Recording: Overnight

Artist: Overnight

Song: It Gets You Down

Recorded at The Horseshoe Tavern, April 17, 2015.

Overnight - It Gets You Down

Overnight is a continuation of the work that Carla and Lynette Gillis (ex-Plumtree) began a couple years back as Sister. The main shift in this reformulation is an increased skew towards heaviness, such that the band is now right at home in the opening slot of a Biblical gig. With a fill-in keyboardist on hand, the group tackled some cuts from their recent debut album for the early-arriving crowd.

[Overnight will be opening for Montréal's Heat at The Silver Dollar on Thursday, May 28th.]

In-store: Sonic Boom Record Store Day

Sonic Boom Record Store Day (feat. Teenanger / Bidiniband / Rouge / Ben Gunning / Sister / Light Fires)

Sonic Boom Records. Saturday, April 16, 2011.

Once again, the good people at Sonic Boom went all-out for their annual celebration of Record Store Day, crafting an event that really made the store feel like a special destination on a soggy spring day. Besides offering many of the exclusive RSD releases for sale, there was free pizza for the customers and special guest DJ's spinning their favourite songs. And, all day long on the hour there were live sets on the basement stage.

2 p.m.: Teenanger

I missed Modern Superstitions, who were first up on the day, coming down the stairs with Teenanger just getting started, and quickly bringing a considerable racket to the low-ceilinged basement. Bristling with infectious energy, the band spoke punkrock truth to power: "This song's for Stephen Harper — it's called 'Evil Man'." With a few minute-long bursts, like "Tired of You" ("This one's a little bit of a mosher — so keep your children safe, I guess.") this quick set put a lot of climb-on-the-amps energy into the room, ending with the looming menace of "Frights".¹

Listen to a track from this set here.

3 p.m.: Bidiniband

It's not rock'n'roll until someone falls over, regardless of your age. So even if it might seem that one-time Rheostatic Dave Bidini has been spending most of his time transitioning himself to a CBC-approved author, there's evidently still some hunger for rock'n'roll chaos. Bidiniband are not a dramatic reinvention from what he used to do — and in fact the set opened with "Fat", one of Bidini's Rheos songs, and the nimble guitar line and those specific cadences ("I'm sorry / if I said / you were fat") clearly had the same DNA as the newer stuff, its shifting musical and narrative structures being a recurring implement in Bidini's toolbox.

Bidini was backed by a veteran band, including fellow Rheostatic Don Kerr on drums, bassist Doug Friesen and guitarist Paul Linklater. The latter (also a member of The Pinecones) brought plenty nifty guitar moves and swapped Record Store Day stories when Bidini chatted about working at the Albion Mall Music World — and why he got fired.

Meanwhile, there was a mix of songs from the group's first album The Land Is Wild alongside a few from the then-in-progress In The Rock Hall², including the album's title track, which would be the set's dramatic peak. Working up from a slow start ("it starts like every Neil Young song, but don't worry," Bidini joked) to a big guitar showcase with Linklater stepping down from the stage to the floor to solo, Bidini joined him and the stood shoulder to shoulder in a wide stance before doing a back-to-back power move, Bidini leaning over to serve as a table for Linklater to lean back on while he soloed.

Whether it was will-to-rock enthusiasm or just a declaration of seniority, the band played the longest set of the ones I saw on the day, going past fifty minutes, and would have been willing to keep going if allowed. The set closed out with "Last of the Dead Wrong Things", with another build-up-to-guitarpalypse where Linklater managed to unsettle himself and fall over before Bidini slipped in a few lines from XTC's "Making Plans for Nigel".

Listen to a track from this set here.

4 p.m.: Rouge

Rouge was a band I'd been wanting to see for a while, based solely on the members' other strong work. Founded by Kelly McMichael (also of Gentleman Reg's band) and Jessica Tollefsen (known for her work in Green Go) as a sexy disco dance party spectacular, they were now rounded out by Jess' sister Emma on drums. The set started off slowly, fighting against some technical gremlins, but once they started "Modern Lovers I" and the beat picked up, there was no looking back — this had get-you-moving appeal aplenty.

Electro-pop sexual revolutionaries with runs in their pantyhose, the musical imperative was universal enough to generate an extra awww factor when some small fry up front dancing were invited up on stage for the next song. ("I hope no one's paying attention to our lyrics," McMichael mused afterward a little sheepishly.)

