cmw

CMW Review: Alcoholic Faith Mission, Ryan Warner and The Moonlight Ride, March 9, Rancho Relaxo

Posted on March 11, 2011 by Paul in Canadian Music Week, Concerts, Everything | 2 Comments

Toronto – And so it was that on the first night of Canadian Music Fest, I trudged out into some truly dismal weather to make my way to Rancho Relaxo to check out some bands, all the while hoping that it was worth getting up off the couch to see.  Luckily it was.

Ryan Warner and The Moonlight Ride were already playing as we made our way into the bar.  They offered up some decent, Tom Waits influenced folk rock that featured horn and accordion.  They had a couple sound issues, most notably during “Under the Floors,” a song they had apparently just written yesterday.  It was a good song, probably the best of their set, and it reminded me a bit of the band Karate, but they were forced to start it over when the song became overtaken by a massive amount of feedback.  The lesson here perhaps is to wait more than a day before performing a brand new song.

Alcoholic Faith Mission were up next and I have to say they were pretty impressive.  They had a lush, warm sound that included keening vocals, keyboards, and copious amounts of trombone (it was seemingly played through a pedal at one point.  Either that, or that guy can get some seriously sick sounds coming out of that thing naturally).  One of the highlights was “Sobriety Up And Left,” introduced by the singer through an apparently true story about him waking up spitting up blood.  Despite that gruesome image, it was a beautiful song.  The audience definitely left with a good impression.  I wouldn’t be surprised if a few people there that night check out one of their other shows this weekend.

Ryan Warner:

Alcoholic Faith Mission:

Alcoholic Faith Mission play The Dakota Friday, March 11 @ midnight and The El Mocambo Saturday, March 12 @ 8:00 pm.

CMW/SXSW Preview: Alcoholic Faith Mission

Posted on February 10, 2011 by Ricky in Canadian Music Week, South By Southwest | 1 Comment

Toronto – Between the Raveonettes, Efterklang and Alphabeat, once could argue that Danish indie pop music is on a definite rise. You can add Alcoholic Faith Mission to that list. A quintet (why is there six in their press picture?! whose the extra mystery person?) met in Brooklyn and formed their mission statement in that fabled borough. Despite being from the land of Danes and.. Danish, the group now resides in Brooklyn and probably record their music in some cool loft in a restored factory. The band has had several releases already, but it was with their most recent release Let This Be The Last Night We Care that caught the eyes of the most important people on Earth – music critics. When your mustache has caught the attention of Esquire, you have clearly done something right.

What about their music, you say? Well let me point out that their EP cover for their latest release, Running With Insanity

Looks a lot like Caribou‘s Swim

What does this say about the music? nothing. However, if you go deeper, you can say that great minds think a like and Caribou’s album was awesome and so by nature, due to the great minds theorem, the Alcoholic Faith Mission EP will be great as well. That might be thought of as lazy/creative journalism, so instead, I’ll say that from what I’ve heard of their material, Alcoholic Faith Mission is full of toe tapping, upbeat and warm music that is great for spring time listening. The winter is soon to be over, the sun is on the horizon and listening to the title track of this EP, it’s hard to think otherwise.

Alcoholic Faith Mission is playing BOTH CMW and SXSW, which is awesome, since I just wrote a preview article for two events for the price of one. Yay me.

CMW: Rancho Relaxo, March 9, MIDNIGHT
CMW: Dakota Tavern, Friday March 11, MIDNIGHT
SXSW: Probably everywhere

Alcoholic Faith Mission – Running With Insanity by Paper Garden Records

CMW: 2010 Festival Highlights

Posted on March 29, 2010 by Mark in Canadian Music Week, Concerts | 1 Comment

Toronto – Well the dust has settled on another Canadian Music Week. I’ve had an opportunity to take a step back and have a good think about the shows I’ve seen, so I’m ready for my recap.

Best show:
It’s a tie between Plants & Animals and the last 20 minutes that I saw of the Handsome Furs set. I’m going to go with the Handsome Furs because it was so intense and energetic.

Best show from a band you have never heard before:
Bahamas. He is a solid guitar player and singer. Of the Jason  Collett/Zeus/Bahams trifecta, it was the aesthetic of the Bahamas songs that I was most drawn too. In terms of musicianship, he seemed like a cut-above his band mates.

Worst show:
The angry music during the middle of the Constantines set at the Indie music awards had me high-tailing it out of the Royal York before they were finished.

Best CMW moment:
The Handsome Furs encore. Because encores are so rare at music festivals like CMW that have strict set times, and because it was so good.

Worst CMW moment:
There are two worst CMW moments. The first would be showing up early to see Joel Plaskett, only to wait in line for the better part of an hour in the cold windy rain. On top of that, they were running behind so the doors opened late.

The second is a vicarious moment. I met a young woman who was so discouraged about the Plants & Animals lineup that she decided to forego that show to make sure she got to see the Handsome Furs. She arrived at the El Mocambo early but accidentally went upstairs instead of downstairs. When she realized her mistake, they wouldn’t let her in downstairs. This was a shared culpability situation, but better handlers at the door could have easily avoided this problem.

Here were Paul’s moments at CMW

Best Show: Parlovr @ Sneaky Dee’s. It was 2 AM. They seemed totally drunk, off the cuff, and a little bit goofy, but still blew me away with their songs and their stage presence (which was actually probably due to the apparent drunkenness) and proved that they were more than just another band of Montreal hipsters.

Best show from a band you have never heard before: A tie between The Atlas Moth And P.O.S.

Worst show: Nothing totally sucked, but Homicide @ The Comfort Zone was a bit of a letdown. Mind you, I only caught like 1 or 2 songs.

Best CMW moment: Separado! That movie just made me feel good.

Worst CMW moment: The mandatory coatcheck at The Phoenix. I’m fine with keeping my coat on, thank you very much.

CMW Review: Jeff Martin, Mar 13, Mod Club

Posted on March 16, 2010 by Mark in Canadian Music Week, Concerts | 3 Comments

Toronto – Former Tea Party front man Jeff Martin played the Mod Club last Saturday. It was an exciting set of music both new and old that had me cursing the super quick 30 minute sets at the Mod Club that night. It’s not entirely fair that I’m writing this review because I was such a huge Tea Party fan as a teenager. I’ve long since internalized their first two albums Splendor Solis, and The Edges of Twilight.

I was skeptical as to what exactly to expect from Jeff after so many years. Thankfully he still plays to his strengths: eastern-influenced rock played with open-tunings that resonate with a gutsy metallic heft. I can’t believe I just used the term “gutsy metallic heft”; I’m such a douchebag. Anyway, he opened with The Bazaar, and kept the crowd happy by later playing the crowd favourite Sister Awake. He also kept things fresh by playing some of his newer non-Tea Party material that fit well within the set.

He peppered Tea Party lyrics into his other songs as if he spontaneously felt like it.

What I forgot about Jeff Martin is how consummate a musician he his. He can seriously play the guitar, and he can seriously sing. I don’t know how much of his set was rehearsed, but it certainly felt like an off-the-cuff set from a musician extremely comfortable in his own skin. He peppered Tea Party lyrics into his other songs as if he spontaneously felt like it.

His last song was a particularly impressive blues number that borrowed lyrics from old blues greats. As exotic as his tastes are, Jeff reminded us that he’s still got roots in the blues and can fuse that with his other influences into a style all his own. Although we may tend to typecast him in a particular era and style; he’s definitely his own musician and worth approaching on his own merits.

CMW highlight.

« Previous   1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10   Next »