Gig: Hooded Fang

Hooded Fang (Santa Guerrilla / Doldrums)

The Drake Underground. Thursday, December 9, 2010.

Sometimes the smaller details can be the most telling. As advocates of a hands-on DIY approach to art, it wasn't too surprising to note that the ticket for Hooded Fang's album release show wasn't your standard ducat. Instead, the band had used old baseball cards¹, with an attached sticker giving the usual details. Clearly, the band was making an effort to create a special night.

That impression would be bolstered on seeing the elaborate stage backdrop the band had put together, playing further on the album's Honest Ed's-styled Doug Kerr artwork and adding several figures by graffiti artist Elicser. As the room filled up, the DJ's pumped out a mix of 90's vintage boom-bap. I smiled to myself — how often do I hear a hip-hop mix where I know all the songs? All told, it was a livelier vibe than the last time I had seen Hooded Fang in these digs.

There was an interesting line-up for the show, too. Rather than worrying about finding bands with a complementary sound, the openers were kindred DIY spirits. And, more directly, one could trace the origins of this bill back to the DAPS All Ages shows that HF members April Aliermo and Daniel Lee have been putting together, where both openers had previously appeared.

The first of those was Airick Woodhead's Doldrums project, a swirling one-man mix of knob-twisting experimental pop. Having crossed paths with Doldrums a few times already, I sort of knew what to expect — but also figured that this set would run counter to my expectations, as Woodhead's vision tends to become subject to new tangents every time it seems to be coming into focus. Here, as he took the stage, I wasn't sure when the looped and layered vocals — the main ingredient in the mix here — actually coalesced into a "song". And once it did, it was hard to tell where one thing ended and the next began, with a constantly morphing sonic backdrop that would segue from one vibe to the next. Whispy layers of gauzy vox would suddenly give way to beatz and zworping synths.

I have no doubt that this chopped-pop is a little bit self-indulgent, and certainly some of the "songs" didn't quite gel. And on this night, Woodhead seemed a bit more interested the slo-jamz, which can be less engaging than some his more animated stuff. But having seen this develop over the course of the year, I'm stuck with the notion that there is a vision behind it all. There are a few places where it doesn't quite work, but I think of Woodhead as aiming for a higher slugging percentage instead of a safe batting average.

Though Woodhead's hazy pop deconstructions were received with polite-but-restrained applause, there was at least the sense that it was on the same general wavelength of the crowd at hand. That wasn't as much the case for Santa Guerrilla, whose ultimate sonic destination is a hip-hop informed funky flow, even if it gets there by less-familiar means. The most immediately striking thing about the band is their use of kulintang gongs, native to the Philippines.² Most of the eight members rotated around, taking on different percussive roles to go along with the drums and Alexander The (also of Times Neue Roman) on keyb.

His gear was a bit balky at the start of the set, and while he tested his connections, the rest of the band to eased into the set, vamping until it got fixed. Better than just standing around staring at the crowd, but it was less attention-grabbing than a bold, kick-ass opening would have been. That gave the semi-curious in the crowd a bit more licence to lose focus, and it never really felt like the band "had" the room as much as they could have.

That said, once they got rolling, I was enjoying this a lot. Although the music all comes from one place, they're exploring a nice range within it, from some more atmospheric stuff to tasty pop. Plus, the quick set ended with "Ang Musica", which remains pretty damn fantastic. Perhaps because it was at a bit of an angle to Hooded Fang's more straight-ahead fare, some of the crowd seemed unsure of how to take this, but I remain convinced that this crew are really on to something.³

Listen to a track from this set here.

Hooded Fang's music has its share of intriguing tensions — not only between the restrained nature of the lead vocals from Daniel Lee (and sometimes Lorna Wright) and the bouncy rhythms of the music, but also in how the lyrics are often far less sunny than the upbeat musical settings would suggest. But of course, with the immediate appeal to sing along and/or dance, you never have to think about any of this. And on this night, the band was doing all the could to bolster their zazz, with all seven members wearing silver trim. And in addition to their striking stage decoration (which could have passed as a backdrop for one of the musical theatre productions that member Nick Hune writes tunes for) there were also 8mm projections by Craig Orrett.

Lots going on for an enthusiastic, hooting crowd out to celebrate the album. Unfortunately, it was also a rather yappy crowd as well, but the chatterers couldn't overpower the songs, starting with "Laughing". The band was busily celebrating the album, but also dipped back to their debut EP for the catchy "Circles n Blocks".

There were extra strings from Mika Posen (of Timber Timbre) and Anissa Hart (of Ohbijou) for an excellent "Mutant Bear", which was a slow-dance partner with "The Pageant". That was a mid-set breather before things got even more extravagent. During an extended "Green River" three space aliens in funky toxic waste suits appeared at the back of the room to bust some moves. They shimmied up through the crowd, tossing glitter along the way, to make their way up to the stage. As the song ended, one crowd-surfed back to the far end of the room. Quite the spectacle!

The band closed out the main set with "Love Song", but quickly returned for an encore, playing the newer "Almost Done" before going out with a couple of their oldest songs ("Land of Giants" and "Fall Leaves"). On the home stretch the band got pretty loose and celebratory, going out with a big clapalong. That would make for an hour-long set, consisting of almost everything in the band's catalogue — and indeed, the whole of the album save one song would get an airing.

So a good night all around, and a worthy celebration to send Hooded Fang's Album into the world.

Listen to a track from this set here.

