I first heard about Rose Cousins in 2009, when she joined Ana Egge in lending backing vocals to Joel Plaskett’s triple LP Three. That big stack of wax plays as Plaskett’s definitive statement on his past, present, and future – and Cousins and Egge’s harmonies weave in and out of those 27 tracks like a Greek chorus in the Nova Scotian’s odyssey. At La Sala Rossa, however, I saw firsthand that Rose Cousins is not just a bit player in someone else’s story. She has her own emotional sagas to share.
Fresh-faced folk trio Port Cities served up a pretty and sincere introduction to a mostly-seated Sala Rossa, but they made sure to play all the way to the gaggle of us standing at the back of the room. Friends and singer-songwriters from Cape Breton, Dylan Guthro, Breagh Mackinnon, and Carleton Stone have combined their forces and voices to produce an earnest collection of stories about romances gone bad, good, and maybe (at least in the case of ode to adultery “On the Nights You Stay Home”) somewhere in between.
With Guthro on electric guitar, Mackinnon on keys, and Stone on acoustic guitar, the members of Port Cities seamlessly trade lead vocal duties from song-to-song, gliding through smooth-as-butter tunes like “Back to the Bottom” and “Sound of Your Voice”. But they also share vocals during songs too, with harmonies that prove this group is a true sum of parts and no slave to any one ego. That’s why they have no trouble offering up an in-your-house concert to one lucky raffle winner at the merch table. It’s only with this kind of passion, humility, and teamwork that a band can have the trust in themselves and eachother to climb down from the stage and play – completely unamplified – to the crowd of strangers around them. Port Cities may have only just released their first album – but this is definitely just the beginning of their story.
When the intermission lights dimmed and Rose’s band took to the stage, I swear I heard someone in the audience yell out: “Make me cry!” This is the rowdiest the crowd would get, largely composed of a particularly chilled-out and polite slice of the CBC Radio demographic – but the joking cry for crying would very likely get what they bargained for. With her first tune alone, the plaintive opener on her new record Natural Conclusion, Rose put her heart on her sleeve and brought the crowd to its butts. Right from the start, with lyrics grounded in the #relatablecontent of inadequacy and doubt (“I will never live up to this portrait / I’m just posin’ / I don’t know if I have what it takes / to be chosen”) and a voice that is both strong as hell and achingly vulnerable, Cousins took full advantage of the intimate Sala Rossa to connect with her people.
But even though the melancholy of “Chosen” is a recurring motif on the album and in her performance, songs like the rockier “Chains” and jazzy “Lock and Key” prove that Rose still finds some hope and grit beneath the doom and gloom. This is helped in no small part by the musical and emotional support of her band, a four-piece featuring drum, guitar, upright bass, and pedal steel. At many times throughout the night, particularly during her migrations between guitar and keyboard, Cousins explained how important it was for her to be touring with these boys – a first in her career. It’s clear that there’s a lot of love between all of them, and this interplay adds real warmth and community to songs that might otherwise feel too sad and lonely. During one interlude, Rose introduced each band member and their cocktail-of-choice, letting the crowd share in some inside jokes before sincerely dedicating “Tender is the Man” to her group of “tender men”.
Because her songs are so shot through with regret, longing, and confusion, it might be easy to caricature Cousins as a sad sack, but that would mean wrongly dismissing her songs’ universal experiences and feelings as affectation. What’s more, it would completely ignore her very sharp and self-aware sense of humour – the kind that produces the not-so-subtle fuck-you of “My Friend” and proudly shills t-shirts that say “Rose Cousins Made Me Cry”. Still, even with the jokes, Rose never fails to treat the musical experience with absolute reverence and respect. Whether it’s with an impassioned cover of The Tragically Hip (“Gift Shop”) or her own tributes to the healing power of song (“Donoughmore”, “Freedom”), Rose Cousins has no trouble using music to make the crowd a part of her ongoing story. It might not always be an easy path, but she’s happy to share it.
Review – Dan Corber
Photos – Steve Gerrard
