Sudbury

Played an awesome house concert in Sudbury two nights ago.



Clayton Drake of M Lemon and the Birthday Cakes is an awesome host (not to forget John too), and I've been at their place for the last 2 nights, playing music in the basement, going out for breakfast at a little diner, or just sitting around talking about music and what we're all doing musically. Lots of tour stories and 'shop talk'. We had about 30 people crammed into the basement for the show, and everyone had a really good time, I'm excited to come back and have everyone come out once again. Although, next time I'll be at the Nightclub, which is apparently in the same building as a stripclub. Hopefully they're not expecting THAT kind of show!

The other bands that played were Little Albert, an improv noise group that totally one-upped me by using not one, but two theremins, as well as a bassist that had two (smaller) loop stations. I followed them, and then Andrew Lavoie came on and did some acoustic solo work, incorporating delay loops into some originals, blues and a few covers. Solid night!

North Bay tonight, should be a lot of fun, as I'm on a bill with the Rough Sea and Greater Than Giants; an eclectic mix! My favorite!

Fix!

Yesterday, Shannon Lepere and I shot a stop animation music video for my song "Fix", which will be submitted to Much Music, as well as placed on my upcoming DVD once it's completed.

However, we also had some help from my mother and Megan De Roover, as well as Rebecka Van Deventer! I won't give too much away, but we did use between 500-600 bandaids, and took roughly 2500 photos to create the video. I'll have more details about that as the video is edited!

NXNE 2009

I was invited to this year's NXNE in Toronto, so this entry will be a little synopsis of my trip, as well as a pseudo-review of my experiences during the festival.

The festival ran from Wednesday June 17th until Sunday, June 21st, however, there was little happening on the Wednesday and Sunday, so most of the activity occurred from the 18th to 20th.


June 18th:

The day began with a booth at the Indie Music Marketplace, where I had the opportunity to sell CD's, and promote the show that night. Several other merchants were also performing at the same venue, so that was great to see. Beyond that, I made some new friends, including Mick DiMaio from StereoGoesStellar.

*photo courtesy of Shannon Lepere - 365 Days of Jumping

Unfortunately they were playing that night as well, otherwise I would have loved to see their brand of piano pop/rock, which is reminiscent of Ben Folds, Something Corporate, and at times I even hear the voice of Placebo. Regardless, we talked about their recording process and their new album while registering for the festival, and by the time I popped the disc into the car, I was already hooked, and it's still being listened to on a daily basis!

I was scheduled to perform on Thursday at The Painted Lady, a really cool little bar with pin-up/strip/burlesque memorabilia on the walls. The stage area was a little tight, and was situated at the back of the room, at what looked to be the end of a hallway no wider than 8 feet.
- The show began with a family act, The Wilkins, who put a fresh spin on a 70's rock sound, because of the inclusion of synthesizers/keys.
- I followed, pushing through a severe cold which had almost rendered me voiceless, but the crowd still enjoyed it and got a taste for what it is that I do.

*photo courtesy of Shannon Lepere

- After me was Rob Szabo, whom I had been informed not to perform after (like it was my choice), because no one else could even compare to his greatness. He delivered a powerful acoustic set, and my attention was drawn in more by his inclusion of a wooden foot pedal with a microphone inside to simulate stomping sounds simply by tapping the top of it with your foot. We chatted before his show, and he was a very kind and friendly person, and it would be great to share a stage with him again.
- After getting my first of two parking tickets, I decided to leave halfway through Paisley Jura's performance. I was disappointed because her band included trombone, glockenspiel, standup bass, lap-steel guitar, piano, drums and a bunch of other things too. We had met at the Indie Music Marketplace earlier that day, and it was really neat to see how she transformed from jeans and a sweater to an evening gown jazz/contemporary singer/performer.
- The last performer of the night was Solarists (pronounced So-LAHr-ists), whose frontman Cam McLellan was going to perform solo for the night. I had also met Cam earlier that day and was really saddened that I couldn't stick around to watch his set. But the sickness was getting the better of me, so I ended my night early.

