BeatRoute Magazine B.C. print e-edition - January 2017

JANUARY 2017 

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TALIB KWELI 

LYDIA LOVELESS 

The Revenge 

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PuSh Fest musical turns queer comedy in to a royal bloodbath 

January 2017 1

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January ‘17 

Publisher 

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syddanger.com 

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Front Cover illustration 

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Contributing Writers 

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Kaje Annihilatrix ∙Kevin Bailey ∙ Sarah Bauer 

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Lucas Kitchen ∙ Jackie Klapak ∙ Coralie Kournay 

Danny Kresnyak ∙ Ana Krunic ∙ Elliot Langford 

Paul McAleer ∙ Jamie McNamara ∙ Alex Molten 

James Olson ∙ Jennie Orton ∙ Johnny Papan 

Mitch Ray ∙ Yasmine Shemesh 

Maya-Roisin Slater ∙ Paris Spence-Lang 

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Sadie Vadnais ∙ Alec Warkentin ∙ Graeme Wiggins 

Christina Zimmer 

Contributing 

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04 

05 

06 

Working for the 

Weekend 

∙ with Steve Mann 

the arkells 

blue rodeo 

afi 

comeback kid 

08 fruit bats 

10 

11 

13 

17 

kyle morton 

jp maurice 

the tequila mockingbird 

orchestra 

the katherines 

12 breakpoint 

little sprout 

15 

lydia loveless 

THE SKINNY 

∙ Frank Love ∙ Regrets 

∙ Alcest ∙ Dead Time 

ELECTRONICS DEPT 

∙ Clubland ∙ Talib Kweli 

∙ Dumbfoundead ∙ Stevie Ross 

19 comedy 

∙ Sundee Dhaliwal 

20 city 

21 cover 

22 

∙ Federal Store ∙ Pandora’s Box 

∙ Harzoon Mirza 

∙ The Revenge of the Popinjay 

push festival 

∙ Portraits in Motion ∙ Sweat Baby Sweat 

∙ Dirtsong 

24 queer 

∙ Queen of the Month 

∙ From the Desk of Carlotta Gurl 

∙ Queer View Mirror 

26 film 

∙ This Month in Film 

∙ Canada on Screen 

31 

37 

ALBUM REVIEWS 

∙ The xx ∙ Childish Gambino 

∙ Kid Cudi ∙ The Rolling Stones 

LIVE REVIEWS 

∙ Aesop Rock ∙ Neurosis 

38 vanpooper 

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with Steve Mann from File Under: Music 

Maya-Roisin Slater 

Steve Mann was a plastic guy. Hawking vinyl 

lettering, ink cartridges, and raw sign making 

materials at a soul crushing office job, a life in sales 

was not exactly shaping up to what he’d hoped. 

Away from the water cooler he led a double life in 

an indie rock band called Philoceraptor, a project 

which Mann himself says he “Didn’t completely 

screw up.” During this trying time in his life is when 

he met Karen Hood through a co-worker. Sensing he 

needed a change, she asked him to combine his love 

for music and savvy at selling non- biodegradable 

goods as a manager for the label she was running, 

File Under: Music. It’s been three and a half years 

since that holy union, and Mann’s soul is now 

notably un-sucked. Hood started the label herself 

in 2007, signing a young Dan Mangan and helping 

him build his successes. Before her first foray into 

the music industry Hood was a councilor, and her 

business partner Lisa Stewart an actor. “I wonder 

how hard it would be to start a record label?” they 

asked themselves. And here they are ten years later 

in an upstairs Chinatown office surrounded by 

boxes of CDs and records, with a whiteboard on 

the wall tracking File Under: Music releases that 

became so extensive they stopped updating it in 

2013. We sat down with Mann in this very office to 

get some juicy details on the thrilling ins and outs 

of a nine-to-five in this crazy ‘ol thing we call the 

music industry. 

BeatRoute: What do you do at File Under: Music? 

Steve Mann: I’m a label manager, which means 

I have to do many things to keep this machine 

Photo by Sarah Whitlam 

rolling. So specifically I would say anything that 

has to do with the input of music, so finding artists 

and making sure everything’s set up properly. So 

art, production, to getting it out here, figuring out 

how we’re going to promote a record, setting up 

budgets for that and also all the writing and copy 

and creative we do to so people can find out about 

the music we put out. 

BeatRoute: What’s the hardest part of your job? 

SM: There are two really hard parts. One is figuring 

out what to do with the industry at any given time 

because it changes so fast, and the big change is that 

sales are decimated compared to what they were 

and unfortunately the fact that sales are decimated, 

people don’t really understand what affect that has 

on getting people to love artists again or connect 

with them. On the other side of the coin it’s dealing 

with artists. Because as much as I love artists—and 

I do love artists—it takes a lot of communication 

so they know what’s best for them. And I try not to 

say that condescendingly because I mean it with 

all the love in the world. There are things that I’m 

sure they think will work, that I know because I’ve 

done it for so many records, so many releases, that 

just don’t work. But it’s because they’ve never done 

it before and they don’t know any better. So like 

“We want to put this record out right away and we 

just finished recording it!” Well it takes six months 

to set up everything to do that properly, please 

believe that that’s true. So I guess one way to put 

that is earning the trust of our artists, and trying to 

turn their music into business. People shit on that 

as a concept all the time, but I think it’s a very noble 

pursuit in a very Ayn Rand-ian sense, I think the best 

way to show value for something is to get money 

so there can be more of it. So as much as it might 

bug NEEDS one day that I’m like “I need you to do 

your social media a little better, and I’m going to 

put an ad on this thing.” It’s because I want them 

to make more money so they can make more music 

and they can go and make this bigger and better. 

So that’s a difficult bit of terrain to traverse, I think 

I’m not horrible at it because I’ve been on that side 

of things, I know the value a little bit more than a 

soulless record executive. 

BeatRoute: Do you think your experience as an 

artist before working with File Under: Music has 

affected how you do your job? 

SM: It’s definitely made it easier. Because I can 

appreciate things, like there was an artist I spoke to 

about doing a thing with and he was really hesitant 

because he wrote a record that was a break up record. 

And he thought as much as it was a good idea to do the 

things that we were talking about doing, he’s like, “I can’t 

put this record out right now, because if I put it out my 

relationships really over.” And I was like, “Your relationship 

is really over, right?” And he was like, “Yeah it is, this 

just makes it real.” It’s just like you know what I totally 

understand it, hit me up when the time’s right for you. As 

much as I know this will work, I’m not going to force you 

into it. Because nobody’s going to be happy at that point. 

So the empathy definitely does help, and it also helps me 

talk people through the dark times if you will. 

BeatRoute: So, what’s your favorite part of your job? 

SM: Being able to listen to so much music all the 

time. And the fact that I can see through the code 

a bit and see there are paths to success. It’s very 

very very difficult. I think Vancouver’s especially 

challenged sort of compared to Toronto, Montreal, 

and Ottawa. It’s just geography. We’re trapped by 

the mountains, the next market to the East being 

Kelowna, we’re trapped by the ferry you need to get 

to Victoria so you lose a lot of your cash just trying 

to get there, and the border is only going to get 

harder to cross from here on in. Whereas if you’re 

in Toronto, Montreal, or Ottawa, you have those 

three cities to bounce between and as soon as you 

get your visa and you drive around the great lakes 

you go through three Canada’s worth of people. 

So I find in Vancouver there’s almost a mindset of 

there’s no point in really trying because all we can 

do is fail, and I think Vancouver sells itself short a 

lot of times for that. My greatest joy will be when 

I can figure that out for bands and help them be 

really successful. 

For more on the File Under: Music singles series, visit 

fileundermusic.com 

4 

January 2017

music 

THE ARKELLS 

road warriors focus their attention on the details 

Lucas Kitchen 

Oh how the times have changed. After 

winning a couple Junos and releasing 

their fourth studio album, Morning 

Report, in 2016, the Arkells have 

embarked on yet another far reaching 

tour covering North America and parts 

of Europe. For lead singer Max Kerman, 

whether they’re playing a stadium 

opening for Frank Turner or headlining a 

sweaty bar in Germany, it’s all the same 

— you never know who’s watching. 

“The one thing I’ve realized is that 

you’ve gotta take every little detail 

seriously and really care about every 

aspect of the show,” Kerman says. “You 

never know the thing that might move 

the needle so you’ve got to try your best 

and hope good luck will find you.” 

Good luck certainly has found the 

multiple Juno award-winning band. 

Just this past November the Hamilton, 

ON based rockers played what Kerman 

described as a “bucket list experience” at 

Massey Hall in Toronto when they played 

two back-to-back sold out shows. 

“We were almost afraid we’d be 

let down because we built it up in our 

heads so much, but then it exceeded 

expectations,” Kerman says. 

Playing those larger shows in 

stadiums or theatres doesn’t allow the 

Arkells to mingle with the audience 

post-show as much as they used to, but 

that connection to their fans is still the 

most important aspect of the band’s 

life. VIP experiences, contests, and 

membership in the Arkells Collegiate 

Vocational Institute have all been part 

of them giving back to their fans. 

“We noticed a lot of people like 

covering us on acoustic guitar and the 

golden ticket idea grew from that,” he says. 

That “golden ticket idea” being that 

fans submit videos of them covering the 

Arkells’ latest single, “My Heart’s Always 

Yours,” and the winning video would 

earn that fan a free ticket to any and all 

Arkells concerts for 2017. 

“We still get such a kick out of being 

a part of someone’s life and that hasn’t 

changed at all as the band has grown 

in Canada. When you put yourself out 

With Morning Report, The Arkells have found the sweet spot between being big enough to breathe and close enough to touch 

there in the world you never know what 

you’re going to get back.” 

The band released their first single, 

“Drake’s Dad,” off their most recent 

album last May, which came as a bit of 

a pleasant surprise from a band that 

seemed to be perpetually touring. Just 

how did such a pavement pounding 

group manage to record an album 

while still travelling the continent? For 

Kerman it came from their previous 

recording experience. 

“I’ve realized [recording] can be a 

bit of a dodgy experience when you’ve 

just got one or two months of time 

blocked off to be holed up in a studio.” 

This led to the group recording the 

album over several months with a couple 

stops in LA and Toronto and the help of 

four different producers. Overall, Morning 

Report is a solid addition to the Arkells’ 

catalogue and Kerman feels the same way. 

“We really like the job and we 

wouldn’t force anything if we felt it was 

shitty, but because we were so jazzed 

on the songs we thought let’s just get to 

work. Why do we have to assume that 

we have to wait another eight months 

to put out new music? If the whole team 

is jazzed then let’s fuckin’ do it.” 

Arkells perform at the Thunderbird Sports 

Centre (Vancouver) on February 1. 

BLUE RODEO 

one thousand arms over a split lane highway 

Danny Kresnyak 

CanCon legends prepare to break the odometer while bringing their new album to a vast Canadian audience 

Luminary Canadian country rockers 

Blue Rodeo and their crew are hard at 

work on final preparations for a coastto-coast 

tour across Canada in the dead 

of winter. Anyone who’s attempted this 

on any level understands the mass of 

challenges it presents. 

Why would a band with more than 

three decades of CanCon icon status, 

shelves cluttered with Juno awards 

and millions of albums sold, choose to 

subject themselves to the bitterness of 

the elements during the harshest time 

of year? 

According to co-lead singer, 

western-shirt enthusiast and heartthrob 

of the true, north strong and free, Mr. Jim 

Cuddy, they do it because, “Canadian 

audiences are faithful, they stick with 

you. You show up, They’ll show up, the 

front row may be in parkas, but they’ll 

be there.” 

“The only catch is, you can’t suck… 

too often. Or that will get noticed too.” 

According to Cuddy, the new record, 

1000 Arms, is a return to the early style 

of their first records that captured the 

band’s live vibrations. This includes 

harmonies and call-and-answer vocal 

parts shared between Cuddy and his 

chief musical collaborator Greg Keelor. 

The material on 1000 Arms 

explores and embraces the nature of 

what a community is and what it does. 

The title track, penned by Cuddy, was 

Inspired by a podcast about the true 

story of a woman afflicted with bi-polar 

disorder. The women was a beloved 

character, operating a unique coffee 

shop in her neighbourhood. At times 

she relied on her neighbours to help her 

through her manias, and the security 

she was offered by their collective arms 

helped her to thrive, held up by the 

good will of her neighbours. 

Blue Rodeo’s career is made on this 

sound, and this tour during the barren, 

desolate part of winter is a thank 

you to their fans in classic Canadian 

tradition. “When we were first starting 

out, it was wide open. Nobody toured 

at this time of the year so it was easy 

to get dates.” And as Cuddy, a familyman 

through and through, added, “it’s 

the time of year when you are missed the 

least at home.” 

The tour will touch down in 

big-whistle stops with two shows 

in Vancouver, two in Calgary, and 

other major centres before returning 

home with thousands of new clicks 

on the band’s shared odometer. 

Blue Rodeo will also visit smaller 

communities, places like Thunder 

Bay, where the tour begins on 

January 11, roughly eight-hours (in 

ideal conditions) of winding split lane 

Canadian Shield highway from the 

nearest major population centre. And 

Estevan, Saskatchewan, where Cuddy 

says he’s seen “a new prosperity…” 

due to “migration, where places like 

Saskatchewan used to have entirely 

unique identities, now Canadians have 

moved around and brought their own 

traditions.” 

Cuddy says this effect has 

strengthened the national fabric and 

given Canada a chance to be the catalyst 

in connecting the global community 

with real progress. 

While this ethos and tour reach 

wide, Cuddy wants to go further. “I 

want to play Rankin Inlet,” and a host 

of other places which are often left 

out of the national policy dialogue yet 

are vital parts of the Canadian identity. 

Particularly now, as we face a post- 

Brexit, staring-down-the-barrel-ofpresident-Trump 

world that seems to 

have chosen to isolate itself from the 

notions of community presented in this 

work, and by this tour. 

“Some artists may feel they have a 

toothless grip, but In Canada, we’ve had 

the opposite effect,” said Cuddy. “We can 

do a lot more than just get out the vote.” 

Blue Rodeo performs on January 27 and 

28 at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre. 

January 2017 MUSIC 

5

AFI 

darkness prevails from the sunshine state 


AFI frontman Davey Havok doesn’t 

want to talk about the tattoos he 

recently, and mysteriously, blacked out. 

He also doesn’t want to divulge the name 

of his soon to be released book, a sequel to 

Pop Kids (his 2013 coming-of-age tale about 

a pop-culture obsessed, pseudovegetarian, 

atheist, pyromaniac, trapped within a 

rural northern Californian town). And he’d 

rather not disclose the direction of his soon 

to be released musical project, DREAMCAR, 

featuring members of No Doubt. He can, 

however, talk about AFI’s new album, 

The Blood Album, which is going to be 

released this month via Concord Music. 

After ten studio albums and 25+ 

years holding a microphone as the lead 

personality for his gloomy goth rock 

troupe, it makes sense that he would 

probably want to keep his cards close to 

his chest while talking about his creative 

outlets. One thing at a time, and right 

now, Havok still has blood on his hands. 

Talking on the phone from Hollywood, 

the 41 year old sounds refreshingly 

chipper and excited that the record is 

finished and ready to be released. 

“I’m really happy with how everything 

turned out,” he says. “We spent a lot of 

time working on it and we’re excited to 

share Blood with our fans.” 

You can tell Havok is in interview 

cruise control mode, but what more can 

you really say? The album was recorded 

over the course of the last year and was coproduced 

by guitarist Jade Puget and Matt 

Hyde (Deftones). The theme of blood runs 

throughout, not out of a twisted fascination 

with vampires or anything overtly cheesy 

like that, but it’s something Havok says was 

unconsciously on his mind while writing for 

the album. 

“The theme of blood just kept 

coming up in a lot of the lyrics I was 

writing so when we finally paired down 

the album from the 60 songs we had 

originally written, I brought it up again 

with Jade and we decided that calling it 

The Blood Album made sense.” 

The end result is a sonically diverse 

collection of tracks that may or may not be 

surprising if you’ve been following the band’s 

career for the last ten-plus years since they 

topped the Billboard charts with their 2003 

major label breakout, Sing The Sorrow. 

Havok is still channeling his inner 

Morrissey with hints of Danzig always 

present in the background, but this album 

slightly veers back to the band’s punk/ 

hardcore roots — gang vocals, razor 

sharp 4/4 riffs, all cleverly disguised 

underneath anthemic compositions 

and crystal clear production. 

Obviously gone are the lighthearted 

days of “I Wanna Get A Mohawk (But Mom 

Won’t Let Me Get One)” off the band’s 1995 

debut, Answer That And Stay Fashionable. 

Havok has presumably removed the black 

nail polish along with his tattoo sleeves, but 

AFI grow up and find balance in the darkness with The Blood Album 

the punk rock ethos is kind of still there, just 

hiding in plain sight. 

“It’s not like it happened over night 

though,” Havok says. “There was a very 

gradual progression to our success and 

it wasn’t until 2006 that the mainstream 

media even started to pay attention to 

us. So it’s not like how some bands will 

put out one album, it will get successful 

and then by their next album they’re 

playing stadiums. For us it was a much 

more gradual progression.” 

Havok might be all covered up but at 

Photo by Jiro Schneider 

the same time, he’s completely exposed 

on The Blood Album. 2016 was a dark 

year and 2017 doesn’t look like it’s going 

to be much better, but maybe it’s ok to 

hide in the darkness. 

When asked how he finds solstice in 

these sinister times, Havok is quick to answer, 

“Anything Nick Cave does. The new Neurosis 

album. The New Tom Ford movie, Nocturnal 

Animals. It’s beautiful and perfect.” 

AFI performs on January 24 at the 

Commodore Ballroom. 

COMEBACK KID 

hardcore heavyweights continue thrashing from all angles 

Johnny Papan 

On the grind for more than a decade, 

Comeback Kid has been a long-lived 

dominant force in the hardcore punk 

scene. Founded in Winnipeg, MB at 

the strike of the new millennium, their fast, 

heavy, aggressive and melodic sound has 

gained them notoriety both nationally and 

internationally, recently taking the quintet 

through South America and Europe. 

“We do a lot of international 

touring,” explains guitarist Stu Ross, 

who has recently acquired the job 

of talent booker at The Cobalt, one 

of Vancouver’s most notorious live 

music venues. Ross recalls some 

of the band’s craziest experiences 

Photo by Bryan Hall 

Tales from the hardcore world of military police, sweaty over capacity gigs, toys for sick kids, and the joys of new songs on home soil 

performing abroad. 

“A few years back in Bandung, 

Indonesia we had a show cancelled due 

to what local police chalked up to permit 

issues,” he says. “The promoter ended up 

moving the show onto a military police 

base about an hour from the city. We had 

to surrender our passports upon entry.” 

