“This is an album of real gratitude and real authenticity,” Dan Sultan tells Apple Music. “I was able to exorcise things that were unacceptable and manifest for myself a feeling of peace and acknowledgement—which is a nice place to be as an artist.” Now sober after battling substance abuse and addiction, the singer of Arrernte, Gurindji and Irish descent points to the fact that his fifth studio album is self-titled—and that it’s his first release to feature only his face on the cover—as being representative of this inner peace and the themes of acceptance and gratitude that permeate the LP. Produced by Eskimo Joe guitarist Joel Quartermain, Dan Sultan finds the First Nations singer-songwriter matching his confessional lyrics with a rich well of rock ’n’ roll, soul, pop and blues. Here, he talks through the record, track by track. “Story” “It’s about when I was four years old, and there was a note on our door saying, ‘Fuck off, Abos,’ or something horrible like that. It’s the first time I remember knowing that people didn’t like me because of my heritage. But it’s also a song about being an adult and being stripped of your experiences, or your experiences being devalued, going unacknowledged, which is just as hurtful and potentially harmful as the initial experience. In spite of all that, I’m a beautiful father and friend and husband. I have my moments, but my kids are safe and happy. That’s my measure of success. It’s a positive song—going through those things and being great in spite of it.” “Won’t Give You That” “It’s about not being defined by anything. I’ve certainly made mistakes in the past, but I’ve done things that have been more beautiful than not. If you pay attention to the media [reports about me], everything’s horrible, and it’s just a bit of a lazy approach. My story is a beautiful one. I’m someone who has always been an artist, has always been a musician, and I’ve always been really good at it. I’ve loved doing it. Now I’m in a place where I’m better than I’ve ever been at it, and I feel great. That’s my story.” “Wait in Love” “It was when I stopped drinking. I wasn’t well. My relationship with my wife, then-girlfriend, was relatively new. And it wasn’t fair. [In the song I’m saying to her], ‘Can you wait in love with somebody?/There’s some things I have to do.’ Basically, I was not being as much of myself as I could be. That’s a horrible thing when you’re in a relationship and you’ve made promises. When you tell someone you love them—that’s a promise. I wasn’t doing that until I was able to. It’s a love song with immense gratitude, acknowledging how fortunate I am to be where I am.” “Ringing in My Ears” “It's just a song of gratitude—acknowledging the past and feeling grateful for the moment and hopeful for the future. Which I think is a nice way to live.” “Fortress” (feat. Julia Stone) “It’s about coming home after a long day and feeling the lashings of love that wash over you, clean you. It’s about that safety and that security that you have from loved ones, which I’m extremely fortunate to have every day in my fortress.” “Chance to Lose Control” “It’s about finding peace with yourself. You can’t change anything else. I’m not going to try to change the way someone else is feeling or thinking. I can try to take on each day with a peaceful mindset. That’s just for my benefit. You can go through things and relationships can begin and end, you change jobs or you move or whatever it is, change your mind about things. But it’s still just you. It’s about finding peace with that.” “Rise Up” “It’s a message to myself. I'm not trying to tell anyone else what to do, but I think where I’ve gotten frustrated before, or even angry before, is feeling like people aren’t doing what I think they should be doing or anything like that. I’m in a much better place now—where I don’t actually have any of those wants or expectations on anyone else’s behaviour. It’s about taking a bit of control over your echo chamber and finding peace within yourself. That helps me find peace with everything else.” “Saint Nor Sinner” “That’s a song about me having day-on-day benders at my house when I used to live alone—before I met my wife and had a family—when I was pretty affected by drugs and alcohol. I’d have these big parties on my own, and it was so much fun. But then the bridge hits and it’s this moment of reflection, and it’s really sweet and beautiful: ‘You can fight me with your reason/And I can show you my hand but as I rise to my feet/I fall where I stand,’ sometimes literally. It’s really sad, but it’s such a fun song.” “Boats” “The bushfires inspired that, and the images of people having to escape their homes by getting in boats. Kids on their parents’ shoulders, having to be held underwater while hot ash rains down on the ocean. Terrifying. It got me thinking about how scary things must have to be to have your kids out in the middle of the ocean, in the middle of the night, as opposed to in their own bedroom. Then it evolved into being about asylum seekers and refugees. I asked The Peacemakers Ensemble [choir] from Western Sydney, who are all asylum seekers and refugees, to sing on it, and it gave the song that credibility.” “Undreamt Shores” “I was watching one of those shows like Great Canal Journeys, something really beautiful and quiet. They said, ‘Weaving through the canal to undreamt shores,’ or something like that. I’d never heard that [phrase] before. So I hung on to it. It’s a song about just going with it, sort of like ‘Chance to Lose Control’. Things change, relationships end, or your feelings about something change, and you arrive at a new place. It’s about an arrival. It’s scary and it’s exciting.” “Lashings” “It’s the whole record in a song. It’s about acknowledging the past, and being grateful for the moment and excited, motivated for the future. The lyrics are beautiful. I was in my home watching my kids play—it’s lashings of love. That’s a really beautiful thing, so I wrote that bit there and then, in that moment.”