Ora Cogan and the Alchemy of Compassion

Despite what the title of Ora Cogan’s new album “Hard Hearted Woman” might suggest, the Canadian artist is anything but emotionally closed off; her sentimentality is still firmly in her own hands rather than surrendered. On the opening track, Honey, the mantra-like repetition of the album’s title doesn’t signal a woman numbed by the world, but one determined to exist on her own terms, to savor life, celebrate it, and hold onto joy. Written in the wake of anti-trans legislation passing across the United States, and shaped by Cogan’s grief for her queer and trans friends, the song evolved into something tender and defiant, where compassion pushes back against fear. This transformation of fear into love, and of love into art that sustains community, speaks to an almost alchemical process and to Cogan’s ability to nurture as an artist. It’s this kind of woman whom I talk to on a sunny Paris day over Zoom, one who reminds you of why an artistic endeavour matters in the first place. 

We find each other talking quite a lot about lands that tell their own stories: Stories of birds and trees, of disasters and shared meals. These histories of landscapes play a determining role in Cogan’s worldview, where this “web of life that includes all sentient beings” demands responsibility of its inhabitants. “Being a white lady on stolen land, in this so-called place Canada, I look around, read about history, and I look at what people are going through now and the roots of systems of oppression. I feel this burden of responsibility, but also a heavy heart,” she explains. Living in Nanaimo, Canada, a part of the world that’s been stewarded by Indigenous people, she lives in proximity to intact ecosystems that have been around for thousands of years. “That's not the case in a lot of places where there's already been a lot of colonial action in the forestry industry. I can’t do the landscape here justice, it’s a wild ecosystem that has been taken care of for countless generations by people who have respect for the land. It's kind of like a microcosm of life in general,” she continues. A constant reminder to Cogan of her responsibilities, as well as being one of the components that gives her work its life source. 

To record her album Heard Hearted Woman, Ora Cogan sought refuge in the pull of her surroundings. With her studio based in Nanaimo, she likens her hometown to Twin Peaks: beautiful yet gloomy, where vast stretches of water lie only fifteen minutes away. Most of the album’s vocals, along with portions of its guitar and accordion arrangements, were recorded there. On the record, the tang of her vocals recalls Vashti Bunyan, while the album’s atmosphere feels like it draws from the likes of Fairport Convention and Grouper. There’s a constant push and pull between past and present, all held together by a sense of emotional continuity and Cogan’s capability of being able to draw from a bigger well of sources while expanding the playing field. 

The recording sessions happened during a deeply turbulent period in Cogan’s life. “I was really a mess,” she admits. “I was going through a lot of personal turmoil. I’ve often tried to approach the creative process with more professionalism and control, but that desire didn’t seem to bend to my will.” Rather than resisting the chaos, she allowed intuition to take the lead, embracing a process shaped as much by collaboration as by trust in her own inner voice. For Cogan, solitude seems to have become essential to that process. She speaks of the power of being alone in a room, free from the energy of others. Her artistry emerges from an intimate understanding of her inner world, a kind of “know thyself” philosophy that grounds her and her collaborations. It seems to be this inward clarity that allows her to build meaningful creative relationships and cultivate the close-knit artistic community surrounding her today. On this record, she collaborated with artists from her hometown as well as friends and musicians she had previously toured with, making “Hard Hearted Woman” an album born from mutual understanding and trust.

Photo credit: Alexa Black

The way this album reveals itself to the listener is through layers upon layers of meaning, enveloping hidden worlds beneath visible ones. Beneath the smoky, psych-driven haze lies a deeply country heart, one that both borrows from and expands upon the finest traditions of the genre. Yet beneath even that lies lyricism that reads like fragments of magic, spells, and intuition that give the record an unmistakably esoteric allure. The artwork reinforces this feeling. It reminds me of a portrait Aleister Crowley himself might have posed for, cloaked, enigmatic and embodying "something", even though you don't understand what "thing" is yet. In the image, her reflection lies just beneath her, as though mirrored on the surface of a lake. It recalls the idea of the “other self,” the hidden double that acts as both source and shadow. She does not appear estranged from this self but deeply connected to it.

“I make a deal with my inner critic,” Cogan explains. “I say: You can be the biggest bitch later and rip apart everything I’ve written, but for now, you need to let me be free and say whatever comes to me.” That inner pact seems to permeate the songwriting itself. The lyrics often feel stream-of-consciousness, as though they emerge from a place beyond rational construction. There is a rawness to them, but also a strange coherence. Musically, that coherence is tied all together with guitars that sound brooding yet jolted with energy, organs and the undebatable chemistry the musicians have with each other. “Music has a very special power, I think that it can affect reality and it can certainly affect our nervous systems and bring people together in a really special way.” Cogan says. “Seeking community and looking to be on the right side of justice and bending towards the truth and bending towards deeper perspectives, growing and shifting with God as a living thing is important.” 

"Music is a living thing — a vocation, a magic spell. It can be profound or really simple, funny and goofy. But it’s also about flying in the face of hateful ideology and bigotry and saying: I love you, I respect you, you deserve dignity, and I want to be in a sweaty room with all of you. Something good can come out of that energy."

This understanding of “ritual” and having respect towards it comes from Ora’s upbringing, as she grew up in a pagan and alternative community, with the hippies on the West Coast. Customs, the way people live together and connect through mutual stories is therefore, incredibly important for the artist. “What’s beautiful is discovering the different threads that connect tradition. You might think a song is purely American, then trace it back and realize it has traveled all over the world, across hundreds of years, languages, and meanings.” she says.The transmission of stories in her case, if read literally, would be songs about rivers, smokes, fires and shadows–about separation, an inner compass, and a sense of unity with all that surrounds us, if explored more deeply. Much like in alchemy, singular elements dilute into a bigger picture, much like a Klint painting. Her music represents a way of moving through the world with heightened sensitivity, of gathering and transmitting fragments of memory, dread, beauty, and instinct before shaping them into something the listener can inhabit too, as participants in the same evolving mythology.