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KT Tunstall wouldn’t have been able to prepare during her Tucson recording session for the emotional upheaval that lay ahead, even if she had known it was coming.
Just six months after the Scotswoman returned to her London home, her father died. The month after that, she separated from her musician husband, who was also the drummer in her band.
Others would have abandoned the recording project.
‘‘Music for me has always been medicine and its always been something that I turn to when I need a change of state of mind. Certainly, as someone who creates music, it’s a huge compliment when I do find out that my music has been used in that way,’’ she says.
‘‘So I delayed a little bit going back out but by the time I did go I was really happy about being back in the desert with these great musicians.
‘‘I felt very free, very liberated and I was in a really good place by that point and so the second half feels much more hopeful, when I kind of expected it would be the other way around.’’
The result of Giant Sand frontman and producer Howe Gelb’s encouragement to Tunstall is her fifth album, Invisible Empire // Crescent Moon.
Singer-songwriter Tunstall, 38, insists it’s not a grief, or break-up, album. Despite its melancholy feel, none of the songs directly reference her divorce.
While critics embraced fourth album Tiger Suit, they hailed her most recent collection of alternative country style songs, recorded on a reel to reel tape machine, as her best yet. She said it was the easiest and fastest album she’s ever made.
‘‘It took a little bit of self-confidence to go ‘It’s cool, rely on the beauty of the song and the strength of your voice and think about Bob Dylan at Newport Folk Festival and just go for it’,’’ she said.
Australian audiences will be the next to hear her live when Tunstall arrives in April for her first shows down under since a stint at Byron Bay about six years ago.
She’s delighted to hear about her preceeding reputation as an enigmatic entertainer.
‘‘You can go somewhere as a group of people and I love the idea that you’re this one-off community for an hour-and-a-half that will never ever be the same again.
‘‘It’s just these people in this room this once, this time, this date and in a world where you can download anything for free, you can’t buy being there, you’ve got to be there.’’
Tunstall spent her 20s in indie bands Elia Drew, Tomoko, Red Light Stylus and the Fence Collective before Relentless Records heard about her through their talent scouts and made her an offer.
The label’s assessment that Tunstall wasn’t ready yet saw her develop her songs and improve her live performance before the 2004 release of her pop folk debut Eye to the Telescope featuring single Black Horse and The Cherry Tree, which she performed with a loop pedal in what she now realises was a watershed moment on British television show Later ... With Jools Holland. ‘‘I was on with The Cure, The Futureheads, Jackson Brown [and] Anita Baker. I felt like such a small fry on the show that I didn’t worry about it. Then [when I] won the popularity poll for the whole thing afterwards, I was like ‘what?’’’
The album also included arguably her most recognised song, Suddenly I See.
Tunstall remains proud of her pop country tune with uplifting lyrics but has no qualms about her increasing divergence from its sound and the darker, cathartic nature of her most recent release.
‘‘I’ve always had this thing that no matter how personal a song is, there’s a process that happens once I share it where the whole thing loosens up a lot,’’ she says.
‘‘I was excited to share these songs because it’s really about saying everybody goes through shit. It’s probably one of the biggest failings of us as humans is not being able to realise that we’re all going through the same thing at the same time.’’
KT Tunstall will perform at Lizottes
on Wednesday, April 23.