Happy long weekend, everyone! How are you spending Victoria Day? I think we all know how good ol’ Mayor Ford will be spending it. But really, drug abuse is a serious, horrible thing, so as much pleasure as we are all taking in this final epic fall he is taking for being the ULTIMATE anti-drug hypocrite, it’s important to remember that if it all turns out to be true – this man has a serious problem and he needs help. But first and foremost, he needs to get the hell out of office. 

Speaking of office, did anyone else watch The Office series finale? It made me sad of course, but I didn’t love it. I know Michael was just making a cameo, but if he’s gonna come back, let him come back and be Michael! That was a little disappointing. It felt more like a finale for the cast of this season rather than a finale for the entirety of the show.

Anyhow, the links:

• 10 Embarrassing Moments From Rob Ford (Possibly Explained By Crack Cocaine) It really does help explain away most of these ‘incidents.’
• Help get the video out by donating money before Ford buys it!! They’re almost at $30,000 already and it’s only a few hours in. This can happen. And if it doesn’t, they’re donating the money to CAMH, which is an incredible organization that does great work for people with addiction and mental health issues.
• Twitter reaction to crackgate. Oh my.
• What We Do and Do Not Know About Rob Ford and Drug Use I hate the man for destroying my city, so it was of course easy to jump on the hell yes, fuck you Ford, bandwagon, but Torontoist presents some very valid points here.
• Elektra Records founder Jac Holzman: ‘Apps are in every artist’s future’. Truth.
• Rdio And Shazam Expand Full Music Track Streaming Partnership To UK, Canada, Australia, Brazil And Mexico. Finally.
• Shazam Is Generating Big Bucks for iTunes and Amazon. This is the future of music, labels can’t claim digital is harmful anymore.
• Rock the microphone: Shazam unveils the top tagged music of 2012. Oh god. Sadly this is what the general population is listening to.
• The Ten Worst Bands of the Nineties. Apparently Rolling Stone did a poll and somehow (aka in a desperate attempt for pageviews) they put Nirvana as an option – and they came in 5th. Nirvana is the 5th worst band of the 90s??!! According to who? Probably the people who Shazamed the music in the link above…
• How Music Blogging Landscape Has Changed.
• Our Favourite Toronto Music Blogs – I got a nice little shout out on View the Vibe as one of their fave bloggers, the write up is too kind!
• Take a sad song and make it better: Listening to downbeat music helps people get over a break-up. I realize this is a ‘tell me something I didn’t already know’ link, but apparently the general consensus is that you should listen to happy music when you’re sad? God knows when I’m unable to eat, sleep, stop crying and leave my bed, the last thing I want to hear is a fucking Carly Rae Jepson song. But I am known for my love of sadsack music, so I digress.
• Mother of Alice in Chains front man sues dead son’s bandmates.
• LimeWire to Pay Labels $105 Million to Settle Copyright Suit. Really? I think I last used LimeWire almost a decade ago.
• 30 Unconventional Business Cards. If you recall my business cards, you’ll know I’m all about a memorable card. Everything else just gets tossed.
• This Is The Most Epic Brand Meltdown On Facebook Ever. Absolutely hilarious, but also, kind of sad and scary. Watch the Kitchen Nightmares episode if you haven’t, these people are the definition of lunatic. This woman needs years of extreme therapy, and a husband that isn’t a creepy enabler.
• Pete Cashmore: Top 10 Things My Generation Likes. The Times issue all about the Millennials is quite inspiring. We’re not all that bad, or so they say. The idea that we’re all entitled spoiled brats needs to go, for once and for all.
• My Medical Choice. So Angelina Jolie’s surgery was big news this week. I hate to play devil’s advocate on a touchy subject, but I can’t help but have it cross my mind that she really just wanted her boobs back after 3 kids sucking out their glory, and this provides an easy out for the “omg you bought new tits!” insults she would otherwise get. Of course, I think it’s awesome to be proactive about your health and she definitely tested high, so I shouldn’t be such a cynic, but it does seem like convenient timing. Breast removal and implants are incredibly extreme before you even have any kind of cancer, but more power to her. The normal female population can’t really afford to do such a thing.
• Are foodies quietly killing rock-and-roll? Heh, I can’t imagine life without either.
• HELLO! magazine shames Canada and beauty by naming Avril Lavigne Most Beautiful Canadian. No, really. Why not just put Rob Ford on there with his crack pipe?
• Metal Concert Bracelets - would you wear this? Unless it’s solid gold I get really bad reactions to jewelry (I’ve had my ears pierced no less than 5 times in the same spot because of bad reactions – finally gave up) so I know it would probably be a nightmare for me, but even-so, I’m not sure I would want to wear that. Concert bracelets are annoying enough when they’re just plastic.
• Portraits of Soldiers Before, During, and After War. This is quite stunning.
• Guys: Holding A Guitar Makes You More Attractive. It’s science, guys. You don’t even have to know what to do with it, just hold it. Panties will drop. But really, it’s an instant visual cue to women that you are potentially ‘sensitive’ and in touch with your emotions, and that’s all we really want.
• Finally, our man in space returned this week, but not before making this crazy cover of David Bowie’s “Space Oddity,” IN SPACE. Truly, Chris Hadfield is the coolest astronaut of all time:

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Happy Friday! I’m just finally starting to get over my disgusting cold, and thinking about actually leaving my house again, which means today is gonna be a productive day. I hope that is the case for you as well. This weekend is packed with great shows in Toronto, are you headed to Foals, The Breeders or Charles Bradley?? Let me know.

Anyhow, here’s what has interested me over the past couple weeks:

• Westboro Baptist Church To Picket Jeff Hanneman’s Funeral By Singing Ozzy Osbourne’s ‘Crazy Train’. I think the world is excited to see this picket happen, because the WBC psychos will finally get to experience the wrath they deserve, by way of scary Slayer fans.
• Westboro Baptist Church Claims ‘God’ Killed Slayer’s Jeff Hanneman, Fans Dare Them To Picket Funeral. Seriously, it’s gonna be funny.
• Adam Yauch Park officially open in Brooklyn Heights. Awww. Awesome.
• Beastie Boys Sign a Memoir Deal. Also awesome.
• Gwen Stefani ‘Wild Horses’: No Doubt Singer Screws Up Song In Front Of Rolling Stones. Oh my god this is terrible. I almost feel bad for her because how incredibly embarrassing that must have been, but if the Stones ask you to sing with them you learn the lines. And it’s a simple song! Most of it is the chorus repeated!
• Lust For Laughs: Iggy Pop’s concert rider funniest in rock history? I wanna hang out with the guy who wrote it.
• The Invention of David Bowie. A great, detailed look back at his career.
• From Hannah Georgas to Alex Cuba: Canadian musicians on their 1st instruments. This is cute. See them when they were kids!
• See What Sigur Rós Looks Like On The Simpsons. I know no one really cares about the Simpsons anymore, but it’s kind of cool Sigur Ros is gonna be on. I’m gonna make it a point to actually tune in.
• Neutral Milk Hotel Reunites, Announces 2013 Tour Dates. YES! I already saw Mangum and it was probably in my top 3 concert experiences of all time, so I can only imagine with the full band it’ll take the number 1 spot. Praying for a Toronto date.
• Music Dealers: ‘Brands are picking up the pieces of the music industry.’ “It’s almost not cool if you don’t have a brand behind you. If somebody doesn’t think you’re valuable enough to put in a commercial, it’s almost an insult to a band these days.”
• Ticketmaster Accuses 21 of Fraudulent Ticket Buying.
• 5 reasons Why #Coachella’s Social Media Strategy is Genius. It really is great, but it has the large audience and years behind it to account for that.
• Troy Carter Says The Next Technology Disruption In Music Will Happen In Terrestrial Radio.
• In Songza 3.0, Music Isn’t A Choice. It’s A Lifestyle. Hell yes. Songza is my most used and most loved app on my Android. Highly, highly recommended if you’re somehow not already addicted.
• Discover Music Through TV Shows You Like.
• El Mocambo set to close for the summer (or longer). Boo.
• Do Not Touch: A crowdsourced music video, where your mouse pointer is the star. This is neat.
• Rap, Both Good and Bad for Business.
• Music-Map – the Map of Music. This is neat, type in any artist to see all the related artists, then click on another artist to see more related artists. Great way to find new bands you may not know but will probably dig.
• What Song Did You Lose Your Virginity To? Tell me! Mine was Radiohead but I can’t remember which exact song because I was kinda busy.
• World’s most expensive turntables. Insane.
• This Ad Has a Secret Anti-Abuse Message That Only Kids Can See. I like the idea but I agree with the comments - publicizing this kind of defeats the purpose, parents are going to crouch down to look at it. But hopefully it still helps some kids out.
• These 4 Sisters Were Photographed Every Year For 36 Years. I kinda wanna do this with my sis, so cool.
• Banned Captain Beefheart TV Commercial: 60 Seconds The Networks Did Not Want You To See. Lol why was this banned??
• Book Publishers Scramble to Rewrite Their Future.
• Finally, more Beastie Boys greatness – a very early interview with them:

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Another giveaway! Black Rebel Motorcycle Club is back with their new album Specter At The Feast, and they’ll be playing Kool Haus in Toronto Thursday night in support of it. I couldn’t be happier. They’ve been one of my favourites since they released the absolutely flawless Howl in 2005 – one of the strongest albums of the decade.