With everything "live", this is an exciting rock unit to boot, capable of mixing in a bit of a menacing groove, as witnessed on the final track "Destruction". You can hear a couple songs on their bandcamp, but given that they play around regularly, you should definitely see 'em — all the better if it's late at night in a dark room.

Listen to a track from this set here.

5 p.m.: Ben Gunning

A change of musical gears after that, with Ben Gunning bringing the same expansive lushness I'd experienced last time I'd caught him and his combo. There's more than a touch of Steely Dan and bands of that ilk in Gunning's (quite literal) yacht rock stylings.³ This time 'round the band was without the next-level smoothness of Joseph Shabison's saxophone, but it was still pretty lush, thanks to Michael Davidson's smooth work on vibes.

For me, the real delight was the presence of Allie Hughes, Alana Stuart and Felicity Williams on backing vocals — that's an enormous amount of talent on stage right there. Gunning's slightly adenoidal yelp is sometimes the least elegant part of his songs, so it's to his credit that he's canny enough to use the backing vocals to provide a sweet countertexture. Songs like "Reverence" brought all this into focus, with Gunning's gift for hooks on display in equal measures with a slightly strained vocal. But by no means is his singing the sort of thing to induce seasickness — you should more think of it as the most workmanlike crewmember on a luxury yacht, for there'd be no trip without it.

Listen to a track from this set here.

6 p.m.: Sister

Sister, a "tender, heavy indie pop" unit, is led by guitarist/keyboardist/vocalist Carla Gillis (here rocking a Black Mountain t-shirt) and her sister Lynette (drums/vox), both formerly of Plumtree. Along with bassist Pete Johnston, the trio play with a savvy spareness, the fizzy blur of Plumtree's songs supplanted by a penchant for beefed-up arrangements that are self-confident enough to linger and rock out a bit. That was certainly evident on a tasty guitar outro to "Wishbone" early on. They also eke out a fair amount of variation, from the implied twang of "Off Ramp Up Ahead" to the piano-rock of "Imaginary Love Notes".

Frequent collaborator Geoff Miller joined the group on keyboards for "Orion", broadening the sound a bit. At the more rockin' end of their spectrum, the as-yet unreleased "Showed Up on the Beach" is constructed to be easily expandable for as much guitar soloing as the occasion requires, while the set-closing "Feather on the Ocean Floor" came with a bouncy, dance-y vibe — plus an awesome fake ending and reprise that feels incomplete without a disco ball spinning overhead.

Although the music is somewhat unassuming it's good stuff. After a relative abundence of shows following the release of their EP, the band has been quieter of late, but hopefully this augers a return with some new songs in tow.

Listen to a track from this set here.

7 p.m.: Light Fires

With James Bunton busy recording with Ohbijou in Montreal, it looked like this might be a solo set from Light Fires. But vocalist Regina Gentlelady (who sounds something like this guy) managed to find some company on stage by enlisting a couple mannequins from the depths of Sonic Boom's storage area. The set started with an a capella number, employing an autotuned vocal effect (which I didn't recall from when I'd seen Regina before) before hitting play on the laptop to kick in the beats. Still working out the solo kinks⁴ it didn't quite take, and the song had to be restarted.

Some of the songs, like "The Better", had stuck with me from that last time, but it was really with the big beat of "10 Feet Tall" that things really got moving, and I was pleased to see that Regina was getting cheers from the crowd starting to build up for Zeus.

There was also lots of new material, including a "political" song (about a "new revolution") as well as one that borrowed Maggie MacDonald's "I like to work / I like to fuck" chorus from a Republic of Safety song. And the set closed with the kick-ass anthem "If You're Bored", Regina telling the crowd there would be a video forthcoming with no shortage of sass: "The video starts me. [beat] Obviously. [whispered:] Who else would it star?"

Listen to a track from this set here.

There was still more to come, with the biggest crowds of the night assembling to see Zeus and Wooden Sky. I surely would have enjoyed that as well, but I had to head out and duck on to the subway for another show.⁵

Bonus content! I lent a hand to Graeme, who was capturing the day's events for NOW, so my audio is used on the videos for all the bands above.

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¹ This is the title track of Teenanger's new album, which will be seeing the light of day at a release show with Young Mother and Strange Attractor at Sneaky Dee's on March 1, 2012.

² In the Rock Hall has, in fact, just now been released, and came with an album release show just a couple weeks back. Perhaps appropriately for a writer with such a fondness for hockey, Bidini + band will be playing a free (and kid-friendly!) show at Harbourfront Centre's skating-themed weekend right next to the rink in the Lakeside Terrace — February 19, 2012, 2 p.m.

