Sarah McLachlan was on a cruise off the coast of California recently when the political shifts that have taken place in the United States hit her squarely in the face. “It was so funny,” says McLachlan, a native Canadian. “You know instantly who the Republicans and the Democrats are. The Democrats sought me out and said, ‘We’re so sorry.’ And then I’d speak to some other people who are, ‘Yeah, we know this is a bit of a disruption, but things will settle down soon.’”
A lot has changed, politically, culturally, and musically, in the decade since the singer-songwriter — and face of the Nineties’ all-women Lilith Fair tour — released her last album of original music, 2014’s Shine On. In the Nineties, McLachlan’s style of emotive pop nestled alongside grunge and West Coast hip-hop on the charts, providing a comforting alternative to far more in-your-face music. But even with her success, and that of Sheryl Crow, Alanis Morissette, and more, the idea of a festival entirely devoted to women artists was considered a huge risk. That didn’t deter McLachlan: From 1997 to 1999, she oversaw Lilith Fair, a tour that showcased artists from Fiona Apple, Emmylou Harris, Tracy Chapman, Monica, and the Pretenders, to Bonnie Raitt, Liz Phair, Indigo Girls, Suzanne Vega, and Mary Chapin Carpenter. It was a massive success and a cultural moment.
Now, McLachlan is ready to return. In September, she’ll release the album Better Broken, a collection of songs both new and long in gestation that chronicle two breakups, strained relationships with her oldest daughter, and the war on women. Working with new producers, Tony Berg and Will Maclellan, instead of longtime cohort Pierre Marchand, she’s also fashioned an album that adheres to her trademark sound but blends in elements of light funk and country.
By Zoom from her home in Canada, McLachlan talked about the legacy of Lilith Fair, why a 2010 version failed, and what inspired her to make a new album after more than a decade — as well as the ubiquitous ASPCA ad that introduced her ballad “Angel” to a whole new audience.
Other than a Christmas album a few years ago, Better Broken is your first record in 11 years. Why so long?
Just life happened. I’m the principal fundraiser for the Sarah McLachlan School of Music [in Vancouver]. I was raising two teenagers. I actually wrote a whole lot of songs about a breakup. “Wilderness” is the cornerstone of the demise of that relationship. [Sample lyric: “There’s no pretty words to dress up the betrayal as anything but what it is/So I guess I can blame you cause my heart is shattered.”] I wrote a bunch more, and I played them all for Tony and Will. And as I was playing them, I felt, “I don’t want to give this that much energy. I’m so done with that. What’s the best song from here?” “Wilderness” was the best song. So we saved that. And I had “Rise,” and I did not want to wait. I just felt like I want this song to come out, so I needed to start recording.
“Rise” touches on modern times but with a hopeful outcome: “This time is gonna be different/I heard it on the news/Men are gonna lay their weapons down/Women keep the right to choose.”
I started to write that with Luke Doucet, who I’ve written a bunch of stuff with, coming out of Covid before Ukraine, before Israel and Hamas, before Roe v. Wade was overturned. The idea was born of thinking Covid would bring all of us together. It would remind us of our shared humanity and that we all need each other. But I saw everybody getting pulled apart. I’m like, “Oh man, this is so disappointing. This was a beautiful opportunity for us to come together.” And it clearly didn’t work out that way.
For me personally, it’s imperative to continue to stay hopeful. There are days it’s very challenging, but I have to believe in the good of humanity, that more of us are intrinsically good than bad, and that we just want what’s best for our families. So yes, the song is hopeful. Let’s create this more utopian vision of how things could be if we remembered that we weren’t all that different.
Given how much pop has changed since your last record, what was your musical goal going into this one?
If this was going to be my last record — because I thought it was — I wanted to try something new. I worked with [producer] Pierre Marchand for years and years, and I absolutely love and adore him and I love those records. But I thought if this is my last record, I feel like I owed it to myself to push myself and challenge myself with new people.
You thought this could be the last album you’d make?
I don’t know why I thought it was. Maybe because I was away from the industry for so long. I kept doing gigs here and there, and I was so involved with my kids and my music school, and I thought people don’t make records anymore. And because it took me 11 years to have enough material, I thought, “Well, hell, I’m gonna be really old [for another one]!”
The other thing is that making a record is the fun part. Then you have to leave and promote it and tour. I always struggle with that part, and the older I get, the more I struggle with it, because I’m a homebody. I love my routine. The last time I did a record, it was nine months of promotion. And it didn’t move the needle. I’m like, “Really? Nine months and I didn’t sell any records?” That is a luxurious position to be in, and I’m fully aware of that. But I think there was some trepidation that going out to promote the record, to do it justice, I need to do a significant amount of work. But this was such a joyful process that I can’t wait to go make another record now.
