a day in the life of ...

Top 10

2011-12-31T11:33:00.000-08:00

Braids - Native Speaker
Explosions in the Sky - Take Care, Take Care, Take Care
Bon Iver-Bon Iver
M83 - Hurry Up, We're Dreaming
Fleet Foxes - Helplessness Blues
Jay Z/Kanye - Watch The Throne
Austra - Feel It Break
Rural Alberta Advantage - Departing
Eleanor Friedberger - Last Summer
Cults - Cults

Fall 2011

2011-12-29T23:27:00.000-08:00

09.22.2011 Braids

I got into the Braids show just before they got on. The Electric Owl is a venue I've never been in. It's a very cool venue. It almost has sort of a supper club vibe to it. The stage is located at the side of the venue with a decent sized large dance floor and dining tables in the outer areas. From a live music standpoint, this place shines due to it's vibrant stage lighting and high stage. Makes me wish I was able to go to more shows. Anyways, There's really not much I need to report. The only out-of-the-ordinary thing that occurred during this show was a photographer (actually there were a lot of photographers at this show) getting too close to the lead singer and in response having her show him away. She didn't seem to upset. They played for under and hour without an encore and if you like their album as I do, you'll find that their sound translates well to a live setting. I think there may have been a new song in there, but I can't quite remember.

$10/14

09.25.2011 Pearl Jam/MudHoney

I was a pretty big PJ fan in my younger years and was even a Ten Club (PJ's fan club) member for 4-5 years. Some of my friends scoff at me when I tell them that seeing PJ in 2003 is in my top ten shows of all time, but I don't care. Nowadays I've almost entirely sworn off arena sized shows (my connection with the band weakens the further away I am from the source). So my motivation isn't really that high to pay PJ's $70+ ticket. Don't get me wrong I still want to see PJ, but can't really justify paying money for it. So how do I end up going to this show without jeopardizing my principals? Answer: On a technicality, via winning tickets via CFOX. It just so happens that on the week they announced tickets, they were having an all weekend phone in thing, caller 9, etc. I haven't listened to "modern radio rock" in years so this was a particularly cruel task. So on that Saturday while running errands, I would listen to the radio and if need be, pull my car over to call the radio station every time they cued. Luckily I only had to put up with about 2 hours of radio rock. I was actually pretty excited when I won and may even have dropped an F-bomb in conversation with the radio DJ, because our "winner" conversation wasn't broadcasted.

Oh yeah, the show. The seats were out in the back of the venue, lower bowl, 10 or so rows up. View wise, they're actually not bad. Distant, but could be worse. For Mudhoney, I think I would have enjoyed their set more in a smaller setting. I found their sound, like I guess most opening bands on an arena tour, to be very boomy. On a couple of their final songs they brought out McCready and Ament.

One positive consequence of 20 years of being an active band is a very deep catalogue. Bee Girl was a song I never thought I'd ever hear live. Midway into their set PJ reminded me why I'm not longer a Ten Club member. Vedder commented on the number of people in Seattle that had come up for this show. With the house lights turned up he asked to see a show of hands who was from Seattle. I kid you not, it looked like 85% from the first 15 rows were from Seattle. What's the point of keeping membership if you could never get under row 10? (I think when I saw them in 2003 I would have been able to get at best row 17 with my membership number) . If you've ever seen PJ, you'll know what to expect, a fair mix of old material with new material scattered about. Oh yeah and it's one long show. 20 years of being a band gives you the freedom of over 2 hour sets. I think they were approaching some sort of curfew/union time limit thing because the last song, Yellow Ledbetter seemed very rushed. Not that it was bad in any way, but after listening to hundreds of PJ bootlegs, you sort of pickup on it when you hear it.

$50/0

09.09.2011 Explosions in the Sky/Twin Sister

I keep getting Twin Sister and Twin Shadow mixed up. I know I downloaded one of the aforementioned on a free leech some time ago and remembered liking it. I was hoping the opening band was one the ones I've heard of. I was wrong unfortunately. It wasn't the same band. It turns out the band I've heard before was Twin Shadow and the band I found myself trying to stay awake for was Twin Sister. Yep couldn't get into them at all.

Last time I saw EITS was at the Croatian Cultural Center and They didn't exactly fill it. This time around with another album under their belt they've started to fill out and in this case sell out small theaters. To fill out their (wall of) sound, they've employed the services of Esteban Rey, who I believe was their former merch guy. On most songs he plays bass while Michael plays guitar.

Yasmin the Light is probably one of my favourite openers. It reminds me of the days when I first discovered this band. On top of the new songs, other crowd favourites played included "The Only Moment We Were Alone" and "Your Hand in Mine". The band seemed to really be enjoying themselves. You could see Munaf with a big smile on his face as he was slapping his guitar pickup to make the "boom" noise in the intro of TOMMWWA. As always the Vogue sounded awesome. Honestly they're one of my favourite bands ever and they're shows that put you in such a good mood that even when Munaf came out at the end of the show my heart still skipped a beat hoping there'd be another song even though I know better.

Edit this setlist | More Explosions in the Sky setlists

Full Set

$28/30

09.20.2011 CBC Midnight Music: New Pornographers / STARS / Midway State

This was actually a welcome surprise. CBC had this thing called "Culture Days" where they had a bunch of events celebrating the arts. Only notable thing I can remember from this even were open houses at the CBC downtown and this here program. It's called Midnight Music because it started at 10 pm here, but when broadcasted live, the east coast tv audience sees it at midnight. Anyways I get down there and it's pretty packed, mostly with people who are waiting for their friends to show up at the bars/clubs 10 blocks over. So yes a lot of disinterested people in the crowd. It's actually a pretty small space that they've taken over. About the width of a road and length wise less than a block? The whole show was pretty interesting seeing what goes on behind the scenes of TV taping.

Can't really say I'm a fan of Midway State after seeing them. I can certainly respect what they do, but I just couldn't get into them. Parts of their set reminded me of Patrick Watson.

Stars are always a crowd pleaser. I didn't enjoy their latest album as much as their previous ones, but their live shows are still decent. As with all their shows many a rose were thrown and there was lots of confetti filling the air. I'm still finding pieces of confetti days after the show.

No Neko or Dan Bejar on this show. Which is not really that unexpected as they don't usually show up on tour unless it's right after a new album release. Neko has an excuse as she doesn't really live in Vancouver (not that Newman does) but Dan Bejar doesn't. Newman playfully chided him, saying that he was probably just at home watching TV. Actually the cool thing about attending this show was the off air between acts segment. To kill time and keep the crowd from being too bored, several CBC personalities including Jian Ghomeshi and Strombo, would entertain the crowd with random banter and interviews with the bands. I don't know if he was trying to be a dick or was blissfully unaware, but Jian kept asking Newman Vancouver specific questions meant for someone who lives in Vancouver. Newman, moved from here to NY a while ago. Also, it was pretty weird seeing Mama Yama with the puppeteer visible. The puppeteer looks like Ellen Degeneres, I couldn't tell if it was a man or woman, especially since the puppeteer never broke character so we only heard the "Gilbert Gotfried" voice.

In case you're wondering each band played one song, short interview and then the next band would come on. When they went off air, each band returned for 2 more songs.

$24/0

Polaris 2011

2011-09-14T22:21:00.000-07:00

Q: Who do you think will win the 2011 Polaris Music Prize?

A: Braids - Native Speaker. Maybe I should buy a ticket for their show next week before it sells out (as a result of their future win).

09.05.2011 Eleanor Friedberger

2011-09-12T22:27:00.000-07:00

Eleanor Friedberger is one half of brother sister duo The Fiery Furnaces. The Fiery Furnaces songs are known for their elaborate time changes and garage rock sound. While waiting for a new FF album Friedberger released a solo album and is currently touring under it as the current opener for The Kills. Her solo work is more in the realm of singer songwriter, but there is some overlap. Before her show at the Commodore, she played a instore set at Zulu Records to about 30 or so people.

Summer Re-Cap 2011

2011-06-10T23:08:00.000-07:00

Maybe I'll turn this blog into a quarterly...

05.20.2011 Kathryn Calder/Himilayan Bear

Missed opener, Louise Burns' set. She used to be in Lillix and is now doing the solo stuff. Completely different than Lillix. On a side note, I was once backstage at Warped Tour and overheard Lillix's manager trying to get into the backstage area. I don't know if he got in or not.
Missed all of but the last song of Himilayan Bear's set. I think HB is another solo artist, but this particular last song also had 2 members of Calder's backing band joining him.
Calder played for roughly an hour with a full backing band. They sounded really good and reproduced the intricacies of the album well. She played almost of the entirety of the her debut album, filling out the rest of the set with a couple of new songs. Most of the new songs were pretty mellow in nature. Between songs, Calder told the crowd that while at the crossing the border, she had misheard the border guard asking the band name and instead told them the name of their van, "baby ray". She later joked about smuggling a baby ray over the border. She ended her set with a Castor & Pollux.

Edit this setlist | More Kathryn Calder setlists

$12/$14

03.23.2011 Patton Oswalt

I've seen other comedians in the past and most of the time I'm disappointed to find out that their sets normally consist of 40-50% material already found on the "Live CD" they're touring on. Also for whatever reason I'm usually disappointed when their sets run less than an hour. I dunno it just seems like I'm not getting my money's worth if i show up at 8 and i'm out on the street again by 10. Since he is one of my favourite comedians I figured I would check him out, even with my low expectations. Oswalt newest bit of comedic awesomeness is a book that actually has some BC content. In it he recounts in journal form, his experiences working in Surrey for a week 20 or so years ago. Anyways, his set ran about 70 min, which is pretty decent as far as standup sets go. His set was about 90% new material was very nice. I didn't think they were all home runs, but overall very entertaining and worth the money.

$25/$30

05.30.2011 Wolf Parade / Frog Eyes / Himilayan Bear

A few weeks before this show, the promoter's weekly email leaked out that this would be their final show, ever. Subsequent emails later had this little tidbit removed. I guess they wanted to avoid any finalities.
Completely missed Himilayan Bear this time. I've never been able to get into Frog Eyes, but there were many people in the crowd who loved their set. Being local to this area (Victoria, close enough) doesn't hurt either.
Now being it was their last shows, bands normally take one of two options: A. One last hurrah where they get it all out, playing all the rare songs that their fans have wanted them to play but they never do, or B. The "best" show of the current era. Wolf Parade opted for option 2. The setlist was essentially the setlist you would expect them to play in 2011. All their staples were played like 'Sons and Daughters of Hungry Ghosts' with new songs from their current album like "What Did my Lover say?" and "Little Golden Age" to fill out the setlist. I read in an interview somewhere that the reason why some songs were not played anymore was because either they knew the audience wouldn't enjoy it, or that the band themselves wouldn't enjoy playing it and thus the audience wouldn't enjoy hearing it. Towards the end of the set Dan remarked on the unprofessionalism of the band, I thought they played as well as any other time I've seen them. I was pleasantly surprised there was a second encore. After 'Fancy Claps' finished I really couldn't think of anything else they could have encored (again) with. They ended up letting the crowd onstage while they performed a veeery loose cover of Dylan, and I guess GnR's version of, "Knockin' on Heaven's Door." Oh yeah officially, they haven't broken up, it's just an indefinite hiatus. I guess that's better than broke up and 5 years later reunion.

Edit this setlist | More Wolf Parade setlists

$40/$35

07.09.2011 Hannah Georges / Neko Case / The New Pornographers

For Vancouver's 125 birthday, The city of Vancouver threw a birthday bash at Stanley Park with 3 days worth of FREE concerts, all with local artists. I managed to go to only one of those.
I loved Hannah Georges' albums and was pretty excited to see here live. For some reason I just couldn't get into her in a live setting. I dunno, it might have been the large stage thing. It just didn't seem to translate well. I think I'd enjoy seeing her more in a smaller venue like the Biltmore or even Venue. She played about 40 min and even included some new songs that she's been working on.
For all the times that I've seen Neko w/ the New Pornographers, this was the first time I've seen her solo. My reaction is mixed. Liked quite a few songs, but was reminded that I really don't like the alt-country thing that much, even if Neko's the one bringing it.
Well this is a first, I've seen the NP without Neko, and now I've seen them without Kathryn. Well sort of. Kathryn ended up getting on stage about 2 to 3 songs in, apparently she was at a dinner reception or something. Not surprising as the traffic getting into Stanley Park that day was ridiculous. Carl Newman also commented that Calder was getting married. Sorry folks. I don't really have much else to say other than I enjoyed it for the most part and that It was a fairly standard NP set. One you would expect to hear at a recent show. About an hour and no encore due to curfew.

$30/$0

07.16.2011 The Klaxxon

This one's pretty random. I was in Tofino this weekend and someone was mentioning that there was a "SKA" show by a band call The Klaxxon. My first thought was Klaxxons? and Ska?, that doesn't really make sense. Then I noticed the absence of the 'S' at the end of Klaxxon. Well turns out they're a SKA/world music band from... I can't remember, but I want to say Columbia. They were the only band that night and played 2 sets. Pretty fun stuff. There was also a lot less skanking going on that what I would have expected.

$10/$12

.... and that was my summer in terms of live shows. On second thought maybe I'll just turn this into a bi-yearly thing...

04.22.2011 Starfucker / We Need Surgery

2011-06-03T15:46:00.000-07:00

First update in a while. Still going to shows, just less of them...

Local opener was called "We Need Surgery". They had a dance rock sort of sound. Had a sort of preppy stage image. Only thing that struck out was that their singer was really good. I'm talking he could probably do studio work as he has a very 'mainstream rock produced' sound. A lot of people in the crowd knew of them. I did not since I'm apparently out of the loop now.

I was a little surprised that Starfucker's first song, 'Hungry Ghost' featured their singer on turntable. For some reason listening to their first album at home, I never thought a turntable would be used live, probably because it's been years since I've seen a rock-based band with turn-tablist. The show really started to take off a song later during 'Myster Cloud' when the synth leads kicked in mid song. This show was their second to last show of a lengthy tour across the states. They seemed tired but were by no means sloppy and they did bring the audience what they wanted, a sweaty dance party. Their singer reminds me of Island's Nick Diamonds, both have an affinity for face paint. I found the laser beam lighting machines they had onstage cheesy at first, but actually worked out pretty well as the night grew on. Material was a mix of old songs and new ones. To Starfucker's credit, I can't really recall many lulls in the their set, most of the crowd was dancing about the entire 70 or so min they played.

$15/$15

03.26.2011 Esben and the Witch / Julianna Barwick

2011-04-01T16:58:00.000-07:00

I had to describe what Esben and the Witch's sound was like to a friend who listens mainly to top 40. The music mags have settled on 'gothic' something or other but I thought it brought up to many thoughts of dumb new emo or some black metal outfit. I wanted to say "experimental" but settled on a rock band playing a soundtrack to the salem witch trials. I was a little surprised to find out that they'd been here before last year. They've had some buzz back home in Europe since, but remain pretty under the radar here, which is why their headlining show this time around was at the Waldorf Cabaret, a small venue, possibly smaller than the Media Club.

Opener was Julianna Barwick. The thing she does better than anyone in the room was vocal loops. When I say vocal, I mean like ethereal choir-y vocals. Looping, she was able to create a very lush wall of voices. She may have had a minimal synth setup as well. I quite enjoyed her set. My interest did end up waning towards the end. It's one of those things where it might be better as background music if you're going to listen to it for a long stretch of time.

Not surprisingly, and this may also be due to the limitations of the venue, Esben and the Witch played to a very dark room. My camera scoffed at this, but it fit the mood so I didn't really mind. I knew going in that EATW's percussion department was pretty limited to one cymbal and a floor tom, with each member taking turns having a go at it during certain songs. Playing the floor tom would be an understatement, they were trying to break it. I was still a little surprised to find out how much sampling was used during their live set. Not really sure how I feel about that, I kept looking back at the mixing board to see if it was being done live, still not sure. Vocally and instrumentally their live show holds up their album. I would actually say they're a better live band. Due to a curfew, they only played 45 min, though I get the feeling they're also a little worn out from a long tour, as this was the last date of their NA tour. Still their songs were full of energy when they needed to be, (they really punished that floor tom), and dark and gloomy when it wasn't, just the way the audience wanted.

03.12.2011 Kaki King / Megan Washington

2011-03-20T00:00:00.000-07:00

Opener 'Washington' was Australian Megan Washington, a charming solo keyboardist-singer songwriter type. Not surprising, Megan Washington and Kaki King's live show have something in common... they like to talk. The standout banter for Washington was a story about her "Vibe-rater" or the thing in your head that discerns good vibes from bad vibes. Kaki King makes fun of her later in her set for that one. Song wise, she was entertaining enough. Proficient on the keys and decent melodies, Washington kept me entertained for the 30 or so minutes she was allotted.

The crowd for tonight's show was really mixed: The usual main street hipsters, weekend warriors, obvious lesbians and somewhat surprising, older guitar enthusiasts or the portion of the "Yale Hotel" crowd with internet (i kid, she's played the yale before). One thing I've always hated about the Biltmore was it's low stage. Kaki seems to be aware of this to as she suggested that everyone on the floor sit down, otherwise only the people in the front would be able to witness her awesomeness. Something that I've always loved about Kaki King's music is that she always finds a way to reinvent herself. Her first couple of albums were primarily solo acoustic driven instrumentals. Eventually she started releasing songs with vocals. Later albums feature her with a band and playing electric guitar. Her current tour is basically her and various non-standard-rock-show acoustics. I think she had somewhere between 5-7 different guitars that included a monstrous harp guitar (two 6 string necks, one regular other bass) and a dobro banjo hybrid (a "dojo"). It was nice that Kaki explained each guitar before using them.
I felt like was taking music class again. As mentioned before, her show has a lot of banter between songs. I thought this was probably the funniest:

Due to the dance party afterwards, Kaki chose to forgo the encore and play right through, still clocking in at about 90 mins worth of material which included "Adency" an Andrew York cover and "Because It's There", a Michael Hedges cover, the latter whom Kaki is often cited as being a major influence. Filling out her set were a few songs from her instrumental days and a lot of unreleased material. More to the point of reinventing herself, or at least trying new things, she also played a "Celtic" style song towards the end of her set. She really only sang on one song and that was the last one, "Sunnyside", off her new album. By this point her voice was pretty shot from having a cold and talking all night so technically I guess you could say her voice sounded terrible, but I sort of thought that it went well with the lyrics which was about heart break.

$20/$15

03.08.2011 Noise Night: Zev Ascher / Ejaculation Death Rattle / Al Mader

2011-03-08T16:15:00.000-08:00

I wasn't really planning on using this as a blog post but since there were live performances and I've been accused of a lack of local content (guilty as charged), I figured what the hell. Recently I found out that Mondays at the Vancity Theatre on Seymour and Davie show music docs/films every Monday. Most of them being the non mainstream, the kind you'd expect to see on IFC. I've been told most of the time they don't even make any money. In fact on this night, there were maybe 30-40 or people if that, and most seemed to know one of the bands personally in one way or another. On top of everything, it's a really nice theatre. Anyways today was "Noise Night". Basically an exploration of the "Noise" scene.

First up was "The Minimalist Jug Band". Basically a guy, named Al Mader playing a washtub bass. It had a very open mic feel to it. At times it was pretty amusing as well, lyrically. I was surprised to find out from the MC that other artists have covered his material.

The first film shown was a documentary about a local band noise band called Tunnel Canary. Aside from its arts school low budget feel, I thought that the documentary was well made. It explored TC in it's most active period during the late 70s and 80s. When I say noise I'm talking about .... (--Trying to think of the most accessible band in this genre --) .... bands like Merzbow and Oxbow. If i had to describe TC, other than calling it noise, I would say a drummer and guitarist making dissonant and discordant music (lots of feedback and ... noise) with a female front woman who screamed most lyrics as if in a horror movie. Most songs appeared to have no structure, however it was mentioned that there were lyrics and she wasn't just screaming randomly. Reminds me of most death metal or Converge. Later parts of the movie highlighted a newer Vancouver band, The Mutators. The highlight of the film was footage of Tunnel Canary playing a street busker set on the Plaza at Granville and Georgia to business people passing by.

The second live performance was Ejaculation Death Rattle. Their noise unit seemed to have a bit more structure than TC. There was violinist, 2 vocalist droners and what appeared to be a live sound mixer. They weren't too bad. As expected it was very droney. I enjoyed this set more than the first.

Before the second documentary, there was a short performance by Zev Ascher, the director of the second movie shown that night. He basically sat at the bottom of the theatre making noises on an ipod app to some visuals. Can't remember which app.

The second film was called Subcultural Revolution: Shanghai. I thought this movie was pretty great, though I thought it went off on too many tangents. This documentary highlighted various people in Shanghai with different views on society and politics. Though not a main focus, a noise band called "Tortured Nurse" was featured.

The night overall I found to be well put together. The time devoted to each portion of the night was perfect. It was informative and thought provoking without being too self indulgent, and it definitely could have been the latter. Amusing side note for me, throughout the night, there were skill testing questions put out by the MC to the audience for prizes. Due to the genre's obscurity, quite a few questions weren't answered. All of them flew over my head.

$14/$14

02.16.2011 Godspeed You! Black Emperor / Total Life

2011-02-28T22:22:00.000-08:00

I still remember sometime in 2003 when Godspeed was touring the US and I really wanted to see them. They started with the east coast and were planning on doing west coast dates afterwards. That was until they broke up. Their reformation is easily the most excited I've ever been to see a band play live. The opener wasn't really worth writing about. Total Life as he was called was a one person laptop/dj/looping noise maker and the only act to put me to sleep in the 15 or so years I've been going to concerts.

Godspeed ended up being the exactly what I imagined they would be 8 years ago. A dark and brooding orchestral force. Also worth mentioning were the visuals. It was like watching an old artsy film put to the perfect soundtrack. This photo best illustrates what I'm talking about. My only complaint for this show was that in my dreams back in 2003 they played both Moya and East Hastings.

Godspeed You! Black Emperor
02.16.2011
The Vogue Theatre
Vancouver, BC

source: DPA 4061>diybb>H140
lineage: WAV(m)>FLAC
editing: Fade in/Fade out,volume raised in some parts, removed some talking

Setlist:
01) Intro/Hope Drone
02) Storm
03) Static
04) Albanian
05) World Police and Friendly Fire
06) Dead Metheny
07) Rockets Fall on Rocket Falls
08) BBF3

mp3s and a better player here.

$40/$40

02.11.2011 Lou Barlow @ Zulu Records

2011-02-20T19:32:00.000-08:00

If you grew up in the 90s it's likely you would have come across at least one of the bands Lou Barlow has been in. Lou Barlow was one of the founding members of Dinosaur Jr. After leaving Dinosaur Jr, he would go on to form Sebadoh amongst other projects. He would end up rejoining Dinosaur Jr years after. Sebadoh is currently on tour. Before their show in Vancouver Barlow played a solo set at Zulu Records. He's a pretty funny guy, lots of self deprecating humour. During the set he asks the crowd for requests and ends up turning most of the suggestions down. He also mentions be sick this night and has to do some warm up exercises before going into song mode.

$10/$0

01.22.2011 The Thermals / Juvenile Hall

2011-02-10T01:03:00.000-08:00

An hour after doors, I was kind of worried that The Thermals would be playing to an empty room. I mean I know their drawing power has diminished somewhat over the years, but I wasn't expecting to only see 30-ish people in the venue after an hour after doors opened. Turns out all there was a hockey game going on and the venue really started filling up afterwards. The show actually ended up selling out. Hmm so let's recap what's changed since I last saw these Portland pop-punk rockers (circa 2007) - 2 albums, some music videos and a they lost a guitarist, er touring guitarist.

Juvenile Hall were up first. They were a 3 piece all girl band from Vancouver. They played pop punk / riot grrrl kind of stuff. They remind me of that other all girl Vancouver band the Riff Randalls. Not really my jam.