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¹ My ticket was a '91 Craig Grebeck card. Though best remembered in these parts as a respectable utility infielder with the late '90's Blue Jays, on the card the youthful Grebek, in White Sox duds, seems to be looking forward to a bright future, on the cusp of a rookie season where he'd put up a 136 OPS+ in part-time action.

² I was amused to note that the large gongs were hanging from what was, in fact, a portable coat rack — a tidy home-made solution to the problem of getting them on and off the stage expeditiously.

³ For those that would like to investigate further, the band now has a mixtape for sale in their bandcamp page.

Gig: Powerhouse Sound

Powerhouse Sound

The Drake Underground. August 5, 2010.

I was unsure when I should show up for this one. Early doors means an early show at The Drake, but I couldn't find a listing for the start time. And given the band and the presumptive demographic, I figured it'd be an older, punctual, eager-to-sit crowd. I was actually quite surprised when I stepped from bright sunlight to basement gloom to discover that there weren't seats set up. The room was almost totally empty and the airconditioning set several clicks below comfortable. I could have used a drink — possibly a hot toddy, given that my teeth were chattering — but The Drake is too pricey for the likes of me to imbibe. With the few patrons on hand reclining on the couches hugging the wall, it was positively morgue-like as I settled in, waiting for the crowd to arrive.

As it turned out, the crowd avoided this gig entirely, and it ended up being woefully underattended. So it was in front of a pretty spare room that Powerhouse Sound, playing without an opening act, took the stage. The lack of crowd was a little surprising, as saxophonist Ken Vandermark has a pretty decent following. Plus, this grouping — what one might reductively refer to as Vandermark's "rock unit" — contained additional rock-nerd cachet with Jeff Parker and John Herndon, two of the members of Chicago post-rock titans Tortoise, in its ranks.

Despite the thin attendance — I counted maybe thirty people on hand — the band threw themselves into it. The "songs" were interspersed with a series of structured duo/trio improvisations, starting off with Nate McBride's processed bass and Jeff Parker's electric guitar¹ in a effects pedal powered atmospheric duet that segued into "Shocklee". That one, like most of the band's compositions, is a dedication to a musician that has inspired Ken Vandermark — in this case Bomb Squad producer Hank Shocklee. Those linkages are sometimes pretty direct and sometimes more opaque — here we had the continued scrim of complicated knob-twisting concrète backed by a steady beat giving hints of the dense sound collages the song's namesake helmed.

Then, a guitar/drum duo segued into "King to Crown (for King Tubby)", McBride's bass work riding a repetitive riff. That one owed more to an idea of dub methodology than to reggae per se, although that influence came out directly on "Exit-Salida (for Burning Spear)", which was first extended jam after the quicker explorations to start things off. The first set wrapped up with "Leap", a brand new composition. Whether this one was "for" anyone wasn't mentioned, but it lead off with little stabs of guitar, and Vandermark's sax took on a funky edge. Halfway through, it took a darker, slower turn before dropping back into the funky mode it started in.

That would make for a forty-five minute set before the break. The room cleared out with the smokers heading outside to be joined by those who needed to warm up a bit while, as usual, Ken Vandermark manned his merch table. He can usually be seen at gigs like this, putting himself face-to-face with his audience not just to shill some albums, but to share a chat with anyone willing to wander over. Meanwhile, I eyed the crowd, mentally assembling the weird Venn diagram of diverse musical types (jazzbos and "serious" music types, but also jamband heads, proggos and post-rock nerds) who unite at shows like this.

The second set led off with "Old Dictionary (for Bernie Worrell)" and then "Edges of Tape", another new one² which had a solo in the middle from Parker that consisted mostly of artful tuning. The set ended with what, after some digging around, I'm taking to be "Broken Numbers (for Betty Davis)" — it certainly evoked that namesake, with a tough-funk sound and yowling sax line — and enough energy from John Herndon that he knocked his cymbal over. As there was throughout, there was applause from the scattered audience, but not the effusive sort. Which wasn't to say it wasn't dug, there just wasn't a critical mass of people to get each other too riled up and build up the energy in the room. Which might be why on this night there was no encore. But still, a really enjoyable show.³

Check out a couple tracks from this gig here.

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¹Gear fetishists would have appreciated Parker's setup here, with amps on each side of the stage to give him an extra way to pan and mix his effects.

² It's interesting to note the lag between hearing these new ones live and seeing them emerge in recorded form. The foundational document for Powerhouse Sound is the Oslo/Chicago: Breaks double album, which contains many of these songs recorded with two different lineups on different sides of the Atlantic. The band actually has a new release, Overlap, which does indeed mostly overlap that same material with a different lineup, but still doesn't have the new jams we were hearing on this night.

³ Special thanks to BradM, who was also out this night with his recording rig, and allowed me to piggyback onto his microphone stand. It allowed me to get a pretty nice capture of the show, but it's not quite as rich as the sound from his more sophisticated setup. Brad has shared his recording at etree.org, and, at this writing, it is still being seeded.

NXNE 2010: Saturday (Part 1)

NXNE — North by Northeast Festival, Toronto, 2010.

