When Gavin Gardiner moved to Toronto to go to school, he experienced some serious culture shock from his days growing up in Morden, Manitoba. He grew up listening to what he calls popular folk like Bob Dylan and Simon and Garfunkel, and spent his early teens wanting to be a songwriter but the move to the big city galvanized things for the young musician.
It was 2003 when he felt perhaps most at odds with the world; he felt most at home with his words and was inspired to seriously contend with putting a band together to put his songs out to the public. What would become The Wooden Sky would not only offer Gardiner a new outlet for his creativity but would also spotlight a quest for offering authenticity in a world of pop pabulum.
In 2009, with the release of The Wooden Sky’s latest effort, If I Don’t Come Home You’ll Know I’m Gone, some of the accolades received suggested Gardiner’s quest was in earnest and he had come upon something really special. Folk, country, gospel, rock, pop and more are incorporated into what The Wooden Sky do, referencing everything from Hank Williams to Wilco.
“When I came to Toronto, I didn’t really have a lot of friends or anything else to do so I kind of just wrote songs about it,” offers Gardiner. “I saw someone perform once and they were talking about how everyone into rock, when they hit their 20s they start finding Gram Parsons and then fall in love with country and I guess there’s an element of truth to that.”
“Townes Van Zandt, all of those songs are sad and morose – and still kind of beautiful in that sense – but I also love some upbeat rock stuff, too,” adds Gardiner. “That’s what I like about artists like Neil Young, because he has both of those sides to him. He often separates them into records but I haven’t really felt the need to do that. It’s nice to put all those songs on one album. It doesn’t have to be all the same thing, all the time.”
When terms like “genre–defying” and “career–defining” are thrown about, the more jaded might let their heads swell – but for The Wooden Sky, the terms are more than applicable. The disc reels and rocks with a subtlety that bristles with authenticity – underscoring Gardiner’s own struggle of putting his most personal details into song for public display.
