Wednesday, March 7th, 2012
Review of Chains Of Love’s Strange Grey Days
Dine AloneImpressing with a live show is one thing, but eliciting a similar positive response with a record, away from the energy the crowd and the volume of the PA, can be a good deal tougher. Vancouver’s Chains Of Love nailed the former and then some at NXNE last year, but despite one of the most impressive things about the show being that they obviously had good songs to go along with their crackling Motown-friendly, garage-soul sound and onstage charisma, I didn’t immediately assume that their debut album – whenever it arrived – would necessarily deliver the same punch.
Happily, said debut – Strange Grey Days, due out next Tuesday – doesn’t disappoint. At seven tracks and 20 minutes, it’s a bit slight – okay, a lot slight although the CD version appends both sides of last year’s “In Between”/”Breaking My Heart” single – but its an enjoyable ride. The fuzzy, faded sonic aesthetic feels authentic but thankfully doesn’t obscure the polished musicality of the band or bury Nathalia Pizarro and Rebecca Marie Law Gray’s sweet vocals. The record is decidedly front-loaded with the uptempo numbers are unquestionably the strongest numbers, but the momentum of those earlier tunes is more than enough to keep things moving and put the whole thing in the “win” column. When – not if – the outfit manages to really stick the slower numbers, they are going to be a force.
The album is currently available to stream in whole courtesy of Exclaim, and they’ve no shortage of local dates coming up – two showcases for Canadian Musicfest at The El Mocambo on March 23 at 11:30PM and March 24 at The Horseshoe at 9:20PM, and then they’re back on April 14 in a supporting role for Said The Whale at The Great Hall.
MP3: Chains Of Love – “In Between”
MP3: Chains Of Love – “Breaking My Heart”
Stream: Chains Of Love / Strange Grey Days
Speaking of Canadian Musicfest, Montreal’s Adam & The Amethysts have three shows during the fest: 8PM on March 22 at The El Mocambo, the afternoon of March 23 at Saving Gigi and 11PM on March 24 at The Drake Underground. They’ve released a new video from this year’s Flickering Flashlight to get y’all excited.
Video: Adam & The Amethysts – “Prophecy”
Rich Aucoin has only got the one March 24 appearance at The Indie Awards on the calendar for Canadian Musicfest, but he’s also released a new video from We’re All Dying To Live, this one all fancy and animated and such.
Video: Rich Aucoin – “P.U.S.H.”
We’ve been waiting so long for the debut full-length from Guelph disco-pop band The Magic – since NXNE 2009 for me, at least – but it’ll finally be here in June and based on the first sample track, it’s been worth the wait.
MP3: The Magic – “Door To Door”
One of Arcade Fire’s contributions to the Hunger Games soundtrack is now available to stream over at Entertainment Weekly. It’s out March 20.
Stream: Arcade Fire – “Abraham’s Daughter”
Kill Screen talks video games with Damian Abraham of Fucked Up.
Pitchfork reports that one of the many Record Store Day goodies coming on April 18 will be the very first vinyl pressing of Destroyer’s 2006 album Destroyer’s Rubies. Destroyer plays The Opera House on June 23.
The AV Club, hour.ca, here, and Beatroute talk to The Wooden Sky.
Islands are interviewed by Torontoist, The Province, Calgary Herald, Beatroute, and Chart and play a video session for Exclaim.
Tuesday, March 6th, 2012
Toronto to get a dose of hard, French Justice (and yet another serving of M83)
Pedro WinterSo yes, Radiohead was far and away the big concert announcement of yesterday, but not far behind was the announcement of the lineup for this year’s HARD, an electronically-oriented festival that’s made Toronto stops the last few years. It’s existed on the periphery of my radar, but the 2012 edition has my firm attention.
HARD will bring some French electro action in electro-disco duo Justice – supporting last year’s Audio, Video, Disco – and retro-futurist shoegazers M83 – marking their third show in Toronto in support of Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming – to Fort York on August 4 with Toronto’s own Austra and Portugese dance crew Buraka Som Sistema as the undercard. And if you’re Osheaga or Lollapalooza lineup-spotting, well it seems a safe bet that both fests will have some synthetically Gallic flavour this year.
A national historic site – particularly one that’s celebrating the 200th anniversary of being blown up – seems an odd place for a rave-up, but also somehow perfect. Either way, I’m just super-keen for any kind of festival in the city’s downtown and even though this is maybe dancier than I’d normally hit up, I’m surprisingly keen on it. Tickets are $49 and are on sale now; there were a limited number of $39 early birds, but I think they’re all gone now. Alas.
