Rifflandia Recap in Pictures : Thursday Night

This blog post is brought to you by Rifflandia Music Festival and beautiful, sunny Victoria, BC.

To follow NxEW-ers Brenda (myself ) and Alex (OfAnders)'s exploits this weekend at Rifflandia, you can follow our tweets. (You don't even need Twitter.)

Hannah Georgas

Timber Timbre

The Racoons

Shad

DJ Champion & His G-Strings

For the complete set, visit my Flickr!

Char2d2 Small Vampires EP and Concert Review

Char2d2, consisting of Charla McCutcheon (Bella) on guitar and Eric Breitenbach (Lefinn, Heatwave) on drums, opened for Victoria band Immaculate Machine Saturday, September 12 at the Biltmore Cabaret in Vancouver. I was truly blown away by their set, as I had gone in with no expectations and very little knowledge beyond name recognition.
For this reviewer, there are a few things you need to check off in order to deem a set truly excellent.
As for them?
- Packed dance floor after only a few songs: check
- Responsive crowd: check
- Band members sincerely enjoying their time playing together: check (big grins all around)
- Presence of other musicians: check (rumors have it that Tegan of Tegan and Sara was around)
- Positive audience bathroom reviews: check

What truly caught me off guard was the ability of this duo to fill up the lounge with more energy and sonic presence than many considerably larger bands I've seen. Charla's guitars did not seem sparse even without the presence of bass, and Eric kept the rhythm driving and pounding throughout their much-too-short set.

Below is the set list of songs that they played, mostly off their Small Vampires EP (except for the starred ones):

Only Man For Me
You Are A Small Vampire
Don't Want To
I Am Safe
B-Day Girl**
Some Will Have To Go
Torn Apart**
Take and Send

Since grabbing a copy of it at the show, I've been listening to Char2d2's debut EP Small Vampires (what is it with vampires anyway?) on repeat. It's a disc full of lovely romantic pop ditties that are guaranteed to stick in your head.

I cursed myself for not putting the album on my iPod as I was humming You Are A Small Vampire the entire commute to school and back. And why not? Charla has an excellent sense of melody, which is combined with a lovely girlish voice, bright melodies and sweet choruses such as,

can I be the one that you wake up at 6am?
and we talk to the clouds till we fall back asleep again

The result is an uplifting album which will make you vow to love your cherished ones just a little bit more. 

The Small Vampires EP, like their set at the Biltmore, is short and sweet, and ends much too quickly. It leaves you smiling but wanting more, like a single forkful of cake. Hurry up with the full length please!

Small Vampires was written and co-produced by Charla McCutcheon, with the other half of that producing team being Tegan Quin of Tegan and Sara. 

Char2d2 will be playing at Victoria's Rifflandia Music Festival on Saturday Sept. 26 at the Metro Theatre. Make sure you catch them; you will not regret it!

You can buy Small Vampires at Maple Music or on iTunes.
You can find Charla of Char2d2 on MySpace and Twitter.

Matt Mays Recording New Record in NYC

Below is a tweet from Matt Mays earlier this evening. Self-explannatory. Judging from his cryptic website, the new album should be out this fall.

Help Rock Plaza Central Write a Book with Twitter

Via Open Book Toronto: Starting Tomorrow (July 4, 2009) Chris Eaton of Rock Plaza Central (who also happens to be a novelist) will be tweeting "daily stories of 140 Characters in Length." Readers are then asked to respond with ultra-short stories of their own. The results will be gathered and the best selected for publication in Steel Banana's anthology "GULCH: An Assemblage of Poetry and Prose.

To get in on the fun and keep up with Rock Plaza Centrals other shenanigans follow http://twitter.com/RockPlaza!

The Boycott that Wasn't

This morning I logged onto Twitter and found this from CBC Radio 3's Grant Lawrence:

"Did Canadian music blog @nxew really boycott #nxne?! why?!?"

I had no idea this was a question. Nowhere on the blog, or anywhere else as far as I know, did anyone say that we were boycotting. There were in fact several - posts - promoting NXNE Events and encouraging people to attend - including people who couldn't be in Toronto. I even said last night several hours before Grant's post:

"Yesterday (Saturday, June 20, 2009) NxEW.ca turned 3 months old. Of course yesterday was also the biggest day of the North by North East music festival (because I'm in Toronto) that means I am playing catch up. Starting a few weeks before the festival began I was deluged with email and requests pertaining to the festival. I still have alot of email to wade through and several hours of video to check."

So I was really surprised by the question and responded:

"@GrantLCBCR3 @adammacisaac @unjoyeuxluron - No @NxEW didn't boycott #nxne - where did that come from? - JB"

Note: @adammacissac and @unjoyeuxluron were not a part of the rumor, they simply re-tweeted Grant's question and so were included in the response.

There was no direct answer to the question and to the best of my knowledge no one involved with NxEW.ca was asked about the rumor before hand. Grant has asked if I'd be interested in being on this afternoon's show to talk about it, I've responded with a definite maybe and haven't heard anything since (though I asked again where it was coming from.

I was, as a matter of fact at CBC Radio 3's NXNE Showcase on Saturday - I didn't talk to Grant but I did run into Craig Norris. I was really impressed with the crowd chanting "CBC" have a look (part of the several hours of video I mentioned)):



So, no idea where this is coming from and may or may not be on Radio 3 talking about it this afternoon, but I'd really love to hear where this is coming from. I sincerely hope that there is a good source for it and it's not just unsubstantiated crap to give Radio 3 something to talk about. I mean, it is unsubstantiated (and untrue), but given that I talked to someone at Radio 3 at NXNE on Saturday I hope that there is a point to this exercise.

