Monday Roundup #34

In the absence of concert listings, my regular Monday dispatches have fallen off. After bringing some life to the blog with the "bumping into" series, I figure I should get back in the groove. I'm guessing that this will be a bit like what used to get shoved into the end of the post when I was doing listings — some bandcamp suggestions, nods to a few livestreams, and sundry community notes (email me if you have anything that needs broadcast in the latter category!). Plus maybe a look back through the MFS archives.

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Video Hits:

• Here's little taste from Hot Garbage's upcoming debut full-length (out October 29th) — if I label this as a "sleazy, murky throb", do understand I mean that in the most complementary way.

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Livestream nation:

• This Native North America/@2RiversRemix Virtual Feast is going down tonight (Monday, September 6th), and has some heavy hitters, including Duke Redbird, Leanne Betasamosake Simpson, Leland Bell, Vern Cheechoo, Willie Thrasher & Linda Saddleback, Willy Mitchell and The Try Umphs.

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Concert listings:

• NIDUS: the gauzy meshwork of an invisible thought / Cedarvale Park 2021-09-11 (Saturday, 7-9 p.m.). $free. [FB event]

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It happened this week...

• A formative event for me as a show-goer and show-documenter, let's check out a few samples from Owen Pallett's 30th Birthday Party, held on the 2009 Labour Day weekend at Lula Lounge. A remarkable gesture from an artist who had "made it", this day-long event was a celebration of local micro-histories, bringing together artists that had inspired and shared stages with him. As a time capsule of a then-just-passed moment, it's the sort of thing we definitely need more of. (You can read my — literally — exhaustive notes from the day in three parts here, here and here.)

Electric Canaille Trio - Vincent Massey

Alex Lukashevsky - Horsetail Feather

Diamond Rings - Something Else

[Do remember that you can click on the tags below to go back and find the original posts (and often, more stuff) from these artists.]

Monday Roundup #1

In the absence of concert listings, my regular Monday dispatches have fallen off. After bringing some life to the blog with the "bumping into" series, I figure I should get back in the groove. (Although we may yet bump into a few more peeps!) I'm guessing that this will be a bit like what used to get shoved into the end of the post when I was doing listings — some bandcamp suggestions, nods to a few livestreams, and sundry community notes (email me if you have anything that needs broadcast in the latter category!). Plus maybe a look back through the MFS archives.

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Community notes:

• In case you missed it, you can catch Saturday's Long Winter (which is, in this Winter of our Sepration. being transformed into "Long Winter TV") over on youtube:

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It happened this week...

• ...on January 22, 2010 at the Out of This Spark 3rd Anniversary Party at The Garrison.

Forest City Lovers - Song For Morrie

• ...on January 21, 2011 at The Tranzac.

Canaille - Angeer

• ...on January 24, 2012 at Soundscapes.

John K. Samson - The Last And

[Okay, jeez, that was harder than expected to not pick even more things. Still, going forward, this is more likely to be constrained to one or two picks. Do remember that you can click on the tags below to go back and find the original posts (and often, more stuff) from these artists.]

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Bandcamp corner:

• Heidi Chan's series of Bachelard EP's over the past year have investigated different approaces to modular synthesis and are all rewarding listens, but things really stretch out in a satisfying way on this new collection of "minimalist, hazy" pieces:

Recording: Canaille

Artist: Canaille feat. Isla Craig

Song: Yekondowotch Mender (Hirut Bekele cover)

Recorded at The Music Gallery ("Ethio T.O." concert), March 25, 2011.

Canaille feat. Isla Craig - Yekondowotch Mender

My notes for this set can be found here.

Gig: Ethio T.O.

Ethio T.O. (feat. Canaille feat. Isla Craig / Ethio Fidel)

The Music Gallery. Friday, March 25, 2011.