I think the Thermals as a (power) trio is the right fit for them. The touring guitarist was pretty forgettable anyways. There were two distinct instances during the show where the sold out crowd really got into it. First one happened during an interlude or breakdown of a new song where the drummer went into the crowd to party it up. The other was when they played "Here's Your Future", which caused, just like last time I saw them, a pretty intense pit at the stage lip. The majority of the show was newer songs from their last two albums. I think there were only 3 or 4 songs from "Body, Blood ..". Highlight of their set for me was "Never Listen To Me", which was primarily Hutch doing only vocals during the verses. It was as close as they would come to playing a ballad that night. I get the feeling Hutch didn't like the way someone did a stage dive during the end of their set. When pressed by the crowd for a second encore, Hutch declined, not looking all too happy.

$12/15

Dan Mangan - Sold

2011-02-09T20:51:00.000-08:00

Dan Mangan's newest music video for "Sold" was shot at Famous Foods! Go East Van!

Death From Above 1979 - Romantic Rights (Live 04.02.2005)

2011-02-08T20:19:00.000-08:00

Just in case you didn't already know, DFA1979 reformed. They're playing Coachella and Sasquatch and a full tour later.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qACnGMd9Yq4&feature=player_embedded

Comeback Kid - Lorelei (Live 03.10.2004)

2011-02-06T14:03:00.000-08:00

I couldn't really get into this band after their original singer left.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MiIPmd0V0YY

Jill Barber - Hardline (Live 03.20.2008)

2011-02-06T13:57:00.000-08:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=32XMHwCMCko

Top Ten List 2010

2010-12-05T11:36:00.000-08:00

Having a blog that updates, legally gives you the right to have and publish a top ten list. None of these are in any particular order.

Albums
======

Kaki King - Junior
A concept album about secret agents from one of today's most underrated guitarists.

Fang Island - Fang Island
An album that never failed to put me in a good mood whenever I listened to it.

Arcade fire - the Suburbs
It's the Arcade Fire.

Robyn - Body Talk
Guilt-free pop music.

New Pornographers - Together
More awesome pop rock anthems from Vancouver's own.

Caribou - Swim
Dan Snaith has a PhD in Math. He definitely knows a thing or two about beats.

Envy - Recitation
Combines the whirlwind emotion of post rock with the gut wrenching rawness of hardcore punk.

Janelle Monae - Sub-Archandroid
A diverse melting pot of forward thinking R&B/Soul.

Beach House - Teen Dream
Reminds me of my love for dream pop

Kanye West - My Beautiful Dark Fantasy
An incredibly ambitious album from everyone's favourite interrupter. He shoots high and amazingly hits his target.

Honorable Mention (aka number 11): Crippled Black Phoenix - I Vigilante

in case you care, my favorite song was probably a toss up between Crash Years (New Pornographers) and Daisy (Fang Island).

Shows
=====

02.06.2010 Do Make Say Think / Happiness Project / Years
A really diverse lineup, yet it all falls under DMST at the end of the day. HP was very interesting and was a perfect break from the usual concert norm.

07.14.2010 New Pornographers
Capping off a two night stand, it's a full lineup in the band's hometown playing for a surprisingly rowdy bunch of people. Nice.

02.24.2010 Wintersleep
One of my favourite bands playing in a all too small venue. Wintersleep at the "Atlantic House" as close as you'd get to seeing them in their (original) hometown of Halifax

11.10-14.2010 Wintersleep / Ra Ra Riot / Listening Party / Parlour Steps / Hey Marseilles

2010-11-16T01:19:00.000-08:00

Being unemployed/barely employed sometimes has it's advantages. For one you can sleep in until 11 am and go to as many shows as your savings will allow. So when I had the opportunity to see Wintersleep a bunch of times on their Canadian tour, I jumped at it. I was only planning on covering the BC shows because I don't think anyone cares about the US shows, but they do have some other Vancouver content so I might as well squeeze it in.

Seattle

Seattle's always had a pretty weird set of rules against fun (infamous Teen Dance Ordinace or as my friends in Seattle referred to as the "Footloose" laws), so it wasn't really a surprise when I heard that you couldn't have alcohol on stage. Not really a problem for me, but still weird for those who play music.

Never really got to see Parlour Steps in Vancouver so it was nice to finally catch a set of theirs, even if it's not in Vancouver. Most of their songs are mellow indie rock-ish. Crowd seemed to be into them. For some reason I keep getting a alt-country vibe from them, but I can't explain why.

Most people were there to see Land of Pines. You could tell because by the end of the night there were probably only 30 people watching Wintersleep's set. Those that were though, were treated to a encore of Danse Macabre. It was originally supposed to be Nerves, but Danse was requested by one the die hards pretty much the entire night.

Portland

This was at Mississippi studios, which was more like a really small theatre. Very interesting almost vintage vibe to the place. Parlour Steps opened up this show as well. I think i'm they're starting to come around on me. I really enjoyed their set this time. I didn't stick around for Hey Marseilles. I can only say that they sounded like Beirut from what I heard of their soundcheck. Not much to say about this show.

Victoria

Victoria's show was at a medium sized theatre called Alix Goolden Hall. It used to be a church, but is now used by the Royal Conservatory of Music, so you can imagine how cool this venue is. Listening Party's set was probably highlighted by someone in the balcony starting the wave. It took him about 3 tries, but once the rest of the balcony jumped aboard, the whole building ran with it. It went around for 5 or 6 revolutions.

The immense size of the venue, coupled with the awesome lighting made for a fantastic show. My only complaint was the crowd, which was a bit sterile. People who wanted to dance were directed to the side of the venue and security made sure people stayed in their seats otherwise. I know Vancouver has a reputation for audiences not dancing and keeping their hands in the pockets and showing now excitement, but at least they'll stand up at a rock show. Patrons were left sitting, awkwardly, until the encore. Even then the encore songs only had about half the crowd standing.

Vancouver

Listening Party was well received at this show. Probably because they're partly based here. They had fair amount of their fans singing along in the first 5 rows. I'm still not sold on them. Ra Ra Riot's first day on this tour was today. It's kind of weird how the band Rah Rah has also opened up for Wintersleep as well. On the same tour as well. I had checked out Ra Ra Riot when they first started getting a lot of buzz from their first album a few years ago. To be honest, on record, I thought their sound was okay, but nothing spectacular. Their live show has since convinced me that I should revisit their albums. They turned a lot of heads at the Commodore tonight. Might have been the larger stage, but they were pretty energetic onstage, moving around and engaging the crowd who ate it up.

Found out that Wintersleep's show was being recorded for a later broadcast on Sirus Radio. Pretty cool. I wonder how many shows I've been to the Commodore have been broadcasted on Sirius that I don't know about. This show was probably the best one I saw out of the five. Sold out and lots of energy. Nerves was a the perfect closer for the night with it's extended outro and drum solo.

Whistler

Pretty weird seeing Wintersleep in a small venue, Garibaldi Lift Company, which was essentially just a large bar. Ra Ra Riot opening up again. I think the show probably would have done better if it was during ski season, which won't happen until the week or so after. That being said, the venue was decently filled by the time Wintersleep got on. Ra Ra Riot's set was well received, though they didn't move around as much as they did the night before. Smaller stage I guess. Actually the venue had a very living room like vibe to it. Of note, during Wintersleep's set, the cellist and violinist joined in for "Preservation". It was a nice touch. Although it got me wondering why they weren't conscripted for the intro to "Experience the Jewel". Oh well.

Surprisingly, the setlists for the shows were pretty similar. Pretty much a good mix of all 4 albums. Not too many big changes from a year ago. Whistler didn't get "Nerves", which I assume having something to do about hitting the 1 am curfew. Actually one thing I did notice, is that while they do seem to be playing the same number of songs on the set, they're taking less breaks in between songs. A couple of last tidbits. I actually did hear Wintersleep try to work through "Migration" during their soundchecks, but I guess not enough practice. Also the stuffed/toy dog is named Jenny.

Monotonix - Live in Vancouver 2008

2010-10-24T15:29:00.000-07:00

10.13-14.2010 Broken Social Scene / Sea and Cake

2010-10-17T00:29:00.000-07:00

Opening for both shows were Chicago based Sea and Cake. This band is probably best known for having Tortoise member John McEntire drum for them. I've never been able to get into Tortoise aside from a few songs. I could actually imagine myself being quite bored if I ever had to seem them live, much like how I was during the majority of Sea and Cake's set. Really the only aspect of their show I found interesting was McEntire's drumming. He's pretty good. To be honest, aside from the times when various members of Broken Social Scene would sit in on certain songs, I had trouble telling one song from another.

Even though I know I'll never see Feist, Amy Milan or Emily Haines sing with BSS in Vancouver, I am comforted with the fact that most of the other core members who wrote the early BSS albums are still touring. I thought that the first show was pretty long as it clocked in at around 2h 15. The second show proved to be even longer, pushing it to 2h 30. The setlist was quite varied, with songs spanning their catalogue. Thankfully, the two shows were different enough to make it worth it; not that 2+ hours of music is ever not worth it.

Maybe it's because BSS now has a few songs where Whiteman is the lead singer (and guitarist), but Whiteman was more vocal than I've ever seen him. During the first show he actually had something to say between songs. The most substantial being his support for the sex-trade workers and getting prostitution legalized a la Amsterdam. What can I say? He's a forward thinking man.

Fire-eyed boy had a pretty cool saxophone solo/jam in the middle of it. Not sure if they did this in the past as well. Guilty cubicles was a welcome surprise in the first night. I'm not really a fan of anything off 'Feel Good Lost', but it's nice to hear something they don't normally play. I've said it before and I'll say it again, Brendan Canning looks odd without his beard.

"Almost Crimes" was somewhat of a surprise as I could never see the laid back Lobsinger sing on such an upbeat song (she did do backups). Lead vocals were provided by Andrew Whiteman's wife Ariel. She's probably the least gifted of the BSS singers I've seen, but she definitely has the swagger needed to pull off the aforementioned song.

The biggest WTF moment of the 2 night stand occurred during the 2nd night. They brought out Neil Osbourne of 54-40 fame (you know "Every time I look at you... I go blind.." ...actually if you weren't listening to Canadian radio in the 90's you probably wouldn't know...) . After introducing it as the song Kevin Drew first made out with, they somewhat surprisingly launched into 54-40's "One Gun". I'm unclear if this was done ironically or unironically.

After seeing these two shows, I sort of feel stupid for thinking this show would be any less of a show just because a couple of divas (not my words) didn't feel like committing to touring well after a band got big (I should note that James Shaw of Metric fame flew in for the show). The mix of old and new songs were well chosen and really the only song I wanted to hear that they didn't play was "Major Label Debut". You really can't complain about a band when they play 2+ hours and vary their setlists. Now if only Kevin Drew could be less Bono-y...

$45/$45

10.03.2010 Land of Talk / Suuns / Rah Rah

2010-10-04T22:18:00.000-07:00

I actually remembered to bring my camera to this show, but apparently the band had requested no photos at the show. huh..

Anyways, Rah Rah, the first band, is not the same as that other band Rah Rah Riot. I'll confirm this when I see the latter in November. They're a really fun band. You could file this band under the indie label. Their singer has a sort of country-ish feel to it. Biggest surprise with this band was their drummer. She spent most of set behind the kit, but in the latter half, she did some singing and played bass as well. She could probably front her own band.

Suuns ("Sooons") is a band from Montreal that's very hard to classify. For the most part they reminded me of Maserati, but noisier and with more of dynamic sonic range. Their guitarist uses a lot of delay and distortion. They kind of drifted between lofi electronic music to catchy dancey indie rock. Like I mentioned before, hard to classify.

One thing that doesn't surprise me about Land of Talk after seeing them through the years, is that the lineup is pretty flexible. Case in point most of the older songs featured the power trio formation of Liz Powell on guitar/vox, Joe Yarmush on bass and Liam O'Neil (replacing Andrew Barr for a couple of shows). Despite the short notice and being only the second show that he was playing, Liam O'Neil filled in very well and didn't seem to miss a beat (bad pun). This is not the same Liam O'Neil from the Stills, though apparently Liz Powell knows em both. The new songs (and even some of the old ones for that matter) featured members of Suuns adding extra guitar and synth. In addition, a lot of songs also had Liz's friend and artwork contributor Corianne Tate as a backup vocalist. The setlist favoured heavily on songs from their new album Cloak and Cipher. While almost all the other albums were represented, I wouldn't have minded hearing either "Corner Phone" or "Give me back my Heart Attack", both of which slayed me last time I saw them. I will say this, I really can't say that Land of Talk's shows are predictable. The last 3 times that I have seen them, all 3 of the shows were quite different from each other. Tonight not being an exception.

$15/$15

09.10.2010 Gaslight Anthem

2010-09-20T14:12:00.000-07:00

Gaslight Anthem's latest album didn't exactly blow me away like their previous release did. Luckily, I'm a sucker for free shows. I've got to hand it to UBC, they've really come a long way in terms of quality of entertainment over the years. I remember seeing a lot of pretty bad CANCON rock over the years. It was fairly surprising to see a non-Canadian band headlining this years Welcome Back BBQ.

The set overall was a mix of all their albums with focus more on the latter 2 albums. Most of the fan favourites from the last album were well represented. It took about 2 songs before the crowd was pogo-ing and moshing along. Even though they've grown in popularity since the last time I saw them, singer Brian Fallon is still has humble as ever. Between songs he also suggested shows to go to that very night (Comeback Kid/Madball was his pick). It might have been that they were playing the same night, but Fallon also snuck a few lines from The National's Fake Empire during a jammy breakdown midset. Biggest surprise of the night was the encore. A 3-4 song encore which started after the scheduled curfew time.

$15/0

07.14-15.2010 The New Pornographers

2010-07-17T20:49:00.000-07:00

I'm pretty lazy these days so the thought of writing two reviews as oppose to a combined one would probably push this review further into procrastination. Now being the poor student and soon to be unemployed graduate, I wouldn't normally go to both shows of a two night stand. I've been burned too many times by bands who've played similar and sometimes exactly the same sets on all nights. I'm happy to report that The New Pornographers are not one of these bands. Both nights were different enough that I felt my money, although no longer in my pocket, went to a good cause.

The first night was a bit of a bittersweet affair. As the band walked out to this really well known 70s epic prog rock song, I'm sure almost everyone noticed that Neko wasn't there. Now I've said it before, Kathryn Calder can hold her own, (I like her voice more than Neko's) but being used to the albums, shows without Neko just aren't the same. The crowd respectfully stayed in the seats for the first couple of songs until Carl, before starting "Use It", stated that "You can stand up if you want." This started a mass exodus of people to the front of the stage, officially starting the rock show. Carl explained a couple songs in that Neko was stuck in Vermont due to a cancelled flight and that he "blamed God." I guess to make up for it, they played a rarely played "To Wild Homes."

Night two had people at the stage lip as soon as the Do do's left the stage. The crowd at this show was much much more involved and actually quite raucous. This led to a lot of banter from the band. Neko commented on a shirtless guy in the balcony who apparently was a bit distracting. Both nights had Carl pointing out how much weed was in the air, like all Vancouver shows. It was nice to the Bejar sung, "Jackie" back in their setlist. I had never heard that one before in the many times I've seen NP.

Both nights ended with Bejar's "Testament to Youth and Verse". During the "No no no no no" chorus the band stopped playing, inviting the crowd to repeat it. Awkwardly, both nights the crowd had to be coaxed into participating, nevertheless everyone had fun I'm sure.

07.01.2010 Stanley Clarke Band / Andy Milne's Dapp Theory

2010-07-06T17:22:00.000-07:00

The Vancouver Jazz festival is usually pretty good about bringing in pretty decent jazz acts. This year their crowning grab was Return to Forever bassist and bass innovator Stanley Clarke. Extra special was the addition of the phenomenal Hiromi Uehara in the piano chair.

Unfortunately, I was unable to catch the majority of Andy Milne's set. The beat poetry spliced into the music was a little new to me and at times the drummer seemed to overplay his parts, but overall from what I heard they were quite good.

I should actually mention that this was the first time that I attended a show at the Centre for Performing Arts (former the Ford Centre I think). The acoustics are nice and the decor in the atrium was quite classy. Stanley's band consisted of him, Hiromi on piano, Ruslan Sirota on synth, and Ronald Bruner Jr. on drums. The remarkable thing was despite the age of Stanley, the rest of the band were in their late 20s / earyl 30s. Much like someone else alluded to, it was very much like a great jazz legend passing the torch to a new generation of musicians.

Stanley started his set with on the electric bass playing a solo piece. This was actually the only time he played his electric. The rest of the set he played his upright acoustic. The set was comprised of half songs from the 2 albums Stanley did with Hiromi and the other from his previous projects. And true to jazz form, some wonderful solos and improvisations. From my experience last year, I was already well aware of how great of a pianist Hiromi was. What really blew my mind was how good Ronald Bruner Jr. was. Seeing mostly rock and indie shows, it was pretty eye opening how much he depth he added to the band. Realistically, anyone of the members in the band could've carried the show.

$75/60

05.06.2010 Video Games Live

2010-05-13T13:27:00.000-07:00

I was at Video Games Live last year. As I recall, it was a pretty good show top to bottom. As such, I was expecting an equally good show this time around. This time around, the event was at the newly renovated Queen Elizabeth Theatre. If you have ever been to the the old QE Theatre you would have been pleasantly pleased by the changes. The old venue had very majestic and ornate feel to it. The newly renovated venue was noticeably cleaner in both aesthetics and tidiness. It was certainly a much more modern looking venue.

Much like last year, the pre-show festivities, included a costume/cosplay contest. Probably due to the fact last year's was around halloween, the number of entries were decrease from last years. The majority of the costumes were Final Fantasy related, but the eventual winner was a very amusing, yet mildly inappropriate, Earthworm Jim costume.

My post from last year was pretty thorough, so I'll make this a little more abridged. For the most part the main elements and structure of the shows was pretty similar to last year's. It started with the the typical Classic Arcade Medley, included an interactive audience game section (Frogger this time around) and a live Guitar Hero section. The solo piano portion was back, this time with the original "Video Game Pianist", Martin Leung. Actually, I think the 'staples' were actually in the same part of the setlist as they were last year.

Also returning was Victor Lucas and the guys at "Reviews on the Run". This time they ripped on "Record of Agarest War". This was probably one section of the show that I really don't mind seeing again. Some of the jokes and segues that were used in the show were repeats from the years before. The dialogue at times were repetitive and on the campy side, but overall things were smooth and well run. The setlist had a few repeats, "Halo", "Warcraft", "Kingdom Hearts"; but it did have enough new material to make it fresh. New entries "Shadow of the Colossus" and "Assassin's Creed" were particularly well done. The "Mega Man" rendition was okay. I still prefer the other renditions of it.

Once again, the encores were where the the show really took off. One grip was that the violin solo during "Chrono Cross" was barely audible through the amped guitar sections. The show ended as expected with Final Fantasy 7's One Winged Angel. I don't think the show was a as special as it was last year (a lot more one off / premiere songs), but the setlist was a little better.

Setlist
Intro/Symphony warm up
Classic Arcade Medley
Sonic The Hedgehog
Shadow of the Colossus
Interactive Frogger Competition
Skype Interview with Ralph Baer
Mass Effect
Assassin's Creed 2
Final Fantasy Piano Medley
Final Fantasy 8
Legend of Zelda
---------------------------------------
Electric Playground / Reviews on the Run Segment
Kingdom Hearts
Bioshock
World of Warcraft
Super Mario Brothers
Super Mario Brothers Piano
Super Mario World - Athletic Level Piano
Tetris Piano
Guitar Hero Challenge: Van Halen - Jump
Mega Man Medley
Halo
---------------------------------------
Castlevania Rock
Chrono Trigger / Chrono Cross
Final Fantasy 7: One Winged Angel

04.30.2010 Red Sparowes / Caspian

2010-05-04T22:45:00.001-07:00

I was rather bummed to find out that Fang Island, who was on this tour, wouldn't be making it out to the Canadian dates due to a passport issue. (always a passport issue...) At least we got a longer Caspian set.

Caspian's front man, Phillip Jamieson is a tall dude, which came in handy because the Biltmore has a low stage. Anyways, they started their set with a couple of tunes from their latest album Tertia. If you like post-rock you'll like these guys. Their style of post-rock is similar to Explosions in the Sky and Mono. While their songs don't tug at your heart strings quite as hard as Mono's does, they do do the genre justice and can rock out with the best of em. Since they had a longer set than usual they were able to bring out an oldie, Brombie from their first album. Their last song, Sycamore,

Admitted, I'm a bigger fan of Red Sparowes' early albums than their later releases. They still do bring get the job done though when it comes to moody brooding soundscape-y post rock. Looks like they've replaced one of their guitarists since the last time I saw them. I know this because one of the guitarists is now female. They're still doing their projections if you're wondering, which a few people in the crowd were using to play with their silhouettes. The setlist contained some older songs, but was generally dominated by newer ones. I don't think Red Sparowes have worsen over the years, but to be honest, I really don't recall the newer songs being that memorable. For those who stayed until the end of the set, there was no encore, but I'm sure most were happy to get their post rock fix.

Caspian's Set:

01) La Cerva
02) Malacoda
03) Moksha
04) Quovis
05) Further Up
06) Further In
07) Brombie
08) Sycamore

mp3s: http://www.archive.org/details/caspian2010-04-30.flac

Red Sparowes' Set

01) Intro
02) "A Hail Of Bombs"
03) "Giving Birth to Imagined Saviors"
04) "The Great Leap Forward Poured Down Upon Us One Day Like a Mighty Storm, Suddenly and Furiously Blinding Our Senses"
05) "Buildings Began to Stretch Wide Across the Sky, And the Air Filled with a Reddish Glow"
06) "A Swarm"
07) "A Message of Avarice Rained Down Upon Us and Carried Us Away into False Dreams of Endless Riches."
08) "In Illusions of Order"
09) "As Each End Looms and Subsides"

mp3s: http://www.archive.org/details/redspar2010-04-30.flac

$15/0

03.20.2010 Postdata / Julie Fader / Clinton St. John

2010-03-24T15:32:00.000-07:00

I've always loved seeing a show at the Media Club. Even back when it was the Green Room, it always had that small intimate charm to it. Recently, the owners made the venue even better with a couple of improvements. The soundboard had been moved back to the to where the merch booth had once been and some of the tables were replace with... wooden blocks. Anyway, place is now a perfect spot to catch a couple of great singer song writers.

Clinton St. John opened the set. Apparently he's opened for Wintersleep in the past. He sung very well and didn't seem as rusty at performing as he made himself out to be. Almost remarkable was the fact that the audience was quite attentive and there was a distinct lack of talk, especially for an opening band.

Julie Fader filled in the middle slot of the show with her blend of acoustic guitar driven. She was accompanied by Jonathan Anderson, who I believe if I did my research correctly, also goes by the moniker, Jonathan Inc. He has a very nice Guild Starfire VI. In retrospect, I'm really starting to appreciate the fact that Canada has a lot of great female (and male for that matter) singer/songwriters. The best thing is that they're all a little different. Julie Fader included. I suppose the best way to describe her sound is very introspective with a hint of melancholy. Tim and Paul from Postdata even jumped in for a couple of her songs.

Postdata, who are essentially Tim and Paul from Wintersleep (Paul's brother is actually in the band instead of Tim, but couldn't tour due to school), closed the show to a much larger crowd than I expected. It'd be simple to say that Postdata is just Wintersleep acoustic, but it's really much more than that. The song writing is quite stripped down and the overall mood is much more personal and for lack of better word raw. They played most of the songs off of their self-titled album then filled the rest of the setlist with I suppose 'new songs', but who knows when they were written. "River run" was probably the most interesting of the new songs as it carried a sampled drum beat. Returning the favour, Julie Fader even added some backing vocals on a couple of songs. The show ended with Kristen Cudmore from local band Language Arts lending some vocals on "Warning". Actually it ended well before 10 pm.