June 19th:

Friday was the first day of attending conferences, which I have to say were quite poorly advertised. The website made no mention of the different panels, and the only way I found out about the conferences was from a special NXNE issue of Lucid Media, which hightlighted the top 3. I later found a comprehensive listing, and even met up with some friends in The Furr from Winnipeg who I sat with in some of the panel discussions. We sat through two different panels, and left both of them early because they were not presenting anything informative or new, and in the case of one of the sessions, all of the panelists were engaged in conversation with a member of Fucked Up at the back of the room, and they spent the entire session discussing ridiculous tour stories from when they'd travel together. It was hilarious, for sure, but definitely a waste of time.

After the conferences, I made my way to Lacquer Channel to meet with Phil Demetro, who will be mastering my Windows and Doors album. As soon as I arrived I was excited, because he was in the middle of mastering a new remix of The Midway State - Change For You, a track I'd fallen in love with a while back. He gave me a quick show of the place, and even took the time to listen to some of the unmixed wav files so that he could assess what he would need to do. He was very pleased with the mixes as they were, and gave some additional praise to the guys at Dining Room Studios, making me feel very, very confident that this new album will end up sounding great! It was a perfect boost after a lacklustre showcase and poorly organized conferences.

I then made my way over the distillery area of Toronto, for a meeting at Balzac's Coffee to meet with someone regarding the application process to become a musician for Cirque Du Soleil. Imagine that!

That evening, I manged to catch several different sets in a few different venues:

At Supermarket, I caught a little of Bass Lions, and then most of The Paint Movement's set. This showcase featured mostly Nevado Records' bands, and I'm definitely impressed with the quality of their signings, purchasing a Paint Movement disc before leaving. Moving on, I caught Crush Luther at Montana's Sidestage. I've been listening to them for a while, and was really looking forward to a stellar set, but like many performances at NXNE, I found it to be a little tired, and less exciting than I had hoped for. Still, it was nice to hear some recognizable material at the festival filled with acts I'd never heard of. As we were leaving we saw 10 minutes of Parklane from South Africa, who played cliche hard rock/nu metal, but I still felt bad because there were only 3 people watching them by the end of their set which began at 1 am.

June 20th:

Again I attended the conferences, hoping for something more substantial than before. I was not so fortunate. I did however, manage to meet Matt Pollesel from iheartmusic.net, as well as someone who claimed to be the 10th most popular user on youtube.com. The secret to his success? He gets his friends and himself to grab an acoustic guitar and do cover renditions of songs that are currently popular, meaning that people will type in the song name and then watch their renditions while trying to find the actual video they're looking for. Brilliant, but tacky.

All that aside, I attended the Six Shooter Records free barbeque, not only filling my belly with delicious veggie burgers, but also my head with great music from some of their acts. The day was a rainy one, but Six Shooter were ahead of it all, having put up tents all around their back lot, and even bringing in dozens of bags of gravel to put on the ground to prevent bbq'ers from getting their feet soaked. The highlight for me was of course Martin Tielli of the Rheostatics, who was joined by Luke Doucet and Selina Martin.

*photo courtesy of Shannon Lepere

We left soon after to go to a Secret Session at TARA, where we caught the tail end of a funky group, whose name I unfortunately cannot recall.

That evening, I managed to catch Novillero at El Mocambo (sans horn section, which left me slightly disappointed), and then walked all the way to the Whippersnapper Gallery on College St, in the hopes that I would meet Jonas Bonnetta from Evening Hymns whose set I had missed. The lineup wasn't very long, but the capacity of the room was small, so we ended up visiting Soundscapes record store across the street, and who else should be in there than Jonas himself! It was one of three occasions that night when someone called/spoke/yelled out my name. After leaving some discs to be sold there (hint hint, "Dichotomy" is now available at Soundscapes in Toronto), we headed to Lee's Palace to catch C'mon who were the tightest performers of the entire festival (that I saw). We kept moving, and caught Hot Panda at the Horseshoe Tavern. I've been seeing their name a lot lately, so I figured I'd check them out. They were definitely energetic, but I find myself getting bored fairly quickly with what I would consider to be some of the more typical indie acts. Grand Analog was next at the Reverb, and was a great performer. It was interesting to see them live, because I had the opportunity to book them for the Superior Youth Festival in Thunder Bay, but left the decision up to the local skateboard coalition. Grand Analog was humourous because at one point a girl (with a guy in tow) jumped up on stage and started dancing and giving peace signs and more, all the while Grand Analog kept performing and even sarcastically commenting on how much they love the Reverb, because of the great importance they place on stage security. Once that concluded, we kept walking, dropping in at the Hideout to see the corpse painted faces of Fattooth, one of which was a Joker lookalike.