Billed as "a celebration of Ethiopian & Eritrean music in Toronto", this entry in the Music Gallery's "New World" series did an admirable job in bringing together a really interesting mix under one roof. The full-house was certainly not just the usual MG crowd, and there was a sense of energy in the room as the night began. Starting things up were jazz titans Canaille — or "Can-Isla" as guest curator David Dacks dubbed them, owing to the presence of vocalist Isla Craig on most of the songs. Jeremy Strachan's six-piece started in their usual instrumental mode with "Watusa", a Sun Ra jam they've been playing for awhile. It had a couple ragged spots, but that gave them a chance to get their bearings for the meat of the set. Launching into a new song — one that I recall seeing the band play on the day Strachan had written it — Craig joined the band, weaving her pure tones alongside the horn lines, making this feel elegant and sophisticated.

Although Ethio-groove music has long been one of the defining elements in Strachan's compositional approach for this band, it was intriguing to hear them go full-on, tackling "Yekondowotch Mender", a Hirut Bekele song. I have no way to know if Craig — singing low in her register, but still not down as far as Bekele — was mangling the Amharic, but she sounded great doing it.¹ And by that measure, there's praise due for all the musicians in negotiating this material, staying true to the sound without being slavish copyists. It seemed pretty effortless for the horn line (Strachan plus Jay Hay and Nick Bulligan) and Mike Smith's bass work was super funky. Dan Gaucher, an excellent improvising percussionist, seemed to be playing a bit more by "feel" than we'd hear in the next set. And Jesse Levine — who's knocked my socks off every time I've heard him play with Canaille — was again excellent here with his sonic function of simultaneously tying everything together while adding an unpredictable edge.

The band brought the Bekele song home in three minutes, which is a blink of the eye compared to most Ethiopian bands. After that, though, they settled in for some solid grooves. Most of the material here was reworked versions of the songs that would later show up on the band's excellent Practical Men album — best of all might have been an extended run through "Angeer", the prelude giving Levine a chance to show his stuff before another vocal turn from Craig, the whole thing stretching out past ten minutes. And then, in a version of "Practical Men", Strachan's flute was almost like a duet partner with the vocal.

The set closed with a slowly simmering Tilahun Gessesse song ("Ewedish Nebere") and a reworking of older tune "Francophonie". Really great stuff — a well-built bridge between Toronto and Addis.

Listen to a track from this set here.

That set a high standard for headliners Ethio Fidel, but this band of crafty vets have held their own in sharing the stage with plenty of big names before. The first thing to draw the eye was singer Fantahun Mekonnen, carrying a krar and wearing a cape somewhere on the Elvis/Liberace spectrum. His lute-like instrument drove the first number, which built up into a robust nine-minute jam. (As mentioned above, Ethiopian bands are rarely in a hurry to get to the next song.)

Opposite of Mekonnen in the front line on stage was bandleader Girma Wolde Michael, a true star in the local Ethiopian music scene. He's the guy that touring superstars (like Mahmoud Ahmed) call to play sax when they come to town. They were backed by a rhythm section of Gezahegn Mamo (keybs) and Andargachew Abebe (bass) behind them. And holding down the drum chair was Daniel Barnes, a veteran of the local jazz scene who has schooled himself in the tricky terrain of ethio rhythms to the point that he's also a "go to" guy when someone needs to get a band together.²

For the second song, Mekonnen put down the krar for what would turn out to be a slo-jam, complete with with Mamo's tinkly 80's keys and Abebe's nimble five-string bass runs. Given the recent coolness of such 80's soft-rock sounds, this sounded downright contemporary — the backing track could have come off, say, the latest THOMAS album. Pushing even further than that limpid lite-rock sound, some of the material pushed towards what registered to my ears as smooth jazz. Though a kickin' beat kept it mostly interesting, I wasn't as much of a fan of that part of the band's repertoire.

But there was a whole lot of goodness after that. A real mix, too, with sentimental tizita-style ballads chased with more upbeat songs that got the crowd up and dancing. I'm sure a lot of these were classics from the "golden age", given that a few were familiar even to a neophyte like me. Mekonnen worked his frontman mojo throughout, returning to stage at one point in a different, bright-striped outfit — a strong presence even if it wasn't too chatty with the crowd. After a quiet duo for krar and sax, the set — more than an hour long — ended with the scorching "Behilem".