MP3: Austra – “Lose It”
Video: Justice – “Audio, Video, Disco”
Video: M83 – “Midnight City”
Video: Buraka Som Sistema – “Hangover (BaBaBa)”
Joel Plaskett – who is eight weeks into the recording of his one-song-a-week album Scrappy Happiness – still due out March 27 – has been announced as the main attraction at this year’s Canadian Musicfest kick-off party way up on top of the CN Tower on March 21. Admission is gained only by winning a contest, so if you want to be there, get on that. And if you want to see him a little closer to sea level, there’s still the May 18 and 19 dates at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre. Spinner and The Globe & Mail talk to Plaskett about the Scrappy Happiness experience so far.
Video: The Joel Plaskett Emergency – “Somewhere Else”
Memoryhouse will play an (adopted) hometown record release show for The Slideshow Effect on April 13 at the El Mocambo.
MP3: Memoryhouse – “The Kids Were Wrong”
With his debut album Acousmatic Sorcery set for an April 3 release, up-and-coming Chicago singer-songwriter Willis Earl Beal has made an April 30 date at The Drake Underground as part of a Spring tour. Pitchfork has a profile on him.
Video: Willis Earl Beal – “Evening’s Kiss”
Los Angeles hippy-rock collective Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeroes will be at the Kool Haus May 13 to preview songs from their new album Here, due out May 29. Tickets for that are $29.50 in advance.
MP3: Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeroes – “40 Day Dream”
The Big Pink have released a new video from Future This
Video: The Big Pink – “Give It Up”
Pitchfork talks to both Claire Boucher and director Emily Kai Bock about the new Grimes video from Visions; D also has an interview. She plays The Horseshoe on March 19.
Video: Grimes – “Oblivion”
The Guardian talks to folks responsible for creating Chairlift’s new, “choose your own adventure”-styled video from Something. They’ll be at The Horseshoe on March 28.
Video: Chairlift – “Met Before”
Blouse have released a new video from their self-titled debut. They play The Garrison on May 5 supporting Bear In Heaven.
Video: Blouse – “Ghost Dream”
Hot on the heels of the first video from Port Of Morrow – out March 20 – comes a second one from The Shins, though this much simpler than the one for “Simple Song”. At this rate, there’ll be clips for every song on the album by the time they hit The Molson Amphitheatre on August 4, opening for The Black Keys.
Video: The Shins – “Bait And Switch”
Bjork goes all “fantastic voyage” in the new video from Biophilia, just premiered at NPR.
Video: Bjork – “Hollow”
Monday, March 5th, 2012
Review of First Aid Kit’s The Lion’s Roar and giveaway
Neil KrugThe Söderberg sisters of First Aid Kit make no attempt to represent themselves as anything other than what they are – two girls barely on either side of 20 harmonizing on heartfelt songs that conjure the spirit of bygone and world-weary Appalachian folk traditions a world and era away from the from the Stockholm suburbs where they grew up. It’s a contrast and harmony that made their first two releases – 2008’s debut EP Drunken Trees and the 2010 full-length The Big Black & The Blue so interesting; feeling simultaneously young and old, wise yet naive, clearly foreign yet still so authentic.
It’s a tension that’s less pronounced on their second album The Lion’s Roar, but that’s because rather than tip things one way or the other, they’ve managed to not just balance their elements but blend them. Credit must go to veteran producer Mike Mogis, an expert at helping bands bloom creatively while keeping their roots firmly intact – sonically, the album stays close to the sparer arrangements of the debut but when it needs to get big, it does – but you cannot discount the experience the duo have gained in the past couple years on the road; they’ve simply gotten much better, and were pretty good to begin with. The weightiness that’s always existed in their songwriting feels more comfortably borne, and yet Roar also contains some of their most buoyant songs to date – “Emmylou”, a gorgeous paean to two of the great partnerships of country music, is an early frontrunner for one of the songs of the year and “I Found A Way” soars close behind.
I don’t think there was ever a time when First Aid Kit were regarded as any sort of novelty – “oh look, young Swedish girls who think they’re country!” – but if anyone ever took them less seriously for any of that, they’ll be hard-pressed to hold onto those prejudices. The Lion’s Roar is a strong statement and demands to be heard.
MTV UK has an interview with First Aid Kit, who kick off a headlining North American tour at the end of this month and will be at the Great Hall in Toronto on April 4. Tickets for the show are $18 in advance but courtesy of Embrace, I’ve got two pairs of passes to give away for the show. To enter, email me at contests AT chromewaves.net with “I want a First Aid Kit” in the subject line and your full name in the body. Contest closes at Midnight, March 31.
Stream: First Aid Kit – “Emmylou”
Stream: First Aid Kit – “The Lion’s Roar”
Video: First Aid Kit – “Emmylou”
Video: First Aid Kit – “The Lion’s Roar”
In talking about another young female Swedish artist worth watching – Amanda Mair – I’ve been saying that her self-titled debut was supposed to come on back on February 15; that it did, but only in Sweden, apparently. about.com has a June 5 North American release date written down and DIY reports that it will be out officially in the UK on June 11. To tide us over, another single is now available to download to go with the previously released video. It’s good.