03.19.2010 Immaculate Machine / Sun Wizard / A Pale Blue

2010-03-23T19:22:00.000-07:00

Wasn't really a fan of the first band, A Pale Blue. Might have been a case of not digging their alt-country-ish sound. In fact for me it was very forgettable. Some people actually described the singer as Tom Petty-esque. Fans of the genre may disagree.

Sun Wizard, has a pretty cool name. When I was watching their set, I was reminded of that mid 90s band Soul Asylum. Crowd seemed to dig them. In fact, I do believe that a large portion of the crowd came out to see them. There was a couple in the front who made use of the empty stage lip area and really tore up the dance floor.

Tonights show was a little bit special because long time members Kathryn Calder and Luke Kozlowski would be performing after being on hiatus. Kathryn's been dealing with an ill family member while I believe Luke hasn't even been in the band for a while now. I figured if I was going to see an IM show, this might as well be it. The band started their a little over an hour set with "Only Love You For Your Car", from their new album. I knew my prayers for older songs would be answered when they followed up a few songs later with "C'mon Sea Legs" and then "Dear Confessor".. I've never seen the band before, but I'm sure most people will admit that the band is better with Kathryn and even Luke in the lineup. There were many old favourites played. The crowd ate up older songs like "Jarhand" and "There's No Such Thing as the Future". Luke's drumming was solid. I was pretty impressed by their other guitarist Jordan as well. Having seen the New Pornographers a few times, I was already a fan of Kathryn Calder's voice. It's really unfortunate she hasn't been able to play with the band recently. She has a really beautiful voice. Without trying to be insulting, it'd be hard to imagine seeing this band again without her. As teased in their twitter, they also threw in a cover of "The Chain" by Fleetwood Mac, which I noticed gets covered by a lot of Canadian bands. Highlight of the night was the main set closing "Neighbours Don't Mind," which had Brooke screaming at the end.

Interview: Parlour Steps (March 2010)

2010-03-23T16:50:00.000-07:00

This interview is part of a series of interviews conducted via email with a bunch of Vancouver/Victoria/BC bands who played this year's SXSW (South By South West Festival in Austin). They were selected to play at SXSW by applying via their Sonicbids account. Her current video has her without her glasses. wow.

Please identify yourself(ves) for those reading, what you do in the band and who else plays in the band

Hi, there cyberlovers! This is Caleb from Vancouver band Parlour Steps. I'm the singer, along with Julie, Rees, Rob, and Alison.

Tell us a little about the history of the band

We started playing trippy soundscape experiments for new theatre pieces. From there we shortened the song lengths and found poplove.

How would you describe your sound

Lately we've been telling people to imagine Black Francis and Peggy Lee starting a band together backed by Motown's Funk Brothers.

Are there any emerging local bands that you really like?

We're huge Mother Mother fans. We also adore Dan Mangan, Language Arts, Portico... it is a really hot time for Vancouver music right now.

Any good SXSW stories?

We did an interview in a moving mobile internet truck, built with glass walls. We sang a few songs and spat out half-cut answers as we drove around twon, seat-belted in. People were hooting and hollaring as we drove by. Quite strange, really.

Where and what was the best thing you ate while there?

The tex-mex food was excellent. We dug Austin's thriving whole food/ organic/ local-sourced food revolution. We're also big fans of the American free-pour method of drink making. In Canada bartenders can be stingy with the drinks, so we're all about the "generous" nature of their American counterparts.

What's a song from the 80's that you really like?

We still listen frequently to Paul Simon's masterful Graceland album. Diamonds on the Soles of Her Shoes is just one of the many off that amazing album.

What's the coolest thing you've ever bought?

Hard question in many ways. I'd say this little percussion shaker in the shape of an Avacado that our guitar player, Rees, bought. It's the best sounding shaker I know of, never found anything better, and it's been recorded on our albums countless times.

What are your near-future plans band-wise?

We're touring down the westcoast of the U.S. in June, then some local and regional shows through the summer. We've had a very busy fall and winter, so this summer we want to enjoy this beautiful part of the world we live in.

Thanks for doing the interview, you have the last word, say what you want to say

It is a supreme pleasure to be a part of this awesome Canadian music scene. This polite little country of ours is birthing some of the most exciting new music of this present moment. It is both exciting and humbling to be a small part of that. Thank you for listening.

http://www.parloursteps.com
www.myspace.com/parloursteps

Interview: Billy The Kid (March 2010)

2010-03-23T00:45:00.000-07:00

Photo Credit: Tommy Au

This interview is part of a series of interviews conducted via email with a bunch of Vancouver/Victoria/BC bands who played this year's SXSW (South By South West Festival in Austin). They were selected to play at SXSW by applying via their Sonicbids account. Her current video has her without her glasses. wow.

Please identify yourself(ves) for those reading, what you do in the band and who else plays in the band

Me! That's it!!!

Tell us a little about the history of the band

My punk rock band started demanding things like food, and water, so I packed up in an '87 Volkswagon Golf and the rest is history!

How would you describe your sound

Boring. Really, reeeally boring. You should porbably avoid it at all costs...it's so boring that Garth Hudson from The Band fell asleep while we were recording together. True story!

Are there any emerging local bands that you really like?

A million! Check out Acres of Lions for sure.

Any good SXSW stories?

How 'bout that time I never even applied for SXSW cause I didn't think I would get accepted but now I'm playing 7 times?

Where and what was the best thing you ate while there?

The alcohol was delicious

What's a song from the 80's that you really like?

I LOVE Lovers In A Dangerous Time. I crank it whenever it is on.

What's the coolest thing you've ever bought?

money. I like to trade money for different looking money. It doesn't make a lot of sense but it happens in a different city every day I'm sure.

What are your near-future plans band-wise?

I have about 3 weeks to finish my record then I'm writing for some film and TV stuff then back out on the road!

Thanks for doing the interview, you have the last word, say what you want to say

If you hate major labels as much as I do you should probably go to my website and download a free track http://www.billythekidonline.com

http://www.billythekidonline.com
http://www.myspace.com/billythekid

Interview: Yukon Blonde (March 2010)

2010-03-22T13:37:00.000-07:00

Photo Credit: Coreena Lewis

This interview is part of a series of interviews conducted via email with a bunch of Vancouver/Victoria/BC bands who played this year's SXSW (South By South West Festival in Austin). They were selected to play at SXSW by applying via their Sonicbids account. I wonder if they were backing JRF at that GLS show I went to...

Please identify yourself(ves) for those reading, what you do in the band and who else plays in the band

I'm Jeffrey Innes and I sing and play guitar and so does Brandon Scott. Graham Jones plays drums and sings, and we have a good friend with us right now named Andy Bishop from a band called Red Cedar playing bass and singing.

Tell us a little about the history of the band

We used to be called AlphaBaby. We played a lot of shows, cut very few records and held onto our silly name forever. We had been touring with Jon Rae Fletcher as his backup band as well as playing our own set and he constantly reminded of how bogus our name was. It because apparent when several agencies refused to check us out because of our name. We also had terrible luck on our last tour, (crashed our van, lost our homes, keyboardist quit etc.,) so we dropped everything, changed our name and moved.

How would you describe your sound

Very modern and new.

Are there any emerging local bands that you really like?

Hell yes. There's a band we've recently become friends with called the Orpheans and they are soo amazing. Red Cedar are our best friends and play with us once in awhile, Treelines Ladyhawk, Sun Wizard, Minto, Said The Whale, Hannah Georgas, Aidan Knight, Bend Sinister, We Are The City, Kingdom Cloud, Dan Mangan, Buffalo Swans, Black Mountain and company, and Sports are some of our friends bands we really like too.
Also, they sort of live in Van, but Rah Rah is one of the greatest bands ever.

Any good SXSW stories?

Well, so far on our first day, we all got pretty sunburnt and crazy dehydrated. Yesterday we started drinking and playing/ watching shows at 11 am and didn't stop until 1 am. We met The Besnard Lakes which is my favorite band right now and found out today that they're staying in the same hotel as us. I feel like a stalker sorta.

Where and what was the best thing you ate while there?

Homeslice pizza. I feel like i'm doing a pizza tour right now instead of touring the record. I've tried pizza in every town (including NY, Chicago and Boston), and the only pie that remotely compares to home pizza is that of Austin. Good work

What's a song from the 80's that you really like?

Tears For Fears "Everybody Wants To Rule The World". That's #1 right now.. but there's a million good songs from the 80's.

What's the coolest thing you've ever bought?

I think the "coolest" thing I ever bought was those Nike Airs in 96. I felt really lame in them, but they we're the coolest shoes at the time. I took them off once in the field at school to go run after girls and they got swiped. I've never gone out of my way to buy cool shit since. I had the exact same thing happen with my Macbook with all my music on it, except I loved it, and it wasn't a field but rather a coffee shop in Kelowna where I knew everyone. Asshole just got by us all...

What are your near-future plans band-wise?

Tour as much as possible. We have some new songs that we'll hopefully record by December, but until then it's the dusty trail.

Thanks for doing the interview, you have the last word, say what you want to say

I'd just like to say that with a list of bands as big as the one I listed, there could easily one or two close friends bands that I love but am forgetting. I'd like to apologize in advance for the unfair exclusion.

Thanks for the interview!

http://www.yukonblonde.com
http://www.myspace.com/yukonblondeband

Interview: Sex With Strangers (March 2010)

2010-03-21T18:18:00.000-07:00

This interview is part of a series of interviews conducted via email with a bunch of Vancouver/Victoria bands who played this year's SXSW (South By South West Festival in Austin). They were selected to play at SXSW by applying via their Sonicbids account. Their official website isn't the usual bandname.com, I checked.

Please identify yourself(ves) for those reading, what you do in the band and who else plays in the band

My name is Hatch Benedict and I am the lead singer for the band, Sex With Strangers. Alongside me we have Magnus Magnum on bass, Wedge Beavers on Guitar, Bobbie Dunlop on vocals and Dallas Archangel on drums. We also have an iPod that goes everywhre with us...It's name is Jimothy.

Tell us a little about the history of the band

Magnus, Wedge and I have been playing music together, off and on, for nearly 15 years. We started out as a young crust-core, punk band in 1996 called Harvey Switched, then transformed into The Switch. We played and toured together until 2001 or so.

Magnus and I started going in more of an electronic direction in 2003, sporadically writing and recording songs with our prodcuer Mark Henning (Pure, Combine the Victorious). It took us a few years, but we finally put together some new material for an EP in 2006. We posted the stuff on MySpace under the name "Sex With Strangers" and things just rolled from there. The single "Dance Police" started to blow up online and the next thing you knew we were on our way. Wedge, Bobbie and Dallas joined the fold full-time and we've gone on to release two more full albums, "The Modern Seduction" and our new record "The Tokyo Steel".

How would you describe your sound

Robot-rock

Are there any emerging local bands that you really like?

Girlfriends & Boyfriends, Accost, Katastroyka come to mind...Very cool stuff happening in Vancouver right now!

Any good SXSW stories?

The fact that you can go an entire day and not pay for a drink is rather exciting. The whole scene down here is off-the-charts. Imagine the Olympics with way more interesting people and the smell of BBQ everywhere. It's the musical equivalent of Disneyland.

Seeing Cheap Trick getting interviewed up-close was strangely intoxicating as well.

Where and what was the best thing you ate while there?

The brisket at Stubb's. The single best piece of protein I will ever digest.

What's a song from the 80's that you really like?

"It Doesn't Really Matter" - Platinum Blonde

What's the coolest thing you've ever bought?

My first MircoKorg...It continues to be a hit-maker today.

What are your near-future plans band-wise?

One more round of brisket at Stubb's for starters. We're looking forward to the Canadian festival circuit this Summer, shooting a follow-up video to our single "New City Anthem", and then it's off to work on our next album...Which may or may not be about robots.

Thanks for doing the interview, you have the last word, say what you want to say

Bobbie's fond of the word "quagmier". Also, if you're in Vancouver, come check us out at The Shark Club on Saturday, March 27th with TV Heart Attack. I'm smuggling brisket back to share with everyone. Thanks!

http://www.myspace.com/sexwithstrangers

02.24.2010 Wintersleep

2010-02-27T13:20:00.000-08:00

I never thought I'd get to see another small venue (under 200 cap) Wintersleep show in Canada again, but thanks to the Olympics, Wintersleep was booked to play at the Backstage Lounge as part of a series of concerts put on by the Atlantic Canada House. To avoid another BSS situation, or worse, I figured I'd arrive at the venue at 3 pm to watch the Canada vs Russia Men's Hockey game at 4:30. Mind you, the concert portion of the night had doors scheduled for 10:30 and Wintersleep going on at midnight. On first thought, maybe I went overboard on the getting there early part, but as it turns out, it wasn't such a bad idea. When I got in line there was about 30 people in front of me. At that point they were already at capacity (around 150 cap). When the game started at 4:30, I was about 15th in line. When the game ended, I was able to get in. I think a lot of people who actually watched the game inside also stayed to see the show. I didn't go back outside, but I know for fact they left a lot of people standing outside.

Before the opening act, Shaun Majumder came out and did a rehashing of his Crosby numerology bit.

First act up was Chris Kirby. He reminded me of younger version of Wide Mouth Mason, if they had a piano and not a guitar. He played a loooooong set. I thought he was pretty good. He definitely knew his way around the ivories. My interest in him quickly started to wane after an hour into his 90 min set. The crowd seemed to love him though.

If you read this blog regularly, you'll know that I've seen Wintersleep more times than I really need to. So I'll just mention things that were different. There was a change in the bridge before end of Miasmal. I think John Samuel seems to added some different vocal harmonies to some songs. They played a new song, which people have been calling "Black Camera", the setlist calls it "New Inheritors". "Black Camera" is still sung in the chorus though. Loel added a sampler to his kit. So the stomping/clap intro to "Weighty Ghost" sounds more like the album now. Mike's playing a black Rickenbacker 400x now. Their set was over after 70 min, no encore. I talked to the band afterwards and they mentioned they'll likely be touring Europe and then the U.S before coming back to Canada.

$30/0

02.21.2010 Coeur de Pirate

2010-02-23T13:00:00.000-08:00

The Maison du Quebec or Quebec House, is pretty much a 4 sided tent without a roof. Inside is a stage and a medium sized cafe. Food coming out of said Cafe looked really good, but probably really expensive.

Coeur de Pirate or Beatrice Martin's set started immediately after Canada's loss to the US in the Olympic prelims. Her music probably helped the mostly Canadian crowd forget about the crushing defeat only moments before. She was in fine form, playing everything off of her debut album. After the first song, she asked if this was an English or French crowd. I think they decided on bilingual because she ended up doing both French and English banter. She also played a new song called "Place de la Republique", which I believe is the same song I heard at Hillside last year. Actually come to think of it, I wouldn't be surprised if she's been playing the same setlist night after night. She prefaced "Pour Un Infidele" saying that she had been stood up by someone today and that he was a douche bag. She also threw in two covers to fill the set, Etinne d'Aout by fellow Quebecers Malajube and Umbrellas by Rhianna.

After the set, she announced another set at 8 pm, which was 20 min from now. I figured I might as well wait it out.

The biggest difference between the first set and the second was a habs sweater.

The setlist was the same as the first. This time when she asked the crowd if she should speak French or English, they decided on French. So the banter was pretty much the same as well, aside from it being in French, though near the end she started speaking in English again. I think my only complaint of the night was that this venue an open air venue, and I think I'm catching a cold waiting in line for all these free shows.

$20/0

02.21.2010 Broken Social Scene

2010-02-23T11:30:00.000-08:00

One of the drawbacks of free shows is that you have to get there early in order to guarantee your entrance into popular shows. For some reason I figured since they'd only announced the show the day of, there wouldn't be that many people lining up. I got there at 7:30 (show at 10, doors normally around 8:30) . At this point there were about 400 people in front of me, at least 200 behind and probably 100 or so already inside. I was told at my position in line, it was unlikely I would get in before the show started. Still, I was hopefully because with the high odds of seeing Emily Haines, Feist and Elizabeth Powell, it would be worth the wait. So I did. Man I feel like a chump. I'm not sure it was worth it.

I got in. There were about 50 or 60 people in front of me when they cut the line off at show time. However, the people running the show left 200 spots open for vips and other guests. Unused spots would be given to the people in line, 3 songs in. My first indication that something was up was when 2 songs in they played Shoreline, traditionally a Feist song. She wasn't singing it, Lisa Lobsinger was. I don't dislike her singing, in fact I think she's gotten a lot better at filling the large role she's been thrown over the years. She still has that dazed like look on her face though. Was a little surprised Jason Collett didn't show up. Andrew Whiteman wasn't around either. Mid set, Julie Doiron was brought out to help on a Neil Young cover. I sort of saw this coming because she was pretty friendly with the BSS members at the Hal Wilner show a few days ago. Sam Goldberg also helped with the vocals. To my disappointment they played Anthems, without Emily Haines, who was in town (again). Instead vocals were handled by Lobsinger and Doiron.

Julie was brought out again to perform "Consolation Prize" backed by BSS. To be honest the rest of the show was pretty uneventful. They pretty much rounded out the set with less popular newer songs that don't depend on female vocals. Most of them from the "BSS Presents..." albums. I wonder why Elizabeth Powell, who should still be in town and has put in time with BSS, was oddly absent. By the end of the set I had to reluctantly let go of the hope that this show would be like one of the classic BSS shows that gave them the reputation they have now. In fact, I have a feeling that this is probably a new stage in the band's life, one that does not include Feist or Haines and probably others. I'd love to see Julie Doiron in more BSS shows, but if she's going to re-join an ensemble, I'd rather see her play in Eric's Trip. After 90 mins the show was all but over. The crowd wanted more, but Kevin Drew came out with bad news claiming there was essentially a curfew. He did lead the crowd into singing a few lines from U2's "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For."

$25/0 + 3 hours of my life

02.19.2010 Stars / Hey Rosetta

2010-02-22T19:29:00.000-08:00

I should preface this review by saying I suppose the fact that the guy who I bought the ticket from sort of dicked me a around and wound up meeting halfway through Hey Rosetta's set, whom I really wanted to see. I think the worst part of it was that while I was waiting, a scalper tried to sell me a front row ticket for the same price.

From what I saw of Hey Rosetta, I was pretty impressed. They've got a pretty good live sound with a nice layering of sound complimented by a string section. Well a cello and violin player. The crowd was really into it, especially their radio numbers. Suffice to say much like Two Hours Traffic and Said the Whale, there is good number of up and coming Canadian indie bands.

I've Stars a good 6-7 times in the last 3 years or so. I suppose I really shouldn't feel the need to be surprised, I was hoping for something special about this show; this being the olympics and all. Unfortunately, I suppose when you hit a market so many times, the surprises become less and less. Most of the setlist were standard Stars staples from the last couple of years. I think "Ageless Beauty" was reworked a little with an addition of an extra guitar from Evan Cranley, which left the song with out a bass part. I wouldn't exactly say it was an improvement. Actually, what I was most disappointed in were the handful of new songs that were played. Granted "In our bedroom after the war" was a pretty good album, the new songs far from memorable. In fact, aside from "Dead Hearts", I don't think I can recall what the other new songs sounded like. Negativity aside, I'm sure 99% of the crowd left happy, so what do I know.

$35/$50

02.19.2010 Sam Roberts Band / Dan Mangan / The Arkells

2010-02-22T15:54:00.000-08:00

Ah Surrey, haven't seen a show in Surrey in a couple of years. Apparently all the stereotypes are true. Lineup getting in at around 7pm wasn't that bad. Just about 10 min.

I thought The Arkells were pretty good tonight. I'm not going out of my way to see them, their shows just happen to be very convenient. As much as I imply otherwise, I still think, they put on a good show. With a shortened set, they played most of their faster tempo 'rocker' songs. Crowd was into it, no surprise there. They ended their set with that "I'm John Lennon in '67' song.

I really liked Dan Mangan's set. He was very humble in his demeanour and the crowd was very receptive to his folky singer songwriter type songs. He ended his set with "Robots" which had everyone singing along.

Oh look it's a Sam Roberts show where I didn't bail before he got on. Live he's as good as everyone says he is. He played all his radio hits, keeping the Surrey crowd happy and even found time to round out his set with a mind boggling really long jam that bordered on self indulgent. I have to give him credit for that, I wasn't expecting that from him.

$15/0

02.18.2010 Hal Wilner's Neil Young Project

2010-02-19T20:43:00.000-08:00

I don't think I would have gone to this show had I not been offered a ticket at a veeeeery reduced price. I was told this show was sold out. A week before I was checking available seats and noticed that you could pretty much get any aisle seat you wanted on one of the sides for the second night.

Glad to see two Canadian ladies that I really like, have a large role in this event, namely Julie Doiron and Elizabeth Powell. Julie was as energetic as ever and Elizabeth sang "Don't Let it Bring You Down" near the beginning of the set, which was well received by the crowd. When they weren't doing main vocals, they were doing backup vocals for other artists, so they were pretty visible the entire night.

Sam Goldberg does a pretty good Neil Young impression.

Emily Haines and Jimmy Shaw did a beautiful version of "A Man Needs a Maid" that would make Neil himself proud. Emily sung while Jimmy provided keyboard support.

People really liked Lou Reed. A lot of "Loooooouu" chants were heard every time he entered and exited the stage.

Elvis Costello was as expected, a crowd pleaser.

I've never really heard of Joan as Policewoman, but I was impressed by her violin playing. The one solo she did was electrifying.

I've never heard of the poet Eric Mingus, but it would be hard to forget him after seeing him. He did a song with a such a dirty roots-blues intensity growl, he had to remove his glasses mid verse. He also performed a spoken word interpretation later in the set.

For some reason I always thought Sun Kil Moon was a she, he's definitely not. There were a lot of highlights this night. Elvis Costello had a blistering guitar solo towards the end of the night that almost lead me to believe that his guitar would catch on fire. He actually received a standing ovation for that. I can't imagine myself paying the amount of money it would take to see Costello now, so it was nice to see him at the top of his game.

In another show stealing performance, Jason Collett (if memory serves me) got the crowd to participate in a musical version of the wave, using hand rubbing noises and thigh slapping and floor stomping.

Fucking Up was a group song which featured an intense playing James Blood Ulmer on guitar. His axe chops gave Costello and run for his money.

The night closed off with a sweet rendition of "Only Love Can Break Your Heart" featuring Kevin Drew and Julie Doiron doing a duet (with a handful of people and of course the audience doing backup). I'm glad they didn't decide to take the easy way out and use the almost cliched cover "Rocking in the Free World".

The whole gang

The man who brought it all together, Hal Wilner.

Oh yeah, the majority of Broken Social Scene is in Vancouver right now. The Ontario Pavilion is has a show that's TBA. My money is on BSS playing.

$50/30

02.17.2010 The Arkells

2010-02-19T13:46:00.001-08:00

This concert was held at the Ontario Pavilion, which essentially is a really large tent, among a bunch of other tents for Saskatchewan, Molson Canada and Quebec. The deal is before 9 pm, there's some information stuff there, but afterwards they clear out all the minors and start a concert. Actually I didn't find any of these tents that great, except maybe the Molson one, but that one costs an absurd amount of cash to get in.

Today it's the Arkells from Hamilton, ON. There seems to be a lot of Arkells fans out in BC. Two songs in and they have the crowd dancing to that Hugo Chavez radio hit. The lead singer looks like Paul Murphy. The Arkells really seem to like Motown. There were a couple Temptation's snippets and teases scattered throughout the set. I found the sound in the tent to be okay, not really that great. It looks like the majority of the people came to party, because at the end of the 75 min or so set there were a lot of holes in the room. I may not be the biggest fan of their music (it just doesn't do anything for me), but I can't fault them for their stage presence. They know how to work a crowd with their rock show antics. And since it didn't cost a penny, it's hard not to have a good time.