Without any idea of what to expect, the 

band was taken to a defunct bunker where 

they were greeted by a roaring crowd of 

more than 700 people. “The place had dirt 

floors, a concrete stage and a hole in 

the ground to piss in, but there was a regular 

functioning P.A. system. The show was super 

fun and well worth the wait.” 

Another show was cancelled in 

Tel Aviv, Israel. Last minute, the band 

was invited to play at a 200 capacity 

DIY venue instead. “The show was 

fucking nuts. Wall-to-wall people, 

hotter than hell, so much energy 

and excitement. It made for such 

a memorable experience.” In 2014, 

during a South African tour, shows 

went smoothly and CBK performed in 

front of hundreds of fans each night. 

“The craziest thing was the actual 

travel through the country, city to 

city, the townships, the countryside. 

We got to play with cheetahs, horseback 

with giraffes, and swim with sharks. So 

that whole trip was pretty nuts over all.” 

Recently, the group showed 

their charitable side, playing a full 

set of mosh-worthy tracks at the For 

the Children festival in Los Angeles. 

A charity event, attendees were 

required to donate toys upon entry, 

which would be given to children 

in need. “It’s a cool festival with a 

really great cause. We were happy 

and honoured to have been involved 

with such a special event.” Comeback 

Kid headlined this two-day festival, 

packing the Union Hall alongside 

some of the grittiest punk bands from 

around the globe. The angelic nature 

of the event, however, would not stop 

the show from becoming a heavenly 

combustion. A video of Comeback 

Kid’s set, which can be found on 

YouTube, shows fans thrashing 

from all angles, toppling over each 

other, jumping on stage and throwing 

themselves back into the thunderous 

sea-like pit. The band would end the 

night with one of their biggest hits, 

“Wake the Dead.” Alas, a truck would 

leave the venue jam-packed with toys, 

and rowdy audience members would 

exit with proudly worn battle-scars. 

Comeback Kid is currently writing 

the follow-up to their 2014 album, Die 

Knowing, anticipated for a Summer 

2017 release. This month the band 

will spend some time in Vancouver 

working on the album and playing 

a one-off show in a more personal 

venue than you might expect. 

“It’s a great opportunity to see 

CBK in an intimate setting,” Ross says 

about their upcoming show, which will 

be at the Cobalt. “It’s a tighter room 

than we typically play in Vancouver. No 

barricades or security lurking near or on 

the stage. We’re able to play our show for 

you the way it’s supposed to be played.” 

Surely, this will be an explosive one, 

not for the faint of heart. 

Comeback Kid performs at The Cobalt 

on January 21. 

6 MUSIC 



FRUIT BATS 

back to life after a discourse in grief 

Sarah Bauer 

Fruit Bats is a band you might have a 

hard time explaining to your Grandma, 

but it’s the name under which multiinstrumentalist 

and singer-songwriter 

Eric D. Johnson has become known for 

by fans over the past 20 years. So much 

so that while touring as a solo artist, 

he found himself having to mention it 

every time he played a show. 

Going solo was meant to signify a 

clean break from the Fruit Bats moniker 

in the wake of personal crisis for Johnson, 

who with his wife had lost to a miscarriage 

what would have been their first child. 

In 2014, under the name EDJ, Johnson 

released his most cathartic and personally 

revealing work to date. The sound was all 

folksy and warm Fruit Bats, but its content 

was a discourse in grief. 

Coming from a folk-pop band on a 

productive stride since the early 2000s 

“indie rock” heyday, with Sub Pop label 

cred and string of critically celebrated 

albums, Johnson could not anticipate 

the comparatively quiet response to 

EDJ. Bringing Fruit Bats back for its 

latest record, Absolute Loser (Easy 

Sound Recording Company), made 

sense practically for its connection to 

EDJ’s material. 

“EDJ and Absolute Loser should 

probably somehow be released 

together. In many ways they’re like a 

single statement,” says Johnson. “It was 

weird, but ultimately people recognize 

Fruit Bats so I just thought I should 

probably use that name again.” 

There couldn’t be a better set of 

tunes to reinstate Fruit Bats back to its 

fanbase than what is found on Absolute 

Loser. Its ten tracks are tied together 

with the kind of sweetness that recalls 

cozy Sunday mornings listening to 

the oldies station on the radio while 

your mother makes breakfast in her 

bathrobe. There is nostalgia and sadness 

but it’s well cloaked as any fine country 

record should be with rollicking guitar 

and smiling verses. 

It’s back to basics with snappy 

banjo on “Humbug Mountain Song” and 

strumming guitar on “Birthday Drunk” 

and Johnson’s unmistakable high tenor 

voice carrying listeners to joyful and 

familiar places. Those familiar with past 

albums The Ruminant Band and Spelled 

in Bones will take comfort in Johnson’s 

unflaggingly thankful approach to 

observing the varied turns of life. 

“Good Will Come To You” is as 

optimistic as the title suggests, with 

only a sigh of a suggestion this could be 

the kind of pep talk Johnson has had to 

give himself before. 

“I have a feeling that good will 

come to you / I have a notion that good 

will come to you,” he sings, and he is 

believable. May good come to us, so 

long as we are kind to one another. 

It worked for his rescue dog Pinto, 

a very sweet terrier occupying most of 

Johnson’s Instagram feed these days. 

Pinto is “really nice,” Johnson says, but 

“you’d kind of have to be nice to be 

a homeless street dog in Mexico and 

manage to get rescued like that.” 

Fruit Bats perform on January 13 at 

the Cobalt. 

With Absolute Loser, Eric D. Johnson finds solace in nostalgia and the sweetness in rescue. 

8 


KYLE MORTON 

going solo and slowing things down 

Safiya Hopfe 

Salem, Oregon’s favourite collective 

of orchestral indie rock, Typhoon, has 

seen growing acclaim since releasing 

White Lighter in 2013, but frontman 

Kyle Morton recently chose to take a 

step back from his band in the interest 

of trying something new. 

In his words, “Typhoon projects 

always take a really long time and they’re 

always agonizingly slow. So I wanted to 

do something sort of fun and easy and 

labour-less.” Morton wanted something 

that would allow him to take a breather 

and make use of a pile of songs that had 

accumulated over the years, behind 

closed doors while the creative process 

of his 18-piece ensemble absorbed all 

recording efforts and creative focus. 

The result is What Will Destroy 

You, an instrumentally minimal 

and altogether intimate solo record 

that grapples with love, loss, and 

the apocalypse, coherently and 

holistically despite the aura of 

spontaneity and coincidence with 

which all of the songs actually came 

together. As it turns out, the overarching 

theme— “exploring love as either the 

thing that will destroy you or that will 

save you”— came after the making of the 

record itself, leading naturally to the title 

What Will Destroy You. 

Simply put, though, it’s no concept 

album. Morton highlights how little of 

it was premeditated and explains that 

most of the songs were written “offthe-cuff.” 

“I had the songs in the bag 

before we even started, they were songs 

I had written almost by accident.” He 

continues to explain that the process 

took around a month in its entirety. “I 

recorded it with my old friend in Long 

Island, an engineer who worked on 

all the Typhoon records, and we just 

recorded it in that, I would just drop 

by his house a couple nights a week 

and we finished it in about a month. 

With Typhoon, I keep using the word 

laboured but it’s belaboured almost.” 

The painstaking diligence Morton 

attributes to Typhoon’s artistic process 

is unsurprising, considering the 

sheer grandeur reflected both by the 

ensemble’s size and the abstraction 

of the ideas they work to unravel. 

Desire, death, and attraction are but 

a few examples of the “philosophical 

concepts” the band has tackled, and 

that he himself tends to gravitate 

toward no matter what he is thinking or 

writing about. But the reality of concept 

albums is that they don’t always 

materialize organically. “When you try 

to force something it will sound sort of 

strained, and definitely when I listen to 

our last Typhoon record, White Lighter, 

which is the record I’m really proud of 

and something I really like, there’s this 

feeling of pressure and strain. I mean for 

one, we played all the songs so fast on 

the record, I don’t know what we were 

thinking. Like god it sounds like we’re 

on amphetamines or something.” 

Ironically enough, it’s been busier 

since the record’s release than during 

the making of it. Kyle Morton is touring 

solo for the first time, though he’s always 

had a pretty good time performing by 

himself at shows here and there in Oregon. 

He refers to the “clown-size shoes” he has to 

fill in the absence of his many bandmates, 

and in addition to working a day-job 

explains that every spare minute has been 

spent recording Typhoon’s new record. He 

isn’t shying away from any of it though. He 

calls the world of making music “a dog-eatdog 

world” but he doesn’t intend to back 

out. “It seems to be pathological. I don’t 

know if I can stop now.” 

Kyle Morton performs on January 9 at 

the Rickshaw Theatre. 

Typhoon frontman Kyle Morton gets melodic with his new solo offering. 

Photo by Jen van Houten 

JP Maurice 

celebrating the musical anatomy of boys and girls 

JP Maurice is no longer a victim of expectation as he prepares for the release of his new EP, Girls. 

Heather Adamson 

Vancouver songwriter JP Maurice is 

ringing in the New Year with a new 

album. His six-track EP Girls drops on 

January 14, which stands strongly on its 

own while building anticipation for an 

LP that will be released later in the year, 

very fittingly entitled Boys. Two albums, 

simply yet aptly named for an artist 

whose interwoven relationships with 

musicians and industry professionals 

are central to the life he has built for 

himself, which includes being a partner 

at Vancouver’s Blue Light Studio. 

“Being a part of the studio has been 

wonderful,” says Maurice. “It is a place 

where I feel supported and nourished as 

an artist and a person. It can feel really 

overwhelming being out there in the 

music industry on your own and now I 

have help around me that is solid.” 

Embedding himself in the 

Vancouver music scene as a songwriter, 

performer and producer, Maurice’s 

multifaceted career has influenced the 

maturation in his own music and the 

choices he has made for his upcoming 

releases. Girls is layered with group 

vocals on various tracks and highlights 

Maurice’s penchant for strong pop- 

rock offerings. A chameleon of sorts 

when it comes to genres, Maurice has 

the ability to maneuver effortlessly 

between anything from a crooning jazz 

infused ballad to a classic rock anthem 

and shares that the LP will have more of 

an alt-country vibe. 

The pressure to prescribe to a certain 

type of music or produce a particular 

sounding album has eased for Maurice 

over the years. 

“I hit a pretty low point a few years 

ago,” says Maurice. “I was a victim of 

expectation. But I’m at a point now 

where I have a lot of great friends and 

people around me. I just want to keep 

making records and staying creative.” 

Preparing for the release of his new 

music and knowing all too well the 

emotional trappings that can come 

along with it, JP Maurice is confident 

in his choices and the songs that he is 

sharing with audiences at this stage in 

his life. 

“Honestly, I am not worried about 

how my music is going to be received. 

Humanity and the state of the world are 

things I spend time worrying about.” 

JP Maurice performs at the Biltmore 

Cabaret on January 14. 


9

THE LEMON TWIGS 

1960s glam made to last in Long Island 

Photo by Autumn de Wilde 

Christina Zimmer 

For a band that has only just released 

their first full album, Do Hollywood, in 

October of 2016, the Lemon Twigs from 

Long Island, NY have already received 

some significant publicity in global 

media. Brian and Michael D’Addario 

were nominated New Band of the Week 

by The Guardian UK in July 2016; their 

album has received a lot of praise with 

regards to its diversity, sophistication, 

and unconventional sound, and their 

eccentric dress code — Brian looks 

like a 1960s rock star and Michael goes 

for the glam look — has prompted 

mixed reactions. The fact that their 

music style brings back the sound of 

the Beatles, the Beach Boys, and Todd 

Rundgren — performers who have 

been influencers to the brothers from 

an early age, also thanks to their songwriting 

father, Ronnie D’Addario — is 

in particular remarkable considering 

that the brothers are only 19 and 17 

years of age. Speaking to Brian during 

his holiday break in Long Island after his 

return from touring the US and Europe 

to promote the new record, he explains: 

“We were five when we started playing 

drums and I was seven when I started 

playing guitar and writing songs.” In 

the meantime, Brian masters the guitar, 

bass, drums, keyboards, horns, and 

strings, and also owns a trumpet, a 

violin, and a cello. Together, Brian and 

Michael solely executed all instrumental 

accompaniments on the record and 

only when playing live, the brothers 

are supported by Danny Ayala on the 

keyboard and Megan Zeankowski on 

the bass. 

The style of their music is often 

described as baroque rock of the 

1960s, psychedelic, vaudeville. Asked 

where they get their inspiration from, 

Brian replies, “Initially the Beatles 

were inspiring, so were a lot of bands, 

Leonard Cohen was and still is very 

inspiring to me. I’m really like inspired 

by music that I don’t know so much 

about, usually the point of inspiration 

is when I’m first discovering something. 

So like I can be inspired by Big Star or 

by opera, like Henry Purcell, or Richard 

Rodgers musicals, but those things that 

I mentioned I don’t know too much 

about but when I hear something, 

because I don’t know so much about it, 

it inspires me to learn more about it and 

try to make music like that.” 

The album consists of an equal 

amount of pieces written by both 

brothers in 2014 and is rife with 

impactful melodies, instrumental, 

and rhythmic variety and attention to 

detail — this also goes for their first 

two single releases. “These words,” 

written by Brian, features a forceful, 

harmonious chorus transitioning into 

a rapid instrumental symbiosis of piano 

and xylophone, whilst the anthemic 

“As long as we’re together,” penned by 

Michael, is skillfully interrupted by a 

playful synthesizer solo. 

With some written material in 

the bag, they contacted Foxygen’s 

Jonathan Rado online and sent him a 

few pieces, he really liked them, and the 

rest is history. According to Brian, Rado’s 

appreciation of the music really inspired 

them whilst collaborating with him for 

the album: “Now there was kind of like 

someone listening, it felt like there’s an 

audience for the first time, someone that 

didn’t have any reason to like our music, 

that we could craft our songs for.” 

During their upcoming shows, the 

brothers will be performing songs from 

their recently released album, some 

Two teenagers fresh out of a time machine blow minds with Do Hollywood 

new material which will be compiled on 

an EP due to come out in 2017 as well 

as one of the songs from the next full 

album, which has yet to be recorded. 

The new songs, Brian reveals, are of 

the same origin as the songs from Do 

Hollywood as they were demoed at the 

same time but, according to Brian, they have 

a different energy to them when played 

live. So there’s plenty to look forward to for 

existing fans and fans-to-be alike. 

The Lemon Twigs perform at the Cobalt 

February 1. 

THE 

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10 MUSIC 


THE TEQUILA MOCKINGBIRD ORCHESTRA 

celebrating ten years of chasing the worm 

Heather Adamson 

Victoria’s homegrown Tequila 

Mockingbird Orchestra (TMO) are 

celebrating ten years as a band and 

they are going on an anniversary tour to 

celebrate. It’s quite a legacy for any band 

to make the decade mark and these five 

musicians appreciate everything they’ve 

gone through to get here. “It’s hard for 

bands to stay together,” says vocalist/ 

guitarist Kurt Loewen. “Ambition, 

distance, inspiration, and creative 

differences can work against you but 

we are grateful for what we have.” Three 

of the five are original band members 

and the current five-piece have been 

playing together for the past five years. 

Now spread out living in various parts of 

the country, they reunite to create and 

tour together three to four months out 

of the year, a healthy balance they have 

struck between those that would be 

happy touring all of the time and those 

that don’t want to be on the road much 

at all. Apart for much of the year, they 

place a lot of value on the time they 

set aside to continue their collective 

artistic pursuit. “Aside from creating 

more music together, our main focus 

is to be really good to one another 

because that is what got us here in 

Photo by 

bitternorth.com 

the first place,” says Loewen. 

Having toured across Canada 

and internationally, Loewen spoke of 

some of the places they have lived and 

performed in over the years. Berlin, 

Spain, Yukon, and Montreal, to name a 

few, are places and experiences that have 

influenced the constant evolution of the 

band’s music. Their reputation for being 

collaborative, spontaneous, and endlessly 

creative has led to many opportunities and 

they plan to harness this energy for their 

upcoming tour to share with audiences. 

The band will be performing 

in Vancouver on January 12 at the 

Rickshaw Theatre, a show being curated 

by Ruhamah Marie Buchanan of Rogue 

Spade Arts. “Seeing TMO perform 

Victoria tribe of brotherly love celebrates ten years riding the creative Rapids together. 

during the Sunday night closing set at 

Kaslo Jazz Festival this past summer was 

incredibly inspiring,” says Buchanan. 

A huge fan for years, Buchanan has 

been waiting for the timing to align 

to showcase the band in a certain 

format and the tenth anniversary was 

the perfect occasion. “I enjoy creating 

multi-media immersive environments 

by inviting musicians, circus performers, 

and visual artists of different mediums 

to perform collaboratively,” says 

Buchanan. The night is set to include 

performing arts troupe Omnika in 

Motion, as well as local troubadours 

The Tailor, and MEGANG, along with 

a few other surprises. “We haven’t 

even met Ruhamah yet,” says Loewen. 

“She reached out to us and we were 

so grateful. We want to honour her 

impressions of us from our performance 

in Kaslo by embracing improvised 

collaboration, spontaneity, and 

openness on the stage. It has always 

been about the performance for us.” 

After a decade of performing 

and touring together, the Tequila 

Mockingbird Orchestra is more like a 

brotherhood than a band. “Other than 

my immediate family, they are the 

longest relationships I have had in my 

life,” shared Loewen. “It is heavy and 

beautiful and I wouldn’t change a thing.” 

The Tequila Mockingbird Orchestra perform 

at the Rickshaw Theatre on January 12. 

FEATURED CONCERTS 

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The katherines 

the soulfulness of sisterhood 

Maddy Christal 

The Katherine’s are a three-piece 

Vancouver based indie-pop band 

comprised of two sisters, Kate and 

Lauren Kurdyak, and their life long 

friend Kaitlyn Hansen-Boucher. 

Their debut album, To Bring You 

My Heart (604 records), will be 

released this month and is an 

extensive tapestry of sound and a 

lyrical ethnography full of youthful 

reflections. 

The Katherines were recently 

graduating high school yet have 

managed to release a highly selfaware 

record that encapsulates 

the experience of being vulnerable, 

confused and heartbroken. Front 

woman Kate Kurdyak has an 

intoxicating voice that is rich 

in depth and experience. It is 

palpable to listeners immediately 

that the three are well trained and 

highly technical, however their 

sound is whimsical and youthful. 

Kate’s fun and courageous spirit 

is well suited to her music. It is 

clear she doesn’t take herself to 

seriously, yet seriously enough. 

