Fall 2011

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

02.19.2010 Stars / Hey Rosetta

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

07.11.2009 Broken Social Scene / Rattlesnake Choir (Toronto)

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

06.21.2008 Stars

The last time I saw Stars, I actually convinced myself that I really didn't like them as much as I thought I did. Then again, the last time I saw them, the drunk moshers really ruined the mood of the show. Still, I was a little disappointed with the setlist last time as it didn't really change a whole lot in the last couple of years. I wasn't planning on going to this show, but after reading this post on A&C's forum, I reconsidered. I'm a sucker for "special" and "secret" (There was none). Looking back I probably should have been more skeptical as I haven't seen any other evidence to support the claims in that post.

I arrived just before Stars got on. They were checking the drums as I walked into the Malkin Bowl. I've never been there before, but apparently it's supposed to be 2/3 the size of the Hollywood Bowl in Cali. (Radiohead played there in 2003, I don't know why I'm mentioning this...) The Malkin Bowl is actually quite nice. It's surrounded by trees and is all lawn. It's like Deer Lake Park, but more intimate. I don't think I'd go there if it were raining.... but on a nice summer day, it's a great outdoor venue.

Torq seemed to be in a really good mood today as he was playing in his home city. He could literally walk home from Stanley Park. During one of the earlier songs, possibly Window Bird, Torq pointed out a bald eagle flying into the trees. It was nice to hear 'The Big Fight' mixed into the setlist, more for variety than actual demand (It's not one of my favourites, but it is the first time I've heard it in a couple years). It appears the new version of Going, Going Gone is here to stay as well. I think they seem to have added a new short couple-chord intro to that song as well if I'm not mistaken. Amy and Torq had a pretty funny exchange of words when Torq started to (sarcastically) put over the New Kids on the Block. He asked for cheers from the crowd. Amy described it as "disgusting" and demanded boos. Overall the band sounded great and was very enjoyable watch. The bitterness from the last time I saw them has been washed from my mouth. I didn't get as much setlist variety as I wanted, but I did get a show that was a lot better than the last time I saw them. I also got to hear "The Woods" live for the first time, been waiting for that since about 2005, hooray for persistence.

01) Intro
02) The Night Starts Here
03) Ageless Beauty
04) Soft Revolution
05) Window Bird
06) Your Ex-Lover is Dead
07) Ghost of Genoa
08) Bitches in Tokyo
09) Set Yourself on Fire
10) The Big Fight
11) Going, Going, Gone
12) What I'm Trying To Say
13) Elevator Love Letter
14) My Favourite Book
15) Midnight Coward
16) One More Night
17) Take Me To the Riot
18) In Our Bedroom After the War
==
19) Reunion
20) Calendar Girl
21) The Woods


$30/$36

04.11.2008 AMS Block Party: STARS / Wintersleep / Five Alarm Funk / Most Serene Republic

The AMS Block Party is the offspring of UBC's annual, and now dead, Arts County Fair. Which is rather unfortunate, seeing as the lineup for the last 2 years were really good. So, instead of a large stadium festival type setup, UBC's end of the year drunken festivities were held on a field with a capacity of about 6000. I think I read somewhere that ACF was stopped due to it being too costly and that they had a lot of trouble with overly drunk douche-bags. I guess the reasoning is that, while music and cheap beer will no doubt still bring out the douches, at least with a smaller capacity, there'll be less of them.

I've seen Most Serene Republic 4 or 5 times now. Always in an opening slot. They seem to open a lot of good shows. Frankly, I find them a little boring. However, the 30 or so people watching them seemed to enjoy it.

Five Alarm Funk sound like a group of white guys playing James Brown inspired funk. They were actually well received by the heavily inebriated crowd.



Wintersleep was scheduled for 45 min. They ended up playing about 35 min. The later start time was either due to Five Alarm Funk (although I didn't really like them I won't assume it was their fault as I didn't check when they ended) going overtime or longer setup time was needed (probably more likely?). To make matters worse, apparently there was miscommunication in terms of set times. I believe Wintersleep thought that they had a 60 minute slot instead of their 45 minutes. This meant that 4 songs were knocked off their setlist. I'm actually really enjoying hearing 'Yellow Bellied...' as their usual opener. 'Drunk on Aluminum' worked better as an opener when it was still played with a tambourine. For some reason Paul's acoustic wasn't working so he used a clean electric instead for 'Weighty Ghost'. I was thinking of suggesting they play the old version.