Some of the album adheres to the sound people expect from you, and other songs take unexpected musical twists.
Ballads like “Gravity,” “Wilderness” and “Only Human,” those to me are the traditional “old Sarah.”
Your brand, if you will.
I don’t want to use that word, but it’s kind of my vibe, right? But we got to explore all these other vibes. We were struggling with “The Last to Go.” Here’s another, slow piano ballad; 76 BPM is my happy place. But it was like, “We need to do something different here.” Will created this beautiful drum track and all these weird sounds, which took the song out of the maudlin place it was in and makes it cool. I’m terribly uncool. But it felt cool to me. Same with “Better Broken,” which has this almost Prince-ish guitar stuff.
“Reminds Me” has pedal steel and is almost country.
Like a lot of people, I went down the Yellowstone rabbit hole during Covid and fell in love with the cowboy vibe and that kind of country music. So I thought I’d try and write a cowboy love song. Thank God for that song, because we needed some levity on the record. It’s definitely emotional whiplash, because the record goes all over the place. But there are a couple main themes that keep playing throughout it.
Troubled relationships, for sure, with lyrics like “So I walk on with this rage and with this hunger/With this insatiable desire to take you down/But it’s leading me into my darkest corner/Where there’s no peace to be found” from “Only Way Out Is Through.”
Oh, yeah. I kissed some fucking frogs, man [laughs]. I went through some shit. Reclamation of self is a big recurring theme. Finding my footing again a couple times after getting divorced. That was 13 or 14 years ago now, but these relationship themes kept coming up. As a writer, you’re going back and looking historically and I realized I have a ton of patterns I kept revisiting.
What sort of patterns?
Staying in relationships too long, conceding too much, giving in, giving away everything and getting very little in return, which all boils down to having a lack of enough self-worth to stand up for myself and say, “I deserve better than this.” I’m a product of my mother, who was chronically depressed her whole adult life. She was angry and bitter and resentful for her limitations, limitations placed on her and that she allowed to happen, due to what it was like in the Fifties and Sixties.
I started thinking “I’m going to do things so differently.” And as you get older, you go, “I’m kind of doing the same thing here. I need to break these patterns.” I’m 57 years old, and I’m still learning. My youngest daughter is about to leave for university. I’m going to be an empty-nester. So there’s another death but this beautiful birth for her to go out in the world and start to build her own life. But for me as a parent, as a mother, it’s a little bit devastating.
Are you a believer in the “pain is art” school of songwriting?
Doesn’t hurt! [Laughs] I think my best stuff is derived through suffering personally, because when I am struggling, that’s when I want to write. That’s when I’m trying to find a way through and music has always been that vehicle for me. It’s hard to write when I’m happy. I just want to enjoy it.
Talk about “Is This the End …,” which has a Celtic feel.
That started out as a little lick on a guitar, all the high strings. Tony said, “You know what this reminds me of? There’s this movie from the Fifties about the end of the world called On the Beach. It’s set in Australia and they know what’s coming and they all walk out on the beach and sing ‘Waltzing Matilda.’” We’d been talking about the end of the world a lot, between the environmental challenges and political ones and everything else. I’m a very positive person. But I keep thinking that this is actually a possibility, because things are getting really dark.
Anyway, he told me about On the Beach, and I said, “I’m going to write about that.” We got a lot of people who had played on the record and a bunch of their friends to come in. We fed them a lot of tequila, and everybody sang the chorus at the end. It’s joyful and fun but really fucking sad. If this was the end, what do I want to do? I’d want to go out and surf.
It’s like a companion piece to “Morning Dew,” the Bonnie Dobson song that was also inspired by that movie.
Oh, I did not know that!
What strikes me about the breakup songs on the album is that unlike some modern pop hits on that topic, which aren’t afraid to be overly dramatic and use expletives, yours seem pretty civil.
Well, I’m not 19. I don’t have that same angst. That’s not where I naturally go. I have a different kind of angst [laughs], more measured. I suppose that if I wrote in a journal, there’d be way more “fucks” in there. But language is really powerful, and I want to articulate things in a way that’s still poetic and conjures up a lot of different images, but doesn’t necessarily spell it all out. I know I have been that way a couple times on this record. I played “Wilderness” for my daughter the other day, and she looked at me and said, “Be careful dating a songwriter!” That one’s a bit on the nose. But I don’t need to talk about what it’s about. It’s abundantly apparent.
Last year you returned to the road with a 30th anniversary tour playing Fumbling Towards Ecstasy, which felt like your first step back into the limelight.
It’s always a little nerve-wracking. I don’t have the stamina I had at 25 or 30. I certainly discovered that with the last tour, where I basically blew my voice out before the tour even started, and was on steroids the whole time just to get through and did some damage. I had to do vocal rest and rehab. So I’m learning my limitations, and maybe shouldn’t sing for seven hours straight after you haven’t done that for a while.
