,” Arden told Outwords.

“What I really wanted to be aware of was to make it funny, you have to laugh through some of this stuff, and have to see the humour in it – my mom taught me that. She laughs in the face of sheer and total disaster and I just love that about her. She is so kind and funny and never feels victimized or that the world owes her anything. They worked hard all their lives and built their house. My parents aren’t famous, they haven’t written a book on physics or saved a baby out of a fire. They have never done any grand gesture they are just these really hard working, humble soldiers, the ones who are not noted. I guess this is my way of making sure they were noted.”

The book was released alongside Arden’s ninth studio album Uncover Me 2, her second album of covers. She hooked up with legendary producer Bob Rock to create the album. “Bob has a ton of pop sensibilities, Rock and Hyde and The Payolas in the 1970s had some massive hits. The work he has done with Michael Buble was extremely poppy. He is not a one-trick pony – he can do it all. Bob, (manager) Bruce Allen and I all came to the table with songs. The Smiths’ tune Last Night I Dreamt Somebody Loved Me I had never heard in my life. I love The Smiths but had never heard that song. He had me try a Stones tune and a Mark Cohen tune and some of it didn’t work but the stuff that did. I grew up listening to Fleetwood Mac and listening to Doris Day singing Que Sera Sera with my folks. There are five decades of music on there and probably an equal amount of songs from Bruce, Bob and myself.”

Since the release of 2009’s Free, Arden has been busy writing the book, but she hasn’t been writing music, something she intends to change this year. “I haven’t written one note, one song.  I am dedicating three-quarters of this year to writing and recording my next record.”

Arden hits the road for an extensive Canadian tour this winter, visiting the Pantages Playhouse in Winnipeg February 29. “I am not sure what to expect for this tour. We have yet to sit down with the lighting and stage directors to talk about the set. I don’t go to lengths where I am being lowered on a plastic horse in the middle of the arena or anything like that. I think our shows always look nice and the band looks and sounds great. There will be some surprises. Bruce and I have been talking about trying different things. It makes me laugh even thinking about it. It gets harder and harder each time I do a record to fit things into a two-hour context, people do need to pee at some point you can’t be having them sit there for three and a half hours.  We have a week of rehearsals before we hit the road so we will sort it out then.”

It will then be back to Toronto to film the second season of Canada Sings, the hit Global series that saw teams of everyday people form singing groups to compete for charity. Arden, Vanilla Ice and Simple Plan’s Pierre Bouvier had the unenviable task of deciding a winner each week. “It was really hard. They don’t want to be stars, they are groups of baggage handlers and doctors and teachers that are scared out of their wits, who are not performers and wanted to help their charities. For us it really tugged at our heartstrings. We wanted them to all be tied but that doesn’t make for good TV. So it had to be a democratic vote. We talked it out – the costumes and choreography and how they were singing and the mash-up choice, all that stuff factored into it. I am really looking forward to taping the next season.”