Interview with Ocie Elliott: ‘Take Me Home is about that feeling of wanting to get out of a situation or headspace’

Musical duo Ocie Elliott – Jon Middleton and Sierra Lundy from Victoria, B.C., Canada – will release a new single, ‘Slow Tide’, on 29 January, which is ‘essentially about reawakening from a time of degradation’, according to Middleton.

The two have come a long way since a chance encounter in a Salt Spring Island café, which led to a spark, collaboration and the beginning of a personal and musical partnership two years ago. With gentle acoustic chords layered over gorgeously complementary voices, intertwined with gentle harmonies, their songs explore love and connection. The duo has been aptly described by one reviewer as ‘the aural equivalent of indigo painted skies and the first summer stars’.

Fittingly, their name has an interesting provenance: ‘In the early days of our getting to know one another, I discovered a 1920’s name generator online,’ Middleton explained. ‘Sierra has a love for 1920’s fashion and so out of curiosity I put my name in the generator and it came out as Ocie Cleve, which I thought was a sweet name. Sierra started calling me Ocie, and it became an inside nickname. When it came time to name the band, we struggled for months with different ideas, but towards the end the name Ocie came back up and stuck. We added Elliott since it flowed nicely and since we both are fans of Elliott Smith (an American folk singer).’

Last month, they released their single, ‘Take Me Home’, with Middleton on lead vocals. ‘For us, ‘Take Me Home’ is about that feeling of wanting to get out of a situation or headspace and be back in a space or place of familiarity, comfort and peace,’ he said.

The song has a lovely pensive quality to it: ‘I get all these thoughts burning through my mind, some of them are on fire, some are just unkind. I turn my TV on, I want to go blind. The words scroll through my head and I get so resigned. Take me home, I don’t want to stay here. Take me home, I don’t want to stay here.’

‘Once the pandemic hit, the title took on a much more relevant aspect!’

In March last year, they released their fourth album, In That Room, which seemed increasingly prophetic as the pandemic unfolded. Middleton said they didn’t set out with a preconceived idea of how the seven track album should sound: ‘Once the songs all came together, it seemed like a fitting title since the writing of the songs, the recordings of them, and much of our lives in general took – and take – place in one room or another. Once the pandemic hit, the title took on a much more relevant aspect!’

One of the standout tracks for me on the album is ‘Forest Floor’: ‘We wrote that one on a winter tour while in the mountain town of Nelson, BC.,’ Middleton said. ‘Sierra started to play the chords and we got silly with them for a while, jamming and singing random bits of whatever came to mind. The chorus came out of these initial ramblings, I think the bridge did as well. Since we had voice-memo’d the whole thing, we listened back, liked it a lot and started working on it more intentionally soon after. The lyrics came from our separate perspectives of how we met and the early days of knowing each other.’

The song evokes long, summer days: ‘The water runs and the sun’s aglow and shimmering in the river cold, I jump in fast, from a height I fall, and come on out to heated stone with you right there and we’re all alone.’

Middleton will quite often have a musical idea or the outline of a song: ‘I’ll show it to Sierra and we’ll dig into it until we are both happy with it,’ he said. ‘She is very honest and great at determining what works and what doesn’t. Other times, Sierra will be working on a riff or piece of music and we’ll both be intrigued and go from there.’

‘Recklessness has to subside on a personal level before any meaningful change happens on a larger scale’

The final track on the latest album, The Reckless, reminds me of Nick Drake, I tell him: ‘Hmm, interesting! That’s nice to hear. I mean, the song was written about our present state in the world regarding the destruction of the natural world and the idea that ourselves and the coming generations can become more aware and steer away from the recklessness. Ultimately though, it’s about the idea that change has to start with ourselves and recklessness has to subside on a personal level before any meaningful change happens on a larger scale.’

Since releasing their debut full-length album, We Fall In, in 2019, they have played with Mason Jennings, Sons of the East, Kim Churchill, Roo Panes, Current Swell and Joseph, touring Canada, US, and Europe and having their song ‘Run To You’ featured on an episode of Grey’s Anatomy. 

They are both fans of Canadian indie folk singer-songwriter, Leif Vollebekk, and Canadian folk and country singer, William Prince. Middleton cites his musical inspirations over the years as ‘Nirvana, Mississippi John Hurt, Toots and the Maytals, Elliott Smith, Bob Dylan plus a thousand more!’ Lundy cites ‘Simon and Garfunkel, Kurt Vile, John Prine, Ray Charles, Lana Del Ray, Big Thief, Leonard Cohen… too many to count!’ If they could tour with anyone, they go with Gillan Welch ‘since her and her music with her partner David Rawlings are what inspired us to sing together’, Middleton said.

One of my favourite of their songs is ‘Without You’ from their self-titled EP, which was released in 2017. ‘It was one of the first songs we wrote,’ he said. ‘It was actually written about a week before recording our first EP. Sierra was away on a trip to New York City to visit her sister and I was at home. I realized we needed a song on the EP on which Sierra was lead vocalist and so I envisioned her voice and ‘Without You’ came out. When she got back home, I quickly taught her the melody and it sounded so great when she sang it. When we recorded it, Sierra actually barely knew that song because it was so new, haha!’

(Photo credit: Kelly Lovett)