Recording: Dany Laj And The Looks

Artist: Dany Laj And The Looks

Songs: Annie + Small Town Miner

Recorded at The Horseshoe Tavern, September 6, 2019.

Dany Laj And The Looks - Annie

Dany Laj And The Looks - Small Town Miner

Celebrating their ace new platter Everything New is New Again, Dany Laj and Jeanette Dowling enlisted some local friends to present a special expanded lineup of their group. With Mike Duffield filling the rotating drummer's seat for a couple legs of this tour, it made sense to pull in his Beams partner Anna Mernieks to add some extra guitar, as well as her Ace of Wands bandmate Lee Rose on violin and keybs. That served to beef up the Rockpile/Rumour vibes in this set, giving Laj a fuller, more soulful palette for his articulate working class anthems (Laj's Kirkland Lake upbringing is directly referenced in the set-closing "Small Town Miner"). Filled with amiable swagger, the band blasted through a series of older tunes before presenting the new tracks with power-pop precision. Joyful and self-affirming, the whole thing was delivered with the sly grin of a road-warrior crew revelling in their craft.

Recording: Anna Mērnieks/Mike Duffield/Colin Fisher/Kristel Jax

Artist: Anna Mērnieks/Mike Duffield/Colin Fisher/Kristel Jax

Song: [edited excerpt]

Recorded at Dundas Video ("Track Could Bend #13"), April 5, 2016.

Anna Mērnieks/Mike Duffield/Colin Fisher/Kristel Jax - [edited excerpt]

To my great surprise and delight, Track Could Bend has survived and thrived for a full year. To celebrate, I invited everyone who played the series' first twelve months (more than seventy people!) back for a birthday party. In the end, the night consisted of twenty-seven musicians collaborating over eight short sets, most of which were spontaneous "bands from a hat", drawn by lot before the set started. Given the wide range of musical practices and backgrounds, it was quite exciting to see how much coherence and excellence resulted.

This musical collusion saw Colin Fisher (who, as in his appearance with Body Help at TCB#7, was playing guitar) and Mike Duffield (drummer double duty at TCB#3 in Someflowers of Hell and Demerised Elf Funk) look like they were ready for some serious action when Kristel Jax (who played TCB#3 as Brigitte Bardon't) launched things on another trajectory entirely by interjecting a looped radioblast of a pop song. Anna Mērnieks (the other half of Demerised Elf Funk) was on saxophone, and glided above the fray as everyone found their equilibrium — soon sounds were sliding past each other like fragments of half-heard radio stations as the needle slid down the dial.

[The next Track Could Bend will be at Dundas Video on Tuesday, May 3rd, featuring Kosher Dill Spears, Terms Of Venery (Mike Smith, solo electronics) and Glamour Nails (Lina Allemano + Justin Haynes).]

Recording: Demerised Elf Funk

Artist: Demerised Elf Funk

Song: [first piece]

Recorded at Dundas Video ("Track Could Bend #3"), June 2, 2015.

Demerised Elf Funk - [first piece]

Demerisation (from Latin, literally "to remove the sea") is the process of creating crystalline salt sculptures by allowing ocean water to evaporate. Elf funk is a musical genre that is often said to have peaked in 1968 — but as the recent resurgence of Hobbit Prog proves, there's new life to be found in every musical style. With the help of local drummer Eddie Muffilk, an Elf Funk aficionado, noted scientist Kari Sēnnamen has created musical patterns based on the salt sculptures she has discovered in her lab. Arranged for banjo and drums, the results are delightfully pleasing and full of unexpected moments of invention.

[Track Could Bend will return to Dundas Video on July 7th — more details coming soon!]