She currently resides in small town 

Squamish, studying social sciences 

at University. She is truly a nonjudgmental, 

warm and intelligent 

conversationalist who straddles 

between remarkably intellectual 

to admittedly silly. Her plans for 

the future involve two album 

release concerts in Vancouver and 

Toronto in late January before a 

more substantial tour across BC 

in the spring. Shortly following 

that the band will record their 

next album, in which most of 

the material is already written. 

Kurdyak shared that she would 

love just to get in the car with her 

fellow bandmates and see where 

they end up at some point in their 

career. Embodying the soul of rock 

‘n’ roll but the mind of a realist, she 

expressed her gratitude for being in 

a band with people so close to her. 

“We flight like sisters, then 

make up and it’s really great,” she 

says. “We share everything, which 

brings us closer.” 

Kate writes the songs while 

Lauren and Hansen-Boucher 

provide diverse instrumentality. To 

Bring you My Heart features their 

unique approach to songwriting 

and pop-infused indie ballads. 

A wide array of Canadian talent 

is featured alongside the ladies 

on this notable album, including 

Hawksley Workman, Fake Shark’s 

Kevvy Mental and Hot Hot Heat’s 

Steve Bays. 

The album is a collection of 

complicated songs with vulnerable 

lyrics and honest musings. The 

sound is bold, which pairs well 

with the humble lyrics generously 

delivered. 

The Katherines perform January 20 at 

The Cobalt. 

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11

BREAKPOINT 

challenging black and white thinking with debut EP 

Sadie Vadnais 

On Commercial Drive, the snow has 

put the street into chaos, grey slush and 

asphalt stopping up busses, pedestrians 

falling over themselves trying to get to 

where they want to go. It’s hard not to 

smile, sitting with Jacob “Winter” Grey 

and Evan Bettcher (drummer Jayden 

England couldn’t get there), talking about 

their album which feels very similar: chaos, 

upheaval, deviation from the norm. 

“We’ve all been there, to the 

breakpoint. We didn’t mean to get there, 

but here we are,” says Grey, lighting a 

marlboro. “It comes from a personal 

place…it’s very metaphorical.” 

“Yeah,” adds Bettcher. “We basically 

do whatever the fuck, and make our music 

from that, the good and bad contrast.” 

It’s a great punk album for a band of 

young people to come out with, but that 

shouldn’t be the focus of its listening as 

it hits with thrash and metal too. It’s the 

album you wished you had put out when 

you were in a band, which is refreshing and 

transporting, a theme that Breakpoint 

wanted to accidentally convey. 

“In the track ‘Finger Crossed’ some 

of the drums are a mistake but we just 

kept them because we ended up liking 

them.” Grey laughs, “Our EP was recorded 

Photo by Aly Laube 

in a bathroom with the fan going.” 

“Our sound has changed so much,” 

Bettcher adds. “We listened to the EP 

over and over and then improved...but 

we just want our audience to come to 

their own conclusions about what the 

album is.” 

“Last time we recorded we were 

going for free thinking,” Grey nods in 

agreement, “but this time I think you 

just dig for what it means…we tried 

not to be political, but our track ‘For 

Eyes To See’ is about fracking and the 

pipelines, but you might get something 

different, you know? Everybody should 

take something different from it if that’s 

what you need. We wanted to put 

meaning to every riff.” 

This self titled album is a testament 

to all the great highs and lows that 

come with being young. It’s a crashing, 

weaving attempt at bottling the angst 

and hilarity of growing up, and they 

come close, then ease off, keeping it 

accessible and tight enough to not be cliché. 

Breakpoint is the line in the sand when you 

felt you just had to ride the wave. 

Breakpoint album release show is at 333 

Clarke Drive on Jan 27th with Frogpile 

and Mouthbreather. Tickets are $10, 

doors at 8 PM. 

Another great punk EP for those who want to survive youth cliche-free 

Photo by Lauren Ray 

This Vancouver trio found their way out of the woods and into an artistic collective 

LITTLE SPROUT 

swiping right never turned out so well 

Elliot Langford 

“I don’t know why I swiped right... but I 

said hi to you first,” says Amie Gislason, 

singer and guitarist for Little Sprout. 

“Did you?” asks drummer, Sean Gordon. 

“Yeah!” laughs Amie. 

Several Skype sessions later, 

Gordon took a ferry from his home in 

Nanaimo over to Vancouver to meet 

Gislason in person. Soon enough, 

not only were they dating, but they 

were forming a band, with Gordon 

recruiting his friend and roommate 

Reese Patterson to play bass. 

“I was like ‘Reese can play bass I 

think,’” he says. “And that just worked 

out really well, sort of luckily.” Little 

Sprout’s tape marks the first formal 

music release for any of the members. 

For Gislason, it’s the realization of a goal 

she had since she formed her first band 

as a teenager. 

“[As a teenager] my number one 

goal was to be in a band. My number 

one influence was ska and I was listening 

to a lot of System of a Down,” she laughs. 

Her band Time To Quit lasted half a 

year, and played a handful of packed all 

ages shows, breaking up when her best 

friend and bandmate moved away. 

During her twenties, Gislason went 

through a long tumultuous period of 

alcoholism and drug addiction during 

which playing music hurt. “Playing 

guitar reminded me of better times 

and of being functional,” she says. 

After going through recovery, one of 

Gislason’s goals was to play music again. 

And not only to write new songs, some 

of which were inspired by her addiction 

and recovery, but to revisit some songs 

that had been laying dormant for a 

decade. 

“The songs that survived through 

that time deserve to be played if they 

survived that long. ‘Solar Wind,’ I wrote 

when I was 16 or 17.” 

Little Sprout balances the heavy 

emotional weight of some of the lyrics, 

with contrasting poppy angular guitar 

parts and playful drumming. 

“I like having the lyrics be super 

depressing and then having a cute guitar 

part,” Gislason says. “But I also have a 

song about dating an alien!” 

The three band members are 

also visual artists and collaborate on 

bright colourful imagery for the band. 

For Gislason, both art and music are 

“Ways to express things [she has] never 

been able to communicate in words.” 

She describes her strength as being 

as a realism-based painter, Gordon’s 

art as more abstract, and Patterson’s 

background is as a graphic designer. 

They note their roles in the band as 

being similar. 

“Abstract, representational, and 

form,” Gislason says describing Gordon, 

Patterson, and herself. 

“I would say I’m the most grounded 

in reality,” says Patterson, to which the 

others laugh. 

Little Sprout plays tape release shows at 

333 in Vancouver on January 14th and in 

Nanaimo at the Vault on January 20th. 

12 MUSIC 



midwest country singer breaks out of the barn 

Graeme Wiggins 

When you’ve been writing with your heart on your 

sleeve for your entire adult life and have developed 

a devoted fan base like Ohio country singer Lydia 

Loveless has, it can be heard to branch out and 

progress without some bumps in the road. And 

even though she doesn’t see her new album, Real, 

as a huge switch up, fans can be a little more 

picky. 

“I don’t think it was that much of a jump 

given that there was something else in between. 

I also have a lot of fans that are like Indestructible 

Machine is your best album ever so maybe people 

just don’t fucking get it, if that’s their opinion 

about what my best work is,” she explains. 

The progression on Real was a natural one 

that came out of “just getting older, and actually 

growing up a bit in the past few years.” The process 

of recording started for her early, and initially 

involved little in the way of knowledge. 

“I was sort of learning to write songs and 

make records by just doing it. I started and just 

immediately jumped into the studio and started 

recording so my learning process is pretty apparent 

in the progression of my albums and this is just a 

little more sophisticated sonically,” she says. 

This sophistication apparent both in 

production and her lyrics is most evident on 

“Heaven,” a keyboard-infused track about God and 

religion. 

“I know that white people get really angry about 

keyboards and non-guitar instrumentation. We had 

some fun with that.” So while this might upset some 

of her fans, she’s definitely happy with the result. 

“I’m making it sound dumber than it was; it was 

fun and experimental and great and as far as the 

songwriting goes, I was progressing into a little less 

‘born in a barn’ sound writing style anyways.” 

That progression takes time, which can 

make her fans impatient, but in order to write 

new songs, you need time to just exist. There’s 

only so many songs about the boredom of 

touring that can be written. “People are always 

like ‘It’s been so long since your last record’ and 

it’s been like two years. I’m only fucking human. I 

don’t have Max Martin in the room with me. I’m 

not Taylor Swift where I just read my diary in a 

boardroom and someone starts beat-boxing over 

it. I actually have to create this shit. And remember 

to be a human too.” 

The end result is a deeply personal record 

that comes out of some less than happy 

experiences she’s going through. This is reflected 

in the title of the album, Real, which points to 

questions of perception. 

Her notoriously fierce live shows might be 

a little different north of the border, but expect 

an engaging one nonetheless. As she explains, “In 

Canada they’re a bit stripped down because some 

of my band members can’t get into the country 

so it might be a little more on the acoustic side, 

but I think they are pretty confessional. I try to 

engage the audience. I’ve never been much for 

listening rooms, I know that’s what artists want 

is for everyone to shut up and listen to my art 

but I like to talk to the audience a little bit. I’m an 

entertainer and performer, I’m not here to make 

everyone miserable.” 

Lydia Loveless performs at the Biltmore Cabaret 

on February 2. 

Photo by 

David T. Kindler 

With Real, Loveless stares adulthood down and never blinks 


13

WAINGRO 

“When Mitch and I were just starting to collaborate 

he was throwing their first show at 333, just down 

the street from an afterhours [venue] I had a show 

that night at. Waingro packed the room and ended 

up getting Mitch's whole show shut down. The 

remaining band on the bill, Molten Lava, being a 

touring band at the time jumped on my show and 

ended up being one of my favorite bands ever. 

Thanks Waingro.” 

- Taya Fraser 

*Waingro has played all four of Art Signified’s anniversary shows 

ASTRAKHAN 

“One of the best show memories with them is when 

Mitch, our friend Driscoll, and I went with them on a little 

island tour. We basically drank our weight in whiskey and 

got in shit from various people for partying too hard. It 

was perfect, specifically locking Adam We (Guitar) in the 

Cambie Hostel bathroom and filming him having to 

breakout. Also Jerome (drums) was forced to party with us 

the whole night.” 

- Taya Fraser 

*Astrakhan’s Reward in Purpose was one of 

BeatRoute’s top 25 local albums of 2016 

HERON 

“I believe the first Heron show we did was Burgerfest, 

guitarist Scott Bartlett puts on the one day festival with us 

and is one of our best pals. I really look forward to how 

many amps Scott ends up with, probably comparable to 

the amount of face tattoos Ross ends up with.” 

- Taya Fraser 

*Ian from Passive and Eric from the Dirt both did stints in BRASS 

BRASS 

“One weekend I had a show at the Railway and Taya had an after 

hours show the same night. We both had bands drop off our shows 

at the last minute so we both suggested to the other that we get 

BRASS to fill the slots. They came through at the last minute and 

thoroughly blew both of our minds. I remember showing up to the 

after hours show and I had just missed BRASS' set and Taya had a 

look on her face like she had just seen God for the first time. The 

next few months were some of the best times ever.” 

- Mitch Ray 

ART SIGNIFIED 

IV YEAR ANNIVERSARY 

HEDKS 

“Hedks is my band. I didn't want to play this show 

because I felt it a little biased me being in the band. But 

my bandmate Twitch works so god damn hard, when 

Mitch asked if we would I couldn't deny her the show.” 

- Taya Fraser 

ERIC CAMPBELL AND THE DIRT 

“We had to get from our show in Saskatoon on Tuesday night all the 

way to Toronto on Thursday night. It was about a 40 hour drive with no 

meaningful stops. It was cutting it so close that if someone took too 

long in the bathroom at a gas station then we were at risk of missing 

the next show. To make matters worse, the van we had rented was 

suspect at best, and it was the kind of situation where if we went too 

fast it might overheat, and if we went to slow we might miss the show. 

It was kind of like the movie Speed.” 

- Mitch Ray 

DOPEY’S ROBE 

“I know all those guys through their prior projects. I saw them 

live and they were awesome, seeing them open for the 

Allah-las was great, they’re a new band but they really belong.” 

- Mitch Ray 

COUSIN ARBY 

“Scott got a huge almost life size cut-out of a horse for use as 

a stage prop at Cousin Arby shows. And I'm quite certain it's 

just been sitting on the deck of our apartment for months and 

has never been used.” 

- Mitch Ray 

*Cousin Arby is a country music project by Scott Postulo, who is 

Mitch Ray’s landlord and Taya Fraser’s boss, and a great friend. 

DEAD QUIET 

“Kevin has this lyric, it goes, ‘you have my respect and I 

owe you my life.’ We’d always joke about it. I think he 

thought we were making fun of him, but it’s really just a 

great lyric. At the last anniversary show, he stopped the 

song at the part, looked right at us and said ‘Mitch and 

Taya, you have my respect and I owe you my life. Everytime 

that lyric came around he would stare right at us.” 

- Mitch Ray 

*Dead Quiet is a newer project by frontman Kevin Keegan, 

formerly of Montreal’s metal band Barn Burner 

Art Signified celebrates their four-year anniversary with 

many guests and friends on January 20 and 21 at the 

Rickshaw Theatre. 

14 MUSIC 


FRANK LOVE 

Frank Love pushes female fronted punk in loud new directions 

Prachi Kamble 

Frank Love makes soul punk. Their 

punk is hardcore but it also has some 

serious dance issues. “Aside from punk, 

soul, and lately opera,” explains lead 

singer, Juljka Klingler, “we borrow from 

soft, weird, indie stuff, as well as from 

hip-hop and angsty pop.” Three years 

ago, Frank Love’s members, a mix of 

punk veterans and band newbies, 

came together to get the aggressions 

of their daily lives out via music. Now 

they find themselves confronted with 

a pleasantly reinvigorated intent for 

musical creation. 

The band released Hot Garbage 

with Owen Reimer in 2015, and Strange 

Attitude with the legendary Jordan 

Koop in early 2016. A fall trip to Koop’s 

studio on Gabriola Island, later in 2016, 

yielded a brand new album that led 

Frank Love into uncharted territories. 

Koop directed the structure and melody 

on many of the songs. “[Koop] gives you 

freedom yet maintains the timeline,” 

says Klingler. “He provides critique yet 

remains neutral, and respects your 

process while respecting his own. It’s 

not as easy as it sounds!” The album 

touches on fresh and important 

themes. “We have one song called ‘Dirty 

Water’ which is about how many First 

Nations reserves don’t have access to 

drinking water,” she reveals. “We also 

have a song called ‘Dark Lipstick’ which 

is about loneliness and lust while ‘Group 

Therapy’ typifies our band. It talks about 

how music can be soothing in sorting 

out the paradoxes of life.” Another 

intriguing form of experimentation on 

the album is that of singing in a madeup 

language. Klingler laughs off this notfor-the-creatively-squeamish 

endeavour 

with modesty, “you don’t have to think 

of the words, which is an added bonus!” 

she says. “You are free to focus only on the 

melody which takes you to unexpected 

places, creatively. They say that praying in 

‘tongues’ takes Catholic priests closer to 

God. I can’t say I was closer to God but it 

sure took me somewhere!” 

Frank Love has created quite the 

reputation for themselves in the local, 

live punk circuit, steadily winning 

over fans with powerful shows at the 

Railway Club, the Waldorf, Lana Lou’s, 

and The Rickshaw. The band members’ 

interpersonal relationships create a net 

of unshakeable trust that allows them 

to bare their souls on stage. Half the 

band being female is a refreshing pull, as is 

expected, but add to that Klingler’s on-stage, 

alter ego and you start to grab attention fast. 

Klingler sings many of her songs in a man’s 

shirt and a buxom, old man beard, when she 

dons this enigmatic persona. “My partner 

and I thought we couldn’t possibly be a 

couple in a band together, so we decided I 

would be this man named Baus Rod. I 

took it pretty seriously in the beginning 

but now I think I can gain more from 

being myself.” With Baus Rod, Frank 

Love takes challenging the gender roles 

in punk, one-step raucously too far. 

Don’t miss Frank Love’s scrumptious 

punk spread on 2017’s first Friday the 

13th, at the Rickshaw Theatre. 

REGRETS 

older but not wiser, a heavy project for the fun of it 

Alex Molten 

As the snow tumbled out of the sky 

onto an ill prepared Vancouver and the 

streets turned into a slushy wasteland, 

vocalist Heath Fenton and guitarist Taylor 

Lipton settled into a booth at What’s Up 

Hot Dog to discuss the upcoming album 

release for their new metal band Regrets. 

The two have known each other for 

years through the Vancouver metal scene 

and their former bands. Earlier jamming 

sessions came to nothing, but now, a little 

older and debatably wiser, they have formed 

Regrets and are getting ready for their album 

release show. The line up features Patrick 

Taylor on guitar, Ryan McDonnell on bass, 

and Eliot Doyle on drums. 

“When I first started playing metal I 

wanted to be a rock star. Took me about five 

years to realize no…” says Fenton describing 

the change in his approach to making music 

over the years. 

“I was super competitive about it when 

I was young. All night and all day always 

trying to be a hundred and ten percent,” 

laughs Lipton. “I’d have hand grips going in 

the car so that I could play guitar better. Now 

it’s just I want to have fun.” 

It is with this attitude that Regrets 

came to be. Lipton was writing songs as 

his former band Abriosis was winding 

down and decided to approach Fenton 

about starting a band. He missed Fenton’s 

vocal style and knew he would be a good fit for 

this new project. Fenton jumped at the chance 

and now the two are taking on Vancouver. 

“Heath’s been in so many bands since 

the nineties, Patrick was in [the band] 

Excruciating Pain, and I was in Abriosis and 

we were touring a lot in our twenties and 

everything but now we’re kind of at the 

point in our lives where we want this fun 

project,” says Lipton. “Regrets is basically that 

fun project for us. We want to be able to play 

mixed bills with other bands and rock out.” 

Their first album Work Hermit is 

definitely heavy metal. Fenton’s vocals are 

far from operatic and they slide from a harsh 

metal sound to a hardcore punk feel but 

with classic sounding metal riffs threading 

their way through the seven songs on the 

album, it is definitely grounded in the metal 

world. The release date is January 3rd and it 

will be available on Bandcamp for free. Be 

sure to check out the stand out track 

“Ghost Stabber”. 

Regrets will be performing on January 

27th at Pat’s Pub and Brewhouse. 

