Chelsea Crites gets back in the ring
Niagara singer embarking on cross-country radio tour to promote new single
It was a wall Niagara singer Chelsea Crites wasn’t sure she’d get past.
Last year, as she approached a decade chasing a country music career, the doubts began to creep in. Had her window passed? Was this what she really wanted?
It was the same self-doubt every artist faces at some point, she realized.
But it crippled her songwriting. She wasn’t able to write anything for nearly a year.
“If we’re being honest, I was tired of the industry,” says the Port Colborne artist, a mainstay in the local country scene. “I was running into dark corners every single time I’d release something.
“I still did music for the past year, but I definitely was in a funk with the original stuff. I wanted to lay low. I didn’t really know what I wanted to do with my music.”
She wasn’t even sure her heart was in country music any more.
“Every single time I’d release something, I just felt like it wasn’t working. I started to think to myself, ‘Is this really what I’m supposed to do?’ I know artists have this all the time. I was having those moments like, ‘I just wish something really good would happen … something a little bigger.’”
As she continued to play bars and restaurants, Crites had an unsettling thought: Is this as far as she’d get?
“I’d be like, ‘Is this going to change? Am I going to take the next step up? Even though I’d come so far, I felt like I was at that tipping point. I wanted to find that one thing that would tip me over.”
That next step came in the form of new song suggested to her by a friend in publishing. Released Thursday, “Ready for the Fight” is a pure pop song with only a trace of the country sound Crites is known for.
The inspiring lyrics – which she says can apply to anyone’s personal struggles, not just hers – kick-started a renewed emphasis on original songs.
They’ll appear on an upcoming EP, “Civil War.”
“It’s a brand new sound,” she says. “I took the year off to recreate my image, figure out what I wanted to do. I re-designed my logo and everything, and just took a year to step up my game.”
After doing some showcases at the Canadian Country Music Awards in Hamilton from Sept. 7 to 10, she’ll embark on a crosscountry radio tour to promote the single.
It’ll mean less local appearances, but more national exposure.
“I’m not doing too many bar shows in Niagara in the next little while, just because I’m focusing on this single.”