$5/0

02.12.10 Malajube

2010-02-19T11:10:00.000-08:00

It's hard to believe that it's almost been 5 years since I've seen Malajube. I found it amusing that when I arrived at Performance Works in Granville Island and asked when Malajube (I said "Malajube" in an distinctly lazy-anglo accent) would be on, one of the french-speaking workers replied with "who?". For kicks I threw in my best french interpretation of the correct pronunciation ("muluh-ju"), and that seemed to work. Anyways, crowd was a mix of hipsters, people looking for free shows and french speaking canadians, probably a lot who've spent time in Quebec at one point or another.

Since it was free, I was expecting somewhere between 30 min to a 1 hr set. Surprisingly they played just under 90 min. The lead singer seems to have a thing for hats on stage. I should try and catch them play a set in the summer time to see if he continues this trend. The band was in fine form. Maybe it's just me, but I found that their sound was really tight this time around. The heavier rocking chorus parts had more of an edge than I remember from their albums. The crowd was really into it, saw a lot of crowd surfers and after the encore even a large pit. The song selection was a mix of the last 3 albums. I'm mainly familiar with the Trompe L'oeil album, so it was nice that they played pretty much everything I wanted to hear off that album.

$20/0

02.06.2010 Do Make Say Think / Charles Spearin's Happiness Project / Years

2010-02-18T19:10:00.000-08:00

The opener for this night was Years, which in Ohad's words is a previous incarnation of Do Make Say Think. I actually thought they were really good, as they were for the most part a stripped down version of Do Make Say Think. The first couple of songs were either Ohad solo or Ohad and someone else doing accompaniment. The solo songs were mostly Ohad with a guitar and looper. Ohad dedicated one of the solo songs to his daughter, as it was her guitar she was using. The last couple of songs were pretty much Do Make Say Think, the whole ensemble.

Charles Spearin's Happiness Project followed. It was self described by Charles as a science experiment exploring the idea of happiness and putting music to it. Basically what he did was record interviews with his neighbours. Afterwards he would play them back with instruments. So if you recall in the "Peanuts" cartoons when the kids would talk to the adults you'd have a saxophone playing instead of the voice. Well same sort of thing but you'd hear the voice as well. The most interesting interview was from a girl who was deaf for all her life up until a few years ago. I don't think I'd pay to see a headlining set, but as a opener it was fairly entertaining. Obviously with a project like this, some things worked, others, not so much.

Since this was an early show, it seems like Do Make Say Think put an extra emphasis on giving the near sold out crowd as much bang for their buck before curfew. They played the entire Do, Make, Say, Think in it's entirety, though not in order. I think the saxophonist from the Happiness project was a new addition because I don't remember her from last time. Highlight of the night was definitely "The Universe!" which had both the band and the crowd rocking out. Throughout the set, Justin kept apologizing for the shortened set because of the curfew, though I didn't think it was that short, maybe short for a DMST set. They still managed to squeeze in about 90 min set. The funniest part of the show was when Justin exclaimed "We're going for gold! Bitches!". At the end of the day, I suppose if you like Do Make Say Think, then I guess this was a pretty good show.

$20/14

01.29.2010 Great Lake Swimmers / Jon Rae Fletcher

2010-02-07T01:55:00.000-08:00

I first saw Great Lake Swimmers about 2 or 3 years ago when they were opening up for Final Fantasy. At the time, Onigara had just came out and I was pretty big on their single "Your Rocky Spine". To my chagrin, the crowd was being too busy having a conversation with themselves to care. What a difference a couple of years make. Despite playing in a much larger venue, the crowd was almost silent throughout most of the set.

Opening the set was Jon Rae Fletcher. He played a 45 minute set of mostly folk, roots and rock. The crowd loved him. While this is probably due to the fact that he is from BC, his performance was engaging. In fact, he even got a 1 song encore from the crowd.

After a quick change, Great Lake Swimmers hit the stage with "Everything is moving so fast" from their new album Lost Channels (which is very good by the way). Drawing from their previous works, the Swimmers played a pretty varied set. At about the halfway point of the show, singer Tony Dekker, played 3 songs acoustically. Not surprising to anyone, and not taking anything away from the rest of the band, it's Tony Dekker who is the real star of the show. Playing stripped down versions of some of these songs, really punctuated how good they really were.

Towards the end of the show they played a trio of their best known (radio hits) songs, "Pulling on a Line" and "Still"; which I suppose is the main reason why they sold out the theatre. As an extra special treat, during their 3 song encore, they played "See you on the Moon". Aside from being rarely played, it was a song that is most well known for being in the style of a children's song and yet not patronizing. This was obviously the icing on a superb night.

$30/0

01.23.2010 Julie Doiron

2010-02-01T23:43:00.000-08:00

It kind of took me by surprise to see Julie onstage after they opened the curtain for the first band. Someone was telling me that she would be headlining this gig. On this tour she was actually the opener, but as I was told she's a bigger draw in Vancouver. Oh well, I thought to myself as she started into "Wrong Guy", at least I'll be able to leave early.

Last time I saw Julie, she played, backed by a full band. This time however, she was only backed by a drummer who I didn't recognize. Said drummer also played accompanying guitar for a couple songs as well, even though on most of the songs she was the only one playing guitar, she really rocked it out. Some songs sort of reminded me of the classic grunge style songs. Clean to mild distorted verses followed by heavily overdriven choruses. Midway through the set, Julie mentioned that they had been listening to Ladyhawk before doing a cover of "Teenage Love Song". I think the drummer forgot some of the words. Some would say they butchered it, Julie laughed it off, apologizing to Ladyhawk afterwards. I dunno if they were in attendance.

This show was actually an early show. Funny enough, there was another show afterwards, Attack in Black. This would probably mean Julie would do a couple of songs with them afterwards like I saw them do at Hillside. I guess to return the favour, the singer for Attack in Black, played drums for a couple of songs while the aforementioned drummer and Julie played guitars. It's actually quite amazing when you think about how different this set was in comparison to the set she did only 6 months ago. Normally, I don't expect too much for 90% of most bands opening sets. This particular set exceeded my expectation.

I left before the Bowerbirds. If I didn't have somewhere else to go I probably would have stayed.

$12/15

Interview: Petroleum By-Product (January 2010)

2010-01-13T18:59:00.000-08:00

State your name and what you do in the band, and who else plays in the band?

Sally Dige Jørgensen - Creative Director. Vanessa Turner - Marketing and Sales. Robin Borawski - Public Relations.

Tell us a little about the history of the band.

It was a project that initially began with the focus on our modern-day mono-culture. We were fascinated by the introduction of new artificial materials and technology and how these unnatural mediums have become naturalized into our everyday lifestyle.

We enjoy most to glamourize the lifestyle our generation has manifested, and thus have come up with our own Petroleum By-Product manifesto:
“Denaturalize – Dehumanize – Efficient Lives – Commercialize”

How would you describe your sound?

Pop

Tell us about the video you recently shot for the song 'TV Date'.

It was a collaboration with the music video film director Davide Di Saro'. Just a simple setting and some great colours and lights. The team involved in making this video included, Ewa Chruscicka, Ryan Betts, Rodrigo Barraza, Owen Ellis, Johannah Jørgensen, Davide Di Saro' and Petroleum By-Product.

Name a song from the 80's that you like.

"Cccan't you see" by Vicious Pink.

What's the coolest thing you've ever bought?

A giant size Andy Warhol book.

Are there any other local emerging bands that you enjoy?

Animal Bodies

What are your plans for the new year band wise.

Release more records. Be on a label. Go on tour. Be more superficial.

Thanks for doing the interview. You have the last say, say what you want.

"Cheers thanks a lot."
-Patsy Stone

http://www.myspace.com/petroleumbyproduct

01.05.2010 Tegan and Sara / An Horse / Astronautalis

2010-01-06T00:47:00.000-08:00

Astronautalis was a late added opener to the show. He's a one man laptop "rapper" from Seattle, who's toured with Tegan and Sara in the past. He calls himself a rapper, but he wouldn't be out of place in the spoken word genre. The large Orpheum stage did not appear to faze the lone wordsmith on stage as he was all over the place. On some songs he would be on roaming around the stage, on others he'd be in the crowd and on one he climbed the speaker stack to do a song for the people in the balcony. Pretty entertaining overall.

As Astronautalis left the stage, An Horse entered. I thought they would be doing their own sound check, but nope they started playing. In their own words, it was a "seamless change-over". I'd actually like to see more of these kinds of change overs. An Horse were pretty talkative during their set of songs from their only full length album "Re-arranged Beds." I don't remember them talking that much the last time I saw them. They played a new song which youtube is calling "Dress Sharply." Crowd loved them, not really a surprise.

During their 3rd or 4th song, Tegan and Sara both had the same Gretsch guitars. Tegan's was black while Sara's was blue. Speaking of guitar gear, I'm jealous of Ted Gowan's starcaster (original not re-brand) and also their Dr Z amps for that matter. Their set was comprised of all of their new album and A LOT of songs from their last 3 albums. In fact the song total was around 27, roughly 2 hours. WOW... As with all T+S shows, half the fun is the banter. Today there was a lot of it. One of the notable stories was Sara recounting her days in junior high and not getting any valentine candy/flower-grams. A (more) popular girl named Tara would get some and similarity of the names would always make her more disappointed than just not having her name called. After coming back from the encore break, the twins came back alone to do some acoustic songs. One of them being a stripped down version of "Feel It In My Bones", a tune that they recently wrote in collaboration with Tiesto. "Call it Off", which was also done stripped down, was a mess, as it was started and restarted a couple of times. The girls however took it in stride and eventually got the crowd to sing along as well after telling a humourous tale of how in Germany an interviewer kept referring to them as 'partners'. I think Sunny Dhak (ex-3 inches of Blood/Pride Tiger) was doing monitors for T+S as his first name was mentioned on stage at this point. Yeah, no one cares about this little tidbit. The show ended with crowd favourite "Living Room". I think a lot of people would feel ripped off it it wasn't played.

$50/$50

End of Year Lists

2009-12-23T11:51:00.000-08:00

Albums
Converge - Axe to Fall
Regina Spektor - Far
Sunset Rubdown - Dragonslayer
Clues - Clues
Metric - Fantasies
Torngat - La Petite Nicole
Tegan and Sara - Sainthood
Between The Buried and Me - The Great Misdirect
La Patère Rose - La Patère Rose
Julie Doiron - I Can Wonder What You Did With Your Day

Honourable Mentions:
The Rural Alberta Advantage - Home Towns (technically it's 2008)

Shows (Vancouver Only)
Land of Talk 11.14.2009
Wintersleep 4.02.2009
Regina Spektor 11.02.2009

Honourable Mention
Torngat 10.16.2009

12.11.2009 Mew / Machu Picchu

2009-12-13T16:23:00.000-08:00

The last time I was at the venue lazily called "Venue" it went by the name Plaza Club. Since then it appears to have under gone some renovations. Enlargement of the stage and improved sound system appear to be the biggest welcomed changes.

About a month ago, I saw Machu Picchu opening for Land of Talk. Admittedly, I couldn't really hear anything from the spot I was standing in in November, but for this show I was finally able to catch their set and actually hear the nuances of their set. I still think they're an ok local band. They have this one really catchy song that I liked. Their drummer had a really basic kit. I'm not a drummer but I found it funny that it had his kit had the same number of elements as the rock band drum kit. Their set might have actually been less than 1/2 hour. Maybe it had something to do with them and Mew's tour manager:

"our band opened for MEW tonite at VENUE. MEW's tour manager is a fucking lil prixxx! time to relax. REMEMBER TOUR MANAGER:U AREN'T THE BAND!" via MP's twitter.

If I didn't like Mew, and I was say a random weekend warrior trying to get my party on before the Kid Cudi show (happening later in the evening), I would probably describe Mew's show as boring. Let's face it, they were pretty stagnant the entire time with minimal crowd interaction. However, I'm sure if you are a Mew fan then you probably went to see a band play and not exercise. Their saving grace in the visuals department were their light show/video screens. Lots of really weird, borderline creepy imagery.

This one particular bear image was even synced up to the bassist's vocals, which sort of makes me wonder about backing tracks. Not that they lip sync. The juxtaposition of blinding white light and dim lighting from song to song would probably give some people headaches, but I found it pretty cool. As much as I'm impressed by Jonas' live vocals, I also enjoyed the songs where the rest of the band would do backing vocals and harmonize. The song selection for the night was a mix of old and new. Pretty much a handful from the new album along with most of the staples from the past 2 like 'Am I Wry? No', "156" and 'Zookeeper's Boy'. Really the only song they didn't play that I wanted to hear was 'Snow Brigade'.

$20/$22

11.14.2009 Tiesto @ HMV

2009-11-16T14:42:00.000-08:00

To preface this entire post, I've got a friend that is just crazy about Trance music. Most of the time when I'm talking to him, all the names of the artists pretty much go over my head. There is one name that he mentioned so often that it pretty much stuck. The one, the only Tiesto. Arguably the top dance/electronica/(or some other subgenre) DJ in the world. Actually, the main reason being it's an instore at HMV and it was free, but I digress. In retrospect, the whole situation seemed a little ill planned considering Tiesto was to spin at a 10,000 seat venue later that night, but first doing a small instore for probably a maximum of a tenth of that.

The lineup for the instore began several hours before the set even took place, with wristbands being handed out around 11 am or so. By the time the show started, it was already dark and the lines were stretching around the HMV building. Tiesto's 4 CD turn tables were set up in the corner of the store closest to the busy Robson and Burrard intersection. The whole store, inside and outside, was jam packed. After a half hour delay, the 30-45 minute set began. Not surprising, the set was intensely loud and the crowd was super into it. There were certain points of the set when I thought they'd have to shut it down due to capacity limits.

In terms of performance, Tiesto's choice of music was certainly catchy and crowd pleasing. However, being the philistine of the Trance world that I am, I wasn't exactly blown away by his technical prowess on the turntables. Other than a couple of on the fly mixing, I really couldn't tell the difference from what he was doing and just pressing play. It's possible he was just saving his 'A' game for later that night, but there were times when I thought he was just phoning it in. Actually my friend who is a DJ and even a Tiesto fan remarked later that his mixing was pretty off that set. Regardless, you had to be impressed at a man who could command a packed house and make them eat out of the palm of his hand. There was definitely no shortage of charisma, theatrics and stage presence behind the decks. Like a well seasoned veteran, he seemed to know exactly how to move and what to do to keep his fans and the mini-party moving and that's all that mattered.

$20/$0

11.07.2009 Land Of Talk / Machu Picchu

2009-11-10T12:51:00.000-08:00

The show billed as an early show with doors at 7, which is when I got there. Doors opened an hour later. I don't normally do this, but I actually went to the venue without a ticket thinking it would be undersold and usually tickets are cheaper at the door. This turned out to be a mistake as, the lineup for non-ticket holders had to wait until the ticket holder's line disappeared. As my luck would have it, there was a line up to get in, which I've never had to do at the Biltmore. This was probably due to most people thinking that doors were earlier. It didn't help that everyone who brought their big cold weather rain jackets had to have them coatchecked.

I had a chat with Joe LoT's bassist when I got in. He said to expect a totally different show later in the evening. I shrugged it off thinking it would be just new songs. I had a chance to ask him if they ever played "2 Ships" and "Dark Nature Places" live. It looks like they did, around 2007 for a short period of time. The aforementioned songs, for those who don't know, appeared as bonus tracks on the European version of their 'Applause Boo Cheer Hiss EP', in order to bring it closer to "LP length". There's also a possibility they'll be reworked for a later LP.

I think Machu Picchu is local, but I'm not quite sure. They do sound familiar, I just can't place from where. The drummer was wearing a Cobalt T-shirt. One of the guitarists, I know I've seen him before. Plus I'm pretty sure they're associated with My!Gay!Husband! somehow. I think my overall impression of them is mixed.

This marks my 6th time seeing LoT in one form or another. Admittedly seeing a band this many times makes it harder and harder to leave the show impressed. Fortunately, the show was quite a departure from any of the previous shows. The Biltmore's stage has a curtain that they use to hide the change over. I never would have expected to see a fourth person on stage when they opened the curtain launched into a blistering version of Corner Phone. It took me a minute to realize that Joe was handling guitar duties and the fourth person, who turned out to be their guitar tech, covered bass. This would be the case for a couple of the songs, but most of the set they were still a trio. I should make note that Land of Talk were also using some onstage visuals as well. Most of it consisted just visual background noise, but it still upped the stage ambience of the show. The rest of the setlist varied from the usual staples to include lesser played songs such as, "Troubled" and "Corner Phone". Overall, you couldn't help but be impressed by how tight the band sounded, especially drummer Andrew Barr (which shouldn't surprise anyone seeing as how he also plays in the Slip). Towards the end of the night, frontwoman Elizabeth Powell mentioned how packed it was at the Biltmore and how there was only 120 people last time at the Media Club. Unfortuanately, judging from the crowd of disinterested clubby looking people talking behind me, I've got a feeling they were already letting people in early for the "Dance Party" after the show. Still another good night for one of Canada's best kept secrets.

$30/$10

11.02.209 Regina Spektor / Jupiter One

2009-11-09T02:56:00.000-08:00

I've been wanting to see Ms. Spektor since I heard her first (major label) album Soviet Kitsch. A luck would have it, she wouldn't hit Vancouver until the tour afterwards. Unfortunately my school exams kept me from catching her on latter tours. I think that happened twice actually. When I found out that she would be playing at the Orpheum this time around I got excited. It's a beautiful venue and the acoustics in this building are awesome. As I entered the building I overheard someone tell their friend that when their Dad found out that the show was at the Orpheum he offered to go instead just to stare at the decor inside.

Jupiter One apparently knows how to market themselves. They have a who slew of songs that appear on commercials and video games. Sadly I didn't recognize any when I was watching them. I would describe their sound as corporate indie pop rock. I kind of feel sorry for the people on the right side of the venue because the way Jupiter One was set up, they only occupied the left side of the stage. Makes, sense, it's pretty hard to move a grand piano, which was in the center of the stage. Anyways, I found the band to be pretty boring, their sound was a little to safe for my tastes. It didn't help that each member seemed to be confined by an invisible box and wouldn't move outside it until the last song, which is when they started to rock out.

Like I said, I feel sorry for the members of the audience on the right side of the venue, especially in the front couple of rows. Their sight light couldn't have been that great because Regina was on the piano the majority of the time. The length of the grand piano (Steinway and Sons, if you're curious) probably would have obstructed someone's sight line. Anyways, Regina started her roughly 80 min set with "The Calculation", the first song off her new album Far (or as she would like called, Far(t), I didn't bring it up, she did..) I was actually pretty impressed with how well behaved the crowd was. Most people were refrained from talking to their neighbour and spent the night listening to the music. I guess the classiness of the Orpheum rubs off on everyone. A couple songs in, she introduced the band. There was a violin player, a cellist and none other than a certain ex Pearl Jam-mer, Matt Chamerlain on drums. I can only imagine how those previous Commodore shows were. Anyways between songs, Regina seemed humbled by the show of appreciation the crowd had for her after each song. She was taken aback, when between a song, someone yelled out if she would join them for dinner. Being too nice to decline the offer, she went into the next song. She played all the favorites from her past albums, like "Fidelity", "On the Radio" and "Apres Moi", and the majority of the new album, though I was a little surprised she didn't play "Blue Lips". For "Poor Little Rich Boy", the stage hand, brought out a wood chair and put it beside the piano. Immediately I thought there'd be a duet. Instead she was given a drum stick, which she used to perform the song's percussion while playing the piano and singing. She hits the sticks hard too, pretty sure I saw splinters flying. No wonder they were selling drumsticks at the merch table for $5 a stick. The final song of the night was a country song called "Love, You're a Whore". I don't think it was ever released, but it's a very fun song, which got everyone up on their feet and clapping. I guess you could call it a barn burner.

$70/$50

10.18.2009 Matisyahu / Dub Trio

2009-11-09T00:55:00.000-08:00

Well, sold out Matisyahu gig in Vancouver. Who would have thought? Does Matisyahu even get airplay in Vancouver? Anyways, before the show, I was wondering who would be opening. To my surprise, it was Dub Trio. It turns out they're part of Matisyahu's backing band. Nice. Apparently people have heard of Dub Trio, or rather fans of Matisyahu have heard of Dub Trio. You'll have to forgive me I still can't believe their fanbases would overlap. Dub Trio's 45 min set was as expected, lots of time changes, spacey "dub" jams, and a whole lot of style changes. Crowd seemed to enjoy it.

Dub Trio's Set:

Now Matisyahu I'm familiar with mainly due to his song "King Without a Crown". When he played it, it sounded totally different. Let's call it the "Dub Trio" version. Highlight of the set was probably Matis doing a full 3-5 min of beat boxing. There were many moments in the set where Matis would just let the band jam out and he would stand by the side of the stage and take in the energy of the crowd and the music. He's probably one of their biggest fans. This was a pretty long show. It's been a while since I've seen a Commodore show go over 2 hours. Actually, if I had to mention anything negative, it would be just that. The show was almost exhausting. Almost every song approached the 10 minute mark and had a fairly loose jam integrated into it. That being said, the energy from the crowd and the strangely mesmerizing intensity coming from Matis made the show.

$15/$0

10.16.2009 Torngat / Role Mach

2009-11-08T23:59:00.000-08:00

Torngat at the Toast Collective. So who is Torngat? Well you know that band the Arcade Fire? Well they used to have a french horn player (maybe just live or on record, whatever just not a main member). Well that horn player plays in Torngat. Both bands are from Montreal. Actually, that horn player also plays in a the other Arcade Fire associated band, Bell Orchestre. I double checked he's in those pictures I have from that Bell Orchestre show I went to in June.

The other question that remains is where is Toast Collective? It appears to be a fairly new diy venue near Fraser and Kingsway (across the street from Les Faux Bourgoeis). This is probably the second most diy venue that I've ever been to. The first one being someone's living room. In fact I'd say this larger than you average person's living room. If you can picture a typical boutique store, it'd be about the same size. I did a rough count, there was about 40 people there. I'd say at least a quarter were either in the opening band or friends of. If there were any more people in the room I'd say it could get uncomfortable real quick, especially with the lack of vents and the fact that the entrance pretty much was beside the makeshift stage. All things considered, I really like this venue, it's a very small, but it's a very cozy spot. That being said I'd probably hate it if it was packed.

The first band was local and started with an instrumental glockenspiel/xylophone piece, which roughly lasted 12 min. Apparently this incarnation of the band isn't what they normally do, as they were billed today as acoustic (which i guess they technically were). Oh btw, the back of the venue has a living room couch setup. As it was, they played on the floor with their friends on the couches, so it was just like playing to their friends in their living room. After the 12 min, the lead singer grabbed an acoustic guitar and they played some other songs I didn't know. I think one of the xylophone guys works at the Biltmore doing sound or something. The last song was sung in Cajun French.

Torngat hit the stage....well front right corner of the room shortly after. Torngat is actually just 3 guys with a whole slew of instruments and effects. I can't remember the last time I saw so much gear stuffed into one corner of the room. The majority of the set was culled from their newest album La Petite Nicole. The old school analog synths which the band uses really gave their music a haunting feel to it. Their music, stage setup and instrumentation really didn't look too out of place in the very indie DIY art space. I think they'd sound pretty wicked in an old church, not that they didn't sound good here. I actually thought the drums would drown everything out, but nope, you could hear everything ok. Their set was a little under an hour, no encore. Probably didn't need one, I think most people were just as happy hanging out with the band afterwards.

more photos from the promoter's website here.

$15/$10

Interview: The Pack AD (Oct 2009)

2009-10-17T17:01:00.000-07:00

photo credit: Justine Warrington

The Pack AD will be heading to New York to play at the CMJ 2009 Music Marathon and Film Festival. They were selected to play at CMJ 2009 by applying via their Sonicbids account. A long time ago, I used to work in the same bookstore as Maya.

Please identify yourself(ves) for those reading, what you do in the band and who else plays in the band.

This is Maya Miller - drummer, organizer, and exactly one half of The Pack A.D. Becky Black plays guitar and sings and is exactly the other half of The Pack A.D.