It's bad enough that the MMVA's were allowed to be turned into the Great American Douche Fest - Canadian music doesn't need the National Enquirer treatment.

Two Hours Traffic Tweets New Record

Polaris-nominated band Two Hours Traffic tweeted approximately 15 minutes ago announcing the above news about their upcoming record. This will be the third full length album by the Charlottetown-based power-pop band. TERRITORY should be released around September.

K'naan VS. Naan

We all have difficult choices to make in life, and this is not an exception.

K'naan's reaction on Twitter:
@Iamknaan Quite a few of you went with my rival! Thanks a lot! http://www.food2.com/blog/2009/03/04/food2-fight-knaan-vs-naan/knaanvsnaan/

Happy Saturday!

Who's Who on NxEW Twitter

If you follow NxEW on Twitter (and really, why wouldn't you?), you may have noticed that lately the updates have been ending with a couple of letters in parentheses, like (JB) or (sk). This isn't some crazy new Twitter lingo, it's just our way of indicating which particular author is responsible for each individual tweet. You see, the NxEW Twitter account was just opened up to a number of authors in order to keep it more up-to-date, so everyone involved has been assigned a short signature. This should mean that someone is on the NxEW Twitter page far more often, allowing us to tweet about events as they happen, carry on conversations with our fellow twitter-ers, and post links to interesting news about the Canadian music scene that doesn't necessarily warrant a full blog post. Direct messages are still going to be handled by our fearless leader, Justin Beach, but the rest of it is going to be shared-- just look for the signature. You can see who's who on the Twitter page, and for your convenience I've posted the list below with links to author bios and personal Twitter accounts, where available.

AofA = AlexofAnders, @AlexofAnders
AD = Aidan Denison

AK = ak17, @ak_17

BL = Brenda Lee, @kn0ttyn3rb

DB = Dave B, @BuckyKatt
DY = David Yazbeck, @ThursdayBlend
GLH = Chagota, @chagota
JB = Justin Beach, @justinsb

JS = Jadester, @jadedphotos

KO = Konger

SK = Steve Krysak, @stevekrysak

TB3 = John Teeter, @john_teeter

"No Sense" by Jump Rope for Heart for BC's Provincial Song ( RT @ak_17 @nparts #provincialrock )

Over at the Ampersand, they are asking the question of "What would be the 'provincial song' of each of Canada's provinces (and territories)?" So far the response has been weak, with only two comments on the board, so they're headed out on Twitter, looking for responses from @CBCRadio3, @exclaimdotca, @DoseDotCa, @exclaimeditor, @stevenpage, @strombo, @theacorn, and @torontoist. They didn't ask @nxew or @ak_17, but I'm giving an answer anyways. My nomination for the official provincial song of British Columbia would be the little known gem "No Sense" from Vanderhoof/Prince George/Chilliwack/Vancouver/? (the guy moves a lot, apparently) one-man band Jump Rope For Heart.



Take a listen: it's a lo-fi masterpiece, and right from the opening line "When it rains, it pours" it speaks to a sense of place, through to talking about the "dark green forests of British Columbia." This is the song that made me realize that there are certain ideas that can only be communicated by someone who has had similar experiences to you, even if it's a simple matter of sharing the same area code and looking out at the same geography. In fact, when I think about it, it's probably a good chunk of the reason I support local arts and culture as much as I do, including writing for this blog. So there you are-- it's Jump Rope for Heart's fault.

You can send your own responses on Twitter by addressing @nparts and using the hashtag #provincialrock. As you can see in the title above, I'm hoping the NxEW Twitter feed will do the same and act as re-Tweet, so pay attention to that if you feel like posting your choices on here.

UPDATE: Yeah, it totally worked. So there you are, Twitter-bloggers. You can post something on here as an @ or a RT, and the Twitter Feed will have it work as if NxEW is sending a response and/or retweeting, so you aren't speaking for all the bloggers on here, just yourself.

Said the Whale Arrest in Progress?

Vancouver rockers Said the Whale are currently on a cross-Canada tour, one that they are documenting using Twitter. However, it seems that after a show last night in Edmonton with Mother, Mother, while on their way to the next gig in Ottawa, something has gone amiss. 20 minutes ago, their Twitter status was "Getting pulled over AGAIN," with things going from bad to worse with "One member of stw currently sitting in the back of the squad car. This isn't going well..." and then "Trailer being searched now" at 11:45 PST being sent from TwitterBerry. You can follow the progress at http://twitter.com/saidthewhale, meanwhile, here's a song Said the Whale wrote about government lawmaking-type people.

*UPDATE Just after 12 PST, Said the Whale changed their Twitter to "Everything all good! Off the hook! Back on the road. We can breathe easy..." Which means the fine folks of Ottawa can expect the full lineup of STW at Zaphod's on the 25th. Oh, and definitely go, this is a band worth seeing.

*UPDATE 2 You can see pictures of the whole affair at http://jonathantaggart.com/ontheroad/. I imagine the full details will be out in other publications soon, STW were just interview on radio3.cbc.ca. Basically, they were stopped because the trailer they had looked to be off-balance, and the police found a (sealed) bottle of alcohol in the backseat and a murse containing what STW euphemistically called "Twizzlers" in the trailer.

*UPDATE 3 The full interview with radio3 is available here, or you can listen by clicking the play link right below.

Tweet Tweet!

Just to let everyone know @NxEW is now on Twitter it is there with the help of TwitterFeed which means that everything posted on the blog will automatically (within an hour or so) show be tweeted. Sweet!