Concerts

Concert Review: Joseph Arthur, August 3, The Dakota Taven

Posted on August 5, 2011 by Paul in Concerts, Everything | Leave a comment

Toronto – Joseph Arthur generally gets lumped into the singer-songwriter genre.  That’s pretty accurate, but there’s a lot more to him than just that.  He makes extensive use of loops and layering in his live performance and it’s pretty impressive to watch.  Each song begins with a general structure – some rhythm guitar or a beat pounded onto the body of his guitar – and then gets built up from there.  Dude is basically jamming with himself.  As I said, it’s pretty impressive to see, but on the other hand, it’s also a little jarring to see him stop playing guitar while the sound continues on.  At one point, he set his guitar down and just sang for a bit over the loop and it came dangerously close to being like a karaoke performance.  A really good karaoke performance though.  Still, of all the performers I’ve seen do the looping thing, he’s one of the better ones.  He even used an awesome talkbox/vocoder effect on his vocals at one point, which brought Tupac’s “California Love” to mind, and ok, some Peter Frampton as well.

For the last few songs of his set, Arthur relied less on the looping and switched to an acoustic guitar.  He even sang the last two songs unamplified while standing at the end of the stage – we’ve talked here before about how that’s a great way to reel the audience in and/or shut them up.  Although Arthur didn’t really have to do much to get the audience’s full attention.  In fact, he pretty much already had it.  It was a pretty intimate show – the dance floor at The Dakota was filled with tables and chairs.  And those chairs were filled with more than a few hardcore fans.  Arthur opened up the floor to requests and of course they came fast and furious.  He ignored many of the requests as it had been awhile since he’d played those songs, but he did take a few requests.  He didn’t play “In the Sun” though, which is probably his biggest song, but he’s got a pretty extensive back catalogue so it wasn’t really missed.

Not just a talented songwriter, Joseph Arthur is also a visual artist and he was actually painting during his set … with one hand … while singing.  That’s pretty impressive.  He actually sold one of those paintings at the end of the night.  As far as merch goes, that’s a pretty unique item.

Concert Review: Craft Spells, Pains of Being Pure at Heart, August 2, Opera House

Posted on August 4, 2011 by Allison in Concerts | Leave a comment

http://kevchino.blogspot.com

If there’s one thing you can say about New York’s Pains of Being Pure at Heart, it’s that they certainly know how to choose an opening act. When we first met them in April 2009, I was dazzled by their openers Zaza (drummer Kurt Feldman was still pulling double duty for both bands at this point). Two years later, POBPAH have steadily and predictably climbed the Toronto live venue hierarchy:

Freshman: Lee’s Palace
Sophomore: Horseshoe Tavern
Junior: Opera House, Mod Club, or Phoenix
Senior: Massey Hall, at which point you are probably not considered an “indie” band anymore unless you’re an opener

In the midst of the touring, POBPAH have remained affable and keen to stay in scope with their March release Belong–something of a semi-departure from their self-titled debut. A sound that our friend at IKVDK refers to as the de facto “Smashing Pumpkins” factor (it’s certainly noisier, graduating from tinges of the Ramones to tinges of…dare I say it…skate rock). I”m not sure I agree with that, but admit that Belong didn’t capture me for nearly as long as their first release did.

That said, I think Belong plays better as a live album because it’s seemingly less-dependent on saccharine vocals and pulls from frontman Kip Berman’s development as a guitarist. Out of all of the band members, I’d say he’s blossomed the most as a performer in spite of sometimes inconsistent vocals. Bassist Alex Naidus often reminded me of the twitchy Sheldon Cooper from the Big Bang Theory and Peggy Wang’s wavering voice seemed too quiet at times. However…and this is a big however, they are still only a couple of years old and at least have the good sense to initiate some audience banter, having mastered the art of settling a room with charm and graciousness.

As for Seattle-based Craft Spells, I missed about half of their short 7-song set, but am sure just about everyone can concede that these kids are something special. First of all, they look like they’re still in high school. Second of all, from what I heard of Idle Labor (one of Josh’s favorite releases of the year with an album cover strangely reminiscent of New Order’s Power, Corruption, and Lies), what they were showcasing has what I call the “sparkle sheen nostalgia” quality to it. It’s the kind of release that wraps you in sickly-sweet memories from the 1980’s–probably the most comfort anyone can feel outside a womb for most people in my age group–there’s dimension there that feels familiar while discouraging comparison if that makes any sense. It doesn’t hurt that Justin Vallestero’s voice is reliant on scrapes and bumps rather than prone to them. These guys are kind of like a rich man’s Mary Onettes‘ with depth and breadth, and I suggest checking them out. It’s likely they’ll be eclipsing as headliners soon. I guess I’m becoming as fickle as those teenagers I bash after all.

