Harvest Festival: The Gathering

Given my too short stay in Australia, it was deemed necessary I check out Melbourne’s festival scene as Canada’s state of affairs has led to attending headlining tours-only. With the geographical isolation of Oz, a rarity of international acts coming through leads to excessive admission charges to make up for visa and travel costs. Next month Welsh band Future of the Left is $47AUS at The Corner. I paid $15CDN in Toronto at ElMo. $10US at Austin’s Beauty Bar in 2009. So dropping $150 for Harvest Festival of more than a handful of desirable bands hooks into my opportunity cost appreciation. And the lineup for this festival was a doozy for overseas acts Down Under.

My prospective schedule for the day:

• Kevin Devine 12:30 – 1:15PM
• The Walkmen 3:00 – 4:00PM
• TV on the Radio 4:00 – 5:00PM
• Mercury Rev 5:00PM – 5:30PM
• Death in Vegas 6:15 – 7:00PM
• The National 7:00 – 7:45PM
• Mogwai 7:45 – 8:15PM
• Portishead 8:30 – 9:45PM
• The Flaming Lips 9:45 – 10:45PM

Actual happenings:

• The Walkmen 3:40 – 4:00PM
• TV on the Radio 4:00 – 5:00PM
• Mercury Rev 5:00PM – 5:20PM
• stand in line for Brazilian Barbecue 5:20 – 7:00PM
• The National 7:00 – 7:20PM
• Mogwai 7:30 – 8:15PM
• Portishead 8:30 – 10:00PM
• Holy Fuck 10:00 – 10:30PM

Saw these dudes twice last year; once at a NxNE afterparty and again when they were surprise headliner for a small show in Kensington Market (OK, I knew ahead of time). These performances were some of the most angular and frantic I’ve ever witnessed. A must see with a sweaty crowd.

Retribution Gospel Choir – 2

I can’t help but compare RGC’s new album 2 with recent Constantines, “Workin’ Hard” vs. “Working Full-Time” aside. They’ve extended past the Low covers found on their debut, going for more bombast with a few sonic twists like an ever-present banjo in “White Wolf”. There’s some noisy blues rock going on with snappy hooks in “Hide It Away” (above) and “Workin’ Hard” along with a few Low-isms, like the outro vocal harmonies of “Poor Man’s Daughter”. An under 34 minute runtime with eight “real” songs is more EP length but it feels just right with the variations in song duration and tempo. Besides, you get to hear Alan Sparhawk rock the fuck out with his unique voice; a bit more tender than the life-weariness of Constantines’ Bryan Webb.

Moderat – Rusty Nails

Dubstep is still a fad but this track is great.

Hey Rosetta! – Red Song

Wherein I Reblog Pitchfork Content

I’m digging Portishead’s transition to krautrock with haunting vocals, as motivated by producer Geoff Barrow’s newfound inspiration in the past few years. This is their new song, “Chase the Tear”, released to raise funds for Amnesty International.

Pitchfork seems to praise Xenophanes by prolific producer Omar A. Rodriguez-López but then slams down a 5.7/10 and pretty much claims, “It’s not fucking At the Drive-In”. I realize they have their hate on for The Mars Volta (which even the review recognizes) but that rating is bogus when Dirty Projectors get a 9.2. Suck on my cultural relativism.

So offset the hate-train, Thee Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra have a preview of new song “Bury 3 Dynamos”, complimented by a hilarious faux FAQ. They seem to be working more toward heavy blues-inspired rock.

The Unwinding Hours

The Pop Cop’s Music Alliance Pact last month posted a new song from Scottish band The Unwinding Hours. Their name is still unrecognized since they’ve yet to play live or released an album. They will soon be known since they were formed by two members of Glasgow greats Aereogramme, whom disbanded two years ago.

Their self-titled album isn’t set to be released until February 5th, 2010 on Chemikal Underground, but they’ve made the song “Knut” available as an advanced preview. You’ll find repeating falsetto vocals, delay-pedal guitar, pounding drums, tension-filled piano, and an escalating string arrangement reminiscent of the build up in Sigur Rós’ “Ára bátur”. I see it as a less pop-oriented My Heart Has a Wish That You Would Not Go (which was one of my top 2007 albums), although this song will be the album opener, so perhaps the post-rock calculation will lead into more conventional songwriting. Either way, it’s worth looking forward to!

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Hey Rosetta! Crowd Etiquette

As an energetic indie band’s popularity increases, its crowds push toward a threshold teetering between mutually respectful enjoyment of the art and selfish obnoxious behaviour that ruins the crowd’s experience. Appropriately-timed polite claps transition to bro chants and shrill woo girls. Before Hey Rosetta! went on last night, the Horseshoe’s MC’s 62nd anniversary introduction name-checked past performances by many beloved artists. It ended with a (quite funny) Nickelback drop that led to much jeering, but ensuing meatheadism for the headliner was not that far off from cock-rock’s worst.

