EXPRESS YOURSELF

FRAZEY Ford leans back in her sofa and looks out across the red-tiled rooftops of Lisbon, shielding her eyes from the late-afternoon Portuguese sun. She is telling us about a recent recurring nightmare, involving a fantastical journey in the company of her son, Saul. “I was driving a car on the highway,” she begins. “Saul is in the back. And where even is the road? You know, a life-out-of-control nightmare. At the end of the dream, we’re flying off into the night, we can’t see the road. Then we land, get out of the car. We’re sat in Portugal, at a market, in a perfect parking spot.”

Ford has been experiencing this nightmare intermittently for the past six months. Coincidentally, her backing singer Caroline Ballhorn – unaware of Ford’s nocturnal anxieties – suggested they visit Lisbon while in Europe for a festival appearance. Interpreting Ballhorn’s suggestion as a good omen, Ford decided to temporarily relocate from her native Vancouver to Lisbon’s busy city centre. “I came because of the dream,” she continues. “The other day we were walking by a market and I said, ‘This is the fucking market from my dream!’ It does feel as if everything kind of magically came together…”

Here in Lisbon, Ford has had time to reflect on her much delayed third solo album, – and how her 20-year career has led her to this point. As one third of The Be Good Tanyas, Ford dug deep into the roots of US folk and country; but since striking out on her own with 2010’s , Ford has been pursuing a more quietly ambitious agenda. Recorded with a bunch of empathic musicians who worked at Memphis’ Hi Records during the label’s ’70s golden era, her 2014 follow-up incorporated country, soul and jazz in one beguiling package. “Frazey cares about traditional music in the US,” says her occasional tourmate, Hiss Golden Messenger’s MC Taylor. “Not ‘traditional’ meaning acoustic guitar and banjo, but types of rhythm that have been passed down throughyields even more astonishing riches. This new album builds on its predecessor adding a dash of understated funk to the mix or what Ford wryly calls “pagan disco”. The first fruits of her new record emerged last October – “The Kids Are Having None Of It”, carried along on spare, country soul grooves and topped off with Ford’s rich, emotive and expansive vocals. A protest song for the Trump era, the accompanying video featured mothers and children from Ford’s community in Vancouver all brought together by a shared desire to stand up for their beliefs. It presents Ford as a positive role model in complex and difficult times. “I feel like Frazey’s really in her power now,” says her former Be Good Tanyas bandmate Trish Klein. “She’s come a long way from the naive, wistful hippie children we once were. But she’s not a cynic. She still believes there’s hope, because she’s surrounded by youth. Being a parent in that community is a big part of her life.”