³ As Gunning packed up after his set, celebrity DJ Norman Blake (from Teenage Fanclub) started to play. He was my favourite of the day, playing stuff like The Diodes and Liliput, and seguing from Swell Maps to Steely Dan. It felt befitting, somehow, that I saw Gunning singing along under his breath to the latter as he gathered up his gear.

⁴ Um — not in that way. So far as I know.

⁵ Record Store Day 2012 is coming up on Saturday, April 21. No word yet on what sort of celebration Sonic Boom'll be putting on this year, but I do note that after a bit of a quieter stretch after moving to their new location, it does look like their in-store shows are starting to pick up again, with Boys Who Say No playing on Saturday, February 18, 2012.

Gig: Tranzac New Year's Eve

Tranzac New Year's Eve (feat. Octoberman / Sandro Perri / The Wilderness of Manitoba / The Rural Alberta Advantage / Light Fires / Hooded Fang / Sister / I Am Robot And Proud)

The Tranzac. Friday, December 31, 2010.

Deciding where I was going to go for New Year's Eve was pretty much a no-brainer. Instead of going to a bar and feeling dour, for the past couple years I'd enjoyed the friendly-faces vibe in the Tranzac's shabby living-room surroundings — the fact that there was good selection of local bands playing is almost just a bonus.¹ At least that's the sensibility I tried to approach the evening with, as more of a fun and social time than a musical event to be observed and documented. That the notes below veer in and out of thoroughness is a sign of my mixed success at the endeavour — try as I might to just hang out, my brain usually gets caught up in the gig at hand.

Pre-show festivities out meant that I got into the Tranzac around 9:30 — early for a gig, never mind New Year's Eve — but it did mean that I'd missed an early set by Laura Barrett. As it was, just managed to catch the end of Octoberman, which is essentially a vehicle for the songs of Marc Morrissette, as far as I can tell. Sometimes he plays solo, but here he was backed by a group of friends — I recognized some of the people with him on stage, including violin player Randy Lee. I didn't have more than a passing notion about the band going in, but the vaguely Wilco-y material that I heard intrigued, putting the band on my radar for a fuller accounting.

Listen to a track from this set here.

Popping into the main hall, caught a bit of the end of Sandro Perri's set², but didn't stick around too long, heading back to the smaller Southern Cross Lounge to snag a spot for The Wilderness of Manitoba. As the acoustic guitar and prayer bowls sounded the extended opening to "Hermit", I wondered if the NYE crowd would stay quiet to listen to this. But though the chatter picked up a bit as the set went on, it was far better than I expected.

Like a lot of local bands, The WoM had played some of their earliest gigs in this room, and their homespun, rootsy sounds still felt quite right here. Fairly packed with people, despite playing opposite The Rural Alberta Advantage, the room was boilingly hot by set's end, which was acknowledged with the otherwise-unseasonable "Summer Fires". A nice capper to a successful year for the band, the set drew mostly from their full-length When You Left the Fire, but dipped back for the older "Evening" (by now a clap-along standard to the audience). And mixing up the setlist, the band played the brand-new "Chasing Horses", a sign that there's more to come.

Listen to a track from this set here.

And then back to the main hall — where the big digital clock projected above the stage was at about quarter to eleven — for the end of The Rural Alberta Advantage's set. Didn't feel too bad about missing out on the rest, having caught them at Lee's a couple weeks before. It was surprisingly roomy for a set by a band that'd sold that much bigger venue not long before, with a small cadre of folks up front, and a lot of elbow room and people chatting further back. And it was rather unusual to see Paul Banwatt to the rear of his bandmates in the "usual" drummer alignment instead of being lined up with them at the front of the stage — though that was explained as singer/guitarist Nils Edenloff thanked Hooded Fang for sharing their gear before they wrapped up with "The Dethbridge in Lethbridge"

I only saw a song-and-a-half of RAA, which is okay, as on this night I was more looking forward to Light Fires, who I'd been interested in seeing for awhile. I'm generally interested in anything new from Reg Vermue, for whom this has become an outlet for something different than Gentleman Reg, his "name" band. But though usually considered as having come from the troubadour school, he has long shown an interest in electronic music — the electronic stylings of "We're in a Thunderstorm" having been presaged by some other dancefloor dabblings. Further giving this a distinct identity, Vermue performed the set as Regina Gentlelady, his drag persona, foregrounding all the brash fabulousness he can muster.

