ARIA-Award winning country singer-songwriter Shane Nicholson hasn’t taken long to release his tenth album, ‘Love And Blood’, but for him it feels like a while.
Shane has kept a very busy schedule since the release of his last album, 2015’s ‘Hell Breaks Loose’, producing albums for other artists in his home studio. “Producing is one of my big focuses or has been lately,” Shane says.
“I’ve basically got about three or four albums for other artists in various stages of completion. I made about 12 albums last year. It’s my favourite place to be. I love all the other parts of being a musician, but none of it compares to being in the studio.
"I needed to create some space to be a listener and love music [again] and find that feeling that as 13-year old made me want to write songs."
"I live above the studio, so I pretty much get out of bed and roll down the stairs. I don’t even have to get dressed. That’s my definition of success,” he jokes.
Now it’s Shane’s turn to release music following the well-received ‘Hell Breaks Loose’ with his tenth studio album, ‘Love And Blood’. Shane sees the album as a summation of where he is now. "I guess it’s my most current survey of the human condition. That’s what most of my records are and what they continue to be.
“I noticed that what changes isn’t so much the subject matter, it’s your perspective as you get older and write from different points of view with a different mindset. It’s been interesting watching that evolve; my take on one subject is different than it may have been twenty years ago when I first started releasing records.”
Shane had been through a lot before making his newest album. He became single again after a divorce from Kasey Chambers and had suffered from writer’s block. “I learnt it was because I’d been working so much in music I hadn’t been listening to it as a listener and just enjoying it, which is the thing that inspires me the most to be creative and write music.
“I’ve learnt over the years that I needed to create some space to be a listener and love music and find that feeling that as 13-year old that made me want to write songs in the first place.”
In order to write songs, Shane sought isolation to keep his mind clear. The place that inspired him was the Hawkesbury River, located near his home on the Central Coast. “Every album I’m trying to find somewhere new and this house on the Hawkesbury had no phone service or internet or anything like that.
“I would just get up to the river, travel down the river in the boat, set-up at the house and write for a few days. Sometimes I’d just sit out in the boat and lie on the floor with the anchor out and write songs. I wrote a lot of the last album in the outback in the red centre and this one physically on the water, so it’s the complete antithesis of the last process. Maybe I’ll do the next one on a space station,” he laughs.
'Love And Blood’ was made with returning producer Matt Fell in his Sydney studio. Compared to the writing process, the making of the album was much easier. “We didn’t even really think about it,” Shane explains.
“We just made the record or kind of let it make itself in a way. I used to be such a control freak in the studio and be quite hands-on and one thing I’ve learned through becoming a producer for other people was that kind of involvement on that level in my own music isn’t always beneficial because I’m not objective and don’t have any terms of perspective.
“The last few albums I’ve been handing that over to a really good friend of mine, Matt Fell. He’s been handling production on my albums and I’ve been operating more like an artist. I just get to sing and play and enjoy the process.”
The first single from the album is ‘Safe’, a song about wanting to protect the one you love. “We knew ‘Safe’ was special as soon as we did it,” Shane says.
“It came up very easily and had a really strong vibe about it. I’m excited to have that as the first single and my girlfriend is excited because it was a gift I wrote for her. She’s very excited to hear a song on the radio about her, so I’ve won some brownie points with that one.”
The music on ‘Love And Blood’ is brighter than the stark ‘Hell Breaks Loose’. Shane believes this change is because he and Matt have “taken what we know works and just pushed it a little bit further into an area we haven’t worked in before”. They did this by incorporating new musicians and instruments to give the songs different personalities.
A notable addition is James Greening, who added horns to the stomping ‘God’s Own Army’, with Shane praising him for “sounding like an entire New Orleans street band just by playing all these different instruments one after the other. He’s incredible!”
‘Love And Blood’ is stacked with guests including Imogen Clark and Josh Pyke. But one that left Shane starstruck was American country singer Buddy Miller, whose vocals appear on ‘One Trick Pony’. “He’s been one of my idols for a long, long time. I really wanted to record a song with him; it’s always been on my bucket list. To hear someone that you admire so much singing lyrics you wrote is always a cool thing.”
Touring will be the next thing on Shane’s mind, with shows happening over the next few months. An early date will be at the Broadbeach Country Music Festival on the Gold Coast, which will act as a launch for the album. “Touring has always been a little bit of a thorn in my side,” Shane admits.
“I love the playing part, but I’ve never been too fond of the travel part. It had been a gruelling decade of touring and I wasn’t looking forward to touring it, but the last one went so well and the crowds were so good; it was like a whole new chapter. I enjoyed the tour so much it reignited my vigour. I haven’t felt that for the last few albums, but now I’m excited.”
‘Love And Blood’ is released 28 July, 2017. Shane Nicholson plays Broadbeach Country Music Festival (Gold Coast) 29-30 July.