The crowd called the band back for one more which tore it up even more with another of those classics, Mekonnen hitting an ecstatic series of moaning high notes to appreciative whoops from the crowd.

A lot of great stuff here. I'd originally posted a recording here, but I've added a couple more here so you can appreciate this band's versatility.

On the whole, a very successful night, and a deft bit of programming for the Music Gallery. It's worth noting that the night was guest-curated by David Dacks, who has just taken over as the MG's Artistic Director. That should be seen as a very promising sign for the institution's continued vitality, and hopefully he'll keep mixing things up with more shows like this.³

Also continuing the community-building vibe, the friendly folks at St. George the Martyr — the Music Gallery's landlords — invited the crowd up to the rectory to sit together and share a free meal. A warm way to close out a most-pleasing night.

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¹ Although I suspect Craig did fairly well with the Amharic — she gave special thanks to musician Daniel Nebiat (as well as a couple cab drivers!) for helping her with her enunciation.

² His prominence is probably also a result of the fact that most contemporary Ethiopian bands — whether out of fashion or mere convenience — eschew the drummer and usually get by with programmed beats from the keyboard player.

³ Also worth noting is that Batuki Music, this show's co-presenters, are putting together a must-see special event, called Ethiopia: A Musical Perspective (Saturday, February 11, 2012 at Glenn Gould Studio) which will carry forward the spirit of Ethio T.O.

Recording: Canaille

Artist: Canaille

Song: Safer Than We Know

Recorded at The Tranzac, November 19, 2011.

Canaille - Safer Than We Know

Full review to follow. A worthy celebration of the fab, funky Practical Men at The Tranzac. You can check out the whole album here — and then go and get yourself a copy!

Recording: Canaille

Artist: Canaille

Song: Angeer

Recorded at The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge), January 21, 2011.

Canaille - Angeer

My notes for this set can be found here.

Gig: Canaille

Canaille (Stop Time)

The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge). Friday, January 21, 2011.

With some time to kill before a gig down at The Silver Dollar, I was well-pleased to catch word on the social networks that Canaille were playing a last-minute evening gig at The Tranzac. That also made it a convenient chance to check out Stop Time, a group with a couple familiar faces, including Michael Davidson (one of the primary go-to guys for local rock groups wanting to add a vibraphone, as well as playing in a number of his own more improvisatory groups) and drummer Dan Gaucher (seen in more projects than I could count, and doing double-duty on this evening). The group was rounded out by Harley Card (guitar) and Dan Fortin (bass) and worked as more of a composers' workshop than jam session.

"Dredge", the first song, was pleasantly mellow but could be slotted in as Tortoise-y post-rock, with gentle melodic pushes from vibes and guit pushed along by the rhythm section. Perhaps unsurprisingly for any band named after a musical concept, some of the compositions gave the impression that they were little experiments, playing with texture here and rhythm there, and the music was more subtle, often on the quieter side. They focused more on the interplay than on a musical attack or out-front solos — that meant there were a couple places where this edged a little bit more towards "smooth" than I'd prefer. But on the whole, pleasingly understated stuff. The set closed with a couple from the band's Twice album (available on their bandcamp), including "Bail" and "Permanent Bad Move", the latter the more extended of the set, with a slow build that simmered nicely against Fortin's bassline.

Listen to a track from this set here.

At early-evening shows like this in the Tranzac's front room, audience-members sometimes have to get used to the idea that the musicians are often playing mostly for each other — in the early going, besides the members of both bands and a couple friends, the "crowd" was pretty much me. As as usually the way, though, during the set a few more people drifted in — some more casually than others just to hang out for a bit near the back, some grabbing a seat to take this in. So there were a few more bodies on hand as Canaille set up.

