Lissie’s latest, 2022’s Carving Canyons finds the acclaimed singer-songwriter digging deep to carry on through life’s many uncertainties. Her fifth album is her most personal expression yet. Her songs chart the ripples caused by heartbreak and loneliness, and what happens when the soul perseveres amidst pain. Carving Canyons is as deeply felt as Lissie’s music has ever been.
Carving Canyons came about at Lissie’s own pace, following 2018’s Castles and the piano-based retrospective When I’m Alone (2019). “It wasn’t a time where I felt like I had a lot to say,” she recalls, “and each record typically comes from a shift in my life where I need to share things.” As the COVID-19 pandemic spread across the world, Lissie was also dealing with an impactful breakup on her Iowa farm. “It was such a heavy time—not just for me but for the world, of course—and I needed love, support, and connection,” she says. “Because there was so much isolation, it was an important period of time for me to explore some of my dark places and process it all.”
Lissie took in the nature and observed the seasons changing around her and within her. Then, the songs that would make up Carving Canyons started to flow from her. Carving Canyons is about looking within while dealing with the uncertainty of the future. Here, she finds hope in personal and worldly adversity, no matter what the forecast might say. “Some days it was so terrifying that I didn’t know how to carry on—and then I realized, ‘How exciting. What a gift,’” Lissie recalls while discussing her frame of mind while making the record. “The road in front of me is wide open.”
Recommended for fans of Ellie Goulding, Neko Case, Brandi Carlile and Patty Griffin.
