The CanCon Catalogue

I swear, every Canadian of my generation knows this song. Concerned Children's Advertisers wrote some damn catchy tunes.

This Vancouver duo Japandroids is getting a lot of buzz, I guess mostly thanks to being covered on Pitchfork. I enjoy their stuff alright, but what I find buzz-worthy is the fact that they're releasing their April 28 debut, Post-Nothing, on vinyl and digital download. And that's it. Vinyl. Download. No CD. Last year, the Waking Eyes released Holding on to Whatever It Is, first digitally, then on vinyl, and then, months later, as a CD.

Is this a mark of things to come? Everyone listens to music on iPods now, and if you want a physical product, nothing beats the pop-art quality of a big ol' piece of vinyl. But the compact disc? Meh. Even in computers and cars, disc drives are no longer standard.

--- So what does this mean? Do you mourn the imminent demise of the contact disc? Or is it going to take on the collector's status we assign vinyl today? Leave a comment below!

Shad plays tonight at Lucky Bar. Here's him performing "I Don't Like To" live in L.A. for the Grammy weekend. Not only is his DJ the 2008 world champion, Shad himself plays the guitar. The whole concert can be found here.

Shad - "I Don't Like To" (live at the Canadian consulate in Los Angeles)

The Tranzmitors - "Live A Little More"


*for more songs, hit "click to read more"*


So, tonight is Shad and tomorrow's the Tranzmitors-- and if you're keeping score at home, that's two shows in two days, meaning it will be concert work concert. This almost wouldn't be worth it except the groups involved are so great. I told you about Shad yesterday with his easy-going hip-hop vibes, and the Tranzmitors are a major shift with their jagged rock and roll. They trade in the sort of late-70s/early 2000s garage rock that made me fall in love with music in the first place, the sort of stuff that sounds like it's going to fall apart any moment, but even if it did it would still be amazing. I don't know why a bunch of guys from Vancouver sing with British accents, but the effect is to make you want to grab a pint and raise a toast to the working class. All I can say is don't expect too much from me for a few days after this.

The Tranzmitors play at Lucky Bar on Friday, February 20. myspace, radio 3

 OK, is this a great year for Canadian music, or what? We've already had A.C.
Newman and Malajube, we've got Joel Plaskett, the Great Lake Swimmers, Metric, the Tragically Hip, the Handsome Furs, MSTRKFT, K'naan, and more coming, and now we're definitely hearing from Swan Lake.

If you don't know who Swan Lake is, let's put it this way: you know how a lot of good bands like Wolf Parade, the New Pornographers, and Frog Eyes have that one crazy genius who completely ignores standard music sensibilities and yet still writes ridiculously great songs? Well, Swan Lake is three of those guys, from those exact bands, working together to write ridiculously great songs, only there's no A.C. Newman or Dan Boekner to reign them in.

At this point, I'm so high off of these songs that I can't even begin to describe them except in Haiku form. So here goes:

"Spanish Gold 2044" via Stereogum

Brian Wilson is broken
the jagged ocean crashes in the desert
prospectors rejoice, echo



"A Hand at Dusk" via Pitchfork

a concert hall?
Major Tom has found Stardust
it's a Day in the Life



Enemy Mine comes out March 24. More info about the disc can be found here.

"Pulling A Line"


"She Comes to Me In Dreams"


The Great Lake Swimmers have released their first single, called "Pulling a Line," from the March 31, 2009, release Lost Channels. As per normal, Tony Dekker throws out some great lyrics, evoking the nautical landscape from which the band takes its name. An upbeat track by GLS standards (though not nearly as snappy as "See You On the Moon"), it gives us a taste of the albums professed themes, namely, "telling tales of hidden histories, still "mining for light in the dark wells," still "tuned to an instrument of greater and unknown design."

They've also have another track, "She Comes to Me In Dreams," up on the MySpace. This one is a little more in the band's standard style, EXCEPT when the song hits 1:18 and we get some epic drum hits echoed by some Hawaiian-style guitar picking. It makes me excited for the promised addition of cello and vibraphone to the lineup for some of the songs. The Great Lake Swimmers are one of the few bands with a sound that can actually properly accommodate these sorts of additions.

You can buy "Pulling a Line" here.

