This is the first of two posts. Look out for another coming soon, featuring reviews of Bombay Bicycle Club, J Mascis (of Dinosaur JR), Protest the Hero and more…
Canadian Music Week, or Canadian Music Fest—honestly, at this point I’m not sure which is which—is a blur for media and musicians alike. For five days, starting last Wednesday and ending tonight, Toronto is taken over. Bars, concert halls and even the prestigious Royal York Fairmont Hotel are held captive by dudes with beards, girls with bad haircuts and eager but demanding publicist types.
This year I decided to take it easier than I have in years past, and rather than blindly stumbling from bar to bar, I decided to pick and choose my spots. For me, Canadian Music Fest started on Thursday with the Wilderness of Manitoba who were, for lack of a better term, fucking awesome.
I’d only been exposed to them through a few videos posted over on the forums, but I liked what I heard. I liked it even more live.
Playing a relatively short 35 minute set, it’s pretty surprising how many sound shifts they went through. They started with cello accompaniment, and brought a lot more ambient sounds than you’ll typically hear in the Toronto folk scene. The drums were pretty overpowering—they were thunderous and crashing, again not something you’ll usually hear in folk. Not just in their first few songs but throughout their set there was a real sense of texture to their music,…
It has recently come to my attention that not only do some of you people have lives outside of Sputnik but that there is an entire new phenomenon in this earth known as “blogging.”
Apparently there are individuals who see fit to condense their thoughts on music into chunks of less than a thousand words (daft, I know) – perhaps with the aid of media devices such as video – and see fit to do so on this strange new “blogging” format. In the spirit of togetherness, I have decided to recognise this trend and compile a list of staff and user blogs. We may even add a blogroll at some point.
Please feel free to link to your blog down below and I’ll do my best to add you to the list. Unless I don’t like you. In which case, futch ya.
Living in the facebook/youtube age of instant celebrity can have its benefits. I was reminded of that today. For today, I have found “Friday,” a music video by teenage recording artist Rebecca Black. There are few words to describe what happens in the following video. This is a song about Friday. Which comes after Thursday. And is followed by Saturday. I won’t try to give you context as to who this is because there is none needed. This braces-heavy video is a ten car pile-up, simultaneously awful and mesmerizing. If you find yourself asking ‘Is this really happening?,’ the answer is yes. It is.
Once you have some context, I highly recommend watching this slightly slowed down version which turns Black’s anthem into comedy gold.
So there I was about to write yet another blog about yet another event that I had attended, when I thought to myself “Davey, you can’t write a full blog about the SoundWave Festival. It would turn out like ‘War & Peace’ and the entire SputnikMusic Blog machine would blow up. Plus, you need to stop talking about YOUR experiences (that’s what lists are for) and give the Sputnik-ites out there what THEY want”.
So last week I ran a poll (you probably missed it) as to what you all want & three main answers stood out: (1) Jonny Craig to give you the MacBook you paid for, (2) Sex & (3) Chan to review the new Aiden album about to be released. Those points seemed irrelevant to my blog, so I took the next three best responses and decided to roll them into this one all-encompassing blog. Ladies & gentlemen, I give you (1) Metal, (2) Huge headlining acts, & (3) A tour around Australia!
Prior to our tour beginning however, a disclaimer must first be aired for legal purposes: SputnikMusic shall take no responsibility for any motion sickness caused by unsteady hand-held cameras used in the making of the following videos. The same goes for deafness caused by varying volume levels, seizures caused by blinking lights, and blindness caused by the brightness of security vests.
Our tour today – just like the SoundWave Festival – starts in the north-eastern city of Brisbane, where it is sunny one…
Apart from the day itself being one almighty rock, punk & metal-fest that never fails to please, another great aspect of Australia’s SoundWave Festival are the related sideshows which take place. These shows (which have come to be known as Sidewaves) often see 3-4 bands from the festival placed together on the one bill. As you can imagine, they are exceptional value for money, as well as being an effective way to solve clashes on the day. Examples of Sidewaves this year were (a) Social Distortion, Gaslight Anthem & Feeder, (b) Rob Zombie, Murderdolls, Monster Magnet & Dommin, (c) Sum 41, The Blackout, There For Tomorrow & Veara, (d) Pennywise, Millencolin & The Mad Caddies, and (e) Stone Sour, Coheed and Cambria, Sevendust & 36 Crazyfists. The Sidewave I chose to stroll along to however was the “can’t miss” trio of Anberlin, The Starting Line & Bayside.
