Want to tell the world about your divorce? Maybe even do it with your ex? Even better, why not write a song about it. And better still get that former to do it with you. For that’s exactly what Americana star Kasey Chambers did with Shane Nicholson, her one-time collaborator – in both life and music.
As you might expect, country music is not short of songs dedicated – if that’s the right word – to divorce. Tammy Wynette’s classic “D-I-V-O-R-C-E” is clearly the pick of the crop, while the almost-as-popular “She Got the Goldmine (I Got the Shaft),” by Jerry Reed, is both satirical and incisive.
But it is somewhat rare for the two parties to this troubled event, to actually write and record about it. However, Australian country stars Chambers and Nicholson do just that when they duet on “The Divorce Song,” an appealing ditty on Chambers latest, and 13th, album Backbone.
The pair married in December 2005 and announced their separation in April 2013, having had two children. They have a long musical association. In 2002, Chambers sang a duet “Designed to Fade” with Nicholson on his debut country album It’s a Movie. And the couple co-released two albums Rattlin’ Bones (2008) and Wreck & Ruin (2012). Along the way Nicholson contributed the various Kasey releases, the most notable being their striking duet cover of the Gillian Welch classic “Orphan Girl” in 2011.
But “The Divorce Song” is the first the pair has written together since they parted.
“We wrote it via text, which is a better divorce way to do it,” Kasey quipped in the Sydney Morning Herald. “Shane and I did divorce way better than we ever did marriage, but there’s something magical about the sound we make together.”
And “The Divorce Song” is certainly magical – from a musical perspective that is. Once again, Shane’s smooth vocals adapt wonderfully well to Kasey’s distinctive girlish tones. And, as you might expect with such subject matter, there is an equal distribution of vocals as the pair nicely integrate swapping couplets to sharing clever verses, obviously written with hearts, and truths, firmly on their sleeves.
We said ‘til death do us part
But death didn’t come quick enough
Maybe we did it all wrong
Kinda fucked everything up
We may have left our run too late
And walked down the aisle too soon
But not everything has a forever ring
We sure ain’t no Johnny and June
On reflection Kasey felt the song is far more special to her than she thought it was going to be.
“As much as I know there’s this comical element of the song. I also feel like it is just heartfelt. Because it really does sum up our relationship, where we can laugh about it now, but we had some fucking hard times. And, you know, we’ve been through a lot together and then apart, and we’re co-parenting and all of that, and we’ve now come out the other side and into a really good place,” she told Country Universe.
Kasey’s inner feelings don’t end there. Immediately off the back of the divorce ballad comes another heartfelt, family-related song “Arlo”, which is dedicated to her 17-year-old son. The soothing, very-personal tribute has beautiful undertones as she softly proclaims:
Remember when the bird was hurt down by the willow tree
You held him in your shirt until you had to set him free
I would watch you make believe while everyone was bored
But Cowboys and Indians don’t come here anymore
And I wish you the best I go east you go west
But you’re always on my mind
And I’m blessed and I’m proud I go north, you go south
But I know you’ll do just fine
In your own time
“I wrote the song for Arlo’s birthday, and it was his birthday going from 12 to 13. So it’s a big change, because he’s a teenager now. He’s like a little boy one day, and the next day he’s this cool teenager that doesn’t need me anymore.”
It is one thing to write adoringly about a son, it is another step to salute one of the superstars of modern music. “A Love Like Springsteen” is the sort of song that could be corny , especially with a word-play on some of The Boss’s biggest hits, like “I’m on Fire“, “Dancing in the Dark” and “Glory Days”. But Kasey, helped by a rich musical treatment, turns it into an infectious homage.
I want a love like Springsteen
To fill up my heart’s desire
I wanna live out a daydream where I
Don’t mind if I’m on fire
You’ve been dancing in darkness
I’ve been fading away
So give me a love like Springsteen
And we’ll live out our Glory Days
There is a very good reason for Kasey to engage in this level of self-indulgence. For the 15-track Backbone album was released in the same week as her latest book Just Don't Be a D**khead which traverses her life story - from her upbringing in the Australian outback to Nashville fame, infatuations with the likes of Bruce Springsteen and Keith Urban along the way. Indeed, the album is uniquely paired with the book by QR codes which link chapters to song.
As might be expected from a biography, the book's title has family connections.
"When I told Dad I was going to call my book Just Don't Be a D**khead, he was like, 'Do I say that a lot?' It's not some profound advice, more my dad's approach to life. It's the Chambers way of life, to just do your own thing as long as you're not purposely hurting others," she told SMH.
Kasey's father Bill Chambers is a successful musician and songwriter himself, as was her mother Diane. After working across the vast and arid Nullarbor Plain - where Kasey was raised listening to Emmylou Harris - her parents settled down and eventually started performing together. They soon enlisted Kasey and her older brother Nash - now a successful music producer - in a family group named the Dead Ringer Band, so named because the kids looked like their parents!
And when Kasey set off on her own career, Dad would become a regular guitarist in her various backing bands. And he is a proud member of the recording ensemble which delivered high-quality music on Backbone. It also includes Kasey's current partner Brandon Dodd on guitar. Long-time collaborator Jeff McCormick is on bass and there are a couple of big-names in Sam Teskey, the lead guitarist of the Australian blues-rock band The Teskey Brothers, and American drummer Brady Blake, who has worked with the likes of Emmylou and Steve Earle.
There is no one better to sing their praises - and indeed the album itself - than Kasey:
"I worked with my favourite musicians, and I sang about every beautiful, joyous, embarrassing and tough thing I've gone through. Everything that's gone into making me this person.
"Good and bad, this album is who I am."
Paul Cutler
Editor Crossroads - Americana Music Appreciation
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