June 21st:

Sunday was a lazy day, heading to the beach where I fell asleep and burnt my face a little, followed by visits with some friends from Sioux Lookout, including Nick Sherman who will hopefully be recording a new album at Dining Room Studios within the next year or so.

*photo courtesy of Shannon Lepere

After some delicious homemade lasagna, we decided to forego the NXNE schedule and check out the MMVA's. Yes, I went to NXNE and ended up seeing Nickelback.

However, it was hilarious, because Lady Gaga's performance concluded with her leaning back as sparks/flames shot out of some wire frames that were covering her breasts.

All in all, it was a very random day, but more fun than schedule ridden.

Thornhill

The micro-tour with AVS has begun!

We performed at a cafetorium in Thornhill, at St Elizabeth's high school as part of a music night, and it was great. The stage was excellent, and the audience was really receptive to all types of music (we shared the stage with latin, singer/songwriter, a capella groups and more).

During my performance, I even had a young boy stand off to the side and mimic every movement that I was doing. Thanks to Scott Mackay of AVS from capturing the moment!

Before that, we had an interesting day, having driving from Thunder Bay through the night, we arrived in Thornhill, and had 2 interesting experiences: we founda person on drugs in a park that was coming down, and on the verge of passing out. He had scrapes on his forehead and back of his hand, and it looked like he had bit his tongue badly. He was having trouble walking and claimed to have had problems with his back. Some students from the high school were there and had called paramedics, who arrived shortly after we got there. Naturally, the guy was angry that we had alerted some form of authority.

After that, we headed to The Pickle Barrel, a little restaurant in a mall across the street. Our server was great at first, but then as the evening progressed, he continued to upsell us and then even got mad at the end when we wanted to pay for our meals separately instead of one lump sum for 5 people. Weak.

Regardless, tonight we're in Guelph, playing at Jimmy Jazz, which our friend Brent Coleman has organized for us.

Here's one of his lyrics:

"Can't be bought...
Can't be bought...
Can't be bought...
love...can't be sold."

Recording continues....Day __?

So it's been a long time since I updated the recording blog...I personally blame the fact that I no longer have access to high speed internet, as well as the fact that I was supremely swamped while working on my MA thesis.

Regardless, we've added tons of new things, and we're even starting vocals today!

This is how excited myself and Chris Dorota (audio engineer mastermind) are right now.

More updates soon!

Northern Rocks Tour - North Bay

Spent last night in North Bay, playing a sold out show (we definitely went over capacity!) at the Bull and Quench pub.

It was the first time that I had met the other 2 bands that I'm touring with;

Rabbit Transit - www.myspace.com/rabbittransit - Sudbury, ON
Cody Allen - www.myspace.com/codyoallen - North Bay, ON

We also shared stages with some other pretty cool locals, like Feels Like Yesterday, and the Black Hole of Calcutta, who opened and closed the show, respectively.

Chris Rancourt (of Northern Rocks) and I are pumped to have a short drive to Cobalt, ON today, since I've driven since Tbay, and that was a sweet haul.

Either way, it's Cobalt tonight at the Classic Theatre. There should hopefully be some good photos to come!

Studio Day 9

So after 7 days of working on both acoustic and electric guitars, they are all done! However...there is still one more thing that needs to be done with them: I need to royally abuse my old Fender, by laying it down on a baffle, attaching some mics to it, and slapping away like it was a hand drum. For those of you that haven't seen me live, I used to beat that guitar into submission all the time, using it for 'kickdrum' sounds. I would also slap and tap the neck of the guitar to get percussive 'handdrum' sounds as well as a variety of other stuff. That's all that needs to be done, BUT...I'm taking a short break from recording in order to focus on some other things:
the MA thesis is still being worked on. My transcribing machines finally arrived from the States the other day, so I've been diligently working my fingers every day, either by typing out hours of interviews, or laying down tracks for the album.
Secondly, I'm also working on another soundtrack. This short film is called 'The Drink' and has been put together by Apple Wagon Films. I also happened to be one of the 2 main actors, so it's really neat to add atmospheric music that compliments the visual foreground.

