“The best country songs take you home,” says Nicolette Hoang, frontwoman and songwriter for the Guelph, Ontario-based band, Nicolette & The Nobodies. “I want to write music that does that, songs that take you home.”
Nicolette is romantic about retro Western music; she speaks with a soft grit, a warm and distinguished rattle that lends her observations weight. Performing, she loosens into an unabashed howl, a fluid force turning upward at the edges with unmistakable twang. She keeps her lyrics no-nonsense—earthy comments on the human condition, floridity be damned. She reserves her flamboyance and flair for onstage attire—cowboy hats, fringed vests with matching hot pants, boots by all accounts made for walking.
The child of Vietnamese immigrants, Nicolette’s embrace of Country music and all its glittering accouterments comes as some surprise, to even herself. “I had a complicated relationship with music growing up,” she shares. “Music was more of a skill or a task, it wasn’t really presented as a place for play or to explore emotionally, even though that’s what I was drawn to the most about it.”
Nicolette’s parents arrived in Canada by boat during the Vietnam war, and were placed in Guelph, where they met. Their stories profoundly shaped Nicolette’s household, where stability was the ultimate, and hard work was the only way to have it. “I remember my mother telling me about her first visit to a North American grocery store,” Nicolette shares. “Even though she couldn’t afford much of it, she felt freedom in the fact that all of it was there.” Nicolette’s mother went on to sponsor every member of her family coming to Canada. Her father became an optician, opening a family business that she and her brother currently run. “It wasn’t the dream of my immigrant family for their child to pursue a career in music,” she confesses, chuckling with a wry modesty.
Though, Nicolette’s parents were not without artistic influence of their own. The upcoming album’s cover is a recreation of a painting of Nicolette’s mother; she’s sitting on a wicker throne as a young Vietnamese woman—relaxed, confident, smiling softly—and wearing a dress she made herself and eventually passed down to Nicolette. “When the time came for me to put myself out there with my songs, I knew I wanted to channel the feelings of the woman in that picture,” she shares. Her father’s contributions are also featured. A hobby photographer, he taught her the craft and cultivated a significant body of work, which continuously inspires her. Each single from the upcoming album is represented by a photograph of his, what Nicolette calls “ glimpses into a different life.”
Writing her new album The Long Way (due out April 12th via Arthaus – PRE-ORDER), Nicolette took a period to thoughtfully relish the opportunities before her and to reckon with her role as a woman of color in a predominately white, male genre. The result is a collection of personal and adventurous songs. On The Long Way, Nicolette Hoang is unfettered. “It’s a hot mess of emotions,” she says.
Today Glide is excited to offer an exclusive premiere of The Long Way, an album that captures the very essence of timeless country music, rebellious in cadence and instinctive in melody. Nicolette and her tight band hit out of the gate with plenty of swagger and a fiery approach to country that feels fresh and energized. Brimming with twangy pedal steel, sharp guitar playing, soulful organ, and of course Nicolette’s impassioned vocals that feel perfectly suited for a big country sound, the album rocks and rolls as much as it gets you in the mood to hit the nearest honky tonk. Ultimately, The Long Way is an album for fans of classic country who love the sound but might yearn for a perspective outside of the predominantly male, caucasian narrative of the genre.
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