So what shouldn’t you do as a crowd participant?

1. If the front is packed shoulder-to-shoulder (considering the Horseshoe’s poor sight-lines), don’t reach back to pull three of your friends in. Especially halfway through the set.
2. Don’t get so drunk you’re falling backward over your heels into strangers. Go lean against a wall.
3. If you are 6’3″ and 200lbs+, do not push yourself through a much smaller crowd, clapping off-time, throwing your arm around people, and generally making yourself a fool. Then elbow me in the nose without saying sorry. Dude in the Arkell’s hoodie, you’re a jerk.
4. Don’t makeout with your partner during an anthem with everyone jumping around you. Especially when she’s ugly.
5. During solo piano ballads, do not:
   1. Pump your first in the air.
   2. Take the opportunity to fill the singer’s dramatic silence with “HEY RO-SET-TA” or “YEAHHHHHH!”. They are not playing a cover of The Who’s “Won’t Get Fooled Again”.
   3. Talk loudly to your drunk friends (“THEY’RE SO GOOOOOD”). You can save that until after the encore.

I’m not alone on this (even if she’s talking about the Friday show). In the same spirit, I can reference to Future of the Left’s live album Last Night I Saved Her From Vampires, which is completed by hilarious between-song banter such as bassist Kelson Mathias’ bit on “Dancing Etiquette”.

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I’m not saying the crowd should silently stand still with arms to their side at all times, but there comes a point where extreme extrovert behaviour is souring the performance’s mood. Show the love, respect your fellow fan, and stop acting like such a cunt.

Now the band itself? Awesome, as always. It’s my 4th time seeing them live, the first being more than two years ago at my fav Guelph dive bar, Jimmy Jazz (which never charged cover). For this show, I managed to score a ticket giveaway through the band’s web site (it sometimes pays to join Facebook Pages), but my guest +1 went wasted as friends were either seeing Phoenix at Sound Academy or couldn’t break other social plans with 5 days notice. Which is a shame because I’ve been trying to get as many friends into them as possible since Hey Rosetta’s success so far has been through word of mouth, which led to a nomination for Canada’s Polaris Music Price.

I did notice leader Tim Baker was tentative on his vocals before he admitted to recovering after the previous night’s two-encore set. Romesh’s “Gotta Have More Cowbell”-like tambourine performance more than made up for it! Their set with a solid balance between deliberate and accelerated songs off their past two releases, Plan Your Escape and Into Your Lungs…, along with playing more than half of their (still unrecorded?) upcoming album. This included the Gros Morne tribute for CBC Radio’s Great Canada SongQuest, “Old Crow Black Night Stand Still”, which I quite liked for its diverse movements.

The past three times I’ve seem them, Hey Rosetta! has packed the Horseshoe Tavern and Lee’s Palace, so hopefully next time they’ll move on to a larger venue with room to breathe. They’ll be at MTV Live on Monday, which I’ll be attending so feel free to come along, punch me in the face, and yell, “WOO!”

The Wooden Sky

Despite my self-declared omniscient attitude when it comes to music, some tunes slip between my cracks. They’ve been around for a couple years, but just today I heard The Wooden Sky for the first time. Describe it as roots, folk, or alt-country, I approve of their Keith’s consumption.

Isis – “20 Minutes/40 Years”

New clip from this year’s Wavering Radiant reminds me of Adam Jones meets Cronenberg meets non-Newtonian fluid.

Synth Britannia

Synth Britannia is an excellent music documentary that aired on BBC4 last month alongside Kraftrock: The Rebirth of Germany and Progrock Britannia. It’s a shame that North American primetime can’t air such rich documentaries that treat its subject matter with the utmost respect while entertaining and enlightening. Even by allowing a song play for two minutes in the background rather than MTV-style 5 second soundbite snippets, the viewer is better able to gain context and understanding. Unlike trite wastes of airtime like Icons’ coverage of Oceansize. How about an unhinged perspective on the band?

Austin Last Weekend

Last Thursday through Monday, I flew down with my Torontonian Aussie Rules Football team for a weekend partyfest.

