Singer-songwriter Allison Russell builds community through music amid political division

Grammy-winning singer-songwriter Allison Russell is choosing connection over despair with her new album "In the Hour of Chaos," released this week. The Montreal-born, Nashville-based artist built the record around the idea that community can be an act of defiance in fractured times.

"There's plenty that is awful that's happening, but the only antidote that we have to that is imagining better together in real life," Russell explained in an interview in Toronto. The album gathers a sprawling cast of collaborators — Ruby Amanfu, Brittney Spencer, Norah Jones, Joy Oladokun, and Kyshona, among others — many of them women of colour.

Russell's work has long centered resilience. Her 2021 debut, "Outside Child," documented the childhood sexual abuse she endured before finding her chosen family as a teenager. On 2023's "The Returner," she shifted focus to what was reclaimed, celebrating survivor's joy. The track "Eve Was Black," which confronts racism tied to her abuse, earned her first Grammy in 2024 for best American roots performance.

"In the Hour of Chaos" moves from personal wounds to collective suffering, but Russell insisted on grounding the album in possibility rather than outrage. Opening track "Rainbows" is an acoustic ode to hope: "Magic's only magic if you believe it."

Russell recently spent time on Broadway playing Persephone in "Hadestown," an experience that inspired a partly theatrical approach to the new album. She describes it as "the mixtape for a musical that has yet to be written." The album's communal ethos reflects the chosen family she's built throughout her career, including a new friendship with Norah Jones, whom she duets with on the soul-stirring "Really Real."