Shelter
Olivia Chaney
- Shelter
- Dragonfly
- Arches
- IOU
- A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
- Colin and Clem
- O Solitude
- Long Time Gone
- Roman Holiday
- House on a Hill
Chaney has also released a new video for the album's closing track, "House on a Hill," filmed by Gavin Elder at the rustic, 18th-century cottage in the hills of the North Yorkshire Moors where she made the record.
Chaney will give an album release concert at London's Hoxton Hall this Tuesday, June 19. Tickets are on sale now for her just-announced North American summer tour, which includes headline shows across the US and Canada, plus sets as special guest of Patty Griffin and Bruce Hornsby. For details and tickets, see below or visit nonesuch.com/on-tour.
The Observer gives Shelter four stars, citing Chaney's "dazzling vocals," and noting: "As with its predecessor, The Longest River, it’s a finely wrought piece of work, with Chaney’s swooping delivery turning songs into dramas." Reviewer Neil Spencer says: "Chaney is steeped in folk tradition but not confined by it. Shelter's eight original songs owe more to Joni Mitchell’s Blue than to Broadside ballads." The review concludes: "An elegant, luminous album."
"After 2017's splendid folk-rock collaboration with The Decemberists as Offa Rex, Shelter finds Chaney returning to the timeless acoustic verities of her 2015 solo debut The Longest River," writes Uncut's Nigel Williamson. "Yet there's a subtle and arresting progression too, with producer Doveman underpinning the intimacy of her crystalline voice with exquisite textures of piano and understated strings … [H]ere is transcendent refuge from the storm."
"The ravishing follow-up to the Yorkshire lady's acclaimed debut is an exercise in bejeweled simplicity," says the Daily Mirror in a four-star review. "Chaney's clear resonating voice is a superlative means to convey this eagle-eyed observer's tender intimations … A triumph."
Chaney describes her time writing songs for Shelter: "I had been on the road a lot and was struggling with the grit and loneliness of urban life. I think I'd been questioning what home, belonging, a sense of purpose, and my own culture even meant. I'd been craving wilderness and a return to essentials for a long time. Then, while touring in the US, I realized the place I needed was already in my life. It was ancient, barely habitable, and remote.
"Thus a crumbling eighteenth-century cottage in the austere but magical hills of the North Yorkshire Moors—a family retreat since my teens, with no electricity or plumbing, where the only water comes from a spring—became the home for my work on Shelter," she continues. "We brought out an Arts and Crafts Bechstein piano and an old wood burner to the house; and as summer's end turned to autumn's shorter, colder days, the room with the upright and stove fueled my stay."
Chaney says of working with Thomas Bartlett, "His close affiliation with such a varied and acclaimed group of artists was of enormous importance. His taste and sphere of understanding were as diverse as mine. He prioritized my compositions' meaning and lyricism, rather than jumping on the bandwagon of noisy popularity. I wanted a recording as intimate as the songs and their form. The only other musicians are Thomas and Jordan Hunt, my longtime collaborator who adds strings on select songs. It's just the three of us playing every sound you hear, using our instrumental and compositional craft, and Thomas' musician-producer's ear extraordinaire."
Born in Florence, Italy, Chaney grew up in Oxford, England, in a household whose intellectual and artistic engagement was complemented by an expansive musical soundscape. This included Billie Holiday, Mozart operas, Sandy Denny, Prince, Tracy Chapman, Bert Jansch, Michael Jackson, and Joni Mitchell. She studied at London's Royal Academy of Music, where she took in everything the conservatory had to offer. Her curiosity led her further afield, from Ligeti to West African pop, Edith Piaf to Laurie Anderson, Mary Margaret O'Hara to Lorraine Hunt Lieberson, Sonic Youth to Sappho, Kate Bush to old-time country music—all while finding her own voice.
The range of artists she's shared a stage with includes Robert Plant, Zero 7, the Labeque Sisters, Martin and Eliza Carthy, and Kronos Quartet, with whom she also recorded two songs for the 2017 Nonesuch album Folk Songs. Most recently she fronted a Grammy-nominated album, The Queen of Hearts, forming a new outfit, Offa Rex, with The Decemberists. The Guardian's review of that album said that "Chaney has a magical voice, full of heft, soul and sunlight," and fRoots said, "Chaney has never sounded better," while the Arts Desk said it was her "voice, with its clarity, power and emotional weight, that carries Offa Rex to the heights." The Financial Times added that "Chaney's singing makes 'Willie O' Winsbury' one of the best versions ever."
