Un article récent
Citation :THERESA SOKYRKA GETS A LITTLE COARSE ... WELL, FOR HER, ANYWAY
ROSS MOROZ /
ross@vueweekly.com
The last time Vue spoke with Theresa Sokyrka—the 2004 Canadian Idol runner-up whose surprisingly (and impressively) legitimate solo career continues to build steam with the August release of her second album, Something is Expected—the bespectacled, soft-spoken, presumably Baba-loving Ukrainian-Canadian from Saskatchewan was almost implausibly nice.
She defended Ben Mulroney (“It’s the writers that make him seem super-cheesy,” she insisted), disagreed with my assessment that her finishing second in the contest to the insufferably cherubic Kalan Porter (who? Exactly) was a gross miscarriage of justice (“I really honestly think he was the one who should have won,” she gushed) and, most notably, requested that I omit any curse words from her quotes, even though upon listening to the tape of our interview I discovered she hadn’t uttered even one.
What a difference a year has made. This time around, after endlessly slogging across the country and becoming familiar with the dirty rotten business that is the Canadian music industry, Sokyrka has become considerably more world-weary, dispensing trenchant criticism of the biz and the sometimes-shady characters that inhabit it. With swearing!
“It’s such a shitty business, sometimes—it’s just like ‘oh, man, I can’t believe this is the way it is,” she admits, specifically remembering how excited she was to meet many of her own personal musical, ahem, idols, only to find out that many are, well, kind of dicks.
“People that you think would be completely grateful to be where they are just not,” Sokyrka bemoans. “It’s so weird. They are big huge stars, and you’ve listened to their music for ages, and when you meet them and it sucks you’re just, like, ‘fuck—why do they have to be like that?’”
Even with this new-found cynicism, though, it’s doubtful that Sokyrka is in any danger of turning out “like that.” She still comes off as completely unpretentious, totally honest, and is probably—somewhat unbelievably—as nice as she seems.
But her experience in the music industry over the past couple of years has also helped her develop more confidence as an artist, confidence that allowed her to dictate the direction of Expected, which, unlike her debut, These Old Charms, is almost completely made up of original songs written by Sokyrka, a difference she’s particularly proud of.
“The most important thing to me was to be considered a songwriter, and my first record wasn’t that at all,” she explains. “This album I just really wanted to write myself—it’s really important to have some integrity I think.”
That an ex-Canadian Idol would even think about things like legitimacy and integrity is impressive enough; that Sokyrka is actually managing to make music that, despite being a little bit on the easy-listening side (more MuchMore than Much, if that makes sense), actually delivers on that promise is pretty remarkable, considering how easily she could have fallen into the pit of vacuity that is mainstream Canadian pop.
It makes sense, though, considering her oft-repeated desire to actually have a real career in music, as opposed to simply cashing in on her 15 minutes of CTV-sponsored media saturation like so many of her Idol-mates have.
“I’m not going to be able to pay the bills as a songwriter forever—I know that, and I want to stick with this for a while and learn different aspects [of the music business],” Sokyrka explains.
“I’m really interested in producing at some point, and then probably 20 years from now hopefully I’ll be, you know, smoking a joint with Joni Mitchell or something. That would be super cool.”
A soft-drug reference? And no request to cut out the cursing? Wow—this is getting a little bit, um, rock ‘n’ roll, don’t you think?
“I love songwriting and I like doing it on my own—I’m doing all of these shows on my own acoustically—but I’d love to get a really kick-ass band going,” she laughs. “I’d love to play electric guitar and just wail, you know? That would be awesome.” V
Sun, Nov 19 (7 pm)
Theresa Sokyrka
With guests
Myer Horowitz Theatre, $20
source:
http://www.vueweekly.com/articles/default.aspx?i=5153