Our Song of the Day, and video premiere, comes from Tina Refsnes who hails from the Norwegian capital of Oslo. Her PR describes her music as a potent mix of English new folk and poignant Americana. Whilst citing the folk music of Neil Young, Laura Marling and Sufjan Stevens as influences in her work I’d liken her most to that wonderful Canadian, Tamara Lindeman (The Weather Station). She has that same dreamy liquid sound which can be heard on I Don’t Know below. The song is taken from her forthcoming album “No One Knows That You’re Lost” – available November 6th 2015.
Although it doesn’t say which album inspired her to seek out producer Robbie Lackritz in Toronto it wouldn’t surprise me if it was the last album from The Weather Station (Loyalty) which he co-produced. The PR explains that during the four years studying and living in Liverpool she spent all of her spare time writing songs and playing music. The draw of a larger city is often tinged by the promise of greater rewards. In Tina’s case there was maybe a higher expectation of the ‘urban possibilities’, something she longed for having grown up in the small seaside town of Floro, ‘where an abundance of rain caused the salt from the sea spray to spread up to a mile from the coastline…’. Needless to say, she didn’t find the right expression for her music and, rather wisely, held on until she did. It was on her return to Oslo that she heard ‘that’ Lackritz produced album and the rest, as they say was history.
Maybe it was inspired by those years of coastal living, but she brings a lovely intimacy to her performance on this release which has been heightened by the decision to record it all in one room… “she wanted the listener to get a physical sense of the distance between him/her and an awareness of where the performer was situated within the room”.
That decision to wait to find the right musical expression for her songs has clearly paid off as it shines through her music beautifully.
No One Knows That You’re Lost is released on November 6th 2015.