Concert Review: Eels, Aug 2, Lee’s Palace

Posted on August 3, 2011 by Paul in Concerts | 1 Comment

Toronto – The thing about seeing an Eels concert is you’re never quite sure what version of the band you’re going to get.  It could be a string augmented, acoustic-based band or it could be a stripped down rock trio.  It could even feature one member simply standing onstage without an instrument, dancing wildly and shouting non-sequiturs into the mic, as I witnessed at a previous Eels show a few years back.  But on this occasion, Eels took the form of what would probably best be described as their version of a rock n’ soul revue.  The entire band, including a horn section, were clad in suits and sunglasses.  And beards!  Eels are one of the most impressively bearded bands I have ever seen.  They delivered an upbeat, fun set of tunes from throughout their career, many of them rearranged to fit the band’s current live sound.

Frontman E was in pretty good spirits, shouting out things like “Refreshing!” and “That was very positive!” after songs and joking about how he thought he was in New Mexico in February rather than Toronto in the summer before the band launched into a proper summer song, a solid version of Sly and the Family Stone’s “Hot Fun In The Summertime.”  Another highlight was a punky version of “I Like Birds,” which I didn’t even recognize at first, but it sounded just as good as the original recorded version.  Maybe better.

On a side note, I’d like to point out that before entering, I noticed not one but two huge tour buses parked outside of the venue.  Granted, there are currently seven members of Eels, but it still doesn’t seem like they would require that much space.  I’m not sure why I’m pointing this out, but I thought it was interesting.  Nice to see Eels doing their part to support the tour bus industry. 

Concert Review: Ellie Goulding, August 1st, Kool Haus

Posted on August 3, 2011 by Ricky in Concerts | Leave a comment

ellie goulding kool haus

Toronto – Ellie Goulding‘s stock has been on a slow but steady climb over the past year. The electro-acoustic siren first captured some hearts last year with her dance floor track Starry Eyed. A few average singles (The Writer, Guns and Horses) later, She seemed destined for a comfortable Marina/Little Boots level of success before releasing her cover of Elton John’s Your Song last fall. The cover was pretty much perfect – take an entirely famous song, somehow completely make it your own and then release a video highlighting how cute and adorable you are. Suddenly Ellie Goulding was everywhere. One sxsw trip, royal wedding performance and SNL appearance later and it would seem Ellie Goulding is on the doorsteps of mega stardom. Which brings us to Monday night at the Kool Haus.

A packed all ages crowd anxiously awaited the blonde starlet after the Bag Raiders set. Armed with a three piece band, Ellie Goulding took the stage shortly after nine and played an eighty minute set that spanned her entire discography. The show could be broken up into three acts with the first being an energetic beginning (featuring Under the Sheets) to get the crowd in the proper mood. One of the things i love about pop crowds is that they are just ready to rock. The audience started dancing from the first notes of the first song and rarely let up. The beginning was followed up by the acoustic / intimate middle portion which saw Ellie strum a few acoustic tunes, tell a few anecdotes and delivering her hit single Your Song. I wonder how many people knows it was a cover. It didn’t matter, people loved it. It’s a powerful track and one of those cool lighter in the air moments, only it’s 2011, so instead of lighters, you have a bunch of iphones trying to record the track (to poor effect). The band took the stage shortly after and the show went into the triumphant hits filled (Lights, Starry Eyed) third act. Needless to say, the crowd ate it up.

As a performer, Ellie is pretty content on letting her voice and music do the talking. She’ll frequently play on her guitar, and help with the drums and on a few tracks, show a few dance moves. Her anecdotes are charming and she plays the show with a certain “wow, I’m actually doing this!” enthusiasm that makes it hard not to like. Going forward it will be interesting to see if she goes full pop or continue to straddle the electric/acoustic folk line she has drawn for herself. Either way, if she keeps on writing catchy tracks, no one’s going to care.

Guns and Horses by Ellie Goulding

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