So this week has kinda sucked for me because I had all four of my wisdom teeth taken out on Wednesday, so I am in a lot of pain and can barely eat/sleep/talk. It was the first time I’ve ever had laughing gas/sedation/surgery though so I feel like more of an adult now, like I can cross those off my list of things I need to experience. The pre-surgery was actually kinda fun, felt like I was in an ep of Grey’s Anatomy or something. Thank god for laughing gas though, I was so scared until that stuff took effect.
Anyway, here are the links I found this week. Lots of good/interesting stuff happening lately.
Is Toronto the greatest music city in the world? The Grid published this article yesterday along with the graphic above, and it seems to have started a deeper look into something I quickly became aware of when I first moved to the city eight years ago – the music scene here is something special. It definitely seems to be reaching a peek right now, and I couldn’t be happier about it.
Toronto is Having a Seattle Moment The New York Times followed it up with this article today, pointing out how humble the original Grid article’s take on it was, saying “Let’s get one thing straight: If this debate was about Cleveland, by this point you would be seeing Drew Carey starring in a viral video marching through the city streets while the city’s assorted bands assemble behind him, then fireworks go off in the sky spelling “HELL YES CLEVELAND ROCKS.” So Toronto, wear your crown proudly. If some disgruntled London or upstart Berlin or swaggering Oakland wants to come at you and knock that crown off your head, LET THEM COME. Don’t preemptively concede to them the first four slots in your theoretical Top 5, which you may or may not deserve to be part of!” Seriously. When I read The Grid article my thoughts were, oh god, tooting our own horn, here comes more motive for the rest of Canada to hate us – but screw that. Toronto has been building up something we should be proud of, and any other city would be, so why are we so afraid to own it? I feel incredibly lucky to be living in this city at a time that is so rich with possibility for Canadian musicians.
The Black Keys’ class war on indie-rock I think its great that they want to bring good music to the mainstream, it’s time mainstream radio stopped sucking. The indie rock world needs to get over the whole idea of ‘selling out’ – its the only way to get rid of bands like Nickelback. The average person needs to be aware that there are better options out there.
Coeur de Pirate - Despite being French Canadian in heritage, it is rare that I like much French Canadian music… so that she stands out from the rest says a lot.
Emotional Baggage Check Super cute idea. Have a problem? Check it, receive a musical cure all response. Want to help someone out? Carry their baggage by reading the problem and providing that musical response. Lovely.
Anonymous downs government, music industry sites in largest attack ever And this is what happens when you shut down Megaupload. There is no winning when trying to take down the internet. Not only will Anon fuck with your websites, there will always be another Megaupload waiting in the wings. Or twenty.
SOPA Is a Symbol of the Movie Industry’s Failure to Innovate Truth. The music industry has found ways to innovate since Napster changed everything – iTunes came along, and things like Pandora, Spotify and so on followed. Hollywood can’t stop the internet anymore than the record labels could. The industry has to adjust to the times.
Why Canadian women lack non-hormonal birth control options This is frustrating. I have had so many problems with hormonal bc, would be nice if we could have the same options as other developed countries. Adding hormones to your body isn’t particularly safe.
WATCH: Lana Del Rey perform “Video Games” And, just because she was so harshly slammed after her SNL performance, I figured I’d post up her performing when she was obviously a lot less nervous – to show that yes, she can sing. It’s easy to hate on people, and her persona makes it tempting to rip her apart, but she does have a voice worth hearing. It was just far FAR too soon for her to be on SNL. That’s way to much pressure for someone who hasn’t even released an album yet. A good manager would know this.
Thanks to a very kind friend who knows what a huge BSS fan I am, I ended up with some Broken Social Scene albums I already own on vinyl, and figured it might be nice to do a giveaway for them here in celebration of the decade + of amazing music they gave us, and the end of an era.
So for the next few weeks, once a week, I will be posting up an album to give to you, starting today with their self titled LP on 180 gram vinyl, including a digital download of the album.
To enter, you must first be a Facebook Fan of TTRO, and like the status about this giveaway. If you do not do this, you will not be entered. Secondly, you must leave a comment below using an email address I can contact you at in the space where it asks you for your email, telling me your best Broken Social Scene related story. Contest closes on Thursday when another BSS vinyl will be up for grabs. (Please be aware that if you have never commented before, your comment will have to be approved first before it shows up, you do not need to submit it again).