Miasmal Smoke and the Yellow Bellied Freaks
Archaeologists
Dead Letter
Oblivion
Caliber
Jaws Of Life
Weighty Ghost
Murderer
Search Party *Not Played*
Astronaut *Not Played*
Laser Beams *Not Played*
Danse Macabre *Not Played*


When I go to shows, I usually hope one of 2 things happen, a) rare songs are played or b) something interesting happens. I got my wish (b not a), even though it sort of resulted in me not enjoying the show as much. By now most of the crowd have been drinking and yes, a mosh pit has started. I'm not surprised, I've seen people mosh for Metric and New Pornographers. Amy and Torq looked pretty concerned, as they stopped several songs mid swing to tell people to calm down. Several times Torq was overhead making thinly veiled insinuations of homosexuality at the offenders. During 'Bitches in Tokyo', this amusing exchange was heard:

Amy: WTF Are you guys in some Apocalypto shit over there? What the hell are you doing? This is not Capoeira class
Torq: Amy it's a mosh pit, it's what the kids do these days Oh wait, it's not 1995

'Going, Going, Gone' was kind of a surprise as I didn't recognize it at first. It's been re-worked, think more synth. Someone threw a bottle at Torq during 'The Night Starts Here', resulting in him walking off stage mid song. He of course came back after taking a minute to collect himself. He was lucky it wasn't a wrench, like the one thrown at Matt Good a couple years ago. Incidentally, the latter was also on the receiving end of one of the former's subtle remarks. Despite all the shenanigans, the band was quite 'on' the entire night. Torq and their keyboardist even came out for an encore, as they still had some time left before curfew hit. I guess he felt guilty for losing it earlier. I was hoping they'd play 'Calendar Girl' instead.

Take Me to the Riot
Elevator Love Letter
Soft Revolution
Window Bird
One More Night
Ghost of Genoa
Bitches in Tokyo
Set Yourself on Fire
The Night Starts Here
Going, Going, Gone (reworked)
What I'm Trying to Say
Reunion
My Favourite Book
Ageless Beauty
Your Ex-Lover is dead
===
Barricade (Torq and Keyboards only)


$20/0 I didn't pay anything, but the Stars + Wintersleep is worth at least 20. I still wish they had the backstage BBQ that they used to have.

photos: Adrian Burden

11.17-18.2007 Stars / Miracle Fortress

Almost from their infancy, Stars has been a favourite among Canadian bands, especially within the indie community. Being associated with Broken Social Scene and the Arts & Crafts label certainly did not hurt matters either. Cut to present day and it is not surprising that they are playing 2 sold out shows at the fabulous Commodore Ballroom. One show would be an all ages affair and the evening show, 19+. In some ways this is even a homecoming show as it is their first show in Canada for quite some time and singer Torquil Campbell residing in Vancouver.

EARLY SHOW:

Miracle Fortress is a Montreal based indie rock band opened the show. Red hot from their recent 2007 Polaris Prize nomination, they played to a slightly more than half full crowd. I'll need to hear them again before I make a more sound decision on these guys and girls.

After a brief set change, Stars hit the stage to a giant applause. In comparing their previous appearences in Vancouver, this was definitely the better show. The band, and especially Torquil Campbell (he lives here), seemed to genuinely want to be there. Bouquets of flowers adorned the stage. Throughout the show flowers from said bouquet would be thrown out into the crowd. Songs were played from each of their albums and even some of their older EPs. Even the casual Stars' fan had their fill with songs such as "Your Ex-Lover is Dead", "Ageless Beauty" and "What I'm Trying to Say". Torquil even came out with a light bulb covered jacket for "The Ghost of Genova Heights". They turned out all the lights for that one. After a short break, they came out for a 4 song encore. They played around 90 min to a appreciative all agers crowd.



$20/$25

LATE:

Stars played pretty much the same setlist, and I'm running out of witty musings so I'll keep this portion short. I've decided that I only liked Miracle Fortress about half the time they were onstage.

