With the seasonal shift well underway, nothing is more inviting than some comforting warmth. Warm food, warm blankets, warm music. And Terra Spencer’s new album Chasing Rabbits brings the blanket fort vibe in spades. A collection of ten personal tales, Spencer’s storytelling capabilities are brimming with intimacy and connect the listener right to the songwriter’s heart.
Chasing Rabbits follows Spencer’s debut album Other People’s Lives from last year. For her, this album “is about what it means to come back home,” and that theme echoes clearly across the tracks. Detailing scenes and moments from her life and her connection to the loved ones involved, there’s more than a little Joni Mitchell energy present. Spencer wears her heart on her sleeve and proudly displays the importance of home for her, both literal and figurative, especially on “Feels Like Home.”
“It’s the break in your voice when you call
It’s the photos on my bedroom wall
It’s the words of an old favourite song
The feeling of where I belong”
Spencer’s voice sits as the key focal point of the experience of the album – everything feels situated around her caring timbre and the images it creates. While a decidedly folksy affair, the general sound of Chasing Rabbits is often driven by Spencer’s piano and accented by horns, strings, and choral harmonies that truly elevate the character of the tracks. The instrumentation emotes just as tenderly as the singer’s voice on closing track “Saigon“, in full lament of distance between lovers.
The lyrics for the album are often quite frank and factual, purple prose nowhere to be seen. But it can work wonders for some of the tales being told by Spencer. “Coyotes” exemplifies this, and differs the most tonally from the rest of the album. Strings and pedal steel lend an edge to the mood as the sheer tension of a deadly encounter with a wild animal unravels step by step, highlighting the arduous weight of the moment.
“With a mittened hand, I wrestled
Tried to free my granddad’s knife
Drove it deep into the soft fur
Of the dog to save my life”
Terra Spencer has a wealth of warmth within her work. There is a deep understanding of the preciousness of life in her work – which is no surprise coming from an artist with a career as a funeral director. Spencer reflects fondly throughout Chasing Rabbits, and even the more sombre thoughts come through with brightness. In a straightforward display of care for others, her intimate storytelling and melodic delivery make for compassionate comfort in the November nights.