Manitoba Live Music Event

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"There’s such proximity in Everywhere A Man Can Be, the latest from Saskatchewan troubadour Zachary Lucky. Even with its fully lush country-folk production, the sound of the record never strays far from Lucky’s breathy baritone, recalling Gordon Lightfoot in his tender phrasing..."
- Penguin Eggs

"Lucky’s songs have lived lifetimes. They sit you down, tell you their stories and heighten your senses to the wonders of nature, love and self." - No Depression

The West End Cultural Centre is pleased to welcome Zachary Lucky to our stage on Saturday, November 23rd at 8pm. Lucky is touring across western Canada to promote his latest album ‘Midwestern’, released in October.

The road is no stranger to Canadian country singer Zachary Lucky. He’s used to rolling through hundreds of tour dates a year, sleeping in the back of his car, and playing his heart out in every town he moves through. His latest album ‘Midwestern’, grapples with ideas of fatherhood, the passage of time, and whether his daughters will grow up knowing the Canadian prairies he still loves.

To make Midwestern, Lucky headed south of Toronto to Hamilton, Ontario, to record with producer and engineer Dan Hosh, who had been a long-time fan of Zachary’s previous releases. Lucky had a clear vision for the album and was looking to go back to his roots with a more stripped-back sound. “I have always been more of a guitar and a voice kind of person and have been drawn to music where the song comes before the production” he says. With Midwestern, Lucky wanted to work with a simpler, more direct sound, recording most songs on the album live off the floor and straight to tape: “I wanted these recordings to make the listener feel as though they were sitting right next to us.”

The songwriting on Midwestern speaks to Zachary Lucky’s yearning for rural life (“Back to the Country”), his feelings about leaving home (“There Was A Time When I Used to Roam”), his thoughts on fatherhood (“Rock and Roll Dad”), his own childhood (“Sunday Morning At The Dragstrip”), and there’s even an apocalyptic ballad (“Revelation Blues”).

Lucky shares songwriting credits on some of the songs with fellow prairie songwriters Del Barber and Richard Inman. It’s an album of songs made during a time of reflection, for a man who’s constantly on the go. “When first I started making records, the space of the Canadian Midwest informed the kind of songs I was writing. There’s almost a sense of emptiness in my early songs. I wanted to try and recreate that with this record.”