To get this started I will tell you one of my BSS related stories. After Forgiveness Rock Record was released in 2010 they did a small show here at Parts & Labour, teaming up with Torontoist, that was basically a ‘whoever gets the most likes’ wins 12 tickets to the private show. Top 4 entries got to go, and I ended up in 5th. I still get so sad when I think about what I missed out on, especially now that I don’t know when I will get to see them perform again.
Here’s my favorite track from this album, stripped down, live at Soundscapes:
Pain is temporary. It may last a minute, or an hour, or a day, or a year, but eventually it will subside and something else will take its place. If I quit, however, it lasts forever.
As if I didn’t love this woman enough already. Thanks to Cameron Crowe I came across this wonderful letter she sent to the composer of the Breakfast at Tiffany’s soundtrack, Henry Mancini. It makes me so happy to know she felt the same way about the necessity of music in film as I do. That was one of the first films I watched as a kid where I really noticed the score (it’s also one of my favorite films of all time).
Here’s what it reads:
Dear Henry,
I have just seen our film – BREAKFAST AT TIFFANY’S – this time with your score.
A movie without music is a little bit like an aeroplane without fuel. However beautifully the job is done, we are still on the ground and in a world of reality. Your music has lifted us all up and sent us soaring. Everything we cannot say with words or show with acting you have expressed for us. You have done this with so much imagination, fun and beauty.
You are the hippest of cats – and most sensitive of composers!
I haven’t blogged in a week because I’ve been struggling with this post. Yet again I felt overwhelmed by the decision of narrowing down the list and writing eloquently about each one (last year I didn’t even write anything about the albums I chose for the same reasons), and ultimately kept putting it off, but here it is.
All of these records inspired me in some way over the year, along with many others that I don’t have the time to write about. They are in no particular order – except for the first one you see right below this text – that is the best album I heard all year.
We Are Augustines – Rise Ye Sunken Ships
If this wasn’t on your radar in 2011, it should have been. I completely lucked out in hearing Rise Ye Sunken Ships at all when I was offered the chance to attend and do a giveaway for their Toronto show at Wrongbar, and after hearing the first track on the album all I could think was “WHAT IS THIS?!” I was floored. I get many albums in my inbox from artists I’ve never heard of and I have an instinctive one minute rule that cuts out the crap fast, so I was expecting yet another decent but not incredible band I would probably turn off after a minute as per usual. But when I pressed play on “Chapel Song” there was no way I was turning it off once I heard Billy McCarthy’s stunning voice – I had to hear the whole song, and the whole album. When each song seemed to make me like them even more, I knew I had found my next favorite band.
The more I obsessively read about them, the more I realized why their sound immediately appealed to me – they saved up all their money to come here and record with Dave Newfeld. Newfeld was responsible for opening my mind to instrumental music beyond Radiohead’s output with his work on my favorite album of the past decade (You Forgot It In People), and he is responsible for my favorite album of 2011 now, as well.
He doesn’t get all the credit though. These are obviously fantastic musicians who worked their ass off touring, recording and writing for years, and most importantly who had a story worth telling. I think that is what separates the memorable artists (and albums) from the rest. If you haven’t lived a life worth writing about, it will show in your art. If you have, it will show in your art. I still want to write a screenplay about McCarthy’s life. Rise Ye Sunken Ships is proof that you can come out of a nightmare and use it to fuel success.
Months later, I still listen to this album at least once a week, and it always fills me with the same excitement it did with that first serendipitous listen.
“Chapel Song” is the best opening track you will find on an album – single worthy accessible melodic pop that eases you into what is to come next. “Headlong into the Abyss” is my favorite song of 2011. ”Book of James” is a euphoric cacophony of sound and one of the best forgiveness songs you’ll ever hear. “Juarez” is a catchy, perfect singalong song despite its earnest lyricism. “East Los Angeles” has my favorite line of the year with You said ‘Wave back, cause these are the best days of your life’ I said ‘I know.. I can’t feel anything’ (I don’t think I’ve ever heard a better description of those incredible out of body moments that happen when things are going really well). “Strange Days” lets you literally count away the bad times, and “Barrel of Leaves” is one of the saddest, yet most beautiful songs of 2011.