January 2017 The skinny 

15

ALCEST 

French heavy metal explores the furthest reaches of influence 

James Olson 

France’s Alcest have arisen as one of the 

more unique acts within the broad and 

ever expanding world of heavy rock/ 

metal music. Blending elements of 

black metal, shoegaze, folk, and dream 

pop, the music of Alcest is described 

by the band’s songwriter and vocalist/ 

guitarist, Neige as otherworldly, 

spiritual, and introspective. Over the 

course of five albums, the band has 

developed a sound and style that is 

encompassing in the singularity of its 

exploratory vision. Each record is a 

journey for listeners. 

Their latest release Kodama 

shows the band simultaneously 

exploring new territory and returning 

to a more aggressive songwriting 

style. Shelter, their previous release, 

was distinguished for having a much 

more clean and melodic sound rooted 

almost exclusively in dream pop 

and shoegaze. “[We] needed to go 

for something more personal, more 

contrasted, louder drums, that was 

darker too [on Kodama]. In a way, each 

Alcest album is composed in reaction 

to the one before, and that’s not 

something that we actually plan,” Neige 

explains. “Kodama comes back to some 

of the older aspects of our sound, like 

the screaming vocals and the length 

of the songs for example, but I would 

Photo by Andy Julia 

say that it also has a lot of new elements 

that could be considered as a heritage 

of Shelter.” 

There is a strong influence drawn 

from Japanese culture throughout 

Kodama. The album’s title itself is a 

reference to the classic Hayao Miyazaki 

film Princess Mononoke and the cover 

was heavily inspired by the works of 

Takato Yamamoto. Neige explains that 

this influence runs even deeper in this 

new release as Asian scales were used 

to write guitar melodies for certain 

songs on the record. “We wanted to 

integrate these influences in a way 

that feels appropriate to the context 

of Alcest. The goal wasn’t to go fullon 

Japanese, it wouldn’t have sounded 

right. I would say that it just gave an 

overall feel to the record, an identity,” 

Neige says. “The reason why I always 

was attracted to Japan is because it’s 

so different from Europe, on every 

level. It’s almost like another world for 

occidental people.” 

With Kodama topping many best 

of the year lists for a variety of major 

music publications and a world tour 

under way, Alcest have set themselves 

apart as one of the most creatively 

invigorating acts within rock and metal. 

Alcest play The Rickshaw Theatre with 

Creepers and The Body February 4, 2017. 

illustration by syd danger 

A guy walks into a department store to 

buy a new jacket. He spends $100 on it. He 

doesn’t really want to spend it, but he kind 

of has to. He’s going to a show later and 

he wants to look half decent. He doesn’t 

know much about the bands playing but 

177 people are “going” and another 240 are 

“interested” so logic would suggest that he 

also be in attendance. Hours pass, the night 

beckons and our hero arrives at the show. 

Four local bands. $10 at the door. Fuck that. 

He complains. He tries to get in free. He 

considers sneaking in the back. Eventually, 

reluctantly, he pays. 

I find this discrepancy in priorities to be 

fascinating. Why is it that someone will buy 

an item of clothing for $100 that costs $1 to 

make and could very well have been made by 

the underpaid hands of an exploited child in 

an impoverished country, but scoff at paying 

$10 to watch four local bands? Or balk at 

paying $1 for an album on Bandcamp that 

might have cost thousands to record, done with 

equipment that cost thousands to buy, playing 

music that took weeks or years to master. 

Before you write this off as a sensational 

hyperbolic guilt trip, don’t. Because 1) I am 

as guilty as anyone. In fact everyone is to a 

certain degree. And 2) It is not hyperbolic. 

That’s what makes it interesting. The 

investigative depths required to truly 

uncover the societal reasons for this reality 

require more time and space than a column 

or even a thesis can provide. So what I’d like 

to do is merely pose the question in the 

hopes that people will at least think. Why 

is it that music is held in such relatively low 

regard on a monetary scale? 

It pains me that essentially the only 

way to carve out a living in this industry, 

aside from having a foothold in large scale 

events, is through the profits from alcohol, 

putting a price tag back on music 

From the desk of Mitch Ray 

which generally won’t find their way into the 

hands of musicians at all. Much is dictated 

by bar profits, and it is a direct result of the 

reality that the $10 standard for a small 

show doesn’t bring in enough money from 

the door alone to cover all of the entities 

involved in making an event happen. If you 

tried to quantify hours spent in this line of 

work, the rate of pay per hour is obviously 

not even close to minimum wage for the 

vast majority of those involved. It’s a world 

of underpaid musicians, aided by underpaid 

organizers, graciously documented by 

unpaid photographers and unpaid writers 

who contribute to publications that exist 

entirely from advertising money. Musicians 

give you so much. How can you tell them 

their music is worth less than a can of pop? 

I feel it would require a massive shift in 

values for things to balance themselves out 

on this front, which is a stretch even for the 

most idealistic of dreamers. What we can 

do is contribute as much as possible, inform 

those who are misinformed, and when the 

arts are undermined by external forces we 

can collectively stand up for those artists. 

Until music is treated like an asset rather 

than a nuisance, little will change. You are 

not a terrible person for buying clothes. As 

a friend of mine once put it, unless you’re 

living off the grid and off the land you are not 

exempt, so we are all somewhat complicit in 

the perpetuation of this standard. I’m not 

asking you to sell your belongings and max 

out your credit card on Bandcamp, I’m just 

asking you to think about it next time you 

scoff at paying $10 for a show. 

Mitch Ray puts on events and manages 

artists under the name Art Signified. He also 

co-runs an art space in Vancouver known as 

Studio Vostok located at 246 Keefer. 

16 The skinny 


electronics dept 

clubland 

your month measured in BPMs 

Photo by Dorothy Hong 

Vanessa Tam 

VANCOUVER — What if 2016 wasn’t really a bad year and all of your favourite 

OG musicians and actors were just getting older and therefore you’re getting 

older? What if 2016 was just a normal year and 2017 aims to be just as normal? 

Existential food for thought as you gaze at our top electronic and hip hop 

concert picks for the month of January. 

T.I. 

January 12 @ Commodore 

Atlanta born rapper T.I., known also as Clifford Joseph Harris Jr., is one 

of the pioneer artists behind the now well known trap music subgenre 

of hip hop. Most known for his Billboard charting singles, “What You 

Know,” “Whatever You Like,” and “Rubber Band Man,” T.I. also continues 

to entertain a decently successful acting career in a variety of movies and 

reality television shows. 

Sweater Beats 

December 14 @ Fortune Sound Club 

Gaining popularity in the midst of Soundcloud’s heyday with the release 

of his debut single “Mlln Dllr” on Annie Mac’s Radio1 show, Antonio Cuna, 

also known as Sweater Beats, has always been on his own hybrid wave of 

contemporary R&B and dance music. Currently on tour with a brand new 

live set, only purely euphoric and sexy vibes can be expected from this 

experienced producer. 

Lizzo 

January 27 @ Alexander 

Rapper, singer, and feminist, Lizzo is an up and coming artist who is 

thriving in the alternative hip hop scene. Hailing from Detroit, Michigan, 

Lizzo, real name Melissa Jefferson, is currently on tour promoting the 

release of her latest EP Coconut Oil and her feel-good lead single from the 

project, “Good as Hell.” 

Sango 

January 28 @ Imperial 

Growing up in Seattle, Washington, Sango is a producer who starting 

gaining popularity by associating early on with the LA based music, arts 

and culture collective, Soulection. Driven by producers like J. Dilla and 

The Neptunes, Sango, known also as Kai Asa Savon Wright, continued to 

develop his own sound that’s a mix of 90s R&B, drum samples, and globally 

informed rhythms. 

Method Man and Redman 

January 29 @ Fortune Sound Club 

American hip hop artists Method Man (Wu-Tang Clan) and Redman (Def Squad) 

have lead incredible careers so far both as a duo and as individual artists. Having 

collaborated on everything from albums to the cult classic stoner film, How High, 

the pair continue to bring their working relationship to the next level by judging 

and performing at the Canadian Fire Bowl cannabis competition. Yup. 

T.I. 

TALIB KWELI 

a stentorian voice for the voiceless, and he doesn’t need your permission 

Prachi Kamble 

Talib Kweli needs no introduction. The 

Brooklyn based rapper has created a rich 

and politically charged hip hop scene 

on the East Coast that has stood the 

test of time. With six solo albums and 

numerous collaborations already to his 

name including his critically acclaimed 

work with Mos Def as Black Star, his 

latest collaboration project Awful 

People Are Great at Parties (APAGAP) 

was just released in November on his 

label, Javotti Media. 

Bringing together talents of artists 

who are just as passionate about social 

justice as he is, the record sees artists 

like Hi Tek, Rapsody, Kaytranada, Aloe 

Blacc, and J Dilla peppering the track 

list like sparkling rap diamonds. While 

Kweli himself rapped on some of these 

tracks, he also produced a few of them 

and acted solely as a curator on others. 

“I love group projects,” he enthuses. 

“On APAGAP, I got to sit back and let 

the crew shine, which was important. 

I wanted the world to see that the 

Javotti squad is talented [both] with 

and without me and feel [that] the best 

music is made this way. The more dope 

Talib Kweli opens up tough dialogue with Awful People Who Are Great at Parties. 

artists willing to get down, the better. 

I don’t want anyone to change for my 

sake; I think artists should evolve organically. 

Both my children are artists, and they give 

me hope for younger artists and art.” 

Known to take strong social and 

political stances in his work, Kweli’s activism 

has been a significant component of his 

musical output for more than a decade now. 

“I have taken many artistic chances in my 

career and made all types of songs,” he says. 

“As of right now, I enjoy creating music that 

uplifts people and brings them hope. I think 

it’s necessary for my role to be the voice of 

the voiceless.” 

Currently experiencing the 

aftermath of the recent American 

presidential election, Kweli felt a greater 

creative responsibility towards giving 

that voice to communities and people 

who are backsliding into vulnerability. 

“It is important, now more than ever 

for compassionate people to show 

solidarity towards groups that will be 

increasingly marginalized in Trump’s 

America,” he says. 

Putting his words into action, 

Kweli’s activism saw further culmination 

in two “Ferguson Is Everywhere” 

concerts this year. Starting a Gofundme 

campaign after protesting in Ferguson to 

raised $100,000, he then put it towards 

the concert series in order to raise more 

money and bring positive attention to 

the high-tension issue. “Tom Morello 

came, Immortal Technique, K Valentine, 

Jessica Care Moore, Tef Poe, Pharoahe 

Monch, and more. We celebrated the 

life and condemned the death of Mike 

Brown through art,” he shared. 

It’s thanks to rappers like Kweli, 

Mos Def, Naz, Common, and Lauryn 

Hill that hip hop now enjoys its rightful 

reputation as an intellectual form of 

art and literature and can be used as 

a platform for present day intellectual 

rappers like Kendrick Lamar, J. Cole, 

Lupe Fiasco, Lowkey, and Chance the 

Rapper. “I really don’t care how the 

powers that be feel about hip hop. 

I never did,” says Kweli. “They don’t 

define what great hip hop is, we do. Hip 

hop was created because of exclusion. 

We don’t need a pat on the head or 

approval from the status quo to know 

we dope.” 

Talib Kweli performs at Venue January 25. 

January 2017 ELECTRONICS DEPT. 

17

DUMBfOUNDEAD 

Koreatown’s undisputed rap battle master flips the script 


A lot of rappers talk about the streets 

they grew up in, but for Dumbfoundead 

that would take half an album. Born 

in Buenos Aires, Dumb—né Jonathan 

Park—was smuggled into Mexico by 

his parents, and eventually ended up 

in Los Angeles where he’s been repping 

Koreatown ever since. He’s been on the 

open mic circuit since the age of 15 at the 

same venues folks like The Pharcyde and 

Freestyle Fellowship cut their teeth at, but 

it wasn’t until he started battle rapping that 

he really started to blow up. 

Despite being one of the most popular 

rap battlers of all time—and the funniest by 

far—with the release of his fourth album, 

We Might Die, Park says his last battle is 

likely behind him. “There’s obsession that 

comes with sports… it’s just like any boxing 

match… you’re thinking about that 

person 24 hours a day.” 

By cutting the clutter that comes 

with obsession, Park is experiencing a 

new musical headspace and is finding 

a different side of himself. “[When] I’m 

writing a rap battle I’m sitting down and 

kind of writing almost as if I’m writing 

a script, but I think with songs like 

“Harambe” it was more the energy I was 

trying to paint. My writing process as of 

late… it’s less cerebral and more [about] 

the vibe of feeling as opposed to getting 

into my head and thinking of words… 

it’s more about the vibe of the music.” 

Park has walked this line between 

battler and entertainer for a long time, 

but ironically, it’s in his battling where 

he tries most to clown around and in 

his music where he chooses to fight his 

internal battles. “I think I definitely have 

far more serious moments in my music 

than rap battling. I show a lot more of 

my comedic side in my rap battles which is 

something that I’m really into… I don’t know 

why I haven’t done much of that in my music.” 

As if to accompany this period of 

musical self-reflection, Park is returning to 

his roots for his latest project, a collaboration 

with his Korean counterparts in the 

motherland. Likely the most popular Korean- 

American rapper at the moment, he’s been 

working hard to put his home country on his 

back—at least in North America. With the 

current hysteria around Korean culture— 

something that’s surprising even to him— 

he’s not afraid to tap into the energy of 

rappers like recent collaborators Keith 

Ape and Microdot for his new project. 

“Korean music is not just Korean music 

anymore—it has such an international 

audience. I feel very proud to represent 

the Korean-American experience.” Still, 

this can be a battle in itself: “It’s like the 

Asian-American experience is very 

different. We’re not just Asian, we 

also have this American side that we 

battle with.” 

Sticking to your roots is a hip-hop 

tradition, but it’s more important than 

ever to connect with your fans in new 

ways. “I think the only way you’re gonna 

stand out nowadays is really about 

what you stand for and who you are. 

Anybody can fucking rap, but that doesn’t 

mean people will connect to them.” While 

it seems like a Korean-American rapper 

coming up from Argentina and Mexico 

wouldn’t have to work hard to stand out, it’s 

clear that Dumb puts a piece of himself 

into everything he does through his 

honesty and self-deprecation—the 

former rare and the latter even rarer 

in rap. 

These are tidings of vulnerability 

working its way into the cream of the 

hip-hop crop. While it’s cool to brag 

about cars and cash, rapping about 

feelings and fathers (what’s up, Isaiah 

Rashid) is the new thing. But Park sees 

that some of these new rappers have a 

chip on their shoulder—and that even 

he can be hypocritically hyperbolic. “It’s 

not just about dishonesty with money. 

There are conscious rappers that are 

Dumbfoundead’s been battling his whole life, but now he’s ready to just chill, man. 

very dishonest too. I’ve had moments 

in my raps in the past where I’ve been 

dishonest. Sometimes you fool yourself 

into thinking you care about a cause 

more than you do.” 

That, in a sense, sums up Park’s 

philosophy on music, battling, and his life: 

too often we fool ourselves into caring 

about some shit we shouldn’t, and into 

battling everyone and everything when 

the battle is inside of us—when all we 

want to do is just eat some bibimbap and 

make some fucking music. 

Dumbfoundead performs at Alexander 

Gastown January 26th. 

Stevie Ross creates soulful R&B that’s accessible to the masses. 

STEVIE ROSS 

moving on, owning it, and putting Vancouver on the map 

Vanessa Tam 

Listening to his latest neo-soul 

flavoured futuristic R&B tracks, it’s 

difficult to see the connection Stevie 

Ross had as Subway, half of the rap 

group The Scale Breakers over five years 

ago on Vancouver Island. 

Hailing from a small town in 

Alberta with a complicated past 

associated with drugs and gangs, Ross is 

looking towards the future with a new 

sound and a new overall vibe in terms 

of his music. “I truly feel that everything 

I make is better than the last song so I 

never really am satisfied,” he shares. “I 

don’t wanna be a street rapper but I 

think I do have a story to tell from being 

around that life.” 

Inspired by artists like Kanye West, 

Moka Only, and Drake, Ross’s latest 

project, Something In Wonderland, is a 

project that he has been working on for 

the past five years in collaboration with 

local producer Aaron Hamblin, aka 

Speechless. “We banged that whole EP 

out in like four days. [Hamblin] already 

had some of the beats made and then I 

came in and played on some of them,” 

he explains. “Then for the next like 

three years after that we were replacing 

all the instruments with real horns and 

whatever. It’s crazy that I sat [on this 

EP for so] long but it sort of feels like it 

stood the test of time for me.” 

Always hustling, Ross sells beats 

and hooks that he produces to other 

artists on the side to make ends meet 

and constantly battles with the internal 

decision to either keep them for himself 

or to sell them off to the highest bidder. 

“The new stuff that I’m making, I’m 

writing it for me but if somebody’s like, 

‘Oh I would buy that,’ I’d sell it. Just to 

build my name and get these meetings,” 

he says, justifying his decisions. “That’s 

where I really feel like one day, they’re 

gonna exploit me because for $250, they 

shouldn’t get that [beat] you know? 

But in return, I’m eating off of that and 

paying my bills and I don’t have to go 

work a job. So it’s tough.” 

In terms of the local hip hop scene 

in Vancouver however, Ross remains 

optimistic. “2016 was different I think 

because everybody started mobilizing 

together. Like [Matt] Brevner’s 

connection with Snak [The Ripper] 

and Merk[ules] and then Stompdown 

[Killaz] and them embracing me. Then 

being cool with the Hicu, Seth Kay, 

Spotty and the So Loki guys, I feel like 

there’s all these different groups who 

have like mad respect for each other and 

it’s not fake either,” he says. “Not like a 

few years ago in the underground hip 

hop scene where everybody was sort 

of on their own tips. I really think this 

past year everybody was really like, ‘Yo 

we need to work together because we’re 

never gonna be able to be like Toronto 

if we don’t.’ When I see people out now 

it’s always love, you know.” 

Stevie Ross releases Something In 

Wonderland on Apple Music January 

6th and performs at Alexander Gastown 

January 13th. 

18 ELECTRONICS DEPT. 


SUNEE DHALIWAL 

from comedic dreams and laughable origins 

comedy 

Dhaliwal gleefully lives the dream of telling jokes that would get you suspended for a living 

Johnny Papan 

“I had three dreams: be in the NBA, 

a professional gangster rapper, or an 

actor-comedian. The first two didn’t work 

out because it turns out you have to be 

really good at those things.” Abbotsfordraised 

stand-up comic Sunee Dhaliwal 

has been busting hilarity through packed 

comedy clubs for over nine years; being seen 

at the Just for Laughs festival, on his own 

Comedy Now television special, and even 

opening shows for some of the world’s most 

notorious funny people. 

“I was in sixth grade when I saw my 

cousin watching Chris Rock’s Bring the 

Pain,” Dhaliwal explains in regards to 

discovering his comedic potential. 