Although the most striking element of the band's lineup is the horns, with saxman/leader Jeremy Strachan joined by Jay Hay on tenor and Nick Buligan on trumpet, the biggest change since I had last seen them has been the addition of Jesse Levine on keybs. Adding both texture and mildly disruptive colours, his superb work was nimble and complementary in a way that really buoyed up the sound. His efforts definitely tied together "Angeer" — a new one that Strachan mentioned will be the lead-off to the band's forthcoming sophomore release.¹

That one moved with some straight-up swing, ending on a march beat, and after that, the band zeroed in on Canaille's stock-in-trade, a sound that sounds like a collision between ethiogroove and an old spy movie. As if the material from the yet-unreleased album wasn't fresh enough, Strachan unveiled a brand-new composition that he'd composed that afternoon, a slinky prelude that segued nicely into "Pillows". Despite working from brand-new arrangements on unfamiliar material, the band handled it well, especially Mike Smith's nimble bass guiding it along.

The set closed with Sun Ra's "Watusa" (which will also be featured on the album), and it definitely left me glad I had come down. Potential Things, the band's first album, was pretty tasty stuff, but they've clearly stepped it up a notch — do not miss them when they're playing this fall to support the new album.

Listen to a track from this set here.

After that, it was rather tough to leave the cozy confines of the Southern Cross, especially since the night's later show would be featuring Metal Kites and Gabriel Levine, but I had another show to attend to, so I regretfully moved along.

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¹ Practical Men, forthcoming from the Standard Form imprint, still doesn't have a release date, but I am told that it's done and at the plant now, so it shouldn't be too long before this phenomenal album is going to be unleashed on the world.

Recording: Canaille

Artist: Canaille

Song: Love in Outer Space (Sun Ra Cover)

Recorded at Wavelength 500 (night 1), The Music Gallery, February 10, 2010.

Canaille - Love in Outer Space

My notes for this set can be found here.

Gig: Wavelength 500 (night 1)

Wavelength 500 (night 1) (feat. Bruce Peninsula / Evening Hymns / Pony da Look / Deep Dark United / Canaille)

The Music Gallery. Wednesday, February 10, 2007.

Walking over to St. George the Martyr Church, I had a most pleasing moment rounding the corner, the church coming into sight with the shifting lights of General Chaos Visuals visible through the tall windows. Ah, Wavelength. The first night of the go-out-with-a-bang five-night spree, celebrating the conclusion of ten years of Sunday night shows. Though not quite the end, as Wavelength is set to continue in a new monthly format, certainly a landmark occasion worthy of a big whoop-up and a look back over the past decade.

Inside, the lobby was filling up with concert-goers and musicians milling about, many flipping through their super-fancy commemorative 'zine. Heading in as showtime approached, the nave of the church was fashioned as an open space on this night, with the pews pulled aside and lining the walls, with their front rows occupied with small clumps of people hanging out and chatting until renowned Wavelength host Doc Pickles took the stage.

Welcoming us to "a celebration of putting on ten years of show that don't necessarily entirely suck," and taking some time to evaluate the failed mayoral candidacy of Adam Giambrone, the introduction worked itself around to the presentation of Canaille. Led by Jeremy Strachan, a veteran of more Wavelength shows that he could count — "two or three dozen," he noted during the set, when you add up all the hats he's worn over the years — the usual five-piece was enhanced with guest Carl Didur on keybs, adding some nice extra texture to a set frontloaded with some Sun Ra covers. The band had some minor rough patches in the first couple songs as they warmed up, but hit their groove with the zero gravity swing of "Love in Outer Space". A couple of Strachan's own compositions ("Quodlibet" and "Vincent Massey") rubbed shoulders nicely with the covers and set up the closing celebratory, Ayler-ish "Good Bits" — the most extended song of the set with some nice work from trumpeter Nick Buligan, who'd seemed a bit tentative earlier on. The rhythm section (Mike Smith, bass and Dan Gaucher, drums) were as spot-on as ever. The early crowd, a bit thin and well spaced out, were generally sitting down, many bobbing their heads to the grooves on stage.

Listen to a track from this set here.