He was backed up on stage by the more subdued James Bunton, best known for his work in Ohbijou. Here, the drummer was working with an entirely different set of rhythmic tools, standing barefoot behind a table of electronics working the beat in real time.

As they got ready to play, Vermue teased the crowd with a few a capella lines of Lady Gaga's "Bad Romance", and if I were a more with-it observer of popular culture — in fact, I had to google the lyrics to figure out what song it was — I'm sure I could whip off some astute observations on the aspirational connections at play here. Instead, though, I'll just have to let Vermue's pithy, slogan-worthy choruses speak for themselves, and the most memorable of the lot — "If you're bored, make it up!" — does the job nicely.

Working in this beat-driven domain, Vermue boiled his lyrics down to easy-to-grasp catchphrases, like in "The Better" ("the riskier the better / the butter makes it better") where his words were warped with an aggressive autotune effect. I liked the buzzy upbeat groove of "Let's Get Divorced", after which Vermue had to slow things down for a song that was less dance-y and more synth poppy — and actually one of the best songs they had. Meanwhile, as the pair moved through a full set (nine songs, all told) the crowd was keeping busy batting around the dozens of balloons that had been dropped from above. A good way to ease out the year.³

After that, a quick changeover so Guy Lombardo Hooded Fang could be on stage and ready with a couple minutes to spare before the giant digital clock hit midnight. As the crowd counted down to the new year, D. Alex Meeks greeted it with a drumroll and the horns kicked into "Auld Lang Syne", the rest of the band picking it up with an amusing slight lurch before veering off into an equally unsteady cover of David Bowie's "Let's Dance". As singer/guitarist Daniel Lee read the lyrics from his notebook, Nicholas Hune-Brown pulled a sweet 80's new wave vibe from his keyboards. It had an appropriately "let's get ripped and dance" sort of feeling.

After making notes that Matt Beckett (ex-Bicycles) was sitting in for bassist April Aliermo and considering the merits of a pleasingly ragged run through "Highway Steam", I remembered it was New Year's Eve, and reckoned I should try and have a happy and sociable time to try and start the year off on the right foot, so I made the unusual move of wandering around, and treating the music as background, so I don't recall what else went down in much detail, though there was an unprecedented second cover (even one is rare for Hooded Fang), with a sprightly clap- and dance-along version of New Order's "Age of Consent".

During HF's last song, moved over with a bunch of friends back to the Southern Cross lounge, which was running a little late. We managed to step in to catch pretty much the whole set from Sister, who I'd been waiting to see again after enjoying the first time I'd encountered them. They were still playing the snappy "Wishbone" as we entered, and I thought this might be another set where I'd be paying half-attention, but my friends settled attentively in right up front, so I ended up back in my usual mode.

So named for the connection between singer/guitarist Carla Gillis (also a local music writer of note) and her sister, drummer/vocalist Lynette, the trio (rounded out by Pete Johnston on bass) were mostly playing songs from their EP, as well as some that haven't been released yet, like "Imaginary Love Notes". A bit more considered and "classic rock" than the Gillises past work in well-regarded East Coast fuzz-poppers Plumtree, Sister's songs tend to stretch out to four or five minutes. Letting the groove cook a little, the journey is just as important as the lyrics, fitting for a band whose songs employ no shortage of travel imagery, from the "Off Ramp Up Ahead" to the train in "Orion". On the latter, Geoff Miller once again joined the trio on keyboards, adding a tasty saturation to the sound before the set closed with the jaunty "Feather on the Ocean Floor".

After that, a lot of the crowd started to make their way out, so by the time that I Am Robot and Proud were getting started around 1:30, enough bodies had left that I could grab a seat. And though there was still some boozy rambunctiousness afoot, it was staggery and muted, and this felt more like a regular Tranzac gig. All the moreso with the players on the stage being no strangers to this room. The brainchild of Shaw-Han Liem (on keybs and laptop), the live band is rounded out with Robin Buckley (drums), Mike Smith (bass) and Jeremy Strachan (guit). Those musicians can be found with Liem in a series of overlapping bands, stretching back from the Sea Snakes to more current projects including Tusks and Jim Guthrie's band.