MP3: Amanda Mair – “Sense”
Video: Amanda Mair – “Sense”
Under The Radar brings word of a collaboration between the wonderful I Break Horses and the I-hadn’t-heard-of-them-before-now Philadelphia-based electronic outfit CSLSX, the first fruits of have both a downloadable and video. I Break Horses are at The Sound Academy on May 5 opening for M83.
MP3: CSLSX & I Break Horses – “Violent Sea”
Video: CSLSX & I Break Horses – “Violent Sea”
DIY chats with Norwegian pop collective Team Me, who are on my to-see list at SXSW next week (NEXT WEEK). If all goes well, you’ll be hearing more about them hereabouts. Their debut To The Treetops is out next week.
MP3: Team Me – “With My Hands Covering Both of My Eyes I Am Too Scared To Have a Look At You Now”
The Line Of Best Fit introduces Kiasmos, the new electronic project from Ólafur Arnalds.
Stream: Kiasmos – “Thrown”
New York Magazine has an in-depth profile piece on Bjork and NYC Taper has posted recordings of another of her NYC residency shows from last week.
DIY and The Sun get to know Dry The River, the next great folk-rock hope out of the UK. Their debut Shallow Bed is out April 17 in North America, and they’re streaming the excerpts of the whole thing with commentary over here. The intrigued can see them March 27 at The Garrison opening for Bowerbirds.
Video: Dry The River – “Chambers & The Valves”
Those scamps in Radiohead have announced another block of North American dates and Toronto is in the mix. They’ll be at Downsview Park on June 16 with Caribou, and I’ll save you from double-checking the calendar – that is indeed the Saturday of NXNE. The festival has managed to hold its own agains interloping major shows in the past, but if it takes a free Iggy & The Stooges show to counter Pavement/Broken Social Scene, they’re gonna need something pretty major to keep the kids in the city this time around. But whatever you end up doing that day, let’s not overlook the fact that this means the Caribou machine is back in action, and that’s good news for everyone. Tickets for Radiohead go on sale at noon on Friday.
MP3: Caribou – “Odessa”
Video: Radiohead – “Lotus Flower”
Daytrotter welcomes The Naked & Famous to their studios for a session. They play The Sound Academy on April 5
Digital Spy and DIY talk to Pip Brown of Ladyhawke, whose second album Anxiety has been pushed back from its March 27 release date all the way to May 25.
Sunday, March 4th, 2012
The Magnetic Fields cover David Bowie
rateyourmusic.comWith the release of their tenth album Love At The Bottom Of The Sea upon us this week, I figured that I should have a wealth of Magnetic Fields covers to choose from this week. After all, Stephin Merritt is one of the great pop songwriters of our day and he’s released no shortage of songs rich with melodic and lyrical gems that are ripe for reinterpretation. And no question, there are covers out there but not nearly as many as you’d expect – or I’d expect, at least – and most of the good ones, I think I’ve already posted. That there’s not been a good tribute album to Stephin Merritt’s many projects bewilders me.
So I figured if I was going to post something that’s gone up before, I may as well go with an especially good one – as I think this track from a 1996 David Bowie tribute entitled Crash Course For The Ravers is, remaining faithful to the greatness of the original whilst enfolding it completely within the Magnetic Fields aesthetic. And it last went up over four years ago, which I think puts it beyond any statute of limitations for repeat covers. So says I.
Love At The Bottom Of The Sea is out on Tuesday, March 6, and they are in town at The Sound Academy on March 30; Tiny Mix Tapes, Chronogam, and The Skinny have interviews with Stephin Merritt. All David Bowie has done this year is turn 65, but you can be sure that he did it awesomely.
MP3: The Magnetic Fields – “Heroes”
Video: David Bowie – “Heroes”
Saturday, March 3rd, 2012
riseagainst.comWho: Rise Against
What: Chicago political activist punk band who’ve risen to arena-scale over the past decade
Why: They released their sixth album End Game a year ago and will end the second leg of North American touring for it in Toronto
When: May 10, 2012
Where: The Air Canada Centre in Toronto (all-ages)
Who else: A Day To Remember and Title Fight support
How: Tickets for the show are $50.50 to $64.50 in advance but courtesy of LiveNation, I’ve got one pair of passes to give away for the show. To enter, email me at contests AT chromewaves.net with “I want to Rise Against” in the subject line and your full name in the body, and have that in to me before midnight, April 15.
What else: The band contributed a song to the recent Amnesty International/Bob Dylan tribute compilation Chimes Of Freedom; Examiner.com talks to the director of their video for “The Ballad Of Hollis Brown”.
Video: Rise Against – “Ballad Of Hollis Brown”
Video: Rise Against – “Help Is On The Way”
Video: Rise Against – “Satellite”
Video: Rise Against – “Make It Stop (September’s Children)”
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