Great Lake Swimmers: myspace, greatlakeswimmers.com

via the Ampersand

The problem I have with this idea is that the book works so well because it is vastly open to interpretation. **SPOILER ALERT! SPOILER ALERT**

There's a bunch of people who take it is a religious allegory about the importance of faith, a bunch who take it is proof of the non-existence of god, and then there are those who take it is as a simple adventure story. This works because of the medium in which the story is told. Could it translate into a movie? Maybe. But you would have to do a damn good job of keeping your own interpretation out of the screenplay. It would also be problematic if any hint of the book's "twist" (for lack of a better word) were hinted at at any point prior to the final act.

  The fact is, Life of Pi is a really good book. And movies that are based on good books, especially ones that are good precisely because of how well they use the written medium,  are rarely good movies.

Sometimes I feel like I'm something special because not only did I get a Bachelor of Arts Degree (political science/international studies), but I actually got a (temporary) job from it. Inevitably, though, there's a million people out there to knock me off my high horse. Shad is one of those people.

Not only does he have two critically acclaimed albums under his belt, the most recent of which was nominated for both a Juno and a Polaris Prize, but he made his name in the music world while at the same time getting an undergraduate degree from Wilfred Laurier University. And then not only does he get a much cooler job (professional rapper) than me, but he destroys any dreams of intellectual superiority I might have by balancing his pending superstardom by working towards a master's degree from Simon Fraser.

On top of all that, he goes and makes the best music video (see below) I've seen in years! The worst part is, his music is so good (organic hip-hop with a sense of humour) and his live show so well-regarded (apparently he often has a live band, and he's been invited to play the Vans Warped Tour this year), that I am handing over MY hard-earned money to give HIM more. DAMN YOU SHAD!

Shad plays at the Lucky Bar on Thursday, February 19. Tickets here, Shad myspace here.

Further Reading: concert review, mindyourmind.ca video interview, torontoindie.com interview, eyeweekly, the globe and mail, the national post, exclaim.ca

According to Dan Garnder of CanWest News, the Governor General's office has a secret plot to overthrow the Queen as the head of state. As he says,

What is not to be found on the website of the Queen's representative is a single picture of the Queen... The sentiment couldn't be plainer. To those who created and approved the website, Queen Elizabeth, the Queen of Canada, is nothing more than a legal technicality the lawyers say ya gotta mention. So she's in the fine print, along with "Must be 18 years or older to enter. No purchase necessary. Offer void in Newfoundland."

He also cites the absence of prominent royal portraits in Rideau Hall. He blames not just Michaëlle Jean, but previous GG's including Adrienne Clarkson and Jeanne Sauve, and insinuates their staff are probably involved. The plan, apparently, is

When we have forgotten that we have a monarch, and the Queen has been rendered a constitutional dead letter, the Governor-General will cease to act as head of state in the Queen's absence.

She will simply be head of state."

Now, I'm personally all for bringing the head of state into Canada, especially since there will come a day when Elizabeth dies or abdicates, and everything will be changing then, anyways. I figure rather than spend a bunch of time minting money with Charles's bust and re-writing documents to read "His Royal Majesty," we may as well go all out and find a homegrown symbol for our head of state. Will it be the Governor General? Gardner worries this would "unbalance federalism" by making the Governor General the "superior" of provincial lieutenant governors, but since they're all symbolic anyways, does it really matter?

The problems I see are placing too much authority, symbolic or otherwise, in an office that is appointed by an elected official and that changes hands at least once a decade. The point of a head of state, in my mind, is to provide a consistent symbol for the country that exists outside the political field. The problems that arise from not having this can be seen in various forms, from the extreme of dictatorships (where a leader like Mao or Stalin is absolutely infallible) to the minor (such as the United States, where some people get upset if someone criticizes the President, seeing it as a criticism of his station as head of state, and by extension, of the USA).

But if these problems can be overcome, I would love to have the person in whom all symbolic authority is vested reside within, rather than outside of, Canada. It would be a big step towards the ultimate decolonization of the Canadian identity. So to Michaëlle Jean and the apparent abundance of co-conspirators walking the secret corridors of power throughout Ottawa in a bid to overthrow the Monarchy once and for all-- good luck in your high-class revolution. And to Mr. Gardner, who unveiled this far-reaching, multigenerational "stealth campaign"-- well, good luck. You're going to need it.

