Polaris Prize and Pat LePoidevin Concert Reviews

The first couple article I wrote as a Staff Writer for the Argosy are below. Being on the Arogsy has been a great opportunity to write about the variety of local music in Sackville.

Polaris Prize A-Go-Go

The Argosy's entertainment crew examines the 10 finalists for the 2009 Polaris Prize

By Neil Bonner and Geoffrey Campbell

Neil's Reviews:

Malajube – Labyrinthes (Dare to Care)
I don't know what it is about this record. In the last twelve hours I've listened to it three times, straight through. Objectively I can say that it is a fine record: the band has a good grasp on dynamics, creating big soundscapes that never become overpowering or self-indulgent. They blend the religious stadium-indie of the Arcade Fire, prog-rock flourishes, and Brazilian tropicalia rhythms, while the vocals entwine in winsome and never cloying harmonies. Yet Labyrinthes lacks the edge, personality and sheer demented energy that landed Malajube’s Trompe-l’oeil on this very shortlist three years ago. The record rallies around its middle section, with tracks like the lovely electric-piano fantasy of “Heresie”, the power-pop of “Collemboles”, and the shuffling bossa nova of “Dragon de Glace”. The rest is just bombast in search of a memorable hook.

Great Lake Swimmers – Lost Channels (Nettwerk)
Like Ongiara, the 2007 album that netted Great Lake Swimmers their first Polaris Prize nod, Lost Channels was recorded in a number of isolated, sparsely inhabited islands – in this case, the Thousand Islands near the New York border. Like Ongiara, Lost Channels showcases Tony Dekker’s hushed, awed vocals, as he contemplates existence among the Canadian wilderness. It is to the band’s great credit, then, that Lost Channels feels nothing like an Ongiara retread. The band broadens – though mostly deepens – its instrumental palette without drowning out the fragile, natural core that makes Great Lake Swimmers so remarkable. The album’s opening sequence contains some of the jauntiest material the band has set down yet, including the dreamy “Pulling on a Line” and “She Comes to Me in Dreams”, which sounds like early REM with more mandolin. A recording of castle bells marks the albums segue into quieter, downbeat material that’s more akin to their debut, but it feels as natural as the passing of a day.


K'naan – Troubadour (A&M/Octone)
Here’s an album that tries very hard to do almost everything and, by and large, pulls it off. Troubadour finds K'naan issuing the hip-hop community an ultimatum: step aside and let me show you how it's done. A rap-metal song – in 2009 – featuring Metallica guitarist Kirk Hammett? Why not? A club track with Maroon 5’s Adam Levine? A collaboration with backpacker rap heroes Mos Def and Chali 2Na? Check and check.
But a hip-hop album this varied lives and dies by the personality of its MC. Fortunately, K'naan is a superb storyteller, reflecting on the rap game and his formative years spent in Mogadishu, Somalia with humour, keen observations and vivid imagery. His rhymes are buoyed by the excellent production work courtesy of Track & Field (Gerald Eaton and Brian West) which blends a wide variety of samples with live instrumentation. The prevailing mood is one of hard-won optimism, a celebration of just being able to tell a story. K'naan sums it up best: ”We alive man, it's OK to feel good”.

Fucked Up – The Chemistry of Common Life (Matador)
Here’s a fun little experiment for those reading along at home. Find a parent /
teacher / sibling who isn’t following the Polaris Prize, give them a copy of
this record and ask them to listen to “this relaxing baroque music quartet I
discovered”. Watch their expression change as the lilting, forty-five-second flute intro gives way to creeping guitar and synthesizer riffs before being blown apart by one of the great rock n’ roll screams of the aughties.
The Chemistry of Common Life is full of surprises like that. Fucked Up takes massive multi tracked slabs of thick, shoegazey guitar tracks, and molds them into a unique, widescreen take on hardcore punk. On top of that, the record is dappled with instrumental curveballs like tablas, brass, and the aforementioned flutes, as well as guest spots from Sebastien Grainger, City and Color, and the Vivian Girls. Damian Abraham’s vocals will be a sticking point for many – they were for me, initially – but give it a chance and the thoughtful and sometimes even funny lyrics will start to reveal themselves. It may not be perfect – some songs could stand to trim a minute or two – but it’s a compelling listen from start to finish, and a striking statement from a band that has completely nailed the ideal mix of brains and brawn.

