After a successful run with folk-country group The Be Good Tanyas, singer-songwriter Frazey Ford is embarking on a musical career of her own.
The Vancouver artist has been busy in recent years refocusing her creative energies on soul music since the dismantling of the folk music trio.
Her true passion for soul music runs through in Obadiah, her solo debut album, which was released last week.
"My true love is soul music," Ford says. "It's sort of where I wanted to go for a while."
Ford attributes her unique, creative sound in her new solo album to her colourful past.
She grew up under the influence of her free-spirited parents who fled to Canada from the U.S. during the Vietnam War.
"It was a hard time when my mother was pregnant," Ford says. "I feel like sorrowful music was a part of my inception and that has had a great influence on me."
Her parents lived in communes for a number of years before settling in the Kootenays. They raised Ford in an atmosphere rich with poetry, travel and Bob Dylan, she remembers.
Ford's music career began in her early adulthood when she met future bandmates Sam Parton and Trish Klein while living and tree planting in Nelson. The three girls later moved to East Vancouver where they began playing music together as a hobby. While Parton and Klein favoured early country and folk music, Ford spent her time researching early soul.
"We were like a little group of music nerds who liked exploring early music together," she laughs. "It blossomed into the Be Good Tanyas."
The East Vancouver alternative folk trio went on to produce three hit albums--Blue Horse, Chinatown and Hello Love--and were widely acclaimed in the music world with four-star reviews in Rolling Stone and sold-out concert halls across Europe and North America throughout the 1990s.
But Ford never lost her passion for soul, and when the group decided to split in 2008, she began to explore a new, distinctive sound of her own. On Obadiah, Ford lays down 13 soulful tracks with the help of former bandmate and guitarist Trish Klein, producer and musician John Raham and bassist Darren Harris.
Ford points to both her childhood and motherhood as inspiration for her new album.
She learned how to write not just about herself but those around her after becoming a mother seven years ago, she says.
"Parenthood is this huge shift in everyone's life," she says. "Your whole perspective changes. As soon as you're a parent, it's no longer about you."
"The writing I've done since I had my baby, I've been able to zoom out and go into different perspectives that are not necessarily about me," she adds. "My compassion is greater."
Following three Lilith Fairs shows including a recent stop in Vancouver, Ford continues her Obadiah tour throughout Canada, the U.S. and England.
While she's looking forward to working with Klein, Raham and Harris on the road, Ford hopes to figure out a way to incorporate her eco-conscious lifestyle into her touring, she says.
"I have big gardens here and I keep bees," she says. "Travel can be a little crazy and I definitely think the whole fossil fuel situation is so troublesome. It would be great if musicians could figure out a way to travel so we aren't always flying. You have to make it how you want it I think."
nscallan@nsnews.com