Saturday, June 19, 2010. Featuring: The Soft Pack, PC Worship, The Grates, Jane Vain, The D'Urbervilles

4 p.m.: The Soft Pack @ Yonge-Dundas Square

Taking an early start on a trip out to meet with some friends, headed down for my only exposure to the big outdoor stage at Yonge-Dundas Square.¹ I figured this early in the day it wouldn't be too crowded, which turned out to be correct. On a hot and blindingly bright afternoon, there were clumps of people standing around to take in The Soft Pack, but lots of elbow room at hand. I'd enjoyed the band enough the night before to warrant an encore, and it's always interesting to see how music that sounded great in a crowded club translates in such a different environment. As I came up from the subway, the band was rocking out an extended groove, and at the song's close vocalist Matt Lamkin joked to the crowd, "Thank you guys very much! We're Iggy Pop and the Stooges." In fact, looking around the square, one could see that there were already people in attendance waiting out all the early bands for the night's much-hyped headliner.

But in the meantime, The Soft Pack did a good job — the bigger stage and sound system gave their music a bit of expansiveness. "Bright Side" felt perfectly right in the open air. The band played from a nearly-identical setlist to what they'd done the night before, down to that set-ending "Gagdad", though here it didn't get to simmer for quite as long. And as always, it was amusing to take this in against all the indeterminacies of playing in the open square, with lots of people with only the most tangential interest in the band on the stage wandering around. Someone was getting into the World Cup spirit, tooting a vuvuzela between songs.

Next up were local spazz-rock explorers DD/MM/YYYY but, in deference to the crazy heat, I retreated to the beer garden and found a relatively shady spot. Not having seen them for a couple years, I've been meaning to catch the Daymonths to get a grip on how their sound is progressing, but this wasn't the day for it. After that, headed uptown for some quality patio time. My friends there were intent on checking out the Stooges, so I came back down with them a while later, but mostly just to check out the now-gigantic crowd before retreating to less packed surroundings.

9:15 p.m.: PC Worship @ The Garrison

I figured that wherever I found myself in the earlier hours of the night I'd have some elbow room, given that there was not only the huge draw of the Stooges gig at the Square, but also the BSS/Pavement show on the island. But still, it was a bit surprising to walk into the back room of The Garrison a few minutes past the hour and see no one else in sight. Mildly eerie.

Brooklyn's PC Worship had gotten the bad luck of the draw to be going head-to-head with Iggy Pop and it looked like they were delaying their start as much as possible on the hope of having any sort of audience to play to. By the time they roused themselves on stage, it was a quarter past the hour and there was a small handful of people around. Their timeslot wasn't the only bit of bad luck that the band was up against — the bass that was being passed back and forth on the stage between songs was explained by vocalist Justin Frye to be a result of the the regular bassist sustaining a nasty hand injury.

But, despite all of that, once the band got going, things were fairly interesting. At the outset the band sounded not unlike Woods, sporting a twisty, lo-fi psychedelic sensibility. Of the five members on stage, the two front-and-centre were both seated and switching between instruments — one playing saxophone and lap-style slide guitar (plus handling some of the rotation bass duties) and the other played violin and did sound manipulations on a rig that included a turntable and a pair of old tape decks. With all of these tools at their disposal, the band was equally capable of spazzing out or hitting a few poptones.

The latter tendency came to the fore on "Staring at the Sun", a woozy pop gem with a Pixies-like bassline and little squelchy bursts of tape-rewinding noise. "Wake Up in the Dark" was, in contrast, a sloggy, druggy ode to monotone inertia that built to a no-wave skronkfest, Frye tugging at the bass strings like he was trying to tear them off.

Now fully into it, Frye announced, "we're going to do a cover song", only to be told by a NXNE apparatchik that it would be their last. Frye reconsidered, and sounding wounded said, "we're not gonna play a cover song, we're gonna play 'Sittin' in My Car' — which is what I'm gonna be doing after this." Signing up for things like NXNE is a bit of a crapshoot for a band, and Frye sounded pretty bummed out, getting to shout out his frustration a bit in the song — "come on, man!"

Making his own mini-revolt at the end, he commented, "it looks like we still have thirty seconds left!" as he tore into a punkrock rant, "I'm so fucked! Every day!" whether it was one of their own songs or a remembered hardcore burst, that ended the set. A tough night for the band, and they obviously didn't reach the sort of audience they were hoping for, which is a shame, as there's definitely a local audience for stuff like this.

Listen to a track from this set here.

10 p.m.: The Grates @ Wrongbar

Headed down to Wrongbar, catching Australian trio The Grates just getting on stage. The band has a couple albums out, but seemed to be sporting a lot of new material. It was hard to make out many of the lyrics, but it didn't seem to matter that much — this was happy bop-along music, with sub-three-minute songs, appealing to those who might find Metric too staid and self-serious. Which is to say, very "pop". The band featured vocalist Patience Hodgson backed with live guitar and drums with some backing tracks supplementing things. But, in a sense, everything was window-dressing for the frenetic Hodgson, who was constant explosive energy in motion. Wearing duck-adorned brass knuckles around her neck, she expounded on the Batusi between songs ("sexiest dance ever invented!") and got involved with the audience when the music was playing. Not content to just ruffle the hair of the patrons up front, soon she was sitting on an audience member's shoulders to sing a slower-paced number.

Musically, it wasn't highly memorable. Closer "19 20 20" (from their 2006 debut album) had a bit of an appealing rough edge recalling Be Your Own Pet, but that edge wasn't there for most of the set, and may more indicate what they're moving beyond. The entertaining Hodgson aside, not much to recommend the band. They felt something like the musical equivalent of a vodka cooler — sweet, fizzy and full of empty calories. Pleasant enough while it's in front of you, but nothing you'd remember the next day.