Having previously seen them live a couple of times, I already knew that NYC’s Bayside were one of the best live bands going around. It only hit me on this night however, that they are also one of the few bands who sound great right from the get-go. They either sound-check all day or are just that damn good. Kicking off with energetic new track ‘Already Gone’, the ‘Killing Time’ opener felt like it had been on their live set for the past decade, with the way in which the audience were singing along even if they had barely heard the song before.…
Believer fans should always expect the band to constantly push ahead and deliver something challenging. This is, after all, the band that mixed technical thrash with violins and an opera singer on their 1993 release, Dimensions. They’re also the ones that came back after sixteen years of silence and immediately pushed their sound in a new quirky prog direction on Gabriel without abandoning their thrash roots. If “G.U.T.” is any indication of what Believer’s upcoming album, Transhuman, is going to sound like, though, it appears that their most challenging album is still ahead.
Here’s a list of major new releases for the week of March 08 , 2011. Please feel free to request reviews for any of the following albums from staff or contributors.
Agnostic Front – That’s Life [7″] (Bridge Nine Records) Angelspit – Carbon Beauty(Metropolis Records) — Trey Spencer
Augury – Concealed (Sonic Unyon)
Ava Inferi – Onyx (SEASON MIST)
Banjo Or Freakout – Banjo Or Freakout (Rare Book Room Records)
Benedictum – Dominion (Frontiers Records)
Blood Ceremony – Living With the Ancients (Rise Above Records)
Carol Bui – Red Ship (Ex Oh Records)
Burzum – Fallen ( Byelobog Productions) Children of Bodom – Relentless Reckless Forever(Fontana Universal)
Bruce Cockburn – Small Source Of Comfort (TRUE NORTH)
Colosseum – Chapter 3: Parasomnia (Firebox Country)
Dance Gavin Dance – Downtown Battle Mountain Pt. II (Rise) Defeater – Empty Days & Sleepless Nights(Bridge Nine Records) — Adam Thomas
Dinosaur Bones – My Divider (Dine Alone Records) Empress Hotel – Empress Hotel(Park the Van Records)
Riley Etheridge, Jr. – Power Keg (Rock Ridge Music)
Sara Evans – Stronger (SONY NASHVILLE) Lupe Fiasco – Lasers(Atlantic)— Sobhi Abdul-Rakhman Ghostpoet – Peanut Butter Blues & Melancholy Jam (Brownswood)
Ghost & Writer – Shipwrecks (Metropolis Records)
Aaron Gillespie – Anthem Song (Tooth & Nail Records)
Grails – Deep Politics (Temporary Residence)
The High Kings – Memory Lane (Ard Ri Entertainment)
Sierra Hull – Daybreak (Rounder)
The…
I’ll drop some further notes on this in the morning, but for now I’ll invite you all to tune in to the live broadcast of the sixth annual Choice Music Prize (the Irish Mercury Prize/Polaris/Triple J awards) ceremony.
The show has already been in progress for a little over an hour, with Halves and Fight Like Apes having already completed their sets. James Vincent McMorrow is performing as I speak and the rest of the nominees, with the exception of Imelda May who’s otherwise engaged, will take to the stage as the night progresses.
Today FM DJ Paul McLoone will be interviewing the performers between sets and chairman Tony Clayton-Lea of the Irish Times will announce the winner at around 10.45 GMT. And Morrissey is there! You can read some of my more detailed thoughts on this year’s prize here.
A full list of nominees can be seen here:
Adebisi Shank – This is the Second Album of a Band Called Adebisi Shank The Cast of Cheers – Chariot Cathy Davey – The Nameless Fight Like Apes – The Body of Christ and the Legs of Tina Turner Halves – It Goes, It Goes (Forever and Ever) Imelda May – Mayhem James Vincent McMorrow – Early in the Morning O Emperor – Hither Thither Two Door Cinema Club – Tourist History Villagers – Becoming a Jackal
Previous winners include Jape, the Divine Comedy, Super Extra Bonus Party and Julie Feeney. Adrian Crowley won the 2009 gong.
This is the first of two posts. Look out for another coming soon, featuring reviews of Bombay Bicycle Club, J Mascis (of Dinosaur JR), Protest the Hero and more…
