Singer-songwriter Sera Cahoone has her third solo album coming out on Tuesday, Sept. 25.
For those of you who have not heard of the Colorado native, her music is a mixture of country-western and modern indie-rock with a little lo-fi thrown in. She has toured with Lucinda Williams, Carissa’s Weird, Patrick Park, Band of Horses, and many more acts in the alternative-country type genre.
Sera Cahoone grew up in Littleton, Colorado, and began her pursuit of music at 11 years old. Ten years later, Cahoone moved to Seattle and quickly became one of Seattle’s strongest singer-songwriters in the Americana scene. In 2006, Cahoone focused her singing, songwriting and guitar playing skills on her first album: “Sera Cahoone,” which was praised by both KEXP, an idie-rock radio station, and NPR, a public radio network. The Stranger, an indie newspaper of Seattle, called her debut album “… a breathtaking collection of sad and dusky songs that reveal an artist of remarkable depth as well as a truly stunning voice.” A year later, Cahoone was signed to Seattle label Sub Pop Records, which was once home to bands such as Nirvana, Death Cab for Cutie, Mudhoney and many other artists from the Seattle scene. Sera’s first release under her new label was “Only As the Day Is Long,” which was released in 2008. Cahoone’s music consisted of gentle, airy arranges counter-acted by lyrics full of tension.
This latest album, “Deer Creek Canyon,” dives deeper than her previous albums, which usually concerned the complex agony of dark emotions. Cahoone told Rolling Stone that her album “is about the ever-present gravitational pull of home.” Although she has lived in Seattle, Wash., for 14 years, she considers Colorado her home. (This, of course, explains the title of her album. “Deer Creek Canyon” is the Colorado canyon she grew up near.) Her theme of “home” even stretches to the more personal songs that wrestle with love and friendship (“Worry All Your Life” and “Shakin’ Hands”).
True to her senses, she recruited the talents of her long-time live band (of pedal steel, acoustic guitar, banjo, dobro, bass, drums, violin, piano, organ and cello) for her latest album. The album was recorded in Woodinville, Wash., and co-produced in LA, with the help of Thom Monahan. According to her website (www.seracahoone.com), all of these factors “contributed to Cahoone singing from a firmer foundation this time around, trusting the simplicity, bending against the elements like those trees in Deer Creek Canyon.”
Whether you hail from Colorado, New York, Ghana or even Holland, Mich., this album deserves a chance. If you listen closely enough, the music may feel just like home.