Listen to the closing track “The Instrumental” (my favorite instrumental song maybe of all time) below, and see the first link above or my mixtapes for songs that feature McCarthy’s unbelievable Waits meets Springsteen voice.
Hey Rosetta – Seeds
Hey Rosetta is a band that should have been on my radar all along, yet somehow they were not until this album. When I finally listened to Seeds I was instantly in love. They sounded like a big, baroque indie pop band in the tradition of Broken Social Scene and Arcade Fire, that would need a full stage of musicians to replicate their sound. But there was something a little different happening in their music. The lyrics were more reminiscent of my favorite singer songwriters Jeff Mangum and Elliott Smith. By that I mean they combined my two favorite modern forms of music into one perfect thing, reaching a peak with Seeds.
The credit for this has to go to singer Tim Baker, whose lyrics alone made this my choice for the Polaris Prize this year (of course they had no hope against the Arcade Fire machine). If you want to feel pure joy, listen to “Yer Spring.” If you want to feel pure defiance, listen to “Yer Fall”… my love is dead, I buried it and it’s better hid, all the shit we sling into the whipping wind… just an honest kid, I always did everything they said. If you want to be lifted up from a bad place, listen to “Young Glass” – it always makes everything better. If you want to hear the best song out there about bringing life into this world – I don’t think anything else comes close to “Welcome” – it almost makes me want to have a kid just so I can play it for them. There’s no lying about the corrosive world we are bringing the next generation into, but he offers a hope that they will do better than us.
Arkells – Michigan Left
It’s rare a followup album is stronger than the debut (I very much believe in that saying that you write your first album over the course of your whole life, while the next release only gets a year or two) but with Michigan Left Arkells did just that. I liked Jackson Square quite a bit, but it only had two songs that I felt the need to go back to regularly. With this one, I need to listen to over half the songs again and again, months after having first heard it.
“On Paper” is one of my favorite songs of the year - you were so perfectly pretty, I could love every mistake is easily my favorite line on the whole album. ”Coffee” captures that exact feeling of meeting someone you are really into and the frustration that happens when they’re not available, and there isn’t a person alive who can hear “Kiss Cam” and not immediately want to dance around like a fool. It’s infectious.
While Jackson Square felt like a college anthem album with its strong coming of age themes, Michigan Left is the Arkells all grown up, entering the real world with all the good times and bad times that comes with it (“Agent Zero” has to be the darkest they’ve ever sounded). It has me so excited to see where they will go next.
Radiohead – TheKing of Limbs
As I read other blogs best of 2011 lists, one thing I didn’t see much of was this album. I realize a lot of people didn’t love it like I loved it, and that is fine, but it somehow still shocks me to see it receive such little recognition (or maybe I just read too local).
I think it perfectly continued on from where they left off on what is in my opinion the best Radiohead album of them all - In Rainbows. The softer sound they have been perfecting over the past 5 years is deeper and more interesting than anything from the much beloved OK Computer era. I realize the first half of The King of Limbs isn’t as strong (I actually think “Feral” is the only truly terrible song they’ve ever released), but the fact that the last half is the most perfect Side 2 of an album I’ve heard in many years easily makes up for it. I can’t name how many times I listened to “Lotus Flower” through “Separator” on repeat since receiving the vinyl. “Codex” and “Give up the Ghost” are up there with “Reckoner” as my favorite Radiohead songs of all time. Give it another chance if you brushed it off early on into the year.
Timber Timbre - Creep On Creepin’ On
This was my second choice for the Polaris Prize, and this album is something else. Timber Timbre sound like the testosterone laced version of The Dresden Dolls – embodying that elusive genre Palmer coined ‘dark cabaret’ – with the overt creepiness of Taylor Kirk’s voice and the vampire-ish lyrics allowing for a cohesive image to market, but the music obviously rises above any perceived gimmick. It all feels like a really well done concept album, by what is essentially a concept band. Listening to Creep On Creepin’ On is akin to watching a classic horror film, which is an experience I’ve never had with an album. It’s not a record I can fall asleep to without having some incredibly messed up dreams.