• It was bizarre seeing just how segregated the workforce was between white people and minorities. The cleaning staff at my hotel just stared at us like lost puppies when we made a request.
• We snuck onto UT Longhorn’s playing field. (photo)
• Next day some of us watched a UT women’s volleyball game vs. Colorado. I felt like I was watching a cult ceremony. For volleyball. (photo)
• Avoid 6th street.
• Gingerman needs a Toronto location.
• Tried bourbon for the first time at Club DeVille.
• Saw White Denim at Mohawk.
• Followed up with Future of the Left at Beauty Bar. Don’t remember a thing because they didn’t go on until 1AM.
• Both of the above bands are in Toronto next week, but I couldn’t get a ticket to the solid out Built to Spill/Dinosaur Jr. show!
• I have no SMS history between 2:20AM and 3:44AM on Saturday. The 3:44AM message seems to indicate I met people. Don’t have a dozen drinks starting at 2PM when you weigh less than 150lbs.
• Aussie’s Grill and Beach Bar was the location of the first time I ever witnessed someone chug a margarita.
• 16oz. ribeye at Austin Land & Cattle Co. was excellent even if my stomach wouldn’t let me finish.
• Coyote Ugly on 6th was likely the most embarrassed I’ve ever felt for another human being. I felt less so after witnessing the amount of money milked from my group from those bartenders. Faux lesbianism while feeding cheap beer followed by expensive shots is business savvy right there. They called me McLovin’ but were too stupid to notice I walked out without paying for three drinks.
• Didn’t find the time to eat proper Mexican or Texan BBQ, but did hit some late night Kebabalicious.

After four nights, I don’t think I got the full Austin, Texas experience.

Disconnected Toronto Concert Listings

Just thought I’d highlight issues I have with concert listings in my dear city. I’m talking about advanced ticketing for bands that can pack medium-sized halls. The main problem I have with all of them is a lack of centralized event listings or even a common format where concert-goers can aggregate dates and details through RSS feeds or RESTful apps. Venues in this camp include El Mocambo, Lee’s Palace, Horseshow Tavern, Phoenix, Opera House, and The Mod Club (which has Flash listings that your browser can’t even search.) Sneaky Dee’s are in there too but they haven’t had a working events calendar since their latest event booker started in June. Promoters like Against the Grain and rootmeansquare also have separate listings that go across multiple venues.

Up to now, I’ve been tracking upcoming concerts by using local record stores, Rotate This and Soundscapes. They’re the best way for downtownizens to avoid Ticketmaster/LiveNation service fee money-grabs, instead getting tickets in-person with no scalping pretense. There are still issues with certain events falling through the cracks (no advanced ticketing?) and these listings not allowing custom sort criteria such as band name, date, price, or dated added to listings.

What I’d really like to see is for venues and promoters to use a feed or web service with full show details. It’s great when they show band set times, convenient when the openers are inexplicably terrible. With the event name, venue name, address, and list of artists with start times alongside links on where to buy tickets, all the necessary details are there for a potential customer. It’s a pipedream to get all these competitive profit-seeking interests to use one common service, so maybe just RSS can even the playing field.

Of course, the obvious part-solution to this whole problem would be if promoters would use Facebook . For aforementioned Sneaky Dee events held this summer, the only way I was able to find out about shows was through my friends’ joining Facebook events created by the venue’s event organizer. ATG’s group has also been on the ball (at times) by creating events for headlining artists and sending out invites to every member of their group. However, if all promoters pulled this, you’d be bombarded by dozens of invites everyday. It would be much better to narrow down invites based on genre (crowdsourcing killing art aside) but Facebook doesn’t have that capability unless each promoter created multiple groups. Then the overhead becomes overkill. The coolest filter I can think of is only allow invites for bands in a user’s Last.FM artist library but eh, that’s a web 2.0 mash-up where there wouldn’t be enough of a userbase to make it worthy. Last.FM does have an event recommendation system but it’s focused on the next week’s events that have likely sold out.

I believe Toronto is the second highest ranked city as far as Facebook registration number go (behind London), especially in the core audience of 18 to 35 year olds. Having centralized event pages with integration for Facebook, MySpace, and Last.FM would allow for advertising using free tools (no hosting, monthly registration, or web site development/maintenance fees) that take advantage of social networking for more pleasant concert organizing experiences.

But, of course:

The Twilight Sad

Some thoughts on last night’s The Twilight Sad show in Toronto:

• Venue was a dudefest. There was a line-up for the men’s urinals and an empty ladies washroom. I have only seen this at large-scale sporting events.
• The bartenders kept giving me a handful of change expecting me to tip them higher. When I give you a $10 bill for a $5.25 bottled beer, don’t hand me 3 quarters and 4 loonies. That means I will tip you even less. $0.75 for you.
• I was slightly right of centre about 6 people back and could barely hear the lead guitarist Andy MacFarlane positioned to the left. Of course, it was because the amps were stacked behind him for controlled feedback but there should’ve been something mic’d so the whole crowd could get a better mix. His wailing is their signature sound!
• They played for about an hour with no encore. Who are you? Tool? I don’t believe their set was any longer than when they opened for Mogwai back in May.
• Their bassist may be a robot.
• Love the live interpretation of Fourteen Autumns and Fifteen Winters’ first song “Cold Days From the Birdhouse” instead having an acapella intro.
• Fellow Scots We Were Promised Jetpacks are pretty awesome. Glad I accidentally arrived early enough to catch their set.