11 p.m.: Jane Vain @ The Drake Underground

With nothing insisting itself on me in this timeslot, I again perched myself where I'd want to be later on, heading back east down Queen to the Drake Underground. Passed some time with Jane Vain who turned out to be a band, not a person. Formerly Jane Vain and the Dark Matter, the frontwoman is in fact Jamie Fooks, originally from Calgary, now based in Montréal. With their second album just out, the band already gave the sense of being comfortably in their tour groove, from the drummer's inside-out t-shirt to the inside jokes flying back and forth on stage. Guitarist Nathan Curry kept drawing scandalized looks from Fooks by making a series of increasingly-outlandish claims after each song ("This song has the devil's chord in it", "this next song is about having sex with someone while they're asleep").

Musically, the band's main gear was slightly-gloomy indie rock. Fooks, a pleasant singer with a smoky voice, started off on keybs, and moved later to guitar, which made for some nice intertwining parts with Curry. "The Solution" had some interesting atmospherics, but didn't totally hold my attention. That largely extrapolated to the rest of the set — nothing wrong with any of this, and there were some good moments, but it didn't really win me over. A few people up front were into this, but the smallish crowd on hand was generally indifferent, and as the crowd began to swell towards the set's end, it was clear they were waiting on someone else.

Listen to a track from this set here.

Midnight: The D'Urbervilles @ The Drake Underground

Perhaps, like myself, the crowd had heard some of the carefully-dropped hints here-and-there that this might be be The D'Urbervilles' last show. The fact that they were selling off their stock of t-shirts at fire-sale prices was a sign that something was afoot. Not having any solid information, I didn't know what to think, but I was here just in case. Plus, and more pragmatically, one could look ahead and guess that there might be less shows for The D'Urbs on the horizon, when you consider the explosive response to John O'Regan's Diamond Rings project, plus the prospect of a new album from Forest City Lovers, of which Tim Bruton and Kyle Donnelly are members. That's enough to give one the notion that the D'Urbs might get shifted to the backburner, putting that long-awaited second album on hold.²

O'Regan's purple strat no longer has the word "YAA(!)" in taped letters, but he was adorned, as frequently in the past, in a vintage logo Blue Jays t-shirt and cap — appropriate for the set-opening "Cito G" ("back to back/ we're bringing it back"), which segued into "Boys To Men". A quick dip into the older stuff for "Hot Tips", the guitars buzzing hungrily. A couple more new songs followed, and it's all really good stuff — having heard most of these live two or three times now, I'm totally convinced that the band has topped their previous work. Ultimately, there would only be two We Are the Hunters tracks, though to close things out, the band reached back even further for "Shout It Out! (Organ Song)" from their debut EP.

O'Regan's recent persona makeover as Diamond Rings doesn't explicitly carry over to his work here, except perhaps in a more relaxed and extroverted demeanour as he carries himself with a bit more brashness. Meanwhile, The D'Urbervilles remain a formidable unit — still one of the city's best live bands — so we can only hope that success elsewhere doesn't leave a band as good as this as a mere stepping stone.

Listen to a track from this set here.

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¹ In and of itself, the free shows at YDS have been a big plus for the festival. They certainly get people who aren't running out to get a wristband — or maybe to otherwise take in a show at all — excited about NXNE and add a layer of "event-ness" to the proceedings that can get lost in the whole meticulous process of dealing with all the showcases. And anything that gets bands out of the bars and playing in the daytime during the festival is also positive. That said, other things being equal, I'm generally content to situate myself where the crowds aren't, so I wasn't exactly in a rush to see a lot of stuff there.

² As of this writing, things have been quiet in the D'Urbs' online presence, but they are playing Pop Montreal this weekend.

Gig: Robyn Hitchcock

Robyn Hitchcock (Sunbear)

The Drake Underground. Friday, June 11, 2010.

I probably go to enough shows not to get too worked up about any particular one of them; or, put another way, I go to too many shows to get too excited that often. This was one that I was excited for.

Like the way I'm sure a lot of people feel about their own favoured "cult artists", I've long felt a bit of tension about Robyn Hitchcock — utter confusion that, based on his talents, he's not far more well-known than he is, tempered by a sort of possessive happiness that the result of that is that I get to see him close up and unspoilt by a mass audience.

With something like seventeen albums to his name¹ — a few classics included — Hitchcock has a body of work that might appear daunting to the uninitiated. And yet, he is something close to brilliant — his mix of classic songwriting and beautiful melodies with suggestive lyrics that carry the songs' emotional depth despite (or more likely because of) their surrealist wanderings, as if capturing life in all its squishy, confusing glory. That penchant for abstract whimsy has long blinded some people to his merits, but for my money he's one of the best, and well-worth heading out for.

Though I knew this to be an early show, on what turned out to be a rather lovely evening out, I couldn't be in a rush to get down to Queen Street, and ended walking down on a rambling, indirect route. Climbed down to the Drake's basement at about 8:45 to find the opener already on stage. This was, quite sensibly, set up as a seated show, and as I got there, the place was less than half-filled. Managed to snag a fine seat, second row centre.

That opener was Sunbear, the project of local folksinger Kate Boothman, who was playing solo on this night, though a traipse through her myspace² shows that she often is backed by some choice local musicians — her new one Moonbath³ gets by with a little help from Ian Russell ($100), Nick Taylor (Steamboat) and Melissa Boraski (Eiyn Sof).

On her own, Boothman featured mostly fingerpicked guitar, and her music was "proper folk", in that slightly stiff, vaguely formalistic way. A little austere, like a cold wind, but also with a welcoming purity to it. Between songs, mind you, Boothman was genial in chatting from the stage. Looking around as the place filled in, there was an amiable, out-with-friends kind of crowd, who listened attentively, laughing along.