When did The Pack A.D form and how did you come together?

We were in another band with a couple other friends that didn't work out but from it we discovered that we played really well together so we kept it up, just the two of us.

What do you find so inspiring about the blues?

They're a perfect marker as to what to steer away from. Ha, apologies, you've really caught us at a time of change musically. We both love the blues but we never set out to be blues players and in point of fact, we're not. We rock out and incidentally, all rock comes from the blues.

Are there any emerging local bands that you really like?

In Vancouver: Thee Manipulators and Canaries.

Do you ever miss not having a bass player?

We've never had a bass player in The Pack. We never will. Can't miss something you've never wanted.

You'll be traveling to New York to play at CMJ near the end of October,

what makes this festival worth crossing the country for or is it just another show?

It's always worth it to play New York and what better way then CMJ. Campus Stations are crucial to newer bands.

Are there any bands that you want to see while you're there?

Methinks, that once again, we will not be there long enough to do anything but play our own shows :(

What's your favourite song from the 80's?

I believe Becky's current fave is Puttin' on the Ritz by Taco. For me, err, Paint a Rumour by The Eurythmics.

But to be honest, neither of us listen to stuff from the 80's...should we be? Are we missing a trend? Gasp.

What's the coolest thing you've ever bought?

Recently, a pair of boxers with the map to London's tube lines on them. Hard to come up with the coolest thing ever, most things are really cool at first and then to be honest I lose track of them.

Thanks for doing the interview, you have the last word, say what you want to say.

Come to ours shows at CMJ and bring all your drunk friends and tell everybody because that's they way it should go down. People digging a band and sharing it.

http://thepackafterdeath.com
http://www.myspace.com/thepackad

Interview: Immaculate Machine (Oct 2009)

2009-10-12T16:34:00.000-07:00

photo credit: IM serious 2009

Immaculate Machine will be heading to New York to play at the CMJ 2009 Music Marathon and Film Festival. They were selected to play at CMJ 2009 by applying via their Sonicbids account. I'm not sure if Brooke got my High on Jackson Hill joke or not.

Please identify yourself(ves) for those reading, what you do in the band and who else plays in the band.

We are a rock band from the West coast. The musicians change but right now we are on tour in Europe with a great lineup: Aden Collinge on drums, Brooke Wilken on guitar and background vocals, Caitlin Gallupe (my sister) on bass and vocals, Leslie Rewega on keys and Brooke Gallupe (that is me) on lead vocals and guitar. We are in a hotel in Hamburg right now and I am writing from my iPod so pardon any bad spelling.

When did Immaculate Machine form and how did you come together?

Immaculate Machine started after high school, with three friends who couldn't find a bass player so made do with a trio. We signed with Vancouver's Mint Records in 2005 and released Ones and Zeros, our first album in a proper studio. Then we did a proper tour, with proper promo in proper venues. It was all very exciting, but it has taken me a while - 4 years I guess - to understand that recording at home and doing certain things a little more casually can have its advantages as well.

As a band from Victoria, being so close to Vancouver, have you ever thought about moving to Vancouver? What keeps you based out of Victoria?

Victoria is a constant source of inspiration for me. Vancouver has a lot more going on, obviously, but in some ways all the action of a big city can stifle its personality. I love living right downtown in the of a small city, somewhere you can be in the social centre. For music business reasons, we should probably leave Victoria, but there is more to music than selling albums. Victoria is very isolated. If we were in the music centre of Canada I am sure we would have done dozens of collaborations with K-os and Sam Roberts and all the movers and shakers and all kinds of big things, but... We tried moving to Toronto one year, but we never did any practicing or songwriting because we were too busy being drunk bohemians.

Are there any emerging local bands that you really like?

It's embarrassing but I have been out of touch with local music ever since we started touring regularly. I swore it would never happen, but hard as I try to get to shows and keep up, it's not easy when you are not playing locally all that often. There are a few great bands, like The Racoons (sic).

I'm sure you're tired of this question, but any update on Kathryn?

Kathryn has been taking a break from music this year due to some personal things. I think she will be doing some stuff with her other band next year and we have been talking about what we want to do with the next Immaculate Machine album. But there is nothing firm yet, just ideas.

You'll be traveling to New York to play at CMJ near the end of October, what makes this festival worth crossing the country for or is it just another show?

We will be crossing the Atlantic for this show! We are finishing a European tour in London and flying to New York just in time for CMJ. We have played it before and the atmosphere is amazing. Some of these industry festival are pure havoc when they take over a town but New York absorbs it so seamlessly that you are just like, yup, New York has a zillion things to do all within easy walking distance, why do i not live here? Last time we played cmj, elijah wood stood in line to see us but since it was sold out he never got in. So it was a no-brainer to submit our sonicbids EPK application this year.

Are there any bands that you want to see while you're there?

I haven't had a chance to look, but I am really looking forward to seeing who is there. I hope the Dodos are, I have been meaning to try to see them.

The new record High on Jackson Hill was recorded in Brooke's parent's house in order to get a more "natural" feel. Was there any point during the recording process where the unconventional environment hindered the process?

The sound is a little rougher of course, but if you are not a hi-fi sound snob, I don't think that is too big a deal. Overall the album is much better.

Do you think you'll be seeing more people smoking on Jackson St?

Jackson Street is a small residential road on a great big hill overlooking the whole city, which is difficult when you are cycling there every day, but a great place to hang out. I have no idea what you could possibly be talking about with regards to smoking.

In the song "Only love you for your car," what car is referenced and whose was it?

It references my teenage years, when a car parked in a dark corner was the only privacy you could really find.

There's a song on the new album called "He's a Biter", what's that about?

My sister does all the artwork for Immaculate Machine and always has. She has a fairly distinct style and one day I saw what seemed to be a direct rip-off in a restaurant in Victoria. When I mentioned that this artist was biting her style, she just shrugged and said, I guess that means it's time to move on. Great attitude, little sis.

What new albums have you been listening to?

Dirty Projectors, Blitzen Trapper, Sleepy Sun... but mostly just a TON of Thin Lizzy.

What's your favourite song from the 80's?

Wow that is a lot to choose from. I guess something from Jonathan Richman and the Modern Lovers.

What's the coolest thing you've ever bought?

Last week we were in Prague at the Kolbenova flea market, which is a massive massive garage sale in a dusty parking lot where you can buy anything. Anything at all, from coffins to soy milk to rifles all at the same place. Vendors pull up their cars and lay their wares out on a dusty blanket and you go and try to gesture the numbers since no one speaks any English. I bought a postcard stamped by the Nazi authorities when Czech was still occupied.

www.immaculatemachine.com
www.myspace.com/immaculatemachine

10.08.2009 Mono / Maserati

2009-10-12T15:41:00.000-07:00

I haven't been to the Biltmore in a while, so it sort of surprised me how tiny the place actually is. It's one of those places that are pretty nice on the inside with quite the cozy atmosphere, however with a low stage, it's not really that great if it's packed and you want to see anything below the performer's head.

I arrived at the venue about 5 min before Maserati got onstage and was able to find a decent enough spot. I've only heard a couple of songs from Maserati, one of them is a definite banger, "Monoliths", the other was more of a atmospheric/soundscapes kind of tune. Being my only exposure to them were those 2 songs, I was sort of expecting a "Boris" type of set, half uptempo rockers, and the other half soundscapes, which could go from boring to brilliant depending on mood. Well they ended up going with the aforementioned and not the later. Their set was pretty much all uptempo stuff. Dare I say it, it was dance-y post rock. The crowd seemed pretty into it, actually there was this girl beside me who was pretty much 'rave' dancing. I didn't find it weird at all, until she started doing it during Mono's set. But yeah, awesome stuff from Maserati, although a lot of their songs sound the same...

Mono came out while classical music was being piped out of the PA system, which was kind of interesting. I snuck a look at the setlist during change over and noticed that there weren't any songs before the last two albums. Not that this should surprise me, because even in their last tour, they mainly stuck to recent material. It was a little disappointing that I wouldn't be hearing tunes that I"ve become used to hearing at a Mono concert like "Halycon" or "Lost Snow". If it's any consolation however, their recent stuff does contain songs with the same elements that made the aforementioned songs awesome (crescendos/airplane take offs, chimey melodic songs). Their drummer has a gong as part of his live setup. I never actually saw him use it, though my friend says he saw him hit it during their first song "Ashes in the Snow". If you were near the front row you would have seen Taka at one point in the show on his hands and knees looking like he was overcome with emotions or in a musical trance. At the beginning of Everlasting light there was a pretty cool glockenspiel duet with Taka and the drummer, on two different sets of glocks. There was no encore, just 90 min of emotion rich instrumental musical energy.

$15/$15

09.24.2009 The Gaslight Anthem / Murder By Death / The Loved Ones / Frank Turner

2009-09-26T01:47:00.000-07:00

I think opener Frank Turner almost stole the show from well, everyone. He's a singer songwriter type from the UK playing just an electric guitar. He sings with a lot of passion and energy. At one point he asked for someone in the crowd to play harmonica. (I don't think he cleans it between shows) The volunteer was some scruffy looking guy with a hat and leather pants. That's right leather pants, and no he didn't have long hair, nor was he wearing a matching leather vest to go with it. Weird my calender says 2009 on it. His must say 1983. Fashion police aside, he was fairly decent on the harmonica, even had a pretty good solo when called upon. I'd love to see him play a small venue show.

The Loved Ones followed, with a set of pretty much Warped Tour friendly pop-punk songs. Wasn't really a fan of the music, but they did have a lot of energy despite being one guitarist short. During their set someone was texting (in the front row), which caught the attention of the lead singer who announced he would take the phone away if he caught her doing it again. He later recanted, stating she should do whatever she wants, it's her life. Awww.

Murder By Death was next, and were awesome as usual. They played a few songs each from their entire catalogue; Self described songs about "the apocalypse, whiskey, shitty people and the devi." I don't think there were any off of their first album though. Near the end of the set, Adam played "Bang, Bang" solo. That got most of the indifferent folks in the room interested. They ended their set 40 min set with 'Comin Home.'

As for The Gaslight Anthem, I kind of discovered this band pretty recently. Initially I wrote them off as more emo/pop/punk. Now I wouldn't go as far as calling their stuff any sort of ground breaking or even cutting edge, but I do find their newest album to be a very fun listen. And so is their live show. Their sound does have a throw back sound to it, almost a Springsteen-esque vibe, which would explain this video. Damn the boss is sooo intense. Anyways, lots of energy at this show. Quite a few crowd surfers too. There was no barricade at this show, which meant the roadies and techs spent a lot of the show trying to keep the crowd surfers away from the equipment. After coming back from the encore, lead singer went out of his way to show is appreciation for everyone coming to the show, mentioning that it was a whole lot better than his roofing job in New Jersey. The band played nearly every song off their latest album and a few tracks off their first. There were more than a couple of songs that had false endings. The band sounded great and I think everyone had a lot of fun, audience and band included. I know I did

$25/$34

Awards.

2009-09-26T01:21:00.000-07:00

Have been a little lazy on updates. Have a review and maybe some interviews in the future.

Also Congratulations go out to....

Dan Mangan for winning the XM Verge award for Artist of the Year. Mangan takes home $25k as does Alexisonfire who also won for Record of the year, except they have to split the cash 5 ways.

Speaking of Dan Mangan, he and Hey Ocean! can be seen covering Wintersleep's Weighty Ghost at the Western Canada Music Awards here.

And speaking of the WCMAs

Delhi 2 Dublin won for winning the Western Canada award forWorld Recording of the Year. CBC broadcasts the ceremony for the East coast version of these awards. Apparently Western Canada isn't a ratings draw.

09.17.2009 Sunny Day Real Estate / The Jealous Sound

2009-09-20T22:39:00.000-07:00

photo credits: Tommy Au
more photos here

So sometime in 1999, I was in Sam the Record Man on Granville looking for CDs to buy, when I came across the section on the first floor with the heading "EMO". Perplexed, I asked the sales associate what it meant. She threw around the word 'emotional' but had trouble further explaining it beyond that. She then went on to name a few bands in the genre. The only 2 of the ones she listed that I was familiar with were Sunny Day Real Estate and Dashboard Confessional. I'd heard of DC, but never heard of SDRE. At the time I was pretty heavy into Nu-metal, and bands like DC was far from what I wanted to hear at the time, so SDRE would have to stay in the "haven't heard anything by them" band pile in my head. Many, many years later, I began to regret this decision, as they're band that I know I would have enjoyed at that time. Actually they sound almost like the nu-metal I was listening to at the time. The only difference is that their sound is unique enough that it's stood the test of time after all these years.

First up was the Jealous sound. I guess Jealous means emo, because they sound like a stereotypical emo band. So much so that it was almost ironic. They played a new song, if you're a fan of them I guess you'd want to know. The lead singer looked like a the villian from the 4 season (the awful one) of Heroes. This guy.

Although billed as their first show since breaking up or hiatus, in reality it's actually just their official first show. They actually played a secret show in Tacoma the night before. I kind of felt ripped off after hearing about it afterwards. They started their set with Friday, which got the crowd warmed up for their awesome hit "Seven" which they played next. The rest of the set was a mix of their earlier albums, and a new song. The new song they just called it "New Song" and was apparently a week old. It was an upbeat number with not as much distortion. More of a rocker I guess. The singer revealed a few songs in that he was suffering from a cold or something which affected his voice. He didn't sound 100% but managed to pull off a decent job all things considered. This however seemed to the reason for a shorter set compared to the night before. The band actually left the stage before the encore after about 50 min and came back for a 3 song encore. The first song after coming back was 'In Circles' which left me pretty content. Oh yeah you would think that this show being so close to their home state of WA would be pretty packed especially for their "Reunion" show. Nope, well undersold. In fact, they even closed off the balcony, which you don't see very often. They should have put it at Richards... oh whoops.

Setlist:

Friday
Seven
Red Elephant
Song About An Angel
Grendel
Shadows
Iscarabaid
"New Song"
J'Nuh
Sometimes
Encore:
In Circles
48
Spade And Parade

$25/$38

09.04.2009 A Textbook Tragedy / Sights & Sounds / Party at the Moon Tower

2009-09-20T21:51:00.000-07:00

photo credits: Tommy Au
more photos here

I haven't been in the Media Club in almost a year, but man, they've really changed it, and probably for the better. The sound booth is now located behind the merch table and the bar tables have been taken out, opening up the room for more dancing I guess or maybe lounging. In place of the sound booth is a booth for will call. I think the stage is a little bigger too.

Never heard of Party at the moon tower. Don't recall that much but I believe I the singer had a pretty good screamo-type voice.

Never heard of Sights & Sounds either, but was surprised to find out that this was Andrew Neufeld's (from Figure Four/Comeback Kid) new band. Someone said it was his "prog-rock" side project. I tend to disagree. They remind me of Thursday, and I don't really consider them prog. Useless genre pushing aside, I didn't find their set to be that bad, just not what I would normally listen to. I'd describe it as post hardcore with spacey effects thrown in. Not sure why they played the spacey effects from a tape though, I would have liked it more if it was done live. They had a pretty cool light setup, and seemed to have at least some of the crowd interested.

I'm pretty sure I saw A Textbook Tragedy play on the same show as Stutterfly about 5 years back. I don't remember too much about it though. I haven't really paid much attention to this band over the years mainly because I thought they jocked too many Dillinger Escape Plan riffs. After seeing the show I'm happy to find out that their current repertoire doesn't invoke the same feeling. Looks like they have gained a pretty nice reputation for high energy shows over the years. First song had the crowd moving for the first time in the evening. The crowd was really into it. Even had hardcore dancers doing their thing in the middle of the dance floor. I think I even remember seeing one stage dive as well. Unfortunately, this was an early show show they only had an 8 song set, with no encore. Still it was good while it lasted.

Setlist

White Lightning
What's Pit Beef?
Intimidator
Destroyed In Seconds
If You Want Blood...
Lincoln City
The West Coast Answer
Dude, I'm On Alesse

$8/$12

07.25.2009 Hillside Festival Day 3 (Guelph)

2009-07-30T21:00:00.000-07:00

The first 2 days of the festival had bearable amounts of rain. I don't have any waterproof shoes, so I walked around in flip-flops all weekend. My feet were muddy at the end of most days, however I didn't have to endure the pain of walking in wet socks/shoes. On the ride over to the festival grounds we had so much rain, I thought we were driving under a waterfall. It was a pretty spectacular sight. The good thing about the rain on this weekend was that it usually only lasted about an hour max, and would come and go. But when it came, boy did it pour. Oh yeah and we got thunder too, more about that later.

I went to the Island tent first to check out the annual Sunday Gospel Session. Not surprising, It was packed. I guess people wanted to be in church on a Sunday morning. Amongst the assembled gospel singers, acoustic instruments and such were these 3 intense looking (they were wearing sunglasses) African's playing traditional African instruments. Those instruments made some really unique and interesting sounds, however my attention span is short and the rain had stopped so I made my way to the Lake Tent.

Being that I interviewed them, I figured I should probably see Dehli 2 Dublin play. They were playing with FRED and Eccodeck as party of "Kick out the Jams". The attendance at this tent was pretty low, however most of the people there were dancing it up. It was funny seeing the deadhead hippies dance it up. Dehli to Dublin are a pretty fun band to watch. Kytami knows how rock it out on the fiddle. Andrew their sitar player looked like he was handling bass duties today or maybe it was an electric sitar, he was also wearing a slayer shirt plus a kilt. lols.

I had to drop by the mainstage, and while I was waiting, I saw a bit of Sam Bradley's set. Weird, he's from Vancouver, though I've never heard of him. Standard acoustic guitar singer-songwriter type of stuff. He had a row of fans (maybe 4-5 ladies) with signs near the front of the stage. Vish from CBC radio 3 made a comment about the sign. He read it out but didn't get it. Some sort of inside joke or something.

I ended up at the spoken word tent to find open mic going on. One of the acts I saw was, well of "open mic" quality, and the other was someone telling a heart wrenching tale about finding inner strength and a (sigh, almost cliche) terminally sick boy in a hospital with a feather from a pillow, blah blah blah something about an angel blah blah, well you know how it ends, person is inspired and the boy, well he's terminally ill. Anyways, there was a Fresh Prince of Bel Air episode that was pretty similar. Crowd was very moved though. Saw more than one person with wet eyes and not from the rain.

I went down to a the Island stage to find another packed tent. This time Dancehall Free for All was inhabiting the stage. I was a little disappointed to not see some sort of "Dancehall" band from the Caribbean. They're local, so they had a lot of crowd support. I wasn't really into it and decided to check out the spoken word stage again.

I got there to see C.R Avery do a spoken word story about a boxer. Throughout the story, he did some beat boxing. It was pretty captivating.

What I saw of the Witchies I didn't really care for. I thought they were alright, but I just wasn't really into it and probably would have left to see something else had it not been a thunderstorm in mid swing outside. There was an announcement made by the organizers after the Witchies' set to stand away from the metal support poles that kept the tents standing, as essentially they were giant lightning rods. At one point during the storm between sets, lightning struck just outside the tent behind the stage. I don't think anyone was struck dead on, but I overheard people talking about being able to feel it come down near them. One girl claimed she was struck a couple hours after during the Julie Doiron/Patrick Watson workshop. She's probably a robot.

I know my other writing partner was sort of lukewarm on Clues, from Montreal, but I found their set to be pretty good. My set was probably shorter than his so maybe I had a more refined view of their live show. Clues is Alden Penner's (ex-Unicorn's) new band, I think it also boasts a former member of the Arcade Fire, though definitely before Arcade Fire was touring cross Canada. Clues really had some bad luck going for them. First their soundcheck went way over time causing them to have a shortened set and secondly they seemed to be having trouble finding their drummer as their set time drew near. Someone told me later, it was because he hurt his back from a lightning strike. (Another robot?) I'll have to see how they are with a full set.

Knowing that I had very few breaks from this point on, I went to grab lunch. Wanting to try something new, I opted for an African peanut stew form the food tent. Very tasty, however, I would have liked to had some meat with that. I topped it off with an organic Maple Crunch ice cream cone from another vendor.

So the Andrew McPherson/Julie Doiron/Sam Bradley/Patrick Watson Workshop (entitled Brand New Day) was one of the highlights of the festival for me. Patrick Watson played host and mentioned that Eric's trip was the first show he ever saw as as a kid. Sam Bradley, Andrew McPherson and Julie Doiron each got to play one of their own songs, and then it was improv time. You could tell it wasn't rehearsed because during McPherson's set, you could see Doiron and Bradley looking over at McPherson to try and find the chords to play. Julie Doiron was initially hesitant about the improv idea, but Watson kept pushing for it, as a good host would do. Doiron, mentioned that her daughter Rosey was better at the improv thing so Watson suggested she sing a song about Rosey. And that's what the song was about. Chorus was basically "Roooseeey, Rooooseeey", etc. Pretty cool. Doiron dedicated the song to her kids, the ones not named Rosey. Watson created the next improv by asking the crowd for a song name. I think they settled on "Radical Sock" or "Radical Shoe" something like that. One of Doiron's backing band decided a reggae jam was what it would be. Each performer took turns on the verses. Overall this was one of the cooler acts I saw at Hillside, musicians doing what they do best, creating music.

The previous stage was running later than schedule so by the time I left, it would have been pretty late into The Rural Advantage's set. I reluctantly decided to skip it, because I had to get to the main stage and my stomach was growling at me again. In case you're interested, and I know that you are, I had some yellow Thai chicken curry. Like everything I at this weekend, it was delicious.

I caught Great Lake Swimmers next just as the sun was coming up. They were a lot better than the last time I saw them. Maybe it was the location, but they seemed to have more of a stage presence outdoors. Oh yeah they attracted quite the crowd as well. The front of the stage was elbow to elbow in terms of space. They played a mix of new song and older songs like "Your Rocky Spine" which kept me happy.

You know a couple of years ago I was a little disappointed when Patrick Watson was announced as the 2nd Polaris prize winner, not because I didn't think he deserved it, but I thought others were more deserving. Well after seeing him live, I'll have to retract my disappointment. He really is a gifted song writer. His stage show consists of a drummer, violinist, bass and guitar with himself handling the vocal and piano duties. He seems to find the right balance between folk and rock. In a way it reminds me of the mellower Radiohead songs.

Because this was a festival show, Final Fantasy today was just Owen Pallett, without the projectors. Actually I prefer his show without the projectors, because I find them a little too distracting. Pallett hasn't had a proper studio album in a while so most of the songs he played today were new songs off his upcoming album "Heartland". The highlight of the night during "Lewis Takes off his Shirt". It had started to rain a few songs before, but it really started to come down during this song. I'll let this video explain the rest:

and here's another new song:

The Skydiggers were introduced by one of the organizers as a band that played the Hillside Festival 20 years ago. They're sorta folk/country/bluegrassy. I wasn't really impressed because it's not really my kind of music. Though they seem to have a following that thought standing in the rain/mud was worth staying for. I was pretty bored until one of the guitarists introduced a song about North Vancouver. They I was back to being bored.

And there we have it, 3 days of Hillside Festival. I for one, had a blast this weekend, you know, aside from all the rain, mud, more rain, more mud, thunderstorms, etc. With a strong sense of community, solid Canadian indie rock lineup and overall chill atmosphere, I could see myself coming out to this next year as well.

$50/$0

07.25.2009 Hillside Festival Day 2 (Guelph)

2009-07-28T21:08:00.001-07:00

I started day two in the Island stage. The first act of the day at this stage was a collaboration between two of the better (imo) up and coming Ontario bands: Bruce Peninsula and The Rural Alberta Advantage. I think Bruce Peninsula was a few members short from the last time that I saw them. I don't remember hearing any Bruce Peninsula songs, but they did jam on Fleetwood Mac's "The Chain". Afterwards they joked about covering Stairway to Heaven. The two bands seemed to be having a good time collaborating. I think The Rural Alberta Advantage played and had Bruce Peninsula jam on a few of their new songs. Pretty cool stuff.