The vibe for this instrumental project is technofuturistic optimism, smooth and sleek. This is the sort of music that should come with projections behind the band — perhaps computer-animated footage of an endlessly unfurling highway ahead, or an anime superhero flying off into the horizon. On studio recordings, the band is more strictly defined by Liem's keyb sounds, sometimes sounding like distant kin to Richard D. James Album-era Aphex Twin. But with the band behind him, there was more "rock" (even of a restrained, arranged sort) in the sound, and tracks like the fab "Making a Case for Magic" could easily fit in on a Sea and Cake album, with Strachan's sustained tone bending up against Smith playing the highest notes of his bass. The songs stretched out enough that there were only played five titles in the half-hour set, including a new one called "Circles" and finishing off with "Center Cities" from The Electricity in Your House Wants to Sing, a title which also sums up the band's vibe pretty well.

Casting a warm spell on the humanoids dispersing from the cozy Tranzac, the music gave me a shield of protection against the hell-is-other-people parade of Bloor Street at two a.m. on New Year's Eve. Goodness, was I ever glad I was in the Tranzac all night and not out with those people.

Listen to a track from this set here.

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¹ And, of course, the night was also important as another in the series of fundraisers to help get the Tranzac back on a stable financial foundation.

² A., also searching for a non-bar NYE excursion, came out for the night. Having seen Hooded Fang before, I think he was under the impression that all the bands would be upbeat, poppy fare — y'know, something to dance to on New Year's Eve. That something as artfully askew as Sandro Perri could be featured on the main stage, even relatively early in the night perplexed him, and as we headed out of the room he asked me, "is there any music here that won't make me me want to kill myself?" With HF and Light Fires it mostly ended up a draw and he survived the night.

³ Light Fires are a natural pick for Pride, and will be playing the Alterna-Queer stage (Alexander Parkette, next to Buddies in Bad Times) on Sunday, July 3, 2011 at 3:15 — well worth ducking away from the parade for.

Collaborations #1: Video Round-up

With the frightening immediacy of NXNE out of the way for now, I'll soon enough be returning to my more usual place in the gig/time continuum. (Coming next week — reviews from 2011). While I get caught up on sleep and put the finishing touches on the next couple posts, how about some filler?

Despite my natural inclination to want to retreat to my wilderness cabin, remote from humanity, and peck away at my manual typewriter to craft my manifestos, keeping this thing running tends to put me in contact with folks. And as it turns out, one of the most satisfying parts of the whole operation comes when I can pass a recording back to a band:

And sometimes they show up in interesting ways:

I have a lot of respect for the people who faithfully document the music scene on video — they have a lot more stuff to worry about when they're at a show than I do. I've considered it a badge of honour to be able to help out with a couple of the city's best, including published author Colin Medley:

And I've also pitched in with Graeme Phillips and his army of camera operators:

These guys work in the present tense — a lot of this stuff I haven't even caught up to yet. Hopefully there'll be more to come!

Recording: Sister

Artist: Sister

Song: Feather on the Ocean Floor

Recorded at Sonic Boom (Record Store Day Celebration), April 16, 2011.

Sister - Feather on the Ocean Floor

Review to follow — my notes for this set can now be found here.

Recording: Sister

Artist: Sister

Song: Follow Me

Recorded at The Garrison, October 29, 2010.

Sister - Follow Me

My notes for this set can be found here.

Gig: Sheezer

Sheezer (Sister)

The Garrison. Friday, October 29, 2010.

With Hallowe'en falling on the Sunday, those who planned all week, those who planned all month, those who planned all year had a whole weekend to be in costume. So unsurprisingly on what could be foreseen as a goofy fun-fun sort of night, there were no few people dressed up. Openers Sister got in on the act, the trio all wearing costume ball-style bird masks.

"I think already have feathers in my mouth," announced Carla Gillis after the first song. Gillis, known to local music fans as a writer at Now magazine was joined by her sister Lynette. The pair have played together in bands for a good stretch, all the way back to Halifax Explosion-era band Plumtree.¹ Joined here by Pete Johnston on bass, this was pretty appealing from the get go — power-pop with no lack of crunch but leavened with sweetness. At a theoretical level, this is the sort of thing I dig (and certainly used to dig a lot).

The set started with "Wishbone", a super-catchy tune that might be a cousin to Veruca Salt's "Forsythia", though it leans a bit too heavily on minimal lyrical repetition ("Crack it half / wait / gotta make a wish first"). Though it's easy to pigeonhole the band into that narrow terrain, the songs owe something more to a classic rock sensibility, generally allowing themselves to stretch out. These are more like four-five minute songs than two-three minute bashers — there's a confident, arranged sense of maturity at play. On "Orion", probably the most striking of the band's compositions, the trio was joined by Geoff Miller (bandmate to the Gillises in their synth-heavy post-Plumtree project Bontempi) on keyboards.

