By Sam Littlefair-Wallace, Arts Contributor
Apparently, Americans don’t listen to Sam Roberts. But luckily for us, people from Halifax do.
Last year the Canadian rock and roll musician recorded his fifth album, Collider, in Chicago. The album debuted at number three on the charts in Canada, but didn’t chart at all in the States. Roberts followed the release by touring across Canada and America.
On March 9, he’ll be taking the tour to Halifax. It will be Roberts’ first show at the Halifax Forum, though not his first in the city. On the morning of March 2, Roberts, a 37-year-old stay-at-home dad, took a break from parenting to chat with the Gazette.
“The thing about playing in Halifax is it doesn’t matter what venue we play,” said Roberts. “It’s the crowd, really. That’s the magic of the east coast. The depth of the love of music there is just on its own scale. Music is a big parts of people’s lives out there… it’s on the tips of everybody’s tongue all the time. People play instruments. People sing. People place music—in my mind—where it ought to be placed, in a spectrum of civilization or society. They give it a place of honour, which is where I feel it belongs.”
The first single, “I Feel You,” from his latest album, Collider, came out a year ago. The album marks a more rhythmic, brassy sound for Roberts, which is inspired by the album’s birthplace: Chicago. Roberts and his band went to Illinois to search for creativity, and they found it, infusing it into the new album.
Though Roberts basks in his Canadian fame, his success has floundered on the international scene. Music listeners outside of Canada have yet to start buying Roberts’ albums in large numbers.
“I take pride in what I do, and sometimes too much so, for sure, where I just don’t get why people don’t see in it what I see in it.
“When I write a song I’m like, ‘man, who’s not gonna like this song?’ Well, it turns out that a hell of a lot of people don’t like the song. All the people sitting there and listening to Rihanna and Katy Perry, they don’t like that song even though you’re like ‘are they fools? Are they not hearing what I’m hearing here?’ But they don’t.”
Roberts explained that this level of self-confidence is necessary to succeed as a musician.
“You need that pride in what you do, because it helps you see something through from start to finish,” he said. “But there’s gotta be a point where you have to let go of that. I struggle with that, for sure. Especially when I make a record, I’m like, ‘this is the one, man, this is it, this is gonna blow the doors wide open. Not just here, but everywhere!’” Roberts laughs, “Six months later, you’re scratching your head, going, ‘Why is it that the world doesn’t see things the same way that I do?’”
That may change soon, as Roberts just completed a two-day-long photo shoot for *Esquire* magazine in the California desert. Roberts was placed with four other musicians, who he wasn’t permitted to name. Each of them had to write a song and then had 90 minutes to record it.
Roberts said that more than anything, he felt relief as he finished his 90-minute recording session. He described the challenge as “like an exam that you haven’t studied for. And you’re at the end of the exam, the allocated time, and you’re sitting there staring at a blank page. That could easily have happened.”
Already, he forgets what the song sounds like. “I’m looking forward to getting a mix back, though,” said Roberts.
On stage, he’s more comfortable.
Five minutes before a show starts, Roberts and each of his band mates take a shot of whiskey and wait.
“We’ve done it enough times. We’re in there, joking around a bit, trying to keep the mood light, and then the lights go down, and then you walk out on to the stage and it’s like you’re crossing the threshold into a whole other world. It’s almost a physical sensation… It’s like you’ve gone through a teleportation device.”
“What I’m looking for, in a selfish way, is that feeling of unconscious communication, where I’m not trying to do anything. I’m not trying to remember the words of the song, I’m not trying to put my fingers on the guitar, I’m not trying to get the crowd to do this or that—I’m just giving it. Fortunately, that’s a state for me that I get to more often than not.”
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