I figured I would walk over to the next stage and try and get a good spot for Julie Doiron. To my surprise, the tent was pretty packed for the band "Green Go". I later found out their a local Guelph band, so I guess most of the crowd knew them before hand. They were pretty entertaining, playing a sort of electro-dance /rock sort of sound. They reminded me of You Say Party! We Say Die!, but instead of punk influences, electro synth.

The sucky part of festivals are that you sometimes get two or three bands you want to see playing at the same time. Case in point, I had to miss Bruce Peninsula playing in order to see Julie Doiron. The latter played a set filled mostly with lower key fan favorites. She was still great though, but with time restrictions she didn't have a lot of time for between song banter.

I checked out a bit of Treasa Levasseur next. Wasn't really too into it and took the time to have lunch after a few songs. Yeah I don't remember too much about this set.

Wanting to get a good spot for Ohbijou, I wandered into the tent to find 'Bahamas' finishing their set. I think Bahamas is just a drummer and a guitarist/singer. People seemed to like them as the tent was filled up. The last song saw them bring up a few friends to help out with extra vocals. The names of those friends have since slipped my mind, however, I do recall seeing members of Great Lake Swimmers, possibly Tony Dekker, and possibly Owen Pallett.

I've heard good things about Ohbijou through other media outlets like cbcradio3. I can't really say they blew my mind though. I enjoyed a few of their songs, however found that were kind of boring live, especially in this sort of setting. However, I did get the impression that they would be more enjoyable in a small club with nice lighting.

I made my way down to the Sun stage next where they mostly had spoken word and workshops. Final Fantasy, Buffy St. Marie and Notre Dame de Grass were doing a workshop entitled "Yes we Can". This slogan was also used throughout whenever any of the artists showed any insecurities onstage. Owen Pallett mentioned that he gets nervous on stage, to which someone shouted "Yes we Can". Anyways, the workshop basically consisted of each of the 3 artists taking turns playing a song. Not really familiar with Notre Dame de Grass, who are a Bluegrass act or Buffy St. Marie, but Owen did do a Buffy St. Marie cover, "The Dream Tree" which was kind of cool. That must have been nerve racking, since he mentioned being a big fan of hers.

The workshop ended a bit late so I arrived at Attack in Black's set midset. The room was pretty filled. Towards the end of the set, they brought out none other than Julie Doiron to sing on a few songs. I enjoyed what I saw from Attack in Black

Everytime I see the name "Hey Rosetta", I also think of "Hey Ocean". Anyways, they're an indie rock band from Nova Scotia, and they're pretty cool. They were one of the better acts I saw today. After seeing them live I'd have to say that they are totally deserving of their Polaris prize nomination. They played a good mix of slow mellow songs and rock out jams. I really wish I saw them with Two Hours Traffic now.

While waiting for the next band on the main stage, I saw the tail end of Buffy St. Marie's set. I suppose you could consider her a Canadian institution as she's been doing her thing for a while now. Not really my thing, but if you don't already know, she plays native/aboriginal influenced folk. So yeah there are songs with the Indian chants drums.

Tokyo Police Club had one of the longer time slots of the day. However due to technical issues, they didn't really make good use of it. I've stated before that I found their songs to be too similar sounding. I don't disagree now, but I will admit to having a much better time seeing them this time around. Along with their regular material, they also snuck in Tom Petty's "American Girl". It was nice to see a band looking like they genuinely like playing with each other as they seemed to had grins on their faces their entire set.

Caught the end of Woodhands' set. The place was packed. I think this was the Volunteer afterparty show this night. I'm pretty surprised, I wasn't aware of their popularity. Anyways, they're a duo that are dancey and the crowd loved it.

I don' think anyone left after the Woodhands set, as the Arkells set was also packed. The latter put on a really good rock show and the crowd was eating it up. I think they're local or something because on the ride over we passed "Arkell" street in Guelph. This show actually had a lot crowd surfing at it. I saw a bunch of beach balls and toilet paper flying around. I don't really remember much about their songs, but it was pretty standard rock out stuff. Actually come to think of it they sort of remind me of the Trews.

$60/$0

07.24.2009 Hillside Festival Day 1 (Guelph)

2009-07-27T17:06:00.000-07:00

Since this is kind of a Vancouver blog, I'll start with a short description of this little festival. Hillside is what Under the Volcano Festival in Vancouver would be if it grew to be about 3 times what it is now. A medium to large festival with a sense of community, or as I've been told by some people one of the biggest "hippie festivals" in Canada. They have a food court area, which has all local food vendors. Some of the dishes I ate their included Thai curry and African Peanut stew. If I wasn't worried about public "daily weight loss", I probably would have had a lot more than I did. Also another cool thing they had was re-useable dishes, which were washed by a dish washing staff. Water was also freely available by a company in guelph.

The first "act" I saw was billed as "Let's Get this Party Started". This featured Ambre McLean, Kristin Sweetland, members of Rock City Plaza, Josh Gabriel, Zack Leighton and others. From what I remember, they put on a pretty tight jam.

I caught a bit of Birthday boys afterwards. It might just be the singer, but I left with the impression that they sounded like Nickelback. I strolled over to the the Lake stage mid set to check out Kae Sun who I believe is from Africa or Ghana, but grew up in Ontario. I remember he had a very captivating voice.

There were only two bands I really wanted to see on day one. One was Coeur de Pirate and the other being The Grates. Unfortunately they conflicted time wise. Seeing as how Coeur de Pirate doesn't really play much outside of Quebec and Ontario, the choice wasn't that hard. Days leading up to the festival I was a little worried because I heard she had cancelled her appearance at the Dawson Music Festival a weekend earlier due to exhaustion. I guess a week is long enough to recover. Today Coeur de Pirate was a 3 piece. Beatrice Martin doing vocals and keyboard, a guitar player and another keyboard-er. She doesn't disappoint, as she was quite entertaining. She spoke in both French and English between sets, because afterall, we are in Canada as she pointed out, in French. Her set was at about half capacity not bad for a predominately French singing chanteuse. She introduced "Commde des Enfants" as the song that got her known. Aside from her album material she also played a new song, which she described as a sad song. At the end of her set she also snuck in 2 covers, one by fellow French singing language barrier breaking Montreal band Malajube (Étienne d'Août) and Rhianna's "Umbrella's."

Rock City Plaza pulled in a pretty packed crowd. They also have quite the following. Lots of really drunk people watching their set. One girl did a possibly tongue in cheek proposal to the drummer, which was kind of amusing. Same girl and her friends later danced on stage during the set. RCP reminds me of Neutral Milk Hotel, most notably during Joyful, which sounds a little like "King of Carrot Flowers."

Someone told me that the last set at the Island tent was the one where all the volunteers went to unwind. Makes sense, because it was ridiculously packed for USS. There was actually a huge lineup to get into the area. As you would expect the audience was full of modern radio rock aficionados and college kids. USS is probably best known for their radio hit "Hollowpoint Sniper Hyperbole." I was a little surprised to find out that the band is basically just a DJ/hype-man loading beats and scratching plus a guitarist singer. The guitarist might actually be a gifted song writer, but I just found that any sort of refined musical substance that he might have was pretty much hidden under the dance beats that ran throughout their set. I mean yeah sure it was totally entertaining and the hype man did his job very well, but at the end of the day I just wonder what the band could be if they didn't use dance beats, a hype man and had a full band. Well I guess they'd have to fire one of the members. Oh they had a blender on stage with some fruit. During the last song they mixed in Orange Juice, some blueberries, and a banana and blended it. Then drank it when they were done their set. I'm sure there's a deeper meaning in there somewhere, or maybe not.

$20/$0

07.25.2009 Virgin Festival Day 1

2009-07-26T22:09:00.000-07:00

Normally I'm not really a fan of festivals. Packed crowds, all ages (not that that's a bad thing), generally high ticket prices and short sets are all things I could do without. However, if you wait long enough, usually secondary market ticket prices usually drop by the time the date rolls by. The weeks leading up to said show, I even recall a 2 for 1 promotion somewhere. This usually means the show was undersold, but it also means I was able to snag a ticket for $30.

I get there around 3pm just in time to see Mute Math. Two or three years ago, they had a bit of an indie level hype about them. Somehow I never really got into them. Live, they're not too bad. Decent stage presence; they sort of had a Filter vibe to them. Actually I recognized one of their songs from somewhere, I think it's called 'Typical'. To close their set, they did a pretty cool 3 person percussion thing during the outro to "Break the Same".

After their set, I walked over to the second stage, (or bands they put on so they can set up the mainstage) to find out that it's none other than Vancouver's own Elizabeth. I think I've seen them 4-5 times now. Can't say they've up'd their game too much.

K-os followed up on the mainstage. Much like the day one headliners, the Roots, K-os had a full band back him up live. Having never seen K-os perform live before, I was kind of impressed by his captivating live show. Some of his songs actually used excerpts of classic rock tunes (Rush - Tom Sawyer, Led Zeppelin - Stairway to Heaven) to which he would put lyrics over. 'B-boy Stance' wasn't played, but mega-hits "Man I used to be" and "Sunday Morning" were represented. Much like any dynamic artist, his live renditions were quite a bit different than his album versions, adding more dimension to his work. Was a little disappointed I didn't see Emily Haines make an appearance during this set. Would have liked to have seen 'Uptown Girl' live with her. Of course her absence here can only mean more disappointment later on...

I don't recall who was next on the secondary stage because I was a)finding water b)contemplating whether or not I should shell out for an overpriced Jamacian patty (I didn't).

Broken Social Scene was the last band that I saw. Having to compare this set to the one they did in Toronto would really be unfair. Although this show really couldn't compare (I doubt any show could), the V-fest set was pretty good on its own right. Today lineup was very male dominate.

Hometown resident and Stars frontman Torquil Campbell was included, as well bandmate Evan Cranley. James Shaw of Metric was present, however Emily Haines was not. How peculiar.

Lisa Lobsinger handled all of the female vocals that day. The crowd seemed somewhat into it. It was hard to say. Definitely different than most festivals that I've been to. A pretty good mix of new and old songs were played.

k-os even did a verse or two on one of the songs. The set was about 45 minutes and seemed to end just while things were starting to take off. I actually took off after this. I really don't know if I could sit through another Our Lady Peace set.

Normally this is where the review would end, but as luck would have it, it rained in Vancouver. Actually thunder and downpoured. Ends up the organizers pulled the plug before the Roots got on stage (I later found out that they're planning on doing a free make-up gig in the near future). The also let day 1 festival goers use their tickets towards day 2 (not me, I had other plans). So... I guess those tickets that scalpers were desperate to get rid of, are going to be worth something after all. I guess everyone wins. Well except the organizers I suppose. I've got pretty good odds on there not being a V-fest Vancouver next year.

$30/$30

07.11.2009 Broken Social Scene / Rattlesnake Choir (Toronto)

2009-07-13T21:37:00.000-07:00

My original plan was to stay in Ottawa after Wintersleep because Blues Fest was going on and Matisyahu was playing the next day, however, my credentials were taking a little longer than expected to come through. This posed a problem because I was hoping snag a cheap flight home, which is difficult if you don't know when you're leaving. For some reason, it slipped my mind that the Broken Social Scene show, which was put on to make up for the cancelled Olympic Island Festival, would be happening on the same day. When I finally remembered, my problem was solved. Well it was too late to get a cheap flight, so I chose rail instead. which is by far a more expensive way to travel when compared to greyhound, but cheaper than a last minute flight and a billion times more comfortable than the 'hound.'

I arrived at the Sirius stage a little over 2hrs prior to "doors". Surprisingly the seats were already about half packed, and there was already a band playing there. Upon further inspection it was BSS soundchecking. Very nice.. They jammed on one song I didn't recognize. They also played "Where's Your Heart, Where's Your Mind", which I remember them playing at a show I was at in 2005. Kevin Drew also interacted with the crowd a bit hinting that it would be a long set and that they'd go all the way to the curfew time of 11 pm. He mentioned that the real reason they cancelled the Olympic Island was due to the strike. No ferries were going to Island where the festival was to take place. Towards the end of the soundcheck, after playing Soul Unwind, he brought out Feist to soundcheck the acoustic guitars, dropping a hint of a duet. Oh yeah, it was fairly obvious the show was being recorded for something. There were 2 large camera rigs at the back and 3 cameras on stage, all of the pro broadcast variety. The +$5k kind.

The organizer came out prior to the Rattlesnake Choir's set to introduce a certain Bruce MacDonald. He's a Canadian director best known for "The Tracy Fragments" and "Hard Core Logo." He mentions that they're filming for a feature film, probably called "This Movie is Broken," and that you can upload photos of people kissing to www.thismovieisbroken.com .....ok.

The Rattlesnake Choir are a country, maybe alt-country band from Toronto, and from what I understand are the house band for the Dakota Tavern. Apparently this is also where Kevin Drew and his posse like to hang out. Not really a fan of country, but they did do a bit of Johnny Cash's "Walk the Line" during their soundcheck. They didn't really change my opinion of their genre of music. The fiddle solos were kind of cool I guess.

To be honest, I really liked the two BSS albums after Feel Good Lost, but sort of lost interest a bit with the Broken Social Scene Presents: thing. Now I've seen BSS a couple of times back in Vancouver, and it always frustrated me to no end that I never got to see BSS with Amy, Emily or Feist doing vocals. For the record, I'm not a fan of Lobsinger, and would rather have Liz Powell doing vocals. I sort of wish she was invited to this show... Anyways, as luck would have it, BSS started with a song I didn't recognize, but it sounded ok, I just considered it a long intro theme. It only took 3 songs before they brought out Feist for 7/4 Shoreline. Midway through the set, time was given to each of the ladies to do a song. Amy did a song solo with Evan Cranley and someone else dual drumming. Emily sang "Give me a Sympathy" and Kevin and Feist did a heartwarming duet of medley of Safety Bricks/Past in Present/I Feel It All. The highlights of the night of course would be the gang-vocaled-filled rocker "Almost Crimes." The band kept leaving the stage after thanking the crowd, but kept coming back until curfew had arrived. "Major Label Debut" ended the night with a bang. After the show, the organizer said the band would be sticking around to autograph their new book.

To sum up, yeah this show was ridiculous. Made me forget about not seeing Explosions in the Sky this summer for a night....

Kevy Key Jam (Untitled 2)
Fire Eye'd Boy (Lisa on backups)
7/4 (Shoreline) (Feist
Love is New (Lisa on backups)
Frightening Lives
Chameleon (Lisa on backups)
Day to Day (Amy)
Safety Bricks/Past in Present/I feel it All (Feist and KD)
Gimme Sympathy (Amy and Feist on backups)
I'll Bring the Sun (Jason Collett)
Soul Unwind (Andrew, Lisa and Amy)
Almost Crimes (Feist, Amy, Emily)
Meet Me in the Basement
New Country (Feist, Amy, Lisa)
Anthems for a 17 Year Old Girl (Emily, Feist, Amy)
Bandwitch (Feist, Amy, Emily)
===
Pacific Theme
===
KC Accidental
===
Major Label Debut (Fast)

$100/$0

07.10.2009 Wintersleep / Mothers Children (Ottawa)

2009-07-13T18:00:00.000-07:00

The Ottawa BluesFest is a bit of a misnomer, since it's hardly just music of the blues genre. However, it is a pretty wicked festival. spans almost 2 weeks and brings in all sorts of awesome musical acts. In addition to Stages on the streets of downtown Ottawa, they also have other venues doing smaller regular shows. Anyways, it appears Ottawa has the same problem with live venues that Vancouver does. Apparently this the second incarnation of the Capitol Music Hall. The first one met it's demise when someone decided to build condo's in it's place.

First up was Mother's Children. Possibly without the apostrophe. They were kind of a garage rock band. Lots of energy. However, substance wise, I wasn't really feeling it. Actually the people around me thought the same. As the someone around me pointed out, "all the songs sounded the same." Yeah more or less. Really not the worst opener I've ever seen.

Wintersleep took the stage at around 12:15. Yep past midnight. The crowd was really good. Less of the drunk 'agros' and more of the 'sing along' types. Wintersleep debuted 2 new songs. From the setlist I snagged, it seems like one's called "Experience the Jewel" and "Blood Collection" or "Cat Power", depending on which setlist you have. (My friend's setlist says "Blood Collection", mine says "Cat Power". Paul did say it was tentatively called "Blood Collection" though. The first new song was sort of a down tempo tune, that starts out slow then builds into a nice noisy breakdown where Paul makes a lot of noise on his guitar. Man that sounded like an awful description. I'm not even going to bother trying to explain "Cat Power", only that it sounds like a mid tempo Wintersleep song. They finished their main set with Orca. Sounded really good and really heavy. The encore included one of the new songs while Danse Macabre closed out the night.

Miasmal Smoke & The Yellow Bellied Freaks
Archaeologists
Caliber
Drunk On Aluminum
Astronaut
Weighty Ghost
Murderer
Experience The Jewel
Oblivion
Laser Beams
Jaws Of Life
Orca
===
listen [listen, listen]
Blood Collection
Danse Macabre

$30/$0

06.27.2009 Hiromi Uehara Workshop

2009-07-03T00:46:00.000-07:00

I really don't review too many non-rock/indie/metal music. In fact, the last non-indie/rock/metal show was probably the Lang Lang show that I saw a year or two ago. That doesn't mean that I don't have love for the classical or jazz genres; quite the contrary, Bill Evans still ranks in my lifetime Top 5. I suppose one reason why I find newer jazz/classical live acts harder to get into is just due to the fact that there is so little promotion/press on it. Case in point, by the time I heard of Hiromi's Sonicbloom show at this years Jazz Fest, it was already well sold out. Luckily, Tom Lee was putting on a solo Hiromi Uehara Workshop at their downtown location.

Despite getting there early, there was already a line up formed in front of the Music Hall on the 3rd floor of the building. Seating was on a first come first served basis, with the audience most comprised of piano and jazz enthusiasts, Japanese ex-pats and the odd hippie. Not that I didn't expect a large following, but the small venue was rather packed from the seats to the aisles to the floors with a unnumbered amount of people waiting outside the door.

Hiromi show up to her workshop dressed casually and without the makeup or hairstyle that she is usually presented in - casting a more intimate slant on the event. Much like the seminars that I've seen in the past, the format was half playing half chatting/question and answer. Hiromi started with a piece dubbed "Shoe a la Creme"(?), which was apparently inspired by pastries in France. Her playing was quite engaging and at times mesmerizing. There were a couple of distinct idiosyncrasies in her playing. While playing she would often hum to herself and seemed to play almost in a trance during most of her playing. At one point, towards the end the first piece, she would reach into the grand piano and, I assume, manually tap on the hammers. This resulted in a more percussive muted sound.

After the first song, she spoke at length mostly about her background. She seemed to dwell on the theme that while she was hardworking and had a strong work ethic, there was a great deal of luck associated with her success. From her surprise meeting with Chick Corea, being mentored by Abdul Jamal and hooking up with Stanley Clarke, her career was built on a lot of chance encounters and fortuitous opportunities.

Afterward, she performed a rousing rendition of Bach's "Air on the G String" before taking a round of questions. Most of the questions were pretty standard fare and some bordered on either redundant or pedestrian. Overall the workshop was quite entertaining and well worth the lengthy lineup to get in. Hiromi ended the session by taking a request, the "Tom and Jerry Show", to the delight of everyone.

06.19.2009 The Pack A.D. / Sorcerers / Canaries

2009-06-30T11:10:00.000-07:00

I must admit, I really don't see that many non-touring acts. As good as the local Vancouver scene is, the last local show that I saw was probably Fake Shark, Real Zombie. Even that was almost a year ago. I'm not really sure why this is, but this show was all local, so there you go.

The first band up were Canaries. No "The". Apparently this is important. I wasn't too into them. They had a very lo-fi, synth/party/screamo sort of feel to them, or as my friend put it, "Hey look it's Andrew WK".

Sorcerers were a little better. Firmly planted in the Vancouver Skate scene, their music had a interesting stoner/dub/punk feel to them. Actually throughout their set, they blasted out the smoke machine, making the stage seem like, for lack of better words, an opium den. Ironically, I don't remember much about their set, I do recall their bass player being really tight and their guitar player using a lot of effects, but that's about it.

The Pack A.D.hit the stage to a pretty packed house. The crowd was a bit on the older side (including the owner of Neptoon Records), but there were a couple of the usual indie crowd. The overall vibe of the show was very much like a homecoming gig despite the fact that it was more of tour send off show. Lots of crowd interaction as well as a surprise guest for a song or two. Two things really stood out for me. The first being the presence and power of singer/guitarist Becky. The second being that it was quite apparent that there was an abundance of chemistry between the two girls in the band. The seemed to be playing off of each other all throughout the set. Despite a couple of technical difficulties, the show went off without too much of hitch - a good send off for a band who probably won't be playing Vancouver again until December.

06.19.2009 Wintersleep / The Clicks / In Flight Saftey (Toronto)

2009-06-25T18:46:00.001-07:00

There was a point in time where NXNE and NXNW were pretty much on the same par in terms of quality. No where near the same size or stature of what SXSW is now, but both were growing at a pretty good rate. Somewhere down the road, NXNW completely died, but NXNE seems to have grown up quite nicely. I'm not going to go into too much detail, (seeing as how as I write this it's been over a few days now), but I will say this, the quality of free shows was amazing: Wintersleep, GZA!, the Sonics, The Black Lips and more. It's really a shame NXNW went the way it did.

I think I've been watching too much TV because I could swear that at one of the NXNE booths I saw someone from one of the bands on Much Music's sort of reality band tv show, disBand. The person in question was the blonde from the sort of teen pop duo, that the judges thought were trying to be too sexy for minors, that sung that cheesy song "Sugar Free." Actually what's even funnier, is that I think I also saw the older rapper from Dog Bus shopping at Zehrs with his mom. I need to stop watching tv.

In Flight Safety, are a band from Nova Scotia. They sound like indie rock, I think. I don't really remember to much, except that their singer, unfortunately sounds like Bono. Unfortunate, because that comparison will be made every time someone tries to describe them to someone else, like I just did.

The Clicks, I wasn't really sure if I liked them or not. They're from Toronto, so it was a home town show of sorts, and they might have been an all girl trio as well. They weren't bad, I just didn't really feel a connection I guess.

I stood near the back for Wintersleep, which was actually kind of nice because I didn't need ear plugs. For once I got to hear the songs being played live without the muffle of the ear plugs I normally wear. Anyways, they attracted a really large sized crowd (yeah I know being free helps). Most people seemed to like it as I didn't see very many people leave during their set. Oh yeah all three of these sets were broadcasted live on sirius radio. Pretty cool I guess. Sort of a normal show. The only thing worth mentioning was that after they finished their set, and the Sirius people came on to do their outro talk, about 5 min after the everyone had left the stage, Wintersleep came back on and did Listen (Listen, Listen) as an encore.

Setlist:

Miasmal Smoke & The Yellow Bellied Freaks
Archaeologists
Caliber
Jaws Of Life
Murderer
Search Party
Weighty Ghost
Astronaut
Oblivion
Laser Beams
Baltic
Drunk On Aluminum
Danse Macabre
===
listen [listen, listen]

$20/$0

06.18.2009 Wintersleep / Chris Bell (Hamilton)

2009-06-25T18:14:00.000-07:00

This show was sort of a warm up show for Wintersleep as they would be playing NXNE the next day. What was cool about this show was that the venue is a lot smaller than what they would normally play these days. (at least in Canada) Downtown Hamilton (The "Hammer!") is kind of a sketchy place.

I had a chuckle when I saw who was the opener. Chris Bell does sound for Wintersleep. He's from Hamilton so it would make sense for him to open at this particular show. He's also happens to be the drummer for Sons of Butcher. Yep that Sons of Butcher, though I don't think he was ever featured on the cartoon. There are a lot of mediocre singer song writers out there, but Chris isn't one of them. I was pretty surprise how good it was. There seem to be some Neil Young and Radiohead influences going on. He should do the solo thing more often.