Thanks to Live Nation you can win a pair of tickets to see them play by subscribing to TTRO – just enter your email in that little box on the left sidebar and once you click the confirmation email you will be entered. If you’re already a subscriber and you’d like to enter, just comment below using the email you used to subscribe – where it asks for your email (not in the body of the comment!) – so I can confirm.

Contest ends and the winner will be contacted Thursday morning. Watch the video for the gorgeous new track “Returning” below:

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Happy Friday, peeps! This is a long TGIF to make up for last week, so prepare yourself. I’m spending today (and the next 10 days) in theaters for Hot Docs, maybe I’ll see some of you there? If not, I really hope to see you tomorrow night for the Long Distance Movie party! Check the sidebar and event page for more information. The Top 15 vote is on!

With that said, here’s a ton of great reads to keep you occupied all weekend:

• FAT Art & Fashion Week combines clothes, music, film and performance - I’ve been checking this out all week and it’s AMAZING. Can’t wait to get my review posts up, truly an inspired event.
• Chan Marshall Of Cat Power Tells The Story Of Her Style Evolution - While I don’t particularly care for her current short bleached hair and military style, her classic style has always been a big influence on me. Love her so much.
• The Best Streaming Music Services You Aren’t Using (But Should).
• Digital music: Can streaming save music sales?
• 12 Music Jobs That Can Pay Six Figures - Not everyone is struggling to eat in the music world, but you have to be really really good at these jobs to get anywhere near those six figures.
• Last Shop Standing: Whatever Happened to Record Shops?
• Bands Abusing Kickstarter Are Exploiting Fans - Surprised? I’m not.
• What’s the story on the radio payola scandal of the 1950s? A lot of people seem to be somehow unaware that payola still exists and is actually considered the norm, this article is a fascinating read into the original scandal.
• Music Can Help Premature Babies Develop, Says New Study. Music really is the best cure.
• Installations Of New And Emerging Music From T.O. On The 19th Day Of Every Month - So this is actually a link to something new I’m doing. Once a month I’ll be curating a mix of 7 Toronto based artists for a new website called BANDxCITY, that highlights the local music happening in cities around the world. It’s a great resource for discovering the next big thing happening outside our own little music scene.
• Record Stories.
  
• That time when Record Store Day was everyday. I believe that day will return again!
• Record Your Own Vinyl Record at Jack White’s Third Man on Record Store Day. How cool is this? Toronto had quite an awesome RSD, but Nashville definitely wins because of this. Jack White rules.
• Twitter Goes To Good Morning America To Confirm Twitter #Music, Aiming Straight For The Mainstream.
• Twitter Music Is a Discovery Powerhouse for Your iPhone.
• Graphic designer Storm Thorgerson, made famous by his Pink Floyd album covers, dies at age 69. This guy created some of the most beloved and memorable album artwork of all time, RIP.
• The Pitchfork Guide To Summer Festivals 2013. Two Montreal festivals – no Toronto mentions. People of Toronto, we need to put our city on the festival map.
• The New Résumé: It’s 140 Characters. How do you guys feel about this? My twitter presence has been a key factor in my blogs growth, in jobs I’ve been hired for, and in countless opportunities that have come my way. I definitely think it’s vital in today’s world if you want to leverage yourself in any field - but especially in music.
• Canadian Filmmaking: Rose Lagace on Long Distance Movie. My sister talks about her inspiration for the film and how she decided to get involved with this epic Cinecoup competition.
• What Happens If You Text Your Parents Pretending To Be A Drug Dealer? This is absolutely hilarious. I almost considered doing it to my mom, but she literally just learned how to text – and she has a serious issue with any drug use to the point that it really gets her going, so for fear of making her incredibly upset I decided against it.
• Modern Etiquette: Social Media Do’s & Don’ts. An epic post definitely worth reading for those new and not so new to it.
• America is raising a generation of interns. I always feel conflicted about these articles. Internships have been a part of the career growth process for a very long time now, and even when the recession is long gone they will remain. My internships are the reason I figured out a career path in the first place and I think there is great value in getting a peek into an interesting company and making those big connections right out of school. The worst part about this article is the comments section – a bunch of 50 year old men going on and on about how everyone should get engineering degrees because that’s where the job demand is, and shitting all over humanities and arts degrees. No one should get a degree in something they don’t love just because there is job demand – you just have to be prepared to work harder and make sacrifices early on until you become the best at whatever career path you choose. Having a lot of money while working a job you hate is the easiest way to live a shitty, boring, regretful live.
• A brief history of Toronto’s first cocktail lounge.