Listen to a song from this set here.

It felt weird to behold such an utterly bare stage — not even an amp to be seen. And no merch to speak of, either.⁴ One imagines Robyn Hitchcock to be a streamlined touring operation — one man, arriving by streetcar, guitar in hand is my mental image. That kind of minimal set-up meant for a quick turnaround and when the soundman brought a cup of tea up to the table on the stage, one could figure that the time was near.

Taking the stage in a jaunty shirt⁵, he opened with "The Ghost Ship" (the 1988 b-side to "Balloon Man"), an unexpected choice and rather something of an obscurity, showing the depth of the catalogue that he has to draw from. Even for things that aren't obscurities, the well's so deep that songs like "Mexican God" (from '99's Jewels for Sophia) are unexpected — and a good way to be reminded of the virtues of songs like this that could easily be overlooked.

Given that there are so many songs to choose from, a musician has to come prepared. And, far from just throwing songs out there, Hitchcock was working from a neatly-lettered, carefully delineated setlist. But the idea that the course of the show was so decidedly predetermined was undermined by his verbal asides, always an essential part of his live performances, where the audience gets some real-time samples of his off-kilter worldview. That banter is truly of a piece with his songs.

Stuff like "I Often Dream Of Trains" might seem rather like folk to the casual observer, Hitchcock took pains to comment, "You can tell that is is basically rock'n'roll and not folk music — but I can't explain how". Well — discuss amongst yourselves, I guess. It was nearly a half-hour into the show before he got to something from his new album (the agreeable Propellor Time), playing "Luckiness" as well as "Ordinary Millionaire", a co-write with Johnny Marr⁶.

And then, just continuing the journey, mixing older songs with more recent ones and "hits" with deeper cuts. Before the main set's finale of "(A Man's Gotta Know His Limitations) Briggs", there was a bravado burst of banter, wherein Hitchcock gave a five-minute discourse on Magnum Force, the song's inspiration.

That made for an eighty-minute set, which was followed by "a couple songs in my record collection", a four-song, all-cover encore, visiting some kindred-spirited inspirations, touching on Syd Barrett (a slowed-down and mellow "Terrapin") and The Incredible String Band ("Nightfall") as well as The Doors and Nick Drake. The closing reading of "River Man" was a rather lovely note to go out on. A fabulous show, and done early enough for some further adventures on the night.⁷

You can check out a couple tracks from this show here and here — and because the banter is such a big part of the appeal, I've included a snippet of that along with the latter.

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¹ Not even counting his compilations of rarities, demos and out-takes, which out-number & out-perform many artists' main discographies. Or live releases, of which there are several. And that's not even mentioning his early work with his pre-solo band The Soft Boys, which is worthy and influential on its own. His discography is so deep that it's gratifying to find an online database to aid in navigating through it.

² There are several Sunbears out there, but Boothman is this one.

³ Which is getting a release party at The Horseshoe on Thursday, September 16, 2010, with Eiyn Sof — who has also just released a fantastic album — as one of the openers.

⁴ On not having merch, he later commented that there might be some available at the next afternoon's in-store performance: "I have no idea if they have it... they may have this record in stock... but there's millions of records, really — y'know, if you bought a Sister Sledge record, it's essentially the same stuff. The message is fine-tuned. Or you may listen to Local Natives... essentially it's all the same stuff — it's all a cry for help." The latter reference hints that Hitchcock probably has more of a grip on contemporary music than most of his audience.

⁵ Another sign of his awareness of how things work in today's techno-obsessed society, Hitchcock realizes that spontaneous moments on the stage tend to have an afterlife these days. At one point, pausing to adjust his hair between songs, he commented, "you see these things on YouTube and your quiff isn't together — God help Kennedy if he was assassinated these days." [long beat, looks at his fingernails] "Wouldn't've been in one take, that's for sure."

⁶ You should check out the stop-motion video for this one, which visually fits quite nicely with Hitchcock's style very well, as well as featuring Marr's lovely shimmering guitar.

⁷ And testifying further to the depth of his catalogue, he played a completely different set on the next night's show of the two-night stand. Had I not been occupied elsewhere, I'd have had no reluctance to buy a ticket for that second show as well — and there's not a lot of people that I can say that about.

Gig: Serena-Maneesh

Serena-Maneesh (Depreciation Guild)

The Drake Underground. Friday, April 2, 2010.

Definitely a sign that something was awry when, with about forty-eight hours' notice, it came out that this gig was being moved from the relatively roomy Great Hall to the much cozier confines downstairs at The Drake. Mildly eyebrow raising. Here was a show by a band that made a fairly big splash a few years ago with their first album, and they're being downsized to a c. 200 person capacity room? What went wrong? Do people really have such short attention spans? The fact that the local promoter had been acquired and merged into a new, larger out-of-town operation? Maybe just that it was the Easter long weekend and people were doing family stuff and not going to shows. I suppose I didn't mind the shift to more intimate quarters, but I noted from the Drake's listings that the late-night dance party was still scheduled, so I was hoping that the show would stick to its new, earlier time.

In fact, the doors opened a chunk past the newly-listed eight o'clock, and when I sauntered in, it was to a pretty much empty room. "Where is everyone?" I wondered to myself. "Don't they know this show has a curfew?"