I should really stop doing Wintersleep reviews. this blog has done too many of them. Technical difficulties, kept the doors to the Casbah main room's door closed until around 30 min or so before Chris was scheduled to go on. Wintersleep actually started sound checking pretty late, in fact, after the doors were supposed to open. If you were standing by the door, you would have heard Astronaut and a sort of Jam on the Temptations' classic "My Girl". As for the main set, it was one of the longer Wintersleep sets I've seen, around 100 min. The only new song played was Baltic. Astronaut wasn't on the setlist. Insomnia was added to the encore, which was nice because it isn't played often enough. I think I'm starting to like Listen now as an encore. Having seen the band so many times in the past couple of years, it was nice seeing them in a packed small venue.

Setlist:

Miasmal Smoke & The Yellow Bellied Freaks
Archaeologists
Caliber
Jaws Of Life
Drunk On Aluminum
Baltic
Weighty Ghost
Murderer
Search Party
Astronaut (not on setlist)
Oblivion
Laser Beams
Orca
Danse Macabre
====
listen [listen, listen]
Insomnia (not on setlist)
nerves normal. breath normal

$40/$0

06.14.2009 Julie Doiron / Dog Day

2009-06-16T22:24:00.000-07:00

We've done a write up on Julie Doiron pretty recently, so this will be a bit of a shorter review for the Vancouver Biltmore show.

Dog Day started out the night with a blend of rock not so much unlike Eric's Trip. Boy/girl vocals and post grunge like sound. Their set seemed a little rushed, but I think they were under some time constraints. They played well, but I wouldn't say they rocked out like what other people have described. I'd probably still check them out again. Maybe a headlining show.

I don't know why I'm mentioning this, but during the set change I went and tried to play some of the arcade games at the Biltmore. To my chagrin, after about 2 minutes trying to fish out my quarter from the busted money slot of the Marvel vs Capcom machine, I decided I probably won't be doing that again. The other writer of this blog tells me that the pinball machine has a sketchy launcher.

Similar to the Waterloo show, Julie hit the stage with 2 or 3 solo songs. After that the rest of the band came in and rocked out. I'll try not to repeat the previous review, but this show was a little longer. Usual Julie Doiron fun banter and overall charm was present. Actually there was one point in the show where she sort of implied feeding her kids wine. At the end of the show, one thing was fairly obvious. Julie's backing band is incredibly talented. As mentioned before, her shows don't really use a setlist, but instead are based on what she wants to play and usually will entertain some requests. This night was no different. Some in the crowd requested a song from one of her side projects. She obliged, which resulted in her band fumbling through the song. In fact, I get the feeling the lead guitarist pretty much just improvises all his solos. Which leads me to a whole new appreciation for her live show.

$20/$17

Interview: Delhi 2 Dublin (June 2009)

2009-06-16T19:12:00.000-07:00

This interview is part of a series of interviews conducted via email with a bunch of Vancouver/Victoria bands who will be heading out to Toronto in mid June for the NXNE Festival (North By North East Festival). They were selected to play at NXNE by applying via their Sonicbids account. I'm not 100% sure, (though I am 100% serious) but I think I remember seeing Kytami play in a local doom/sludge/noise band once.

Please identify yourself(ves) for those reading, what you do in the band, and who else plays in the band

I am- Kytami: Violin Shredder, Back up vocals

The other members are-

Tarun: Production, Ableton Live, Tablas, Back up vocals, Shaker

Ravi: Dhol (a.k.a. “thatfuckingdrum”)

Kimchi/Zandrew: Electric Sitar, Electric Guitar

Sanj: Lead Vocals, Hype Man

Tell us a little bit about the history of your band.

Our first show for Celtic Fest Vancouver was off the hook, then we started to get booked even though we weren't officially a band. As we continued on, we discovered we liked working together, had similar goals and inspired each other. We've had tremendous response and that combined with the belief in ourselves is what keeps us going.

How would you describe your sound?

A couple of Punjabi guys walk in to an Irish Pub, have a couple of drinks with the fiddle player then they all decide to go hear a DJ playing at an afterhours warehouse party and on the way there they pick up a Korean guy busking with his sitar on the side of the street.

You'll be traveling to Toronto to play at NXNE in the middle of June. What makes this festival worth crossing the country for or is it just another show?

Every show is important.

What's your favourite song from the 80's?

How can you pick from 10 years of music? Could it at least be top ten? Many different phases and influences within that time period.

What's the coolest thing you've ever bought?

My black electric Skyinbow violin.

For the people who've downloaded your album, tell us why they should check out your live show.

Come party with us!

Thanks for doing the interview; you have the last word, say what you want to say.

A huge thank you to our families, our colleagues and our fans.

http://www.delhi2dublin.com/
www.myspace.com/delhi2dublin

06.13.09 Bell Orchestre (Toronto)

2009-06-15T18:34:00.000-07:00

I gotta say, as much as I like Vancouver, it just can't touch Toronto in terms of free shows. I think Malajube played a free show the night before, Bell Orchestre tonight, and in the next 2 months, I'll probably see Holy Fuck and Broken Social Scene. Anyways, today's show was at the Sirius Stage at Harbourfront center as part of the L'Oreal's Luminato Festival. From what I understand, it's basically an arts/life/culture festival. Lots of free shows and other events to free and feed, your mind. It's a very cool festival.

The Sirius Stage at Harbourfront Center is an outdoor stage on the Harbourfront overlooking the lake. It's also covered so the good times aren't dependent on the weather. Since this was a free show, it attracted both fans of the band, and music lovers of all varieties. Actually I was quite amused to see a large diverse number of 40-?? year olds who thought: "Sunny day, free music, ORCHESTRE ? I'm there!" despite having never heard of the band.

The band was actually introduced by none of than the Mayor of Toronto himself, flanked by one of the organizers and some Cirque de Soleil performers. Kinda cool I guess. Before they started the Mayor relayed a request by the band. They wanted people to dance. A few people stood up to the barricade, but most were content with sitting down as if they were listening to a real... uhh no, a more conventional "orchestre" err "orchestra." They played a pretty tight set of new and old songs that were really quite enjoyable, with the sun just beginning to set just as they started. Despite their best efforts, the band could only muster up minimal crowd reaction, until they played their "dance" numbers: "Les Lumieres Pt. 2", off their first album and "The Gaze", off their recently released album " As Seen Through Windows". Those 2 songs got the crowd (well some of them) off their feet and moving in the aisle (also a good way to get a better view). It was one of the band member's birthday, so there was cover tune thrown in there was well. They ended their set after a little over an hour. An encore followed, with a couple extra songs, which was kind of surprising, but was welcomed by much of the crowd.

$10/$0

Interview: Dan Mangan

2009-06-11T16:16:00.000-07:00

Interview: The Abramson Singers

2009-06-11T16:07:00.000-07:00

Interview: T. Nile and the Children Of Mercey (June 2009)

2009-06-11T15:16:00.000-07:00

This interview is part of a series of interviews conducted via email with a bunch of Vancouver/Victoria bands who will be heading out to Toronto in mid June for the NXNE Festival (North By North East Festival). They were selected to play at NXNE by applying via their Sonicbids account. If you're actually reading this and today's date is June 11, 2009, then you can check her out tonight, 9pm at the Railway Club. If not, whatevs.

Please identify yourself(ves) for those reading, what you do in the band, and who else plays in the band

We are T. Nile and the Children Of Mercey.

T. Nile - Banjo, hollow-body electric guitar, harmonicas
Christa Mercey - Drums and percussion
Laura Mercey - Harmonies, keyboard, trumpet
Mike Mercey - Bass, harmonies
Burke Carrol - Pedal steel

Tell us a little bit about the history of your band.

Christa (drums) and i did a duo-tour of Ontario and Quebec last summer. It was quite the (sometimes hilarious) adventure and between playing festivals and shows, we kept on going back to her folks place to "re-fuel".

I was fortunate enough to get to know her family, which are all very musical;
Her dad is Ray Mercey, of the legendary 7-time Juno winning 70s era band called "The Mercey Brothers".

Over the year Christa and I discussed wanting to form a band together and at some point it crossed my mind that her sister and brother would be great additions. Burke Carrol, while not officially a Mercey, looks quite a bit like their uncle Lloyd, (also of the Mercey Bros) so he's become an honorary member of the family.

The musical chemistry is electric with this band, and I'm so excited to play with them again on June the 20th at C'est What.

How would you describe your sound?

A raw-sexy blend of indie-folk, pop, rock, reggae and awesomeness!

We've already been compared to Fleetwood Mac, Blondie, The Police and Paul Simon (from his Graceland days).

You'll be traveling to Toronto to play at NXNE in the middle of June. What makes this festival worth crossing the country for or is it just another show?

It's never just another show... I can't wait to play with C.O.M.

again... we always get so high of the music!

Also it will be the Toronto CD release show for my brand new CD, "The Cabin Song EP", that was released to the public on june 9th (available on ),

What's your favourite song from the 80's?

how to pick just one??

right now I love "Tide Is High" - Blondie

What's the coolest thing you've ever bought?

My Cherry-Red Ibanez hollow-body electric guitar, and Fender Blues Jr. Amp.

For the people who've downloaded your album, tell us why they should check out your live show.

T. Nile and The Children Of Mercey are addictive live. If you come out the show on the 20th, you'll understand why! ;)

Thanks for doing the interview; you have the last word, say what you want to say.

C'est what is the place to be on June 20th @ 9pm! (actually, you might want to get there a little early because word on the street is that it's gonna be packed).

http://myspace.com/tnile
http://tamaranile.com

Interview: Times Neue Roman (June 2009)

2009-06-09T19:05:00.000-07:00

From Left to Right: Clay Jones and Josh of Styrofoam Ones, with Alexander The and Arowbe of Times Neue Roman

This interview is part of a series of interviews conducted via email with a bunch of Vancouver/Victoria bands who will be heading out to Toronto in mid June for the NXNE Festival (North By North East Festival). They were selected to play at NXNE by applying via their Sonicbids account. A friend of mine read this interview and thought TNR were dicking me around with non-sensical answers. Nope looks pretty legit to me.

Please identify yourself(ves) for those reading, what you do in the band, and who else plays in the band

Arowbe: I'm arowbe arowbe arowbe in recognition of my many selves. I usually do all the writing and vox and right now I feel like Tupac walking out of court spitting on the paparazzi like "thats my new style!" No offence. I'm feel like a two thousand dollar and one cent bill. There actually is one of those.

Alexander The: No dots please. Just a solid line across the face. I do the beats and belly chants in honor of our ancestral folks that led me to believe in wall smacking for the gods that created The Hype.

Tell us a little bit about the history of your band.

Arowbe: There were great chemical reactions when we met in 2007. Everything felt slightly creative, but because Alexander The and I were each signed to different record labels, we were prohibited from recording together. Still, we felt that this was too important of a project and proceeded with our unauthorized collaboration. The formal group, Times Neue Roman was originally established by The British Parliament in tandem with then-Canadian Governor General, Adrienne Clarkson. Her Excellency first heard us on one of our canoe tours across Eastern Canada (We're doing one again this August - http://www.methinkspresents.org/). She was gracious enough nullify our contracts and acquire sponsorship for further voyages.

How would you describe your sound?

Arowbe: Polka-dots and paisley.

Alexander The: I connect the dots.

You'll be traveling to Toronto to play at NXNE in the middle of June. What makes this festival worth crossing the country for or is it just another show?

Arowbe: We make all our band-decisions based on the new science of demographics and the Consumer Confidence Index. There's no room for error in these matters. You have to strive to be perfect. A festival in Toronto is currently the logical market to conquer.

Alexander The: I've studied Actuary Science in University. I have to say we are very close to finding the truth. We've been in the lab for months by minimizing the standard deviation within our product. We can never know the truth but at least we find every variable necessary to increase our means to get to it.

Arowbe: That means we have to play at NXNE.

What's your favourite song from the 80's?

Arowbe: Plastics - "Copy."

Alexander The: Pumpkin Belly by Tenor Saw

What's the coolest thing you've ever bought?

Arowbe: You make me feel unusual when you ask questions like that.

Alexander The: A Kulintang Set from Cotabato City, Philippines. Usually passed down to you if you're lucky. I had to go to the war-torn area of Mindanao to find the brasserie to pick mine up. I passed through evacuation centres and refugee camps to get it.

For the people who've downloaded your album, tell us why they should check out your live show.

Arowbe: Times Neue Roman are a sufficiently stable, electrically neutral group of at least two people in an indefinite arrangement.

Alexander The: Exactly.

Arowbe: I suppose its not so much of a live show as pack of Koi fish swimming in a whirlpool, struggling for life and appearing as hypnotic as a pair of spinning tops.

Thanks for doing the interview. You have the last word, say what you want to say.

Arowbe: There are many things happening in The End Studios: Styrofoam Ones, Santa Guerilla, Broadway Sleep, The Gorgeous Concern, Alexander The's solo project. We dont do side dishes. It's a big buffet in here. We are like a big Wu Tang Social Scene in the city right now. All over the court with a collective of queens and tycoons like MeThinks, Halo Halo, Makeshift, Gov. Gen. Tao Chkn, and Mr. Hands. We love Tonka Puma. Also, Kate Kai Mei Wong, Zaki Ibrahim, Lindo P, PSBEUYS, Sarah Shafey, The Gang of Two, DJ Mensa, all of Kapisananan. So much mob!

Alexander The: There is no exclusion really. We've up'ed our game with our corporation. You can definitely find our calling cards projected on large walls around the city. Just look out for us before and during NXNE around on the streets.

http://www.timesneueroman.com
http://www.myspace.com/timesneueroman

Interview: Octoberman (June 2009)

2009-06-09T18:49:00.000-07:00

This interview is part of a series of interviews conducted via email with a bunch of Vancouver/Victoria bands who will be heading out to Toronto in mid June for the NXNE Festival (North By North East Festival). They were selected to play at NXNE by applying via their Sonicbids account. Hmm technically they aren't a Vancouver band anymore.

Please identify yourself(ves) for those reading, what you do in the band, and who else plays in the band

Joining me (vocals, guitar) for the NXNE show will be: CL McLaughlin (guitar, vocals), Tavo Diez DeBonilla (bass), Marshall Bureau (drums), Shaun Brodie (trumpet, keyboards), Randy Lee (violin), Leah Abramson (vocals)

Tell us a little bit about the history of your band.

It started off as a solo project to record a bunch of songs I wrote while traveling. I now invite a lot of my friends to help the songs come to life.

How would you describe your sound?

Octoberman kind of has a split personality. On one side there's a 6-piece rock band that includes drony violins, Mexicali trumpet lines, crunchy guitars and lots of harmonies. The other side comes from more of a quiet/spare, folk-pop background. The line-up depends on what part of the country we are playing and who is available to join in.

You'll be traveling to Toronto to play at NXNE in the middle of June. What makes this festival worth crossing the country for or is it just another show?

Um, CL, Shaun, and I actually moved out to Toronto from Vancouver fairly recently and have a new Toronto line-up of players for all of our Eastern shows. We are looking at NXNE as just another show.

What's your favourite song from the 80's?

Currently it's "Just What I Needed" by The Cars. Followed closely by "My Best Friend's Girl" by The Cars. I might have to put that record on right now.

What's the coolest thing you've ever bought?

Probably that Cars record. It was 3 bucks.

For the people who've downloaded your album, tell us why they should check out your live show.

The live show is always very different from the recordings. Also, we will be playing lots of new songs and maybe even a Bruce Springsteen cover. We should really learn some Cars tunes too...

Thanks for doing the interview. You have the last word, say what you want to say.

We miss our Vancouver friends and collaborators.

http://www.octoberman.ca
www.myspace.com/octoberman

Interview: Hank Pine and Lily Fawn (June 2009)

2009-06-09T18:34:00.000-07:00

This interview is part of a series of interviews conducted via email with a bunch of Vancouver/Victoria bands who will be heading out to Toronto in mid June for the NXNE Festival (North By North East Festival). They were selected to play at NXNE by applying via their Sonicbids account. If you want to see the face behind the mask, you'll have to see the live show.

Please identify yourself(ves) for those reading, what you do in the band, and who else plays in the band

The Hank Pine and Lily Fawn Snake Oil show consists of:

Hank - renegade cult member with his dead girlfriend (in a garbage bag), determined to rest her soul in New Orleans. GUITAR, CELLO

Lily - half deer half girl with a penchant for stealing babies thus rescuing them from the perils of the modern world. DRUMS, MUSICAL SAW

Cecil the Weasel - Doomsday cult member and Assassin. BASS GUITAR

and Choir members we will try to recruit from the audience ! SINGERS LA LA LA

Tell us a little bit about the history of your band.

Hank and Lily started by making their own comic book... then started making music to go along with the comic... now .. it is a multimedia rock party circus !!

How would you describe your sound?

VAUDEVILLE ROCK - Gospel, country, punk, snake oil side show. (Like the Cramps and the Pixies)

You'll be traveling to Toronto to play at NXNE in the middle of June. What makes this festival worth crossing the country for or is it just another show?

NORTH BY NORTH EAST, is not just another show it is a huge festival with tons of cool bands woo woo... we are so excited !! HANK AND LILY ARE LOOKING FOR A LABEL that will love us and call us their own. Please come check out our show ! June 19th Cameron house, June 20th Rancho Relaxo (2am)

What's your favourite song from the 80's?

Hank - Autechre

Lily - Godstar by Psychic TV

Cecil the Weasel - Little Nicky by Prince

What's the coolest thing you've ever bought?

Hank - Hank's fire ring.... seriously it shoots flames.

Lily - um, I bought a huge bag of fire crackers and had the night of my life.

Cecil - Tangelo oranges in Hawaii - so sweet and juicy.

For the people who've downloaded your album, tell us why they should check out your live show.

The live show is an extension of the album and the comic book... you really need to see how much fun it is when all the elements come together. We need YOU for it to work... so get your best dust bowl circus outfit on, grab your song book and get ready to chant and clap along at the Hank and Lily Snake Oil Revival Rock show. It is never what you expect and it is always a good time. Besides, when else will you get to see a Hideous Deer-Girl?

Thanks for doing the interview. You have the last word, say what you want to say.

http://www.hankandlily.com
http://www.myspace.com/hankandlily

Interview: Dustin Bentall (June 2009)

2009-06-09T17:42:00.000-07:00

photo credit: maryanovich.com

This interview is part of a series of interviews conducted via email with a bunch of Vancouver/Victoria bands who will be heading out to Toronto in mid June for the NXNE Festival (North By North East Festival). They were selected to play at NXNE by applying via their Sonicbids account. And yes, he is the son of Barney Bentall, should that last name ring a bell.

Please identify yourself for those reading, what you do in the band, and who else plays in the band.

Dustin Bentall- songwriter, singer, rhythm guitar player

Del Cowsill - bass guitar, backup vocals

Adam Dobres - lead guitar

Pat Steward - drums

Tell us a little bit about the history of your band.

I recorded my debut album in 2006 with no studio experience and little live performing experience. Everyone in the americana/ alt-country scene across Canada took great notice to it. I spent a couple years touring as a songwriter with my '73 Martin in hand and a bag full of harmonicas. In the time that passed I put together a band with the best g'damn guitar player I ever saw in that time, Adam Dobres from Victoria. Next I found Del Cowsill, son of Billy Cowsill of The Cowsills (Hair, Ed Sullivan Show...) and later with The Blue Shadows. After a year of touring with that band we recorded a record which will be coming out later this year. With the ears of the scene on us we have been playing shows recently with Blue Rodeo as well as crossing borders, musically speaking, to play with Sam Roberts and Matt Mays.

How would you describe your sound?

Rock N' Roll, Country, Psychedelic, fun.

You'll be traveling to Toronto to play at NXNE in the middle of June. What makes this festival worth crossing the country for or is it just another show?

Not just an other show. There is no such thing. We have the incredible honor of playing The Dakota Tavern on Saturday night at midnight on the weekend of NXNE!

What's your favourite song from the 80's?

I'm a little tipsy right now so I'll have to think a minute... "Something To Live For" by Barney Bentall and The Legendary Hearts. That made elementary school a lot easier 'cause my dad was so much cooler than anyone else's dad.

What's the coolest thing you've ever bought?

A '69 Chevy Imala with 42,000 original miles. It saved my life too when an F250 with a camper trailer crossed the center line and hit it head on.

For the people who've downloaded your album, tell us why they should check out your live show.

Live performance is what I am in this game for. That's when the magic happens. Don't get me wrong I love recording but you don't have a room full of people to react from when you are in the studio.

Thanks for doing the interview. You have the last word, say what you want to say.

See us on June 20th. But if you can't get in come back next time because we are going to be doing this for a long time.

http://www.dustinbentall.com/
http://www.myspace.com/dustinbentall

Interviews

2009-06-09T17:21:00.000-07:00

update: added Petroleum By Product

The Abramson Singers (June 2009)

Dustin Bental (June 2009)

Billy The Kid (March 2010)

Delhi 2 Dublin (June 2009)

Immaculate Machine (Oct 2009)

Hank Pine and Lily Fawn (June 2009)

Dan Mangan (June 2009)

Octoberman (June 2009)

Parlour Steps (March 2010)

Petroleum By-Product (January 2010)

Sex With Strangers (March 2010)

T. Nile and the Sisters of Mercey (June 2009)

The Pack A.D (Oct 2009)

Times Neue Roman (June 2009)

Yukon Blonde (March 2010)

05.31.2009 Clues / Apollo Ghosts

2009-06-02T20:31:00.000-07:00

I missed the first time Clues came to Vancouver, but tonight I had a second chance. It was at still also still at the same venue, the Biltmore, and an early show at that. I suppose after seeing both Islands and the Arcade Fire in small venues, I had somewhat high hopes (I know unfair comparison). Expectations aside, there were a couple of surprises.

The night started out with Apollo Ghosts. Songs were sort of surf rocky, folky and heavily influenced by the city of Nanaimo. Not really my thing, but showed some promise. Singer had pretty good presence, bassist had a couple of good licks and the drummer, I don't think, curiously, played a single drum fill the entire night.

Shortly after Apollo Ghosts left the stage, 2 men dressed in black hit the stage unannounced. I later found out they were members of the rarely to tour Jerusalem in my Heart. For the next 5 minutes or so, the audience was hit with a barrage of middle eastern chanting/song/prayer?.

After an even shorter turnover, Clues took the stage. Much like their band name, musically they were a bit of a puzzle. Despite packing the stage with a expanded drum kit and a variety of different instrumentation, it was quite clear from the onset that front man, and former Unicorn, Alden Penner was the main focus of the show. Having only heard a demo prior to the show, I pretty much came into the show with a clean slate. That being said, some things worked somethings... not so much. I did get the impression that the next album would be a better measuring stick as to how to really rate them. Overall, the show didn't exactly blow me away, but did seem to keep me intrigued for the 2 hours I was there.

$10/$12

04.29.2009 Murder By Death / The Sicks / Winter of Freedom

2009-05-10T13:23:00.000-07:00

This was my first time seeing a show at the Bourbon. I was pleasantly suprised with what I saw inside. Excellent lighting, high stage, raised floor on the side and 2 bar areas. This is a very underrated local venue.

The first band up was local, Winter of Solace. The band was comprised of a singer/guitarist, keyboardist and drummer. That's right no bassist, yet I could clearly hear a bass line throughout most of the songs. This really bothered me for some reason. The singer has a pretty good voice that reminds me of a radio rock band. The one thing that set them apart from all the other bands was that they had 2 LCD screens on each side of the stage for visuals. Not a bad idea, but some of the visuals looked really low budget, which took away from the experience.

The Sicks, another local band, followed. They're really not my thing. The first few songs I heard sounded like, DMB/Jack Johnson inspired rock. However midset they switched to Sting/Beduoin Soundclash inspired reggae-rock, complete with accents. I don't t hink they played any covers, but I could be wrong. They left me pretty confused. I guess they'd be a pretty good house band for the Roxy or something.