Putting the audience in the jazzy sort of mindset was arguably a good setup for Deep Dark United, who took the stage wearing customized monogrammed earmuffs. The band, while not technically defunct, is not particularly active right now, making this show a bit of a rare opportunity to see a storied unit in action. Coming very much out of the Tranzac ethos of perverting pop structures with an improvisatory ethos, DDU — a vehicle for the complicated queasy-pop tunes of Alex Lukashevsky — played Wavelength in its first year, a sign of the longstanding ties these musicians have to the local scene. Starting off with "Dead Souls", Tania Gill's minor key piano backed Lukashevsky, building up to a howl of "Dead Sowlllllllllllllllllllllllllls!!". By the jazzy "Nun or a Bawd" (featuring Ryan Driver's rubberband bass and Brodie West's saxophone) the band had locked into their haphazard groove, and in "I Smoke By the Ocean", showed their ability to stretch out the textures of the songs like taffy, lending the song a sense of not so much dread as disorientation — uneasy listening, as it were. Not something you can easily graph points of comparison for, it's an entertaining singularity, if one that I'd rather reserve for special occasions. But it does get under your skin a little.

Listen to a track from this set here.

After that, it was time to stand up at Doc Pickles' urging, as he discoursed on the difference between arches and domes. Regardless of whatever else he was discussing, he was adamant that the crowd would want to be on their feet to take in Pony Da Look, whose operatic synth-rock is always a welcome excursion from the norm. The trio of singer-keyboardists, often switching places with each other, are backed by drummer Rob Gordon, and up front, it's the arresting presence and voice of Amy Bowles that really puts the band on a level all their own. Starting with a song on the more static end of their range — a slow, operatic intro of Bowles' echo-drenched vox over a synth drone before Rob Gordon kicked in with a ba-doom-ba-doom drum machine-like rhythm, all of which'd explode into something more cacophonic before ending back on the same quiet note it started on. After a couple songs, things got less gothic-spooky and more monster-mash-groovy on more upbeat songs like "Ravenous". The arch arising behind the altar made a fitting backdrop for the band, who should always perform in candle-lit churches, catacombs or graveyards. The set ended — with a new one? Bowles called out a title but I couldn't catch it — in a flurry of of recorder leading to shouts of "let the sounds echo!" as the mix did just that, her voice unfurling in a flurry of folded-over haze. Art-rock in the true spirit of Wavelength.

Listen to a track from this set here.

And then, in the best Wavelength manner, a completely different sort of band to follow. I had seen Evening Hymns not that long ago at the OOTS Anniversary celebration, and they would play a similar set on this night. Although this time, surrounded by a quiet and attentive crowd, a much better environment to appreciate Jonas Bonnetta's songcraft. Again starting with the slowly rising fanfare leading into "Lanterns", the band sounded better than I've ever heard them. And they took advantage not only of the space's acoustics, but also the grand piano on a lovely, quiet version of "Cedars". And then, just a couple more songs — including another appearance by new one "Cabin in the Burn" — and the set was quickly over. Cognisant of his relatively junior stature in the Wavelength cosmos compared to some of the other musicians that had played on the evening, Bonetta seemed humbled that he was asked to be a part of it.

Playing, as vocalist/guitarist Neil Haverty counted off, their ninety-fifth show, their fifth time at the Music Gallery and third time at Wavelength, Bruce Peninsula launched into the old-time shout-stomp of "Itty Bitty Baby" and signature song "Steamroller". Characterized, as always, by the choral-flavoured arrangements, the band also played some new material that, interestingly, sounds less directly inspired by old spirituals and more directly descended from The Fifth Dimension and West Coast pop — FM ready, that is to say, if it had only been released thirty-five-odd years ago. Best of all in this vein was "And When the Day Comes" ("This one's no longer called 'Chupacabra'," Haverty told the crowd, though some mutterings back and forth between the band members made it sound like it's not a settled issue). Meanwhile, during "2nd 4th World War", the band's music had wove such a spell on Doc Pickles that, like some sort of ritual gesture, he danced up on stage with a commemorative t-shirt to soak the sweat from Haverty's forehead, as well as the other players. And as if a spell had cast upon him, Haverty launched himself into the crowd as the band segued into "Satisfied", ranging far towards the far end of the room and back, bellowing throughout. That energy carried into the crowd-participatory "Crabapples", everyone shouting along, "Oh, hell no!" to the song's questions of "Do you have a good life? Got kids and a wife?"