“I heard a joke that I didn’t really 

understand. It involved a lot of bad 

words and I recited it at school. I got 

suspended, but I still remember all my 

friends laughing.” 

In 2007, Dhaliwal was unexpectedly 

lunged into his first stand-up show 

ever at Yuk Yuk’s in Vancouver. “I was 

working at Staples, not to brag,” he 

chimes. “My manager posed as me and 

e-mailed Yuk Yuk’s.” In preparation, 

Dhaliwal checked out an amateur 

night, and began looking into his life 

for comedic material. He retold these 

stories to friends and family, narrowing 

his most rib-bruising chucklers into 

a solid five minute set. Despite being 

generally comfortable cracking jokes 

in front of people, Dhaliwal assures his 

first time on stage was nerve wracking. 

“It was an out of body experience.” Not 

long after, he would find himself billed on hot 

shows, opening for the likes of Jo Koy, Charlie 

Murphy, and Sugar Sammy, to name a few. 

Not all performances over his career 

would be shining, however. Dhaliwal recalls a 

time performing at a club with a giant window 

that looked onto the street. An ambulance 

pulled over by the glass just as he had gotten on 

stage, drowning him in red flashes throughout 

his entire set. He also deals with his share of 

hecklers, but does not shy away from 

firing cannons in retaliation. “Anyone 

that heckles, I make fun of relentlessly.” 

When asked what advice he has for 

up-and-coming comedians, the 6’5 Indo- 

Canadian comic says “Have fun. It can be 

a hard job to maintain, but there’s nothing 

like it.” He continues, “I get paid to talk about 

what’s happened in my life. A room full of 

strangers I’ve never met will get dressed up 

and pay money to listen to what I have to say. 

My friends and family still don’t understand 

it. I can’t explain it.” 

On the side, Dhaliwal also works as an 

actor. “I love acting, people treat you better 

than in stand-up.” Recently, he starred in his 

own comedic YouTube skit about going to 

the gym, exercising alongside two real-life 

professional trainers. 

The well-versed funnyman shows 

no signs of slowing down. With a handful 

of gigs already booked for the New 

Year, Sunee Dhaliwal concludes his 

interview with the best part of being 

a successful comedian: “I haven’t 

needed a regular job in six years.” 

He then gently knocks on a wooden 

desk, just in case. 

Sunee Dhaliwal performs January 6-7 at 

Hecklers (Victoria) and January 12 at Yuk 

Yuk’s (Vancouver). 

January 2017 comedy 

19

city 

THE FEDERAL STORE 

the little shop with a big heart 

pANDORA’S BOx 

a rehearsal studio full of possibilities 

Willem Thomas 

While the name may evoke the image 

of a fur trading post back in the age of 

the American frontier, Mount Pleasant’s 

recently opened — November 12, after 

some delays — Federal Store is actually 

a bold, modern take on combining two 

mainstays of urban living: the cafe and 

the convenience store. 

Situated on the corner of Quebec 

and 10th Avenue, within a single block 

of two busy thoroughfares, this bright 

little spot is a fresh, novel addition to 

the already cafe-centric area, providing 

a joint coffee shop and grocery store 

service. With Victoria’s Bows & Arrows 

coffee providing the caffeinated-goods 

and food options already far surpassing 

some more established places nearby, 

expect extended and repeat visits. 

While the cozy space is fully 

formed and feels meticulously arranged, 

the truth behind its origin tells a bit 

different story — one of chance, trying 

new things, and maybe some luck. 

The convenience store that stood there 

previously (and had the same name and 

distinct Coke-style signage) had closed 

and Colette Griffiths and Christopher 

Allen were walking by and decided to slip 

a note under the door that same day. “We 

got a call two days later from the owners 

who live next door in the townhouses 

adjacent to the shop,” says Griffiths. “We 

met the owners, saw the space, and then 

two hours later they called and said it 

was ours.” While Griffiths had ambitions 

of one day opening a coffee shop, The 

Federal Store sort of just fell into place and 

they ran with it. 

After a quite lengthy permit 

acquisition, design, and renovation 

process (they got the keys in March 

2015), the pair have arrived at the end 

result of a decidedly unique cafe and 

grocer. Built over months and months 

of work utilizing “Lots of YouTubing 

and the help of friends,” the space came 

together with assistance from family, 

other local businesses (some of their 

wiring was given to them by Elysian 

Coffee), and the lending of ears and 

advice by a few local already established 

business-owners. “On all fronts people 

have been very generous,” says Allen. 

“Everyone has been super supportive.” 

Griffiths and Allen’s aim is to 

provide a quality community coffee 

shop that also provides many of the 

essentials — primarily local products — 

anyone living nearby may need. It feels 

like a new format of business, and the 

pair have ideas for the future. Among 

those plans? Griffiths says, “A patio 

scene next summer would be fun.” 

The Federal Store is located at 2601 

Quebec Street. 

Johnny Papan 

Upon entry, you are greeted by a giant 

banner of two 1950s women joyfully 

screaming in a concert audience, setting 

the tone for artists coming in to fulfill 

their musical desires. Since opening its 

doors three years ago, Pandora’s Box 

Rehearsal Studios has quickly become one 

of Vancouver’s premiere rehearsal spaces. 

Built and run by musicians, for musicians. 

Spending over a decade as the 

drummer of Terror of Tiny Town, 

owner Paul Alexander is no stranger to 

rehearsals. “One of the inspirations for 

building this space was being unable to 

converse with my bandmates because 

we could hear the band next door,” 

he explains. Alexander, alongside his 

wife Colleen, storage locker specialist 

Dan Flynn, and La Chinga guitarist 

Ben Yardley implemented “box in 

box construction” while building this 

studio from the ground up, always 

keeping the importance of sound 

quality at the forefront. “If we had a 

choice between making it look pretty 

or making it sound good, we made it 

sound good.” 

The 19-room studio was built 

entirely on ground level concrete, so 

artists need not worry about carrying 

gear up and down stairs. Amps, 

microphones, and full drum kits are 

also included within each space. “If 

you’re renting a room for two hours, 

you don’t want to spend 20 minutes 

setting up, and another 20 minutes 

tearing down,” Alexander explains. 

“We include a lot of stuff that other 

places make you rent. Here, you can 

walk in and play after five minutes.” 

What’s pleasing is the broad mix 

of musicians that come into Pandora’s 

Box. “A grandmother will be practicing 

karaoke, while there’s a grindcore band 

in the next room, and a 35-piece brass 

band in Studio 19.” Studio 19 is the 

largest rehearsal space, often utilized for 

music video shoots and small concerts. 

“A lot of artists come here every week, 

some have been with us since we 

HAROON MIRZA 

exploring the connection between sound, light and psychoactive plants 

Cutting out the middle man to create a rehearsal space for musicians by musicians 

opened. It’s a community here.” The 

studio has even caught the attention 

of some big names, including Devin 

Townsend, The Pack A.D., and Black 

Mountain, all of whom have rehearsed 

within these walls. 

Prior to Pandora’s Box, Alexander 

and Colleen ran the Surf Junction 

campground in Ucluelet, BC for 11 years. 

Alexander states the transition from 

running a camp to rehearsal studio was 

simple. “The job is essentially the same, 

we rent space and clean toilets. What’s 

great is that we don’t have to tell people 

to be quiet anymore.” 

Pandora’s Box Studios is located at 1890 

Pandora Street. 

Coralie Kourany 

Local couple decides to bring some sustenance and staples to the brewery district 

This month, Vancouver’s Contemporary 

Art Gallery welcomes British artist Haroon 

Mirza’s first solo exhibition in Canada. 

Internationally known for his interactive 

multimedia installations, Mirza began 

his exploration with plant medicine a 

couple years ago, studying the healing 

properties of psychoactive species of 

plants. In researching their history, Mirza 

became aware of their potential in healing 

psychiatric and physical ailments — 

symptoms of trauma, as well as addiction. 

Plant medicine has been traditionally 

used for thousands of years and, as a result 

of their psychotropic properties, has 

been used in ritualistic, transcendental 

religious practices, offering an alternative 

understanding between the relationship 

of language, art, and religion. 

Through his discoveries in 

psychedelic psychotherapy, Mirza 

chose to undertake his own aesthetic 

sensibility he had felt both visually 

and acoustically through his own 

experimentations. “Entheogens” presents 

his invested interested in geometric 

abstraction and photorealism, which are 

portrayed through raw live electricity. 

The artist kept a visual record of his 

explorations, starting by taking spore 

prints and making electro and acid 

etchings of Psilocybin Cubensis, a 

species of psychoactive mushroom. By 

running electricity through the cap of 

the mushroom, the spore print etched 

a unique pattern onto copper PCB 

blanks. Mirza explored alterations of 

this concept and added components 

of light and sound through an amp and 

speakers — an immersive live visual and 

audio interference that, he states, is “Like 

music composed by light.” 

By demonstrating the fact that 

the information and signals we perceive 

are reduced to various frequencies of 

wavelengths of sound and light within the 

electromagnetic spectrum, Mirza tunes 

into an alternative theory of technological 

knowledge and suggests that there are 

infinitely more signals of frequencies that 

humans are incapable of seeing, as their brains 

are not yet developed enough to identify. 

“It wasn’t a single experience that 

encouraged me to explore this subject, 

but experience itself,” Mirza explains. “My 

self awareness has been elevated in that 

consciousness is way more complex and 

incredible than we can possible imagine.” 

In his creative process, Mirza’s 

manipulation of electric current creates 

a way for the audience to understand the 

relation between sound, light waves, and 

entheogens. As the viewers engage in the 

“Physicality of the work itself; its aesthetic 

and technicality,” they are encouraged to 

think about these plants — and, in turn, 

common Western perceptions towards 

psychedelic drugs — in greater detail, to 

understand a deeper root of our humanity. 

“Entheogens” runs at the Contemporary 

Art Gallery from January 13 - March 19. 

20 CITY 


THE STRAIGHTS ARE IN DANGER! 

For one night in January a fictitious serial 

killer is on the loose and only visible, physical 

homosexual stereotypes will save you. The 

Fox Cabaret is going to be turned into a safe 

haven for straight people. Hold hands with your 

bro, kiss your girlfriend, do anything you can to 

ensure you are visibly homosexual. For one night, 

heterophobia will reign supreme and the choice 

will be clear — appear homosexual or die. 

Studio 58 graduates Anthony Johnston 

and Nathan Schwartz are ANIMALPARTS, 

a performance company based out of New 

York. They are bringing their show, The Revenge 

of the Popinjay, to Vancouver for the 2017 PuSh 

International Performing Arts Festival. Using 

hip-hop and rap as the musical medium, the 

story satirizes clichés of homophobic culture, 

misogyny, male dominance, and aggression. 

“We use unabashed sexualized gay imagery 

which isn’t heard in contemporary music,” says 

Johnston. “We decided to tell a lot of this 

story through the language of hip-hop culture. 

We do our best to use those motifs to our 

advantage, trying to click into homophobic 

and misogynistic culture, which can be found 

in hip-hop. This piece of theatre is exciting 

because it isn’t like anything else, people don’t 

know how to categorize it.” 

The world that is created is inspired in part 

by the lack of queer characters of depth in pop 

culture and mainstream media. 

“The Popinjay is just an act of extremism 

fighting back against all of that stuff. I think 

what’s been interesting about the show is that 

people get really uncomfortable having a white 

gay man saying the things he is saying in the 

way that he is,” says Johnston. “The Popinjay is 

a piece that explores grief and loss and is the 

middle part of a trilogy of work that we’ve been 

creating for over six years. They all stem from 

the death of my sister. This show contains a 

character that is aggressive, anti straight, and a 

potentially violent, gay rap star. It came out of 

our need to try and explore the darker side of 

grieving and the question of what would happen 

if you let your grief manifest itself as an actual 

literal monster. What would that look like?” 

Gay men are often faced with being put 

in minute roles as the sidekick or best friend, 

often reduced to the simplest humour or sassy 

dialogue. The idea of seeing a character or 

piece of art exploring the complexities of these 

diverse individuals and what happens when we 

ask questions of their experiences and emotions 

becomes something of a swan song. 

“When we first asked the question we had no 

idea exploring that question is where The Popinjay 

was born,” Johnson says. “It comes from the 

need to understand personal anger and how an 

oppressed group (the queer community) looks if 

that blows up in some sort of extreme version of 

fighting back. The world that is created through 

this is interesting and engaging.” 

Without having homosexual culture 

overtly in the mainstream, the opportunity 

exists to share it authentically. The beauty of 

this piece of theatre is that the themes are fresh 

since they aren’t served to us daily. Hopefully 

we are secure enough to not have to fight for our 

place in the mainstream so that when a piece of art 

goes there, it can act as booster shot of tolerance 

for those who may be ignorant of such explicit, 

liberating behaviour and language that exists from 

being oppressed against. The Journey of coming 

out takes resiliency and, with it, comes a lot of 

liberation within each individual. 

“What really excites people when they 

come to see the show is that the piece takes 

people through a lot of places on a journey, from 

the first moment of a white guy rapping about 

eating cum and getting fucked and killing 

straight people, seems kinda ‘haha’ funny. The 

idea of being heterophobic is kinda hilarious in 

its absurdity to us because it’s not even a thing. 

It’s almost like reverse racism — there is no 

such thing,” says Johnston. 

Schwartz elaborates, “We didn’t want 

to make a piece of theatre that preached to 

the choir. We can make a statement about 

homophobia and misogyny to a bunch of theatre 

people but I feel like they share that point of view. 

We wanted to challenge it a little further and ask 

‘can we have a gay serial killer character who is 

definitely a bad guy and trying to get the audience 

on board with mass murder as an answer to feeling 

oppressed?’” 

Art has a way of helping bend individual 

worldviews on subjects and, 

at times, theatre aims at being 

created for that sole purpose. 

The Popinjay is a collaboration 

that stems from improvisations 

and workshops around the 

creators’ conversations on 

real life experiences in grief, 

homophobia, and, at times, being the minority 

in a situation. 

“All of this work was created through 

improvisation, both through text and 

movement. Ideas and things that maybe at first 

seem like a joke, we would then be like, ‘actually 

that thing that you said yesterday, shouldn’t that 

actually be in the show?’ We both agree that if 

it’s said, then it came from somewhere,” shares 

Johnston of the creative process between the 

ANIMALPARTS collaborators. “I think that 

push to keep bringing what’s authentic to the 

show and go to the edge with it helps us to find 

really exciting ideas. We have conflicting ideas at 

times and, at the end of the day, we end up with 

something a little more interesting than if we had 

been attempting to make something on our own.” 

Promising an experience that is immediate and 

that gives an environment which sets the tone for the 

show itself, The Popinjay will get revenge and we won’t 

ever be the same. 

“The end of the piece is kind of a political rally 

cult leader calling to arms the audience, asking 

them to join him.” Johnston queries, “Where is 

the line drawn between people raising the roof and 

this funny rapper who is being sexual and lewd, 

grabbing his crotch in his tighty whiteys?” 

The Revenge of the Popinjay is being produced by 

ANIMALPARTS and ZeeZee Theatre for the 2017 PuSh 

Festival. Join the experience January 28 at the Fox Cabaret. 

THE REVENGE 

OF THE POPINJAY 

killing queer stereotypes with humour and music 

by david cutting 


PORTRAITS IN MOTION 

visual poet Volker Gerling captures moments in time 

Photo by Franz Ritschel 


A couple years ago, after Volker Gerling 

finished one of his flipbook cinema 

performances — a show, titled Portraits 

in Motion, where he flicks through 

series of his rapidly-shot portraits and 

projects them onto a big screen — the 

artist met a woman. She was moved 

by the performance and wanted to 

be a protagonist in a flipbook. After 

exchanging a few emails, they lost touch. 

Upon finally regaining contact, the 

woman told Gerling that she’d recently 

been through trauma — losing her father, 

her brother, and her brother’s partner in 

a short time span — and had decided to 

crop her once long hair short. 

“She put her braid in a box, and 

put it away, and she said to herself, ‘I’m 

not allowed to long for my hair, I’m not 

allowed to cry about my hair, I have to be 

strong,’” Gerling explains. “Because she 

wanted to prove that she is able to live on 

without her father, without her brother, 

without [his] partner.” When they met to 

photograph for the flipbook, the woman 

pulled out her hair and held it close to her 

face. “When she touches her hair, you can 

feel all her sadness about the loss of these 

three men and you can feel all her longing.” 

This kind of intimacy — the type 

that provides a rare glimpse into one’s 

soul — is something that is characteristic 

of Gerling’s flipbooks. It’s a result of shooting 

images at a hasty pace, where the gaps 

left between the frames create room for 

spontaneity and storytelling — a genuine 

break into a smile, sadness welling up in the 

eyes, poetry. 

“Right from the beginning, I was more 

interested in really pure emotions and 

honest moments,” Gerling says, speaking 

from his home in Berlin. In the late 

nineties, Gerling attended Filmuniversität 

Babelsberg Konrad Wolf, first studying 

film direction and later changing focus to 

photography direction. A documentary 

showing an elderly woman thumbing 

through a flipbook of herself as a young 

lady inspired the photographer, planting 

a seed in his mind to create his own 

version of the portraits. Then, in 2002, 

equipped with a hawker’s tray, he 

began walking the streets of Berlin 

and showing his flipbooks. He took 

no money with him, relying only on 

contributions he collected in an empty 

honey jar and sleeping, mostly, in his 

tent. Since then, Gerling has walked 

more than 3,500 kilometers throughout 

Germany and into Switzerland, sharing his 

work and searching for new moments to 

capture. 

“For me, when I’m asked, ‘what are 

you doing? What is your profession?’ I 

normally answer that I am a storyteller, 

because that’s what I feel I do,” Gerling 

explains. “That’s a way, a very special way, 

of storytelling.” 

Gerling’s walking project is not just 

about person-to-person interactions, 

though. The process of traversing the 

land and, especially, sleeping outside also 

allows the artist to take in the narratives 

of everything around him — and within 

himself. 

“I found out that I’m not interested 

at all to read books when I’m walking, 

because I want to be in the here and in the 

now,” he says. “I want to hear everything 

that’s around me. I want to hear the 

birds and the animals and the wind and 

the trees and so on. I even don’t want to 

switch on any lights in my tent, because I 

realize that I like to feel when it’s becoming 

dark. It’s sometimes almost as if you can 

feel the earth is moving with you, when 

you are on the ground in the wood, and 

this is a really great feeling.” 

Portraits In Motion runs at the York 

Theatre from January 24 – 26. 

Volker Gerling finds presence by flipping through life one precious moment at a time 

A startling, cutting-edge music, 

theatre and performance art series. 

Genre-defying shows by the world’s 

most exciting emerging artists. 

