Sarah Harmer has a voice that seems almost effortless. Melodies fall from her lips the way the landscape flows past your windows on a prairie highway: rising and falling with the natural fluidity of weather-worn years, and warm like rays of sun through the windshield. It's an essence almost perfectly distilled in Oh, Little Fire.
Fire, like Harmer herself, is full of grace and charm. Songs like 'Captive' and 'The City' glisten with driving acoustics, chiming electrics and soaring melodies packed into two and a half minutes of pop perfection, while 'One Match' celebrates the first stirrings of new love with a breezy groove and tasteful strings. 'Silverado' calls back to Harmer's love of bluegrass (indulged on 1999's Songs For Clem, and 2005's I Am A Mountain), showcasing pedal steel and a dusky duet with Neko Case, and 'Late Bloomer' bends a deceptively cheerful melody to a story of self-deception in love. In counterpoint, 'Washington' is a darker, downtempo study in regret, and album highlight 'New Loneliness' uses spare acoustic guitar, ghost-like drums, and ethereal layers of pedal steel-like electric to create a haunting soundscape for Harmer's reflections on the empty space left in a broken pair.
Harmer recently appeared on NPR in New York City to play a few songs and talk about Oh, Little Fire and the years she's spent working to protect the Niagara Escarpment. You can have a listen here.