The set ended with such guts-on-the-floor intensity, the band seemed almost a loss when called back for an encore, having to re-tune and upright gear that had been played as if there were no tomorrow. But they managed to do a nice job of "Shanty Song" to finish things off. A fitting band to close the night — not only in BP's inherently community-minded ethos invoking the spirit of Wavelength, but also looking forward with a band that's bursting with new ideas and moving forward with vigour.

Listen to a track here.

Recording: Canaille

Artist: Canaille

Song: Dock Boggs

Recorded at the Music Gallery, October 29, 2009.

Canaille - Dock Boggs

My notes for this set can be found here.

I'll gladly entertain any musicological theories on how this piece relates to its namesake, or to the "Old, Weird America".

Gig: Muskox / Canaille

Muskox / Canaille / Damian Valles

The Music Gallery. Thursday October 29, 2009.

Out to the Music Gallery for a triple album release spectacular from the fine folks at Standard Form. Perhaps befitting an operation that runs a music imprint as an adjunct to its print shop and bindery, SF create albums that exist as exquisite physical objects. The packaging for the albums being released on this night were visual and tactile delights, a joyful counterargument to people who want their music only in some intangible form. Similarly, the three musicians playing at this show were also exploring the tensions between the tactile and the intangible, the arranged and the improvised, and the composer's craft and ensemble's skill.

Opening the night was Damian Valles, whose new Rural Routes, an EP on 3" CD, examines his move from city to country. Live, Valles presented his music with solo guitar processed through laptop and pedals, plus a gently brushed cymbal.¹ Starting with birdsong in the background, he added gently-picked loops of guitar, always keeping things intelligently layered and not merely piled one on top of another. When the later section swelled into a louder wave, Valles standing to conduct the building sounds with his array of pedals, it felt earned. Tidily executed in twenty minutes, this was a fine entrée for the evening.

Listen to an excerpt from this performance here.

With things pretty much set up and ready to go, there was only a quick break before Canaille², led by ethnomusicologist-about-town Jeremy Strachan, took the stage. Strachan, switching between sax and guitar, has been using this unit as a larger canvas for his compositions than his sax-and-buckets duo Feuermusik. These tunes, from the new album Potential Things³ contain elements of ethio-jazz and spy themes, but always against a swingin' backdrop. By and large the first few songs were more compactly designed — pop song length, revealing Strachan's talent at, and respect for, catchy tunefulness. Things stretched out a bit more on "Summer Hair", giving Nick Buligan on trumpet and Colin Fisher — who looked to be fighting off a cold or some similar malady⁴ — a bit more room to stretch out in. Anchored by Dan Gaucher's drums and Mike Smith's double bass, the music was vital throughout — smart but never overbearing.

Listen to a track from this set here.

Having seem Muskox just a few weeks previously, I had a good notion of what I was in for. A few changes from last time around, though. Certainly much more elbow room for the players this time — indeed, room enough not just for a grand piano, but also for an extra player joining in on extra marimba and percussion. We were treated to all five pieces from the new album⁵ , plus encore. What can I add to my previous thoughts on Muskox? For whatever reason, when I closed my eyes and listened, my mind dredged up images of sitting in the back seat of a station wagon, watching snow-covered fields roll by. Evocative, then, I guess. And, natch, impeccably arranged.

Listen to a track from this set here.

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¹ In a subtly rural touch, Valles' laptop was resting on a trusty, rugged Black and Decker foldable workbench.

² With my poorly-remembered vocabulary, for months I'd assumed that the band name was French for "cinnamon", but it turns out that it actually means something like "riff-raff".

³ The album's jacket design pays homage to the classic Blue Note look — looking over the back cover, I half-expected to see an Alfred Lion credit.

⁴ I'm assuming that the bottle of cough syrup that Fisher was taking discreet swigs from between songs was for medicinal, and not recreational, purposes. His playing was exceptional, though, and not affected by whatever he was fighting off.