It's almost good I'm so swamped with work that I can't go to any concerts tonight, because that saves me the difficult choice of seeing either Kardinal Offishall (earlier post) or the Library Voices, a Saskatchewan band who I think may have the best name since the Tragically Hip. Because as much respect as I have for Kardi, you can't argue with the fact that it's almost impossible to get the beginning of this song out of my head.



Library Voices play tonight at Lucky Bar with Matt Goud.


myspace, thelibraryvoices.blogspot.com

Back in 1998, the single "Northern Touch" was released. Featuring a number of Canadian rappers, it was a coming out party for hip-hop on this side of the border. Since then, a number of homegrown stars have been touted as "the one"-- the rapper who was going to move beyond these borders and make a splash in the United States and beyond (apparently disregarding Snow, who had done that five years earlier with "Informer"). First it was going to be someone from the song: Rascalz seemed likely, then Choclair. After that, new names like Swollen Members and k-Os started to make waves. But no one made the jump. Until last year when, ten years exactly after "Northern Touch" came out, the man who was brought in at the last minute to be a part of that song (replacing k-Os and Jully Black, who couldn't make the session) and who had in recent times been somewhat disregarded here in Canada, returned in a big way by teaming up with international stars like Akon and Rihanna and becoming the first Canadian rapper in history to hit the top ten in the United States. The song? "Dangerous." The man? Kardinal Offishal, rudebwoy number one, leader of the underground sensations the Black Jays, and an undeniably dedicated and hard-working individual for having made it after so long.

Given the amount that "Dangerous" leans on the already established Akon and the extent to which Kardi has been taken for granted here at home, it's easy to write him off. And while it's true that his latest album Not 4 Sale is nothing if not a commercial venture, it still contains some of the catchiest songs to come out last year, and Offishal's back catalogue is consistent enough that he can be forgiven going pop in order to get some pay-off. I mean, aside from "Northern Touch," which would be nowhere near as good without him, he's got "On Wid Da Show," "Everyday Rudebwoy," "Bakardi Slang," "Ol' Time Killing," "Money Jane,"... the list goes on. And as for those who might accuse him of "going American", well, he is doing a Canadian tour in February, so that's got to say something.

Kardinal Offishall plays tonight (February 17) at Element (formerly Legends). Tickets here.
Kardinal Offishall: site, myspace

LIGHTS - "February Air"


At some point I almost completely lost touch with popular music. I don't know when. I think it has to do with getting an iPod, discovering CBC Radio 3, the Hype Machine, and various reliable music blogs, and deciding I really didn't have to deal with commercials and various incarnations of "Newlyweds with Nick and Jessica" (this dates me) in order to listen to new music, which for the most part wasn't even close to reflecting all the good stuff that was going on. For the most part this has been awesome-- not only is there a lot of great stuff that never goes mainstream, but mainstream stuff sounds better if it isn't overplayed-- allowing me to appreciate pop in small doses as opposed to being assaulted with it until it destroys my soul.

The one drawback is that outside of my own little ghetto, I really don't know what the rest of the world is listening to. The song I'm posting today is a case in point. I heard about LIGHTS through my cousin, who saw her perform some small show in Vancouver last year and said she was going to be the next big thing. I just got around to checking her out now, and figured I would post the track so you could hear it, but according to my research, you already have. See, my cousin was right(ish). Her music has been featured in a bunch of commercials for Old Navy, and she had two songs chart last year. This song, "February Air" was number three on MuchMusic. I didn't even know MuchMusic still played music, so there you are.

Anyways, even if you're sick of this song already, I'm not because it's new to me. The opening synths (done on Garageband?) are the perfect sound for the glossy sheen of pop music heartbreak, but her voice is organic enough to prevent it from getting all Europop. The closest comparison I can think of is the Postal Service
fronted by Robyn without the attitude, and that's exactly what you need for a song that conjures up images of the cold grey of February as the backdrop to a broken heart. This video here, using Toronto as a backdrop, captures this mood a lot better than the official one (which looks way too much like an Ikea commercial).

LIGHTS: official site, myspace