(Toronto) As I get ready to spend a week in Quebec for March Break, I am reminded of the first time I saw Tetes A Claques (translated “a face you want to slap”). If you have not heard of Tetes A Claques, then you must be an English speaking Canadian, because all the French Canadiens are in on the joke.

In 2006 Michel Beaudet started making his own brand of animated shorts and posting them on his website. It took off. Way off. Today, more than one million of his short videos are watched per day on his site, making it one of the most popular francophone websites in Quebec and Canada. Since 2006, Michel has made over 60 of these videos.

Even if the only French you know will allow you to sharpen your pencil in the library, check it out anyway. It is one part creepy, one part funny and it will eventually be a hit in English Canada.

Toronto - Heres a primer for Saturday

Horseshoe – Maybe Smith. See my earlier post about Maybe Smith HERE. I like it. A true independent spirit on the Canadian music scene.

Rivoli - Jenn Grant and the Night Painters – I know of Jenn Grant, but not the Night Painters. Jenn does the female singer songwriter thing which I always enjoy, plus it is only a couple of doors down from the Maybe Smith show. Cheers.

Royal York Hotel - The Indies, featuring acts like Young Galaxy, Tokyo Police Club, New Pornographers and The Besnard Lakes

Lees Palace - The Pigeon Detectives, Brits we featured on an earlier blog entry.

Phoenix - The Breeders. Chances are, if you are a fan of this band, you have tickets by now.

Vancouver, March 5th…I was counting down to this day ever since I heard ‘Do You Like Rock Music’. Loyal readers of this blog will know The Panic Manual loves us some BSP, so get ready for some hero worship.

The evening started out with some pre-drinks at my new favorite downtown hang-out - The Calling. Great food, cheap beers and if you’re there on the right night, you’ll hear some good indie music. The only downside - it’s a hell of a walk to all the concert venues.

This was my first time at the Plaza, which doubles as a nightclub on weekend. I hated the layout. There’s a huge oval bar right in the middle which makes it an annoying obstruction if you can’t fit on the small, crowded dancefloor. Luckily the show wasn’t too packed (around 200 people), so we managed to find a nice cozy spot in the middle of the floor around 8 feet from the stage.

We got to the Plaza at around 10:00 expecting to catch the end of what we thought was the only opening set. It was actually the first of two bands on support - a local band called ‘Elizabeth‘. We arrived with enough time to catch the last 2 songs which were too punky and loud for my taste. The next band, ‘colourmusic‘ took almost an hour to get started due to sound problems. They had me intrigued as soon they started setting up their equipment because they were all dressed the matching white tracksuits. I expected them to be German…they’re actually from Oklahoma. After the long wait the set started off with a grade-six-biology-video-esque voice over introducing the band, which I thought was a unique touch. It continued to come on randomly throughout the entire set telling us little known facts about the band and describing a bass riff that was inspired by Lord of the Rings. The only way I can describe this colourmusic is a hardcore version of Apples In Stereo. Geeky but rockin’. One of those bands that you’re pleasantly surprised with after their set.

11:30 rolls around and British Sea Power finally hit the stage, not that I didn’t enjoy the lead up to their set, but I was there because I indeed Love Rock Music. The lads (and very cute lass on violin) sure didn’t disappoint. Immediately kicking things off with “Lights Out For Darker Skies” they didn’t quit until they left the stage after the encore. The set spanned their entire collection, of course focusing on DYLRM. Although thoroughly enjoying the show I would have to say my highlight was the poor bastard who has mistakenly took the indie fans dancing to the right of us for grunge rockers. Halfway through ‘Atom’ he jumped on stage goat horns extended, yelling at the front row to gather around. They instead spread out and 5 seconds later all I could hear was a loud ‘SMACK!’. The crowd continued swaying around what I would have expected to be a corpse after hearing that rough landing. It took a minute or so when we finally hear an ‘OWWWW!’ (as in Spring Break 2008!! Ow!) and see the stage jumper pop with only enough time to try and high five someone before he was chased, caught and dragged out by the bouncers. Classic.

I would have given this show a 4.5/5 but the doomed stage diver bumped it up to a 5/5. I took a pic of the setlist on my phone because I can never remember all the songs played during a gig. I still missed a couple of them below as BSP’s roadie’s handwriting is as bad as my memory:

Lights Out For Darker Skies
Atom
Childhood Memories
The Spirit of St. Louis
A Trip Out
Down On The Ground
Blackout
Waving Flags
The Great Skua
Remember Me
Favours in the Beetroot Fields
Canvey Island
No Lucifer

Encore:
True Adventures
Carrion

Toronto - Some shows that caught our interest for Friday Night

Horseshoe Tavern – Hey Rosetta! – Hawksley Workman produced these Newfies latest album. Been hearing lots about them. (ricky note: its at 1:20)

Sneaky Dee’s – Hot Springs. Girl rockers from Montreal, cheap beer at Dee’s and Mexican take-out for the trip home. Sounds like a good way close the evening.