⁵ The 5 Pieces album cover is delightfully tactile, a schema of triangles, reminiscent of the Sierpinski fractals that haunted me during my youth.

Recording: Electric Canaille Trio

Artist: Electric Canaille Trio

Song: Vincent Massey^*

Recorded at Owen Pallett's 30th Birthday Party, Lula Lounge, Sunday, September 6, 2009.

Electric Canaille Trio - Vincent Massey

My notes for this set can be found here.

^* Thanks to Jeremy for passing the title along.

Gig: Thirty Years of Owen Pallett (Part I)

Thirty Years of Owen Pallett (feat: Final Fantasy, The Two Koreas, Slim Twig, Electric Canaille Trio, New Feelings, $100, Laura Barrett, Snowblink + Luxury Pond)

Lula Lounge. Sunday, September 6, 2009.

Celebrating his thirtieth birthday, Owen Pallett decided to live out every boy's fantasy: an all-day concert, with performances by collaborators and friends, a show where Owen could request songs, dance at the side of the stage or hop up to sing on a chorus — just because it's his birthday. Not a secret show by any means, but not so widely publicized, the show was PWYC and attracted a good crowd at all points of the day, with plenty young folks and a reasonable turnover as the early-comers tired out and were replaced by the night-time crowd. A testament to the breatdth of Owen's musical interests, there was a real variety of music on the stages, and the whole thing also served as a kind of mega-showcase for the Blocks recording Club.

Owen served as master of ceremonies, cheerleader, roadie and stage manager, keeping his eye on the time during both his own set and others, acting as arbiter when bands asked, "Do we have time for one more?" The left side of the room, the seating area beside the bar at Lula Lounge, had been stripped of its table to create the second stage, perpendicular to the main stage at the end of the room. With sets scheduled every twenty minutes, the bands could set up while the other stage was playing and for the audience, only a ninety-degree pivot was required to change vantage points. When it clicked (and throughout the day it mostly did) bands would be ready to go chop-chop, and several sets were separated by only seconds-long gaps.

Suffering from some bad TTC luck, I arrived at about ten minutes after the listed starting time of 3:40, and was planning to stay to the limit of my tolerance and strength. As it turned out, I lasted the whole damned day. This is gonna be a bit of a long one, then, and even split into thirds, there's a lot to go through — do excuse the abbreviated, blurb-y nature of some of these reviews.¹

3:40 Final Fantasy — arrived at ten to four, paid what I could, and stepped in to catch three songs from the man himself, playing on the side stage. Armed with only with violin and no keyboard, Owen played two Heartland tunes plus "Independence Is No Solution" in the time I saw him on stage. A canny move to put himself in the leadoff spot, as there was a nice-sized crowd at hand at this early hour.²

4:05 The Two Koreas — Been a while since I've seen this local crew, consisting of a combination of local media scribes and slumming "real" musicians. Well, slumming's not the right word, as they aren't just on a lark — they've been dishing out their "jangular electric beat muzik" for more than a half-decade now, and are rather proficient at kicking out the jams in that wide-ranging subgenre that claims The Fall as supreme progenitors. The set started with a couple quick smash-and-grab originals, featuring frontman Stuart Berman's barked vox and shift-stepped dance moves and ended with a massive, frothing cover of Swell Maps' "Helicopter Spies" that veered into something else, and crashed briefly into The Feelies' "The The Boy With The Perpetual Nervousness" for about a ten-minute non-stop rock onslaught. Reasonably good fun.

4:21 Slim Twig — Although I've seen him with Tropics a couple times and once with his avant-rockabilly combo, this is the first time I've witnessed Slim Twig's current incarnation with sample-based material. And although the raw sonic stuff is different, it feels like a different facet of the same musical sense — in this case, Slim's "ahurgaburga" Ballroom-Blitz-on-cough-syrup vox backed with drum loops and sundry other effects, including, in the first song, percussive samples of breaking glass. Though I've always found Slim to be an... interesting live presence, I've never been compelled to go out of my way to see him. This set didn't radically alter my opinion, though I did appreciate its energy and flow, and it got right catchy for the last couple songs with the guit, and then went out with one relying on a sample lifted from "These Boots Are Made For Walking".

