Go HERE to read this story at the OttawaCitizen.com.

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Contest: Hear Sarah First
The Ottawa Citizen
Published: Friday, February 29, 2008

Ontario songstress Sarah Slean releases her new CD, The Baroness, March 11 but you could hear it early at our private listening party at 7:30 pm on Thursday.

We'll take five readers and their guests to a secret location to hear the new disc and share their thoughts on it with Citizen music writer Lynn Saxberg.

Here's what you have to do to get in: Send an e-mail to sarahslean@thecitizen.canwest.com telling us what your favourite Sarah Slean song is, and why.

You can also fill out a ballot at CD Warehouse. Deadline for entries is Tuesday; winners will be notified Wednesday.

If we choose you, you will be treated to food and drinks at the party, and receive a free copy of The Baroness, courtesy of Warner

Music. The grand-prize winner will receive a limited edition lithograph of Slean's artwork.

Be sure to include your name, daytime phone number and age (party-goers must be 19 or older).

Last night I sent a PM to a bunch of Ottawa members on the board alerting them to this contest.

Lynn Saxberg from the Ottawa Citizen has already provided a quote on Get Home:

"An engaging pianist with a flair for drama, the sweet-voiced Sarah Slean will send a chill down your spine with her haunting new single, Get Home."

I think it's great they are doing listening parties. Doing things this way I think helps avoid album leaks and can build a little hype.

I wonder if Toronto will have one or that event at the Mod Club where Sarah played was a live version of one.

Cameron

You can view the listening party on YouTube. Includes interviews of the people in attendance and a first view of the physical album, digi pack.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKdmaS7YjKA

Lynn Saxberg really has been promoting this album and contest. She posted it to her blog, her quote on Get Home has been used in press releases.

Cameron

More from Lynn Saxberg....
http://www.canada.com/globaltv/globalshows/et_story.htm...fc-be04-49529f88a847



Slean finds her home as The Baroness

Lynn Saxberg
Canwest News Service


Get Home, the tortured first single from Sarah Slean's new disc, The Baroness, will resonate with anyone who's had to deal with a cheater. "Liars and cowards," the tiny, elegant Slean declares with the conviction of one who's been stabbed in the back a few times herself, her vicious condemnation deployed in a deceptively sweet voice.

The hurt that drives the song is unmistakable, and the voice-and-piano-based treatment gives it a simple but powerful appeal. In terms of angry-lover songs, this slow, sad piano tearjerker ranks right up there with Alanis Morissette's fiery You Oughta Know.

Early indications are that Slean has a hit on her hands. On iTunes, Get Home was single of the week a couple of weeks ago, setting a record with close to 30, 000 downloads and bumping up interest in Slean's third major-label release. Signed to Warner Music Canada, the multi-talented Slean is also a visual artist, poet and actor - she's been nominated for both Juno and Gemini awards.

In Get Home, Slean sends a sniveling coward home to his wife, depicting a romantic situation in which she appears to be the other woman. Excuse me, but it appears our sweet little songbird may not be so sweet. Who is this Mr. Masquerade she refers to in the song?

When reached on her cellphone between classes at the University of Toronto, Slean says the song is not about one man in particular, it's about a situation that seemed to repeat itself in her love life. "Of course it happened to me," she says, "I couldn't have written that narrative and I couldn't have meant it, singing it the way I did, unless it happened to me, and unfortunately it's happened to me more than once. I felt like I was on a tape loop with that situation."

She finally decided to wrap up the whole series of experiences in one song. "I wanted the song to work as a charm, and sort of exorcise that storyline from my life forever, and it worked that way," she says, "The moment I wrote it, I knew that that just wasn't going to happen to me again. It was over."

After wading into deep emotional territory while writing, Slean says her tendency is to bury it in layers of lush strings and angelic background singing. This time, she had Jagori Tanna, the rock-guitar god from the late-'90s Canadian band I Mother Earth, helping her out in the studio. He provided a stable force when she was tearing her hair out over creative decisions.

"When I record, I tend to completely shatter mentally," she says. "I think too hard, it's like I'm pre-menstrual for the entire thing. And he is sooo steady. He was very diplomatic and calm and that's exactly what I need in that process because I tend to be really frantic and kind of unpredictable.

"I make these songs but then I get nervous about showing them in their naked form. They're so raw, I want to put a couple of orchestras on top and maybe 3, 000 harmonies so that it's nicely hidden in this sheen of artifice. But Jag would go, `That's the beautify of these songs, they're so exposed and so vulnerable. People love that. You gotta keep that.' "

Although Get Home emerged during recording, most of the other songs were written during a seven-month sojourn in Paris in 2006. Slean moved there when her previous album was released, and she didn't love it at first. That's when she wrote So Many Miles, a perky-piano song juxtaposed against the emotional balladry of the rest of Baroness. "I was horrendously lonely, the weather was cool, people were awful to me, and I felt utterly lost and completely unarmed and really scared and empty," Slean says, describing the song as a "little anthem" that "kept me afloat, recharged my batteries when I was sinking in the quicksand."

As for the regal album title, The Baroness, it refers to a character Slean has used before in short stories and film projects. "She's really audacious, has a bit of a strut, wears red gowns," Slean says. "She's kind of the spirit I call on when I go on stage, to get some courage and some brassiness. She's strong and fearless. I consider myself a bit of a wallflower and a bit shy. To go on stage and to do what I do I need to pretend almost, and she is it."

The new album is released Tuesday in Canada and France. Her new management company, the same folks who handle Rufus Wainwright's career, is sure to land a U.S. release, and Slean is ready for an intense period of touring, likely to start this spring, after exams. (She is studying music and philosophy at U of T. )

With a hit single and a new album, it sounds like it could be a big year for Slean - may the baroness be with her.


© CanWest News Service 2008

"Slean is ready for an intense period of touring, likely to start this spring, after exams. (She is studying music and philosophy at U of T. )"

haha the good thing about Sarah being in school again is that now her touring schedule definitely wont interfere with our exams as well