With only a five-song EP to their credit, it's not surprising that there was some other material than that filling out the set. Carla moved from guitar to keyb for one of the unreleased ones with Lynette sharing the lead vox. That one felt a little spare, but better was "Feather on the Ocean Floor", which won with a combination of bouncy bass and cold-shoulder keyb tones. The set ended with Carla back on the guitar for "Showed Up on the Beach", as she announced, "in honour of the Weezer songs, this is totally going to rock." Seven songs all told, and it was pretty tasty stuff. The band don't look to be playing a whole lot right now, but do check 'em out if you get a chance.

Listen to a song from this set here.

Between sets, the crowd was getting thicker. It was interesting to note a sort of divide in the crowd, between people who remember when the first couple Weezer albums came out and the younger crowd for whom this was something more like "classic rock" than "90's nostalgia". Unsurprisingly, that younger cohort were louder and more inclined to dress up — including a crew of women dressed as angels that ended up in front of me. Young and drunk, they didn't quite have their fingers on the notion that giant wings on one's back is an impractical accessory in a crowded bar, and during the headliner's set one of them kept lurching backwards into the woman standing next to me. For a moment, I thought the angel was going to get socked in the jaw, based on the glares that were being issued. "It's like they've never been in a bar before," commented K., shaking her head at them after getting bumped into a couple times herself. But, when Sheezer plays, you're going to get people who are drunk and or/celebrating.

In a nod to both Hallowe'en and their own teamwork, the band emerged in full Sailor Moon regalia.² They started the set with a Blue Album one-two of "My Name Is Jonas" and "No One Else" and kept going song-for-song from there — and it might indicate the level of my Weezer fandom that I only figured that out after the fact. The sound was a little muddled to start, but after a pause to tweak a few details, it came together.

Once the sound was tied down, the set really took off, with little flourishes that gave the music some zing — like Alysha Haugen and Laura Barrett tossing in a coordinated twirl move on "The World Has Turned And Left Me Here". Magali Meagher sang the lead on that one, but over the course of the set, all of the members except Haugen would get a turn on lead vocals.

I enjoyed how the band isn't reluctant to juice things up by rushing the tempos a little — driving the song from behind the drum kit and providing vocals, Dana Snell gave "Buddy Holly" an amusingly zooming ride. Compared to the last time I saw 'em, the band was handling the material more smoothly, but without losing that appealing rough edge.

"Undone - The Sweater Song" involved inviting an audience member dressed as Hurley³ up on stage to act as an as interlocutor with Tuxedo Mask during one of the song's spoken segments. Hurley wanted to sing the lyrics, natch, just as pretty much everyone on hand was doing to some extent. That made it hard for even the likes of me not to crack a smile.

The band had also added "In the Garage" to their repertoire since the last time 'round, with some harmonica from Robin Hatch. The band made one slight alteration to end the set, subbing in "The Good Life" to give the main set a rousing conclusion.

They returned for a three-song encore, now dipping into Pinkerton for the popular sing-along "El Scorcho", which seemed to make people in the crowd very happy, and the band just as much — they were grinning at each other and laughing as they played. Then they went back to finish off the Blue Album with the extended, heartfelt "Only In Dreams". Barrett shouted a Sailor Moon-ish "arigato!" as they left the stage.

It arguably says something about how much I respect the members of this band that I've broken my "no cover bands" rule to see them not once, but twice. Especially for a bunch of songs by a band that I'm neither here nor there about. Which isn't to say that this was some sort of grim experience for me — drunk, bumping angels notwithstanding it was a fun time, but my un-devotedness probably made me a bit more of a scoreboard-watcher than usual, so to speak, keeping an eye out on the division of labour and who took the vox on which song etc. We should all take our fun as we can find it, I guess.

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¹ Plumtree have had a bit of a post-career boost lately with last year's ubiquitous Scott Pilgrim film adaptation, the books having taken their name from one of their songs. For those catching up with Plumtree, there a new best-of album available, which is well-worth snapping up.

² I think Laura Barrett was the titular leader of the pack, but's probably for the best that I can't remember which member of the Sailor Moon crew is which. Though perhaps that implies that I used to be able to, which is perhaps something I oughtn't to brag about.

³ Inviting him up was pushing the limits of the band's self-imposed first-two-albums-only Weezer enthusiasm, no?