Listen to Cicada Songs

1. Faces I Love
2. North Wind
3. Break of Day
4. The Fire Is Low
5. I Am a Stranger Today
6. Petals
7. So Blue
8. Lost in the Green
9. Spring Is Hiding Behind the Snow
10. Cicada Interlude
11. Cicada Songs

Like the collages on the album cover, Cicada Songs is a mysterious vision of past and present. In the artwork, Trevor Sloan juxtaposes vintage images in a novel way; in the music, he hints at singer-songwriters of the 60s and 70s, with references to the likes of Simon & Garfunkel, but with an intriguingly modern twist.

Although this is the second album under his own name, Trevor Sloan has been writing and recording music for over ten years, previously releasing six LPs under the name Phono d’enfant. Described as “slyly intricate with ethereal touches,” his music infuses intimate vocals with acoustic instruments and old synths. Carefully crafted over a year, Cicada Songs reveals a richness of experience and sound. Like a letter from a father to a son, the record moves from youth to adultdhood with lyrics that warmly evoke lost seasons and relationships. “Making this album, I had my son in mind,” explains Trevor. “Some of the songs were written for him like “Spring Is Hiding Behind the Snow” and “Cicada Songs;” other songs just share moments from my life, parts of my soul, people I have known.” The lyrics weave together little details—a seashell from a piano teacher’s house, school yearbooks, public pools, cheap phones and lilacs—to capture the colours of life.

Most of the album was recorded at his home studio in Toronto. Then it was mixed and mastered at the House of Miracles in Cambridge by Andy Magoffin (Great Lake Swimmers, The Hidden Cameras).

Faces I Love

While my brother played the black grand piano in the corner
I was holding a seashell up to my ear
The room was full of books and things,
glass ashtrays and paintings

Among the faces, among the lonely looks
I went looking for your face in someone else’s yearbook
These are the faces I love
This is the stuff I’m made of

The thought of someone or the mention of a name
ripple in my mind like a puddle hit with rain
hit with rain

These are the faces I love
This is the stuff I’m made of

North Wind

North wind, do you know where I been?
How I cast my gaze on the outline of the mountain?

The sun is older than me
The sand in my feet
don’t care about the way
time has left my face
I feel so young in the sun
in the sun, in the sun

I see these teens on the beach
laughing, cursing, trying so hard
Take me back through my life
to the people I have known, people I have loved

North wind, I’m coming for you
Going to swim in your cold, cold blue

The sun is older than me
The sand in my feet
don’t care about the way
time has left my face
I feel so young in the sun
in the sun, in the sun

Break of Day

When the street is golden in the morning sun
the street is safe, the wolves are gone
And the old man who sweeps the steps
of St. Paul’s puts his shoes on

Photographs, gold rush eyes
seem to look upon the work and lives
And the old man who sweeps the steps
of St. Paul’s sees the dust fly

Cool of night, break of day

When the flowers tremble in the morning wind
pigeons fly, day begins
And the old man who sweeps the steps
of St. Paul’s sweeps the dust again

Cool of night, break of day

The Fire is Low

I’ve been thinking of an evening
The hour of night before sleeping
The fire is low but it’s still warm
It’s still warm

Look at us, we’re old friends
How many years? Not much different
from the way we were
when we first met, we first met

We don’t kiss when we lie down
Don’t say “I love you” with our mouths
The fire is low but it’s still warm
It’s still warm

I Am a Stranger Today

Picking wild berries from the side of the road
Walking where the wild deer roam
Thinking of the times here I have known

Something’s changed, something’s changed, I’m not the same
And it feels so strange, feels so strange, I am a stranger today

So long Dinner Bay
So long cold, green waves
I must be on my way

Something’s changed, something’s changed, I’m not the same
And it feels so strange, feels so strange, I am a stranger today

Petals

In the season of falling petals
and crushed blossoms on bicycle tires
I felt the gentle rain, felt the gentle rain
on my pale face again

While the blossoms fell like snow
I thought of people I know
The ones awake, the ones asleep
And my love fell into the breeze

So Blue

Was that you beside the pool?
Time had changed your face and mine too

Fool I know after so long
to feel so blue, so blue

It’s so obvious there’s nothing between us
Now I see there never was

Fool I know after so long
to feel so blue, so blue

Lost in the Green

While the lilacs were wet with rain
While the sun hid and the birds sang
My fingers touched the piano
decorated like an altar in my parent’s home
I tried to find a melody
for all the old longings in me

And I’m lost, lost in the green
And I’m lost in the green

While the ferns were so green and spread
When the winter was finally dead
I thought of a cheap phone I used to use
to call you from the corner of my room
And why you and I came to find
a kiss never kissed eludes my mind

And I’m lost, lost in the green
And I’m lost in the green

Spring is Hiding Behind the Snow

When you’re walking in the dark
When the cold wind blows
Spring is hiding behind the snow

The grass will be green
The birds they will sing
Apple blossoms bloom
Red roses too, just for you

Love can cut you sometimes
Leave you black and blue
But a new love can heal the wound

The grass will be green
The birds they will sing
Apple blossoms bloom
Red roses too just for you

Please remember when the snow falls
And the cold winds blow
Spring is hiding behind the snow

Cicada Songs

Hanging on cicada songs
Running through, after you
a tunnel of green

Birthday wish, first kiss
Laugh lines, blue eyes
haunted by old love