• Vinyl record sales have hit their highest point since 1997 !!! And it’s only gonna keep growing every year.
• How to Listen to Music: A Vintage Guide to the 7 Essential Skills.
• Deconstructing: 10 Years Of The White Stripes Elephant And Exploding Hearts Guitar Romantic.
• Danny Devito’s Coachella Tweets Are The Best Coachella Tweets. He says it all, truly.
• 10 Venues That Shaped Toronto’s Live Music Scene.

• How To Diagnose What’s Making You Chronically Late.
• Stevie Nicks’ Home Is For Sale, Boasts Very Unusual Feature. Nude pool? That’s just a pool with nude people in it…
• Boston bombing aftermath: How you can help. I don’t want to dwell on the awfulness that happened in Boston last week, it’s tragic for so many reasons I won’t even get into, but I’m glad it came to a swift conclusion.
• CNN Has A New Host For The Summer. And His Name Is George. It’s so rare that America actually picks up on the wealth of incredible talent we have here, that this news really shocked me. He definitely deserves the wider audience and I can’t wait to see this new show.
• Train Yourself to Fall Asleep Faster.
• 31 Reasons Birth Control Exists. Heh.
• Finally, I found this hilarious when I first watched it – but when you think of how many people are at Coachella, and how few interviews they actually show compared to how many people they must have tried this on – it’s not actually all that surprising that they found 5 douches in that crowd that would lie on TV.

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Come Thursday, another Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival is upon us for 11 days, and I couldn’t be more excited to be covering it. Documentary film is the most reliable format for great filmmaking, in my opinion, because real stories always resonate – even if the camera work and production value are poor – the aspect of humanity being portrayed is almost always palpable.

With that said, Hot Docs has asked me to give you guys tickets to some of the films I am most excited to see. I have a pair of tickets to giveaway to the first screenings of both The Exhibition and When I Walk.

It is no secret that I have a very strong interest in crime stories. I’m obsessive about shows like Dateline, 48 Hours, Dexter, Breaking Bad and Criminal Minds. The Exhibition blends that interest with my true passion for arts, creativity and artists who aren’t afraid to break the rules – making this one of my top picks for this years festival.

It looks at the largest serial murder case in Canadian history – that of Robert Pickton and his pig farm back in 2007 – and an artist, Pamela Masik, who created paintings based around the faces of the 69 missing women police revealed at the time. Masik created gruesome portraits of the women – meant to highlight a racist and sexist society that let such violence against women take place for so long. But of course, using real victims for your art is going to piss a lot of people off, and for it, she faced a shitstorm of criticism that forced her to cancel the exhibition of this massive collection of work.

Win tickets to see it on Saturday April 27th at 9:30pm at TIFF Bell Lightbox. 

When I Walk is the personal story of director Jason DeSilva and his diagnosis and subsequent battle with a severe form of multiple sclerosis at just 25 years old. As a filmmaker he was used to a life of travelling the world and creating. The disease, as it quickly stole his ability to walk, took this from him.

I watched my aunt live with multiple sclerosis for the first 10 years of my life – visiting her at the hospital every weekend with my dad – watching her turn into a skeleton until she finally passed away. It created within me a fear of hospitals that remains to this day. Not because of her – she was incredible despite all the pain, lighting up with joy anytime we were in the room – but because she was stuck there in this bland place surrounded by a rotating sea of geriatrics on their death bed – young and alive but unable to live – a true nightmare for someone as fun as she was (a rebellious Beatles fanatic and a mod, I wish I could have known her once I was older as I obviously got a lot of my personality from her).

MS is a terrible, incurable disease that strikes a very large portion of Canadians because of our cold climate – and while things are a lot more hopeful now than they were back when my aunt was diagnosed – there is still a lot more that can be done. Films like this have the potential to educate and humanize something that is very hard to understand unless you have experienced it. A cure is within reach.

Win tickets to the Friday April 26th screening at 9:30pm at TIFF Bell Lightbox. 

To win, leave a comment with the name of the film you are interested in seeing (or both, if you’re interested in both), using an email address I can contact you at where it asks for your email address (do not put your email in the body of the comment). 

You can also enter by becoming a Facebook fan and commenting on my status about this giveaway with the film you would like to see.

Both winners will be chosen and notified on Wednesday morning either via their email address or on Facebook, depending on method of entry.

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