Sandrine

As a child, Sandrine sang before the congregation at the church led by her father, a minister. At age six the family left the Sydney area for New Zealand, where they performed as the traveling Christian ensemble the Cornerstone Family. Seeking greater autonomy, she moved out of the family home at fifteen and set up residence in a backyard trailer. While employed as a waitress she encountered secular music for the first time when customers, one of whom gave her the Rolling Stones album Sticky Fingers, played her recordings she had never previously been permitted to hear. Galvanized by the discovery, she started composing songs and departed home soon afterward, choosing a guitar for its ease of transport. Once based in Sydney she completed her debut album, Trigger, issued in 2003. The recording drew interest from American labels and from Kiss’s Gene Simmons, who demanded a meeting during a visit to town. Dissatisfied with press depictions that cast her as a prefabricated pop act, she resolved to record her follow-up outside Australia. After forwarding demos to several U.S. producers she selected Malcolm Burn for the project, and the pair shaped the material at his home studio near Woodstock, NY. Her second album and American debut, Dark Fades into the Light, appeared in 2006.