Music This Week
Art D’Ecco – Desires
Sadies – Riverview Fog
Austra – Messiah
Kathleen Edwards – Options Open
Pierre Kwenders and Clément Bazin – Ego
Sloan – The Day Will Be Mine
Rae Spoon – There’s No End
John K Samson – Fantasy Baseball at the End of the World
Rural Alberta Advantage – Beacon Hill
Art D’Ecco – Desires from the album In Standard Definition, May 19th 2021
Art d’Ecco – Full Performance (LIve on KEXP) – on 2019 album release Trespasser
Reference – Grant Lawrence on CBC Radio 3 did a great feature on him.
There is more on Art D’Ecco in the article from the Georgia Straight
Consider this the latest page in a story he’s spent the past few years writing. His back story includes fleeing Vancouver years ago to hole up in a sprawling island home to care for an ailing grandmother, the relative solitude giving him ample time to invent the character that would become analogue-obsessed rocker Art d’Ecco. And what a great character that creation is, all pageboy hair, greasepaint-and-rouge makeup, and Rodney Bingenheimer fashion cues—right down to the retina-searing flares and platform shoes.
More on how he came up with his unique look:
I was getting my keys cut, and kind of stewing while I waiting,” the singer recalls with laugh. “Out of the corner of my eye I saw a wig store that had this $300 human-hair bob wig. I was like ‘I’ve never been more excited in my entire life.’ I was walking through the Bay on the way back to my car at after getting my keys cut, and figured I might as well go whole hog and buy some makeup. I had no idea what I was doing. I was just freewheeling.
Bob picked his selections from groups that he saw over the last five years at the wonderful Beau’s Oktoberfest in Vankleek Hill, Ontario.
Sadies – Riverview Fog
A group never fails to put on a great show, The Sadies. Here performing this Riverview Fog
Austra – Messiah Album Hirudin 2020
Austra is a singer I have liked for a long time. I first heard her on CBC with her 2011 song Lose It. Pretty amazing display. You can see a 2017 version of the song on CBC here. The voice is something very different.
This Pitchfork article explains the power of her voice better than I ever can:
Katie Stelmanis has a voice like a beacon, a sound that can shear through any accompaniment, no matter how drab. She shares this power with ANOHNI and Zola Jesus, singers who enchant their surroundings with the depth and richness of their timbres, who are instantly recognizable in any setting. Her voice comprises the central pillar of her synthpop project Austra, the feature around which her music crystallizes. The Canadian artist’s previous album, 2017’s Future Politics, shifted deeper into the icy trappings of club music, laminating Stelmanis’ voice inside the production styles of deep house and trance. On HiRUDiN, Austra’s fourth LP, the project breaks from that rut, swinging for big, embodied pop moments that let the warmth of Stelmanis’ voice shine through.
Pitchfork May 6 2020
Kathleen Edwards – Options Open
Kathleen Edwards is represented here this week with a song from her “return from exile” album, ” Total Freedom”. The song is “Options Open” and it looks like she hasn’t missed a beat.
A David Lettermen fave, Edwards was a frequent guest on The Late Show. Dave discards his usual sarcastic goof persona here as shows is a genuine fan.
Ego by Pierre Kwenders and Clément Bazin
album – Classe Tendresse 2020 – on Bandcamp
This is another artist heard first on CBC Frequencies, my go to place to hear new and exciting music.
From the bandcamp bio:
Born in Kinshasa and settled in Montréal since 2001, Pierre Kwenders learned music and found his voice in a catholic choir in the city. With his two EPs and two full-length records, the singer-songwriter has earned multiple awards. Passionate about offering music without borders, he’s also one of the founders of Moonshine, a collective that throws some of the best parties around the world.
Bandcamp
Here is the great video we are playing from his most recent release, the song is Ego
From Exclaim Magazine – Published Oct 21, 2020
Pierre Kwenders has been known to allow every style of music he hears to influence his own. This is even more remarkable given the diversity of influence that would have entered his realm; he emigrated from Kinshasa to Montreal at the age of 16. French-Acadian, hip-hop and Congolese Catholic church music are just some of the many influences in his path. His latest project, Classe Tendresse, is a collaboration with Parisian musician Clément Bazin, who is equally in love with technology and the steelpan.
The blending of traditional African melodies with post-human electronica is complete and seamless. In a sense, this is nothing new. All popular music is influenced by traditional African music and is impacted by advances in musical technology. What is interesting here is that it is not really a blend at all, as one cannot tease out traditional and electronic elements; this is traditional African music as heard through digital technology.
Sloan – The Day Will Be Mine
Sloan perform “The Day Will Be Mine” as part of the East Coast Music Awards (ECMA’s) at the Marquee in Halifax, NS on May 3, 2018. The Marquee is a legendary club in Halifax which is one of the 2 bars immortalized in the song, “ Marquee and the Moon” from the 1999 album “Between Two Bridges.” The Misty Moon closed down a number of years ago, but the Marquee lives on.
A clip advertising their upcoming 2018 appearance at Oktoberfest. The concert clips were taken from the June 28 show at Ottawa’s 27 Club. We were lucky to see both performances.
Rae Spoon There’s No End, album Mental Health 2019
Another feature heard on CBC Radio 3 Grant Lawrence. Very happy I heard this one. Rae Spoon is an artist I was totally unfamiliar with (I say that a lot).
again from Georgia Straight:
Georgia Straight – Apr 28 2021
The narrator is a queer, guitar-wielding musician who arrives in Vancouver in 2000 at the age of 19. Written in Spoon’s usual highly accessible style, the story of youthful exuberance, excessive drinking, and emotional angst plays out across Vancouver—on the bus system, at the beaches, and in various neighbourhoods.
It’s astonishing to consider how far the trailblazing Spoon has come from being a poor couch-surfing, sometimes homeless trans youth living on the East Side. In addition to four books, including the Lambda Award finalist collection of short stories that kicked off their career, Spoon has created a dozen albums. In addition, they achieved their dream of touring extensively.
Here is the trailer from the NFB film made about Rae Spoon. All the music in the film was composed and performed by them.
John K Samson – Fantasy Baseball at the End of the World
“I manage my fantasy baseball team better than I manage my anger these days,” Samson sings. “And I’d trade my best pitcher for a draft-pick and picture of the president writhing in pain.” John K. Samson. Great video from Manitoba’s finest that combines his love of baseball with his loathing of Trump.
Here he is at Beau’s Oktoberfest performing his classic “One Great City”
Rural Alberta Advantage – Beacon Hill
Bob asked during the show which Beacon Hill the Rural Alberta Advantage is singing about. This is another band that he saw at Oktoberfest.
I think if you look at the video below you may get a clue.
Whole-Hearted 