JAN 20 

JAN 21 

JAN 27 

JAN 28 

FEB 3 

FEB 4 

DYNASTY HANDBAG (LA) 

BRIDGET MOSER (Toronto) 

POINT BLANK POETS (London) 

ANIMALPARTS (NYC) 

HONG KONG EXILE (Vancouver) 

LIDO PIMIENTA (Toronto) 

SHOWS 9PM • TICKETS $ 22 

2321 MAIN STREET 

22 


sweat baby sweat 

Jan Martens channels love through movement 


Most of Jan Martens’ pieces of dance 

are derived from an autobiographical 

place. For Sweat Baby Sweat, his love 

duet, the Belgian choreographer first 

looked to a personal relationship where 

he felt afraid of what would happen if 

he were to be alone. To portray this 

struggle, the movement between the 

two dancers, Kimmy Ligtvoet and 

Steven Michel, is minimal — slowed 

down in order to maximize both effort 

and intention. 

“In contemporary dance, normally 

when you lift somebody, you would 

use speed, you would use momentum,” 

Martens explains. “And in Sweat Baby 

Sweat, we slowed everything down so 

it’s become more intense, but also more 

physically hard to do. It was, for me, a 

good translation of this sometimes hard 

work that love can be.” 

Indeed, in moments like, for 

example, where Ligtvoet is balancing 

her entire body weight on Michel’s 

foot, the dancers must work together in 

order to not slip or collapse. It’s tricky, 

Martens maintains, especially when they 

begin to sweat, but it keeps them fully 

present and emotionally aware — and 

also adds an unpredictable theatrical 

element. “Sometimes you see things 

almost go wrong,” he says, “but I think 

it’s the strength of the piece, rather than 

a weakness.” 

Music also plays an important 

role in Sweat Baby Sweat. The piece 

is danced to an 18-minute Cat Power 

song called “Wille Deadwilder,” a track 

Martens chose specifically because 

he enjoyed its repetitive melody and 

its surreal-like associations about 

relationships. Song lyrics are also 

projected on the back wall during the 

length of the performance, aiming to 

speak to the nostalgic connections we 

often have with love songs — the first 

song, for example, you slow danced 

to or the song was playing during 

your first kiss. The lyrics are derived 

from a wide range of artists, from Joni 

Mitchell to the Bloodhound Gang — 

the latter’s “The Bad Touch” for which 

the piece is named. A humourous, yet 

apt, namesake. 

“I liked ‘sweat baby sweat’ because 

it gives content,” Martins says, referring 

to the opening line of the track. “‘Baby’ 

is about love and ‘sweat’ is about the 

physical output which is there.” 

Sweat Baby Sweat runs at the Scotiabank 

Dance Center from January 18 – 20. 

Photo by Klaartje Lambrechts 

MACBETH 

Shakesperean ambition and bloodshed 

bathe The Congo 

Jennie Orton 

On the side of the planet where Donald 

Trump is the worst kind of apocalypse 

that any of us can imagine, the last 20 

years in the Democratic Republic of the 

Congo would rock our foundation to 

rubble. There have been more deaths in 

the eastern DRC than in any conflict since 

World War II, a fact that many of us are 

blissfully unaware of. This is where director 

Brett Bailey and Third World Bunfight come 

in with their adaptation of the Verdi opera 

performance of Shakespeare’s Macbeth. 

The atmosphere of greed and power 

in the Congo pairs well with the tragic and 

violent tale of The King of Scots and his 

bloodily paranoid rise and fall. Actress 

and singer Nobulumko Mngxekeza 

who takes on the role of the insidiously 

ambitious Lady Macbeth, describes the 

adaptation as a much needed look into 

an invisible plight. 

“We see how people that don’t do as 

Photo by Ryhs Graham 

they are told get to be dealt with in a blink 

of an eye and how a person you think you 

know and trust can just turn their back 

on you and want you dead to fulfill their 

needs,” she says. “This adaptation is living a 

life that was lived by another person, feeling 

the pain they go through and went through. 

I could also say one of the benefits for all of 

us, as the artists and the audience, is that we 

are teaching each other about the things 

that we were not aware of before.” 

The opera, though performed in 

its original Italian, is steeped in African 

culture and truth. The act of sharing 

poetry while shining a light on a desperate 

situation is a challenge that Mngxekeza 

feels strongly about. 

“It is also important for those 

people who have experienced and fled 

countries and conflict areas — and 

who might have an opportunity to see 

us perform — to know that we are not 

trying to open old wounds.” 

“Our version of Macbeth sends a 

message and tells a story of those who 

can’t tell it themselves.” 

Macbeth runs at Vancouver Playhouse 

January 16 – 21. 

DIRTSONG 

Black Arm Band recreates 

Indigenous Australian magic 

Prachi Kamble 

Black Arm Band has been telling 

Indigenous Australian and Torres 

Strait Islander stories for over a decade 

now. Their motto is to celebrate the 

past while revolutionising the future, 

through music and art. The band’s 

guest Artistic Director, Fred Leone, an 

acclaimed Indigenous Australian opera 

singer and hip-hop MC, is bringing Dirtsong 

to Vancouver’s Push Festival. Drawing 

from a rich heritage that emanates from 

40,000 years of a colossal ancestral past, 

Black Arm Band productions ask brave 

questions about Indigenous experiences 

the world over. 

With Dirtsong, Black Arm Band 

strengthens the representation of 

Indigenous Australian communities in the 

mainstream eye. “There are 12 different 

Aboriginal languages in Dirtsong,” says 

Leone. “The music, the vocals, and the 

visuals are meant to transport audiences 

into the world of Indigenous Australia. 

You may not understand what is being 

said, but you will get the feeling of home 

and understand Aboriginal people’s 

connection to the land.” 

Leone’s musical career started with 

singing at the Sydney Opera. He has also 

been a major influence in the Australian 

hip-hop scene, founding Impossible Odds 

Records, and winning numerous awards and 

nominations. For Leone, the work doesn’t end 

with the music. Social justice is the driving force 

behind his work and Black Arm Band’s legacy. 

Photo by Nicky Newman 

The collective seamlessly combines traditional 

music with contemporary sensibilities, with a 

staunch intention. 

“With Black Arm Band, I get to be in 

the groove and not only empower myself, 

but use a language that is almost extinct. 

Around 12 people would understand when 

I speak Butchulla!” exclaims Leone. He, 

himself, hails from the Butchulla country 

of Hervey Bay, Fraser Island region, and 

from the Garrawa people of the northern, 

Gulf of Carpentaria areas. Many of Leone’s 

family members have become linguists to 

preserve their heritage. His aunt has even 

written the first Butchulla dictionary. “I’m 

passionate about finding innovative 

ways of transferring knowledge from 

one generation to the next,” he explains. 

“When put into contemporary contexts, 

traditional artforms become easier for the 

youth to absorb.” 

Along with Dirtsong, Leone will also 

be participating in a discussion titled Critical 

Ideas: Home, Memory, Land at PuSh. He will 

shed light on the relationship between man, 

land, and animals, in Indigenous traditions. 

“Australian aboriginal culture is history,” 

he says. “Our memories are embedded in 

the land. Stories and songs are roadmaps 

that you give the youth or the other 350 

aboriginal countries in Australia. To 

travel to another country in the olden 

days, you would have to learn the song 

for every river, stream and mountain.” 

The stories still exist and live in the 

youth today but in the English language, 

“so with Black Arm Band we want to 

take these stories, reclaim them and 

put them back into our traditional 

languages.” 

Dirtsong runs at the Queen Elizabeth 

Theatre on February 4. 


queer 

David Cutting 

In the crowded cubicle that is 1181, it is 

standing room only. There is excitement 

and booze in the air. Everyone is out 

on Sunday and they need a place to 

worship, so Alma Bitches lets them 

pray at her feet. In a crop top, tutu, 

and thong, and with a lewd saying, this 

bearded queen whips her audience into 

frenzy. They are yelling, they are living. 

She stomps around and they cheer. She 

yells into the mic, it’s too loud to hear 

her. This is Alma’s Sunday night cult, a 

show she calls Sanctuary. 

Alma got her start in the Vancouver 

chapter of the Sisters of Perpetual 

Indulgence. “When I joined the Sisters, I 

was in a dark place and saw the best way 

of getting out of that place was by giving 

back and helping others,” she says, 

sharing that, often, people don’t know 

each other’s stories, the rich tapestries 

of their history. “I am in my 14th year of 

sobriety. I had a reality problem — I used 

drugs and alcohol to avoid reality. My own 

experience was that I was abusing it until it 

abused me. I realized I needed to put them 

away and live each day as it comes.” Working 

with the Sisters, doing fundraisers and sing-alongs, 

was a great passion for Alma. 

“The best feeling is when I have just 

finished a show and it feels so good because 

I could see the audience was living for me 

and my guests,” Alma continues. Alma 

hosts two weekly shows, both on Sunday 

nights. The first is Sanctuary at 1181 at 

11:30pm and the second is Shequel at 

XY, later on at 1:00am. Known for having 

interesting themes and fun guests, the 

colourful shows serve as some of the 

local drag fans favourites. “I have always 

ALMA BITCHES 

don’t let the name fool you, she is a bitch 

been a performer,” Alma says. “I used to 

perform with my Sisters, this was when I 

was smaller, we would lip sync and they 

would throw me around the living room 

and our grandmas would clap and be 

entertained.” 

To Alma, drag is a job and she 

encourages younger queens under her 

tutelage to do the same, offering the 

advice to “always remember the bigger 

picture. You are doing a job, if you went 

to your day job loaded, would you get 

to keep that job? Treat this like that job, 

because the audience is there to see 

you, you have a responsibility to them.” 

“I have a beard and it’s not because 

I’m lazy, but because I have a point to 

make,” she stresses, adding that, to her, 

drag is about being as unabashedly 

Photo by Chase Hansen 

queer as possible — taking the gender 

norms and walking the line with them. 

She recognizes that it isn’t everyone cup of 

tea, but that it is important to be able to 

take rules and bend them, because gender 

is not rigid — only our minds are. 

Also travelling to San Francisco 

and Portland to perform, Alma is always 

reaching for something bigger. “You 

have to be heading towards something 

or you’re not going anywhere,” she 

maintains. “As an artist, it is very 

important to have aspirations beyond 

the local dream. Always set a goal.” 

We can hardly wait to see this bitch soar. 

Catch Alma Bitches at Sundays at 1181 

for Sanctuary at 11:30 and Sundays at 

XY for Shequel. 

Photo by Graham Spence 

Carlotta Gurl 

As we face 2017, hopefully refreshed 

and recharged, let us take the time to 

look within ourselves and see what we 

want to accomplish in this New Year. 

I've never been one to stay steadfast 

in my resolutions, and these aren't just 

the ones I make about eating better 

and achieving a healthier lifestyle after 

I throw all the turkey leftovers into 

a blender with a bottle of vodka and 

whipped cream; no, I’m talking about 

the honest to goodness resolutions 

where we really try to inherently 

change something about ourselves in 

an attempt to become better people. 

I almost always say this is the year I'm 

gonna take charge of my life and party 

less and work harder, and for the first 

hour I'm almost there. Then I revert 

back to form, pour myself a martini, and 

say F%$# it! I applaud those people who 

flock in droves to the gym in the month 

of January and work out vigorously to 

slim down that post holiday body, We 

can only aspire to do our best. Slow 

down, take a moment, see where you 

are and where you wanna be, and then 

go after it. After all: the only person we 

are truly competing with is ourselves. I 

too put a lot of pressure on myself at the 

From the 

Desk of 

Carlotta 

Gurl 

beginning of the year to get more of the 

things I wanna get done, and I'm slowly 

learning as I get older to alleviate some 

of that pressure by going after what I 

want with a much more thought out 

strategy and clear head. But hey, this 

time last year I was able to pay off my 

hefty student loan and sock a few bucks 

away so dis bitch can still get it done 

when she needs to. 

2017 marks the six year anniversary 

of my show "Absolutely Dragulous" at 

the Junction nightclub. I'm overjoyed 

that this show has been able to go 

on this long and with such success. 

I have to credit all the amazing and 

talented entertainers in this diverse 

city for showcasing their unique and 

innovative performances. I'm a firm 

believer in evolving with the times 

and this helps take my show to new 

limits. It is very important to ensure 

that no matter how seasoned one 

is that transforming and keeping in 

tune with the world and trends is a 

priority because that is how to remain 

relevant. Always push your own 

limits. Until next time my dahlings, 

stay strong, stay loving, and most 

importantly...stay pretty. 

24 CITY 


Queer View Mirror 

In the main room the music drowns. 

Dionysus is standing tall behind the 

stage as the grandmaster (daddy) of this 

party. In queer temporality, industrial 

time (or homogeneous empty time) cede 

to operate as it has been indoctrinated 

by the nation state. Normative fictions 

collapse under queer time. It’s all part 

of the darkroom effect, a black hole 

sucks up everything into a time warp, 

even the clock cannot escape, and 

spits it back out into public bathrooms, 

parks, clubs, beaches, bathhouses and 

bars. Murmuring, moaning, ahhhhthe 

liquid state of queerness 

Tommy Ting 

The recent events of 2016 have been 

hard to stomach. On most days, I am 

at a loss for words; even my senses 

feel numbed. And over time it feels 

like I have nothing to say. Maybe I am 

suspended in disbelief, but I have always 

felt so much. My ex-boyfriend told me 

that feeling so much and feeling nothing 

at all are very millennial queer effects. 

Was that a read? Or maybe it is just a 

sickness. I have consulted numerous 

writings on the productivity of negative 

effect, but an indifferent one? I am 

unconvinced yet here I am regardless. 

I have never been much of a writer 

because my writings are awkward and 

unsophisticated. To recount my queer 

encounters this year, I return to where 

I always start all my thinking: the pool. 

Room #1 

Five, six, seven, eight, and under! 

The loss of sight heightens all my other 

senses so I feel my way across this dark 

and humid room with my skin instead. 

Haptic-navigation. The room reeks of all 

kinds of bodily and chemical fluids and 

I kind of love it. As I crawl through this 

swamp, I imagine liquid particles rising 

and evaporating into a viscous black fog 

that envelops us with a tingling warmth, 

protecting us from the besieging world 

outside. 

Room #2 

Amorous mourning 

In the next room filled with blue and 

red light, our porous bodies meet and 

press against each other so hard it’s as if 

there were a million micro penetrations 

of your flesh into mine. As our bodies 

enter each other so do our memories, 

identities, and feelings. In this beautiful 

ritual of possession and release, we 

embrace the joy and suffering of things. 

We fall in love and we let go of love. 

Room #3 

Trans-temporal drag disruptions 

ing, slurping, slappings, 

fuck-yeahs, the sudden 

loud banging. We are 

flâneurs in the dark, 

cruising utopia. Queer 

cultural codes become 

the only form of 

communication; it’s 

a visual and body 

language. We want 

to stay here; it feels 

safe here, no one 

will harm us here. 

Temporality takes 

on different forms; 

it’s thick and curvy, 

smooth and lean, 

hairy and sticky 

or even chemically 

aromatic. Queer time 

ticks in all directions. 

No! Not tick, dance! 

Queer time is a dance, 

and it moves horizontally, 

side-ways, back-andforth. 

It is an anti-linear, 

anti-chronological beat. 

The music crashes 

across the dance floor, it 

engulfs us and pulls us 

under into its belly. 

Room #4 

Ah, yes, I remember it well. 

Outside the time is magic 

hour, golden red hues 

slam deep into metallic 

blues. The bruised sky 

entangled and the 

uncanny takes hold. 

Memory is driven 

by present needs to 

imagine and desire 

a better future. The 

fluidity of time, I 

invite you to swim 

in it. There’s no place 

like home, there’s no 

place like home, there’s 

no place like home. 

Time is strange, 

and strange is 

queer. 

January 2017 CITY 

25

film 

this month in film 


Harry Potterthon – Jan. 21st-22nd at The Rio 

When I was 11 I waited all summer to get my letter. Of course, I didn’t really expect 

to go to Hogwarts—just some Canadian HBC outpost version. If you were 

as disappointed as me when the owl failed to call your name, you’ll take solace 

in this two-day retreat into the world of wizards. Running through all eight 

movies in two days, muggles are invited to don their magical merchandise and 

load up on chocolate frogs for what is sure to be a wild two days of pretending 

you have a wand. 

Upcoming Releases 

Split 

James McAvoy plays 24 different people in this split-personality psychiatric 

thriller, including a child, a woman, and a crazy motherf***er. After abducting 

three teenage girls, Personality X holds a coup to take over the entire mind of 

Kevin, with only an old psychiatrist to stop him—along with the help of a few 

of Kevin’s nicer personalities. McAvoy gives the performance his all, surely realizing 

that this allows him 24 chances to win an Oscar. (In theaters January 20th) 

Behemoth (Bei Xi Mo Shou) 

While McAvoy needed 24 voices, director Liang Zhao only needs images to 

bring the reality of China’s environmental tragedies crashing down on his 

viewers. Asia’s economic growth has been harried at every step by an equally 

growing ecological crisis, and Zhao turns a Mongolian pit mine into a ground 

zero for the planet. Featuring stunning image after stunning image, you’ll walk 

out of this one wanting to hug a park full of trees. (In theaters January 27th) 

BEHEMOTH 

CANADA ON SCREEN: 

FREE MOVIES ALL YEAR LONG 


What if I told you that you could 

watch seemingly unlimited movies in 

their original resolution, hand-chosen 

for you by experts, all without paying 

your Netflix membership? Welcome to 

Canada On Screen. 

Intended to celebrate Canada’s 

sesquicentennial, Canada On Screen 

is a year-long national showcase 

of our best in film. Along with the 

Toronto International Film Festival, 

Library and Archives Canada, and 

Cinematheque Quebecois, Vancouver’s 

Pacific Cinematheque has spent years 

preparing for this celebration by 

collaborating on a list of 150 essential 

works of Canadian cinema and moving 

images. The best part? All Canada 

On Screen screenings are free. The 

second-best part? There’s a music video 

category, and Drake made it on the list. 

Jim Sinclair, executive and artistic 

director at the Pacific Cinematheque, 

says it wasn’t easy getting down to 

150. “How many feature films do you 

choose? How many documentaries do 

you choose? How many experimental 

films do you choose? … There was a lot 

of horse trading going on,” Sinclair says. 

Still, the work is important, not just for 

this year, but, as Sinclair believes, for 

decades to come. “We see this Canada 

On Screen project as being a living 

initiative. Every year or two we would 

add new names to this list of essential 

work.” 

