The Weather Station

As the Canadian folk band touches down for a series of Australian performances, including at the Woodford Folk Festival and Sydney Festival, Lindeman talks about memory, voice, and the revelation that she is actually supernatural.

“It’s quite a complex feeling,” Lindeman explains of balancing her acting self and life as a musician. Her voice is very quiet but also very warm; an observation of her singing that many critics have championed. “They are definitely two different things in two different worlds. I mostly acted as a teenager and my early 20s, and then fell in love with music. Once I started making records, especially in the beginning, I kept them very separate. I didn’t want it to overlap.

“I think a lot of people who buy my records don’t know I’m an actor, which is just great. Making music is what I do; it’s my words, my ideas, I’m in charge. Acting, it isn’t about me at all. It’s a matter of helping someone else realise their vision. I don’t really see it as something that has very much to do with me. It’s the least amount of artistic expression in a lot of ways, because there are so many cooks in the kitchen. Producers, directors, writers. Your ideas, well, people listen to them, but they tend to be pretty low in priority.”

Lindeman laughs without bitterness. Her memories of acting seem to be quite cherished, though she doubts the likelihood of stepping in front of a camera again anytime soon. Of these past roles, her time in Australia filming the young adult series Guinevere Jones is recalled with particular fondness, although the experience also proved a watershed moment in the overlap of art and life. It seems such a strange testament; a television series marking you at a certain age, a certain place, cemented in time while your own life moves on.

“It’s not so much about being pinned to a time,” Lindeman says. “I really enjoyed making Guinevere – it was a really beautiful time in my life and I loved the people I worked with. I loved living in Melbourne. But at the end of the day, that is still just a character that I played, and I think especially when I was younger, I found it very difficult. People always wanted you to be that character, they wanted you to be something you weren’t. It’s less that it’s strange to have these pictures of yourself as a 17-year-old floating around, as much as it’s a strange thing to reclaim your identity out of that experience. Even though that person is me, looks like me, it wasn’t.”

The Weather Station’s latest release, Loyalty, saw the band relocate to France for recording, which happened to occur in one of the most atmospheric locations you can imagine: a crumbling mansion surrounded by garden in the middle of winter. It’s the kind of studio you expect must be haunted by a governess and her spectral murdered children, but the surroundings inspired Lindeman to produce what is perhaps the band’s strongest record yet.

“The studio was a small mansion. You’d drive up to it and it’s surrounded by a ten-foot-high stone wall, you punch in a code into this very old metal gate, and you drive into what seems like The Secret Garden. It’s crazy! Just being there made me feel like we had to make something special. Being there felt kind of magical. Everything in this place was so beautiful, it made me want to make a beautiful record. I was less afraid to sit down at a piano and just play something beautiful, since beauty isn’t something that I’m usually thinking about. I’m usually thinking more about the meaning of the song, the form. But in this case I really just felt that beauty.”

It is indeed a simple yet stunning album, sustained by Lindeman’s achingly pretty voice. She sings in hushed, conspiratorial tones, as though each song is a story for you and you alone. Descriptions of her singing style have drawn some colourful terms over the years: mystic, ghostly, nimble, eternal. It makes her sound less a musician and more like a water sprite. Lindeman laughs again.

“I’ve thought about this. The sound of my voice is just my voice, it’s always been there. It’s not something I had to create … I don’t think about whether or not it’s haunting. A water sprite – well, maybe. I just want to talk to you, and my voice just happens to be quiet. When I try to belt, it takes on all of these tonal qualities that I don’t really like.

“The thing I think about the most, though, is how to be expressive. Some people try to express when they sing, but you don’t feel anything. Some people – like Neil Young or Willie Nelson – they don’t have particularly expressive voices, but you really feel something strong when they sing. That’s what I try to think about the most. How to best use the tools I have.”