It’s the first time in years that Kristi Lane Sinclair has unveiled new music.
The day her new single Break is released to the world, the award-winning, singer-songwriter admits she “didn’t want to record these songs.”
Break is the lead single off an upcoming album called Super Blood Wolf Moon and is described as a true account of what it is like to live with domestic violence and post-traumatic stress disorder.
Sinclair says she had to be nudged into recording some of the more personal songs on the album.
“It sounded like the biggest emotional cutting you can do but I think it was my bass player Anna who said this happens all the time and it’s not talked about and there are certain people who have a voice and you’re one of them so you have to,” says Sinclair on the latest episode of Face to Face.
“And I was like dammit,”
Break is the first of four planned singles leading up to the album’s fall release. The song features the throat signing of the late, Inuk singer-songwriter, Kelly Fraser.
Sinclair says the song is “hyper-personal” for her.
“It came after domestic abuse. I had PTSD and basically, I had two broken hand, so, I wrote this teaching myself to play guitar again,” she says. “Just processing and trying to make an accurate description of that event. So, for me it was just like total therapy.”
Sinclair says she is by no means a role model but hopes sharing her story can help other people dealing with similar issue, find comfort.
“Getting the message out there and talking about it, because I feel like stuff like this isn’t talked about and I even had friends say ‘you can’t post about this, you won’t work again.’ And you’re like embarrassed. I’m a six foot tall, Haida-Cree woman, nobody takes me down. But it could absolutely happen to anyone,” says Sinclair.
In press material, the new album is described as a little bit of Bach and a little bit of Smashing Pumpkins. Sinclair says that’s pretty accurate given she studied Bach on classical guitar and loves grunge music.
Sinclair, who won the Indigenous Music Award for Best Rock Album in 2017, says this is the longest she’s ever spent writing and then holding onto music.
Four music videos have already been made and a new single is expected in March.