Also, it definitely wins the best album name ever.
Lykke Li – Wounded Rhythms
This is the record I wish existed when I was 21 – it’s what heartbroken indie girls everywhere should be listening to instead of Cat Power’s What Would The Community Think (which I think exists purely to make such girls feel suicidal – but I still love it). It steals Adele’s spot on my Top 10 because, like Adele’s music it makes you feel better when things are fucking up, but it gets weirder, darker and more interesting than Adele (Don’t pull your pants before I go down, dont turn away this is my time, I’m your prostitute, you gone get some) while still leaving you feeling happy and uplifted. It doesn’t allow you to wallow in the sadness like the others do.
You won’t be forcing back tears when listening to her sing “Unrequited Love” like you would with Adele’s “Someone Like You”. Instead you will feel okay, because like she says on another track - Sadness is a blessing, sadness is a curse, sadness is my boyfriend, oh sadness I’m your girl. That simplistic line expresses how the bad times are rough when you’re in them, but they beget the most creativity and lead to great follow up albums like these. Be thankful for those who break your heart, it leaves you inspired and takes your art to places it would never go otherwise (maybe because there is something incredibly motivating about wanting to show someone just who they gave up on.)
Black Keys – El Camino
I have loved the Black Keys since first hearing Thickfreakness after being told I had to listen to this insane bluesy rock record made by two white boys from Ohio. I have since been constantly impressed with their ability to release quality albums every single time. There usually comes a time when a band starts to suck, or at least lose what originally made them so appealing – especially once you are seven albums deep – but Dan and Patrick seem to have access to an untapped resource of funky blues rock songs. (I should also note that watching Dan perform with Dr John at Bonnaroo was one of the coolest music moments of my year.)
El Camino is the album you should spin if you’re throwing a party and want everyone to have a really fucking great time.
See this video for further proof.
The Darcys - S/T
I feel incredibly happy for the success The Darcys have had over the past year. They are the definition of a hardworking Toronto band, recording and touring for years before losing a lead singer and going through a rough patch that ultimately paid off when they were picked up by Arts & Crafts, a fate most every unsigned Canadian musicians dreams of.
This album is the kind that grows on you. It doesn’t instantly scream favorite album, but the musicality of it – the small details that come to life on the third or fourth listen – and the hunger behind it, ultimately works its way into your soul. The music is haunting but not in a cryptic way like label-mates Timber Timbre – it doesn’t feel like a screening of Nosferatu - instead it inspires a foreboding of something much more realistic, which they perfectly displayed in the unreal video for Don’t Bleed Me. It works as a literal record of the potential for crashing and burning that they were so close to before they ultimately came together as a four piece to rerecord these songs. Singer Jason Couse is a captivating performer with a gorgeous Thom Yorke-ish tone to his voice. It makes me wonder why he was ever relegated to back up vocals in the first place.
The apocalyptic theme builds on the record until the last few songs, ultimately releasing their fears with the inspiring “When I Am New Again” – and The Darcys are new again, similar to We Are Augustines with the break up of Pela – they have been reborn a stronger band, more engaging than their former incarnation.
Rural Alberta Advantage - Departing
There are bands that I love instantly upon hearing the album (like We Are Augustines and Teenage Kicks) and then there are bands like Rural Alberta Advantage, where the record doesn’t immediately resonate as a classic, but after seeing them live something transformative happens and I instantly feel attached. I think somewhere between watching them perform a cover of the Littlest Hobo theme song and a rendition of “Good Night” acoustic, on top of the bar at the Phoenix, I became attached. The songs felt so personal and intimate in that large room, packed with fans. Something clicked and Departing quickly became a mainstay on my iTunes playlist, and it remains there to this day.
Teenage Kicks - Rational Anthems
Technically this shouldn’t be included because it is not an LP, but I listened to this more than any of the albums released this year. Read my long winded review here. You know when I can write this much on five songs it must have had some kind of insane effect on me. I still listen to it all the time, and if they had made it a full length LP it probably would have edged out We Are Augustines for my number one album spot. Teenage Kicks are without a doubt one of the best bands Toronto has ever produced.