The celebration has a goal of 

spreading awareness, not just of 

Canadian films, but of how good they 

are. This includes cinema like 32 Short 

Films About Glenn Gould which laid 

My American Cousin, one of Canada’s most important films, screens opening night. 

groundwork for Bob Dylan flick I’m Not 

There, and Paul Anka documentary 

Lonely Boy which heralded a 

breakthrough for cinéma vérité. 

It’s a difficult task. “Canadians read 

Canadian books, they watch Canadian 

television, they listen to Canadian 

music… but it can be harder to get 

Canadians out to see Canadian cinema, 

because our movie screens are so 

dominated by that massive industry 

across the border... Other countries 

have the same issues, but we’re right 

next door to the guys.” This cultural 

divide, by no coincidence, is explored 

in-depth in the opening-night classic 

of BC film My American Cousin, which 

inspired a generation of disenfranchised 

Canadian filmmakers. 

Sinclair also wants the films 

to inspire the next generation of 

filmmakers, one raised on smartphones. 

“The tools are there. That’s no barrier 

to someone who’s inspired and has the 

vision. We’re not quite at the iPhone 

film stage yet but in ten years that very 

well may be a category.” 

This future-focused mindset 

comes with the territory. To Sinclair, 

Canada On Screen is here to ensure 

the longevity of the industry. “Projects 

like this are ongoing ways of keeping 

Canadian cinema vital… and hopefully 

inspiring the artists of tomorrow who 

can see the remarkable achievements 

of almost the last 100 years in Canada... 

They have the potential and the drive 

and the desire… all they need is the 

inspiration. And Canada On Screen is 

about inspiring people.” 

11:30 PM 11:30 PM 11:55 PM 11:55 PM 

GET A BEER AND GRILLED CHEESE FOR YA FACE JAN 6 DEAD SNOW JAN 13 FREDDY VS. JASON JAN 20 FASTER PUSSYCAT! KILL! KILL! FEB 3 JOHN WICK 

26 CITY 


eviews 

The xx 

I See You 

Young Turks 

The xx’s first album in four years is a much-needed 

reintroduction to the lovelorn trio whose eruption 

waned to a smolder with the passing of time (and 

trends) that followed the power of their debut. 

Sophomore album Coexist (2012) skipped 

upping the ante of their unforgettable self-titled, 

instead honing minimalism and cementing their 

brand of melodramatic melody and vague intensity. 

During the four years between that likable but 

often forgettable work, producer and electronic 

multi-instrumentalist Jamie xx (née Smith) gambled 

on a solo album that had one big chart success and 

perhaps three or four songs worth remembering a 

year later. Despite this reviewer’s misgivings with 

In Colour, it nonetheless went on to dominate 

summer 2015. 

Jumping to I See You, The xx have added a 

major heft to a sound that threatened to become 

tiresome. Most of the record displays an extra 

oomph of musical confidence and a restless need 

to push further rather than restrain and fall back. 

While it does suffer from a sagging midsection, I See 

You has some of the most exciting songs recorded 

by the band and affirms they won’t rest easy. 

Four rattling blasts of horns ring out at 

the beginning of the album with the onset of 

“Dangerous. The use of horns alone is blindsiding, 

but the ease in which they jump to a dead sexy 

bassline cut apart by urgent garage drums is 

dizzying. The xx have always known how to start 

things off with a strong impression while setting the 

tone for an album: The xx’s “Intro” was wordlessly 

urging, Coexist’s “Angels” was achingly lulling, but 

“Dangerous” is abrupt and alarming and alive like no 

xx song before it. Best of all, it’s defiant. 

“Let them say there are warning signs. They 

must be blind.” 

Here and onwards, guitarist and co-vocalist 

Romy Madley Croft belts out her lyrics so assuredly 

it erases any memory of her excessively whispery 

style from previous releases. She and sparring 

partner Oliver Sim (whose honeyed baritone has 

grown from the band’s beginnings in pleasing 

increments, if never as drastically as Madley Croft’s) 

draw more excitingly on their not-lovers-but-morethan-friends 

dynamic than ever. 

That continues on the next track, “Say 

Something Loving.” The pair trade off reiterations of 

one another’s unfinished thoughts and feelings of 

neediness, inadequacy and purity in their love. It’s 

not surprising to see the pair play expert foil to one 

another, but it’s a noticeable improvement on one 

of the band’s biggest strengths. The two are so in 

sync they become an echo, thematically suitable in 

the context of Jamie xx’s meticulous tidal phrasing 

of beats and delay that washes back and forth over 

the vocalists’ laments. It’s like a Caribbean sunset 

after just enough wine and constantly rewritten 

texts to a significant other. 

Next up is “Lips,” an honest-to-God ode to 

doin’ it with that special someone. It’s mostly slinky, 

midnight samples and more sparing on analogue 

instrumentation than even the most digital songs 

released by the band in the past. “Pressed up against 

the ceiling, pushing down on me,” titillates Sim. 

It’s genuinely erotic and as exotic as three sheetwhite 

20-somethings from London can manage. 

The temperate flavour they coyly draw from the 

southern hemisphere is weighted eerily by a Druidlike 

choral sample that reels them back from cheese. 

Closing the first third is “A Violent Noise.” The trio 

complement the electronic stretch taken on the 

previous song by anchoring an earthbound narrative 

about overstimulation and anxiety to a coiled guitar 

arpeggio. It’s both crispy and wet, unlike most xx 

songs in its textural complexity. So ends the best run 

of songs on the album. 

“Performance” is where things take a dip. It’s 

like a beta version of “Infinity” from The xx, with less 

grandeur than it reaches for with the whole slow 

and steady, quiet-loud routine. The narrative is as 

vague as the band ever is, a string sample offering a 

limp substitute for genuine drama. In that just-right, 

downtrodden mood people most enjoy The xx in, 

it’ll do, but is ultimately a weaker version of some of 

their existing material. Unfortunately, this sour taste 

colours the next few downtempo numbers in the 

middle of the album. 

The upward momentum of the first run of tracks 

promised an album-long ascent of a band reborn, or 

at least highly reinvigorated. By contrast, tracks 5-7 

feel like naptime for the group. “Replica” and “Brave 

For You” rely on little more than catchphrases than 

well-executed emotionality. The latter is quite pretty 

in its twinkling instrumental, but betrayed by the 

overwrought lyrics and vocal delivery. Still, this phase 

capitalizes on how easy and cathartic in can be to 

sing along to dramatic love songs. It’s hard to fault 

a band for keeping on with what’s been their bread 

and butter throughout their career. 

The final act is what saves I See You from being 

a half-effort. Twin pop songs “On Hold” and “I Dare 

You” are just so fun to sing along to that fussing 

over predictable lyrics never crosses one’s mind. 

The melodies so purely lovable that their Coldplay/ 

Arcade Fire/Michael Bay adjacency is worth it. 

The band knows it, too. Closing track “Test Me” 

is a briny olive after all that sugar. Self-hatred and 

lashing out at a partner are undercut by minimal 

piano and a reprise of glorious horns. After the 

band plainly lays out the ugliness of their feelings, an 

orchestra of disparate samples stampede over another 

and remind the listener that there always comes the 

moment to shut up and show rather than tell. 

While I See You has plenty of great standalone 

songs sitting right next to weak ones, no piece of this 

album makes sense without the rest. It’s as imperfect 

as it should be. 

• Colin Gallant 

• Illustration by My-An Nguyen 

January 2017 reviews 

27

album reviews 

AFI, AFI (The Blood Album) 

B.K.R., The Fly EP 

Alya Brook & His Soundmen, (I Dont 

Wanna Hear Your) Break Up Songs 

Childish Gambino, Awaken, My Love! 

The-Dream, Love You To Death 

AFI 

AFI (The Blood Album) 

Concord Records 

Oh, the sweet sound of Davey Havok’s 

voice has returned to sing the sorrow 

away for us all. Skate/emo/pop punks 

of yesteryear rejoice and heed the 

nostalgic reminisce of a time long 

since past. One where you were 

blaring 1999’s Black Sails in the 

Sunset, painting your nails – black 

of course – all while disregarding 

the grease stains still left over from 

changing your skateboard bearings 

just hours before. 

AFI (The Blood Album) is a 

wicked addition to AFI’s already 

stellar catalogue of feel-good, 

harmonic, pop-punk anthems. Songs 

like “Aurelia” and “Hidden Knives,” 

showcase their trademark operatic 

resonance, while “So Beneath You” 

holds hints of their thrash roots. 

From beginning to end it is what 

we’ve come to expect from Havoc and 

company. Though, it is admittedly on 

the softer side of their sound. This must 

be expected being that the thrashy, 

skate punk style they once brandished 

has tailed since the turn of the century. 

AFI have come along way since their 

self-titled EP. Those looking for the 

‘90s AFI might be disappointed. Those 

who have loved all that the band has 

produced since, will bask in its glory. 

• Jay King 

B.K.R 

The Fly EP 

17 Steps 

With The Fly EP, B.K.R have made a 

compelling EP of club tools that are 

aimed squarely at the dancefloor. The 

24-minute, four-track EP arrives on 

Dusky’s label, 17 Steps. It proves a fitting 

home for the EP that often sounds like 

what Dusky have been doing with their 

own EP’s on the label. 

The Fly isn’t a game changer by 

any means, but the lead-off track, 

“Bubble and Spark,” with Jamie Jones, 

is a fairly enticing collab. It’s straightahead 

techno track, with just enough 

pad work to give a little levity with 

dancefloor “spark” courtesy of the 

track’s bouncing bass line akin to “A 

Groove” by Mike Dunn. 

The title track is a straightforward, 

909-based stomper much 

like the kind Bicep has been perfecting 

recently. Unfortunately, it’s not as 

good as a Bicep track, seemingly 

designed explicitly as a set filler. 

The final two tracks on the EP 

are the real highlights. The irresistible 

“Dis” and “Das,” are both catchy, 

1080p-meets-Toolroom tech house 

floor-fillers. Built on mean, square-wave 

303 bass lines, and complimented by 

wonky, overdriven stabs, the two tracks 

complement each other perfectly, 

ending the EP on a high-note. 

• Jamie McNamara 

Ayla Brook & His Soundmen 

(I Don’t Wanna Hear Your) Break Up Songs 

Self-Released 

A year can feel like an eternity for an 

artist, or it can fly by with no notice. It’s 

often a matter of how willing you are to 

throw yourself into the self-promotion 

game. Edmonton’s Ayla Brook returns 

from a long recording hiatus with (I 

Don’t Wanna Hear Your) Break Up 

Songs, which finds Brook concentrating 

on the little realities of daily living, set to 

a breakneck, barroom groove that drips 

a froth of Keith Richards down the side 

of a pint of J.J. Cale. 

“Hold On” is a breakneck twostep, 

with Hammond organ and some 

classy gentleman harmonies over the 

choruses, while “Wasting Time” is an 

honest and straightforward missive on 

living and working in the bar industry, 

that kicks off and jives the whole way 

through with that classic Sticky Fingers 

swagger. “On Your Right Side” is relaxed 

in just the right way, as nonchalant as 

Lou Reed over a T-Rex groove. “Reason 

To Stay” is a classic soul rave-up played 

with lean and greasy punk energy, and 

“A Song Before The Woods” closes the 

record with a Romani caravan vibe, with 

a hooky guitar riff over a squeezebox 

vamp to conjure some Eastern European 

hobo happily skipping and whistling 

past the graveyard. 

Eight years have passed since Brook 

released the Danny Michel-produced 

After The Morning After, and Brook has 

found a new willingness to let loose and 

get loud, the clang and groove of boot 

heels on hardwood providing a willing 

dance partner for his hooky musings 

of barroom ennui, a reminder that the 

swinging doors are always there until 

closing time. 

• Mike Dunn 

Childish Gambino 

Awaken, My Love! 

Glassnote Records 

This shit is fire. I’m just as shocked as 

you are to report that, but it’s true. 

Childish Gambino, a.k.a. the dude that 

everyone loves as Troy (and one half of 

television’s greatest ever bromance) in 

Community, has had a wonky musical 

career. It kicked off with a catalogue 

of forgettable, hipster joke raps, before 

evolving a little in his last release, 

Because the Internet, with some Frank 

Ocean-inspired singing that caught this 

listener’s attention—even if it didn’t 

hold onto it very long. 

With Awaken, My Love! Childish 

Gambino sounds authentic, as if he 

shed his self-consciousness and made 

the music he was meant to: that straight 

psychedelic, freaky-funky, cosmicgroove 

nasty. 

The first track, “Me and Your 

Mama,” opens with a contemporary 

synthed-out sound for a couple 

minutes before being smashed to bits 

with an Isaac Hayes-esque guitar lick in 

a drastic switch up, and Gambino lets 

out his impressive primal singing over 

some natural earthy instrumentation 

without looking back. Over the next 

few numbers, he channels Parliament 

Funkadelic very convincingly until the 

noteworthy heater, “Redbone,” brings 

the mood more between the sheets. 

“California” is a somewhat miscast 

earworm that gives the album some 

levity, while “Baby Boy,” oozes Al Green 

soul. The album’s last couple songs close 

it out on an uplifting note, though they 

do drag on a bit. 

To simply call this release a 

throwback sells it short. It holds its 

ground among the pantheon of albums 

it derives its influence from. 

• Kevin Bailey 

The-Dream 

Love You To Death 

Radio Killa Records/ Roc Nation 

Although The-Dream’s last studio album 

came out in 2013, he has been anything 

but dormant. Whether he is gracing 

Pusha T or Kanye songs with his heavenly 

voice, or taking a cue from Beyoncé and 

releasing a visual album, it is always good 

to hear from the R&B veteran. 

Love You to Death is an EP that 

features stripped down, minimal 

production, allowing The-Dream’s 

singing and songwriting abilities to pull 

the listener into his world. If The Weeknd 

28 reviews 


ONF_Beatroute_full page Vancouver_10.25 x 11.25.pdf 1 2016-12-19 11:34 AM

Fancey, Love Mirage 

J. Cole, 4 Your Eyez Only 

Kid Cudi, Passion, Pain & Demon Slayin’ 

stuck to his shadowy roots, while also maintaining 

his current push for more pop accolades, it would 

sound a lot like this EP. As if not to agitate the 

dehydrated brain after a night out, the production 

on this album is reserved and calming, yet the lyrics 

linger like a headache, persistent in subject matter 

and tone. 

“I forgot about them things you did in college. 

Can you forget about them things I did last night,” 

asks The-Dream on “College Daze.” 

The lyrics on this project range from symbolic 

like “the sunlight brings out everything” to how 

we all know a girl that flexes like Rihanna. The 

dichotomy in these two different types of lines 

is what keeps Love You To Death so engaging. 

Production-wise, the EP plays it safe, but it works 

as a concise package, proving that The-Dream is still 

as memorable on his solo projects as the songs he 

features on so frequently. 

• Paul McAleer 

Fancey 

Love Mirage 

Self-Released 

Love Mirage is the new album from Todd Fancey, 

the lead guitarist of The New Pornographers. To be 

honest, I don’t think I’ve ever actually listened to 

The New Pornographers. I decided to review this 

album because my editor told me there was disco 

involved. This is actually true to a large extent. 

There is a substantial amount of disco involved, just 

not the kind that I was thinking of. If there’s any 

one term that can be used to describe this album it 

would probably be “baroque pop,” a type of indie 

that channels white, pop disco acts of the 1970s 

like the Bee Gees and Electric Light Orchestra. 

Fancey recorded the album with vintage 

keyboards and synths, which is probably why 

on tracks like “Carrie,” I legitimately thought I 

was actually listening to ELO for a second. 

Although there’s tempo variation 

throughout the album, with slow crooners like 

“Turn Around Baby,” and the upbeat roller-discomontage-worthy 

“Witch Attack!,” it overall maintains 

the same cheerful, airy spirit throughout the whole ten 

tracks. 

Those who aren’t fans of baroque pop will 

probably find this album ironic at first, but we live 

in an age where irony inevitably gives way to postirony, 

so you might as well hasten the process and 

check this one out. 

• Jonathan Crane 

Flower Girl 

Tuck in Your Tie-Dye 

BUFU Records and Designer Medium 

With Tuck in Your Tie-Dye, NYC-based five-piece 

Flower Girl have created a potent argument that 

the best course for modern malaise is a giant grin 

and a tie-dye shirt. Like a jubilant, jockish Stephen 

Malkmus, Flower Girl leans heavily on a poppedup 

imitation of Pavement, or early Wilco. Often, 

Flower Girl sound like fellow NYC transplants 

in Parquet Courts, blending Americana with an 

indie, slacker ethos. 

With the lead-off title track, Flower Girl 

set a lackadaisical pace with a gentle, acoustic 

guitar chunk and a heady, half-baked-but-extraobservational 

vocal turn from frontman Nick Morris 

that rests throughout the rest of the 12-track LP. 

“Lets Build a Fort,” is another paisley-speckled 

piece of sonic special brownie, combining clean 

electric guitar with a deadpan vocal that makes 

everything seem pseudo-serious. Really, that’s the 

best way to experience this album, with a tongue 

in cheek and not a care in the world. 

• Jamie McNamara 

J. Cole 

4 Your Eyez Only 

Dreamville/Roc Nation/Interscope 

When J. Cole released 2014 Forest Hills Drive 

with virtually no promotion, the album had to 

be something special and the music would have 

to speak for itself. 2014 Forest Hills Drive, as every 

Cole fan will remind you, went double platinum 

without any features, exceeding all expectations 

and carving Cole a spot beside some of the hottest 

rappers in the game. 

With his latest record, 4 Your Eyez Only, 

Cole attempts to reuse the formula that made 

his previous album so successful. He uses the 

same ingredients: a surprise release, no noticeable 

features, and a documentary leading up to the 

album release, but he forgot about delivering on 

the music side of things. 

While the majority of 2014 Forest Hills 

Drive featured memorable hooks, versatile bars, 

and conductive production, 4 Your Eyez Only is 

boring, dull in comparison, lacking energy in every 

extent in favour of telling a story. The concept 

behind the project is about Cole’s friend who died 

and the album is directed at his friend’s daughter. 

The narrative is endearing, but the execution 

is nowhere near Kendrick Lamar’s To Pimp A 

Butterfly, an album that Cole may think he’s 

competing with on 4 Your Eyez Only. While there 

are great songs on this album like the title track, 

“Neighbors,” and “Immortal,” there are too many 

tracks in-between that water down and sabotage 

the entire record. 

With his sales lifting him up, Cole is 

unrelenting in letting his listeners know that he 

is one of the greats, but saying it does not make 

it true; the music has to speak to the claim too, 

something Cole has clearly forgotten with his 

latest release. 

