This article was originally published in the Revelstoke TIMES Magazine. Abigail Lapell will perform at the Grizzly Plaza Gazebo as part of the REVY.Live Outside concert series on August 21.
Acclaimed Toronto songwriter Abigail Lapell is back in B.C. this summer to share her eclectic sound with folk and rock lovers in western Canada.
Years ago, Lapell played a show at the Big Eddy Pub when their stage was used for concerts on a more regular basis. Now, she’s set to return to the region and has booked several festivals across the Interior this summer, with tour dates culminating in Revelstoke as their ‘swan song’ of the season.
Lapell self-identifies her music as indie-folk, bringing together the rock sounds of the electric guitar with the versatile suns of the viola. She’s inspired by artists like Sharon Van Etten, The Weather Station, and Richard Laviolette.
Although she’s based in Toronto, her summer is packed with tour dates at folk festivals in the western portion of the country, a place where her style of music is ingrained into the culture. “There’s a lot of overlap of people who really appreciate folk music and kind of love going to festivals,” said Lapell.
Her latest album, Stolen Time, was released a little over a year ago and draws inspiration from the natural world as well as her experiences with recovery.
“There’s a lot of themes of nature and the elements, the four seasons and grand landscapes,” said Lapell. “I take a lot of inspiration from being outdoors and I was lucky enough to spend some time up in the Rocky Mountains in Alberta writing some of the album.” She added that for her as an emotional writer, nature is a rich source of imagery and metaphors.
Lapell said the more serious themes of the record are related to the mental state she was in while writing, relating to how she felt in lockdown during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“It felt like this idea of recovery was very prominent, and a lot of people turned to different indulgences during that time too,” said Lapell. “Then there was this sense of financial recovery and just sort of social trauma that it was going through and we were all sort of in this arrested state. A lot of those different themes are woven together from a lot of different angles.”
Over the past five years, Lapell has released three albums and earned accolades including three Canadian Folk Music Awards, hitting number one on Canadian folk radio and more than 20 million Spotify streams while touring across Canada, the U.S. and Europe.
Just last month she finished recording a new album in a 200-year-old church in Niagara on the Lake, Ontario.
“[It was] really beautiful with a whole band, and just kind of played live off the floor. I think it sounds really cool,” said Lapell. That record is set to release next year.
“But it’s kind of fun to be travelling around in that posse,” said Lapell about her band. “People can expect to hear haunting ballads and upbeat folk rock and also stories and self-deprecating humour from the road life.”
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