Sarah Blasko

Sarah Blasko’s ethereal vocals drift like a séance through a damp candlelit room. Her style is whimsical and somewhat eerie, that folk-esque sound that escapes is the production of a somewhat delicately composed album.
The artist that has found herself in London town all the way from Sydney, Australia, is a music sensation pretty much unknown to UK audiences. Her current album and UK debut AS DAY FOLLOWS NIGHT has made her a multi-platinum selling star at home, and having originally released the album in Australia in July 2009, it’s been a long wait for her European audience. This multi-award winning artist is accredited with the 2009 ARIA award and Rolling Stone award for Best Female and the J Award for Album of the Year. Therefore, it seems a little unnerving to leave all that behind to move to London for much of 2010 with a focus on building and maintaining a European audience.
Written in 2007 whilst simultaneously composing the score for the Bell Shakespeare Company’s production of Hamlet, of which she also performed in, the album very much reflects that sense of existence from a time long gone. Her influences scale heavy literature and moral welfare, as well as a detailed and direct account of loves and lives past and present. Though shockingly sparse in musical accompaniment, the atmosphere in We Won’t Run and the ensuing tracks is incomparable and is what makes the album a real gem.
“This album feels more like it honestly expresses my tastes and my feelings. I think that in some of the songs you feel that you’re transported to another era, but I think it’s difficult to pinpoint when or where that is.”
“It was good to have something alongside the album writing that had a deadline because it made me slightly more disciplined. It was sort of like exercise that kept my energy up for the task of writing the album. When I did the performances for Hamlet over two months last year, in between the time I was on stage, I would sit at the backstage piano and write my album songs.”
Having met with Sarah at the BBC Club in London for a short showcase of her album, the set-list included We Won’t Run, Down On Love and No Turning Back—a monster of a song that really translates a story into music. Blasko’s ability to do just that; to direct the lyrical content with a strong instrumental presence is inspiring. Her vocals are used then in this way to enhance the musical content more so than to carry the song because of bland and vulnerable instrumentation, which many singer-songwriters tend to do. It’s the pure creative vibe here that divulges an idea few have really managed to put into action.