Learn More - Kirsten Jones

“Life is short,” sings Kirsten Jones, sounding like she’s ready to take
charge on the song “I Don’t Wanna Live Like This.” “You’re either in, or
you’re in the way,” she declares, with a bold honesty that is a hallmark
of all her songs.
Those lines speak to the life-changing decisions that the rootsy singer/
songwriter herself underwent in the years leading up to The Mad Mile, her
first major release. It was literally a sea change: Jones had her eureka
moment while sea kayaking in New Zealand, where she was caught in a
treacherous storm along a part of the coast known as the Mad Mile. Still
recovering from a divorce, she decided to seize the day upon her return
home to Toronto, where she quit her comfy office job and started pursuing
music full time.
She had a head start, recording a debut CD (Drive-In Movie) that was
well received on CBC stations across the country, even reaching #3 on
Galaxie’s Folk/Roots chart. This led to opening gigs for Jim Cuddy, Corb
Lund, Oh Susanna and Minnie Driver, among others. “But I knew that it
wasn’t ‘the’ album,” says Jones. “It was a start. The Mad Mile is what I’ve
been working toward my whole life.”
That meant taking no half-measures. So she set her sights on one of her
biggest influences, Gary Louris of the Jayhawks, and asked him to produce her record. The Jayhawks’ breakthrough album Tomorrow the Green
Grass had been extremely influential for Jones, and their 2003 album
Rainy Day Music soundtracked her New Zealand trip. He had also worked
with some of her favourite artists: the Dixie Chicks, Kelly Willis, Tift Merritt and Lucinda Williams to name a few. “I had his name in my head as
the only person I wanted to work with on this album,” says Jones. “It took
me a year to work up the courage to send him three songs. I looked up his
management company online and put a package in the mail.”
A few months later, Louris’s management got in touch, telling her “Gary
is interested in looking into this further.” Soon enough, Jones was meeting Gary Louris at the Toronto airport and they were co-writing songs
in her living room. Three days later, they had three new songs and had
finished all the preproduction for the recording.
The star power didn’t stop there. Jones had some of Toronto’s finest musicians backing her up in the studio, along with guests such as all-star
pedal steel player Greg Leisz (Emmylou Harris, Sheryl Crow, Alison
Krauss), Oh Susanna, and Blue Rodeo’s Bob Egan; at the last minute,
Egan’s bandmate Jim Cuddy signed on to sing the duet “Hold Me Closer.”
Her engineer, Denis Tougas (Sarah Harmer, Kathleen Edwards), has already
received a 2010 Juno nomination for his work on The Mad Mile, and
www.kirstenjones.com
Billboard Canada’s Robert Thompson recently selected Jones as one of
five acts to watch in 2010, noting “Jones is full of surprises…don’t be
surprised if a label comes knocking very soon” (January 2010).
It’s obvious what all these top-notch players heard in Kirsten Jones:
a gift for honest and melodic songwriting, as well as an immediately
engaging voice, one that Exclaim magazine called “smooth-as-buckwheat-honey.” It’s not only pitch-perfect but evocative and empathetic,
easily drawing listeners in to her lyrics, which are at once deeply personal
and universal. “I like songs that make you feel something without telling
you how to feel,” says Jones. I don’t like to be told ‘my wife left me,’ but
I do want to feel the way the writer or singer does. That’s what good art
strives to do.”
She continues, “What I love about being a singer/songwriter—and what
I love about my favourites—is connecting with people. If I’m in the audience and a performer like Emmylou Harris or Sarah Harmer can bring a
tear to my eye, then they’ve done a good job. At almost every one of my
shows, someone comes up and tells me a personal story about their mom,
about their divorce, about not knowing one of their parents. To be touched
by music is what drives me to do this.”
Though Jones is more than capable of gaining fans through her own singing and performing, it’s just as important to her that her songs have a life
of their own. Citing career artists like Patty Griffin and Lori McKenna as
models, Jones says her aim is to develop her own recording and performing career, with songs picked up by the likes of Faith Hill or the Dixie Chicks.
Based on the accolades she’s racked up so far, that shouldn’t be a problem. Two years in a row, out of 15,000 entries, Jones has made the
final 16 in the International Songwriting Competition in the Americana
category. Both songs, “Bittersweet Grand Canyon” and “You Ain’t Comin’
By,” are included on The Mad Mile. The latter was also a finalist in the
country category of 2009’s John Lennon Songwriting Contest, alongside
another one Canada’s revered songwriters, Gordie Sampson. In 2009, the
Canadian Country Music Awards invited Jones to perform for the second
year in a row at the prestigious Songwriter’s Cafe, where she has performed along with Jessie Farrell, Victoria Banks and Lisa Brokop. Jones
also received Honorable Mention for “I Will Love You Now” in the Nashville
Songwriter’s Association contest.
On “I Will Love You Now,” which she’s been asked repeatedly to sing at
wedding and funerals, she sings: “If I wait ‘til I’m sure/ or until my heart
is pure/Then I will wait forever.” There’s no more waiting: Kirsten Jones
is sure that she’s made the album she’s been working toward her whole
life—and that the world has been waiting to hear, whether they know it or not.