This was Murder By Death's first headlining show in Vancouver and I was pretty surprised with the turn out. I really doubt they get any sort of radio play in Vancouver, college or otherwise. I was a little bummed out that their recent tour with their old keyboardist didn't stop in Vancouver, but at this point I'm just happy I don't have to drive down to Seattle to see them. Anyways, one thing that I noticed was that their show or maybe their new material seemed more .. how can I put this, rock oriented? I've never really been good at describing genres and such, but the way they played, the entire night I was thinking this is probably the perfect bar band. Most of the songs they played, like Brother, Comin' Home and Ball and Chain, were upbeat and fun. The kind of songs you want to get drunk to. The crowd seemed really into it as well. I know I wasn't the only one yelling the 'gang vocals' part in 'Sometimes the Line Walks You'. Really my only complaint this evening was that their set was pretty short, clocking in at less than an hour, no encore. They were playing 80 min sets a few weeks ago.

Adam's Pedalboard

Matt's Pedalboard

$10/$10

04.02.2009 Julie Doiron / $100 (Waterloo, ON)

2009-04-07T19:54:00.000-07:00

Interestingly enough, about a month back, the Starlight was in the running for CBC Radio 3's best venue in Canada contest. Having now been in it and seen a show there, I'd have to say that it deserves all the adoration it gets. It has just enough lighting, decent enough sound, nice large hardood dance floor and great inside decor. I'd be similar to the Biltmore in Vancouver, maybe with a slightly higher stage and tables instead of booths. Anyways onto the show...

$100 opened up the show. They were a 3 piece band doing the alt country thing. Really the only alt country artist that I listen to is Neko Case, thus it would be very easy for me to make Neko Case comparisons. And I will. The lead singer of $100 actually sorta has some resemblance to Neko. She sings with more of a southern country drawl though. I can't really think of anything else worth mentioning as my interested started to wane after a couple of songs. Like I said, I'm not really into alt-country, though my friend who is, said he enjoyed it.

When I was living in Vancouver I had at least a couple of opportunities to see Julie Doiron live, but for some reason or another never got around to. I'm beginning to regret it now. For those not in the loop, Julie is known for playing bass in Eric's Trip, or Canada's version of Sonic Youth. For some of you I realize that I just tried to relate a relatively obscure Canadian artist with another equally obscure Canadian artist. You'll just have to take my word for it that Eric's Trip was an awesome band. For that reason, amongst others, Julie Doiron is (arguably) Canada's reigning Indie Rock Queen and not Feist. Speaking of Feist I recent came across a side by side photo of both Doiron and Feist on flickr that showed some really eerie resemblances. Also they both have an apparent affinity for Vox solid state amplifiers.

First off, Julie Doiron is sooooo adorable. Probably the cutest little thing I've ever seen on a stage. Gushing aside, Julie started her set solo playing "Untitled" and "Me and My Friend", which were by her own admission, "sad" songs. She played a couple more and a few requests from the crowd, "Wintermitts" and "Snow Falls in November", before calling for her band to start the full band portion of the night. The whole show had a very loose feel to it. Doiron didn't have a setlist, pretty much playing whatever song felt right at the time. This included songs which weren't even rehearsed. There was even a song, where Julie taught her bassist how to play it moments before it started. Between songs, Julie recalled a really amusing story about drinking wine, or as she called it 'diet alcohol', in her home province of New Brunswick. Highlights for this reviewer were "Consolation Prize", a new one from her just released album and "Nice to Come Home", which she played while the bassist was sorting out a problem with his amp. After almost 90 min of playing and chatting, she ended her set solo with "Glad to be Alive," also from her new album, which was quite the happy and upbeat song and pretty much the perfect song to end the day with.

$11/$11

04.02-03.09 Wintersleep / An Horse / Johnny and the Moon

2009-04-04T21:02:00.000-07:00

photo credit: Adrian Burden

It's been a wild couple of days following Wintersleep around the northwest. These last two Vancouver Commodore Ballroom shows marked the end of this leg of the tour, but also as I eventually found out the probably the last North American show before they head back to recording a new album Welcome to the Night Sky. In some ways, the last little run of shows really summed up the progression that the band has made in the past number of years; from small intimate gigs to sold out Commodore shows.

Night 1
Unfortunately got to the venue late and was unable to catch An Horse's set. I was told by my friend that their set was really good and that they really endeared themselves, as they have been all tour, to the Vancouver crowd. I was able to catch Johnny and the Moon's set. Featuring Dante de Caro of Wolf Parade, and formerly of Hot Hot Heat, they played what I can only describe as something in the folk/indie/bluegrass range. They garnered little interest from the crowd and really didn't do it for me. I guess I was hoping for something more along the lines of what Wolf Parade does.

Wintersleep was up soon enough and once again they were in fine form. The show was actually pretty similar to the last time they played the Commodore, and yet, there were still plenty of surprises to keep people interested. The entire latest album was played, but some older tracks, "Jaws of Life" and "Caliber" were still also inserted in. I should also mention that the new songs, tentatively named "Baltic" and "Encyclopedia" are really starting to grow on me. "Encyclopedia" in particular could probably make it as a single with it's slight hook and chorus. After a quick encore break, the band returned for a 3 song encore that included the semi-rarely played "Assembly Lines" from their first album. Closing the show was a relatively shorter version of "Danse Macabre". Unfortunately there was no extended jam. The crowd seemed pretty happy however nonetheless.

Night 2
I should mention, that I've actually been lucky enough to be at some of the shows early enough to take in some of the sound checks. Most of them consist of the usual... well sound checking, but also working on songs new or otherwise. Interestingly, "Faithful Guide" was played during the soundcheck (and floated around the first night's setlist), but unfortunately not during the main set :(

An Horse played a little longer than last night. Despite the longer set, they seemed to rush through their set, dispensing with their usual cheerful banter.

Night 2 for Wintersleep was pretty similar to the night before. There were a couple of differences. Night 1 seemed to have little more (for lack of better words) flow to it. Don't get me wrong, both were great sets, but the first night was probably the better of the two. In terms of song selection, the encores were mixed up a little bit. Most notably, "Assembly Lines" and "Danse Macabre" on night 1 with Neil Young's "Words" and Nerves for night two. Their cover of "Words" really brought chills down my spine. "Nerves Normal, Breathe Normal" was pretty standard Wintersleep with the usual killer drumming by Loel. Afterwards hung out with the band (who are very down to earth I might add) a little bit and enjoyed some very nice scotch. Finally big thanks to the band, Chris (their tour manager), Adrian and Mark for all the good times.

03.26-28.09 Wintersleep / An Horse

2009-03-30T14:58:00.000-07:00

....And on the Vancouver side of things. Its been a while since I've made a post. Almost 4 months in fact. For anyone who actually reads this blog, it's quite fitting that the first (Vancouver-ish) review of the year is none other than a 3 show Wintersleep run. Winding down their successful run of shows supporting their latest album Welcome to the Night Sky, this leg was primarily a SXSW / Westcoast run with An Horse.

Portland
I'm not quite sure if Wintersleep has ever played in Portland before. The venue was double booked. Wintersleep in the smaller room "Lola's" and radio rockers Blue October in the main room, Crystal Ballroom. While the building was quite equipped to handle both shows, there was quite a bit of bleed through from the upstairs room to the downstairs. During many quieter parts, you really could not help but notice the bass coming through. Amusingly, the Blue October seemed to be the running joke throughout much of the night. I actually overheard some of the buildings staff quip during load in:

Guy 1: When is Blue October getting off the stage?
Guy 2: Not soon enough.

The opening band (whose name escapes me) seemed a little out of place. They played a sort of folk/lounge kind of music. I don't remember much, but seem to recall that their bass player was quite good and the singer's voice was good. An Horse, who was playing a co-headlining slot, probably should've taken the headlining slot as about half the crowd left after their set. I'm guessing their buzz can be attributed to their Tegan and Sara vibe as their recent Letterman appearance. But seeing as they only have 1 albums worth of material, I guess it doesn't matter that much. They played quite well, I definitely liked them more than I thought I was going to. Their singer, Kate, even has some amusing stage banter, which I always like.

Wintersleep played quite well considering they just drove 10 hour from San Fransico. The setlist consisted of songs from their last 3 releases. No new songs were played, and no encore was played. The set was about 45 minutes. I didn't actually mind too much. It's nice having long sets, but its also nice having small intimate shows too. This may have happened during An Horse's set, but also of note:

Wintersleep: So do you guys like Blue October?
Crowd: No.
WS: Really why?
Crowd: Because we aren't 12.

Setlist:
Drunk on Aluminium
Archaeologists
Caliber
Astronaut
Weighty Ghost
Murderer
Search Party
Laser Beams
Oblivion
Miasmal

Seattle
Seattle was actually somewhat special in that it was one of the only dates that was an all ager. The venue, The Vera Project, was pretty cool. Definitely the best run all ages venue that I've ever been to. If you've ever been to Portland about 5 years ago, it's what the Meow Meow should've been. Clean, decent sound system, with a good lighting system. I've got a feeling that it benefits from grants or some sort of assistance, but still whatever it takes to keep something like this alive is cool.

The first band to hit the stage was an all girl local highschool jazz kind of outfit, Deer Boy. Of their set, 2 things came to mind. The first, they were very good considering how old they were. They were able to hold my interest, which is better than about 1/2 of the opening bands that I've seen in the past. The other was that there was a toddler crawling through the crowd during their set...sigh, comes with the territory I suppose. Deer Boy has some potential. Their stage presence does need some polish however. Their singer appeared distracted/disinterested at times, or maybe just not used to singing and playing the guitar at the same time.

An Horse played another wonderful set with the crowd eating them up.

Wintersleep played a pretty similar set to Seattle. There was one major change. Insomnia was played, which was a nice treat. Miasmal also opened the set, which I always find refreshing. Pretty standard set otherwise, no new songs again.

Setlist
Miasmal
Archaeologists
Caliber
Drunk on Aluminum
Weighty Ghost
Murderer
Insomnia
Laser Beams
Oblivion

Victoria
Finally the last show on my run was Victoria. In some ways, this show played out similar to a hometown show when compared to the last couple of shows on the tour. Indeed the last couple of times, they've been Victoria, the crowds have been pretty wild, tonight was no exception.

An Horse took the stage first. No surprises here, crowd loved them. Doesn't seem to matter whether it's in the States or Canada, the crowd was into it.

Before I get to the Wintersleep portion of the review, possibly the coolest thing happened even before the doors opened. For one of the songs, they actually played a rousing rendition of Neil Young's Words. They also soundchecked the acoustic guitar for Assembly Lines, but alas both didn't make it to the show (Words was on the setlist). The Victoria show had a good vibe, but different than the previous nights. This one definitely had the big time sold out feel to it. The setlist was similar to the previous nights with a few additions. The new songs that they've been road testing last year, "Baltic" and "Encyclopedia" are definitely starting to grow on me. "Baltic" especially, since it's got a cool little jam at the end of it. "Danse Macabre" ended the first set, although it didn't have the extended 10+ minute jam. The only disappointing part was that the set was rather short in comparison to the previous Victoria shows. I was told however, that the fact that they haven't really been playing 90+ minute sets probably factored into things (because they were doing shorter sets in Europe and the US). Also they're probably going to be heading into the studio again to record, which hopefully means a new album soon.

$20/$0
$20/$0
$40/$0

03.15.2009 Bruce Peninsula / Timber Timbre / Hininder (Waterloo, ON)

2009-03-23T18:03:00.000-07:00

Well well well... first show review from Waterloo, ON. I don't think i would even consider Waterloo a secondary concert market, (well maybe a secondary Canadian market) however it does get some somewhat decent shows. For those who don't know, Waterloo is a known for being an hour and a bit away from Toronto and being the home of Waterloo University, one of the better Engineering and Computer Science schools in the country. This is due largely in part to the support that they get from local technology giant Research in Motion (who? they make BlackBerrys, ah....) and probably some other companies.

Anyways, the show was held at the Grist Mill. It's located at south east corner of Waterloo Park. If you picture a log cabin, then you'll know what the Grist Mill looks like. The acoustics inside were pretty good all things considered. If nothing else the venue set a mood for a warm and homely atmosphere.

First up was Hininder, who from what I could see from the back of the room was a singer/songwriter. He sort of reminded me of Rocky Votolato in some respects. I only saw 2 songs, so that's all I can really say.

Next was Timber Timbre. This was apparently the band's first show live. The band consisted of a sax player, a violinist and guitarist who also sung. They had their own stage lighting, which was very minimal, basically just christmas lights laid out on the floor. The first song was a slow number, which fit the lighting of the room. It was almost haunting yet calming at the same, just like sitting around a campfire. Unfortunately, every song seemed to sound like the first, slow and slower. Eventually it wore on my nerves. The last song was performed with members of the Bruce Peninsula.

Prior to moving to Waterloo, I had never heard of Bruce Peninsula. Some of their recent shows around Ontario have garnered them positive reviews. I suppose if i had to describe them to someone, I'd say Sufjan Stevens doing southern gospel, maybe some Arcade Fire in there. They started their set with the song "Steam roller," which is every bit as awesome as it is on album. In fact I'd say that for the most part they are probably better band live than on album. I'll admit that I was pretty in awe of the two lead singers. Both of them are hiding a serious set of pipes. The solo that the female lead sings at the end of "Weave Myself a Dress" was pretty impressive. After about 40 min the band ended their set, only to be brought back for an encore to delight of the 70 or so people in attendance. They ended the night with a cover of Fleetwood Mac's "The Chain."

$8/$10

Favs of 2008

2008-12-31T21:27:00.000-08:00

Favourite Albums of the Year

Land of Talk - Some Are Lakes
Sigur Ros - Med Sud I Eyrum Vid Spilum Endalaust
Trap Them - Seizures In Barren Praise
Be Your Own Pet - Get Awkward
Bon Iver - For Emma, Forever Ago
Jaguar Love - Take Me To the Sea
Wolf Parade - At Mount Zoomer
Coeur de Pirate - Coeur de Pirate
Ladyhawk - Shots
Black Mountain - In the Future

honorable mentions:
The Kills - Midnight Boom
Kings of Leon - Only By the Night

Favourite Show of the Year:
Monotonix 12/29/2008 (I'll have to make a review for this later)

Runner Ups:
1) Video Games Live
2) New Pornographers
3) Wintersleep 2/17/2008

One of the writers of this blog will be moving to Ontario next year so hopefully we'll have some Ontario show reviews. Happy Holidays!

12.22.2008 Metric / Tokyo Police Club / The Dears / Sebastian Grainger

2008-12-24T20:12:00.000-08:00

I'll start off by saying that each show on this tour had ticket proceeds going towards local charities. In Vancouver, the benficiary was Covanent House.

Due to the a little mishap at the door, I did not see Sebastian Grainger's set. He is of course, of the Death From Above 1979 fame. I did however see him in the crowd watching The Dears.

When I eventually got into the Vogue, there were two things that I noticed. First, there were pro cameras all over the place. They built a (probably) temporary platform in the middle of the room to accomodate a large midroom overhead camera setup. All bands were filmed and it looks like we'll be seeing a dvd or video of some sort in the future, hopefully. The second was, it was cold inside. Apparently the heat didn't work in the building. After all those renovations and you guys couldn't spring for heating? Actually nevermind, that actually worked in my favour, seeing as how I didn't want to use their bag check anyways.

Admittedly, I've never really liked the Dears enough to pay to see them live. Their current incarnation doesn't really change my perspective on things, but I will say that I did enjoy their set. For those who don't know, I guess I would describe them as indie rock with soul. Also of note, it was nice to see Chris McCarron, formerly of Land of Talk, still playing music. He's not playing bass anymore, sharing guitar duties with someone else.

Tokyo Police Club is also one of those bands I would enjoy as a opener, but not enough to pay for a headlining set. To be honest, I find most of their songs to be too similar. They did seem to have most of the crowd moving their entire set though.

The last time I saw Metric, the tour was billed as "Road Testing New Songs." That's what they should have called this tour, as there were waaaaaay more new songs played this time around. The majority of the songs played were unreleased. In addition to the pro-cams, there were two large speakers in the back of the room, giving the show a sort of quadraphonic sound experience. Just like the 5.1 surround in your house. It was mainly used during echo-y delay effects. They started their set with their newest single "Help, I'm Alive." Didn't really like the extra backing vocals the guys added during the chorus. "Gold Girls Gun" has a New Wave / Upbeat - Dark Synth feel to it and a cool solo by James. "Twilight" was a slower number. "Lazy Dancer" is a middle tempo mover, which draws similarites to "Hustle Rose." In between the new songs, old favourites like, "Dead Disco", "Handshakes" and "Post of a Girl" were played. The version of "Calculation Theme" I heard last time was played. As I said before, I like the album version better, but I also realize it was probably also be a pace killer when they did play it. They ended their main set with "Stadium Love", which is as you would guess, has stadium rocking potential. After a very short encore, another new song was played followed by an old one. Before the final song, Emily had a little heart to heart with the crowd, sharing some of her insecurities with the audience. She told the crowd that in her head she sometimes thinks her stage antics aren't very cool and other some other self conscious related issues. It was touching, but a little awkward to hear. Live it out was the slow stripped down version, which was a pretty good closer. Overall a pretty nice package of Canadian talent and for a good cause. I was hoping for some Christmas songs...

Setlist
Help, I'm Alive
Give Me Sympathy
Gold Girls Gun
Poster of A Girl
Satellite Mind
Empty
Twilight
Lazy Dancer
Dead Disco
Handshakes
Calculation Theme
Combat Baby
Stadium Love
---
Freddie/Black Sheep
Monster Hospital
Live it Out

$40/$0

11.28.08 Portugal the Man / Earl Greyhound / Wintersleep

2008-12-15T11:17:00.000-08:00

So this post is criminally late, but here goes. In addition, seeing as I only went to see Wintersleep (in an opening slot no less), this review is going to be pretty short. After much apprehension and trepidation due to the fact that the show fell on Black Friday (aka the American Boxing Day), we managed to make it to Seattle with only about a 1 or 2 hour delay. Actually this show was slightly different than most that I've seen due to the fact that it was also the first all-ages Wintersleep show. In that regard, as most all agers are, there was already a decent sized crowd before the band hit the stage.

In a bit of a welcome surprise, there was a significant amount of fellow Canadians who also traversed the border to support their seemingly obscure export. And support they did. For a small contingent, they were quite vocal and somewhat rowdy. The performance went well. Poor Jon Samuel, he experienced at least a couple of technical difficulties during their set. A new song was played to the delight of this blogger. Much different that their previous work. It's kind of a spacey-nerves normal jam-like song. Personally I'm not quite sold on it, but then again I felt that way about 'Dead Letter' (which I don't mind now). I do like the jam that they do on it. I left before Earl Greyhound and Portugal the Man, but I'll assume they were pretty good.

Setlist
Drunk on Aluminum
Archaeologists
Encyclopedia
Murderer
Laser Beams
Oblivion
Miasmal

11.12.2008 Land of Talk / Josh Reichman

2008-11-13T18:46:00.000-08:00

Josh Reichman, is apparently known for being in a band called "The Tangiers." I seem to recall hearing about the latter, though I can't remember from where. Oh well. Reichman, reminded me of Pete Doherty, at least in dress. Anyways, I was rather indifferent with their overall performance. They were doing the indie rock thing, and they did ok.

Despite their show being riddled with technical difficulties, Land of Talk played a pretty solid set, mixing both new and old material. Since the last time I've seen them, the band itself has gone through a few changes, with the replacement of both the Eric their drummer and Chris their longtime bassist, who I believe now plays in the Dears. Both new additions fit in well, if not better than their replacements. Liz is sporting a new haircut. It sort of resembles Karen O's haircut. Not even one song in, the band seemed to be having problems with their monitors. Later on we find out that the vocal monitor that Liz was using turns itself off whenever there's a lull in the vocals. Liz also had other equipment problems, needing to switch guitars mid song due to a broken string. Impressively, they didn't have to completely stop the song. Liz mentions she got a new amp. Looks to be a midsize Orange combo amp. All My Friends was played by request, not that the band had a written setlist. The nice thing about seeing Land of Talk headline, was that people were polite and attentive the whole set. It was so refreshing to actually hear just the band playing a slower number like "It's Ok" and not have to mentally block out chatter from the crowd like the last couple times I've seen LoT play. They ended their main set off with "Young Bridge", which included a nice extended outro. They encored with "Got a Call" from their new album and the familiar "Breaxxbaxx" from their first album. Overall a pretty fun show, though I would have liked to have heard more new songs. Aside from "Got a Call", I've heard all the other songs live before from previous tours. Oh well, there's always other shows.

Yuppie Flu
Summer Special
Sea Foam
Magnetic Hill
Some Are Lakes
Give Me Back My Heart Attack
All My Friends
Death By Fire
It's Ok
Young Bridge
===
Got a Call
Breaxxbaxx

$13/$13

CBC Radio 3 also has pictures here.

10.29.08 Video Games Live

2008-10-30T10:35:00.000-07:00

Music has always been an integral part of video games. In most recent years, there have been a number of bands and events showcasing this natural association. Bands such as the minibosses and Neskimos have been covering Nintendo numbers for a number of years. Other events, such as Video Games Live, use the more elaborate approach of a full symphony.

The concert started about an hour before the music with a costume party/contest. The actual number of attendees who dressed up was pretty minimal. The party itself consisted of a couple of Wii/Guitar Hero/PS3/etc booths. In retrospect the costumes in general were pretty average. The constest eventually came down to a zombie nurse and some alien from Mass Effect, with the latter being the winner.

The concert portion of the event featured the music of the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra with co-founder Tommy Tallrico MC'ing the event. The event was fairly well put together and played out much like a variety show. While music was a primary component of the show, there were many interactive segments interspersed throughout to keep the audience entertained.

The program began with an old school games medley consisting of about 20 games from Pong to somewhere around the 8-bit era. The rest of the program focused many on music from games from the late nineties and beyond. Several of the pieces, in particular used the talents of the Vancouver Cantata Singers quite nicely. In particular, Civilization 4 seemed to almost uplift and awe the audience. Other pieces were almost forgettable, falling into the "epic movie soundtrack" realm.

Interspersed between the tracks were two interactive moments. The first featured a rather large gentleman, forced to wear a shirt several sizes too small, playing interactive Space Invaders. The second was a twelve year old in a Guitar Hero: Aerosmith contest. Both were unsuccessful, but received consolation prizes (actually the latter got it anyway). Perhaps the most impressive pieces were done solo by pianist Lee Ann Leung, sister of Martin "the Video Game Pianist". Her 10 song Final Fantasy medley was stunning. Other notables: The Vancouver band Splitting Adam played live, accompanying the orchestra, to Need for Speed: Undercover. A remix of SSX Tricky was played with the original composers/music directors. The night ended with two crowd pleasing encores, "One Winged Angel" from Final Fantasy 7 and Castlevania Rock.

Despite the charming evening of music, I did have one major gripe. There was a lot of wasted time. All the interactive segments, song introductions and MC banter ate up a lot of time. In fact, one of the segments was a impromptu filming of a video game review of the TV show "Reviews on the Run". While all of this lead to a more polished and well paced show, one could not help but wonder how many more songs could have been added to the setlist.

Setlist
01) Intro/Symphony warm up
02) Classic Arcade Medley
03) Metal Gear Solid
04) God of War
05) Space Invaders
06) Need for Speed: Undercover
07) On My Own
08) Civilization 4
09) Final Fantasy Piano Medley `
10) Metroid
11) Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess
---------------------------------------
12) Intros/Electric Playground Segment
13) SSX Tricky Remix
14) Kingdom Hearts
15) Warcraft
16) Starcraft 2
17) Super Mario Brothers
18) Mario Piano Medley
19) Tetris Piano
20) Guitar Hero Challenge: Aerosmith - Sweet Emotion
21) Halo
---------------------------------------
22) Final Fantasy 7: One Winged Angel
23) Castlevania Rock

$65/$80