Listen to a track from this set here.

4:40 Electric Canaille Trio — The latest offshoot of Jeremy Strachan's Canaille project is a reed-less trio with Strachan on guitar, Mike Smith on bass and drummer Dan Gaucher. Playing from lead sheets, the music was a sort of abstracted surf rock, and although there was an improvisational jazzy undertone, Jeremy seemed to be channeling Hank Marvin more than Bern Nix.³ Another touchstone might be some of the more laid-back, exploratory numbers by The Minutemen. Regardless, this was proficient without sacrificing spontaneity, and a really inneresting set — five compact numbers in fifteen minutes.

Listen to a track from this set here.

4:57 New Feelings — Meanwhile, the side stage had been filled up with a table full of electronic gear for New Feelings, a three-piece consisting of Matt Smith (a.k.a Nifty) and Rob Gordon (former members of Les Mouches along with Owen Pallett) as well as Alex Snukal. The trio's music was "organic-electronic" with all the sounds created live and then looped into increasingly complex beat-driven constructions. As any of these musicians would be capable of creating a fully-fledged live electro-thing on their own, it was interesting to try and see how the division of labour was achieved and how the musicians were playing off each other. Not really my go-to kind of stuff, but enjoyable to hear, even if, like most knob twiddling music, I'm always left with the feeling that it would be more fun to be making it than to watch it.

5:20 $100 — Always one of my fave local acts to catch, I was pleased to note we were getting the full four-piece band (with new bass player?) and not just the Ian/Simone duo. The band led with a mellowed-out version of "Black Gold", chased by its sequel, the lamentin' "Courting My Heartache". Even a broken string on Ian Russell's acoustic could hardly slow the band down, getting out six tracks in their twenty minutes. The set closed with a special birthday request from Owen, a cover of The Judds' "Why Not Me" with Byrds-y guitar work from Paul Mortimer. A good time as always.

5:43 Laura Barrett — And then another local artist that I would go out of my way to hear on almost any day. Laura Barrett — sporting a fetching new hairdo — came backed with Doug Tielli (guit, theremin), Randy Lee (violin) and Dana Snell (flute, glockenspiel, vox). The added oomph of the extra players allowed her to dig into some of the more textured sounds of Victory Garden, featuring four songs from that album. The opening "Wood Between Worlds" was quite lovely, but the vocals were a bit lost beneath everything else, but that was sorted out, and we got stellar takes of "Bluebird" and "Consumption", the latter driven by Tielli's bolero-like guitar. And closed out, natch, by the still-and-always swoon-inducing "Deception Island Optimists Club". Would it be too much to ask for a full set with a lineup like this?

Listen to a track from this set here.

6:09 Snowblink + Luxury Pond — This sneaky double billing in fact looked deceptively like Snowblink, Luxury Pond being Dan Goldman's bandonym and the flipside to Daniela Gesundheit's Snowblink moniker. As to which of the five songs performed belonged to who seems a bit beside the point, given the simpatico collaboration between the two. As I witnessed last week, the pair's songs cause a sort of beguiling fog of wonderfulness to descend. A small, sculptured "Shhhh..." placed on top of an amp didn't entirely dispel chatters in the room, but it wasn't so bad as to overwhelm the band. Perhaps not quite as beguiling as a week ago — I wasn't being taken by surprise this time and had raised my expectations accordingly — but still lovely stuff.

A non-materialization by one of the scheduled bands led to the first gap in the day to change over the main stage, but by this point, three hours in with pretty much no pause, a bit of a break was more than welcome.

The rest of the goings-on will be posted in the day or two.

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¹ And for the first chunk of the day, please excuse the lack of photos — I was fooling around with camera settings, and in the early going took photos that were essentially blank.

² Although it appears that no few people ducked out after the set, or at least retreated to the tables, as the floor was much quieter after his set.

³ Although the band's final selection certainly leaned more towards a Ulmer-esque kind of jazz rock, with Smith adroitly handling a tricky, nimble double-timed bass line.