Recording: Explorer feat. Matty Dee

Artist: Explorer feat. Matty Dee

Song: Under My Wheels [Alice Cooper cover]

Recorded at Lee's Palace (DEATH TO T.O. V), October 30, 2015.

Explorer feat. Matty Dee - Under My Wheels

For its massive fifth year of Hallowe'en covers, DEATH TO T.O. upsized from its home at The Silver Dollar/Comfort Zone to Lee's Palace and the Dance Cave. That allowed it to keep its sprawling two-stage upstairs/downstairs dynamic even as it accommodated a bigger crowd than ever. Besides curating no fewer than seventeen (!) short sets, Dan Burke and Elliot Jones also kept things running on schedule, with one set starting quite crisply as the one on the other stage ended for nearly the whole night. And as always, the bands put in a lot of work — not just musically, but a lot of the time in trying to capture the look and mannerisms of the band they were covering.

Alex Gray was totally on point fronting this re-creation of the classic Alice Cooper band, eyes caked with black make-up as he stalked the stage while Matty Dee tore off the guitar parts. Changing into a straight-jacket and everything, the only touch missing was throwing a live chicken to the rabid Toronto crowd — which is probably for the best.

Recording: Slim Twig

Artist: Slim Twig

Songs: Textiles On Mainstreet + Cannabis [Serge Gainsbourg cover]

Recorded at The Horseshoe Tavern, October 21, 2015.

Slim Twig - Textiles On Mainstreet

Slim Twig - Cannabis

This hometown celebration for the new Thank You For Stickin' With Twig saw Max Turnbull playing with a crew of his frequent musical associates, even if it was a rather different band than he'd brought to the Silver Dollar earlier this year. With Meg Remy busy conquering Europe as U.S. Girls there were no keybs, the gap instead filled with guitars. Lotsa guitars. The core quintet saw the Flying V-sporting Turnbull joined by Simone T-B on drums, Tim Westberg on bass and the expatriated-to-London Anthony Nemet (Actual Water) on guit. That provided plenty crunch as the band rolled through a series of glam-powered rockout versions of songs from the new album, but to up the ante for the finale, the band added Matt "Doc" Dunn and Matty Dee — two more lead guitarists to power through Bowie's "Black Country Rock" and Serge Gainsbourg's "Cannabis", as well as a brand new tune. Quite a wall of sound and a wallop of good ol' Slim Twig ostentatious maximalism.