A concussion in 2019 changed Raina Krangle’s relationship with the music that had shaped her entire life. Listening and performing became physically difficult, even exhausting, at the exact moment she needed music most. “The strange thing was that music could physically hurt and exhaust me, yet it was woven into every aspect of my life,” she says. “I couldn’t imagine not reaching for it.”
She is clear about what the project is really about. “I didn’t want to be the poster person for concussion,” she says. “Eventually I realized I didn’t have to be; I was simply telling the story of something that happened to me and what I did with it. I didn’t choose concussion as my story. I chose what I did with it.”
She found her way back in small, deliberate doses. A Spotify email marking the 50th anniversary of Joni Mitchell’s ‘Clouds’ sent her back to the record, and singing “Chelsea Morning” by candlelight reconnected her with music, memory and herself. New songs began arriving through dreams and music therapy sessions, captured in voice notes and videos. Many of those original materials now live in a companion artistic journal with QR linked recordings. “I didn’t know I was making a project while I was living it,” Krangle says.
The song that started it all, “My Beautiful Dear,” retells her parents’ 54-year love story, its melody arriving in a dream. It also weaves in Bruce Cockburn’s “All the Diamonds,” a song her parents used to sing. At Colin Linden’s suggestion, she sought permission through Cockburn’s manager, Bernie Finkelstein. She later met Cockburn himself after his sold-out Royal Conservatory show in Toronto, where he told her, “I’m looking forward to hearing it.” He approved the reference, setting HEADBANGERS in motion. “What began with a melody in a dream eventually led me somewhere I never expected to go,” she says.
Krangle recorded the EP with Brian Siegel, her musical partner of more than 30 years since they met at Western University’s guitar society, which she founded. She cried unexpectedly while recording “My Beautiful Dear,” while the three newer songs came together in just a few takes. “The Beginning of Something Big” looks at defining moments of social and technological change, “Troy Donahue” reaches nostalgically toward simpler times, and “What’s It Gonna Take?” answers hatred and division with a call to speak up, connect and sing together.
A Toronto native, musician and educator, Krangle was playing Toronto open mics like the Free Times Cafe and the El Mocambo by 16. Her 2012 debut, ‘Solstice,’ includes “Jagged Edges,” co-written with her sister Jodi Krangle, and “Needle in the Hay,” which earned a Colleen Peterson Songwriting Award nomination. Her most recent releases include “Holy Land” and her first ever cover, Joni Mitchell’s “Big Yellow Taxi,” a fitting tribute to the artist who helped lead her back. She has played Winterfolk, the Newmarket Jazz Festival and Hamilton’s Supercrawl. Her children’s music has appeared alongside The Arkells and Tom Wilson on ‘The Mighty Tribe.’
Early response has been enthusiastic. “My god this woman has a beautiful voice,” wrote Roots Music Canada. DJ Alan Cross called her sound “sort of country sort of Americana, sort of ’70s retro pop,” and Cyrus Rhodes of The Muse’s Muse called her “an infectious artist that possesses a ‘Gold Standard’ voice.”
Krangle celebrates with a release party on November 14 at The George Event Space in Newmarket, Ontario. She’ll perform the EP live for the first time with her full band, Raina & The Wranglers.
Release Show:
November 14 Newmarket, ON @ The George Event Space (with Raina & The Wranglers, doors 6:30 p.m., show 8 p.m.)
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