It wasn't, in fact, until 9:30, in what was still a very empty room that Depreciation Guild hit the stage. Taking a spot in the centre of the dancefloor as they began, I looked around sheepishly, feeling exposed, as there was no one within about ten feet of me — just a handful of people seated on the couches up front and a few more back by the bar. About a dozen people in sight, including staff and members of Serena-Maneesh.

All around, a tough night for the Brooklyn trio — one of those gigs where the band must be wondering if it's worth all the effort for this. Unhelped from pretty much any quarter, it even seemed like they were playing under about the least-flattering stage lighting you could imagine — bright, almost like house lights. Soundwise, they were thrown to the wolves as well, with an unsympathetic mix. There just wasn't nearly as much volume or, well, drive as I was expecting.¹ Definitely that shoegazey vibe in there, but without a powerful roar from the sound system, they came across as more merely new-wavey and a little anemic.²

With two guitars, drums, and laptop I was also feeling my standard-issue rockist grumblings about technological determinism and so on — with the drummer wearing a click track and playing along with rhythm tracks from the laptop, he actually seemed mildly superfluous. There was a missing "live" feeling here, and it sometimes felt more like the band were accompanists for the backing tracks.³

The just narrative arc of the whole thing, if this were following Hollywood rules, would be that they pulled it all out despite the adversity and played a triumphant gig. But, in real-life style it was more... okay. Decent tunes, good ideas and so forth, but a little undistinguished. And then, it all kind of ended with a limp thud when they finished a song just shy of the half-hour mark and the soundman came to the front to tell them they were done. The band clearly had more in their setlist and seemed a bit frustrated with things — but they didn't carp, just giving a quick thanks before quickly unplugging.

Listen to a track from this set here.

The place had filled in somewhat, but was still at maybe half of capacity for the headliners. With a guitar tech on hand and enough boxes of merch to serve a Phoenix-sized crowd, Oslo's Serena-Meneesh weren't rolling like they were normally playing venues of this size. Although, by and large, the band themselves looked like they were above such droll concerns, none more than singer/guitarist Emil Nikolaisen, sporting an apocalypse chic look with pants held together with electric tape and a ragged poncho. Not playing like a band in a rush, the instrumental thrum of opener "Ayisha Abyss" unfolded with precision over seven minutes before careening into the howling guitars of "Reprobate!" — which was, by contrast, catchy and concise. For all of their propensity to create more of a moreness, the band can also generate a catchy single — well, within the parameters of noisy shoegaze — when called for.

But indeed there was no time to waste, and the band moved quickly from song to song. No chit-chat, save for Nikolaisen commenting, "Canadians and Norwegians seem to have a little in common — we dance inside." Clearly a comment on the lack of overt movement on the crowd's part. Mind you, with the notable exception of Nikolaisen himself, the band weren't a bunch of dynamic movers. The new bassist — who comported herself admirably — spent most of the set with back to the crowd, watching the drummer, and everyone else was generally rooted in place.

Keybs/electronics player Aadne Meisfjord had a laptop and drum pads amongst his gear and some of the songs started with programmed beats but there was never the sense (in contrast to Depreciation Guild) that the laptop was dictating what the band was playing. Musically, the band was eminently under control, which contributed a bit of a tension to their music. For all the volume and noise (and, compared to the openers, S-M got a nice, loud chest-shaking sound in the room) there's never a sense that a song could fall apart. Which could imply that the band is showing too much restraint and not pushing against the limits of the song. I went back and forth a bit on whether that sense of control hindered or improved the songs.

But the band exploded those limits with their last two songs, including the awesome slowed-down haze of "Melody for Jaana", where that musical restraint felt like the pressure that turns coal into diamonds. That fed into set-closer "Blow Yr Brains in the Mourning Rain", where they came the closest to hinting at out-of-control chaos, with Nikolaisen pulling off his shirt and stepping down into the crowd to finish the song, at one point throwing his body dramatically down to the floor.

Sadly, that was it. A few minutes past eleven, the all-important dance party must start, so we were limited to eight songs in forty-five minutes. Again, the easy trope to trot out would be to say something to the effect that the band squeezed ninety minutes of intensity into a forty-five minute set. But I wouldn't quite go so far. It was solid, professional stuff and I did enjoy it — but not a brain-melting experience. Even if I didn't mind getting home at a decent hour for a change, the show sure could have gone on longer. I suppose we go to shows hoping for a sort of rock'n'roll transcendence, to be lifted up out of, y'know, the muck and mire or the everyday. So when a show feels haphazard and compromised by banal realities, it feels a bit too much like, say, the rest of one's life.

Check out some music from this set here.

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¹ I'd seen the band before, so I had a notion of what to expect.

² However, it's important not to pin that on the band. Spotting me leaning against the wall and jotting down notes in between sets — and clearly mistaking me for someone more important than I am — S-M guitarist Øystein Sandsdalen took a moment to come over to me and explain that they had been doing some extra practice with their new bass player, and as such, Depreciation Guild did not get a chance to sound check. So that, and the enforced quick turnover time, explains a lot about why they didn't sound quite like I would think they wanted.

³ Interestingly, though, the Nintendo beats that were once a major talking point of the band's sound are now more limited to little in-between song segues, useful to pass the time while tuning. Though even then, once they were ready to play, the band sort of had to stand there waiting for the laptop to finish.

Gig: The Wave Pictures

No Shame presents The Wave Pictures / Maylee Todd and Pegwee Power / White Suede

The Drake Underground. Thursday, March 25, 2010.