The only thing I remember that set this show apart from the early one was that Amy crowd surfed during one of the songs. (no stage dive, at least not the hxc version)

After about a quarter of the crowd had left the building, Stars came out for a true encore. True, as in I don't think it was planned. They played their Smith's cover of "This Charming Man". I am pretty certain they did not do this for the afternoon show. In fact, I don't think they played "The Aspidistra Flies" (labeled as Umbrella) at the AA show either.



$23/$25

SECRET SHOW:

OH SHIT! I actually attended this. This was probably the worst kept secret show I've ever gotten wind of. Actually I've only heard of one other, that being a Wolf Parade one that supposedly happened at someone's house after their opening slot for the Arcade Fire in 2005. Anyways, the details were:

MySpace Secret Shows Canada Presents
STARS
Free / All Ages
Sign up to check your bulletins to find out WHERE!!!
How To Get In:
All shows are FREE. Entry is on a first-come, first-serve, so arrive early to get in line to ensure success! You don’t have to bring anything, just show up, and if we can fit you in, then you’re in! Tell Your Friends! doors 6:30

If you were like me, you'd be thinking, If I wanna see this I'll have to get there around 3 or so to guarantee entry with all the high schoolers who'll no doubt do the same thing. Well I've got better things to do, but still, this was intriguing. I was in downtown at the time anyways, so I detoured over to the Media Club around 4:30 to find a very sorry looking lineup with around 40 people (Media Club has a cap at 150). I stood in line for about a minute, when this guy comes around with wrist bands. At this point I ask him if I could leave and come back and he said sure. So I arrive at 6:30 to find that the lineup had gotten a lot longer. Long story short, when I got in, there were about 20-25 or so people who were left out in the cold without a wristband. Well not really, because I think most if not all of them were let in eventually. So I'd say that you could have gotten in even if you had arrived at doors.

The show itself was a pretty fun affair. The setlist was comprised of songs chosen at random from a brown paper bag with the words "Bag O Tunes" on it. They didn't play all the songs in the bag, just an hour's worth. Between every song, Evan Cranley and Pat Mcgee they would do a "Bag of Tunes" jam. There was a lounge version, reggae, punk, and a particularly funny mock-Emily-Haines-doing-Anthems-of-Seventeen-Year-Old-Girl version, if that makes sense. Really funny stuff. You could tell the band was having as much fun as the crowd was. At one point Torq noticed a girl shooting some video on a digi cam. He took the camera and then started to film the crowd and the band, making faces.

Setlist

Your Ex-Lover is Dead
My Favourite Book
The Aspidistra Flies
Bitches in Tokyo
Heart
Calendar Girl
Set Yourself on Fire
This Charming Man
Take Me to the Riot
Elevator Love Letter
One More Night

edit:
leftovers in the bag were:
-soft revolution.
-midnight coward.
-the ghost of genova heights
-tonight
-on peak hill

Not bad for a free show.

As I was leaving they gave out limited (to 350, which is more than capacity...twice as many... huh...) posters of the first picture. Go ebay. haha... hrmmm..

$20/$0

11.21.05 Stars/Bontempi

bontempi, not bad. guy doing keyboard, girl drummer, girl singer guitarist = indie rock pop.

stars. first off a rant. omg vancouver shutup. this isn't the roxy. i don't even know how you can hear yourself talk in front of a speaker.

Going Going Gone
Set Yourself on Fire
Soft Revolution
Reunion
Elevevator love letter
Your Ex-Lover is Dead
Sleep Tonight
What I'm Trying to Say
Peak Hill
Ageless Beauty
The Big Fight
He Lied about Death
Calander Girl
===
What the Snowman Learned about Love
The First Five Times
Tonight

I don't recognize a few of those some from their earlier albums i don't listen to. I was try to figure out what "georgie" was on their setlist that appeared before calander girl. turns out it was he lied about death. georgie being bush. was also hoping they'd play death to death but no. The First Five Times done w/ members of the Organ, Moya (not godspeed), and someones mom, playing instruments which weren't mic'd up and there for not audible. they played 83 min, a little disappointing when curfew was set at 2am. and it ended somewhere around 12:45. overall though, great show. oh yea they were selling limited run t-shirts. $25.

rating: $23/$24