Elliott Brood – Mountain Meadows (Six Shooter Records)
Elliott Brood might have, at one time, labeled themselves as “death country”, an image somewhat strengthened by naming their album after an 1857 wagon train massacre. But that notion goes up in smoke as soon as the album starts playing. With their unflagging energy and intimate production, Elliott Brood bring to mind the Rural Alberta Advantage in cowboy boots. Highlights include the technicolor tattoo of "T-Bill" and the fuzzy "Garden River". Even the closer, "Miss You Now" is a few "ba ba ba's" away from being a pop standard. It's enough to make you want to buy a pickup truck and head out on the open road. Alt-country has rarely sounded this spry and fun.



Geoff's Reviews:

Fantasies - Metric

I’ve just recently become a fan of Metric, so unfortunately I’ve listened to their music more or less backwards. The new album seems to be much more upbeat than their earlier work and absolutely more pop accessible than Emily Haines's solo album. Fantasies starts off strong with "Help I’m Alive", with strong but smooth vocals. Lead by Canadian Haines, Metric’s synth-rock has been accurately described as "deep, danceable and anthemic album”. Metric is one of the few bands that doesn’t get degraded to the point of annoyance by dance parties. Fantasies boasts an array of quality songs with catchy lyrics. Not to be missed are "Gimme Sympathy"’s sharp-tongued existential questioning and the biting "Gold Guns Girls" and the energy of "Help I’m Alive". All in all this is a strong contender.

Into Your Lungs - Hey Rosetta!

I hadn’t heard of Hey Rosetta! until I came to Mount Allison and was told they were the best thing since sliced bread. Canadians seem to have this sense of ownership of anything that’s from their region, and especially after it’s gotten any sort of recognition. I assumed it was like other mediocre things people like because it’s local...but after listening to Into Your Lungs (and around in your heart and on through your blood) I am convinced the praise and recognition is deserved. The lulling folk-rock intro of "New Goodbye" smoothly strength into a confident, but not overly acidic screw you symphony that crashes into noise.
The better known “I’ve Been Asleep for a Long, Long Time” bemoans missing out on life and fits perfectly in the 9/11 Canadian documentary/made-for-TV movieDiverted. The mournful words are hard to glaze over. “All the schools that I went to have all been closed/And all of my teachers are dead I suppose/The songs that we sung have all gone quiet/What happens below as you sleep at night?” (Full disclosure: I have to admit the expertly crafted catharsis of "Holy Shit (What A Relief)" won me over.) All in all when it comes to piano/violin/cello mixed with Canadian folk rock you can’t go wrong with Hey Rosetta!. Not my favourite, but if you like Hey Rosetta!, then Into Your Lungs won’t be a let down.

Soft Airplane - Chad VanGaalen

From the get-go, Chad VanGaalen’s Soft Airplane is a surprising album. Lo-fi indie pop with lyrics like “Take my body/ Put it in a boat /Light it on fire/Send it out to sea” over twanging banjo this album isn’t exactly what I expected. Chad’s sound has been described as Neil Young meets Thurston Moore, and that I can’t seem to disagree with. The songs do seem disjoined from one another and I wasn’t surprised to learn that it had been recorded on a tape recorder and boombox. I find his voice sometimes goes past the good side of whiney and it distracts from the lyrics.
Besides an occasional overuse of synthesizer, the same with this morbid fascination with death seems to be on repeat playing the album once. I did enjoy the background vocals and more traditional guitar of "City of Electric Light". The fresh imagery of lines like, “And I thought you were the moon in disguise/but it turned out you were just a pair of eyes/You were lurking like a creature in the night” were a pleasant surprise in an otherwise slow and downbeat album. There were some highlights... but not enough to pay for the album.

