To borrow and tweak a phrase from Nils Edenloff of The RAA: the air was unbearably electric that night. I rolled up to Lee's Palace with a few good friends, ticketless on account of my tendency to be irresponsible and leave everything to the last minute. We showed up early, but there was already a respectable line-up of die-hards standing against the wall along the sidewalk, eagerly anticipatin..
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Rural Alberta Advantage Brilliant in Humble and Electrifying Performance @ Lee's Palace - November 20, 2009
Your Love Will Be Safe With Me (Bon Iver, Revisited)
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The other night something unexpected happened while I was exhaustingly hauling my body up the stairs to my apartment door. As always, I had my iPod in, and was listening to God-knows-what. The point is, as I was approaching the stairs, I heard the church choir torrent from the beginning of Bon Iver's "Lump Sum" flood through the crack beneath the door to pierce through the noise in my earphones...
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Elliott Brood @ The Opera House - October 30, 2009
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It was the night before Halloween. The city was loud, and the sidewalk grates carried the distinct smack of shit from the sewers to the nostrils of the passersby. Bike chains rattled as excited concert goers locked their rides to the posts and railings outside on the street outside of Toronto's Opera House. Headlining was local heart-pounding, sweat-inducing, hard folk-rocking trio Elliott Broo...
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I(heart)music's Top Bands In Canada Poll - The Mad Ones' Ballot
I am pleased to say that I was able to participate in Matthew from i(heart)music's fifth annual Hottest Bands In Canada Poll. Just browsing through the list will give you enough mind-blowing music to make you fake the swine flu for at least week or two. For the poll, voters were asked to make a list of the ten Canadian bands that they thought have had the best overall year thus far in 2009. Not..
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I(heart)music's Top Bands In Canada Poll - The Mad Ones
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Artist:The Mad Ones
I am pleased to say that I was able to participate in Matthew from i(heart)music's fifth annual Hottest Bands In Canada Poll. Just browsing through the list will give you enough mind-blowing music to make you fake swine flu for a week or two.
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The Mad Ones Podcast #12 - Music I'm Only Recently Getting Into, But Should Have Dug Long Ago...
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It's been a while since I've contributed anything to the Mad Ones, let alone a full podcast episode. For this I am sorry, but I do have a quasi-legitimate excuse. Over the past couple of weeks, I've been consumed with a personally procured assignment: to finally "get into" several of those bands and artists that everybody says you HAVE to dig deep. Having been a closed-minded political punk sno...
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Daytrotter Nails It! - The Tallest Man On Earth Session
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Track:I Won't Be Found (Daytrotter Session)
In recent months, Daytrotter.com has become one of my go-to sources for great new music. Every day, this site puts out a multi-song session by a contemporary musician or band, which is recorded at the website's studio. Along with the session, Daytrotter wordsmith Sean Moeller puts out an article which regularly features well-thought out metaphors and anecdotal imagery to accompany the recorded ...
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I Know Where All Sweetness Lies
Beacons, the sophomore LP from Toronto orchestral pop band Ohbijou has been getting a lot of attention in recent months, and justifiably so. The record has this inherently warm tone that remains present through the album's various waves of intensity. This tone derives from lead singer and band leader Casey Mecija's sentiments about the city in which she lives, and what she takes from days spent...
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Destroyer @ The Horseshoe Tavern - October 3, 2009
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Last night at The Horseshoe Tavern, Torontonians were treated to an amazing show by Destroyer, the musical project of a man who I know consider to be one of Canada’s most interesting and talented musicians. Dan Bejar, who uses the stage name Destroyer, played one hell of a show. The whole performance came off with an almost comic tone, and yet, it demanded to be taken seriously. And it was take.
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Harper Gets By With a Little Help From Yo Yo Ma
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Artist:Yo Yo Ma
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Track:With A Little Help form My Friends
Today I woke up with a strong inclination to write about the live performance that I witnessed last night. It was thought provoking and totally electrifying. I have a lot of words to share on the subject, but before I address them, I NEEEEEED to share this video.As I sat drinking my Sunday morning coffee, I stumbled upon a news article describing how The Right Honourable Prime Minister Stephen ...