What did you learn from that tour and revisiting those songs?
There’s a lot more gray hair out there! I see a lot of people who have grown up with me, who are my age. But I see a lot of mothers and daughters too, and I’ve talked to tons of them who say, “My mom introduced me to your music, and now I’m a big fan.”
How are you preparing for any eventual touring you’ll do in this country, given the tariffs and new scrutiny of visas?
It’s not on my radar yet, because it’s so far in the future. But I will do everything I can to come and play. I have an 01 [non-immigrant] visa and, as of today, I’m still allowed to travel back and forth due to the exceptional job I have, which I’m not taking away from an American. But honestly, anything could change at any time. My daughter’s going to college in California next year. Last week, she ran into my room in tears, saying, “They’re taking away all the international student visas!” I said, “Let me look,” and realized, no, that’s not quite what it is. But there’s this constant tugging this way and that way.
You’ve also been politically outspoken in the past. What’s your feeling of taking those stances given the change in administration in the U.S.?
I’ve always tried to let my music speak for how I feel. There are a couple of songs on the new album that are very much about what’s going on in the world now. I’m way less afraid to be more outspoken about it than I ever have been in the past. The challenge is that I might not be allowed back in the country, so I have to be thoughtful about all of it. I have a daughter in Los Angeles, and I want to be able to visit her, so I’m going to be measured.
It’s crazy that we’re even having this conversation.
I think about it every day and every time I do a media interview. These are the kind of questions you and everybody else are now asking me: “How do you feel about this?” I have my public voice, and I have my private voice, and I’m trying to figure out what the sweet spot is. What I’m showing you here is that I’m not sure how to articulate it yet. I’m trying to navigate it best I can.
Here’s the inevitable women-in-pop question: How have things changed since you started, and especially since the heyday of Lilith Fair in the Nineties?
I absolutely see it as progress. There are many cool, lasting legacies from Lilith. I look at Taylor Swift having all women open up for her. I look at Brandi Carlile and all the different things she’s doing. It’s women using the platform they have to bring other women along, which is what Lilith is all about. It was celebrating women and raising women up, and also giving all of us a community that didn’t exist because we were in direct competition with each other based on the industry.
Yet if you got us all together, we’re like, “Why are we all competing with each other? Your music is unique to you, and mine is to me, and it shouldn’t be a competition.” The massive success of Lilith shifted those old-school attitudes of “You can’t play two women back-to-back on the radio” or “You can’t have two women open together. People won’t come. It’s not marketable.” Well, it turns out it was actually really successful.
How do you look back on the resurrected Lilith Fair tour in 2010, which resulted in a bunch of canceled shows?
There were so many reasons that didn’t succeed. Some were in my control, and some were very much out of my control. I was pretty devastated at the end of it that it was a significant failure, because I feel like it marred the original version. That being said, after all these years, when people come up to me and talk about it, it’s not about 2010; it’s about the original one. That’s what they remember. The energy is carried forward. So, you know, I care less and less about the failure of 2010 because I care way more about what happened from ’97 to ’99 and that lasting legacy.
Would you ever revive Lilith Fair?
No. I’m too old. I think something like that could happen, and one might argue needs to happen. But if it were to, it should be someone young spearheading it who’d let it be something different. I don’t know different how. I’d be happy to be part of it, but I don’t have the energy.
Meanwhile, an entire generation of Gen Zers and millennials associates you with that ASPCA commercial.
That’s funny that it’s 25-year-olds, because, honestly, I feel like that commercial opened up a whole world of fans who are 80 plus — the late-night television thing. A friend of mine was on the [ASPCA] board and said, “Hey, do you want to do this commercial? We’ve never done this before with a celebrity or someone known.” I love animals, and we thought it might be a cool thing to do, so I did it. And in a year, it raised $30 million or something like that.
But the music and the visuals … it’s painful. I couldn’t watch it. It was just like, “Oh, God is awful.” But it worked like a hot damn. And it’s funny, because I’m a super-happy, super-optimistic person, but that showed me as this sort of quiet, sad person with all my puppies and kittens. I’ll never forget the director saying, “I just need a little more [makes a sad face] from you.” So when I got the opportunity to take the piss out of it, with the Audi commercial and the Super Bowl [Busch Light] commercial, that was just gleeful for me.
Do you think that’s the biggest misconception of you, that you’re super-sensitive?
Yeah, but I don’t care anymore. People are going to have all sorts of preconceived notions. I’m sure I’m going to piss some people off or upset some people, or people will think, “Oh, you’re boring.” That’s okay. I am boring. I don’t do anything overly dramatic, certainly not in public. I won’t go out without my panties on. I don’t court any of that stuff. I’m just going to keep on being me, and people can like it or not.
