SARAH HILTZ SHARES TWO NEW SONGS RETCHING IN THE WINGS AND CALM FURY
SONGS EXPLORE THE SINGULARITY OF WOMEN’S ANGER, AS FEATURED ON FORTHCOMING ALBUM CALM FURY OUT ON MARCH 4
LEARN MORE ABOUT THE MUSIC IN THE FURY POD
LISTEN TO PREVIOUS SINGLES, MAY I RAGE, MAY I LOVE,
SWIM AND LOVE & RETREAT
"The first time we listened to Sarah Hiltz’ singles Swim, and Love & Retreat, we were instantly in love. Both songs have a timeless quality to them, as if they’ve always been there in your life,
bringing comfort to difficult chapters." - She Does The City
For the two tracks, Sarah drew from additional references, including Wisdom For Cooling The Flames by the late, great Thich Nhat Hanh and footage of Sinead O’Connor getting booed at Madison Square Garden for ripping up a photo of the pope in protest of the Catholic Church’s history and perpetuation of child abuse.
Sarah reflected on these inspirations, presenting a balanced contrast in her deep study of the topic. On the songwriting process, she adds:
"I knew I wanted to somehow capture what I’d seen in that video in song form, so when I headed to Banff for a songwriting residency in March 2019, Retching In The Wings was the first song I completed there. I started performing it live right away, and it remained a staple in my sets for a full year, until everything shut down because of the pandemic. The amount of times I sensed the room tense and even saw some folks shifting in their seats while I told the story about a woman being angry enough to do something about it, and about how I related to that, was astounding," Sarah says. "This sunk in over the course of a full year of playing this song and observing audience reactions, and I found it both disappointing and concerning. We are all human beings meant to experience the breadth of human emotion, including anger. That doesn’t have to be negative or even divisive. It’s true it might be uncomfortable, but discomfort and danger are not the same thing."
Sarah's follow up to Retching In The Wings, the album's title track - Calm Fury - became the most fitting oxymoron, with some of its themes prominently visible in the album artwork.
"I had been thinking about the idea of controlled burns—setting fire to unhealthy parts of a forest to prevent wildfires that could do much worse damage. And of course, there are safety measures whenever this happens—the blackline or the firebreak—places where the fire can’t easily reach. In the song, I’m recommending the listener to stay in those zones. I’m not coming for individuals with my anger, I’m not interested in tearing anybody down. But I am ferociously angry about systems that cause us harm and allow individuals to cause others harm, and I’m very interested in setting fire to those systems, for the sake of a healthier metaphorical forest for us all to live in."
Part of the research project involved attending a residency at the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity in March 2019. The tracks on the album go deep, looking at: how anger is processed in the body, communication with others, women’s anger and men’s response to it, how it can be used as energy, self-directed anger, justified anger, creativity & anger, and spirituality & anger.
More on Calm Fury:
Calm Fury brings a variety of sounds, arrangements and awesome collaborators into the fold. Sarah was less fixated on capturing a particular sound or arrangement for each song and instead focused on working with people who she felt would honestly engage with the subject and reflect it in their own performance. The album was recorded in Montreal by Howard Bilerman (Leonard Cohen, Arcade Fire) and includes guests, Charlotte Cornfield (drums/percussion), Colleen Brown (keys/vocals – of Major Love), Tara Kannangara (trumpet/vocals), Connor Walsh (bass), Rachael Cardiello (vocals – of Zinnia). Shae Brossard also assisted in the studio, while Sarah Thawer sat in as drummer on a couple of songs. Bruce Cawdron (Godspeed You! Black Emperor) added vibraphone, marimba and tenor glockenspiel across the album, with a feature by Fats Kaplin, performing pedal steel on another track.
Retching In The Wings features: Sarah Hiltz (Vocals, electric, acoustic), Connor Walsh (electric bass), Charlotte Cornfield (drums, percussion), Fats Kaplin (pedal steel), Colleen Brown (piano, background vocals), Tara Kannangara (background vocals), Bruce Cawdron (Vibraphone, marimba).
Calm Fury features: Sarah Hiltz (vocals, acoustic guitar), Charlotte Cornfield (drums, percussion), Connor Walsh (bass), Colleen Brown (background vocals, organ).
Last month, Sarah shared May I Rage, May I Love, waxing poetic on how anger connects with spirituality, and the concept of justified anger, and safe spaces. The video, directed by Sandi Barrett, captures stunning, monochromatic scenes of people in deep reflection, coming to terms with their anger and fears, meeting them in spaces with love and catharsis. Listen here and watch the visualizer here.
In 2021, Sarah kicked things off with Love & Retreat and Swim. On Love & Retreat, Sarah draws from the experience of fraught communication, using the setting of heated arguments and discussions, making this catalytic track the apex of the album as a whole. Listen here and watch the visualizer here. On Swim, Sarah looks at the experience of a lane swim as a method for diffusing anger in the body via a body of water. Listen to Swim and watch the lyric video here.
See the full tracklist for Calm Fury below, and stay tuned for more sonic studies from Sarah Hiltz ahead of the album launch next month.
Calm Fury Tracklist:
1.Retching In The Wings
2.Calm Fury
3.Love and Retreat
4.Swim
5.May I Rage, May I Love
6.Radio Silence
7.Move On
8.Bad Cycle
9.Darling, I Suffer
10.Daylight Savings
11.As Long As You're There
DOWNLOAD – Hi Res Press Photo (by Nick Wong)
DOWNLOAD – Hi Res Album Artwork (by Vicky Lam)
DOWNLOAD – Calm Fury Single Artwork
DOWNLOAD – Retching In The Wings Single Artwork
About Sarah Hiltz
Sarah Hiltz is a contemporary folk artist based in Toronto. Her current project has her researching the ways Canadians experience, express and suppress anger in modern society, especially women, and creating a song cycle in response.
Sarah’s last album, Beauty In The Blue, compiled songs and stories culled from her multiple journeys across Canada as a travelling musician on VIA Rail’s passenger train, “The Canadian." Beauty in the Blue features lush, nuanced vocals and jazz-influenced songwriting.
Sarah has independently released three full-length albums and two EPs since 2009. Her work over the last decade as a talented singer-songwriter has landed her Folk Music Ontario’s Songs From The Heart Award (Political Category), opening slots for Canadian icons Gordon Lightfoot and Ron Hynes, Top 3 placement in a nation-wide music competition (She’s The One), a Best Folk Album nomination (Toronto Independent Music Awards) and earned her an invitation to give a TEDx talk in 2014.