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A Mountain Is A Mouth Eating Up the Sky
Music is the most powerful imaginative stimulant in the universe. It can take you everywhere, overwhelm you with waves of emotion, and bury your mind's eye in a flurry of mental images. It can bring you up, bring you down, and put you squarely into someone else's shoes. Some creations can be stark reminders of music's almost religious power; they immediately make the listener feel the transform..
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Videos: Rah Rah, Chris Hickey, The Rural Alberta Advantage
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Today I've been browsing the blogosphere and have come across several videos that I thought were worth sharing with all of you loyal Mad Onesians. The first is a creepy, skin-crawler of a video set to the song "Fuck NAFTA" by Regina's own Rah Rah.The second is a great video set to the humbling poetry in motion of California singer-songwriter Chris Hickey. Specifically the song is "Kerouac" the ...
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The Mad Ones Podcast #11 - Urban Angst, Modern Dissatisfaction
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As a self-labeled social democrat, I've always felt a kind of antipathy towards the contemporary capitalist structures of society. All too often, people are lost amidst the struggle to be noticed, get a job, pay the bills, get an education, and find an avenue of opportunity. The imperatives of our economic system relentlessly pressure corporations and businesses to improve their efficiency, dri...
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The 2009 Polaris Prize Goes To.....FUCK!
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FUCKED UP - The Chemistry of Common LifeThat is correct. As was said today on Quick Before It Melts, I can't wait to see the various ways the media tries to convey this message with out saying or writing the word, FUCKED. I have to admit, in the months leading up to last night's Polaris Prize Gala, I never even gave this Toronto band a fighting chance. In my mind, (as was made obvious in my pre..
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I Drink Rain and Piss Out Acid
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It's currently 10:30 in the morning. I'm sitting at my kitchen table with a cup of coffee (straight black due to lack of milk), and I'm looking forward to another day of my job search in this sink-or-swin, cut-throat society of ours. As I've been out pounding the pavement for the past couple weeks, I've constantly been having thoughts about whether or not this modern world is inevitably linked ...
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When I'm Gone Don't Be Surprised
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Artist:The Wooden Sky
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Album:If I Don't Come Home You'll Know I'm Gone
A while back, I wrote a post anticipating the release of The Wooden Sky's sophomore album, If I Don't Come Home You'll Know I'm Gone. In it, I spoke about how I felt the band had taken a couple evolutionary steps. Namely, they have grown more sophisticated in sound; there is a wider element of experimentation and a deeper profundity to their lyrics. Now, after having listened to said album on .
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Are You Alone Tonight?
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Album:Shady Retreat
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Track:The End
Any regular reader of this blog will probably be able to ascertain that I have a strong affinity for soft, honest, twang-ridden folk music. Acoustic guitars, harmonicas, banjos, thoughtful lyrics; these are the things that probably strike me the deepest when it comes to music. For this reason, when I come across a song such as "The End" by Pennsylvania's own Peasant, I feel some kind of rush of...
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The Mad Ones Podcast #10 - Toronto
A thousand apologies for the lack of blogging on my part; I've been in the process of wrapping up my sweet summer spent in beautiful and eternally glorious Kamloops, British Columbia. As it happens, I've also moved out east to Toronto with the hopes of landing some gainful and fulfilling employment, while at the same time getting out to a hell of a lot more live shows that can be featured on Th...
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The Mad Ones Podcast #9 - Cover Tunes
While I was in the shower today, I found myself humming along to the song "Panama" by Van Halen (which has enjoyed a recent resurgence in favour among the aimless masses due to it's appearance in the film Superbad). As the chorus came closer to the front of my mind, I broke out into full-blown singing. The point of sharing this little tid-bit of my day is that it got me thinking about cover son...
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The Greenbelt Collective: An Archetypal Indie-Pop Orchestra
Over the weekend, my family and I, being reunited as a whole for the first time in a long while, went on a trip down to Vancouver to dig life and visit our Grandma. While in the big city, my older brother and I had the chance to gather a few friends and waltz on down to East Hastings to see some live music in an endearingly grungy little hovel called the Funky Winkerbean. There, I bore witness ...
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