Three - Joel Plaskett

A talented, successful Canadian rock musician - the fact that he hasn’t moved south of the border yet surprises me as well. I can imagine Joel winning the Polaris Prize and getting signed to a major label... but somehow it seems he wouldn’t defect to the states entirely... there’s something that’s too Canadian about him and his music. Unlike almost all other Canadian content on the radio, I wouldn’t assume the DJ played Joel Plaskett because he/she had to.
From the energy at the start I got more than I expected from Joel Plaskett’s album: a “you left me song” without the melodrama and bore. It’s always nice to hear something that’s usually boring done right. “Table seats four and a couch seats three/Bed for two and a chair for me/Tweedle Dum, where's Tweedle Dee?” The energy and quality stays high up until track five. “Wait, Wait, Wait”... waiting for the song to actually start. I really don’t like the slowed down-so-much-I’m-falling-asleep track. The tempo gets back to listenable with the seedy "Drifter’s Raus". All in all an impressive collection of Canadian content.

Wooden Arms - Patrick Watson

A bit of a slow warm up with "Fireweed" missing the rock aspect of the eclectic orchestral-rock. The album seems to slip by with the slow, soft vocals. I would have to say that "Beijing" was the most listenable of the first half as the others seemed to just fade away before the song really got started. "Traveling Salesman" gets a bit more interesting with more of story. "Big Bird in a Small Cage" conjures up a great beat and the vocal harmony is soothing. “You open up your ears and hearts/You put a big bird in a small cage and it'll sing you a song/That we all love to sing along to the birds that wants”. "Where the Wild Things Are" (which especially caught my attention as the Maurice Sendak novel is still one of my top ten) does a bit of redeeming and the faster beat and slightly spooky electric guitar, and interesting instrumental was a real treat.
Ending with "Machinery of the Heavens" was a good choice - enough energy throughout most of it and slowing down into nothing was a nice finale.
There were some really good bits of the album but in the end it’s a bit too experimental for my tastes.

Music Hall homecoming

Three local favorites perform at the Sackville Music Hall

By Geoffrey Campbell

Going to Sackville Music Hall, the dilapidated shell that apparently once was a great performance venue, was an interesting experience.
It was here that people gathered last Saturday for one of the first concerts of the year, featuring Joel Carr, Corey Isenor and, returning from a cross-Canada tour, Pat LePoidevin.
Since its peak, the Hall has been left in a state of disrepair with obvious signs of aging all around. There was probably space for at least a couple hundred in a standing crowd, but the official capacity was 80, which I was glad of because the floors didn’t seem able to sustain many more. There were plastic lawn chairs set up facing a stage, with the odd inclusion of an upside-down milk crate and a lamp. Light bulbs were hanging over the stage from what could have been an extension cord.
Joel Carr was first up. His music was reminiscent of Bob Dylan before he became famous. The lyrics were somewhat relatable though not all that catchy, but that was the point. Carr's first spoken words were: “Well this is a creepy place, eh?” It was.
The songs flowed more freely after Carr warmed up, but everybody was reminded that it wasn’t a professional show with the words “I’ll probably forget a few verses here.”
It was all in all a good warm-up act, but by the seventh song, the crowd seemed ready for something new.
One audience member commented that Carr "really nailed that E chord... over and over again.”
Corey Isenor was up next. His first song was a slow one about getting his baby to stop taking it slow – a seemingly contrary combination. For the rest of the performance, Isenor played songs with different guitar tunings, causing multiple abrupt breaks between otherwise quality tunes. The songs increased in energy and the mood became more relaxed, with one member of the audience shouting, “That better be water in there,” when Isenor drank from a water bottle between songs.
There were some issues with remembering words mid-song and tuning, but the overall mood and quality of the show was as I expected. Despite minor mishaps, leading Isenor to say that he “should have practiced more,” he is clearly a talented musician, and in another circumstance his performance may be improved.
Last, but absolutely not least, was Pat LePoidevin. After warming up on the ukulele, and singing about a fox drinking wine outside a bar in France, he wasted no time in leading the crowd with "Car Crash." As with many performances, the audience sang along knowingly. "Toumba, Texas" was up next, with more people joining in for the catchy chorus. LePoidevin had some new material which fit well with his established set list. He continued with songs from from his CD, including "What about the Mouse," "The Bird and the Basement," "Cancer," and "Ringo the Rat."
Pat LePoidevin has grown noticeably as a musician; at this show he seemed much more at ease and comfortable with the audience than in past performances I’ve seen. He was very well prepared, and his connection with the audience put him another step ahead of the opening acts. Overall, Pat’s performance was excellent. Sackville is fortunate to have a musician of Pat LePoidevin’s quality. I’ve seen him play three times and can’t wait until he comes back again.