[photo by Shannon Lepere]

Studio Day 1

Whewf!

Day 1 of recording has been completed!

A big thanks to Reggie Modin, who is doing all the drums/percussion on the album, and who managed to crank out 11 out of 14 tracks in our first session! Whataguy!

Tomorrow we continue, including recording a track that will feature Reggie soloing through half of it, as well as other alternative percussion!

I'm so excited to finally have things rolling in the studio, and I shall have more updates soon! I'm getting access to a video camera tomorrow in order to shoot segments of the 'making of' portion of the DVD, but I'll also make sure to throw up some video updates as well!

Stay tuned! Things are coming together very quickly!

Music and tourism time

Being up here in Iqaluit, slightly distanced from my equipment (in the old residence) and the ability to be noisy at any time of day has certainly taught me a few things.

1. Not to rely on equipment for music. There is a reason I have an acoustic guitar. To play music with BY ITSELF.

2. Not all songs need looping (although it certainly does help in some cases!)

3. Songwriting and lyrical content is what I need to focus on at the current moment

4. I really wish that I hadn't forgotten that one cord that allows me to record while I'm here. I've been coming up with some good stuff, and I hope it's not being lost.

5. Coffeehouses are a great atmosphere, so having a variety in repertoire is always a plus.

6. Open Mic nights are positive and negative:
A) Positive: you get the chance to showcase some of your original music to new people
B) Positive/Negative: you can butcher one of your favorite cover songs, and while hating yourself, the rest of the room does not hate you.
C) Negative: Open Mic's with full bands are not a good time to showcase an acoustic ballad. Buzzkill. (Not that I did this, but someone mentioned that I should, to which I replied "are you crazy?!")


I've got a new lyrical snippet in my head, and the end of the chorus sings:

"can you bring me a knife?
for the bones..."

I know...a scrap at best...but hey! I wrote it at a youth centre while listening to kids blaring Guitar Hero III, followed by walking, and soon to be capped off with sitting in a residence room, not being able to play my guitar and imagine where I want the lyrics to go.

The concept for the song will be self-empowerment. Fail to see the connection between that and knives/bones? That's alright...when it's complete you'll understand.



Tomorrow brings the weekend, which means that while I don't have any scheduled interviews, I will play the part of the dreaded tourist, visiting attraction after attraction, taking photos of anything and everything, purchasing overpriced knick knacks from arts groups that take commission from the artists' themselves (I'm kidding, I'll buy it direct from the artist).

I've acquired a new cable for the weekend that will allow me to download pictures, so watch out readers! More photos to come.

...10 days and counting!

With only 10 days left until I vanish from the Thunder Bay terrain, I've been busy (surprise!) figuring out details about my trip up north, making sure that my paperwork is all in order, etc, etc.

However, one thing that has yet to be finalized is how I'm going to bring some of my gear up there. Because honestly, there's no way I'm going to go up there and NOT make music. No way. Thus my latest dilemma is "how do I bring an acoustic guitar and looping devices on a plane withOUT having them broken by airway employees?" The answer will surely be tricky, and will also require leaving some of my gear at home. Soon I hope to have a local audio engineer build me a custom road case for ALL my gear, making touring relatively simple (no random boxes o' stuff), and safe (I've collected a fair amount of gear now...). I'm just really excited to get up there, and find some local musicians interested in showing me some of their own music that I can play along too. As well as throat singing. Hopefully I'll be able to learn more about that.

Did I mention that I was busy? I think so. I met with a professor at the University that I've been meeting with on and off (he never actually taught me, but we chat all the time and have a shared musical appreciation), and we came up with a tentative dissertation topic, as well as a plan for my year break from the academic world as I pursue music full time. Honestly, I didn't want to think about it, but apparently I should be thinking about it now...

Regardless, the topic will be music related, and I should have more information on that for you soon, perhaps when it's a bit more formulated! But here's a potential premise: a comparison of the concert experience to ritual theories.