Mountain FM

 

On oh little fire, her first album in five years, Harmer sounds reinvigorated and positively charged. In the years after touring her last studio release, the Polaris Prize-nominated I’m a Mountain, she set music aside to focus on political and environmental campaigns, helping to shepherd PERL (Protecting Escarpment Rural Land), the organization she co-founded. Only on occasion did she venture into the studio, lending backup vocals to artists such as Neko Case, Howie Beck, and Great Lake Swimmers. Her own music and lyrics were waiting for the opportune time to burst out: as she sings on “Careless,” “All the words that I’ve held too close to my chest / Are calling on me now to get through.”

oh little fire was recorded in a Toronto east end studio run by producer Gavin Brown (Metric), and on Wolfe Island, near Kingston. The songs reflect this dual genesis: “The City,” with its chiming power-pop punch, tells of “places to meet up under the light,” in rained-out streets, while “New Loneliness” is a spooky, spacious track that references canoeing, insects, and “wandering white-tailed deer.”oh little fire was recorded in a Toronto east end studio run by producer Gavin Brown (Metric), and on Wolfe Island, near Kingston. The songs reflect this dual genesis: “The City,” with its chiming power-pop punch, tells of “places to meet up under the light,” in rained-out streets, while “New Loneliness” is a spooky, spacious track that references canoeing, insects, and “wandering white-tailed deer.”