All points aside, it was a really solid show with much love around.

You Douchebags

Some of my favourite musical acts, such as Oceansize, Opeth, and Candiria, seamlessly blend genres with clever creativity and artistic authenticity is a goal met with few compromises. Then there are people that believe juxtaposing any drivel together is a brilliant idea in itself. My disdain for pop music is obvious, but some shite has just gone too far. Behold:

R-tard Writing

The article “Underrated Overground: Give Contemporary R&B a Chance”, published in Best Music Writing 2008 praises overproduction, abandonment of autonomous authenticity, the embrace of corporate-branded commercialism, and lyrical gems such as, “No I don’t strip in the club/Nor trick in the club/But I got friends that do/So my girls that’s getting the dough/The best way they know/No hate girl, I got you.”

Week in Music, February 1-7

Contrived – Blank, Blank, Blank

Another Canadian band that released a new album last November without me being made aware. On Friday morning the daily listing of city events came across my Google Reader with the highlight being a Bluenoser act I hadn’t thought of in awhile. Contrived released Dead Air Verbatim in 2005 and then supported Wintersleep on tour, which makes sense since they share four of the five members with the suddenly popular act. Since they took off, the pre-Wintersleep formed Contrived was tossed to the wayside with an intention of the hiatus not becoming a break-up.

So Blank, Blank, Blank re-introduces their indie rock to the Canadian landscape. Mixed by David Newfeld (Broken Social Scene, Los Campesinos!), this album finds increased diversity over its predecessor which was chock full of the crunchy riffs. While there’s still Fugazi post-hardcore aggression, moody tremolo on “Firing Squad” and “Keepsake” (Dredg? GY!BE?) and intertwining guitars bring a lighter sound more akin to The Constatines’ best driving tunes. The songs are instrumental in nature with minimal vocals that feature the odd esoteric lyric (“When a loving son commits matricide/Will you be there to break our fall?”) thrown in to spice it up. Given the overlap with Wintersleep, there are obvious comparisons to be made (“Celebrate” could be mistaken as a straight-up B-side), but the eight song/35 minute run-time creates an identity that is uniquely Contrived (oh clever band name, you create puns that write themselves.)

Week in Music, January 25-31

The Armada – The Armada

In 2006, The Tea Party’s Jeff Martin released his overwrought solo album Exile and the Kingdom and calling it a disappointment would be an understatement. Lyrics were never his strongest suit so going the non-angsty exotic-tinged folk route was not a musical path worth traveling. He has come to his senses and turned back to dark and heavy material more akin to his former group.

Reinventing himself as The Armada with instrumentalist Wayne Sheehy, this self-titled album sounds much like a continuation of the last few albums from The Tea Party which makes me question how much input Stuart Chatwood and Jeff Burrows had in the end (Where’s The Art Decay?) You’ll find a “No Quarter”/Robert Johnson-like reprise of “Black Snake Blues”, the only decent song from the previous solo album. Otherwise, it’s all-new studio rock material with Middle Eastern instruments abound that take many cues from Led Zeppelin, which is no surprise at all. After listening to the first minute of the opener “Going Down Blues”, I only questioned why they didn’t just cover “When the Levee Breaks” when the bombastic drums and panning harmonica are lifted straight from that classic. All songs hit around the four minute mark with songwriting that aims at a commercial direction in line with The Tea Party’s Triptych although there are no obvious singles to be found.

The catch is the album was released online last November, costing 15 EUR + 3.50 shipping = $29.06 CDN (hello Nietszche quote in the store page header.) Given my refusal to pay for lossy music, you know how I acquired this. Fortunately, it is getting a wider released in North America come March so listen to some clips from The Armada and anticipate one of Canada’s best pop musicians getting back to form (even if he lives in Ireland now)

Shrinebuilder

Shrinebuilder is a new underground metal supergroup of sorts that has a blog called We Burn Through the Night that’s updated by Neurosis guitarist Scott Kelly. These updates make me believe he’s a man whose intensity places himself constantly on the brink of a psychotic breakdown. The line-up:

Guitar: Scott “Wino” Weinrich (Saint Vitus/Obsessed/Spirit Caravan/Hidden Hand)
Guitar: Scott Kelly (Neurosis/Tribes of Neurot)
Bass: Al Cisneros (Sleep/Om)
Drums: Dale Crover (Melvins)