From her time with
Eric's Trip to her decades of work as a solo artist,
Julie Doiron's delicately resilient voice and songwriting have been the cornerstones of her music. The haunting, whispery songs on her 1996 debut album, Broken Girl -- which arrived just before
Eric's Trip broke up -- hinted at just how different the music she made on her own would be from the work with her former band. Though she occasionally returned to rock, most notably on 2000's Juno Award-winning collaboration Julie Doiron and the Wooden Stars, the minimalist approach the singer/songwriter and photographer took on albums such as 2002's
Heart and Crime and 2004's
Goodnight Nobody allowed her to add elements of folk, country, and blues gracefully and let the honesty in her voice take the lead. That honesty made her a sought-after collaborator with artists ranging from
Gord Downie to
Mount Eerie, whose 2008 album Lost Wisdom (and its 2019 sequel, Lost Wisdom, pt. 2) used the poignant purity of her voice brilliantly. Following 2012's
So Many Days -- one of several albums produced by her former bandmate
Rick White --
Doiron didn't make another solo album until 2021's
I Thought of You, a quietly triumphant return that added some swagger to her sound.
Born in Moncton, New Brunswick,
Doiron started playing piano at age ten, saxophone at 12, and guitar at 15. In 1990, when she was an 18 year-old photography student at Mount Allison University, she joined her then-boyfriend
White in the acclaimed indie rock band
Eric's Trip as its bassist and vocalist. That year, she also founded the Sappy Records label, which released
Eric's Trip's music on cassette and vinyl and also issued
Doiron's largely acoustic solo work as Broken Girl. These included 1993's single Dog Love, Pt. 2 and 1995's Nora, songs from which appeared on April 1996's full-length debut, Broken Girl.
Not long after Broken Girl's arrival,
Eric's Trip broke up. For her second solo album, August 1997's
Loneliest in the Morning,
Doiron recorded with prominent indie rock producers and musicians like
Doug Easley,
Davis McCain,
Giant Sand's
Howe Gelb, and
the Grifters' Dave Shouse. Two years later, Tree Records released the EP
Will You Still Love Me?, and
Doiron also contributed vocals to
the Wooden Stars album from that year,
The Moon. She took her collaboration with the band to the next level with 2000's Julie Doiron and the Wooden Stars, a set of melancholy rock that earned critical acclaim as well as a Juno Award for Best Independently Released album.
In 2001, along with contributing vocals to
Snailhouse's album
The Opposite Is Also True and reuniting with
Eric's Trip for a series of live dates,
Doiron issued the French-language album
Désormais on Jagjaguwar that August. Following April 2002's stripped-down
Heart and Crime, in 2003 she collaborated on a split album with
Okkervil River for Spanish label Acuarela and worked with
Gordon Downie on his album
Battle of the Nudes, one of many appearances
Doiron made on his work over the years. For September 2004's
Goodnight Nobody, she traveled to Paris and recorded with
Herman Düne, adding touches of country and blues to her stripped-down style.
Doiron also appeared on
Herman Düne's 2005 album Not on Top and collaborated with Frederick Squire on the project Shotgun & Jaybird.
After reviving Sappy Records in 2006,
Doiron drafted her former
Eric's Trip bandmates
Mark Gaudet, Chris Thompson, and
White to work on her next solo album, marking the first time all four had recorded together in a decade. Produced by
White, January 2007's
Woke Myself Up combined the searing rock of
Eric's Trip with her own minimalist approach and earned a place on the Polaris Music Prize shortlist. The following year, she worked with
Phil Elverum and Squire on
Mount Eerie's searching album Lost Wisdom.
Doiron once again worked with
White on March 2009's
I Can Wonder What You Did with Your Day, another set of songs teetering between folky introspection and indie rock. That year, she also collaborated with Squire as Calm Down It's Monday, who released a split EP that featured alternate versions of songs from
I Can Wonder What You Did with Your Day. She and Squire were joined by
Daniel Romano for that December's
Daniel, Fred & Julie, an album of traditional and original folk songs released by You've Changed Records.
Doiron resurfaced in 2012 with more solo and collaborative projects. In September, her band
Julie & the Wrong Guys -- which also featured
Eamon McGrath, Mike Peters and
Jaye Schwarzer -- released its debut single "Heartbeats" in September. That October, she issued the reflective album
So Many Days, her third album to be produced by
White. The following year, she sang on
Romano's album
Come Cry With Me, and in 2015, she started a series of Spanish-language releases for Acuarela with the single Canta en Español.
Doiron also formed Weird Lines with
Jon McKiel, C.L. McLaughlin, Michael Duguay, James Anderson, and Chris Meaney, and the project's self-titled debut appeared in 2016. Collaborations dominated her body of work for the rest of the decade, including
Julie & the Wrong Guys' 2017 eponymous debut album, a reunion with
Elverum on 2019's Lost Wisdom, Pt. 2, and an appearance on Quebecois singer/songwriter
Dany Placard's 2020 album J'connais rien à l'astronomie. Though
Doiron issued several installments of her Acuarela series during this time, it wasn't until 2021 that she returned with an album. Arriving in November,
I Thought of You featured contributions from
Romano and
Placard and ranged from country and folk-inspired songs to psychedelic pop. ~ Heather Phares