The Cabin Project

The Cabin Project, Portland’s own musical hybrid of folk-rock and indie, releases its 7th album, The Wonder. This record brings a new dimension to the project, cultivating the dynamic elements and harmonic depth that has long-defined the group. The record begins deep in the woods of the Pacific NW, a reflection on Sawicki’s last four years, and the highs and lows that life and its relationships can bring. From the lowest point, through recovery, to the reemerging and discovery of our animals within. The band gifts the songs with arrangements and instrumentation, allowing the listener to reconnect to forgiveness, renewal, and the land around us. The group was born in 2009, after band lead Katie Sawicki threw in the solo touring towel intent on finding a new sound. Her upstairs studio, lined with Doug Fir walls, became The Cabin Project—an invitation to collaborate and work collectively towards a sonically expansive sound. It began with layered tracks, doubled vocals, and rhythms that eventually found their way to drummer and percussionist Zanny Geffel. The two are now joined by Kelly Clifton’s melodic bass lines, Mieke Bruggeman’s atmospheric woodwinds, and original member Adam Sweeney returning on guitar. The Cabin Project remains a powerhouse collective of queer, women and nonbinary musicians and creatives, with an ever evolving perspective in its release of The Wonder. Gillian Frances has been playing music ever since she picked up her father’s drumsticks at the age of five. A child of parents who were involved in the Portland grunge scene of the 90’s, she witnessed firsthand the lifestyle that musicians and creatives can live. At the age of ten, she began attending the Rock and Roll Camp for Girls in Portland, OR--a music camp dedicated to empowering women and girls through music. In addition to Rock Camp, she studied classical violin for many years and began playing and writing songs on the guitar at sixteen. The many different musical worlds that Frances was involved with have blended into a style of songwriting that is uniquely hers--refined and gentle, bold and unafraid, inquisitive and meditative. As a multi-instrumentalist, Frances has been collaborating in bands since she was sixteen, and only within the past two years has she decided to step forward and begin pushing her personal creative work into the world. Notably, Frances played bass and guitar in Black Belt Eagle Scout, was a collaborator in indie-rock band Surfer Rosie and played violin in This Is The Kit. Inspired by artists such as Slowdive, Grouper, Mirah and This Is The Kit, Frances blends folk-inspired fingerpicking guitar with distorted, cascading guitar solos, soft, lilting vocals and drums that can be as soft as a whisper and as thundering as a waterfall.