Out for a No Shame night at The Drake. The joint is too expensive to have a drink, but it is a decent enough room otherwise to get up close to a band. And a nice combination on the night of someone I'd been meaning to see and a couple bands I hadn't heard of — a chance to hear something new.

First up in a quiet-ish room was the soulful sounds of White Suede, apparently playing their first gig. Looks like these revivalists are off to a good start, playing a well-rehearsed set of Motown-inspired soul/rock. There were also some thoughtful arrangements here, and the seven-piece played with a lean and uncluttered groove. Kritty Urinowski's vox — and some rehearsed dances moves, to boot — added a sassy counterpart to Daniel Bedard's slightly more deadpan presence. Reporting that they are working on an album, we got a half-dozen respectable originals (including the winning "Cold Kids" and "Colourblind") and the band finished off with a tribute to their roots with the tastefully-selected Holland–Dozier–Holland cover "(Come Round Here) I'm The One You Need".

There was a slight whiff of The Commitments here — I kept expecting the band to make a nervous comment about waiting for Wilson Pickett to drop in. But if there's nothing envelope-pushing about their sound, it was well-executed, nicely groovy and fit like an old pair of jeans.

Listen to a track from this set here.

The middle act was the big drawing card for me on this night, for though I've seen Maylee Todd on stage a few times before — belting out jams at a Henri Fabergé show, channelling Betty Davis at the Rock Lottery or getting a sluggish indie rock crowd moving at one of her "Sweatshop Hop" interactive exercise classes — I had not seen her doing a set dedicated to her own material. So, a chance to see her with her four-man backing band Pegwee Power, working through a range of styles, her songs swinging whiplash fast from quick to slow and salty to sweet, in a rockin' disco-funky-jazzy stew. Her set included both the jazzy sci-fi excursion "Summer Sounds" (with nice synth sounds from Andrew Scott) as well as a balladic harp and accordion duet (with stand-up bassist Chris Kettlewell pulling double duty). It's possible that her expansive, pan-genre vision might throw some people off, but Todd has such immense stage presence and star power to burn that it seems like she can carry off any song with brio. Even if she she stumbles over a line, laughing at herself all the while, it's in the service of letting the songs breathe with a loosey-goosey spirit.

Alongside the swinging "Hooked" (as catchy as its name suggests), the quieter stuff (including "Protection Plan 101", which saw Todd strapping on her harp) fell in seamlessly. And it still fit in when, not long after, she went big on the set's centrepiece "Aerobics in Space", working up to a joyful shout and imprecating her bandmates, including drummer Jay Anderson, who played the song like he was auditioning for a spot on an Ultimate Breaks and Beats compilation. The band closed with a pretty fabulous cover of Patrice Rushen's "Haven't You Heard". That name didn't ring any bells for me, but looking her up, the description of a prodigiously talented jazz musician with a string of R&B hits sounds like someone Todd could emulate. Her album Choose Your Own Adventure is coming out next month on the local Do Right! label, and should certainly gain some attention from a broader audience.

Listen to a track from this set here.

The headliners on the night were London's The Wave Pictures. I came in with no foreknowledge whatsoever of the trio. As they started playing, my first impression was of a peppy rock band, basic drums/bass/guit, with vocalist David Tattersall pulling out rocking solos on each of the first couple numbers. Very enjoyable stuff. With their combination of rock hooks and observational lyrics, the first sort of comparison that came up in my mind was of a mildly poppier Arctic Monkeys with a Violent Femmes undercarriage (thanks to Franic Rozycki's bass work) and heart-on-sleeve lyrics.

Which is interesting when compared to my after-the-fact impression when I sat down to listen to their Instant Coffee Baby and If You Leave it Alone albums (recently issued on this side of the pond as a double disc package), and found their recorded incarnation to be much more folk-forward. One song is a co-write with Herman Dune, and that's actually a pretty accurate sort of sign-post of their recorded sound. Though that foundation of their sound seems rather obvious in retrospect, on the scene and taking them in for the first time, that wasn't what I drew from it at all — I was enjoying some literate, frills-free rock'n'roll.

The band were equipped with some real top-notch songs, like "Leave the Scene Behind" and "Friday Night in Loughborough" (complete with catchy "la-la-la-la-la" chorus"). And switching things up, charmingly bashful drummer Jonny Helm came around from behind the kit to sing "Sleepy Eye", one arm held coyly behind his back as he sang in an unaffected voice. Not long after, Tattersall stepped down onto the floor to sing "I Thought Of You Again" sans amplification. Around the room — even in the back — everybody quieted down and leaned in to listen. Such a simple trick, but magical when it works.

I was pretty charmed by the band. And they seemed to be having a good time, both in Canada generally ("It's nice to be in Canada," Tattersall joked, "because we all worship the same Queen.") and in this bar particularly, impressed by the turnout at was, truth be told, a semi-full room.¹

They closed with the doubleheader of "Kiss Me"² and "Now You Are Pregnant" — "those two in sequence make biological sense," commented Tattersall — ending on a charming high note. This was one of those delayed reaction kind of sets, where you realize after the fact how enjoyable it was. Not that I wasn't chuffed with it at the time, but it grew on me even more in retrospect. The band already had a few fans in town — there were a couple people requesting songs — and now I'm among their number, so hopefully they'll make it back this way.

Check out a couple songs from this set here.

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¹ "It's really nice you guys came — you have really idea how many shows in a row we just did where there was nobody," Tattersall commented, attesting to the uphill climb there is for a talented but underexposed band trying to "break through" a bit in America.