• Paul McAleer 

Kid Cudi 

Passion, Pain & Demon Slayin’ 

Wicked Awesome / Republic 

Following the backlash towards 2015’s Speedin’ 

Bullet 2 Heaven, it’s no surprise that Scott Mescudi 

a.k.a. Kid Cudi would try his damnedest to revert 

back to the sound by which he originally made 

his name, though to do so in such a spectacular 

(see: incredibly monotonous) fashion, may have 

ultimately been his downfall. 

Passion, Pain & Demon Slayin’, his latest 

effort, is a four-part, 86-minute expression in 

phonetics featuring his archetypal wails, hums, 

and haws, slowly spread over nineteen (nineteen!) 

near-indistinguishable tracks ranging from long 

and drawn out, to slightly-shorter and drawn out. 

If the title is any indication, his recent 

rehabilitation for depression earlier this year 

seems to have directly influenced Passion, 

Pain & Demon Slayin’, with many of its tracks 

featuring Cudi confronting some of his issues 

head on, but it poses the question: What else 

can be said about Cudi and his demons that 

hasn’t already been said over six albums and 

a mixtape? 

The main issue with Passion, Pain & 

Demon Slayin’ is that it’s an amalgamation 

of all the Cudi tropes: highly viscous 

production, fogged-out vocals, and even his 

at-times clever lyricism can’t save what is 

essentially a lacklustre, if not incredibly long, 

performance. 

It’s no Speedin’ Bullet, thankfully, but 

Passion, Pain & Demon Slayin’ leaves the 

listener hoping that the man on the moon 

finds a better place to land sometime soon. 

• Alec Warkentin 


31

JANUARY 

ARRIVAL 

D.A. Stern, Aloha Hola 

Machinae Supremacy 

Into the Night World 

Self-Released 

It is not uncommon for power metal bands to 

incorporate video game sounds into their music, 

but Sweden’s Machinae Supremacy takes this 

influence to a new level. The quintet, avid video 

gamers, choose to incorporate the SID chip from 

the Commodore 64 with their power/industrial 

metal riffs, creating a very unique and instantly 

recognizable sound. Their latest album, Into the Night 

World, is their seventh studio album and it is another 

consistent installment of retro, throwback sounds coupled 

with auto-tuned falsetto vocals, piano interludes, and heavy 

metal riffs. 

For better or for worse they have been following 

the same formula since 2004, and while some may see 

their lack of evolution as a hindrance, they have become 

masters of their particular genre. Typically focusing on 

traditional power metal themes of fantasy and sci-fi, 

Machinea Supremacy follows the grain. However, on 

this album, they do deviate slightly to give a nod to 

themes of love, loss and personal accomplishments. The 

second last, and possible highlight track on the album, 

the instrumental, “SID Metal Legacy,” is the pinnacle of 

the fusion between the distinctive SID chiptune and 

standard heavy metal. All in all, the album is well done; 

going forward it can be reasonably expected that 

Machinae Supremacy will continue to put forth 

similar sounding, but high caliber albums. 

• Kaje Annihilatrix 

D.A. Stern 

Aloha Hola 

Twosyllable Records 

With easy, catchy choruses, and that pop style 

guitar we all love deep down, the sound of D.A. 

Stern will secure a spot in the soft part of your 

heart, but also keep you emotionally hooked for 

the heart-aching and terribly relatable dark lyrics in 

many of his songs. Recorded and produced by Stern 

in his mother’s New Jersey basement, Aloha Hola is 

the artist’s debut full-length. 

The 11-track album is a lyric-to-sound 

contradiction that you can’t help but listen to 

over and over again. With soft odes dedicated to 

heartbreak, melancholy pop melodies about booze, 

and tunes about bright light cities, the album in its 

entirety is the perfect anthem to youth and growing 

up. While bringing you on a woeful lyrical adventure, 

the instrumental accompaniment gives you some 

Sepultura, Machine Messiah 

kinder, lighthearted leeway. With a sound reminiscent of 

the Beach Boys, but also bringing a ‘60s style surf rock finish, 

this album is the perfect psych pop record to remind you 

of why music is your best friend. 

• Jackie Klapak 

The Rolling Stones 

Blue & Lonesome 

Promotone/Universal 

Lost in the shift to urbanized, musical virtuosity through 

the past four decades, was the essential thrust of what 

made the blues what it is: Groove. Unrelenting groove, 

that swing that was immediately danceable for anyone 

who could bend their knees, move their feet, and shake 

their hips at the same time in a deliriously sweaty flail to 

the unsophisticated sounds of a band standing within 

feet of each other. The co-mingling scents of sex, smoke, 

liquor, and possibly gunpowder lingering through 

the air in a conspiratorially dangerous and subversive 

mélange that both excited, and frightened, the people 

who lived through the first rise in popularity of Black 

American music. 

There’ll always be the caveat that white 

musicians took the music of their black heroes 

and brought it to the masses, at times even through 

theft, but The Rolling Stones were always purists. The 

Stones revered this music, and treated their heroes as 

near deities. They may have moved away from the blues 

to develop their own sonic signatures – ones which 

have been template rock ‘n’ roll for 50 years - but to hear 

the Stones let rip on the classic forms as they do on Blue 

& Lonesome is to hear a band which has digested 100 

years’ worth of blues styles and songs, and distilled it 

down to its essence. 

Blue & Lonesome is the album Stones fans have 

wanted for years: to hear the band unencumbered by 

the excesses of ego and production, and in some way, 

to feel what the kids in 1962 must have felt, shaking 

and screaming to the sound of the one band that was 

getting it right the whole time. 

• Mike Dunn 

Sepultura 

Machine Messiah 

Nuclear Blast Records 

With much steam still in the engine, Brazilian 

heavy metal monarchs Sepultura, keep chugging 

along with their fourteenth studio album. Using 

a very cohesive writing and recording process as 

a self-credited tool, they have released what they 

consider to be their most complete album yet. The 

Sohn, Rennen 

engineering quality by highly touted producer, 

Jens Bogren (Opeth, Kreator), is a huge plus factor 

throughout. 

The title and intro track is a completely 

mesmerizing segue into what is a layout of classic 

Sepultura-sounding tracks. The next number, “I am 

the Enemy,” quickly brings back that thrash feel the 

band was known for during their inception. We then 

immerge into “Phantom Self,” which begins with an 

orchestral addition but is filled in immediately with 

driving vocals and powerful axe chugs. 

While the overall sound generally remains 

the same throughout, each track has a different 

feel and tempo. Machine Messiah appeals to the 

true heavy metal lover with no surprises, just 

solid riffs, tasty solos, and toasty, guttural vocals. 

The album finishes off with the wonderfully 

demonic “Cyber God,” which properly accents 

why these well-seasoned veterans are still 

spearheading the metal scene with hard 

charging, unwavering force. 

• Jay King 

Sohn 

Rennen 

4AD 

Rennen, the sophomore release from South 

London producer and singer Sohn, essentially 

follows the same shtick as his 2014 debut 

Tremors. The good news, however, is that this is 

one of the more formidable shticks out there. 

For those unfamiliar with his sound, it 

probably would have been grouped in with the 

“post-dubstep” label when he first emerged at the 

start of the decade. In 2014, when Rolling Stone listed 

him as an “Artist You Need To Know,” he was drawing 

comparisons with fellow Londoner James Blake for 

fusing R&B with left-field, atmospheric electronica. 

According to the press release, Sohn tried 

to limit each track on the album to three main 

elements. In electronic music this is a surefire sign of 

an artist wanting to refine their sound and mature, 

and it definitely shows on the album. Tracks like the 

gripping vocally-driven “Still Waters,” and the 

percussive “Falling,” showcase an artist who’s 

becoming more daring and bold. 

Other standout tracks include “Proof,” with 

its pitch-shifted vocal chops, the album opener 

“Hard Liquor,” which apparently set the texture for 

the entire release, and “Primary,” a song that showcases 

Sohn’s prowess as an electronic producer. 

• Jonathan Crane 

6 

7 

8 

11 

12 

13 

14 

19 

21 

22 

25 

27 

29 

2 

8 

BLADE RUNNER 

THE FINAL CUT 

DEAD SNOW 

FRIDAY LATE NIGHT MOVIE 

HAYAO MIYAZAKIʼS 

HOWLʼS MOVING CASTLE 

PAUL THOMAS ANDERSONʼS 

THERE WILL BE BLOOD 

STANLEY KUBRICKʼS 

A CLOCKWORK ORANGE 

THE GOLDEN GLOBE 

AWARDS 

Live and FREE on the big screen 

TRIVIA, GAMES, PRIZES AND MORE! 

THE GENTLEMEN HECKLERS PRESENT 

BIRDEMIC 

ULTRAMAN DOUBLE FEATURE! 

ULTRAMAN X: THE MOVIE 

AND 

ULTRAMAN: GINGA S 

THE GEEKENDERS PRESENT 

UNCAPED CRUSADERS 

A ʻBatlesqueʼ Tribute To Batman 

KITTY NIGHTS PRESENTS 

A LIVE ROCK TRIBUTE TO 

DAVID BOWIE 

MISCHIEF MANAGED 

HARRY POTTER BURLESQUE 

“Like Harry Potter... But Way Hotter!” 

HARRY POTTERTHON! 

Movies 1 - 4 Jan 21 

Movies 5 - 8 Jan 22 

DAY AND WEEKEND PASSES AVAILABLE 

THE CRITICAL HIT SHOW 

AN IMPROV COMEDY SPECTACULAR 

#DNDLIVE IN ITS FIFTH YEAR 

THE GEEKENDERS PRESENT 

PORTAL 2: 

THE UNAUTHORIZED MUSICAL 

PAUL ANTHONYʼS 

TALENT TIME 

First Thursday Of Every Month 

THE FICTIONALS COMEDY CO. PRESENTS 

IMPROV 

AGAINST HUMANITY 

Oh, the humanity! 

#IAHatRio 

32 reviews 

VISIT WWW.RIOTHEATRE.CA FOR A COMPLETE CALENDAR OF EVENTS. 


live reviews 

Photo by Darrole Palmer 

Aesop Rock 

December 19th, 2016 

Venue 

Queens rapper Homeboy Sandman 

started the show off strongly with 

a set of tracks ranging across his 

discography that showcased his 

finely crafted writing and diverse set 

of flows. Punch lines were delivered 

with humour and his sometimes 

self-effacing, light hearted sense 

of humour came across well. The 

incredible fast rap of “The Carpenter” 

impressed with its velocity and set 

closer “God” from his latest album 

Kindness for Weakness impressed 

for its joie de vivre. 

Upon ending his set Homeboy 

Sandman made a point to tell the 

crowd that they were at a show that 

night that was akin to seeing Mozart 

or Beethoven; that Aesop Rock was 

a one of a kind artist; a virtuoso that 

is up to that level. At the moment it 

felt a touch silly; a fun complimentary 

piece of hyperbole meant to hype the 

headliner and get the crowd amped 

up. But it was clear from the moment 

Aesop Rock took the stage that this 

was a rap show on a whole other level 

than we’re used to. 

While focussing mostly on 

tracks from his latest album The 

Impossible Kid and performing on 

a rural themed stage design that 

seemed mostly to exist due to a few 

lines from his song “Rabies,” he gave 

the crowd almost two hours of rap 

in its most concentrated form. Bar 

after bar, line after line of intricately 

written raps without losing syllable, 

and with a clear and joyous delivery. It 

was astonishing to witness. Whether 

rapping intimate stories about his 

brothers (“Blood Sandwich”), his cat 

(“Hey Kirby”), or therapist (“Shrunk”), 

or delivering some of his greatest hits 

to close out the show (“Daylight,” 

“Lucy,” “None Shall Pass”), there was 

never a moment he didn’t seem in 

complete control of his craft or out of 

breath and it really felt like Homeboy 

Sandman (who joined him on stage 

for a riotous encore featuring tracks 

from their joint EP Lice 2) was right. 

• Graeme Wiggins 

Neurosis/Yob/Sumac 

December 20th, 2016 

Venue Nightclub 

When December 20th’s lineup was 

announced, it was every post-metal fan’s wet 

dream come to life – so it wasn’t surprising 

that in Vancouver (a city that seems to suit 

the genre better than most), Sumac, Yob, 

and Neurosis sold out completely. One 

unfortunate problem was that the venue 

seemed pretty unprepared for this volume 

Photo by Milton Stille 

of people, and a lot of us who came to see 

all three bands wound up waiting outside 

in line, listening to a muffled Sumac even 

though we’d arrived well before their posted 

set time. It seemed that the staff were 

trying their best, but I had already missed 

half of Sumac’s set before I got in. Which is 

even more of a shame because what I did 

get to see from the sludgy supergroup that 

includes Aaron Turner (ex-Isis... the band, 

not the militants), local Nick Yacyshyn 

(of Baptists) and Brian Cook (of Russian 

Circles) was impressive. Their orchestrated 

dissonance kicked off the night and ended 

with a message from Turner, saying that 

“There’s one thing I want to say. It’s that this 

is about love.” An apparent juxtaposition 

with their music, but you could feel it in the 

crowd even at this point. Even at a show like 

this, the music doomy and tuned below 

any reasonable earthly boundaries, I didn’t 

detect a shred of hostility. 

So, below the oddly placed Christmas 

decorations (having your view blocked by 

a Christmas tree at a metal show is strange 

to say the least) we prepared ourselves 

for fellow Pacific Northwesterners Yob, 

out of Oregon. Yob stole the show for me 

personally, and were the most entrancing 

band of the night, and the most classically 

doomy. During “Marrow,” it seemed that 

the usually constant stream of people in 

the crowd pushing to get to the bar, the 

bathroom, their friends – whatever – was 

suspended for the duration of the song. 

Frontman Mike Scheidt’s guitar repeated 

a mantra that seemed to captivate all of us 

for that segment of time, and was a bit of a 

shocking end to the set. By then the venue 

was allowing ins-and-outs, so we could all 

go outside for a bit and collect ourselves for 

Neurosis. 

Californian post-metal legends 

Neurosis are not for the faint-hearted, this 

is even more so when being present for one 

of their live performances. “Lost” off of their 

1993 release Enemy of the Sun kicked off 

their set with a favorite, setting the energy 

levels high for the rest of their set, and 

keeping it up by following with “The Web.” 

Live and in person, their songs have an 

almost industrial feel and energy coming 

from the stage, keyboardist Noah Landis 

beating the shit out of his synthesizers 

with almost more enthusiasm than 

drummer Jason Roeder - while frontman 

Scott Kelly played like any second now 

he was going to throw his guitar over 

his shoulder and go rampaging through 

the crowd. The middle of the set had 

more long and contemplative pieces 

that took the energy down a few notches 

with a few songs from their latest release 

Fires Within Fires. The crowd seemed to reanimate 

when the voice-over interview for 

“Takehnase” began, another crowd favorite 

which once it was launched into made it 

feel as though the vibrations throughout 

the venue would make it collapse upon us (I 

picture a nervous live engineer trying to keep 

decibels at just-below lethal levels) and from 

where I was standing near the front I wasn’t 

sure that I would hear anything ever again. 

Though, I’m pretty sure it would have been 

a worthy way to go. The first half of “At the 

End of the Road” served as an intermission 

but made the crowd a bit restless – even we 

can only listen to white noise guitars for so 

long. They finished on “The Doorway,” and 

Neurosis did a great job of the set list. With a 

band where each album is pretty distinct it’s 

not an easy feat to put together a coherent 

performance. 

By the end of it all, it felt like we had 

all gone through some bizarre meditative 

ritual, on the edge of a bad trip without quite 

falling in. You think you know what you’re 

getting into when you attend a night with a 

lineup like Sumac, Yob, and Neurosis – but 

you really don’t until you’re at the end of it, 

faced with the jarring silence of an emptying 

venue. 

• Ana Krunic 


33

Michelle Hanley 

The Bolt Bus 

The Bolt Bus is a great discount bus service that I use frequently to 

go to Seattle and Portland. It is much nicer than the Greyhound, 

but still pretty terrible. 

The bathroom on the bus is essentially a moving port-apotty. 

It’s got the freaky blue water and the unsettling breeze 

from the toilet and the foaming hand sanitizer in place of a 

functioning sink. There is something particularly degrading 

about pooping while aboard the peasant wagon and I would 

recommend avoiding it. In retrospect, eating at The Cheesecake 

Factory immediately before a five-hour bus journey was probably 

a bad idea. 

Canadian Tire 

(Cambie Street) 

I recently paid a visit to Canadian Tire to sob in the 

bathrooms after the rude cashier wouldn’t honour the flyer 

price on a Magic Bullet blender that I was trying to buy my 

boyfriend for Christmas. It was a truly terrible experience, 

weeping on a toilet, using Canadian tire money to wipe up 

my tears. 

The quality of the bathroom at Canadian Tire nearly 

made up for the terrible experience at the till. The stalls were 

lovely and spacious and the bathroom smelled very pleasant. 

These toilets are quite nice, but not as nice as the bathrooms 

at the Home Depot. 

White Spot (Kingsway) 

White Spot is a local chain of mediocre casual family 

restaurants. I like to eat here because even though I am a 

grown-up adult woman, I can order two kids Pirate Paks for 

myself because it is cheaper than an entree and you get to 

eat your food from a fun cardboard boat. White Spot is great! 

The bathrooms at White Spot are exceptionally lovely. 

There is tacky art of the Pacific Northwest on the walls. The 

bathrooms are clean and well stocked. Although it is pretty 

cramped and there is usually a line up of exhausted mothers 

and their irritating children waiting for the bathrooms, it is 

worth having a poop at. 

34 



UPCOMING EVENTS 

TUESDAY JANUARY 10TH 

SUNDAY JANUARY 29TH 

MONDAY JANUARY 23RD 

CHOIR! CHOIR! CHOIR! 

THURSDAY FEBRUARY 2ND 


SATURDAY FEBRUARY 4TH 

KOBO TOWN 

THURSDAY FEBRUARY 16TH 

CLOUD NOTHINGS 

UPCOMING MRG SHOWS 

~ 

FEBRUARY 4 - ADAM ANT - THE VOGUE THEATRE 

FEBRUARY 7 - WAX TAILOR - RICKSHAW THEATRE 

FEBRUARY 15 - PRIESTS - 333 

FEBRUARY 28TH - ANDY BLACK - RICKSHAW THEATRE 

MARCH 20TH - JAPANDROIDS - COMMODORE BALLROOM 

WEDNESDAY FEBRUARY 22ND 

CLIPPING 

FRIDAY FEBRUARY 24TH 

PALMISTRY 

FRIDAY FEBRUARY 26TH 

KEVIN ABSTRACT 

TUESDAY FEBRUARY 28TH 

THE RADIO DEPT. 

/BILTMORECABARET @BILTMORECABARET @BILTMORECABARET 

36

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