Danforth Music Hall - Hawksley Workman. Speaking of the Hawk, the man himself plays on the Danforth tonight, and the show will definitely be a hot and heavy show. Hot. and Heavy.

Drake Hotel - Wood Hands. Read Eye magazine for more about them

(Toronto) CMW is this week. Here are some notable shows that you may not have heard about that I will be checking out:

Cameron House – Rich Aucoin
Wade says: I have heard that Rich plays The Grinch Who Stole Christmas behind him as he plays his first four songs. His songs go with the movie. Good lord.

Cameron House – The Superfantastics.
Wade says: Good Nova Scotia rockers. Check em.

El Mocambo – The Besnard Lakes.
Wade says: Polaris nominated dream pop band. Lots of hype in 2007

El Mocambo – Les Breastfeeders
Wade says: French band with a crazy tambourine playing fool. I saw them at the Kool House last year and they rocked it. Should be good energy at the El Mo too.

Horsehoe Tavern - Immaculate Machine, Katie Stelmanis, http://www.myspace.com/plantsandanimals
Ricky says: Read my previous posts

Rivoli - Julie Doiron
Ricky says: Read Wades post

Supermarkt - Meligrove Band, Sloan
Ricky says: Sloan needs no introductions

Sneaky Dees - Russian Futurists
Ricky says: Its Sneakys.

Ricky Says:

As you can see, there are a lot of overlapping shows. So I guess you have to pick and choose. All these bands are Canadian, meaning they will be in Toronto a lot. So the bottom line comes to, do you want to stay in one place the whole night, or do you want to move. If you want to stay in one place the whole night, the Horseshoe and the Supermarkt are good options. Those places are gonna be PACKED. Specially Supermarkt, where Sloan is playing a pretty small venue.

If you wish to travel a little further west, you can check out Unfamiliar Record’s showcase at the Wrongbar (1279 Queen St. W), with Toronto bands Lioness and Airfields playing at 9 and 10 respectively. They also have a band called “Boys in a Band” playing, all the way from Faroe Islands. Where is that? your guess is as good as mine. I wonder if they were named after the Libertines song. You can check out more about the night here.

So there you have it, a lot of options from the Panic Manual on what to do on this lovely warm thursday night.

Toronto - WTF IS WITH THIS WEATHER! Its March. There should not be snow on the ground. I am starting to feel like those people in the Day After Tommorrow. It’s cold. Its wet. Its miserable. All these people coming here for Canadian Music Week are never going to come back. Unless they are from other parts of Canada, then I guess it just feels like home.

Even the crappy weather was not enough to stop me from attending the free Lightspeed Champion show last night at the Horseshoe. If I had to pay for the show though…. So yea, NME approved Lightspeed Champion played a free show last night at the Horseshoe. The weather was crappy outside, but I was warmed up by a nice batch of Duff wings, which left my tongue without any feeling. Luckily, I did not go for Death wings, like the people I was with did. Actually, if I had eaten death wings, I could have probably put a match by my ass and light a fire pretty easily and warm the hell up.

The crowd was rather small considering how much hype this guy has been getting lately. However, I don’t really know whats real hype, and what is ‘internet’ hype. I guess considering the weather, this was an okay crowd. Dev Hynes, the lead singer, came out with a violinist at around 9:35. Which pleased me since I was not in a mood for a late show. Thats all this band was, Dev, wearing the finest rat hair hat he could find and a sweater his grandma probably gave him, and his buddy, the violinist. Despite the lack of drums, bass and everything else though, they proceeded to play about 6 or 7 songs, including a cover of the Strokes - Heart in a Cage.

How did the music sound? it was quite good. His album is very stripped down anyways, and relies much on catchy choruses and melodies. This setup was very fitting for him I think. Also, the dude is hilarious. He had no setlist, made a bunch of jokes and told some good stories. Its refreshing to see someone on stage who seems like someone you’d joke around with at a bar or something. For example, he introduced a song about prostitution, saying its from a view of a prostitute. He then said, its not a song about like condoning prostitution and hes not trying to make a statement or anything, finishing with the words ‘im not that deep’. Fuck man, me neither.

So whats the verdict? its a free show. So thats an automatic 3 stars in my book. Combine that with decent tunes and good showsmanship, I think its a 4 star show, -0.5 stars for the weather

3.5/5