² Wherein the detail-minded might note that Tattersall substituted a lyric about loving Thriller for the album version's reference to Pet Sounds.

Gig: Young Galaxy

Young Galaxy / Treasure Hunt / Cancel Winter

The Drake Underground. Thursday, September 10, 2009.

It'd been a couple years since I'd taken in a show downstairs at the Drake. Not because I'd been consciously avoiding it — although it's not my fave joint to go to by any means. Although the Underground room is cozy enough, I must confess I feel a tad uncomfortable amongst the crowd that goes to the Drake to, y'know, be seen at the Drake — especially at the start of the film festival, with extended hours in effect and a whole other type of crowd underfoot. I'm sure it's superficial of me to think that it's just a destination for superficial people, but, well... y'know. Plus the drinks are gawdawful expensive.

An advertised 8 o'clock doors time turned out to be rather optimistic. When I strolled in about 8:45, I joined a queue winding up the stairway to the basement, and waited around for a few minutes before gaining ingress. At least we didn't have to wait too, too long after that for the gig to get under way.

First up, an unannounced addition to the bottom of the bill, a local combo called Cancel Winter. Inoffensive and competent, they played a thirty-five minute set of slightly mershy pop/rock. Two guits and keyb showed some musical versatility, there were hooks there, and everything fell into place just so, but by and large their music didn't do anything for me.¹ File under "vaguely likable", but further research probably isn't warranted. Maybe their presence on this same bill as Young Galaxy made me sort of feel like they were presenting a similar sort of thing, but with the edges filed down some. Well crafted, but a bit too tight for my tastes — probably some commercial potential there, though.

Billed as something of a supergroup, Treasure Hunt came rocking as a double rhythm section — two drummers, two bassists.² Of all the members' past projects, Holy Fuck might be the most immediate touchstone here, although with more of a metal undercurrent — think, perhaps, of Holy Fuck covering Primus, and you're getting warm. All instrumental, so the songs relied on the drummers' rhythmic propulsion and the heavy chugging melodicism of the basses. Generally entertaining, if not entirely down my alley. One of the string players relied a bit too heavily on one pedal, a sort of super-octave device or something that raised it up squeaky helium-like. Some of the shine was taken off it when a bunch of drunken frat-types — the sort for whom Borat impressions are still considered the height of wit — decided to start throwing themselves around with abandon, forcing a bunch of people who had been minding their own business to move out of their way.

Young Galaxy is a band that has managed to worm its way into my favour by twice taking me by surprise with a fantastic live presentation. Their self-titled debut album was okay enough, but I never really got them 'til I saw them them live, opening for Besnard Lakes at Lee's, October '07, and they positively blew the headliner away. Similarly, when I saw them this spring at CMW I was reminded how good they could be, and left anticipating a much-delayed second album.

That album (Invisible Republic) finally came out, and this was the local CD release show. Having given it a couple spins over the days leading up, I was pleasantly surprised with the big strides the band have made with this recording, turning in a positively excellent-sounding disc, packed with good songs. Perhaps it's a weird balancing out, then, that after being jazzed up by the album, I was brought down by a more... ordinary performance. Which isn't to say it was a bad show. But the previous times I'd seen them live, I'd left liking the band more. This time, I left liking the band the same amount.

Not to say the band wasn't working hard at it. Coming out dressed in druid chic, with hoods and ritual makeup, the band were giving their all, but it somehow just came out a little bit flat. The spark and energy that really won me over previously just wasn't there this time 'round. There was a strong start, with Catherine McCandless leading with a one-two punch of "Queen Drum" and "Outside The City", the latter one of only a pair of excursions back to the first album. Stephen Ramsay dedicated "Dreams" to his parents' dog, recovering after having been hit by a car, though sadly in the middle of the track a keyboard cable started to frazzle out, emitting a crackling buzz. Technical problems led to a couple minutes' lag, and when the band finally launched into "Firestruck", the new album's closer — an elegant slow-dance that burns with longing and puts a vivid image in my mind of the night's last dance in a high school gym — a song that should have been the centrepiece of the set... it kinda fizzled. The audience had begun talking amongst themselves and had lost focus. Somewhere in the back, a woman was singing — not singing along, just singing some random thing to herself or her companions. And so forth. In some subtle way the spell was broken, and the song was just a song. After that, the band recovered somewhat, and did a good run through "Destroyer" and got a good cheer for the populist "Come and See"³ before closing out the fifty-minute set with "Long Live the Fallen World". There was no encore — by the end the band kinda gave the impression they just wanted to get through it and get off the stage.

It's kinda unfair — if not unreasonable — to go to a gig expecting to have your socks knocked off, so perhaps part of my disappointment was partially a result of unduly heightened expectations. Again, it was an okay gig. Hopefully this album catches some ears, and the band gets back to town for a less problem-plagued show, with no technical glitches and a different crowd.

Listen to a track from this set here.

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¹ One song was, admittedly, kinda appealing, but it also left me humming "No Cars Go" to myself afterwards.

² Digging around some — the band doesn't seem to have a myspace yet — it looks like the membership is thus: Loel Campbell (drums, Wintersleep), Arlen Thompson (drums, Wolf Parade), Dustin Hawthorne (bass, ex-Hot Hot Heat), Mike Bigelow (bass, ex-Wintersleep/Holy Fuck)

³ "This song's in a beer commercial!" Ramsay noted, which possibly pitched it at the right level for the Drake crowd.